Here's the next chapter. An introduction to the rest of the story; this could be quite an emotional one, just to warn you, and so fairly different from the previous instalment, but hopefully you'll still like it.
And enjoy the end of the chapter!

Harry stood alone in the Room of Requirement. He remembered this place; last year. This was where he'd been with Ginny.

Alone; the silence, the comfort of closeness. When they'd kissed, when they'd admitted their love. Her vibrant red hair, her pale skin. Unforgettable.

The Boy Who Lived stood alone in the Room, large, empty, desolate. A pristine mirror stood just in front of him.

Called from his memories, and projected by the Room, he could see Ginny there; instead of his own reflection. The woman smiled; Harry couldn't help but smile back. He rested his hand on the glass, feeling an echo of her touch in the reflection.

Bye.

A distant whisper, her voice, so weak, resounded in the Room.

Harry looked away from the glass, a tear in his eye. He could do nothing without thinking of her: and should he try to force her image, her memory out of his mind, it felt like the blackest blasphemy.

He did not want to forget her; yet he couldn't live while remembering her.

Silent, the student walked over the hard floor, to the Room's entrance. He pushed it open, inviting any of the DA to enter. Teach themselves perhaps; or maybe they could teach him how to bear it.

Even knowing his parents had died did not compare to this. He hardly knew them. But, oh, Harry knew Ginny. Knew her well enough to know she was utterly unforgettable.

They'd had several other DA meetings earlier this year. Despite a few awkward moments near the start, they'd fallen into a kind of secondary routine; they'd come in, take some free advice from Harry if he was able/willing to talk, and practise amongst themselves. Neville had become a sort of substitute teacher. Not that Harry minded. He didn't mind anything. Not now.

The teachers were worried about him; it would be impossible not to notice that. They watched him, not making any clear signs of interference, yet still being just that little bit too distant. Suspicious.

Dumbledore was his greatest comfort. The headmaster had called for several meetings, mostly about Voldemort, delving into the Dark Lord's past.

Harry did not feel rage thinking of the Dark Wizard. Only sadness. He should be angry; logic seemed to dictate that. It was Voldemort who'd killed Ginny. But thinking of those slit eyes, that pale, skeletal face… He felt nothing but the urge to fall to his knees and cry.

Yet in several of those meetings, they did nothing. Just sat there in silence, Dumbledore knowing Harry would be unable to do anything. The sadness came in phases, times it was bearable, and times it was a struggle even to stand.

He needed something; not someone, never someone again: but something. Something to do, something to focus on. A challenge? Maybe, or maybe just something to distract him. Or something to help.

Still silent, the black haired boy looked around, taking in the practising DA. Neville, as always, was leading them; assisted by the ever-dreamy Luna.

The DA was his family, to a point. Not as close as he was to Ginny; but still a connection. He cared about them; and they definitely seemed to care about him, enough to leave him alone with his feelings, when he was like this. So maybe he could help them.

And of course, there was another that deserved help. It wouldn't be easy to start with, not by a long way, but there was certainly one more thing that he could do.

It looked like the DA would be getting one more member.

O

Luna wandered through the statues of Hogwarts. On one side, tall, powerful, stood a stone wizard casting the first Patronus; a formless block of stone. She drifted below the arch of stone, beyond into a museum of sorts, populated by several impressive, painstakingly carved (or alternatively, magicked up, it was hard to say) creations.

Several minutes later, she walked out of the eerie section, and almost bumped her head on a green, buzzing light, one attached to a silver tube and held by a certain Time Lord.

"Hello Doctor," Luna said lightly. "Could you stop buzzing me?" It wasn't a command, merely a dreamy observation

"Right, well," the Doctor flicked the sonic screwdriver with his free hand, "Ok. That's the place you went through before ending up in 2143?"

"Yes," the blonde paused, "It wasn't as dark then."

That much was true. Luna could remember happily walking amongst the statues last time, examining the detail in the stone and looking for any 'misplaced' hats and belongings of hers. This time it was a struggle to see the creations, something blocking out the light.

"Rule of the universe," the Doctor shrugged, grinning; "No matter what planet, time zone, or dimension you're in, every time you go into a forbidding place, it's always dark. Although this time it looks as if someone blocked the windows, but it could mean the same thing."

"Why would someone block a window?" Luna voiced the Doctor's thoughts. She wasn't overly worried about the answer, she just felt the conversation wouldn't be complete without someone saying it.

"I dunno," the Doctor grinned, "Exciting, isn't it? Something that doesn't want to be seen."

He didn't notice the eyes in the room, adjusted to the darkness, and glaring at the Doctor with something as close to pure hatred as could be achieved by any race. A soulless stare, imagining a thousand, a million ways for him to die.

And it remembered. Not its meeting with the Doctor, but a confrontation, much more recently.

"Give it a student, Lord," a woman's voice. It stared, unable to move, at that masked face.

"Very well, Bella," an exhalation; high, cruel. A pale, thin figure.

Then a child, a First Year at Hogwarts, stumbled out of a flash of blue; just in front of the creature. The child looked up; suddenly desperately afraid. An instant later, the creature, ravenous, desperate, was upon the First Year.

"Release me," the creature then spoke, looking up from the now lifeless child.

Just metres away, some kind of force-field lay; perhaps a magical shield. The creature was unable to break through it.

"Release you/" a laugh from the woman. "Crucio!"

A burst of agony ripped through the utterly unprepared creature. It had never felt pain before: and now it was subjected to torment unbearable to the most trained human. It couldn't even scream.

Eternities later, the burning ceased.

"Now Bella," the high-pitched voice spoke, "We would not want our…guest to feel unwelcome. We simply wish a service done that she would happily perform herself, do we not?"

The creature felt the urge to distrust this stranger. Their high voice gave no real emotion at all, just the sensation of one who played games, who played other people, used them and discarded them like tools.

Yet the level of that all-consuming, new pain. It moved the creature beyond anger, and well into fear. Into terror.

And on that threshold, she saw it again: her husband dying, in the cold, merciless gaze of one who, at times, seemed at least as heartless as the pale man before her now.

Their eyes did not meet, yet the creature felt the pale man's glare.

"We will release you," the words seemed strange in the man's mouth, "To Hogwarts, where you will obey us. Hunt down and kill one man, and you will go free," his voice was little more than a whisper. "Otherwise you will find yourself in the company of dear Bella once more."

Silence. The creature did not move; could not. She could simply listen, and take in the commands.

"We want you to kill the Doctor."

And so, she was here. Hogwarts; now staring at the man she was to kill. The man who-

And she couldn't. It felt wrong, it felt all too wrong. She'd seen that man kill: yet as he stood now, with the childish grin, the bow tie, the tousled hair…

How could they possibly be the same person? It was hard to believe.

With every reason to be angry at the alien, and easily with the power to claim his life, the creature found herself turning away. The same frustration brimmed in her as before; and she could see just one way out of the dilemma.

Kill the Doctor, or face the masked woman's torturous whims. Why was she struggling with that choice?

There was one other way out; but she didn't want to consider it. Instead, she promised herself. Next time. Next time, she would kill the Doctor.

O

Draco Malfoy sat alone. Especially now.

He'd been taught Occlumency last year. It had no doubt saved his life on many occasions since then: leaving his head with such an ache it felt as if it would split open.

The blonde had seen the Dark Lord himself, and looked into those inhuman eyes.

Looking around, making sure he was alone, the Slytherin lifted his arm, and slid the robe down, baring pale skin. A black brand rested resplendent there.

A skull; a serpent. The Dark Mark. Sign of a Death Eater.

A taint; he couldn't get rid of it. He was tainted. Poisoned. Irritated, he rubbed his other hand over the black brand: it soon turned to a feverish scratching, as if trying to scrape the skin off the bone, trying to remove the Mark.

The skin behind it went red; yet the mark was still there, burnt, resolute.

For a few seconds, Draco contemplated getting his wand out, and trying curse upon curse on the taint. He didn't; if his wand brushed the darkness, the Dark Lord himself would feel the call.

Rolling his eyes back, Draco slumped on his chair. Seconds later, a grinning face entered his view; the blonde quickly got up.

"Hello Draco," the Doctor grinned

"Hi sir," the Slytherin quickly said, hastily covering up his arm.

"Oh, no need to do that," the Time Lord shrugged, gesturing to the blonde's arm, "You're a Death Eater now, no big deal. Well, I suppose it is, still, Hakuna Matata!" the Doctor grinned, before hesitating, "Why is it I always end up quoting the Lion King?"

Draco paused, unsure of quite how to respond.

"Oh yeah," the Doctor nodded; "Dumbledore said he wants to speak to you. See him after Potions. It's probably about how old Tom wants you to warp loads of Death Eaters into Hogwarts via vanishing cabinet. Nothing major. Chop, chop!"

Malfoy paused, again with no clue how to respond. The Doctor was a walking of contradictions; one moment, he was a bumbling idiot acting less intelligent than several First Years: the next, he could say pretty much everything going on in his mind with startling accuracy.

Nervous, Draco nodded a few times, before standing, walking away.

The Doctor grinned, sitting down on Draco's vacated seat. He waited there a few seconds, thinking, before swinging back to his feet.

The Time Lord wandered out, through the corridors. There was something, possibly natural, most likely not, that forced Luna into the far future; and drenched her in temporal potential energy in doing so.

Things that could cause that? The Doctor frowned.

Compressed time locales, a 'time spring' (equipment from Galifrey which pushed things through time), an accelerator, him on a bad day, a sufficiently spicy curry, a Time Lord, a very confused chronovore, a time scoop, or Super-Man.

All of those seemed unlikely. Perhaps it could have been the masked woman, Bellatrix, taking them through time; yet in that case, though it sounded cold, the Doctor couldn't believe Luna would have survived.

The Time Lord stopped outside, resting on a towering spire, thinking. It was a short time until he noticed the woman approaching him.

"Hello," the Doctor span around; "Trelawney, isn't it?" He grinned, surprised at seeing the divination teacher here

"Thank you," the seer spoke, nervous. "I am- not at all used to leaving my room, alas, the Inner Eye does command it."

"Really," the Doctor was suddenly interested; while he was never a great fan of predicting the future, he respected time and its majesty, and so was intrigued by Trelawney's message 'from the future'. "What is it? Bow tie sale, fez shop…"

"It is," the seer coughed, "This is most irregular, um."

Sybil Trelawney hesitated for a moment, shy; it wasn't often she had to report such messages.

Then, abashed, she repeated what she'd seen. "Well, the message was 'Hello Sweetie.'"

The Doctor blinked; and his face broke into a grin.

The Time Lord shook the teacher's hand, gracious, before whirling around and running towards the Entrance Hall. Feet pounded on the stone.

It was Hogwarts; a castle, and the one way you always came in to any such installation, especially one as heavily guarded as this place with Voldemort on the loose, was through the front door.

The Time Lord stopped, right by the huge gates. Time passed. He waited where he was.

He wasn't sure quite what he was so looking forward to. Was it the aggravation, the knowledge, or just…her? Or was it the sense of a kindred spirit; out of time, and utterly mischievous?

Well, whatever it was, she was late.

Amy wandered into the room, frowning as she caught sight of the Time Lord.

"Hiya," she waved, "Rory's off looking for his ghost. Reckons that'll be some way to figure out what's going on. Anyway, why are you here?"

The Doctor paused. Of course, he could tell her, but it would probably be best not to. If she didn't show, then it'd be a waste of time; and in any case, it would be best to avoid Amy's jibes.

In any case, it looked like he wouldn't have to answer.

Right in the middle of the hall, a light gradually flared up, and faded away.

A certain, mildly tanned, blonde doctor stepped out of it, catching the Doctor's eye. A quirky smile; "Hello sweetie," she echoed Trelawney's prediction.

"Doctor Song," the Time Lord inclined his head

"River!" Amy rolled her eyes, "Could've done with your hat-shooting expertise earlier."

"My what?" River Song frowned

"Wait, Amy," the Time Lord extended a hand, "How far are we? Have we done Stonehenge, or America yet?"

"Which Stonehenge?" River frowned, whipping out the blue book, "Which America for that matter? I've done the rather fun trip to DH Lawrence."

"Nope," the Doctor covered his ears with his hands, "Haven't done that. Amy, no spoilers!"

The time travelling lady frowned, looking from redhead to Time Lord; she frowned, focusing on Amy.

"Is hoot his hats, huh?" she raised her eyebrows, "Please don't tell me he was wearing that god-awful cactus-thing again."

"He wore it before?" Amy said, disbelievingly

"Yeah," River laughed, "Bought several in the twenty second century."

"It's a good hat!" the Doctor protested, cutting in. River span around

"It was a cheese grater!" she threw her hands into the air, "Not a hat!"

"Yeah, well," the Doctor remarked after several quiet seconds, straightening his bow tie. "I knew that." More seconds of silence; "Cheese graters are cool."

"Not as hats!" River rolled her eyes despairingly.