Heavy steps echoed on the floor, making it pound just as much as Albus's head. He opened his eyes cautiously and found himself with several wands pointed at him and, as he figured once he looked around, his relatives.
They were all sprawled on the floor, some on their stomachs, some on their backs and some were already sitting up, reaching for their wands. As he looked to his side, he saw Teddy hurriedly wrestling something (presumably the time-turner) around his neck and underneath his shirt and only then reaching for his wand.
"Don't even think about it, kid." A gruff voice caught Al's attention.
He looked up, searching for the voice and his eyes got caught on the weirdest man he had ever seen in his life. He was currently going around the kids taking everyone's wand away, but Al could definitely tell that this was one battered man, if he'd ever seen one. As he walked between them there was a constant "CLUNK!" of wood, coming from his walking stick, and also a very noticeable limp. He had a mechanical eye that was going haywire and Al could have sworn… yes! As the man finally reached him and pulled his wand forcefully from him he could see it clearly. A small chunk of his nose was missing. Al had a strange mental image of someone putting this man together like a puzzle, and not being able to find the final piece to complete the nose.
As the man stepped back, both his normal and his magical eye were fixed in him, a frown taking over his face and his lip curled up in some kind of sneer, making him seem even more disfigured.
Al had the distinct impression that he knew the man. The magical eye seemed to be screaming out at him… something his father had told him… what was it?!
And suddenly he knew. And although nearing impossible in normal circumstances, adding a weird time-turner and looking at the rest of the people that had come and "welcomed" them, he knew.
"The Order of the phoenix." He murmured, in awe.
Everyone turned to him.
"That's ridiculous!" countered Rose immediately. "The Order doesn't exist anymore."
Al couldn't agree more. And yet…
"Look around." He asked.
And they all did. Their eyes moving from the battered man, to the young woman with bubble gum hair, and finally to the elderly man with a kind expression and snow hair and beard.
Teddy stared unbelievingly at the woman with shockingly pink hair and Al could barely contain his jaw that wanted to drop at the sight of Albus Dumbledore, alive and well, and most of all, not framed in a portrait.
"Oh, not good." Said Lorcan. "So not good."
"Alright, that's enough." Growled Moody. "Up! All of you! Now!"
His wand was pointed solely at Teddy, who he clearly thought was the biggest threat, seeing as he was the oldest.
Teddy remained calm, but he slowly moved in front of the children, standing between them and the raised wands. Hands up, showing his complete surrender, he addressed Moody, "Look, you can all lower your wands. Do we really seem in any way threatening or dangerous to you?"
"You have just entered extremely protected property, and some of you look remarkably alike to some people we know, which could mean a poor attempt at the polyjuice potion. So no, we will not lower our wands until we have satisfying answers proving your innocence." Moody replied coolly.
Teddy opened his mouth but apparently couldn't come up with a good enough answer because he simply nodded and sighed dejectedly, saying, "Yes, well, when you put it in that way…"
James took a step forward and clapped his hand on Teddy's shoulder saying enthusiastically, "You're doing great, buddy!"
"Shut up, you idiot!" snapped Dom. "This is all your fault!"
James gave her a look of pure indignation.
"It most certainly is…! But still, if Teddy wasn't so clumsy…"
"You're not blaming this on me, you…!"
"We don't have time for this!" Shouted Moody, effectively stopping the argument. "Follow." He led the way to the kitchen, where the rest of the Order was awaiting to know what had caused the noise that had interrupted their meeting.
Ignoring the many confused glances thrown in his way, Dumbledore mentioned to the big wooden table in the center of the kitchen, saying, "Please, take a seat."
"But… they're kids." A man that Al immediately recognized as Sirius Black (because of pictures his father had shown him), stated dumbfounded.
"Excellent detective skills, Black." Said another man, in a mocking voice. This one, Al recognized not by photos but by the portrait sitting in the headmistress's office, at Hogwarts. He hadn't changed much: apart from a slight sneer, his face was expressionless, hidden by a lank curtain of black hair. He had only seen this man show an emotion different than derivatives of anger once; when he had learned of Al's middle name.
Sirius glared and was about to rebuke when someone who Al knew much better than either the two man intervened. She appeared much younger, and her eyes were still on full brightness, she had yet to lose a son. But clearly Molly Weasley mastered the art of putting everyone in line even in this time, as she immediately cut Sirius off before he could rebuke while simultaneously ordering Moody, "Alastor, put your wand down! For Merlin's sake, they're children!"
"We're not certain of that, as of yet, Molly," started Dumbledore, although he didn't seem overly concerned "but we can lower our wands for now. They are wandless and, I'm sure, about to present us with identities, proof of those and a reasonable explanation as to why they ended up here."
He said the last part a bit forcefully, to the time-travelers, leaving no room for them to object.
Teddy, being the oldest, felt that he should take responsibility and deal with it, seeing as there was no getting out of it. Not without the Order's help, anyway, and for that he had to give them some answers, which could be extremely dangerous. One wrong thing said could have a huge impact on the future.
He quickly scanned the room. There were a lot of Order members. Too many. Sirius was alive but the Order seemed to be fully in the active, given the plans scattered all over the tables. So, that put them somewhere between 1995 and 1996. He couldn't be sure, since this time-turner differed so much from the ones he had heard about but as they landed in the same place he felt it was safe to assume that the date was the same, as well, (minus the year, obviously) as the one they had traveled from. From a quick glance at grandpa Weasley, which showed no bandages on his neck, he figured he was probably right. So, the date was June 21st, 1995. They had left on June 21st of 2020. That meant they had traveled 25 years to the past. 25 years. He had paled considerably, his hair going from brown to a nasty shade of green and a quick look at the others showed he wasn't the only one to have reached that conclusion.
He was wallowing in despair when someone interrupted him.
"You're a metamorphmagus!" remarked Tonks, excitedly. "That's so cool! I'm one too!"
And if as to prove it, her hair quickly went through all the colours one could imagine and some they couldn't. Despite everything, Teddy couldn't help but smile and say, "Yes, I know."
A lot of people stared and raised their eyebrows and Teddy cursed himself for letting that slip out. It wasn't common knowledge that Tonks was a metamorphmagus. As Rose saw several of them open their mouths to point out that fact, she quickly said, "We need some time to talk among ourselves."
"Absolutely not!" said Moody in an outraged voice.
"I agree with Alastor, they could just be trying to get their stories right. Clearly that wasn't their initial plan." Said a man that Albus identified from some pictures as Remus Lupin. He chanced a sideways look at Teddy and saw him positively drinking in all he could on his father, not that Al could blame him, really; he, himself couldn't help that his eyes were often straying to Dumbledore, although it wasn't quite the same thing.
"You got that right." said James in an undertone.
"Just five minutes, okay? And then you'll have the answers you want." Teddy promised. "Please."
Everyone looked towards Dumbledore who, after thinking for a moment, consented to the condition. The kids moved to a more secluded corner of the kitchen, closely watched by the Order members, who seemed to be expecting an escape attempt at any moment.
"So," started Teddy. "I know most of you have reached a conclusion as to when we are."
"Hum... no, not really..." countered Fred.
"For Merlin's sake, can't you pick up on simple things, Weasley?" asked Scorpius, speaking for the first time since "the accident".
Fred opened his mouth but was immediately elbowed on the side by Lysander.
"No time for arguments now."
"Let's just figure out what to do." Said Rose, as usual, in a practical manner. "Obviously they will ask questions that we won't be able to answer without jeopardizing the whole future as we know it."
"But we have to tell them something, I mean, they're already pretty suspicious of us." Remembered Lily.
"Yes, but we don't have to tell them everything, right?" Asked Fred.
"Yeah, we can just tell them what they really need to know and try to put it in a way that doesn't completely destroy time and space as we know it?" Suggested James.
"I don't know if that's such a good idea." Said Dom.
"She's right, if they suspect we're withholding anything they might just give us to the aurors." Said Scorpius.
"Well, so what do we do?" Asked Louis, crossing his arms and leaning against the wall.
"Al, any thoughts?" asked Dom.
Al had kept quiet, blocking his relative's voices out, trying to think what the better solution would be, seeing as in this case there wasn't exactly a perfect solution, one that could solve everything. He finally answered, "A few, but no guarantees they will work."
"Well, we'll be called shortly so, let's hear it." Said Lorcan.
Al nodded and proceeded, "First we get rid of some of them. The less people who know about us, the better."
"Agree." Said James, and the rest of them all nodded to show their agreement.
"And about the actual questions?" asked Lily.
"I'm fairly certain that should we tell them that we're from the future, most of them, like Dumbledore, Snape, McGonagall, even Moody, would back up a bit, as they know how dangerous it could be to obtain information from the future. But, of course, we'll still have to give them our identities and most likely give away some information from our time." Said Al. "The thing is, if we manage to contact our parents, they'll probably find a way to fix most of the mess we've made and will probably do here, even if they have to alter some memories... maybe... hopefully."
"That's a lot of ifs, mate." Said Fred.
"And even if they can erase out mess, who's to say we can actually contact them? There are a good twenty five years standing between us." Reminded James.
"Yes, but we'll have their help." Said Rose. "Snape, Dumbledore and Sirius... I'm sure they can get their hands on loads of books about time-travel! And besides," she continued, ignoring James's and Fred's groans at the thought of having to read books while on summer vacation. "Dumbledore and Snape both invented their own spells, maybe they can create one that will enable us to make contact with the future."
"And also..." started Al hesitatingly. "I feel like I know something about that time-turner."
"How so? Isn't it just a time-turner?" Questioned Lily, confused.
Al shook his head and answered, "No, Lil, regular time-turners were golden, and they couldn't travel for more than just a few hours." He explained. "But anyways, I can't answer anything yet, I don't know exactly what I know, I can't remember, nor can I remember how I know it." He finished, earning himself some disappointed looks from the others.
"Well, that's something at least. I'm sure it'll come back to you, sometime soon." Said Scorpius, offering him a small smile.
"So," intervened Lorcan. "We have to deci..."
"Time's up, kids." Called Sirius from the other side of the kitchen.
"Well, guess we're going with Al's plan. It's the best we have... Hopefully they won't ask too many questions." Said Louis, finally pushing himself off the wall.
"Ready to talk?" Asked Tonks, once they reached the Order. It looked like they hadn't moved at all, just kept watching them throughout their conversation.
The kids all exchanged looks before nodding together.
"Very well, then." Said Dumbledore, smiling and clapping his hands once. "If everyone could take a seat, we shall start right away."
There you have it, the second chapter, a tiny bit longer than the first. I hope you enjoyed it! Let me know what you thought in the reviews, if you like the course the story is taking, and so on. I appreciate every single one of them! It really makes my day when I see I have new reviews, so thank you very much to those who left them :)
Some quick side notes:
1 -English is not my first language so I apologize for any mistakes you find, please let me know so I can correct them as soon as possible.
2 -If any of you would like to offer your services as beta-reader for this fic then please let me know, send me a pm and I would be very, very grateful!
3 -I'm trying to make the characters as believable as possible, and concerning the next gen, I'm trying to portraying them in the way I imagine them to be (keep in mind that I'm completely disregarding The Cursed Child), if you think it's too far off, I apologize but it's how I see them.
4 -If you find any mistakes concerning the actual story and/or the original hp plot (i.e., chronological mistakes) please let me know as well.
And that's about it! Don't forget to follow, review and mark this as a fave, if you enjoyed it so far and would like to know where it goes and I will (hopefully) "see you" in two weeks!
All the love, M.
