Otherwise known as: How Luna tore apart the fabric of reality so that her friends could get decently laid, and accidentally saved the world in the process.

A/N: Unbetaed as always, please go easy on me, I put myself at your mercy! Or rather, my self-esteem. It's all the same, isn't it?

Love Always,

Eli x

Disclaimer: I do not own the works herein, all characters from the Harry Potter Universe belong to JK Rowling, and all characters, storylines, situations, plots and the like do not belong to me. I make no money from this work.

Warnings: Rated M for situations, swearing, violence... The whole lot, basically.

Iacta Alea Est

Chapter Two

The girls landed with a thud in the middle of nowhere, it seemed. The lightshow that was their transportation died out all at once, leaving starbursts in Hermione's eyes as she desperately tried to make sense of what had just happened. There was a damp spot on her chest, her shirt sticking to her uncomfortably. The ground was soft and damp beneath her knees.

They were, in fact, stood in a meadow; green, lush grass underfoot and twinkling stars in the sky. They all released their hold as one, staggering backwards as they aimed to get some understanding of their surroundings. It was an orchard of sorts, Hermione thought before her brain clicked quickly into battle mode; Summoning her wand to her hand and automatically shifting until she was back-to-back with Ginny in preparation for any threats. The trees were flourishing in the early-spring heat, tempered though it was by the nights breeze. They were set in a perfectly symmetrical ring around them, thick and almost entirely impenetrable from their perspective. The air was clear, only the scents of flowers and dirt on it.

Satisfied with the lack of immediate danger, Hermione fell to her knees beside Lavender, her hands scrambling over her clothes to check the wound. "Oh, Gods," she whispered as her eyes fell on the sodden shirt Ginny had wadded into the bite. It was soaked through, the previously light blue material black with blood. Lavender wasn't conscious, but as Hermione poked and prodded at her, a pitiful moan escaped her mouth.

"Here," A calm voice said, and suddenly vials were being pressed into Hermione's palms; Essence of Dittany, Silver Paste, Werewolf Saliva to seal the wound, and Blood Replenishing Potion for afterwards. Hermione nodded gratefully even as something in the back of her mind screamed at her to pay more attention, she was missing something big. Instead, she leaned over Lavender and set to work. She removed the wad of cloth with a sympathetic wince; the blood had started to clot around it and the removal was not at all clean. The wound itself was horrendous. The werewolf seemed to have made no bones about whether she lived or died from his bite - he had torn the chunk of skin out entirely, leaving Lavender's remaining skin ragged and the wound inches deep. By Hermione's estimation, Lavender was lucky to survive.

She bit back a sob as she worked the paste and saliva into the mangled flesh that would certainly scar. The sometimes vapid Gryffindor had more than enough scars from Greyback, her classically beautiful face had been ravaged by his claws and teeth during the last battle, leaving puckered and malformed skin from her hairline all across the left side of her face down below her neckline to her hips. The brunette could remember the werewolf's feral glee as he'd munched away at her, his face covered in Lavender's lifeblood as he cackled around a mouthful of human flesh. "Aw, my pretty girlie," He had hissed into what had been left of her ear, and the fear in the still conscious girl's eyes had had Hermione launching herself at him in a protective rage, despite the two girls animosity towards one another.

Hermione hadn't been the hero that day, though. Sybill Trelawney, instead, had rounded the corner in a blaze of righteous fury, her eyes flashing as she'd screamed at the man murdering her favourite student in a way no person deserved. Hermione had run to join a different fight at the sound of the woman's approach and so didn't see the end of it, but Bill Weasley had informed her afterwards with an uncharacteristically manic glee in his eyes that Greyback had been unrecognizable by the end. The brunette remembered this, now, and tried to pass this comfort on as she quietly begged her antagonist to live. She hadn't survived one monster only to be the victim of another.

Behind Hermione, Ginny had no such distractions as she advanced on Luna, who seemed to be inspecting the woodland that surrounded them. She glanced at Ginny once, took in the heated anger in her eyes, and her mouth twitched upwards. "I hope you weren't too terribly attached to Harry," she mused, not even twitching as Ginny drew her wand.

"What did you do, you crazy bitch?!" The redheads venomous tongue lashed out as she took a few steps toward her friend, who chuckled.

"I didn't do anything," Luna said serenely, eyes wide and innocent. "Fatedid something, I merely facilitated. There's no going back now."

Ginny growled and went to lunge, Luna dancing out of the way with a tinkling laugh.

"Girls." Hermione snapped, her attention still on her patient. "Stop. Ginny, some wards, if you please." Ginny looked like she was considering mutiny, but Hermione snarled. "Now."

Ginny flew into motion mostly on instinct, because this was what Hermione was good at after seven years of wrangling her boys through this adventure and the next. Probably, Ginny thought with a smirk, this is just another Tuesday for her. She looked calm and determined, weathering the storm as always, making the best of a bad situation. Ginny admired her; for all of her faults, Hermione was her best friend and sister and had always been the rock upon whom Ginny could lean for support. This situation, whatever it was, would likely be no different.

"Protego Totalum, Fianto Duri, Cave inimicum…"

Hermione sighed when it seemed she had done all she could for Lavender, whose colour had returned slightly in the time that she'd been healing her. She felt for her pulse and the rush of relief upon feeling it thrumming was nearly overwhelming. With a huff, she leaned back onto her hands and glanced up at Luna, who was watching Lavender with a small smile playing on her face. "Lu," she began, only to be cut off by a flick of Luna's hand.

"Fatesent us here, Hermione. It wasn't me."

"I know what I felt, Luna. You punched me, right here." Hermione gestured to her sternum, where the shallow wounds were bleeding into the fabric creating a paste of sand, glass and fluid. "You knew that was where I was wearing the Time-Turner-"

"Time-Turner?" Ginny gasped, whipping around to point her wand at Hermione accusingly. "You were wearing a Time-Turnerto the Pub? How irresponsible can you get!" She stomped around the warded area a few times, desperately trying to get a hold on her burning fury. "Are we in the past? Is that where we are?" She collapsed to the ground, her hands clutching at her chest desperately. "Merlin, of course we are, of course,it just makes sense, doesn't it? Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck-"

"Ginny," Hermione reached out, hiding her hurt when the redhead recoiled from her hand. "We don't know that. It could have just… knocked us off course?"

Even she didn't sound convinced, but it didn't stop her from shooting daggers at Luna when she decided to chip in in her usual carefree manner, "Nope, we're in the past. 1979, in fact."

"If you know so much, Luna, then where are we?" Hermione snapped, the weight of the situation crushing her. It barely even occurred to her to argue with Luna, not when she was cradling a savaged Lavender Brown in her lap and Ginny appeared to be having a nervous breakdown. The redhead had curled up in a ball, her hands fisted in the remains of her shirt, shaking and sobbing incoherently.

Luna's eyes widened as she pointed at the treeline, excitement vibrating off her as three shadows worked their way out of the darkness. "Oh, brightest witch of our age," she sighed happily, "figure it out."

The three silhouettes made their way into the moonlight, preceded by an ominous growling that rippled through the air and raised the hairs on all of their necks. Ginny dove to cast more wards, quickly, as the possibility of a new threat occurred to her. Luna was giggling quietly to herself as she watched Hermione stare in the newcomer's directions, a frown-line on her brow as her brain worked frantically to decipher the situation.

There was an obvious hierarchy to the mismatched shapes – the largest in the front, a vibrating tonne of sandy fur; a slightly shorter shape so black it almost blended into the trees at his left flank, and behind them both a towering stag. There was no other thing it could be, not with its antlers reaching up towards the heavens, standing out against a background of stars.

All three girls seemed to forget how to breathe as the largest form prowled closer, stopping every few feet to sniff the air and let out another rumbling growl. It was truly massive, made of shadows and teeth and glinting golden eyes that rang a bell, distantly, in Hermione's mind. She squinted a little, but it was only when the eyes of the creature swung over their hiding place and touched on where she was for a moment that she remembered.

"Padfoot!" Professor Lupin hissed, reaching out to slap Sirius' hands away from his plate for the third time. It was the day of the full moon, and Hermione had been watching him get more and more on edge as the week wore on. There was an electricity to the air, an expectation, and it seemed that some of the more anxious adults had been holding their breath around the werewolf for the past few days, eyeing him warily as they moved through the house. Hermione had never quite understood this fear of the man, not the wolf – though she would admit that his snarls were intimidating, and she wouldn't dare to do what Sirius was doing now. Contrary to popular opinion, she had quite good instincts for self preservation, thank you.

Molly had cooked up a full English breakfast for them all before another long day of cleaning (or, as Ron liked to say, "slave labour") and had set aside a plate of extra bacon for the Professor, who only ever seemed to eat meat in the run-up to the moon. Sirius, being Sirius, had taken offense to what he called 'blatant favouritism' and had spent the last twenty minutes trying to steal his food in more and more ridiculously blatant displays. After this most recent, he let it be for a few minutes, but Hermione was no fool. She watched closely for the slightest movement and-

"Damn it, Sirius,fuck off!" came the snarl as the Black heir dove across the table, both hands out in front to snatch the plate away. The lid on Professor Lupin's temper flew off and he tackled the other man to the ground, both releasing constant grunts and growls as they struggled for dominance. Sirius released that barking laugh of his as the two grown men wrestled in front of the table of wide-eyed children, and eventually lolled his head to the side in the most impertinent display of submission any wolf had ever seen. Hermione had to viciously strangle down the sudden and intense jolt of arousal she felt as Professor Lupin had leaned over to trail his teeth along the Pack mark the other man wore. He bit down, but not before his eyes flicked up to meet Hermione's chocolate brown ones, and the girl gasped quietly. They were the bright gold of the wolf.

Hermione sucked in air desperately, coughing and gasping. Tears filled her eyes but she couldn't even blink them away, fixated as she was by the scene. She could recognize, now that the dots had been connected, the giant shaggy dog as Sirius Black, and the stag – well, that barely bore thinking about right now, not if she intended to survive the night. A swift check on Luna showed a strange expression that Hermione recognised as Luna's kind-hearted version of smug immediately: slightly vacant, drifting, with the corner of her mouth twitched up and her usually massive eyes softened slightly as she met Hermione's.

"What have you done?" Hermione gasped out, arms tightening protectively around Lavender's shoulders causing her breathing to stutter a little.

Luna might have replied, but that was the moment the wolf they had once known as Remus Lupin decided to pounce.