A/N: I'm about to go through and reply on the reviews page, but for the two non-member reviews thank you for your feed back! J, I'm glad you like it and Guest, I have to admit that I don't have any Scor/Lily planned for this fic, but I have a lot of mystery, adventure and ridiculous time-travel shenanigans and I hope you like it anyway!
Keep a lookout for next chapter on Friday. I can safely reveal that chapter four will contain more Scorpius, time traveling elephants in Malfoy Manor and strange occurrence that will lead to an even stranger adventure.
Chapter 3
The next morning, everything went completely fine right up until it all went wrong.
Lily Potter strode through the crowd and straight down the grand, curving flight of steps in the middle of a square in London. The stairs had been spelled to be ignored by Muggles, and were currently covered in a stream of ministry officials winding downwards. The days of entering via disguised toilet were long past.
Severus Snape followed the red haired young woman, disguising any anxiety he felt with a sneering face and fast walk. They made it to and through the security point without trouble- apparently his unspeakable status had gone through, because the young man at the wand weighing desk said only, "Thank you, Mr. Tick, you're all set."
They went in, Lily breaking off from him after saying, "Oh, there's Auror Jones in line for tea. I can never catch him without his partner, and she always prevents me from making any headway on convincing him to switch departments. I'll just go get us some tea, then. Wait here for a moment?"
He nodded his ascent, scanning the room. It had changed a lot since he was last there, though of course that had been in the days it was controlled by the Death Eaters. It was brighter now, noisier, and the rather horrible fountain had been replaced with one of Dumbledore with jets of water streaming from his pointy hat. The sculpture had somehow managed to capture the mischievous twinkle in the man's eyes, and he held a wand and a bag that spilled out what looked suspiciously like lemon drops in one hand, a stone Fawks about to take flight off of the other. Snape scowled at it.
A group of extremely high up officials including the Minister herself swept into the Atrium, marching along importantly.
"So you see, Madam Minister, that's why I think it's important that we cut the funding for the Department of Magical Games and Sports and give it to the committee for International Magical Cooperation." Said a middle aged red haired man in a pompous tone.
"While I agree with you, Percy, I'm not sure it's going to be that simple. Also, how many times am I going to have to tell you that you don't have to call me, 'Madam Minister' all the time, I mean, I know I just got the position but-" The Minister froze, causing an undersecretary to run into her and burst in a flurry of apologies. "Um. Percy, just to verify, who would you say that is twenty feet in front of me, dressed all in black old fashioned robes, scowling furiously?"
Percy looked around efficiently and said, "That is Professor Snape, mam." Before his head caught up with his mouth and he froze as well.
The Minister turned to the Auror on her left. "Corner, go and bring me that man." The Auror nodded, looking uncharacteristically nervous. He had changed a lot since his Hogwarts days, but there are a few things that never go away and one of them is a childhood fear of your scariest teacher. He squared his shoulders and marched up to the man in black, calling loudly,
"Excuse me, sir? I have to ask you to come with me." Heads all around them turned to see what was going on, and a few of those between forty and eighty gasped and took a step backward.
"Why?" Snape sneered at him, looking him up and down scornfully, then pausing. "Micheal Corner, isn't it? You blew up your cauldron on the first day of potions class." He added in mocking tones.
"Um." Said Michael. There were titters and excited, confused and fearful murmurs. "I have to ask you to come with me, Professor. Right now." He stood up straighter, drawing his wand. He would not be intimidated by this man anymore!
Snape reacted automatically, his wand out and in dueling stance before the other man could blink. "I demand an explanation, Corner!" He hissed menacingly.
Michael quailed inside.
It was at this moment that Ron Weasley walked in and saw one of his team facing off against Snape. He did not think about which side to take, he did not have to. He ran toward them at full speed bellowing,
"I got your back, Corner! Don't let him get away!"
Snape, eyes widening at the implication, disarmed Corner non-verbally and growled, "What is the meaning of this, Weasley?"
"Hey, you give him back his wand!" Ron yelled.
"Sod off, Weasley!" said Snape, baring his teeth. He would not take orders from Ronald Bloody Weasley, even if the man was now older than him.
In addition to being older Ron was also now much better at dueling, thanks to being an Auror for more than thirty years. His short temper, however, was still the same.
Flashes of light, bangs, and walls of enchantment sprang up between them like a fire. Several random bystanders were stunned by Ron's rapid fire technique and Snape's almost uncanny ability to dodge, deflect and fire back as good as he received. They were both completely in the moment, shrieking insults at each other, when an authoritative female voice yelled, "STOP!"
Both of their eyes went to the furious figure striding toward them. "RONALD! What the devil are you doing, dueling Professor Snape in the Atrium! You know bloody well he was never actually Dark!" Shrieked the Minister for Magic.
"But, Hermione-" Started Ron.
"No! Just, no!" Yelled his wife. "Put your wand away, and now!" She turned toward Snape. "I'm terribly sorry, Professor. That was all a misunderstanding that got far out of hand. I asked Corner to bring you over to me so I could ask you how you got here, which he took to mean 'apprehend you.'" She explained.
"And that was something I wanted to help with." Said Ron firmly, glaring at Snape.
"I am sure that it was, Weasley." Sneered the ex-Professor.
"None of that!" Hermione demanded imperiously. "Professor, I do need to know why you are in my ministry, and, well...why you aren't dead."
"Time travel accident at the D.O.M." Called Lily, coming up with two cups of tea. There were general murmurs of 'ah, well, that explains it.' "I knew he looked the same!' and 'oh, right, of course.' The crowd began to disperse, mystery as solved as it would ever get, with the D.O.M.
"Sorry about that, I had no idea they would be here this morning or I wouldn't have left you alone. Here's your tea." She held out a cup to Snape, who looked at it for a moment, then slowly put his wand away, took the cup and said,
"Thank you, Miss Chime." In a dignified way. Ron, seeing this, reluctantly put away his own wand. Hermione let out a sigh of relief.
"Thank you, Miss Chime, well diffused." Said Lily's Aunt. It might seem odd from the outside for a niece to be called by a code name, but only if you were not familiar with how Hermione felt about rules. "How long and how classified is the explanation?"
"Very both, Madam Minister." Replied Lily.
"'Madam Minister?" Asked Snape in a tone of deepest shock with a side of horror.
"Yes." Hermione said in a ha-so-there voice, and turned back to Lily. "Will the Department need anything from me to fix this?" She asked professionally.
"Oh, no. I can't say much, but what I can say is that we can't put him back where we got him from, and if you want 'why' we'll need a half hour and a private office." Lily replied.
"Well then what are you going to do with him?" Ron asked in suspicion, looking at Snape, who smirked at him.
"We've already done it-we got him to sign an Unspeakable contract and hired him. He'll be a great asset to the Ministry." Lily explained. "His code name is Mr. Tick."
"What?" Gasped Ron.
"Good, that seems sensible. I look forward to working with you, Mr. Tick, should it ever happen." Said Hermione smoothly. "If you'll excuse us, we have a meeting to attend. Ron, you are needed in the Auror department, right now."
"What? Why?" He asked, goggling.
"Because I am the Minister and I say so. Come on." Ron was towed away before he could ask the Unspeakables more probing questions.
"I suppose Granger did not turn out too badly after all." Said Snape grudgingly.
"She's certainly improved life for Muggleborns, werewolves and non-human magic users in Britain." Commented Lily, starting to walk towards the lifts. "The old families generally hate her, and there's been three assassination attempts in the month since she took office. She's even more liberal than her predecessor, and that was Kingsely Shacklebolt."
"I see Dumbledore's schemes worked out perfectly, then." Snape said as they walked into the lift.
"Um. Did they?" Asked the highly surprised man already standing in it.
Snape stared at him intently, back very straight. "Well, considering you're standing here, alive enough to stare at me like a buffoon and the Order members seem to control Britain, I would say so, Potter." He said condescendingly.
Harry blinked and shook his head, looking back up at Snape's sneering face to prove to himself that this was real.
"I'm the head Auror now." He said, as though reminding himself.
"Yes, that's about what I expected." Said Snape, in derisive way that made it clear he was in no way impressed.
Harry turned his eyes to those of his daughter, the elevator sinking down after she'd pressed the correct button. "Lily, why is my dead potions master insulting me on my way to work?" He asked somewhat helplessly.
"Time travel accident." She repeated cheerfully. "He's stuck here permanently, too, so get used to it. Just try to remember that you're older and you outrank him now."
Snape gave Harry a look which said plainly that he would never acknowledge such a thing as long as he lived. They arrived at the Auror's floor after a horror-stricken silence, and Harry edged out, stopping in the doorway to ask Lily, "Are you coming to dinner on Sunday? Your mum is making a ham." In a vain attempt at normalcy.
"Yeah, I'll be there. Good luck with work!" She replied, sunny.
"Er. You too." Said Harry, with one more look at Snape.
The moment that the lift doors banged shut, Lily burst out laughing. "Oh my," She breathed, chuckling. "I don't think I have ever seen him that intimidated in my life! That was marvelous."
Snape allowed himself a tight smile. After a moment, he said, "Why didn't you tell me directly that he was your father?"
"Well because you have a bad habit of treating people like their parents, and I wanted you to have time to figure out that I'm very little like them before you went and decided I'm another foolish, arrogant, fame seeking Potter/Weasley mess." She replied lightly, still chuckling.
He looked at her disbelievingly. "Even though you are a cunning Slytherin Unspeakable with more books than most Ravenclaws? I hardly think I am that blind." He said in mild offense.
"Yes, well, my father hates attention, would give anything not to be famous, and is so humble I think it's actually an inferiority complex. You never noticed that at all." She pointed out.
Snape blinked. "I thought it was an act to fool the rest of the staff whom he pandered to."
"No, he just acted tougher around you because he felt threatened. I mean, you've known him for years, do you think he has the kind of mind to which it would ever occur to live an act for personal gain? It would go against his gigantic sense of honor. If he was poor and starving and someone accidentally dropped a sack of galleons at his feet, he would return it politely and ask where he could find a job. Ah, here we are, bottom floor."
They stepped out, Lily quieting to leave the man with his thoughts. She opened the black door in silence, and they were walking into the Round Room.
"This is the Round Room." She announced. "The walls are about to spin."
The walls began to spin. She took a step forward and said, "Miss Chime of Temporal Investigations, door five."
The room stopped immediately, a door directly in front of Lily. She opened it. "That will work for you now, too. If you don't say anything, it will just stop on its own eventually, at whatever door is least helpful. Each door goes to a different sub-department, which studies something different. There's twelve-Time, space, thought, love, hate, death, life, the soul, magic's source, energy, alchemy, and fungus." She rattled off in a bored voice.
"Fungus?"
"You would be surprised."
They had walked through door five and into a room filled with odd things. One wall was covered in every kind of clock, one wall with shelves of devices Snape did not recognize, and in the corner lurked a huge, squat metal cabinet that looked like it could withstand several blasting curses and a charging bull. Another corner was filled with a variety of baffling measuring tools, a locked glass cabinet of potions, and a giant, sturdy steal box with a little glass window along its length. A beautiful sparkling light showed through the window. A couple desks were shoved up against one wall, but most of the floor was open, with a large ring chalked into the middle.
"This is the work room, where our agents leave and arrive from. I'll give you a rundown of what everything in here does later. For now, the two cardinal rules to remember in here are: do not ever open the big, glowing steal box without proper handling procedures- It's filled with raw time, which we place into time turners. We used to just keep it in a big glass bell jar that you could reach into, but when we were invaded by teenagers and Death Eaters in '96 there was an unfortunate occurrence..."
"Ah. Yes, Yaxley's baby head incident. I have heard about it." Snape nodded, looking with interest at the box.
"Yes. The other cardinal rule is to remember that the cantankerous looking iron cabinet is full of time turners and act accordingly. We used to keep them in that pretty glass cabinet so you could see what was there, but Neville Longbottom shot it with a stunner by mistake and caused a self-repeating loop of breaking and repairing time turners. Luckily Mr. Clock, one of the best head of Department we've ever had, came in from the mid 60's and was able to stop the time loop at a point before they were broken. But we still moved everything into that magic proof iron beast just in case." Lily walked through the door in the back.
"Longbottom always did have poor aim." Snape said, but it was halfhearted. He'd been unable to muster true vitriol toward the boy since he had seen the way he led that ridiculous student rebellion. It may have made his life more difficult, but it had saved several students from death and torture and for that he was grateful.
"He became a Professor, you know. Herbology, took over for Sprout. He was head of house for my brothers." Lily commented as they walked through a high ceilinged, glittering room filled with gold orbs. "This is the hall of prophesy- you'll pass through it a lot, it always seems to appear on the way to wherever you're going, but the only one who works in here is Mr. Foreshadow. It's a bit like being a librarian, being the Keeper of the Prophesies. You just keep them neat and labeled and in alphabetical order, and if someone wants one you verify they're allowed to have it and you get it for them. By the way, don't ever touch anything in here, there's a curse on the prophesies that will give you magically inflicted madness if you try to take one that isn't yours."
"I am aware. Lucius told me about the battle here." Snape replied.
"Good. Ah, here we go, home sweet home." They had reached the waiting area that had been deserted except for Sally and Willbe the previous night. That was not the case today. The room bustled, and the moment Lily walked in she became the center of attention.
"Miss Chime! I've found a loop on the causality matrix that doesn't fit!" called a tiny, excitable man in an exciting tie.
"I am positive that the thing that escaped from the Life Department is making a nest under my desk, if anyone cares." mumbled a gloomy wizard in suspenders.
"Miss Chime, Agent Nick is due to leave on assignment in an hour but he's just come back and now there's two of him in the staff room and he's eating twice his fair share of the muffins!" complained a thin, disproving witch with narrowed eyes. The rule about crossing your own time line existed mostly for those fool enough to attack themselves and to prevent 'armies of one' as they were known. Any time agent worth their wand had a passcode or signal known only to themselves for identification purposes, and kept their own company fairly frequently.
"Ma'm? You remember Archibald Goldman, the Auror? He's just turned up in a broom cupboard on the third floor, covered in mud and two years older than he was when he disappeared ten years ago." Cut in Mr. Sands, Lily's second in command. She rubbed her temples, and raised her hand for silence.
"Alright, in order of how I heard them, Agent Gears, put the matrix on my desk, I'll check it for glitches before we panic about it. Borris, try luring it out with muffins and catching it in a rubbish bin, I hear there's a bounty on it. Miss Flow, I don't care how many muffins Agent Nick eats, it's fine. There are enough muffins for everyone, even for that thing from the Life Department. Sands, send Archie Goldman to my office for a formal interview. And this is Mr. Tick , he's new today."
Mr. Sands nodded. "Yes, I met him next week. Very efficient."
"Good." She said, without batting an eye. "Train him, I don't have time. Oh, and Sands, according to Agent Springs, there will be an incident at Weasley's Wizard Wheezes at three; fetch the temporal cleanup crew just before then. Mr. Tick, good luck."
The rest of the day passed in the usual dancing on the edge on chaos that was life in the Temporal Investigations Department. Lily stayed in her office most of the day, dealing with other people's catastrophes and attempting to fill out standardized Ministry forms for something that did not even fit normal tense structure.
At five o' clock, she filled out her last form. Sands tried to tell her it wasn't her last form, but she informed him that he was wrong. She stood up, stretched and grabbed her bag to floo home, then remembered.
"Sands," She stuck her head out her office. "What happened to Mr. Tick?"
"He was given an advance paycheck and the afternoon off for flat hunting." Sands confirmed.
Lily left with relief, collapsing into her favorite chair like a puppet with cut strings.
"And she returns." Sneered a voice from beside her. "Have a nice time?" He asked with venom.
"Ugh." She said, letting her head flop backwards and closing her eyes. "I don't have the energy for an argument right now, Severus."
"Late night?" He asked, implication written across the statement in bold.
"Yes, actually." She snapped. It had been, they had read for several hours without noticing. "What's it to you?" She snapped, eyes flashing.
He stared at her haughtily for a moment, and slowly deflated. "Nothing." He said, low and quiet, then sighed in pure frustration. "I grow so tired of being nothing more than a memory in the walls, Lily. You… are one of the few who has ever treated me as a human being. Even counting those before I died." He added, sneering, before the expression faded into bitterness. "The idea of losing you to the mundane world is… disconcerting."
"I'm sorry, Severus. I know your existence has never been an easy one." She said, quietly. After a moment where he just stared at her with dark emotions in his darker eyes, she said, "I was up late reading."
He nodded, looking somewhat happier. "Why did you ask me to leave?" He asked with the tiniest note of pleading and a little residual anger.
She took a breath, thinking. Should she tell him about the other Snape? Would that make him feel better, jelous of the living one, replaced? In this mood, she knew that nearly anything she told him would make him morose.
"Because his is a special, time travel related case, and I thought it would freak him out to see you. It was his first night here from the late 90's, during your time as Headmaster. You didn't exactly have a good reputation then." She said, feeling bad about her words as she said them. All technically true, but painting an incorrect picture together.
She felt less bad when his shoulders relaxed and his head came up. After a moment, he asked, "What was so awful about your day that you didn't have the energy to argue with me? I thought it one of your favorite pass-times." He said dryly.
She smiled tiredly. "Oh, you would not believe my day! On top of the ongoing case with Marvo Higgins, the string of burglaries and the ten missing elephants which we are now sure are definitely all the same elephant time-bended, we got two students misusing Time turners, old Archie finally turning up but not the right age to have been gone ten years, and a five year old Uncle George at the joke shop because the new product he and James' are testing worked too well... I swear, for the good of the world's sanity we should ban those two from collaborating, not that they'd listen…"
He let her talk about her day, asking pertinent questions and laughing at the right times, trying to convince himself that hearing about the world was enough.
Snape had settled into the department so seamlessly it began to feel as though he'd always been there within the span of a week. He was, as billed, efficient in everything he did. But there was one task at which he excelled, and it was one no one else had wanted anyway. He even enjoyed it.
"Mister...Tomas, was it?" Mr. Tick sneered, looking down at his paperwork and flicking his eyes back up to the trembling sixth year student sitting in front of the Time Agent's desk.
"Would you care to explain to me exactly what you were thinking when you decided to use your ministry appointed Time-Turner to repeatedly leave the school without your absence being noted?" He fixed the boy with a Look.
"Er...I was, well, there's this girl who lives in London, and I just..." Managed Sean Tomas, rubbing his palms together and looking to the side.
"Mr. Tomas, are you under the impression that your love life is more important than the whole of time? Do you have the slightest idea of what you could have done?" Mr. Tick's voice sounded like he found the whole thing distasteful.
"Well, I mean, I figure that you can't really change the past, it all just kind of turns out the way it was always supposed to..." Said Sean rather doubtfully.
"That is an overly simplistic perspective, Mr. Tomas, and a very convenient theory, which I would guess is why you never questioned it. Do you understand how the time turner you use works, in any way? The theory behind it, or the reasons behind the rules you were given?" The Time agent asked in a deadly calm voice.
"Er...well, no I guess I-" Started Sean, fidgeting.
"And did you ever think to investigate further before using this highly magical, dangerous device you have been given to visit a girl?" Mr. Tick fired.
"I figured you'd never give them to students if they were really dangerous!" Argued Sean, eyes wide.
Mr. Tick sighed a put-upon sigh. "There you are right- I would never give time turners to students. That decision was made by the same Minister who insisted that the Dark Lord was gone forever and Dolores Umbridge was a good person to put in charge of children. Fudge cleared the use of registered time turners for the public in 1992, and since that point over 200 alternate realities have been created and countless headaches for Time Agents like myself have been incurred. Over a hundred people have died in time travel related accidents to date, or become caught in permanent, paradoxical loops. Time does not simply 'just turn out the way it was supposed to', Mr Tomas." He reached into his robes and pulled out a small sphere. "You see the lines in this ball?" He asked.
Sean leaned forward cautiously and peered into it. "What is that, some kind of three dimensional maze?"
"No, this is a causality matrix. A map of time as it is now. Before time travel it was a straight line. Every time you loop back on your own time line, you risk further splitting time. It is my job to prevent that." His eyes skewered Sean to the chair, his voice becoming a sibilant threat. "That means that if you ever do anything with that time turner that is not permitted, you will answer directly to me. I am not bound by the same rules as your Professors, Tomas, or even by the ones that apply to most people." Mr. Tick said this with relish, eyes glittering evilly.
"Your current recklessness is certainly appalling but if I ever hear of you doing it again, it will be nothing like as appalling as what will happen to you afterward. Do I make myself clear?" asked Mr. Tick in the low, smooth voice of a natural predator.
"Yes, sir!" Squeaked Sean Tomas, every inch of his skin crawling with terror.
"Good. You may go at your leisure." Mr. Tick turned his complete concentration to his paperwork like flipping a switch, as though Sean no longer deserved one iota of his attention.
Sean ran. He found Professor Longbottom waiting for him in the hallway to deliver him back to the school, and stared up at him with haunted eyes. "I'm so sorry, Professor, I had no idea! I swear to Merlin I will never do it again! I'll drop the classes, I'll never touch a time turner for the rest of my life! Just please, don't make me ever see Mr. Tick again." Sean pleaded.
Professor Longbottom frowned. "Well, it's your choice whether to keep the classes, Sean. But regardless, if you obey the rules set by the Department of Mysteries, I see no reason why you should have to speak with Mr. Tick again. Just...keep that in mind."
"Oh, I will, sir! No one will ever have obeyed the rules as well as me!" Sean swore earnestly.
"Um. Good. Would you wait here for a moment?" Sean nodded. Professor Longbottom hesitated a moment, and then opened the door and walked in. The man sitting at the desk looked up at him extremely quickly.
"Yes, Longbottom?" He snapped impatiently.
Neville froze, instinctive tendrils of dread clenching his middle and his mouth falling open. After a moment, he forced himself to reply in a normal tone, using all of his Gryffindor bravery.
"Just wondering what had gotten into Sean, but now I understand completely." He managed, hoping he didn't sound breathless. "Well, except that I don't at all. I, er. I thought you were dead."
Snape sighed. He had grown tired of the same explanations over and over, so he went with something new for personal amusement. "They needed someone most qualified to scare people into behaving and had all of time to choose from. Who would you assume they would have picked?"
Neville nodded. "Yes, that makes sense. I would have picked you too. Do you need anything else, Pro- er, Mr. Tick?"
Snape smiled smugly and said dismissively to the head of Gryffindor House, "No, Longbottom, that will be all." And went back to shuffling his papers. Professor Longbottom left hurriedly.
It was distracting, how familiar he was. Lily had to constantly remind herself that this Severus Snape hadn't known her his whole life the way she had him. Actively stopping herself from staring at this three dimensional verion of a portrait she'd known all her life was becoming a habit.
The most distracting thing was that she kept getting the feeling that he was trying not to look too long at her either. There was no active tell, no eyes skittering guiltily away when they met-only a impression when their eyes did meet that made her feel he'd been waiting for this glance for hours. It was the way she looked like her grandmother, she knew. Bt that didn't make it any less strange or awkward. It did not help that they were the only two people in the department who regularly staid after hours or arrived before 8.
Currently, it was just past six in the evening, and everyone except Lily, Snape and Borris had gone. Borris was at his desk, muttering complaints to no one in particular, and Lily was in the Records Room. It was a deceptively small space and if you were unaware of its properties, you might think that the Department of Temporal investigations did not have many more records than the average department.
Lily's brows were furrowed in concentration as she read through the file in her hand, dropped it onto the pile she was collecting and absentmindedly flipped the dial on the cabinet from May 2023 to June 2023. She opened it again to start searching determinedly through the new selection of files. A knock came on the records room door and Snape walked in. She jumped slightly, then made herself relax.
"I have finished going over the time-turner records of every Hogwarts student, calibrating the time matrix's and imputing today's necessary coordinates into yesterday's homing devices. Reports are on your desk, as well as a few suggestions about making the matrix's self-calibrating and the homing devices more efficient." Snape stated without preamble.
She blinked. "All of that would have taken anyone else a week. I was depending on it taking you at least till tomorrow."
Snape looked neither flattered nor chastised. "When I work, I focus on it completely. It is not my fault if others do not."
"True. Well, I'll have to come up with more for you to do tomorrow, but for today you can go ahead and head home." She said, starting to look back at the files she was sorting through.
A hollow look came across his face. "It isn't very late. If you are still working, there is surely more to do."
She looked up at him. "It's half past six. Borris is only here because he's avoiding his wife who henpecks him mercilessly. I'm working on a personal project in my spare time. Don't you want to go home?"
His eyes became shuttered, black hair swinging over his face as he shifted weight and said stiffly, "My new quarters are... empty. The only thing in them that is even reminiscent of home is the book collection you returned to me, and I have finished rereading them. Going out in public attracts too much attention. Being an old teacher in a small community is a fast way to a kind of notoriety, and I was not exactly popular." He said delicately.
"Ah." Understanding dawned, and Lily felt a flash of empathy for the looming, haughty man in front of her. "Well, if you really want something to do, you could help me look for sightings of a blond man with green eyes and a gray bowler hat in the records."
"What time period?" He asked, not caring about details.
"Between the time we started keeping records and the present." She smiled apologetically. "Well, I've already covered 1600-1840, and 2000-2022. There's a reason I do this in my own time."
"But you can't travel that far without time sickness and leaving a mark we would see on the matrix." He frowned. "Why not simply identify his time line and find him that way? With someone who has traveled so much, it would be easy to locate."
She shook her head. "No good, he doesn't leave a personal time line behind. Yes, I know that's not possible. Look anyway, will you? If you want something to do."
He shrugged and turned to the nearest filing cabinet. They worked in focused silence for the next forty minutes until Snape said, "Ah. I have found him. Only...no. This cannot be right."
Lily looked up. "How many places is he in at one time?" She asked, sounding vaguely interested but not surprised.
"Seventeen." Said Snape, staring at the file. "But you become-"
"Time sick if you cross your own time line more than five times. Yes. Go ahead and toss it on this stack, I'll go through it with the others later." She said, turning back to her cabinet. Snape cocked his head to one side, looking at the pile she had indicated.
"These are all sightings of this man?" He asked.
"Yes. Those are the ones I've found this month. There are others." She said. "You'll find that if you talk about him in circles of experienced time travelers you'll get the same sort of derisive snorts you'd expect if you started talking about the rotfang conspiracy or the crumplehorned snorcack. There's too many conspiracy theories about him to count. The rest of the Department think he's a practical joke, a myth. They call him Mister Time, say he helps agents in dire need, that he's the guardian of time itself, all kinds of things. But no one really believes he existed- no one can be in that many places at once and not have a personal time line... It's like a person who doesn't show up on cameras or infrared." She said distractedly.
"Infrared?" He asked in puzzlement.
"Oh. Sorry, muggle tech is a hobby of mine, a friend got me into it. It's a sort of sensor that tracks body heat, more or less. Ah, here we go, another report of him. Huh. Walking through every aisle of a library again. He does that a lot."
Snape frowned. "If everyone in this department considers him a prank, why don't you?"
Lily considered for a moment before saying shortly, "I've seen him. He saved my life, my first assignment out, when I was barely 18. No one believes me."
Snape returned her considering look, nodded once and then walked over to the pile of files and began to read without commenting. After a few minutes he sat down on the step ladder and began pouring over the documents. Lily kept looking, kneeling next to the ladder to hunt through the same drawer over and over on different settings, and eventually found two more sightings before she looked at her wrist and realized what time it was.
"Oh Merlin, it's past 11!" She gasped.
Snape looked up. "What? It can't have been that long, surely."
"Apparently so. I just get so sucked into this case that I lose time. Damn, I wanted to look through those files tonight." She said regretfully.
"I have already read the majority of them- I could write a summery, if it would be useful." He offered.
"If you have the time, that would be great. But right now, you should sleep." She said, reaching her arms up to stretch and run her fingers through her hair.
"Very well." He conceded, eyes resolutely not following the movement of the scarlet hair but staying fixed on the files. "I will have the report ready for you tomorrow."
Lily nodded and bid him a good night. After a few minutes packing up, she flooed home, mind still chewing on the frustrating mystery of Mr. Time.
