A/N: In this chapter, I've let Hermione show off her "know it all" knowledge a bit. :) :D

4: Bearings

The darkness of night always made things look different and that much more creepy and uncertain, and being in a dark churchyard amongst gravestones didn't help to lessen the feeling.

"We're going to have to try and work out where we are," Hermione said in a low, soft voice to Ginny. "But we'll have to be very quiet and very careful. As well as not knowing where we are or what the date is, we have no idea just what we've landed into the middle of. Oh, and I think it's safest if we only refer to You Know Who as 'You Know Who', as his name was taboo from our time, there's no telling what the name might do across the timeline."

"Okay. You lead on," Ginny replied. "I'll do whatever you say."

Hermione nearly laughed, because what Ginny had said was the last thing she ever expected a member of the Weasley family to say.

They both stood up slowly, and Hermione turned her head this way and that to try and listen for any sounds. Whether it was for the presence of people or animals. After a few moments, hearing nothing more than a fox some way off, and an owl hooting in a nearby tree, Hermione linked her arm through Ginny's and walked forward towards the church.

The pair's footsteps sounded extra loud as they walked over twigs and onto a gravel path. In desperation to be stealthy and with a raised level of alertness, everything sounded abnormally loud.

"Where are we going?" Ginny asked in a whisper.

"To find the porch," Hermione answered. "There are usually posters and leaflets pinned up in church porches, and from there we might get an idea of where we are, and the date."

"How do you know where the porch is?"

"As we walked towards the building I saw a large window at the end facing us, making that the eastern end, so a porch is usually on either the north or south sides," explained Hermione, still in a hushed voice.

"How do you know that?" Ginny asked, impressed.

"We studied old churches at Primary School once; before Hogwarts. They all look slightly different on the outside, but the position and parts are usually the same."

They walked slowly on, with the two women edging off onto the grass to stop the crunching sounds of the gravel on the path. Walking along the side of the church, both of them noted the darker patches for the window recesses and the buttresses casting equally atmospheric alcoves of shadows. A small bit of building, outlined in dark silhouette, appeared to jut out ahead and it was likely it was the porch that they sought. But it was then that Hermione suddenly stopped, causing Ginny to clash into her side and nearly fall over.

"What?" Ginny whispered, warily.

"This is familiar," said Hermione, looking up at the building.

"Well, you said yourself, these churches all look similar."

"No, it's not that. Just a moment," Hermione turned and looked back the way they had come, then turned to look at the church building again. "I wonder?"

"What?" Ginny asked again.

"I won't know for sure until I look at something," the brunette said.

She grasped hold of Ginny's hand and got her to walk with her partly back the way they had come, before turning off between a row of graves. Whether holding her hand was to comfort Ginny or herself, Hermione didn't know for sure.

They walked along a long row of graves, occasionally halting to listen for any sign of life around them. The walking wasn't always easy due to the uneven ground, a lot of it from the subsided ground of graves, along with lumps and bumps and areas that had so obviously been touched by the digging feet of rabbits.

Hermione stopped at a gravestone; giving a cautious look around the churchyard she wordlessly lit the tip of her wand and leaned over to study the stone, the light was just enough to see some of the lettering on it. Giving a small "Hmm" she moved to the next gravestone, and then the next one. To Ginny it looked as though her friend was looking for something she thought should be there, or she knew to be there.

It was at the third gravestone that Hermione stopped for longer, before lifting her head and looking at the church building; but she wasn't really looking at it, her mind was racing in all directions.

"I was right," Hermione said to Ginny, aware that her friend was staring at her bewildered. "I'm not sure how I feel about that."

"What are you right about? Who is it?" Ginny asked as she guided Hermione's wand hand back to the stone to read some of the words engraved there for herself. "Kendra Dum...DUMBLEDORE?"

"Sshh."

"Sorry," Ginny whispered, clapping a hand to her mouth as she read further down the gravestone in a very quiet voice. "'And her daughter Ariana'. AND Dumbledore's sister? The one who was in the painting at the Hog's head? Then this is..."

"Yes, it's Godric's Hollow," Hermione confirmed.

"But...but they died around the turn of the 20th century didn't they? I seem to remember reading or hearing that Ariana died in about 1900." Ginny said softly, before she suddenly had a horrifying thought. "Tell me we're not that far back and that grave isn't fresh? Please?"

Hermione lowered her wand hand to investigate the ground around the stone. It was fairly flat, with a good covering of grass and no cut marks from turf being removed and replaced in recent times. There was a sinking subsidence to the ground which covered the six feet of earth over poor Ariana's and Kendra's coffins.

"It's not fresh," Hermione said. "It's been here a long time. It doesn't help us know much about the date, but it's not 1900 or even 1905 at least."

"Hermione? Are...are Harry's parents buried here?" Ginny wondered.

"Yes," the brunette answered. "Ha...Harry and I found them on Christmas Eve." It seemed it was impossible to avoid speaking her best friend's name, even had she wanted to. "They're over in that direction," she said, pointing her arm in the direction of a boundary hedge, several rows away.

"Let's go to them," Ginny said. "I feel we ought to. Then at least we can confirm we're not too far back in time as well."

"Good idea," Hermione said, as the two women linked arms again.

They walked for a time, both feeling strange to be visiting this grave, knowing that they had left Harry, the son his parents had fought so hard to keep safe, dead at Hogwarts.

Reaching the row Hermione remembered vividly, she walked along it. She turned to look at the dark shadows of old gnarled trees and the position of the building and knew that the grave was here. Turning back to the row she prepared herself to see the names of James and Lily Potter again, feeling almost like she had let them down in not helping to keep their son alive.

"They should be...here," Hermione said, confused, as she was faced with no grave at all, just an area of brambly overgrown nothingness.

"Are you sure you've got the right row?" Ginny asked, not managing to keep the nervousness from her voice. The light puffs of mist as they spoke, didn't help to douse the nerves and eerie feeling of the whole predicament they were in.

"They should be here. I remember that big elaborate old tomb at the beginning of the row. We passed that, so we're in the right row."

"Well, that answers something, doesn't it?" the redhead voiced, slightly glumly.

"We've been sent back to a time before the Potters were killed," Hermione put a hand to her face, rubbed an eye then her forehead, as if it would help her to see more clearly or think better.

"So we've established we're not in 1900, and probably not for several years after that, but before 1981, right?" Ginny summarized.

"Hmm," Hermione answered, nodding.

"At least we know where we are," said the red-haired girl in an attempt to remain positive. "It's more than we knew several minutes ago when McGonagall dumped us here."

Hermione smiled at her friend. "You're right," she sighed. "We need to try and work out the date soon though, because when daylight comes, we might look hideously out of place. Let's go back to finding the porch. Now I know where we are, I remember the main porch entrance being on the south side, so that outline of a bit of the building sticking out, was definitely it," she said, pointing back in the direction of the gravel path again.

"Hermione?" Ginny got her friend's attention again as they began walking to the porch. "Godric's Hollow has always been a large village, well large-ish, right?"

"Yes. Why do you ask?"

"Well, I know a lot of villages don't have muggle or magical street lamps, but don't you think it's all a bit dark? No lights shining from anywhere?"

"It could be the early hours of the morning. The church doesn't have a clock as far as I can see, so I don't know. We don't know what season it is either, and it's a little cloudy so I can't even begin to work out the placement of the stars to get an idea of it."

"Even if it's say, three o'clock in the morning, you would expect to see one light somewhere, or if we're a long way back at least a fire or a fire's embers showing a glow somewhere, surely?" Ginny voiced, continuing her line of thought.

"I don't know," Hermione answered. "It does seem odd."

Hermione didn't like not knowing the answer to something and Ginny also didn't like Hermione not knowing the answer to something. It set both girls more on edge.

As they were walking along the side of the church again, they could just see the outline of the small porch ahead. They were about ten yards from it when they heard a noise, like a low rumble in the distance.

"Thunder?" Hermione asked, as they stopped to listen hard.

Whatever it was, it hadn't stopped and was a constant sound with no break.

"That's like no thunder I've ever heard," said Ginny, reaching for Hermione's arm, to draw some strength from her friend.

The rumbling noise continued and seemed to be getting louder, as if something was gradually coming closer.

"Hermione, I don't like this!"

"You're not the only one," the brunette admitted, equally confused and nervous. "Let's get to the porch."

They continued walking, arms linked once more and as close together as was possible, as the rumbling seemingly crawled closer.

As they reached the entrance to the porch, aware of the thundering noise edging steadily closer still, they then began to hear a series of booming noises, like someone rolling a huge empty oil drum down a hill. And in the near distance on the horizon the sky kept lighting up as if from sheet lightning.

Ginny sat down on one of the small benches that lined either side of the porch. Hermione walked up to the church door and with a very small light from her wand, she looked at a leaflet pinned to the door itself.

"Oh," said Hermione, after a few moments, giving a deep sigh.

"What does it say?" Ginny asked eagerly, hoping for anything to distract her from the unknown noises outside. She had begun to feel cold and wrapped her arms about herself; some of the cold she was feeling was from the situation they found themselves in, some of it from the night air.

"I'm not sure you want to know," Hermione said very slowly.

"Of course I do!"

"Well, that leaflet has not only answered the date, but what that noise is too," said Hermione as she slumped down to sit on the bench opposite Ginny. "We're back in World War Two."

"World War Two?" Ginny asked, confused. "I feel I should know about that, but I can't remember anything about it? Besides, how would the leaflet answer the date and what all that blasted noise is?"

Hermione took a moment and tried to think of the most concise way she could explain such a monumental period in history in a few sentences.

"World War Two was a large muggle war, which basically involved the whole muggle world," she began. "Initially it involved Germany and their little deranged leader Hitler, trying to take control and conquer all of Europe. Poland, France, Belgium, Holland and so on, even parts of Africa, and Britain opposed it and fought back with their Allies, the ones able to fight it anyway. In later years America joined the war on the Allies side, after Japan started to cause trouble too. Anyway, from that poster I can tell you we're in 1943, two years before the end of it, and that noise is very likely a German bombing raid. Muggle aircraft, used to fly over and drop bombs. We're probably hearing gunfire or even anti-aircraft positions firing shells into the sky, miles away, which would explain that flashing on the horizon. If it was a formation of our own bombers flying away, we obviously wouldn't be firing at them."

"Oh," was all Ginny could answer, initially. "1943? War? So we've just come from war and carnage to more war and carnage?"

"Looks like it," Hermione answered, feeling weary. "Think of Hitler as the muggle version of You Know Who, even down to both having a complex over pure-blood heritage and, yes, basically it's the same type of situation here. Certainly, many innocent people on all sides lived through hell and lost their lives."

They were silent for a while, deep in their own thoughts, both wondering what on earth they had been sent back to and why.

Suddenly they heard some very loud sounds roaring over their heads. It was a different sound not so deep as the other rumblings and Hermione knew that at least three or four small aircraft had flown over them or nearby.

"Hermione?" asked a nearly shaking Ginny. "What was that?"

"I think it was smaller planes, which means it might be our fighters going to intercept the bombers."

The noise of the heavy bombers increased and it seemed certain that they were going to fly over the very village, or near to it, as both young women could feel the stone floor of the porch tremble with vibrations. Hermione got up and sat next to Ginny, and put an arm around her, huddling up to her, feeling just as scared and lost as the redhead and a little cold herself. Neither said anything, because it would have been hard to be heard over the noise above.

Every time a fighter, most likely a Spitfire or Hurricane, apparently fired rounds at a bomber Ginny and Hermione flinched, almost as if they could feel the bullets bouncing off the porch they were sheltering in. The action was probably not that near in reality, but the previously silent night air echoed every sound that much louder. After several minutes the rumbling had started to lessen a little again.

"Why didn't they bomb us?" Ginny asked, once the noise of the aircraft had receded to the distance again.

"There's nothing here to bomb."

"What about the church? It's a big building?"

"Not a strategic place though,"said Hermione. "Those bombers were probably heading to, or came from, one of the cities or an airfield. They always tried to knock out the strengths of the country. Airfields, factories, docks, industry in general. Sometimes stray bombers would just drop their bombs on any old place, but thankfully, I never remember reading that Godric's Hollow ever got bombed. If we had to be anywhere, here isn't a bad place, all things considered."

"That's something, I suppose," Ginny replied, a little wide-eyed. "Are you an expert on this war then?"

"Another thing we studied at Primary School," Hermione said. "Also, my late Grandad was in the army during the War and he used to tell me things. Grandma was always telling me things about living through the 1940's. Anything from how they dealt with the food rationing and finding all kinds of things to do with potatoes, to dealing with annoying ARP wardens."

"Potatoes?" Ginny chuckled softly.

"Food was rationed so much that you had to substitute ingredients for something else. Sometimes they would mash up potatoes to add to flour to make the flour go further and any pastry then became more filling too."

"What's an ARP warden?" asked a quizzical redhead; they were both still almost whispering.

Hermione gave a soft laugh, mainly because she was so happy to be using her knowledge and talking about things she knew about, rather than guessing or wondering about things, which they had been doing ever since arriving here. "ARP stands for 'Air Raid Precations'. The wardens used to patrol the streets and make sure everyone had their windows blackened out with curtains and screens so no light was visible at night. That's why it's so dark in this village. Although they're unlikely to be bombed here, and never were, it's still best not to attract attention with lights, that's what was known as the 'Blackout'. The wardens also used to help by getting people to shelters and helping the public in general."

"There's so much the magical world doesn't take notice of," said Ginny, thoughtfully.

"Sadly, that's true. The magical world sometimes ignores things in their own world too and then we wonder why we get problems?" Hermione shook her head. "Anyway, we know we're in Godric's Hollow in 1943. It's a start."

"Er, Hermione...your grandparents."

"What about them?"

"Well, they'd be alive...here," said Ginny. "In this time period."

"I hadn't thought about that, but you're right," Hermione said, then gave a small sigh. "I can imagine what you're thinking and you're possibly even wondering about your own ancestors too, but we can't be distracted by thoughts of seeing them. Also, it would be extremely dangerous for us to meet them."

"I know that," said Ginny sadly. "It's just so strange to think of them here, and not that much older than ourselves."

"It turns the brain into knots doesn't it?" said Hermione a little wearily. She would have loved to have seen her grandparents again, but knew only too well the high risks with it. It could greatly harm her own future and even her own existence.

"What on earth does McGonagall want us to do here?" said Ginny, bringing Hermione back to their current position.

"I'm not sure. She said a couple of times about bringing something back, but never got a chance to say what."

"She said it was all connected to...what? And to bring something back?" Ginny thought outloud.

"It's 'vague' at its most vague," Hermione said."What I do know, is that we have to be careful with our every action. We can't alter lots of things. It's almost like trying to walk in the snow and not leave footprints."

"Oh well, this will be easy then." Ginny said drily.