A buzzing noise stirred Hermione awake, and she became instantly aware of how cold she was and shivered. She opened her eyes and saw a ceiling with bulb-less lanterns and realized that she was on a cement floor in an abandoned building. Her leather jacket was gone, and her wrists were manacled down. The left sleeve of her thin, black polo was bunched up around the crease of her elbow, and she could barely make out the bleeding, letters etched on her stinging skin.

MUDBLOOD

Blinding hatred coursed through her veins, making her body tremble. She was going to rip into Lestrange and break every bone in his body and relish every snapping sound they made!

The buzzing returned and was coming from her right, and she noticed a man laying down beside her. His wrists were manacled as well, and he was unconscious. Her heart leapt to her throat when recognizing his crooked nose. But instead of billowing black robes, he wore a smart black and grey tweed suit with black polished loafers. Instead of greasy, longish hair, it was cut and groomed and clean.

"Snape," she whispered hoarsely. He didn't stir but the buzzing was coming from him and sounded like a cell phone going off in his inner coat pocket.

Voices echoed off the walls, and Hermione tried to listen but could only distinguish a man's voice. American, nasally, melodic, and gravelly. Much like a wheeze. She swallowed and tried to calm down by studying her surroundings as best as she could. While sweeping her vision from left to right, she recognized where she was. The abandoned building on Charring Cross Road. The killer's previous hideout and the place she used to visit all the time after passing through the veil, hoping and wishing every time that she'd find her way home.

"Ah, Snow White awakens," the man from afar rumbled. He was tall and had a gaunt face, a beard, and a buzz cut. He walked towards her, stopping by her feet to show her the, long gleaming knife in his hand. "Your skin is superb," he purred. "I've carved up people for millennia after millennia, and your meat is by far the most enticing. It made such a delicious sound when Rabastan sliced into you."

"Get the hell away from me," she hissed.

"How rude of me. I have yet to introduce myself. I'm Alastair." The irises and pupils of his eyes disappeared, leaving behind blank, white orbs.

A demon with white eyes, she'd never encountered one or ever even heard of one. He laughed and waggled the knife at her. "I'm guessing Dean never mentioned me, the petulant child." Hermione froze at the mention of Dean's name and glared. "You see, I was his mentor down in Hell and, oh, you should've seen him, Hermione. He. Was. Glorious. Not like the sniveling, pitiful fool he is now."

"Mentor?" Hermione didn't want know what that meant and set fire to what her imagination wanted to conjure. "What's going on?"

"Your friend Rabastan sold you out."

A muffled scream entered the room, and Hermione saw two men drag in a gagged and bound Rabastan Lestrange. One of the two men removed the his gag and shouted, "This was not part of the deal! I give you them, and you restore my full power!"

"Mmmm." Alistair nodded in faux consideration before whirling around and plunging the knife into the man's throat. A juicy, disgruntled noise echoed off the walls as he gurgled for life, blood spilling freely down the front of his shirt. When Lestrange sagged, Alistair removed the knife and flicked the blade, droplets soundly hitting the concrete, and then pointed it at Hermione. "I think I'll slice you from womb to throat, how about that?"

"Keep it simple." From behind Alistair, a pretty girl about fourteen in a school uniform and long blonde hair appeared. "I want her."

"She's a little old for you," Alistair replied.

The girl's eyes turned white, and she licked her lips obscenely and pinned Hermione with a knowing smile. "Sam will love me in you."

Hermione growled vehemently."Lilith!"

Lilith walked by Alistair and crouched down to crawl over Hermione, blonde hair tickling the brunette's face. Hermione tilted her head and sputtered to get the tresses out of her mouth, yet Lilith lowered her face and touched her lips to her ear. "I know all about the deliciously naughty things you do with our boy Sammy. I've wanted to take you out for drive a long, long time." Lilith sat up and straddled Hermione, and she pulled out the hex bag Ruby gave Hermione from her blazer pocket. "But this kept me from you. Found it in your jacket."

"You can't possess me!"

Lilith's skinny fingers crept underneath the left manacle holding Hermione in place and pulled on the bracelet Sam gave her, breaking it. She waved the jewelry and tossed it aside. "When I bleed the life from you, no soul will keep me from your meat."

"My body will reject you." It wasn't her soul that kept demons from possessing her. It was her body, her blood, her magic.

Lilith gripped the hex bag tight and licked her teeth. "We'll see." The canvas burst into flames, the fire lapping at the demon's fingers and blistering the skin. She showed no sign of pain. "Start the ritual. My master is waiting." She got to her feet and left the room.

A vicious wave of nausea consumed Hermione. Shit! Lilith was talking about a seal! The building on Charring Cross Road must be one. And the blood of her and Snape…

"Snape," she hissed. "Wake up! Wake up now!"

Movement was seen from behind his closed eyelids, but they didn't open. Alistair began reciting a spell in a forgotten language, slowly advancing on her. When he got to her, she concentrated on the manacles holding her and broke them. His chanting paused and he purred, "Fascinating." He picked her up by her hair and held the point of his blade between her breasts, puncturing a small hole in her sweater and scraping her bra. Her eyes landed on the burnt up hex bag she'd been hiding on her person since leaving the States. She cast her vision to the ceiling and shouted the first thing that came to mind, "Castiel!"

Alistair stopped his chanting and dropped her gracelessly back on the floor and roared, "No!"

The front door to the building broke open and the dark-haired man in the same trench coat she remembered from Dean's car marched in with a plump, dark-skinned man in a suit. They didn't even spare her a glance but quickly advanced on Alistair who disappeared into thin air. She rolled onto her stomach and got on all fours before climbing to her feet to face the angels. Castiel and his hypnotizing gaze zeroed in on her.

"We need to destroy them, Castiel," the dark-skinned man said.

Hermione took a step back. "I haven't done anything wrong."

Clearly troubled, Castiel looked away from her. "You don't belong here. How you even got here..."

"Then send me back."

"Kill her," the other angel ordered.

"Send me back!"

"It would be unwise." Castiel pinned her with an exasperated expression.

"So killing me is a better option?"

"Sending you back would disrupt the natural order of your world. You already died. If I were to return you to your dimension, it could cost the lives of dozens of people. Your kind."

A solid, heavy ball settled in Hermione's stomach, and she stared at the filthy floor. "You're lying," she accused." I don't belong here. Like you said. My family is there. My mum and dad, please. I want to see them. I beg of you, please."

"Castiel!" barked the other angel and he regarded him.

"Leave us. I'll take care of this."

The other angel tossed him a exasperated glare before disappearing, the sound of flapping wings hitting Hermione's ears. "You must forgive Uriel. He can be…"

"A prick." Hermione folded her arms, shivering. "Are you going to kill me now?"

"You calling for me stopped a seal from breaking. This is a victory, and I thank you. But your kinds of peculiarities have no place in this dimension and could cause a domino effect of chaos, especially since your power is stronger than it should be. The fact you require no device to channel your magic through troubles me."

"Put me in my world and it won't matter."

Castiel stared at her morbidly. "You must understand why you can't go home."

"And I can't stay."

Hesitantly, he replied, "You've dedicated your life in doing God's work. That does not go unnoticed."

"I wouldn't exactly call hunting doing God's work."

He continued on like he hadn't heard her. "You've saved many and sacrificed much in helping innocents. Though you are a potential threat, I will not kill you but ask you give me no reason to. Detract from the path of righteousness, and I will eliminate you and the others who hide themselves."

"It's…" Hermione frowned and nudged her head at Snape. "It's just me and him now."

Castiel opened and then closed his mouth before giving a downward tilt of his chin and disappearing. Like Uriel, he left behind the sound of flapping wings.

Hermione sunk to her knees and clasped her hands together, settling them on her legs. On the outside, she appeared to be praying but on the inside, she was trying to accept for the last time she wasn't returning home. The Trickster never told her the reason he wouldn't take her back but Castiel had, and it horribly made sense.

She hugged herself and the image of her mum and dad surfaced in her mind before she gingerly got to her feet and looked down upon Snape. He was still unconscious and she contemplated shaking him awake when deciding against it. She placed a palm on his chest and a white light poured from her fingers. A Tracking Charm should suffice, not wanting to reveal herself quite yet and definitely not wanting a repeat of what happened with Lestrange. She was going to be careful this time.

Hermione found the bracelet Sam gave her, examining it's broken clasp with a frown and then shoved it into her pocket. She'd fix it later.


Three Days Later…

Hermione walked the University of Westminster around midmorning, travelling the chilly grounds of the campus where it thrived with life as students trekked across snow to catch their classes. She had waited three days to summon the courage of pursuing Snape and this college was where her magic lead her. Why that man was here, she had no idea but was curious to find out.

The magic pulled towards the direction of Cavendish, and she instantly disappeared into a throng of students. She shuffled along with them into a building and into a theater-shaped classroom and walked up the steps to find a seat. She scanned the area, searching for Snape's face and saw no one resembling him, so she sat down towards the back and in the middle. Within thirty seconds, two boys sat down on each side of her and hastily pulled out notebooks and textbooks.

"Did you read the chapter?" the one on her right asked. He had dirty blond hair and glasses but didn't bother glancing at her because he was too busy whipping through the pages of the textbook.

"I skimmed it," the boy on her left answered. "Not enough to save me."

"You read it?" the blond boy asked her, finally looking at her and smiling.

"No."

"Think he'll have a quiz today?"

Hermione shrugged.

"I'll think he'll have a quiz today," he murmured right before she saw Snape silently stalk into the room and reside at the front. He put a briefcase down on the table and started up the overhead projector.

"Take out a piece of paper," he said slowly and series of groans erupted throughout the room.

"Quiet! If you read the chapter like the syllabi instructed, there should be little reason to complain." Once the projector was on, a list of questions appeared on the screen covering the whiteboard. "Begin."

The boy on Hermione's left tore out a piece of paper from his notebook and placed it on her desk as well as gave her a pen. She picked it up tentatively and flashed him a quizzical smile.

"Same thing happened to me a few days ago. Got the days mixed up and brought all my Monday Wednesday junk to my Tuesday Thursday classes," he whispered.

For two minutes, Hermione rested her chin on her hand and quietly tapped the edge of the pen against the desk before reserving herself to look at the questions on the board and realized that Snape taught a chemistry class. From the looks of the questions, she'd assume an intermediate level. A wicked, childish idea bubbled into her mind which she couldn't deny for the life of her. In the right hand corner of the college-ruled paper, she wrote Hermione Granger and answered the questions to the quiz.

"Time," Snape said.

A student in the front raised her hand. "Professor Prince, may we have a few more minutes?"

Ignoring her, he said, "All of you pass your quizzes down to the front."

Once all the papers were collected, he put them in his briefcase and began a stimulating lecture on carbon. A half-hour in, Hermione's back and bum began to protest, and she squirmed in her seat. She'd forgotten how physically uncomfortable being a student was. When the class finally ended, she sighed in relief and gingerly got up from the desk, her hips and back popping in the process. God, she was getting old.

"How do you think you did?" asked the boy who gave her the paper. He was stuffing his notes into his book-bag and zipping it up.

"I got them all right."

He gave her an unsure smile. "You sure about that? Hardly anyone masters his quizzes. They're a grade killer."

"I'm not worried." She handed him his pen. "Thank you."

He took it and offered his hand. "Andrew Phelan."

She accepted it stiffly. "Morgan Black."

"I guess I'll see you around."

She smiled but said nothing and merged into the mass of exiting students. Snape was still at the front gathering his lecturing material and paid no mind to who was leaving the classroom. He hadn't changed much, ever still the strict and meticulous and difficult professor she remembered him as. How he came to Westminster or even this dimension, she didn't know, but she could wait. She waited this long already. What was a few more days?


Snape's class took place on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. He probably taught more, but Hermione wasn't about to go to all of them. Her student days were behind her, and a college degree hardly impressed demons, vampires, and ghosts. Her old life had been all about the academics, and though she prided herself on being brilliant, this life was about staying alive and surviving the upcoming apocalypse. While lurking about the campus, she eavesdropped on several conversations about the catastrophes happening around the word. One seal may have not been broken but there were loads more bursting by the hands of Lilith.

Like she had on Wednesday, Hermione shuffled into the packed classroom and sat down near the back. Two girls sat down by her this time and neither paid much attention to her which was just as well. She threw the hood of her black jacket over her head, hunched over the desk, and rested her chin on folded arms. When Snape entered, he did not enter as briskly like the class previous class. This time he actually bothered to look at the class, his black eyes sweeping over the 150 faces. He didn't find her, and she would've been impressed if he had. So many students, and she looked a little bit different than she did at sixteen.

After a minute, he opened his briefcase, pulling a large stack of papers out and placing them on the front table. "The class average for the quiz was sixty-seven percent. Disappointing. You can pick them up after class."

Another hour of hell for Hermione's back and bum. Throughout Snape's lecture, she rubbed at the knot forming at the base of her spine. She knew that most of the problem was the beatings she took in the last ten years. Hardly thirty and feeling like sixty, she was.

The class concluded and Snape stood rigid and ready by the stack of papers. Thankfully for Hermione, about half of the students didn't bother picking up their quizzes, so she was able to sneak out without drawing any attention to herself. However, she did crook a finger and her quiz speedily flew between the students and into her hand.

The quiz was untouched, not a red mark anywhere. There wasn't even a score and after stealing glances at the other students' papers, she knew that wasn't normal.


Hermione took a hunt with Junior in Kensington which lasted the entire weekend. She poured herself back into her flat on Sunday night, showered her bruised body, and stared at her reflection for a while, caressing the shiner. Blasted siren and her impressive right hook!

She opened the drawer by her stomach and pulled out a small jar of healing cream. She hadn't used it in a while, wanting to stretch it as long as possible. The ingredients were expensive and hard to come by, so she only used the smallest amount and delicately rubbed it over her eye, clocking the gift Lestrange gave her in the mirror. She desperately wanted to slather on the entire jar of cream on forearm and erase the foul name from her body, but the years of hunting and prioritizing when it came to her healing cream had left her body permanently marred and somewhat immune to new imperfections. The MUDBLOOD scar would have to stay.

A, small sick part of Hermione liked what Lestrange had done. He gave her a permanent reminder of her roots, her origins, her home. If she ever began to believe this world was home, this physical reminder would keep her grounded and mindful of the truth.

The following morning, she peeled herself off the mattress and got ready for Snape's class. Perhaps she was merely miffed by her frustrating hunt, but she was done dawdling and playing mind-games with her former professor. It was time to confront him, so she sat in the back of the room again and listened to his lecture. Ten minutes before the class was to end, he started verbally quizzing random students. Many of them didn't know the answers in which case he'd ask the same question but to someone else until someone got it correct, pointedly ignoring any person raising their hand. Three minutes before the hour was up, there was a question which stumped every student, therefore, aggravating Snape.

"Really? No one? Pitiful." He turned around slowly and faced the whiteboard and began erasing the formulas he wrote during class.

Hermione rested her elbows on the desk and said, "There are twenty-four potassium isotopes but only three occur naturally, therefore, the only ones that are stable and consist of 39K, 40K, and 41K."

The hand holding the eraser froze for a moment before continuing. He said, "That is correct, Miss…"

"Granger. Hermione Granger."


A/N: No Draco again! Don't hate me. (But do you feel we're getting close? I feel we're getting close) Also, I'm not going to pretend I know anything about chemistry, carbon, or potassium. The internet is amazing and knows stuff, and I am not and do not.

Thank you readers, reviewers, and followers. I know some of you were surprised about Rabastan, and I had so much fun borrowing him from Ms. Rowling, only to slaughter him. I'm also giddy in adding Snape. He's just so frustrating and cool and a whole bunch of adjectives that don't really fit together in the same sentence.

I want to apologize in advance. I'm not sure when I'll get to update again. It may be next weekend or the following or the one after that. *Shrugs*

Please Read and Review!