Not my presid- Universe. Not my universe.

Minerva waited with Irma and the Aurors in Hogsmeade for Sirius Black to pick up his godson. Well, Irma, the Aurors, and Harry, who looked askance at the woman he'd always thought of only as a stuffy old librarian waiting with his teacher. She didn't really feel the need to explain, not now. She just needed her wife's reassuring presence at her back.

Sirius looked… older, she thought, when he Apparated into the village square. Of course, it'd been a good ten years since his arrest and the last time she'd seen him, but ten years did not put so many lines on a man's face, nor weigh his shoulders so heavily. Azkaban and the loss of his friends had brought him from a child, to an old man. What did that make her, then? Probably ancient.

She drew him aside somberly. He had to understand, before he took Harry. "Remus is in the Hospital Wing," she said, before he even had a chance to ask. His panic flashed across his face, so she immediately shook her head. "He's fine, Sirius, just a broken arm and shoulder. Madame Pomfrey mended it easily. She just wants to keep him for observation for a few hours because it involved a joint, and make sure none of the mobility is impaired. He'll be with you and Harry in time for dinner."

Sirius, for all his flaws, had never been a stupid man. He asked the question she would have had one of her students given that explanation. "And what was Remus doing- he said the attack on the Chamber of Secrets would be safe!"

McGonagall raised an eyebrow. "He did, did he? He's certainly gotten better at lying since his school days." Whenever the Marauders played pranks in their school days, she'd targeted Remus as the most likely to admit to the prank. "Of course there was risk. We were killing Slytherin's monster. But we were insanely lucky last time that none of the students died, and we couldn't count on that luck to work out twice," she said.

"Luck didn't work out, did it?"

She said it quickly, because if she lingered over the words she'd certainly lose her composure. "The beast woke up to feed, presumably on rodents. Of course, it smelled us. It bit Pomona- Professor Sprout," she corrected herself upon Sirius's look of incomprehension, "and smashed Remus into the wall. We escaped, and had Harry close the chamber, but Pomona succumbed to the basilisk's poison."

There. She'd said it. Hur-bloody-rah. They'd won, really. It could have turned out so much worse. They could have all died. At a certain point, luck runs out, and it seemed some days they'd used all theirs up in another lifetime.

Sirius opened his mouth, then shut it again when it became obvious he had no idea how to put any his thoughts into words. Finally, he managed to say rawly, "The basilisk. Is it dead?"

"It will die," Minerva said, meeting his eyes with her steely gaze. "Roosters don't just crow in the morning. If the basilisk moves to kill one of them, the frightened bird will sound off and the beast will die. And Albus is going into the Chamber with us at the end of the holidays. If the beast isn't dead yet, he will kill it. It was supposed to be safer this way." And it was, really. She knew Pomona. She'd rather of died any day than lose a student to the beast.

"Did you hear about Lockhart's interview?" Sirius asked. "He told the Prophet Hogwarts wasn't safe. How many people is that dead this year? Seven?"

Minerva winced, but Irma rested a hand reassuringly on the small of her back and answered, "Eight. Ronald Weasley was killed by Pettigrew."

Sirius stared at her red-rimmed eyes, and shook his head, slowly. "He wasn't your students yet, Professor, Madam."

Minerva smiled, a bitter grin with absolutely no amusement in it. "Ever since the day he arrived at Hogwarts in a dream, he was. Most of wizarding Britain under the age of forty will always be my students." And I mourn every single one of you, now or in the dream.

He couldn't respond to that. She wasn't sure if anyone could, really. Pomona hadn't been her student, unlike the other seven, but she'd been friends with her during her school days. Instead, Sirius simply nodded to her and took Harry's hand, Disapparating.

Now that the Boy-Who-Lived was safe, the Aurors left too, one by one, some casting regretful looks back at Minerva. Many of them had been her students, too. Soon, they left her and Irma alone in Hogsmeade's Square.

Irma rested her head on Minerva's shoulder. "I know it doesn't feel like it, but we're winning," she murmured. "Remember how many people died in the final battle last time, including Pomona? We'll prevent the dark ending."

"With a dark beginning?" Minerva asked, though she knew her wife was right. Yes, Pomona and a cadre of innocent students were dead. Yes, there were children in Azkaban. Yes, You-Know-Who was running about causing trouble, or at the very least some of his followers were. Yes, the world was turning against Hogwarts.

On the other hand, the basilisk was dead. An innocent man had been released from Azkaban, and was on the road to recovery, while some of the darkest torturers in the history of Wizarding kind were imprisoned. Nearly all of You-Know-Who's horcruxes were destroyed. Even as the world turned against Hogwarts, the houses unified against the common threat. Her students were free enough to concentrate on things like house elf freedom instead of staying alive, even if it made it harder for her to free the imprisoned.

"Light would have no meaning were it not for the darkness," Irma said, summing up her thoughts as she took her hand to walk back to Hogwarts.

Percy Weasley wasn't expecting the fake cheer his parents tried to interject into their Christmas holidays. It almost would have hurt less if everyone were somber. But no, the twins were catching up on their prank-pulling (Percy wondered if they thought nobody had noticed they hadn't pulled any at school this year), and Bill and Charlie wore constant, careful smiles. Only Ginny showed her true feelings, which were more sullen than sad.

It was as if they were all playing a careful game of pretend, a facade that was already wrought with cracks. Charlie excused himself from the dinner table after Mum accidently set out an extra plate, and Bill snapped at Ginny for some minor slight. Fred and George's pranks were far gentler than normal, and Dad had stopped working on the flying car entirely. They'd even taken down the clock, likely so the missing hand wouldn't serve as a constant reminder, as the portrait in the Gryffindor common room had.

He remembered Fred dying in the dream world. He wondered if this had been what his house was like afterwards. The dream ended shortly after the battle did, and Percy woke in the early morning sun with his rat staring at him. He should have known he was Pettigrew, that the dream was real. Everyone acted strangely after the dream, from Fred and George being more protective of each other and not immediately teasing him about his scholarly pursuits to Ron's nonchalance about his upcoming sorting.

"Are you still beating yourself up over everything, Perce?" Charlie asked, plopping down besides him on the couch.

Charlie had always been the brother of his who was kindest to Percy, never teasing him for his academic ambition and adherence to rules, so Percy made an effort not to be snappish when he said, "You're not the first to ask, and no, nothing you say is going to change my mind."

"Suit yourself," Charlie said calmly. "Just don't go around getting yourself hurt all the time like you did at Halloween. That's not the point of being a hero, Perce." Percy bit his lip to keep from pointing out that other members of their family had gotten awfully hurt during the Second Wizarding War. After all, the aim of everyone during this version of now seemed to be things turning out different. Well, things were certainly turning out different, weren't they?

"Anyway," said Charlie, either unaware of the nature of Percy's inner thoughts or simply ignoring them- Percy was never sure how well his brother could read him-, "I actually wanted to ask you a favor." Percy frowned, wondering what Charlie could want from him. "Remember Norberta, the Norwegian Ridgeback I told you about at the sanctuary in the dream world?" He nodded. "Well, last time Hagrid helped me find her. She was originally owned by a dealer in dangerous animals, as an egg, and Hagrid made a difficult bargain to save her for me. Can you ask him when you get back to school for the year to keep an eye out for her for me? If it's not too much trouble?"

"Of course," Percy said, smiling slightly in relief that it wasn't like Mum and Dad pushing for him to take back his Prefect's badge or urgings to keep up in his studies. (Of course, he was keeping up, but his teachers kept asking him if there was something wrong, besides the obvious. He supposed that one E on a Transfiguration essay had McGonagall worried. Technically speaking, exceeds expectations was lower than she expected of him, and wasn't that a fun one to wrap one's head around?)

"Now, do you take Care of Magical Creatures? Larry says, and I agree, that we have rather the shortage of caretakers with more brains than most rocks at the sanctuary." Larry was Charlie's coworker at the sanctuary. That summer, before everything went to hell, Percy and Bill had started taking bets as to how long it would be before Charlie declared his undying love for the bloke or something given the way he looked when he talked about him. Since Larry hadn't even been mentioned in the dream, nor any other boy nor girl friends, obviously they'd both lost their bets, but caring about his brother's love life had taken a backseat to everything else going on.

"No, Arithmancy and Ancient Runes. Fred and George take it, though," he replied, slightly perplexed. Now he was trying to offer him a job for later?

Charlie chuckled. "Yes, but can you imagine those two with access to dragons?" Percy paled slightly as he remembered what havoc their inventions had wrecked over time. "Exactly. Well, think about it, alright? We could still use analysts instead of more grunt workers like me, and I know how much you love analyzing things."

Percy nodded, thoroughly confused by now, as Charlie got up to go talk to the twins, who stood together by the fireplace fiddling with one of the decorations suspiciously. Before he could let his thoughts wander again, Bill approached him, grinning. "So, did I tell you about this new job I got? Seems the Flamels have this really old vault with a lot of ancient relics in it, and a lot of those relics have some very nasty curses on them. See, there's this one I'm working on called the Casket of Ancient Winters, that if you opened, would basically cause a new ice age-"

The decoration Fred and George had been fiddling with came to life and started marching down the mantle, singing, "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way…" while making obscene gestures.

It was only that evening, as he was drifting off to sleep, that he realized his older brothers were trying to make him, no, all of them, forget about Ron for one day and have fun. (Which when it came to him, seemed to involve encouraging him to look into jobs where he could obsess overly much about details. His brothers perhaps knew him a little too well.) And the most terrifying part was that it worked.

Damp soaked into the knees of Neville's trousers as he knelt in the frost, trimming back the evergreen bushes on either side of the front stoop. Muggle plants, but no less beautiful for it.

The door creaked open, and he heard the clacking of Gran's cane on the stone. "Neville? Are you ready to visit your parents?"
He stood, looking over his work with satisfaction. Gran's knees pained her sometimes, so she'd often been unable to keep up with the garden that'd been her pride and joy in her youth. Neville's care of it was the one thing she never criticized him for, though it'd be nice to hear she was outright proud. "I just need to change first."

She looked him up and down, frowning at his muddy clothes. "Scourgify," she said, and with a wave of her wand, his clothes were cleaned. "We'll Apparate."

"Yes, Gran," Neville said, taking her arm. She didn't turn and Apparate as he'd expected, though. "Gran?"

"You're being careful at that school of yours, Neville?" Gran had attended Beauxbatons, and thus always held a certain disdain for Hogwarts, mixed with the grudging admittance that Dumbledore 'was one of the best damn wizards of all time.' She'd told Neville once, though, that she'd seen his father's clumsiness growing up and known he'd be even more ridiculed at the French school, that she'd always known if he weren't a squib he'd best attend Hogwarts, and then, of course, it made sense for Neville to follow in his parents' footsteps.

He wondered if she regretted it, now. "Because of what happened at Halloween, Gran?"

"Because of what always happens at Hogwarts, Neville. Bravery and sacrifice are all well and good, but too many generations of this family have been damaged in war. Don't argue with me, boy." He hadn't even realized he'd been opening his mouth to protest. "Sheer luck kept you alive through the early years, unless you think you can defend yourself against basilisks or dementors."

Neville crossed his arms over his chest. "I can produce a corporeal patronus-"

"Because of lessons you remember from when you were fifteen," she said.

He looked away. "I know you supported the closing of the school during second year last time." He hadn't told anyone, besides Hannah Abbot, whose parents felt the same. He knew the average Gryffindor wouldn't understand.

Gran closed her eyes. "There is a difference between going to war when you're seventeen, and going to war when you're eleven or twelve. I will not face your parents and say their son has died before he could even make an informed choice about fighting."

"If you were going to pull me out of school, you would have after Halloween," said Neville. All his friends were at Hogwarts. He was doing better in Potions than ever before, and even inhaling less toxic fumes than at the beginning of the year. (Professor Snape had spoken to Morag and Sue's parents. There were remarkably fewer explosions from that corner, now, though Neville didn't know how long that would last.) He couldn't leave, not now.

"I would have," she agreed. "I know you, Neville. You fit in well in Hufflepuff, but you certainly weren't out of place in Gryffindor. You'd find another way to walk into danger. I need you to promise, though, that you'll be cautious."

Now that he'd faced You-Know-Who, even if it was only in a dream, Gran seemed much less scary. Instead of a terrifying specter with a vulture-capped hat, she seemed an old woman, worn from war and loss, worrying for her only grandson.

"I promise."

Hermione had to admit it was nice to have friends who could actually visit during holiday breaks, and spend time in her room without her father popping his head in every five minutes to 'see if anyone wanted anything.' (She'd insisted she had absolutely no interest in doing anything with Ron or Harry, but her father was ridiculously overprotective. At least he didn't remember that she eventually got together with Ron, though he did often ask Hermione why they'd just up and moved to Australia. She'd lied, of course.)

On the other hand, Padma Patil trying to figure out the internet was less amusing than annoying. "And you say this doesn't physically exist anywhere?"

"No, of course not-"

"It's squirreled away in that box," Sue said, pointing to the CPU. Hermione glared at her as she mouthed, "It's easier this way."

Padma nodded. "Oh, that makes sense." She glanced at Morag, who as far as Hermione knew was a pureblood but still had clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle her laugh. "What are you laughing at?"

She blushed, glancing at Sue, who said, "We just never expected Hermione to have a pink plush unicorn on her bed."

It was Hermione's turn to stammer incoherently. "I got it when I was five! I didn't even know unicorns were real!"

"Why's it still on your bed, then?" Padma asked, and Hermione really had no answer for that. Judging by the other girl's smirk, she knew.

But she was Ravenclaw, she remembered, and she'd overheard enough conversations among the older students to know how to make something sound smart, even if it made no sense whatsoever. "Because it serves as a reminder to me, of the symbolic use of unicorns in popular culture as symbols of innocence, and the use of pink as both innocence and femininity. Society views females as innocent, which is why pink is considered a feminine characteristic, and why Morag is wearing a pink dress right now. Ergo, Morag is innocent." Morag, of course, blushed even brighter at that.

Sue clapped Hermione on the shoulders. "We'll make a Ravenclaw out of you yet. Did you make Krum give you an essay proving why he loved you before you said yes to the Yule Ball?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "I wasn't that bad," she insisted. She had a quite satisfying argument with him first, though.

Padma mouthed, "They were," pointing at Sue and Morag, and Hermione had to stifle her smile at the thought. Of course, thoughts of romance quickly led to thoughts of Ron, and her mood soured. "Want to play a board game or something?" she asked hastily, because avoidance was working well enough so far.

Note to self: Never again play Scrabble with a group of Ravenclaws.