A/N: Guys I am so so so so so so so sorry that it has been so long in getting my arse in to gear and writng this chapter. My word programme kind of crapped its pants and refused to work and i only just bought a new one the other day.

AND THEN I wrote like 3/4 of a chapter (chapter 11) only to realise I had written it on the internet and published it so I had efectively wasted a good five hours... :[

So here is the new chapter and there should be another one soon :) And im very sorry once again.

:(

but enjoy this enlightening chapter... Not alot happens but it was needed for Hermione to grow and for her to come to term with what is happening and from being the self-absorbed idiot that she was becoming. :)

Chapter 13

Throughout the night she was restless, having a lot or difficulty rolling over to sleep. She felt constricted, like she was wearing something too tight, or as though someone was lying on top of her, regardless of how much she tossed and turned. Eventually, in the wee hours of the morning, she fell in to a sleep with fluorescent dreams, colours flying at her in every direction. Shapes appeared and then flittered away before she could catch a good enough look at it. Noises and calls rang through her ears, wolves howling, screaming, hissing and even snarling. There were buildings flashing through the scene and occasionally people's faces, but they were going too quickly for her to have too good a look.

However one face stayed and stared at her. It was her mother. She didn't look like her Mother as she knew her; but she knew it was her, she could feel it. And she was beautiful. More beautiful than any woman she had even seen before, but she looked old in mind if not in years. Her lips moved, but she couldn't hear her, not even one word. She couldn't lip read. All she knew was that she was concerned and that what she was trying to say was very, very important. She could tell, however, that her Mother loved her was apparent and that she cared about her so much made her feel warm inside whilst simultaneously making her feel cold; knowing that she was no longer in this world. After her Mother's face faded, she saw her Father but he didn't look like Lord Voldemort. He looked like the young man from Harry's memories. He was handsome; much more handsome than she had realised. He had a carefree nature reflected in his eyes. He looked so much more like a boy, nothing like Voldemort. No fear of death, no anger at another race and no hatred was in his eyes. He looked happy. Then he blinked, and everything flipped. The rage and fury that was in his eyes burned them red. His superiority complex shone on his face and she could see that a lot of his anger was directed at her, but she couldn't understand why.

For hours her dreams continued, more and more people flashed in front of her mind. More and more family members flashed to the front of the foreground; her aunties, her uncles and even the grandparents that she never met. All of them had different expressions, different personalities showing on their faces and in their eyes. Her Father's family came across and she saw that her Father was not wanted by his, and his Mother was delusional, believing that tom Riddle Sr. was in love with her. She couldn't comprehend that someone could be so sure of another's feeling without any confirmation whatsoever.

More and more things were thrown in her face: her relationship with Harry and Ron; Her relationship with Ginny and other girls; her relationship with her professors and most importantly her relationship with Sirius. It was painful, she wept internally. Seeing how people had seen her, how people had treated her and why. The relationship she had with Harry and Ron cut deep. They had used her for her intellect and quick-thinking when they were younger; and as they grew the ratio shifted from intelligence to looks and she had never even realised.

Ron saw her as an easy vagina on two legs that would pop out babies when and where he chose. That she could earn enough money that he could be whatever he wanted and she would accept him however he was because she was that desperate. Their entire friendship had been a complete misunderstanding. Harry wasn't much better in all reality. He saw Hermione as too intelligent to find a nice husband and would settle for the first man that would ask her – which is why her dating Krum had been such a massive shock. Neither of them saw her as the woman she could be; only the girl she was and because of that she had a lot more emotional growth left in her.

All of the females in her life judged her as the whore of the 'Golden Trio', believing that she was always so stressed and studying so much to concoct more love potions to keep them sniffing at her door and her door alone. Even Ginny thought there was more to her studying than a legitimate need to prove herself a vital part of this world. She thought she was looking for glamours and spells to fix her hair or to brainwash people into thinking hers looked good. It occurred to her that they were jealous of her intelligence and of her close bond with Harry and Ron who were very attractive and coveted males.

But the worst one to face was her connection with Sirius.

She looked at what they were before the veil. How they hadn't liked each other, how he had felt Hermione was acting like Harry's mum. How he had felt she was smothering him. She saw how he had seen her before her family were taken from her; as a frumpy, bushy haired, spotty child. He couldn't see what she would become, similar to how Harry and Ron had seen her. But then she saw how he had always respected her intelligence. How he valued her loyalty and had wished that there had been someone like her around him when he was younger; wondering how his life would have turned out if there had. She saw how he was protective of her because of this; how he hated when Ron and Harry talked down about her when she wasn't there and how much he hated when Severus had done so.

And after the veil was a complete different story. He had known her Mother before she had passed, and to see her child had reminded him of how much respect she had commanded and how beautiful she had been. He could see her Mother looking through her eyes and it made him proud to know her. He respected her so much more after he came back because he knew how much she had gone through and she had come through strong the other side. He saw her strength as beauty and even though he knew it was wrong he found an affection growing from her that wasn't entirely platonic. It had made him feel needed when she had clung to him to function properly; to require his presence more than others to chase away the shadows.

He had tried very, very hard to keep his feelings squashed, never knowing that deep down she had clung to him because she had felt the same. He was a lecherous old convict and he had felt that he was not good enough to know someone as pure, loyal and intelligent as she was. He had felt and still felt the need to protect her; especially after what she had already been through. And when she was a victim to that botched potion from his own godson and the Weasley children pure unfiltered hatred and fury had run screaming through his veins. He had been furious that he had had to decide between leaving her in what would turn very quickly to pain, or to taint her innocence. He was still angry that even people on the 'light side' would do something so heinous to fulfil their own desires and take advantage of someone so pure and trusting had hurt his sensibilities and belief that 'they' were better than 'them'.

And lastly she had faced herself. She saw herself when she didn't know who she was or what she was and knew that somewhere deep inside she had felt wrong in her skin because it wasn't exactly her skin. And once she had shed that everything fit. But the insecurities she had felt since she was two were still there. She couldn't drop them because her looks had changed. It was a difficult thing to get her head around because she could see the two selves she had side by side: the old self and the new self. The differences in the bodies were very different. The insecurities about her thighs and stomach on her old body were irrelevant on her new body because the problem was no longer there; the constant need to flatten her hair just making it dirty and creating new problems because it was no longer dry. Insecurities that she had been dealing with for years started to fall away. Her belief that she was only sought after for her intelligence was very true for her classmates, but she could see that Sirius, Severus, Lucius and so many other didn't. They loved her for her and would protect her and stand with her as an equal. They wouldn't expect her to be a leader or to stand in the shadows. She felt like a lot of things had been lifted off of her shoulders and resolved.

It felt like an age had passed when she woke. Her entire body refused to co-operate. The fatigue was so etched in to her limbs that to move one took a mammoth of thought to lift a single finger. And even if the finger was lifted, it would soon flop back down again as though it was made of lead. Her eyelids felt glued down and there was no one she could trust to help her in her most embarrassing peril.

She knew what she must do. She knew that it would not be easy and that it would not be quick: but it had to be done. Slowly, oh so very slowly, she crept her hand towards her neck, taking breaks along the way. She inched her fingers towards her neck, taking a good while to jump from the bed to her torso. Even when her fingers did get close enough to touch her necklace, they were not so close that she could grasp it.

Her fury and frustration began to eat away at herself for being so incompetent. Tears fell out of her unseeing eyes and that made her angrier. With adrenaline coursing through her veins she caught hold of the necklace and rolled over so her arm dangled over the edge of the bed; tempting gravity to aid her in her plight. Thankfully gravity listened and helped her rip off her necklace.

Her magic gushed to the surface, flowed over his skin, through her hair sleeking it in to definable waves through her bed head. It danced over the film over the top of her eyes, leaving a rainbow of steps through her otherwise dark vision. Her magic flowed to her fingers and made her fingers snap and crack as they clenched and unclenched; clicked in rhythm and then unclicked in the same order, her toes followed suit. She bit the inside of her lips in a desperate attempt to contain her voice, unaware that the other inhabitants of the room had already left. She made a choked gasp, before clenching her jaw closed so tightly that she felt her teeth crack.

The magic began to course through her jaw and quivered at her teeth, coursing through her gums and wiggling some teeth out from the bottom, pushing them up by the roots. Her despair at losing her teeth gnawed at the back of her mind. What would she look like without teeth? How would she even be able to tell if she couldn't see? Her mind created more pain than her body could ever come up with, it distracted her mind off of the physical pain and she lost herself in her own persecution.

What felt like days past, weeks even. Her mind dragged her deeper and deeper in to her own spiral of depression; holding her there where nothing in the physical world could reach her. She didn't wake even when they slapped her face. Not even when they did it twice. They decided that they should move her, and Hermione felt something akin to floating, safe somewhere. It felt like she was being shielded by all the wicked things in the world. Like there was someone there to protecting her, holding everything else at bay.

She fell again back in to the darkness, but she could feel that there was light being shined on her eyelids. That she couldn't hide from it. Similar to when you face the sun with your eyes closed. It was blinding. In fact it was so blinding that there were fuzzy spots decorating her eye balls. Her eye lashes began to flutter, and she realised she was waking up from what felt like the dead. Her eyes focused for a second before un-focusing and refocusing again. They danced their little dance before they focused with such clarity that she snapped them closed again.

"Hermione? Hermione, are you alright? Hermione talk to me!" Sirius's concerned voice practically screamed in her ear. She flinched and rolled away, cowering underneath her hands and covering her ears as she whimpered slightly. He grasped what was happening immediately. "Sweetheart." He breathed. "Are you alright?" She nodded timidly, freaking out a little bit more as she could hear that he was breathing the words in her ears, yet she could hear him as though he was talking like he did in class.

"Sirius?" She rolled back towards him and cowered in his arms, hiding her head in his chest to block out the sunshine. "What the hell just happened?" She nuzzled her nose against his chest, causing him to hold her tighter.

"I think you just ascended."