It had been two years since the war had ended, but it felt like longer. Hermione could only blame herself for that; she did, after all, push herself into a job that seemed almost as exhausting as the war had. Everyone had told her to take a break but she couldn't, if she stopped moving, then she'd have to remember everything, and she couldn't have that. Becoming an Unspeakable seemed like a thrill, especially now that Kingsley was Minister for Magic. Without Fudge and those who had been corrupted by Voldemort prowling the halls of power, Hermione felt genuinely free to pursue the research she'd been longing too. Hermione knew her sharp and intelligent mind was up to the task of understanding the veil that was held deep in the Department of Mysteries. Though, she had another goal, one she did not share with her superiors. Hermione wanted to bring Sirius back, and that kind of magic was not welcomed anywhere, not even in the Department of Mysteries. Hermione couldn't say that she didn't understand why this type of research was not appreciated; it was opening a door that could never be closed. But Hermione felt a responsibility to Harry, and to her 16-year-old self who had seen him die. If she couldn't solve the riddle, then no one could. But Hermione didn't expect it to consume her life entirely for almost two years. It felt like she'd spent two full years awake, speeding through life. Only feeling normal when she made progress or had an idea that sent her racing back to that room.

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It was almost a full year into her research when Hermione noticed something change within the veil. It was all her fault, which is what she kept telling herself that night as she laid on the floor, heart threatening to bound right out of her chest. The veil was aware; it had to be. She'd set up a desk on the rocky platform the archway was situated upon, so she could always be near the subject of her obsession. But this was a thoughtless mistake considering the hours she spent in the room, many nights and days passed without her getting even an hour of sleep. The uneven surface, coupled with her lack of sleep, had sent her sprawling across the floor. She'd tripped on the leg of her desk chair, and her blood went cold when she realized she was far too close to the veil with no opportunity to redirect her momentum. But then as she hit the floor and her arm fell through the stone archway, the veil moved. It billowed perpetually, but this time it was deliberate and quick. It flew out of her way and ostensibly saved her life. After that night, she began talking to it like it was a creature, not ignoring it like an object. She applied the same realization to her research, if she approached the veil as a living thing rather than an insentient object, then the possibilities for working with the veil were almost endless. After a few weeks, she could sense a change in the archway, when her coworkers would come to be appraised on her research the aura of the veil shifted to one of unfamiliarity and mistrust, but with her, it felt open and curious. It would move out of her way if she strayed too close, sometimes even seemingly moving to engage her or show off. It never made noise, but the changes were impossible to ignore for Hermione, who spent days in front of it.

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"Mione, come on. You haven't come to Sunday dinners in almost a month, and Mum is certain it means you aren't eating at all." Ginny grumbled at her over tea one morning before work.

"I'm just so busy; I don't always have the time to come. Not to mention avoiding Ronald is a silent mercy." Hermione responded, a grimace quickly assuming it's position on her face. The thought of her ex-boyfriend was a sour one, and being in the same room as Ronald did not appeal to her despite the promise of Molly's cooking.

"Please, do it for me. To save me from the woman's whinging." Ginny begged, grabbing Hermione's hand across the table.

"Fine, but I make no promises about every Sunday. Work is just too-" Hermione trailed off, she couldn't reveal much about her work, but no one could miss that it consumed almost all of her waking thoughts.

It had been part of the reason she and Ron had failed as a couple. He couldn't understand her obsession, and she couldn't explain to him even without the restrictions of the unbreakable vow. He'd never understand the complexity of the magical theory or the extent of her devotion to her cause. She barely understood it at times, and she was living it.

"I know," Ginny told her with an understanding smile, "I just wish you'd focus on yourself sometimes. Even just a bit, because you look terrible."

"Seriously, Gin, you trying to inflate my ego?" Hermione chuckled, but she knew she looked worse than she had at the end of the war.

She'd never admit it, but Molly had been partly right about her worrisome eating habits. She couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten something that wasn't microwaved or retrieved from a vending machine. Let alone got more than an hour or so of sleep, and it all was showing on her face. Her eyes were sunken, and she was so skinny, her clothes awkwardly clung to her in a way they never had before. She hated it, but she seldom took the time to notice. She was making progress, and that was what mattered, she wasn't sick just preoccupied, not than anyone else seemed to understand the difference.

"You look like you haven't slept in weeks Hermione, and you are swimming in a jumper that you always used to complain was far too snug to be comfortable," Ginny told her, fixing her with a pointed look.

Hermione couldn't defend herself; Ginny was right. So instead, she gave her a sad smile, and they continued drinking their tea in silence. Hermione wasn't excited about having to attend Sunday dinner at the Burrow, but the thought of a home-cooked meal did stir her stomach to attention.

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Hermione was at work when she received an owl from Ginny, and after reading the letter, she considered herself lucky that it wasn't a howler. She'd forgotten about Sunday dinner, and Ginny was beyond frustrated with her. Hermione tried to pen an apology, but she had been awake for almost 36 hours at this point and could barely grip her quill, let alone write a coherent apology. In all honesty, Hermione didn't realize that Sunday had even come and gone before she'd received the letter. She tried to feel guilty, but she was so tired that she was on the point of delirium, and Molly Weasley's feelings were of little consequence to her right now.

She contemplated flooing home and passing out on her bed like she did so many times in the early hours when she could no longer focus on her work. But then she had another idea, a foolish idea, and she couldn't stop herself. She'd done the research and spent the last day in a half locked in the bowels of the Department of Mysteries, creating an experimental charm. She was confident it would work, more confident than she had been with any of her other ideas. Hermione had a plan; reason with the veil, use her charm to paralyze its powers for a few moments and use a spell she'd constructed last year to call Sirius to her. Hopefully, he'd grab her hand, and then she could yank him out, back through the veil and reasonably back to the world of the living.

Rational, well-fed, well-rested Hermione would've scoffed at the absurdity of her plan. But exhausted, delirious Hermione was ready to be done with her project. Willing to put her theories to the test, the thought of her potential death not even registering in the few parts of her brain that were still coherent.

And so she began to ready the papers she would need to conduct her test, her first attempt at bringing the dead back to life.

Hermione held her wand to the veil, and it reached out and flitted around the point playfully.

"I need your help tonight; I am going to do it. You've heard me talk about the research so many times; you know what I'm going to do. Please help me, please." Hermione almost begged the archway, for the first time feeling silly talking to a translucent veil. She had no way of knowing if it would help, but it seemed to flutter in response to her words. She could only hope it was a flutter of agreement.

"Chaleb conpescens murmur bestia" She spoke gently, a blue stream emitting from the tip of her wand and flowing into the veil. It didn't reappear on the other side of the archway, and Hermione took that as a spur to keep going, it would work. It had to.

"Hominem vocate ad me" Hermione almost chanted, she was calling Sirius to her if she could. Hoping it would be him that she pulled from the veil and not some other poor lost soul.

She watched this time as a golden light emitted from her wand and flowed into the veil, lighting up the gray shimmer within the archway. It filled her with hope, hope that it would work. That all of her time hadn't been for naught.

That she could get him back.

Without an ounce of hesitation in her body, she reached her free hand towards the veil. It fluttered a bit, as if unsure whether to move out of her way, but she was persistent. She pushed her body forward, reaching into the archway before her. When her fingers crossed the border, it felt like she was plunging her hand into a bucket of ice water, but again she persisted. When she was elbow deep, she stopped, realizing with surprise that it hadn't killed her yet, that it was working.

Suddenly she felt a cold hand, with jutting bones, grip onto her outstretched one. It startled her at first, but she knew this was her chance, she had to pull them out. She prayed it was Sirius because if it was anyone else, she wasn't sure what she'd do. She couldn't march them to the Minister and proclaim her success; this had all been done in secret. She had to get it right; it had to be Sirius.

Hermione yanked the person as hard as she could, summoning a force she didn't think was possible in her sleep-deprived state, and suddenly a pale naked body was bowling her over. The two of them landed in a heap on the hard rocks of the archways platform, and Hermione was disoriented. She scrambled to extricate herself from the boney pale limbs that surrounded her, scrambling backward.

At first, she couldn't recognize the person in front of her, other than that he was a man. And she only knew that because he was naked and spreadeagled in front of her, any other time and she would've turned bright red at the realization. Instead, she had her wand trained firmly on the man in front of her. He was gasping for air and beginning to acknowledge his surroundings.

"Hermione?" His croaked, their voice cracked and broke as though he hadn't spoken in years.

Hermione couldn't stop the gasp that passed her lips; it was him.

"Sirius." Hermione breathed in response, crawling to his side at once.

He was staring at her like she was everything and nothing all at once. He looked at her and through her, studying everything around him. She could see the panic and confusion on his face and had no doubt it was mirrored on her own. For the first time since she'd started her research, she was considering the consequences of her actions. What had she done?

"What did you do?" He asked her; it sounded like both a question and an accusation. She felt a flash of regret and fear as she wondered if she'd indeed done the right thing, or if she'd been too obsessed to see herself wandering down a dark path.

It was too late for those thoughts now, she had to do something about him. Thankfully it was late, so late that she doubted there was anyone else in the Ministry but her. She needed to get him out now. No one could find a naked Sirius Black in the Ministry; she'd be thrown in Azkaban for sure. She also wasn't sure he'd be spared the same fate, so she needed to get them both out as fast as possible.

"I'll explain everything, but I need to get you somewhere safe first. Please, just trust me, Sirius." She begged him, and he only nodded in response.

Hermione transfigured some of the pages of her notes into a set of robes for him, making sure they included a large hood to hide his face. She turned away as he dressed, though he didn't seem embarrassed by his nakedness in front of her.

She grabbed him by the crook of his arm and began to lead him through the hallways, aiming for the nearest hearth connected to the floo network. There was one in her often unused office, and she made a beeline for it. Regardless of the disillusionment charms that she had cast on the two of them, she wanted to take no chances at being seen; thankfully, her office was only a quick walk away.

Once they crossed the threshold of the door marked Unspeakable Granger, she finally released the breath she'd been holding. She ignored the build-up of dust and memos on her desk and made her way towards the fireplace. She pulled him into the hearth with her, and she was struck by how docile he was. The Sirius she remembered would've insisted on knowing where he was going, on at least being informed, but now he just stood quietly and let her lead him along.

"Arlesford!" Hermione cried with a throw of floo powder, and a torrent of green flame engulfed the two.

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They shot out of a fireplace in an abandoned cottage in Arlesford in Hampshire. Hermione didn't let them rest for more than a few seconds before she was dragging Sirius up to face her.

"Do you feel up to side-along apparition? There's only one place I can think of to take you, and it has a Fidelis charm cast on it." Hermione explained, hoping she didn't splinch him when they apparated. The incident with Ron in the Forest of Dean had been gruesome enough to last her a lifetime.

"I'll be fine, Hermione," Sirius assured her, though his face stayed stoic and empty as he spoke. Hermione was worried about him and needed to get him someplace safe soon.

She grabbed his arm and shot him what was supposed to be a reassuring smile, and then she felt the familiar tug of apparition. She focused on the house in her mind, and then they were standing in the rain on the front stoop.

Hermione was the secret-keeper of the house and its occupant, and she knew she was taking a significant risk coming here. But it was the only place no one would even know to look for her, for him. Without stopping to dwell on her anxiety, she mustered the last of her strength to knock on the door loudly.

It creaked open after a few moments, and the light from the house almost blinded Hermione. The street was virtually pitch black, except for the lights in the windows of the small brick houses lining the road.

"Hermione?" The man questioned, but his attention was quickly drawn away from her. He noticed Sirius; he recognized Sirius and looked at her in disbelief and anger.

"What the fuck?" He asked, unable to tear his eyes away from the man at her side.

"Severus, please. Let me explain."

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