The girl had always thought her death would be easy, quiet. It would happen in her sleep or something of the sort. Nothing painful. Nothing scary – nothing terrifying. Solitude had been everything for her in this life, after all: no enemy to threaten her, because no one cared enough to hate her. So to die bleeding out in a dirty alley was an astonishing surprise for her.

I don't want to die.

The thought sang in her head through pain and disbelief. She tried to stand up, her clothes torn and blood running down her body, but even twitching was agony. So she slipped away, with no one to care and no one to mourn her.

Except she didn't. Not really.

There was something after death, neither paradise nor hell but an infinite in-between, where souls could be together until they were ready to go back to Earth. The girl didn't get that. She floated for what felt like eternity in a warm, black space, her ears full of whispers she couldn't quite understand. She tried, of course she tried, but each time she focused on one of the voices, it faded away.

"Mary! Mary, no, please! Someone help her! Please!"

The girl was cold, so cold. Her body shivered on a hard surface. She couldn't see, could barely hear the gravelly voice of a man somewhere over her head. She sensed that something had changed, that her body was somehow not hers anymore. Her blurred perceptions barely allowed her to understand that much, and nothing more.

"Mary, please don't leave me, please…"

There was a wail – hers – and a sob – not hers. Whoever this Mary was, she clearly didn't listen to the man's plea. The girl, exhausted, closed her eyes and slept.

"Please, Aunt Minerva, take her. Take her. I can't even… I can't…"

"She's your daughter, Gareth. And you want me to take her away?"

"She's Mary's daughter as well, Aunt Minerva. That's… That's too much."

"Very well. But you'll stay out of the child's life, then. Completely outside of it. Until she asks about you, until she wants you around, if she ever does so, you'll leave us alone."

"I… Very well. Thank you, Aunt Minerva, I'll…"

"You'll nothing, Gareth. Get out, go mourn, and don't come back. The babe and I will be alright, and we'll be alright without you."

The girl, confused, felt a pair of hands pick her up. She had started to get used to this feeling, how tiny she suddenly was, how helpless. She was hungry, tired, and then hungry again, and the cycle repeated itself ad nauseam. If days or weeks passed, she had no idea: she was too lost, too trapped in her own body, to make sense of anything. Her needs were met before they could really torment her, and for now it was enough. It had to be.

She was alone with her thoughts for the most time, her senses too weak to tell her anything. She had started to pick up on an older woman's voice – the one the heartbroken man had called Minerva – but Minerva didn't speak often. She hummed, though. She had a lovely voice, airy and always on tune. Hearing her almost made the girl purr with contentment. Minerva always sang when she fed her, cradled her, changed her. By that time, the girl had realised she had somehow become a baby, which explained her blurry senses and the big hands. She had a name, too: Anthea.

Anthea was only mildly freaked out by her predicament. She had perfectly clear memories of her life, of being raped and stabbed in a dark alley – such a cliché, when more than ninety percent of rape and assault victims know their attacker. Her life had been a very long series of clichés, though, so one more didn't really surprise her. Absent father, boarding schools, a mother who projected her reveries of grandeur on her daughter and turned her into an unhappy overachiever… Even the shabby flat in the centre of London had been a cliché.

So, no, Anthea wasn't too freaked out about her death. She wasn't really freaked out about her new life, either; if anything, she was curious. Surely, if people could just be reborn and keep their memories, it would be a well-documented phenomenon, but she had never heard of anything of the sort. She hadn't even believed in reincarnation, or in anything, really.

She had always had an excellent memory, one that didn't allow for any form of forgiveness, but this life gave 'eidetic memory' a whole new meaning. With hard and constant work – she didn't have anything to do anyway – she turned her memory, this vast, dark, and empty field, into a lively metropolis. When she allowed the outside world to reach her again, her mind was a replica of Tokyo as she remembered it from a month-long visit in her first life. Each little apartment, each house, each moving car even, held a memory. She just had to step in to watch it happen, as vivid as the first day. She could find any of them in an instant through the chaos, but being lost in such an everchanging environment helped her feel safe, protected. By herself, no less. She didn't need anyone to take care of her.

Didn't she? Well, of course, this Minerva person changed her nappies – yuck – and fed her and sang to her, but this was just a temporary arrangement. From the conversation she remembered hearing, Minerva wasn't even her mother. It sure felt like she was, though. Like she loved her as she would a daughter. But Anthea knew better. She had battled through every single one of her twenty-five years of life to gain independence and freedom. She would do it again. And again and again, if need be.

One night, Minerva held her close, closer than she usually did, and sobbed her heart out. She muttered something that sounded a bit like 'James' and 'Lily', but surely Anthea misheard. Anyway, she allowed Minerva to almost smother her. She remembered needing to hold something when she cried, too. Maybe not a living, fragile baby, but still. Besides, what could she really do about it? She was a baby, for fuck's sake. The worst she could do to anyone was shit herself, and she really didn't feel like doing that.

A year went by, then two. Anthea learned to walk and speak, and she was still bored to tears. She spent the time in her memories, rereading books and rewatching movies, but she lacked new stimulation. So, when she realised that she was actually in the Harry Potter world, and that her Minerva was Minerva McGonagall, again, she didn't feel like freaking out.

Sure, a war had ended and another one would start before she was of age. It was a problem. But a problem she had time to prepare for. She had read the Harry Potter books in her previous life, after all. Panicking wouldn't do her any good, but planning? Planning could save lives. Planning could twist Fate's arm and hold it there, painfully close to snapping, until She let go of destiny and let Anthea decide. Wouldn't that be grand?