Hermione woke up to the unforgiving, blinding morning sun shining through the window and Draco's form wrapped around her body, his breaths ghosting across the back of her neck where his noise was buried, still well asleep.
After she managed to ply herself free from his arms around her waist, she slowly glanced at him. His normally sharp, strong features had softened into a completely relaxed, utterly adorable little pout when he slept. He resembled an innocent schoolboy more than the proud man she knew. And even though Hermione would have loved to relish in this stolen moment of serenity just a bit longer, the pressure on her bladder forced her to leave the bed.
Five minutes later she stood in the kitchen, flimsily dressed in a long sleeping shirt and shorts, preparing morning tea as she ate an apple, staring into the void as last night's event played through her mind. There was a slight telltale soreness all over her body that she couldn't help but relish in.
She hadn't felt this elated in months. Though, questions remained to be answered.
The water boiler was coming to a simmer and before she could pour herself a cup, she heard the sound of feet slapping closer. Her heart started racing and just as she turned around to see a disheveled, sleepy Draco dressed merely in boxers crossing the kitchen, and she heard a mumbling that sounded like "I thought you left", but before she could process the words, he had already pinned her against the kitchen counter and pressed his lips to hers.
All the possible greetings and words she had haphazardly prepared slipped from her mind at once and she sighed, melting into his embrace as his tongue slowly captured her in a lavishly long morning make-out.
As good as it felt to kiss him – it really did – and even though she could have continued for hours, once her mind caught up with the present again, she moved her hands from his messy hair to his chest and slowly pushed until they separated.
Draco opened his eyes sluggishly, blinking like he'd woken from a dream.
"What?", he mumbled, and Hermione almost surrendered at the adorable sight of his already pinkened cheeks and tousled hair.
"We need to talk", she breathed, reconsidering whether the talk was worth it.
"That doesn't sound good", he mumbled, diving for her jaw and Hermione almost lost touch with her brain when his lips dragged across the column of her neck to her collarbone, sucking intently. Their bodies were pressed flush together.
"First, we do need to talk about last night's fight- ", she began, until he found a particularly sensitive spot and began worshipping it. Her skin was still raw and sensitive from last night.
"Hmm?", he emitted, and Hermione laid her head back, closing her eyes as she relished in the feeling. His hands had traveled underneath her oversized shirt, exploring her still sore body.
"… and secondly- "
She sucked in air as he found another spot and she turned her head to give him better access, which he utilised fully. His thumb brushed underneath the swell of her breast.
"… secondly, about us", she finally finished, not even sure what she was talking about anymore.
Suddenly, his mouth disconnected from her neck and she almost hissed at the loss of contact. She turned her head and found his face emerged, just inches from her own, licking his swollen lips.
"That's a way to ruin the mood", he mumbled, but she knew he wasn't mad. After all, he still had her pinned against the counter and he wasn't making any movement to release her.
"I know. But we still need to- "
Draco leaned forwards and dropped another soft kiss on her lips, interrupting her.
"If it wasn't clear already, I like you", he followed up immediately, watching her reaction.
Hermione felt her heart swell to the point of bursting at his words; it felt stupid, like she was a naïve schoolgirl again with pointless crushes, but the way his usually grey, dark cloudy eyes seemed completely clear and open as he looked at her now, she really couldn't blame her heart for fluttering.
"I like you, too", she whispered. Her voice almost cracked.
A lazy smile split his face and he leaned forward for another kiss, one of his hands splayed across her lower back as he pulled her even closer.
"Good."
"We still need to talk about last night's fight", she insisted. Draco's face blanked, and he dropped his head on her shoulder.
"You really know how to turn a guy on."
He was nibbling at her collarbone again, dragging his nose over her neck, his breath creating goosebumps on her skin, and once again, with all of her might, she pushed him away just far enough to come to eye-level again.
"I know how to turn a guy on, trust me- ", she began, ignoring the immediate widening of his eyes, "-but last week really was horrible for me. I want to know what you were thinking. Especially on Friday."
His hands dropped to her waist, leaning back a bit as he closed his eyes, inhaling deeply.
"I know opening up is not easy for you. Just… try. Please."
His eyes cracked open and he was looking at her again that way, the way that made her heart flutter and thoughts turn off.
She waited a few moments.
"Zurich really… freaked me out. Once because we almost got caught and… because of the kiss."
Hermione nodded.
"I didn't want to forbid you from working this case, but I- ", he stopped talking and dropped his head to her shoulder again, taking a deep breath. Hermione placed a hand in his hair, stroking through it, waiting for him to keep talking.
"I was so worried- and freaked out, because the kiss wouldn't- I just saw you in a much different light. Not all of a sudden, but much stronger now. I didn't know how to deal with it. I shouldn't have forced you to make promises I knew you couldn't keep."
Hermione combed her fingers through his hair rhythmically. His arms around her waist tightened.
"And I was telling the truth about Friday. Theo said I'd been a 'sad, pitiful twat' all week and he forced me to go out with them. I really did plan on doing something else."
"What else was your plan?"
"Being a sad, pitiful twat getting drunk alone in my apartment."
She couldn't help but laugh at that and she felt the vibrations of his chest against hers as he chuckled with her. Finally, he raised his head again.
"I'm sorry", he mumbled, searching her eyes carefully for any kind of doubt. She kissed him softly.
"Apology accepted", she whispered as she pulled away, but his lips chased hers and soon enough, Hermione had lost track of time again.
Minutes later, they broke apart again to catch their breath.
"I admit, I could have been less stubborn too", she whispered, and Draco nodded.
"And in hindsight, my plan really wasn't that great", she admitted sheepishly, and Draco laughed beautifully.
"But since we've cleared the air now- ", she started again, but got distracted by his lips on her neck once again. She would have been annoyed by now if she didn't know exactly how addicting it felt to kiss him.
"- We can continue with this case again."
Draco halted his adventure down to her shoulder and sighed.
"Fine. Only to expose Rabnott, and to keep you from attempting something stupid again - "
"It wasn't that stupid - ", Hermione protested but Draco smothered her with another kiss, and despite her sore lips, Hermione really couldn't resist.
The next morning, they arrived at their office exactly five minutes apart from each other. Hermione had insisted on formulating somewhat of a plan yesterday, until Draco had unanimously decided that he wanted to take her on their first date, and they'd spent the evening at a cozy muggle restaurant around the corner, where absolutely no one they knew could accidentally bump into them.
They didn't want to make the new development of their relationship public just yet but rather relish in the bubble of new love; which was why, even though Draco had spent the night at her place again, they had timed their arrivals to avoid raising suspicion.
As Hermione walked through the spaces and halls of the ministry, the same path she walked every day, everything around her seemed to be just a bit different; a bit more vibrant, lively, and colourful. She smiled at everyone she passed; her feet barely felt like they moved; it seemed more likely that she was floating on a cloud. One day with Draco had erased weeks of uncertainty and pain.
There were barely any memories left of how she'd felt only two days ago. Only an endless series of new, sweet memories that had filled up the entirety of her Sunday.
As she was sat at her desk, ignoring the newly arrived piles of reports and new or old cases, and simply staring into space, she could tell by the pulling in her chest that she was merely waiting for Draco to arrive, too.
It was odd, she thought, but she couldn't remember ever missing Ron like that, even when they were still naïve, love-stricken teenagers. She had loved him, she truly did; they'd had a lot of fun during the romantic part of their relationship, but never had she spent an entire day with him without barely any break, and immediately missed him as soon as their ways parted.
Even though her lips still felt sore from the last snog they'd had before she left first, she was already checking the clock as the minutes ticked by.
Hermione couldn't remember having been this in love in a long time.
When the door finally opened, she jolted upright, only to deflate when Cormac entered, a sheepish look on his face.
"Hey, 'Mione – I was hoping to catch you alone. I wanted to ask you something."
Hermione nodded. "Sure, what is it, Cormac?"
He closed the door behind him and strutted into the room, taking a seat in front of Hermione's desk. His hands smoothed down the front of his coat.
"I really did have fun last Friday, and you disappeared so fast on Saturday, that I didn't get the chance to- "
Hermione's cheeks were growing hot as realization dawned and both of them flinched as the door opened again, only to reveal Draco. He saw her first, his eyes soft and clear, but as soon as he noticed Cormac across from her, the grey in his eyes darkened almost unnoticeably.
"Morning, Granger. McLaggen", he greeted coldly and stalked to his desk, sitting down. Cormac's eyes followed his movement and when he turned around to Hermione, his cheeks were tinged a light pink.
"Oh well, I would have hoped to do this alone- "
"Don't mind me, I'm not listening", Draco said, bowed deep over some paperwork he had procured, obviously listening.
Cormac was red now. Hermione tried not to grimace.
His voice was much quieter, almost a whisper, like he was hoping to somehow be quiet enough for Draco not to hear. He was wildly fiddling with the hem of his coat.
"Well – I wanted to, uhm, ask you if you'd like to get dinner this Friday. Just us, you know."
A quill scratched loudly on parchment where Draco sat and Cormac nervously shot a look behind. The blonde was still undoubtedly listening.
"Cormac, I – Thank you, I really appreciate it, but I can't", Hermione said with as much care as she could. Cormac looked almost purple.
"Oh, I just thought – I'm sorry, I just thought we were really hitting it off last Friday, I don't really understand- "
"I'm dating someone else", Hermione blurted, her neck burning.
Draco shuffled obnoxiously.
Cormac's eyes were ridiculously round.
"Really? I was sure you weren't – I asked around a lot, so I – not to say I was stalking you! No, I was just making sure the coast was, uh, clear? You know, like making sure you were – available- "
"I don't really talk about my personal life at work, so- "
Cormac shuffled conspicuously closer, leaning in to whisper.
"I even asked Malfoy! He told me you were available!", he insisted, and Hermione looked up to find Draco's head bowed deeply over his parchment, his quill bending with the effort, a slight shaking to his shoulders.
"Did he?", she mumbled, and Cormac nodded enthusiastically.
"Either way, that must have been a while ago. Sorry, Cormac."
Cormac leaned back. "Yes, of course. You're right. I'm sorry, I'll just- "
He scrambled to his feet and mumbled incessant apologies as he slowly moved towards the door.
"Goodbye, Cormac", Hermione waved with a slight cringe.
"Bye, McLaggen", Draco pressed out, hunched over his parchment, pretending to scribble wildly.
"Yes, goodbye, see you", Cormac said hastily and like a gust of wind, he was gone.
The door finally clicked shut, and Hermione's eyes immediately shot towards Draco, who was lain across his desk, face buried in his arms, shaking uncontrollably as she could hear muffled laughter. She bit her lip to no avail; soon enough, she was giggling, too.
"You told him I was single?!", Hermione squealed, pressing her hands over her mouth to keep the laughter in. Draco emerged, cheeks split into a permanent smile she'd seen more yesterday than in the past ten years combined, flushed pink like Cormac just seconds before.
"A week ago!"
With that, they descended into even more laughter.
The next two weeks passed in a blur. Hermione told Ginny about them on Tuesday, after they realized that keeping it a secret any longer would make either of them burst, so each of them was allowed to tell one person. Draco chose Theo, who apparently descended onto his apartment with an insane amount of heart-shaped balloons, heart-shaped cupcakes and anything heart-shaped there was to buy.
When Ginny walked into their office on Wednesday for their lunch-meetup to find Hermione pinned between Draco's mouth and the bookshelf, Hermione laid down a strict no-making-out-or-else-at-work-rule. This was obviously opposed strongly by all three other parties involved; surprisingly mostly Theo, who burst into their office the next day, proclaiming that he must put an end to the dictatorship that Hermione was enforcing.
It was the first time Hermione could remember that she had talked to Theo, and she could quickly see why the two men were friends; they were absolute polar opposites. It seemed that Theo was insane enough for the both of them, and she learned from Draco that he had served as his main emotional support during the week after Zurich, despite not being asked to be so.
13 days of pure, romantic and borderline psychotic events had left them with more than enough time to realize that this definitely wasn't a short-time fling. Spending time with Draco had taken a 180; every minute was better than the last, every quarrel a bit more ridiculous, every kiss a bit more sweet. From the second he left, she was counting the hours until they saw each other again; being around him turned her into a person she very much liked.
It also allowed them to come up with a comprehensible plan for how to finally expose Rabnott. A lot of make-out sessions and morning, noon, afternoon, evening and night sex had been involved in bribing Draco into helping her; it was both useful to the plan, and also purely for Hermione's satisfaction. It turned out that he really did know what to do with that foul mouth of his.
On Saturday night, there was a fundraising gala for the wizarding preschool program that included witches and wizards of every blood status, organized by the Department of Magical Education. They'd been invited because of both their status and wealth.
It was the perfect opportunity, just like the last event had been; They had a reason to be at the Ministry after work hours, and they ran little risk of encountering anyone in the Department of Mysteries.
Using the Cloak of Invisibility, they had spent most of their last weeks lunches following several of Rabnott's minions into the Entrance Chamber behind the black door. It seemed that the door which lead to the office changed every hours of the day and they had soon discovered a rhythm (thank Merlin they both took Arithmancy at Hogwarts), that made them pretty confident in their plan.
There had been lots of other spells involved that had made them absolutely undiscoverable, as well as several attempts to steal floorplans and authorizing badges. None of it had worked, but without Harry's cloak – he'd stopped asking back for it – they wouldn't have come so far in the first place.
The gala had come to a close: it was nearing midnight, and the last few drunk sponsors and ministry workers were clearing out. Draco and Hermione had mingled at first, then retreated into a corner of the hallway outside, sat there covered by the cloak for at least three hours while they waited for the ministry to empty. It was a tiresome wait; Hermione had conjured pillows to give her and Draco something other to sit on than cold tiles, and Draco had fallen asleep on her shoulder over an hour ago.
Despite the growing nervousness from what they were going to do, the last two weeks of nonstop investigating and spending time with Draco, however fun it had been, had exhausted Hermione endlessly.
She jolted awake into the pitch-black of the ministry, completely disoriented for at least ten seconds as she blinked around wildly, trying to discern anything out of the pitch-black darkness around her.
Draco was still leaning against her, snoring softly, and Hermione realized that she had fallen asleep.
Absolutely bloody glorious.
Draco awoke with much protest after Hermione cast Lumos, and she quickly checked the time to find that it was only one am. The gala had completely cleared out; the silence around them was near deafening.
"Do we have to?", Draco nagged, and though Hermione had learned to absolutely adore his morning crankiness, she had no time for it now.
"Come one, we need to go", she mumbled as she stood up, pulling off the cloak. Draco groaned.
"I don't get paid nearly enough for this nonsense- "
"I'm paying you with love and sex, now shut up", Hermione interrupted him as she pulled out a summary of the pattern they had figured out, matching it up with the current time.
"Hm, that you do", Draco hummed in agreement, leaning over her shoulder to read along with her. His slender finger pointed at the correct point in the pattern just as she found it, too.
"This one."
"Let's go."
After they hauled ass through the ghostly hallways of the normally bustling ministry, they reached the ministry of department with the singular black door they had been watching constantly for the last weeks. There were only torches lighting their way and Hermione felt a chill run up her spine; she couldn't imagine now doing this on her own two weeks ago.
As they opened the door into the circular room, faced with twelve exactly similar black doors around them in a circular motion, Hermione's heartbeat increased.
Just like they had planned, Draco stayed at the door, holding it open to keep the room from rotating, and Hermione soon sought out the correct path, the one three doors left from the one they had entered through.
She swung it wide open and was now finally faced with a nearly identical corridor like the one leading to the black door; only for this one, there were more and more black doors lining the hallway.
She turned to Draco, holding the door while she stretched out to grab his hand, and only using his fingertips to hold the first door open, they met in the middle.
They counted down in unison.
"…One!"
With that, Hermione yanked Draco towards herself and they stumbled onto the floor in the new hallway, watching as the door closed behind them and they could feel and hear the telltale rumble of the circular room rotating behind it.
They looked up from where they had scrambled onto the floor at the dark hallway around them.
They had entered the office space of the Department of Mysteries. That had been their only goal; this was where their plan ended.
It turned out that the hallway seemed to be literally endless; after checking the first few doors to find nothing but unpromising pitch black darkness past the immediate threshold, all they could do was keep walking down until something in the monotonous repeating of the same black doors over and over, seemed out of place.
The hallway grew small and tiny at the end of the horizon, and Hermione's hope dwindled with every passing minute. She was hyper-aware of Draco's presence now; not in the usual way she'd gotten accustomed to now, but more shameful than anything.
She had dragged him into this. They didn't even know if they could get back out through the same door they'd left behind. Perhaps they were in grave danger, exploring the most top-secret Department of the Ministry.
On the other hand, Rabnott was still abusing her power. There had to be done something, and this was the only thing they could come up with.
Constricting thoughts and an imminent feeling of panic grew into a pulsing, anxious ball in Hermione's chest, and soon enough, she was trying to control her breathing.
"Hermione?"
Draco had noticed the stagger in her pace and turned around to see her pale and shivering, trying to hold back tears. The colour drained from his face as his eyes grew round, searching her face and body for any indication for what was wrong.
"What is it? Are you hurt?", he asked, lunging forward to pat down her front and sides for any injury.
Hermione could barely keep herself from sobbing. Exhaustion had caught up.
"I'm so sorry Draco - we worked so, so - long to get here, and now we don't even know what to do, and we might not even know how to get out, and I just- "
She hung her head as the tears started rolling and before she knew it, Draco had wrapped her up in his arms, holding her close.
"Don't apologize for anything. I wanted to do this too", he mumbled near her ear, stroking through her hair, and Hermione shook violently with another wave of tears, trying to hold them back, gasping for air.
"But I- I dragged you into this, I shouldn't have, and now we're just lost and might not even find anything", she continued, wiping at her tears wildly. Her throat felt like it was closing up; the tight ball in her chest made it impossible to breathe. Draco interrupted her with shooing-noises, rubbing her back in a soothing, circular motion.
"You didn't drag me into anything. We're in this together."
He repeated the words in whispers, like a ritual, over and over until Hermione's breathing calmed down and she rested her head on his shoulder, allowing the chaos in her chest to calm down. A few minutes later, after she was sure she'd avoided the panic attack, she slowly leaned back, and for a moment he watched her, expecting another bout of panic.
"Thank you", she whispered, and she leaned forward to press a soft kiss to his lips.
It was sweet, far too short, and when they separated a second later, Draco grabbed her hand.
"Come on."
With new courage in her heart, they scanned their surroundings for a few moments.
"We're in a loop. There's something we have to do to break out", Hermione said, searching for any kind of inconsistency in a single door, a tiling, a different hue of black.
"Revelio."
They waited for any kind of change in their surroundings; They had tried the spell already ten minutes ago, and the result was the same.
Hermione turned towards the wall, tapping it thrice with her wand. "Aparecium."
Nothing changed. She tried every revealing charm she knew, and she could hear Draco doing the same on the other side of the hallway.
"Specialis Revelio."
Hermione raised an eyebrow as Draco mumbled the spell: It was a spell she had never seen performed correctly; whether if it was for a lack of charms to be discovered or because of the abhorrently difficult execution. She turned around curiously, wondering if it could have possibly worked.
A translucent shine of smoke was hovering on a tile to Draco's left. Hermione's mouth slipped open; she had never seen a spell discovered before.
They neared the tile, and Hermione automatically performed another Aparecium, Alohoroma, Revelio; any unlocking spell she could think of. Nothing worked.
"Dunamis. Aberto. Annihilare."
Hermione watched Draco try every single one they had ever learned at Hogwarts. Nothing budged.
"What if it doesn't have to be unlocked? Only… activated, somehow?"
"What if it doesn't need some fancy spell?", she thought out loud.
"What?", Draco asked, confused.
"What if it needs brute force? Like Open Sesame?", she continued, walking closer to inspect the inconspicuous tile.
"If we try that, we could just immediately blow up the whole hallway."
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Don't be dramatic. It's worth a try."
"Alright then. You do the honours", Draco sighed, stepping back and performing Protego to shield them both from whatever blast would rip the wall apart now.
Hermione braced herself, practicing the correct wand movement a few times.
"Open sesame."
Hermione shielded her eyes from the expected explosion, the fire blast that would usually turn any door into firewood, but instead, there was merely a soft click.
She opened her eyes to see the black door nearest to the tile cracked open. The force shield disappeared, and Draco stepped forward to pull it open.
Behind it was a large office space that looked much like the ones on all the other floors, if it werent for the depressing, black tiling and torches lining the walls.
"Bloody- ", Draco started muttering, looking at Hermione in awe. Then he stepped forwards, grabbed her face between his hands and gave her a bold kiss.
"You're bloody genius", he breathed as he pulled away, and before Hermione could react, he had grabbed her hand and pulled her with him into the large office space.
They wasted no time at any of the desk scattered throughout the large space; from the same layout throughout the ministry, they knew that Rabnott's office was very likely the one at the far left end of the room.
As they burst through the door after performing at least a dozen other unlocking charms, Hermione realized that they may have been one of the first unauthorized people ever to enter this office.
Thank Merlin it was empty.
The room was meager; There was only one large desk at the opposite end of the room, made of black stone, with a triumphant chair towering behind. There was no window, no other source of light but the light from the ceiling reflecting off of the bare, black walls.
"She's got a knack for interior design", Draco mumbled, and Hermione bit the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling.
They stepped into the room, looking around for anything they could discover, but a depressing office and obviously well-hidden documents, and whatever Rabnott actually did as Head of the department.
The door behind them clicked shut, and with it, on the opposite side of the room, another door seemed to protrude out of the wall, like it was emerging out of black tar.
Hermione turned to check that the door behind them was still there – it was – and after a shared glance, they approached the new door.
"I bet she has an open-door policy", Draco mumbled as Hermione performed the most difficult unlocking charms she had ever read about.
Surprisingly, it was yet again Open Sesame that did the job.
It seemed to be some sort of magically enlarged closet; it reminded Hermione of the cathedral-high Prophecy room, but in a much more modest, smaller form. The ceiling was not nearly as high and it felt less claustrophobic, but they were similarly surrounded by dozens upon dozens of high shelves filled with odd machinery.
Hermione stepped closer to the nearest one, ignoring Draco's attempts to tug her back, and leaned close to inspect it.
"Draco, this looks almost exactly like the machine we stole from Zurich."
His resisting stopped and he gingerly joined her side.
"You're right."
They looked up at the hundreds of time machines surrounding them, too many for the bare eye to see; probably too many to count, either.
"Merlin."
Merlin indeed, Hermione thought, as her eyes roamed the vast shelves. How could they possibly need that many time machines?
"There has to be a difference between each one. They don't need that many."
"Difference as in the actual mechanism, or difference in the setting?", Draco wondered.
"Setting I'd say? Perhaps they're pre-configured…"
"…Maybe the dates they travel to have already been set", Draco finished her thought, and Hermione nodded. She walked towards another time machine, realizing amongst the bits and pieces of shrapnel and gears and screws, that it seemed to be the exact same as the one next to it.
"Impossible to tell the different settings", Hermione concluded. Draco rounded the shelf, inspecting another machine from the other side.
"Probably determined by some performed spell."
"What about a Specialis Revelio?", she thought out loud, and Draco shuffled back around again.
"I wouldn't try that, they're so fragile – "
"Not if performed correctly", Hermione interrupted, raising her wand.
"Hermione, don't be foolish. We have no idea what that machine is capable of."
Her wand lowered, and she turned to look at him.
"What should we do then? Just leave it all here? We have to try something."
Draco's gaze wandered across the rows upon rows of shelves towering above them, his tense jaw clicking in thought.
Then, as though the air had suddenly been sucked out of the room, Hermione was immediately aware of her surroundings with every single sense.
She stared at Draco, wide-eyed, and she knew he felt it too. He'd frozen, eyes fixed somewhere behind Hermione.
"Someone's there", he mouthed, and Hermione nodded with the littlest movement she could muster.
The air in the room had turned into a tense, dangerous non-visual fog that made it impossible to think clearly. Hermione had no chance of sensing where the presence came from; it seemed as though a blinding layer was suddenly blocking all of her magical abilities. In the far back of her mind, she knew that this was a property of the room, the entire department, or whoever was suddenly in the room with them.
Hermione was frozen in place, her breathing shallow, as she allowed Draco to hold grip of her arm tightly as if he was afraid she'd vanish in front of him, and with his free hand, he raised his wand towards a point behind her.
"Protego!"
"Petrificus Totalus!"
The voice boomed through the room, shaking the shelves and filling it up to the ceiling, and Draco's protective shield was not enough to completely secure them from the powerful performance of the spell.
Hermione gasped as she felt the force of it hitting his shield and dispersing, a blast of wind blowing through them and blind bits of the missed spell bouncing around the shelves around them.
Suddenly, they were stumbling and falling, and pieces of the Petrificus Totalus was blasting machines near them apart, and the bursting machinery engulfed them in a bright, blinding light, and all Hermione could do as she helplessly felt her body and mind being squeezed through time and space, was to hold onto Draco.
Their bodies crashed onto hard, wet ground and the first thing Hermione noticed was the grimy, nasty smell of smoke, blood and fecal matter invading her nostrils violently, forcing an unpleasant choke-cough.
She kept her lids tightly pressed together, too scared to take in where they had landed.
"Draco?", she croaked; there was a pounding headache pulsing behind her forehead and her body felt completely exhausted and tattered. It reminded her of the effect time travelling had on her in third year, although this was much stronger.
Much, much stronger.
"Hermione- ", she heard Draco say from somewhere near and just then could she actually feel her tingling limbs return to their senses. His hand was still wrapped tightly around her upper arm.
What interrupted him was a retching fit and soon enough, she heard the despicable, squelching sounds of someone getting sick right near her. She could barely blame him.
Finally, she opened her eyes.
For a second, she panicked at the pitch-black darkness, wondering if she had gone blind, but soon enough her eyes got used to the lack of light and she started to make out the shabby houses lining the narrow alleyway they had landed in. The wet cobblestone they were laying on was rough and ill-placed.
Hermione turned her aching body sideways to see Draco hunched over, trembling, his arm pressed across his stomach, spitting out the last bits of vomit. She conjured a napkin and got rid of his sickness.
"Thank you", he groaned, wiping his mouth, and Hermione performed another mouth-cleaning spell that she usually only used when she overslept, which was never.
"Where are we?", Hermione asked, looking around them. Meagre streetlights hung here and there, illuminating the odd bit of street that only shed light on more dirt, human-made trash and a sort of grimey, well-used appearance to the walls around them. A thick, white and grey fog was hovering over their heads, obstructing the view of anybody who would attempt to see through the alleyway. It sent a shiver down Hermione's spine.
This was not the kind of place she would want to be at night.
Then, as though her hearing had suddenly returned, she realized that in the far distance, she could hear voices shouting and sirens going off. They sounded odd; not like the modern ones she was used to.
"What in the bloody- "
Hermione turned to look where Draco was pointing and just now noticed the archway behind them leading into a small court. On one side hung a plate that read "Model Dwellings", but that wasn't what had caught Draco's attention.
On the other side, was a chalk writing in awkward, oversized handwriting she could barely make out.
The Juwes are the men that Will not be Blamed for nothing.
Hermione read the words over and over again, trying to make sense of them, when her gaze wandered down to a piece of cloth on the ground that had been tainted brown and red.
"What- ", she started, but she was too speechless to continue. At the same time, Draco slowly got to his feet, walking closer, one hand still pressed to his stomach.
She stood up too, inspecting the ground where they had landed. Nothing but them had travelled to whenever they were; not even bits of a machine.
It was just them. Her breath caught in her throat when Hermione realized that they had no way of getting back to their time.
"Goulston Street. Isn't that in Whitechapel?", Draco spoke, and Hermione turned around to see a street sign above their heads. Its design was not the same she knew from modern day London.
"How will we get back?", she blurted, focus returned to the empty street they had landed on. Draco turned in a full circle, giving their soiled surroundings a look-over. The atrocious smell was already the least of her worries.
"We got here because the machine got activated. It probably has a set timer, and we will travel back after a predetermined amount of time."
It made too much sense.
"We can't know that for sure", Hermione insisted, the doubt at the back of her mind eating away.
"There's nothing we can do, except find out where and when we are", Draco replied. Hermione groaned, frustrated.
"How do we do that then?", she bit back. Draco rolled his shoulders.
"Accio today's newspaper."
They waited a few moments, looking around for anything whirring their way. The sirens and voices had grown quieter and Hermione felt a bit less on edge.
Then, out of a half-opened window on the second floor of the building to their left, a tattered newspaper squeezed through the small gap, dropping into Draco's hand. Hermione shuffled closer, leaning over his shoulder to read, and he held the newspaper higher.
The opened page was filled with enquiries about local music and London Symphony Concerts, but what concerned her most was the date on top.
"September 29th, 1888", Draco mumbled as her eyes read the date.
Her gaze wandered back to the chalk-graffiti on the wall next to them, and the grimy piece of cloth on the ground. And the nagging in the back of her mind finally got released, and like a broken damn, a river of information she'd read a long time ago and stowed away in the back corner of her mind, rushed over her.
"We need to go", she whispered, gripping Draco's arm tightly.
"Why? What is it? No one's here. We shouldn't leave, this is where we landed."
"No, we need to leave. Those voices and sirens- "
They both looked up at the right end of the alleyway, where the noises had suddenly grown louder, and they heard discernible voices barking orders.
"Draco, we're in the middle of- "
And then, a large shadow rounded the corner and Hermione could only see the peaked cap with a police medal on front when she heard a loud voice boom through the alleyway.
"There they are!"
Had it not been for Draco pulling her away, Hermione wasn't sure if she had been able to move, but as it were, they sprinted down the dark alleyway, away from shrill voices, shouts, and the deafening blow of a gun reverberating through the narrow street.
Draco screamed something, and so were the policemen on their heels, and so were the bullets they were running away from, and Hermione cast a Protego, barely thinking, and suddenly all of the noises turned into a deafening, rushing waterfall that surrounded them in a hot white blaze, and as their bodies were catapulted out of the Whitechapel street and through time and space once again, Hermione felt a pain shoot through her body from her lower back, paralyzing her ever nerve and shooting pure, unfiltered electricity into her limbs.
The last thing she could remember was Draco's hand in hers and the earth-shaking ache that vibrated from her core through every single rib, and the feeling of her chest being ripped apart and laid bare to the world.
When Hermione woke again, her head was filled with cotton. Her tongue lay heavy in her mouth, and her body felt sore, like it was trying to melt into the bed she was laying on.
Bed?
As she felt around the surface she was laying on, a soft cotton duvet cover, the sterile smell she remembered from her parents' dentist's office invaded her nose.
Through the blinding light above her, she could slowly start to make out her surroundings.
She was in a hospital bed, in a hospital room, and there was a Healer sitting on the chair next to her bed, bowed deep over a chart. To her left was another bed with the curtains drawn.
She stared at him, willing her mouth to open or body to move, to somehow gain his attention, but she was paralyzed. Her entire body was useless. It was one of the most terrifying things she'd ever felt.
She was completely helpless.
When her breathing became erratic, the flaring of her nostrils finally got the man's attention.
It was an older wizard; the wrinkles around his eyes and the lively glim they greeted her with immediately gave her a small sense of calm.
"Good morning Miss Granger. I'm Healer Lewis."
Hermione couldn't speak. She stared at him, wide-eyed. He raised a calming hand.
"Don't worry. We have given you some very strong potions to deal with the injuries. Your lack of mobility is a side-effect, it will probably wear off in a few minutes. Until then, I have to ask you a few questions to know the extent of memory damage done."
Hermione wanted to nod. Her heart was pounding; Mental damage? She could still remember everything, what kind of damage could there have been done?
"Let's start like this. Blink once for yes, twice for no."
He asked her name, what year it was, who the current minister for magic was, and Hermione became impatient. These questions were gratuitous; she could remember everything, but she couldn't tell him that.
As the questions droned on about her past at Hogwarts and current position at the ministry, a slight tingling returned to her tongue, and with an embarrassing amount of effort, she opened her mouth just a bit.
"I rem'er e'rrything", she forced out, and the Healer looked up.
"Miss Granger, I must ask you to keep calm, the potion we gave you still has an incredibly strong effect on your body- "
"I remember everything", she interrupted him, speaking more clearly. The words froze in his mouth and he stared at her.
"You do?", he asked.
Hermione couldn't nod, but she shortened her answer as much as she could.
"Until we travelled back."
He scribbled wildly on the chart.
"Well, this is highly unusual, albeit positive. We have to conduct further tests for the time being, and you surely want to know what happened- "
"Where's Draco?", she interrupted him again.
"Since you got the worst of the shot, Mister Malfoy has had a much faster recovery. He woke up three days ago. He left a few minutes ago, but I'm sure he'll be back momentarily."
Hermione couldn't nod yet.
"Okay", she said, absent-minded. Three days? How long had she been asleep? What happened?
If they thought she'd have memory issues, what about Draco? What if he couldn't remember what had happened?
What if he couldn't remember… them?
"Before we start the testing, I should leave you to rest a bit. Healing is very exhausting, and your body has done a lot of it over the past week."
Hermione watched as Healer Lewis stood up and gave her a last, warm smile before he walked out of eyesight, past the curtained bed.
A week of healing.
The last moments she remembered replayed at the forefront of her mind; the yelling, screaming, the deafening blinding light and the searing pain.
There was an ache in her lower back; too little to really bother her, but enough to be constantly present.
As she sluggishly managed to pull herself up by a pole overhead into a sitting position, she heard the door open again and for a moment she wondered what Lewis could want again.
Then, a disheveled Draco with his arms full of sandwich and snack bags rounded the corner.
He stopped, staring at her, wide-eyed, frozen in motion. Hermione could barely breathe as she took in his shabby appearance; it didn't seem like he'd shaved in a while, and the casual pajama-like clothes he wore definitely didn't seem like his usual perfectly groomed self.
"Draco", she whispered, and like the world had suddenly started turning again when in a blur of movement, Draco surged to her side and swept her still somewhat limp body into a reluctant hug. She just barely registered the sounds of bags hitting the floor.
"They told me you'd be in pain when you wake up", he mumbled, and Hermione let her heavy head roll on his shoulder, closing her eyes as she inhaled his oaky scent.
"I was. It's better now", she breathed, and his arms tightened just a small bit more.
"So you – you remember?" he asked after a few long, stolen moments of just basking in the others warmth, pulling back to look at her.
"Of course. I don't understand, why shouldn't I remember?"
She took in the dark rings under his eyes, the ghastly complexion and his knot-stricken hair.
"You look like you haven't slept in days", she continued before he could answer her question. She longed to touch his hair; even though there was a week long gap in her mind, somewhere deep inside, her body knew it had been a while since she'd touched Draco, and she was longing for him.
"How could I sleep? You looked like you were dead."
"Well, I'm not", she retorted, and he cracked a tired smile.
"Thank Merlin for that. Who would have nagged me about doing the paperwork ever again?"
She wanted to slap his shoulder, but her hand only managed to rest on it.
"I hope I have more duties than that in your life", she protested half-heartedly, smiling.
The moment seemed to last forever, yet not long enough. His eyes were so light, like the sky clearing out after a thunderstorm, despite the insomniac darkness around them. No one had ever looked at her like this before.
Like pure love.
He cleared his throat.
"When I woke up a few days ago, I couldn't immediately remember what had happened. Almost everything we'd done inside the Department of Mystery. It returned yesterday, though."
The department of mystery, Hermione thought. Rabnott!
"What about Rab- ", she interrupted, but Draco stopped her with his thumb, sealing her lips shut.
"Let me get to it."
He shuffled back just a bit, making himself comfortable on small space he could fit on without pushing her away. Hermione would have made room for him, but her legs were still numb.
"Remember the police chasing us? I told you, there was a pre-set timer. It activated while we were running and we got sucked back to our current time, but one single bullet that would have struck us got caught in between travels. It splintered, most of it hitting you, some of it me."
Hermione nodded, and she noticed then that she could nod again.
"Under usual circumstances, any bullet wouldn't have hurt us that much. Its properties changed when it got squeezed through time and space though, and when we finally landed here again, it had an unknown effect, ten-times stronger. Since you got the worst of it, the Healers thought that you might have even worse memory loss than me."
"Then why haven't I?", she asked. Draco's jaw clicked.
"You're alive and well, that's all I care about."
She met his soft gaze and a blooming warmth spread from her chest, covering her still partially numb body with a hot, tingling sensation. Without looking away for even a second, he continued.
"But, had you not realized where we were when you did, they might have actually got us."
Hermione remembered her momentary conclusion of the situation they had gotten caught in, and she wondered if she was right.
"You knew it, right? You brilliant witch", Draco said, placing his hands on either side of her neck, stroking her cheeks.
"You figured out where we were, and what time."
Hermione opened her mouth, recalling the bits of information she had read about in her True Crime obsession at age ten, remnants of which were in her living room bookshelf.
"The night Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes died, presumably by the hands of the notorious Jack the Ripper", she mumbled, repeating the words she'd read once in one of her many books.
Draco nodded.
"Whoever was actually supposed to travel there would have been there to pick up the cloth, the only piece of forensic evidence in the entire case. But you figured that out, didn't you?"
He was looking at her again with that look of pure awe. Hermione's head was swirling with all of the new information.
"Rabnott?", she asked.
"Oh yes, Rabnott. The room with the machines got blown up, and because it was impenetrable by magical forces, we landed one floor higher, in the middle of the Quidditch League Headquarters."
"What about the person who was there?", Hermione asked. Draco's hands dropped to her lap, holding hers and he looked down.
"It was one of Rabnott's minions. He died in the explosion."
Hermione let the information sink in. A nameless underling had died. Because of them. A moment of silence stretched out between them. Draco had intertwined their hands, his thumb softly stroking her tingling palms. She barely managed to curl her fingers around his, holding on tight.
"But, Hermione – we got what we wanted. We blew the Department wide open. Rabnott and all the others have been apprehended, and a huge investigation has been launched."
She glanced up from their hands in her lap, meeting his eyes.
"We did it. They want us to be main witnesses once we're completely healthy again."
Hermione looked at Draco, unable to deny him the relieved, warm smile he gave her. Her chest was pulsing, constricting confusingly. They'd done what they had set out to do.
Yet, someone had died.
No one else could get hurt because of Rabnott anymore.
"We did it."
And Hermione let herself hug him, still a bit numb. Draco was a wall of support she could sink against, glad they still had their lives, and even more glad that he had been there with her.
But while she laid in his arms, the words sitting at the top of her tongue, she refused to let them out.
She didn't know yet that this exhausting trial would need every last bit of their energy; that it would keep them up at night, reliving how they almost died 110 years in the past; that the machine they'd stole from Zurich would be one of many pieces of evidence, and that Die Neugefundenen were going to be dispersed and all of Rabnott's wrongdoings they had merely suspected, were to be uncovered.
That it was her Protego at the last second that shielded her from the worst outcome imaginable; that Harry was going to be less than satisfied, although proud of what they had used his cloak for, then a bit disgusted when he walked in on them weeks later making out in their office, then a bit more pleased that Hermione was nothing if not happy with her standoffish boyfriend who kept breaking the no-making-out-or-else-a-work-rule.
That Theo would gift them, in celebration of their recovery, heaps upon heaps of Valentine's chocolate even though it was October, and that he would keep sending them candy lingerie every weekend, insisting they should try it just once.
That one day, just a few months from now while she'd be watching Draco attempt to prepare a horrible breakfast for the both of them in her kitchen, too distracted by trying to figure out her muggle stove to notice her, that she would walk up and hug him from behind, reaching up to whisper I love you in his ear, before he could pin her between his hips and the counter to conquer her body while they laughed.
Hermione didn't know any of that yet, but she soon would.