Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, I don't make money from this fic.
April 2, 1977 Hogwarts, Scotland - Hospital Wing
Hermione awoke with a pounding in her head, the light around her too bright. She gasped, breathing heavily. Her arm felt heavy and she looked down, squinting against the bright room. There was an IV in her arm, a purple liquid making its way into her veins. Hermione tried to move, but found she couldn't move more than her head a few inches one way or the other. Looking about her, she saw Sirius sitting next to her, his parchment and quill that he'd been scratching away on cast aside when he'd heard her gasp.
"Hermione?" Sirius asked quietly, almost disbelieving.
"S-Sirius?" She said, her voice cracking and her throat dry. Suddenly, Sirius leapt out of his seat, headed for Madame Pomfrey's office.
"Madame Pomfrey! She's awake!" He yelled across the ward. Hermione was surprised by how quickly the elderly matron made it to her.
"There you are, dearie! Gave us a right shock, you did. Let me take off this stasis spell. Do try to stay still, now." She witch said, pulling out her wand and muttering a quick spell. "There. Now you can sit up, but do try to move slowly, dear. Let me help."
"Why am I so sore?" Hermione asked as the older woman.
"You've been unconscious for the better part of two weeks, dear. Mr. Black, would you fetch the Headmaster please? He requested to be informed when Ms. Potter awoke." Madame Pomfrey said.
"She just woke up, I'm not leaving her." Sirius said. Madame Pomfrey gave Hermione some water as she checked her over further. Hermione looked up to Sirius.
"Sirius, I need to speak with Dumbledore soon. And alone. I'm fine, I promise, but I need you to do this for me." She said, her hand finding his and squeezing it. He sighed.
"Alright. But I'll be back in an hour." He said. Hermione nodded, and Sirius left the room to fetch Dumbledore.
"So this coma was caused by a vision, Ms. Potter?" Dumbledore asked Hermione. She nodded.
"I'd been doing my mediations nightly and then the nightmares and visions just stopped. It worried me for a couple weeks, then, this." Hermione said. "I'm having a hard time figuring out my head." she said.
"How have you been dealing with them? Perhaps I can help you sort things out?" Dumbledore said, leaning back in her chair.
"Compartmentalizing all of my emotions and the visions and trying to control them." Hermione said.
"Hermione, you can not put something as fluid as thought and time in a box." Dumbledore said, pulling out his wand. He swished it and several plumes of smoke emerged, hanging in the air. "The mind works in funny ways, and though I cannot speak fully for these visions, I can speak for memories in general. They are very fluid things, they flow with the passage of time, ever changing, ever evolving. Memories flow and change, just like water, or smoke." He said, twirling his wand and causing the smoke to twist and turn every which way.
"If you try to trap it, block it from coming through entirely," He said, flicking his wand. A clear wall appeared, holding back the smoke as it continued to move. "It will only grow. You can't box emotions and memories up and leave them, because for every emotion you feel today, there will be another tomorrow. And eventually-" he said, swishing his wand, causing the smoke to amplify. It pushed against the white wall, causing it to bulge, and then, eventually, to shatter, the smoke pouring out over the ruins of the wall. "The box will break. My guess is that this attack was so bad because of the way you have been trying to deal with the visions."
"But, sir, how else can I deal with them?" Hermione asked.
"This last vision, you said you don't remember it, yes?" Dumbledore asked. Hermione nodded.
"I only remember bits, nothing really useful." She said, frowning.
"Then perhaps, instead of trying to repress the visions, you should be trying to have them." He told her.
"How do you mean? Like gazing into a crystal ball?" Hermione scoffed.
"While I agree Divination isn't the most noble of magics, that's not a bad analogy. Perhaps being aware that visions may happen at any time will lessen their effects on you. In becoming more open to them, opening your 'inner eye', if you will, it is possible that you could gain some modicum of control over them." He said thoughtfully.
"This sounds ridiculous," Hermione sighed, "but I'll try it. Anything's better than a two-week coma." She said.
"Speaking of which, I've spoken with your professors, and they've all assured me you will have ample time to turn in any missed assignments. Mr. Black should have most of your homework if I'm not mistaken." He said with a smile.
"It helps that I was a week ahead in my classes." Hermione sighed. "So much for staying ahead all year."
"You'll be fine, I'm sure." He said, looking her over. "As you know, my office is always open for you." He told her, nodding as he stood to leave. Hermione sank back into the bed, trying to work out what happened the night she passed out, when Dumbledore turned for one last word.
"I expect great things from you, Hermione. But remember, you can only get so far by yourself." And with that, he quit the hospital wing.
May 25, 1977 Hogwarts, Scotland - Unused Classroom
Hermione paced back and forth at the front of the classroom, waiting for him to show up. She'd not had much luck in correcting her meditations for her visions by herself, and as her sleeping patterns were getting progressively worse, her work had started to suffer. What Dumbledore had said begun to weigh on her mind. She was doing this alone.
She didn't talk about the muggle killings she witnessed when she closed her eyes, didn't talk overtly even about the visions she'd experienced. She'd wanted nothing more in the past few months than to forget she saw anything at all.
And that was her problem. In order for her to control the visions, she had to first accept that the visions were something she couldn't change. She was stuck with them, and no amount of wishing or hoping them away would change that. But who was she to talk to? Dumbledore was busy with other matters, too busy, indeed, to play therapist to her. Professor McGonagall was much the same. So Hermione only had one other option.
She jumped as the door creaked open and Regulus slipped in. Hermione breathed a sigh of relief and padded over to the boy, hugging him tightly.
"Thank you for coming. I just- I need some help with all this." Hermione said.
"It's not a problem, love, you know that." Regulus said, hugging her tightly before releasing her and grabbing a chair. He straddle it and got comfortable before looking to Hermione. "So what do you need help sorting out? All you said in your letter was we needed to talk about time."
"These visions I'm having. I think-" She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I think in order to acknowledge that they're real, I need to talk them through with someone. You're the only one who knows who I feel comfortable venting like that to. Would you- be okay with that?" She asked, preparing herself for a rejection.
"Of course, Hermione. If it will keep you safe and not passing out every two weeks, of course I will listen." He said with a smile. She sighed heavily.
"Before I start, I have to warn you, my dreams and visions are really graphic sometimes. Are you okay with that?" Hermione asked, looking into his eyes.
"Hermione, I've been trained by my mother and father to be a death eater as soon as I turn seventeen. I've already been forced to witness death and torture already. I can handle graphic." Regulus said, looking Hermione in the eye. His grey eyes were blank and Hermione almost didn't recognize him. She nodded, a shiver running down her spine.
"Alright." she said. She began to tell him about every vision, every nightmare she could remember, all in very explicit detail. Sometimes Regulus would interrupt because he didn't understand what was happening in the story and Hermione would have to rethink how it happened to explain it. There were some stories, like that of the little muggle girl she had watched being murdered, that she cried over. Regulus held her while she cried, encouraged it, actually.
"You're grieving them. If that's not acknowledging the visions, I don't know what is." He murmured to her when she apologized.
"Can we do this again?" she asked into his chest, wiping the tears from her eyes. "There's so much more, and likely even more after tonight, and it's getting late."
"Of course. How about once a month? We'll set the date so no one will get suspicious." he said. Hermione nodded.
"Thanks for this, Reg." She said, drying her eyes and hugging him again. He held her tightly.
"Don't worry about it." He told her quietly. "It's the least I could do."
June 19, 1977 Hogsmeade Station, Scotland - Hogwarts Express
Hermione walked down the train, the boys behind her, looking for an empty compartment. Lily had gone to sit with a few of her friends but promised she'd drop by their compartment at some point during the trip. Hermione finally found an empty compartment and slid the door open, padding over to the window seat at once and hauling her trunk onto the overhead luggage shelf.
She settled in as the boys followed suit, putting their luggage away and settling down, but Hermione noticed something was off. Peter looked anxious, almost worried, and he kept checking his watch. James, Sirius, and Remus were in the midst of a conversation about complex charms that Hermione had stopped following when they stopped answering her questions. She knew they were talking about the Marauder's Map, she'd seen a prototype stuffed in one of James' books. Of course, the other three were too caught up on their conversation to notice Peter's fidgeting, and when the train finally pulled away from the platform, he stood, moving towards the door.
"Where ya off to, Pete?" Sirius asked, looking up from their conversation.
"Gonna find the trolley. Tradition." He shrugged. And something clicked into place for Hermione. He'd been late to join the compartment on the way to Hogwarts as well. No one had seen him on the platform, and Hermione had been asleep by the time he'd gotten back. It didn't take the trolley witch long to traverse the train, and Peter never really came back with many sweets. So he must be doing something else. Something that would make him shift in his seat and check his watch.
Hermione waited about ten minutes after he left before she excused herself to go to the bathroom. She walked down the train, looking in the windows of compartments until she found that not only had the curtain drawn down over the window, but also filled her ears with a buzzing noise she was all too familiar with. She slipped into an empty compartment diagonal from the one in question and waited as, one by one, people began leaving it. When she saw Peter slip out, just after Mulciber, she knew she was correct. She opened the compartment door and pulled Peter inside, shutting the door and pulling the curtain, before pulling out her wand muttering the same spell she'd encountered on the other door.
"Hermione?" Peter asked, looking terrified.
"What the hell are you doing with the likes of those death eater wannabes, Peter?" She asked, seething. She didn't put her wand away, and that seemed to make him even more nervous.
"I- I wasn't-"
"Don't lie to me. I watched several people come out of that compartment before you. Wilkes, Mulciber, Rosier. They're not exactly quiet about their beliefs, now, are they?"
"Hermione, you don't understand-" Peter said, holding his hands up.
"Then you'd better start explaining," She said.
"I'm just playing the field, gathering intel." He said, stumbling over his words. "I'm a pureblood and yes, while I'm a gryffindor, most of them know I'm a follower, not a leader. It's the perfect guise." he said.
"They why are you shaking like a leaf? I told you not to lie to me." Hermione growled.
"I- I don't know what else to say." He told her, looking to the ground.
"Then I suggest you listen up. I've Seen things about the future, Peter. I know what's coming. If you keep messing with those death eaters, if you keep digging yourself deeper into this pile of shit, you will end up killing your best friends." Hermione warned.
"What?" Peter asked, his eyes widening.
"James and Lily. If you continue to play into Voldemort's hand, you will be responsible for their deaths. James, Sirius, and Remus trust you with their lives. And they are willing to lay down theirs for you." She told him, moving closer to him and poking a finger into his chest.
"How- how could I-"
"And that's not all, Peter. Because if that happens, Sirius will come after you. You'll get away, but another of your friends will be sent to Azkaban, for your supposed murder."
"But- there's no way Sirius would kill me." Peter frowned.
"Oh he would try. But he would fail. And then he would be wrongfully imprisoned for years." she spat at him. "And then there's Remus. The person you became an animagus for. He would be left alone. James, dead. You, assumed dead. And Sirius, imprisoned for the murder of you both. You became an animagus so that Remus wouldn't have to be alone. And yet, the path you are on now, you'd might as well spit in his face and tell him to bugger off."
"I- Remus- Sirius- James. Because of- me?" Peter asked, very close to tears.
"Yes. They would die for you, Peter. Know that. And remember that there are absolutely people in this world worth dying for." Hermione told him, her voice quivering. She turned, ready to leave him standing there, shaking and contemplating the future when he spoke again.
"And you?" He said. She froze. "If I- stay on this path. What becomes of you?"
She hadn't given it much thought. She would be writing history with her presence in this timeline. She had no idea what to expect. But she could extrapolate.
"Dead. Or worse, enslaved. He knows about my visions, Voldemort. I think he seeks to use them in his exploits. But I wouldn't go willingly." Hermione allowed herself a grin. "I wouldn't go down without a fight. Can you say the same?"
She flung the compartment door open and stalked away, leaving Peter to crumple onto the floor of the compartment, a sobbing mess.