Minerva stared apprehensively at the piece of parchment in her hand. On it were the words she planned to speak during the ritual. On it was the words she had to speak during the ritual, which she muttered quietly under her breath as Albus went over the circle's runes one more time. She had asked herself on more than one occasion since the meeting a day prior if what they were doing was the right thing. Could she do it? she wondered.
So many things had gone wrong, and not just surrounding Harry Potter. They had all failed that boy, but they had failed his parents even more.
She remembered James and Lily well. James, ever the troublemaker and a bully in his youth, had nevertheless excelled in her class. Lily had always been Filius' favorite, of course, but Transfiguration had been her third-best subject after Potions. Which really, Minerva admonished herself, meant nothing, because Lily Evans excelled at everything except Herbology. She had never had the patience for it, Pomona would tell her sadly in the years following their deaths.
James had never been any good at Potions. Too busy throwing ingredients into Slytherin cauldrons and without the attention span necessary for proper timing, James barely scraped an A on that particular OWL.
She tore herself abruptly out of her reverie when Albus said softly, "It's time."
The seven of them, all clad in pure white ritual robes, stepped into their points of the circle. Molly Weasley stood at the top. Her wand trembled slightly in her hands and Minerva fought down the urge to go to the woman, to comfort her and tell her it would all be alright. She would ruin the ritual circle if she did that, and what comfort could she offer than wasn't pretty words, anyway?
Beside Molly stood George, his own wand steady and a kind of grim determination in his eyes. The look tugged on Minerva's heart. She had seen it on far too many of her students as they headed into battle, knowing that death lurked before them but charging in anyway.
Next to George, Severus Snape stood with his shoulders rolled forward and his expression as sour as it always was. His grip on his wand was so tight his knuckles turned white. Albus was to Severus' left, his own eyes as twinkly as ever. Was it Minerva's imagination, or was their something almost...reluctant in Albus' posture? She pushed the thought away.
Nymphadora's hair was its usual cheerful bubblegum pink, but her smile was strained. Remus was standing at the next point, looking as if he wanted nothing more than to reach out to her.
The mother, the brother, the enemy, the mentor, the friend, the required Dark wizard to balance out the abundance of Light magic swirling through the room (because though Remus would always fight for the Light, he was a Dark creature first and foremost), and her, the seer, completing the seven-pointed star.
"And so it begins," Albus said grimly, and brought his wand down in a flurry of sparks. Remus jolted into action, sealing off the circle with a series of borderline Dark spells.
"I, Molly Prewett Weasley, stand for my family!" said Molly, her voice quivering slightly. "I stand for the love we have for each other. I summon my son—" her voice cracked, "to this dark world!" She drew a penknife from her pocket and cut off a chunk of her red hair. She placed it at her feet and tossed the penknife across the star to Nymphadora. With a wince, the former Auror cleared her throat and said loudly, as if challenging some higher power, "I, Nymphadora Tonks, stand for myself!"
And with both her parents dead, it was true, Minerva thought sadly.
"I stand for what has been broken and brought back. I summon my friend!" And she drew the knife across the palm of her hand and let blood drop onto the runes at her feet, which flashed a bright crimson. She threw it to George.
"I, George Fabian Weasley, stand for the dead. I stand for whom we have lost, and I summon my brother from across the void." With a shake of his head, he left his tears fall to the floor and gave the knife to Remus.
"I, Remus John Lupin, stand for the injured. I stand for the pain each of us have felt. I summon the light!" He, too, cut his palm with the knife and let his blood drip on the Hogwarts stones.
Severus was next. "I, Severus Tobias Snape, stand for what could have been. I stand for the possibilities this damn war has extinguished, and I summon the object of my pain." He spat on the ground and tossed the knife, with no little bitter viritol, across to Minerva.
"I, Minerva McGonagall, stand for my students. I stand for their suffering and for their hope. I summon Harry James Potter!" With a hiss, she clenched her hand around the knife and let her blood run down the handle. She shut her eyes and thought of Harry, only Harry, because as the seer her job was to keep the building intention of everyone in the circle focused. It was a momentous task, and she knew if she let her concentration waver the summoning would go terribly, dreadfully wrong. The wording of the ritual was so deliberately vague they might summon Fred, or James, or some strange monster directly from hell.
She threw the knife blindly, praying it would make its way to Albus so he might finish the ritual.
"I, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, stand for our freedom!" he roared, his voice so bolstered by magic that each and every one of them could feel the power reverberating in their bones. "I stand for all those fighting for a better future! And I summon my student, their son, their brother, their friend and their light and their pain!" She heard the faint plop of blood on stones, and with a crack, the air in the room seemed to split with a terrible force. It felt like the tolling of a thousand bells, like forty gongs struck at once. Wind whipped around the room, so strong it nearly pushed George out of his sector of the star, both shoving them all away from the center and drawing them in.
"Hold!" commanded Albus Dumbledore, the magic forcing them into a sort of modified Body-Bind. Minerva kept her eyes shut tightly against the wind and—Merlin, were those voices? No, not voices. The wind was howling in the small room, like the sound of panpipes only amplified to tremendous heights. Don't think about it, Minerva admonished herself, and forced her thoughts to Harry. Harry James Potter, small, scrawny, and with a dangerous glint in his eyes—green, like Lily's—so reminiscent of his father. Never as mischievous as the twins...or perhaps, just as trouble-making, just in different ways. The troll, Minerva recalled. She remembered sprinting through the halls with the other members of the staff and coming upon a scene that by any rights, should have been a tragedy. Would have been a tragedy, if not for Harry James Potter and Ronald Bilius Weasley. Hermione Granger had been there too, taking the blame for an incident that had certainly not been her fault. Such a brilliant witch, even at that young age.
The three of them had been incorrigible, Minerva thought fondly, before flinching away. Concentrate.
Harry James Potter and the sarcasm and snark that was uniquely his own. His mother had been nothing but polite, Minerva remembered, and James had had this kind of roguish charm that drew the girls in his year to him like flies to honey and had gotten him out of numerous detentions. Harry with his strange need to save people, the part of him that rebelled when people were in danger. His parents had been similar, she realized, but never to the ridiculous extent he had taken it.
And it had gotten him killed.
She shifted gears abruptly, still keeping the boy in her mind's eye. Not as gifted as his Miss Granger in theory, no—but suited to practical demonstration more than anything. He had thrived in Defense, hadn't he? And able to cast the Patronus at such a young age. He had been a leader, too, she remembered. A natural leader and teacher.
Not for the first time, she felt a flare of doubt. Were they doing the right thing? Would the Harry they summoned be their Harry, or someone fundamentally different?
She pushed the thought away. None of that, she told herself.
It had been all of ten seconds of Minerva's frantic visualization when it was like the air folden in on itself. With a massive thunderclap, a bright light exploded from the center of the ritual circle and ejected them forcibly from their positions.
Minerva landed hard on her arse, groaning. She scrubbed at her eyes, trying to fix her temporary blindness from the flashbang. What she saw made her gasp—in recognition and horror—and made a feeling of deep foreboding settle in her gut like a lead weight.
A man with a head of dark hair crouched in an unorthodox—but dreadfully familiar—dueling stance. A wand was clenched in his left fist as he shielded wandlessly with the other, the glimmering blue of a standard Protego dull in comparison from the bright light of the ritual. "What," the man bit out, "the fuck?"
"That's not Harry," George muttered, leaning against the wall with a pained expression on his face. "And I think I cracked a rib."
Minerva could only sit in shock because she knew that man. Recollections of school years from what must have been an age ago pushed their way to the front of her mind.
"Tom?" she heard Albus ask incredulously.
Tom Riddle, she thought faintly. They had managed to summon proto-Lord Voldemort himself. She remembered him, all right. Three years older than her and in a different house entirely, Minerva McGonagall hadn't known him very well at all. But she had seen him, known of him, because it had been impossible in those days to be unaware of the name Tom Riddle. Rumors shadowed the man like a cloak, even as a teenager. Whispers in the halls of did you see what he did to Avery the other day? and Lacey told me he speaks to snakes and, once, I heard Nott is in the Hospital Wing because he challenged Tom to a duel. Minerva had scoffed at the last one as a young girl, because Nott had been an incredible dueler. Poetry in motion, Professor Merrythought had said.
Years later, Minerva had scoffed still. From what she knew of Tom Riddle now, if he had truly duelled Nott, there wouldn't be anything left of him to put in the Hospital Wing.
And now he was in front of her.
"Don't move," she hissed through clenched teeth, scrambling to her feet and pointing her wand at him. Remus and Tonks had similarly recovered, but Molly was out cold on the floor. The ritual must have taken a lot out of her, or she knocked her head against the stones, Minerva thought. Albus was stock still, looking at his former student with an expression of abject horror. But Severus had his wand up too, his own face impassive.
"Don't move?" Riddle asked, an edge of incredulity creeping into his voice. "If this is some sick prank I swear, I'm going to hang Fred and George by their damn toes on the dungeon ceilings."
George let out a low moan at his brother's name, and Riddle whipped his head to look at him. "Where's Fred?" he asked quizzically, not threatening at all.
Minerva could only stare.
Remus, however, seemed to be under no such obligations. "Who the hell are you?" he snarled. "You're not Harry."
"Obviously," Riddle drawled, still crouched in a dueling stance. "You're not Remus Lupin either, by the way. It's a nice impersonation, but I'm afraid the real Remus has far fewer scars and far less of an attitude."
He surveyed the room quietly, lifting one dark eyebrow in surprise and confusion. "Who in Merlin's name are you?" he asked, addressing Tonks. "I don't believe we've met."
She bristled, her hair turning a violent shade of red. "Nymphadora Tonks," she said proudly, and tossed her head.
"Muggleborn?" he asked placidly, not a trace of malice in his voice.
"Halfblood. Andromeda Tonks' daughter."
Riddle raised both eyebrows then. "Andromeda Tonks has a daughter? A halfblood, Metamorphmagus daughter?"
Tonks immediately looked a bit sick. "That's me," she agreed, and lifted her wand slightly higher. "And who're you?"
"Tom Marvolo Riddle," he said, sweeping a slight bow. "Professor of DADA at the esteemed"—his voice dripped with sarcasm and annoyance—"Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Now, can we all stop pointing our wands at each other and have a civil conversation? I fear Dumbledore may choke on one of his lemondrops, and poor Minnie looks like she's about the have a heart attack."
Minerva watched as his dark blue eyes slid off to the left and down. He shook his head very slightly before refocusing on Tonk's wand, which was pointed right between his eyes. "Please?" he tried.
With a loud exhale, Minerva stepped closes. "If we can get an Unbreakable Vow that you will do us no harm," she said, "then we can talk."
Tom Riddle's mouth twisted into a half-smile. "I don't make those lightly, Minerva, dear. You best give me a damn good reason before I make one of those."
She pursed her lips and shot a spell into the air. It was one of those strange, novelty prank spells she had borrowed from Fred, Merlin rest his soul. The blue light burst above their heads, showering the room with a fine blanket of—
"Cooking flour?" Tom asked incredulously, having shielded himself from it. Yet he had neglected to shield the lump of something by his left knee. He seemed to grasp Minerva's intention a split-second later. "Ah, that," he muttered, and Banished the flour with a sweep of his wand. Remus had shifted his aim to where the lump had been, scowling even harder.
"Might as well come out then," Riddle said, cold eyes calculating. "I believe we've been found out."
A shimmering, opaque fabric was tossed to the floor and three people seemingly appeared out of thin air, all with identical fierce expressions and wands gripped tightly in their hands. "What are we doing in the Room of Requirement, Professor?" asked Hermione Granger, her riotous mass of curls cropped to her chin. Her usually soft and inquisitive brown eyes were narrowed in concentration. She dropped into the exact same dueling stance Riddle had adopted upon his arrival, with only a slight shift in her stance to account for the height difference.
"The Headmaster doesn't look great," Ron Weasley observed, a Protego cast from his wand in front of the three. "Reckon he's had a heart attack?"
"The pink hair is cool," said Harry Potter, looking at Tonks. "But the threats are getting a bid old." He stretched out a finger and poked it away, grinning in an exact imitation of his father.
That was when Minerva McGonagall really did keel over in a faint.
A/N The paintball training exercise was a reference to TheImportanceOfLungs' fic, Wizard of the Kaleidoscope. It's a fun read and has very nice worldbuilding, especially if you're someone who isn't familiar with the Nasuverse.