Last time...

She froze once more upon finding a familiar glint of gold and glass in her bag, and an even more chaotic idea began to take shape within her mind. Had she conjured it? Had she summoned it like she had so many other things? With it, her idea felt a little more plausible, but still something was missing. She needed a way to know it had worked before stumbling into this, and she couldn't do that if she didn't at least see some sign of herself having already acted. A snap caught her attention; a letter emanating cooling magic floated down, bearing a single inscription.

Get cracking

Would she really be so bold as brass as to stand in front of herself, even invisibly, just to give this note? Who was she kidding? Of course she would! Hera quickly packed up her bag once more, before bolting out of the side entrance, not noticing how flummoxed Snape had become considering she'd just tore through his sticking charm without a thought; having forgotten it was there at all in her haste. If only she had stayed to watch the door close a second time.

Chapter 66

She knew the rules, knew not to be seen when she used the time turner, but she also couldn't count on this sort of luck lasting forever. She'd have to make the time count. Three turns for three hours. Breaking into Umbridge's office was ludicrously easy, especially considering the woman didn't have charms to prevent against things like lock picking, and she sent a silent thanks to Fred and George for teaching her how to do this back in Second Year. Oh, the standard spells were there, but those were easy to bypass.

The abnormal overloading amount of Pink didn't even register, only finding the schedule mattered anyway. She didn't even realize how dedicated she was to the search until she looked up and saw multiples of herself. It was more than a little discombobulating. This. This was why you weren't supposed to mess with Time. Closing her eyes, allowing herself to focus on the search once more, and she went back to it.

Why hadn't she noticed she'd been seeing things from more than one perspective? Were things like this just going to keep happening until she leveled out? How much more of Loki's abilities was she likely to have? Could she shift genders as well? Species? Just how many animagus forms could she take? Was there a limit? Best not have thoughts like those while dealing with the ultimate Ministry stooge.

In any case, one of her copies found the schedule. It was nothing then to copy the parchment and add a Protean Charm. Then it was off to deliver a note to herself in front of Merlin and everyone while under the Invisibility Cloak, and really Draco was right about that. She was going to have to look into it at some point. There were far too many layers involved in its creation for it to be a simple Invisibility Cloak. She was not expecting the door to open up once more behind her, nor for Professor Snape to be standing as if waiting for…She took off the cloak.

"I take it you were successful in whatever endeavour you attempted?" He asked. She nodded. "Am I going to have to provide an alibi?"

Hera couldn't help it, and snorted at the very idea.

"No, but I've still got a lot of work to do." She admitted, before hesitating as she continued. "I did something earlier that I'm not sure I understand. I'll have to show you when there's a free moment…I think it could be useful, but for now I have work to do."

"So long as you don't miss class." Snape warned. She was gone before he'd even finished the sentence.

Sybil Trelawney stared at the note with some consternation. Her class was being inspected? Albus Dumbledore had protected her because of her gift, weak though it was, for many years. She didn't think that protection was going to quite cut it this time around, not when it was the Minister that had sent this woman, and Albus being on the outs with said Minister. A noise from the classroom caught her attention, and she went down to investigate. She wasn't sure what she was expecting to find, but Hera Potter hard at work rearranging her classroom hadn't been on the list.

"Well? Come on then. We've got a lot to do and little time to get it done in." The girl insisted, upon seeing her.

"Miss Potter, what is this?" Sybil asked, looking around the strangely clean and incense free room. "What are you doing?"

"Saving your job." Miss Potter declared outright. "Now, come on. I wasn't kidding about the time constraint. Did you really have to have so much incense in here?"

It is with an uneasy sigh that the inspection goes off without a hitch. Umbridge frowns, of course, but Hera had put in a lot of work to make sure that Professor Trelawney would make it through. If the woman fails her, it will be out of pettiness; which is still a possibility. The woman's attention is still drawn to Hera's private work station, which turned out to be far more of a boon than a problem. The way they were able to spin it, Umbridge's only official complaint was that the class seemed to be mislabeled as if it could teach Divination when it was clearly a study in the History of Divination Practices. They could work with that.

"Miss Potter, I don't know how you knew that she'd be here today," Professor Trelawney stated after all the others had gone. "but thank you."

Hera wrinkled her nose at the thanks, as such things had always made her feel uncomfortable; it was just more noticeable now that she had ties to the Underground as she did. The only one she'd been able to thank without feeling weird about it was Tony.

"You'd do well to keep your guard up, you know. It's not over yet, Professor." She warned quietly, before slipping from the room.

"Miss Potter, you will stay after class." Minerva ordered, even as Dolores wrote furiously in her corner. Dealing with that woman was going to take a deep well of patience.

"Yes, Professor." Potter replied dutifully.

She did too, even through Dolores' thinly veiled interrogation attempt. When Dolores had gone, Minerva turned her attention back to Hera.

"You did a good thing today, helping Sybil." Minerva proclaimed fondly. Hera started.

"Professor?"

"Oh, I don't know how you did it, and I suspect you broke far more rules than one should be comfortable with in order to achieve what you did. Still…You do your mother's memory proud, your father's too." Minerva insisted, but then frowned. "I want you to watch yourself around that woman, Miss Potter. I won't be so foolish as to think I can stop you from doing whatever it is you have planned, but please promise you will be careful."

Hera grimaced, not willing to give a verbal promise; which was really the best Minerva could have expected.

"Off with you now, before you're late to your next class."

The young girl waited till she was just at the door before turning back around again.

"Yes?"

"I know that Hogwarts is sentient, but I think we take that for granted sometimes, that it can do just about anything." Hera revealed, her voice barely above a whisper. "I think we forget that before it was a castle, and a school, Hogwarts was an idea. Ideas need help from time to time, to shift and change and grow, but if we let her…Umbridge will destroy Hogwarts, and…Hogwarts is too important. I won't let her have it."

Later that evening…

"Minerva? Can I trouble you for a bit of tea and sympathy?" She hears, and turns to face the Floo in mild wonderment. It had been some time since Severus had thought to trouble her for anything close to that, and it sounded like he sorely needed it now.

"Of course, Severus! I'm about to settle in for a wee dram, if you're interested in joining me." She agreed, having had quite the stressful day herself. Severus stepped through the fire not long after, and Minerva finally got a good look at him. "Dear Merlin, Man, what happened to you?"

"I hope you have more than a dram in here." Severus supplied dryly. "I'm going to need it after what I just saw."

…

"Alright, Potter, out with it. What did you do?" Severus asked. Potter looked a little out of sorts after the admittedly long day she'd just experienced due to the somehow summoned Time Turner. "Walk me through the memory."

"Walk you through the…"

"Yes, walk me through the memory." Severus reiterated. "Place yourself in the mindset you were in before. Maybe it will trigger something."

"Okay. It…it happened when I broke into Umbridge's office." Potter admitted, fidgeting. She began pacing around the room. "I just wanted to find the schedule, but there wasn't a whole lot of time. I had to hurry. There were so many places to search."

Severus startled when Potter split into two.

"I was kind of frantic."

The two Potters split into four; all continuing to pace in different directions, though thankfully only one of them was speaking.

"I was so focused on finding the schedule."

Four became eight, became sixteen, became…oh dear…; all pacing in different directions.

"It was the only thing that mattered, and then when I found it…"
…

"And she just…stumbled onto this ability?" Minerva asked, looking a little pale herself now that he'd explained. Severus nodded, holding onto the tumbler she'd given him like it was a lifeline. "Merlin help us."

Meanwhile, Tony Stark was having problems of his own; His mind wandering to a conversation they'd had before she'd stepped onto the train.

...

"Does it bother you that I make weapons?" Tony found himself asking.

"What?" Hera wrinkled her nose in confusion. "Tony, you're so good at what you do, the newspapers call you The Merchant of Death. Do you know how bloody brilliant that is? Why would you even ask that?"

"The look you give me sometimes when I talk about the work I do at SI." He admitted easily.

"Tony, that's not…Wars happen. Weapons will be made by someone, always. I'm not giving you that look because you make weapons." She sighed in exasperation. "I give you that look because you don't keep track of any of them."

"…What?"

"Do you know where your weapons go, Tony?" She countered, and he's halfway to opening his mouth to say that of course he does, when she stops him. "I'm not talking about being assured by someone else. I'm talking about youknowing where your weapons are going."

"Why does it matter?" Tony asked, flabbergasted as to why this of all things would matter to her. "I have Obadiah for that stuff."

"It's not his name on the company, Tony." Hera reminded him, pinning him with a look. "He might be reaping the benefits of the choices he makes, as anyone in his position would, but you're the one people blame when he makes a bad call."

"Hera-"

"I'm not telling you not to trust him. I'm telling you this is the one area you need to step up and quit being a child on." Hera insisted, cutting him off. "Know where your weapons are going, Tony. You'll regret it forever if you don't."

...

That was the thing. Hera didn't trust the man that Tony had grown up loving as a father, the man who had encouraged him to keep inventing even when Howard didn't. It bothered him that she didn't trust the man, but he couldn't bring himself to ask her why. The way Obadiah looked at her bothered him too, like Hera was ruining every plan he'd ever had. It was strange to Tony, because he was finally doing all the things Obadiah had harped on him for about being more responsible, and the man wasn't happy about it!

Hera was trying to tell him something without outright telling him, probably because she didn't want to take his godfather away from him, but that just made him wonder what she knew that could even make that a possibility. He'd finally gotten around to really looking at the tapestry she'd woven in her sleep, and it gave him no answers regardless of how long he looked at the thing. It was just a line of Humvees in the middle of a desert. It told him nothing. What was out there that Hera worried about? Obadiah assured him that every bit of Stark weaponry was accounted for…

…but what if they weren't?

Only a rushed and whispered explanation in between classes had kept her friends from demanding answers about what she'd done for Professor Trelawney, but with Hogsmeade weekend was coming up, Hera knew she didn't have that luxury anymore. So when classes were over for the day, she took Ron, Hermione, and Draco to an unused classroom, and told them what she'd done. She showed them the Time Turner that the ministry still hadn't come for. They had to know she had it, right? Maybe they didn't want to risk coming for it with Umbridge there. She just didn't know.

"Hera…" Hermione began.

"I know." Hera groaned. "I just…acted without thinking. It was such a bad plan. I had no idea what I was doing, or if it would work, and there was no way for me to ask for help."

"Except for how it was really well thought out for being such an on the fly plan." Draco mused, leaning up against the wall.

"He's not wrong." Ron concurred from where he sat on top of one of the desks. "Why are you so bad at chess again?"

Hera snorted. "Your guess is as good as mine. I can create well thought out convoluted plans, and switch them up on the fly as needed with the best of them, but I can't translate that into chess."

"Well, since we're here, have you given a thought to teaching?" Draco inquired. "I wasn't kidding when I told people my father was strongly considering transferring me to Durmstrang because of that woman."

Hera nodded, sighing a little in defeat. "Yeah. I saw my denial in the common room die the way of the dodo before I'd even finished saying the words."

"Excellent!" Hermione chirped, suddenly a little too happy for Hera's peace of mind. "I can have any potentially interested parties meet us at the Hog's Head. No students ever go there, so we won't be overheard."

"Absolutely not." Hera refused. When Hermione looked affronted, Hera endeavoured to explain. "You said it yourself, Hermione, no students ever go there. We'd stick out like sore thumbs, guaranteeing someone would in fact overhear us."

"We could just rent a room at the Three Broomsticks." Draco suggested. "They host parties there all the time. No one would think twice about it, not with it being a Hogsmeade weekend."

"Think we could get Sirius and Remus to visit?" Ron wondered. "Remus at least has lesson plans he could bring."

"Yeah, but how could we tell him without her finding out?" Hera countered. The others looked confused at this. "Guys, she's made herself judge, jury, and warden. I'd bet my entire vault she's made it to where we can't even send out mail without her knowing who it goes to and what it says."

"Then we suggest that they visit, that we miss them." Hermione suggested. "She wouldn't be suspicious of that, would she?"

"She might if she knows Remus is going to be there." Hera grumbled. "You didn't hear what she called Professor Flitwick."

No one seemed to know what she meant by that.

"She has a problem with what she considers half-breeds." Hera informed them, and oh they did not like that. Draco's anger surprised her, considering he had been raised to think in a similar fashion, but she had forgotten that he held Professor Flitwick as one of his favorite teachers. "What do you think her opinion on werewolves would be?"

"Maybe Professor Snape could help?" Hermione suggested. "He might be able to bypass her security somehow, if she has something like that in place already."

"I'll think of something, and ask him." Hera nodded. "I'm more concerned about the meeting itself. Whoever shows up might look for a demonstration. What should I do for that?"

With that, all three of them perked up, and the conversation quickly became one of lesson planning.