Completed: 1/8/04 8:01 PM

Posted: 1/8/04 8:10 PM

Author's Note: Wow…it's been a little over a week. I think that might be the longest I've ever gone for this particular story. I'm afraid to say this might not be the last either. School is back in session and, though I'll try my best to keep up the tight schedule my teachers can on occasion be a rather pain.

Writing Note: I'm also working on a Draco x Hermione ficlet for a good friend of mine – it's her birthday present. January 10th. I'm hoping to crack down and finish it for her that day, so I don't know if there'll be time for TR until after that. I'm also doing a Harry x Hermione contest fanfic and the deadline is January 30th, but I don't think that will interfere too much.

Romance Note: You know there's a bit obscure romance references in this chapter, which will become much more overt in the next chapter. You know she can't really do much without her memory, now can she?

Next Chapter Note: Includes: flirty-romance and romance of all kinds, SPSoP training scene, and (if it'll fit) some connection bits between Hermione and one of the characters she hasn't really been interacting with.

Right…enjoy already!

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Snape all but shouted the password at the stone gargoyle responsible for guarding Dumbledore's private rooms. Hermione actually stopped in amaze as what had seemed like ton-heavy stone statue came to life and jumped out of the way. Her wonder was quickly shattered however, when Snape pulled her through the slowly opening doorway and her elbow caught on the rough stone walls of the stairwell. The enchanted steps had just started spiraling upwards, but Snape was too impatient for that and Hermione was very nearly literally dragged up the stairs.

They stopped at the second landing for her professor to bang, rather rudely, on the door. She twisted her head back to look up the stairs that continued to climb without them. Where there more rooms up there?

"Albus!"

She was brought to a stop in front of a cluttered desk, behind which sat Albus Dumbledore. Awkwardly standing, which her significantly taller professor's grip on her bicep pulling her shoulder up at an uncomfortable angle, she sniffed loudly and inclined a head respectfully.

"Good morning, Headmaster," she murmured eyes downcast. It was, to say the least, embarrassing to be dragged into the office of one's Headmaster.

But Dumbledore was all smiles. Calmly setting down his quill atop the parchment he'd been working on, he folded his hands on top of his desk and beamed warmly at Hermione.

"Hello, Hermione. Are you feeling better?"

"Headmaster!" Apparently, Snape had had enough of being ignored. "Do you have any idea what your prized student has been up to?!"

Dumbledore sighed and took off his glasses. He rubbed the lenses with the sleeve of his robes, though it was more out of habit than necessity. "I have a fair guess."

Snape's mouth dropped unattractively and his fingers tightened bruisingly around Hermione's arm. "Headmaster, you can't be serious—"

"Ahem." Dumbledore had replaced his glasses. "Severus – if you would be so kind as to shut the door."

Snape didn't move until Dumbledore settled his calm, weighty gaze upon him. The pressure on Hermione's arm dissipated, though there was still a sorry ache in her bicep, and while her Potion's Master slammed the office door shut she took a step closer to the reassuring presence of her Headmaster.

They both waited patiently – Snape less so – while Dumbledore whispered a long string of words that eventually turned the quiet study into a muffled space between four walls that glowed a faint, cheery gold. It seemed a bit much for hearing a minor dispute.

"Now, Severus, kindly tell me what Miss Granger has done to warrant your bringing her here?"

"Are you aware of the Reanimation Potion?" Snape demanded.

Dumbledore leaned back in his chair, tapping his index finger thoughtfully to his lips. "Oh yes, I have heard of such a thing. Quite difficult to brew as I recall – the ingredients themselves are extremely rare." He straightened again, placing his hands in his lap. "But why bring such a thing up now, and in Miss Granger's presence I might add. The youth are quite impressionable, Sev—"

"She already knows it," Snape sneered. Dumbledore gave a soft "ah" and sighed, needlessly bobbing his head in understanding. Hermione suspected he knew all along, but didn't fancy getting grabbed again so she kept silent.

"She could recite every ingredient, even explain how best to acquire them," Snape continued, placing his palms on the front of Dumbledore's desk. "But! She refused to tell me where and by what means she discovered this information."

He looked absolutely livid, and rather than face his rage, Hermione moved to put one of the sitting chairs between them before speaking. "Professor Dumbledore." He looked to her kindly. "I would gladly tell you, sir. Only...I can't remember where I learned it; just that I know."

"This is a serious situation, Headmaster!" Snape hissed.

"Severus," the simply act of standing and the ranting Potions professor was effectively silenced. "In all likelihood, it is probable that Miss Granger truly can not remember." He looked between the two of them – standing a room apart – and motioned to the two chairs. "Please sit."

Neither did.

Stepping out from behind his desk, Dumbledore moved to the large display case behind it and opened one of the glass doors. "As you know, Severus, Miss Granger went through a traumatic ordeal. It's only natural that she would be affected. Poppy and I have deduced that, in a rather Slytherin showing – if you don't mind my saying, dear?"

Hermione dumbly shook her head.

"With a cunning that would make Salazar proud, Miss Granger repressed everything that wasn't of value to her survival in Azkaban." The word made her shiver. "And wisely so. She realized that the less memories that were available, the less the guards would be able to access and feed off of. The only truly happy memories she kept were those of her friends, Misters Potter and Weasley. Is that correct?"

Again she nodded.

He continued to fuss with the cabinet, and it gave Hermione a moments pause. Such a powerful and intelligent wizard who could so easily see what had happened to her, could just as easily be an old man doddering around with ancient trinkets he hadn't the heart to let go of.

"The rest were all purely factual," he continued, gruffly. "And unlike Miss Granger here, Dementors gain no sustenance from books and facts."

Hermione flushed and rubbed absently at her sore arm.

"So, as it sounds, everything that she's been working on for the Order was deemed 'necessary for her survival'. All the knowledge exists in her mind currently, but without any other memories linking to it, it has nothing to explain its coming about. The end result is there, but no process leading up to it."

"That sounds right, sir," she said. "I've been having this odd sense of 'knowing' something, without actually 'knowing' it." She flushed. "Does that make sense?"

"This is all preposterous," Snape snarled.

"Perfectly so!" Dumbledore replied with a laugh. "Allow me to demonstrate."

Hermione watched his arm as it drew back, and caught the metallic flash in the dim glow of the room's sound barrier. In less than half a breath she was throwing herself in front of the potion's professor, knocking him back off the desk. She caught the sword's pommel as the blade arced towards her, and swung it once to dissipate the velocity before she spun the handle in her palm and slashed, with shrieking steel, an 'x' in the air before her.

Dumbledore beamed. "Excellent, my dear!" He clapped, "Good show!"

Hermione stared in horror at the blade she held in her hand and the way she gripped it became suddenly awkward. It tumbled from her numb fingers and hit the floor. Rubies glinted in the light, dazzling her eyes as she tried to read the name engraved on the flat of the blade. 'Godric Gryffindor'.

There came a strangled noise from just behind her, and Hermione had nearly forgotten in her shock the Professor she'd just defended. She whirled around and had a moment of panic before she looked down to see the dignified man sitting on the floor. Hermione fell to her knees beside him and started to help him up.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Professor. I didn't cut you did I? I don't know what came over me—"

Snape looked at the babbling young witch fuss about in a way that, prior to that day, he'd never seen displayed in his presence, before turning his shock and disbelief to the twinkling Headmaster who, only moments before, had tried to skewer him. There were few times that Snape questioned the mentality of his superior and this was one of them. The old man had gone completely nutters.

"Terribly sorry, Severus," the white-haired man said jovially. "All in the name of science you know."

"What exactly has this girl been doing for the Order?" Snape demanded, trying to shake the brunette off. She pulled her hands away – fists straying often times to her worried lips – but she remained hovering just at his side.

Dumbledore had reseated himself, and was currently adjusting his voluminous robes to seat himself comfortably. Eyes twinkling, he popped a lemon drop into his mouth and beamed at Snape. "I honestly don't know. Bit mysterious and all that."

"Headmaster!"

"You can go now, Severus," Dumbledore said around the candy he was sucking on and waved absent-mindedly at the door. "I have a few things to discuss with Miss Granger privately, before I send her off to her classes."

"But Professor," Hermione spoke up quickly as Snape billowed out. Nervously gripping the back of one of the chairs, she said; "I can't do anything in the other classes I'm taking, sir...I haven't got my wand."

"Oh, yes. The snapping of one's wand is a most grievous affair," he said in a cheery voice that was entirely out of place. "Lemon drop?"

An anger that she'd never before directed at the man she looked up to flooded straight from her chest to her fingertips, curling the slender digits into tight shaking fists that trembled against her legs. She gritted her teeth. "In all due respect, sir..."

"Oh!" He exclaimed suddenly. "Where have my thoughts gone these days? You'll forgive me if I am too amused because without the proper piece of knowledge that, of the two of us, only I am currently in possession of, I could understand your distress at the loss of your wand."

"Then please, explain," she gestured for him to do so while forcing herself to calmly sit down on one of the chairs arranged before the desk.

"Do you recall an incident before your removal involving a self-discovery spell in Defense Against the Dark Arts?" He inquired genially.

Hermione genuinely paused a moment and thought. Unconsciously she worked her lower lip between her teeth; eyes fixed on some point diagonally off the ceiling as she worked through the mass of what Dumbledore had called "Order work". She wasn't even sure what this "Order" was – it sounded like some sort of cult to her. Finally she sighed. "No...I'm sorry."

"No need to apologize, no need. It's quite alright," he said. "I'll give you a brief description that should suffice until your true memory returns. This spell was designed to make the castor more in touch with their magic and their own personality and by so doing, increase the strength of their spellcasting. In the case of you and your six comrades – Lily, James, Harry, Sirius, Ron, and Remus – it acted as a catalyst for something called the 'Seven-Pointed Star of Power'."

Seeing her confused look, he tried to explain a little better. "This Star was outlined in the same Scrolls you used to bring the Marauders forward in time—"

Marauders? Forward through time? Now she was even more confused. Just a moment ago he'd been talking about those strange people that had been sitting across her at breakfast and now he was rambling about time and what sounded like a forward-propelling spell. She was quite sure something of that nature was highly illegal.

"You, Hermione, have inherited the characteristics of 'Magic'. You can now see my amusement can't you? You don't need a wand for your lessons. A bit of training up by Tonks and your spellwork will be a snap." He chuckled heartily at his own joke. "The others have begun their work a bit ahead of you, but you were always able to catch up in things..."

Hermione's head was reeling as he went on and on. Who the devil was Tonks? And what did he mean 'no wand' – that would be impossible!

"Oh my, you're still confused." He looked sympathetic, and Hermione tried her best not to yell at him for making her even more confused in the first place.

"Let's try this." Riffling through one of his desk drawers he pulled out a fully set tea tray, complete with steaming teapot. Eyes widening, Hermione leaned a bit out of her chair as she strained to look into this apparently gargantuan drawer.

She was startled out of her peeking by a loud CRASH! Dumbledore had taken one of the tea saucers and smashed it against the top of his desk. She gaped at him. Shifting one of the china cups waiting eagerly to be filled with tea to the silver tray he picked up a second saucer and held it aloft.

"Now look at this disk," he instructed. "And imagine it...as that." He pointed to the powdered, jagged pieces of china lying scattered on the desk – painstakingly hand-painted flowers looking melancholy with their serrated edges and cracked petals.

Hermione had to admit, it was a bit difficult to concentrate with such a steady stream of conscious thoughts rushing through her mind, but Dumbledore was patient. He waited silently as she fidgeted in her seat, tolerantly as she rubbed at her eyes and forced them to focus on the small saucer in his fingers. And when she was finally ready to do as he'd asked there was no sign of fear on his aged face.

She narrowed her eyes, as if she could break the plate by sheer force of stare.

"Don't see the plate breaking apart...see it already broken – the process of getting there is inconsequential."

Right. Hermione's nose wrinkled as she began to sweat. Break you stupid plate!

Hermione bit back a scream as porcelain showered over her in a violent rush; she hardly got her arms up in time.

"My, my. That was exciting wasn't it?"

Slowly, she lowered her arms. Dumbledore, his already messy desk covered in a fine white powder, was patting his beard clean and surveying the vaporized tea saucer with befuddling amusement. He looked up at her and chuckled at the slack-jawed look upon her face. His half moon spectacles were useless underneath the white film that had collected on the lenses.

"Wow..." She breathed. Did I do that?

"Let's try it again, shall we?"

Hermione had spent the lunch hour with Dumbledore, munching on the food brought up by house elves, and eventually working to reform the objects she'd broken. It was some time in the afternoon that she was eventually excused, and walking down the empty hallways that spoke of classes still going on she spent the time in quiet reflection.

She was capable of doing wandless magic. She'd already been shown that to be true, but she had no idea how. In Dumbledore's mind that wasn't important. However, she wasn't satisfied until she knew all the answers.

Her hands were still tingling and that bothered her. The entire lower portion of her arm pulsed with above normal heat that became stifling in the large sleeves of her robes. Her hands themselves, from fingertip to wrist line, were inordinately sensitive to the touch; as if the nerve endings beneath the skin were supercharged.

She reached the Gryffindor Tower with relative ease and without the aid of the Marauders' Map. Either she was regaining her directional memories or she was, as Dumbledore had said, a "quick study".

"Cassiopeia."

The portrait door cracked open and she nudged it the rest of the way with her shoulder and stepped inside.

"Hermione!"

Something jumping in her heart made her realize the emptiness that had taken the place of her two best friends. That hole began to fill as she looked across the common room. Ron had knocked the chess board onto Lily in his haste to stand and Harry was on his feet as well. A strong pull like that of a portkey tugged at her navel, jerking her into action and moving her across the room.

"Are you alright?" Harry demanded moving around the furniture. "What did that slimy git do to you?"

She smiled and let the bespectacled boy lead her to the couch and sit her between the two raven-haired boys from breakfast. Shifting awkwardly, she gave the boy on her left a wide smile. "Hello again."

The boy, Harry's look-a-like, laughed softly and shook his head before the actual Harry recalled her attention. "Hermione?"

"Oh, sorry. It was..." Bright emerald eyes, flecked with gold, darted across her face from a vantage point just below her neck while her best friend crouched in front of her. She smiled wanly. "Nothing. It was nothing."

"Ahem."

Hermione looked up from Harry to the brunette boy sitting kitty corner to her at the coffee table who hadn't paused in his parchment work to clear his throat. Her gaze moved down to Harry who had looked back at the boy as well. As Harry turned back to her, she glanced at Lily. Her own jade eyes were moving between the brunette boy and Hermione.

"You can tell us," Harry insisted. Her eyes were still fixed on the doggedly working boy sitting a dozen paces away. As if her gaze was a tangible feeling, he glanced up at her through shaggy bangs but looked quickly back down again.

"I know..." she said slowly. Brow crinkling in the boy's behavior. Her eyes held his shape 'til the last moment, her head turning back to Harry. "Dumbledore just talked to me about what's been going on lately. It's kind of...overwhelming."

Harry smiled and patted her hand. "I understand—"

That's all Hermione heard before she was overcome by burning pleasure. Jolts lanced up her arm in sharp, tingling bursts before melting down into her chest with a consistency of syrup. It was only luck that she was sitting down for her legs felt as strong as a house of exploding snap cards.

"Harry..."

The flood rolled back and she could see again, though a deep haze was slow in leaving her vision. Lily was gesturing Harry over and she caught the wide-eyed look on the redhead's face before Harry straightened and blocked her view. She pulled her hand back as calmly as she could, but was surprised to find it shaking. Her cheeks felt red and it wasn't too far a stretch with her breath coming out in wisps and her heart thundering enough to rustle her uniform. Lips straining into a smile, she shifted her weight and stuffed her hands under her legs as Harry walked away.

"So...why aren't you in class?" She asked, solicitously.

The boy on her right ran a hand through his long hair, catching her attention. "Neville got his arm transfigured into a table leg. McGonagall cancelled class."

"Oh," she said softly and returned to looking at her lap.

The silence stretched. Ron and Lily resumed their game, the brunette was still continuing his school work, Harry had pulled his broom and its servicing kit out of nowhere, and the two boys on either side of her were solemnly silent with books open on their laps. No one made much of a move to include Hermione and she discovered fully how out of place she was.

Clearing her throat she looked hopefully to the long-haired boy and tried for conversation. "So, umm...what is it you're reading?"

"Background information on the Aureus Prophecy," he said gruffily. He squinted at his current page before turning it. "You remember that, don't you?"

When she didn't answer he glanced up at her and the smoldering blue eyes with their ebony framing lashes looking through silky raven strands, which in any other situation would have made a girl melt straight down into her stockings, made Hermione cringe gently and turn her face downwards.

"Aw geez – I'm sorry, Hermi-"

"No, no." She called him off with a forced smile that strained her lips so that Sirius feared the skin would crack. "It's not your fault I've lost my wits."

He pushed the book away until it formed a rather precarious balance on his turned ankle, and gave his attention of to her with an expert flick of the wrist that sent his long black hair over his shoulder. Hermione stared at the brushed back hair like it was a different entity entirely.

"Any idea when those great memories of yours are comin' back?" He asked, throwing his arm over the couch. His fingertips were grazing her shoulder.

"I am afraid not." She sighed and looked away, giving him her profile.

It was hard not to tackle her to the ground, and hug her with overjoyed shrieks that he'd later vehemently deny, and squeeze her until she was little more than a slender, human-shaped stuffed toy. She'd just come back from the most terrible wizarding prison in the world and the whole school was acting as if she'd merely been misplaced in an obscure Canadian province somewhere. He couldn't believe it. The worst was yet to come, saved for last and all that rot, for as she sat there – undoubtedly Hermione and as much 'flesh and bones' as she could be after prison meals – she made no sign of recognition or displayed even the tiniest, itsy bitsy snitch-flicker of remembrance of him. Ever.

She pulled her wildly attractive thorn-bush of hair into an even messier pile atop her head, but his dangling fingers caught a tiny curl at the nape of her neck and expertly twined it about. He might as well have been Snivellus the way her syrupy eyes were studiously fixed elsewhere.

And then, outstandingly, she leaned to the side – neck pressing against his stilled fingers and hand fluttering up to rest lightly – beckoningly – on his elbow.

"Why does he stare at me?"

Her whispered words were disappointingly not the ones he'd hoped for hearing with one Gryffindor Head Girl's murmuring lips so close to his ear. Grudgingly accepting the curiosity festering from her inquiry, he followed her gaze. A quick burst of motion ending just before his eyes locked on the alleged 'stare-er', Sirius ground his teeth and gnawed aggravatingly on a misfortunate thumbnail. Remus.

The boy's ears were tinged lightly pink and the sway of his quill seemed to have a desperate sort of sashay. Sirius wagered fifty galleons that if he went over for a look at his homework he'd find it filled with nonsensical doodles – created in a panicky burst of desire to 'appear busy'.

The fingers wrapped in her curl twitched. "I'm sure he's not."

Hermione just shook her head and looked down, and – as if linked by a spider-thin string – Remus looked up. Sirius' fingers closed convulsively and he quickly grabbed his book back up into his lap trying to appear as if he couldn't see his mate staring, though not quite sure what 'that' looked like. Hermione shifted against him and he could have sworn she muttered "I told you so".

She lifted her gaze slowly, giving the brunette a chance to avert his own eyes, and stared into the flickering flames of the common room fireplace. She'd read of an odd conscientious in the world of Muggle literature that if one stared into a fire long enough the solution to their current quandary would be reveled. Dutifully, her eyes followed the ornate woodwork in the mantel, dropped courteously down the bricks and alighted on the golden-orange flames. She stared at them for only a moment, the bright light pricking her eyes, before dropping her eyesight lower. The hearth was unswept and the golden pokers smudged with soot. It looked as if it hadn't been used in months.

A sigh was the only sound of her disappointment. There were no answers for her. The sound of quill on parchment stopped a moment and then continued again. Over the din of the other students lounging about with their rare freedom from class, Hermione's ears picked up even the smallest of sounds; the faint squeak coming from Harry's lap as he ran the oiled dragonhide cloth rhythmically over the shaft of his prized broom, the click of marble figurines as they moved across the checkered board with the occasional uprisings of battle and shattering pieces, the pop-crack-sizzle of the fireplace, the rustle of cloth on cloth as the Harry look-a-like shifted more than he turned the pages of his book, the soft puff of the long-haired one's breathe on her ear and neck that fluttered her stray bangs.

No one else seemed to take notice of these small, insignificant things, but Hermione noticed them. They were a six-stringed symphony screeching in her ear, unable to be ignored. The brunette boy's eyes were itching into her skin.

"James," she whispered, shifting to face the long-haired boy. If she'd been looking she would have seen that both boys on either side of her looked up. "Why is he looking at me so keenly?"

He closed his book raked his hair back. He looked annoyed. "It's Sirius."

"I am being serious," she insisted, leaning closer. "Does he...fancy me?"

Sirius licked his lips. There was only a moment of hesitation before he looked up into her face; her long nose, slightly upturned at the end with a faint splattering of freckles across its bridge, lips, though thin, were the most alluring shade of coral, brows, thicker than was currently fashionable, were furrowed in questioning perplexity – a shape which they held often, and oval eyes made larger by their strange honeysuckle color and longish pitch eyelashes. Without the distracting mop of woolly curls, her face truly was rather pretty.

"No," he said smoothly. "Moony hasn't ever fancied anyone – we're starting to think he's a bit of a eunuch."

Hermione frowned and was matched by the angry scowl James was shooting Sirius over his shoulder. He grinned, and hoped it made him look reassuringly innocent. James, however, slammed his book shut and pulled himself off the couch. Giving disgusted looks to Sirius all the while, he abandoned research to sit down beside Lily to help salvage her miserable chess skills.

Sticking his tongue out juvenilely, Sirius crossed his arms over his chest. Stupid James. What does he know anyway? Riding the wave of smug superiority he turned back to his sole remaining couch companion and nearly jumped out of his skin to see her wide eyes boring into him.

"I think you're wrong." Was all she said.

She shifted, almost imperceptibly, but Sirius immediately noticed the loss of warmth along his left side where the line of her body was no longer pressed against his. She seemed to be settling in for a long wait. Her legs crossed at the ankles, and one arm she folded across her knees leaning forward to place her chin in her other hand and her elbow on her thigh. Unblinking eyes remained steadfast on their subject, and the brunette boy began to shift restlessly.

Hermione studied every part of him she could see, hoping that some obscure detail might spark a memory; some clue that would impart to her the reason of his fixation upon her. It wasn't particularly difficult by any means, for he was an interesting subject and fair of face.

His hair was somewhat caught between the traditional brunette and blonde colors, and though difficult to term, it reminded her of gold let too long to tarnish. It wasn't completely hopeless like Harry's, nor perfectly silken like long-haired one, but it was thick and was at that point just before it became necessary to have it cut or be unable to see. Tufts jutted out above his ears, no matter how many times he tucked the locks behind, and he was constantly brushing his rugged bangs from his eyes to read.

She remembered his eyes from breakfast – another piece of himself that was stuck between. An interesting mix it was between ice-coated steel and the blue of a robin's egg. She was pleasantly intrigued to find that, despite how he hunched over his book and the goodly distance between them, she could see those eyes as clear as the nails on her fingertips.

The rest of his face was nearly effeminate in nature. It was slender with high, prominent cheekbones and a less prominent jaw than the rest of the boys his age claimed. Even his lips were shaped in the high bow more common to women and it made the thin, pale lips infinitely hold the ghost of a smile. To his luck, his nose was a bit large and Roman and, combined with the raised white lines stretching scarringly across his face, offset the feminine features that might otherwise have made some think him a woman. It was, in all accounts, an interesting face.

Despite its absorbing qualities, Hermione looked away from his face and down the length of his arm to the parchment packet he was working in and the book propped up in front of him. Like his eyes, the cover of the book was quite plain to see. He was working on Potions – and quite devotedly so.

He had a nice way of writing. It was gentle-sloped and elegant, with an annoyingly perfect attention to reproducing each letter the same; every 'a' like the other. Not a single stroke went out of place, no matter the tense locking in his shoulders. The quill he held between his first two fingers and his thumb, resting the spine's edge against his ring finger. The controlling grip kept the quill from moving too much all over the place, though it did quiver somewhat as his hand moved across the parchment.

She was still staring fixatedly at the reserved motions of the eagle quill when it exploded right in his hand.

Everyone jumped, feather bits rained down on the floor, and Hermione looked guilty.

"What...the bloody deuce was that?!" Ron exclaimed.

Remus gaped at his empty hand and then looked up at the miniature rainstorm above him. "I don't know what happened; it wasn't me," he confessed, looking around at everyone's startled faces. "Sirius...if you did that—"

"I wasn't anywhere near you, you ponce!" Sirius defended.

Remus frowned at him, thin lips turning downwards, and began brushing himself off. "Who knows what your six year old mind would find entertaining—"

"HEY!" Sirius was on his feet now. "You're not a Prefect anymore Remus, so stop acting like some stuck-up—"

"Guys..." James held up his hands, trying to quell the fight that was already blossoming.

"Actually, I am!" Remus bit back, his voice wavering slightly as he fought to keep it from rising. He fished through his robe pocket and pulled out the shining silver badge. His frown was nearly frightening. "Or have you been too busy admiring yourself in a mirror to notice?"

"Oh, brilliant! You're fitting right in – aren't you Moony?"

He'd gone too far and he new it. He could see the hurt in those angrily narrowed eyes and tight pressed lips. They were both breathing heavily through their noses and the animosity between them was thick and dividing. James watched them with a growing sense of dread in his thoughts. Remus rarely ever fought so heatedly with them – he would frown, and disapprove, and would sometimes ignore them for days after a particularly terrible prank, but his personality kept him from actually confronting them. It was disconcerting to realize that simply being in this time was changing them.

It was Harry, hardly taking notice of the fight, who broke the silence – as always focusing on what was important to him.

"Where's Hermione?"

Her feet dangled off the floor.

She remembered that – her bed being so high as to make her look like a small child. The blankets too were voluptuous and dwarfing in their very nature. The mattress had sunk beneath her weight the moment she'd hopped onto it and she'd immediately thrown herself back and reveled in the overwhelming comfort. Never again would she take a proper bed for granted.

But since then she'd sat up, moved to the edge to watch her own legs dangle, and began to take in the foreign room. Looking around, nothing seemed to spark a remembrance and she sunk her fists down into the bed in frustrated defeat. Just then, she spied a beautiful book, covered by rich red leather. Even if she couldn't remember her friends, she knew that a book's proper place was on a shelf.

She hopped off the bed and took a moment to kick off her Mary-Janes before moving to replace it on one of the many shelves. She picked it up dutifully to store it, but as her fingers wrapped around the book a golden lock along the pages clicked softly and the book magically unfurled in her hands. Still determined to put it away, Hermione almost shut it again without consideration but the words upon the pages caught her attention.

Instead of the assumed print, she found the writing inside to be inked and humane in nature. The only explanation was that it must have been a diary of some sort. Her diary. Intrigued by the precise cursive script within and the possibility it contained, something 'familiar' about it niggled her brain and she unconsciously began to read, sinking into the chair at her vanity.

BANG!

The door to the boys' dormitory slammed open adding the bright stairwell torchlight to the faint sunlight that was just beginning to rise over the horizon and through the window. If the slamming of the door hadn't awoken him, the large shape landing atop Harry's bed did.

"Harry, Harry!" Hermione was whispering frenziedly. "Wake up!"

Harry fumbled across the bedside table for his glasses, while simultaneously trying to sit up beneath his heavy blankets and an even heavier Hermione. " 'Mione?" he mumbled, shoving his glasses awkwardly over his nose. "What'r you doin' up so early."

"Haven't slept yet," she explained. He squinted at her groggily in the half-light. She was still in her school uniform; skirt slightly rumpled, a scarce two buttons holding her blouse, it's rolled up sleeves, together, and her tie's knot pulled loosely down to her breasts. Her bare legs were splayed out around her.

"Why-"

"I've been reading this!"

He looked from her grinning face to the object she was holding aloft. It was a book. Ordinary looking enough. Book-shaped with a red, leather cover. He was understandably confused about his friend's unfounded zeal over a simple book – though she was rather fond of such things.

Red...

Leather...

Wait.

Being suddenly jarred from sleep was not helpful at all to one's neural processes; but with each blink, the sleep rolled back, and the pieces started coming together and Harry struggled to figure out what this all meant.

Light caught the edge of the book and a golden lock-clasp flashed brightly, blinding him for a second. He gasped.

The diary!

"What..." He couldn't keep the hope out of his voice. "What do you remember?"

"Everything."