Dinner at the Burrow was always a chaotic affair with so many people around. Two years after the second defeat of Voldemort it was even more so with Percy and his girlfriend Penelope announcing their engagement, George bringing around Angelina Johnson his newly married wife. The announcement of her pregnancy was the actual reason for the party on this night.

Ron and his girlfriend Hermione were having another fight. Ron was getting kicked out of the Auror Academy and he was blaming Harry. Harry tried to point out that Ron was not meeting the scores and was trying to coast by on his fame as part of the Golden Trio. Ginny was beginning to get angry and jealous as Harry took Hermione's side yet again.

The Weasley parents were trying to calm everyone down as George, Percy and Angelina discussed who would draw wands first, Harry, Hermione, Ron or Ginny.

Suddenly a large red and gold swirly vortex opened in the side wall. Bits and pieces of furniture suddenly blew across the room. Everyone lined against the far wall with their wands drawn. Personal attacks and disagreements temporarily forgotten.

A tall slender attractive red haired women wearing some kind of black bodysuit came out followed by a male who appeared similarly dressed but only a few years young. The two of them stood looking at the others as the vortex spun itself down and shut. Harry noticed they both had what looked like guns of some type on one hip, wands in cross draw holders and some kind of bracers on each arm.

The female glared at the assembled people and spat out a question, "What is today's date?"

Harry stepped forward with Hermione beside him, "First off why don't you tell us who you are and what you're doing here?"
"Today's date or I get angry!"
Harry looked at Hermione who shrugged, "Its March 3rd 2000. Now that we've established when we are how about you tell me who you are?"
"I'm Rose Granger-Weasley this is Albus Severus Potter. We've come from the year 2042 to put right what once went wrong."

Harry frowned at the woman as he shook his head, "What? Time travel is illegal. Plus all the time turners got destroyed."
"Yeah I know that Uncle Harry that's why my team and I spent the last five years developing a thaumic temporal manipulation vortex. I want to do this the easy way and talk to you, but if I have to I can do it the hard way too."
Albus stepped forward, "Father I know you can cast the Familia Paternis Spell. It will confirm who we are."

Harry raised an eyebrow but cast the spell. A thin gold light shot from the girl to Ron and the Boy to himself. Then went out when harry canceled the spell. "Okay that tells us who's your daddy but not what you're wanting to put right."
"We want to make sure you and Hermione Granger get together and not the Weasleys."

Ginny stepped forward at that point "WHAT? You build some kind of time travel machine and come back here spouting some crazy crap saying you want to prevent us getting married."

Ron was shaking his head too, "What the hell. That would mean neither one of you would exist."
"Yeah and it means that Hermione would live past the year 2017 and you wouldn't be in Azkaban for life Ronald Weasley." Albus stated flatly.

Hermione gasped, "What you, are you trying to say Ron killed me?"

"Exactly Miss Granger. You were caught with a close range bombarda to the chest when Senior Auror Harry Potter went to arrest Ronald Weasley for violating the Statute of Secrecy. He would have received a fine and time served but investigation uncovered multiple violations of assault on muggles, violations of the statute of secrecy as well as spousal abuse." Albus stated flatly.

"Bullshit" Ginny declared. "Harry you'd never arrest Ron."
Harry shrugged, "If he broke the law I'd be duty and honor bound to do so. Best friend or not."
"Really mate? You'd arrest me."
Arthur cleared his throat, "Ron when harry becomes an Auror he swears a magical oath to uphold our laws, serve and protect the public and the wizarding world. If he found out you committed a crime he would have to or he would be ruined."
"Haven't you been paying attention to anything they've been talking about in the academy Ron?" Harry said.

"Yeah well I mean how do we know this is real. They may be our kids unless the spell got fooled somehow."
"Ronald you cannot fool that spell. To fool it you'd have to physically overwrite your entire magical pattern. Its even better than Muggle DNA testing." Hermione pointed out.

"Yeah right. I didn't do anything. This is just some hallucination George brewed up."
"Sorry mate. None of this is mine." George said in honest sincerity.

"Well young lady you just go back to your time right now. I'm not going to give up on my relationship with Minnie."
"Gah that is a horrible nickname." Hermione turned to Ron.

"What you let Harry call you Mione." Well yes because I don't mind that. Minnie? That doesn't even make sense for my name. It is better than Herms at least."
"Yeah well you set fire to my underwear last time I called you that."
"So I had warned you!"

"I was in them at the time!"

"I warned you not to ever call me that again. You deserved it."
"ENOUGH!" Harry shouted.

"Hey its just a little lover's quarrel Harry mate. We'll outgrow it."
"No you actually don't. And while you never actually physically hit our mother you have come close enough that we spent several nights with our Gramma Molly while Mother went to stay with Uncle Harry and Ginny."

"Who is we? Do you have a sibling?" Hermione asked with a slight smile.

"I did. He's dead. He committed suicide a year after you were murdered by Ron." The red head coldly said.

Hermione's face fell then was replaced with a cold angry look at Ron.

"So uh Albus Severus. Interesting name." Harry asked trying to defuse the situation and let people calm down.

"Yeah two of the biggest assholes in your life and you named me after them. The man that kept you in the dark like a mushroom, kept you beat down and abused, and never gave you the support he should have and the potions master who had an obsession with your dead mother because she dumped him after he turned dark and started hanging out with people that saw her as less worthy to live than herd animals."

"Yeah well that is a different interpretation."

"Oh yeah and that's not counting the fact he was the one that got your parents killed by telling the dark lord about the part of the prophecy Dumbledore let him overhear."

"That is all very interesting but what about the claims you just made about Ron and I?" Hermione huffed calm enough to speak without shouting again.

Harry nodded, "Okay. I assume you brought back something to corroborate your claims?"
Albus fiddled with something on his right bracer then reached into a pocket that was magically enlarged and pulled out a file. It was marked official investigation and trial records of Ronald Bilious Weasley. Dated December 15th 2017. Sealed with an official ministry security seal. Albus reached out with his finger touching the seal, "I, Auror Inspector Albus Severus Potter, authorize Harry Potter and Hermione Granger to read this file." There was a slight sparkle then the seal broke. Harry nodded as he took the file.

Ginny glared at the two traveler, "Harry loves me. He knows we're meant to be together."

Albus laughed hollowly, "Really? Trust me I heard a lot of things said at the divorce and the funeral that really dispute that."

"Harry?" Ginny asked uncertainly.

He grunted an unintelligible reply then slid the folder to Hermione. "He really did all of that?"
"Yeah the investigation revealed quite a lot of times he had confunded Muggles, used the Obliviate spell on them Violated the Statute of Secrecy multiple times. Minister Malfoy had to commute the sentence from death to merely life in Azkaban. The entire Wizengamut except for three had voted for death."
"Well that's wonderful. At least I had three friends. And Minister Malfoy?" Ron said with a bit of graveyard bravado.

"Yes Minister Draco Malfoy has served very well and responsibly over the last nine years. After he got over the grief of his first wife's death. Fortunately he met a very nice muggle woman and she has accepted our world. Since she was a bit younger than him he has two more children besides Scorpius."

"Yeah but who voted to acquit me."

"Oh they didn't vote to acquit they voted to give you life in prison. Neville Longbottom, Ernie MacMillian, and Theodore Nott. Uncle Neville said it was unfortunate that the Dementors had been destroyed as you deserved to suffer for what you did to Hermione." Albus said with a snort of amusement.

"Neville said that?" Ron growled.

"Yes he did."

Hermione slapped the folder on the table and glared at Ron in a cold fury. She did not look like she trusted herself speaking. She just glared at him through slitted eyes.

George stage whispered to Percy, "Two knuts says he's on fire before the nights out."
"No bet."

"SO that is a very interesting investigation. Ron was a very naughty boy." Harry quipped, "But that still doesn't make me understand why Ginny and I got a divorce or why you would go to this much trouble to unexist yourselves. Changing the timeline like this has got to be rather disruptive."

"We hope so. The wizarding world had not changed very much. By the time we got to school we were still using parchment and quills. Studying by lamps and torches. When uncle Neville became headmaster recently he began to make changes at the school but even then the Pure-bloods resisted."
"Yeah but magic and technology don't work together." Arthur stated.

Rose shook her head, "It does. They are not incompatible. I applied the scientific method to the problem and there is an entirely new branch of magic at Hogwarts that we can study. Techno-wizardry is the blending of technology and magic. Another thing Minister Malfoy pushed forward under Granger's law."
"Granger's Law?" Hermione said at the same time Ron did.

"Yes named after Hermione Granger the brightest witch who wasted her career in the magical creatures office. It removes a lot of the legal restrictions on muggle technologies and items. Flourish and Blotts has opened a coffee shop and sells pens, paper notebooks and even E-readers."
"E-Readers?" Hermione shifted mental gears at the unfamiliar word.

"Electronic books. Imagine the complete works of William Shakespeare on a wafer the size of my thumbnail mom. With room left over for Keats, Wadsworth and Longfellow."

Hermione had a rather thoughtful expression that made Ron at least relax a little

"As it is Muggle technology has developed to such a degree they are beginning to notice the wizarding world. Unfortunately without cooler heads to guide us the clash between our two worlds might wind up very badly."

"I'm sure Harry will do his best."

"Dad drank himself to death in 2028 after mother divorced him."

"What? That's the second time you said divorce. Why did I divorce him?"

"Because at the funeral he admitted that Hermione was the first girl he made love to and that his heart was broken when she died, that he would never love again."

Ginny frowned as Harry and Hermione both looked at the table blushing. "You two had sex? When was this?"
"After Ron abandoned us on the Horcrux hunt. We did it a few times to comfort each other. After the battle we talked about it and agreed it was just because we were tired and frustrated and felt hopeless. We wanted to feel something." Hermione said calmly.

"No actually its because I realized we might die and I wanted to express my feelings to the girl I really loved."

"WHAT!" Two Weasley's screamed in unison. The other Weasleys were not sure what they should do. If they interrupted then they might cause more problems, if they did nothing they could be witnessing two broken relationships.

Harry swallowed as he ran his fingers across the table. Hermione was looking uncertain as she watched him.

"I stepped aside because I thought Ron made you happy. Because I thought you'd be taken care of and given a good life. Finding out he killed you. I won't stand back. Hermione I love you. I don't want to keep going without you anymore."

Ron stood up, "You fucking asshole. You just can't stand to see me get anything. You can't stand to see me win."
Harry stood up so fast his chair flew backwards, "I thought we had that resolved Ron. I don't care one way or another if you win or lose or whatever. You are responsible for your own screw-ups but I won't let you hurt Hermione!"

"I haven't hurt her. You're letting what might happen get to you. Its the future it doesn't matter. It hasn't happened yet."

"But it will. You never change Ron. You keep doing the exact same crap over and over."

"No I don't I change and learn and grow."

"Really? Going back to first year you poisoned my relationship with her. You made her cry so bad she was in a bathroom with a troll coming. Hermione is the only person on this planet who ever stood by me through everything. Who actually cared about me and looked out for me. Yeah we haven't had the best of relationships but I still love her. And I'm not marrying Ginny! So you can get that out of your skull!" Harry had balled the front of Ron's shirt in his fist when there was a strange whooshing noise as Albus smiled and vanished.

"What where did he go?" Ginny asked pointing at the empty chair Albus had been sitting in.

"Where did who go?" Rose asked.

"Albus? The son I had with harry. The one that came back in time with you." Ginny screeched in shock.

"Harry has no sons. He's a bachelor. He loved Hermione so much he stepped aside for her when she said she loved Ron. He never married anyone. Meanwhile she stayed with that bastard Ronald. He got jealous and possessive and ruined her life. Ruined my life. I hate him so much I built a time machine to come back and kill him so I could never be born." She had drawn a very strange looking chrome gun. Its barrel was fluted and ended in a crystal lens. It was pointed directly at Ron's head so he had a very clear view of it.

"Wait. What about the grandfather paradox?"

"I took that into account mother. I can't let him kill you again. You deserve better than him." She said pointing the gun at Ron.

Harry shoved him down and stood in front of Ron.

"Move uncle Harry. I know you want to save everyone but not this time. He has to die. He has to be stopped."
"Rose. Look it couldn't have been that bad." Ginny said as Ron was frozen in fear.
"His drunken beating of Mom, of me, of Hugo. That's why Hugo died. He got mad at Hugo for ruining some stupid Chudley Cannons memorabilia and he beat him so hard his magic couldn't even save him. Mom was already in Mungo's from the miscarriage his beating caused. I can't let that happen."

Hermione started crying. "But Rose. The grandfather paradox. It'll never let you kill him. You'll never stop it."

"Like I said mom. I took that into account. I disentangled my quantum slipstream from the temporal matrix at that time period when I left. When I reintegrated with this temporal flow my quantum state entangled with the local reality frame of reference. The grandfather paradox doesn't apply to me."

"But that means you can't go back either." Harry pointed out calmly. Hermione glanced at him saying nothing but Rose laughed.

"Uncle harry this was always going to be a one way mission. The energy cells in my suit are rigged to explode if someone tampers with them or if I have remained in this quantum field longer than an hour. We have under 30 minutes to let me kill Ron so I can go away or all of you die. Its better this way. Its better for everyone."

"You hate Ron so much you'd kill all of us. Irrevocably change the timeline just to prevent him marrying Hermione." Harry spoke softly like they said to do in training. He didn't know what else to do. It had been only around fifteen minutes they had been dealing with this. Apparently the ministry had not detected her time travel.

"Yes. I wanted to try talking first. To try and get mom to listen to reason. I knew she still loved you. She kept the picture of you when you graduated Auror Academy until she died. She used to sit up crying looking at it. We buried her with it. Uncle Neville and Aunt Luna said you'd recover but we buried you a few months later. You'd drunk yourself to death Uncle Harry. That's when I began my research into time travel. When I knew I had to do anything to stop him. To prevent their marriage."

Hermione was standing with her eyes closed, tears running down her cheeks. The strange whooshing noise started to build again and Rose faded out just as she pulled the trigger. Harry looked down at his chest but finding no wounds looked at Hermione who was hyperventilating. Ron had stood up and went to put his arm around her when she knocked it away, "Don't. No. I need to leave." She stepped to the side and apparated out.

Harry didn't take time to think he cast the auror spell that let them follow someone who had apparated and leaped after her.

=====xxxxx=====

Unsurprisingly they were standing in the Forest of Dean under a half moon. Hermione was crying softly now. Harry walked over in front of her so she could see him. She looked at him in pain her eyes already red and beginning to get puffy, "Harry I. I changed the time line so she never existed. I'm confused. I thought I loved Ron, I thought he loved me. But both timelines my own daughter was willing to come back and prevent our marriage. The second one by killing her own father."

"Well I suppose you could take pride in the fact she was smart enough to build a time machine in the first place."

Hermione rolled her eyes at him. "True. Even with Ron's DNA no doubt muddling things up."

"So since uh. Well now what?" Harry kicked some pine needles with his toes.

Hermione sat on a log and created a fire to warm up and give them some light. "I don't know."

"Well there's some words I never expected to hear you say."
"Is there any particular reason you followed me?"

"Well to make sure you were okay. I can go if you want me to." Harry hoped she didn't and it must have carried in his voice.

"No. Just sit and let me think for a bit."

Harry sat quietly like she asked. She had at least stopped crying. Taking her shirt tail and rubbing her eyes she sighed and sat staring into the fire. Levitating sticks over and keeping it going. Harry wasn't sure how long they sat like that. He wasn't watching anything but her.

Finally she sighed, "Why do you love me."

Harry froze for a moment as his mind blanked for a second then he smiled, "Because I realized that without you I'd be dead. That I needed you more than anything else, anyone else. That you've shown you're the one I can trust. Trust with my life."

"What about Ginny. Don't you love her?"

"I care about her. I do. Just she's not quite. I dunno. She's got a temper that is crazy. She's popular and social and wants to go places and do stuff and is dragging me to clubs and parties and out. I sometimes like it but most of the time I just want to come home and sit and relax. The training is crazy. It makes me wish I was back studying for OWLS to take the load off some days."

She chuckled gently, "Now there's words I never expected you to say."

"Yeah."

"Ron says I'm boring and a stick in the mud. Plus he keeps pushing me for sex. We've done it on occasion and he's not very satisfying."
"Uh I'm sorry I guess."

Hermione laughed, "Sorry. I've felt so comfortable talking to you Harry. I feel like I could talk to you about my monthlies and you'd not say anything bad or walk out of the room like Ron does."

"I guess. Its no big deal really its part of who you are. I talked about Cho and other girls with you. So Ron gets squicked out by a simple bodily function."

"Well yeah. I've used them a time or two as an excuse not to have sex. He pushes for it a lot more than I want to give it. I mean I'm a healthy young woman but even I don't want it nightly."

"Okay. That's a bit much. Must be a Weasley thing. I want to just sit or lay and cuddle and Ginny takes that as a sign to get naked."

"Well I think tonight ended things with them."

"True. I don't want to go back." Harry said with a sigh.
"Maybe we can work on giving it a go." She said reaching out to take Harry's hand.

======xxxxxxx=======

It was the year 2020 Chief Auror Harry Potter was walking next to his wife of 18 years Under Secretary for the Minister Hermione Potter. Chief researcher for the Granger Institute, wife and mother. The number of hats she wore made Harry's head spin sometimes.

Their 15 year old dark brown haired son was charging ahead waving to friends already. His Gryffindor robes flapping behind him. His cousin Teddy Lupin had given him a new Dark Detector so he was scanning everyone and everything with it.

"Daniel James not everyone is dark." Emmaline Lily his 12 year old sister with long wavy black hair and deep green eyes sighed once again. Her broom over her shoulder as she pushed a cart that was half books and half sporting gear it seemed like. Her second year as a Ravenclaw was shaping up to be just as interesting for both the school and herself as she was a genius level sports star who could calculate trajectories on the fly and hurl the quaffle off angles that made the other teams wonder if she had somehow charmed the ball.

The youngest child hung back. At 10 years old he was still filled with wonder at all of the magic floating around. His messy black hair and deep brown eyes accented his father's face as he was the spitting image of Harry. His bravery and inquisitiveness was going to give the hat a quandary Harry was sure.

"Hey dad I see Celeste can I go say hi?"

"Sure Siri." He said to the young boy who ran off to the short thin blonde girl standing next to her ethereal mother who was talking to her older three children. Sirius Remmie had a major crush on the young girl that was the daughter of his godparents Neville and Luna Longbottom. Neville was not there of course as he would be waiting for the train at the other end in the castle. His job as Head of Hufflepuff and Herbology would be rather pressing. Not that Luna couldn't handle things. Editing the Quibbler and running a magical creatures preserve was not for the weak.

Harry looked around and saw Ginny and her husband Seamus with their four kids. It had taken several years for their friendship with her to rebuild.

Unfortunately Ron never forgave them. He had wound up with Lavender who was a loud common innkeeper at Hogsmeade. She had given him five children and was on their sixth. Working with his brother at the joke shop he had become the manager of the Hogsmeade store at least. So they didn't ride the train since the school was just a short walk away.

"Minister Malfoy." Hermione said to her boss as they walked up to him.

"Hello Potter. Potter. Another year begins eh?"

"Yeah how's Astoria?"

"Doing better the muggle chemotherapy you and the Institute wanted to try is killing the curse. She's tired and didn't feel like coming out today but said if I ran into you to thank you once again for working on that."

Giving her boss a quick hug she smiled, "I'm glad it worked. Astoria has been good for you."

He shook Harry's hand then moved off with his young daughter who would be going next year.

The two Potter children who were going on the train came over agreed to be publicly hugged by their parents then vaulted on the train with the other students. Leaving a scattered crowd of siblings and parents on the platform as the train rolled out.

"Well seems like the future is not as bad as it could have been eh?"

"I guess we can still give it a go. After all there's still plenty of time." Hermione said with a cheeky grin.