Chapter 3: A Bit of Bookkeeping

Hermione could have cried in relief when Dumbledore arrived in the hospital wing and found his way to the foot of her bed. By this point the two boys who looked hauntingly familiar had given up on asking her questions she refused to answer and had wandered over to another bed across the room. Hermione had taken one look at the mop of sandy hair belonging to the sleeping boy before clenching her eyes and turning away, unable to look upon the young face of her late professor.

Dumbledore had the same look in his eye that Madam Pomfrey and Sirius seemed to and by the look of his slightly shorter beard and less aged appearance Hermione came to the conclusion that she had been correct. Thoughts whirled around her head as she tried to come to terms about what had happened to her and she suddenly came to the conclusion of that tiny little box that Neville had given to her.

"I assume you are looking for my matchbox?" Dumbledore had spoken upon seeing her frantic search. Hermione's gasp of surprise and widened eyes seemed to work as response enough and he sank into the recently vacated chair at the bedside.

"I must admit that when a strange woman seemed to appear as if by apparition in the middle of The Great Hall as if fresh out of battle, it did surprise me. But that was nothing compared to when I found this within your palm." He continued, fishing the aforementioned box from the pocket of his robe.

At Hermione's gulp he kept going, "I assume that me and Mr Flammel's experiments eventually came to a head then, and we finally found how to harness raw time energy…" Nickolas Flammel? What in the.. "...and I dread to ask from what time you have come and to what dire a situation you must have been in in order to activate it." Dumbledore finished.

Realising that they were not in fact alone and that one person in the room had enhanced hearing, although they may be asleep. Hermione soon replied " Um, Professor. Surely we could discuss this more privately considering it's of a time sensitive nature?" Lowing her voice down to a whisper at the end.

Casting a silencing charm with a chuckle, "I see that I have chosen the perfect person for this job then, I assume you know of the rules and of why I have sent you?" At her still confused expression, he frowned and explained the project that he and his good friend Nickolas had been working on. Hermione's eyes widened as she listened.

It was July 1977 and Dumbledore and Flammel had been working on trying to enhance the energy contained within time turner's for the last 10 years since their information had been released to the public. After understanding the potential that this brand of magic could possess as well as the dangers, they had both been working on ways of restricting its use as well as secretly exploring it's limits.

Recently, they had come to the decision that if they were to overcome the odds and find a way to send someone back a long time, then this could only be used in a time of extreme need. This idea had come about after the escalating powers of Voldemort and the Death Eaters had come into play and Dumbledore saw how the odds seemed to play against the side of the light.

Understanding that one of the two could well die soon, even with the Philosopher's Stone (these were trying times after all), they had come up with a symbol of their project, should someone be sent back and would have to prove themselves. This image was of a simple hourglass surrounded by a series of dashed and solid lines of varying thickness, in the shape of overlocking diamonds, squares and triangles.

Hermione trailed her calloused fingers over the same design on the back of the metal, matchbox sized container that Dumbledore had given to her part way through his explanation. It seemed to be made of tin with small hinges on the side, testing them, she flinched when opening the box, expecting something to zap her away again, yet all she saw were a few loose grains on the sand seen in time turner's, which seemed to have lost their powers. After realising that he had stopped speaking she looked up to see an odd look on his face.

"I can see that you do not know any of what I am telling you which makes me think that things must be much worse than I assumed if neither of us got the chance to explain why we sent you back, or even ask you for that matter." A look of pity clouding his face as he took in the bedraggled look of the child before him.

After this man seemed not to care that he was leaving three teenagers to take on the most dangerous dark wizard of all time with no instructions or help, Hermione knew that what was coming next was going to be bad if it warranted that look. "I'm afraid that you have been sent back to change everything."

Her eyes widened and she spluttered for a second trying to comprehend that statement. Have every muggle TV show and series documenting time travel got it wrong - surely she was not meant to change anything because then we would be left with a paradox? And even if that were not so, why the hell was it left to her to change the fate of the wizarding war? Surely Dumbledore could understand that no one should hold that much knowledge and power?

It would seem that all of these questions were written all over her face because her headmaster quickly explained how, with time, as soon as someone is sent back, that whole previous timeline is destroyed as the person cannot go back to a time that doesn't exist yet. Instead they simply begin to exist in the past, even if their actions were to result in them not being born in the future (as often happens with time correcting itself,) they would not start to fade out like Marty McFly. The same course of events would of course happen if said person didn't interact with anything or anyone when they start to live in the past, but that would be nigh impossible to do.

"I'm afraid, Hermione is it? That the future me has decided on you to be the one that is worthy of gift, but also must consider you level headed enough to comprehend the great burden that you must now bear." Suddenly it clicked. Hermione would be the one to know who would die and when. She was expected to live with all of these people and prevent their deaths, whilst knowing that it would be her fault and her fault alone, should anyone else die this time around.

It was Wednesday when she arrived, she soon found out, and she had overheard from her Marauder guests that they were all headed home on the Hogwarts Express tomorrow. Not that she would be joining them. Essentially, she was alone here; no family and no friends, the majority of which would not even be alive for a number of years yet.

She had decided with Dumbledore that she wouldn't tell anyone of her knowledge of the future because it would put her at too much of a risk from Voldemort, who was steadily gaining in power by the day. At first, he had suggested that Hermione should pass off as a half-blood relation to a teacher who would be snapped up and fostered by a supportive family should Dumbledore ask. But she had quickly shot that down, glancing at the ugly slur taking up her forearm and refusing to pass off as anything else. Furthermore, she concluded that it would be difficult to lie to people in everyday life, but to lie to those who would treat her as family would be too hard to do all the time at 'home'.

That left a very small group of people that would accept a muggle-born as one of their own, but would also be able to keep her secret as a time traveller. Although Dumbledore claimed that everyone he explicitly trusted would not believe in blood prejudice, Hermione knew even twenty years in the future, that sort of attitude would be very common, which didn't leave her feeling very optimistic.

In the end, the pair decided that Hermione would essentially become the ward of Dumbledore's brother Aberforth (after some tricky brotherly negotiation on Albus' side) so that she would be trusted by the Order by association, when they introduced her, and so that she would be close to Hogwarts should she be needed. It was also ultimately decided that Hermione should take her last year again, alongside the Marauders, in order to get her full education, ingratiate herself into the community, and as Albus put it 'try to get a little bit of your childhood back where possible'.

After receiving her things back from Madam Pomfrey (minus the clothes because they had to be cut off of her and then burned), she did a quick inventory. This included her wand and her purple bag which she had stuffed into her sock. Within that, she came across her far depleted supplies from their time on the run, a number of books that would probably have identical copies in this time, Harry's broom, and the Marauder's Map. This last item greatly surprised her and she realised that she must have stuffed it into her bag without thinking after frantically searching through it throughout the battle. She had to make sure that the Marauders didn't see that.

Making sure that she was alone in the hospital ward, she started to categorise her books into textbooks for her seventh school year (which she had bought anyway for something to do whilst on the run), dark magic books researching horcruxes, a number of books regarding the hallows (including Albus' biography), fiction books, and the notebooks she had made containing her discoveries made during the hunt.

She took out her last empty notebook and began a list of the most important things to consider at the present time, especially regarding the students she would experience in the next year. Primarily, she knew that she needed to befriend the Marauders and Lily in order to protect them and make sure that no harm would befall Harry in 1981, yet she had a while to sort out that aspect.

That led her to Wormtail, or Peter, who probably would not have turned at this point, although he was probably considering it. She would have to keep a close eye on him, maybe change his mind, as well as Severus Snape who she was dreading meeting the younger version of, and one Regulus Black, who would turn on Voldemort and die two years from now.

Secondly she would have to refind and destroy the seven horcruxes. A slight moment of joy surged through her as she realised that at this time he would not have created them all, definitely not Harry or Nagini, which means that there would only be five. However, that was quickly dampened when she realised that she would have virtually no way of destroying them as The Sword of Gryffindor would not have had any basilisk venom imbibed within it yet.

Finally, she contemplated her final mission; saving the lives of those killed in the first war. Hermione gasped and reached for a frayed book on the top of the last pile, not believing that she could have forgotten about it. This one was like a scrapbook of sorts, jam packed and worn as if added to and viewed by multiple people. It was Ron who first suggested that they make this book… No don't think of him… and thank goodness that he did.

It started out as a way for Harry to remember his parents and the people that they surrounded themselves with, but ended up as some sort of weird therapy type exercise for those members of the Order who lived during both wars. Eventually every person had submitted a person or people they cared about, including a photo where possible, a birthdate, a death date, description of what they thought had happened and any information they remembered or missed about that person.

It was interesting to see how, as the book progressed, there seemed to be less and less information surrounding each person, as if not many people knew of what had happened to that person, or they wanted as many acquaintances as possible remembered. Hermione distinctly remembered how Moody had remarked about how morbid that this seemed, but then how she had later observed him diligently adding in the names of all of his lost auror trainees and partners that had died throughout the years.

Regarding both her new entries and the overflowing 'Death Book' in each hand, Hermione realised how dangerous that these could be in the wrong hands and quickly applied a few defensive spells, adding a reminder in the notebook to research some better spells before snapping it shut. Dumping everything back into her bag to be properly sorted and cleaned later, Hermione got ready to leave and meet her new guardian, exiting the hospital ward alongside Albus when he came to collect her.

Up next is Chapter 4: A New Home?