Hermione nearly jumped out of her skin as she turned on the light upon entering the sitting room of her home. Hidden in the dark, awaiting her return were both Farrah and Sirius. Farrah had a bouquet of fresh flowers gripped tightly in her small hands, and she saw that Sirius had taken one out and put into one of the pigtails of her thick, black curly hair. She beamed brightly as she and her father both shouted 'WELCOME HOME MUMMY' as loudly as they could. Sirius stood beside their younger child, a cake balanced on one hand. Hermione raised and eyebrow and smiled at them, confused by the surprises.
"Wow!" Hermione said, bending down to pick up Farrah, who still clutched the flowers to her chest. "What is all this?"
"Its a 'we love you the most' party!" Farrah explained, shoving the flowers into her mothers face. Hermione blinked rapidly as pollen flew, but she laughed and put Farrah back on the floor and kissed her head; she then took the flowers and laid them on the coffee table. She turned to her husband, who grabbed her under her chin and gave her a quick but heated kiss.
"Well!" Hermione said, looking around where Sirius had obviously helped their daughter draw pictures which hung all over. "I love it!"
"YAAAAAY!" Farrah shouted, clapping her hands excitedly. "Can we eat the cake now, daddy?!" She ask, looking up at Sirius with large, pleading eyes.
"After supper, Button. Remember?" He said, gently booping the tip of her nose with his pointer finger. "Pop upstairs and change into pajamas before pizza comes! Then we can start the movie!"
"Okay daddy!" She said as she ran off, nearly falling in her excitement. Hermione laughed as she watched her go, then came back into Sirius' embrace who gave her a much deeper kiss in their child's absence.
"For real, what is all this?" She ask as she pulled away.
"Well..." Sirius said, twisting a curl of his wife's hair around his finger, "I just thought; Moony and Dora are getting married, and Lily is pregnant again... I didn't want you to feel left out or sad about any of it all. So I talked to Farrah about how we could surprise you. She suggested we order food, you know, so you wouldn't have to cook... Or suffer through my weak attempt at cooking. And a movie and cake, because... Well it was a reason for her to have cake." Sirius laughed.
"This is so sweet, thank you, Darling." Hermione hummed, giving Sirius' cheek a quick stroke. "I will go put something more comfortable and loungey on for the pizza, too."
Sirius smiled proudly to himself and settled back on the couch, kicking his feet up onto the mahogany coffee table, the very back of his mind amused at how upset his mother would be if she could see her home now; Filled with muggle items, his muggle-born wife and their half-blood children... and his motorcycle books scuffing her table. The pizza wasn't due for another twenty minutes, and knowing his wife and daughter as well as he did, he decided to close his eyes, a bit tired from the day.
He had no sooner found a comfortable groove to relax into than a booming knock sounded on the door. Confused, Sirius sat up.
The pizza delivery people usually used the doorbell, which Sirius had installed about a month after he and Hermione had moved in. He waited, and a second set of frantic, hard knocks shook the door on its hinges. Sirius was suddenly on guard, and he quickly disapperated upstairs to Farrah's room, who he scooped into his arms and hurried her into the master bedroom where he sat her on the bed. Hermione looked confused and he explained that someone was at the door. He brandished his wand from his pocket and popped back downstairs.
Bracing on the door, Sirius waited and listened. the knocks came again, and then he heard mumbling. "Bloody fucking hell, since when do they even lock their door?" Came James' muffled voice.
"What ARE you doing?" Sirius said, flinging the door open. "I was ready to attack you for crying out loud!"
"Keep that energy." James said, reaching forward and grabbing him by the wrist. "We got to go, now!"
"What?" Sirius demanded, following James' stumbling, hurried footsteps.
"There... is a fucking... basilisk." James said, dragging Sirius still; but at the mention of the mythical snake, Sirius dug in his heels.
"How do you know about it?" Sirius ask, confused, his voice squeaking with surprise.
"How do YOU know about it?" James demanded in return. The two wizards simply stared at one another for a moment.
"Hermione told me." Sirius confessed. James looked even more confused.
"Hermione told you." He repeated.
"Hermione..." Sirius sighed, remembering James wasn't as aware of all the information she'd given to himself and Remus when she first landed. "Hermione knows things. I can't exactly explain how, but just trust me."
James stared at him, then blinked a few times.
"Why didn't she say something before now?" James said. "The fucking thing is LOOSE."
"ITS OUT IN THE CASTLE?!" Sirius shouted. James nodded, his face looking at Sirius like he was insane.
"That is why I'm here, trying to drag you to Hogwarts!" He explained.
"Where is Remus? Does he know?" Sirius ask, jogging to catch up to James, who had started to walk again.
"That's the thing- nobody can find him." James explained. "McGonagall said he needed time off, and wouldn't tell more than that. Something weird is going on."
"So how did you find out about the snake? Did someone find it?" Sirius ask.
"It came down onto the Quidditch pitch, snapped at students on brooms and then sped off back toward the castle, disappearing into the back." James said. "Hasn't been seen since. Dumbledore called for Moody, and he brought me with him. I ask about Moony and that is when I found out he wasn't there."
"Where are the students? Harry and Della?" Sirius demanded as they began to run to the Ministry transport spot.
"All closed in the great hall, helped ward it myself." James explained, hoping to calm the worries of his friend about his elder daughter and Godson. "We have to find it and kill it."
Sirius stopped running, and after a few feet, so did James and he turned to his friend, jogged back and looked at Sirius, who was deep in thought with furrowed brows.
"What is it, mate?" James ask, a hand on Sirius shoulder.
Sirius looked up suddenly, his grey eyes snapping up so quickly James nearly jumped. He grasped tightly on the wrist where James' hand rested on his shoulder and disapperated them without a word.
The two of them landed in the study of his home and he left James standing by, confused and dizzy, to find his wife. He sent Farrah back to her room and got Hermione by the hand, rushing her into the study.
"Tell him." He said, nodding to James. "Everything you possibly can- Tell him."
"Tell- Tell me what?" James ask, looking from one Black to the other. He looked frightened. Hermione sighed, and took a box from a shelf, unlocked it, and handed a picture to James. There were three children laughing in the image; his Harry, Ron, Molly and Arthur Weasley's youngest son, and a girl he didn't immediately recognize.
"That photograph was taken by Fred Weasley on a Thursday in May, 1991. Not last year, but last year of another life." Hermione said. "The girl is me."
James looked up at his friends, brows furrowed as he tried desperately to make sense of what he was being told.
"Harry was my first friend at Hogwarts. I'm afraid I was a bit annoying, overbearing in my need to prove myself as a muggle-born student. I read everything I could, and used any opportunity I had to make it known I was smart. When my academic appetite became too much for a normal course load, McGonagall gifted me with a time turner. I used it to take double the classes. Years later- I used it to fix everything that went wrong in the first war, and to prevent the second."
James sat, hazel eyes wide in horror and shock, mouth agape.
"In the first war-" Hermione continued, "Peter convinced you to make him secret keeper, rather than Sirius and Remus, and he gave you over to Voldemort- who killed you and then Lily, who died protecting Harry. He tried to kill Harry, and was ripped from his body, and had to-"
"Use the Horcruxes you had us destroy." James finished, nodding. He looked pale, and swallowed thickly as he looked back to Sirius.
"Lily and I... died?" James ask quietly. Hermione nodded sadly.
"When Harry was just one. He had to live with Petunia." She confirmed.
"Petunia?! Where were you? Where was Remus?" James demanded from Sirius.
"Prison. They thought I did it. And Remus was homeless, and still a werewolf, mate. Harry was the infant that 'killed' Voldemort. No way the ministry was going to let him have little Harry." Sirius sighed.
"Its such a long story, James. I really am sorry. I had to save you though. All of you. You and Lily. Sirius and Remus died in the died in the second war- so many people did. Harry was so depressed and he blamed himself so much- I had to do it." Hermione explained.
"No, thank you. Thank you, Hermione." James said with an uneasy, still shaken smile.
"Hermione also knows about the basilisk, too." Sirius said, crossing his arms over his chest. "We best get more information before we go in blind."
"How?" James ask, looking now to his friend's wife.
"Second year, Harry killed it saving Molly and Arthur's youngest child." She explained.
"MY HARRY?!" James squeaked. Hermione couldn't help the slight snort.
"The Harry I grew up with and the Harry I have the honor of helping to raise are similar in many ways- but they were also incredibly different. He was very brave, and so kind- just like now. But he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders and he always felt like he had to save everyone. When Ginny was taken, he and Ron, the youngest Weasley boy, they went to find her because the adults were taking too long. And they did find her, and save her; and Harry killed the basilisk- He summoned the sword of Gryffindor, which I believe you can find in Dumbledore's office."
"Well, surely if my twelve year old did it once, Sirius and I can do it now. I wish we had Remus- We need to find that out too. Has anyone ask Tonks?" James ask.
"She is gone, too." Hermione said, suddenly remembering. "Lily and I went by to ask her about painting the new nursery for you and she had a sign up that the shop would be closed the rest of the week."
"I hope they're okay. I can't believe we have to do this without the brains of our operation." Sirius said, shrugging on his long, dragon leather duster coat. "First we save the children and Hogwarts- then we find our mate." He said with a firm nod. James returned the gesture. "Hermione, darling. Go over and take Farrah with you- keep Lily calm." He instructed. Hermione, knowing her pregnant friend's anxiety and nervous disposition, agreed.
"I want to hear more of this when everything is settled again!" James called over to where Sirius held Hermione close and was giving her a long, passionate goodbye and good luck kiss.
"Be safe!" She called as the wizards once again hurried away and down to the disapperation point.
Hermione took a deep breath, reminding herself how skilled and capable both James and her husband were as wizards and aurors before going in and gathering Farrah to head over to Aunt Lily's house for the evening.