AN: This is coming far too late than I had originally intended and much later than any of you all deserve. The past few months have been among the very best and as of the last few weeks among my worst. No Sob Story. You don't want to read that. But, despite my crash computer ( alas, we mourn the marriage law fic that never was…) here's a little diddy of a chapter brought to you by my work lap top (please don't fire me.)

Chapter 24:

Falling Plans

Hermione's life seemed to be in a spiral fall for the rest of the week.

Sleep eluded her. When it finally came, it was racketed with nightmares similar to the first one. Always the same hall way, but the faces changed. Sometimes it was Ron she dug out of the rubble. Other times it was Fred. She waited in perpetual fear that one night when she closed her eyes it would be Harry's turn, and he would be the face she dug out. But not yet. For now, Hermione's meddling of the time line hadn't jeopardized Harry's attempt for survival.

But last night had been different. Last night she was under the rubble. Lying there in the dark. She wondered if that was it, and she was actually going to have a some what decent night's sleep when she felt the rocks around her shift, and guttural cry break out as Fred found her.

"No—God please no—Hermione—" his voice broke when he said her name. She couldn't move, she couldn't say anything. She couldn't blink her eyes shut. She just exist right then in his arm as he rocked her back and forth.

Aside from being dead, and of course Fred being so effected by her death, she preferred this dream over the other alternatives. She had even begun to think that this would be a possibility. If Ron's life was in flux, if Fred's was—why would she be excluded?

If her death meant Harry would survive to finish the job, she could do that. That's what she had resolved last time. It was her same resolution.

But what would that mean for Fred if you left him behind?

Plenty of time for that, she thought. Plenty of time and—he would understand. At least, she hoped he would understand…

She sat in the Gryffindor Common Room the Saturday night following Ron's attack. Harry had joined Ron in the Hospital Wing, following McClaggan's Quidditch Foley, and the mob that had emerged from the portrait hole following the defeat had dissipated, most of the students turning in for an early night. In true Gryffindor fashion there were a handful of students nursing the loss with some goods from the kitchen and a smuggled case of Butterbeers, a few of them even coaxing the defeat with talks how they were still up for the cup in a few scenarios.

Despite the loss, Ron was ecstatic; while Harry's entry to the Hospital Wing took some of the attention away from him, it also brought new faces and visitors. The story of Ron Weasley's poisoning had caused quite a stir at breakfast the morning after the attack. The story Ron had given, of the poison, of telling Harry what to do through spasms—that had been fed as gospel to the other houses courtesy of Lavender Brown, Ron's official companion through the ordeal. Hermione had seen Harry roll his eyes a couple times during her retelling of the story, throwing Hermione a smirk as he shook his head, but otherwise didn't say anything and let him bask in the glory of survival.

Now stories would churn of Harry and yet another fall from the Quidditch Pitch. If Draco Malfoy wasn't coming up with half hearted attempts to murder Dumbledore, she supposed he would take today's events as though Christmas had come early. Not only had Gryffindor Lost, but Harry had been made the fool by his own Chaser, falling to the ground before the teachers had interfered.

But Malfoy isn't Malfoy this year. This year, he's a prisoner just like you are.

Hermione remained alone, awake in the tower now. Books spread out on the carpet in front of the fire as she leaned against the chair, fingers tracing the pages of her book, trying to see what other event could possibly be jeopardized. Her stomach felt like it was full of a cauldron's content, bubbling with dread.

Everything. Everything could be at risk now.

Ron choosing Lavender, that wasn't the end all be all. In fact, aside the fact of awkward months of prolonged snogging, it wouldn't effect her at the least. Despite Lavender proving the most faithful of girlfriends—she had been at the Hospital Wing from start to finish of visiting hours, trudging up Ron's Wizard Chess set to keep him company—Hermione doubted the relationship would last when fall came around when Harry, Ron and Hermione appeared missing from the train. Despite the story of Spattergoit, Lavender would know her Sweetheart was gallivanting somewhere with Hermione Granger and that would be enough for her demons to run and for her to end the relationship.

Spattergoit though—you're going to have to look at that too—if Ron and Lavender spent every waking moment with each other, wouldn't it make sense for her to have it too?

Or worse, what if she tried to get to Ron at the Burrow—Molly Weasley would be better prepared for the companion of the Phlegm, and would act to kill if she jeopardized Harry's Mission.

She scribbled Spattergoit across the margin of a list of events she had come up as vital for the next year; possible fixed points. The Rescue of the Cattermoles—that was more for the Cattermoles and other Muggleborns that it was for Harry—and perhaps it was for her too. She couldn't stand by and let it happen—Ron Leaving, or else they never would've gone to Godric's Hollow, where Harry would end up find out about Grindelwauld—Malfoy Manor—Malfoy Manor—

She looked at her forearm. It was still smooth, the light of the crackling fire giving the normal pale skin a blush like a sunset. Maybe if she did a charm before hand, or asked Fred to try and come up with some numbing agent so she didn't feel the pain…

Is it worth it to know how it ends? She thought, would it be wrong for it to all just go away? To try and figure it out the second time but not bare guilt or shame if you can't save everyone? She was thinking this might be a solution. McGonagall had suggested it at first—and it would be a solution too when Bellatrix tried to read her mind at the Manor.

She can't read something if you've forgot it.

A crack, louder than the fire, sounded behind Hermione. She jumpt forward, nearly sumer saulting and pulling her wand out from beside her and pointing it at a very befuddled Dobby, who at seeing a wand between his eyes jumped back himself.

"Dobby, oh I'm sorry," Hermione said, dropping the wand, her hand pressing her temples together. "I wasn't expecting the House Elfs to be coming up already to clean, I didn't know you apparated in—"

"Dobby hasn't come to clean, Missus," he said, his hand clenching a scroll which he extended towards Hermione, "Professor Dumbledore asked Dobby to get this to Miss Granger immediately, without delay," he explained, "Apparating has the least amount of room for delay."

Hermione opened the scroll to see the familiar emerald ink and slanted hand writting, I received your note upon my arrival. Please come immediately, tell the Gargoyle you favor Aeros.

She took the note and threw it to the fire, "Come on Dobby," Hermione said, getting up and clearing her journal to empty pages, tucking it in with the other books on the floor, "Let's see what the Headmaster thinks."

((*))

"I See another Gryffindor thought it prudent to go to the Hospital Wing in my absence," Dumbledore said upon her arrival in his office. Fawkes sat cooing on the window perch, and the instruments atop his desk played a melodic hum.

"One day they'll rename that the Harry Potter Hospital Wing," Hermione said with a smile, "I think he's spent the most time in there than any our year."

Dumbledore smiled and sat behind his desk, "Poppy tells me the minute Harry Potter graduates from this school she'll be turning in her notice. She had said the Weasley twins were going to put her in an early grave but after your first year I think her first and primary mission became keeping you three alive."

"She did a good job," Hermione answered plainly, "If it all works out—we do."

The smile on Dumbledore's face slid and he looked at Hermione as though she had told him she was sick. "I read your letter, about the dream." He sighed, pulling the letter out and looking over it again. "Have you had more?"

"Almost every night," Hermione answered, "Sometimes its Fred I dig out, other time's its Ron. When it's Ron the real me is there telling me I chose the wrong brother. That I killed Ron Weasley."

"And when it's Fred?"

Hermione paused for a minute, trying to remember if there was a cry out—

"I—I break down. Start to go numb. She'll stand there and watch, but not say anything."

"Has, Has Harry ever been in the rubble?" Dumbledore asked, his features sharp as though it were carved in stone.

She shook her head, "As far as I see, choosing Fred hasn't resulted in Harry's death."

It was as if though a mountain had been lifted from Dumbledore's shoulders. "Very good," he sighed, "Very, Very Good. And I'm happy to hear about you and Mr. Weasley" he said with a smile that seemed to touch his eyes, "There ought to be more love in the world."

"But Professor—"she started, "Professor, I can't get the thought of them dying out of my mind—Harry's death isn't in my dreams but—it's different. It's not like other people who I know will die. I feel as though I have more power than I should—that I could unwittingly end up killing people because Fred and I—"

Her words stopped as everything and everyone she had suppressed into the little book seemed to crash down on her. Collin. Lavender. Dobby. Nigel. Mad Eye. Tonks. Lupin. Fred. "Professor, would—would there be any way for you to erase my memories?"

The smile was gone.

"You want me to modify your memories so you don't remember what's to come? So it's as if you were never sent back in time—"

She nodded. She had been think about this, perhaps subconsciously for a while. If her memories were modified, she wouldn't know when the dust cleared if Fred or Ron were alive or dead. And if one of them were, she wouldn't know it was her fault. She wouldn't do anything that would compromise the search for the Horcruxes. The logical, cool and collected Hermione Granger would return and they would all be better off for it.

"Miss Granger, it's nothing short of miraculous that you three completed the task I left you. You know what will happen. You know how it will all end—if anything that's an asset; to try and replicate the same thing by chance—"

"It could prove all the more successful," she pushed back, "Professor, I—I've had nightmares long before this. Of other people, other people I couldn't have saved even if I tried. Who's not to say when I have to go through it again I don't clamp up and lose it? What if I forget something and it dooms us all? What if—"

"I've told you that this time around it would be harder for you," Dumbledore said quietly, "And I don't desire for you to go through more than you already have. None of you. You have already sent your parents away, memories modified. You have gambled your heart with a man who may die—this on top of the scares you carry from the first war—"

"Those scares aren't healed and they'll do more damage than they will good," Hermione protested.

"You'll be going into this war with more experience than the entire Order of the Phoenix combined. Harry Potter couldn't have a better resource than you."

"Please," Hermione asked, her voice breaking, "Professor, please—"

"For the Greater Good Miss Granger, we must press on for the Greater Good," He said, looking down. Fawkes turned to the scene, the old man behind his desk as Hermione's lungs seemed to collapse and the air vanish from them instantaneously.

"There's other ways—I could ask someone else to modify—"

"My dear Miss Granger," the Headmaster started, pain in his expression as well, "There are only two people that know of your travels in time. I doubt Professor McGonagall would go against my decision."

Hermione stood up from her chair, "Then perhaps someone else needs to know" she said before silently leaving the office and running down the stairs.

This was the second time she had fled Dumbledore's office in tears without dismissal. When had she gotten to be so emotional? Hermione kept her emotions in check. She had last lost it when Snape had made remarks about the beaver teeth Pansy Parkinson had given her fourth year. Other than that she had kept it together.

Somewhere between being on the run and the last funeral, that had all changed. She hated it, but she cried. Quite a bit. It felt as though she had spent her life time quota on tears in less than a year's time. Molly had said it wasn't a bad thing to cry—that it wasn't a sign of weakness, but Hermione couldn't stop but struggle and hate herself when it snuck up on her.

She knew she didn't really want Dumbledore to take her memories. But she wanted the hurt to go away. She didn't feel like a solider anymore. She didn't feel like she could be of use to anyone anymore without threatening to crack under pressure.

Maybe telling someone wouldn't be a bad idea, but the idea died as soon as she thought of it. Who could she possibly tell who wouldn't feel like her, as though they had been given a burden they had neither asked nor cared for?

She was half way to the tower before she realized she wasn't going to Gryffindor tower. She kept climbing stairs until she reached the door that lead to their tower. Where, only a week ago, she had forgotten she was Hermione Granger, the time traveler. When she had just been Hermione and he had just been Fred. When she had beautiful moments of not thinking about anything. When their biggest concern was how to tell the family without Ron attempting to murder both of them.

The tower top seemed colder without him there. The wind was starting to pick up and she could hear a wolf crying out across the lake. The moonlight shone down on the hill across the lake, the one that in a years' time may bare white stones.

"You can't take him!" she yelled out against the wind, the rage behind her tears spilling out of her "You hear me, you can't take any of them!" She yelled again, loud and wildly, as though her existence depended on those words and those words alone. She collapsed on the stones and let the racking pain in her chest heave out as her tears sealed her midnight vow.

((*))

It had been one of Fred Weasley's best weeks. And also perhaps one of the toughest.

Dumbledore left the school on Monday to do business, so there was no need for him to go to deliver post at the Castle. Which, roughly translated to meaning he hadn't seen Hermione since he left her at the Portrait hole. He had hoped that perhaps Dumbledore would've heard, the Fat Lady was a bit of a gossip. If he didn't know better, he'd guess she had told the entire school, or at the very least the Gryffindors, about the two of them. Dumbledore, the sentimental sap, would've heard of the young love and asked for his grocery list to come through the post, courtesy of Fred Weasley.

But no, of course not. No need to call for Fred Weasley. Not yet anyway.

So he had turned to writing her letters. He didn't know if the first one had cleared the mail screening. He didn't like the thought of his first letters to Hermione being read by prying eyes, so he had asked Tonks to drop them off when she got to the school, or when she was on guard in Hogsmeade.

They weren't anything special he supposed. Just a few lines. Encouragement for her classes. Volunteering to come and help clear her mind when she didn't need to think anymore. Things like that.

But in his dreams—they were going on adventures, the two of them. Swimming in the pond by the Burrow. Going dancing in Muggle London. Splashing her as she sunbathed on the Southern Coast. Camping like they were at the Quidditch World Cup. Last night he had a dream of the two of them somewhere foreign. Sitting snuggled side by side as they went up a ski lift, his perfect state of content reflected back to him with her ski goggles.

He had taken her hand and seen the charm of the time turner glittering in the sunlight, an eerie blue around it before he woke up.

The shop was starting to pick up; with more reports of attacks bad day boxes were flying off the shelves quicker than they could make them. Pygmy Puffs seemed to be the latest source of comfort for OWL students; in all honesty, it was a good thing Dumbledore hadn't needed his post or Fred was sure George would've throttled the old man. And what time wasn't being invested in keeping the shop running was being spent in their communications campaign.

Their initial idea of partnering with the Quibbler to pass secret messages had only fueled Lovegood's fire, but Fred was starting to see doubt. People still favored the Prophet, now that Fudge was out of Office. Many thought it was going back to its proper place in touting the true and accurate news. It still had a very heavy Ministry bias but people would choose that over cover stories from the Quibbler.

"What if we put an advertisement in the Prophet, something vague, " George said late Saturday night the eraser of his pencil thumping against his temple. "Something vague but obvious enough to say 'Greyback attack headed for your neighborhood.'"

"But how would someone in the Moors understand that?" Fred asked back, "It won't be worth it if no one gets it."

George straightened up and looked at their list of ideas they had been working on the past few days. "Have you asked Granger about it yet? She might have an idea."

"You know how long it takes for post to get through—apparently they're adding another wave to go through it after Ronnikin's poisoning," Fred answered, looking too down at the list. He noted his brother smile.

"What are you smirking at?" he asked, uneasy when it hadn't gone away after a few moments. "Just that even though he doesn't know you're seeing her, Ron's already doing his best to get in the way. And he doesn't even know it, bless him."

Fred casually elbowed George in the arm, "Just making an observation, that's all. When are you guys going to tell the family, I want to make sure I have snacks for the battle that goes down."

"We're just going to let them discover it casually," Fred said nonchalantly. That was what they had talked about, he thought. He still liked the thought of telling Ron while he was in the hospital so Madam Pomfrey could drug him as needed—

"So at the train station," George said with a smile, "I'll see if I can knick some candies from the trolley witch, she still has a soft spot for me I think."

"Yeah and I think she gave us so many free samples hoping we would get fat and not try and run off the train again," Fred sighed, rolling his eyes and throwing the pencil down. In frustration he ran his hand through his hair, trying to clear his mind in hopes to find what they were missing.

"What do people know about the resistance?" George said after a moment.

"That we're out numbered—"

"Well, yes, that, "George started scribbling something down and turned to Fred. "They won't know any of our code words. The Order is known to some, but not all. And for good reason, we need that little bit of anonymity. People know who are loyal to Dumbledore. Maybe we're looking at all this wrong. We're trying to think how we can get mass messages out to the public but instead maybe we need to think of how to get mass messages out to the Order."

"Go ahead, this is the best we've had since color coding our packages," Fred said, folding his arms and leaning back in the chair as his brother went to work.

"We'll have to come up with a name that people from the Order would know. Padfoot maybe?"

"Death Eaters have Pettigrew we can't go off of the Marauder's Map," Fred sighed, "But I understand what you're thinking. So we have the code word, now what?"

"Alright, say it was just 'Padfoot' for example—Wanted: Skilled Wizard to teach ill child, Start date would be when the attack is coming and then the location would be where it was headed. All inquiries send to Mr. Padfoot, and then we set up a bogus address. If they Order see that in the Prophet and they understand, they can let people in their area know."

"It's not bad Georgie," Fred smiled, "I think it could work."

"Would you like me write up the proposal to Dumbledore or would you like to do the honors?" George started but then paused, "How about I write it and you deliver it eh? Probably too important for it to go through the usual routes of communication, don't you think?"

"You're a good brother when you're not a bloody romantic, you know?" Fred asked as George took out a paper and started scratching out their plan.

"Let's be honest, I've always had a soft spot for Granger and the thought of her having to endure the nausea of Won-Won and Lav-Lav without the occasional interruption from yourself seems unbearable," he replied, "I'm a selective Romantic. And don't you dare tell that to Angie."

"Right," Fred said, before he looked at the pile on his desk. There were still plenty of ideas to be worked on before the term ended and their summer rush began. He and George had thought about still expanding to Hogsmeade but he had a feeling that would have to wait till after the War. He could see how their communications network might end up taking more time than he had anticipated.

"You know this is only a stepping stone, right Freddie?" George asked, as though he knew what his brother was thinking, "This will work for the short term but if things get worse—if Voldemort gets a hold of the Prophet—"

"We'll have to think of an Option B. One that won't risk too many people from the Order," Fred answered. "They'll intercept owls, they'll meddle with the Prophet. Lovegood's press will hold out for a while but there's no guarantees' they won't go after him when he gets too loud—"

"So we're going to have to think of a way to get news to the masses in absolutely secrecy," George said, looking at his freshly started parchment as thought it was already dead in the water.

"We're going to have to try," and for a moment Fred wondered what Hermione would suggest. They couldn't give out galleons like they were revamping the DA. If it feel in the wrong hands, it'd be a disaster, setting people up for traps.

Muggles had felephones to get a hold of one another. They had the odd rectangle with moving pictures in it—he had seen that when they blew up the Dursley's living rooms. They had—they had radios.

Something seemed to come alive in Fred all at once and he hit George's arm before he realized he had done so. "George—the radio—"

"It's not on Fred, you need to embrace music though, I think it'd help our creativity."

"No you dolt—the Radio. The one Lee's uncle left him. That's sitting upstairs. What did they use it for?"

The thought came to his brother like a sunrise, light starting slowing before bringing him up to speed "To communicate with the continent during Grindlewald!"

"Let's keep the plan for the Prophet, We can keep that going for now," Fred lept up and pushed his chair away, "But let's start looking at getting that radio up and working again, shall we?"

((*))

AN: Seriously, I hope I don't make you guys wait so long for the next update.

Wanted to address a few things in this chapter, particularly with Hermione: She defiantly has some scares that she's carrying from the last war. The line where she says "Those scares aren't healed and they'll do more damage than they will good" have actually been something I've been thinking of for a while. Feel like a jerk for having Dumbledore have said for the greater good-that was meant to be Hermione's tipping point. Kind of feel like I've been giving her a good share of those. ((Don't worry, there is a point to all of this, I promise...))

And the seeds of Potterwatch are coming! Take that!

I can't begin to express how kind y'all have been. I really appreciate your support! This story would have long ago died if it wasn't for readers like you (I feel like a PBS ad...)

Till next time,

Kait Hobbit