A/N: Just a short, transitional chapter.
I'm terribly sorry for not replying to any of your reviews for the last chapter - my plate is extremely full at the moment. I'm going to use whatever free time I have to write, and I think you might like updates over PMs?

DISCLAIMER: I own nothing but this twisted so-called "plot".
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There was a crowd and there was conversation; there were students of all ages and families of all sizes. Superficially, nothing was amiss – platform nine and three quarters looked as it always had, year after year.

Everything was different.

And it wasn't because Hermione hadn't had her parents drive her to the station, or because there was only George and no Fred, or because she saw fewer familiar faces than usual. It was the atmosphere, oppressive with its overriding heaviness. Parents held their children for longer.

The last time Hermione was here, she'd been plagued by a certain hyper-awareness and foreboding. This time she felt abstracted and disassociated.

The Hogwarts Express fizzled and hissed as it came to a gradual stop, its chrome red body and gleaming windows reflected the hundreds of faces that watched its arrival.
"It's going to be so strange," Hermione muttered, "Getting on board without you and Ron."
Harry half-smiled in a rueful manner. "Look at it this way – there'll be no twats around to distract you from your studies."
As if on cue, a voice speared through the multitude: "Hi there, buddy!"
"Hello, Theo," Hermione said, biting her lip as Harry laughed, "Luna. How's your father?"
"Much better," Luna replied happily, "He's marrying his nurse."
"What?!" Hermione, Harry, and Ginny, (who'd just escaped from her mother's clutches,) cried. Theo stared upwards and pursed his lips, looking determined to say nothing.
"He's marrying his nurse," Luna repeated her words extremely slowly. "Oh look, it's Neville!"
Indeed it was, and the intriguing subject of Xenophilius' great love affair was unceremoniously and unfortunately dropped. Instead, they stood around quietly and listened to Neville's grandmother's acidic monologue against muggle fashion. ("What is that scrap of cloth she's wearing? A skirt! You call that a skirt?")

Therefore - and quite understandably - it came as no little relief when the warning bell sounded and it was time for them to climb aboard.

Her mind was full of Ron's half-arsed half-wave, Mrs. Weasley's highly dramatic weeping, and Harry's long parting hug. She blindly followed Theo down the train, passing by open compartment doors with students stowing away their luggage and chattering indistinguishably. It was a strange thing to be witnessing while only partly paying attention: It was like she was standing still, unmoving, and flashes of random people's lives were flying past her. In one compartment, four first years were meeting for the first time... perhaps they'd become friends for life. In another, three Ravenclaws and a Slytherin were arguing about charms. In yet another, an amorous couple was reuniting. Further on, there were two strangers, silently staring out the window. She witnessed beginnings and middles, friendships and love, excitement and quietude... the whole glorious medley of life like a series of Edward Hopper paintings.

They were walking in line, with Neville in the lead, followed by Luna, Theo, Hermione, and finally Ginny who had receded into herself much like Hermione had.

"Here we are!" Neville declared eventually, coming to a stop.
Hermione emerged from her stupor like a gopher bursting out of the soil.

Dean greeted them cheerfully when they entered the cabin, smiling warmly at them all one by one. He was stretched across the entire length of one row of seats, so Theo returned his salutation by knocking his feet to the ground.
On the opposite row, by the seat closest to the window, with his hair artfully dishevelled and robes loose around his neck was Malfoy. He nodded at Luna, sneered at Theo, and ignored Hermione entirely, and nodded once again at Ginny.
He said to Neville, "Where's your crown, Longbottom? And what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be in your special, gilded, ruby studded head boy cabin?"
"No thanks," Neville replied as he shoved his trunk under the bench.
"You don't sound bitter at all," Theo chirruped with glee, and when Malfoy sneered at him again, he beamed. "Dear me, Draco. Are you still sulking?"
"Fuck off."
"Aw, come on. It's just a harmless little singing fountain in the middle of your room! I think it looks lovely with all those butterflies fluttering around it."
Malfoy set his jaw and glared out the window, ignoring Theo... and everybody else who'd begun to laugh.
"It's such an enchanting scene, I tell you," Theo went on, "And don't you just love how it actually never stops singing? It was a tricky charm to master... but I did it. For you."
"What's it singing?" Dean asked as he gasped with laughter.
Theo's answering smile was angelic. "Bananas in Pyjamas."

xxx

The countryside zipped by in broad strokes of green and grey, the landscape thick and lush with rain. Little drops struck against the window, splattering like tiny water balloons.
The atmosphere inside the compartment was one of ease. Luna, Neville, Theo and Ginny were playing gobstones, (Luna's... er... "improved" version,) as Dean cheered them on. Malfoy was still staring unwaveringly outside, and Hermione lost herself in her new transfiguration text book.
Chapter One: Advanced Human Transfiguration.
Well, she'd successfully altered Ron's appearance before their Gringott's break-in. She supposed she'd be able to manage that.

"Hey," she heard in her ear, and looked up into Dean's smiling face.
"Yes?"
His smile widened. "Nothing. You just looked so much like... you, you know?"
"Hermione Granger reading a book, you mean?"
"Exactly. It's comforting."
"Oh, I don't know," Theo muttered without looking away from the little rocks in front of him, "I think I prefer the sight of Hermione screaming bloody murder from the back of a blind dragon."
("Can't believe you made me sit that one out," Dean grumbled.)
"Me?" Hermione sputtered, "I was screaming?"
"Yes, you were," Theo informed her.
"Was I the one raving about ending up in Poland?"
"Finland."
"Aha!" She tapped him on the arm with her book, and he acted as though she had brutally battered him.
And she loved him for it. She loved them all for it, actually; that they could sit there after everything, and make inane jokes about it all.

("Oi!" Neville cried, pointing at Theo, "That's cheating you lousy Slytherin! Watch it! Don't you know I'm a powerful, world famous snake-slayer?")

As she chuckled, Hermione's eyes wandered to the lone quiet member of their congregation. The dense cloud cover outside had rendered reflective the glass before him; and Malfoy was watching them. She might have believed that he was peering through the mirror image, but then their gazes met. Her laughter died, and she blinked... and when her eyes reopened he'd looked away.
She shook her head, and turned her attention back to Dean. "So why isn't Seamus here?"
"His grandmother died."
"Oh my! I'm sorry to hear that."
"Ha," Dean barked, "You'd be the only one. Nasty old shrew, she was. Fucking batty, bitter old crone."
"I think that's how they make all grandmothers," Neville mused idly.
"But she did one good thing before copping it," Dean went on.
"And what's that?" Hermione asked.
"She left him a mountain of galleons."
"That's nice."

("Stop. Cheating. Nott." Ginny growled.
"I am not! Oh. Heh. I am Nott. That never gets old.")

"Bugger's over the moon."
"Has he any plans for this fortune?"

("Luna, my star, tell these horrible people that I am not a cheater."
"As the official creator of Gobgood Lovestones, I hereby declare that Theo is not a cheater."
"YOU'RE A CHEATER, TOO!")

"Yeah. He's bought a pub."
Hermione was laughing again. "That's just so... so..."
"So Seamus?"
"God, yes!"
Dean sniggered, "Well he's completely obsessed with making it perfect. Obviously, N.E.W.T.'s and all that shite is hardly as important."
"What's it called then?"
"Finnigan's."
"Of course."
"I mean... what else could it be? He wants me to paint a mural over the Christmas hols."
"That's wonderful!" Hermione exclaimed, "Any ideas?"
"A Toulouse-Lautrec Moulin Rouge sort of scene. But with Leprechauns."

Ginny had looped her arm around Hermione's as they strolled towards the carriages that would take them to the castle. When they stepped out from under the station's roof, Hermione drew out Bellatrix's wand and cast a quick water repelling charm over the both of them.

"Thanks," Ginny said and peered upwards, "I really hope this bloody rain stops before quidditch practice begins."
"Who's the captain this year?" Hermione asked, trying to sound like she cared.
"Demelza," Ginny replied loftily, and her eye twitched.

Thestrals stood in a long line, scuffing the ground with their hooves and shaking their giant wings.
"Over here!" Neville shouted, waving them over to a carriage, but Hermione sucked in a sharp breath and jogged off in the other direction. When she'd reached the Thestral with the oddly short tail, it snorted affectionately and nuzzled her hand.
"Hello," she whispered as she ran her fingers down the silky mane that she'd once clung to for dear life, "How are you?"
The thestral responded with another expulsion of air.
"I hardly think about that night anymore," she told it, "So much happened after –"

"What are you doing?"
Hermione looked irritably over her shoulder. "Catching up," she snapped.
"With a thestral?" Theo clarified.
"I look forward to it every year, too," Luna cut in happily, "They're such lovely company."
Hermione cocked a brow at Theo, daring him to say something now.
"Oh, let's just get in," he mumbled, taking Luna's hand and pulling her into a coach. Hermione gave her thestral a parting pat and followed.

...She immediately wished she'd gone back to where Neville and Ginny were.

Of course, Theo and Luna sat side by side, so it left her to take the seat next to Malfoy. Save for a barely noticeable huff, he didn't react at all.
They rode in silence, looking out at Hogsmeade and the evening sky. Like Diagon, every building here had been restored, and that old, quaint, rustic charm of the village was right back to what it once was. But there was no erasing the visions that Hermione's brain superimposed upon the scene: Of apparating with Harry under the cloak, of running from Death Eaters, of Aberforth, and Neville's scarred face.
Closer and closer they got to Hogwarts; the beat of the Thestrals' hooves against the ground was the rhythm of Hermione's heart... and they accelerated in tandem. The rickety motion of their vehicle racing over cobbled streets jangled her no worse than the convulsing of her soul. She took in big gulps of rain-fresh air and peeked over at the opposite seats. Light from the streetlamps outside was sweeping over Theo and Luna's faces periodically, revealing their strained expressions. She didn't care to look at Malfoy; it was bad enough that most of the tension inside that small space seemed to be radiating from him. But before she looked back out, she did, from the extreme corner of her eye, notice that his hands were closed in tight fists on his knees.

Phoenix analogies were trite, particularly in this context, so Hermione actively did not think that Hogwarts rose like one from the horizon. She did not think back to its crumbled, broken... ashy... state, and marvel at how sturdy and whole it now looked.
While the castle did look spectacular, it wasn't like seeing it again for the first time. Yet again, a ghostly film appeared before her vision and she saw fiendfire. She heard explosions, and walls caving in. The sizzle of a curse that just flew by her ear. Percy's cry of no no no, Malfoy saying Crabbe, Hagrid being carried away by giant spiders, Greyback on Lavender, Harry! NO! Harry! Bellatrix raising her wand at Theo –

She breathed out and it broke into a sob. What the hell... she was actually crying. She blinked hard – once, twice, thrice – and after the teary layer had gone from her eyes, she forced herself to look at the castle; she forced herself to see the present. Every window was lit and glowing.
They neared the grounds where the Whomping Willow's twisty branches stuck out against everything, as though paralysed in the middle of a feral dance. She turned to look at the other side to see that familiar column of smoke that would be leaking out of Hagrid's hut. What she was confronted with instead was Malfoy's profile, blanched and on edge. The bright lights emitting from the castle had given him a thin golden outline. Hermione followed the line down his face and throat and robes, to the space on the seat between them, finally reaching her own hands. They were clasped together tightly, pale and trembling. She heard a small whimper and looked up to see Luna bury her face into Theo's neck, and he put his arm around her and sighed. His eyes found Hermione and they seemed to ask, are we ready for this, and Hermione stared back. She had no idea what her face was telling him – she had no idea what to think of his question – but he would read and understand what she was feeling anyway. He always did.

As their carriage slowed, some part of its mechanism creaked. They were well in the grounds, and the main entrance to Hogwarts, that large glowing archway, was the light at the end of her tunnel vision.
Clip clop clip clop clip clop
They were in the courtyard where Harry's believed to be dead body had lain. Ginny's awful cry, Hagrid's anguished sobs, Voldemort's sick delight all echoed in her ears. And then they came to a stop. For a moment, none of them moved. Hermione and Theo looked at each other again and –
Are we ready for this?
We have to be.

Theo was the first to disembark, and he held out his hand to help Luna and Hermione down. They were soon enough joined by Neville, Ginny, Dean... and Ernie Macmillan, who shook everybody's hands like he was going to solicit them for votes.
"Difficult business isn't it, coming back?" he muttered, "Yes, indeed. Quite difficult. Although I must commend those responsible for rebuilding the old place..."
He continued to ramble as he walked, and Hermione hung back so that she wouldn't have to listen, (and apparently, Theo, Luna, Ginny, and Malfoy had had the same brilliant idea.) She watched the backs of her friends as they trundled down the pathway, slowly getting swallowed up by the luminousity emitting from the castle. She inhaled deeply, and it was like her lungs where crumpled paper bags that crackled as they filled with air.
"Come on," she whispered to Ginny who'd been staring at the spot where Harry had lain. "Come on."

Obviously, there had been many poignant, heavy instances in Hermione's crazy life – instances she could recall in high detail and in saturated Technicolor. The kind of moments when time slowed so every second was embossed onto her mind, reshaping her cerebral crevices so her brain was like the wall reliefs in Buddhist temples, telling the story of her life in images.
...She was far from the enlightened one.
But anyway, she lived another poignant, heavy instance as she climbed up the steps to the entrance hall. Step one: The stones under her feet felt solid and lumpy, like her heart that had jumped up into her throat.
Step two: The insides of the hall became clearer as her eyes got accustomed to the dazzling light.
Step three: The polished wooden doors were on either side of her like arms open for an embrace. She could see the shining marble banister of the grand staircase that had been decimated during the battle.

And then she was inside.
Every occupant of every painting was standing and watching. Every torch was blazing, and every gem in the house point hour glasses was glinting. Hermione's vision swam again, but she shook her head before another flashback could assault her. A large hand squeezed her arm, and she turned to offer Theo a tight smile.
We're ready, right?
Right.

The Great Hall was quiet. That itself threw Hermione off completely. Her group appeared to be one of the last to arrive, and this time, she couldn't stave off the influx of memories. That terrifying, awful row of dead across the centre of this room...
The room that was full of floating candles hovering under an open sky; that had long wooden tables and benches and colourful banners and tall bronze candelabras.
No dead bodies.
No dead bodies.
No dead bodies.
She was shaking as she made her way to the Gryffindor table, seating herself between Neville and Ginny. She watched Luna float over to the Ravenclaw table after pressing a kiss on Theo's cheek. Theo and Malfoy walked stiffly across the room to the Slytherin table.
Hermione tracked and noted other faces from her year: Zabini, Greengrass, and Tracy Davis. Padma, Michael, Anthony, Terry, Lisa, and Mandy. Ernie, Hannah, Susan, and Justin.
...Parvati wasn't there. Would Hermione be alone in her dorm? To think she'd longed for that every year...

From the teacher's table, Hagrid waved at her. Professor Slughorn had busied himself with a bottle of wine, but every other professor was watching their students with absolute focus. A few had eyes too bright. Madam Pomfrey was dabbing at hers with a handkerchief. Trelawney was outright bawling.
And at the centre, Professor McGonagall sat with her back straight, and it looked completely wrong for that seat to be occupied by anyone but a towering man with a long white beard. Hermione hadn't thought about Dumbledore for quite some time... and now that she did, she realised that the edge of bitterness hadn't faded yet; honestly, she didn't think she'd ever forgive him. Then there was the absence of Snape – another jarring anomaly. The table looked incomplete without his sallow, sneering face. He'd been the most unpleasant shit of a man, who'd surrendered himself for the love of a dead woman.
The self-appointed puppet master was the epitome of Gryffindor-ness. The Slytherin was self-sacrificing. There was no veracity in those stupid houses. The red and gold scarf around Hermione's neck was yet another pointless, meaningless label forced onto her, and she was sick of it. All she wanted to do was tear it off herself.

The silence in the hall meant that they heard them long before they appeared. Shuffling, tentative footsteps that conveyed trepidation and uncertainty. Professor Sprout led the lot, as frumpy as ever, but less pink faced and cherubic. The fifty-odd children that followed gazed about themselves with round eyes that were full of stars made out of reflected candle flames.
The sorting began and the hapless kids were sent into their respective boxes. The little boy whom Hermione had helped in Flourish and Blotts got sorted into Hufflepuff, and when she smiled at him he tripped over nothing.

xxx

To her, the feast had tasted like chalk and sawdust, prepared by the unappreciated rank of Hogwarts' soldiers: The house-elves. Not among them was the one who'd been murdered in front of her. Not among them was brave, barmy, devoted, free-spirited Dobby.
Ugh, this is just what she'd been afraid of; spending every second remembering things she was supposed to be moving past. And it had just been an hour and a half since she'd stepped into the castle.

The sound of clinking cutlery stemmed and soon the food disappeared. Professor – Headmistress McGonagall fluidly got to her feet and cast a serious, searching look around the hall.
"Good evening, students," she intoned in her brittle, matter of fact way. There was no playful twinkle in her eyes, her voice was not gentle and comforting in a way that forced you to trust her only to later find out that she'd been manipulating you all along. Poor Harry, Hermione thought and bit her lip. He spoke of Dumbledore with reverence once again, and it had everything to do with this strange death vision. She wouldn't be surprised if he'd do something ludicrous like naming his firstborn after the old man.

"...new dawn, and a new era in the history of Hogwarts and the history of Wizardkind."

Wow, she really hadn't expected that kind of sentimentalism from someone like McGonagall. Blether. She zoned out again, and watched Luna make her glove tap dance on the Ravenclaw table.

"...extremely proud of each and every one of you, for the way you stood to defend your school and your peers..."

Theo and Malfoy were watching Luna too, and it looked like it was killing them to keep their laughter contained. Hermione averted her eyes immediately, lest she catch their mirth. They fell instead on Neville, and he was listening to McGonagall drone on with such rapt solemnity that Hermione damn near lost it anyway.

"...know that the late – the great – Albus Dumbledore would be so honoured to have called you all his students..."

Christ, Hermione had to bite her lips between her teeth and curl her toes to stay in control. She felt Ginny nudge her side sharply.
"What's wrong with you?!" she hissed at her through her teeth.
Seriously, what was wrong with her –

"...each of you demonstrated the finest traits and characteristics that your houses espouse..."

A soft, silly laugh gushed out of her and she slapped her hands over her mouth. On either side of her, ten people turned to stare. Dean winked at her. The idiot.

"But that said, this year is going to be tough. You will need to work thrice as hard to learn all that you missed out on last year, as well as cover your current year's curriculum. Expect no leniency as far as academics is concerned. It is also my pleasure to introduce to you the new members of our esteemed faculty: Professor Herbert Jansen, who will be teaching Muggle Studies, and Auror Hestia Jones, who will be taking over Defence Against the Dark Arts.
"Now, please head back to your respective common rooms and have a good night's rest. Hogwarts is truly delighted to have you all back within its walls. I request the students re-doing their seventh year to stay back, please."

The cacophony that ensued was achingly familiar, and it sobered Hermione up at once. God, but the way she was oscillating between emotions would surely drive her mad very soon. Among the scuffling feet and chairs being scraped, Ginny bade them farewell. The call of "first years, this way," rebounded all around, gliding over a muddle of random phrases –
"– Fuck, I'm so tired –"
"– chocolate soufflé was as good as ever –"
"– I just... I just can't believe that she won't be with us anymore!"

When the room was cleared of all but Hermione and her classmates, McGonagall stepped around the staff table and walked so she was nearer to the doors, gesturing them all to come closer. Now that the gathering was more intimate, and they were all who they were, their old professor dropped her stern facade a tad. She smiled at them, though her eyes were sad, and she said, "It is absolutely wonderful to see you all."
She looked at them, one by one, and while nobody could ever possibly accuse McGonagall of having a grandmotherly air, this was as close as she'd get to it.
"For a long time we – the staff, board of governors, and I – had thought we'd be putting you all up in your respective house towers, like always. It would have just been a matter of fitting in an extra room or two, and of course that wouldn't have been a bother.
"But then I thought about what you all have been through..." she sighed heavily and looked a hundred years older, "You rose to the challenge last year so admirably. You rallied together, forgot your enmities and took care of the school, of the younger children, of each other–"
McGonagall broke off again, and her gaze shifted to something far, far away.
"The bonds and friendships you have formed are something not even – not even Albus could have – Oh, dear me. We... have converted the dark tower into a dormitory for you. Mr. Filch will show you the way. Goodnight."
She left as abruptly as Filch suddenly sprung out from behind the large wooden doors. "C'man" he muttered, and they tottered aftered him. Not that Hermione needed his help in finding the place.

So here was something to unite her and Harry and Ron again: They would all be living in a place Sirius had felt hopeless in.

Her room was essentially identical to her old dorm, but much smaller. There was a four-poster bed, a thick carpet on the floor, a wardrobe, a desk and chair, and a tiny attached bathroom. Very serviceable, perfectly comfortable, and decked in the safely neutral colours of purple and copper.

Purple and copper suffused the round common room outside her closed door, too.

Hermione shed her clothes as she slowly ambled over to the window. Standing before it in nothing but her shirt and knickers, she wrapped her arms around herself and looked out at the dark cloudy sky and the darker grounds. She stared until an onslaught of raindrops against the pane startled her.
Fifteen minutes later she was curled up in bed, as wide awake as she'd ever been, listening to the downpour and intermittent rumbles of thunder.