Chapter 15: An Ounce of Prevention...Missed

Chairman Duroul called the meeting of the Council of Recorders, Earth Group, to order. At the table sat fifteen people dressed in similarly eccentric outfits to Zaman. The mixture of colors could prove dizzying to the mind of even the most jaded eyes. The group included eight men of various ages, from middle-age, to old, to really old, and seven women, one young, and four that looked similar in age to Professor McGonagall and two that were truly ancient. Neville was placed in a chair against the wall where he could witness the proceedings, but not be a direct interference.

"We are all aware of the reason for this meeting, so we may as well go ahead and begin," said Duroul, seeming to not be interested in formalities. "This question is not about what has happened. We all know what Zaman's apprentice has done. It is not worth our time to rehash or analyze it. The question is what we should do to correct or adjust to it? Does anyone have a suggestion?"

"There is always, of course," began a very elderly man in a yellow suit with a bright, rainbowed tie, "the option of doing nothing and just allowing things to continue on the new tangent caused by the event that has happened. We can allow it to become the new main timeline."

The event he referred to was Neville and Neville's effects within their system of existence. Neville winced at being referred to in such a cold way.

"Thank you, Quijh," replied Duroul. "That is an option. What do you then suggest we do with Neville Longbottom? How do you plan to facilitate his future?"

"Well, that is the issue at the end of this, isn't it?" said a woman in a white cape covering a bright red suit matching her wide-brimmed hat, which was accented with a white ostrich plume similar to Zaman's quill. "We could just place him back in the timeline he created and let him live out his life in it."

"That does sound like the easy way out," injected Zaman, "But we need to consider the timeline he has skewed the normal flow into, and its projections for the future, especially as it affects not only Earth, but the rest of the universe."

"And what, exactly, are they?" asked another woman in an electric lime green dress with coordinating blue fringe on the collar, sleeves and hemline. "You seem to know something, Zaman."

Zaman stood up and proceeded to launch into a comparison.

"We should be all aware of the natural flowing timeline that we have been on up until this event occurred. Is there anyone here who has not viewed the projections on the line for the future?" he asked, looking at the others.

They all nodded in agreement.

"Okay. It looks like we are all aware, then. So, what then," he hemmed, "will change beyond this event as the new grain of sand we are riding moves out from the narrow spot in the hourglass we call the present, for lack of a better term, into the future universal time? Instead of going straight down the natural line of flow we have all seen, where are we now going to go?"

"I take it you have something to say about that which will give us pause?" said Doroul. "Something that will complicate the decision to just let time take its…uh…new course?"

Neville was sitting quietly, feeling quite uncomfortable with the discussion. It was very difficult to hear one's self-referred to as an object, an event, a problem, as it were. He felt like speaking up, but knew better.

'Yes, I do," continued Zaman. "I find the new line quite troublesome. I think we have to consider it before rushing to a convenient decision…"

"…well, then, let's hear your concern, Zaman," said Duroul, trying to get him to move to the point they should be considering.

"As I was saying, we all know the current track. Here are the details of the new track. With the new track, Dumbledore will never have existed. That, all by itself, can and will have catastrophic results in the future timeline."

"Harry Potter will still be born, and his parents will still die at the hands of Lord Voldemort. The circumstance surrounding that will be different, but Lord Voldemort will still lose his powers and Harry will become a horcrux. He will still end up at Hogwarts."

"Other than the absence of Dumbledore, the difference will not be profound. Minerva McGonagall will be running a fine school. BUT, and I emphasize but," said Zaman, waving a sweeping arm in the air, "this is where things start to really go askew. Harry Potter will die in the Chamber of Secrets from a bite by a basilisk because Dumbledore's phoenix will not exist to bring him the Sword of Gryffindor, and then heal his wound from the basilisk bite. That means Ginny Weasley will also die, allowing Lord Voldemort to rise from the horcrux in Tom Riddle's diary. A new war will brew years earlier than in the former timeline. Hermione Granger, who we all know will rise to become a very important future Minister of Magic, will die along with her future husband, Ronald Weasley, because Neville will not exist to kill Voldemort's snake. Lord Voldemort will go on from there to conquer the Ministry of Magic and take over the magical world in the UK and begin his suppression of muggles still armed with five active horcruxes. As the timeline progresses, he will take over the entire magical world on Earth and bring the muggle population under his repressive control."

"This is very disturbing," said a man with a brownish, brimmed hat covering a prodigious amount of curly, brown hair and an exceptionally long, multi-colored, striped scarf over a knee-length reddish-brown coat.

"Now, we will be getting far out from this point, and the accuracy of the projection will become less exact, but it is almost a certainty that Lord Voldemort will eventually develop a desire to go on from there to other worlds. He will force the muggles to create spacecraft that can move his influence off the Earth and eventually to more and more distant worlds within our network. Personally, I find this potential timeline unacceptable. We cannot let this tangent become the new main timeline. The whole of the peaceful universe we are dedicated to creating will eventually be in jeopardy."

Neville, even though he did not fully understand what was going on, had a horrified look on his face. None of this sounded good, and he knew he was at the root of it.

"I agree," said the woman in the lime green dress.

Duroul looked around the room, seeing a lot of agreement on the faces of the others. "Can we then agree that this current timeline is unacceptable, and must be remedied?"

Everyone nodded in the affirmative. Seeing their consensus unanimous, Duroul said." What is our line of action to adjust things? Who has an idea?"

"I recall that this all started, according to the report, with him meeting a girl at a trip to South Kensington – 1862 – May 1. We should return him to that coordinate and prevent the meeting. If we eliminate the meeting, we return the timeline to its original track," said the elderly man in the yellow suit.

"That could work," said Duroul. "I think that is the best…"

"…Wait," interrupted Zaman. "That will still leave us with Neville. What do we do with him?"

"We put him back at the school," said the elderly man.

"How does he account for the time between his disappearance and reappearance? He will still have the knowledge of us, our place, and the entrance into my office. If they get that out of him, my office will be filled with curious people. That's unacceptable."

The room was now abuzz with people speculating. "That is definitely unacceptable. Do you have another idea?" asked Duroul over the chatter in the room.

"We can make him a janitor here," said another.

Neville was more nervous than ever. What would they do with him? Were they going to kill him? Was he going to be a prisoner forever? They were never going let him return to his apprentice status. He was never going to be allowed another opportunity to mess up the universe's timeline.

"I am going to propose that we take him back to an hour or two before the event where he discovers the entrance. According to his story, he fainted, and they left him alone. When he came to, he snagged his robe on the lever board and opened the entrance used by the librarians to come collect records. He needs to tell someone not to leave him alone if he has a problem during class. They need to help him, so when he comes to, he never opens that door."

"What about events that have occurred since his disappearance?" asked the man with the colorful scarf. "They will be altered."

"Yes, they will," replied Zaman. "I have looked at events that have taken place during this interval. Nothing relevant to the natural flow has occurred. Other than eliminating the search for a missing student, the normal flow at the school will only see a temporary, nominal change. That is as long as we do it very soon. That will make it a very clean procedure."

"Are you certain of this," asked Duroul, looking directly at Zaman. "We don't want to swap one mess for another."

"Yes. This will work. It is our best option. The natural flow will restore at 99.95 plus percent. It should make it back to 100 percent once we pass the overlap with the point where I send him back. That should prove quite acceptable. If we were to simply kill him, as someone thought was a good option, the timeline would suffer much greater damage, and never fully recover. This way Neville will never know this event occurred. We can go on with our work without distraction or the burden of having to care for him in perpetuity. The timeline would be restored to 100 percent in a relatively short period."

"Okay," said Duroul, looking around the room. "Is this our plan? What say all of you? Speak now. This is your chance."

Everyone sat quietly, nodding their consent. It was a rare moment in recorder history that an entire table was in total agreement on an issue.

"Can you make it so, Zaman?"

"Yes," he said, looking at Neville, who was still frightened, but feeling a little better.

"Then go ahead. But keep a close record of things. We will still need to make a report to the Supreme Council. You know how much of a bunch of sticklers they can be about things of even lesser importance. We need to have ALL of the facts…I mean ALL of the facts on hand. We will never hear the end of it if we mess up. We'll all end up janitors or paper shufflers like the group from the Taurian Supercluster did after the Merope Three Incident. That caused a collective wince from the entire group.

Duroul adjourned the meeting. Everyone walked out in their respective ways. Zaman took Neville by the arm and pressed a button next to the red light on his watch. In a blink, they were back in the office. Tea and scones were waiting for them.