Chapter 13
Disclaimer: JKR owns Harry Potter.AN: Thanks to septentrion and LadySunflower for betaing.
This was no normal unconsciousness. I'm very familiar with the darkness caused by natural oblivion, but this was something else entirely. Then again, what can I expect from punching my future self? In my anger, I had forgotten about the paradox danger. Still, as far as I knew, the universe hadn't imploded. It just felt like I had.
A shudder ran through me. That last thought hadn't been mine, yet I had experienced it as clearly as if it had been.
Just like every one of your thoughts feels like one of mine, Granger.
Get out of my head!
Believe me, I would if I could. But as it happens, I might as well ask you to get out of mine with the same success rate.
Ever since you began tearing my world apart, nothing has gone right. I would tell you to get out of my world, but I suspect that would be about as effective as telling you to get out of my mind.
Nothing has gone right since then? Granger, you'd have to delve back far further to reach the root of this whole mess.
To that fatal car crash, you mean? You're pathetic if you use that as your excuse for your murderous nature.
Car crash? So it wasn't just a dream….
Just a dream? Oh, I see… so that's where my more usual nightmares went. In exchange I suffered your nightmarish memories. But that must mean—
That I'm not from your future. No, Granger, the fact that I have alternate memories should tell you that it's impossible for me to be a time traveller.
What are you?
I'm a dimensional traveller. I didn't want to reveal that! It seems that there is no way to keep secrets from you.
Coming from an alternate dimension would explain a lot. But how had Atropos skipped dimensions in the first place?
It's hardly polite to refer to me as if I'm not here, you know.
Come to that, where had our paths differed in the first place?
What are you—
It's as if a flood gate just opened, pouring a stream of her memories out. I get the feeling that she's seeing mine just as I see hers. At least I can differentiate between what is my memory and what is hers, but it hurts so much—
'What did Ronald Weasley know, anyway? But… he's right. I don't have any friends. I never have. They must all think I'm a nightmare….'
Pushing open the lavatory door, I walked out, sniffling as I brushed tears away from my face. Pausing, I wrinkled my nose. Something smelled horrible. A grunt from overhead made me look up.
Crying out, I made use of the monster's slow thoughts to run around it. But the door was locked!
Fear froze my limbs, my wand remaining uselessly in my pocket. There was just time – for an absurdly detached part of my mind – to identify the monster as a fully grown mountain troll before it swung its club at me.
That could so easily have happened to me, if not for Harry and Ron….
That should have been the end of me. Instead, I returned to life, my body broken and bleeding on the floor. Puzzled, the troll was raising its club to strike again. Acting on instinct, a blindingly bright spark shot from my outstretched trembling hand. The troll was soon nothing more than a heap of ash, the club distorted by the heat.
Seconds afterwards, Professors McGonagall, Snape and Quirrel had burst in. I blacked out just as Dumbledore arrived.
I awoke days later in the hospital wing. Dumbledore had sworn the teachers to secrecy on the pain of losing their magic, and the Ministry knew nothing of my being a Necromancer. It seemed that Dumbledore wanted to see if Necromancers (for that was what I was) could be anything other than evil.
Perhaps I should have been grateful, but that was difficult when it was clear to me that I was nothing more than an experiment to him. Nor did it help that I had no friends… even the teachers that had liked me before all but ignored me, fear in their eyes whenever they looked at me.
I learned through eavesdropping in the common room that Potter and Weasley had locked me into the girl's toilets, not knowing that I was there. Looking at them, I was willing to bet that even if they had known, they would still have done it. McGonagall had the nerve to award house points to them for cornering the troll, although she did lecture them about not making sure that no one else was trapped inside, too. Not that Weasley took any notice, guffawing, 'Pity the troll didn't kill Granger!' as soon as McGonagall had gone. She overheard, I'm sure, but it's clear that I could no longer count on my own Head of house.
The only teacher who treated me as he had before was Snape, and that wasn't a good thing. It only encouraged me to withdraw further, no longer volunteering answers.
Oh, Severus… What would have become of me if you'd been like that?
Being around Quirrel was almost like my occasional meetings with Dumbledore. He seemed to watch me with an almost hungry expression when he thought I wasn't watching. I could sense his pulse change when he did, almost as if his heart was beating twice with every beat.
No wonder, considering Voldemort was living off him like a parasite at the time!
When I saw my parents in the Christmas holidays, it was obvious that home was no longer a refuge. We had been worlds apart when it became clear that I was a witch, but now the rift was virtually impassable. They couldn't understand the changes in me, and I couldn't find the words to tell them. It's not as if they would have understood, anyway.
At the end of the year, it was sheer dumb luck that Potter and Weasley survived their escapade keeping the Philosopher's Stone safe. I was the only Gryffindor who didn't toss my hat in the air at the end, instead just dropping it on the floor.
My life was hellish enough without a dirty great snake trying to kill me, so I took advantage of my year-old powers to kill it before it could set eyes on me. I found an old diary in Moaning Myrtle's toilet, not that the whinging ghost bothered me, too afraid of a Necromancer to do so. The diary felt… odd. Almost as if it was alive. I mentioned it to Dumbledore when I next saw him, and he confiscated it. I presume he destroyed it, but he didn't see fit to explain anything to his pet Necromancer.
The next academic year, I was granted permission to use a Time-Turner for my studies. I just didn't mention that I was using it to explore the castle, too, finding a strange room that appeared when it was required. I was able to persuade it that I required a veritable library about Necromancy, allowing me to perfect my control over my powers by the time my third year was at an end.
Having suffered at Potter and Weasley's hands over the years, forbidden to use my powers against them, it was most satisfying to see both of them taken down a notch when Dementors sucked the soul out of Sirius Black. I could have done without seeing Snape strutting about with an Order of Merlin, Second Class pinned to his robes. The temptation to atomise his precious medal…
Fourth year was a turning point in my fortunes. The satisfaction of seeing Potter floundering to keep from being toasted by a dragon, to the worry on the professors' faces when Potter came back with Diggory's body, proclaiming that Voldemort was back. As a Muggle-born, perhaps I should have felt equally afraid. But like calls to like. Whatever Dumbledore hoped, his experiment was failing. I knew it, deep down.
It was the summer after Voldemort returned that Hermione Granger truly was no more. As usual, I was spending my holiday with my parents. We were arguing about my return to Hogwarts, as my parents thought the undesired changes in me were due to my magical education. They were right, but it was my Necromantic self-education that was most to blame. Much as I hated the people in it, I loved the castle and the learning. When Dad put his foot down, I just lost it. My control over my powers was shattered, and they saw me for what I truly was. Seeing how badly I was scaring Mum – and shaking in fear himself – Dad ordered me to leave and never return: 'You are no daughter of mine!' I saw red. By the time I regained my senses, my parents were dead, their blood dripping from my hands. I didn't mean to do it….
Compared to that, a car crash was a mercy…
I lost track of time, keening on my knees beside the butchered corpses of my parents. Overwhelmed with grief and guilt, I didn't sense the intruder until he spoke to me. Voldemort had come in person to recruit me. Hermione Granger died with her parents… Atropos was born.
Exposed as a spy by my information, unwisely slipped by Potter within earshot of me at the end of our fourth year, Snape suffered a slow, painful death. All that was left after Nagini ate him was his precious Order of Merlin.
Oh, God….
The Ministry had detected the Dark magic responsible for my parents' deaths, and Dumbledore joined them in their hunt for me. Voldemort sheltered me when no one else would, overseeing the rest of my education personally. Using his contacts in the Ministry, my lord and master made it possible for me to sit my exams. I passed every O.W.L and N.E.W.T with flying colours, while my former classmates at Hogwarts reportedly struggled, sabotaged by sub-standard teaching… and an overall lack of intelligence.
His plans ripened, Voldemort was ready to take his place as overlord of Wizarding Britain. It didn't take much to make the Ministry fall. Half of the officials were Death Eaters or sympathisers. Hogwarts was another matter. It was simple enough to cause the wards to fall; they were nothing against the overwhelming Dark magic of Necromancy. But the occupants put up a fair fight. Not all of the Slytherins were from Death Eater families, and not all of those held with Voldemort's cause, so the majority of the students fought on the side of the Light. But they could not win, not against an army of the undead raised with the aid of a Strengthening Elixir.
Dumbledore distracted me long enough so that Potter could duel Voldemort. Whilst I was finishing the old fool off, Voldemort fell, his body somehow vanishing like mist in direct sunlight. There was no way for me to bring him back….
Potter didn't survive long enough to take so much as a victorious breath. His glasses, cracked from the heat of his atomisation, dropped into the pile of his ashes. The rest of the Light was fast extinguished.
It could have ended there, if the Death Eaters hadn't tried to overthrow me. Not an advisable thing to do when surrounded by the undead… I went berserk, and I was empowered by a Strengthening Elixir. By the time the red rage had left me, it wasn't just Wizarding Britain in ruins.
Pondering what to do next, something from my Necromantic readings rose to prominence in my thoughts. My life had little meaning without Voldemort, so rather than moving on to the next country, why not the next world? The information was incomplete, and so untested, but in theory it was possible to travel to a parallel universe… where Voldemort would possibly still be alive. I slept on my decision, but I had no uncertainties. My greatest danger would be from myself in my new playground, and from the method of transport itself. The veil probably would strip me of my powers for several months, less if I took another Strengthening Elixir. Unfortunately, I would only be able to take my clothes and wand with me, although my robe was a cousin to an Invisibility Cloak, a gift from Voldemort allowing me to slip between the shadows.
My plan worked perfectly, up until my powers returned and I attempted to bring Voldemort back from the dead. But all was not lost. Depositing the soulless body at my refuge, I sneaked into St. Mungo's to steal a fertility potion. On the way back 'home', I captured a Muggle boasting to his friends of his sexual prowess. Turns out that he wasn't lying….
I may vomit. Voldemort doing that with me is nightmare material. It was bad enough without seeing it from her perspective!
Ditto! I knew Snape was your lover, now husband, but I could have done without seeing you shag him.
Should I be relieved that seems to be the end of the submersion in her memories? I suppose it is a relief—
that—
is—
not—
who—
I—
am—
but… it would have been so much better if it was. Is a monster like me capable of being a mother?
She's pregnant? Of course. She stole a fertility potion, then shagged… er, I'm not going to go there again! Come to think of it, I can feel another life within her if I concentrate.
She's insane. How will destroying this world make it a place to raise a child? I wonder what the Ministry regulations were concerning pregnant enemies. No doubt the possibility of Necromancy being hereditary would mean that it would have made no difference to their intolerance. What would I do if my own child were to become like me? It would be reason enough not to have children; I don't have enough confidence in my mothering instinct, or lack thereof, to risk raising a Necromancer. But what if Severus wants to have children? Hold on. It's not just Atropos and her child I can sense. Oh, f—