So... Okay haven't updated in ages. No explanations... Yeah I suck! But college (and Organic Chem!) seem to be taking up so much time it's crazy! You haven't truly dies until you've taken Organic Chemistry!

Also... I've had this ch handwritten for 2 mths now but just chose to write it..

And since I just hopped into the Doctor's TARDIS and have traveled through space and time and now fallen through a crack in the time vortex that has dropped me in an AU - I own Harry Potter! Just not in this universe apparently...

He sat in Ron's empty room staring intently at the photograph in his hand. It was the one that Moody had showed him all those years ago in Grimmauld Place. He'd asked Moody for a copy of it after Sirius had died. Ron and Hermione hadn't understood his morbid fascination with the past. They thought it would only deepen his existing wounds. What they didn't understand was that he had to know. Had to believe. That there was a time before all this death and destruction -when his parents and Sirius were alive; when they were happy. Usually when he looked at the photograph he'd attempt to trace his parents' facial features. He'd look for himself in them- his face, her eyes, his hair, her smile. He'd try imagining the scene, that one instant of their life when the picture was taken. They looked like they'd just shared an inside joke – the way they were laughing, oblivious to their neighbour's stares. They looked ... alive! That was the only word to describe that moment.

But today not even their happiness could zap him out of his misery.

He'd tried sleeping, but that didn't work either. Neither did eating, Quidditch, or (though he wouldn't admit he tried this) school work. All that he could concentrate on was Dumbledore's words.

"She's coming here." "She's coming to Hogwarts." She. Hogwarts. Bellatrix's daughter.

The words kept ringing in his head until he could hear nothing else pounding in his head but a buzz, like a persistent bee. Finally he couldn't take it any longer. Picking up a glass of orange from his bedside table he threw it at the wall in an attempt to drown out the voices. The glass shattered in a million pieces just as the door opened. A few pieces of glass ricocheted of the door frame causing the person who had just entered to flinch in shock.

"Harry? Are you okay?" asked a now panicky Hermione.

"Ya mate... Are you alright?"

Harry glanced at the two of them warily. Even though he had told them everything else that had happened between him and Dumbledore, including the prophecy, Slughorn and his private lessons, he had not told them about all this. No need to worry them more than necessary was the reasoning he had used to reassure himself. Yet he knew the real reason he hadn't told them was because he didn't want them to see how badly he was handling this. It looked like it was a little too late for that though.

"Harry, what's wrong? You've been silently brooding over something ever since you came back from your trip with Dumbledore." said Hermione.

"You know you can you can tell us anything don't you? We're going to be with you all the way Harry, no matter how dangerous it is." added Ron.

Harry's heart swelled looking at his two best friends. Whatever happened this next year, at least he knew he wasn't going to be dealing with it alone. And he knew something was going to happen this year. No way could he expect any different from the devil spawn. But first he had some explaining to his friends to do.

Forty seven minutes and 29 seconds had passed. Harry had just finished recounting everything Dumbledore had told him about the girl to Ron and Hermione.

"He said WHAT? And SHE'S coming...? And he believes? Has Dumbledore finally LOST IT!" asked Ron getting more and more exasperated with every word he uttered. "And how could Dumbledore believe she'd be any different from that cruel bitch she calls mother?"

"Exactly!" started off Harry until he was interrupted.

"Cruel and cold hearted? Like her mother?" How can you judge her when you don't even know her?" snapped Hermione angrily. Both boys stared at her uncomprehendingly.

"You can't be standing up for her?" growled Harry, suddenly furious. "After what happened in the Department of Mysteries? To Sirius?"

"Harry I'm sorry about Sirius too. But that was Bellatrix who killed him. All Bellatrix. If you judge her because of whom she was born as then you're as bad as Malfoy who judges me because I'm Muggleborn."

"But Hermione... those are two completely different... I mean Malfoy's... Malfoy. A pure blood prejudiced git. We're just..."

"Better because we're not pure blood? What about Sirius? He was pure blood too – from the most ancient and pureblood family there was. Is he anything like his family?"

"Don't compare Sirius to her! EVER!" screamed Harry suddenly, startling the two of them into silence. "He was nothing like his parents. He ran away from home remember? Whereas she must have had one of the most pampered and indulgent childhoods possible."

Hermione stood up ashen faced. "I know how much you hate Bellatrix, Harry" she started off shakily. "But all you can tell from this letter is her daughter's name." Nothing about her or her childhood. What if...?"

"I can tell Hermione." insisted Harry. "My instincts are hardly ever wrong and right now my instincts all point to her being exactly, he stressed the word a little, like her mother. As though considering the matter final he sat back down on the bed, the letter Dumbledore had given him explaining everything and the photograph in his hand.

"You may have won over Dumbledore, with your charm and lies" he muttered so quietly that the other two almost didn't realize he was talking. "But there's no way anyone's ever fooling me again. When you try something, and I know you will, I'll be waiting. I'm gonna watching you Aranea Lestrange.

A whiff of smoke from a now burning letter escaped into the air and was immediately blown away by someone exhaling quietly.

Please, please review and tell me how you thought that was! The good news is I've got the next ch written out already so if you review I'll update sooner :) Or maybe I can convince the Doctor to take you with us...

:) Review! And tell me what you think - even if you hate it :)