July 4

Area 51, Nevada

"Aren't you supposed to be working with Doctor Levinson?" asked Winona, upon finding Hermione levitating a piece of the acrid Scout Ship that some of the Area Fifty-One technicians had left behind for the night.

"It's not worth it," sighed Hermione, rotating the piece of hull around with a gentle swipe of her wand. "I mean, when they nuked that Johannesburg Destroyer, he started drinking, and then when he heard about the fourth wave of attacks, he kept drinking."

Winona cast a quick tempos, "That was six hours ago."

Hermione checked her own wrist watch, one she'd charmed to accurately show the time, as well as numerous other features, "Okay, perhaps he took a nap, or rather passed out, a few hours ago, but it's hopeless. You and Mr. Shepard expect him to make some grand discovery, like he did with the countdown clock, but it's not going to happen. We should be trying to figure out how to portkey a bunch of aurors or hitwaizards onto their ships, to take them out."

"At least the London Destroyer finally left after Birmingham and Manchester, though the loss of most of the Netherlands is small consolation." sighed Hermione.

"I told you not to watch the news," said Winona, leaning on the edge of one of the tables. "Plus, shouldn't you be asleep right now?"

"I'm on British Summer Time, I was barely awake on the flight in from Las Vegas, though I'll have to admit, the International Portkey wasn't very nice," said Hermione.

"You see now why my brother and I always carry anti-nausea potions, though, don't you?" asked Winona.

"I know, and you have always made sure that we understood the importance of preparation, but what good is that doing us here?" asked Hermione.

"Well, we, my brother and I, we know that David is going to come up with what we need, and he'll work better if he comes up with it, rather than being suggested. So, until he reaches that point, we need to work on other things," said Winona.

"Other things?" asked Hermione. "Like what?"

"Well, how about communications? We know that they're interfering with radio transmissions, so what can we use that goes around that restriction?" asked Winona.

"Well, since you're asking me, it must be some sort of melding of tech and magic, since that's my area of expertise," said Hermione.

"I honestly don't know how this is going to work, just that I feel that we need it. We can't just go in and blow up the Mothership, there are innocents aboard, and I won't want our victory over the acrids to be colored by a xenocide," said Winona. "So, I come to you, my most promising student, brightest witch of her age, and the best techno-thaumaturge on the planet. How would you compensate for the loss of radio?"

Hermione thought for a moment, her wand still idly spinning the chunk of the acrid Scout Ship. "Well, I'm thinking, at it's base, we need something magical, but something magical that could interface well with technology."

Winona nodded, "Good."

"We're trying to replicate radio, but not like the Wireless, since that's just on different frequencies. Magic, for all intents and purposes, is a point-to-point method."

"So, how to connect the two points?" asked Winona.

Hermione chuckled, "If I had a few billion pounds and a decade or two I'd use quantum entanglement to tie two things together."

"Any way to do that magically?" asked Winona. She'd just had an idea herself, but wanted to see if Hermione would get there too. She'd done it in the original timeline, so why not here?

Hermione tapped her finger to her chin while she bit her lower lip in thought, then, in a burst of inspiration, looked up. "I've got it. The Protean charm!"

Winona smiled and nodded, "Okay, so, you use that to create a sympathetic link between two objects."

"Yes, and if we use it on the radios, perhaps the antennas or something similar, then they can be used even past the interference!" said Hermione with a smile.

Just then they head some crashing from the hangar, and Hermione groaned, her happiness lost.

"What's that?" asked Winona, stepping away from the table and towards the white walkway down the center of the research chamber.

"Probably Doctor Levinson waking up from his last bender to start his next," sighed Hermione.

"I think … I think we better look in on him, just in case," said Winona, nodding towards the hangar. "Plus, we need to start work on your Protean charm linked radio anyway."

Hermione shrugged, and followed, still levitating and playing idly with the piece of the Scout Ship.

As they stepping into the hangar Winona reached out and stopped Hermione, watching Julius and David talk, the latter sitting on the floor, and the former bent over him.

"Look at myself, I haven't spoken to G-d since your mother died," said Julius softly to his son. "Well you see, sometimes, we have to remember what we still have."

"Like what?" asked a despondent David, wondering what was left when all else had failed in trying to stop the alien invasion.

David gaped with a fish for a moment, "You still have your health."

His son merely chuckled in response.

"Why did you stop me?" asked Hermione softly, making sure her question wouldn't carry across to the father-son moment. She'd learnt her first week in Ravenclaw that there was a difference between a whisper and a soft word.

"Come one, come, David, David, you need your rest," insisted Julius. "Get off this freezing concrete floor before you catch a cold, come on."

Winoa smiled at the same moment David got his revelation. "There it is," she said softly in response to the seventeen year old witch's question.

Suddenly both David and Hermione got similar, if not the same, revelation.

"What did he just say?" she asked.

"What did you just say?" asked David.

"You mean about faith?" asked Julius. "Well … See, a man can live …"

"No, no, no," said David, as Hermione dashed down the ramp, echoing the same words.

"Not that dad, the other part," said David, pulling himself up off the floor.

"What?" asked Julius.

Just then David caught sight of Hermione, and in that moment, the two geniuses connected.

"I don't want you to catch cold," said Julius, as Winona, still at the top of the ramp, holding the piece of Scout Ship Hermione had almost let hit the ground in his hand, mouthed the same words.

David groaned, his idea fighting with his hangover.

"What is it?" asked Julius, turning back to his son. "What's the matter with you?"

"Genius," said David, racing past his father.

"It's so simple," confirmed Hermione, who awoke the technician sleeping at his console.

"Genius?" asked Julius.

"My dad," said David.

"You father," echoed Hermione with a chuckle.

"A total genius," they said in unison.

"David!" shouted Winona from the top of the ramp.

"What?" asked David, turning to look at the sister of the man who's saved countless lives. The two of them were rumored to be some sort of time travelers or visitors from another dimension. He didn't trust her as much as he did her brother, but there was still something there, that same spark of genius and madness that he'd seen when that helicopter had landed at the edge of Central Park.

Winona tossed a plastic vial at David, which the man caught.

"What's this?" asked David.

Hermione grabbed the vial from David, looked at it, then handed it back, "It's a hangover potion, or rather, a hangover removal potion."

"Really?" asked David.

Hermione just nodded.

"That's cheating," sighed David.

"That's the first rule mundanes need to learn about magic, it cheats, and magicals, we're lazy, cheating, bastards to the last of us," explained Hermione. "Now, let's get working, this virus isn't going to write itself, and the drivers the guys here have come up with aren't quite going to cut it."