This chapter is part of a rewriting of this story. Subsequent chapters may be in present tense and first person. This story should still be understandable, but changes are to be made. This warning will be at the beginning of every revised chapter until there are no revised chapters left. Thank you for your patience.

As with the first chapter, please tell me what you think of the changes I have made. I love to hear your opinions and I hope you enjoy it. :)

"Where are we?"

The words came to Harry as though through a thick curtain. He groaned, head pounding while the rest of him felt oddly numb. Luna was next to him, he thought, her left hand still intertwined in his. He opened his eyes slowly, squinting at the bright light.

They were in a flat, rocky field, surrounded by knee-high grass. There was a small tree to their right. Luna's hair was in tangles, her striped skirt covered in mud. She was sitting up, taking the time-turner with her, and he distantly heard clanging from the metal links of its chain as they rattled together. His hand felt colder with it gone.

Harry remembered very slowly that she had asked a question. He surveyed the ground around him again, eying the landscape warily. "I wouldn't rightly know, but it looks like The Burrow, doesn't it? Minus, well, The Burrow." He pushed himself up to stand roughly.

"It rather does," Luna agreed softly. Her gray sweater was a mess of small twigs and fuzz; she barely seemed to notice, absentmindedly trying to dust it off with the tips of her fingers. "We must've got thrown back before Molly and Arthur married in-what was it? 1968? 1969? Before 1970, when Charlie was born."

For a second, Harry felt his breath catch in his throat as it hit him-everyone they knew might as well not exist. At the very least not in the way they knew them.

He cleared his throat forcefully. "Luna-I mean. What do we know about traveling forward in time?"

She met his eyes for a long moment before looking out to the skyline. "When someone travels back into time, Harry, they create a brand new time-line.

Everything that hasn't happened yet ceases to exist. There isn't a future to go back to and, if there is, we could never reach it."

Harry tried his best to process this. He felt faint. "But-there has to be a way-" Ron. Hermione.

Luna's hand clasped his for just a moment, holding lightly before letting go. "I'm sorry," she murmured. They didn't speak again for some time.

There were no words.

Later, they both agreed to try finding the Lovegood house and use their Floo in order to reach Diagon Alley. Luna ensured him the building had existed for many centuries and should, rightly, exist whenever they were as well. If it didn't, they were in more trouble than they already imagined. Harry followed her there carefully, trudging through tall grass and covering his jeans in dark stains that he knew would likely never come out.

"What if they're home?" he asked her. "Your relatives?"

Luna's hair was a wild mess, curls tangled into each other thoroughly. "They don't have any reason to think we're any more than we are-strangers that got turned around and need to use the Floo. It shouldn't be a problem."

That made sense, he thought. It would be okay. Harry took a few deep breaths and tried not to think about what came after that.

The house was coming into his view. It looked the same as it always had, tall and black and cylindrical. Harry stared at it for only a moment, but the sight was oddly therapeutic. Some things hadn't ever changed.

Luna nodded to him faintly before trudging forward to the door, taking each step upward in a practiced motion. She eyed the handle almost warily. "It's either going to let me in or it won't," she murmured slowly. "I'm hoping it'll recognize me as a member of the family, or at least the bloodline."

"And what then? If it doesn't?"

"I'm not certain," she said pausing. With one hand, she reached for it, clasping the dark metal lightly. "Let's hope for the best, shall we?"

She turned it swiftly and pulled backwards, smiling as the door offered no resistance. At least some things were going their way. Harry followed her in, trying to avoid even brushing up against the door.

The fireplace was directly to their left, with a small, bright yellow pot of Floo powder sitting beside it.

"We probably shouldn't stay for long," Luna said mournfully, eyeing her home as if it were the last time she would be allowed to do so. The furniture was different, but the feel of the house was still the same. She didn't want to go.

Harry clasped her shoulder for a second and gave her a small smile, remembering that he wasn't the only one who had lost something. "We have to go," he said firmly. "But I am sorry."

She nodded, closing her eyes for just a second before opening them again. "Okay then," she said, striding over to the fireplace. "Let's do this."

They held hands as they fell into the fireplace, determined not to lose the last thing they had left.

Diagon Alley bustled around them as it always had, but this time it felt claustrophobic. The shops were different, and everyone gave them odd looks, seeing Luna's destroyed hair and his ripped jeans and seeming to have no idea what to think of them.

They both stuck to the sides of the streets, trying to avoid the crowds in order to take a breath.

"We need to rent a room," Luna said.

"I think I can see the Leaky Cauldron up ahead." If Harry stood on the tips of his toes, he could just barely see over the masses of people around them.

Grabbing Luna's hand, he pulled her through the throng of people around them, taking one determined step after the other. When they finally made it inside, they each took a deep breath, despite the large amount of tobacco smoke fogging up the building. Harry choked on it slightly, but Luna just frowned, going forward.

"Hello," she said to the bartender, a heavyset woman with a round, friendly face. "Could my brother and I have a room for the next few nights? We've had a long trip getting here and I'm afraid we have nowhere to stay."

The woman smiled at them in a vaguely maternal way, ushering them a little away from the crowd. "Yes, of course," she said. "Two galleons a night should be quite right for the both of you. Coming in town for the new school year, are you?"

"Oh," Harry said, faintly surprised. "Yes, of course. What day is it, again?"

"We got a bit lost," Luna explained to her quickly, counting the coins out in her pocket as she did.

"Oh, it's the thirty-first," the woman said kindly. "You'll have to catch the train tomorrow at nine and three-quarters."

Luna nodded her thanks, handing the money over in exchange for a key. They both followed her upstairs to their small room. It was fit with two single beds and a bathroom. After cleaning themselves up as best they could, they went back onto the street. With the shared coins out of both of their pockets, they bought robes and underclothes for themselves. Luna insisted on buying a newspaper as they made their way back into their room.

"August 31st," she murmured almost disbelievingly. "1943. Harry, that's forty-six years, within a few weeks."

"We're still fighting the war with Grindlewald, then," he stated from his side of the room. Harry couldn't find it within himself to feel more than a blank shock at it anymore. There would always be a war.

They both lay in their beds, the lights turned dark. For several moments, they didn't speak.

"He's back now, you know. He's alive." Luna's words came to him in the dark, and Harry shuddered, knowing exactly who she meant.

"I know." He had tried to avoid thoughts of it the whole day, as if by ignoring the possibility would make it go away.

"He's going to be at Hogwarts tomorrow. You're going to have to look past him like he isn't there."

Harry took a deep, shuddering breath. He wasn't certain he could do that, but he would try. "I'm not ever going to get past him, am I?" he asked her slowly.

"I don't know," she whispered. "I really don't know."