Chapter 59: Monday, December 8, 1980

"Sometimes you have to pick the gun up to put the gun down."

-Malcom X


Following Remus' return home, Hermione had only seen him but a few minutes a day. And while she desperately missed him, and wanted more than anything to talk to him and find out what had happened while he was gone, his time had been largely split between going over details of the weeks he was gone with Dumbledore in private or at his parents house, looking after his mum and spending as much time with her as he could.

Hermione knew Hope's time was on this earth was limited now, and Hope knew it too.

She had worked on a healing potion saturday when she returned back to the cottage she shared with Remus that afternoon. Hermione had left long before Remus did, not wanting to intrude on the privacy the small family so desperately needed. Instead, she went to work on modifying a muscle strengthening potion so that Hope would be able to have some sort of benefit of having a magical family.

Hermione used the muscle strengthener she had created long before coming back to this time, the one she had given Harry upon waking, as the base. After diluting it to a fraction of what would be acceptable in a magical body, she added a bit of pain relief and a touch of calming draught. She knew it wouldn't cure Hope- there was nothing she could really do there. Most of her knowledge when it came to healing was magical and the muggle healing she did know was practical, trauma-based knowledge; resetting bones, stitching up wounds, taking vitals without a wand… Things that were used in the midst of battle. Internal medicine hadn't been something she really studied much, not seeing much of a use for it.

She found herself, not for the first time, wishing Draco was around. He had taken so naturally to healing, and found internal muggle medicine to be fascinating. He had read on the topic at length in the little bit of spare time they had, and while it had never really been extremely useful to them, he often talked about the differences in diseases between muggles and wizards. Growing up as a muggle, Hermione knew a lot of these. Her grandmother had died of cancer, a disease she had never even heard of a wizard having. Obviously, she was aware that there were terrible diseases that were incurable for muggles, she had just never really found the knowledge to be useful. However, now she wished she would have thought twice about that.

Still, she equipped Remus with the potions when he arrived home late Saturday night, giving him exact instructions on how to administer them and explaining thoroughly that because Hope was a muggle, the potions would prolong her life, but it was not a long term solution.

Now, Remus was at his parents house again, and Hermione had spent the afternoon with James and Lily at their house, helping Lily put up decorations for Christmas and talking about the plans for the New Year. James was growing restless, not that Hermione could blame him, but several months confined to his own home was causing him to go stir crazy.

"He hasn't said anything about his assignment yet?" Lily asked quietly, adjusting Harry against her chest as she nursed him, her fingers running lightly through his hair.

"No," Hermione said, taking a sip of her tea. "He hasn't told me what happened. Lily, you should have seen that wound! He's lucky that infection didn't kill him! All he said was that he was attacked and he had to do some things he wasn't proud of."

"What does that mean?"

Hermione shrugged, sighing in defeat. "I haven't the foggiest. He won't talk about it, won't tell me even if it went well or if we have more enemies we need to worry about. And with Hope… I don't want to press the issue."

Lily frowned, "I don't blame you there. When James' parents got sick, he was inconsolable, not that I can blame him. Mum and Dad were really two of the best people you'd ever meet, but they died so close to one another." She shifted Harry a bit and sighed, "Though, I've always heard that when two people love each other the way Effie and Fleamont did, they don't last without the other very long."

"Do you think that's true?" Hermione asked.

Lily shrugged, "I don't know. I don't think I could live very long without James, if I'm being honest. He's a pain in my arse most of the time, but I don't think I'd last very long without him." She looked down at Harry, who had fallen asleep while eating, his mouth hanging open as he snuggled closer to her, "Well… Maybe now I could. But a part of me would always be missing."

Hermione felt a strange clench in her chest at the thoughtful, sad look on Lily's face. She cleared her throat, "At any rate… I'm sure he's worried about Lyall. He said last night he had a bit too much to drink, Remus had to help him into bed."

"Lyall has always liked to drink," Lily said. "It's not surprising he would have a bit too much right now."

They continued to talk, changing the topic to something a little more entertaining and a lot less sad- Sirius and his flying motorbike. In the last month or so, Sirius had made a lot of progress on getting the charms right so that his motorbike would hover more than a few feet off the ground. He had finally gotten it several yards in the air last night and had been overjoyed to show it to everyone… Until he crashed straight into the wooden privacy fence on the other side of James and Lily's garden. James had spent nearly three hours in the cold this morning with Sirius, trying to perfect the mechanics to get it off the ground.

Hermione had to admit, it was actually a fairly impressive bit of magic involved to get the bike to where Sirius had had it, and she was certain that between him and James, it would be flying in no time.

As if on cue, Sirius burst through the front door, tripping over the fern and spilling the soil everywhere while also managing to swear loudly and startle Harry awake. Harry began to whimper and Lily and Hermione both shot Sirius a fierce look.

"What are you doing?" Lily hissed, beginning to rock in her seat a bit to get Harry back to his nap.

"Where's Prongs?" Sirius asked, an urgent look on his face.

"In the garden mending the fence that the pair of you idiots broke yesterday!" Lily said.

Sirius quickly stepped through the house, not bothering to remove his boots, and opened the back door. He shouted for James to come inside and Harry began to whimper again. Lily sighed in frustration, rolling her eyes as she shifted Harry to her other shoulder and adjusted her blouse. James jogged up the couple of back stairs and into the house, pulling his cloak off and toeing his boots by the door.

"What is it? What's happened?"

"Where's Moony?"

"Visiting his mum," Hermione said. "What's going on Sirius?"

"Oh, good. We have time then," Sirius said, breathing a sigh of relief. With a very grave look on his face and a very serious tone of voice he looked at James and said, "John Lennon was killed in New York City today."

Hermione and Lily exchanged a look of total confusion before looking at James, whose face had dropped and eyes gone wide. He gasped, "No!"

"Yes."

"Oh shit! Oh fuck!" James said, pacing the living room. "Hermione, when is Moony supposed to be home?"

"I-I don't know, he didn't say."

"Oh god," James said. "We have to be the ones to tell him. He'll take it so much better from us! What if his parents turn on the telly? Shit! Should we send him a patronus?! Tell him to come home and-

"Absolutely not!" Hermione said, standing up from the sofa and looking between James and Sirius incredulously. "You will not send a Patronus to his dying mother's house to tell him to come home so you can tell him someone he has never met in his life was killed in another country. He's an adult. He will be fine."

"Oh kitten," Sirius tutted. "You don't understand."

"You're right, I don't."

"Moony doesn't just like the Beatles," James threw his arm over Hermione's shoulder, looking her in her face with a very serious expression. "He lives for them. They split up the year before we went to Hogwarts and we heard about it for three years. He still gets upset if you bring it up! They're his heroes, his idols! He'll defend them with more vigor than he does us half the time!"

Peter had joined them now, having been working on a few things in his room the last couple of hours. "Did you say John Lennon died?"

"Yes. Murdered in New York!" Sirius said.

"Oh Merlin, what are we going to tell Moony?" Peter said, suddenly looking very nervous.

"We could just make sure he doesn't see the paper for a while?" Sirius suggested, "Maybe buy us some time before-

Sirius was interrupted by the crack of apparition just outside the front door, and Remus strode in, kicking his trainers off and hanging his cloak. He entered the living room, looking positively distraught.

Hermione stared at him. There was no way he looked this upset about a rock star's death. Absolutely no way. Not when his mother was on her deathbed and his father was racing to get to his through the bottom of a bottle. Not when he had just spent three weeks in what was seemingly enemy territory and been attacked by hostile werewolves. Not when there was a literal war happening around them.

"John Lennon was murdered," Remus whispered, his face going pale as he looked amongst Peter, James, and Sirius for comfort. "Did you hear? I just heard it on the radio."

"I'm so sorry, mate." James said, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Yeah, is there anything we can do?" Sirius asked.

Hermione stared at the men, mouth slightly gaped as she tried to make sense of this. Her extremely intelligent, well read, top of his class boyfriend was on the verge of tears over a musician? She liked The Beatles as much as the next person, listened to them frequently growing up and even more so now, living with Remus. Of course, she had favorite songs and favorite albums and she would never have wished death upon the front man, but this seemed ridiculous.

"Are you kidding?" Hermione finally said, her tone exasperated as she looked between the four. "Are you actually having a moment right now?"

"It's John Lennon!" Remus said in disbelief, looking shocked that he should even have to explain.

"I'm aware," Hermione said. "And it's tragic for his family, I'm sure. But Remus you didn't know-

"Didn't I?!" Remus said.

"Oh no, here we go…" Peter grumbled.

"When I find myself in times of trouble, John Lennon speaks to me! He always has! His words of wisdom!" Remus said, his hands flailing about as he spoke, with passion over the lyricist. "Have you any idea the moments in my life John's been a part of?! The formative years he got me through?!"

Hermione pulled her eyes away from Remus, biting her lip hard to keep herself from bursting out into laughter. Because, well, it was rather ridiculous, wasn't it?! She could certainly understand feeling a connection to a song or an artist, or a book… But this seemed completely nonsensical. She looked to Lily, who was clearly trying not to laugh but somehow also managing to keep her face looking sympathetic.

After a long rant from Remus, in which he explained the direct ways John Lennon had affected his life, he said he needed some time to himself and left through the front door. Hermione took her seat next to Lily and looked around at the group, her arms folded over her chest and her brows high into her hairline.

"When was anyone going to let me know that my boyfriend was an absolute nutter?" Hermione asked, her mouth pressed in a thin line.

Sirius barked a laugh and shrugged, "Sorry, kitten. They didn't call him Loopy Lupin for no reason at Hogwarts, it wasn't just because he was a bit off kilter from Moony."

Hermione sighed, rolling her eyes heavily as she pushed herself up to her feet. "I suppose I had better go check in on him."


Hermione found Remus laying in their bed, staring up at the ceiling with the White Album humming from the record player on the dresser. His hands were behind his head, ankles crossed and his breath was steady as he listened to the music play. Hermione was surprised to hear that it was Paul McCartney's voice coming from the record player, not John Lennon's, and Remus was listening to Blackbird, her favorite song but one he didn't usually listen to if she wasn't around.

"Quite a dramatic show you're putting on," Hermione said, unable to keep the wry smile from her lips.

Remus turned his head to shoot a narrow-eyed glare at her, "It's stupid, I know."

"Tell me about it," she said, nudging his knees over and sitting on the bed.

Remus sighed and sat up, leaning against the headboard and pulling his knees up to his chest. He grimaced, his top lip curling up a bit as he rubbed at his side. Hermione sent him a questioning look but he waved it off, "I'm fine. Just sore, still."

"Why are you so upset about this?" Hermione asked, "I understand the connection to the music, but…"

Remus laughed quietly, shaking his head a bit. "I know. When I was a kid, right after I was bitten, I had a really rough go at it. All of the sudden I had all these… these things in me I couldn't explain. Still can't, most of the time. Instincts, I guess… But I… I didn't… I was angry all the time and this is what fixed it." He motioned to the record player, "Not this, specifically. But music, I mean. And poetry, and plays, and books… Anything I could lose my mind in for a while."

Hermione frowned a bit, "You were angry?"

Remus nodded, "There's this… I don't know how to explain it, really, but there's this aggression. I feel it all the time, burning in the back of my brain. It was a lot harder when I was younger, especially before James, Sirius, and Peter came around. But I could always count on John, Paul, George, and Ringo to get me through."

"I'm sorry I said you were being ridiculous," Hermione apologized.

Remus chuckled, "Suppose I am. It's just with mum and… and everything that's happened…"

"Remus," Hermione began, her voice a little more hesitant than she would have liked. "What happened while you were gone? You haven't… You seem different."

He closed his eyes, his face pinching as if he were in pain. "I can't…"

"You know you can tell me anything, don't you?" she asked, "You know I'll never think differently of you for doing what had to be done."

"You can't possibly know that," he whispered.

"So tell me, and find out for yourself."

She didn't want to pry, didn't want to push him if she could help it, but something had happened while he was in Poland and she could tell it was eating him up. Every time he came back from an assignment, she could always tell a small difference in Remus. When the assignments were successful, as they had recently been, he had a new confidence about him. A swagger that emboldened him to be more sure of himself, as if the acceptance of people like him was something that had been missing his entire life. He would never admit it, but there were some things that a witch or wizard without lycanthropy just simply would never understand, and he craved that understanding.

But this time, he was completely dispirited, unwilling to talk about anything and shutting himself off. He'd only been home a few days and he had gone out of his way to avoid everyone. Hermione knew some of that had to do with Hope, she could see it had crushed him to watch his father crumble into pieces. He had been spending so much time with them, administering the diluted potions, so she could metabolize them, trying to keep her alive the best he could. But even then, Hermione had the distinct feeling that much of his attitude had nothing to do with Hope's illness and more to do with whatever it was he had been forced to do on this mission.

Finally, after at least a quarter hour had passed, Remus' words left as a breath on his lips. "I had to take a life."

Whatever she had been expecting, those words were not it.

They had talked about what they would do, when presented with the option of taking a life or capturing a foe. The entire Order had talked about it, actually. And while they all seemed to be in agreement, that every human life was important and worth saving, they all knew that sometimes in war, it was your life or theirs. And if they were a Death Eater or aligned with Lord Voldemort, they were to be taken down; any means necessary.

Hermione realized she had been silent for far too long when Remus finally looked up from his knees, his face betraying the turmoil he had been so desperate to repress. He looked as if he were going to be sick.

Hermione let out a breath she hadn't realized she had been holding, "What happened?"

Remus began explaining the assignment he was on, starting from the moment he had left. He had gone by Portkey to a desolate village outside of Warsaw and then made his trek on foot to the magical community of Grodzisk. There, he met with the Alpha of the group of Werewolves he was to be talking to, Josef. Josef led him to the edge of a forest, where he then knocked him unconscious before taking him to the commune where they resided.

When Remus woke, he said it was dark and there were at least two dozen or more people there. Given the moon was only a day off, the pack was apprehensive to trust him, and after being shunned and slaughtered by muggles and wizards alike in two other wars in the last three or so decades, they weren't a friendly bunch. They wanted him to prove himself, prove that he was one of them and that he respected the hierarchy of the wolves.

"I didn't know what that meant," Remus said, miserably. "If I'd had known… I wouldn't have agreed… But Dumbledore said it was important that we secure as many allies, by any means necessary! I- I didn't…"

It was a man in his early thirties, a muggle who had been setting traps outside of the commune and had taken a few of their own in silver chains. They captured him and hunted him during the full moon.

"How do you know it was you?" Hermione asked, "You never remember the transformations, you could have-

"I woke up with his blood in my mouth and his body three feet from me," Remus said. His voice was cold and detached. "I was bleeding, attacked by one of the other wolves for killing their prey. They didn't think I would do it, and I did."

"Remus, you can't blame yourself. You weren't you! You wouldn't have killed him had you been!"

"I agreed to do it, Hermione," he said. "I agreed to hunt a human for sport. A muggle at that! To prove they could trust me, and they attacked me anyway. We were never going to align ourselves with them. They think we're a fucking joke."

Hermione could feel the anger in his words, see the frustration on his face. He had crossed a line that he had been terrified of crossing for so long, and he had gotten no benefit from it. He had not gotten what he had intended to get by crossing the line and he was troubled that he had let himself go that far to begin with.

"Why were you gone so long, then? If you knew by the day after they wouldn't align themselves?" Hermione asked.

"I went to Krakow," he said. "Met with one of Dumbledore's contacts there. No luck though, they didn't want anything to do with our cause either. Said that if Josef had thrown me out on my arse for disrespecting his pack, then I was no good to him."

A long silence lingered between them, Remus stared down into his lap, his face looking completely broken as he grappled with saying what he had done aloud. She could tell he was completely disgusted with himself, ashamed for allowing himself to hunt for sport to appease a group that had no intentions of aligning themselves.

Hermione took a slow breath, biting her cheek as she nodded. "I killed an unarmed Death Eater on November 6th 2000." She whispered, her voice shaking slightly.

Finally, Remus looked up and met her gaze, his brows pulled together in question.

"We ambushed a group outside of Balleycastle in Northern Ireland. They had recently blown up a muggle primary school in the countryside and killed most of Balleycastle's muggleborn population, which wasn't a lot to begin with. I was on medical, as always, and I had just spent the better part of an hour healing a girl called Hannah. She was badly injured, internally bleeding… We had been fighting for hours. They surrendered, apparated out, what was left of them."

Hermione paused and took a long, slow breath to steady herself. "I did a round with the other medic and a few others, sweeping over the ground to see if any of ours had been left behind. I came across the Death Eater that cursed Hannah. His leg was broken, his wand gone, I don't know who got him… I looked in his face and he pleaded for understanding-I didn't give it to him."

Remus' expression was completely guarded, Hermione had absolutely no idea what was on his mind. It had been the one kill she committed that had been completely in cold blood. When her life had not been in immediate danger, when she could have chosen to walk away and leave him, or to send him to Timbuktu. And she had turned her wand on him, pointed the Vinewood between his eyes and muttered the killing curse.

"It's war," she said. "You've told me before that they aim to kill, while we aim to save. Sometimes we have to kill in order to save. And sometimes what we deem worth saving changes when we're faced with the option to take the life of someone who would have taken ours. The lines are blurry, it's not white and black. It's grey, it's so much grey."

Remus stared at her for a long time before his mouth twisted to the side and he bobbed his head a bit, "I thought it was for the greater good. All that rubbish we talk about in meetings, that we should put the cause above everything… and when I woke up with that bloke's blood in my mouth, his skin still between my teeth… Is the greater good worth losing ourselves?"

Hermione took in a heavy breath, her eyes burning. "I don't know," she whispered.

Another heavy reminder in her time here that she didn't have all the answers, that she didn't know as much as she thought she did. She hated the 'greater good', she hated the thought of having to put the cause above all else, above the people she cared about and their lives. She had been furious with Dumbledore months earlier for stressing the importance of the greater good. But here she was, hypocritical as ever, preaching the same things.

The grey area and the greater good looked eerily similar, in Hermione's opinion.

.


.

a/n: Hey everyone! Sorry for another late post! I was once again with my family for NYE. Happy New Year though! Here's to hoping this one is a lot better than the last for a lot of people! After this post, I will be going on a 2 week (ish) hiatus from posting. So I'll be back January 16th (saturday) with posts!

In the mean time, if you haven't, please check out my one shots! I have a bunch of Remione ones haha also, come join my fb group: Mimifreed Writing, and chat with me!

See you all in a couple weeks!

xo