AN: Hello, fanfiction and Harry Potter fans. I do not own Harry Potter, but feel free to enjoy this or hate it. If you enjoy it please leave a lovely comment, if you hate it, then leave some constructive criticism, thanks!

Can You Take the Jump?

Chapter 6

"Monster."

Her eyes snapped open, her entire body was tense and sweat poured out of her. She blinked a few times, making sure that the plain white ceiling above her was the only thing she was really seeing.

Soon enough, her brain started processing her surroundings. She was fine. Everything was fine. Everyone was fine. Slowly, her heart rate leveled back to normal and the tension in her body eased, allowing her to turned on the bed to look at the clock.

5:30 AM; 1971, January 30th. Although there was still a couple of hours left, today was the day that Hermione Katlin Evans turned 11.

She turned to her bedside table and saw her usual line up of potions and muggle medication. Calming draught, liver protectant, kidney protectant, blood thinners, enzymes, antibody production aids, etc. etc. Without a second thought, she used the nasty potions to swallow her muggle pills then rinsed her mouth with the least foul potion. She slid out of her warm sheets and stepped onto the cold floor and walked over to her sleep transcript. The long roll of paper was a documentation of her magic levels during her short hours of sleep. It measured other things, such as her sleep cycles, her level of movement, and heart rate, but her Healers focused on the magic because it was what dictated whether she was developing further resistance to her Dreamless Sleep Potion, which she was.

"I'm sleeping less and less." She muttered to herself, but she didn't really need a piece of paper to tell her that, she could feel the exhaustion settling into her bones. She placed the paper into her hospital bag to get it checked out by her Healers during her next check up.

She turned to the clock on her bedstand; it was around 2 hours before the sun would rise, and another hour before her mother would wake up and prepare breakfast for their family.

She pulled on some joggers, a sweater, and some runners before she set off on her daily run. She quietly stepped out of her bedroom and walked down the steps into the quiet neighbourhood of Cokeworth, England. The street in front of her house was coated with a thick and untouched layer of snow, but she could hear the huge snowploughs roaring in the distance to clear the streets for the morning commute.

She spent the first 15 minutes stretching, using her porch railing as a barre and then moved on to cardio. Hermione strapped 5 pounds on each ankle, her best record was 4.5 miles/hour, but that wasn't good enough, she needed to be faster. A mental buzzer went off in her mind, announcing her start. Her vision narrowed as she ran, only able to see the lightly salted pavement up ahead. She imagined the cloaked figures from her dreams were right behind her, chasing her down. It didn't matter if her heart felt like it was going to explode, it didn't matter if the muscles in her legs were burning, she needed to keep going. She pumped her arms and pushed her body further and faster.

Before she knew it, she was at her front porch again.

"You know, your hour and a half run wouldn't feel so short if you stopped running like you're being chased by the devil. Or in your case, would you be chasing the devil?" A voice spoke sarcastically at her. She looked up to see 32 year old Harry Potter sitting on her porch railing with his Head Auror uniform on. His beard looked ungroomed and his hair was long enough to tie up in a man-bun, hiding the scar that made him so famous as a child.

"You should enjoy your runs, look at the scenery around you, feel the wind hit your skin and running through your hair."

With practiced ease, Hermione ignored her hallucination as she kicked off the snow on her shoes and quietly entered her home once more. The warmth of the house seeped into her chilled body making the pain in her knee far more noticeable. Her excessive running was causing her to have runner's knee, but she couldn't break from her morning habit, and she couldn't seem to take it easy. It was her way of releasing the stress and tensions from her restless sleep. It was her escape.

"If it was really an escape from your dreams you should stop imagining Death Eaters chasing you when you go for you runs. It'll actually let your mind calm down for once."

She continued to ignore the grown man by aggressively walking through him and into the kitchen.

Hallucinations had become a daily part of her life. The symptom that used to only occur when she wore a cursed object around her neck, now appeared before her as if it was normal. They usually took the form as him right now, looking like the last time she remembered him looking when he was still Harry Potter.

She grabbed herself a large glass of water and guzzled it down. She took a few moments to catch her breath and focus on her heart pounding in her chest. Once she was properly calm, she grabbed the coffee in the cabinet and placed it in the coffee machine for her parents to enjoy the second they woke up. Afterwards, she limped her way to the washroom to take a shower.

The bathroom filled with steam as hot water poured down her body. The soreness she had from her nightmares and her runs.

When she stepped out of the shower, she could smell coffee and hear tinkering in the kitchen indicating that their mother was awake.

She wiped the mirror with her hands and saw her reflection. Hermione Katlin Evans was a very different girl in comparison to Hermione Jean Granger. Hermione Evans had long auburn hair that hung in a way that Hermione Granger could only ever dream. Hermione Evans's teeth were straight with no beaver-like front teeth, her skin was fair unlike her past life's dark-olive toned skin. She had unique colored eyes that seemed to change in the light. She was also taller than she'd been in the past, and judging by their parents' figures, she assumed she would be much leaner than she remembered herself being at their age.

Simply put, Hermione Evans was pretty; it was a type of pretty that society considered pretty. Looks were something Hermione Granger had struggled with as an adolescent, but she had other ways of making up for the fact that she wasn't the exact image of society's beauty standards. She was intelligent and wise; she knew politics and knew how to lead with fairness and justice. She had become useful in the eyes of everyone else, so that her looks never really mattered. People learned to respect her for something other than her external appearance. Besides, she had a husband who loved her even if she woke up with a birds' nest for hair, he worshipped her stretch marks as they were a sign of their struggle to have their beautiful children, and he admired all her other flaws with all his heart.

Although the end of their life was much different, she could bet everything that Ron loved her deeply during their life together.

Hermione touched the dark circles under her eyes, a clear sign that her latest dosage of Dreamless Sleep Potion was working less and less. If her parents saw her at this state, her mother would start to worry and her father would start drinking again. Without a second of hesitation, she raised her hand and placed a strong glamour charm on her face. The purple bruise-like dark circles under her eyes disappeared, the dullness to her skin was replaced with a youthful glow and a rosiness returned to her cheeks. Satisfied with her appearance, she reached into the medicine cabinet and took the joint-pain relief cream and spread a dollop on her knees after changing into her clothes.

"Good morning mum." Hermione stepped into the kitchen and gave her mother a kiss on the cheek.

"Happy birthday, darling." Ivy Evans returned the gesture, then gave her daughter a big hug, squeezing her until it actually hurt. "How was your run?" She asked as Hermione turned away to grab a banana off the counter, but noticed the small limp and frowned. Hermione's health was a constant concern, but when her daughter turned around turned around, Ivy smiled once again.

"It was good. Still haven't beat my record though."

"Oh honey, I'm sure you'll beat it eventually."

Hermione hummed in agreement. "Oh, mum. Lily has that birthday party with her classmates today. She said she wants the cake brought to the school by noon." She reminded.

"Oh, right." Ivy's eyes widened. She looked around the kitchen, no breakfast ready, no lunches packed, and only 50 minutes until everyone needed to be up and ready. "Uhm, Hermione, can you-?"

"On it." She was already up from her spot, pulling out the ingredients for a birthday cake.

If Ivy was to scale the level of difficulty of raising Hermione from 1 to 10, it would be both 1 and 10. True, they'd largely missed the first five years of her life – it was still a sore spot for her and her husband – but she was still young, they'd expected her to fuss, cry or whine, but she never did. Hermione always listened and never complained. Robert would joke that she was easiest child to raise, but Ivy's greatest wish was to hear Hermione complain like a normal child for once, let out her emotions and even throw of temper tantrum.

"Happy birthday, honey." Ivy repeated, feeling regretful and guilty toward the child that deserved more, but she simply couldn't provide.

Her daughter smiled sweetly, "All I did was get born and cause a bunch of trouble. You're the one that should be rewarded for doing such a good job carrying us when we were in your belly."

The thought of complaining about the fact that she was making a birthday cake for her twin sister's birthday party – which she wasn't invited to – didn't seem to come across Hermione as she perfectly measured out the ingredients for the cake without even referring to a recipe. The youngest Evans daughter was never allowed to go to school like her sisters, but seemed perfectly content in sitting in Ivy's flower shop, quietly reading books. She never said one word about her predicament, as if she knew a complaint would dishearten her parents even more. Ivy knew how much Hermione must've wanted to go to school. Not only was she intelligent, Hermione sought after knowledge unlike any person she's ever met. Hermione practically homeschool herself, knowing how to speak, read and write when she was still in St. Mungo's, leagues ahead of both her sisters.

Perhaps it was her intelligence that made her mature, but her unparalleled maturity prevented her from opening up and speaking to Ivy about anything. Hermione's independence made her feel useless, and less of a mother.

Hermione recognized the sad look in her mother's eyes, so she mustered up the brightest smile she could. "You know I love baking. I'll do this. You worked hard yesterday, making sure the flowers were at the wedding venue on time."

"Hermione, I'm fine!"

"If you insist on doing something, you should go wake everyone else up. They react the best when you wake them up. Dad nods his head, but never wakes up, Tuny likes to throw pillows at me and Lily pulls the blanket over her head."

Ivy laughed, "Honestly, I'd rather do the cake and breakfast." Hermione stuck her tongue out at her mother, only causing her to laugh even more. Ivy left the kitchen to wake her daughters and husband up, she glanced back her youngest with a worried stare at her knee.

Birthday breakfasts were a loud affair in the Evans household. Ivy allowed the birthday girls to dictate what they wanted for breakfast, but seeing how their youngest girls were twins, the two took turns. She looked expectantly at Hermione, but instead of saying what she wanted, she pointed to Lily.

"I'll just have what she's having."

Lily, who'd previously looked like she was going to fall asleep on the table, immediately sat up straight. She took up the opportunity immediately, asking for chocolate chip pancakes without a moment of hesitation. Ivy glanced hesitantly at Hermione who didn't like sugary breakfasts, but saw her smiling at Lily while combing out her twin's bed head.

"How are my favorite birthday twins!" Robert Evans greeted his family with a big smile when he reached the breakfast table. He gave each girl a kiss on the cheek and a hug, while he gave a small peck on the lips for his wife.

"Dad! My present!" Lily stuck her hand out to their father as soon as he sat down.

"Oi, do I look like St. Nicholas?" He asked offended.

Lily's smile turned sheepish as she slowly placed her hands back to her lap. "Good morning, my loving and dear father, may I please have my present for my birthday?"

Robert laughed at Lily's effort to restrain herself. "Tonight, after dinner."

Although she was disappointed at not receiving her present immediately, she quickly turned her frown upside down as she leaned towards their father with an expectant look.

"Can you at least tell me what you got me?!"

Ivy walked over to the table and placed a mug of coffee in front of her husband, then pinched Lily's cheek. "It wouldn't be much of a surprise if we tell you, would it?"

"Mum!" Lily cried, pushing her mother's hand away from her face with an annoyed look on her face.

"Oh, hush." Ivy laughed, "I'm allowed to do this, my babies are 11 now! I'm allowed to feel a little sad and a little old."

"Mum, you're still beautiful." Hermione reassured, then gently kicked her father under the table.

"Ah—yes! The most beautiful woman in the world and the best mother in the world!"

Though she didn't see the kick, she'd been Robert Evans's wife long enough to know such words didn't come out of his mouth without prompt. She smiled a thanks to Hermione before turning back to the pancakes.

By the time Petunia finally came down for breakfast, Lily and Robert had had 9 pancakes between the two them while Ivy and Hermione barely finished their first.

"Chocolate chip pancakes again? Gee Lils, you sure are original." The thirteen year old flicked her nose up at the breakfast table.

"It's our birthday breakfast! We never judged you for what you want on your birthday, so cut it out!" Lily argued, defending her pancakes.

"Our?" Petunia scoffed, she looked at Hermione's plate which still had half a pancake left. The older sister raised her brow, but Hermione discretely shook her head. She rolled her eyes, but sat down without saying another word.

Hermione gave her older sister a thankful smile, which was ignored.

She thought it would be difficult being sisters with Petunia Evans knowing the horrible treatment she gave Harry when he was growing up, but she had a side to her that Hermione Granger never knew. Petunia Evans was rough around the edges, that was for sure. She snobbish, annoying and never stopped complaining about everything, but there was a softness to her that shined through on occasion. Only two years older than Lily and herself, Petunia was forced to share her parents' love with not one, but two younger siblings. She was expected to be more mature just for being two years older, but in the grand scheme of things, what difference did two years make? Petunia was still just a kid herself.

Hermione assumed her tough act was just that, an act, but she hoped that she could change the future so that the act would melt away and reveal Petunia's true nature, which was to be kind and generous.

So far it was working. Hermione hadn't heard the word 'freak' come out of Tuny's mouth yet, so whatever she was doing was working.

After breakfast was done, Hermione moved to place the dirty plates into the sink, but her father took the plates out of her hands, "Birthday girls shouldn't be the one to clean the dishes. I'll do this. You should go get ready for the hospital."

…

The Janus Thickey ward in St. Mungo's was busy like always with people rushing around. Hermione nodded a greeting to the some of the workers that didn't seem to be too busy, a gesture which they returned with equal nonchalance.

To say that Hermione was an unusual patient at the Janus Thickey ward was an absolute understatement. Patients in the long-term care facility were typically not allowed to leave unless they were fully healed or with guardian's consent, but since her ailment was a never-ending fight that remained dormant most hours of the day, she was the only official patient that was allowed to leave. She was also the only child that was allowed check herself in without a parent around.

Hermione casually stepped into the blood sampling room and rolled up her sleeve without hesitation. She barely blinked an eye when the needle pierced her skin to draw out her blood.

"It's always a pleasant surprise to walk into the blood room and not hear children scream like we're trying to kill them."

Hermione turned to the voice of the main healer of the ward, Alphard Black stood at the door of her little cubicle with a smile on his face. The man was still as handsome as when she first saw him; taller than the average wizard, Alphard had short black hair combed neatly to place with expensive robes peaking beneath his healer's coat. His storm grey eyes sparkled with humor, his straight and tall nose had a small dent at the tip, indicating the placement of his reading glasses. His abnormally white teeth were on full display as he grinned at her.

The large man swooped in, careful not to disturb the arm with the needle inside, and gave her a one-armed hug as if he hadn't seen her in years, when in reality he'd seen her mere 2 days ago.

"What are you doing here?" Hermione asked. "Why aren't you with your other patients?"

"Because today is special, it's your birthday."

"Happy birthday, Hermione!" The healer assistant congratulated as he finished bottling her second blood sample and getting ready for the third.

"And it's not any old birthday." Alphard added, he brought his other arm forward, the one he'd been keeping behind his back to reveal a paper box and placed it on her lap. She gave him a questioning look, but he smiled, urging her to open it. Cautiously, she removed the large purple bow on the top and opened the box to reveal a single chocolate cupcake with pink frosting and white sprinkles.

"Happy 11th birthday." He pulled her close and gave her a small fatherly kiss on her temple. "Now quickly eat it before Bones finds out that we gave you artificial flavor and artificial food coloring." Alphard leaned forward and tried to cover her with his body as if Healer Heather Bones was standing behind them, judging.

Hermione let out a small chuckle and took a large bite out of the pink frosted cupcake. Although she had chocolate chips in her pancakes that morning, she allowed herself to indulge since it was her birthday. Surprising not as sugary and dense as she thought it would be, she looked up at her Healer in surprise.

"Wow, this is great." Hermione stated as she took another large bite. "I'll have to thank Pinky when I see him later today."

"How do you know I didn't make it?" Alphard placed a hand on his chest, pretending to look offended.

The healer assistant stifled a small laugh.

"Oi! I'm your boss you know!"

Hermione chuckled, "I've seen you cause an oatmeal explosion and burn toast. This cupcake tasted way too good to be made by you and it had Pinky's signature pink frosting on it."

"Smart-ass."

"You know mum's pretty upset because she's sure you're the one that taught me all the curse words."

"Blasphemy!" Alphard cried out. "You knew those words since you exited that woman's womb! I don't know what she did when you were in there, but I'm pretty sure your first word was 'fuck'."

That was true.

"Well, you can prove your innocence at dinner tonight." Hermione said, but when she looked over at Alphard's face, she knew something was wrong. "You can't make it to my birthday dinner, can you?"

"No can do, sorry kid. I got a new patient in last night. Grabbed his father's coattails just before apparating."

"Ouch. Alright, but you can tell mum that you're not attending."

Hermione ignored Alphard's protests and thanked the assistant healer as she got up for her next appointment. She navigated through the hospital with ease, not making a wrong turn once. It was natural that Hermione knew the hospital so well, since she lived here as a permanent patient for the first 5 years of her life as Hermione Evans.

After her parents won their custody battle, out of precaution, Hermione still didn't leave the hospital for extended periods of time for a full year until the Hospital hired Demascus Belby, the genius Potioneer. Demascus Belby, the father of the future Damocles Belby who invented the Wolfsbane Potion, became a critical figure in her life when he figured out a way to alter the Dreamless Sleep Potion to decrease its addictiveness and toxicity while not effecting its effectiveness.

Hermione still remembered truly meeting her sisters for the first time. How much her palms sweated when her parents arrived in the driveway, how her parents promised that her sisters were excited to see her, how much that wasn't the truth. Everyone's awkward smiles and hugs.

"Hermione," Alphard extended his hands, stopping Hermione from going to her next medical testing. Hermione wordlessly reached into her bag to pull out her nightly sleep reports. Alphard wordlessly scanned the strips of paper. The previously bright smile fell and his face darkened.

"We should go see Belby."

Once all her preliminary tests were completed, the two walked together to Belby's private office. Alphard glanced down at Hermione, it was often quite hard to get a read on the young girl, which was shocking considering her age, but not so shocking when you took her life into account. To this day, no one knew exactly what she dreamed about, it was something she never told anyone, no matter how many therapy sessions she had been put through.

Therapy was one of the first proposed treatment plans, that ultimately failed because of her heavy mouth. No therapy technique seemed to work. Alphard used to wonder if it was because she never trusted them, but he realized it had nothing to do with trust, but rather fear. She didn't want them to know, because the things she dreamed were so terrible, so terrible that a parasite was able to leech off her emotions.

Knock knock

"Come in!"

The two entered the Healer Belby's private potions laboratory. The highly coveted Potioneer was clearly funded and supported heavily by the hospital and government considering the size of the room. However, one wouldn't notice how large it was due to the stuff that was in littered all around. Books stacked as high as the ceiling, boxes of empty potion bottles of all sizes, and two walls with shelves stretching from edge to edge dedicated to ingredients and potions, some completed, some waiting to be completed at a specific date, some just waiting for Belby to finally get around to, and some experimental. The middle of the lab were three rows of tables, lined with cauldrons, distillers, and other equipment necessary for a potions master to do his job.

If one judged Damascus Belby by his looks, many would assume he belonged in the streets as a homeless man than a genius who was the country's highest paid Potioneers. There was a slight madness to his eyes, and his hair and beard were never well kept. Thanks to the grotesque smells and splatters potions tended to make, his Healer robes were covered in odd colored liquids that gave off a funky smell.

Despite the mad scientist look about him, Hermione knew better that to question his ingenuity. He was probably one of the smartest men in this generation, only out-shined by brilliant minds like Albus Dumbledore.

Belby was not necessarily a blood supremist, but he did have a subtle inferiority complex towards the Sacred Twenty-Nine (A/N: nine, because 'prestigious' group of purebloods still included Potters at this time). He had a political mind that understood the current government climate, so Hermione didn't expect him to continue making her potions without asking something from her one day. Whatever he asked for, there was no way she could refuse, she owed him a life-debt and he knew it too.

Alphard silently handed her sleep charts to him and waited his verdict, knowing it wouldn't be good. She watched his eyes scan the paper, his eyes getting darker and darker as he read the chart further and further.

"Are you sure you're drinking the adjusted potion I gave you on your last check up, two days ago? If this paper is right, that means you already need another alteration."

Hermione nodded. "The nightmares are seeping into my consciousness by my fifth hour of sleep. Already."

Alphard looked downright panicked, but Belby stared at her in curiosity. Her dosage for Dreamless Sleep potion had been steadily increasing ever since she'd been on the potion as an infant, but the dosage had never needed to increase at such a drastic rate.

"There are three possible reasons as to why this is happening." Belby sat behind his desk and held his hand in front of him. "One, your obscurial has suddenly gotten stronger because of your internal fear and anxiety. Two, you're deteriorating. Three, both reasons."

He placed her Dreamless Sleep potion on his desk and slowly pushed the vial closer to her. Hermione's Dreamless Sleep Potion (DSP) was mixture of muggle drug therapy and magical potions. Muggle muscle relaxants and dissociative drugs with magical sedatives and memory loss components. However, as brilliant as Belby was, there were two things he could not change about DSP. It's toxicity and its addictiveness. With the increasing dosage of the active ingredient in DSP for her potion, the toxicity was building up in her body faster than her organs were able to clear it away.

She was probably one of the few magical children in the world who's had acute liver and kidney failure. Internal organ-wise, she might as well be a 50 year old alcoholic with a tendency to frequently dabble in recreational drugs.

It was why she was on a restricted diet, why her mother was hesitant to give her the chocolate chip pancakes this morning and why Alphard had prepared the cupcake in secret. Her organs could barely digest water, let alone a whole birthday cake.

"At this rate, you'll reach maximum dose by the time you're 13. Then this potion might as well be useless to you." Belby calmly explained. "I would also like to remind you that an Obscurus isn't just a danger to your family, you are also a risk to the wizarding community. You are living time bomb, so if this potion becomes useless, you'll be locked up in a remote island or met with severe magical restrictions."

"It's not…I'm not deteriorating." Hermione stammered. Alphard carefully approached her, but she stepped back. "I'm not deteriorating." She said more confidently this time. Hermione raised her head to look Belby directly into his eyes.

"I'm just nervous about Hogwarts. I'll be getting my letter today." Hermione explained. "I must be subconsciously getting nervous, which translated as anxiety."

Belby studied her with his dark eyes.

Alphard's eyes moved from Belby to Hermione several times, before letting out a forced chuckle. "Come on, Healer Belby. Don't you remember how it felt to be at that age, nights before getting your official Hogwarts letter? That thrill, but also that nervousness for the 1 in a million chance that the mail wouldn't come or that the owl would get lost and you'd never get your invitation?"

Belby looked to Alphard then turned back to her.

"Fine, then I guess you won't need a change in dosage since you'll be getting your letter today."

Hermione didn't allow a single muscle in her body to tense up at the final decision, instead she nodded her head in acceptance and left the laboratory.

She heard Alphard exit right after her, his hurried steps chasing her. He grabbed her arm and forced her to turn around.

"You need another potion."

"No, I don't. What I said in there is the truth. I'm sure I'll be fine after I get my letter today."

"Hermione, I don't think—"

"Alphard!" Hermione cut him off. She knew what he was going to say, and she frankly didn't want to hear it. She knew she needed the new potion as well, but she'll be damned to admit that she was deteriorating. She couldn't be. She simply can't be. She had things to do, things to achieve in this timeline, people to save and people to kill.