21 June 2114
Isle of the Dead, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry

It was odd not having either Hardwin Potter II or Ronald Weasley at her back, even all of these years later; the three of them against the world, just as it had always been for the most of their school career. Three little Gryffindors shouldering the weight of the world, taking it by storm. At least that had been the idea, the rose-tinted altruistic idea; one which had completely shattered as the Second Wizarding War had drawn to a close and all of the smattering of uprisings and plagues that had followed.

Things hadn't changed that much at first; there had been a shit-ton of red tape to eade through in order to reform Wizarding Britain, and no one (bar the few fanatics) wanted a repeat of the First Wizarding War. Then there was the decision to return to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry, the source of so much heartbreak and heartthrob, to complete their schooling and officially graduate. It was something that neither Harry nor Ron saw any sense in doing, and what little burgeoning relationship between her and the ginger had all but shattered, if it had ever been there at all. It had been the first of the real cracks between the three.

Ron, high on the infamy granted to him as a war hero and telegraphed best friend of the Chosen One, had ridden the wave of wealth offered to him as far as he possibly could go. He snubbed those he suddenly deemed beneath him, and spent coin like it was going out of style. This usually meant that he delved into his suddenly deep pocket as if it were never ending—much like her little beaded bag—and when the coin finally did run out, suffice to say, it was a bit of a shock. Now penniless, the ginger had turned back to family & friends for support—people, mind you, that he had originally shunned as being below him in those few months of wealth & prosperity. That had been the second crack.

Predictably, Harry had joined the Ministry of Magic as an auror-in-training, sailing through the programme with little difficultly (whether due to his reputation, his family name or experience, was still up for debate). Although, Hermione was always a little smug whenever he wrote to her, sourly complaining about having to relearn all of the defensive basics. How a simple stupefy had saved his life more than once, and how all of these intricate spells were a waste of time. It still made her chuckle whenever she pictured "the Chosen One" having to relearn basic shield charms and so forth, amongst the hoard of other auror hopefuls.

His departure from her life wasn't as drastic as Ron's had been. Instead it was more a gradual decline as his career encompassed his life. He'd always been one to throw himself head-first into dangerous situations without nary a thought to himself. Still, they'd talk every so often, sharing anecdotes in the halls of the Ministry as they passed, or at the annual Weasley dinners that the matriarch insisted on hosting even as her hands began to fail her. But it wasn't until his eventual pursuit and marriage of one, Ginevra Weasley (Harry had always been at home at the Weasley's), that the two of them had finally—fully—drifted apart. One consumed by work, the other by family. That was the third crack.

Finally, there was Hermione herself, who had focused first on her schooling, and then on her career as a Ministry officer. Because of course, she'd gone into the Ministry upon graduation, just like everyone thought she would. And she had excelled, just like everyone thought she would, but only in so far, as their prejudiced system would allow (Whomever had said that you could change a system from the inside, was an idiot). Hermione had jumped around the departments at first, going from the Oblivator Headquarters to the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad that typically dealt with the younger generations, before finally settling down in the Department of Regulation & Control of Magical Creatures.

She had done well there (she'd done well pretty much anywhere) as she had never really lost her passion for such things, (Harry had cheekily worn his old S.P.E.W. badge when she'd finally ended up there, and he'd found out). And she did enjoy her time there, fighting for certain Bills with her usual bullheadedness and staring down both great hulking beasts and prejudiced purebloods with that patented Gryffindor courage. Despite this, there was still something missing that she could not quite place. That had been the fourth crack.

Looking back on it, Hermione couldn't help but wonder what would have of happened had she put a little more effort into staying in touch. Would she have married Ronald? Would she be a mother? Would her parents (still not quite the same from their obliviation) have been grandparents? If she had stayed in Australia, would she have gotten to know the little brothers who had appeared in the time she had been gone? If she went back to the family home, would that ridiculous family feud still be going on?

(Supposedly, the late Dagworth-Granger matriarch, Heather Dagworth-Granger, had once loved William Shakespeare as a child—the two having grown up in the same small town together in 1564-1616—with a passion that was unbridled. But she had been passed over for her sister, Anne Dagworth-Granger; who later became Anne Shakespeare, his wife. Unable to let the author go, the witch had proceeded to decree her sister & all of her sister's descendants heretics and henceforth named her own descendants after his characters in the hopes of catching his attention. Anne had responded by doing the same, as a sort of "fuck you" and in the generations proceeding thus, the tradition had continued ever since. And so, the family had been split; those on Anne's side who took the name "Dagworth" whilst those on Heather's side took the name "Granger", and all because of a stupid boy).

They were lonely questions—sad questions—ones that she often tried to ignore, although it wasn't always easy; particularly as old age appeared to be the age of reminiscence & regret. But those days were long gone, buried alongside the very childhood friends whom she so dearly missed, leaving her to wander the British Isles all alone. Or, in this case, the Isle of the Dead upon Hogwarts' far shores, during the later hours of the summer solstice.

Hogwarts, herself, had changed since the years that Hermione had been there. Gone was the crumbing stone walls & burning trees, instead replaced by the impressive castle she had come to know & love over her years at the school. The walls, once bare from the spoils of war, had been refilled by the late Headmistress McGonagall who had commissioned several new works of art depicting fallen comrades & family, as a kind of memoriam for them. It was sweet, if a little hard to see her classmates, teachers and friends happily chatting to the ghosts or having champagne with the Fat Lady. She had spent many a-day during her seventh year at Hogwarts in front of some of those portraits, just weeping.

The elderly woman would've of loved nothing more than to pursue the endless halls of her alumni with just the portraits as company. Perhaps she would have of visited Fred's portrait to tell him of his brothers' adventures, or maybe she would've gone down to the kitchens to see the little House elves still tinkering away down there, covered in soot and flour. Or perhaps she would stargaze from the top of the astronomy tower, or lose herself in the endless aisles of the cluttered library. But that was not why she was here, not tonight. It was not why the full moon still shone overhead like a beacon. It wasn't why the usually barren Scottish isle was currently occupied, nor why she'd desecrated the headmaster's tomb that now stood as her altar. Or even why there lay a morningstar at her side, not to mention the dormant eldritch egg that lay at her leathered feet.

Eldritch monsters were rather curious creatures; things—beings—of the Void that very rarely crossed through the Veil to cause anything other than destruction & chaos in this plane. Those few—those brave, stupid few—who carried the eggs, like this one, across the planes had barely tapped into the potentials of such creatures (if they even survived the journey or the demonic contracts to obtain them, that is). Where dragon hide was widely known to be used in a multitude of ways, eldritch eggs were (so far) used for one sole purpose: time travel. Something which Theodore Nott had discovered in his work as an Unspeakable in the Time Vault. Plied with copious amounts of firewhiskey, the Slytherin boy had finally let slip how the otherworldly eggs where the original source for time turners, and the original source for time travel, in general. It had been a fascinating story really, and a disastrously impulsive thought to get rolling; one for the ages, really.

Shaking her head as if to physically clear the memory from her mind, Hermione returned to the task at hand; there were only so many hours left in the year's solstice, it had to be done now. Now, when the veils between the two planes were the thinnest. It had taken her a loooooong time to both research and find these particular items needed for the hodgepodge of a ceremony. But in the end, she had gathered them all: One of the aforementioned eldritch eggs nicked from the recesses of the Time Vault (being one of the few things that had survived their tryst into the Department of Mysteries), the Unholy Morningstar paid with an arm & a leg at Borgin & Burkes, and the eery sight of Hogwarts' Isle of the Dead, wherein the ritual would take place.

For everything else, she had (not-so-legally) raided as many Pureblooded libraries as she could, and even delved into a few of the muggle legends about good ole Camelot. Nott, despite not knowing it, had been a great help on many an occasion in divulging what little information he knew about time travel—even if he had been hammered at the time, and far more interested in talking about the discrepancies between women and dragons. After that, all she had needed to do was wait for the right time to act.

At her back sat the ruins of the ancient groundskeeper's quarters, the ones that had once been used back during Merlin's time. The ghosts of those long-passed seemed to be both judging her and curiously hovering nearby, as she reached for her little drawstring bag and stuffed the item into the folds of her clothes. This time, she was far more prepared for the dangers that they would face, the bag baring more than just a few cans of food and a wizarding tent; one could almost consider it a doomsday bunker, if wizards even had those.

A low grunt fell from her lips as she bent to retrieve the morningstar which she held loosely in her hand, trying her very best not to drop the handheld spiked ball & chain on her foot. Next up came the bowling ball-sized eldritch egg with the aid of a quick feather-light charm, allowing the elderly witch to hoist the heavy thing up to her chest. It took Hermione a moment or two to sort out her grip on either item and then she was slowly shuffling over to the marked ritual area between the tombstones.

Carefully stepping over the tarnished rune stones and around brightly burning candles (as much as old bones could), Hermione noted the familiar pressure of her wand tucked behind her cauliflower ear, and held in place by faithfully wild curls. Unlike both of her boys (no matter how many years had passed, Harry & Ron would always be her boys), she did not keep her wand strapped to her wrist, instead tucking it behind her ear alongside her quill where they would both often get lost in the jungle of curls that was her hair.

Still, she couldn't help but spare a glance down towards her scarred wrist where it remained faithfully hidden behind enchanted bandages, as if protecting her from the horror of the memory that it had caused, or perhaps to remind her why she was even doing this in the first place (because she was a perfectionist with far too much time on her hands and lost in days of old). This time would be different, she would make sure of it.

Hefting the egg higher until it was tucked tightly beneath her chin, Hermione craned her head back until she felt like she was going to tip over. Teeth grit in determination and chin tilted up in defiance at the heavens, as if she were stubbornly denying their fates cast down upon them by the Gods. She would make sure that this time was different, no matter what. Still, she couldn't help the slurred words of warning from Nott that came to mind as she set her shoulders and prepared to do the unthinkable. "…Why're—hic—why're you so in—int'rested—hic—in-in ole magicks anyway, Granger? You—hic—y'know they're dang-dan-dang—bad, right? Most of it's pretty—hic—pretty dark stuff and—hic—and, if you're in for a knut, you're in for—for—for a gall'on. Once you start, you—hic—you can't shtop—shtop for nothin'…"
"I know, Nott" Hermione muttered to herself, as if she was worried that talking any louder would wake the dead. "But you know me, I hate failing"

Setting her shoulders back and standing straight with feet shoulder-width apart like the soldier she was (you never really got rid of that, she found, being a child of war) and finally begun the ceremony as the moon disappeared behind foggy clouds, as if wishing for plausible deniability in whatever she was about to do. Hissing out a breath of effort, Hermione began to swing the morningstar above her head like a propeller, the words she'd practised time and time again flowed from bluing lips as the cool evening made her breath barely visible by flickering candlelight.

"Dei temput, sit nobis reddere, iter recipere, ut heri!" All around the witch, the world began to blur as the obsidian egg heated up with otherworldly magicks. The incantation had to be repeated over and over again, words flowing into each other until they no longer made any logical sense, as time flowed backwards like a movie being rewound on superspeed. At some point, Hermione had closed her eyes against the nauseating blur of colour and high-pitched wail of sounds that sped past her little circlet.

Within herself, her magicks seemed to pour out of every orifice with force, like someone had stuffed a spotlight inside her body and turned it on. It uncared whether she'd closed her eyes or not, and carried on, unhindered, burning like a thousand suns. She wasn't quite sure how long this ceremony was supposed to take—none of the texts had specified a particular length of time—but between this breath and the next, she was gone, leaving behind only a small burning circlet and a pair of footprints pressed into the dewy grass.