Chapter 15:

It didn't even occur to Harry that he could have lied until after he was done with his tale.

"…and then Umbridge just snapped my wand and burned it! The stone sent me back to this morning after they tried to arrest me, and I lost it after I saw Snape. I attacked him…" he blushed "maybe a few times. Until you stopped me. And now we are here. Something must have changed with the hearing because they haven't arrested me yet but still…"

He trailed off to the sound of a quill scratching. He looked over at Hermione for the first time in what felt like hours. He had expected her to be scared, or disbelieving, or maybe worst of all, looking at him as if he had finally snapped. What he did not expect was her to have a large stack of notes next to her, scribbling on a fresh sheet of parchment as if were a normal day in class.

She looked up at the sudden silence, and he saw faith reflected back at him. She believed him, he realized with something bordering on wonder. He had expected her to try to argue and try to present him with all the reasons he had to be insane, but she trusted him. She would have believed him if he told her that he thought Flitwick secretly danced ballet on the weekends. Because he was her friend and had earned the benefit of the doubt.

She spoke. "Can… Can I see it? The stone?"

Without a word, he pulled it out and held it out to her. It sat in the palm of his hand between them, twinkling green and innocent. She reached for it, and he pulled his hand back. "I wouldn't. It almost tore me apart to touch it."

"But how can I know for sure?" she whispered, as if the very presence of stone had caused a hush to appear in the air Here Harry could see the limit of her faith. Despite her unwavering belief in what he said, it conflicted with her rational mind, the basis of her personality. She could believe that he believed what he said him until the cows came home, and that may be enough in some cases, but she herself would never believe it without proof. Hard evidence. That was how she worked and what he would have to provide for her to fully get her on board.

"But you don't believe me. You want to but you don't"

"I think you believe what you say but you might be confused or concussed or anything. It just sounds so far fetched!"

With a sigh, he took her hand. "Brace yourself." Harry told her

"Brace myself for what?"

For the first time, he reached intentionally for the power of the Time Stone.

Using the power of an Infinity Stone on purpose was not all what he expected. The first time he had touched the stone it had felt like a battle, where even a wrong thought could have gotten him disintegrated to ashes. This time the power was simply… there. Like it had already judged him worthy, and was simply waiting for him to use it. He touched that glowing ball of energy inside of him, and Hermione gasped.

Flowing along his left arm was a series of strange ruins. They were glowing green, and holographic like those cards Dudley had collected a few years ago. He wasn't well versed in ruins by any stretch of the imagination but even he could tell these were odd. They hissed where they touched the air, as if their very presence was corrosive to the atmosphere.

He looked at them and suddenly knew what to do, as the information had been beamed into his head. Or, as if he had done this before…

"Hang on" he told the suddenly scared looking Hermione, and with a flick of his wrist, twisted them through time. The world blurred around them. Wind howled around them from an unknown source.

It was odd. He had expected it to feel like fire was escaping from under his skin, but instead it felt more like an electric current. Painful for sure, but bearable. For now.

Suddenly the wind died, and the pair of them were standing in a clearing of wildflowers in a dense forest. The hospital wing was gone, hell the entire castle was gone. Just trees and flowers as far as the eye could see.

Hermione dropped his hand and bent over to empty her dinner onto the nearest tree. When she was finished she asked the all-important question. "Harry? Where the bloody hell are we?" Even the shock of hearing her swear was not enough to wipe the smile from his face.

"I think the more important question is…" he started

"Oh don't you dare say it" She all but growled at him.

"…WHEN are we?" Harry laughed.

"Harry Potter that is the biggest time travel cliché in the book! I did not watch every episode of Doctor Who with my father to have my first question be WHEN are we! Try again."

He looked at her and said nothing. She growled. He smirked. She growled again.

"Fine…" she said looking for all the world as she would have his head. "When are we then?" The words looked as though they physically pained her.

"503" He said, the date popping into his head automatically. "Almost 500 years before the castle was built. On the future site of the hospital wing." He looked around to get his bearings. "Give or take twenty feet and three months."

She let out a crazed giggle. "For a second there I thought you said we had traveled to 503 AD." He shrugged and gestured to the sea of trees.

She reached down to pick a flower, taking deep breaths. "Why here?"

He shrugged. "It seemed the fastest way to get you to believe me. What better way to get you think I wasn't crazy than take away the entire castle. I just picked a number."

"You can take us home, right? This wasn't some one-way suicide trip? Because if you can't, our bodies won't even be dust when they start building the castle."

"Definitely. 98% sure."

Hermione snorted. "Better odds than your usual plans then? Come on, I want to see something before we go." And she went off into the woods, Harry hot on her trail.

The pair emerged from the woods on a hillside, overlooking the entire valley. It was nothing but thick woods in every direction. Everywhere there was the noise of a forest at work: the buzzing of insects along with the calls of the birds swooping in the trees. A pack of wild boars pushed through a nearby bush, squealing nosily as they ran. The trees themselves were a riotous array of oranges and reds as the wood stretched to the base of the mountains. In the far distance, a heard of Centaurs roamed leisurely following a stream.

Harry turned to his left and saw the lake. Or rather the lakes as there were two smaller lakes divided by a long narrow spit of land that stretched from one bank to the other. Clearly, the two had merged over the centuries. He saw the telltale tentacles of a giant squid as it lazily stretched above the water. Clearly the ancestor of the current squid, or maybe magic squids were just immortal…

A sniffle interrupted his thoughts. He turned and saw Hermione with tears forming in her eyes. For several minutes neither of them said anything.

"It's beautiful" she croaked finally. "It's what you read about, the perfect IDEA of a forest but to actually see it…"

"I can see why they built here."

"True"

"You can almost feel the magic in the air. Even before the actual magic."

They were silent again for a while, taking it all in. Then her hand slipped into his.

"Not that I couldn't spend forever here, but it's getting cold, and I can't hunt my own food. I want to go home now. The short way preferably."

He chuckled. "One trip through time coming up."

He mentally reached for the stone, and they were off.

Harry and Hermione didn't talk much as they watched history race past them. For a long time there were nothing but forest and animals. Several times over the centuries, wildfires broke out and took out most the of the valley, the flames racing around them but not touching them. The trees regrew around them like stalks of grass before falling again. Snow fell and melted again and again.

Then there were houses, the first remnants of what would become Hogsmeade, and people amongst the trees. A few at first, and then a steady stream as they hunted game

Fields sprung up, and then there were no more trees. The entire valley had been clearly seemingly overnight, almost as if by magic, and then there were builders and stones, and the castle began to grow before them, like a stone flower growing from the land. They could see the excavation of the dungeons, what would one day become the Slytherin common room, and then it was covered by stone. The wood scaffolding of the towers was too covered by stone.

As soon as it started, the castle was complete looking almost the same as it would a millennium from now.

Hermione tugged on his hand. "Look, I think that's them. The Founders." She said with something like awe. Sure enough, there was a plump women in yellow, who could only be a young Helga Hufflepuff, standing outside the front doors, warmly greeting what had to be the first class of students to ever come to Hogwarts. Further inside, he could just make out a flash of a green cloak. The students all entered, and then suddenly Helga was outside again, welcoming another group of students inside, and then another. The students got older, and then left were replaced by newer students who got old and left themselves.

Decades passed in minutes and suddenly it was sunset. There was an enormous boom, almost more of roar, that caught his attention. The earth shook. He turned his head to see the founders racing off to confront… something at the edge of the tree line. It was large and man shaped and purple? The thing's skin was definitely a light purple. Something about it was sickeningly familiar, like he has been here before. And on his wrist, was something he couldn't quite make out. Something golden...

Hemione tugged on his arm again. "Harry why are we slowing down?" Indeed they were slowing down, almost to a full stop but Harry didn't notice. He was craning, his neck, trying to get a better look at the being's wrist. It was wearing a golden glove, and on that glove, he could see glowing stones, including a familiar green one on the thumb.

He felt ice slide down his throat and lodge there. He took an involuntary step towards the prone man, towards the full set infinity stones. He was so close to all of them! He dropped Hermione's hand, the pair falling out of the time stream.

"Harry wha…" He wasn't listening, he took another step not quite knowing what he was about to do, but knowing he was going to something. "We have to go!" she whispered urgently "Now"

Suddenly, the purple man locked eyes with Harry. Its throat was a ruin of blood and jagged skin, like someone had taken a large axe to it, but it spoke clearly in his mind.

"Who… are you?" thoughts that were not his own invaded his mind, painfully thundering around like wild horses. "Why do you have my stone?" He took a step back, suddenly not wanting to be anywhere near this thing. Hermione caught sight of it and let out a gasp.

Its eyes narrowed, and he felt it rooting through his mind. A sharp pain burst behind his eyes, like something was pressing on the inside of his face, trying to get out.

This being, this Thanos, for Harry suddenly knew that was its name as surely as he knew his own, felt powerful and ancient in a way different than Voldemort did. Voldemort was smart, and charismatic but slippery like a poison fog that invaded your mind and slowly corrupted you.

Thanos was as inevitable as an avalanche. Run, hide, it did not matter. He would find you.

Harry grasped for Hermione's hand and tried to send them forward, but nothing happened. It was almost as if he was being squeezed, like a giant hand had hold of him. Iron, invisible fingers drove the breath from his lungs, and the thoughts from his head like juice from a lemon.

He struggled, and the phantom grip got tighter. Thanos's eyes narrowed. Hermione let out a panicked scream, as if she was drowning, her face slowly turning blue.

Thanos shifted, ignoring the shouts of Slytherin and Gryffindor as they pointed their wands at him, as if he intended to stand and come after him. Harry knew that if he got to his feet to come after them, he inevitably would catch them the same as if he would go throw himself at its feet.

"Where are you running off to child?" The voice once again echoed in his mind like a rockslide. "We have so much to discuss." He braced himself for more pain…

And then it was over.

One of the founders, Harry would never know which one, had gotten tired of being ignored and sent a spell at Thanos, hitting him in the neck. The titan roared, and broke eye contact with Harry. The pressure lifted, and the duo ran like a cork shot out of a bottle.

By the time Harry felt comfortable enough to stop them again, it was 1912. They were on the banks of the lake. The night was quiet. He still felt like he could feel those eyes watching him.

Hermione swung her terrified gaze to him "What was that thing?"

Harry could only stare at her.