Hermione Granger and the Year Hidden from Hogwarts
Harry Potter Fanfiction
Chapter 13
A/N: Another chapter! Procrastination at writing on my paid stories is in full swing. I'm supposed to have my next book—also a ghost-seeing teenaged girl with a harem of boys—ready by July, but Hermione's story is talking too loud right now to concentrate! So, enjoy that while it lasts! On that note, if you like my style, enjoy reverse-harems with plot, action, and suspense, check out some of my original stories on . All of my books can be read for free if you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited, so it's a great way to support me.
And without further ado, here's the next chapter! There's a parallel here to the Philosopher's Stone. Can you spot it?
October 31st, 1991
Hermione tweaked the flow of energy to find that pale golden color—sorry, light straw, according to the new reference guides Ms. Walker paid a hefty sum to have painstakingly produced—and used it to lift the ostrich feather from the table in front of her.
It wasn't about trying to lift something heavy, not today at least, but about controlling the movement and direction of the item—a test in dexterity rather than strength.
"Now, send it through the hoops if you will, Miss Granger. Your record is thirty seconds. Let's see if you can beat that today before they bring in Subject 202."
Hermione nodded, still trying to get used to how to move an object in three dimensions. It was a lot different than walking—a rather two-dimensional exercise, one-dimensional if you considered the dreaded treadmill, that she hadn't realized until she had to start adding in the height factor of altitude to her depth perception.
Charles timed her with his trusty stopwatch as she blundered her way through the "Hoop Loop" as she'd coined after it'd been introduced as the circuit of hoops.
She did not beat her record, but she did manage to bump her feather into the rings a lot less.
They brought in Erkling, only unlocking his cage remotely once he was safely inside the containment unit. He'd nearly escaped one day, so great was his desire to come after Hermione, that they'd had to reconfigure their procedures to prevent any future breakouts.
Hermione watched as they unloaded him, yelling and screaming about wanting to eat, all the while staring at her.
She tried her best not to imagine the missing Russian children that had lost their lives to this creature. Even if she had the ability to touch him, she wouldn't have. Her psychometry skills would've read the murder on him in an instant, something they'd discovered by accident when helping out on a police case. She'd tripped while walking through the brig at the Scotland Yard, and a man who'd been there for a speeding citation had reached out to catch her arm. He was now sitting behind bars because she'd been able to describe the deaths and victims to such great detail to perfectly mass three of their open cases ruled as unconnected homicides. When their paradigm shifted to looking into connected serial killings, the detectives had been able to find the proof they'd needed.
It was an entirely unpleasant experience that Hermione didn't wish to repeat any time soon, especially with Erkling and the missing children. That was better left vague.
"You know," Hermione began, studying the brown—sorry, dark earth color swirling around Erkling's mouth as he yelled and raged. "I was thinking that since we've hit sort of a dead end with this guy, what if we reached out to Dr. Wang to have him bring back Invisibilis? He had a purplish color I'm trying to replicate, but my memory's not the best for pulling up the exact shade he used for his invisibility."
"Sorry," Dr. Hampton said, signing his name off on the transfer papers. "Who?"
Hermione rolled her eyes. "These creatures have names, you know. Invisibilis, the disappearing ape."
Dr. Hampton exchanged a glance with Charles who'd stepped out from behind the bank of computers. "I'm sorry, Miss Granger, but did you say disappearing ape?"
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Fine, if you're going to be stubborn about it. Subject 101."
The two exchanged another glance.
"Stop that," she insisted, feeling the first prickle of something being wrong. "You know I hate it when you two do that."
Charles scratched the back of his neck. "Hermione, your fire lizard—"
"Salamander."
"Right, your fire salamander is Subject 101."
Her head cocked to the side. "But why? He's not a part of MI5's creatures."
Dr. Hampton shrugged. "Sure, but Ms. Walker still insisted he be catalogued into the database."
Putting that aside for now, Hermione carried on. "Fine, I'm assuming we didn't catalogue Invisibilis because the Chinese have some sort of claim on him? Name or not, though, you have to know what I'm talking about. That creature was what set us on the trail of exploring these fantastical beasts in the first place. If Dr. Wang hadn't reached out to you with that case of the haunted road in the first place, we never would've known…" Hermione trailed off when she caught sight of the looks they were giving her.
"Dr. Wang?"
A cold drop of fear slithered down her shoulders. "Yes, Dr. Hampton, Dr. Wang, your friend and colleague."
"Oh, don't get me wrong. I know who Dr. Wang is. I'm just trying to figure out how you know him. When would you have met him?"
"You're both having me on," Hermione laughed, her amusement drying up in the next instant when their serious expressions didn't shift. Alarm colored her words. "We went on the expedition to China together! He brought Invisibilis here to London for us to study for a week. We discovered I had a sort of bond with the creature because he would only make himself visible when I was around! Dr. Wang went on the trip to Lake Baikal with us!"
As if unable to control themselves, the men shared a look once more, and she could tell now what it meant.
They didn't believe her.
"Hermione—" Charles began, and she didn't need him to finish to guess what he was about to say.
"No, I'm not crazy!" She rushed to the special shelf they'd cleared just for her in the lab where she could document her own notes. She pulled the correct journal from the shelf, the one with information on Invisibilis and flipped through the pages. "Look, I'll prove it to you. Right here…"
A blank page amidst a sea of meticulous notes, stared back at her.
Her brows drew down. "No, how can this be?" she breathed.
She turned and turned again. More empty space stared up at her. Somehow, every single thing she'd ever written down about Dr. Wang and Invisibilis was missing.
November 10th, 1991
Sweat dripped down Hermione's forehead as she tucked into another roll, attempting to dodge the rubber ball tossed at her while keeping the feather aloft in the air.
Since they'd brought her endurance up over the months of running, Ms. Walker had read in a trainer, a man used to train recruits for the field. He was tasked with creating increasingly difficult scenarios that required her to combine the somersaults and acrobatics they practiced with her paranormal abilities.
While it was loads more fun than running like a wheeled hamster on a treadmill, it also was taking its toll on her body while it adjusted to this new level of rigor, both physically and mentally.
On the plus side, she could mentally lift a lot more than a feather these days.
"Okay, that's enough for the day, Miss Granger," Trainer Hart declared. "We'll practice this gauntlet exercise for the rest of the week. And Monday, we'll add you returning fire with that neat little telekinesis ability you have. So, chin up. We're making great progress."
"Cheers," Hermione groaned, stretching this way and that as she headed to Lab 5.
Inside, there were a few additions to the usual duo. Ms. Walker and a few older men in three-piece suits stood around, deep in discussion.
"Ah, the lady of the hour," Ms. Walker called, smiling at her as the rest of the room turned in Hermione's direction.
Hermione nearly tripped over her two feet, wishing not for the first time that she was able to use her levitation skills on herself. "Sorry, I'm a mess. I just left my exercises with Trainer Hart and haven't seem to have gotten my land legs back yet."
Ms. Walker's smile strained a bit but held in place. "It's quite alright, Hermione dear. Come join us. We have something exciting to discuss."
Hermione glanced from Dr. Hampton's blank expression to the microscopic frown creasing the brows on Charles' face. "Alright."
"We've gotten the go ahead to shift your entire focus solely to helping to capture and retain these creatures that seem so fond of you," Ms. Walker informed with a small clap. "Isn't that exciting?"
Hermione paused, because at first, yes, it did. "Wait, so I won't be doing any police work? What about the ghosts? What about helping solve murders and cold cases?"
One of the older gentlemen waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. "The cases are cold anyway. It's not an efficient use of our time and resources."
Hermione blinked. "But what about the missing persons cases I help on?"
That was what made the inconveniences of having these ghosts and awful memories of people dying worth it—to help rescue people.
Some uneasy glances were exchanged before Ms. Walker separated from the group and approached her, crouching down. Her hand landed on her shoulder, and she felt more than heard Ignis hiss in anger from her hair, but luckily, he remained hidden.
"Hermione," Ms. Walker began in a caring tone. "It's a tough decision to make."
"Not really. We're talking about people's lives here."
"Sure, one or two here and there. Don't get me wrong, the half a dozen kidnap victims you've helped retrieve was impressive, but these beings… if we can study their skills, crack the code on their powers, we'll have the potential replicate them and advance technology by decades. We're comparing the lives a handful of potential people spanning your entire career versus helping our entire nation step forward in the world race for power."
Hermione understood suddenly why the doctors looked so conflicted. Russia was still in a rocky standing, though the newly elected president hadn't been assassinated yet. Word had it that the KGB would be disbanded within a month or so.
All the world leaders were holding their breath, waiting for this event, getting all their ducks in a row.
But still…
"You want to protect your parents, too, don't you? They would be at risk if Britain was unprepared for this Cold War to restart. Would you really value the lives—potential lives of strangers above your own parents?"
Tears clogged her throat and filled her eyes though they didn't spill over. "That's—" not fair, she meant to say, but grief robbed her of her ability to finish. She swallowed down the childish statement, having learned early on that life wasn't fair. Instead, she cleared her throat and went with, "I can do both. The missing persons cases hardly take any time."
Ms. Walker gave her a sad smile that felt more patronizing than reassuring. "Yes, but MI5 trains experts, not jacks of all trades. You weren't our first psychic, and you won't be the last. You clearly have this affinity for these creatures that's been witnessed by several on numerous occasions. We'll let the regular psychics help the police while you focus entirely on your field training regiment with Trainer Hart and controlling these beasts."
Hermione blinked. "Control?"
"Yes. We're hoping you can establish a link to them and get them to do your bidding. Who knows what all is out there in this great big world, and we can't have another near miss like with Subject 202. If there are bigger and more dangerous creatures, we'll need you to be able to control them. Like you do with Subject 101."
Subject 101?
"Oh, Ignis," she remembered out loud. "But I don't have—"
Ms. Walker raised a mocking brow. "Don't you? He doesn't have the ability of human speech like Subject 202, and yet somehow you're able to venture out into the heart of London and attend school without risk of that lizard revealing himself."
Hermione processed that information.
Was Ms. Walker correct?
Had she established some sort of link with Ignis without realizing?
Ms. Walker stood, as if she'd seen her affirmative answer in her delayed response. "Good. I'm glad you see things our way, Her—"
"But—" Hermione bit her lip. "But what if I don't want to link with Erk-ah, Subject 202? There's no telling how old he is, and I might be subjected to hundreds of deaths, children's deaths, in his memories!"
Ms. Walker patted her head, but her voice grew an icy edge. "We all have to make sacrifices, Miss Granger, for the greater good." She bent at the waist until her face was right in Hermione's. "I've already tried to plead with your humanitarian side, but if you need more motivation, you'll do this for us, or your parents will have a very difficult time ahead of them."
Hermione's breath caught because she was smart and had followed the ominous words to their logical threat. "You would harm my parents?"
"We're the Security Service. We could do anything we wanted, from blacklisting their dental practice to making sure they disappear so that we have no one standing in the way of our plans for you." Ms. Walker straightened back up, patting Hermione's cheek. "Keep that in mind for future reference when you feel like questioning your orders again. And we'll keep this little chat between us, girl to girl, yes?"
November 21st, 1991
Hermione figured out the missing piece in the bonding process. The realization slammed into as she dropped into a low roll while telekinetically sending two balls back at the agents coopted to help in these training sessions. Both missed their intended targets, but it was difficult trying to split her attention in that many directions.
She'd get the hang of it, eventually. Trainer Hart was very thorough, especially backed by Ms. Walker's insistence that these skills would be necessary if she were to venture out on more expeditions to capture dangerous, unknown beings.
"Colors!" she gasped as she straightened, a millisecond before four rubber balls pelted her form, knocking her clean off her feet.
"Stop!" Trainer Hart's loud voice groused as he stomped over. "You lost your concentration."
Hermione glanced up at him as she caught her breath. "I think I figured out how to bond with Erkling."
"Subject 202?"
"Yes."
Trainer Hart scowled but held out a hand to pull her to her feet. "You better get out of here and head to the labs, then, but I expect you to make up the missing time tomorrow!"
"I will," she yelled back, already on her way out the door.
She burst through Lab 5's door with all the excitement and force of a hurricane, nearly making Dr. Hampton drop the slide he'd been about to view under a microscope. "I think I know what I need to do!"
"Miss Granger? We're not expecting you for another—"
"Erkling. You need to get Erkling now. I think I understand the last step I need to bond with him. I have to match the color of his natural energy."
Dr. Hampton and Charles exchanged a glance.
Charles put down his notebook. "I'll go fetch him."