But even then, for all their unexpected advantages against the Yuuzhan Vong, the damage suffered by Dimitra during the invasion was still immense. Local scholarship divides the conflict into four phases: Zero Day, the Battle for the Earth, the Battle for the Sky, and the Cold War. Zero Day refers to the opening attack, from the initial detection of the approaching fleet in the outer system until the Yuuzhan Vong retreat to a handful of positions hugging the equator four days later.
It is impossible to know precisely what the objectives of the Yuuzhan Vong forces were — there exist no survivors from the task force — but from observations of their deployment it is possible to make reasonable assumptions. A limited orbital bombardment targeted major urban areas worldwide, immediately followed up by small detachments of warriors with associated air support. Given the population of Dimitra at the time, and how widely they were distributed, Yuuzhan Vong soldiers were spread quite thin, in most cases only a few hundred warriors expected to subdue a city of millions. Simultaneously, at least four separate large-scale landings of equipment and raw materials were made in sparsely-populated areas of the equatorial belt, to begin the process of terraforming the planet.
Due to a quirk of Dimitran history, the more advanced industrial societies tended to be concentrated in the northern hemisphere, at temperate latitudes — most such societies were well away from the main landing sites. The best guess of contemporary scholars is that the Yuuzhan Vong underestimated the threat of these industrial societies, trusting the warriors sent to the cities to be enough to subdue the locals, or at the very least to kill their leadership and throw them into disarray. While communication and transportation networks were successfully crippled, the political leadership of a handful of small nations devastated, the initial attacks were successfully beaten back, allowing these more powerful temperate nations to reinforce the embattled tropics.
These initial attacks on urban centers were a failure, but the casualties sustained by the Dimitrans were still significant. Large volumes of material and equipment were lost in the early exchanges — in particular, air forces were reduced to perhaps a fifth of their previous strength in the first twelve hours alone. Ground forces fared better, but vehicles and soldiers were lost in large numbers before the Dimitrans could adapt their tactics to their unfamiliar opponents. Between indiscriminate slaughter committed by Chazrach and warriors, strafing runs by atmospheric craft and coralskippers, and the intermittent bombardment from orbit, casualties among the populace were devastating, if not crippling.
5th September 1995 (63:5:19)
— Contact plus 00.00.03:12.00
Hermione couldn't sleep.
Rock-on-Clyde was a bit ridiculous, but she wouldn't expect anything else of the outrageously extravagant magical nobility. She'd been brought in through the guest wing — the room visitors would come in by floo, though they'd actually apparated in, the wards were simply thinnest in that particular room. The hall was big and empty, pure white marble sparkling with imbedded quartz, the floor a mosaic of polished tile including a large, lovingly-detailed reproduction of the Potter coat of arms. The rest of the guest wing was equally fine, the marble broken up with carpets and tapestries in bright vibrant (Potter) red, gold glittering here and there. Somewhere in there was a formal ballroom, which Hermione hadn't seen, a couple hallways lined with single bedrooms, so party guests could stay overnight rather than risk the floo while intoxicated.
All those bedrooms had quickly filled up with evacuees (mostly from Knockturn Alley), as that first day went on people split into groups and moved over into the terraces. That was what the elves called that area of the complex, anyway — the core of the manor had been built on the top of a hill, the terraces descended the slope in tiers. There were full-size flats over there, with bedrooms and salons and bathrooms and kitchens and everything. Hermione wasn't sure how many there were, exactly, but it was certainly possible to house hundreds of people in an emergency.
Which was, she'd been told, precisely the point: every magical noble family had a residence large enough for them all to retreat to if need be. In times of war, or when they were threatened by a feud with another family, or whatever else. The Potters had been a decently large family once upon a time, centuries ago, so they had beds for a correspondingly large number of people — especially if they used sofas and the like to squeeze out even more sleeping space than intended. Rock-on-Clyde was hosting hundreds of people now, she didn't know exactly how many, most of them evacuees from Knockturn Alley and even some muggles, every single flat in the terraces occupied, often multiple families sharing one. The impoverished Knockturn locals were accustomed to sharing living space, nobody had complained about the accommodations — even the muggles were seemingly more concerned about magic being real, and worrying about the literal alien invasion going on outside.
(They had the space, but Hermione was concerned about food. Cediny said they didn't need to worry about it for a while, but how long was "a while", exactly? Surely they couldn't feed this many refugees indefinitely, and the invasion was going to cause market disruption on a literally unprecedented scale...)
As the terraces had filled up, Hermione and the Weasleys had been moved to the main family's rooms, at the top of the hill, which were also ridiculous. There were a few common rooms, a sprawling living room, a game room — mostly centred on a card table, but there was also an unfamiliar version of table skittles and a variety of board games, some of them even familiar, muggle-made (if dated, from the 60s and 70s) — and even a cosy little library. (Relatively little, that is, comparable to theirs back home.) There were a surprising number of bedrooms attached, enough for Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, the twins, Ron, Ginny, and Hermione to each have their own, and still have a few leftover — supposedly, this area was for the Lord and Lady, their children, and sometimes even their grandchildren to live, so the size of the place did make sense.
It'd been Mrs. Weasley, in discussion with Cediny, the chief Potter elf, who'd decided who would sleep where, and they'd left the Lord and Lady's rooms entirely empty. Apparently, there was another, smaller salon in there, and multiple bedrooms — it was typical in the nobility, and even among wealthy commoner families, for the lord's wife to have her own living space, Hermione wasn't sure why. She'd initially expected Mr. and Mrs. Weasley to at least take the Lady's rooms, but Mrs. Weasley had insisted it wouldn't be appropriate. The "Lord"'s rooms, of course, were reserved for Beth, though Hermione had no idea how much time she'd actually spent in there. Hermione knew Beth had been to Rock-on-Clyde before, but she'd lived in London with Sirius — she'd likely never spent more than a couple hours here total. Supposedly, she'd come back to sleep here at least once since the attack started, though Hermione hadn't even known she'd been in the house until after she'd already left again.
Hermione had been in the main library at the time, and as much as she was worried about Beth, she hadn't been able to summon much regret for missing her — the library was incredible. It was set up in a squat, circular tower, bookshelves wrapped all the way around the inside wall, a shallow ramp slowly spiralling up all the way to the ceiling maybe fifteen, twenty metres overhead. Hermione couldn't go all the way to the top — the more potentially dangerous a book was, the closer it was to the top, protected with successive layers of wards to keep guests or children from getting into anything questionable — but that still left thousands and thousands of books to look over. And that wasn't getting into the various artefacts on shelves or stands sealed under glass, like in an actual museum, weapons and jewellery and enchanted devices she couldn't identify, some of them looked absolutely ancient, and a rune-littered bowl she recognised as a pensieve, dozens of bottled memories on racks in expanded space fit into its plinth. Not the most impressive library Hermione had ever stepped foot in, of course, but still very nice.
(To be honest, Hermione was slightly jealous — Beth didn't even like books.)
Poking around the library was a nice distraction from worrying, or from thinking about anything more consequential than the books right in front of her. She hadn't slept very well the last few days. The room she'd been given was perfectly comfortable, of course, it was, just... She'd been anxious — by that point, they hadn't known much about the extent of the attack, and she hadn't gotten news from her parents yet — which had made getting to sleep that first night difficult. And then there were the nightmares, the inhuman howling of the reptilian aliens, the earth shaking with bombs, inexplicable bug-shaped projectiles tearing into people, and...
She'd startled awake after only a few hours, shadows jumping in the darkness, it'd taken her a moment to remember where she was — more to the point, that she wasn't back in that tube station. The feeling of blood wet and sticky on her hands, she'd needed to go to the bathroom and wash them, despite the fact that she could see they were clean just fine, it was the only thing that'd calmed her down.
Hermione didn't know how Beth did it. That one little fight in the tube station, and Hermione was... And Beth had volunteered to keep going, had all but refused to go to safety — she'd been out there for days now, doing who knew what. She was aware Beth just didn't react emotionally to some things the same way as most people — due to lingering trauma from being abused as a child, Hermione was certain — but knowing that, intellectually, and understanding it were two completely different things. It'd been days now and, just, she didn't understand how Beth could do it, that was all.
(It almost certainly wouldn't be good for her mental health in the long run, but Hermione was aware trying to talk her out of it wouldn't accomplish anything — as long as she thought she could do some good out there, that she could help, Hermione knew Beth would keep fighting. The wonderful stubborn noble idiot.)
They had gotten some news from outside, by now, if rather less than Hermione would like. Apparently, in the short span of time they'd had before the aliens reached earth, representatives to the ICW and the other big international organisations had agreed to suspend Secrecy for the duration of the crisis — since Secrecy was defined by international treaties, the leadership couldn't just declare it ended on their own — which was largely irrelevant but still interesting to know. (It seemed the leadership of the muggle and magical worlds were in close enough contact to be able to react that quickly, which Hermione hadn't been aware of.) The Ministry had declared a general state of emergency, power temporarily handed from Fudge to the Director of Law Enforcement, Susan's aunt Amelia — Hermione wasn't as informed about magical politics as she would like, but she was pretty sure this was a good thing. According to Beth's cousin Tonks, Director Bones was far more reasonable about almost everything, and even believed them about Voldemort being back, so she guessed that was something. There'd be a big important Wizengamot meeting in a couple days, where the magical government would decide on the direction they'd take going forward, so they had to wait until then for anything further.
She knew a little more about what was going on with the muggle government. The civilian and military leadership had mostly all survived, those in London safely evacuated. There'd been some concern about the Queen, currently in Cairo as part of a diplomatic tour of certain Arab countries, their primary methods of communication knocked out in the initial attack — but at some point over the last couple days, they'd passed along word through the military's back-up radio systems that the Queen was fine, they would get her back to Britain as soon as they were confident it was safe to move. (By land, or maybe sea, the risk of an aeroplane being shot down in transit too great.) The government was taking certain emergency measures that had been prepared starting back in the 50s, when people had begun to have concerns about the effects of a war fought with nuclear weapons, but never actually implemented. The civilian government did still exist, the Prime Minister still in charge, along with the rest of the Cabinet, but many other functions and services had been suspended indefinitely, even basic ones.
Including, as it happens, Parliament — with the continued landings and invasions, they had no idea when or where it would be safe for Parliament to meet again. They hadn't been officially dismissed, since the Queen wasn't in the country at the moment, but Hermione had heard that they'd been informed to consider themselves dismissed in the meantime, until the Queen could get here and formalise it. They'd organise elections again as soon as it was safe to do so, however long that was going to be.
(Hermione was pretty sure they couldn't just do that...and wouldn't that mean the PM and the Cabinet were out of a job too, since they only held those offices by virtue of also being MPs? At least, she thought the PM went out with Parliament when they were dismissed, but she didn't know for sure, it'd been ages since anything like that had actually happened. She was certain the established rules had been seriously broken at some point over the last few days, but they did kind of have more important things to worry about — Hermione wouldn't be surprised if, so long as there was a credible façade of civilian governance to prevent them from slipping into outright military dictatorship, nobody was going to make too much of a fuss.)
All kinds of other things had closed down as well. Schools, rail stations and airports, nonessential businesses and government services, even utilities completely shut down or rationed in anticipation of damage or sudden changes in supply or use — even down to individual petrol stations, pumps left inactive for all but emergency vehicles. They'd even tried to drain the fuel from petrol stations inside the targeted areas, to prevent possible secondary explosions, but with how little warning they had they hadn't gotten to very many. (Apparently there were areas around London and in Manchester and Sheffield that had been all but burned to the ground, enormous fires still ongoing.) Most government offices had closed for the first day or two, but then they'd opened up again (outside of the affected areas), the emergency radio messages calling all public employees in to work — to help with the increased workloads a lot of services would be facing due to people fleeing the major cities, but also for possible reassignment, it was a whole complicated process that was only just beginning. Though, remarkably quickly given how little notice they'd had, but Hermione guessed they had had plans set up.
According to Dad, nobody was certain when or whether they'd be getting paid — all the central offices in London had been abandoned, and the government's computer systems were down — but the vast majority of public sector employees had still turned up as requested anyway. Pitching in, and all that.
Hopefully they'd be able to get everything back into working order in a relatively short time-frame. The government had relocated to Oxford, commandeering parts of the University buildings to set up a semi-permanent headquarters — considering the Palace of Westminster and significant parts of Downing Street had been destroyed in the bombing, 'semi-permanent' was probably going to be a pretty long time. (When Hermione had been told the Houses of Parliament were gone she'd had a dizzying moment of surreality, it was, just, the entire world was slipping away, it seemed like, it was hard to believe this was really happening sometimes.) They'd been a little worried openly setting up operations would draw the aliens to them, but, however they were picking targets, they weren't going after the leadership specifically. Given their weird, biological technology, the common assumption was that they weren't listening in on radio broadcasts at all, maybe didn't even have the capacity, so it was very possible they had no idea the government had moved to Oxford in the first place. They'd been a little cautious, at first, but as their presence hadn't drawn any attention they hadn't bothered, the town practically turning into a military/refugee camp overnight.
Hermione had been back to Oxford, just yesterday, Remus apparating her over after they were sure it was safe so she could check in with her parents. The town was halfway unrecognisable, especially around the University — the buildings were the same, the contours changed only slightly by bits of communications equipment tacked on here and there, the streets empty of cars but filled with all variety of military vehicles. There were people all around, camped out under haphazard tents or just out in the open in green spaces or right on the pavement, gathered in big clumps listening to radios set up here and there or one of the places they were handing out supplies, in a queue for one thing or another (mostly to volunteer or to get information). Getting all the evacuees situated was a pretty big problem, especially since the announcement that the government had fled to Oxford had drawn a flood of volunteers from nearby counties — they'd filled up practically every available building in town, but even then hadn't had enough, the excess left to crowd the parks and streets, it was a mess.
Her parents had even taken in refugees — when Hermione had shown up, she'd been a little surprised to find a dozen-plus unfamiliar people in the house. Their house was pretty large — Hermione remembered, when they'd moved into the place when she'd been five or six, wondering what they were going to use it all for — so they had plenty of space to take people in. There being strangers in the house wasn't even an entirely new phenomenon, the guest bedrooms made available for local Party members (or associates) who needed a place to stay for a couple weeks, for whatever reason. The Party was working to organise the refugee camps as much as was possible, help to make sure everyone was getting everything they needed, so Dad had been in a position to offer their house for people with disabilities or serious medical conditions, especially children, who might want to have a doctor around, just in case. There were several families crammed into their house, Hermione had noticed at least one kid in a wheelchair (palsy, maybe), a couple blind people, one person she thought had Down's.
When they'd talked, Dad had admitted he'd stolen insulin from the hospital — he would have tried to buy it off someone, but they'd been busy enough there hadn't been anyone to talk to (and who knew how long pounds were going to be worth anything anyway) — so there must be a couple diabetics in the house, and also a kid with leukaemia. Dad wasn't an oncology expert, but he was pretty pessimistic about the boy's chances, especially given the interruption in proper care and the risk of secondary infections from the move and the somewhat crowded living conditions. He'd keep an eye on it as best he could, the parents also already informed of what to look out for, but he was worried that, by the time they noticed anything was seriously wrong, the kid would have already deteriorated enough they'd lose him. His chances were probably better in a house with a medical doctor on hand than in one of the camps around, but Dad had been careful not to make his parents any promises.
Dad had been called in to help at the local hospital — they'd already had his name on file because Mum and Dad both had admitting privileges there, in case there was an emergency they couldn't handle at the practice — in addition to his shifts there and checking in with the refugees in their house also helping the Party put together a clinic for the refugees, to take care of minor things so people with non-critical issues didn't crowd the hospital too much. He actually hadn't been at home when Hermione had shown up, the strangers in her house had pointed her toward the clinic — in the early process of being assembled at that point, tents raised from poles and curtains and bedsheets, or whatever they had on hand, washing stations jury-rigged with garden hoses. When Hermione had found him, Dad had been split between treating a teenage girl with a jagged scrape on one arm (from falling debris) and some pretty nasty smoke inhalation, and answering questions from volunteers how they wanted the clinic set up.
Seeing her father doing normal doctor stuff like looking over an injury like that wasn't that unusual. Her parents were primarily dentists, but they were proper medical doctors, and had kept their certifications in other areas up over the years — they volunteered at a local free clinic when they had the time, Hermione had been brought along now and then back when she'd been too young for them to feel comfortable leaving her home alone. (She'd spend the whole time reading quietly in a corner, but still.) Seeing him in the middle of a messy refugee camp yelling instructions to people setting up a very haphazard-looking clinic had still been somewhat surreal.
(Dad admitting to outright stealing medical supplies had also been rather surreal, but on reflection she couldn't say she was that surprised. Better they get used than sit in storage somewhere.)
Dad had been rather taken aback when she turned up — her parents hadn't known exactly when the attack had hit London, they'd hoped Hermione had already been on the way to Hogwarts. He'd been swamped with people at the time, couldn't get away to talk, so Hermione had helped out for an hour or two to get through the queue of patients. Hermione had picked up some basic first aid over the years — she even had a certificate back in her room from a class she took last summer, though she didn't know what that was worth exactly — but since Secrecy had lapsed anyway, she went ahead and just used magic for most of it. Her healing magic was pretty limited, and she didn't have potions on hand, but for the little things they were dealing with here it was better and quicker than what she'd be able to do otherwise. Most of the refugees were remarkably matter-of-fact about magic existing, but she guessed they'd had a couple days to get used to the idea by then...and magic being used to fight aliens and heal the injured was probably about as good of a reintroduction as they could have hoped for, really.
A couple of the volunteers were rather shocked by her doing magic, though — she vaguely recognised them, they must be local Communists she'd met at one point or another. (She was brought to events sometimes, but she could be pretty bad at remembering people.) Apparently, Dad hadn't mentioned his daughter was magical yet, so that'd made a little fuss.
They'd managed to get away after a little while, caught up. Hermione had managed not to cry, talking about Sam, if only barely — Dad being extremely sympathetic about it and hugging her and everything hadn't made it easier to keep her composure. Mum wasn't around, for a surprising reason: it turned out even former reservists were being called back, particularly ones who had special skills, like medical training. (Hermione's parents were very fit, but they'd had her late and were getting up in years — Mum was probably too old for them to consider calling her in in ordinary circumstances, but these weren't ordinary circumstances.) Part of the reason it was so surprising was because Hermione had...kind of forgotten Mum had been in the Army? She'd left well before Hermione had been born, and it just wasn't something that came up very often. That Mum was from a big military family, had been raised relatively conservative — only relatively conservative, since she'd joined the Army rather than get married straight out of school like a 'proper' young woman — her personal politics not swinging to the left until after she'd met Dad, was the sort of thing Hermione was vaguely aware of, but just didn't think about very often.
It helped that she didn't see much of Mum's side of the family, had barely even met her grandparents. She'd been told, just a couple years ago, that they didn't approve of Dad, for exceedingly offensive reasons — Dad had a single Algerian grandfather, and apparently that was too much colour for them.
(Which was completely absurd, not only because racism was stupid, but Hermione's great-grandfather had been an actual war hero who'd been killed in the literal French Resistance, but she guessed that was beside the point.)
Mum was off somewhere with a bunch of lapsed reservists and volunteers, getting run through some basic combat training — review for Mum, but Dad suspected it was all new for a lot of them. (Also, they were probably all half her age, but Hermione didn't doubt she was keeping up just fine. Her parents dragged her out hiking sometimes on holiday, and Hermione just about killed herself trying to keep up with them, every time.) Last Dad had heard, she'd been told to prepare herself to be sent off to one of the big alien landings in the tropics, probably Africa or India, they didn't have any detailed plans at this point. Which was a seriously scary thought, her Mum being sent off to a warzone on another bloody continent, but there was nothing Hermione could do about it. Just had to...wait, and hope everything turned out alright.
She'd gotten the impression Dad was nervous about it too, was distracting himself with work. (She suspected he wasn't sleeping much either.) Hermione's aunt Tienne had provided another excellent distraction from his worries by apparating over to update Dad on how their family were doing — Orléans hadn't been hit, so Grandmother, Tienne, and her aunt Anne were all fine; her cousin Mailys had been in Paris at the time, but she'd gotten out, had already joined them at Grandmother's house; her uncle Rémy and his family, near Nantes, were also fine; Tunis had been hit, and Tienne hadn't found her uncle Eugène and his family, she was sure they were alive but not where they were. (Tunis had been hit, their house intact but empty, Tienne assumed they'd been caught up in the evacuation.) Which was all good news, of course, but Hermione was taken aback by the detail that Tienne had apparated straight to their house in Britain from Orléans, because apparently her aunt was a mage? Since when?!
Dad said Tienne had been equally surprised that she hadn't needed to tell him about magic, because she hadn't known about Hermione, either. She'd known that, for Statute of Secrecy reasons, they hadn't been able to tell Dad's (or Mum's) family about magic — the families of muggleborns were allowed to know, but only those in their household, living with them — and it turned out it'd gone both ways, so Hermione hadn't been told that her aunt and her cousins Aimée and Théo were also all muggleborns. Not a huge surprise, she guessed, since magic tended to run in families there were pretty good odds she'd have close relatives with magic, but still, it was ridiculous. Despite being his (half-)sister, Tienne was only a few years older than Hermione, Dad had long moved out and across the Channel before she'd even been born, so he hadn't counted as a member of the household — Grandmother had wanted to tell him about it, but she hadn't wanted to risk Tienne being removed from her custody if she broke the rules too flagrantly. It was all, just, ugh, Hermione was very annoyed.
From what Tienne had told Dad, Grandmother was actually a squib, born in one of the magical noble families that had been wiped out in the Communalist Revolution in the 30s and 40s — Tienne had told him their grandparents' names, which was actually news, they'd thought their mother had been abandoned at an orphanage as an infant. (Which, she had been abandoned at an orphanage, just at a later age than she'd implied.) Dad had forgotten their given names (tired), but apparently Hermione's grandmother had been born Athénaïs d'Angeus, which was a name she recognised from History class, one of the more important French noble families on the magical side. Which was a little surreal, she still didn't know how to feel yet about having an actual connection to the magical world (if in the wrong country).
Anyway, after getting lunch and talking for a bit, Hermione had floated the possibility of staying in Oxford with him — somewhat to her surprise, he'd said it might be better for her to stay at Rock-on-Clyde. It was still possible the town would become a target, with the government and the military here, she'd be safer under the Potters' wards. Also, he'd thought she was safely away at Hogwarts, so he hadn't bothered saving her bedroom for her, they'd have to kick out the family living there for her to move back in. And he was going to be extremely busy for the foreseeable future anyway. The primary floo hub in London was down, but they didn't need to go through London to get from Wales to Oxford — if Hermione wanted to visit now and then, check in and maybe help with the refugees some, of course that'd be great, but he'd be more comfortable with her staying where she was.
So that was what she was doing. She'd sent a messenger charm to Remus, telling him she'd be taking the floo back to Rock-on-Clyde, just to test whether it worked — and she'd been here since. She hadn't gone back to Oxford today, Dad really was very busy, she didn't want to distract him too much. Instead she'd, just, poked around the library, read whatever seemed interesting.
And she...waited. For news, for the fighting to end, for some inkling of what she was supposed to be doing with herself. Just waited, and worried.
She felt like she should be doing something, she just...didn't know what. She wasn't much of a fighter — proper magical duelling required being able to whip out the right spell at a second's notice, and Hermione was too methodical, just couldn't get the hang of it — so going to help with that would be a good way to get herself killed, and she didn't know enough healing magic to be much use as a medic either. (Also, front-line medics needed to be able to fight too, she'd just get in the way.) Despite all the refugees packed into Rock-on-Clyde, there wasn't really any work to do there either — Cediny had called in elves from other Potter properties, they had it handled. Hermione did feel rather guilty about that, but most of what the elves were doing seemed to be on Cediny's initiative — Beth and Sirius had brought the evacuees here, but accommodating them was left entirely up to the elves — and she had delegated the lion's share of the cooking to refugees who knew what they were doing, their guests mostly cleaning up after themselves, so it could be worse?
(Naturally, Beth was also uncomfortable with the magically-enforced servitude house-elves were bound by — Hermione had noticed before that, when talking to Potter elves, she seemingly consciously avoided phrasing anything in a way that could be interpreted as an order, so they wouldn't be magically compelled to do as she said. Which was still not great, but... Also, Beth had hardly ever been here before, so in a way it was more like they were all guests in Cediny's house, and Beth hadn't ordered them to look after the refugees, so they weren't required to be as friendly and accommodating as they had been so far, and... It was complicated, Hermione guessed.)
She could go back to Oxford to help out, but she wasn't certain how much help she would be, exactly. Things were still a huge mess there, and she didn't have any particular skills or knowledge that would be special help, she couldn't help the feeling she'd end up just getting in the way. Maybe after things had calmed down a little bit, and... Oh, she could make some potions to stock the clinic with — muggle medical supplies were going to be relatively difficult to come by, especially a couple months down the line, but there was no reason she couldn't fill in the gaps with magical ones instead. Not just for the refugee camps at Oxford, she guessed adding to the stash the Order was keeping probably wasn't a bad idea either. And the Potters had a lot of greenhouses and stuff for potions ingredients, so she'd probably be able to get most of what she needed relatively easily. She would need to write down instructions, of course, as well as the few interactions and allergies to look out for — potions were generally less sensitive to those sorts of things and less prone to side-effects, but there were still potential problems — but they were usually rather straightforward, there was no reason muggle doctors or nurses or even volunteers should be too confused.
She quick made up a list of issues she thought the clinic Dad was setting up might need to deal with, and which kinds of potions would be useful for that; she added a note to herself to look into things she didn't know of a potion for off the top of her head, and to drop by Oxford tomorrow and ask Dad if she was missing anything. It was too late to do that now, though, so that was all she could do at the moment. And so, after such a short period of productivity, she found herself at a loss again.
It was late — though she wasn't sure how late, exactly. Ron and Ginny and Mrs. Weasley had all already gone to bed, Ron rather reluctantly. He'd stubbornly tried to stay out here with her, but he'd run out of steam only in the last half hour or so, yawningly suggesting she try to get some sleep herself. That didn't seem particularly likely — she hadn't slept well last night, and had made up for it by sneaking a nap in the early afternoon — but Ron might not realise that. (She hadn't told him about the nightmares.) It was pretty quiet here in general, the main family's rooms far enough away from the terraces and the guest hall that the activity there didn't reach them here. But it was even quieter than normal, the air still and heavy. Hermione was curled up in one of the chairs in the big salon with her Armithmancy textbook — she had the feeling Hogwarts might not be returning to normal business for a little while, so she might as well go over what she was supposed to be learning. That might be more difficult in Runes — Babbling didn't teach from a textbook, the required books for the class just references — but Hermione didn't want to bother her with questions about what they'd have been studying...maybe the Potter library would have something useful, she didn't know much at all about warding...
She'd been reading the same paragraph over and over for at least a couple minutes, not properly taking it in. Her eyes weren't quite cooperating, tired, but also she just kept getting distracted, losing her train of thought in mid-sentence. Worrying about the literal alien invasion going on, worrying about her parents, worrying about Beth. Worrying about the end of Secrecy, and the response to the invasion, international politics were about to get extremely complicated. Not to mention, worrying about Voldemort — everyone was distracted with the literal aliens, but he was still out there, and who the hell knew how he'd deal with this situation? She couldn't imagine the Death Eaters would be happy about Secrecy ending, that could get very bad, very quickly...
(Everything was a mess, and Hermione didn't know what to do about any of it.)
"Oh, Hermione."
She twitched at the unexpected nose, glanced up toward— "Beth!" Jumping out of her chair, the book toppling down to the floor (oops), she started crossing the room toward Beth, weaving impatiently through the furniture. Beth's hair was a wild tangled mess, an asymmetrical red halo around her head, the skin of her face and her arms noticeably pinkish, as though sunburned, where it wasn't darkened with ash, thin trails of a dried greenish-black fluid Hermione knew was alien blood peeking out at her collar. She looked tired, face long and blank and eyes deep and puffy, shoulders visibly slumped — but Hermione didn't see any obvious signs of any injury, just exhausted. Hermione met her with a hug, Beth twitching just a little, startled. She felt tense, but warm, and very much alive, the relief hitting hard enough Hermione felt tears prickle at her eyes.
(If Beth had gotten herself killed somewhere out there, Hermione didn't know what she would have done.)
Slowly, as though uncertain, Beth's arms found their way around her — gripping far more loosely than Hermione was, but Beth could be overly cautious about these things. Aware of how Beth could be about touching, not wanting to make her too uncomfortable, Hermione quickly let go, took a half-step back. "I was so worried, I haven't seen you since— Well. Are you okay?"
"Fine. Tired. It's late, I thought everyone would be in bed by the time I got here."
"Everyone else is. Except the twins, they're somewhere helping out." They'd spent most of the last few days helping people get out of the magical enclaves in London, sorting through half-burned-out magical districts for cursed objects and potions reagents that shouldn't be left just sitting around. Hermione hadn't seen much of them since moving to Rock-on-Clyde, but a bedroom was set aside for them anyway. "And, this isn't a I'm completely miserable but don't want to make a fuss 'fine', is it? You know I hate it when you use that word."
Beth rolled her eyes — there was less energy to the expression than usual, but it was still reassuring that she was seemingly well enough to be exasperated with Hermione's nagging. "I'm tired, and sore, but other than that. I had a broken wrist, but the healers took care of that, and gave me a potion for the burns, and..." Beth reached into a pocket, drawing Hermione's attention to how oddly she was dressed. Mage-made clothing, definitely, baggy trousers and a wrap-around short-sleeved tunic of an unfamiliar style, both in plain, undyed linen. From the spots of alien blood Hermione had noticed, she guessed Beth's clothes had been a total loss. She'd pulled a fist-sized ceramic container out of her pocket, said, "I'm supposed to rub in some of this before bed, for burns and bruises and stuff. But seriously, Hermione, I'm okay."
"Good, that's good." Hermione was tempted to ask about the broken wrist — she needed to take a mental step back and remind herself that broken bones weren't nearly as big a deal to mages — but she didn't want to bother Beth too much when she was already so exhausted.
"Mm. I was going to get something to eat and have a shower first, or a bath I guess, but I...can't remember where the kitchen is." Beth was giving the living room around them a vaguely distressed sort of look, eyes wide, lost.
That was almost a little funny, but Hermione had to agree Rock-on-Clyde was a bit much. "It's over here, come on..."
Beth was quiet on the way to the kitchen, listening to Hermione fill the air with ramble — nervous habit, couldn't help it. About her parents, what was going on in Oxford, what she knew of what the Order and the government were doing, whatever came to mind. She seemed mildly amused by the revelation that Hermione had had an aunt and cousins at Beauxbatons for years without knowing about it, which was somewhat irritating, but she guessed it was kind of ironic from a distance. Yes, everyone who'd been moved here was fine, so far as Hermione knew, she hadn't heard anything...
Normally, Beth was a very energetic person, just in general. Hermione had noticed that she often seemed to have trouble sitting still for very long at a stretch — barely a couple minutes into class and Beth's fingers would start tapping at her desk or her foot would start bouncing, uncomfortably shifting in her seat. It was noticeable in the way she walked too, though exactly what it looked like depended on her mood. If she was preoccupied with something, or angry, she tended to hunch in a little, motions quick and sharp, feet hitting the floor hard enough for her shoes to get a good clunk against the stone floors at Hogwarts. If she was in a lighter mood, there'd be a bit of a bounce to her step, her arms swinging, almost like she were skipping down the halls. Walking alongside her, Hermione sometimes felt exhausted just watching — she didn't know where Beth got the energy, honestly.
There was none of that now. There was a gingerness to Beth's pace, cautious. That wasn't entirely new, at least, almost like she'd just been to a hard quidditch practice — she had said she had bruises, so that explained that. But even then, normally her characteristic energy would still be there, barely contained, making Beth seem stiff, strangely on-edge. (People who didn't know her as well sometimes misinterpreted it as concealed upset or anger.) This time, she just seemed...slow. Limp and distracted and just...tired, Hermione guessed. She'd seen Beth sleepy before, when she had nightmare episodes, but this was...more than that. She didn't think she'd ever seen Beth this absolutely exhausted before — she even completely missed Hermione asking a question once, only half paying attention...
Hermione didn't realise she was biting her lip until she noticed the twinge of pain, forced herself to stop.
The kitchen was relatively large, but compact, cabinets and multiple work surfaces densely packed into the space. The ceiling was somewhat low, which might ordinarily make it seem a bit claustrophobic, but the greyish stone of this area of the building only made up the floor and three walls, the ceiling and fourth wall glass — above looking up at the sky, the curve of the library tower visible to one side, ahead opening into a sizeable greenhouse, filled with berries and herbs and the like. The sky was fully dark by now, clouds mostly covering the speckle of stars, lights from the kitchen slashing through the greenhouse, most of the contents hidden by multiple layers of knobby shadows.
Hermione started to lead the way to the pantry when she was startled by a little pop of house-elf apparation. "Hello Beth, Miss Hermione. Are either of you wanting something?" One of the reasons Hermione didn't know how to feel about the elves here was that they certainly looked better than elves she'd seen elsewhere — their clothes were nicer, clearly hand-made with care, and... Well, she assumed the rich greenish skin tone was healthy for house-elves, without the hint of a greyish tint she'd seen on some of the Hogwarts elves. (Of course, that they were healthy and happy didn't necessarily mean anything, but it was easier to convince herself that they didn't need or want her help.) This was, um, Tisme, Hermione thought, one of the younger women, Cediny's...niece, maybe? Hermione mostly tried to pay attention to eye colour to identify them — Tisme's was a fiery orange — since they had way more variety than in humans, but that wasn't always reliable.
"No, that's fine, I was just going to...I don't know, make a sandwich or something." She gave the stovetop a somewhat sceptical look — it was magical, the buttons and switches completely unfamiliar. "I don't know, is there bacon in here somewhere?"
Getting a sandwich together was maybe a little more complicated than Beth had assumed — loaves of bread sold pre-sliced were very much a muggle thing, and the bacon didn't come in a package all sliced up nice either — so Beth, looking slightly exasperated, ended up accepting Tisme's help making her dinner. Hermione had eaten... That had to be over five hours ago by now, she hadn't realised it was so late. Anyway, she didn't need a whole thing, but she did ask Tisme if she could go pick herself a handful of berries — Tisme summoned a little bowl out of one of the cabinets, lights in the greenhouse turning on with a snap of her fingers, go right ahead. Apparently their growth was magically accelerated, she didn't need to worry about using up berries they wanted to use for something else, which was interesting. She guessed they'd have to use some kind of fertiliser, they'd quickly exhaust the soil otherwise, there must be potions for that...
By the time Hermione returned, Beth and Tisme were at the stove, standing side-by-side muttering to each other. The stove was at a height that didn't seem convenient for either of them, Beth needing to lean over somewhat, Tisme on a little step-stool. It took several minutes, the two of them bouncing to this thing or that, Tisme occasionally explaining where something was or how one thing or another worked, but eventually Beth had her sandwich, plus a scoop of beans and mushrooms in gravy — Hermione suspected Tisme had pushed the beans on her, because elves could be naggy like that. (Like Mrs. Weasley, but much less abrasive.) It was a somewhat odd sandwich, buttered bread and bacon and strips of what Hermione thought was leftover baked chicken (or maybe duck) and slices of cucumber and several herb leaves from the greenhouse and a layer of crisps. (Made out of carrots and turnips or whatever was on hand instead of potatoes, they did have a bit of extra vegetable flavour to them but not so strong it was distracting.) Tisme had mentioned cheeses, but Beth had turned them down, said something about her stomach not being up to it at the moment. Which sounded slightly absurd to Hermione, she meant, maybe the rest of that sandwich would be fine, if it weren't for the bloody cucumbers — she had no idea what the hell those were doing there. Beth's taste could be a bit odd sometimes, so it wasn't the first time Hermione found herself looking askance at something she was eating, but still, cucumbers? on a bacon sandwich? Bloody weirdo...
Tisme gave Beth a funny look when she asked if she could just have a glass of water, Hermione suggested she try some of the cider instead. The Potters — by which Hermione meant an orchard Beth owned — actually made the stuff for sale, but they kept some too, and it was pretty good. Beth muttered something about falling asleep in the bath again, but she accepted the cider, and they sat down at a little table in a corner of the kitchen.
Between bites of her odd sandwich, Beth filled Hermione in on what she'd been up to since the tube station, what was going on out there in general. Beth had been to half the Continent, it seemed like — Rotterdam, Paris, Moscow, Istanbul, Barcelona. She didn't even remember where all she'd been, Sirius would just apparate her somewhere and they'd help with evacuations, clearing rubble, hunting down alien landing parties or flying against their fighter planes. (Not "planes", Hermione guessed, since they'd come down from orbit they must be some kind of spacecraft.) She'd actually been part of the escort getting the PM and the royal family out of London, and by the sound of it had played a significant part in them getting through it alive — Hermione joked that that was the sort of thing that people ended up with knighthoods for, Beth had just rolled her eyes...and then said she technically already had two of those, which was true, Hermione had forgotten about that. Beth's description of the aliens, just, firing on a crowd of defenceless captives in Manchester was horrifying, but Beth hardly seemed to notice, voice flat and eyes blank, focussed more on her sandwich than the story she was telling.
Beth was lucky she'd gotten out of the big alien ship with only a broken wrist — if Sirius hadn't done an insanely reckless apparation to come back and get her, she probably wouldn't have made it out in time. She was remarkably matter-of-fact about that too, of course, Hermione didn't really expect anything else.
(Beth could have died, easily, and Hermione wouldn't even have known about it until someone thought to tell her.)
Hermione was rather relieved to hear that the fighting seemed to be mostly done now. Or, Europe was through the worst of it, at least — they'd managed to fight off the initial attacks in the north, but the aliens had made much larger landings in a few places around the equator, they still had to deal with those. Beth didn't have any better idea than Hermione what was going on down there. Long-range communications were still down — they were slowly putting together a network using magical means, but it would take time to get detailed updates from outside of Europe — so they had very little idea what exactly the landings were composed of, nor why the aliens seemed so focussed on the equatorial region. If they intended primarily to wipe out those most prepared to resist and take over the planet, one would think they'd focus on temperate latitudes in the northern hemisphere — Brazil and India were significant regional powers, of course, but nobody would try to argue they had the same capacity to fight back as, say, the United States or Russia. That power difference didn't exist in the same way on the magical side, true, but still, Hermione wondered if they knew anything about Earth at all. Beth admitted that they'd seemed blindsided by magic, and didn't do so great against muggle weapons either, so...
Beth floated the possibility that they'd mostly gone around the equator because there was something they wanted there. Maybe natural resources — nobody was certain, but it did seem likely that their landings had been aimed at tropical rainforests — or maybe the climate there was simply their preference. It made sense that, assuming they hadn't started out taking the humans seriously as a threat (which seemed like a pretty good bet to Beth), that they would send most of their stuff at the thing they wanted most. All their technology seemed to be alive, so, maybe they needed a tropical environment to grow them? They might be building factories down there, or whatever the proper term should be — that was Beth's theory, but they'd find out when they got there and saw for themselves.
Which was actually a good thought, Hermione had to try not to show her surprise. People tended to underestimate Beth's intelligence — not least of all Beth herself — she didn't want to give the wrong impression.
"You plan on going. To help root them out." It wasn't really a question.
Beth nodded. "If they'll let me, I guess. Sirius won't try to stop me, he gets it, but... Well, I'm technically of age in magical law, but that's just because magical Britain is fucked up, you know."
Hermione was very much aware of that — technically, the closest equivalent to legal majority in magical Britain was the age of contract, which was thirteen. There were thresholds above that, but they were based on educational qualifications, not a person's actual age. For example, the restrictions on underage use of magic defined "underage" as people who hadn't yet gotten their OWLs (or equivalent)...and also only in muggle areas, but Hermione had already worked herself up enough over that. (The Ministry could track where magic was cast, but not necessarily by whom, and were primarily concerned with the maintenance of Secrecy — so magic-raised students, living in magical enclaves with magical guardians, could practise magic over the summers, but muggleborns couldn't without risking expulsion, so ended up falling behind their magic-raised peers.) Theoretically, if one finished their OWLs at thirteen, they were no longer covered by underage restrictions, and could get an apparation licence and everything. And now that Secrecy had been well and truly shattered, Hermione guessed that restriction didn't matter anymore anyway.
It was called the "age of contract" because it was the age at which magical law recognised people as competent enough to consent to a contract. And that meant any contract — employment, debts, marriage, anything...including something in magical law called "corporal indenture", which was was basically slavery.
Yes, thirteen-year-olds selling themselves into slavery was perfectly legal in magical Britain — there were legal brothels in London that made contracts with people that young, legally. It was extremely messed up.
(Magical Britain needed a proper revolution, badly.)
So, technically, Beth was a legal adult on the magical side, despite being barely fifteen. So, theoretically, she could join whatever group they'd be putting together to fight the aliens in the tropics. Or at least there would be no legal reason she couldn't — Hermione wouldn't be surprised if they wanted volunteers to have their OWLs, at least. And this group would probably be working with muggle governments, who had their own laws on the matter, and might object to their allies using literal child soldiers.
But then, they were being invaded by aliens — maybe people would be willing to overlook it, under the circumstances. Especially since Beth was exceptionally talented for her age, and would be able to catch up quickly, thanks to being an omniglot. Maybe not so early in the crisis, but if things got worse before they got better...
She didn't want to think about... Mum was already going to be sent off to another continent to fight actual aliens, and that was bad enough. And Beth was only barely fifteen, she shouldn't have to do this, there was no reason she...
Hermione didn't want to lose either of them, but she definitely didn't want to lose them both.
"I really wish you wouldn't."
Poking idly at the remains of her beans, Beth glanced at her, the barest hint of a smile. "Yeah, I'd guess not. I know you don't like it when I get in trouble."
"This is so much worse than that. This isn't... I'm serious, you could die."
"Believe it or not, I am aware of that." For some inexplicable reason, she almost sounded amused.
"It's not funny, Beth! I don't know—" Hermione cut herself off, realising going down that tangent wouldn't do any good. She knew why Beth didn't take her safety seriously — the Dursleys, to put it briefly — and forcing Beth into an uncomfortable conversation about that just now was only going to make her even more stubborn about it. "I'm scared you're going to get killed out there, thousands of miles away, and there'll be nothing I can do about it! Why is that so hard to understand?"
Frowning down at her beans, Beth muttered, "I do understand. It just doesn't change anything. I'm not... I can't just sit here, and do nothing. I would hate myself for the rest of my life, I can't."
"There are other things that need to be done! I went to Oxford yesterday, and there's plenty of work to go around, getting all the refugees situated and— We don't have to worry about Secrecy anymore, so there are all kinds of potions and enchantments and wards people could use, I was just starting to look into all that. And with the damage to big cities, and all the people made homeless, there's a tonne of reconstruction we're going to have to do, that'll be going on for years, and having magic will make that all a lot easier. International trade is going to, just, collapse, I'm sure, so we'll have to worry about food and medicine and who knows what else, and magic can help with all that too, and—"
"Maybe there are a lot of other things, but I'm not good at other things, Hermione!" Beth dropped her spoon — rattling against the plate, getting gravy all over the handle — both hands coming up to rub at her face. Her breath thick and shaky, god, she looked so tired, Hermione's heart clenching, she had to resist the urge to reach out to her. (Beth didn't tend to react well to unexpected touching.) After a moment, she said, "People are dying out there."
"I know that."
"I don't think you do. I mean, obviously you do, like, factually, a thing you know, but..." Letting out a heavy sigh, Beth dropped her hands, showing the red in her eyes. Staring right at Hermione, strained and intense, she asked, "Do you have any idea how many dead bodies I've seen these last few days?"
"...No." She'd said she and Sirius, between attacks, had helped with evacuations and freeing people from ruined buildings — Hermione would guess it was a lot. Maybe literally hundreds. "I'm sorry you had to see..."
"It's not about— That's not what I'm saying. Not really. Maybe you can... I can copy information out of people's heads, but that doesn't mean I'm any better at using it than they are. Half the time I don't even realise I know something until someone reminds me, I'm not— Sure, I'm an omniglot, but I'm still me, you know. I can learn stuff quickly, but knowing a bunch of things doesn't stop me from being a big dumb idiot."
"You're not stupid, Beth," Hermione insisted, for what felt like the millionth time — she really hated it when she talked about herself like that.
"Maybe not, but... Maybe you can help with all that other stuff, but, did you forget how shite I am with potions and enchanting? Like, I can know exactly what I'm supposed to do, but I still fuck it up, I don't know why I'm—" Beth cut herself off, leaning over the table, her hands again rubbing at her face. At least in part, Hermione suspected, to hide tears.
Hermione guessed she wasn't...entirely wrong about that. Beth was a natural with charms, but potions and enchanting were both a different kind of magic. It took prior planning, and a meticulous attention to detail, and patience, that just didn't seem to come easily to Beth — her seeming inability to sit still for more than a couple minutes at a stretch didn't exactly suit her to a long brewing process, or delicately carving rune after rune. Hermione couldn't count the times Beth had gotten visibly, terribly frustrated in Potions class. Professor Snape's condescending, abrasive tone didn't help — that man had an uncanny ability to strike right at Beth's sensitive areas with laser precision with only a single flatly-delivered sentence — but Beth had complained that she could have the formula bloody memorised, know the theory of how it was supposed to work — sometimes better than Hermione, thanks to the encyclopaedic memory of attributes and interactions omniglottalism allowed — but still not be able to get the potion to come out right. She just didn't have the temperament for it, she always got impatient and rushed, or her attention would lapse, ruining potion after potion, time after time. And her few attempts at enchanting weren't much more successful.
So, she was right about that part, maybe — but that didn't mean she had to— There were other options, there had to be other options. "Reconstruction, then, that takes a lot of charmwork. Hell, you could swing a hammer if it comes down to it."
Beth's lips twitched. "Yeah, it takes charmwork — and also enchanting, not to mention training I don't have. And, it's kind of a finicky thing, I don't know if... At least with a potion, the worst I have to worry about is the thing blowing up in my face — I'd rather not be responsible for someone's house falling down around their ears."
"I'm not saying you'd be designing things yourself, someone would be there to tell you what to do."
"Still, it's not..." She sighed, her eyes tipping up to the ceiling for a second. Picking at a couple bits that'd fallen out of her sandwich, moodily glaring down at her plate, she said, "I'm not good at anything else. Maybe I could help with reconstruction, sure, just another hand holding a wand. But battlemagic is something I'm good at. Like, really, not just for my age — I fought with a lot of grown-up mages all around Europe today, so I know that for a fact. Not, like, the best or anything, but, definitely better than average. I took down that first flying thing, clearing out those landings in Manchester and Rotterdam, I barely got hit the whole time, people around me dropping one by one. The big one over Paris, it was my idea — I had help, but I was first in line, blowing the hole open and getting inside, who knows how long it would have kept firing on the city if I hadn't been there. Someone would have come up with it eventually, but... I'm good in a fight, Hermione, I don't know why I'm... It's just what I'm good at.
"Sure, maybe I could stay here in Britain, and help with...whatever. But... Today, if I hadn't helped, how many more people might have died? Dozens? hundreds? Maybe thousands, with Paris. If I stayed— If I was working on reconstruction or whatever, sure, it's helping, but every day, I would wake up and think... Maybe, there's someone out there who's not quite as good as me, maybe they're short one more person than they would be. And so maybe they can't do as well, or as much. And I would wonder, how many people are dying somewhere out there, right now, that wouldn't be if I were there, instead of here? I'm not saying I could, like, fight off all the aliens all by myself, or whatever, but... This is something I can do, I'm good at this — and if I don't do it, if I stay here, people will die, people who didn't have to.
"I know you, and Ron and the Weasleys, and Sirius, I know you'll all be worried. I know I could die, and you'll all be hurt by it. But how many lives is that worth, Hermione? Hundreds? thousands? Can you tell me, honestly, that it'd be worth it? Because, I'm sorry, but I don't think it is."
...No. No, Hermione couldn't tell her that. She didn't even really believe that Beth not going wouldn't mean more people dying — she might have said that kind of talk was completely absurd before, she was only one fifteen-year-old girl, but, well, she didn't think Beth was lying about these last couple days. So. She couldn't guess how much of a difference it would make, but, some, surely. Part of her kind of wanted to say that, yes, the lives of hundreds of strangers she'd never meet thousands of miles away were worth less than Beth being here and safe, but she seriously doubted Beth would believe she meant it — and if she did, she'd probably just think less of Hermione for it.
That was just...not fair. That wasn't fair at all.
Hermione wasn't consciously aware of when her hand had found Beth's. She hadn't pulled away, as she often did when people grabbed at her without warning — gripping back, not painfully tight, but noticeable. Blinking down at the table, Hermione struggled to control her breath, her own chest trying to strangle it out of her, cleared her throat. "Dammit, Beth, why do you– why do you have to have a good point?"
Her lips twitched. "Lucky for you, it doesn't happen very often."
"Oh shut up, you." With her free hand, Hermione quick wiped at her eyes, cleared her throat again. She wasn't going to break down over this, nothing had even happened yet, Beth was going to be fine. She'd made it through these last few days, hadn't she? "I'm going to miss you." Because she'd likely be gone for months at a time, Hermione meant — she refused to consider the odds of Beth never coming back at all.
"I'm not going anywhere yet. We don't even know what this is going to look like yet, it'll be a couple weeks at least."
"And what if whoever's in charge does decide you're too young to take along?"
Beth shrugged. "Then I'll fly there myself — I might have to wander around for a little bit, but Firebolts are fast, I'll find the warzone eventually. I'm not just going to sit here, no matter what happens. I couldn't live with myself."
Despite how miserable this all was, the possibility of losing Beth hanging over her like a dark cloud, could barely breathe, Hermione still felt an amused scoff force itself up her chest. "You're bloody impossible, Beth."
Smirking over at her, the expression losing some of its depth from exhaustion, Beth drawled, "Believe it or not, I am aware of that."
Even local authorities have managed little more than rough estimates, given the chaos of the time — conditions on the ground would not improve to a state to permit a thorough accounting for another three years. The best scholarship available suggests that, during Zero Day alone, between the slaughter around the primary landing zones and the strikes at urban centres, perhaps a hundred twenty million people were killed, representing as much as two percent of the total population. In the first week.
And those casualties were only going to mount as the weeks dragged on — Zero Day might have ended in victory, but the Battle for the Earth had just begun.
— Garm Kelchis Dance, Homeworld Found: An Introduction to Dimitra and Its People
excerpt from Chapter III.6, "The Yuuzhan Vong Invasion
And that's the end of the first section! Woo!
As mentioned before, this story will have four parts; this fic is just the first part, the other three will be their own fics in the series. First Contact is composed mostly of vignettes, going over the Yuuzhan Vong invasion and Earth's initial exposure to galactic society — think of it more like an introduction than a fully fleshed-out fic of its own. I thought jumping straight to Sirius having drinks with Han and Leia in shitty dive bars out on the Rim and Beth being very exasperated with everyone at the Jedi Temple would be extremely confusing without explaining how the hell that all happened, so here we are.
The second part is going to deal with some aftermath of the Yuuzhan Vong invasion and Beth and Sirius both leaving Earth (for different reasons), and eventually the Dark Nest stuff — which will go rather differently, due in part to changes to the worldbuilding and Jaina Solo's character. (They can never write that girl consistently author to author, it's very irritating.) The third part will feature Jacen Solo being his usual self-centered idiot self — if you've read the books, you know what I mean — and also internal Imperial politics. Then the fourth part will have Abeloth, the Lost Tribe, and also Beth doing a revolution for funsies. Will be a while until we get there, but should be a shit-show. Earth happens to be in the Unknown Regions, so we won't actually be seeing any canon named Star Wars characters until the second part — don't expect super contrived scenarios to bring the canon characters from both sides together right away, I guess is what I'm saying.
Also, for the first time ever, I'm going to spoil the main romantic focus of this series: Beth/Jaina is going to end up taking a fair proportion of the third and fourth parts. Honestly, every single relationship Jaina has had with literally every man in her life in canon was written absolutely terribly — except with her father, they're adorable — and I'm the author now, so fuck the police, I do what I want.
First Contact itself will have three sections. The second section will go over the war with the Yuuzhan Vong, as well as some of the major technological/political changes going on in the background. There are a total of sixteen scenes planned at the moment, not including the excerpts — probably fewer than sixteen chapters total, since some of them will go together, but it will be significantly longer than the first section. I'd initially assumed it'd be shorter, but then I actually sat down to plan it, and oh shit, there were more things I needed to include than I thought, oops. Those will all be posted one by one once the section is complete, which might take a while — I'm still trying to work primarily on The Good War, and writing in general has been slow lately, due to sleep problems and also gardening. The third section will involve more aliens showing up in the solar system, but thankfully they're not insanely genocidal this time, and actually have civilised first contact protocols, so that goes pretty well.
I'm working on writing up a summary of the history of the Star Wars side of things, from the end of Episode VI up to the beginning of the second part — I imagine it'll be seriously damn confusing for people who haven't read the old EU books otherwise, and also I'm changing some things, so. I'll plan to post that between finishing the first part and posting the second part.
Right, I think that's more than enough from me. See you all later.