For each attack, they could only go back once with the Time Turners, and many of them had already been seen elsewhere at the same time. It was difficult to decide the teams for the last round of trips, especially when they did not know where each enemy was, and which of their own team members would be seen where. The mission, they decided, was not a complete failure, but a timely lesson, especially given that none of them died. No one was surprised when Professor McGonagall showed up, even though it was the middle of the night.

"Do I understand rightly that you are trying to go after the Death Eaters directly?"

"We don't have much of a choice," Ron managed. He was not back at a hundred percent, and perhaps not the best choice to argue that they would be fine. "They're going after muggles. They're trying to drag us out by hiding among them and forcing us to go looking for them. That's the genius of the plan. Some of them are in the masks and robes, and others are hiding. We don't know which is which until we get there. Even they don't know about each other. If we let it go until tomorrow, they could all be in muggle clothes, or they could all be starkers; we'd never know until we split up and we're spread thin as it is-"

"Why did you go forward with this without asking for any kind of-"

"We don't report to you," Susan said, annoyed. "The Department of Magical Law Enforcement, as my aunt knew it, is no more. Hogwarts is no more- what's coming in to replace it has been many times assured to be completely separate from what we're doing-"

"Why would you not, Miss Bones, ask for any kind of help?"

No one had an immediate response. The only sound that could be heard, actually, was Blaise groaning in annoyance as Michael was probably trying something experimental. He had a strange disposition for a Healer, and would probably never make it in a magical hospital, but was decent in the battlefield.

"Perhaps the Notes of Saint Mungo would be relevant here," the teacher started. Had Terry been present, and not knocked out so he would at least not feel the pain as his entrails were magically levitated back into place, he might have known the exact line reference. "Save nothing for me should I return to you anon; it is the elders who should save for the young, and not the young for the elders."

Harry, on the other hand, could not remember where in the text the line was, only that Mungo was one of the earlier ones in the book, but later chronologically- but he knew the general idea. He was pretty sure that the saint went on to express that he was growing tired of being requested to give a speech 'one more time', asking 'one more time before what?' and going off on some other point as if he forgot his own annoyance.

"We're aware that the implication is that elders are being asked to help the younger generation, and not necessarily parents and children, but we work well together and we've started to understand that we're the assault team, while the Order mostly acts defensively."

"It seems you are aware that this distinction is entirely within your own imagination, but it is true that there are those who have not dueled in over a decade." She sighed. "Do you believe, though, that the only kind of help you could accept is additional wands?"

"I wouldn't turn it down, but I see what you mean," he said. "Anyone who can't take orders from me or one of my friends is welcome to not join us. I don't think any less of an adult who can't take orders from me. The ones who can are probably going to be the butts of jokes years from now, and that's if we don't all end up dead."

"Why not leverage them?" she asked.

"We really should have," Susan said after a moment. Had she not, though, just characterized even higher ranks as dead weight? "It must have been because we've lost so many of them. We decided that as dangerous as it was for us, we would be going up against Death Eaters, and it seemed like we would just be throwing away lives."

"Is our experience with these monsters useless, then?" the old Transfiguration teacher asked. "Did you not think to ask us about how we handled Rookwood or the others?"

"I thought we were mostly dealing with the ones who weren't taken in at this point. Rookwood was, but he's stronger now; he has a-"

"A prototype Time Turner, we know. Did you know, though, that he has a Blood Ticker?"

"A what?" Ron asked. "Is that some sort of parasite?"

"No. The muggles would call it a pacemaker. Severus told us that he was born with a heart condition that has no simple fix as of the present. As a child, his life was only narrowly saved with a device that was originally designed for educational purposes, but hastily repurposed to regulate his heartbeat. At this point, it's irremovable, and it does its job well enough that the thought has probably never crossed his mind."

"Can you hear it?"

"You would have to ask someone who has been close enough. If so, though, it would make it impossible for him to disguise himself, even with the Polyjuice potion. Most likely, he would be getting in and out, pausing time as long as he could manage before having to apparate out after killing as many muggles as possible."

"That's plausible," Harry said after a moment. "You're right. We should have consulted you before we started this."

"I am afraid it is too late now. You have almost certainly been seen, and Voldemort knows that you will respond to threats to the lives of muggles by imperiling yourself."

"Shouldn't we?" Ron asked. "We lead from the front in this organization and everyone working for us appreciates it. Are you saying-"

"Voldemort will definitely take the opportunity," Ginny said after a moment. "She's right about that much. I don't know, though, how he would figure out where Harry was specifically-"

"He'll use the mental connection. There's no way he was trying to get into my head back in first year; he was too weak at the time, even with Quirrell's help. It's just a matter of proximity. Our minds are connected because our souls are connected-"

"You know, then."

"We know." He only stared back a moment before Susan started up again.

"If it's that much of a risk, then we can't justify it. Ron was only just saying that they're trying to draw us out. Killing one of us might have brought him closer to his goal, but the real purpose was to draw out you specifically. He doesn't know you have the Time Turner, so he wants you off your game and distracted by your concern for other people's lives."

"He told you one time that there was no good or evil, only power, and those too weak to seek it," Ginny said, remembering one of their many conversations. "I'm sure he's rather frustrated by the fact that he was defeated by some form of magic that runs on love. I can only imagine how much research your mother must have done before she found out how to use it to protect you."

"Even now the research is beyond what would be considered dark," McGonagall said. "Ancient, and forgotten, and right there in the words of the Phoenix Script. The power of love was precisely that which the Dark Lord did not know. It is, unfortunately, the only thing he does not seem to know. He dismissed researching what Lily Potter might use to protect her son and paid for it." She frowned. "I very much doubt that he never came across it. Almost certainly, he was aware that there was an ancient art, and whether he decided he had no need for it because he could not produce the quality of the heart that made it possible, or whether he decided that it would have to be weaker than what he intended to use matters not. It is not for any intellectual or effortful failing that he knows not love."

As obvious and basic of a concept as it was, no one seemed to be calling her naive for speaking of love as a great strength. It was for love that they continued to suffer for their fallen friends. Elphias Doge and Daedalus Diggle of the Order were getting up there in years, but no one reminded anyone of that when they died in the struggle against the Death Eaters. It was for love they had fought, and therefore it was for love they had died; that was the motivating factor that united their forces, more so than anything else. Would he have to remind his own units of that? Had they all paid the price for the use of dark magic?

"We've been having some conflicts lately," he said after their teacher left, satisfied that they were not heading right back out into the field, at least not until they had compiled more information. "I've always said that you're all free to think what you want. I wouldn't be able to get everyone on the same page on everything if I tried. That doesn't mean that we can't solve our conflicts, though."

"Like what?" Neville asked after a moment. "I mean, if you're on about what happens after..."

"I know you haven't said as much about it, because under the best of circumstances, there's nothing we can really do, until then, but I think it's become obvious that we all have stakes in this. We can't have fought for this long without thinking of some way that this could all be prevented in the future."

"Really?" Ron asked. "You're sure about that?"

Everyone was quiet.

"Are you about to tell me I assumed too much?"

"Mate, if we're all talking like friends here, and not officers, then I'll put it on the line for you. I'll go with you and Hermione to the ends of the earth and beyond, but there isn't a chance in hell we're ever going to be out of the woods. I've said before that we can't tear down too much, but that's already over. The most we can do is rebuild, and have an illusion of continuity, but that's all it's going to be, and it won't last long."

Nothing of what he said rang of panic or ill-considered words. No one was immediately disagreeing with him, though, or taking advantage of the words of someone so high-ranking, even Michael, who might have thought it was a good opportunity, and for that Harry was grateful. He had not planned to remind everyone of his personal view that the best way was what he had put forth; he was speaking of hope, not a specific policy to pursue. His oldest friend's objection did not constitute a derailment at all, but someone else stepping in would, and perhaps they recognized that, or perhaps they recognized that hope was the truly important subject.

"Ron, it can be easy, in a way, to keep fighting through because you're doing it for someone else. I didn't say this before, and maybe I should have before I started on this other point, but part of the reason that I haven't ever tried to unify our positions is because I actually want everyone's true beliefs. This isn't a group of people where if I have a problem with someone, I can just overlook that, or just decide to be glad that I annoy someone so much because they're annoying to me and their viewpoint doesn't matter. None of you are just comrades to me- none of you are even just friends to me, and I know this sounds absurd and I'm really hoping that no one's about to say that-"

"You're not alone in that," Susan said after a short sigh. "I realized it after one of our conflicts. We're not just people who happened to go to the same school. That's how I thought of a few people even in the DA, but any kind of lack of commitment was filtered out hard when we started this. I thought, going in, that everyone wanted to build the kind of world that I wanted, because I never had the 'when this is all over' conversation with anyone except Hannah, and even she was hiding something from me. I realized, though, that I had something better than a bunch of people who agreed with me; I had a group of friends willing to give their lives." She looked away.

"It's good that we all want to help," Michael said after a moment. "It's useless, though, if we don't decide how we want to help. We should have the conversation that we were about to have."

"We'll have it later," Ginny said. "I've been having the same problem. I can't help but think that even if I did make a perfect world, I wouldn't be there to live in it. I've been throwing myself at enemies because I don't mind the thought of falling in battle anymore. I keep thinking that if someone made a statue of me, that would be the only way that I could avoid just getting worse and worse forever. I wondered if I ever wanted a happy ending where we could live in peace again, and if so, when I stopped. Stopping with the dark magic didn't make this stop, but it made me more aware of it."

"Terry's been struggling with guilt, even though he gave it up," Neville said. "That's his story to tell, though. I only said it because it seemed like he wasn't bothered to tell me. I don't know what would work for everyone, but I think we need to read more. I think we need to get together and help each other. The Weasleys were brave enough to say that they've been having problems, but we don't know that's the end of it."

Hearing him use the word 'brave' was poignant, perhaps because he never would have called himself brave years ago; even one or two years ago; before fifth year, he hardly did anything. Cowardice, though, was not his problem; it was just a lack of confidence in himself. What he needed more than anything else was to see that what he knew about everyone else applied to himself as well. The process had been long, but there was probably no faster way.

"I have a question. Does dark magic work in an emergency?" he asked. "I've never managed to use it in that context when I wasn't regularly using it."

"No," Ginny said. "It's not like accidental magic, which is born out of need. Unless you happen to really need to use dark magic, and simultaneously be able to focus on the hatred or lack of respect or whatever else- I don't think you'll manage it. Are you saying that it's useless if we don't practice it?"

"It's killing us," Harry decided. "We've done all the experimenting we need to do. It was a crutch that we used early on and it's outlived its usefulness. We don't really need any of the Unforgivable Curses. The Imperius provides a few specific advantages, but it's not like it's the only spell that Blaise can use. We'll torture information out of people if necessary, and we don't need the Cruciatus for that. We'll have to deal with the nightmares and whatever else comes from using known spells to kill people."

"Then it's settled," Ron said. "We need to come up with a new tactical arrangement. We can't fight unless we know what we can use against the enemy and that means that I have to draw up some formations. Don't think that you'll be able to kill the target, guaranteed, in one hit; it's not that simple; I've been trying to use only known spells the whole time."

It was a legitimate point, and at the same time a transparent way of shifting the focus of the discussion. There was some argument that they had done as much already, though. Was it even possible to have hope if there was no clear plan for the future? If agreed to something, would it sound more real? Neville seemed to be thinking the same thing.

"We'll have a majority decision. Everyone who wants to can lay out specific policy decisions for after the war. We've been putting this off because we've been treating it more like a strategy than a matter of opinion- this isn't something that's going to be decided objectively, because it's a matter of values, and we were never filtered by our values, or at least not so much as commitment and giving a damn."

"I agree," he said after a moment of looking around at the others. "Treating it like a strategic thing isn't really putting off having the discussion, but it does delay a conclusion to it. We should accept that we don't have a way to be certain about the future, and we have to pick a path forward. If you don't like the idea that's chosen, all I can promise is that it wasn't chosen for no reason and it wasn't chosen by a bunch of incompetents."

"That will require some time, and it will also require some time to draw up some new strategies, so it's fine," Susan said. "It sounds like Ron really didn't have an opinion on what we should do after the war because his convictions are more based on people than ideas, and he's thinking more about the short term and how we get to the place where we even have the ability to make that decision. Anyone who wants to work with him can, and then anyone who has generally agreed with me so far can work with me. To be fair to Blaise, we'll have time for him to decide what to do as well. I think there are three main camps if I'm not mistaken."

Harry had only managed to isolate two, though there was some room for variation between them. It would be nice to have it all out in the open rather than some stating their views, and others hedging their bets. Why had they not done so already? If they really had faith in what they were saying, would they not want to explain it to everyone else? He supposed that there were some who might be hoping that Michael seems to be winning enough for Susan to give up, and then take up arms from there, or something like that. At long last, it seemed like he and Neville were the last two around.

"Are you the same as Ron, then?"

"No. I figure if I were, then I would be helping him, like Ginny and a few of the others. I don't think Terry was particular about politics either... or maybe that's the wrong word for it." He frowned a moment. "Do you have an opinion on the subject?"

"It's not that I don't. I think it's more like I don't want to cast the deciding vote. The others have been waiting on my words, and if I said something, I feel like they'd go with it to preserve the group, or the ones who would... they'd be losing out on their own chance to speak just because they wanted to keep everyone together."

"Isn't that something that they value, though?" Neville asked. "Our own unity? It's not something that's guaranteed to them. The contract makes it so that we have to be loyal to group, but there's an implication that it'll be over after the war. We don't even have to be friends for life; that's something that we're choosing."

"So you think that I should do the same thing?"

"I don't know what you should do. I just came to help you figure it out."