The Granger Principle (Harry Potter AU) (Complete)

[Starfox5]

Neat!

Click to shrink...

As for the guards, they're probably just standing around trying to figure out what the hell is happening to the dementors.

Click to shrink...

Well... the group knows what happens when dozens of Dementors gather in one place. Odds are the guards aren't just standing around.

This is a fun story, and doesn't get near enough comments for the time, effort and quality you provide.
Thank you.

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Thanks!

 

[killgore444]

Well... the group knows what happens when dozens of Dementors gather in one place. Odds are the guards aren't just standing around

Click to shrink...

You're right. They're also trying to figure out what's happening to the dementors.

 

[Starfox5]

You're right. They're also trying to figure out what's happening to the dementors.

Click to shrink...

Or they're trying to figure out what's happening to them...

 

[Starfox5]

Chapter 79: The Cold

Northeast of Azkaban, North Sea, Wizarding World, May 15th, 2006

Ron was already wearing a hazmat suit, as was Harry, so they helped Hermione into one, then Sirius. Not that the other man needed much help - for all his complaining about 'having thought I'd left NBC drills behind', he still remembered the procedure.

"I want to come as well!" wizarding Luna said while they dressed. "You'll need another wand!"

"We'll need another wand here, in case other wizards arrive - or something goes wrong," Hermione retorted. "You're the only one able to detect disillusioned people."

"But…" The other witch closed her mouth with a pout as Luna put her hand on her shoulder. "Phooey."

Ron couldn't help it - he chuckled. Which earned him a rather pouty scowl. "Sorry," he said. He wasn't sorry - the witch's reaction to what they were doing, and what they were about to do, was just too…. too 'Luna', probably. And he needed the laugh, too.

"But will the four of you be enough to deal with it?" Luna asked.

"We just need to get the guards out - we'll stuff them in my bag to transport them," Hermione said. "Short-term, it'll be fine."

Ron nodded. Long-term… well, if the guards had to stay in there for very long, odds were the group had been killed, and the guards would've died anyway.

Hermione moved to the DMSO tank and waved her wand. A moment later, another tank appeared. Then two more. She cast a few more spells. "I've cast Extension Charms on the tanks, and I've duplicated the mixture inside. That'll be enough for you out here. We'll take the main tank with us."

Ron was already grabbing it. If things went bad, they could simply drown the entire prison in the DMSO mix.

Harry installed the replacement tank and hose while Ron checked the tank before strapping it on.

"Let's go."

Ginny piloted the tank to the top of the prison tower. Ron glanced down. "Courtyard looks empty," he said.

"My spell hasn't detected any humans," Hermione replied.

That meant no markers floating in the courtyard, Ron reminded himself. The spell didn't let you see the markers through walls.

"I feel like we're doing a prison break," Sirius commented as they stepped on to the ramp and jumped down on to the tower's roof. "Dropping down from a chopper into a prison."

"Usually, the prisoner climbs into the chopper," Harry replied.

"Not if they need to be busted out of a cell first," Sirius said, aiming his hose at the door leading into the prison.

"Focus!" Hermione snapped. "Lives are at stake!" She pointed her wand at the door and cast a spell. A moment later, the door swung open. "Let's go!"

Ron was the first one in and down the stairs. The room below was empty, but there was a body on the stairs leading further down. Grey robes - Hit-Wizard. Ron went past it, to secure the stairs.

"Still alive, but barely." Hermione was wrapping the wizard in a thermal blanket with heating pads, Ron saw when he glanced over his shoulder. Then she patted him down until she pulled a key out of his pockets. "He must be the commander of the guards here," she said. "This is the key to the dungeons." She stuffed him into her bag. Like a body in some D&D games, Ron realised with a suppressed chuckle.

"One down, five to go," Harry commented.

"Right." This wasn't the moment to make gaming jokes. Ron nodded and proceeded downstairs. Was it… yes. He checked the thermometer on his wristband. "It's getting colder," he told the others.

"Really? Damn, you're right." Harry said.

"It could be residue from the mass of Dementors outside," Hermione said.

That was possible. But Ron wouldn't bet on it. There were Dementors nearby - in the basement. He was sure of it.

They found a second Hit-Wizard - a Hit-Witch in this case - in the next room, near a broken cot and what looked like a medicinal cabinet. She was semi-conscious, mumbling incoherently through chattering teeth. And waving her wand around.

"Stupefy."

A red spell hit her, and she slumped over.

"Obliviate."

No witnesses, right. Ron moved on as Hermione treated and stored the witch. Two down. Four to go.

The next two rooms - an office and what looked like a guard break room - were empty as well. And it was getting colder with each step. Not yet cold enough for Ron to feel anything inside his sealed suit. That meant there were no Dementors close enough for their aura to work. So Hermione had been correct - this had been lingering effects from the monsters outside.

Two more rooms and stairs followed. Offices - but not in use any more. No paperwork, empty wastebaskets.

Then they reached the ground floor, Ron recognised the room from their visit. Another witch was on the ground, by the door to the yard. Shivering - she wasn't dead, not yet. But she was holding her head and whimpering. And she didn't even notice them before Hermione walked up and stunned her.

That meant they had half of the guards. And half were still missing. With the courtyard empty, that meant that the guards had to be downstairs. In the prison. "Let's hope they weren't as stupid as to enter the sealed parts of the prison," he said through clenched teeth.

"They wouldn't send their brightest wizards and witches to guard an empty prison," Harry pointed out.

"But not their laziest and most inept, either," Hermione replied. "Not after we blew up the pier."

And that had been his fault, Ron knew. If he had thought of another way to handle the Dementors, if he had managed to avoid getting detected… He gasped. "Dementors! I can feel their aura."

Harry and Sirius cursed as they pointed their hoses at the corners of the room.

"They must be below us," Hermione said. "There aren't any in here." She walked over to the door leading down into the prison.

"Careful." Harry took a step closer to the door as well.

"If there were a Dementor hiding behind the door, we'd have noticed," Ron told him.

"If the Dementors are so close, the guards must be dead already," Sirius muttered.

"We don't know that. And we have to check," Hermione said. She pointed her wand at the door, then used the key. "There was an alarm charm on it," she explained.

A leftover from before they had removed the prisoners? Or something hastily cast recently? It probably didn't matter. Ron took point, shivering slightly. At least if a Dementor attacked him, the others would get a warning. He heard Hermione lock the door behind them - couldn't risk those monsters getting out and reaching the others, if anything...

No. He clenched his teeth. He would destroy any of them before they got to him. If only he could see them.

He reached the first prison floor. No sign of the guards… wait! Something had moved in the corridor ahead. A broken bucket had just rolled…

He was freezing. So cold… Damn it!

He opened the valve on the hose and sprayed the corridor. A moment later, body parts - Dementor parts - rained down on him, and he had to shield his head with his arm. "Dementors!" he announced - too late.

"Bloody hell! I almost…" Sirius scoffed. "Damn!"

"But why were they in the corridor here, and not…" Hermione gasped. "There are more ahead! They must be… the guards! Expecto Patronum!"

The otter shot past Ron. "Stay behind me!" he snapped, moving ahead. He sprayed more mixture as he reached the corner, but nothing blew up. No surprise there - the spell would have driven the Dementors off. But better safe than sorry.

"Careful!" Hermione said. "The guards won't be protected by hazmat suits!"

And the cells weren't waterproof. But Ron wouldn't let himself be eaten by a Dementor. Or more than one.

He rounded the corner and saw the otter floating at the end of the corridor - no, not quite at the end. He sprayed the hallway down again. More explosions. One part hit his chest, but not hard enough to hurt. And he was still freezing.

"Is anyone left?" he asked.

"I don't see anyone," Hermione replied. "But… We need to check these cells!"

She started checking the observation slits on the cells lining the corridor. Ron moved with her. Walking helped with the cold - but not that much. He was still shivering despite the effort it took to move with the heavy tank on his back.

Empty. Empty. Empty.

"Nothing here. Nothing here."

"Dear Lord!" Hermione exclaimed.

Ron whirled and rushed towards her. She was already opening the cell.

"The three missing guards! They must have locked themselves in! But…"

She was inside before he reached her, wand weaving back and forth over the three bodies curled up on the floor. "They're still alive, but… we can't risk stunning and transporting them! I need to treat them here. They're almost… frozen."

They indeed looked frozen, in Ron's opinion. But humans could survive extreme cold - for some time. If they were lucky.

Not that anyone stuck in this prison was lucky. It was a cursed, cold forsaken place, filled with monsters and the dregs of society…

He gasped and checked the thermometer. It was getting colder.

No. "The Dementors are coming!" he yelled.

And the monsters were trying to cut them off - like they must have done to the guards.

"Expecto Patronum!"

An otter shot past him. Ron looked over his shoulder. Hermione shook her head. "I can't keep it up and treat them! It's no good!"

The aura was getting to her! "Treat the wizards!" he yelled, then sprayed the hallway with some of the DMSO solution. Nothing exploded. The Dementors weren't close. Not yet. "Hurry up!" he yelled.

"I'm doing what I can!" Hermione yelled back.

"How much longer?" Harry asked.

Ron released another spray of the DMSO solution. The water on the floor was starting to freeze, he noticed. "We need to push them back - we can't let them get too close." He started walking towards the stairs - carefully.

"The guards survived with the Dementors at the door, didn't they?" Harry said as he followed Ron.

"It's not them - it's Hermione. If the monsters get too close…" He clenched his teeth. They were trapped anyway. And anyway, Hermione wouldn't be able to save the guards. They would all be killed for nothing...

No! He released more of the DMSO mixture. It didn't reach the ground, did it? He turned his head away and raised his arm a moment before Dementor parts flew through the air again.

"Close!" he muttered.

"Too close," Harry added, using his own spray.

More monsters blew up.

"Step back - you've got limited ammo," Ron told him. His own tank was unlikely to run out. Not before he would die, anyway, swarmed by the horde of monsters here. Or frozen solid in the water they were spraying…

No! "NO!" he yelled, pointing the nozzle at the stairs and spraying first up, then down, hosing the stairs leading down to the lower levels. He advanced, up to the stairs. A good choke point. And the water wouldn't run back to the cells. Not that it would, anyway, with the Dementors' aura freezing it so quickly.

He stepped on some of their remains, crushing them under his boots. The ice that had formed on the floor cracked under his feet, too, as he sprayed more DMSO down the stairs. "Keep an eye on the upper stairs," he snapped. If any Dementors had managed to get past them…

"Ha ha ha - how?" Harry replied.

"Just spray it regularly."

"I'll run dry that way."

"Spray conservatively."

Ron laughed at his own stupid joke. But it helped. He was still cold and freezing - was his sweat freezing on his skin, trapped inside the suit? - yet…

Suddenly, he was pelted with a veritable hailstorm of body parts. Far too close and far too numerous to avoid. Or resist.

He was blown backwards, stumbling, and slipped on the ice on the floor. The heavy tank on his back pulled him down - and dug into his back when he hit the floor. This was it. This was his end. Dying like a fool for slipping up…

He should get up, fight, but it was all so pointless, anyway. Just delaying the inevitable. Harry was down as well. Not moving. All Ron's fault. Well, now he'd pay for his mistakes. For thinking that he could be useful, could do anything as a mere muggle, fighting the bogeymen of wizards. It was all so stupid...

He felt something on his head, gripping his cowl, lifting his face up, towards the ceiling. Then he felt… something. Almost peaceful…

"RON! Expecto Patronum!"

He blinked as a shiny, translucent otter shot past him, and whatever had been holding him let him drop back down on to the floor. That had… He gasped. The monsters had almost killed him! And he had let them!

He grabbed the hose again, pointed the nozzle downstairs, and just kept spraying DMSO down the stairs, baring his teeth when more explosions followed.

"Ron!"

"I'm OK!" he yelled back. "Save the others!"

He'd empty the whole damn tank down the stairs. Fill the stairs with ice - form a wall of ice! - to block the Dementors.

They wouldn't get to him again - much less past him!

"Get Harry!" he yelled.

"Wingardium Leviosa!"

Harry, still unconscious, started to float next to him - and Ron switched aim, shooting DMSO solution at the stairs leading up. It flowed back down, though - and slowly started to freeze.

"Harry!"

That was Sirius. Ron glanced over his shoulder. The older man was dragging Harry further back towards the guards. Towards Hermione.

Gritting his teeth so they wouldn't chatter from the cold, he switched targets again and sent more DMSO downstairs. No explosions followed. They must have retreated.

"How's Harry?" he yelled. If his best friend was…

"Hypothermia," Hermione replied. "Stuff some heating pads into his suit, Sirius!"

"Harry! Goddamnit, Harry!"

Would opening the suit expose Harry to the DMSO mixture? No, Hermione and Sirius knew what they were doing, They had to know.

He moved the nozzle around a bit. It was so damn cold. He could use heating pads himself. Why hadn't they stashed some inside their suits?

He was pelted by Dementor parts again. What was driving those monsters to charge towards certain death? Didn't they realise what was happening? Were they unable to? Or were they so desperate that death didn't scare them?

They had been starving, hadn't they? Oh damn - they were the only Dementor meal in range. Of course the monsters would come for them! But then, why hadn't the Dementors attacked the guards before? They hadn't swarmed the prison until after Ron and his friends had started to kill them.

He shook his head. He couldn't dwell on that. Not now. He had to focus on keeping the Dementors away.

The stairs leading downstairs were now covered with a thick sheet of ice. Ron doubted anyone could descend without slipping and falling - not that the Dementors were hindered by that, of course, seeing as they floated above the ground. But the stairs leading up to the ground floor were also covered in ice, if not as thickly.

"If only we had a flame thrower," he muttered. But that wouldn't help, anyway - the ice would melt and instantly freeze again, and the fire would contaminate the air, probably burning the oxygen, which wouldn't hamper the Dementors in any way, but would endanger everyone else. It was so unfair…

He gasped, then hosed down the stairs leading downwards. A Dementor must have snuck closer.

But no explosion followed. Were more of them massing? Could they use each other as living shields and just rush him? Have some soak up the DMSO while the rest advanced over their exploding corpses?

"Zombie rush," he mumbled. But with magic, he had a cheat code - an almost unlimited tank of DMSO solution. Still… it took some time for a soaked Dementor to explode. Not long, but it added up. If the monsters had enough warm - or cold, in this case - bodies…

"Hurry up!" he yelled. "They're up to something." Something bad.

"I'm doing what I can, but they've been severely affected," Hermione yelled back.

"Harry's coming to," Sirius told them. "Harry!"

Ron heard his friend groan something and smiled - with his teeth bared - as he hosed down the stairs leading up again. Harry was alive. But they had to go. And now. Before the horde swarmed him and then his friends.

He trained the nozzle on the stairs leading down and sprayed them. And was pelted with body parts. And again. And once more.

"Rush! It's a rush!" he yelled, taking a step back as he kept the DMSO shooting down the seemingly empty stairs. "I can't stop them!" He was just a muggle - and they were rushing him, faster than he could destroy them. They'd kill him, then his friends. And Hermione. And nothing he could do could prevent that. He might as well just give up…

No! He clenched his teeth and kept the stream up even as the explosions came closer and closer, body parts hitting him hard enough to send him reeling, stumbling back. He slipped and fell, landing on his back - on the tank, bruising his ribs and hurting his back - but he kept the hose pointed at the stairs, killing the monsters.

Something smacked into his head, and he saw stars for a moment. Damn it.

The next explosion was so close, it blew the nozzle out of his hands and threw him backwards. He rolled for about a yard, then came to a stop, the tank crushing the ice beneath it. Cursing, he reached for the hose, which was dancing around, spraying water everywhere. All over him, too. More explosions followed. He was hit once again by what felt like tennis balls. Tennis balls hit by Ginny. And his hand refused to work. His fingers just didn't want to close around the hose.

Snarling, he wrapped his arms around the hose, using his body to point the hose down the stairs. At the Dementors. DMSO solution ran down his suit before freezing. He could barely see out of his suit any more. And it was so damn cold.

But he kept the hose pointed at the enemy. Ignored the cold. The pain from the explosions. How he couldn't move any more, frozen to the ground. All that mattered was killing the monsters.

He kept moving his body to move the nozzle - to cover the stairs. Moving got harder with every moment - he couldn't feel his hands any more, and his legs were stuck. In ice, he realised.

His legs were covered in ice. Frozen to the floor by a thick sheet of ice. He could barely lift his chest any more. Every movement hurt and felt like trying to break something. Ice.

He kept swaying back and forth, frozen limbs wrapped around the hose, reeling from explosions and Dementor parts battering him. Something - some liquid - ran down his face. And froze. DMSO? Or blood? Did it matter?

He couldn't see clearly any more. Ice covered his mask and hood. He couldn't feel his arms and legs any more. And his head hurt. But he had to keep moving. Keep the nozzle moving. Keep the monsters from killing his friends. Keep the monsters from… from… He blinked. And couldn't open his eyes any more. His eyelids were stuck.

He kept moving. Blindly. Everything was so cold. So dark. So… so...

*****​

Ron blinked. Where was he? It was… it wasn't dark. But it was cold. No, he was cold. Or was he? He looked around. He was in a bed. In a room. In Hermione's tent. In their room.

And he hurt. Damn it, he hurt. Everything hurt. Breathing hurt. And his… his hands - his arms - were covered in bandages. As were his legs and most of his torso. There were bandages around his head as well. What the…?

"He…" He broke off in a coughing fit, which made his ribs hurt even worse. "Hello?"

"Ron? Is that you? Are you awake?" Luna - no, wizarding Luna - opened the door and stuck her head in. "Are you awake or having a nightmare? If you're having a nightmare, I'm not going to wake you up since Hermione said you needed rest."

"I'm awake," he replied.

"Oh! Goodie!" Smiling, she entered the room, then blinked and turned around. Sticking her head through the gap in the door, she yelled. "Everyone! Ron's awake!"

She turned back to him and beamed at him. "Hermione will be here shortly. She's currently busy flooding the dungeon."

"Flooding the dungeon?"

"She cast a Gemino Curse," the witch told him - as if that explained everything. Or anything.

"Ron!" Ginny arrived. She looked upset. And her smile was quickly replaced by a glare. "What were you thinking? You were almost frozen solid! If not for Hermione's magic…" Her glare was swept away by tears, and she started to sob.

Where was Harry? He should comfort her, shouldn't he? He was her boyfriend, wasn't he?

Ron blinked again. What was wrong with him? He was thinking… it was weird. And hard.

"Hey, Ron. Back among the living?" Sirius peered inside, with that fake cheerful smile on his face he used when he was trying to hide his feelings.

Ron nodded, then winced at the pain that caused. "Hurts, though."

"Pain's good. It tells you you're still alive," the other man replied.

Ron chuckled weakly at the stupid saying. He could do without the pain. But more importantly... "What happened? Where's Harry?"

"Harry's stuck in bed as well. Concussion," Sirius said.

"Oh." Ron blinked again. "What happened?"

"What do you remember?" Sirius asked in return.

Everyone was watching him. Waiting for his answer, Ron realised. But why? What had he done? He blinked again. "I was fighting the Dementors on the stairs. Blowing them up."

"Yes."

"And…" What had he done? Oh. "They rushed us. Rushed me."

"Yes. You kept spraying them, even when they were almost on top of you. And the water froze on the ground. And on you." Sirius nodded, now looking far too grim.

Ron moved his head to look at his bandaged limbs. It had been… Damn, it had been so cold. He had lost all feeling in his limbs. "What's the damage?" he asked, steeling himself for the answer.

"If not for Hermione pouring potion after potion down your throat, you would be dead," Ginny snapped. "And you'd have lost all your limbs."

"Oh." That was a sobering thought. Although… "And what did I lose?" Fingers? Toes? He could feel them wriggling, but the pain made it hard. And how many fingers and toes was he supposed to have anyway?

"Nothing. Well, almost nothing," wizarding Luna said.

"Almost nothing?"

"The tank - the water tank, with the hose. We didn't lose the flying tank. But you already knew that since we're inside it. So, even if we had lost it, we would've been lost with it."

His head hurt a little more. "I mean body parts."

"Thanks to magic, none," Luna told him. "But it was a near thing. I think Hermione had to regrow your fingers. Or heal them. She wasn't exactly coherent after treating you." He saw that she was biting her lower lip and very tense - almost trembling. It must have been a near thing, indeed, to shake her like that.

His eyes widened. "What time is it?" he asked. "And what about the guards?"

"They're all safely sedated," Luna said. "And it's noon."

"Noon?" And they were still on Azkaban? "What is the Ministry doing?"

"Nothing, as usual," wizarding Luna told him with a sneer. "Though, to be fair, they don't know what's happening. The guards aren't supposed to be relieved until tomorrow."

"That's stupid," he snapped. Leaving guards on Azkaban for so long? No wonder they hadn't been able to flee in time.

"That's the Ministry," the witch replied. "They didn't manage to sound the alarm, as far as we know."

He snorted. "And Hermione?"

"What about her?" Luna asked.

"Is she hurt?"

"Not physically," Luna replied. "But…"

"She's been at it for an hour, flooding Azkaban with DMSO and dry water," Ginny told him.

"She said to be sure that the Dementors are dead, she needed to fill the dungeons and all the other tunnels," Sirius added. "Which makes sense."

"She's been recasting the Gemino Curse ever since she finished treating your wounds," wizarding Luna told him with a smile.

Oh. That wasn't like Hermione. Well, unless she was obsessed with something. "So…"

The door to his room was pushed open, startling Sirius, who had been leaning against the door frame. "Ron!"

And there was Hermione. She was still wearing her hazmat suit, but she had pulled the hood back, and her hair had started to escape from her messy ponytail. She had rings under her eyes and blood - or something similar - smeared across her face.

Ron had never seen anyone more beautiful.

"RON!"

She rushed to his bed. He held his breath, trying to brace for… But she stopped at his side. "Ron," she repeated herself, more softly this time.

He smiled at her. "Thank you for saving my life. Again."

She opened her mouth, gasping, then closed it again. "It was…" She shook her head.

He heard her sniffle, once. And saw her swallow before she drew another, shuddering breath. Bloody hell - she was close to crying. That was his fault. "Sorry," he added.

"What?" She blinked, staring at him with her mouth open. Surprised. "You're sorry? It wasn't your fault!"

Like hell it wasn't. He had slipped, hadn't thought to fall back in time, hadn't managed to get up...

Her surprised expression changed into a familiar glare. "It wasn't!" she told him with narrowed eyes. "I should've been prepared for that. A mere conjured wall would've prevented them from reaching us."

"But their combined aura would've reached us," he retorted. "Like it reached the guards." He blinked. "Where are the guards?"

"Oh. We put them in an enchanted trunk. They're sleeping."

"Potions?"

"Yes, of course. We wouldn't risk them waking up and escaping." She frowned again at the insinuation.

He nodded. For a moment, they looked at each other without saying anything. Everyone else had left, he noticed almost absentmindedly. "I shouldn't have let them freeze me," he said in a low voice.

"You didn't let them freeze you - you froze from the sheer number of Dementors, and their aura. And the water you sprayed them with," she told him. "I should've done something about that before you… before you were…" She swallowed, shivering, as she shook her head.

"Sorry," he repeated himself. That was his fault. If a wizard had been there, instead of him…

"Don't be sorry!" she spat. "You saved us all!"

"Harry almost died." And Ron almost died as well.

"And he would have died if not for you. Sirius and I would've died if the Dementors had reached us - or had managed to get close enough to freeze us through walls."

"Sirius could've killed the Dementors," Ron replied. All you had to do was to point the nozzle at the hallway and let the DMSO mixture do the rest.

She shook her head. "He hasn't had any experience with Dementors. He wasn't exposed to their aura until today." She leaned forward. "I had trouble focusing enough to save the others from hypothermia - and I've dealt with Dementors before. There were just too many." She sat down on his bed, sighing. "I should've been better prepared. We should have been prepared for such a…"

"Horde?"

She nodded. "Ever since the pier, we've known that the effect of their aura grew much, much stronger when they assembled in large numbers. But I didn't think there were so many of them."

"No one did." Least of all the Ministry.

"I should've prepared for the worst, though. I was too optimistic. Too…" She clenched her teeth. "And it almost cost us all our lives."

And their souls. "No one else expected this, either. Not Dumbledore, not wizarding Bill and Fleur, not Harry and Ron," he told her.

"I should've expected it, though," she repeated herself.

"You knew more about Azkaban than your friends who've worked for the Ministry for years? Or than the people whose job it is to keep an eye on the Dementors?"

"No, but…"

He tried to reach out to her, but his arm didn't cooperate. Instead of touching her thigh, the bloody useless limb only twitched. He muttered a curse under his breath.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing." At her glare, he added: "I can't move my arm."

"That's normal."

"What?"

"It's so you don't move too much and harm yourself. Most Healers use potions with that effect," she explained. With a wry grin, she added: "It also keeps patients from hexing each other - or disapparating without paying, or so I've been told."

"It wasn't like that when you saved my life the first time," he said.

"I wasn't using healing potions meant for the hospital. I was using the sort of potions that you use in the field to keep going."

"We're in the field right now."

"We're in a flying t...armoured transport. At a safe altitude above the island," she corrected him. "And you needed the best potions. You were..."

That was a sobering thought. He nodded. "Thank you."

"Don't thank me. It was my fault," she insisted.

"No, it wasn't." He tried his best to glare at her. "Let's make a deal: You stop blaming yourself, and I do the same."

"You'll stop blaming yourself?"

"Yes." Perhaps she was right, and no one else could've done better than he had. He didn't know.

She hesitated a moment, then slowly nodded. "Deal."

He sighed. "Good."

She snorted, then leaned over and placed a soft, almost chaste kiss on his lips.

He really wanted to be able to hug her, right then.

"What are we doing now?" he asked once she pulled back.

"You will be resting. And we are going to destroy Azkaban so it won't ever be used again as a prison."

"So it's time to release the Firestone Lice?"

"Yes. As soon as we have confirmation that the tunnels beneath the island have been filled, Luna will release them."

"I want to see that," he said.

"You need to stay in bed," she replied with a deep frown.

"So?" He grinned. "You're a witch, aren't you?"

She glared at him, any trace of guilt and self-recrimination gone from her expression.

*****​

Half an hour later, he was literally stuck to his bed, which was floating and turned so he could look down on the island. It didn't seem as sinister in plain daylight from about a few hundred yards up. Just a desolate, barren rock with an ugly prison on it.

"Ready?" Hermione asked.

"Yes! The poor dears have been going stir crazy," wizarding Luna said. She was straddling a broom, like Luna. "They're not meant to be kept in a trunk!"

"Release them."

Wizarding Luna flicked her wand, and a trunk floated out of the back of the tank and began to descend to the island. The Lunas followed it down, the witch keeping her wand trained on the trunk.

"Couldn't she have shrunk the trunk and carried it in her pocket, then restored it to its natural size once she reached the prison?" Ron asked.

"Yes," Hermione replied. "She said this way was less disturbing for the animals."

"Oh." That… fit the Lunas. He nodded.

The two Lunas reached the roof of the tower, and Ron could see the trunk being dropped on to it. He couldn't see any details, but after a minute or so, they were on their way back to the tank.

And behind them, a huge swarm of magical stone-eating lice was starting to reduce Azkaban to rubble and dust.

Good riddance.

*****​

Black Lake, Scotland, May 16th, 2006

Azkaban razed! Dark Wizards Take All The Dementors!

Ron stared at the headline of the Daily Prophet. "Isn't the Prophet supposed to be the mouthpiece of the Ministry?"

Hermione sighed. "I think that the lack of direct intervention by the Ministry and the time passed since Skeeter's trial have borne fruit. It's really unfortunate timing for the Prophet to develop a spine at this particular moment, but with first the Hogsmeade 'attack', and now the complete destruction of Azkaban, the pressure to report those blunders is too great."

"Ah." He reached for the cup of tea on the tray in his bed and muttered a curse when he pushed it away, spilling tea over his bed, instead of picking it up.

"Oh, let me!" Hemione flicked her wand, and the stains disappeared. Another flick refilled his cup.

"Thanks." He tried again, moving his arm and hand more carefully, and managed to grab the cup.

He took a sip, then put it back - slowly and carefully. "So, what's the diagnosis?" he asked.

Hermione blushed a little. Did she think he wouldn't catch her casting a spell at him? "You're healing up well. Your recovery rate is within the expected range."

"But I'm not yet healed enough to get out of the bed. Or eat a meal at the table." He shook his head - it hurt a little, but much less than the day before.

"Some wounds take time to heal," she told him. "Regrowing bones, for example. Or recovering from having extremities literally frozen solid."

He winced. Without magic, he'd be dead. Or a cripple. A temporary period of weakness was a very small price to pay for surviving this without permanent injury. Time to change the subject. "So, what's the Ministry's reaction?" After arriving at the laboratory, he had been stuck in bed and slept through until noon today, but he was sure Hermione had been in contact with her friends.

She sighed. "The Minister isn't amused."

Ron scoffed. He didn't care about Shacklebolt.

Hermione grimaced. "And there's been mass panic in Hogsmeade - apparently, a substantial part of the village expects another attack, this time with Dementors."

"What? Even though we dropped all the guards off unharmed at the coast? And haven't they realised yet that the Dementors are dead and not merely gone?" That was…

She sighed again. "Well, the guards were hurt before we healed them, so they might think that's just a ruse. And according to Harry, the Department of Mysteries is still working on identifying the parts we left behind."

They had expected that. But vanishing all the body parts hadn't been feasible. "And they'll suspect you once they verify the destruction of the Dementors."

"Yes." She turned a little and sat down on his bed, looking at the ceiling for a moment. "But without proof, there's not much they can do officially."

"They could paint you as a dark witch." He had heard the stories of her Harry's time at school.

"They can try. But that would antagonise Harry and Ron and my other friends. And it would antagonise me. Not the smartest course of action if they still want me to join them."

"They might not want that any more," he pointed out.

"Some won't," she replied. "But Croaker? He'll want to recruit me even more, now that I've 'proven myself'."

"That sounds like a quote." He narrowed his eyes, ignoring the small amount of pain that caused.

"He told Harry that he would like to recruit whoever destroyed Azkaban, provided they weren't a dark wizard."

"Ah." That fit Ron's impression of the old wizard. "What about the Lunas?"

"So far, people have focused on the absence of the Dementors, not the destruction of Azkaban. Although the International Committee for the Preservation of Magical Creatures has already urged the Ministry to declare the island a reserve for the new breed of stone lice discovered there." She smiled. "Luna's supporting the proposal, of course - she's currently writing an article to that end."

He shook his head.

"Of course, the Ministry won't do that. They're not that foolish."

"Let's hope not." If those things ever managed to escape and breed…

"But they will investigate. With a little luck, that'll take so long, the lice will die off before the Ministry delegation reaches a conclusion."

He nodded. "Let's hope. We're bound to get lucky one of these days!"

"That's not how probability works," she retorted.

After a moment, they laughed together. And Ron tried not to show how that hurt his bruised chest.

And he didn't protest when Hermione buttered his toast. Or fed him, one piece a time.

"Oh." She suddenly chuckled.

"Hmm?"

"I just remembered a similar occasion. Long ago. After Malfoy Manor."

*****​

The smell of fresh bread woke her from a nightmare. What…? She sniffed the air. Yes. It smelled like a bakery in the tent. And Ron wasn't in bed.

She grabbed her wand from under her pillow and looked around. She doubted that any Death Eater who managed to find them and get past their protections would try to lure her out with fresh bread, but… better safe than sorry.

"Hermione? Are you up?"

Ron! "I just woke up," she replied.

"Good!"

The door opened, and Ron walked in - a huge tray floating next to him. Croissants. Tea. Pain au chocolat. She felt her mouth water at the sight. And the smell. "Continental breakfast?"

"It seemed more suitable for breakfast in bed," he said.

"Where did you get all of this?" They didn't have most of that in the pantry.

"Muggle bakery in London," he replied. "I thought you deserved something special."

She knew what he meant. After Malfoy Manor. After Bellatrix. She sniffled, once, as the tray set itself down in front of her.

*****​

 

[Starfox5]

Chapter 80: The Solution

Black Lake, Scotland, May 18th, 2006

Ron sighed with relief when he entered the shower. Cleaning charms - or grooming charms, as Hermione called them - worked well, but nothing beat an actual shower if you wanted to feel clean. And after two days spent in bed, getting fed and treated like an invalid, being able to take care of himself felt wonderful.

Even if his skin was still looking patchy, what with the newly-grown parts even paler than his normal skin tone. And he still occasionally experienced some odd twitches in his limbs, but those were only happening rarely now.

He turned the shower on, keeping the showerhead pointed away until the water ran hot. Which, this base having been built by the Phoenix Gruppe, didn't take long at all.

He sighed again, closing his eyes, and stepped under the shower. Yes. He stood there for a minute or two, just letting the water run down his body. Then he stepped back, letting the water hit his chest, and grabbed the soap. He had lost some muscle tone, he noticed. Not much, but, apparently, magic hadn't perfectly restored his limbs.

Well, he'd already known that magic wasn't perfect. It was still a wonder to be able to walk around, to be alive, after what he had gone through, even though he wouldn't be fit for the field for some time.

Not that there was anything to do in the field, anyway. Azkaban was gone. The prison had been reduced to louse food. The dungeons were flooded, and, as Hermione had explained, the supports of the tunnels might rot in the water and cause the tunnels to collapse, too, although magic or the temperature of the water might prevent that.

Ron didn't care. The Dementors were gone. Blown up all across the island. The island was just a barren rock now - nothing more. Not even ghosts lingered there, apparently - though no one had found the reason for that.

He finished his shower. According to wizarding Luna, there were no ghosts on Azkaban because there, death came as a relief, and so no prisoner or guard wanted to stay. It was as good an explanation as any other - better, actually, according to Hermione, than the theory that the Dementors consumed the lingering ghosts along with the souls of those they kissed.

He shuddered as he towelled off. Those weren't new theories. To think wizarding Britain had used the prison for centuries…

He closed his eyes again as he used the hairdryer. It was over now, anyway. But the fact that the Ministry hadn't closed down the place before said enough about the country as a whole.

They couldn't be trusted with knowledge of the portal.

*****​

Hermione, Sirius and the Lunas were returning from their morning run when he reached the lounge. Ron smiled at Hermione and wrapped his arm around her waist as she tried to walk past him. "Hey!"

She gasped in surprise when he pulled her in for a quick kiss. "Oh, no! I'm all sweaty!"

"So?" He grinned at her pout. She looked hot in her exercise clothes.

"Really, Ron! I need a shower!"

He couldn't argue with that - her top was clinging to her skin; she must have overdone it again. He released her with a smile, nodded at everyone else and ignored Sirius's joke about being a slacker as he grabbed the newspapers already set out on the table, next to breakfast. The one newspaper he was interested in, though, hadn't arrived yet.

He was halfway through the sports section in The Times when Hermione returned, now dressed in slacks and a polo shirt. And she was carrying the Prophet!

"Hedwig?" he asked.

"Who else?" she replied as she sat down.

"Any changes in the coverage?"

She held the front page up for him to see.

Dementors Destroyed? What Dark Ritual Did This?

He groaned.

She nodded. "They claim their information was leaked by one of the Unspeakables."

"Croaker?" He took a sip from his cup, then speared a sausage with his fork. He had missed having a proper breakfast, too, while healing in bed.

"Even if he is behind it, he'll have used an underling, I think," she told him. "Plausible deniability."

"And a possible scapegoat," Ron added after swallowing. "And what do Harry and Ron say?"

She frowned. "They haven't sent any letters. But we'll be meeting them this afternoon."

"Ah." He couldn't tell if that was a good or a bad thing. But he didn't really care. They had done a good thing. And if others disagreed, well… who cared?

And, a small, selfish voice in the back of his head whispered, the more resentment and suspicion Hermione might face over this, the bigger the chance that she wouldn't decide to remain in Wizarding Britain.

*****​

"So...!" Wizarding Ron grimaced as he filled his cup at the table in the briefing room. "Kingsley isn't happy at all. He even had us talk to the editor of the Prophet, to warn them not to print confidential information since it would endanger the investigation."

"Typical!" Hermione muttered.

"Hey!" wizarding Harry cut in. "People are even more scared now. Hogsmeade was bad, but razing Azkaban? And 'taking' the Dementors? The Wizengamot would probably have replaced Kingsley as Minister for Magic if they had found anyone willing to take over in the middle of this crisis."

Hermione huffed. "We destroyed the Dementors! The Department of Mysteries should have officially confirmed that already!"

"They haven't, though," wizarding Ron told her. "They're still investigating the nature of the unknown material that was left behind on the island."

"They're either unable to confirm what the parts are," wizarding Harry added, "or they're dragging their feet because they don't want to admit that someone managed to do what they thought was impossible."

"A stance not entirely uncommon in both the bureaucratic and academic spheres," Dumbledore commented. "Few ambitious people like being shown up or - worse - being proven wrong about something." The old spymaster was sipping from his cup of tea with an expression that suggested - at least to Ron - that they were talking about the weather instead of what sounded like the greatest political crisis in Wizarding Britain since the war.

"They've had enough time to piece together a Dementor from all the parts we left," Hermione muttered.

Ron chuckled. The idea of the Unspeakables putting together an exploded Dementor as if it were a crashed plane… "There might be too many parts for that to be feasible."

"They should at least try!" Hermione said. "And really - it's not as if I can publish what we did without incriminating myself and everyone else. They could reap the fame for the discovery."

"I'm sure Croaker at least suspects it was you," wizarding Harry told her. "As does Kingsley. He hasn't asked us to investigate."

"Yes," Ron's counterpart agreed, "he hasn't even asked us what we think."

"He might not wish to find out for certain where your loyalties lie." Dumbledore smiled. "He suspects, of course, that he wouldn't like the answer. But as long as he doesn't put you on the spot, there's always the chance that things might go his way."

Ron snorted. "I think he just wants to save face."

"That is also possible. Or he doesn't want a potential successor involved in what he must assume might turn out to be an unsuccessful investigation," Dumbledore replied.

Hermione narrowed her eyes. "Do you think that Shacklebolt wants Harry or Ron to become the next Minister?"

Wizarding Ron laughed. "Percy would kill me. He's been dreaming of becoming Minister since he was a prefect. At least."

"Arthur would be a better choice," wizarding Harry added, shaking his head.

"War heroes are popular choices for such offices," Dumbledore said. "Especially at a time when the population is scared and frightened." With a cynical grin, he added: "Of course, it could also be a manoeuvre to force Dr Granger to decide whether or not she'd let her friends fail instead of 'coming clean'."

Ron frowned. That sounded a little too convoluted.

"That doesn't sound like Shacklebolt," Hermione echoed his thoughts.

"You don't know him like we do," Ron's counterpart pointed out. "That would fit him."

"He's been Minister for seven years," wizarding Harry added, "and before that, he worked with the Prime Minister."

Hermione pressed her lips together. "Well, he better not try anything like that!"

"But we can't exactly let him take the blame for this, either, can we?" wizarding Ron asked. "It's not his fault."

"If he had abolished Azkaban earlier, this wouldn't have been necessary," Hermione retorted.

"But then we'd have had to deal with the Dementors going crazy before we knew how to destroy them," wizarding Harry pointed out. "That could've been ugly. It's not as if there aren't any dark wizards who would make deals with them if they had the opportunity."

Hermione clearly disagreed but changed the subject. "But what can we do? We can't exactly reveal that we did it - that would destroy your careers. At the least."

"And we'd face prison," Ron added. He didn't want to go to prison for Shacklebolt.

"Well, I might have an idea," Dumbledore said, smiling widely. "We can create a dark wizard and frame them for this. Since Minister Shacklebolt already suspects that Dr Granger is behind this incident, I don't think he would investigate the matter too closely."

Ron frowned. Even taking that into account, such a deception would require at least one body to be convincing enough. They couldn't have a living decoy, after all.

And that meant Dumbledore was proposing murder. Judging by the expressions of the others at the table, they had realised that as well.

"You want us to frame an innocent wizard and murder them?" Hermione asked through clenched teeth.

"Not an innocent wizard," Dumbledore corrected her. "But I doubt that I would be wrong were I to assume that Messrs Weasley and Potter know at least one wizard who deserves death."

Ron looked at the two wizards. Judging by their stony expressions, Dumbledore was right. Again.

"It would still be murder," wizarding Harry said. "And framing them for the attack on Azkaban? That's a tall order."

But the wizard was already arguing the difficulty of the task, not its morality any more.

"As I said, I doubt that the Minister will have the matter investigated too thoroughly," Dumbledore replied.

"But others will. We've got good people in the Corps who won't just accept any old fabrication," wizarding Harry retorted.

"And then there are the Unspeakables. They won't be happy if they don't find the victim's notes;" Ron's counterpart added.

"Then we'll have to have them find the dark wizard's notes covering the way to destroy the Dementors." Dumbledore looked smug.

Hermione frowned at him. "And what would've been the dark wizard's motive for destroying them, rather than recruiting them?"

"They planned to decimate them, then recruit the cowed survivors," the old spymaster told her. "Yet they underestimated the number of Dementors and were forced to destroy them."

"And why did they save the Hit-Wizard guarding the prison?" she asked.

"To throw the Ministry off the scent and muddy the water." Dumbledore inclined his head. "A weak explanation, I'm aware, but the key to a successful deception is to avoid making it too perfect. People aren't perfect, and neither are their plans."

"And what's your plan's weakness?" Ron asked.

"That's what we'll have to find out before we implement it, of course." The old man spread his hands. "I don't know enough of the Wizarding World to make perfect plans."

Hermione scoffed. Ron did so as well. Dumbledore knew more than he should, far more.

And wizarding Harry shook his head. "No. It's one thing to cover up an accident. But to kill someone as part of a cover-up? That's going too far."

Wizarding Ron nodded. "That's a line we won't cross. We're not at war any more."

Dumbledore's smile didn't change, but that didn't have to mean anything. "A laudable stance," he praised the two wizards as if he hadn't just suggested that they murder a dark wizard to help keep the Minister in power. "However, if Minister Shacklebolt already knows who is to blame for his current troubles - and you would know best, having worked with him for over seven years - then what are the odds that he will, as the saying goes, try to take everyone down with him?"

"Kingsley wouldn't do that," wizarding Harry replied at once.

"Probably not," his friend added. "I'll have to sound out Dad and Percy - they've worked more closely with him."

"So you would consider there to be a risk?" Dumbledore leaned forward. His smile wasn't showing his teeth, but Ron was still reminded of a shark. A shark that had smelled blood in the water.

"What can he do?" Wizarding Harry shrugged.

"Throw the book at you?" Hermione replied. "Accuse you of corruption? Abuse of power?"

Her friend snorted. "Accuse me of helping to destroy the Dementors? That would backfire on him."

"And even if it came to a trial, the Wizengamot wouldn't dare find us guilty." Wizarding Ron shook his head. "Send the Boy-Who-Lived to prison? And his friends? Who had just done what everyone thought impossible?" He scoffed. "Even if Kingsley's close friends in the Wizengamot and those who owe him voted against us, too many would be scared of the reaction of the public. Or yours," he added with a grin. "If you can kill that which couldn't be killed, what else could you do?"

Hermione, as expected, didn't look happy at the reminder that the rule of law in Wizarding Britain was somewhat compromised.

Dumbledore, though, as Ron noticed out of the corner of his eye, looked quite pleased. Had he expected this outcome? And why?

"So our best outcome is that Shacklebolt gets removed from office for failing to arrest us. If he actually tried to arrest us, we would be acquitted because the Wizengamot is too afraid of us," she said with a frown. "And that would damage both the Ministry and any attempts to reform it. We'd be back to the days when only Dumbledore's morals kept him from dictating Ministry policy."

"In a nutshell, yes," wizarding Ron told her. "And odds are, people will assume you did it anyway - and become afraid."

Hermione's lips formed a thin, white line. "And such fear either compels obedience - even anticipatory obedience - or pre-emptive attacks on me or my family and friends."

Dumbledore nodded.

Ron frowned at the old spymaster. He knew Hermione. She would try to distance herself from the Ministry to avoid either outcome. Which would make her more dependent on Dumbledore.

"What about using a, ah, body, for the deception? Someone already dead?" Hermione asked.

"An unknown dark wizard who was able to invade Azkaban?" Wizarding Harry sounded sceptical. "It's one thing to fake some clues that they were behind the destruction of Azkaban, but faking an entire life?"

"People will investigate them. And dark wizards like that don't appear out of thin air," Ron's counterpart added. "They were taught somewhere. Learned the Dark Arts somewhere. Cursed people. Even if we pick someone supposedly from another country, people will look into them. And if they don't find anything about them…" He shrugged with a grimace.

"I believe the effort needed for such a deception is a little beyond our current means. At least in the Wizarding World," Dumbledore said. "In this world, I could arrange things. But I lack the experience and contacts to arrange such a decoy in your world." He shook his head. "This isn't a viable alternative, I'm afraid."

"I'm not about to have someone murdered just to save my reputation," Hermione said. "Certainly not to hide my own actions."

And that was it. It looked like Shacklebolt was on his own. And Dumbledore, for all his apparent helpfulness, had simply increased his importance in the whole affair.

*****​

Black Lake, Scotland, May 20th, 2006

Wizengamot Demands Answers! Minister Unable To Keep Us Safe!

Ron dropped the Daily Prophet on the table - with the headline facing the desk. Hermione might have chosen not to save Shacklebolt, but there was no need to rub the consequences in her face.

"I've already read it," Hermione commented from where she was studying scrolls of parchment. "It's as we expected. They're already speculating on who's going to be his successor."

"Ah." He nodded. "And who's in the running?"

"No one's exposing themselves at this point. They know everyone else will be ready to tear them down. And Shacklebolt might focus on them as well. They'll wait until he's gone for good," she told him.

Not any different from politics at home, then. "Who's the worst Minister we could get?"

"The worst? Miles Travers. He's the leader of the blood bigots. But he won't get elected." She scoffed. "The bigoted purebloods will want someone a little more acceptable, but still from an old pureblood family."

"The Weasleys?"

She laughed at that. "Arthur might actually have a chance, but not thanks to the likes of Travers. Since he's not involved with the DMLE, he should avoid most, if not all, of the blame for the failure to apprehend us, and he's popular amongst most of the population who didn't fight for Voldemort."

"Unless we're exposed," Ron said. Such a scandal would end Mr Weasley's career.

"If Dumbledore is correct about how much we would be feared, perhaps Arthur might be elected despite such a revelation. But for all the wrong reasons." She pursed her lips. "And it's all my fault."

"Our fault," he corrected her. "And it wasn't - we just had bad luck:"

"Blaming bad luck for your mistakes is not a good way to learn from the experience and avoid making further mistakes," she retorted.

"Sometimes, you do everything right and you still fail." He shrugged. "Besides, destroying all of the Dementors is worth a change of government."

"I don't care that much about Shacklebolt. I care about the fear we caused. And the reputation and influence we might acquire as a result." She sighed. "But it's out of our hands now."

"I'm sure Dumbledore will do his best to meddle with the Ministry during this crisis."

"Of course he will," she agreed. But she sounded resigned rather than outraged. The whole affair must have hit her harder than he had thought.

"So… back to researching the wording for the Fidelius Charm?" Ron asked. That would distract her.

"Yes. The sooner we find the best wording, the sooner we can secure the portal. And ourselves."

He nodded and walked over to the table to look at the notes.

Hermione Granger knows how to create a portal to another dimension.

Hermione Granger's research can open portals to other universes.

Hermione Granger works in a secret laboratory to create portals to other worlds.

A portal to another dimension was opened near Hogwarts.

Dimensional travel is possible, and Hermione Granger knows how to do it.

The last one had a scribbled note that it might be too complex.

Hermione, who had glanced at the notes herself, scowled. "It's no use - we can only hide one secret with a Fidelius Charm. And whatever secret we hide leaves us vulnerable in at least one world. If I hide the location of the portal, people will still know I am doing important and valuable research and might come after us in either world - especially if they know we destroyed the Dementors. If I hide the research, they will still know where I'm working. Eventually."

She huffed in obvious frustration. "And if I try to combine the secrets, the spell becomes so difficult to cast, the chance of me managing to do so successfully becomes almost impossible."

"Yes, it's not exactly a solo-friendly quest," Ron joked. Then he blinked. Could it really be so simple? "I have an idea," he said, smiling. "You…" He trailed off. Better safe than sorry. "Can you cast a privacy spell, first?"

She frowned but nodded.

Smiling once more, he went on: "You don't have to hide everything by yourself, do you?"

Hermione blinked. "That's…" She trailed off. "You mean we should spread the secrets out amongst several wizards and witches, each of whom casts a Fidelius Charm?"

"Yes. Is that possible?" It might not work, after all. Magic didn't seem to be very logical with regards to its limits.

"It should… although I don't recall any text mentioning two Fidelius Charms hiding related secrets, and the possible consequences. Since you can't cast the spell twice in your lifetime, few wizards and witches would've volunteered for such an experiment, anyway." She sighed. "And that's why it's not a workable solution - we can't expect other wizards and witches to give up the chance to use the spell for themselves."

"Harry and my counterpart would help you, wouldn't they?"

"I can't ask that of them! What if they later need to protect a crucial secret?" Hermione shook her head, her messy pony-tail swinging back and forth.

"More important than this?" Ron gestured at the rest of the room. "And, speaking from experience, if you never use a limited resource because you might need it for something more important later, you end up never using it." Dozens of RPGs had taught him that. "Also, if anyone comes after you for your research, they'll be in danger as well. And they'll be involved, too, in that case." As would be Ron and his own family and friends, of course. But they couldn't cast the Fidelius Charm.

Hermione bit her lower lip. "That's…" She sighed again.

"...not entirely inaccurate?" He grinned at her.

She rolled her eyes in return. "You might have a point."

Yes.

"But I know that if I ask this of them, they'll agree because they want to protect me." She shook her head. "That wouldn't be fair."

"They would also want to protect their families and friends," he pointed out. "And I think you underestimate yourself." Or, not that he'd tell her this, overestimate herself if she still thought she could do everything alone.

She pressed her lips together.

"You don't have to do everything yourself," he told her after a moment.

"I know," she said. She didn't look like she really believed it, though.

He raised his eyebrows at her. "Do you?"

That earned him a glare, and she clenched her teeth instead of replying. He kept looking at her.

After a moment, she sighed. "It's hard."

He nodded. She'd been the only witch in the world for years. Of course she would think she had to do everything herself. "But not as hard as trying to do this by yourself."

"Don't rub it in."

He hid his grin behind his hand as he pretended to scratch the side of his nose.

*****​

No 12 Grimmauld Place, London, Britain, Wizarding World, May 22nd, 2006

"You want us to cast the Fidelius Charm?" wizarding Ron blurted out, sliding forward on the armchair in which he was sitting in wizarding Harry's living room. "Blimey!"

"No!" Hermione snapped. "I'm asking if you would consider doing this since the amount of information I need to hide to effectively keep my work and my family safe is too large to be covered by one spell. I've researched the matter, and it shouldn't be dangerous - there was a case when two wizards, father and son, hid two spells, a curse and its counter-curse, at the same time to keep others from copying their work."

"Our families are also involved and need to be kept safe," wizarding Harry said.

"Of course. I didn't mean… I mean, the charms should keep everyone involved safe, but I wouldn't want to…" Hermione trailed off.

"That's not what I mean," the wizard told her. "I meant it's obvious that helping you will also protect our families."

"And even if that weren't the case, we'd do this for you," his friend added. "Honestly, Hermione!"

Ron carefully refrained from saying 'told you so'. But Hermione frowned at him anyway. "I'm sorry. I tried to do it with one spell, so you wouldn't have to do this, but…"

"Hermione." Wizarding Harry leaned forward and put his hand on her knee. "You'd do the same for us."

"Well, yes, but…"

"No buts!" Ron's counterpart cut her off. "We won't let you down, just as you didn't let us down."

"Yes." Wizarding Harry released her knee. "And anyone else you need will help you, too."

"I don't need anyone else," Hermione said quickly. "I've narrowed it down to three spells - three secrets: One to hide the value of my research. One to hide the locations. And one to hide the ritual. That should cover everything important with the fewest number of..."

Ron joined the other two men in chuckling as Hermione pouted at all of them.

"Honestly!" she complained, but that only set off another round of laughter.

"So, if we have three Fidelius Charms, we'll have three Secret Keepers," wizarding Ron said once everyone had calmed down. "Can we use the same note to share the secret?"

"I think we could, but it would be safer to keep them separate," Hermione said. "If anyone managed to get a hold of a note with all three…"

Someone like Dumbledore.

"You mean to keep them physically separated?" wizarding Harry asked.

"Yes." Hermione nodded.

"And we can also limit the knowledge of those involved peripherally," Ron said. "Not everyone who works in the laboratory will have to know the whole truth. They don't know the truth right now, anyway." Or weren't supposed to.

"And once we have cast the spells, we'll have to tell everyone who needs to know the secrets;" Hermione added. "That means we'll know who is aware of the truth."

"And we'll be able to control who Dumbledore recruits. To a limited extent," Ron said. "He'll still be able to recruit agents in both worlds, but we'll know any of them who are aware of the truth." And that would be a nice counter to the old man's influence.

"And what if he wants to inform someone you don't approve of?" wizarding Harry asked.

"Then we'll have to discuss matters," Hermione said. "And find a solution."

"At least, thanks to this, we'll have more leverage on him," Ron added.

"We could skip the notes altogether," wizarding Ron said. "As long as we have to tell them the secret in person, that's an additional layer of security."

Ron nodded. It would be inconvenient but safer. Dumbledore might be able to influence Hermione by making her feel indebted to him, but both her friends?

"But having to gather everyone in person might cause a problem if we need to inform someone as soon as possible," Hermione replied. "And if anyone gets stuck on the wrong side of a portal, we might be unable to get enough help to free them."

That was a good point as well.

"A hidden note for emergencies? Only written when a Secret Keeper goes through a portal? No one would have to know…" wizarding Harry suggested.

"Dumbledore will expect such a ploy," Ron said. "Even if we don't actually do it," he added with a wry grin.

"So we might as well do it," his counterpart suggested. "At least it'll be amusing to see how he reacts when he forgets all about you and us."

"He'll already have taken precautions against Obliviation, so we can't just surprise him with this, or he might trigger them," Hermione pointed out.

"He's the former 'C', the boss of MI6," Ron reminded them. "He's a spymaster. And a former master spy."

"Like Snape was?" his counterpart asked.

"He wasn't just spying on one person, but essentially, yes," Hermione told him. "And he wasn't acerbic like Snape, but very charming. He seduced an enemy spy."

"Grindelwald." Harry shook his head. "But yes, we can't underestimate them. But how will they react to this, ah, shift in power?"

"That's the question," Ron said, sighing. "He's been holding most of the cards until now. And he already knows that we were considering the Fidelius Charm."

"Yes," Hermione agreed.

"So he'll have taken precautions against it?" wizarding Harry asked.

"Without a doubt." Hermione nodded emphatically. "Which is why we need to discuss this with him beforehand. We can't spring this on him."

Indeed. Even if Dumbledore was informed of the secrets quickly, he wouldn't forget that. And Ron was sure that the man could carry a grudge for a long time.

"Great. We'll have to negotiate with Dumbledore," wizarding Ron complained.

"With a version of his who's even more cunning and subtle than the one we knew," wizarding Harry added.

"And without the guilt our Dumbledore felt about what we had to do." Hermione looked grim.

But they weren't wrong.

"But first you'll need to learn how to cast the spell," Hermione told them with a rather toothy smile.

*****​

Black Lake, Scotland, May 27th, 2006

"How was the lamb?" Dumbledore asked. "It's not a new recipe, but I don't believe it's been served here before."

"It was excellent," Hermione replied. "My compliments to the chef."

"Our compliments," Ron agreed.

"Yes. Almost as good as Mum's," his counterpart added honestly, if not the most diplomatically.

Wizarding Harry merely nodded.

"Excellent! I would have been very disappointed if we started our discussion without having had a most delicious meal first." Dumbledore smiled at them.

Ron wasn't rattled. Of course the old man had figured out that they hadn't invited him to dinner - if you could invite someone to their own house, serving food cooked by their own chef - just to chat about the weather.

"Yes. It's quite a heavy subject," Hermione said as the waiter cleared the table.

"Then I think starting now would be best - we can take a break with dessert." The old man's smile grew. "Crème brûlée, amongst other delicacies, or so I was led to believe."

"Very well." Hermione took a deep breath. "We've found a way to secure the portal's location as well as the whole project. It's not perfect, of course, but it should deal with the worst threats."

"Using magic, of course," the old man cut in.

"Yes. It's a difficult charm, but very effective at hiding a secret."

"The Fidelius Charm, as you mentioned before?"

"Yes." Hermione didn't even flinch. "Or, to be more precise, three of them."

"Ah."

Had Dumbledore's eyes widened for a fraction of a second? Ron couldn't tell.

"The secret of the portal, and everything around it, is too complex for a single spell," Hermione explained. "Splitting it up into three secrets, however, should be manageable."

"Indeed. An ingenious, if obvious - in hindsight - solution to our problem." Dumbledore nodded. "Although it will complicate running this site." He smiled. "The government won't take well to suddenly 'discovering' that your research isn't as valuable as they thought. I fear that your reputation will suffer - and might not recover. Your research grant at Imperial College will certainly not be renewed, and you might be blacklisted."

"And anyone doing research based on my work might also suffer the same fate. That's a price I'm willing to pay," Hermione replied, meeting the old man's eyes.

It would hurt her pride, though, Ron knew. To be thought a failure by the scientific community - her peers and especially her rivals - would not be easy for her to stomach. Would the challenge and excitement of running a trans-dimensional research project be enough to compensate, if no one but a select few would ever know about it? If everyone, in both her worlds, thought she was a failure or doing unimportant things?

He hoped it would.

"When do you plan to do this?" Dumbledore asked in a deceptively friendly tone. "Healer Rosenberg will have to be informed so he will not suddenly forget about us."

"And a few more of your operatives, I guess," Ron said. He carefully didn't smile.

Dumbledore smiled with just a hint of teeth. "While it pays to have friends in various places, I wouldn't trust many of my acquaintances with this knowledge," he replied.

"But you trust a few," wizarding Harry said. "People who know their way around Wizarding Britain."

"Healer Rosengarten still has a few friends in the country," Dumbledore admitted. "It's rather hard to recruit wizards in this world, as you know."

"But it's not as hard to recruit operatives for the muggle world," Ron pointed out. Who would be able to support Rosengarten - and keep tabs on him, to some extent at least.

"Indeed." Dumbledore beamed at him as if Ron had correctly answered a question in class. "I'm sure you will all get along swimmingly."

Ron doubted that.

"However," the old spymaster went on, "I would suggest taking the current Prime Minister into our confidence."

"Why should we? It won't change my public standing, and making the government aware of magic will cause them to try and research it," Hermione retorted.

"But it would also ensure that the government wouldn't, out of literal ignorance, try to shut down this site." Dumbledore sighed. "Environmental activists have tried to declare the whole area a national reserve before."

"You mean it would save you the time and money needed to convince the government not to do that," Ron said.

"Indeed. As you are no doubt aware, politics is a business that requires a lot of effort, both monetary and personal, to remain on top of things." Dumbledore inclined his head. "I would very much prefer if I didn't have to spend too much time lobbying the government just to maintain the status quo."

"And it would increase your standing with the Prime Minister, wouldn't it?" wizarding Ron said. "People will assume you're involved in all sorts of top secret things."

"And they would be entirely correct," Dumbledore replied with a grin. "But I must confess that such a side effect wouldn't be unwelcome. Gellert keeps accusing me of being just a smidgen too vain."

"You just want to show up your successors," Ron told him.

"My successor's successors," Dumbledore said - but he didn't deny it. "But apart from my vanity, there are valid reasons to inform the Prime Minister. Especially if there should be an incident that we cannot handle without help from the government."

Such as a Russian attack - or an attack from another world.

Hermione pressed her lips together but nodded. "That's a valid point. And it's not as if the Prime Minister would be able to tell anyone our secret."

"Indeed." Dumbledore slowly nodded. "Though I think it would be amusing to see the man try."

Ron wondered if the old man was bearing a grudge for a Prime Minister leaking secrets of his.

*****​

"So…" Hermione said once they were back in their room, and she had cast a privacy charm, "that went better than I hoped."

Ron frowned a little. "Provided he doesn't stab us in the back." He stripped off his sweater, then pulled off the holster from the small of his back. "He will have recordings of your ritual."

"I assume so," she replied as she started changing as well. "But that won't help him once the Fidelius Charm has been cast."

"That would be one reason for him to move before you can cast it," Ron pointed out.

"He would have to strike at us, the Lunas, Harry, Ron and the others in my world, before anyone could react. And if he fails…" Her smile was thin-lipped and more than a little grim. "He knows I've taken precautions against such a betrayal."

Notes with her friends. And orders to cast a Fidelius Charm hiding the spell. That would cut off Dumbledore's access to the other world - and leave it open to Hermione's friend to avenge her. Which they would.

Ron nodded, then slipped into his pyjamas. "And what about being thought a scientific and academic failure?" He lay on the bed and watched her.

Hermione tensed, then took a deep breath. "I'd be lying if I said I didn't care. It hurts. To think all those sexist, patronising buffoons will feel vindicated about their dismissal of my work…" She clenched her teeth. "And I can't tell them without endangering everyone and ruining all our hard work to keep everyone safe, even though the few other researchers working in my field will now be facing the same loss of reputation."

He nodded but didn't say anything. Let her work through this herself.

"But," she went on, baring her teeth, "I'll be able to explore new worlds. Discover new wonders. Learn things unknown in both our worlds."

Ah. "You plan to reverse-engineer those?"

"That would be almost like plagiarism. No, I plan to improve on whatever we find."

"But everyone would still think your research is without value."

"Yes. But I'll be able to live with that if it keeps us safe. It'll be annoying, but it's a small price to pay." She sat down on the bed and grinned. "And if any of my 'peers' should gloat about my 'failure', then I think I'll be able to spare some time to show them that they shouldn't anger a witch."

Ron laughed and hugged her. "You can always ask my brothers and their counterparts for help, I guess."

"I'm planning to."

He felt relief - it seemed that Hermione would be able to stomach the future ruin of her academic reputation. Eventually.

*****​

Black Lake, Scotland, June 3rd, 2006

It seemed that Dumbledore hadn't hired another wizard or witch, Ron realised as he looked at the operatives the old man had gathered in a recently added - extended - room near the portal room for the casting of the Fidelius Charms. Rosengarten was the only wizard amongst them. Of course, there could be a disguised wizard or witch hiding amongst Dumbledore's muggle agents, but… Polyjuice Potion would've stopped working after an hour, and they knew the men and women working at the laboratory. Dumbledore might've managed to hire one of their counterparts, but that would mean the witch or wizard would have to replace them for the foreseeable future, or the deception would be revealed once the actual muggle operative either disappeared or had to ask to be told the secret.

Of course, Dumbledore might arrange an accident or a similar cover story to explain someone's absence, but he would have to delay that for quite some time, to avoid suspicion, and how many wizards or witches could flawlessly integrate into the workforce here?

And even if Dumbledore managed that - and Ron wouldn't put it past the old man - they would still know the faces of his operatives, muggle or wizarding. Between the cameras in the room and their own memories, they had the half a dozen people - four men, two women, all probably trained like James Bond - pegged.

"So… we'll be starting the casting soon. Please stay in the room and don't leave even if you might feel confused," Hermione announced. "We'll rectify that as soon as possible."

"We already read that on the door," one of the male operatives - he had given his name as 'John Smith' - said.

Ron frowned at the dismissive undertone.

As did Hermione. She smiled toothily at Smith and told him: "Yes, I would hope that you did. However, I'm stressing it again because you will feel confused and you might even feel the urge to leave the building. Which would make tracking you down and fixing things harder, so try not to do that."

"I could just seal up the room," Rosengarten suggested.

"That might lead to violent reactions from certain people," Hermione retorted. "We'll hurry here once we've finished casting."

They could stun them, but… it would be good to see the effect first hand. And they probably wouldn't let themselves be stunned easily.

"I'm certain the situation won't get out of control," Dumbledore said. He was, as usual, smiling, but Ron could see both the guards and the operatives present tense in response. The old man had a formidable reputation. For a reason, of course.

Grindelwald scoffed. "Just get it over with, I've got more important things to do than wait here."

Hermione looked at the old men, then at Ron. He nodded at her and gave her his best confident smile. She returned his nod and left the room.

Ron sighed. He hated waiting. It wouldn't take too long - less time than the portal ritual - but still… to know your mind would be messed with, and just let it happen… He forced himself to relax. There was no need to make the dangerous people in the room more nervous.

"So… you're ex-CI5."

Ron looked at Smith. "Yes." He and Harry had made the news several times, after all, and Smith would know that.

Smith stared at him. "And now you're the doctor's bodyguard. Her companion."

Ron had to chuckle at that. In a way, the man was correct - though Hermione was travelling to other dimensions, not through time. "Pretty much, yeah," he said. "Though we don't have a TARDIS." They had a flying tank, instead.

"But she could make one, right?"

Ron shrugged. "She can't make a time machine or a spaceship." At least as far as he knew, anyway. Or, perhaps, not yet.

Smith looked disappointed. "I would've liked one. Could be useful."

"I think Mr Dumbledore would insist on getting one before you," Ron told him.

"Oh, indeed." Dumbledore smiled at both of them. "Though, as far as I know, even with magic, you cannot create a TARDIS."

"But we could build a spaceship with magic," Grindelwald said. "Beat any other delivery system currently on the market."

"But that would reveal magic, which I doubt would be conducive to our future plans."

"Even a little magic would enhance the efficiency of a rocket, and greatly increase the profitability of our aerospace division."

And Rosengarten could easily cast a few extension charms on fuel tanks and cargo space, so this was probably nothing more than a polite way to hand out advance information about their plans.

Well, that would be neat, but compared to… Ron blinked. Compared to what? What was he doing here? Nothing of importance happened here. He was wasting his time here… but why had he come here in the first place? It wasn't as if…

"Dear Lord, what am I doing here?" Smith exclaimed.

"I believe we should remain calm," Dumbledore said.

The door was opened before anyone could say anything else, and Hermione entered, followed by… twins of Harry and Ron? They were their… counterparts… but…

"My research is very valuable and allows me to open portals to other universes," Hermione said after casting a privacy charm

And Ron remembered. That part at least. But what was he doing here? This was an unimportant location. Why had they come here, to the arse end of Britain?

Then his counterpart told him.

Oh. That was why they were here. But there was still something missing. Something that didn't make sense.

And then Harry's counterpart told him about the existing portal.

Oh. Before he could say anything, though, Hermione and her two wizarding friends disapparated. Right - they had to inform the Lunas as well as the Grangers, his family, Harry and Sirius. That wouldn't take them long, though.

And as expected, they reappeared after less than two minutes had passed - and went straight through the portal.

"That was fast," Grindelwald commented.

"They were all already gathered in one place," Ron explained. "It's a Saturday, after all. Even Ginny managed to take a break with Harry."

Hermione stepped back through the portal. "Finished at The Burrow. Harry and Ron stayed there."

"Ah." Dumbledore nodded. "The operation was a complete success, then."

"Yes," Hermione confirmed. "As far as everyone but a select few are concerned, my research is worthless and this location is completely unimportant."

"But we know better, of course," the old spymaster said. "And now that our families' and our own safety is assured, what will you be doing?"

Hermione smiled and stepped closer to Ron. He slipped his arm around her waist.

"Oh, we've got plans. I think you'll like them," Hermione told him.

Ron nodded and pulled her closer. Their secrets were safe now. Their families were safe. Azkaban was gone.

They had all the time in the world now to work on visiting more universes.

Ron couldn't wait.

*****​

 

[killgore444]

Great chapter.
I think you're over thinking the bit about Shakelbolt and a so called dark wizard. It's not a perfect plan, but sending a letter to the Ministry, or just directly to Wizarding Harry, claiming to be a muggle who's family was destroyed by dementors during the war, who also managed to piece together information on the wizarding world, and then figured out how to destroy them would throw things for a loop.
Just make sure you include something about thanking those who faced the dark wizard who was responcible so the wizarding world didn't blow a further gasket in fear of an army of muggles hell bent on revenge.

Or just go with a anonymous 'dark wizard' who was simply after revenge for a family member killed by a dementor. Maybe include some 'Small' amount of ridicule for the current administration and the coverage in the Prophet to get the Prophet to swing back to good coverage for Shack.

Simple!

And yes, I know it's not actually simple.

 

[Starfox5]

Great chapter.
I think you're over thinking the bit about Shakelbolt and a so called dark wizard. It's not a perfect plan, but sending a letter to the Ministry, or just directly to Wizarding Harry, claiming to be a muggle who's family was destroyed by dementors during the war, who also managed to piece together information on the wizarding world, and then figured out how to destroy them would throw things for a loop.
Just make sure you include something about thanking those who faced the dark wizard who was responcible so the wizarding world didn't blow a further gasket in fear of an army of muggles hell bent on revenge.

Or just go with a anonymous 'dark wizard' who was simply after revenge for a family member killed by a dementor. Maybe include some 'Small' amount of ridicule for the current administration and the coverage in the Prophet to get the Prophet to swing back to good coverage for Shack.

Simple!

And yes, I know it's not actually simple.

Click to shrink...

Well, the Ministry would probably quickly realise it's a red herring if there was nothing but some letter - and more complex deceptions require resources the group lacks. (And a muggle destroying Dementors? That would bring in the ICW for a breach of the SoS...)

 

[killgore444]

Well, the Ministry would probably quickly realise it's a red herring if there was nothing but some letter - and more complex deceptions require resources the group lacks. (And a muggle destroying Dementors? That would bring in the ICW for a breach of the SoS...)

Click to shrink...

But it's not really a deception, at least not as to what happened. A muggle DID kill all the dementors. They'd just be trying to cover just WHO that muggle was. And in any case, everyone important already knows/suspects it was Hermione and friends, they'd just be working the Prophet angle to calm the population down.

As for the ICW, so? Depending on how they worded it, the ICW would have to look at the incredible breaches of the statute from the war and the actions of the dementors (never a fun thing). Then, assuming they included enough kiss-ass to 'The-Brave-Heroes-Who-Sacrificed-So-Much" and how they held no grudge against wizards in general, the ICW just might (with a little political pressure) decide they got lucky and not want to press this mysterious muggle(s) in fear they'll release the information they have to the wider world. Doubly so if they include information on DMSO so the ICW can effectively fight any demontors that weren't in Azkaban.

Although admittedly, it'd be better to claim to be a wizard who did it. Then they could even be truthful (to an extent) about how they did it. Even part of the research could be given to them. Since everyone knows that Hermione was trying to gather resources to study demontors, they wouldn't assume it was her, and might just dismiss the thought because of her unsuccessful efforts in that regard.

Like I said, not a perfect plan by any stretch, but it's probably better than doing nothing. Besides, they're all way to proactive to sit and do nothing.

 

[Starfox5]

But it's not really a deception, at least not as to what happened. A muggle DID kill all the dementors. They'd just be trying to cover just WHO that muggle was. And in any case, everyone important already knows/suspects it was Hermione and friends, they'd just be working the Prophet angle to calm the population down.

Click to shrink...

Making up a threat even more terrifying isn't helping to calm people down. Muggles seeing magic?

As for the ICW, so? Depending on how they worded it, the ICW would have to look at the incredible breaches of the statute from the war and the actions of the dementors (never a fun thing). Then, assuming they included enough kiss-ass to 'The-Brave-Heroes-Who-Sacrificed-So-Much" and how they held no grudge against wizards in general, the ICW just might (with a little political pressure) decide they got lucky and not want to press this mysterious muggle(s) in fear they'll release the information they have to the wider world. Doubly so if they include information on DMSO so the ICW can effectively fight any demontors that weren't in Azkaban.

Click to shrink...

The Statute of Secrecy wasn't breached during the war or by the Dementors - that was covered up. But having a muggle destroying Dementors and Azkaban? That is a huge threat to the SoS.

Although admittedly, it'd be better to claim to be a wizard who did it. Then they could even be truthful (to an extent) about how they did it. Even part of the research could be given to them. Since everyone knows that Hermione was trying to gather resources to study demontors, they wouldn't assume it was her, and might just dismiss the thought because of her unsuccessful efforts in that regard.

Click to shrink...

Like I said, not a perfect plan by any stretch, but it's probably better than doing nothing. Besides, they're all way to proactive to sit and do nothing.[/QUOTE]

Sometimes, doing nothing is better than doing something half-assed. This is one of those times.

 

[Starfox5]

Epilogue: Five Years Later

Black Lake, Scotland, August 20th, 2011

Ron sighed when he left the bathroom. That shower had been just what he needed after his morning run with Hermione.

"Is something wrong? You look tired. Should I reschedule the briefing?"

Ron didn't startle at the sudden interruption but sighed again as he turned to look at the translucent figure standing beside him. "No, Jeanne, I'm just relaxing a little."

"Are you certain? You are usually more alert in the morning. Or... did you and Hermione have a row?"

"No, everything's fine," he told her. "I am sure."

"If you say so." The projection nodded. "If you need assistance, just speak to the picture."

"Yes, I know," he replied as the figure faded from view. And sighed once more.

"Is something wrong?" he heard Hermione ask from the bedroom behind him.

"No," he told her. "Jeanne's just been hovering again."

"Ah." Hermione nodded. "She's still young," she said.

"It's been three months," Ron pointed out as he entered the kitchen and put some bread in the toaster before grabbing the teapot - always hot and ready thanks to a few charms. He ignored Crookshanks's begging - the cat had already been fed, before they started on their morning run around the lake.

"She's still, fundamentally, a portrait. They can't learn things as easily as actual humans. Oh, are you hungry, Crookshanks? Are you? Here! Have a treat!" Hermione fed the little monster, then grabbed The Times from the table and sat down.

Ron grunted and took a seat himself. At least Hermione had limited the new 'Projecting Portrait' to the living room and hallway. If the portrait was able to come into their kitchen - or their bedroom… In hindsight, reverse-engineering the effect that created looped 'ghosts' hadn't been a good idea. Wizarding Fred and wizarding George, of course, would disagree, but you never really realised how annoying a magical 'holographic portrait' could be until you had to live with an overeager one for months.

Well, the students at Hogwarts would know, of course - Hermione's portrait enjoyed being able to project itself out of a painting as well, as did other portraits. And once they figured out how to let such projections manipulate things… Ron was very glad that portraits couldn't cross worlds.

He snorted as he grabbed the Daily Prophet and skimmed the headlines on the front page.

Minister Declines to Comment on Status of Azkaban

Arthur would know better than to touch that. Let the International Committee for the Protection of Magical Creatures sort out that mess. Once they had made up their mind whether or not the site still counted as a reserve after two magical species had - seemingly, in the case of the Firestone Lice - gone extinct on it. Then they could discuss whether or not a memorial would be erected there - and whether or not it should cover the prisoners or the creatures.

"Something funny in the news?" Hermione asked.

"No," he replied. "Just the usual about Azkaban." The ICW and the Ministry had been at it for - literally - years without finding a solution. That the Unspeakables still hadn't - officially - come to a verdict didn't help, of course.

"It's the middle of summer; they're always starved for news," Hermione commented. "Like The Times spending two pages on the 'recovery of the rainforest in the Amazon basin' while avoiding any mention of the change in Brazilian government policy that made said recovery possible. They did the same last year."

Ron nodded. They both knew what was behind this 'change in policy', of course. But that was a touchy subject. He grabbed a fresh slice of toast and started buttering it.

"Any actual news?" Hermione asked.

"No," he replied. "Just the usual rumours, gossip and the sports news."

"Good. I'd hate to leave if there's a crisis in either world." Frowning, she added: "Though I wouldn't mind leaving before Coraker's next recruitment offer arrives."

He nodded in agreement. Unfortunately, the Head of the Department of Mysteries had only grown more insistent on recruiting Hermione after the Fidelius Charms had been cast - he apparently couldn't stand the thought that she was wasting her talent doing unimportant research. At least last year the Ministry had finally closed its investigation into the destruction of Azkaban without results. The rumors were still around, though.

And he had his doubts about whether Hermione minded the recruiting attempts or the rumours as much as she claimed she did - after all, compared to how her reputation as a scientist had all but vanished in Ron's home world, it was quite flattering.

But that was also a subject better left alone.

*****​

"I'll fetch the others," Hermione told him when they finished breakfast. "See you in the briefing room."

"Alright."

There was the familiar sound of Disapparation, and he continued clearing the table. Perhaps a projection that could do this would come in handy, he thought. It would feel a little bit like living in the Star Trek universe.

He finished in the kitchen and left their apartment - through the door leading directly to the laboratory. Hermione and Sirius had still beaten him to the briefing room.

"Morning!" Sirius greeted him. "Harry and Ginny send their regards."

"Thanks," Ron replied, taking his usual seat. With the US Open starting soon, Ginny wouldn't risk a trip to another world - she really wanted a second major. And that meant Harry wouldn't come, either - the last time he hadn't shown up at an important tournament, the divorce rumours had flown faster than Ginny's smashes.

That left… ah! The Lunas had appeared in the middle of the room. "Hello!" Luna smiled and waved. "Sorry for being late, we had to treat a wounded bear."

"Oh? It's OK now, I hope?" Hermione asked.

"Oh, yes - we closed the wound. But we still have to keep him for further examination. And Barney must be feeling lonely now," wizarding Luna said. Then she perked up. "He's a brown bear, and your backyard could easily harbour him for a week or two!"

Hermione grimaced. "But we won't be home since we're going on this mission, remember?"

"Oh, right." The witch sighed. "It would've been perfect. Your garden is, after all, a modified habitat - so all we would need to do would be to modify it back!"

Ron frowned a little. This wasn't the first time the Lunas had tried to get them to keep more animals.

"But it wouldn't be good for Crookshanks," Hermione retorted. "He's getting a little old, and he doesn't like major changes. Such as having another animal in his territory."

The little monster was anything but getting old, in Ron's opinion. The cat was just lazy and a glutton. But as long as it kept their extended garden from being turned into an underground animal shelter, he wouldn't contradict Hermione.

"Oh, right." Wizarding Luna nodded. "But you could get him used to the idea by slowly introducing other animals. We've also got a jaguar cub that could use some feline company."

"But they would learn the wrong behaviour from Crookshanks," Ron cut in.

"Crookshanks is a good hunter!" Hermione protested.

"I meant with regard to humans," Ron told her.

"Oh."

Before Luna could attempt another argument to sway Hermione, the door opened and Dumbledore entered. "Sorry - I was delayed by some business. Business business," the old man told them. "A slight dispute about taxes. And also the report from Moscow - Putin continues to show no sign of regaining his memories." He smiled at the Lunas. "Did you receive my latest briefing about the Ugandan government?"

"Oh, yes! It was very helpful, thanks!" Luna beamed at the old spymaster. To see those three working together still seemed weird to Ron. Though he knew that Dumbledore's intel had been responsible for the Lunas' success in Brazil. At least Dumbledore was using his influence on the two Lunas to restrain them somewhat. And, hopefully, keep them from doing anything rash, like an uncontrolled growth of the Amazonian rainforest.

"Right. Let's get started then," Hermione said. "We're about to enter a new world. Preliminary excursions by autonomous drones looked promising. The world has a breathable atmosphere, the same climate as we have here, and not much pollution as far as we can tell. No pathogens either, according to our analysis. Background radiation indicates no or very few nuclear tests. We didn't detect any radio transmissions, though. Nor did we spot any structures at Hogwarts' location."

Ron nodded. He already knew that.

"So… another 'virgin earth'?" Sirius asked. "Can we call it Mary this time?"

"No," Hermione told him with a glare. "However, it might be another world devoid of human life. There's no way to tell until we've covered more of it."

And it would be better not to leave that to drones.

"Perhaps it's a world where everyone's a wizard or witch!" Sirius suggested with a grin.

"Perhaps," Hermione said - in a tone that showed she didn't think so. "So we'll go through the portal and explore the surrounding area which hasn't been covered by the drones."

Using drones could potentially alert the residents to their presence by their radio transmissions - they had learned that the hard way in that world where the Cold War hadn't ended in 1989. And where the Black Lake was a top secret military installation.

"So… tank time?" Sirius asked with a wide grin.

"Tank time!" wizarding Luna agreed.

"We'll take our transport with us, of course," Hermione sort-of-agreed. "But I stress: This is just a short scouting mission to establish a baseline and get a picture of the area around the portal in the new world."

"Yes, yes." Sirius nodded.

"And to take biological samples," Luna said.

"The mission objectives can be adjusted, of course, if the situation should warrant it," Dumbledore added. "But discretion is paramount at this stage."

"No blowing up the local's holy rocks, got it," Sirius said - much too flippantly for someone who might do exactly that, in Ron's opinion.

"Then let's go," Hermione said.

*****​

Of course, they couldn't go immediately - they had to wait while Hermione prepared the ritual in the main portal room, then wait some more while she performed it. It wasn't as if they could keep the portal open around the clock, like they did with the portal to Hermione's world in the secondary portal room. An unknown world? With the portal opening to an unsecured location? That would be asking for trouble. Trouble that they might not be able to handle.

*Did you add another room?" Sirius asked, looking around. "I think it took us a little longer to reach the portal room than last time."

"Not to my knowledge," Ron replied, glancing at wizarding Luna. She had promised not to add any more rooms without asking first, and he hadn't noticed anything different, anyway.

"It's a veritable bunker complex now," Sirius went on. "I think we could fit my entire old regiment in here, tanks and all, with everyone having a room of their own, and we'd still have room to spare!"

Ron snorted. It wasn't that big, but it came close. And having as much space available as you wanted came in handy, at times. Like when it came to housing all the generators that powered the portal rooms.

Magic made so many things easy. It allowed Ron to carry enough weapons and ammunition on him to fight a war for years, and Sirius to carry a tank in his pocket.

And they might need all of those weapons if this world turned out to be as dangerous as the Cold War World, as Ron had dubbed it - Hermione called it 'Earth-4'. "Let's hope that this is going to be a milk run."

"Another virgin earth would be great," wizarding Luna said. "Perhaps one where dinosaurs survived? Imagine if we could get a T-Rex!"

And Ron had thought that giving the Lunas access to megafauna - on Earth-3, as Hermione had labelled the virgin Earth they had found first, a number of species extinct in this world had survived, which strengthened the theory that humans had hunted them to extinction - was the worst they had to fear. "I doubt that you could convince anyone that dinosaurs survived on a remote island or valley," he told her.

"It worked with the Haast's Eagle and the moa," Luna replied.

"Several top scientists still think either species is the result of genetic engineering," Ron pointed out. And he strongly suspected that wizarding Luna had influenced the scientists supporting the theory that the two species had genuinely survived in a remote part of the islands.

"Obviously delusional conspiracy theorists," Luna said.

Ron gaped at her. Did she just…?

"But we could go that way with the dinosaurs!" wizarding Luna added, smiling widely. "We'll claim that we cloned them, like in Jurassic Park. Just without the dinosaurs eating people, of course - that wouldn't be good for their digestion; they aren't used to humans."

Ron could never tell how serious wizarding Luna was being, but this time she had to be joking. "Well, we don't know yet if there are any dinosaurs. And if we find any, odds are they won't be the dinosaurs we know about." He grinned. "They might've evolved into giant chickens!"

Both Lunas frowned at him. "Don't crush our dreams, Ron!" Luna scolded him. "Sooner or later we'll find dinosaurs!"

"I don't think that's how probability works," Ron told her. "So far, all the worlds had the same geological age."

"So far," wizarding Luna said.

"And it takes Hermione a long time to connect to a new world," he pointed out.

"The time she needs to find a new world and connect to it is growing shorter, though. Soon we'll have a world per month, I think." Wizarding Luna smiled. "Which means more chances to find dinosaurs!"

"Why don't you just transfigure birds into dinosaurs and enlarge them?" Ron asked.

"What? That would be cheating!" Wizarding Luna glared at him. "Daddy taught me better than that."

"Yes," Luna chimed in. "You can't just make up new animals like that. Well, you could, but it would be fraud."

Ron shook his head. Whenever he thought he understood the two of them… "Anyway, how much longer?"

"About an hour," wizarding Luna replied at once. "Unless Hermione's found a way to further optimise the ritual."

She hadn't. And he knew exactly how long the ritual took. But he also wanted to change the subject.

"I wouldn't mind riding a dinosaur, fake or not," Dumbledore cut in. Of course he would want the subject to continue - the old man was already far too close to the Lunas, in Ron's opinion.

"Well, we could probably conjure one, if we studied it enough," wizarding Luna said. "Or if we studied a dragon. They're similar to dinosaurs, just magical, you know - but they're not related."

"Oh, to ride a dragon!" Dumbledore sighed, then grinned. "I think that might even convince Gellert to join us on one of these expeditions."

Ron doubted that - the old German was usually far too cautious to risk life and limb like that.

*****​

Ron watched as the portal appeared and flickered a few times before stabilising. He checked the computer display next to him. "Power demand is stable," he said. "And within expected parameters."

"It better be," he heard Hermione mutter as she left the ritual circle. "My calculations are correct."

Ron left the waiting room - or the control room, as Hermione liked to call it - and joined her in the portal room, followed by the others. "Any trouble?"

"No. Everything went as expected," she replied, running a hand through her hair, which had come loose during the ritual. Sighing, she pulled it back into a ponytail, fixing it with a conjured scrunchie.

Wizarding Luna was already peering at the portal, not bothered by the weapons aimed at it, and, since she was in front of it, at her. Ron had stopped asking what she was doing - she couldn't actually see through the portal. Not without the drone that Luna was starting up.

And here it came. The hovering drone, trailing a glass fibre cable, flew a circle around the waving wizarding Luna and vanished through the portal. Ron joined the others with Lina, staring at the screen in front of her. It showed the forest they had seen before.

"Nothing's tried to eat Ms Drone," Luna stated the obvious. "Good."

"It means whatever animals might be present aren't hungry," her counterpart added.

"Or they can tell a machine from an edible organism," Hermione corrected them.

"If you have the right digestion system, anything is edible," wizarding Luna retorted.

"Well, it does look safe. Safe-ish," Sirius said. "Let's go?"

"All readings are in the safe range," Hermione said after checking another screen. "I guess we can risk stepping through."

Ron nodded and stepped up to the portal. A last check of his fatigues and webbing as well as his enchanted ballistic vest - everything was in order. Not exactly the most peaceful sight, should he stumble upon any natives, but better safe than sorry.

"A small step for you, a huge step for dinosaurs!" wizarding Luna said

"The vegetation doesn't match the time of the dinosaurs," Hermione told her.

"Going in," Ron said, before taking a deep breath and stepping through the portal, dragging a fibre cable behind him.

The slight unease turned into slight nausea - quite a strong reaction, he noticed, for someone with his experience with portals. He ignored the slight urge to vomit and looked around, hand on his gun.

It looked like a normal forest in Scotland. No sign of megafauna - no huge claw marks on any of the trees, at least. Or a path of uprooted trees as wide as a highway. Still… he pulled a rifle out of his pocket. "Looks normal and safe, but I've got a bad feeling about this," he told the others through his communicator.

"Is there enough space for the tank?" Sirius asked.

Ron looked around, "Barely, but yes."

"Coming through!" Sirius appeared out of the portal and almost collapsed. "Ugh…" He held his stomach. "That's far worse than I expected."

"Hermione theorised that the greater the differences between worlds, the more pronounced the nausea is," Ron told him.

"Well, that would explain why I feel worse than when I first stepped through a portal." Sirius shook his head. "OK, let's deploy our tank!" He reached into one of his belt's pouches and pulled out a tiny tank. "Fly, my precious!" he called out as he threw it into the air.

Ron took a few steps back as the tank rapidly grew to its real size while floating a foot above the ground. He trusted magic, and the tank's enchantments had proven their worth and safety many times, but… it was still a tank appearing in mid-air.

No sane person liked standing beneath that kind of thing.

Of course, Sirius was already climbing up the still descending ramp.

Ron shook his head and pushed the button on his microphone. "The tank's been deployed."

"Coming!" Luna stepped through the portal, followed by her counterpart, and both stumbled almost in sync. "Oh… I feel as if I had eaten too much dessert," Luna said.

"Yes…" wizarding Luna agreed.

Then Hermione appeared behind them, stumbling a little, but otherwise not showing any reaction - just like Dumbledore. The old man nodded. "A slightly more noticeable transition than usual."

Hermione was kneeling, but only to set up a radio relay connected to the base by a cable running through the portal. Once they deemed it safe enough - or in an emergency - they would be able to contact the others in the laboratory. Provided this world's United Kingdom didn't react to unknown radio transmissions in restricted areas with a volley of anti-radiation missiles.

He shook his head again. They would've picked up radio transmissions by now. Unless this world was so technologically advanced that no one used radio any more. Which would be… probably dangerous, but Ron would really love to visit such a world. Science fiction, but no longer fiction...

"Come on, Ron! We're about to take off!" Luna yelled at him from inside the tank.

"Coming." The ramp started to slowly close as soon as he stepped on to it, but he was used to such antics and easily climbed inside and made his way to the driver's - or pilot's - seat. "Ready for take-off," he reported over the intercom once he was buckled in.

"Take us up!" Sirius replied.

Ron pushed the altitude controls up, and the tank rose up until it passed through the canopy above - breaking off a few branches in the process.

"It looks like the drone pictures," Hermione said. "Just an empty spot where Hogwarts would be."

"Looks like a virgin earth." All the worlds with humans - though they only had visited three so far - had had a man-made structure on this spot. Hermione had a theory about that, but she needed more data to confirm it, or so she claimed.

"Fly us over it anyway," she told him. "Just to check."

Ron did so, flying at a slow pace over the treetops, then over the lake, towards where the castle would have been.

And suddenly, ruins appeared in front of him.

"Oh! There's Hogwarts! But I only see ruins!" he exclaimed. "The Muggle-Repelling Charms must be active."

"No," Hermione said in a strangely soft voice. "I can see the ruins as well."

Oh. "But that…"

"There were active spells that hid the castle… the ruins… from us before we crossed the wardline. But no Muggle-Repelling Charms," Hermione went on. Ron thought he heard someone sob over the intercom, but he wasn't certain.

"Do you think this was the work of muggles?" Sirius asked. "A modern witch hunt? Or a siege?"

"I can't tell from up here," Hermione replied. "But the destruction doesn't seem to be the result of modern weapons. I don't see craters."

"A few well-placed explosives could bring down the castle," Dumbledore said. "If a saboteur managed to sneak inside…"

Of course Dumbledore would consider that. He probably had been on such missions.

"We'll find out. Take us down!" Hermione snapped.

Ron slowly guided the tank down, to hover over the remains of the courtyard. "Can you see anything?" He couldn't see anything on the screen - the mirror - which was enchanted to show what was below them.

"Something's moving in the remains of the Astronomy Tower," Luna reported.

"On it!" Sirius replied, and Ron heard the turret swing around.

"Don't shoot! It's an owl!" wizarding Luna yelled. "And another!"

And indeed - half a dozen owls appeared, leaving the ruins of the broken tower to fly around the tank.

"Native species," Hermione said. "Are they post owls?"

"They don't seem to be afraid of humans - or tanks," wizarding Luna replied. "But that could be simple curiosity. We need to show them a letter to see if they have the instincts of a post owl!"

Ron suppressed the urge to question the witch. She was the expert on magical creatures, after all. Still...

"The presence of owls, presumably resting and nesting in the ruins, might indicate that no large predators are present," Hermione said.

"Unless the large predator likes owls. Or doesn't like how they taste," wizarding Luna told them. "Some creatures are very finicky eaters. Some only eat humans. Vampires, for example."

And wasn't that reassuring?

"I don't think we'll be meeting any vampires in broad daylight," Sirius commented.

"Unless they manage to hide from it," Hermione replied. "The castle might be in ruins, but the dungeons might've survived. And there are other dangerous magical creatures who could hide down there."

"Should I move to a higher altitude?" Ron asked.

"No, no. It seems safe enough here - as long as we're cautious," Hermione told him.

"I'll keep the gun ready!" Sirius announced. "If we need to, I can reduce the entire castle to rubble."

He wasn't wrong, Ron knew - with the enchantments on the tank's main gun, Sirius could fire it almost constantly and at a much higher rate of fire than possible without magic until the cooling charms on the barrel were overwhelmed. Which took a long time - they had tested that, of course.

"Alright," Ron said as he unbuckled himself. "But let's be cautious." Exploring the ruins of a magical castle - it sounded like a fantasy game. But one where you could easily die.

He moved to the back of the tank, where the ramp was. Hermione was already there, as were the Lunas. "I'll take point."

Hermione nodded, drawing her wand. She would be right behind him, of course. He knew better than to ask her to stay behind. And they needed a witch with them.

But not two. One had to stay in the tank. Wizarding Luna knew that but still pouted.

Shaking his head, Ron let the ramp descend and stepped out of the tank. The ground felt normal under his boots - and the grass reacted as grass would when stepped on. It didn't cry out or change colour or try to strangle him.

Ron quickly walked around the tank. He didn't see anything dangerous, and nothing attacked him. "The protections are… spotty," Hermione said, following him as she waved her wand. "Some spells are missing, despite being crucial for protecting the castle. Then there are a slew of non-essential spells. And yet some obvious spells are missing."

Ron was tempted to make a joke about people having different views of what was crucial, but that would've been stupid. Life was a harsh teacher, so people tended to learn what was crucial and what wasn't. Wizards and witches were no exception.

Hermione suddenly disapparated and reappeared five yards away. "No Anti-Apparition Jinxes." She flicked her wand. "But the walls are enchanted to be more durable… it's a weak enchantment, though. No…" She suddenly frowned. "It's fading. But… how could that be?"

Ron narrowed his eyes at the corner of a broken wall nearby. "Take a look at that," he said, pointing at the cornerstone.

Hermione followed him, then frowned. "What…" She trailed off.

"Half of the stone is withered and covered with moss, the other half is pristine," he told her.

"That's… Did they cast the same enchantment twice, on the same stone, and it only took on one half each? And had one be cast by a student and another by a master?" Hermione shook her head. "That's… shoddy spell-casting doesn't even begin to describe this. I don't actually know how this could work - you can't just enchant parts of a whole like that. Not with the spells I see here."

"Perhaps they found a way around that? Or perhaps magic works differently in this world?" Ron speculated.

Hermione shook her head, almost violently. "Impossible. If it worked differently, our spells wouldn't have worked. The tank wouldn't have unshrunk as smoothly as it did. Or flown. The portal wouldn't have connected to the world in the first place. No, this is impossible, and yet it happened. How?"

Ron shrugged. Sometimes, his ideas were right on the money, sometimes they weren't.

"I don't know, but I'm going to find out," Hermione answered her own question.

She waved her wand around, casting more spells. "It's the same for most of the courtyard here." Looking around, she added: "We need to check the Great Hall. Its remains," she corrected herself. "Then the dungeons."

"And the towers," Ron added. Two of the towers still rose above ground level. Not by much - one and two stories, respectively - but they might contain clues.

"Yes. But the Great Hall first."

Hermione turned round, her eyes darting about, then quickly marched towards one of the bigger piles of rubble.

Ron hoped that their magic worked - digging up all those broken stones and other debris wouldn't be fun.

"Oh! They do like letters!" wizarding Luna exclaimed. "Post owl instincts!"

Ron turned around and saw that she was standing on the ramp and waving an envelope at the owls. Half a dozen of them were flying around her and trying to grab it. When she released it, the owls briefly fought each other until the largest flew away with the envelope in its grasp to the top of a nearby tower.

But there it stayed.

"To whom did you address the letter?" Hermione asked, turning back towards the tank.

"You," wizarding Luna replied. "But it seems they can't read. Hey!" she yelled at the tall owl and pointed at Hermione. "That's Hermione!"

The owl remained sitting, however.

"Could it be an untrained post owl? Never learned how to handle letters?" Ron suggested.

"A post owl needs very little training - its magic and instincts ensure that they know how to and can deliver letters and parcels. Most training is in the small details - delivery times, how to avoid muggles and so on," wizarding Luna explained.

"Curious," Dumbledore remarked, using binoculars to study the owl. "It could also be a magpie-like instinct, though I would expect the owl to carry the letter to its nest in that case."

"Or it's just a curious bird," Hermione said.

"A wild bird that doesn't show any fear of humans?" Ron asked. "What if they've never seen a human in their lives?"

"They still should have the instincts of a wild animal," wizarding Luna replied.

"Well, why don't we examine the Great Hall's remains?" Hermione suggested. "Perhaps we'll find some clues there."

"Indeed." Dumbledore stepped off the ramp and joined them. He wasn't holding a weapon, but Ron knew that the old man's pockets were stuffed with an arsenal of the best and deadliest both Phoenix Gruppe and the retired boffins from the SIS he had hired could build.

Not that Ron minded having more firepower and options. Certainly not when standing in the ruins of a magic school in another world.

As it turned out, magic did work just like back home. Hermione had no trouble levitating most of the rubble and checking for anything buried underneath. Such as the remains of plates and silverware.

But they found neither.

"Whatever happened didn't happen during a meal," Hermione said.

"Although it seems that this area was also affected by whatever caused the phenomenon you are so determined to investigate," Dumbledore added, pointing at the remains of a table.

Either someone had taken a saw to it and cut it in half following a wavy, meandering pattern, or magic had gone screwy.

"This is…" Hermione shook her head again. "The other parts rotted away, yet this part is untouched."

"As if someone took an eraser tool and randomly moved it through a 3D object on a computer," Ron commented.

"With magic, that might be a more precise comparison than you would expect," Dumbledore replied.

"Well, we could search the rest of the ruins that are above ground - or we could look for the dungeons," Hermione said.

"What about the towers?"

"They are above ground, and at least partially open to the elements," Dumbledore pointed out. "We might have more luck finding anything that survived whatever catastrophe befell this school in the catacombs."

Hermione was already walking to a particularly tall heap of rubble, swishing her wand. If modern archaeologists saw the way she was carelessly moving the rubble, they would be appalled, Ron knew. But he didn't want to wait a year for someone to carefully remove the rubble using tweezers, either.

"Ah!" Hermione smiled with evident satisfaction as she finally unearthed the remains of some stairs leading down into a dark but obviously at least partially intact basement.

A dungeon.

"I'll take point," Ron said.

"Wait." Hermione stopped him with a raised hand. "There could be curses on the stairs."

"Together, then."

"Yes."

Dumbledore didn't comment, but Ron knew the old man was smiling behind their backs.

They slowly made their way downstairs. The air smelt… not as bad as Ron had feared. Of course, they still used Bubble-Head Charms, just to be safe.

"This is the part of the dungeon that leads - led - to the kitchens," Hermione explained.

"Yes," Ron agreed. He recognised parts of it from his visits to Hogwarts.

But the kitchen had been… erased, Ron thought. Replaced with the remains of walls and plain dirt.

"That means the Hufflepuff dorms are probably gone as well," Hermione said.

"What's in the other direction?" Dumbledore asked.

"The Slytherin dorms and the Potions lab. Let's hope they survived in a better shape." In a softer voice, she added: "Which would be ironic."

The Slytherin dorms hadn't survived, either, they discovered on the way. The Potions lab, however… It looked mostly intact. Mostly.

"If Snape were to see this, he'd have a breakdown. And blame Harry for it," Hermione said as they stood in the door to a room that looked like a bomb had exploded inside. "The explosion seems to have originated from the potions ingredients cupboard. I wonder…"

"Hello? Who's there?"

Ron froze. As did Hermione. Even Dumbledore twitched.

That was Dumbledore's voice.

Ron tensed. He had never met the wizard, but by all accounts he was one of the most powerful wizards in the world - and one of the most dangerous. Someone who might very well be able to wreck the entire castle with magic Hermione didn't recognise...

"Headmaster?" Hermione replied. "Where are you?"

"Over here, in the vault room."

The vault room? Ron looked at Hermione.

She didn't seem to know where that was.

"The voice is coming from that direction," Dumbledore said, pointing towards the wrecked door in the back.

"Snape's office." Hermione flicked her wand and vanished the rubble blocking the way, then the door itself. "Headmaster?" she repeated herself as she approached the opening.

"In a manner of speaking."

That sounded ominous. Ron frowned and passed Hermione, drawing his pistol. "I'm taking point." If anything happened to him, Hermione could use magic to save or fix him. But if she got cursed, he couldn't do anything for her. And he had the better reflexes.

She didn't reply but took a step back. "No curses on the entrance - at least as far as I can see."

Ron took a deep breath and entered the room. It was a dusty - and partially collapsed - office. "Hello?"

"In here. In the vault room," the voice replied - from a shelf.

He examined the shelf. "How do you open it?"

"There is a… a hidden lever on the side. By the ground, yes."

"Stay back!" Hermione told him before he could reach for it. She pointed her wand at the shelf and something clicked.

The whole shelf swung out, revealing a small, dark room.

"Not much of a vault," Ron commented as he shone his flashlight into it. A lot of small shelves - most of them broken.

"Snape had a private vault. I wonder if his successor knows about it," Hermione muttered.

"Light. At last. If I were alive, I would probably be blinded."

Ron pointed his flashlight and gun at the voice's origin. "A painting?"

It was a portrait. A small one - barely the size of the Prophet's front page. And it showed Dumbledore, dressed in a bright turquoise robe with shining golden stars on it.

"Hello. You look familiar. Oh. Mr Weasley! And there you are, Miss Granger! How fortuitous! And you are..." The portrait trailed off. "Albus?"

"Albus Dumbledore, at your service," the old spymaster said, bowing. "Although I'm not the wizard of whom you are the portrait."

"Oh. And you are not the Miss Granger and Mr Weasley Albus knew, then, I presume."

"No, we're not," Hermione told the painting.

"You are from another timeline, then? So it is possible... " The portrait beamed at them. "Albus would be so relieved. He had given up hope, you know."

Ron was confused. What did the portrait mean by that?

"What do you mean? And what happened here?" Hermione asked. "How did Hogwarts, your Hogwarts, fall into ruin? The spells are all wrong - I don't have the first clue how this could have happened!"

The portrait sighed. "It is a long story. A long and tragic story."

"Then it might be best that we share it with the others," Dumbledore said. "Lest you need to tell it twice."

"Oh, I do not mind telling it twice. Or thrice. I have not been able to talk to anyone since Albus left, you know? And for a portrait meant to talk, that's quite the predicament."

"Nevertheless, I believe it's best if we join our friends before listening to your story."

"It is not actually my story - or only in very small part. It's Albus's. And the others. But mostly Albus's, I believe. Wait! Others?"

"Yes," Hermione told him. "We're not here alone."

"Marvellous! Did you bring a portrait with you?"

"Unfortunately, no." Hermione shook her head.

"Too bad. I had hoped to be able to leave my frame."

"Speaking of your frame…" Ron looked at it. "It's not cursed or anything, is it?"

"What? No! Just stuck to the wall."

Hermione flicked her wand, then gave it a swish. "Not any longer," she announced as the portrait started to float. "Let's get back to the others."

*****​

"Oh! Dumbledore's portrait!" Wizarding Luna, somewhat predictably, gushed over their discovery.

"Miss Lovegood. And Miss Lovegood? I was unaware that you had a twin." The portrait looked confused.

"We're sort of twins, but not really," Luna told it. "Closer than twins, yet further apart."

"Oh. That must get confusing, I imagine."

"Oh, yes," Hermione confirmed.

"And you have a flying car," the portrait replied. "Do you travel through time with it? Like nomads? Or do you have a more specific purpose than exploration?"

"We're not time travellers," Ron told it. "But you mentioned your story - or Albus's story."

"Ah, yes, I did, did I not?" The portrait sighed. "It is a tragic story. Albus told it to me - many times - before he left. He was a tad obsessed, by the end." It cleared its throat. "The war had lasted for years - the Second Wizarding War. Albus's Order of the Phoenix steadfastly fought the Death Eaters. The Ministry stood firm as well. Yet, as in the First Wizarding War, Tom refused to give battle to Albus, and rarely faced the Order and the Aurors. Instead, he struck at the weak and defenceless. Those the Order and the Ministry could not protect. Soon, people were fleeing their homes, gathering in Diagon Alley, Hogsmeade and the Ministry, seeking protection. The Ministry tried its best - but it was not enough. Through treachery, the Ministry fell, and with it all those who had sought refuge there."

Ron winced. Hermione had told him how the Death Eaters fought - and how they treated their prisoners.

"The people scattered and fled - many of them coming to Hogwarts. Tom had never dared to face Albus, after all." The portrait sighed. "And even after taking the Ministry, he did not dare to challenge Albus. But he had Hogwarts surrounded - put under siege. Many dark wizards and dark creatures were gathered. Hogwarts was no easy target, though, its defences repelling every assault. But Tom was crafty - and cunning. And utterly unconcerned for his followers. He spent them like water, trading two or three of his wands to kill a single one of the defenders of Hogwarts. It was soon clear that sooner or later, the school would fall."

The portrait sighed dramatically. "And that was when the Order, and Albus, became so desperate, they risked everything on a mad gamble. They decided to meddle with time."

Hermione gasped. "But that was banned after it almost destroyed the world!"

"Indeed. But, as Albus told me, they were facing certain death - or worse. The war had gone on for years, and both sides had stopped giving quarter. And what the Death Eaters did to those who had the misfortune to be taken captive…" It sighed again, shaking its head. "Albus resisted at first, but after a particularly costly skirmish, which led to the death of a dozen young students, he gave in and approved the plan. They would travel back in time to prevent Tom's birth. No one would die - Tom would simply never be conceived. His father would not be fed a potion by his mother, and would not fall in love with her."

The portrait smiled with obvious regret. "A neat solution - too neat. The ritual went wrong. Instead of Albus travelling back in time, Hogwarts was, in his words, 'sent tumbling head over heels through time'. Back and forth, apparently at random, with different parts travelling to different times."

"But the people…" Hermione trailed off.

The portrait nodded. "Aged hundreds of years in moments whenever the part of the school in which they found themselves travelled forward in time."

"Yet you seem to imply that my counterpart survived," Dumbledore cut in.

"He did. Initially. For, you see, a few years before that he had been saved from certain death by his friend Nicholas Flamel."

"He drank the Elixir of Life?" Hermione said.

"Indeed. It kept him from ageing - for a time. Long enough to last until the school finally settled. On an empty world in the distant past. But no one else had survived. He was all alone. Alone in the entire world."

"'Alone in the entire world'?" Ron asked.

"He travelled far in the time he had left - he even sent out enchanted owls to known magical places - yet he found no living soul. No humans. Not In Britain, nor on the continent. Nowhere."

"Dear Lord…" Hermione shook her head.

"He assumed that either they had appeared in a timeline where humans had never evolved - or that the uncontrolled time travel had erased humanity; that his actions had prevented humans from ever existing." The portrait smiled, though sadly. "He hoped for the former, feared the latter, yet could never find the truth. He taught me all he knew in the time he had left and worked the strongest protections he could on my frame. All so I would be able to tell his story, should anyone ever visit Hogwarts."

"But… if humanity was erased, then Hogwarts wouldn't have ever been built. That would be a paradox," Hermione replied.

"Albus said that was probably the reason the castle survived. It was a paradox," the portrait told them.

Ron shook his head. "Perhaps we should leave the castle, then. Before something happens."

"Yes. Better get some distance from the ruins," Sirius agreed.

"I concur," Dumbledore added.

Hermione nodded. "Let's go! Wait!" She looked at the portrait. "Do you want to come with us?"

The portrait blinked. "Now that you ask… I have fulfilled my purpose, have I not? I do not need to wait for visitors any more. I certainly waited long enough. Yes, I would like to leave this place. And visit another frame or two, if possible."

Hermione smiled for the first time since the portrait had started to tell its story. "We may be able to offer you something even better than visiting another frame."

*****​

Black Lake, Scotland, August 20th, 2011

"So we have a portrait that might have spent aeons waiting in the darkness in our base now," Ron said after closing the door to Hermione's office behind them.

"Would you have left it behind?" Hermione asked, raising her eyebrows at him as she went over to her desk and started sorting through some of the papers there.

He sighed. "Well, no." Of course he wouldn't have left the closest thing to an A.I. behind. Still… "I'm just pointing out that it might have suffered some trauma."

"It's a portrait, not an actual being. Judging by how much time passed since the other Dumbledore 'left', I would say that if the portrait were affected by its isolation, it would've succumbed by now. The Headmaster probably took that into account and took steps to protect the portrait against it."

Ron nodded. That sounded like what a Dumbledore would do. "But we can't just tell it everything. Especially not if it learns how to travel to other frames."

"We won't. And the Fidelius Charm will prevent it from telling anyone, anyway," Hermione said. "It didn't realise what had happened until I told my secret to it."

That was true. He leaned against the wall. "So, we found another virgin world. Or a haunted or cursed world." Billions erased… No! That was too... And who could say whether that had actually happened, anyway? As the portrait had explained, the school might have travelled across dimensions, rather than through time - or it might have opened a new time stream.

"I still can't believe Dumbledore took such a risk!" Hermione exclaimed.

"He was desperate." Ron shrugged. "Desperate people aren't known for making good decisions. And he wasn't the Dumbledore you knew. Either of them."

"No, he wasn't." Hermione sighed.

"Are we going to look for his grave?" Ron asked.

"I don't think he has a grave. If he wanted to rest in a grave, he would've prepared one at Hogwarts. I think he wanted to disappear completely. To leave no trace other than the portrait he'd prepared."

"Ah. He wanted to control the narrative." Ron nodded. That sounded like another Dumbledore thing.

"Yes. Which means we can't just trust everything the portrait tells us," Hermione said. Well, that was nothing new. "So, since we already have a virgin earth to explore, and we don't know what exactly happened in the one we visited this afternoon, and whether any effects might linger, I don't think today's world should be a priority for further exploration," she went on.

"The Lunas like the animals that evolved there," he pointed out.

"If new species start appearing in our worlds, people will notice," Hermione said. "I'd almost prefer it if they started recreating dinosaurs. Those we could hide as the results of genetic engineering."

He chuckled. "Don't tell them that - they'll take it as permission."

She laughed as well. "And Dumbledore would finance the project - and cover it up."

"Oh, yes. 'Phoenix Dino Park'." Ron checked his watch. "It's still early. Do you want to go out?" He could use a distraction after this trip.

Hermione mulled it over for a moment. "In fact, yes, I think I do," she said, nodding. "Nothing too heavy, though - we've got a family dinner tomorrow."

"Ah, yes. I hope the twins attend."

She blinked. "Why?"

"If they're present, Mum won't bother us about getting married. She'll be too busy with them."

"Ah, good thinking." Hermione snorted and sat down, stretching. "Well, it's still a picture of domestic bliss compared to the other Weasley family dinner. Which, remember, is in a week - just before school starts."

"Right." And then there was the Granger family dinner after that. At least all four parents got along reasonably well, even if there were occasionally some awkward moments. And the Grangers of Ron's world had finally been able to grieve for their daughter.

Bah. Time to lighten the mood. "Let's hope this Hogwarts won't be ruined by this year's students."

Hermione laughed, though it sounded a little forced. "The school has seen worse, much worse, than my friends' children."

Ron wasn't so sure. But it didn't matter. For now. "So, you're going to look for the next world, then?"

She nodded. "Shouldn't take too long, either - I've refined the process now."

"Good."

Ron smiled.

Another world, another adventure. With Hermione.

He wouldn't have it any other way.

*****​

The End.

*****​

Author's Note: My beta-readers, fredfred and InquisitorCOC, deserve my gratitude. They helped a lot. Especially fredfred has spent countless hours correcting my mistakes, catching continuity errors, britpicking pointing out loose ends. Thank you!

 

[killgore444]

Good story.
Two questions:
1] Do you have a FFN account? I'd love to add this story to my community there.
2] Any chance of a sequel?

 

[Starfox5]

Good story.

Click to shrink...

Thanks!

Two questions:
1] Do you have a FFN account? I'd love to add this story to my community there.
2] Any chance of a sequel?

Click to shrink...

1) Yes. Same pen name - Starfox5.

2) I'm not ruling it out - it'd be perfect for crossovers - but after 81 weeks I'm writing a different story now

 

[Qazda]

Thanks!



1) Yes. Same pen name - Starfox5.

2) I'm not ruling it out - it'd be perfect for crossovers - but after 81 weeks I'm writing a different story now

Click to shrink...

what's next?

 

[killgore444]

Thanks!



1) Yes. Same pen name - Starfox5.

2) I'm not ruling it out - it'd be perfect for crossovers - but after 81 weeks I'm writing a different story now

Click to shrink...

Thanks for the story.
And you do a much better job of updating than I do.

 

[Starfox5]

what's next?

Click to shrink...

"Stranded" should be posted around the weekend. It's an AU where Voldemort was killed for good in 1981 and Harry's greatest problem is getting one over on that insufferable swot Granger. Well, until they both get stranded on a seemingly deserted island.

Thanks for the story.

Click to shrink...

My pleasure.

And you do a much better job of updating than I do.

Click to shrink...

I've got daily quotas, so to speak - I usually write on the train while commuting. A strict schedule has both advantages and disadvantages, but it seems to work for me.