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“Now, Miss Granger,” Professor McGonagall says, reaching for the young witch’s hands. “It is imperative that you must not interact with your former self at all when you use the Time Turner.”
“I understand.”
“Move in the shadows. Be in the place you want to arrive before you begin the process of flipping the hourglass. Do you remember how many turns to demarcate the passage of an hour?”
“Yes, Professor, I remember.”
“You must be exceedingly cautious. The sands of time are not forgiving, and one misstep could have catastrophic consequences for us all.”
“I’ll be careful, I promise.”
~∞●∞O∞●∞~
“Oh, look at this. It’s the Mudblood. All alone. Funny, that.”
“Why’s that funny? Didn’t realize showering was a group activity.” Hermione squeezes her eyes shut as the razor-sharp whip of a Stinging Hex lands on her bare ankle. She hops on one foot, cursing her desire to be clean before bed. “Ow! Stop!”
“Now, now, Millie, we don’t play with our food.” Daphne leans in, wrapping one of Hermione’s sopping wet curls around her finger and tugging it lightly before letting it spring free. “We just want to talk. Let’s have a nice chat, shall we, Granger?”
“Afraid this isn’t a good time. Maybe tomorrow.” Hermione hurries to the other side of the bath, clutching her robe closed around her shoulders, the towel wrapped around her body beneath falling in a wet plop to the floor, tripping her up as she attempts to scurry away.
The sound of the Slytherin girls’ laughter echoes around the high ceiling of the bathroom at her plight.
“No. How about now? You’re an awfully difficult witch to get ahold of. Although, you seem to be everywhere. Why is that, Granger?” Pansy Parkinson leans against the bathroom door, both arms banded across her chest, blocking Hermione’s only exit.
“And why would you want to get ahold of me?” Hermione spins back around, moving backwards to keep all of them in front of her where she can see them. Her pulse accelerates and she starts breathing faster, fingers cramping from the vise-like grip she has on her robes. Eyes darting around, she notices her folded stack of clothes just behind Millicent’s back, the tip of her wand barely visible between her pajama top and bottom, and makes a very foolish plan. It feels like everything this year has been a very foolish plan.
“You’re everywhere—and nowhere.”
“Well, that’s me. Flying under the radar.” Hermione mutters, inching forward on her toes, toward her clothing.
“What?” Millicent cracks her knuckles, a deep furrow forming between her thick eyebrows.
“What are you even talking about, what is radar?” Daphne begins to crowd in on her right side again.
“Nothing. It’s a Muggle thing. Unimportant.” Hermione shakes her head, pushing one hand across her forehead, brushing away the cold water dripping down her nose from her wet hair, easing around to the left of the long bench.
“How right you are, Mudblood,” Millicent says, jumping up on the bench, before lungeing at her from the elevated height. “You’re nothing. Unimportant.”
“You need to learn your place.” Daphne coos, beckoning her younger sister closer. “See, Astoria; Granger thinks she’s better than us. It’s up to us to protect the Sacred Twenty-Eight.”
“Not this again.” Hermione’s heart is pounding in her chest. Sure, she’s smart, but to take on four witches, by herself, when she’s practically naked is not something she wants to add to her ever-growing résumé. “I do not. I’m sure you’re a perfectly nice girl—”
“Don’t!” Daphne whips her wand out and pushes Astoria behind her. “You don’t speak to my sister, you filthy—little—” Red sparks shoot out from the end of Daphne’s wand and Hermione dives for the wall, the spell just barely missing her.
She squeaks and holds her hand up in front of her. “Stop it!”
“That’s exactly what I mean.” Pansy pushes off the door in an aggressive manner. “How dare you tell us what to do? How dare you tell us anything?”
“Pity, the Golden Girl is improperly attired. Someone ought to call a Prefect and take House Points.” Millicent spits as Hermione fists the lapels of her robe back together over her body. “That’s the only thing that’s important to you, right? House Points—and Potter? And that red-headed git.”
The depraved edge of their laughter brings up the small hairs on the back of Hermione’s neck and she has to force herself not to beg.
“Yes, let’s do that. Call a Prefect.” Hermione ignores all their insults, growing more and more concerned about her immediate safety.
“I don’t think so.” Pansy saunters closer, flipping her own wand from one hand to the other. “The nitwit professors around here might be blind to you, but I’m not. That bloody hippogriff, it was obvious you had spelled it to attack.”
“Get. Out.” Hermione orders, side-stepping away in an attempt to hurry back toward the rest of her belongings. “Stay away from me.”
“Or what?” Daphne edges in closer, tipping her chin toward Millicent, successfully boxing Hermione into a shower stall.
“You’ll regret it. Accio wand!” Hermione lifts her chin, pivoting around on her heel, her wand lands in her hand and she yanks the shower curtain closed. Murmuring another hasty spell, she transfigures the curtain to a locked door and puts her hand to her neck.
She hears them crash into the newly transfigured door, and realizing she doesn’t have any time for second thoughts or other options, rapidly flips the Time Turner end over end as fast as she can.
“Come out, come out, Granger; you’re just making this worse on yourself, you know.” Daphne’s palm cracks against the fabricated door.
“We just want to talk, Mudblood.”
“You’re going to learn what happens when you hurt a member of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, you little bitch!”
The door gives way, and Hermione squeals, flipping the Time Turner again and again and again as she drops to the floor, crawling beneath the shower walls to get away from the grabby hands of Daphne Greengrass and Millicent Bulstrode.
“Come on, come on, come on!” she murmurs, flipping it faster and faster, “Help me!”
“No one is going to help you. It ends here,” Millicent vows.
“Stop, please stop!” Hermione cries, scrambling away on her belly, kicking out with one foot. “Why are you doing this?”
But she’s stopped and yanked backwards by her ankle, “You need to learn your place, you’re finally getting it. Down on the floor like you are now. You think you’re better than us, besting us in all our classes. It isn’t natural. And it’s going to stop. Now.”
And then, it does. She—and everything else—is gone.
~∞●∞O∞●∞~
Hermione opens her eyes, cowering on the floor of the fifth floor Girls’ Lavatory with her arms over her head. She’s still dripping wet, but it’s dark in the empty bathroom. And the air, it feels—different—somehow. Warmer.
She wraps her robe around her, clutching her wand in one hand, and flattens the other against the wall as she stands up. Tipping her head, she keeps her ears peeled for any dangerous noises.
She’s relieved to discover that she’s quite alone in the bath, and is able to Transfigure herself a suitable jumper and skirt from a clean stack of towels. After a quick charm to dry and loop her hair back away from her face, she presses her body to the wall, and decides the best course of action is to find Professor McGonagall.
She creeps down the deserted halls, growing more and more confused about what is going on when she discovers that they are completely empty and she seems to be utterly alone. There’s no one about. Not a Prefect. Not even Peeves.
She pulls her wand and casts a quick Tempus Charm, and discovers that it is only half six in the evening and sunlight is streaming through the windows at the end of the corridor.
When she finds no one in the Transfiguration classroom, her sense of dread deepens and she decides to try the Headmaster’s Office. But the passageway is closed, and locked. Swallowing her fear, she begins to make her way to the Great Hall, her bare feet padding against the cold stone.
Pushing open the large oak doors, the Great Hall too, seems empty. Hermione’s eyes scan the interior of the large room and she calls out, “Headmaster? Professor?”
But sitting all the way across the room, on the Head Table is the Sorting Hat.
“Ahhh, this is new. Bringing the students in one at a time to see me now?”
Hermione gapes for a moment, her mouth falling open before she shuts it with a click of her teeth. A long moment stretches out where she ponders what to do, before she shakes her head to clear the fog that the Hat had actually spoken aloud to her. The walk across the Great Hall seems longer than ever before and a cold sweat clings to her body, heedless of the shower she’d taken—however long ago that was now.
“I-I’m sorry.”
“I’m a bit rusty, but I suppose as long as you’re here, I could break with tradition and…come on, then. Pick me up, take a seat, and put me on your head.” The Hat croons and Hermione blinks several times before following the instruction.
“Oh. Well, this is interesting. Tsk, tsk. You’re not supposed to be here.”
“I am supposed to be here! Hogwarts is my home. How dare you!” Hermione’s stomach flips and she clenches her fists, oblivious to the main doors of the Great Hall opening, and streams of students entering.
The Sorting Hat chuckles, “Such spirit, such fire. Crafty little lion, escaping the snakes, so smart, so loyal, but so lonely. Ah, Hermione Granger, what do I do with you?”
“Gryffindor, obviously.” Hermione answers, her stomach knotting with the possibility she could get a different answer from the first time she’d had the Sorting Hat on her head.
“You would do well as a Gryffindor, of course. But—”
“You know, of course, you must know what I’ve done. You said my name, you know me! Can you help me? What is happening?”
“Help will always be given, blah blah blah,” the Hat drolls on. “But I suspect you know this already. And there is another that requires your help more now, and that is why you shall be in— SLYTHERIN!”