Out of Time
By Rurouni Star

Prologue

"A lifetime is more than sufficiently long for people to get what there is of it wrong."
-Unknown

Forbidden.

Forbidden, what she was about to do.

But the headmaster wasn't there to stop her; he would never be there again, to lend her his wisdom or his lemon drops or his understanding talks, even if she'd for some reason wanted them. Even if it was all a useless gesture, one that would destroy her soul, perhaps…

It didn't matter, now.

"Sorry," she shrugged emptily, talking to no one in particular, and, in particular, to one. He was dead, of course, like everyone else (even if he had gone earlier) but she knew he wouldn't have wanted her to risk herself like this, so she apologized.

How many turns this time? Ah, she'd figured it out, hadn't she? One, two, three, four, five- over and over and over again-

The earth blurred.

Time moved.

And-

Hermione woke up with a gasp, clutching at her chest, sweating and feeling, for all the world, like she had just made an awful kind of decision. She knew, though, that couldn't be true. She'd just arrived at Hogwarts a few days ago, and classes had started with such a bang that she hadn't any time to make any life-changing decisions.

The details of the dream had faded from her mind, and now they fled it completely as she realized where she was.

"No!" she whispered.

In Defense Against the Dark Arts, sleeping on the desk she'd been at, her notes unfinished.

Tears threatened to overcome her, and she covered her mouth with her hand. No, no, no, this was impossible, she'd been concentrating so hard-

"Ah, Miss Granger? I'm sorry, I had thought it would be best to let you sleep." Her teacher's kind voice carried down to her from the stairs that led into his office. He walked up to her and put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry, McGonnagal informed me of your special… ah… circumstances. And while the specific instructions do say it's for use only to get to classes…"

She looked up, taking strength from his hand to keep her eyes from watering. His own blue eyes were twinkling mischievously in a way no other professor's ever had. "You are trying to get to your class, are you not?"

Hermione nearly sagged in relief. "Oh, oh yes, I suppose I am."

Professor Lupin winked at her. "I certainly won't tell." Then pointed at her sheet of notes with his wand, muttered an incantation, and watched as it filled with words.

Hermione stared at him. She'd never heard of a spell that would transcribe unsaid words before-

"Off with you," he said then, straightening and brushing his well-worn robes. "The next class is due in a few minutes. You'd best be out by then." He said it with a stern voice, but she noticed the twinkle of amusement was still there. "About three hours should do," he added then.

As she fumbled with the timeturner, Hermione decided that she liked this teacher.