CHAPTER 1

Hey, all! In the middle of both updating and editing this story in order for it to comply with future possible plots. Hermione is in her late twenties, because she has to seem young but not too young. And thus, the other characters are older as well. Sorry for the crazy change. Another thing I'd just like to note: in this universe, Hermione's parents were killed by Death Eaters despite her Obliviation of them.

Also, this is just a slight AU alteration: 221c is livable.

"I'm soooo changea-" Moriarty pauses when he sees the crumpled form lying on the ground.

"Who is this?" he asks, looking curious. Well, everyone in the room was curious, for goodness' sake- the woman had simply appeared out of thin air!

"We- we don't know," John answers, feeling anxious and oddly protective of this woman he had never met.

"Oh, really?" Moriarty grins, amused. "Well, well, well. Look at her, boys." He studies her intensely. She is in terrible shape- barely conscious, bruised and scraped, with gashes and scars all over to boot. She is cradling her arm, which is twisted at an odd angle. The whole scene is very bizarre. Then, of course, the mystery girl decides to speak up at quite possibly the worst moment she could.

"Help…" she croaks weakly, and, calming his breathing, John very slowly crawls over to where she is lying down.

"John!" Sherlock hisses. "What are you doing?"

"She's hurt!" John whisper-yells. "I can't just sit here and do nothing!"

"But- Moriarty!" Sherlock says incredulously. Moriarty smirks.

"I am well aware of him!" John seethes. He runs his fingers lightly over some of her cuts and injuries, feeling worried. There are no medical supplies around, and she is losing blood quickly. Ignoring the red dots on his and Sherlock's backs, he takes off his cardigan and presses it to some of her more urgent wounds.

Luckily for them, at that moment Moriarty's phone chooses to ring- his ringtone is, rather auspiciously, "Staying Alive." He wrinkles his nose and rolls his eyes a little.

"Do you mind if I get that?" he asks Sherlock tiredly.

"Oh, no, please," Sherlock responds, sounding all too polite for the situation. "You've got the rest of your life." Moriarty nods and answers the call.

"Hello?" he says. "Yes, of course it is. What do you want?" He mouths "sorry" to Sherlock, who in turn mouths, "oh, it's fine," in response. Moriarty turns around slowly, pacing. Suddenly, he whips around, fury in his eyes.

"SAY THAT AGAIN!" he yells. "Say that again, and know that if you're lying to me, I will skin you." John is only barely paying attention, more focused on the girl in front of him.

"Wait," Moriarty walks towards Sherlock, John, and the strange girl. "Sorry, wrong day to die."

"Oh, did you get a better offer?" Sherlock asks casually. Moriarty looks down at his phone, then turns and starts walking away.

"You'll be hearing from me, Sherlock," he says. "And so will she." He points at the nearly-dead woman, smiling briefly before returning to his call.

"So if you have what you say you have, I will make you rich. If you don't, I'll make you into shoes." With the final threat, he leaves the pool. Sherlock checks for any possible assassins still present, then turns to John. John is still trying to keep the girl alive.

"We need to take her to a hospital," he says.

"N-no," the woman finally speaks. "Not the h-hospital, please. I can just-" She tries to sit up, but John gently pushes her back down.

"Okay, but at least let me take care of your injuries," he answers.

"I'm fine, really," she says.

"It doesn't look like it, does it?" John, with a little effort, scoops her up into his arms.

"Come on, Sherlock, help me get her back to Baker Street." Sherlock looks at him.

"Wait," he says. "Don't you want to know how she got here? She appeared out of thin air!"

"Sherlock!" John says sharply. "There is a life at stake. For God's sake, help me take her somewhere we can save her!" Wisely choosing to save the interrogation and the speculation for later, when the subject in question isn't delirious with pain, Sherlock helps John bring her home.

oOo

Hermione isn't fully awake when they bring her to 221b Baker Street. The whole ordeal has taken a toll on her, and her memories of recent events loop over and over again in her brain.

A rogue Death Eater, cornering her in a dark alleyway.

"I've got you now, Mudblood!"

A battle, strong hexes, jinxes, and spells being hurled at the speed of light.

"Do you really, Dolohov?"

Injury after injury, pain after pain.

"Oh yes," he grins, yellow teeth glinting in the moonlight.

It's too much. She can't take it. She's running out of power.

"You-" she hisses, drawing out the last of her energy, "-WISH!"

She Apparates to the swimming pool in London she always used to go to.

She's not alone.

Someone is trying to help her.

"Look at her, boys."

"You'll be hearing from me...and so will she."

She doesn't really pay attention to any of what the two strangers who are supposedly helping her say. She has no idea where she is. Her mind is whirring, trying to find a way out, but she's too weak. She'll have to regain her energy till she can fight, and hope she doesn't die before then. Hermione falls asleep.

oOo

The woman is still asleep after John has already bandaged and treated the worst of her injuries. She looks peaceful in her slumber, her face still drawn and pale, but lacking the twisted expression of pain she wore when she was awake. Her bushy hair is matted with blood and sweat, and she's covered with grime.

He's busily working on her while Sherlock paces, his brain searching desperately for an explanation for this occurrence. John knows that Sherlock will drive himself mad if he doesn't find a reason for what happened, and to be honest it's kind of funny to see him so… lost. For once in his life, Sherlock Holmes doesn't know the answer to something! If John wasn't so wrapped up in healing the girl, he would laugh at the thought.

He notices a particularly nasty gash he had missed on her left shoulder. He takes off her shirt (luckily for modesty's sake there's a tank top underneath) to get a good look at that arm. He is so concentrated on her shoulder that he almost doesn't see the scar.

The word "MUDBLOOD" is printed in large, jagged letters on her arm. The skin around it is fairly healed, but the scars haven't faded one bit. He suspects that the word had some sort of secret meaning he isn't privy to, but he can easily tell it's a derogatory word. One that's supposed to mark her, to separate her from her peers. It's clearly borne of torture. What had this girl gone through?

"Sherlock," he says quietly. "Come here." He nods towards the girl.

"What? What is it?" Sherlock goes to where John is kneeling. John points at the scar.

"Can you do your analysing thing right now? I want to know about this girl before she wakes up and you do it and she immediately leaves."

"Okay. Hmm…" Sherlock appraises her. "Bushy, untamed hair, so she doesn't care about her appearance, but her clothes are, or rather, were, meticulously well-kept and matching, which suggests that she is not sloppy, only with an extreme disregard for what others may consider 'beauty.' Even in her sleep, she clutches both that carved wooden stick, which means multiple things. One, that the stick is a weapon, because her body is rigid even when she is supposed to be relaxed, which means she is on alert at all times, and there is no other reason someone who is that tense holds anything in their sleep; two, she has PTSD, judging by the frown lines and the immeasurable amount of scars on her body- no one goes through what she has and comes out either mentally or physically unscathed; three, she is a soldier, which was perhaps the easiest deduction of all, because of all of the other things. She has been through torture and has faced imminent death many times, and is quite a skilled fighter as well, since she's managed to escape every time. But the real question is, what was she fighting?The scars are old enough that when she got them she couldn't have been a soldier in this country, because she was too young. So this must have been an underground war. But how could one person sustain so much damage- and I suspect she isn't alone in this, because generally everyone in wars get scars- and not arouse government intervention? That is what we need to ask her when she wakes up. What does the stick mean? What was she fighting for? What does 'Mudblood' mean? And also," he leans in to take a closer look, "she has a ginger cat." Satisfied with his assessment, he sits in his chair and puts his hands together, clasped under his chin.

After a couple of minutes of silence, the woman stirs. John taps her on the shoulder lightly.

"Hello?" he speaks softly. "Can you hear me? What's your name?" The girl's eyes shoot open and she jumps onto the couch, standing. Despite being scared out of his mind, John is fairly impressed at her agility.

"Quick reflexes," Sherlock murmurs. "Don't be threatening. She's clearly on guard."

"We're not going to hurt you," John begins cautiously. "Look, we even fixed you up a little bit. We just want to know some things about you." The woman thinks for a moment, then smirks and hops off the couch and takes a seat. She's smiling as if she knows something they don't, which could very well be the truth.

"Penelope," she says. "Penelope Clearwater."

"Well, Penelope," John says. "Um, can we ask you a few questions?"

"Go ahead." She's not even trying to hold in her smile.

"What does 'Mudblood' mean? What were you fighting against? What is that stick?" Sherlock asks her rapid-fire questions.

"I have dirty blood, bad people, and you don't need to know," she shoots back, not at all surprised by what Sherlock figured out. Sherlock is definitely shocked by that, though his eyes only widen infinitesimally and his lips barely twitch. "May I leave now?"

She doesn't give them time to answer, as she disappears again.

"Did you notice that tic in her right eye? Fascinating," Sherlock murmurs.

oOo

Hermione knows she probably shouldn't have Disapparated like that, given the Statute of Secrecy and all, but she couldn't help it. The men had already seen her disappear once, so what did it matter if she did it one more time? Harry and Ron always told her to take more risks, so why shouldn't she? Technically the first time was a mistake, so no one could fault her for doing it again. She Apparates to Ginny and Harry's flat, giving them quite a scare.

"Hermione! What are you doing here?" Ginny exclaims. Ginny gives her a warm hug.

"I...I may have made a mistake," Hermione replies. Ginny sighs.

"What did you do, 'Mione?"

"I," she pauses to take a deep breath, "I Apparated and Disapparated in front of Muggles." She cringed, waiting for the backlash that was sure to come.

"And you didn't Obliviate them? 'Mione, come on! It's a simple Memory Charm! Ugh, I suppose it's too late now. And they call you the brightest witch of our age."

"I just didn't think of it!"

"What even happened?"

"Well, Dolohov cornered me in an alleyway and was about to finish me off when I Disapparated to the pool where my aunt and uncle used to take me when I visited them as a child. I thought it would be empty, but it wasn't, and these men were talking, one was threatening the other, but I was so hurt I went unconscious. And then I woke up in two of the guys' flat, I suppose. It seemed like one of them healed me. They asked me a few questions, I evaded them, and then I Disapparated."

"Wow," Ginny says. "Fun. Did you at least manage to get a few good hits in on Dolohov?"

"I think I took away further use of at least one limb, if not two."

"Great!" Ginny cheers. "I didn't know you had it in you!"

"Yeah, well...why don't we move on?"

"Okay," Ginny smirks at Hermione's obvious disappointment in herself. "How's the flat-hunting going?"

"Not bad," says Hermione, relieved to be rid of that conversation. "My great-aunt said I could stay in her building. I was actually on my way to check out the flat when Dolohov found me."

"Oh, cool! What's your aunt's name, again?"

"Martha, Martha Hudson."

oOo

John scrubs the rug furiously, eager to wash away any reminder of the "Penelope," if that's really her name. She got blood on the carpet, and Sherlock has already taken some blood "samples" and started to experiment. He's still trying to get the stains out when Mrs. Hudson comes up the stairs.

"Boys!" she calls, far too chipper.

"Hello, Mrs. Hudson," John says, resigned to the fact the the blood is never going to come out of the floor.

"I just came up to tell you and- Where's Sherlock? Sherlock!" she calls. He comes out of the kitchen with sterilised gloves on.

"What, Mrs. Hudson?" he asks impatiently.

"My great niece is moving into 221C tomorrow! You two will get along marvelously with her, she loves to read, and she's very pretty, of course-"

"What's her name?" John interrupts.

"Oh, Hermione. Lovely name, really, very Shakespearean. I can't wait for you two to meet her! Why don't we all have dinner together tomorrow night, then? I'm sure she will be excited to meet you both, as well." Mrs. Hudson chatters on excitedly.

"Absolutely," John says just to keep her quiet. "We'll see you tomorrow, Mrs. Hudson."

"Oh, dear, do you need help with that stain? Blood can be awfully tricky, I should know-" she whips a small spray canister and a rag out of her apron and within moments, the stain is gone. John looks at her, awed. She notices.

"Don't look so surprised, dear, I've seen many a 'permanent' stain in my time. Well, till tomorrow, boys!" She bustles out of the flat, looking very satisfied with herself. John sighs and Sherlock returns to his experiment.

oOo

"Ginny, would you like to come with me to my great aunt's? I'm sure she won't mind me bringing an extra guest to dinner."

"That works out well, actually, because Harry is going out with the rest of the Aurors for a drink, Ron included." Ginny winks at Hermione.

"Ginny, are you still on that? Ron's like a brother to me; it's practically incest when I kiss him! Not to mention your mum is basically my foster mum, so that just adds to the weirdness."

"Just saying," Ginny grins impishly. "I'd love to have dinner at your aunt's."

"Great!" Hermione answers. "Come over at, say, seven? It's 221C Baker Street."

"No problem."

Please review!