AN: Oh my, it's been a while huh? Lovely to see you, well not see you but talk to you? Write to you? Whatever, you know what I mean. Anyway sorry for the long wait but we finally made it through the stages of grief! This is a turning point in the story, I know Hermione has been extremely emotional in the previous chapters and maybe even a bit of a b, I'm sorry if that's bothered anyone, grief in is a hard process after all and we can all be a bit whinny through it, but now she will start to immerse herself into her new life and no matter how hard she tries you know the marauders and Lily won't let her keep everyone at arm's length. Granted she'll still be very emotional, she's been through a lot and I just see Hermione as someone who feels both deep and keen emotions, but she won't be quite so distraught and will begin to learn to deal with painful familiarities that surround her. I hope you enjoy this chapter!

Warning: Still not much of a proof reader.

Disclaimer: Still don't own Harry Potter, Still wish to own Sirius Black!

Chapter 13: Stage Seven: Acceptance

He wasn't worth it, Hermione concluded as she loosened one last livid little scream into the soft, downy pillow of her assigned bed. That lascivious beast of a man wasn't worth her ire anymore then he was worth her time, she had more important things to deal with. She had been thrown into the height of the most brutal war in wizarding history for Merlin's sake, and with nothing to show for herself aside from her 'inferior' blood status branded as a curse on her arm; a curse that would only bring about her death and that of many others if she didn't stop it. She may have been down for the count for a mite of minute but that didn't change the fact that she was Hermione freaking Granger and if there was a fight to fight she was going to win it and if there was a life endangered she was going to save it; she may die in the effort but that was hardly a great tragedy now that she had nothing left to live for… there was nothing here for her and there was no going back, but no sense in any further wallowing when there was work to be done.

Throwing on a comfy Weasley Jumper and her favorite, obviously well-loved, pair of light wash, worn and ripped skinny jeans she exited her room to immerse herself in what she did best, research. This was an aptitude that earned her the inescapable title of 'Brightest Witch of her Age,' her ability to think her 'Golden Trio' out even the most harrowing of situations; but hers was a tittle she often times loathed if not for the limitations and sometimes scorn it brought about peoples view of her character, then for what she perceived as the invalidity of it, after all there was many a witch smarter then she… they just weren't the best friend of Harry Potter. That's not to say that she could ever, nor would ever want to, regret her friendship to the magical worlds 'Savior,' but it certainly brought about increased recognition if her picture on the front page of the daily prophet multiple times during their fourth year of magical schooling was anything to go off of…

Though, with her newfound resolve to at least begin acting in a capacity that aimed towards fulfilling her self-(and future Pettigrew) assigned charge of becoming a war-time champion of life and protector of innocence. She had no time to muse on the unsavory aspects of her former life for they, as well as the more pleasant moments, were in the past now, or rather the future… Either way she looked at it they would never come to be again and there was no sense in dwelling when there was so much for her to do here; so many lives for her to save and a world to change for the better. She had come to terms with the fact that the life she'd once lived with the people she'd always love was over, as well as the fact that she may not ever have a true life again, no matter how hard she was willing to try (which she wasn't), but what she could not accept was sitting idle when there were people that needed her, even if they didn't know it, and lives to be saved. She would garner a better future for all even at the expense of herself, for she knew that was what it would ultimately come to; how could it not when she was surrounded by such painfully familiar yet still so foreign faces? She would never survive this with her sanity intact, but one thing she knew was that even if she died inside, James, Lily and the others never would; Harry would know what it was to live a life with loving, affectionate parents and familial support, as would Neville for that matter, even Molly would never feel the excruciating loss of her beloved brothers.

The Prewitt twins reminded her almost excruciatingly of the identical set of Weasley boys she left behind, she'd always had a soft spot for the twin pranksters even going as far as to develop the trivial fluttering's of a fledgling crush on Fred; that was of course until the moment she looked into the depthless grey eyes of a guiltless- in actuality if not in his own mind- sorrowful fugitive that utterly and irrevocably changed her life. She would surely die to save the jovial brothers that had already managed to endear themselves to her in this new reality she'd found herself thrust into, just as she would any other innocent soul that found themselves facing the wrong end of a malicious wand; but she needed a place to start.

Arriving in the library of the sprawling Pettigrew mansion, she began a riffling search through her tried and true beaded little bag, the only companion she had left in the both painfully familiar and yet completely foreign world she'd woken up to. Once she finally scrounged up a scrap of parchment and quill, which had somehow managed to stay immaculate and crumple free under the hefty burden of all the other items she'd deemed necessities on her foray to save the world, tears had filled her deep brown eyes, the physical reminder of their failed attempt, of what she'd lost in punishment for her ineptitude, was nearly unbearable; she vowed she would fare way better in this round against the epitome of all evil that Voldemort represented.

Her eyes narrowed with resolute determination as she set to work. In order to stop them, she had to familiarize herself with the innumerable tragedies that happened here in the past. She needed a timeline of every battle, kidnapping, movement, and mission –whether failed or successful- that had happened here, not a single event could be discounted... Meaning she had a busy night ahead of her.

With a sigh and brief flexing of her sore muscles, still stiff from the recent moments of her depression induced disuse, she settled in for a long day's work.

o~O~o

Distraction. Sirius Black needed a distraction. He was feeling things, confusing, befuddling things that in erstwhile were completely alien to his system. Sirius Black was known for a variety of traits, his lasciviousness, debauchery, humor, his steadfast loyalty and raging Black temper… What he wasn't known for was compromise, he didn't negotiate, conciliate, accommodate or waver, sure he was always up for a good time, but he didn't go with the flow, he created the flow. He was a man very stuck in his ways and devout to his core beliefs, one of those beliefs being that love did not exist; not for him, not in the romantic sense anyway. Sure James had Lily to marry and spawn a houseful of green eyed, messy haired children with, but Sirius didn't conform to the ideals of monogamy; one witch could not hold his perusing interests for all eternity thank you very much, even a few months was pushing it. He was a collector, a connoisseur if you would of the female body, and his plethoric interests were both fleeting and many varied. One woman couldn't fulfil him, they were simply incapable of holding his evanescent affections and wandering eye. No matter how lonely, and admittedly snobbish, this truth appeared he wouldn't change it if he could; how could he ever trust one witch to hold his heart anyway? Trust her not to crush it in her tiny, dainty little fists? After all his family, his blood, were supposed to care for him and he need only remember what came of those relationships to place no credence in love and have an intense aversion to trust, no matter how his friends and the surrogate parents he found in the Potters tried to change that outlook. His love for them was all his ailing, and undeniably fearful of affection -or rather rejection- heart could take; loathe as he was to acknowledge such dissuasions of emotion, and as much as he would never admit to them aloud, it didn't change the truth of the sentiment, Sirius Black simply didn't do love. He just didn't open himself up that way, to the chance of being hurt, to the chance of being broken and battered, degraded and shamed by his fondest of feelings being not just unrequited but stomped all over, beaten from his body and blasted from the wall- that being quite literal when his being stricken from his family tapestry was considered.

He sounded dramatic, and it may be true that he never really much cared for his family and their ways, he certainly didn't feel the 'fondest of feelings' for them as he so exaggerated earlier, but he had at least loved his little brother, plus being excommunicated by the ones who are supposed to be genetically wired to care for you in at least some regard certainly gave a guy a complex.

Godric he sounded like a flowery emotional fool, he was turning into James and it was long past time to get plastered with his mates and put all this Hippogriff shite behind him. He'd been acting like an overly hormonal teenage girl, pouting up in their room like they'd just been snubbed by the latest horny prick to catch their fickle, transitory interests, and he was now ready to drown his misery in a bottle of acrid muggle whiskey. He didn't even like the girl for Merlin's sake! So what if she gave him a good tongue lashing? Her opinion of him didn't matter, period. With the resolution to not give a shite planted firmly in his mind he dashed down from his room to where his friends sat chatting idly around the kitchen island, none of them were scheduled to work their respective jobs or any upcoming order mission for the next several hours so it was the perfect night for a bender.

"Alright wankers," he announced himself as he strolled to where they sat in huddled comradery, "I'm feeling the need to get piss drunk, up you get were heading way to that muggle bar in town so I can get properly sloshed."

"Does this sudden need to drown your troubles in endless booze have anything to do with the not so little argument I heard you have with the extremely little witch staying down the hall," James asked, suggestively wiggling his eyebrows.

"You just earned yourself the very much not coveted position of designated apparator hubby, see no witches opinion matters to me but I doubt if future wifey Potter approves of her husband to be stumbling to bed at odd hours of the night pissed off his stumbling feet. Not so excited for married life now, are you Potter?"

"Hey," the bespectacled wizard protested. "You're just jealous any witch can stand me for more than one night," he huffed.

"Oh, believe me, any witch whose spent one night with me would be ecstatic to do so again," the estranged Black heir assured.

"What like McKinnon," Remus taunted.

"Ugh, bloody witch is obsessed with me, though she is pretty decent between the sheets so… but yeah despite the fact that she's absolutely insane she's a good example, I drive them mad, ladies just can't get enough of Sirius Black and his godlike sexual prowess," the marauder announced smugly.

"Godlike my arse, you're a prick Pads," Peter rolled his eyes.

"Maybe so Petey but the ladies love my prick and my being one doesn't make that any less true," Sirius smirked.

"Oh shut up, you arrogant berk," James scoffed.

"Rightfully so," Sirius practically sang.

"Alright enough messing around," Remus intervened, ever the voice of reason, "let's just get to the bar, even if it's barely past five."

"There is never a wrong time to get totally smashed," Sirius announced in objection to the joking scorn of that statement.

The werewolf rolled his eyes heavenward, "Whatever you say pads," he snorted striding towards the front door as the others trailed behind, ready for a night of drunken tomfoolery with their lifelong friends.

~o~O~o~

Hermione was getting absolutely nothing done, her mind was a flutter with mournful wonderings and fond remembrances of the world she left behind without so much as a 'by your leave.' How could she move on in this new reality when she'd been removed from her own without even the smallest moment for a goodbye? All she'd ever known was left behind her, or rather in front of her, on this journey and she'd left so much unsaid; what she wouldn't give to tell Harry how much she loved him one more time, or share affectionate banter with Ron about how much of a prat he was. She sighed as she looked at her notes on the past, or the present now if you prefer, or the future of the past? Whatever, either way they had barely more than a few words on them. This crusade was entirely ineffectual if she could not focus but it was getting harder to do so by the second as her mind wandered to the faces she left behind and so many words left unspoken. With that realization dawned on her sorrowful mind with a sudden jolting sensation not unlike being doused with a bucket of icy water, yes there were things that she never got to say platitudes, phrases, confessions and her brains idle mutterings that never got to the open plains of spoken word and never could, but that did not mean that these feelings could not be shared in the written word. Sure the ones meant to read them would never see the actual words but there was something therapeutic, soothing even, in the idea of getting her musings out on paper. Letters, even with no tangible recipients, were her ways to get her emotions out, to lay it all on the line accept it and move on; she had too much hanging in the balance here not to move on at least in some way.

Who to start with though? She had so much left to say, to everyone, Harry, Ron, Ginny, her parents, the Weasleys, Neville, and even Luna Lovegood. How could she ever tell them how much she loved them? How sorry she was? How she appreciated their friendship? How much she'd miss them and the true depths of her despair at the thought of never seeing them again?

She started with easiest, yet still overwhelming task of writing Luna. Telling her how her eccentricities made her day, how her odd musing that many scoffed at held so much wisdom, how her dreamy contemplations helped the brunette understand and learn many things not just about the world around them but herself as well; after all it was Luna that made her realize she was in love.

Neville… He was her first friend and she addressed him as such, she told him how his steady presence in her first months in a whole new world, alone and otherwise without support, was everything to her. She told him how his bumbling ways endeared him to her, giving her the sense of purpose that she needed as she helped him make his way through his studies, that the need she felt to protect him gave her a reason to stay in those initial rough and friendless days, but also that, in the end, it was he who protected her. He who grew into the bravest wizard she'd ever known, one that was not afraid to defend his friends not just from the enemies looming outside their safe little circle but also the worst enemies they held within themselves, their pride, their self-doubt and their stubborn rashness. She promised him to give him the life he always deserved but never had the chance to live, with parents who loved him, who remembered him, ones that would never leave his side or withdraw their love for him.

She thanked Molly and Arthur for being the parents she hadn't known she would need and love so keenly in the wizarding world. She thanked Fred and George for always being there to make her laugh even on her darkest days. She thanked Charlie and Bill for being the overprotective big brothers they were, ones who scared away any boy who so much as looked at her sideways, it had been overbearing at the time but it never failed to make her feel loved; never failed to make her feel like she was an intricate part to their huge and crazy family.

Ginny was like the little sister she'd always dreamed of having. Hermione told her that and so much more about how she was the only girlfriend she'd ever had, the only one she could go to and complain about Harry and Ron being complete and utter prats, because they definitely had their moments of behaving thus, without fear. She was the only one she could gossip about cute boys with or giggle about silly girly romance novels or the latest scandal in the schoolyard. She told Ginny how she knew Harry loved her too and that she could think of no one else worthy of her best friend and brother. Told her that she would miss staying up late at night chatting about the most banal and pointless of nothings with, thanked her for always being there for the things the boys couldn't be; like when Sirius died and Ginny was the only one she felt comfortable in telling how much and I what wat she loved him or when her short term flames were being stupid and made it so all she wanted to do was eat gallon upon gallon of ice cream. She ended with calling her family, stating how much she loved her, and acknowledging how she would never stop missing her, from her fierce, fiery temperament that never failed to make Hermione smile, especially when the girl directed it at her protective older brothers, staunchly refusing to listen to or abide by a single direction they gave her, to the gentle smile she reserved only for those she truly loved.

Ron, they had the type of sibling relationship where they were always razzing each other, poking fun in a playful way, the things they said would end in a black eye if coming from anyone else but with them it just worked. The love and affection behind the "bossy know it all," and "uncouth, heathenistic troll" remarks took all the bite out of the words and allowed Hermione to accept her flaws without the sting of rejection or betrayal. Ron, to put it simply, gave her confidence, by acknowledging her imperfections with a witty joke while affection shown in it eyes he made it seem that her inadequacies didn't matter, not to him and certainly not to her; so what it she was a short stack if he could say so with an adoring smile on his face. He was also the only one she could depend on when it came to reining in Harry Potter, the "Chosen One" had a tendency to run in blind and it took the both of them to talk sense into their Raven haired best friend when the time came for it. Hermione was who Harry came to when he needed to talk about his roiling, turbulent emotional stressors but she had never been able to distract him quite like Ron, with quidditch and a friendly game of chess that the red head never failed to win. They were a team, they relied on each other, and while his emotional range was that of a teaspoon it was a teaspoon with filled with a brimming meniscus of brotherly love for her and her own heart pounded with the same amount of love for him. He was her brother and he would always be in her heart and mind and she let him know so in her letter; he had impacted her life in a way that transcended time, literally, he gave her self-assurance and a sense of love that could never leave her and she told him of her gratitude for doing so.

When Hermione became a part of the wizarding world she and her parents had grown apart, but they were all she'd had for so long, the girl who had no friends growing up because she was so much smarter than the other kids, so different. Strange things had happened around Hermione from the moment she was born and it made others wary of her. For the children she met it reflected in the constant bullying or the outright ignoring of her existence, she couldn't say which of those sentiments was worse. As for adults, they held her at arm's length, never truly embracing her presence, she was there but she simply didn't matter, she just was. Her parents had loved her unconditionally, through all the accidental magic the heartbreaking sobs and the begging of why others couldn't just accept her for who and what she was. They had been her best friends when she had none, her confidants where her peers couldn't be bothered, her everything in a time where she had nothing. She'd sent them away, but always with intention of bringing them back, of rebuilding that relationship outside of the influence of Voldemort, and dodging fugitives, and triwizard tournaments, now she would never get the chance. She had a lot of regrets when it came to her parents, allowing that space to grow betwixt them until it became a near insurmountable chasm of secrets and dishonesty, never spending enough time with them, letting the problems of the bigoted wizarding world get in the way of her love for them, but there was nothing she could do about them now other than apologize and tell them of all the love she would always feel for them in a letter stained with tears that could never say enough and could never be received.

Harry, his letter was the hardest of all to muster through and it read as follows…

Dear Harry,

My brother. Merlin Harry I don't even know what to say to you, no words can describe what I feel for you or the searing agony of being without you… You were the center of my world Harry, my sun, I revolved through life under the purpose of keeping you safe and now I've left you; I've failed at the one thing I was always most determined to do. I wanted to protect you, to show what the true love of a real family was and I hope I at least succeeded in the second part because Harry you were and always will be my family. Everything I've done from the moment you rescued me from that troll on that first perilous adventure we shared, the one that bound us and Ron together for life, has been done for you. Merlin you were dealt such a crappy hand in life, you deserve so much more than the pain and degradation you felt from the second after your parent's murders and I wanted to give you what I could of that more. I couldn't bring your parents back then, but I can now and even though I'll probably never see you again, at least not in the same capacity, I'll still be fighting for your protection and love every moment of every day.

I don't know if I can live without you Harry, not truly, but for now I can survive for you, for your wellbeing and the hope that you can have a better life this go. One with parents that live and breathe and love you and a gaggle of marauders to teach you how to prank and woo witches. Maybe you and a certain redheaded witch will actually have a shot at happiness now, huh? If there is one good thing that comes from our parting it's the chance that I now have to give you the life you deserve, I hope that means you'll forgive me for leaving you behind. I miss you so much, I feel like I'm suffocating without you here but if my mission is successful then all my pain is worth it, because I love you Harry, more than I can ever say and this my chance to make sure the world finally does right by you. Goodbye brother.

With eternal love,

your 'Mione

She'd had so much more to say to Harry, she'd always have more to say to Harry, but she couldn't push anything else out past the choking sobs she felt heaving in her chest. So she gathered all the letters into her shaking hands and dashed in a stumbling gait out of the house, plunging herself deep through the woods with tear addled steps as her emotions flooded from her eyes.

Her sobs eventually ceased as she came across a tempestuous river gushing between the trees of her sylvan escape, stumbling to a stop she clutched the letters to her chest for a few breathless minutes. When her body finally stopped trembling she moved the letters away from her rapidly beating heart, ripping them to pieces and tossing the shreds into the air to burn with a softly muttered incendio. Hermione watched as the ashes fluttered momentarily in the breeze before drifting down to mingle with the rivers fast rolling currents, floating forever away from her.

"Goodbye, I love you all," she whispered in a gentle voice coming from a throat still constricted with her tears. She turned from her place of farewell then without a backward glance…

She had work to do.

AN: Well that's it I hoped you liked it, Sorry if any of the interactions or parts seemed rushed I was just very excited to have the chance to write again and wanted to get this out for you guys ASAP. I love you all so much for your continued support as I muddle my way through the world of fanfiction, thanks for reading and have an awesome day! Hope to see, talk to, write to or whatever it is I'm doing with you guys again soon so be on the lookout for a new chapter in the coming weeks!

Much love,

~3lw