Ah, Disclaimer! Thou that art necessary, but unwanted, but always assumed! As if people should be reminded that I am but an intruder upon the 'Verse, furtively attempting to fix egregious lack of awesomeness and nonsensical character decisions in the shadows of stories I do not own ...

-xXx-

"Hermione, will you marry me?"

He was on his knee, with the traditional ring-in-a-box held in an upraised hand. His expression was hopeful, and had his usual optimistic cluelessness.

Hermione hesitated. "Stand up, Ron. Before I answer, I need to know something."

He stood, slipping the ring box into his robe's pocket. There was no doubt, hesitation, or, well, anything, going on beneath his surface emotions. In her mind, she snorted. This is Ron we're talking about, there's barely anything going on on the surface.

"Sure, what to you want to know?"

"Ron, do you promise to answer my question completely, with no deception, regardless of what I ask?"

He frowned a bit in thought. "Okay, but you have to promise in return that you will keep my answers secret unless I give permission. I will answer all your questions, but you will keep my secrets for me, right?"

As if Ron has any real secrets. "Okay …." As soon as the first syllable was out of her mouth, Ron grabbed Hermione's arm and towed her along as he ascended the staircases of the Weasley home. Up they climbed, until finally, at the fifth floor, they stopped and entered Ron's bedroom. Rom drew her inside, closed the door, and with this wand, poked the molding around the door – it slid downward, revealing an extensive array of miniaturized runes. A muttered incantation later, and the runes lit while the molding returned to its original location.

Ron smiled genially at Hermione's confusion. "It's the most complete security rune system I could fit into the space I had. As long as we don't start screaming, nothing we say can be detected outside."

"But … but … you didn't even take Runes!"

"Well, no. I stared reading Bill's Runes and curse-breaking manuals when I was about seven. Taking Ancient Runes at Hogwarts would have been boring."

Blink. Wha?

"Um, Hermione … Hermione …"

"What? Oh, right … So why didn't you take arithmancy?"

Ron shook his head. "I had access to Bill and Charlie's books, right? So when I read the arithmancy texts, it was obvious that arithmancy has nothing to offer except a more refined version of Divination." At Hermione's blank look, he went on, "I play chess, Hermione. The logic involved behind the arithmetic and algebraic operators isn't a real challenge to me."

She shook her head and refocused. "Why did you leave during the hunt?"

Ron was a little thrown by the change of subject. "It's … a little complicated," he hedged. "How much time do you have?"

"As long as you need." Hermione's expression promised dire consequences for an incomplete explanation.

Ron then settled Hermione on the bed, and he pulled the desk and wardrobe away from the opposite wall with a flick of his wand. He took down the five eye-wateringly orange posters of the Chudley Cannons with another series of wand movements, laying them carefully on the desk. The absent posters revealed a group of mis-colored rectangles on the wall; Ron tapped two of them with his wand in a staccato rhythm, and the wall faded. Hermione gasped. Behind the wall was a shallow compartment, showing a series of small notebooks – easily over a hundred – and a whole bunch of pegs, from which dangled two …

"Time turners!" Hermione gasped. "How did you get them?" She whirled to Ron. "Where did you steal them from?"

Ron chuckled. "They were given to me, and there's just two, now." He sat down on the chair. "I originally had a few hundred, because every time a messenger came back to deliver a notebook of instructions, they would hand me their time turners, and then disappear. Over and over again," he said softly.

Hermione sat down on the bed with a whump, bouncing slightly. "Explain," she said curtly.

Ron sat back and put his hands behind his head. "When I was almost seven, I got an … unusual … visitor. It was myself. I – He – gave me two time turners, and a notebook. All he said was, 'These are for you. Read everything first.' So I did."

"But … time turners can only go six hours into the past, and that's only if you've got one of the powerful ones! How did a six year old you get two of them!"

Ron smiled easily. "From me of course – the six hours in the future me. And from the six hours ahead of him, and the six hours ahead of him … a long way in the future, a Ron Weasley obtained two of the best time turners in existence, and made a plan that killed off the world that he knew. And every six hours before his decision, the prior Ron Weasley made the same decision, until it got to me."

"What did the notebook tell you?"

Ron shrugged. "It set up the procedure for using the time turners for an extended trip: when they were to be used, what information needed to be passed along, the obligation that I've … given to myself, I guess. I was instructed to study runes and charms, runes for application and theory and charms for power, and to conceal my abilities as best I could by emphasizing my natural state of idiocy."

Hermione snorted. "You did that well."

Ron took no offense. "Thank you," he smiled easily. "I was given exercises to do that would strengthen my core, and I learned how to put together my essential spell book – the spells, curses, and jinxes that I needed to use to complete my mission."

"And what mission is that?"

"Why, to keep you and Harry alive so that Tom Riddle could be sent to a permanent death."

Hermione frowned. "Why me? I mean, I understand Harry, but …"

"Because you help keep Harry alive, and because you prepare Harry for his fights. My job was to make sure that you were effective … and to whittle those fights down a little, so that Harry could win," he admitted.

"What do you mean?"

Ron settled back and began the story.

"The protections around the Philosopher's Stone in our first year were all put there by Dumbledore and the teachers, right?"

"Of course, Ron."

"And we found that we were able to get around those protections fairly easily, right?"

"Well, there were some scary moments …"

"Did it ever occur to you that the protections were kind of tailor-made for our group?"

Hermione's eyes grew wide.

"And just why did Dumbledore commission a logic problem if you weren't part of the Chosen One's group at the time the obstacles were placed?"

Hermione stopped breathing for a moment. "So that means …"

Ron picked up the sentence for her. "…that the obstacles were chosen by someone with a knowledge of the strengths of the team that would face them." He nodded. "A version of me went back to before first year – not all at once, in a relay," Ron hastily added, "to guide me into maneuvering Dumbledore into placing the obstacles that we needed to be there."

"Just how did you do that?"

"Um, we'll discuss my methods later."

Hermione was still in thought for a moment. "So how did you finesse our second year's adventures?"

Ron shrugged. "Think back to all our time at Hogwarts."

Hermione nodded.

"Did you ever hear of anyone breaking their wand except for me?"

Hermione's eyes closed as she thought back.

"And if anyone did have an issue with their wand, how did their parents and the staff of Hogwarts react?"

Hermione whispered, "They took care of it immediately."

"So it was very anomalous that my semi-broken wand was kept in that state for a while, isn't it?"

Hermione quickly straightened up. "But Harry's fight against the basilisk! How could you know that he would live though it?"

Ron shrugged. "Well, a phoenix can cure anything. And I persuaded Dumbledore's phoenix familiar to turn up at the right time, with the right weapon, and the right defense. It wasn't a perfect solution," he admitted, "I ended up rejiggering the timeline going back and forth trying to make it so that roosters were available – but every time I tried that, the end result was losing about half the students in the school as the basilisk was sent on a rampage. My last time through, Harry apparently said that he would be willing to put his life on the line to prevent that, so I went back and arranged for Lockhart's spell to bring down the ceiling, so that Harry could take out the snake."

He paused. "It was a gamble, but it was the only path I could find that didn't end up with massive deaths. We didn't end up with one!"

Hermione murmured, "Not even Mrs. Norris."

"Exactly!"

"So what about third year?"

Ron smirked a little. "Do you believe that time travelling is a dangerous thing to do?"

"Of course!" She was definitely exasperated now.

"So why would a thirteen year old girl be allowed to have free access to a time turner just to take more school classes? Shouldn't that be reserved for attempts to remake causality?"

Hermione was stunned. Why did they let me do that? "Um …"

"It was the neatest solution to rescuing Black from being summarily executed. It allowed Harry to rescue himself and Black from the Dementors, and – almost as importantly – it gave you an experience with your limits."

"Why was that important?"

"Because if you truly feel like you can do anything, you overload yourself and have a breakdown on the Hunt. Harry dies protecting you from the Snatchers."

"Really?"

"There were a few other considerations, too. You could have had the brush with your limits in fifth year, but that would have made everyone if Gryffindor a little on edge, trying to deal with your manic studying, and our grades would suffer." Ron's smirk was back. "And I figured that you and Harry should have your own time turner adventures. Spread the fun around, like."

Hermione sighed. "Fourth year?"

Ron sat forward. "That was tricky. Every report I got from up the timeline was that Harry didn't take the Tournament seriously if I was around him, so we had to fight so that he would prepare himself. I really hated to screw up the Ball for you and Harry, but if you had gone with your preferred partners, Skeeter's character assassination would have hit before we could have countered it, and then we would have lost all public support, and the rest of the fight would have gone downhill. It really was an issue of sacrificing one night's fun so that we could have an easier time for the next three and a half years."

"And the Tasks for the Tournament?"

Ron tiled his head. "I think that what you're really getting at is why didn't I make everyone's life an easy walk in the park and get all the obstacles out of the way?" Hermione nodded. "At no point did a future Ron Weasley, full of knowledge, cunning, and immense power, ever show up and save the day. What I got was a letter that passed through a long relay of postmen, and I had to change what I could however I could." Ron got up and looked out through the window, facing away from the girl sitting on his bed.

"It was just me. It was always just me."