A/N: So, this was a story inspired and requested by the user Mr. Shadows. He gave me the idea for Hermione's failed trip to Australia and the depression she undergoes in the process.

I have been playing around with this idea for a while now (see my other stories with Ron and Hermione) and first thing I want to say is that this one is much more realistic, in the sense that, the relationship here is mostly canon, even though it undergoes obstacles. It's a rather tragic, bittersweet Romione.

As for Hermione's downward spiral and Ron's grief - those are the consequences of war and no epilogue showing them happily married with children can change that.

This takes place two years after the Final Battle of Hogwarts. So they're both twenty.

I hope you enjoy it and please share your thoughts.

I was always wrong, you, all in white.

The Vaccines – All In White

(~)

Wendell and Monica Wilkins were no longer her parents.

They were alive and they were happy and Mrs. Wilkins was expecting their first-born. The neighbours all wondered why the Wilkins had waited so long to have children.

"We wanted to be settled somewhere where we felt at home," Monica Wilkins explained to her neighbours when they called to hear the happy news. "And we never felt right in England. Australia, on the other hand, it's all we ever dreamt of."

Although, if you asked her why Australia in particular, Mrs. Wilkins would shrug her shoulders in a helpless gesture, as if she were telling you it's beside the point to ask something which was a mystery to her, too. A wonderful mystery, all the same.

Wendell Wilkins was less vague about it. He said: "Better pay, better health system and you get a lot more sun! What would keep us there, anyway?"

What, indeed.

(~)

"You have reached Level Five of the Ministry of Magic which houses The Department of International Magical Cooperation which includes, The International Magical Trading Standards Body, The International Magical Office Of Law..."

Hermione suppressed a yawn as the gentle voice from above announced their arrival. Her body was swaying along with the movements of the lift and she had to press hard on her heels to prevent her falling over.

It didn't matter, though. If she did fall, she wouldn't scrape her knees. Ron was there. He'd hold out his hand and steady her. He was standing next to her, looking down sheepishly at his new shoes. He never liked to dress up. But the Ministry imposed a certain attire code that not even a Junior Auror could ignore. Especially when said Junior Auror was asking for a favour.

The doors opened with a screech, as they always did.

Sun rays criss-crossed the corridor in front of them. The artificial morning light poured out of the charmed windows in a white blur. Hermione squinted. She couldn't stand the glare of it. It was a faithful replica of the winter light outside and that light was cold and unforgiving. Everything was white and bright in winter. She had loved it, once upon a time. Now, everything screamed a perverse sort of purity. She pulled a couple of buttons from her coat.

Ron's hand searched for hers. Hermione's hand landed on top of his, stroked gently, then quietly moved away and into her pocket. It was saying "no, not until we finish this."

Ron tried again, but he only grasped air. He threw her a questioning look.

"All right?" he asked.

"All right," she answered.

(~)

Her smile, smiling smiles, smiling the smiles of a smiling face. That is how she felt and it needed no other words.

(~)

"I'm sure it's only a formality," Molly Weasley assured her as she poured her another bowl of carrot soup. "The Ministry knows they failed us once. They don't want to do it again."

"I suppose the politics of this are too complex to ignore. But all these unnecessary safety measures, I have to wonder..." Hermione trailed off, drawing invisible shapes on the table cover.

"Unnecessary? Hardly so, I would think," Arthur Weasley chimed in from the other end of the table. He was, and always would be, a staunch defender of Ministry protocol. "With so many Death Eaters still lurking about, trying to regroup, I should think this is quite fair."

"It's only a simple matter of Apparating," Hermione replied, her voice tinged with simmering frustration, but ultimately, polite conviction. "We have drawn up all the possible locations available and they are within our safety perimeter. We have it all planned out. Besides, Australia has trained more Senior Aurors and is better prepared for emergencies –"

"Oh, tosh! Australia wouldn't know how to pull up its wards if even one of those deranged murderers decided to go on a spree," Arthur replied, his tone cajoling, but his ears already red.

"Dad, come on," Ron urged quickly, "let's not turn this into an argument. Hermione's right. These are her parents. She's a right to go about it her way."

Hermione would have felt grateful for Ron's intervention, only she didn't. She was staring at Arthur Weasley and wishing she were less angry. And no matter how many circles Ron's fingers traced on the small of her back she wouldn't be able to get rid of the knot in her stomach.

She turned her eyes on Charlie and Bill and the rest of them gathered round the table. Harry and Ginny were absent. But everyone else seemed to support Arthur's view. She wondered if Ron secretly did, too. She couldn't say anything, though. Fred's place was still empty at the table. If she had a right, they had a right too.

"She has a right and of course you do, Hermione," Arthur said, his eyes surveying her with barely concealed exhaustion, "but you must understand how dangerous it would be to leave the country without letting the Ministry do its job. It's simply too early for that kind of expedition."

Too early? Too early?

Her ears were ringing. Her breathing was shallow.

"I've waited for two years. Isn't that enough time?"

"We know how long you've waited for this, dear," Molly spoke up, throwing Arthur a look.

"Eet is terrible to wait for something like zis," Fleur concurred demurely. Her parents were still in France and they wouldn't be visiting any time soon.

"You must miss them terribly," Molly added, patting her shoulder.

Hermione clenched her hands on her chair. No, she didn't miss them. Missing them was the last thing on her mind. Good God, didn't she understand her parents had no idea she existed, or that she was theirs? She couldn't even miss them, because she had no one to miss.

What sort of statement was that? You must miss them terribly.

She smiled a smiling smile. "I do."

(~)

So now they were here, signing documents in blood.

They had come obediently and would leave (the Ministry) obediently and would come back obediently, for more documents, obediently.

"Here, and here, and here."

Ron was sitting at a separate desk. Shedding blood was an intimate, personal, private matter. It was just you, the blood quill and the thick piece of parchment. Only these blood quills did not carve words into your skin, as well.

It was just the same, Hermione thought. They could have broken all her fingers, it hardly mattered.

She paused and frowned. What's wrong with you? Stop it.

What was wrong with her? Earlier that morning, she had slapped herself in the bathroom because she had conjured a tube of toothpaste instead of mouthwash. And then she had knocked down a chair on her way out and she had knocked it again, angrily.

"I'm done," she announced and handed back the papers.

"Very well. If you will please follow me to get you registered for an Oceanic magical pass..."

For the first time in her life, she had thought of pulling the famous hero card. "I'm Hermione Jean Granger and this is Ron Billius Weasley. Do you really think two people of our capabilities and intelligence can't handle ourselves like adults in a situation of mild if not inexistent risk, when we have dealt with real, mortal peril before we could properly cast a Patronus?"

But she would never use it. As much as it chagrined her, she was not that kind of person. She could not mould herself into anyone else, no matter how useful that would be.

And apparently, they were already receiving the famous hero treatment.

Very few civilians were allowed to travel magically, these days. It was true that Ron was not a civilian per se, but Junior Auror only got you as far as Scotland.

She and he were part of a privileged group, then.

Got to get rid of those pesky knobs first, Arthur Weasley's voice came to mind.

The Ministry was hell-bent on proving that they could win this one small, underwhelming battle, even if they had not fought in the War.

"Why is the pass restricted for twenty days? I thought we would get two months."

The committee exchanged uncomfortable looks.

"We're terribly sorry, Miss Granger, but the circumstances have called for a limitation in..."

She droned them out, because Ron had just entered the room and he was still looking down at his new shoes.

What can I do in twenty days? Can I find them in twenty days?

(~)

"Proudfoot," the older man grumbled in his short beard and nodded his head as if, surely, they remembered him.

Hermione threw him a perplexed look, but Ron nudged her and grinned.

"You were stationed in Hogsmeade with Tonks during our Sixth Year," he beamed proudly.

Hermione mentally kicked herself. How did she not recall that?

"Right, of course," she began apologetically, "you were part of the squadron Dumbledore assembled for heightening security."

Proudfoot nodded, chewing on his beard. "Correct."

An awkward pause settled between them. No one wanted to address the elephant in the room: Nymphadora Tonks.

"She was – she was a fiery one. Good with Stealth and Tracking," Proudfoot finally spoke, taking it upon him to eulogize the dead.

Hermione suppressed a sigh. They all knew that Tonks was terrible at Stealth and Tracking.

This man knew nothing about her. He hadn't even bothered to notice her skills.

Ron offered a small and painful "she was good at everything, really" to diffuse the tension.

"Well, don't think I'm no good," he added, forcing a smile. "Ain't called Proudfoot for nothing."

Hermione threw a cursory glance over their magical passes to avoid meeting his eyes. The man was over thirty and wore the proud title of Senior Auror, which is why he was considered experienced and suited for their journey.

The question, now, was different.

What can I do in twenty days with this man following us?

(~)

"Do you remember what Sirius said? Do you?"

"Ron, please don't bring that up now. Don't bring him into it."

"But I have to! Since you seem to think we can just avoid this. We have to talk about it."

"It's not the same. Back then, Voldemort was alive and He was controlling his troupes directly, now they're just a bunch of disorganized anarchists –"

"He might be dead, but His ideas, the things He told those people, those remain. You, of all people, would understand that. Sirius said it was terror and panic and confusion. They tortured people and turned people and you never knew who was who. Don't tell me Voldemort was overseeing all that. Don't tell me those Death Eaters hadn't gotten a taste for violence. That had nothing to do with Him."

"What are you implying? That they're just as dangerous now? When you cut off the head, the limbs are helpless –"

"So they lash out because they're helpless."

"You're being paranoid."

"And you're being reckless, which is nothing like you. I'm the reckless one, remember?"

"But He's dead! Why on Earth did we defeat Him if we still fear Him?"

"We don't fear Him, that's just it. I think we fear what's left behind."

"It can't be worse than when He was alive."

"No, of course not. But, it doesn't mean it's all good."

"Oh, really? I hadn't noticed. Here I thought the Ministry was just playing a practical joke. I mean they wouldn't really make me jump through hoops just to get my own parents back."

"I'm not fighting you on this, Hermione. You know I'm on your side. But dad's got a point about the Ministry. They're doing what everyone else's doing. Trying to cope. You can't just wipe out someone from existence and call it a day. Voldemort left people behind -"

"I know there are always consequences to everything, Ron. You don't have to remind me."

"So, you understand those Death Eaters are the consequences?"

"They can't harm us."

Can't they, though?

Neither of them said it, but they were both thinking it.

(~)

Ron's fingers deftly removed her bra. He was getting better at it now. The straps had been a pain in the beginning. He'd told Hermione not to help him. She had laughed, then.

Now, as he pulled her into his arms, she stood still for a moment, before slipping her arms around his waist. He felt heavy, heavier than usual and his skin was not as warm as she wanted it to be.

She had the sudden vision of being stoned.

It was odd. She was standing in the middle of a crowd. She was naked and they were throwing small stones at her. Not big enough to cause permanent damage, but large enough to bruise.

Her skin turned purple and, by degrees, yellow. The ripe yellow of quinces. And they kept at it.

They, however, were all one person, who was him, and the pain was subsiding or simply becoming pleasure, so it didn't matter anymore.

She caressed his back and she opened her lips to tell him something nice or encouraging, but at the last moment, she just sucked in air and closed her eyes.

(~)

You're not exactly in love when you're twenty. But you're almost there. You're in love with love, which is also good. She was in love with love and he was in love with love and it was marvellous that they were both in love with the same love. And they were almost there.

(~)

For one, she was grateful to leave winter. It would be much warmer in Australia. And this terrible white light wouldn't follow her. Whatever happened, she had to find a way to shut off this white light.

(~)

They had six matches for a Wilkins family in Australia. Those were the only Wilkins families that showed signs of magical disturbance. Also, it was the wet season. They'd landed straight in the wet season. It rained. It rained a lot and lightning crisscrossed the sky as her eyes became more and more accustomed to the whiteness that had not left her. Every colour her eyes landed on borrowed a shade of white. Even the food tasted white. She could not describe it and she never tried to, because no one knew she was feeling white.

(~)

They never tell you this, but that's what it is. Depression is a great whiteness that won't let you stay in the dark. All you want to do is pull the covers over your head and sink into a state of un-being. But depression snags you out like a fisherman would catch a worm through his hook. It shows you that you are still "being" and that you are forced to "be". It denies you relief and refuge.

People think you are depressed because you don't feel anymore. If only. If only.

You're depressed because you have to feel, when you don't want to. Depression is a mother coaxing you out of bed in the morning, only so you can find out there is no family to greet, no school to go to, no future. No hope.

(~)

The first three couples were a dead end.

Danielle and Martin Wilkins had three sons who were all working in constructions in New Zealand and they did not like to be disturbed in their old age. Their only magical connection was a distant cousin they never talked to.

Christine, Jenny and Arthur Wilkins. Jenny was their daughter, but they refused to exclude her out of their introduction, even if the question was: Are you Mr. and Mrs. Wilkins? Their connection to magic was Jenny, who was too young to know.

And then you had people like Brook and Alistair. They liked to sleep naked in their back yard and they performed séances. Their connection to magic was forced, futile and embarrassing. But you had to admire their tenacity.

"So far, so good," Ron would estimate in the mornings when they shared coffee in their hotel bedroom and Hermione browsed through magical identification files.

They had to check in with the Ministry every step of the way. So far, they had wasted almost two weeks. Most of it on formalities.

They had to wait until they could check on the fourth couple, because the Senior Aurors believed there was some kind of rally in Barossa Valley that smelled like a Death Eater gathering.

But Ron was optimistic.

"We're nearly there," he would add with a polite smile.

Proudfoot would knock on their door. He'd be invited in and offered breakfast.

He never refused, even when he could tell Hermione Granger was not very fond of him.

He was a man of few idiosyncrasies; in his moderately lengthy existence, he had only developed a certain fondness for dogs and books on Veela sightings. Those two did not go together very well. But he liked himself enough to ignore the twinge in his chest every time he thought about what he was doing there, following two kids on a rather miserable journey.

"The brunette with the sad eyes who had saved the world" is what he called Hermione in his mind.

She called him Mr. Proudfoot.

(~)

"Please, don't call me that, Miss Granger."

"Your name?"

"Just call me Proudfoot."

"That seems too...familiar. And disrespectful."

"Fine. Well, how about I call you Granger?"

"All right."

"So you'll call me Proudfoot?"

"What does it matter?"

"It matters."

(~)

Five days left until departure.

The fifth couple: Wendell and Monica Wilkins. Hermione had an inkling it was them. She had made sure she didn't know their first names when she had shipped them off to Australia, like precious goods. But something about those names rang a bell in her head that had not been rung in a long time.

That is why she was so afraid to proceed further.

Every day, Ron urged her to try. And she knew he was right.

She was being mad.

She was finally here, she had finally found them and she was throwing away her big chance.

They were running out of time and the family reunion was right around the corner. One Apparition away, actually.

But even happiness is hard.

She would take baby steps out of bed and straight into the hotel bathroom. And there, she would stand with her forehead pressed against the cool mirror and count back from a hundred.

"Look, I know you're nervous, it's only normal, but once you're there, you'll feel much better about this. You're just unsure because it's been a long while. But that doesn't mean things can't go back to the way they were. People have done it a thousand times and no one's come out of it for the worse. Restoring memory should be child's play to you. Let's just go visit them. That's it. We won't do anything else –"

"Ron, I love you, but please shut up."

(~)

They came close the next day. They came up to their house. It looked over a derelict warehouse. But there was a nice garden up front. And there was a smell of homeliness in the air. Ron opened the gate. He almost knocked over a pot of gardenias.

Hermione turned and bolted in the opposite direction.

(~)

Monica Wilkins went into labour one Wednesday evening, during a heavy shower. It was earlier than scheduled. Much earlier.

Premature births were the norm at someone her age, but she'd been assured it wasn't a bad sign. Birth complications resulted in minor risks, these days.

Wendell Wilkins was even more confident. "That darling boy is just dying to get out, is all."

They knew it was a boy. They'd never wanted a girl, not really.

She was beyond herself with excitement as she was admitted to hospital.

And she kept moving, dancing a song inside. These were moments to be treasured and she blinked and tried to preserve every image and sensation on the filmy surface of her eyes.

Filmy? Why filmy?

What was happening to her eyesight?

Could Wendell see him? Could Wendell see their little boy? Her little boy. There he was. All in white.

(~)

It was Proudfoot who broke the news. And he sealed his fate. Hermione Granger would hate him forever.

(~)

Wendell Wilkins saw the young woman standing in the parking lot. Her vacant gaze disturbed him. She was a strange, younger version of Monica. He could swear, the girl looked just like – well, no, not just like her. But rather, she resembled Monica in a beautiful, understated way. She had singled out Monica's best features and stolen them in the dead of the night.

He shook his head. He hadn't slept for almost three days now.

He was already seeing his dead wife in everyone. The people around him had warned him about that.

(~)

Hermione watched her father with half-lidded eyes. She knew they shared the same dull, lifeless, stupid expression. Too stunted to even properly react. And beyond all that, a sadness that had nothing to do with grief and all to do with anger. She had failed them. And she had failed her father even more by making him believe it was his fault.

Because Wendell would go on thinking he had rushed Monica into an unwanted pregnancy.

Wendell would go on, without a son, without a daughter. He would go on.

(~)

Ron knew right away it was the wrong thing to say. After he'd said it, he tried taking it back, but he couldn't. You couldn't take things back with her.

"So, we should just spring it up on him?! We should just wave his new family in his face?! Look, dad, you lost a wife and son, but you gained a twenty-year old daughter who can do magic, but that won't bring them back!" Hermione had yelled in the emptiness of their bedroom and her voice had ricocheted off the walls like a gunshot.

"He's still your father, no matter what..." Ron had mumbled helplessly. But it was in vain.

She had walked out of their room and he hadn't stopped her because honestly, he didn't understand.

Whatever happens, family is family. Even if it hurt right now, it would hurt more to leave Australia and not come back with her father. What did he have here anyway?

But he was arguing with no one.

(~)

Barossa Valley turned out to be a hoax. But the Ministry had registered three Imperios in the area.

Someone had submitted.

Someone had fallen.

(~)

Proudfoot had to look away. He couldn't look her in the face. Even the soft powder of freckles on the tip of her breasts made him want to push her away.

But he sat there and kneaded her skin and moved when she needed him to move.

It was all about her anyway, he wasn't even there, not really. He was a background on which she tried to find pleasure.

She forced herself to moan and enjoy it and for a while, she did. It was a game of self-persuasion and she just had to win. It did not make the darkness dark. It did not make the food taste good. It did not make rain, rain or cold, cold.

And it was still, all white.

But it was a whiteness she had grown used to.

(~)

The worst stage is accommodation. You don't get comfortable with your depression. That never happens. It's more perverse than that; you assume it's your natural state and there's no point changing it.

You don't want to go back to colour and darkness, not after all this white.

It won't make a difference. You might find meaning again, but you've already gone through the waste land, so no matter what Emerald City you encounter this time, you'll always see the white edges in the background.

(~)

Two days left until departure.

Ron crawled under the sheets and let his thoughts run a different course. He knew he'd dream about Fred again. Whenever he encountered death in the world, there was the nightly meeting with his own ghosts.

And Hermione wasn't here. They couldn't hold each other. He'd have to grind his teeth and dive in alone.

She came back around dawn and she sat on the edge of the bed, watching him fidget in his sleep. She watched him until he woke up.

"Why didn't you wake me?" he asked.

"You're awake now."

"Do you want to have breakfast with me?"

"I'd...I'd like to eat somewhere else."

"Great, let me get dressed," he said and his face betrayed the nightmares he'd just fought.

(~)

Two witches had been given the Killing Curse. In a flat in Perth.

They hadn't been tortured and they did not look pained.

The Ministry believed there might be a third party they hadn't considered.

(~)

There was a wooden bench across the street.

They sat down. They ate quietly and mechanically in front of Wendell Wilkins' house. His car was not in the driveway.

The few people walking by looked at them strangely. Ron wondered what they saw. He supposed that tragedies of any kind changed people's appearances, at least for a period of time.

You no longer looked fully human. It was as if your skin could not adapt to the environment and you couldn't change the environment itself so you just had to stay that way, alien and alone, until it passed.

Ron turned to her and his eyes pleaded. He wasn't sure what he was asking her, just that he had to beg for something, he had to stand on his knees and embrace her body until it went cold. But he didn't get on his knees.

Several minutes passed and they exchanged glances, but she never responded to that pleading look.

Until she spoke.

"It was a stupid idea."

Ron felt a jolt in his bones. "Why'd you say that? I find Australian wet season charming."

Hermione suppressed a small chuckle.

"No, not this. This was necessary, I suppose."

"Then...what's stupid?"

"Me. My actions, to be specific."

"I find that hard to believe."

Hermione sighed. "Why did I think I could protect them?"

"You did, though."

She shook her head. "If I hadn't wiped their memories, if I hadn't brought them here, they would still know they had someone. They wouldn't have felt the need to start anew. And Monica – my mother – she wouldn't be –"

Ron grabbed her shoulder.

"You're being bloody stupid now. Do you really think this goes back to you? Merlin, Hermione, people die without our help. And it's not a sequence of cause and effect. It's random and awful. And most of all, unfair."

"Still, if I hadn't been so arrogant –"

"Yeah and if Voldemort hadn't grown up in a piss-poor orphanage and if his mum hadn't doped a guy full of love potions and if the Ministry weren't so full of shite sometimes... you see where I'm going with this?"

Hermione smiled through the tears.

That's when she realized she was actually crying.

She had not been able to cry at all since it happened.

"I guess you can't avoid it," she mumbled, between sobs.

Ron gathered her in his arms and held her tight.

"Avoid what?" Ron asked, lips pressed to the top of her hair.

"Loss," she said into his chest. "You can run away from it, but...it will find you."

Ron felt tears smarting in his own eyes.

He knew what she meant. She had tried to be one step ahead, but the War had found her parents, either way.

"Yeah. The sodding bastard will find you. He's persistent."

Hermione choked on her laughter. Ron laughed too.

"I dreamt I was talking to Fred last night. You know what he said?"

"What?"

"That I'm a smarmy git who's got a big nose."

Hermione laughed again. "He said that?"

"Yeah."

"Do you dream about him often?"

"Suppose I do."

"Ron?"

"Yeah?"

"Does it get better?"

He pondered the question for a long time as he caressed her back.

"No."

"Never?"

"That's a long time."

They parted briefly, but held hands.

"This isn't just about your parents, is it?"

Hermione lifted her head. She watched his blue eyes grow and shrink in the morning light.

"I mean, you've been like this for a while and I know they were always at the back of your mind, but –"

Hermione looked away from the white light.

"It feels to me like you've been fighting something else," he said slowly, drawing out each word. He was afraid of what she'd say in return.

Was it death? Was it the War?

Was it all in her head?

No, it had to be in his too.

"It's just so strange, Ron. How everyone's moved on. And I haven't. I think my whole world has become that one year."

Ron turned to look at a speeding bicycle, chasing the wind as it passed by.

"We were heroes. We saved everyone. We killed Voldemort. It feels like we conquered the sun. And we'll never do any better again. We'll never accomplish anything else," he said, reciting the words like a poem he knew by heart. Because he knew it by heart.

Hermione nodded her head.

"And we'll never feel accomplished again," she said. "We'll never feel right. We'll never feel full. We only had those moments. Those nights. Those terrible nights..."

Ron felt a lump rise in his throat. He couldn't open his mouth to let it out.

"And I miss it, Ron. I miss it. Nothing else can compare. Nothing else will matter. I thought my parents would. I thought – I thought we would."

Ron closed his eyes. There it was. There it was.

He thought they would, too. He really thought that out of everything that gave him nightmares, this relationship, him and her, would be exempt.

He rested his head on top of hers.

It felt too intimate now, like touching a stranger. But it was the closest stranger he had.

They, the "you and I", weren't exempt. They were broken.

I do love you. I love you too. Words which never needed saying.

(~)

The reports were strange, but there was no need to grow alarmed. That's what everyone said.

These were not Death Eaters. These were much younger.

Misguided youths who thought they could win.

It was always the same. It started anew every decade; a fresh batch of troubled minds, overfed on death and violence. And it ended like all generations ended, forgotten and surpassed by the young and new.

But the Ministry could handle misguided youths.

(~)

They sat there for a long time, hands clasped, their breaths coming out slower, their thoughts dimmer. The sun travelled higher up into the sky.

Hermione heard a car park in the driveway.

She didn't open her eyes.

They were sleeping and dreaming.

It was all white.