Hello hello lovelies! Happy Saturday!

The two groups have finally met, and tensions are running a little high! I truly hope you all enjoy this chapter, and I am really sorry it's taken me so long to update!

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Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to J.K. Rowling, and only the story line and any OC's belong to me.

The flames curled around her fingertips and engulfed the bit of parchment grasped in her hand. The witch stared at it as the parchment blackened and curled in on itself, before slowly dissipating in a twist of smoke.

"Good thing I memorised it," the witch said softly, and Hermione's brow knitted together at that.

"Merlin's saggy tits!" James exclaimed, pushing past everyone and bolting across the lawn, halting abruptly right in front of the witch and wizard.

"James Potter, mind your tongue," Dorea scolded automatically, but her expression melted into a smile when the boy launched himself at his Mother; Dorea was several inches shorter than James, and he'd lifted her clean off the ground and spun her around in a brief half-circle.

James placed the witch back on her feet, but didn't release her. Charlus tentatively approached the pair, a broad and hopeful smile on his features, and the moment James caught sight of him, he shifted from one parent to the next.

"What the fuck is happening, Moony?" Black asked quietly, a hand on Lupin's shoulder as they broke away from the crowd of wix and descended the stairs onto the front lawn.

"I don't know, Pads…it could be a trick, or a trap," Lupin said, raised his wand and pointed it directly at the back of Charlus's head.

James was looking over his Father's shoulder, and his eyes widened. He untangled himself from Charlus, and threw himself in front of the man, "what are you doing?"

Black's wand hesitantly rose as well, "James, get away from them."

"What is wrong with you?" James demanded, hazel eyes flashing as he threw his arms out to the side. The wizard made his defiant refusal to budge abundantly clear.

"Just because they look like your parents, doesn't actually mean they are," Lupin said, voice steady and cold, but disbelief and shock was apparent across his features.

The younger Sirius and Remus cautiously moved to join their older counterparts—Sirius was still gripping Hermione's hand tightly, so she'd been dragged along with them.

"They could have come here the same way we did," Sirius pointed out gently to Black, whose jaw tightened. The man was pale, as if witnessing ghosts from his past.

Dorea was curiously staring at Black, Lupin, Sirius and Remus, but her gaze settled on Hermione. There was a hardness to the young witch's gaze that caused the older witch to pause.

Hermione understood Lupin and Black's aversion to blindly accepting that this was the other dimension's Dorea, Charlus, and whoever their two companions were—she still hadn't gotten a good look at them. For all they knew, this was a ploy by the other side, taking advantage of last year's impossible events to lull them into a false sense of security as they dismantled everything they'd built from the inside.

"If that's the case then—" Black was cut off by a loud grunt, and a soft, "what happened?"

One of unconscious boys roused, hand thrust into his raven hair as he sat up, and one of his grey eyes wedged shut as he squinted up at all of them.

"Regulus?" Sirius asked, instantly releasing Hermione's hand as he rushed towards the boy. Sirius fell to his knees beside Regulus, and when the boy groggily faced him, Sirius dove forward and tackled him to the ground in a hug.

The wizard had been so intently focused on his possible brother that he hadn't taken notice of who the other boy was.

Regulus however, was stiff as a board, and Sirius just as quickly withdrew with an embarrassed noise in the back of his throat. He moved into an upright position, and shifted all of his weight back onto his hands—his elbows straight—with his legs outstretched in front of him.

Dorea cleared her throat, "it seems we're a bit at a crossroads."

"You could say that," Black chuckles darkly. "You may be who I hope you are, but we can't afford to take that chance."

The look on the woman's face belied that she already knew the answer to her next question. "Who do you hope we are?" Dorea asked with a tilt of her head, folding her arms over her chest as she took a step towards the men. Black's expression darkened, so she halted in her tracks and merely studied them in silence.

"A man and woman who helped raise me, but who died about twenty years ago," Black started, swallowed thickly.

"Twenty years," Dorea murmured, the infinitesimal widening of her eyes the only indication that the revelation surprised her.

"Who would both do anything for their children. Which I suppose extends to doing something incredibly foolish and following after their reckless son."

"You mean like blood magic? Blood magic that causes one to travel to another dimension, and evidently to the future?" Dorea offered, and Black sucked in a sharp breath pumped full of hope. The war had taken so much from him, and he might not always show it, but inside he'd become quite cynical and wary of everyone outside of their close circle.

Peter Pettigrew hadn't always had the best timing (an example of which was when he set off a dungbomb in the alcove in which the Marauders were hiding, after Filch had rushed past it), and he'd certainly chose a dreadful moment to awaken. The boy sat up sharply, a hand on his head as a stream of light groans came out of him.

Sirius scrambled backwards, and in a mad burst of movement he flew onto his feet. Sirius hastily pulled his wand out of his robes and pointed it at the boy. "Why did you bring him?"

"Padfoot," Remus said calmly, breaking away from the quartet that had formed in his absence, and taking a calm step in Sirius's direction.

"No, Moony. He was a coward and backed out, who's to say that he won't end up exactly like this dimension's Pettigrew?!"

Charlus, sensing the situation was spiralling downwards, stepped in with a clear, calm voice, "I think that we need to start again. This is clearly a surprise for everyone, and holding each other at wandpoint is hardly going to solve anything."

The group on the porch had remained silent up until that point—aside from Theo making a comment here and there to Blaise, which Ginny poked him hard in the ribs for—but Harry stepped to the front of the pack and said, "I agree. Everyone needs to lower their wands. We can come inside, and James, Sirius and Remus can ask them all the questions they deem fit to confirm their identities."

All eyes were on Harry.

The boy with the lightning scar did not seem to notice this, and pressed on, "we can use the pensieve, or—"

"If you say legilimency then I shall have to refuse," Dorea said adamantly with a firm shake of her head, her raven hair bouncing about. The witch began to approach the porch. "We have just as much cause to distrust you as you—"

Dorea's lips were pursed pensively, until her gaze fell on Harry. Dorea's eyes roved over him, flabbergasted as stepped closer in an attempt to garner a better look at the boy. "Salazar." The witch's eyes flitted to the rest of the young wix and truly drank them all in. "I think we have much to discuss."