Summary: There are many alternate universes that branched off from each other, differing in many different ways. The most powerful enchanters and enchantresses of which there is only one in all of these universe holds the seat of Chrestomanci. Hermione is about to find out that that she is destined to hold the power to maintain the balance in all of these universes.

A/N: Order is inspired by the Star Wars saga, Queer is inspired by a prompt by boooksteaflowers, which was continued by deskgirl and nonbinaryviola.

Thank you for reading and reviewing this SereniteRose. I hope you get to read and enjoy this one. :)

The Next Chrestomanci

Normal

Hermione Jean Granger woke up at the alarm of her clock. It showed 5 am. She rolled out of bed, falling on the carpeted floor, her bushy hair sticking out everywhere. She pushed her hair out of her face and went to the adjacent bathroom to brush and shower. She pulled whatever clothes she got and wore it.

Kenji Yamamoto gracefully got up from bed the moment his alarm clock buzzed. It showed 4 am. He brushed his teeth with an electric brush and exercised for a while before he showered. He carefully selected his clothes for the day, chose a nice shirt to go with his suit and selected what cufflinks he would wear.

Hermione pushed the floating cereal around her bowl and looked across the huge table to the Chrestomanci who was reading different news from the different universes. She gulped down her orange juice and stared out the window.

Kenji took a surreptitious look from the side of the newspaper he was reading and looked at his charge, he then pushed the Daily Prophet to her. Both are now reading newspapers.

Hermione accompanied Kenji to the grocery store, picked up their individual toiletries and small items, which despite being able to ask the staff at the castle, Kenji and later Hermione, preferred to do by themselves.

Hermione studied while Kenji went through paperwork with his assistant. He would later leave to attend some meetings. The whole day will continue with more and more of these meetings for him while Hermione studied.

Sometime later, there would be a call for help, from one of the other universe. They would both fix themselves quickly and rush off.

Order

There are different universes or plane or realities where the development and existence of beings is different from each of the other ones. As Chrestomanci, or Chrestomanci in training as in the case of Hermione, she has access to all of these universes and her being a nine life enchanter enables her to travel to each one with ease, unlike some enchanters or enchantresses who requires rituals to travel to different planes of reality.

In this particular universe, the planet of Alderaan is one of the Core Worlds. It is a planet covered with mountains. As the Galactic Republic is losing its power, it was ruled by Queen Breha Organa and represented in the Galactic Senate by her husband, Senator Bail Organa.

It is also the proud home where the thoughts of freedom was birthed in this galaxy, and this planet played a pivotal role in the establishment of the Rebel Alliance, which is a movement that sought to restore the Old Republic's values.

From space, it appears as a blue-green orb enveloped in a white web of clouds. Its surface had vast bodies of water, covered in snow-capped mountains with patches of green grassy hills. It is known in the galaxy as "the planet of beauty" both for its natural beauty and the beauty of its infrastructure.

The cities on Alderaan were carefully designed to respect the natural beauty of their environment. For example, the palace of the royal family and the city around it blended into the local snow-capped peaks. Alderaanian architecture made use of white synthstone, which inspired the architecture of certain mining economies of the Outer Rim Territories, like the floating colony of Cloud City, and the planets Lothal and Garel.

But was Hermione here to sightsee? No! Was she here to help intercede in a brewing inter-galactic war? Not even close! The office of the Chrestomanci does not deal with wars or battles of the natives of the different universes. The job of the Chrestomanci and in this case, his successor in training, is to correct any irregularities or imbalance caused by magic or misuse thereof.

Knowing her "rebellious" tendencies (she fought in the Second Wizardry War in her world), Kenji Yamamoto, watched her closely as she did this particular mission.

She is here on one of what she now views pointless exercises. A few weeks ago, a dark artifact was recovered from a dead world by one of the "explorers" from Alderaan. Given the lack of magic and knowledge of it in this particular universe, those who brought it back to this world have no idea of what they were dealing with.

Some calls these artifacts lack-luck, created by powerful enchanters for no other reason than for them to be entertained. Small powered ones were enough to cause wars and catastrophes. But this particular dark artifact was powered with enough dark magic to put all the dark artifacts from Hermione's world to shame.

She took it in her hands, her magic as a nine-life enchanter ensuring her safety from its malice, and placed it in a container with runes to render the artifact's magic null. The curse-breakers would deal with this later.

As she and Chrestomanci left, they did not notice the moon that appeared in the moonless planet. Hermione can only hope that she was able to remove the lack-luck artifact before it sucked out the luck of the entire planet. But she figured it probably won't be so bad, it's not like there's a force out there to obliterate an entire planet. Right?

When one lives to be thousands of years, they would have a seemingly endless stream of regrets. You've just seen one of Hermione's. Because even as Chrestomanci Shinji Yamamoto would comfort her that there could have been nothing she could do at that point that won't interfere with that universe's politics and natural order, the faces of the people she'd only briefly seen in her short time on that planet would haunt her nightmares seeing as it is one of her firsts.

Pain

There were always Dark Lords or dictators or tyrants, oppressors by a variety of names whose regimes may last for several generations or just briefly. In the end, they would be overthrown and then for sometime later a new one might rise or maybe the whole group of people might learn. But then they will forget again and the cycle begins anew. Shinji has learned this from his years as Chrestomanci and as far back as the office that lasted for thousands of years went. The seat has seen the rise and fall of civilizations, groups of beings and even the evolution and rise of culture of different sorts of beings.

In truth, the action Chrestomanci did on Hermione's home world is akin to such and he knows that somehow somewhere along the way there could be a rip into the reality and in one way or another a dark lord will rise. But he stepped in only to retrieve his successor. He does not claim morality or complete apathy but he only did what was necessary. What he did was highly discouraged for his office but at that point he knew she wouldn't have come and would have probably lost all of her lives trying to save her friends.

But Hermione has only been in this job for a few years and she had always been soft hearted. His heart clenched as Hermione held the body of the infant to her chest. She was of course angry at her inability to do anything as he told her that if they overstepped the boundaries, it could have more impact and repercussion to the universes they dealt with, maybe not now but certainly later in time. She had yet to see the results of such action in person but he did show her some memories and records on the Chrestomanci Castle.

Of course, that knowledge does not stop the pain. He crouched down beside her as she cried and held her in his arms. He wishes he could shield her from all the pain but if she thought seeing strange innocent beings die before their time, just wait until her loved ones succumb to time and death.

He knows the feeling of loss and pain all too well…

Queer

Other than her home world, Hermione has a favorite world and even though he didn't say it outright, she knows Chrestomanci also likes this world a lot. They even have a small apartment and a favorite café in this world. It is a polar opposite of her home world. Here magic was so common that the lack of thereof is the rarity.

Their landlady dabbles in witchcraft to brew homeopathic remedies for the people in the complex. There are also service golems in various sizes and shapes who makes sure that their magic users aren't crowded, get medical attention and go where they need to (Chrestomanci brought home some of these). They don't get distracted from their tasks, they can be hollow to hold things like medications or small objects and in some rare cases they even develop an attachment to their user despite not being alive.

There are many strangely cheap five star food diners that bake actual love into their apple pie and will always know what you want and what your dietary restrictions are without being told. But this world has much more to offer them, for it is a world of wonder, if only for the lack of materialism and the laid back attitude of the people of this world.

Preschool kids are learning basic sigils from their playmates on the playground. Grade school kids learning silly charms from each other on school bus, the same way kids from Hermione's world learns swear words. These children also have clapping games across the bus aisle, but instead of rhymes they dabble in spells.

There are illusionists busking illegally, shimmering lights disintegrating as they run. Chalk artists making works that are so realistic, they come to life off of the sidewalk. Then, there are one man bands in the park, with instruments floating around playing themselves. Punk concerts in empty lots with amped out music and lights, but noise-cancelling spells and illusion hide them in plain sight from anyone outside of the lot.

Hermione really likes the magical graffiti of this world. Some vanishes when certain people passes by, some appears only when certain people passes by like the police to insult them. Murals, living art works akin to magical portraits in Hermione's world, which are alive and swirling with vibrancy. Murals that, if you listen closely, can be heard and not just seen.

There are mages whose plants are grown in tiny rooftop and window box gardens yet they are lush and filled with life.

Elemental wiccans taking sometime to tune into the magic of the new city they've just moved in. There are alchemists tutoring and creating potions on the side to support their experiments and research. In schools, there are psychic teachers who know when their students are cheating, hired because they also instinctively know who are finding difficulties in their schoolwork.

Teenage girls making friendship talismans and amulets for everyone and mass-texting everyone luck and speed spells when their parties get broken up by cops. Chrestomanci also told her that in this world, there are young people who gets into dark magic, but like in Hermione's world, their friends finds it difficult to talk about it with them. But there are intervention programs for people who abuses hexes and runes.

There are mediums who work for suicide help and as therapists, predicting people in need and making sure to be there just at the right moment to lend them a helping hand; re-assuring them and boosting their self-worth and will to live.

Some evenings, there are kids hiding out in someone's backyard or an alley passing around a joint and casting minor illusions to watch while high. In the police force meanwhile, there are necromancers in forensics who speaks with the dead to solve homicides and even cold cases. There are also those in the police force, DEA and even detective who are lie detectors and empathic.

"This place seemed so queer and illogical at first but I like this place a lot." Hermione mused as they looked down from their seats in the balcony overlooking the city. Chrestomanci smiled, drew her chair nearer to his and they sat side by side in silence. Hermione placed her hand over his and he quietly placed his other hand over hers.