CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
"Where the devil have you been, Tom?" Snape demanded as he and Hermione stepped out of his office hand in hand. Snape glanced at their joined appendages and rolled his eyes. "Great, that's not supposed to happen till later. Miss Granger, will you excuse us, please?"
Hermione nodded, and smiled when Tom squeezed her hand before letting her go.
"What are you playing at, Tom?" Snape demanded. "Do you know how hard it is to make a replicant forget that it's in love?"
"Sorry, it just happened," he said, trying to wipe the smile off his face.
"This is going to take a lot of work," Snape complained. "I have to make the clone, and then I have to erase just the right memories in her so she doesn't forget everything, and—"
"Fortunately for you two, you're not going to have to any of that," said a woman's voice from a nearby doorway.
"Lady Mione, what are you doing here?" he demanded as she sauntered into the room.
"I've been waiting for you for over an hour, Professor," she told him. "I do understand that you might be busy, what with the war raging outside, but I was certain you would want to tie up the final loose end and send the original time-traveler back to 1945."
"What do you know about that?" Snape asked her as he stared off somewhere past her head.
"Come on, Severus, you don't think my husband talks in his sleep? The Dark Lord he may be, but he's still a human being, the same as you or me," she said. "I've figured out how to avoid my redundancy, if you must know. You see, you're about to kill him, which would leave me without a Tom of my own, since I know this one wants the younger variety. Who wouldn't? But, then I got to thinking. I happened upon a youth serum a couple years back that I have been saving up for this very moment. You don't need another replicant to go back in time. I want you to send me instead."
"But he's going to kill this Hermione," Snape reminded her. "Why would you want to go back, knowing that you will die by his hand?"
"I would rather die knowing I served a purpose than to linger here where I no longer belong," she explained. "This Tom and his younger Hermione can look after our children, who are mostly grown anyway. I've already arranged for their futures, each owns a house of their own, and Tommy is already about to be a father, so you'll get to have fun seeing our grandkids. And who knows, maybe the two of you will have some kids of your own—although I can't imagine how you're going to explain their relationship to Tommy's kid later on!"
"You're sure this is what you want to do?" Snape asked, his face a mask of worry. "And you don't want me to wipe your memories of anything?"
"Nope, I'll just take my potion and take my chances," she said. "Getting him to fall for me will be the easy part—it's getting him to kill me I'm more worried about."
"This is so insane, I don't know where to begin," said Tom as he ran a hand through his hair. "Why don't you just stay here and become a grandmother, and live a normal, healthy life? I hate the idea of sending you to die."
"Tom, there will only be one of you left in this timeframe," she said. "I couldn't stand to live knowing you were with someone else, even if that someone is me. Don't you understand that?"
Tom reached over and pulled her to him, kissing her softly on her forehead. "At least I know I made you happy in some way," he whispered.
"You did," she said. "Now, let's get this over with, shall we?"
Lady Mione pulled out a potion from her pocket and drank it down while Snape pulled a time turner from his. Her features began to writhe and contort as he set the time and place for her, then slipped the necklace over her head.
"Thank you," she said, and then she was gone.
"Well, that was unexpected," Snape commented.
"At least we didn't have to figure out how to make my Hermione forget me," Tom grinned. "I don't think it would have been easy."
"Father?" Harry called as he stepped into the hall. "Who was that woman?"
"Never you mind, son," Snape answered as he gave him a hug.
"I've killed the Dark Lord," he announced. "The war is over."
#
"There you are, Tom," said Hermione as he joined her at the celebration feast. "We're about to drink a toast to Harry."
"Yes, so I heard," he said, and surreptitiously dumped a vial into each of their drinks before handing one to her. Then he kissed her soundly, right there in front of everyone, and her cheeks pinkened prettily with embarrassment as Ron and Harry grinned back at her afterwards.
"Let's hear it for Harry Snape!" shouted his mother from the front of the crowd as she held up her glass.
"Hear, hear!" shouted Hermione and Tom as they stood arm in arm, and then they both drank down their glasses of pumpkin juice. Hermione dropped her glass, and it shattered on the floor. Tom sat down rather abruptly as well. The two stared at each other as their potions sunk in and the memories began to flow freely. Without a word, the two of them thought it prudent to leave the gathering behind for a little privacy.
"You stupid bastard!" Hermione hissed. "You just put my memories into the wrong head! I can't believe this!"
"Oh, damn!" he whispered as he put his hands to his face. "And Lady Mione's memories are in mine, too."
"Now what do we do?" Hermione—or at least her body—asked as she stared at the two empty glasses, one of which lay in pieces on the floor. "I wanted to be the Minister of Magic. I wanted to be the actor, and the historian, and the father of the children we will eventually have. Now I'm going to be their mother instead? Me, the most powerful Dark wizard who ever lived?"
"Well, let me put it this way: short of me grabbing up the pieces of shattered glass and licking them for your memory fragments, I think we're stuck being each other from now on," Tom said apologetically.
"So now I'm a seventh year hottie and evil mastermind all rolled into one, and you're my brainy but seductive wife hiding in a man's body?" she asked with an amused grin he knew full well was coming from the man within her.
Tom laughed as he reviewed a few memories that revealed just how kinky Lady Mione actually could be. "You know, you always did say you wanted us to have a threesome," he pointed out.
"Yeah, but I kind of thought I'd have a penis at the time," said Hermione's voice but obviously with Voldemort's thought in it.
"Isn't Hermione still in there?" Tom wanted to know. "You've been talking like yourself this whole time."
"Yes, she's here. She simply passed out from shock," he said. "Don't worry, I'll certainly break her of that habit soon enough. You know how much weakness annoys me."
"Go easy on her, will you?" he asked. "She has one of the strongest minds I have ever known. And I know it quite intimately now."
"Yes, I'll just bet you do," he answered. "It's going to take years to pull out these memories and swap them around to our liking. I suppose we'd better get used to having sex with ourself."
Tom chuckled. "I don't know about you, old boy, but I've been doing that for years…."
FINIS