A Paradox In Time

A Man With Many Faces

"What do we do now?" Hermione cried in a shrill and panicked voice.

"Well, for a start, we don't panic," Harry replied.

"Don't panic!" Hermione shrieked, incredulously. "How can you say that? How can you be so calm? Molly has killed Hector ... he's dead, and so is our future."

"Our future is not dead ... and neither is Hector," Harry muttered, ruffling through some papers on the desk to the right of the room. "In fact, I'm not sure he ever lived at all."

Hermione blinked in her confusion. "Harry - have you lost your mind? I'm cradling a dead corpse in my arms, the corpse of Hector Dagworth-Granger. If he's dead now, then he was definitely living not so long ago."

"You're cradling a corpse, yes, but it isn't Hector ... at least, not according to these documents."

Hermione grimaced in a mixture of surprise and disgust and pushed the dead body away from her lap. "Urgh. Then who is it? Who has Molly killed?"

"That man's name is - or was - Maurice Dagworth," Harry revealed, sliding a parchment identity sheet over to Hermione after she leapt up and joined him at the desk.

Hermione's eyes flashed over the document at rapid speed. "It says here that he is the judge due to attend the trial today. Look! His schedule there confirms it!"

"And he has to pass judgement on the Weasleys," Harry added, flicking through the scattered papers of an open folder. "And four other families, too. Including the Diggorys. Fancy that. You know, it really irritates me when you see just how many Magical families were willing to support Grindelwald in his blood war ... it makes you wonder just how many of them would have secretly supported Voldemort, too."

"I'm not sure the support would have been all that secret," Hermione muttered darkly. "The ideals of both tyrants were strikingly similar, and the world view of many Magicals, who we might consider moderate or tolerant, skirt the borders of the ideas of supremacy anyway. I don't think it would be much of a stretch for such families to switch sides."

"That's a bit harsh," Harry frowned. "I don't see the Weasleys as blood supremacists. For all that Molly is doing now, I'd draw a line at outright bigotry. The Weasleys suffered losses to Voldemort don't forget."

"The two things aren't mutually exclusive," Hermione argued. "Sometimes, the most worrying form of racism is the one conducted in ignorance or worse ... not seeing that those actions and opinions are wrong. "

"How do you mean?" Harry asked, turning with a curious expression.

"Well, didn't you ever get offended by the way that Arthur, Ron and others decried the Muggle world, even if it was in a jokey and jovial style?" Hermione questioned, cautiously. "You were raised a Muggle, don't forget, just as I was. And I know how I felt to those slanders."

"You were offended? By what?" Harry asked, irritation stirring in his gut before he'd even understood why.

"By the way that Arthur in particular looked at the Muggle world as quaint and backwards, like Muggles were curiosities to goggle at in a zoo," Hermione went on, bitterly. "Ron was simply dismissive of all things Muggle ... his view was akin to the sort of thing Draco Malfoy might have said. Every time he criticised the Muggle world, I felt a bit of that ... I felt insulted on behalf of a culture not there to defend itself."

"And you decided to be his girlfriend, even with such strength of feeling?" Harry quirked.

Hermione blushed and looked away. "I hoped I might educate him in time. I was a Muggle, and if he really cared for me it might change his opinion on things."