Author's Note: In honor of my birthday today, I'm updating all four of my current WIPs! Please follow me to check out other stories. Thank you for being so patient as I've had this story on the back burner for so long. I have a number of plans for it. In a few months I should be able to get to a point of fairly regular updates.

Also, I just wanted to let everyone know that this story is an Alternate Universe time travel story and NOT a Causal Loop time travel story. Yes, in the original story Dumbledore didn't know about the Room of Requirement until Hermione's fourth year. In this story because the timeline has changed with their appearance, he now knows it exists… sort of.

Chapter Three

Draco was dead. That was the only possible explanation that made any sense for why he was lying on the stone floor of Hogwarts looking up at the wizard he watched die on what was one of the worst nights of his entire life. When the Room of Requirement began violently spinning and all of the detritus left behind by generations of Hogwarts students pelted them in the head and body, something must have struck them a little too hard in the wrong place. A dull throbbing in the back of his head where it met the ground when they were thrown through the door seemed to confirm his suspicions. Except wouldn't all pain end in the afterlife?

Perhaps the more plausible excuse was that he'd just simply gone mad. More than once in his eighteen years he felt as if he stood on the precipice of complete insanity. If there was anyone alive who had reason enough to lose all their wits, he thought he qualified. And the way that she kept staring at him made him wonder if she was concerned he would do something violent and harm her. It bothered him on a deep, visceral level that she might be scared of him. That was the last thing he wanted.

Whatever the true explanation was, Draco couldn't deny that Albus Dumbledore towered over him staring down at them with a look of confusion and concern. If the Room of Requirement killed them both and brought them to a place where the ones who'd died before them could interact with him, wouldn't the former Headmaster recognize two of his most memorable students? Granger was one of Potter's best friends, always getting into trouble and then somehow earning points for their House because of the batty old man's evident preference for Gryffindor. And as unpopular of a Headmaster as he'd been in some social circles, surely he would've remembered students who tried to murder him?

The night at the Astronomy Tower still haunted his dreams. Sometimes he feared closing his eyes because of what he might see replayed over and over again. He might not have been what others would consider a good man, but he felt certain that there was undoubtedly one thing he positively wasn't: a murderer. He didn't have the stomach for it. Watching the Death Eaters and the Dark Lord commit callous murders without giving it any thought throughout that terrible last year of the war proved that to him without any confusion. He was the worst Death Eater imaginable. Not only would he rather kill himself than harm anyone else, he didn't even believe what most of the others did. Not really. His arm was Marked against his will. Even if he prostrated himself before the Dark Lord and swore that he would follow him for the rest of his life, he'd only done it because he was a bloody coward.

"Are you both all right?"

Dumbledore or his imposter, whatever he was, reached a hand out to help Granger off the floor. Seeing her stare at the Headmaster with a mixture of fear and hesitation made Draco rethink his theory that he'd gone mad. They wouldn't have gone mad together, would they? Perhaps there was some sort of spell or curse that could cause widespread insanity that he wasn't aware of, but he couldn't understand who might cast it. For all anyone in the castle knew, the Room of Requirement was damaged beyond repair. It would've taken more effort than anyone in the entire school, staff and students alike, were capable to replicate the events of the past quarter of an hour.

"I think so. I must've tripped and fallen. Poor Draco took the worst of it. Are you all right, Draco?"

Once on her feet she reached down to offer him help up too. A silent conversation passed between them in those few seconds that he didn't fully understand. He wished he was a Legilimens. Wouldn't being able to read her mind be fascinating? If he could ever figure out how to do it without her knowing it, he wasn't ashamed to admit that he'd try. She'd always been a mystery to him, no more so since they returned to the castle. He would have to assume by the look she gave him that she wanted him to say as little as possible. That was fine by him.

"Yes, I'm fine, Hermione. Just bumped my head."

Dumbledore's attention returned to the splintered door when he was sure that both of the mysterious students were mostly unharmed. Even the dull pain in his head was slowly dissipating. There was a gaping hole where the Room of Requirement had been just minutes earlier. Pieces of the heavy wooden door littered the corridor. A few slivers still clung to the doorway. All they could see from where they stood was a pitch black darkness within. Draco no longer felt a pull towards the room. If anything, he longed to run in the opposite direction and never return to it. Whatever they'd done, the room wasn't the same.

"I'm not familiar with this room. To be perfectly honest, in all of my years as a professor I wasn't even aware there was door on that wall."

"Hogwarts has a great deal of mysteries. No one knows them all."

There was a subtle change in the Headmaster's expression when he turned away from the hole in the wall to stare at Granger. He no longer seemed concerned or confused, but wary and suspicious. The desire to run from the castle became overpowering. Without even realizing he was doing so, Draco inched closer to the witch, ready to grab her arm and pull her, if necessary.

"I'm also not familiar with who either of the two of you are or why you are in the castle right now. No one is supposed to be here yet. Even if you were students, which I know you're not, term won't start for weeks."

Draco exchanged another nervous look with Granger. Neither of them rushed to explain who they were or why they were there. He did think it strange, however, that she wasn't putting her blind Gryffindor trust in the wizard she and all of her friends seemed to worship. It made since why he didn't trust Dumbledore after their history, but why didn't she want to explain? Everyone on her side of the war blindly trusted the old fool. He didn't understand.

When he felt the familiar sensation of someone trying to peek into his mind, Draco felt even more afraid than he already had. What if Dumbledore suspected that he was there to try to kill him again? Would he even bother making an offer to spare him or would he just avada Draco to be done with it? He remembered the horrible lessons his aunt used to give him in Occlumency. Nothing about that woman had been soft or kind. Not wishing to experience anything close to that again, he pushed the old man out of his mind without giving it much thought.

As he felt his shields slam into place, he knew he'd made the wrong decision. All he'd managed to accomplish was to give the Headmaster even more reason to be suspicious of their appearance in the castle. The twinkling blue eyes narrowed. He stepped closer to Draco.

"Obliviate!"

Professor Dumbledore's eyes glazed over for half a second. Confused by what just happened, he stared around the corridor like he couldn't remember why he was there in the first place. Only when Draco felt Granger grab his hand in hers did he seem to remember she was there too. He'd been so focused on making certain the wizard couldn't read memories of the night he'd been murdered.

"Thank you ever so much for the tour, Headmaster Dumbledore. Such a fascinating history. We appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to show us."

"Uhh, yes… why of course, Miss… miss. I'm glad you enjoyed it."

If Granger had been able to place new memories in his mind when she cast the memory modification charm or if he was too polite and concerned he was losing his mind so he played along was unclear. Draco was grateful for her quick thinking. What could have happened to them if she hadn't stepped up was unthinkable. He knew firsthand there was a reason why the part of the castle the Slytherin dormitories was in was called the dungeons.

"We will be going now. Draco and I will have to think very seriously about whether we will transfer here for our last year or not."

Still keeping a tight grasp on his hand, she pulled him down the corridor towards the main staircase. Walking quickly, she didn't say anything until they were out of earshot of the dazed Headmaster.

"We can't stay here. Something's wrong."

Draco was in no fit place to argue with her on that point. Of course something was very wrong. He had many theories, each one more unbelievable than the last. They ran down the staircase as swiftly as the moving parts would allow them. No one met them on their way. Even for the beginning of the Christmas holidays that seemed odd. There were always professors and students that were staying behind milling around the castle.

Once they were out the main doors of the castle on the ground floor, Draco couldn't deny that he was terrified. The thick woolen jumper he put on that morning had nearly been insufficient for the chill in the December air. Outside on the grounds the heat from the bright sun made the jumper unbearable.

"Draco, where is all of the snow?"

"I don't know."

She looked as frightened as he felt. It made no sense. How could they have been in the middle of winter just a short time earlier and now the summer? Something truly sinister was happening. He wanted answers, but didn't even know where to begin.

"We should go to Hogsmeade. I don't feel… I don't feel safe here any longer."

There was nothing about her suggestion that he wanted to argue with. If she hadn't suggested leaving the castle grounds first, he would've done it. Realizing he was still clutching her hand, he dropped it. All he needed was one more unnecessary complication in his life.

Neither of them spoke the entire way to the village. What could they say? Everything happened so quickly and made absolutely no sense. Outside of the Hogwarts gates, each of them sighed quietly in relief at the same time. Draco felt the corner of his lip threaten to turn into a smirk. Was it possible they had more in common with each other than he'd thought for seven years? In his younger years he was half-convinced that Muggle-Borns were something less than fully human. Many lessons were learned the hard way during the last part of the war.

Part of him kept expecting to wake up in the Hogwarts infirmary with a nasty head injury. Could he possibly be dreaming? It made more logical sense than the idea that the Room of Requirement somehow managed to repair itself well enough that it could then use itself as some sort of time travel vortex to hurl them both back into the past when Albus Dumbledore was still alive. Draco bit back a snort at the very idea that such a thing was possible. Yes, he was still sure that he was about to wake up any moment to find Madam Pomfrey lecturing him about being more careful when he moved about the castle.

Hogsmeade looked different than he expected it to look. He'd just been there the weekend before buying some last minute Christmas gifts for his parents. Unsure how to explain it exactly, it seemed that some of the familiar shops he'd been shopping in most of his life looked newer than they used to. Others were rundown and closed. Of course he also couldn't explain where all of the snow had gone and why it felt like summer.

Nor could he explain how they'd just seen Albus Dumbledore when Draco knew he was dead. His was the first murder he'd ever had to watch with his own eyes. There had been others, of course, but he would never forget his first. Especially since it was one that he was supposed to commit.

The feel of Granger's sharp tug on his arm broke him out of his thoughts about that horrible night. Any excuse to think about something else was always welcome. She held what looked like a newspaper she'd pulled out of a rubbish bin. Her eyes were wide and her skin was almost transparent she was so pale.

"What is it, Granger?"

She didn't answer him at first. Worried she hadn't heard him, he repeated the question. Instead of saying anything, she tightened her hold on his arm to drag him away from the other shoppers on High Street. Their destination was little more than a dirty hole between two ramshackle shops that he thought had once been Gladrags Wizardwear and a greengrocer called The Magic Neep. What happened to the buildings since his last visit to the village to be in such a miserable state of disrepair was just another mystery to add to a growing list. He wasn't sure he'd ever had a more bizarre day in his entire life.

The moment he saw the date at the top of the front page of the newspaper Granger pushed into his hands he was certain he hadn't. Understanding why her face had grown so suddenly pale, he felt his knees threaten to buckle. It was impossible. There was no bloody way they were reading the newspaper correctly. When he read the morning edition of the Daily Prophet over breakfast just hours earlier, it was December 1998. How could it now be June 26, 1965? He needed to sit down.

"You look like you're about to faint."

"I might. Is it possible this is all some sort of elaborate prank? Or a hallucination?"

"One that we can both see? I don't think that's possible, Draco. I think… I think the Room of Requirement brought us to the past."

He didn't understand how she could be so calm as she uttered such a ridiculous theory. Wasn't she supposed to be intelligent? Over the years he questioned her sanity continuing to be friends with Potter and Weasley and them dragging her into such dangerous situations, but he never doubted how smart she was. All previous opinions he held about the strange witch were called to further scrutiny. Perhaps he'd been wrong all along. She could very well be both stupid and insane.

"We should get you some cold water. That'll help."

"I'd rather have something stronger."

Though most of his experience with drinking was limited to passing a smuggled bottle of fire whiskey around the boys dormitory he shared with the other Slytherin boys in his year, he could think of no other way to calm his nerves after what he'd already experienced that day. His father's weakness for alcohol during the last year when their manor was taken over by the Dark Lord caused him a great deal of shame, but he didn't care in that moment. Maybe he could finally learn what sort of escape his father found in fire whiskey.

"I think I would too."

Despite finding themselves in a frightening and unprecedented dilemma, he couldn't keep the grin off his face that appeared there at her words. Granger was certainly full of surprises. Not for the first time he wondered what his old school rivals got up to in Gryffindor Tower. There was a lot still to learn about the witch, and if they really were stuck in the past as he feared, he'd probably get the chance.

"We could go to the Three Broomsticks."

"No, I'm not allowed to go back in there."

He hated that he didn't have to explain why he'd been banned from the popular tavern. Everyone, it seemed, knew all about how he'd cast the Imperius Curse on Madam Rosmerta sixth year repeatedly to get her assistance in his failed plot to murder the Headmaster against her will. It was something of a miracle he hadn't been chucked into Azkaban for the rest of his life. Unforgivables were called what they were because they were supposed to be unforgivable. The Wizengamot had been overly kind to him during his trial. They must've felt sorry for him being placed in an impossible position thanks to the careless actions of his father. Sometimes he really loathed that man for what he'd put his family through. They didn't deserve any of it.

"Well, yes, under ordinary circumstances you'd be right, but Draco, I don't think these are ordinary circumstances. If this newspaper is correct, it's over thirty years before you… you were banned."

One deep sigh from him and she seemed to understand his reluctance to return to the scene of his old crimes even if they hadn't technically happened yet. Grateful that he wouldn't be forced to recount his experiences, he followed her down a side street to a dingy pub he'd never been brave enough to enter before. Not even in the middle of his most arrogant days when he felt like the most important person who lived in the castle. The Hog's Head had a nasty reputation for a very good reason. Professor Snape always warned the Slytherins to stay away. When he mentioned it to his father, he'd agreed.

Granger pushed the pub's door open without fear. Had she been there before? Draco couldn't imagine a scenario that would put the witch inside the notorious pub, but once more, he was well aware that he still didn't know much about her at all. His father always talked about how nasty Muggles were. Maybe she was used to that sort of filth? What kinds of homes did Muggles live in anyway? He couldn't imagine they could be very nice without magic. How would they be able to see in the dark without wands? Fire was rather primitive, so perhaps they…

All further considerations on the inner workings of a Muggle home ceased when he saw the wizard standing behind the bar. The same twinkling blue eyes he'd just seen up at the castle eyed him with unmistakeable suspicion. Unlike the Dumbledore he'd tried to kill, this wizard didn't bother to hide that he didn't trust his two newest patrons.

"That's Aberforth Dumbledore, Professor Dumbledore's younger brother."

He didn't need her whispered explanation to figure out the family resemblance. Part of him was tempted to forget all about his earlier concerns about returning to the Three Broomsticks. Whatever welcome he found there was sure to be better than being faced with another Dumbledore. What would the man think if he knew that Draco would try to kill his brother in the future? He seemed frightening enough to murder him where he stood.

There were only a handful of other customers in the pub. Despite being a busy Saturday afternoon in other parts of the village, few wandered to The Hog's Head. Draco could understand why. When Granger offered to order them drinks at the bar so he could finally sit down, he didn't argue. It would've been more gentlemanly to escort the lady to her seat and purchase the refreshments, but based on the day they'd already had, he wasn't about to stand on ceremony. He wanted to put as much distance between the other Dumbledore and himself as he could.

A table in the furthest corner of the pub from the bar was mercifully open. Ignoring the stares from the other colorful characters sipping their drinks, he crossed the main room of the pub with all of the confidence he'd watched his father exude when entering a room full of people who hated him. As much as there was to hate about the man, even Draco couldn't deny the man knew how to make an entrance.

He was finishing up clearing the thick layer of dust off of the top of the table and the two chairs when Granger arrived with two glasses in one hand and an entire bottle of fire whiskey in the other. Again he felt the corner of his mouth twitch up into another amused grin. For another time that day despite having a great deal they needed to discuss, neither of them spoke as they sipped at their first glass of fire whiskey. Before that day he wouldn't have believed anyone who told him that it was possible to sit in an almost companionable silence with the witch. His past experiences with her were filled with moments when she couldn't keep her mouth shut. There seemed to exist a physical impossibility for her to be quiet around him unless he said something cruel to make her cry her silent tears.

One day he knew he would have to atone for all of the hateful bullying he'd committed. How? He didn't have the first clue. All he knew was bullies grew into men like his father and his father was the last person he wanted to become. He only hoped it wasn't too late, but part of him feared he was. Could a person ever really change? Or were they destined to be the same for the rest of their miserable existence? Not caring for where his thinking was going, he gulped the rest of the fire whiskey in his glass and reached for the bottle.

"So how do you suppose we fix this, Granger?"

"'Fix this'?"

"Yes, how do we get back to our…"

He remembered there were several other pairs of ears around the room that could be listening in. They didn't need the further complication of someone thinking they were completely mad and dragging them off to St. Mungo's. Even with a questionable clientele frequenting The Hog's Head, there could still be trouble. Draco lowered his voice.

"How do we get back home?"

With a quick flick of her wrist and a muttered word he didn't understand, Granger covered their immediate area in some sort of spell. Done carefully with her wand hardly leaving her pocket, it was possible that he was the only one in the pub who noticed. Trusting her spellwork, but still feeling quite paranoid, he scooted his chair closer to hers, leaning in like they were just a young couple on a date. No one would be too suspicious of whispers then, would they?

"Do you think we have to go back to the castle and try to go back through the Room of Requirement?"

Draco was at a complete loss. Unsure even where to start trying to fix the problem they were in, he hoped that she had more to offer in terms of ideas or even just hope. Hadn't she spent the last several years getting dragged into Potter's dangerous schemes? It didn't take much effort to understand she was the real brains behind all of it. Without Granger, who knows if the Dark Lord would've been defeated. Their world could've turned out quite different. Did everyone else understand that? Somehow he doubted the rest of their society understood fully her contribution. Sure, Potter cast the final curse, but she got him to that point by saving his arse more times than he knew.

"It was still broken when we left Professor Dumbledore. I can't imagine that it would've fixed itself again in such a short period of time. It took months after the Fiendfyre. I'm not sure that we can go back, Draco."

That was not what he wanted to hear. What could they do stuck more than thirty years in the past? Why would the Room of Requirement take them back that far? He was beginning to wish he'd never discovered the room. How much simpler would his life have been if he couldn't figure out a way to get his aunt and Greyback and the other incompetent Death Eaters into the castle that horrible night? Likely the Dark Lord would've killed him for his own incompetence, but that hardly sounded terrible. Maybe that would've been best all along.

"So we're just stuck here in the past, Granger? Stuck here with no way of going back?"

"I think so. Unless the Room of Requirement can fix itself again. That might be too much to hope for."

He sighed into his glass. They were utterly and completely fucked. If they couldn't get back to their own time, how were they going to survive? With no money, no right even to his name? He didn't want to consider all of the possibilities. Though also seeming defeated, at least Granger was a tiny bit more upbeat about it. Clearly she wasn't a stranger to hopeless circumstances. Her entire friendship with Potter was just one right after another.

"What were you saying right before the door reappeared on the wall? You wished you could know why your father…"

"Became a Death Eater. Why he did all of it. I said that I wanted to know my father when he was just a stupid boy."

"How old was your father in 1965?"

As he did the math in his head, he poured himself another glass. Did all of this come into being because of his wishes? He'd said he wanted to change everything that happened, everything that ruined his life and his parents' lives. Was it possible for the Room of Requirement to grant him such a wish? If he'd been asked before it happened to him, he was certain he wouldn't have believed it. And yet there he was sitting in The Hog's Head wearing a woolen jumper on a hot June afternoon with Hermione Granger in 1965. Never had he felt more powerless or more ignorant. He sighed.

"He was eleven."

"So you get to know your father when he was just a stupid little boy. The Room of Requirement made that happen."

"I'm sorry that you got caught up in all of this. I should've gone into the room alone. You shouldn't be here with me. I'm sorry, Hermione."

She rested her hand on top of his forearm. Involuntarily flinching because she touched his Dark Mark through the fabric of his sleeve, he hoped she didn't notice. If she did, she had enough grace not to mention it.

"It wasn't just you, Draco. I wished for something too."

"What?"

It was her turn to finish her glass in a single deep swallow. They would both be intoxicated soon if they didn't slow down their pace.

"I wished I could go back in time before I cast the spells to take away my parents' memories. Perhaps I should've been a little more specific. Thirty-two years before might have been a bit much."