Ideas of Perfection

Hermione entered the Ministry of Magic, excited about the day that was to follow. After two years working at the Department of Mysteries as what they labeled a “position one intern,” which meant that she would have the potential to become one of the highest ranked Unspeakables in the department, she was now officially an Unspeakable, if still in training. But it excited her to know that she was finally going to get to start doing work of her own, not just learning about the work of others. She was also excited to be meeting some of the other trainee Unspeakables, those she would be competing against for the highest positions in the department. It was rare to meet others while still an intern, as you had to undergo rigorous testing and challenges before truly becoming a part of the department.

Hermione had passed this two year period with flying colors, and would now be beginning her training in the time room, which excited her to no end. When she’d gotten her assignment a month earlier, she and Harry and Ron and the rest of the gang had gone out to celebrate. Only two new Unspeakables from each year were accepting into the time room training, by far the hardest and most lucrative. It was part of the department that was considered the most important and was making new breakthroughs every day. Only the best of the interns were selected, sometimes only one or none if those rising weren’t as good as in years past, and those highest in the department had started almost exclusively in that venue. She had no idea if anyone else from her year had been selected, but she didn’t care. It was just such an honor to be assigned to the time room that she didn’t care.

Getting off the elevator at the bottom floor, Hermione was the only one to exit into the hallway. She went through the security measures needed before entering the round room, walked clockwise, and went through the fourth door on her left. Home. Or, the time room. But it would probably be home for the next two years while she learned the intricacies of time and what they did there, and hopefully got to start her own project. After two years, which was a hard amount of time to fathom, though she knew it would pass more quickly than she had imagined, especially if she became engrossed in her work, she would spend an additional year rotating between the other departments to learn about them. At that point, she would apply to work on a certain subject, and at this point, where she worked wouldn’t determine her future rank in the department, but rather how well she did.

Just the thought of it all left her excited to no end. She entered the room but stopped inside the doorway as she had been instructed. A moment later, a distinguished looking man in fine cut robes approached her. She recognized him immediately as the head of the Department of Mysteries, a man she’d only met once, during her last round of interviews to be accepted into the time room as a trainee Unspeakable.

“Miss Granger, a pleasure to see you again,” he greeted, holding out a hand which Hermione accepted with a firm handshake.

“It’s pleasure to see you as well, sir,” she replied with a light smile.

He nodded. “Come then, our other trainee Unspeakable in the unit arrived just a moment ago. You should meet him, as I’m sure you two will be working together quite a lot. You are both quite exceptional.”

“By all means.”

Hermione followed the man farther into the room and through another doorway, wondering who the other Unspeakable would be. She wondered if it would be anyone she knew, but reminded herself that those who joined the program to become an Unspeakable weren’t often given that opportunity straight out of Hogwarts. They normally had to prove themselves in another line of work first. Only the students who truly stood out were accepted, with at least ten NEWTs, top grades, good recommendations, and a successful interview. Not only did Unspeakables need to have good background knowledge in all basic areas of magic, but they needed to be quick learners who could pick up easily on new disciplines, have high intelligence quotients with the abilities to grasp confusing concepts and make connections where others could not, and, because they were often privy to the latest breakthroughs in magic, must be able to defend themselves should anyone try to steal important information from them.

As soon as she entered the next room, her eyes fell upon the young man who sat patiently, if a bit nervously, in a chair. His legs were crossed and one hands rested on his knee while the other ran through his thick, dark hair. He looked about her age, maybe a year older, which surprised her, but made her realize that she probably knew him from Hogwarts. In fact, he did look vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t place his face. Well, she was sure he hadn’t been in Gryffindor, because she would know him. Probably a Ravenclaw. They were normally the studious types who wanted to be Unspeakables and such. He stood up upon sight of Hermione and approached, clearly able to tell that she must be a trainee as well.

The director approached him with Hermione at his side. “Blaise, I’d like you to meet Hermione Granger.” Hermione paused at his words. Blaise? Slytherin Blaise, who had abandoned his house mates to fight with the Order? “Hermione, this is Blaise Zabini. You two will be training together.”

Hermione accepted Blaise’s extended hand and shook it, studying his face. She could easily recognize him now, the boy she had known while at Hogwarts, but he certainly had changed a lot in the past two years. His features had changed and he had truly turned into a man. Hermione knew he would recognize her immediately because of her bushy hair, but wondered how much different she looked in other respects.

“Miss Granger and I are acquainted,” Blaise replied, never taking his eyes off her, and offering her a smirk identical to one she’d known Draco to use. Vaguely, she wondered if he had stolen it from the blonde or if Malfoy had adapted his signature look from a dark-haired friend who would eventually become an enemy. “We were at Hogwarts together.”

Clearly, the head of the department knew this. “Oh, yes, well, I didn’t realize you had been friends there.”

“Oh, we weren’t friends,” Blaise corrected him. “I was in Slytherin ...”

“And I was in Gryffindor,” Hermione finished, assuming it was enough of an explanation.

“Well, I hope you won’t have too much trouble working together.”

“I’m sure we’ve both left our childhood prejudices aside,” he said.

Hermione almost wanted to correct him just for daring to speak to her, but was happy to know that he wouldn’t be treating her with the disdain that Gryffindors normally got from Slytherins, even long after their Hogwarts days. She could still remember with perfect clarity the fight that Mr. Weasley and Lucius Malfoy had gotten into in Flourish & Blotts back before second year. In fact, he seemed just as mature as she could have hoped.

“Although, it might be a little hard for me,” he continued. “Seeing as how Hermione here was the only person keeping me from graduating at the top of the class.”

Hermione, who had been looking over at the director, looked back to Blaise. “Really?” she asked. “I was under the impression that Padma Patil was right after me.”

“She was,” Blaise answered. “Until seventh year. Let’s say it took me awhile to realize the importance of working hard and doing well, but I never could catch up to you. You beat everyone by a landslide.”

Hermione smiled. “Well, it looks like you didn’t do badly for yourself if you’re here now,” she commented, then realized the director was just watched them banter. “Er ... sorry, sir.”

“Perfectly fine,” he replied, actually looking amused. “Things will go much more smoothly if you two get on well. But I suppose you’re both curious about what work you’re going to begin. Come, you can meet the head of the Time research department and then your supervisor for the next two years.”

*************************************

The rest of Hermione’s day flew by as she became acquainted with her new workplace, as well as the other people in it. Everything seemed such a whirlwind that Hermione wondered how she could have spent two entire years as an “intern” and know so little about the actual work of the department. And she had been one of the highest ranking interns they took. How could anyone work for the Department of Mysteries and know less than she did now?

But Blaise seemed as taken aback as she did, clearly playing follow the leader and trying to remember his way around as well as the names of all the people they’d been introduced to. In fact, Blaise seemed very different from the Slytherins she’d known at Hogwarts. She hadn’t expected them all to be like Draco and Pansy, but there were certain traits that Slytherins, by definition, were supposed to embody, and frankly Blaise didn’t seem to fit into them that well. To be fair, he must be ambitious if he had gotten to begin his career as an Unspeakable in the Time room only two years out of Hogwarts. But Hermione was here, too, and she would always be a Gryffindor at heart (that sorting hat had certainly gotten told when it tried to stick her in boring old Ravenclaw!). She would just have to remember to keep an eye on Blaise until she got to know him and his true colors a bit better.

By the time she collapsed into her flat at eight o’clock that evening, Hermione was exhausted. Harry and Ron had wanted to take her out for dinner in honor of her first day in the Time room, but she’d had sense enough to tell them that she’d probably just want to fall into bed. She was infinitely grateful that she had decided to live alone after Hogwarts. Her living accommodations were perhaps not as nice as they could have been, but the fact that she could do whatever she wanted whenever she wanted without worrying about bothering a roommate was worth it. Not that she ever did much that would bother a roommate, unless staying up all hours of the night to do work was a bother.

Surprisingly enough, Padma Patil, who had joined the Order in seventh after Parvati had convinced her to, had propositioned her into becoming roommates. She had started a lackey job at the Ministry as well and thought they would probably be having similar lifestyles. Hermione, who had gotten to be pretty good friends with her, almost felt bad saying no, but knew that she would regret it, and would do better to live alone. Technically, she knew that she wouldn’t be a bother to Padma, but every time she had to stay up late to work or get up early, or every time she wanted to have someone over and just hang out when Padma was busy, she would feel bad about it, and end up worrying and fretting ... instead, they tried to meet for lunch at least once every couple of weeks.

Harry and Ron, on the other hand, had become flatmates straight out of Hogwarts. Harry had absolutely refused to go near the Dursley’s now that he was of legal age, and it didn’t hurt that no one was bothering him to since Voldemort was gone. Even if he wasn’t, Harry couldn’t have hidden away forever. In any case, Ron, as much as he loved his family, had decided he wanted to strike out on his own without having to answer to his mum if he came home late or didn’t come home at all. Hermione suspected that Harry was paying all the rent since Ron was still in Auror training, but she never asked about it. Money had always been a sensitive issue with Ron, and if Harry had managed to touch the subject lightly enough that Ron had conceded the issue, then Hermione wasn’t going to step in and ruin it. Besides, Harry was always insisting that he had plenty of money, and he would worry about it when and if the time came to worry about it. It wasn’t like he had no redeemable qualities or talents, or was that what Hermione thought?

So that subject had been lain to a rest, and Hermione didn’t even dare ask what he was actually doing now. It seemed that no one really knew what Harry was doing, not even Ron. If he did, he wasn’t telling Hermione, and she knew that he always spilled Harry’s secrets to her, just as she’d done for him. If you were lucky enough to get Harry to open up about something he didn’t want to tell, chances were he wasn’t going to make the same mistake again, and so they had to share what they got. So Hermione was pretty sure that Harry hadn’t told a single soul what he was doing, except perhaps Remus, whom he claimed to see on a regular basis, though Hermione hardly ever saw him and Ron confessed that he’d only known one time when Remus was in their flat.

It was a bit suspicious, and Hermione wondered if, in fact, Remus had something to do with Harry’s job. For almost an entire year after Hogwarts, she’d been convinced that Harry had decided he’d had it rough enough and taken to idling away his days while investing the money his parents’ had left him. She’d been so busy she didn’t have time to check that he wasn’t sleeping until noon every day and then wandering Diagon Alley all afternoon. The only way Ron knew that Harry clearly did have a job was the fact that he would often be gone before Ron in the mornings, and sometimes be hurrying to hide papers when Ron returned in the evening. In any case, Hermione was more surprised that he’d been able to keep his new occupation from the press, for they were far more prying than Hermione or Ron would ever be.

In any case, Hermione figured it was probably something a lot more exciting than her budding career as an Unspeakable, to Harry anyway. Working as an Unspeakable seemed pretty exciting to her, she had to admit. At least, it had before she and Blaise had been given identical stacks of papers and research notes to “look over” that evening, just as some introductory material to the research project they would be joining, a study of time turners and ways to improve them. All Hermione wanted to do was crawl into bed, but looking at the stack, she knew it would be hours before she laid her head down on a pillow. Picking up the pages on top, Hermione began scanning the text. It was going to a be a long night.

*************************************

When she arrived in the Time room the next morning, Hermione was pleasantly surprised to find that she had beaten Blaise in. Not that it truly mattered, but she didn’t want anyone to think that he was more dedicated to his work than her because he arrived earlier. She would have to keep note of that, and make sure to come at an appropriate time.

Since she was, after all, half an hour early, Hermione settled down at a table in the lounge area and pulled out some of the papers she’d been given the day before, scanning them as she sipped from a cup of strong, black coffee. She still hated the taste, but she’d learned not to grimace with every drink, and it was really the only thing that could give her the jolt she needed in the morning. The faithful tea drinker in her had disappeared when she had begun her internship at the Ministry, and nowadays she often wondered how she had made it through Hogwarts without the wonderful, caffeine-rich liquid.

She had only gotten through a page of reading when the door to the room was flung open, and in stepped Blaise. He looked good, she realized, too good for seven thirty in the morning. His dark hair still looked a bit damp and his eyes glowed as they scanned the room. He had a copy of the Daily Prophet folded and stuck under his arm and was carrying a thick briefcase which Hermione suspected was crammed with the same stack of papers she was now suffering over. Smiling at her, he approached the table and plopped into a chair across from Hermione.

“Good morning,” he said, nodding and unfolding the Daily Prophet to scan the front page.

Hermione wanted to grunt her reply; she hated being around people who were cheerful when she wasn’t. “Morning,” she replied, ever so slightly sulkily, then went back to her reading.

She tried to concentrate on what seemed like an important passage about the function of a time turner, but realized it was describing things she’d known since third year, when she’d used one herself to get to all her lessons. She wanted to just give up on the reading since she’d hardly learned anything new since the first article, which was probably the longest and most informative, but she couldn’t help but worry that there would be something important hidden somewhere else that she would need to know. Still, she couldn’t help but feel as though she were wasting her time. She had just continued to read on when she noticed a soft, musical sound radiating around the room. She looked up quickly, only to realize that it was Blaise, humming, as he read through the Daily Prophet.

“You’re one of those morning people, aren’t you?” she interrupted, a little bit surprised at her own boldness. He was, after all, still a Slytherin, if the nicest one she’d ever met.

Blaise’s concentration was broken and he looked up at her. “Morning person? Yes, I suppose I am. You’re not?” he asked.

“Do I look like I am?” Hermione asked, attempting a smile. “Of course, when I only get a few hours of sleep a night, I’m not really an any-time person ...” Blaise laughed at that. “...But on good days, I guess I’m more of an evening gal.”

There was silence between them for a moment in which they just looked at each other. “So, you didn’t finish the reading?” Blaise asked casually, breaking the silence and nodding down towards her papers.

Hermione flushed. She’d fallen asleep on the couch the previous night. She’d woken up at six with papers still clutched in her hand and half a pile that she hadn’t even looked at yet. But she hadn’t wanted anyone to know that, particularly not Blaise. Well, she supposed it would be worse if her superiors knew, but all sorts of worlds opened up when your biggest competitor had something on you.

“No, I finished,” she replied, trying to sound as casual as he did. “I’m just looking back over it, trying to refresh it in my mind. Why, did you not finish?” she asked quickly, then regretted it.

Blaise looked unaffected. “No, I finished it.”

The two studied each other for a moment, and then Hermione turned back to her reading and Blaise returned back to his paper. They sat like that for a few moments in complete silence until Blaise once again broke it.

“Actually, no, I didn’t,” he said. Hermione looked up and he was grinning sheepishly. “Fell asleep right next to my soup bowl. Guess I’m luck I didn’t fall asleep in it. Yesterday was exhausting.”

Hermione laughed, feeling more relaxed. “Oh, all right, you got me,” she said. “I didn’t finish either. But at least I was on the couch ...”

She paused as she spoke, the thought occurring to her that perhaps Blaise had only said this to get her to admit her mistake. It would be a very Slytherin thing to do, lie to get what he wanted, so he could use it against her later. But something about the way he was laughing with her, comfortable with her, told her that he was being genuine. She didn’t know why she was being so paranoid. It was just that she had worked so hard to get where she was and she didn’t want it ruined because she had been a poor judge of character.

She managed to get through another large chunk of the stack by the time they were to begin, and Hermione felt satisfied that she would be able to answer most any question they threw at her. She followed Blaise back to the time turner lab and they were set to a menial task, which was apparently to help them get a grasp on the function of the time turner. Hermione wanted to tell them that she had used one for an entire academic year and that she knew the function perfectly well, but thought it would be best to hold her tongue. She was sure she’d have the chance to show off her expertise in the matter at one point or another, and it wouldn’t do to look like she was trying to show off anyway. She had, she was loathe to admit, learned that lesson from Professor Snape.

When lunch rolled around, Hermione settled down into the lounge with a lunch she had brought with her and a good book. She figured that if she wasn’t going to have any time to read books of her choosing at night, since she presumed she would be busy with work for the Time room, then she could take a true break at lunch time and read then. She was a little less than amused, however, when Blaise entered, sat down in a chair across from her, and pulled out not only a lunch that he, too, had brought for himself, but the exact same book that she had been about to open up. It was a dissertation on very recent research that had been done to improve the strength of all different types of charms, including many that had proved useful during the war, like Shielding Charms. It even had an entire chapter talking about recent breakthroughs on improving the Fideleus Charm and the safety of both the protector and those protected by the charm. Hermione had almost considered going into Charms research, but had opted for the more exciting, more well-rounded Department of Ministries. In any case, she still liked to keep up with recent events in the field, but it was hardly a book she would expect to find someone else reading, especially not a someone whom she had never remembered as particularly talented in N.E.W.T. level Charms.

“You have good taste in reading,” Blaise remarked when he noticed Hermione staring at their identical reading choice.

“As do you,” she countered. “I’m curious, what made you want to read a book like this.”

Blaise looked slightly affronted. “You say that as if I were another species, Granger,” he said.

Hermione blushed. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.” Even though she had, in a way. “I just had never taken you for one particularly ... erm ... interesting in Charms.”

Blaise could tell exactly what she meant. “I think maybe you’re confusing me with Nott. How that boy made it into N.E.W.T. level Charms is beyond me. Not that it was particularly one of my strengths. I’ve always been interested in the field though, and I like to keep up on recent developments in a wide range of areas, whether I’d be qualified to do the research or not.”

Hermione was surprised to find that she was actually a bit impressed. She knew that many of the Slytherins were very ambitious and would do whatever it took to get what they wanted, but she didn’t think that what Blaise had said counted as that. He was working for the Department of Mysteries and if his goals was to become Head of the Department, then reading a book about Charms research that would be obsolete in five years didn’t seem very relevant to her. He seemed to be another intellectual like her and she almost didn’t want to admit it, but she was quite ecstatic to have found someone she might be able to discuss academic ideas with. She loved Harry and Ron to death, but she couldn’t really talk to them about what she read or studied. They wouldn’t have understood and even if they had tried to listen, she knew they wouldn’t really care either. And Padma may have been near the top of their class, but she was into politics now and had no times for academic matters. She vaguely wondered if Blaise would ever be interested in such discussions.

Settling into her seat, Hermione nibbled on her sandwich as she devoured the words from her book. Page after page was scanned and flipped until the lunch hour had passed and it was time to go back to work. Hermione found that she didn’t really mind. Shutting her book, she led Blaise back to their work. So maybe it wasn’t anything groundbreaking. Someday, she would have a book to write on her own discoveries. And maybe young students would read her work and hope to do the same thing someday.