Aug. 1st - Narrow Escape
Title: Narrow Escape
Author: 3am_moonlight
Crossover: BtVS / Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Rating: Gen / Teen (because of the end of the Gift)
Word Count: 1,136
Timeline: BtVS: Post-The Gift & HP: the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Disclaimer: The Buffyverse belongs to Joss and the Potterverse belongs to J.K.R.
Summary: Buffy's swan dive in the Gift somehow clashes with Harry and Hermione going back in time to rescue Sirius, causing Buffy to land in Scotland in 1994.Author's Note: Written for Day 01 of the 2019 August Fic-A-Day.
After saying goodbye to her little sister, Buffy ran the short distance to the edge of the tower and made a swan dive off of it. She was scared, she didn't want to die, but she had been cheating death for more than five years and she made the deliberate choice to give her own life for Dawn and everyone else. Buffy was a Slayer and that meant she was always going to have a violent end, but by choosing to die tonight, she got to save everyone one last time.
She briefly closed her eyes as the swirling portal rushed closer but reopened them just before she hit the outer edges of it. A part of her mind made note of how pretty the colors were, but most of her concentration was on what would be the last few seconds of her life.
About half-way through the portal, the colors changed from white, blue, and pinkish-purple to gold and white, and she got the distinct feeling of being flipped around and then pulled backward through a whirlwind rather than falling down. It was an odd but not entirely uncomfortable feeling.
The next thing she knew she was standing much too close to two other people without even realizing she'd landed on a flat surface. A thin golden chain was suddenly digging into her neck and by the looks of it the necks of the two other people. Beyond them was a large wooden door and beyond that, she saw pale sunlight. Another quick look around revealed them to be standing in what seemed to be a hallway of a very old stone building.
One of the other two people turned out to be a bushy-haired brunette with cognac-colored eyes who seemed to be in her early teens. The other was a short boy about the same age with black messy hair and a couple of very green eyes behind black glasses. Both of them looked as startled as she felt, but the girl quickly regained her senses and dragged both of them across the hall and into a storage closet. All three of them tried to avoid the buckets and mops and other cleaning supplies while trying to find somewhere at least semi-comfortable to stand.
After the girl managed to close the door behind them she removed the chain from around both of their necks before collecting the chain and dropping what looked like an hourglass pendant under her shirt. Buffy instinctively used one hand to rub her neck where it had dug in even more as they moved from the hallway and into their new hiding place. Meanwhile, the boy had found his voice.
"Hermione? What happened?" And in what seemed like more of an afterthought, he asked: "And who is she?"
Looking at the two teenagers Buffy decided she was the adult there and should take charge of the situation, or something. Or at the very least figure out what happened since she was relatively certain they were not in Sunnydale anymore or even California. It didn't feel like a Hell dimension, but there was a lot of ambient magic everywhere. She was also close enough to her two companions to know they were magical as well, but neither gave off a vibe of evilness so she decided to run with it and not think about her own attempted suicide to save Dawn.
"My name is Buffy," she introduced herself into the semi-darkness. "Who are you two, and where are we?" Easing into it would hopefully work. The little room wasn't entirely dark, at least not to her, but she was guessing the others were probably not able to see much of anything.
"My name is Hermione," the girl promptly introduced herself, "and this is Harry."
The newly named Harry continued, "We're at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."
The Slayer blinked a couple of times. "Come again?" She had excellent hearing, but that couldn't be right.
Harry repeated his answer, and then added: "It's located in the Scottish Highlands." So she did hear him right. Apparently, Sunnydale wasn't the only place with weird stuff happening.
But then he lost interest in Buffy and began asking his friend questions instead. Which caused her to launch into an explanation about using something called a Time-Turner to attend extra classes during the school year. Buffy smiled to herself in the darkness, Willow would've loved the ability to attend more classes. Buffy herself would've loved having it so she could more easily be both the girl and the Slayer. A tiny little hourglass and she would've been able to both spend more time with her sister and friends and still be able to do her duty and slay the monsters.
Then Hermione began talking about someone named Dumbledore, who had apparently given her vague permission to abuse her privilege with the Time-Turner to save someone named Serious Black. Mucho weirdness, but they did seem to be in the Land of Tweed. Or at least, adjacent to the Land of Tweed.
Then she heard several sets of footsteps and some scuffling and muffled voices. A little while later so did the teenagers.
"Are you saying we're both in this cupboard hiding, and out there sneaking out under the Cloak?"
"Yes," Hermione replied. "I believe we're on our way to Hagrid's. It sounds like no more than three people and we're walking slowly because we're under the Invisibility Cloak." More nifty magical stuff, straight out of some fantastical movie.
The teens kept talking as they seemed to have forgotten she was even there. They kept going back and forth trying to figure out what this Dumbledore person wanted them to do. Which eventually turned out to be saving a mythological creature from having its head cut off for something a misbehaving student had made it do. Interrupting with a few questions along the way had been slightly entertaining when both of them had jumped a little and squeaked.
Flimsy, mostly non-existent plan in place, they snuck out into the deserted entranceway and down the stone steps on the other side. It was getting dark and a forest on the other side of the large lawn was turning gold in the distance. Sneaking around the side of the building, hurrying over a vegetable garden, they went behind several greenhouses where the kids took a quick break while Buffy carefully looked inside to make sure no one was there, and then they made a run for the forest.
She still didn't know what happened or how the portal made her land in a magical school in Scotland, but it seemed like she was going to team up with two teenagers to help an escaped prisoner escape again on a mythological bird whom they needed to save first from getting executed.