Hermione watched them stay silent and her patience ran out.
They'd crossed through time specifically to kill her, and they couldn't even bother to explain why?
"Since you won't talk, don't blame me."
A cold glint flashed in her eyes. Her mental force surged outward and drove into all three minds at once, forcing its way through in search of memories.
Strange's face went white.
"Damn!"
"She's trying to perform Legilimency!"
He knew exactly how powerful her Legilimency was. If she succeeded, every secret they carried would be laid bare.
He let out a sharp cry, no time to think, and green light flared at his wrist. All three of them vanished into thin air.
The Legilimency probe found nothing.
Hermione narrowed her eyes. That emerald glow had a very specific signature. The Time Stone. No question.
So they'd run back to the future.
With her current strength, she couldn't stop the Time Stone. Not yet.
"Fast little escape, wasn't it."
She snorted.
Had her plan to use Loki to lure the Chitauri been exposed? But even if it had — was that really worth crossing through time to kill her over?
That was a massive overreaction.
There had to be something deeper going on.
Hermione pressed her fingers to her temple. Things were getting more complicated by the minute.
Still, she hadn't come away empty-handed.
It was rushed. She hadn't gotten everything. But she'd caught some key fragments before they slipped away.
And in those fragments, she'd seen a sphere. Mysterious. Unremarkable at first glance.
Strange had been intensely wary of it. Whatever it was, he'd been adamant that Hermione must never find out about it.
Which made her very interested.
If it had the future's "14 million" that nervous, it was definitely not a simple object.
"Looks like future me has gotten herself into even bigger trouble," Hermione murmured to herself.
She had a feeling that sphere was going to be the key to everything.
Maybe she should start looking for it.
A while later, Tony, Banner, Steve, and the others filtered back one by one.
They found Hermione standing exactly where they'd left her, expression strange, completely still, clearly turning something over in her mind. They exchanged glances and asked what had happened.
Hermione shook her head and gave them a bright, easy smile. "Nothing."
As if nothing had happened at all.
...
Half an hour later.
Everyone stood outside a kebab shop called Shawarma Palace.
"The super popular kebab place you were raving about," Hermione said, looking at the sign, then at Tony. "This one?"
Her expression was the kind reserved for people who had said something profoundly stupid.
Tony, still oblivious, nodded. "Yeah. What's wrong?"
Hermione shook her head. Not worth explaining. She pushed the door open and walked in. The others followed.
The inside was a wreck. The surrounding buildings were rubble; the whole block had taken a beating. Somehow, this little shop had survived intact, which was either miraculous or deeply unfair to everyone else.
The owner, Elvin, was crouched on the floor sweeping up debris. He heard the door and said, without looking up, "Not open today..."
Who comes in for kebabs right after an alien invasion?
Was his shawarma really that good?
Business had been so much worse since Hermione left...
He trailed off. He'd finally looked up.
Hermione was standing at the front of the group. His voice died mid-sentence and came back as something much warmer.
"Hermione? What are you doing here!"
Hermione smiled. "Hi, Uncle Elvin. Long time no see. I brought some friends for shawarma."
Tony finally caught up, pointing at Hermione, then at Elvin. "You two... know each other?"
"Yes," Hermione said. "I worked here part-time two years ago."
Elvin let out a big laugh. "So you're Hermione's friends! This meal is on me!"
"You have no idea how crazy this place got when she was working here. Customers lined up out the door just to eat the shawarma she rolled herself!"
He shook his head, wistful. "But then summer ended and you went back to school, and you never came back."
"If you were still here, business would be ten times what it is now. Easy."
The Avengers looked at each other. Something clicked. They all turned to Tony.
Tony's jaw dropped. He pointed at Hermione. "You're the Shawarma Girl?"
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Obviously."
The Hogwarts dining hall was no place for a person with functioning taste buds. With her particular Eastern palate, if she hadn't learned to cook at Hogwarts, she'd have starved.
She gave Tony a challenging look. "And you said I only know how to brew potions. Keep it up and I'll put ten tomatoes in your shawarma."
Tony's mouth twitched.
Being proven wrong was deeply awkward. He had no comeback.
The Avengers watched them bicker and started laughing.
Elvin was still somewhere in the warm glow of seeing Hermione again. It took him a moment to actually register the rest of the group.
He looked at the person who'd been talking to Hermione.
Wait.
That looked a lot like Tony Stark.
He looked closer.
That was Tony Stark.
Iron Man.
His gaze moved across the others. Apart from the mild-mannered, scholarly-looking one, weren't these the same people who'd been flying around fighting aliens not an hour ago?
The Avengers. That was what they were called.
Elvin rubbed his eyes. Thought he might be seeing things. Then he looked back at Hermione, and the shock in his expression was real.
She knew these people?
He couldn't quite make it fit. This was the same girl who'd worked in his shop for pocket money.
He stared at the assembled superheroes. A thought surfaced, slow and then all at once, and it was a frightening one.
The look he turned on Hermione shifted into something closer to alarm.
"Could it be..." His voice came out unsteady. "Hermione, are you... the Wizard Lady?"
If anyone had left the deepest impression in that battle, it was the small figure in a black robe who'd moved through the fight like something out of a myth, magic of every color blazing around her. But she'd been seen only from a distance, hood pulled low, face hidden. Everyone had pieced together only the basics from her voice and her build: young, female.
Hermione nodded. "Yes."
The Gryffindor uniform had become something of a symbol during the battle, so she'd changed into civilian clothes afterward. Otherwise she'd be stopped everywhere she went.
Simple white T-shirt. Light blue jeans. White canvas shoes. Her long hair loose over her shoulders, no makeup. She looked clean and easy and completely ordinary.
Nobody would look at her and think: that's the girl who wiped out an army of aliens with a gesture.
But she was standing here with the superheroes, and the Wizard Lady was conspicuously absent. Elvin wasn't slow. He could do the math.
He opened his mouth.
He didn't know what to say.
➤ Next: Reviving Coulson
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