This story is a result of a very nice PM from an incredibly sweet person who complimented me on my writing :3

So therefore, this story is dedicated completely to AshwoodDraven88 in hopes of her finding a better boyfriend than that toss pot :)

Read, enjoy and please don't forget to review!

Harry sat down heavily on the chunk of rock.

It seemed to be a part of the Teachers' table, the one that until recently had sat at the head of the Great Hall.

Harry's head was swimming, the place was in tatters. His head ached as an aftermath of his 'death'. Ron was with his family - none of them were celebrating. Hermione was with Ron, fully accepted into the family as Ron's girlfriend. Voldemort was finally gone, Harry's quest in life - his duty - was complete. He was now 'The Saviour of the Wizarding World'.

But Fred, Fred was gone. So was Remus and Tonks. Even little Colin Creevey was dead.

Everyone - his parents, Sirius, Dumbledore, Snape, Cedric - all dead at the hands or orders of the Dark Lord.

And Harry hated it.

The good guys always win, yes that's true, but at a price that stories never seemed to include. They all died for the cause - The Greater Good - and it made Harry feel sick to even contemplate the fact he had lived through it all in spite of everything.

Harry was a survivor of a war he had hoped to stop and it gave him a heavy feeling of horridness in his gut. He should be in a pub somewhere drinking and celebrating but he was in the abandoned Great Hall mourning for what shouldn't have been. He felt so broken, so useless and so depressed. Thinking of the safety that the Wizarding World was now able to feel didn't make him feel anyway better; it made him feel worse. Worse that he hadn't secured a victory for the Good Side before everyone had been brutally murdered or changed beyond comprehension.

If only Voldemort had died before he had become the darkest wizard to grace the world. If only someone went back in time to kill him before he had killed almost everyone Harry held dear. If only...

-oOo-

Harry sat down at his desk, a desk marred with sheets of paper and scorch marks that were a result of his increasingly unstable temper. Harry knew he was obsessed. He knew that it was an unhealthy reason that had driven him to becoming an Unspeakable.

He had heard that the first step towards curing a problem is to admit that you have one and Harry had. He had a problem, he was obsessed since it had occurred to him realistically those three years ago back in the Great Hall, after that defeat of his nemesis Voldemort. He wanted to turn back time, turn it back so that he could murder the murderer and save the world in an entirely roundabout and secretive way.

He looked up at the sound of a door to see Zacharias Smith, his fellow Unspeakable enter the room. Smith wasn't someone Harry interacted with voluntarily if he could help it but Smith had an annoying tendency to seek Harry out for no apparent reason.

Harry didn't like the man at all. He hadn't forgotten his aloof and snide manner during their DA meetings and he hadn't forgotten the way he eyed Ginny like she was a piece of meat. Still he tolerated him with politeness and - unless he could pull an excuse out of a hat - he accepted the man's invitations for a drink.

The invitations that had become increasingly often. Smith had only been turned down two days ago in favour of helping Kingsley with his Aurors and he was already back with a request.

"Harry!" Smith said beaming at the dark haired man. "I was wondering if you would like to have some dinner with me? I've made a reservation at Lumos." Harry looked scandalized, "Lumos is a gay bar, Smith!" He bellowed at the man rather scarily and his molten green eyes forced the man to back up a step.

The man turned white, "Potter, you and I both know there is no use in pussyfooting around. We're both men now, not the boys we once were."

Harry stood up, his headache reaching astronomical proportions. "Precisely, Smith. We are both men. I don't know about you but I do not swing that way!"

If Zacharias was white before he was practically colourless now. His extravagantly coiffed hair was wilting and washed out looking. "You aren't gay?" he asked hoarsely. He took a step back and sat trembling on a box of files. He had made the biggest fool of himself. The man he had been lusting after since the moment they had started with the DA - back in that dingy hovel The Hog's Head. Harry was the man who had made him realize he was gay.

Harry was also the one who he had childishly mocked since he had had a crush on him. Harry the completely straight man who he had just invited on a date to a gay bar.

Harry was taking pity on him now. "Uh no Smith, I'm with Ginny."

The man blinked rapidly, trying desperately to quell the need for tears that had spontaneously arisen. "Oh well, I'll see you around, Potter." And he left. With tears glinting in his eyes and his heart broken. He had finally accepted what he had shirked since he had met Harry face to face at DA. He was completely in love with Harry James Potter. A sad unrequited love that would haunt him until the end of his days.

Harry let him go, thinking that it was ironic two people had walked away from a date with him saying "See you around". Although he had wanted to go on that date with Cho, any sort of romantic outings with Zacharias Smith were definitely a negative. He sighed tiredly and went back to his desk, flicking through an enormous book that proclaimed to be an complete encyclopaedia on Time-Travel and it's varying forms.

The entire book was dry and filled with fluffed up nonsense. Harry had worked out a few theories from between the fluff and had a few new ideas that might just work out. If he ever got finished with the experiments on magically changing the curses on cursed objects to the opposite. It was a thankless task, there was no real reason for doing it but what the Minister said needed to be done had to be done.

He was researching Time-Travel outside his working hours, heck he was researching it when he wasn't working or sleeping. Even during the time Hermione banished his books from his reach he mulled over ideas, forming new ones and tinkering with failed ones.

Ron thought he was barmy; he and Ron hadn't spoken properly in months. He was far too preoccupied with his need to kill Voldemort when the freak was a kid to pay attention to his mates. Even his relationship with Ginny was suffering. She was admittedly a Professional Quidditch Player and travelling with the Holyhead Harpies a lot of the time but even so, he should really make an effort when he did see her.

He ran a hand through his hair - probably the thousandth time he had that day - and read blearily though the chapter on the mechanics of Time-Travel. Hermione was expecting him for dinner at eight; he had two hours until then.

-oOo-

Harry looked into the mirror in Ron and Hermione's bathroom.

His trademark messy, uncontrollable hair was worse than it usually was. His bright green eyes were weary, hours in front of his books leaving them red, itchy and strained. His glasses were sitting crookedly on his nose, something that happened five minutes after he fixed them without fail. His face was prematurely lined, reminding him of Lupin with a sharp pang of sadness. If only he could get him back.

He splashed a little water on his face and studied the mirror once more. His face was tanned from hours spent helping Aurors on their wild adventures out foreign. Harry was always the one who went out foreign with the Auror Department. Just as he was the only one who they turned to for back-up.

Even amongst the elite Aurors Harry outshone them. His duelling skills were unrivalled even by those of Dumbledore - should the man be alive. Kingsley had begged him to request a transferral from Unspeakable to Auror but so far his pleading was ignored. Harry wanted to turn back time and the Department of Mysteries was the place to find out how.

He sighed, straightened his glasses and wandered back to Ron and Hermione's kitchen.

His two best friends had married each other at the age of nineteen. Harry couldn't find any fault with the idea even though they were young. They had known each other for eight years at the time so they knew the quirks of the other and could accept it.

They were twenty now. How fast time had passed.

They looked up from a letter as Harry entered, suspiciously stopping their conversation. Ron folded the letter and shoved it in his pocket with a strained smile at Harry. They weren't really best friends any more, Harry realized with a growing feeling of horror. Harry had pushed them out, leaving only his obsession and a mutual feeling of love towards the man and his wife.

Hermione hurriedly began to dish out the dinner she had made, the mouthwatering scent reminding Harry like a smack in the face that he hadn't eaten since breakfast two days previous. She had taken lessons from Mrs Weasley and was now an accomplished cook, just like her mother-in-law.

"Harry," she said warmly. "Take a seat, I've made a chicken casserole. Ron adores it, more than he does me!" Harry flicked a glance at Ron, watching him stare at Hermione with an expression that showed he was hopelessly in love with the woman standing mere feet away from him.

Harry sat and grinned at them. It was so long since he had smiled that he wasn't sure his face would hold the strain. "Hey Ron, fancy a game of chess later?" he said, the smile was hurting his cheeks but he relished the pain. It meant he was moving forward. Ron's head whipped around, goggling at Harry with amazement. He suddenly smiled back and everything was as it had been when they were at school and Harry had his best friend. It felt great, the warm feeling spreading through his chest loosening a knot of hopelessness that Harry hadn't even realized was there.

They tucked in to their meal; chattering more freely that they had since before the war. Harry watched his friends covertly as the meal went on. He hadn't witnessed their happiness together in a very long time.

-oOo-

He had done it! Finally finished with the device that would bring him back to kill Tom Marvolo Riddle.

And it was all because he had made up with his friends and stopped being so taken with the idea. He had still been obsessed, but no way as bad as he had been before the thing was complete.

He could turn back years, finally a little tinkering with your basic time turner and he was ready to go!

Hermione wouldn't be told - Ron either. Ginny, well he would leave a letter for her back at the house encase he didn't come back for some reason. All he had to do was a little research on dates and he would be perfectly fine. The time turner - his upgraded one - would be able to take him back in time and then forward to present day.

He was going to have his parents back! And Fred, Sirius, Remus, Tonks, Dumbledore - heck even Snape! He wondered what it would be like to be held by his mother. What playing Quidditch with his Dad would be like? Whether Sirius would get married and then Harry could have a perfectly nice cousin. Unlike Dudley, although Harry hadn't heard from him since before The Battle of Hogwarts.

For a few moments before he left, he paused in his preparations. This was it and he was beginning to feel a niggling doubt at the back of his mind. What if it all went wrong? What happens if another evil wizard rises to take Voldemort's place? What if Harry, facing the young Tom Riddle couldn't pluck up enough blackness in his soul to finally kill someone? Kill a child in cold blood?

He shook the doubts away - he could do this. Voldemort had started in Hogwarts in 1938. So if Harry went back to 1935 and killed the boy, Dumbledore won't have visited him yet and he wouldn't know he was a wizard.

It was 2001. Harry needed to go back sixty-six years. Back to when Voldemort was a boy of only nine years. Harry hated planning the end of a boy who had had no chance to live but that was the way of things. If he went back and killed him there would be a lot less evil in the world. He took a deep breath, he was trying to convince himself to go. It was something he had worked so hard at, he would hate if he didn't go through with it because of a few jittery nerves suddenly popping up from nowhere.

Maybe he would go and see his mother first, see how she was when she was young and carefree - something Harry had never had the luxury of. With that in mind, he made his way to the Atrium at the Ministry and proceeded to apparate home.

-oOo-

Ginny was there. Sitting on the couch wearing one of his t-shirts and her pyjama shorts.

"Gin?" he said cautiously. He hadn't been expecting her back for quite some time, she was supposed to be touring somewhere in Norway just then. He sat his wand on the dresser and moved towards her.

Ginny stood up and stalked towards him. It was the exaggerated hip sway he didn't understand, Ginny in all his years knowing her had never done that. "Harry," she practically purred, "Come make love to me."

She looked him in the eyes then, just like she did every time she hinted towards them getting involved. She took out her wand, the darkness in the sitting room made everything seem surreal. A tingle went up his spine and Ginny continued to take off his robes and shirt. He suddenly needed to kiss her more than anything else. "Gin," he murmured and pulled her mouth up to his.

The kiss was harsh, passionate and pulled Harry in until he felt like he was drowning in her mouth. It was nothing like the way his Ginny usually kissed but it felt nice. Arousing.

He pushed his hands into her hair as they practically grappled one another for dominance. It was rough, terribly rough but in a strange way it was exciting. It felt wrong, like he wasn't kissing Ginny at all. But he opened his eyes and met hers, her warm brown eyes that were alive with a strange fire he hadn't seen in them before.

Harry heard a slight click, one that was so like the way Ginny's knee cracked that it dispelled all his doubts about this actually being his darling. She grabbed him again, kissing and nipping at his lips before drowning him again with her mouth. It was a deep kiss, slower than the frantic pace he had been going at. A kiss that spoke of love in massive volumes.

There was a sharp intake of breath from his right and he wasn't bothered to look and see Hermione or Ron after catching him and Ginny kissing yet again.

He kept kissing her for a long minute, even as their unwanted observer came forward and pulled at him. He couldn't hear anything over the roaring buzzing silence. It seemed someone had cast muffliato on him!

Ginny drew a breath through her nose - doubtlessly having heard her brother or sister-in-law. She felt different however. Her mouth became wider, lips thinner, her hair was short. She also grew so Harry was the shorter one.

He tried to pull back forcing her away from him, but her muscular arms knotted in the effort of holding him against her mouth - against her chest. Her chest that lacked breasts.

Harry - his mind blown by the thought - realized it wasn't a Ginny he was kissing, it wasn't even a she. He fully concluded that he was kissing a man. And so his struggles turned desperate, frantic in their need to escape the embrace of the male stranger now kissing him.

Harry was useless without his wand, it was where he had placed it on the dresser.

The man yelped, a result of a stinging hex thrown by the person who had finally thought of using magic against the man instead of trying brute force. Merlin bless Ron or Hermione or whoever it was!

He pulled away finally, gagging and retching. It was a good job he hadn't eaten yet. He bent double, clutching his stomach as the dry heaves turned to sobs. Why did some freaky man have to fancy him enough to get Ginny's hair so they could kiss him?

There were arms falling over his shoulders, drawing him gently forward. Harry pushed away blindly and raised his head to see who it was.

Ginny.

Really Ginny this time, he'd recognize that look in her eyes anywhere.

Nevertheless he had been fooled once that night, he wouldn't be again. "What tattoo does Ron have?" he asked Ginny.

She smiled, that endearing smile that dimpled her cheeks and made her face soften dramatically. She understood the need for secrecy on the subject seemingly so she leaned forward and whispered so the other person in the room had no chance of hearing what she was saying.

"Ron has a pygmy puff - but I didn't say where."

His remembrance of the comment made her smile sadly. Harry crawled forward and dumped himself in her arms, harsh breaths like sobs still making their way through his mouth.

Ginny held him and did her best to comfort the man she had loved since she was ten. It was a long time - dare she say it - almost an obsession for a while but still she realized at the end of the day, she loved Harry completely and unchangingly, always...

Harry stood finally, looking down at the glaring, bound body of Zacharias Smith. Oh how he loathed that man.

He smirked - almost evilly - and reached down and dragged the man into an upright position. With a final burning glance towards Ginny, he apparated to the Ministry to hand over his co-worker to Kingsley.

-oOo-

Ginny was in bed when Harry finally got back.

He paused at her side of the bed and dropped a kiss onto her forehead, "Why are you back early, Gin?"

"Smith sent me a letter saying you wanted to see me tonight."

Harry laughed uneasily, "I still don't know how he got in through my wards."

Ginny chuckled warmly, gazing at her boyfriend with a loving, slightly exasperated face. "Harry dear, don't you remember the project he came over to try out with you? The one that destroyed the entire sitting room?"

The dawning realization on Harry's face was adorable. She couldn't believe how childlike he still was despite the notorious reputation of Unspeakables.

Harry slipped in between the sheets on his side of the bed, "Oh yeah," he said shaking his head slightly, " Bloody git."

He leant in to share a kiss with Ginny and tension that he hadn't known about melted away.

She kissed like you were the only person in the world. All passion but gentle. Her kissing was just like her fiery but gentle, loving. He sighed happily and they relaxed together, bodies moulding around each other.

She cuddled as close as she could get and interwove their limbs together.

"I love you, Gin." Harry said sleepily just as his consciousness was fading.

"I love you too, Harry." She replied, almost shocked that she meant it completely.

With Harry and her, the feeling that they were only together because it was expected was strong. She realized, clamped in his arms, that she wasn't with him because of some unofficial or unspoken organized relationship. She was with him because he was Harry James Potter, the courageous and daring-to-the-point-of-stupidity Unspeakable. A Gryffindor through and through. He was a closet romantic and she had often awoken to roses or a breakfast in bed with toast that was charmed to have 'I Heart You' toasted darker on to them. She loved him because of him, not because he was The-Boy-Who-Lived or some such nonsense.

He was her Harry.