This story is Non-Deathly Hallows Compliant and Contains the Female Harry, also contains mature content and/or language. Viewer discretion is advised.
Summary:
Harry Potter has just died. The end. Not the ending everyone desired, but that's that—right? It would've been if some nosy spectator hadn't decided otherwise. Guess it's back to Hogwarts for Harry again, with just a few minor changes that is. Like gender. And time periods… Not to mention murderous, megalomaniac, teenage dark wizards.
Determined to succeed this time around, Harry seeks justice and truth, but who said that the truth would be reassuring? Fifty year old secrets, lies and scandals will be unearthed, but what of the truth about himself? Maybe darkness didn't lurk in just the obvious.
Harry will realize that not everything is as it seems, and that maybe the end shouldn't be hoping for a new beginning.
Disclaimer: It's not mine.
Edit. : Monday, January 16, 2012.
The End
Prologue
"This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."
—Winston Churchill.
Usually when you're evil, you're evil to the core. Well, that's what Harry Potter had thought anyways.
It was just the good and bad for him; light and dark, black and white. There wasn't a shade of grey, not one that anyone acknowledged that is.
If you had "darkness" in you, you were automatically the enemy and taken down as such. If you appeared to do "good", no one would see much further.
Harry grew up with the world, and it's faults, burdened upon his shoulders, as the Boy-Who-Lived, as the one who survived. He was the Saviour. A Child of Prophecy. The Chosen One.
And unfortunately, no one was about to let him forget.
"You'll be honoured in death"
"You're fighting for the greater good"
"The world is counting on you."
"You were chosen."
People often told him how proud they were, how great he was, and what a deed he was doing for everyone, but was it worth it to be their saviour?
Was it worth the praise? The criticism?
The love? The hate?
The money? The charity?
The fame? The scandals?
What was it really worth?
A death? Or two? Maybe five? Twenty? Any?
Truthfully speaking, it really didn't matter if it was worth anything at all—simply because no one truly cared.
Ironic, isn't it? While the world expects Harry Potter unravel its solution and bring salvation, it would never reciprocate and listen what he had to say.
They would hear they wished. See what they willed. Remember what they wanted. And understood only what was evident.
And there the evidence was, the cold, hard truth, he was their saviour and he failed to save.
May 2nd, 1998
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Great Hall
Harry was sweating profoundly, gripping his holly wand with moist hands, trying to force away the overbearing pressure, from the expectations of the spectators and the pounding curse itself.
They're treating it like a show, like it's all some scene from a life-depraving soap opera. Is it a good show? Exciting? Terrifying? Dramatic? Too close to reality for comfort?
His arm ached from attempting to hold his own against the harsh green light that was slowly, but surely advancing foreword.
Green. Bright green. Bright, bright, bright. Green, green, green. Green. —I have green eyes, green like my mother's eyes. Wonder if this green is like my eyes?
Harry gritted his teeth from the numbing pain on his right arm, clenching even harder on the wand to prevent it from slipping out of his clammy grasp. The sweat was making it exceedingly hard.
It's like holding a girl's hand for the first time. Who was my first, again? Cho? Ginny? ...Hermione?
His knuckles were bone-white from his grip; nails digging further into his palm and letting red, red blood trickle down his pale forearm.
Why does it hurt so good? Kill so perfectly? —Odd. Don't remember masochism being my thing since, well, NEVER.
Harry looked determined on the outside, green eyes blazing along with the offending curse. Yet internally, he was in a lucid state, as if he was just like the rest, like he was also just a spectator.
Is this a dream? Am I dreaming? Nightmare? Maybe?
The blue glimmer flowing steadily from his wand fluctuated a bit, letting the green light to slowly start to overcome it, inching closer than what was comfortable. A small flame of doubt lit within Harry.
I'm supposed to win, right? I have to win. —Will I win?
He could feel the air crackle with magic; it was somber, it was miserable, it was uncomfortably tense, but it was also angrily powerful. The power stabbed his insides in a pleasant way, warming his magical core. You could almost physically see his lighter aura clashed dangerously with his opponent's, sparking the air.
I see fireworks…
He wasn't in the right mind. He wondered if he had ever been in the right mind.
I agreed to die, for God's sake! Even more than once, too...
He couldn't even pay attention to what was occurring before him. It was as if he was an outsider to his own duel. But he knew he couldn't afford a loss because of the numbing sorrow eating away at his already questionable sanity.
I got to snap out of it! Out, out, out? I wonder if— No. Focus.
Through his peripheral vision, he could see that the Great Hall was piled with his fallen schoolmates, both those who fought with the good and the evil, but noticeably more of his own friends lay in bloodied heaps.
His tear ducts stung, but he had already cried enough in the past few hours that his eyes seemed to refuse to let anymore water out. So, he steeled his resolve and faced his opponent head on with all of his strength, jaw clenched and eyes set.
I'll be their brave little soldier. I will do it for them. I promised to succeed.
•••••••
Glaring into the red eyes of his greatest adversary and deadliest opponent, Lord Voldemort, Harry knew that it was now or never.
The tall, pale, serpentine man, the Lord Voldemort, held his long yew wand, the brother to Harry's holly, in his right hand while clenching the Elder Wand in his left. A bright light, peculiarly green like Harry's eyes, was pushing its way towards the boy from his pale wand, being stopped by just a glimmer blue.
He was sure of his win, as the boy looked positively lost with his dazed green eyes, but the self-assured twist to his lip-less mouth soon fell into an, almost, feral snarl.
The glimmer of blue light spontaneously sparked powerfully from his opponent's wand and began to grow, eating away at his own curse, which had once been dominating.
As blue grew, green faded, inching a bit too close than that of Voldemort's liking. His scowl deepened further, eyes flashing viciously and more severely.
The green light escalated into double it's luminosity, faint wisps of both faint greys and black intertwining with the darkened green, and thrashed forward violently.
The two spells were now equally strong, each assaulting the other ruthlessly at the middle, but the Avada Kedavra seemed to grow stronger with Voldemort's hatred, just as Harry's Expelliarmus was decidedly dimming.
Suddenly, the bright blue light seemed to swiftly devour itself and withdraw into the holly wand, causing the green to strike fast and engulf the surroundings in a blinding light.
As the light faded, Harry could be seen, slowly falling to the ground.
It was as if everything was played on slow motion. Dramatics were in order.
The cold glimmer of triumph flashing from Voldemort's snake-like crimson eyes as the life in Harry's vibrant green ones faded into oblivion. Cold, menacing, high-pitched laughter echoed throughout the once Great Hall. Voldemort cackled like there was no tomorrow and stood victoriously above Harry Potter's dead carcass.
He lifted his wand; a new power had filled him, the power of the true Master of the Elder Wand. He laughed harder and more emotionlessly than before, almost bringing impossible tears to his icy red eyes.
It was true when people say, "Nothing shows a man's character more than what he laughs."
The people in the Hall visibly shuddered.
Specific Date Unknown
Somewhere in between the sheets of Time and Fate
Unknown Location
Harry awoke, groggy and tired. Blinking slowly a few times, he observed his surroundings. There was nothing, a desolate wasteland of nothingness. There was no ground or sky, just pale gray mist swirling everywhere.
Then he remembered that he had died. He remembered taunting laughter. But that was all.
Other than a few flashes of pale skin and scarlet eyes, he remembered little to anything.
Who am I? What am I? Where am I? What just happened?
Sinking to the floor and covering his face with his hands, he breathed in and sighed deeply. Only to feel the tingling feeling of his cold breath passing through his hand, raising the hair on his neck.
Looking down at his hands, he saw pale skin like before, but now instead of its normal rosy hue, he saw a translucent grey, or rather he saw through it.
His jaw just dropped.
It all came back, the green curse, Voldemort's laughter, the Great Hall, his own magic devouring itself; all of it.
Am I dead? I can't be dead! This is not happening! Shit! Shit! Shit! I can't be! There isn't a train station or anything! And Dumbledore isn't here! And, and, and— ...Am I a wizard or not?
Quickly reaching in his robe and taking out his wand from the pocket he usually kept it in, seeing that it wasn't currently lying near him, he whispered desperately.
"Point Me."
The wand spun frantically around his palm, his disturbingly see-through palm, and seemed confused as it kept pointing at random directions, unable to find the North.
Refusing the urge to snap the wand into two, Harry sighed exasperatedly and tucked it back into its place inside his robes.
He then began frantically pacing back and forth; clenching his eyes shut tight before flashing them open as if it would somehow break the spell. His very own spell of death.
Then, he abruptly stopped, choosing to turn towards his left and sprinting off into the mist.
•••••••
He couldn't hear a thing, not even the sound of his breath, the pattering of his feet, not even the beat of his own heart.
He had been running for what he had estimated to be hours.
Something isn't right. There isn't anything here. Not the murmuring of the dead, not a specter wandering, and not even any sort of scenery, other than the indistinct grey mist. —I'm fucked.
At the thought, there was a large, unexpected "CRACK!" from behind him, successfully jolting him internally and making him jump up in shock.
Spinning around to meet the sound, and almost tripping over his feet, he instinctively reached for his wand in his robes, only to find nothing there.
After glancing around, looking for the wand and wondering where he had lost it, he finally looked upward angrily, where he found himself staring at an androgynous figure, which was too ethereal to be described as beautiful.
Its long hair was fine and a delicate hue of silver, with matching pale eyes.
The being had pale skin pigmented like Harry's own translucent complexion, but like its eyes and hair, it seemed to glow strangely silver.
Its face was not beautiful, not even pretty, but something of indescribable allure. It was otherworldly and scared Harry just a bit.
"Are you looking for this, child?" The being spoke, its voice a surprising husky tone rather than melodious.
In its raised hand, it held a wooden wand that seemed to dimly glow through the gloomy grey mist.
Looking disbelievingly at the wand and at the being, before checking his pockets once more, Harry pointed an accusing finger at the being.
"Who are you? What do you want? When did you steal my wand? Where am I? Why am I here?" Harry gruffly questioned, his voice cracking frequently.
"Child, you ask so many questions and I have so little time. All you need to know is that I am Fate, and you are dead."
"What?"
"I believe that I had said you were—"
"No! That's impossible! I couldn't have died!" Harry frantically interrupted, "I had promised my friends that I would fulfill their dreams! You're a liar! Liar! Lia—"
"It seems that you've broken your promise. I am not the liar in this instance, for that would be you," Fate's indifferent voice interrupted, delivering the statement, not cruelly, but matter-of-factly.
He visibly crumbled, both on the outside and on the inside.
"I, I, I—"
"You, in particular, are here because neither the Living nor Dead can accept you. You were prophesized to save all, but you failed and left many rather—unsatisfied. You are to be given one more chance. One last chance. You are the Saviour, no?"
"I don't know anymore. I just don't know. I can't remember why I fought so hard if not even my own magic would believe in me at the end. It had just decided to give up. It was tired, not from exhaustion or over-use but from believing in me. It doesn't matter who I am or who I was," Harry said.
Fate smiled humourlessly, "You will remember. Remember it, and change all that was in the past."
With a wave of hand, a beautifully gold-framed mirror appeared, spun from the nothingness. Images flickered slowly, gradually becoming faster. Harry could see glimpses of events and memories he had lived through in the rapidly moving pictures.
His parents' death. His time beneath the cupboard. Dudley and the Harry Huntings. First words of Parseltongue. Hogwart's letter arriving. His friends. His "family". Voldemort. Voldemort. Voldemort.
They just kept going and going and going, round and round and round, making Harry's head feel disoriented and ache.
Abruptly, they stopped at the destined time.
Harry stood by a mirror, watching his own death replay itself.
Anger begins to boil, but beneath it a helplessness as he watches himself die.
Seeing his own being thrown back into the pile of dead friends and foes causes more anger to churn in the pits of his stomach than seeing his own death.
My friends. My family. I'm sorry.
The Weasley family, all red-headed, was thrown to one side, ripped apart. You couldn't tell which body was whose.
He could see the once beautiful Ginny, so full of life, now dismembered like a broken porcelain doll. Her head sat there staring, as blood dripped from her eyes, nose and ears.
A tall boy lay a few feet from that pile. He was ripped open and disemboweled, as well as headless. He could only guess whom it was judging his singled out body from the Weasley family. His best mate, brother and one of the most wanted Undesirables, Ron.
Teeth sank into his bottom lip, almost drawing blood. His fists clenched as the image changed.
Hermione, oddly stunning and intelligent, was Harry's best friend and dearest sister. Tears prickled his eyes as he saw her lifeless form.
Hermione's once plentiful dark brown curls were sheared short and her chocolate brown eyes, hauntingly, wide-open. Harry couldn't bear to gaze upon the large, gaping hole on the top of her head.
It was gone.
She could never read again, as they had stolen her most prized possession, her brain.
Harry felt a tear trickle down his face, teasingly slow, which he quickly reached up and wiped it away.
He couldn't turn away from the mirror, his friends and only family, it would be a dishonour to those who gave their lives if he couldn't even face their deaths.
Whispering gruffly, he turned towards the being.
"You can't change it. You can't change the past! It's already ended. It can't be changed."
"I couldn't, but maybe you could."
He could see Luna, no longer having the dreamy daze in her eyes, as a look of blank terror was pasted upon her eccentrically bold yet delicately formed face.
She had been hit with several Crucios before a simple Avada Kedavra, much less brutal, but not more painless.
Neville lay there, throat slit and still crying, tears sliding down his demure face.
More and more others were murdered, some brutally with the "mudblood" ways that the Death Eater hated and looked down upon, while others were defiled after their death.
He fisted his hands and clamped his eyes closed, teeth chewing the insides of his mouth, drawing fresh, tangy blood.
A moment passed. It was silent, except for the faint grinding sound of teeth.
Harry's face suddenly slackened, green eyes wide and freely letting out all that suppressed anger and tears.
His mouth was screaming, but no words came out, only a wretched howl.
He screamed.
And screamed.
And screamed.
His screams were hoarse, enraged and bone-chilling, and though they were not forming words, the sound alone spoke the unspoken with complete clarity.
"I'll do it. I'll stop him. I'll do anything, just stop it! Stop it. Stop. Stop. Stop." He spun away from the mirror to face the so-called "Fate", his own face was pale and tear-stricken, his breath coming out uneven and shaky.
"'Anything'? That could be a sacrifice to everything that is now yours." You could almost hear a smile in lilting into the monotone, just almost.
"I don't care. I would do it! What do I have now, anyways? At least, I could keep my promises this time. I'll be stronger than before. I would do anything to change what's past."
Frantically, Harry wiped away the tears that insisted on flowing constantly, clenching his jaw with resolve.
"I'll mark your words then, Harry Potter. Remember, you said 'anything'."
"I will definitely keep my word, no matter what consequences, but is it even possible to change it? How could I change it? It's already past."
"You'll go back, of course. You'll go backwards and change what is needed to be changed."
"What do you mean?" His voice was ladled with a tinge of suspicion beneath the unease.
"Precisely what I said, Harry Potter."
"Time travel?"
"Indeed."
"To when exactly then, huh?"
"Fifty years, Harry Potter. Fifty, or so, years."
"WHAT! Why would I go that far back?"
"You aren't quite the wittiest, are you? But, nevertheless, you'll work out something, eventually, when you get there. Or, so I would hope." Silver eyes were amused, and the twist of its lips depicted a wry smirk.
Harry looked at the being as if it were crazy, emerald eyes clearly uncertain and a slight bit offended from the wittiness comment.
"Um, Mister, uh... Mr. Fate? Don't bad things happen to those who mess with the past to that extent? Plus, is it even possible to travel that far into the past? I mean, a few hours was one fucking thing but this is years! Fifty, fucking, years!"
"You are able to travel through Time because I am twisting it in your favor, but if your reason for the travel is gone, you shall forever roam here, in what we call 'Nowhere'. Fitting name, no? I think so, at least... Others call it some different names, too; the Limbo, the In Between, the Purgatory, and so on and so forth. It's what you call a place of neither here nor there.
"In any case, you are able to change the past but you must realize that there will be repercussions. Any one of your actions could set off a butterfly effect, of either positive or negative, for those in the future. You have now become the one who will be spinning the world's fate, so choose carefully. There won't be a second chance once again. After all, this was already your end, and greediness is sorely frowned upon."
Fate closed its silver eyes and the surroundings faded into a black oblivion.
Harry could feel a harsh prick of millions of needles against his skin.
He felt his bones crack and reform, causing a blood-curdling scream to rip through the air.
Harry felt the ground give away from underneath.
August 11th, 1944
Diagon Alley, London
Some Back Alley
He fell onto a stone paved path, legs and arms numb.
Standing shakily, he observed his surroundings.
It looked as if he was in a back alley, and from where he leaned against the cold wall, he could see men and women walking leisurely.
They were certainly wizards and witches judging by their attire, as well as the fact the street had a rather old-fashioned resemblance to Diagon Alley.
Cautiously trudging out of the alley with the help of the brick wall, Harry straightened his stiff muscles and paced down the street, attempting to blend in.
Looking about, he gasped in shock.
It wasn't the familiar warm crackle of magic, nor was it completely restored Diagon Alley.
Those were indeed marvelous and surprising but it was his face reflected back to him in a shiny shop window that truly shook him.
Maybe he shouldn't have agreed to "anything" as quickly as he did.
Maybe he should remained wandering around "Nowhere".
Maybe he regretted it.
Maybe, maybe?
Too bad that it's definitely too late to go back.
The end of Harry Potter certainly brought a new, and most likely disastrous, result.
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