Disclaimer: I don't own the HP series.
Warnings: There is going to be slash but way later. Violence, swearing and use of the F word, depressing thoughts and moods, suicidal behavior and/or thoughts.
Thanks to Hot Damn for telling me about the typos, I appreciate it.
*This chapter has been edited (4. 2018)
("Oh, I think I'm breaking down again.
Oh, I think I'm breaking down."
Breaking Down by Florence and The Machine.)
Harry woke up suddenly from his sleep and felt an odd urge to go somewhere. He quietly got up. Some people were still awake considering the battle that had recently ended, but many were given sleeping potions to help them calm down and rest. A few were wandering around aimlessly, crying softly so Harry's actions didn't seem odd at all. He could hear Ron's snoring as he left the room. Harry did not know where he was going, he felt as if he was in a trance.
He knew his feet were moving, heading to somewhere he needed to be.
He should stop, call for help maybe. But he could not direct himself to do anything but watch. It was like he was watching everything through the eyes of someone else. After going through many corridors and staircases, he finally stopped upon entering a gloomy looking room and noticed something that made alarm bells ring in his head.
It was the Mirror of Erised.
It was beckoning him forward. Harry could not stop at all. The closer he got the more he could see. The appearance of his parents and Sirius smiling at him and waving became clearer as he got closer. There were other people in the mirror but he did not recognize them.
He was seconds away from slamming into the mirror. His legs only moved faster and he did not understand where they expected to be going. He screamed into his mind. His body continued to move and he could not even flinch as he felt a white light surround him as he vanished into the Mirror of Erised.
Tomorrow, people would wonder about The-Boy-Who-lived's disappearance, his friends would be unable to believe there could be more grief; you'd think winning a war there would finally be a chance to live. Hermione and Ron would spend a lifetime searching for their best friend and failing.
They would never see him again, nor would anyone else.
Harry Potter found himself rising and scrambling on a bed he did not recognise; in a room he had never seen before. His body felt a little bit smaller and weaker, however, that thought rushed to the back of his mind as panic flared everywhere else.
Where was he? Had he been abducted by Death Eaters?
Hard footsteps headed to his direction. More then one voice calling out his name.
Where was his wand? Harry needed to prepare himself. He fell off the bed and grabbed a wand he did not recognize from the nightstand, just in time for the doors to open. He struggled with the blanket as he raged.
He stood up and pointed his wand. Lasting only a second before he tumbled onto the floor in a heap.
Something was wrong with his left leg and his entire body was shaking, unused muscles exhausted. What was going on? This was not his body. Harry could not think clearly at all, his breathing was coming out too fast and he could do nothing but attempt to calm himself, though he knew it would be futile. This was not normal at all and no amount of lying to himself could convince him that everything would be all right.
Entering the room was the shocked faces of his father, mother and Sirius Black. But that was impossible, they were all dead. What kind of sick dream had his mind conjured up? Perhaps his mind had finally cracked.
Harsh laughter left him. Fuck, even using his voice hurt, as if he had not spoken in long time. Being in a different place and then seeing his dead family proved too much to handle.
Harry passed out.
He was dreaming. Harry's dream took place in The Cupboard Under the Stairs, in front of him was Dumbledore, his gentle eyes staring into him.
"Dumbledore...?"
"Hello my boy," Dumbledore's blue eyes weren't twinkling." I believe you may be wondering what is going on here. "
Harry wanted to scream and shout but all he managed to do was nod shakily. He was having a difficult time trying to understand what had happened. The day before, they'd finally won the war against Voldemort. Of course, it hadn't felt like much of a victory considering the hundreds of lives lost. He could still hear the sound of battle ringing in his ears, spells being shouted at one another, people screaming, people dying. He wondered if it would ever leave.
He should be dead.
"You should be," Dumbledore said. Harry must have said it aloud or perhaps they did not even need to speak here.
"After you died and the Horcrux was destroyed you were brought to life once more so that you may finally defeat Lord Voldemort because The Prophesy called for it and it was necessary to be fulfilled, there was no other way. But after that Harry, my child, you could no longer belong in that world." Dumbledore said gravely.
Soft clangs of plates being washed could be heard outside the cupboard, a background noise to fit the fantasy, light from outside fluttering in.
Harry felt as though something was calming him forcibly, otherwise he would be a having a very loud and very violent breakdown. He didn't think it was just the room itself that was keeping calm, even though living with the Dursleys was hell, his cupboard was his safe place. When he was younger, not a child, he'd never been that, he would feel as though the darkness would protect him, that if he couldn't see anything, then no one could see him. No one could hurt him.
Nobody could see his tiny form in the corner, arms wrapped around himself as he cried. Desperately wishing someone would hold, hug him and keep him safe unconditionally. That he would actually feel the warmth of the arms holding him.
That they would be real and love him.
But such childish thoughts weren't allowed to remain with him. They were a weakness that had to be avoided. Soldiers needed to be able to focus, and Harry most of all.
He felt disgusted at his younger self. Such desperation was truly pathetic.
"I won the war though, didn't I?" He laughed. "Is this fates gift to me?" Harry breathed brokenly "Am I stuck then? In some sort of purgatory where IMPOSTERS wear the face of my dead family!"
"Harry you need to calm down and listen." And instantly his body relaxed, much to his annoyance.
"I just want to be left alone. If I can't live with my friends then at least me die in peace," Harry whispered bitterly. "Do I even have a choice?"
"I'm sorry my boy but you do not," Dumbledore said.
Harry leaned back, listening. There was nothing else to do.
"You've been placed in another universe, in that Harry's body. The Harry of that universe was already dead, or should I say brain dead. That child had been completely unresponsive for years."
"What happened to him," Harry asked.
Dumbledore was sitting cross-legged across from him, parts of his face obscured in darkness. Harry had his legs stuck out uncaringly. He could not feel physical pain in the dream world. For the first time since he'd discovered he was a wizard and was given Dudley's second room, he wished he could stay in the cupboard forever; he didn't have it in him to fight anymore. If he didn't belong in his own universe anymore that he wanted to die instead of live in another. It made no sense for him to belong in different world instead.
"Because it is not your time yet, this world needs all the help it can get. And perhaps Fate thought you might appreciate that fact that your parents are very much alive in this world."
'Fuck fate,' Harry wanted to rage. Those imposters would never be his parents; his parents had died for him.
"In this world Voldemort was defeated but it only took him a year to rise again. Here, Neville is the boy who lived. His grandmother sacrificed her life trying to protect him." Harry released a breath he didn't know he was holding. Dumbledore continued, "Voldemort only went after one baby that night. Because of that, Bellatrix, the Lestrange brothers and Barty Crouch Jr. were never arrested and publically known to be Death Eaters. So Voldemort was brought back much earlier here than in your world. A year after his defeat, the Longbottom's were having a family outing in Diagon Alley and were attacked by masked Death Eaters, many of them were killed or knocked unconscious but the few left managed to sneak from behind and take some of Neville's blood, which, as you know, they needed for the spell. They escaped and Neville, otherwise for the cut was unscathed and perhaps a little bit traumatized. His parents, though injured protecting their son, were fine as well."
Neville got to keep his parents, both of them. Unlike Harry. But in this world he wasn't the Boy-Who-Lived. "So how did I, him, how did he end up..." Harry wondered to Dumbledore.
"When this worlds Harry was nine he was kidnapped and held for a year by Death Eaters as punishment for your father's actions, he and his friends killed or made unconscious some 20 Death Eaters between them and The Order. The survivors were arrested and sent to Azkaban for their crimes. The Potters' were a quite well known light family and rumored to be in The Order. That is why they retaliated against them by taking you. A year later you were discovered, tortured, beaten, and completely unresponsive. This Harry was dead you see, in everything but his body which still survived and would never have woken again. Harry you must understand that you are him now. Some of his memories of torture will come to you, slowly. But nothing else. Your body is thirteen now"
"His." Harry sighed, giving in. "my leg…there was something wrong". Dumbledore beamed, what looked like a smile in the dark, but he couldn't be sure. What did it matter if Dumbledore approved oh him excepting this 'new' life?
He missed Ron and Hermione desperately. It wasn't fair.
"Harry was deeply affected by the Cruciatus curse. The leg will need therapy to get better and now that you, Harry, are awake, you will be able to treat that. You also may shake at times, because of how your body was affected; your parents will probably take you to get treated of course. The torture will also explain some of the memory loss their Harry has. You have two siblings, Heather, a second year and William who is in his first year."
This surprised Harry, he never imagined that if his parents had lived then he would have a brother and sister. He wondered what his life would have been like before realizing it would have been just like this. Perhaps every Harry in every Dimension is cursed to a life of torment.
"There's no need to be dramatic, my boy." Dumbledore seemed different, but he didn't have the capacity to question it at the moment. "There are some other differences but you shall find them out as you go, Harry is after all going to be experiencing many things for the first time so it will not seem out of the ordinary for you not to know everything."
"What about Pettigrew?" Harry needed to know how he was supposed to react to that rat in this world. Perhaps Pettigrew was different here.
"Don't trouble yourself with him. In this world many things are different, try not to judge others as you know them in your world." Dumbledore hadn't really answered his question but Harry decided to leave it.
"If someone tries to use Legilimency against you, all they will see is snippets of the torture young Harry endured. No one will be see that you're from another dimension and you will also be unable to say that you are."
There was always a catch.
"When you woke up in this Harrys body, you were not exactly silent so your parents, who were having lunch with Sirius, were surprised and are currently hopeful as Mediwizards told them you were never going to 'wake up'. This is a miracle to them. Here you are very loved." Harry snorted, of course he bloody was. Dumbledore ignored him. "The wand you grabbed when you awoke was your mother's spare as she repeats a spell everyday and spends a lot of time checking in on you even in that unresponsive state to insure your muscles don't completely deteriorate, although they are very weak due to your time being tortured." Lily clearly had never lost hope.
"You're going to wake up now." Harry swallowed, how could anyone prepare themselves for this?
"We will speak again Harry."
And wasn't that a relief.
