It's July 1st, 1991. Again.
I've been waiting here for three hours now. The building is a run-down and somewhat dusty combination of an ale-house and bed-and-breakfast. Still, I knew from last time that the two would first meet here.
Ah, there's the boy now.
"Harry Potter... it's a pleasure to meet you at last!"
Ugh, how long do I have to keep up this act?
...
You know what? Screw it. I'm hijacking the future, temporal instabilities be damned.
"Harry, this is Professor Quirinius Quirrel, who just so happens to have Tom "Voldemort" Riddle growing out of the back of his head. Would you be so kind as to hug him to death and save yourself the trouble later?"
Okay, so everyone's staring at me like I'm insane, but hey - as Dumbledore always figured, it's for the greater good... isn't it?
Oh, look. Quirrel's backing away from the boy. He re-e-e-eally doesn't want to be hugged to death, does he?
And on the count of three, there are ten stunners aimed at the man. Poor guy, but he does have a part of Voldemort's soul inside of him. Speaking of which, Voldemort's soul-piece just flew off into the sunrise.
Just as planned
That reminds me, I need to see Lucius Malfoy about that diary. And I need to talk to Dumbledore about certain... things.
Poor, poor Lucius. Still scrimping on his anti-apparition wards, I see. His little snotball of a son is starting at Hogwarts this year, too. I for one hope he doesn't try to run the school like his father did. Still, Lucius was always good for a laugh.
"You know, Lucius, if the Aurors come knocking on your door, you'll have too much mud on your face to be a School Governor. Especially if word gets out that you have Tom Riddle's old diary." I say in what I hope is an off-handed manner. Now I've got him unnerved, though, so it shouldn't be too much trouble. "How about you give it to me; I'll see to it that the ministry doesn't get their hands on it."
I could be evil and turn that into a lie, but these people do care for each other very deeply. I'm not going to break apart a happy family for the greater good.
He's looking at me now, afraid of what might happen to him if Voldemort ever finds out. Still, he'll do it. Family is important to the Malfoys. "Dobby, please go fetch the book from the vaults."
Success. Now, I need to convince the Weasleys to surrender their pet rat. Maybe I should bring Severus along for that one? After all, he really did regret Lily's death.
May as well bring Dumbledore and Potter to the Burrow. There's more than one thing that can be fixed now if everyone's here.
"Excuse me, Molly Weasley? May we see your pet rat Scabbers for a moment?" Dumbledore said.
"Er, yes. RONALD! DUMBLEDORE WANTS TO SEE SCABBERS!"
I can't help but smile. Snape's looking about as comfortable as Rita Skeeter at a kneazle-lovers convention. Speaking of animagi, the two free unregistereds are both here - Rita in my hair by invitation, and Pettigrew in Ron Weasley's hands.
Oh, look, the rat's terrified to see Snape. I point my wand and almost shout "HOMORPHUS!"
Instantly, Ron drops the rat, who becomes the long-dead Peter Pettigrew, complete with missing finger. And that thud you just heard was Snape flooring him with a solid left hook. Before Snape can really lay into Pettigrew, I motion for Harry to go inside and get used to the place. Dumbledore's taking Molly aside, and he's got some nice-looking legal documents in his hand too.
I'd rather Harry had a place he could call home rather than Harry being protected by resentful relations.
As long as I'm freeing Sirius Black, I may as well check in on ol' Barty Crouch. Only, this time I've got a team of aurors on hand, including Mad-eye Moody. Rita's in her usual spot in my hair.
There's little Winky, ushering around an invisible person. On my signal, we all bash down the door. Stunners everywhere - poor Dawlish got two of them to the face, what a shame - and we hear four thuds instead of the expected three. I can practically hear Rita's quill buzzing at how Bartimeus Crouch broke his son out of Azkaban. I didn't bring any dementors here, so we get three still-souled beings marched out of Crouch House.
It's too bad we can't just torch the house diadem-style, but it (like Umbridge) hasn't actually done anything bad yet.
The school year is underway, and I've given all my students the first day back as a vacation day. Lord knows I need it. I can't seem to shake the feeling that I've forgotten something, but who cares?
I've already handed Albus the diary, and Sirius scoured Grimmauld Place until he found that damn locket. Snape brought his old Potions book along with the Hufflepuff Goblet. I look at him quizically, but he just shrugs and says "I have my ways." Maybe I haven't given him enough credit. Then again, he did survive the brunt of what The Marauders did at school, so he can't be a total Slytherin.
I spent the rest of the day trying to find the Lost Diadem inside the Room of Requirement. It would have been much faster if that bust of Paracelcus or the Vanishing Cabinet had been here already, but still.
All that's left now is the Ring of Gaunt, and I'll be damned before I let Albus "I Miss Ariana" Dumbledore ruin his hand over the Resurrection Stone.
So, I guess I get to torch the Gaunt Shack, and the horcruxes with it. Joy.
"All that's left is for Tom to kill Harry again." I say with heavy heart. Severus glares at me, then glares at Dumbledore. He's got the Stone in his hands... both stones, actually. "Which means that we've done things slightly out of order."
Dumbledore looks at me. "What do you mean, slightly out of order?"
"How do you kill something that's not technically alive? How do you extract a horcrux that's inside of another living being?"
Dumbledore's eyes darken. So Harry still has to die.
I knew I was forgetting something.
It was the next morning that all the pieces finally fell into place. Voldemort STILL possessed the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, who turned out to be Gilderoy Lockheart. Two inept fools in one body... I think I preferred Volde-quirrel better, at least he could pretend to be a competent teacher. Now we have a basilisk running around under Volde-hart's control.
If it wasn't for the fact that Lockheart can't even kill a simple rooster, this would end up being a problem. Then again, I did have a rooster in my care ever since I came back.
And he's left the door open. Nice, I can end this quickly. Harry's here with me, and we're about to put an end to Lord Volde-mock-me-now, and for good too.
Sure enough, Loc'demort threw a hissy fit as soon as I revealed my rooster, and he zapped Harry with an Avada Kedavra in his rage. Maybe I should have mentioned that Harry was a Horcrux?
Ah well. With a couple of slashes of Gryffindor's Sword, Voldemort's in three pieces. Like he should be. And now Harry's coming around. I guess he decided to live his life after all.
One quick obliviate means I can go back to pretending to be a charlatan divination teacher. My memories of last time even guarantee that all my predictions for the next few years can be perfectly accurate... for certain degrees of perfection, anyway.
Life is good.
