Forward or back?
"You cannot help"
Harry whirled around and saw Albus Dumbledore walk towards him, and instantly became a lot more guarded than he had been when he faced Voldemort a few moments ago.
"But you are dead?" He burst out.
"Quite" the old man replied serenely.
"So I dead too?" Harry asked a bit confused. He had after all expected to die, but whatever expectations he had for the afterlife, meeting his old headmaster in this strange all white place certainly wasn't among them.
"That is the question, but on the whole, I think not"
"Explain" was all Harry managed to say.
And so Harry got the whole story slowly out of his old headmaster, how Harry and Voldemort had been tied closely together, not only trough the blasted prophesy, but also though their wands and Harry's blood being used to resurrect the Dark Lord.
Through it all Harry said nothing, just let the old man talk. He knew thanks to Snape's memory that the headmaster had planed from the very beginning that Harry had to die, and hearing the old man's explanations, while some of them made sense in a sick sort of way, wasn't really any comfort. Quite the opposite, he was both stunned and revolted at just how much this once trusted man had put him trough all with the ultimate aim of dying at Voldemorts hand. For now though he held those feelings to himself.
He also heard the whole sad sop story of the Headmaster's early live, the illness and death of his sister and his close friendship with a later dark lord. How they had formulated the plans for world domination in the name of "the Greater Good", and how Dumbledore had learned that he couldn't trust himself with that kind of power.
While Harry outwardly tried to reassure the Headmaster, that he had not been a dark lord, he couldn't help silently agreeing with the headmaster's claim, he certainly had played god, not only with Harry's but many other lives. Even if the headmaster didn't use his power to force the world to conform to his ideas, Harry couldn't help wonder if this has entirely a good thing. The headmaster had held more power, than Voldemort could ever hope to achieve, because the headmaster had been respected even revered rather than just feared. A lot more people had followed the headmaster, because they believed in him, than would ever follow Voldemort.
For more that 50 years the old headmaster had held all the power in the Wizarding world and had done absolutely nothing with it. Rather than push for the tolerance and trust in the Light that he always preached, he had done nothing. Because Harry was very much a young man of action, of doing rather than planning, to him at least doing nothing was actually worse than doing something, worse than doing almost anything.
The headmaster instead had sat back and allowed Voldemort to grow into power, on the basis of widespread bigotry. He had allowed numerous Death Eaters to walk free with rather feeble excuses. He had allowed imbeciles like Fudge, Crouch and Umbridge to run the ministry, and had allowed many laws benefiting the purebloods to pass through the Wizengamot. Closer to home for Harry the headmaster had allowed Harry to be abused for years at the Dursleys, despite knowing how he was treated. He had allowed Sirius to go to Azkaban for 12 years without a trial, despite the fact that the man had been part of Dumbledore's own order. He had allowed bigotry and bullying almost free reign at Hogwartz, as well as hired a string of incompetent teachers, all in the name of granting second, third and twenty-seventh chances to people who didn't deserve it, resulting in students who barely knew one end of a wand from the other, students who learned trough experience that even if you got caught doing something you shouldn't, there would be no consequences what so ever.
Then followed a brief discussion of the Hallows, how Harry was now truly a Master of Death, because he wasn't afraid of it. How the headmaster never could be, and only had been worthy of holding the wand. This led Harry to other less than pleasant thoughts of the old man in front of him. If he had held an unbeatable wand, then why had he not confronted Voldemort himself, but Harry already knew the answer, true to form the headmaster had done nothing, instead choosing to pin the fate of the world on a vague prophesy and a baby. Come to think of it, if the wand was unbeatable, only changing hands through treachery, then how had the headmaster won it from his old friend Grindewald? And why on earth would he wont a total bastard like Snape to be its new master?
The two of them sat on the bench for a very long time without talking, Harry was trying to reconcile what he had once thought of the trusted old man beside him, with the revelation, that Dumbledore had planed for Voldemort to kill Harry all along. He has trying to think of a reason, any reason to go back and confront Voldemort again, and he couldn't think of single thing. He had already done it once and lost. True, he had sort of lost on purpose, but there were absolutely no reason to believe things would end differently, if he gave it another try. Voldemort was still vastly more powerful, knowledgeable and experienced than Harry, and he had a private army of killers and dark creatures to help him, whereas Harry would be totally on his own as always. Pinning his hopes on the fact that Voldemort wasn't the true master of the Elder wand seemed beyond ridiculous. And just because he had less to fear from death than Voldemort did not make any less dangerous. After all, there were no guarantee that Voldemort would actually kill him, he might leave Harry alive to teach torture technique to new recruits, or Belletrix might crusio him into the same state of non-life as Neville's parents.
"I have to go back?" Harry asked, he couldn't quite believe what the old man was asking of him. He had after all given his live for the fight against Voldemort once today.
"It is up to you. If you choose to move on, you would be able to 'board a train' so to speak" the old headmaster said smiling, he seemed to find the though of a train station very amusing. And all-tough he said the it was up to Harry its was quite clear what he wanted Harry to do.
"I get a Choice?" Harry couldn't quite believe it, this could quite possibly be the first time anyone, especially the headmaster, had bothered to ask Harry, what he wanted to do. "Why should I?, so I can be a Hero of the Wizarding World again? At least for a while. Get a new stupid nickname? 'the-man-who-won' seems just about ridicules enough to be usable."
The old man looked at Harry for several long moments, actually opened and closed his mouth once, obviously he hadn't expected Harry not to instantly agree. Eventually he found his voice again.
"But what about Voldemort? What about Nagini, the last Horcrux?" the old man asked in obvious disbelieve.
"Don't worry about that, Neville know that the snake has to die, and he will make sure to get the job done. He can be depended upon to do what's right. After that Voldemort is mortal, and anyone can kill him, provided they can ever be bothered to cast at him", Harry wasn't for backing down, in fact the more he thought about it, the less he wanted to go back.
The headmaster looked stunned for a minute, before turning into he apparent fall-back position, the disappointed grandfather, "You told Mr. Longbottom about your mission, even when I asked you only to share that information with your two best friends."
"Them? HA" Harry actually had to laugh "You actually expect them to do something useful? Yes, Hermione is very good at research, but you didn't exactly leave us a lot to work with did you?" The headmaster didn't seem to have a response to that and thankfully kept quiet. Well, how could he respond, he had after all just admitted, that his "meaningful bequests" were meant to slow Harry and his friends down rather than actually help them. So Harry continued, "and Ron? What a waste to bring him along, the only thing he did was complain and eat. All tough I probably should have expected that, it has after all been his way for all seven years, I have know him.
"He has helped you, and stood by you in the past", the headmaster gently tried to remind Harry, but he wasn't ready to listen to that particular type of BS, when he knew better for himself. "Helped me? Stood by me? You have got to be kidding me, the last time, the only time, he actually helped me, as in did something I couldn't do myself, was at the end of FIRST year, when he played a game a chess!." Harry had to clamp down on his emotions before they got the better of him. "As for standing by me, the 2 times in my life where I really needed his support, he turned his back on me. First with the tri-wiz tournament, where he didn't believe me, and second when he walked out on not just me, but his supposed girlfriend as well, during our mission."
Seeing that the headmaster was readying to defend Ron, Harry quickly went on, "Ron deserted us during the mission, not because he was scared, but simply because he was hungry. You obviously suspected that he would at some point, after all you gave him the deluminator, so he could get back, because you are all about second chances and believing the best of people, even when proven wrong time and again." Harry felt the need to defend someone, who would have made a much more worthwhile friend than Ron 'big mouth' Weasley. "And no, I didn't tell Neville about the mission, he just knowns that the snake has to die, that is all. He might even kill Voldemort. After all, he could have been the child mentioned in the prophecy, couldn't he? You could have had it wrong all these years, couldn't you?" Harry challenged.
"As I told you when I revealed the prophecy, you are clearly the one he marked" The 'I know best' headmaster was making a comeback, that didn't sit well with Harry.
"Why does a scar have to be 'the mark', doesn't growing up without parents 'Mark' a person? How about if Voldemort tries the brand Neville with the Dark Mark, but he refuses to bow, wouldn't that make Neville his 'equal'?" now that Harry had the opportunity to challenge the prophecy, that had dictated his entire life, amply assisted by the old man in front of him, he felt he should use it, "Now that I have died at Voldemorts hand doesn't that make him immortal? Why did you deliberately set my up to die, if that was a possibility? Vanquish doesn't necessarily mean kill does it? Didn't what happened in 1981 full-fill the prophesy too? Are you that sure of your interpretation of some drunken ramblings from a squip trying to land a job? When did you become a seer or an expert on divination?"
The old man surprisingly had nothing to say to that, probably because he didn't like the answers he could come up with, instead he tried to bring the discussion back to the for him rather important issue at hand, trying to convince Harry to go back.
"But how about your friends, they are still your friends after all. You cannot leave them behind, can you?" asked Dumbledore.
"They are together now, they have each other" replied Harry remembering the kiss, his two best friends had shared right in the middle of the battle.
"Harry, wouldn't you want to be there with them, sharing in their happiness? Their long happy life together" the old man asked, his eyes back at full twinkle.
Harry stared at him for several long seconds, as if he had never seen the headmaster before. "Ron and Hermione? Long happy life?" Harry managed to ask. "Did you leave your brain behind in your portrait headmaster? Those two would never work out. Hermione is a brilliant and driven muggleborn witch, who want to have a career, making the magical world a better place for other races. Ron is a stupid, lazy, bigoted pureblood ass, who would expect his wife to be just like his own mother, staying home, taking care of him, his house and his children." Harry thought about it for a moment, then amended his statement. "Although it is possible that Ron will 'allow' his wife to have a job, if that meant he got to sit on his ass all day listening to Quidditch games on the wireless. Of cause he would still expect her to handle all the housework, and be incredibly jealous and resentful of any little bit of success that came her way." Harry went on "No, Headmaster, Ron and Hermione together is a train wreck waiting to happen, and I am not going to stand next to the track, when it does."
The old man looked a bit shaken at Harry's quite forceful declaration, and the twinkle in his eyes had dimmed noticeably. He did rally quickly though. "How about the rest of the Weasley family, they consider you one of their own, you know, and even now young Ginny is waiting for you to come back to her."
"The Weasleys are Ron's family not mine. Just because they put me up for a few weeks over the summer, does not make them my family. Mostly thanks to you a have no family", Harry said. Thinking of his family was very difficult, he had never had the chance to get to know them, but now that he had died, he had held some kind of childish hope, he would get to change that. "My parents died because they fought for you, and trusted you to keep them safe, and mostly because your vaulted spy told the stupid prophesy to his true master. Sirius spent most of his adult live in prison, because you couldn't be bothered to give him a trial, or any other help for that matter. Locking him up in Grimauld Place was only marginally better that Azkaban."
Harry then went on to demolish the second part of the old man's claim about his so-called family. "Yes, Ginny did promise to wait forever, while I went off to save the world, which actually only shows that she never saw me as a real person, she only saw the fairytale hero." Harry drew a deep breath before the next revelation. "As for waiting?, for her 'forever' turned out to be a couple of months. She was already with her next boyfriend only 3 weeks into the school year."
"How do you know that Harry? I thought you didn't have contact with anyone during your mission" The old man sounded genuinely surprised.
"The Marauders Map" Harry answered simply, but seeing that the old man didn't seem to understand, he elaborated. "A map made by my father and his friends, it shows where everyone is at Hogworts at all times. Somehow I don't think Ginny has spending time in a broom closet with an other guy after curfew to do homework."
The mention of the Marauders apparently gave this headmaster another angel from which to push Harry, as he quickly enquired "How about Remus Lupin?"
"Remus?" Harry asked a bit bewildered "what about him?"
"Wasn't he your friend? Don't you owe it to him to take care of his orphaned son?" The old man asked in his best concerned grandfather voice.
Now Harry was really confused, sure Remus had made Harry the godfather of his and Tonks' son, but he hadn't bothered to ask Harry if he wanted the job, and Harry hadn't actually ever seen little Teddy. There really wasn't much to the 'Honour' of being godfather for Harry, it certainly hadn't worked out all that well for him, had it?
"Uhm, no" was the best answer he could come up with. At the old man's disbelieving stare Harry went on "Like Remus looked out for me, after my parents died? No, Remus wasn't really my friend, he was a friend of my fathers years ago. Its wasn't like he put much effort into getting to know his friends son, was it?" Harry challenged, clearly the old man had no answer for that other that to look sadly at Harry, so Harry went on "Other that being the second least incompetent defence teacher you saddled Hogworts with, he was never really a factor in my life." As an afterthought he added "although I suspect, that he but in quite a few hours as prison guard at Durskaban"
And that seemed to be it. The headmaster clearly didn't want to explore the situation around Privet Dr. and why Harry considered it to be a prison, or Remus' obvious absence from Harry's life. He seemed to be out of arguments.
Harry though still had arguments, or rather one argument left, the most important one"I will be free of you, free of Voldemort, and free of your so-called war. Free of the wizarding world and it ridicules expectations." Harry tasted the world that had never, ever applied to him. With a deep breath and a smile on his face he said the single word, that summed up everything he ever wanted "FREE". As he said the drawn out word he was surrounded by a soft white light and when it faded Harry Potter was gone from death train station.