A/N-00: You've probably read TT stories with these elements before. Bittersweet victories in a dark future; desperate hero tried to go back in time, to right what once went wrong. But what happened to the past-self that was so carelessly replaced?

July 31st, 1990

"Happy birthday, Harry Potter." The boy living in the cupboard under the stairs whispered to himself.

Harry Potter suppressed a grunt as his stomach growled. He turned and tried to go back to sleep; fortunately, having done housework for fourteen hours a day meant that he was desperately tired, and after some more turning and grunting he went back to sleep again.

Harry Potter was ten years old and tired of his life. He wasn't even sure whether he had ever been loved; his parents had died when he was only a year old, and Aunt Marge and Aunt Petunia had always called them irresponsible drunks, for what else could they be, having a child at a mere twenty-one-years-old and getting killed in a car accident? Sometimes Harry wondered what power, what curse, enable him to get up every morning.

Harry cried himself to sleep, but made certain his sobs were quiet enough not to wake up the Dursleys.

He dreamed of darkness—for it was what he always saw, in the cupboard and in his life. He dreamed of stars—cold, distant, uncaring like the rest of the universe, present but never giving him warmth. He dreamed of parents—a beautiful mother and a handsome father, who looked just like him, skinny with glasses and dark hair and bright green eyes…

The image of his father was looking about, as if confused by the view about him.

"Dad?" Harry whispered, wondering if he was dreaming or finally lost his mind. The wraith did not notice him, however. Harry mustered up more courage.

"Who are you?"

The wraith started and turned; his hand went to his waist as if reaching for something, but paused half way through. He looked into Harry's eyes, and Harry found himself inspected by a pair of emerald eyes just like his own.

"I am you, Harry, or I will be—and I am here to help." The man swept aside the bangs on his forehead, revealing his own lightning-shaped scar.

Harry gasped.

HPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHP

The man gently calmed the ten-year-old, and told him of wondrous magic, of beautiful Hogwarts, of the terrible Dark Lord, and of the devastating war. He knew the story was horrifying, but the boy needed to know.

After what seemed like years (he reminded himself that they were in a dream, after all), his adult self looked Harry firmly in the eyes.

"I agree this is a lot to take in, Harry, but listen to me: this is very powerful, very dangerous magic. I will give you my memory and knowledge, to prepare you so that you can do better than I when the time comes. We cannot—we must not—let Voldemort rise again."

"How do we do that?" Harry asked, alarmed.

"By merging our souls—don't worry, you will still be the dominant mind, I will disappear into your subconscious though your personality might change slightly. Once the memory transfer is complete, I will fade away."

The boy looked at his adult counterpart with narrowed eyes, but nodded after a long pause. Both Harry Potters let out a deep (and unnecessary) breath.

"Let it begin." At once, the two turned transparent, as if they were glass versions of themselves; his future self smiled encouragingly at the younger Harry. The smile promptly froze, however.

"Oh sweet Merlin, I forgot about him!" He pointed at Harry's head.

"Who?"

"Voldemort! When he tried to kill us he left a piece of his soul behind…and it's still inside you! I have mine removed long since but you—"

His words were cut off as Harry felt pain like he never had before. Something inhuman shrieked—a tendril reached out from Harry's forehead and attached itself to the older wizard's scar.

"Power…such power…want…yessssss…"

Future-Harry was horrified as Harry screamed. Voldemort's splinter soul was trying to absorb them both! If it succeeded Voldemort would be reborn—with the body of the Boy-Who-Lived! The older Harry tried to grip the tendril and pull at it, only causing the boy to scream louder. Two souls and one soul fragment struggled to control the body of the ten-year-old. Harry was not prepared for such a battle, a battle fought with him as battlefield and prize; and he knew (somehow) that the battle could be won, but his weak self might not survive. Harry screamed again.

"Destroy you, Dessssstroy you!"

Harry could feel himself weakening; the fragment was drawing power from him. Future-Harry only refocused his attack on the fragment; either he had no reserve to spare on Harry, or didn't care about protecting his younger self. Neither was good news. He ignoring the boy's screams, and attacked again.

As the two-and-a-bit souls struggled, power pouring against each other, Harry suddenly caught glimpses of memories: a wand, cored with phoenix tail feather; a goodbye kiss from a bushy haired girl; a flash of sickly yellow light; warm, disarming laughter from a tall, lanky boy; pain, pain as a giant blind snake bit him on his arm; the twinkling eyes of an old man; long, red hair covered her bare back like smooth silk, a girl turned and kissed him; a horde of walking dead people, and he recognized too many of their faces; a man with a silver arm, grovelling in front of him; twin girls in his arms, so tiny, so beautiful; a giant memorial filled with names; green light, a green not unlike his own emerald eyes; red eyes from a snake like face, looking satisfied; silvery grey eyes, so beautiful, so sad, filling him with such self-loathing; pain—

Harry could only feel pain, so much pain…why did his dark thoughts and his future self both hurt him like this? He wanted to run, he must escape…

With one last scream, he tore apart the connection between himself and Future-Harry—just as his adult self sent a blast at the soul fragment of Voldemort. Harry felt like he was tumbling into a dark, brilliant tunnel, as the fragment tore loose, and Future-Harry screamed, horrified at what he'd done—

And then merciful, silent darkness claimed him.

?

Harry Potter opened his eyes abruptly. He was disoriented; his head hurt. Strangely enough, though, he did not feel hungry at all. He groaned and sat up—and found himself out in the hall, the cupboard somehow having opened. Harry reached about for his glasses, and came upon a stick; he felt a strange sensation, a rightness, and instinctively grasped it. He found his spectacles a moment later and put them on. He blinked and looked again.

If Number Four Privet Drive was a temple then Petunia Dursley was its guardian and high priestess. She kept it immaculately clean, which meant that Harry spent hours every day cleaning every surface in the house. But this was not that house. Harry could recognize some old, broken pieces of furniture, the wall behind the dust and dirt, but this couldn't possibly be the Dursley home—

Harry found himself staring at a gaping hole. The entire south wall of the house was missing; what is going on?

And why did the room look smaller, lower?

"Freeze, Potter!"

The words sent Harry jumping in the air, and somehow the stick found its way into Harry's hand. Harry turned about, trying to find the source of the voice, and caught a glimpse of several black-cloaked men and women running at him. They looked alarmed, serious, and each had a stick in his or her hand, and each stick was pointed at him like a loaded gun.

More dangerous than that, a voice said in the back of his head. He lifted his arms to show that he was unarmed.

Unfortunately, he didn't realize he was still holding his own stick.

"What's going—"

"—Stupefy!" One of the men panicked and shrieked. A flash of red flew from his stick and hit Harry in the chest, and he dropped into unconsciousness again.

?

Harry Potter woke up suddenly and completely, again.

"I got to stop waking up like this." He groaned.

"Yes you better, Harry." A deep, calm male voice said from his right side. Harry tried to sit up, but found that he could not move at all from the neck down.

"You're too dangerous to leave unrestrained, even without your wands." The man walked into view, a tall, black man in his twenties (Harry couldn't tell for certain). He gave Harry a reserved smile.

Well, at least I wasn't paralyzed, Harry thought. He asked, in a slightly weaker voice than he really was, "wands?"

He tried to remember…the red light from the stick…that man who knocked him out…a black-haired man knocked into a stone doorway, veils…

He shook his head. Where did that last image come from?

The tall black man frowned at him slightly. He pulled out a stick and muttered something, too low for Harry to hear. A tiny, glowing Harry Potter appeared in thin air; the man stared at it and frowned some more. He walked out of Harry's limited view. Harry heard the door open and close. He was alone.

If Harry wasn't so confused he would be worried about his situation. He was sprung from his family's ruined house by black-clad men and women, who had a strange stick-weapon that could knock him out easily. His head hurt and had no idea where on earth he was. He flexed his arm again, or tried to, but couldn't get any reaction at all; he briefly wondered whether he was simply drugged. But why? What did these people want with him?

The door opened again, interrupting his thoughts. A woman whispered, a soft, cool voice, to her companion.

"We know what he was trying to do, Dean, and we have the results. Neither of us are experts in this field, but I can make an educated guess. I think he succeeded."

Dean—the tall black man with the deep voice—responded, his calmness gone. "But nothing's changed!"

The woman—Harry struggled futilely to see her—sighed. "Give me a second." She muttered a word, and suddenly Harry couldn't hear anything. He looked about in confusion (again), and saw Dean and the woman walked into his line-of-sight. The woman had long, blond hair, a fair complexion, and wide, silvery grey eyes. Their lips were moving, but still Harry couldn't hear them. They kept looking at him, the woman with a hint of…something in her eyes. Finally they seemed to come to a decision. The woman pulled out a stick—a wand, Harry reminded himself, as he regarded it with wary eyes—and flicked it. Suddenly the sounds of the world returned to him.

"Can you hear me, Harry?" This was the second time a stranger called him by his name. Not that he minded too much, but he hated being in the dark about things.

"Yes I can, and can someone please tell me what's going on?" Given his recent ordeals, Harry's patience was a little worn out.

"Give me a moment." She gave Dean a look, who shrugged. The women waved her wand again, and suddenly Harry could feel his wiggling toes. "You can get up now, Harry."

Harry was a bit surprised, but he really had spent too much time in bed recently. He sat up, slightly disoriented…and mightily confused.

He jumped off the bed, and the sense of wrongness deepened. He looked at the two people in the room, and suddenly realized the reason.

Using the door as a reference, Harry judged Dean to be slightly above six feet tall. The woman was nearly a head shorter; which would make her at least five feet two inches. Harry, standing up, could see the top of her head as well.

Harry looked down. No; they were both on level ground.

How did he…?

"For your information, I am five-foot-three and you are five-foot-eight. I am Luna, by the way." The woman smiled, correctly reading his thought. She took his hand in hers, softly, and pulled him over to the wall. "In fact, you might want to tell me what you see here."

Harry looked up. It was a mirror. He looked into it. His reflection stared back. It looked like him—

Yet it wasn't him. It couldn't possibly be. The reflection had his shocked expression, yes, and the green eyes, and the scar, but it was the reflection of a man with prematurely greying hair and a lean but muscular body. He tore off his shirt. There were scars, so many scars everywhere.

"What's going on?" He demanded, and for the first time he realized how much deeper, coarser his voice was.

Luna sidestepped his question. "What's the date the last time you saw a calendar, or newspaper, or tele-video?"

"Television." Dean corrected automatically, his eyes boring into Harry's, as if trying to read his mind.

"I was cleaning the kitchen before I went to bed. It was the thirty-first of July, 1990." Harry told them. "I was singing 'happy birthday' to myself before the weird dream—and all these crazy stuff—happened. I just turned ten."

"Happy birthday Harry." Luna smiled despite herself, but Harry now recognized what he had noticed before: a strange sadness that shone through her silver eyes. A lump formed in his throat: why is she so sad? "It's not your tenth, however, but your twenty-ninth birthday.

"The year is 2010."

XXXX

A/N-01: This is inspired by many time travel stories, particularly Nightmares of Futures Pastby S'TarKan. I hope that story gets an update soon…

A/N-02: This is a one-shot at the moment, although I have written bits about Future-Harry's life. If I do continue the story, it will be about the temporally displaced 10-year-old-soul Harry, who now had to clean up the mess 30-year-old Harry left behind.