A/N: This chapter should be better than last chapter. Albus is going to stop being a moron soon.
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Albus levitated a platter full of food as he escalated himself to the seventh floor. He'd bewitched the tray to replenish itself from the kitchen, and had begun thinking about how to reenter the mysterious room. He decided to start where he'd entered it in the first place. After a few minutes of stair climbing, he arrived across from the tapestry of trolls. He stared at the bit of wall with a blank expression. He made a few motions at it with his wand, careful to keep the tray floating. Nothing happened. Albus paced, challenged.
Before long, and with no apparent stimulation, the door appeared on the wall. Albus hummed in curious satisfaction and then marched himself gravely inside.
The room was better lit than he had left it and there was a table next to Harry—and Harry was awake.
"Hello, Harry," said Albus quietly.
"'Lo, Albus," said Harry. "Suppose you've got some questions for me."
Albus didn't say anything but drew up a chair in front of Harry and sat down with one leg crossed over the other, a convincing picture of ease.
"Your wand is under protection," said Albus.
"I'm not gonna use it, but isn't it in that box over there?" Harry nodded towards the wooden box at the foot of the reading chair. Harry knew it was there and knew he could use it if he wanted.
Albus smiled faintly. He wasn't used to being wrong.
"Fawkes hid it from me before," said Harry. "That day when you hid it. He thought you and I should chat. I wouldn't have stayed that day if I'd known where my wand was. Today he seems to think you're angry enough that I should have the protection."
"The phoenix is dead, Mr. Crockett. You murdered him."
Harry was quiet for a moment. "That's true. Only the Elder wand could kill the body of a phoenix. I'm sorry for doing it," said Harry, throat tightening with how sorry he was. He opened his mouth and shut it again and opened it again to speak. "But he's alive, Albus. His soul's in my body, like part of mine was in his. Something must have happened after...After I...when —" he cut off and took a few breaths before continuing. "He doesn't seem too unhappy at the moment. He rather likes fingers," Harry said idly flexing his hands. He played with his hands for another minute, and when he spoke again it was thoughtfully. "My name isn't Crockett. It's Potter. I am Harry James Potter."
"Yes, I suppose I knew that," said Albus. "Why are you using an alias?"
"Have you ever met anyone named Potter?"
"Yes. I am acquainted with Charlus and Dorea Potter of Godic's Hallow. They are an old wizarding family. Are you their relation?"
"Yes."
"Cousin?"
"No. I'm their grandson." Harry was tired of dodging questions. His remorse made him honest.
"They have no child."
"Yet."
Albus tried a different tact.
"How do you know of my death?"
"I witnessed your death, Albus."
"By what means?"
"I saw it. I was with you the night you died." Albus frowned and moved on.
"And you know of my sister?"
"I know that her memory has haunted you and will haunt you more than anything else for the rest of your life."
Albus stopped asking questions for a moment, taken aback by Harry's answer.
"I will answer any question you have for me," Harry offered to the silence.
"The truth?" Albus asked quietly.
Harry smiled, remembering himself, a small boy in a hospital wing, asking Professor Dumbledore the same thing. He remembered Dumbledore's exact words as if it had just happened, and he replied as Dumbledore had. "The truth is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution. However, I shall answer your questions unless I have a very good reason not to, in which case I beg you'll forgive me. I shall not, of course, lie."
Albus nodded. "I saw part of my death through your dream. Why was someone trying to kill me?" Albus asked. It was a remarkably similar question to the one Harry had asked Dumbledore in the hospital wing when he was eleven. "Why was Voldemort trying to kill me?" Harry'd asked.
He almost laughed at the reversal he was experiencing with Albus, and he knew what his answer had to be, and continued in exactly the same way as Professor Dumbledore had when he was a child.
"Alas," said Harry, "the first thing you ask me, I cannot tell you. Not today. Not now. You will know, one day," he quoted. He paused for a moment before adding, "I'm not really worried about revealing parts of the future to you—you're brilliant enough that no one can tell the difference between when you know and when you guess — but your death is something that I shouldn't discuss with you beyond letting you know that it will be on your terms."
Albus nodded, knowing he would not be able to argue.
Having lingered on these comforting and flattering truths for quite long enough, Albus seemed to steel himself for the inevitable next part of the conversation.
"Your soul is in seven places," Albus accused.
"Yes."
"Did you kill six people?"
"No. I have killed one. Today. My soul was in seven places but was still intact as a whole. When I killed Wister Bloom one of the seven pieces tore away and turned into a horcrux. Do you know what that is?"
"Yes. Where is the horcrux?"
"I—it…I believe it…" Harry blinked rapidly, his eyes stinging. His chest contracted and a lump formed in his throat.
"Tell me, Harry," Albus leaned forward, intense as ever.
"Albus- it's gone. Feel for yourself. I'm whole again. I don't know how...it just hurts so much," said Harry.
And Albus did feel for himself. Harry suddenly felt completely wrapped in a tentative curiosity, and it was gone as quickly as it came.
"You purged it with remorse," whispered Albus, in awe. The information had strong meaning to Albus, he having just finished learning all there was written about the soul.
Harry nodded, hot tears threatening to fall down his face.
"Why did you kill him, Harry?" Albus whispered, pleadingly.
Knives were stabbing Harry's heart and he felt like water was filling his lungs.
"I didn't give him—Wister— a glance. I was so angry at Riddle. My attack was at him. It...it was something he once did to me," he choked. "The only difference is I am not Tom Riddle. I have brought about the death of men and women before, but none of them were by my own hand. None were by my and only my decision. I remember - it's so foggy now - thinking it couldn't be any different—it couldn't be hurtful to kill someone as pitiful as Wister. I was invincible. It was my ego - that damn broom, running unchecked and unbalanced through me. I'm never going to be without all of the parts with me ever again."
"But Fawkes is dead, Harry. What part of you is running unchecked now?"
"Love," said Harry, simply.
"Love?"
"I…er...he's helping me control it," said Harry, looking up. His watering green eyes met Albus's blue gaze for a second too long. "He hid it from me a lot when it was in his body, and I'm still…working out what it means. It's not something that could hurt anyone but me anyway," he said in an undertone.
"What did Tom Riddle ever do to you?"
"If you asked him that, he'd probably tell you truthfully that he has done nothing to me but what you've seen."
"What…Will he do to you?" asked Albus, showing he'd begun to understand.
"He will orphan me, scar me for life, make me the number one undesirable in all of Britain, turn my body into a horcrux for sixteen years, kill many of the people closest to me, and he will unsuccessfully use the killing curse on me a total of three times. And he will make me the most famous wizard in the world."
"How old are you?"
"Thirty nine."
"How old are you?"
"Negative twenty three."
"How old are you?"
"My year of birth is nineteen eighty."
"How did you get here?"
"I apparated."
"How did you get here?"
"Well," said Harry, resigning to tell the whole truth, "I put on a very large time turner, got knocked out by a large glowing crystal which must have set off the time turner, fell to the floor and was enveloped by the crystal along with a room full of random objects. Somewhere in the process, my soul found its way into six of the objects around me. For ten years I re-lived memories stuck in that crystal and then one day…I was free. I found myself in the Forbidden Forrest. I figured out what year it was, and spent two years adjusting myself to my new powers and tried to figure out what to do in this time. I made a good deal of money with investments, and then one day I wanted to check something. I knew that Tom Riddle would be working at Borgin and Burkes and I decided to check on him. He was there, and he told me he was planning on applying to work for you.
"I had been alone for two years in this time. I made little contact with people out of habit. It was a nice change. For twenty six years I was a hero. For twenty six years I was famous. I finally found myself some peace.
"But when I heard Tom Riddle say he was going to be the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, I knew that's where I wanted to be. I knew what would transpire in that interview and knew that you would still be looking for a teacher. I wanted to come back here. Hogwarts was my first home. I wanted to be in the castle. And I knew that I would know people here. I wanted to be around people I lo—know."
"You know Minerva."
"She was my head of house and teacher."
"Rubius."
"He was a friend and teacher. We had tea with him a lot—never eat his stoat sandwiches."
"Horace."
"Teacher…and a real bother. I was famous, remember." Albus smiled.
"Ms. Sprout taught you herbology?"
"Yes."
"Binns?"
"Let's just say you'll never ever have to replace him."
"And what of me, Harry Potter? What was I to you?"
"Do you want to see? I guess it would make my story more credible."
"We have a pensive."
"Right," said Harry. Albus waved his wand and the table with the pensive moved itself over to them.
"You know I could have been doing magic the whole time…tampering with your mind to make you believe me…spinning lies…Have you ever seen a modified memory?"
"Yes," said Albus.
"Then you will know when you see mine that they are real and that I have been telling the truth. I have reason to believe that I won't be messing with the natural order of things by showing you this. When I was a child, you always knew what was happening. Just know that a lot will happen to you before these memories, and a lot has happened to me since.
"Now, er, do you mind if I unchain my arms to remove a memory, or do you want me to let you do it?"
"I think I'd be impressed in spite of myself," said Albus, resigned.
Without breaking eye contact with Albus, Harry accessed his magic and removed the chains around his arms. He moved one hand to his temple and pulled out a long silvery chain of memories which he dropped into the basin.
"I'll go first?" asked Harry.
Albus gestured for him to proceed and Harry attempted to lean forward but was restrained by the chains around his chest and waist.
"Oh, I forgot about those, Harry," said Albus, reaching to fumble with the chains.
Harry's heart jolted as they touched. "Help me, Fawkes," Harry called inside his mind. "Is this what you were keeping from me?" he asked, intensely aware of Albus's proximity. His heart began to race when Albus's hand brushed Harry's clothed torso around the chains. Level headed, Fawkes pushed a thought through to Harry.
"Albus, Albus—either I can vanish the chains myself, or you can just think about them vanishing a few times. This room will take care of it."
Albus stopped messing with the chains.
"What is this room?"
"It's the Room of Requirement. The house elves call it the Come and Go room. It appears when you need it how you need it."
"That explains a lot," said Albus.
The chains vanished.
"After you, then," said Albus.
Harry leaned forward and immersed his face in the substance of the pensive. He pitched forward and fell through the surface before landing on his feet in the crowded Great Hall. A moment later, young Albus landed next to him.
"It's nineteen ninety one, September first."
"Your first day of school?"
Harry didn't have to answer because the door to an antechamber to the right of the hall banged open, and all eyes watched as the first years filed out, led by Professor McGonagall.
"Shall we?" asked Harry.
They strolled down the center of the great hall towards the front table and the line of first years.
"Can you guess which one is me?" asked Harry as they reached the group.
Albus waded through the group until he stood before a red haired boy and a black haired boy.
"You look remarkably similar."
"Do you notice a difference?"
"The scar, naturally," replied Albus. "It's still there, isn't it?"
"You've seen it?"
"Yes."
Harry didn't have time to ask when because Minerva had set the sorting hat on the stool and it had begun to sing. Albus didn't watch the sorting hat. Instead, his gaze had landed on Minerva, wrinkled and stern.
"She must be my age," he muttered.
"Except she looks it," said Harry. "You look my age."
The hat stopped singing and Harry and Albus saw Ron turn to the eleven year old Harry and say, "So we've just got to try on a hat! I'll kill Fred, he was going on about wrestling a troll." Little Harry smiled weakly.
"I was so nervous," said Harry.
"Is that a Weasley?" asked Albus.
"Yes. Ron was my best friend. That there's Hermione, my other best friend. We hated her until about Halloween, though. She and Ron ended up married. I, er, married his sister." Harry glanced around the hall and his eyes landed on the Weasley twins. His eyes were prickling with memory. "You know, Albus, er, I think I'm going to take a walk. Feel free to… to look at people, or whatever." And with that, he paced dreamily back down the table to sit beside Fred and George leaving Albus alone with the first years.
Albus looked up and down the decreasing line of eleven year olds, before he heard a familiar cough. He looked up to the head table in time to catch a glance from the man in the seat of honor. Professor Dumbledore looked back down at his plate.
Albus dodged around the first years and walked up behind the table until he reached his silver haired counterpart. His right arm was moving.
He was writing.
Albus moved closer and peered over Professor Dumbledore's shoulder. On the golden plate there were two pieces of parchment. One was yellowed and cracked around the edges, but Albus recognized it immediately. It was an illustration of a phoenix in black ink. An illustration that Albus had drawn recently.
The other piece of parchment was new. Scrawled across the top in a mysteriously familiar shade of green was, "Notes to Self:"
Professor Dumbledore's right hand moved across the page again. In it was perched a scarlet and gold phoenix feather quill.
"He won't know about this conversation." Dumbledore paused and started a new line.
"I came to trust Harry implicitly, but for now I believe mine is the only voice you trust. Firstly, I am, in fact, Albus Percival Wolfric Brian Dumbledore and this is the year 1991. Though I appear to have aged appropriately, I'm still taking my little tonic."
Professor Dumbledore smiled privately, and tucked a long lock of hair behind his ear. Albus's eyes went wide and bent closer, knowing now for sure that this was an aged version of himself.
"You're in a memory of Harry Potter's in the year 1957 when Harry is desperate for a friend. He is telling the truth; Fawkes is alive within him. Harry's soul is pure and undamaged due to his remorse, but he is confused. Forgive him. Help him find his way. Merlin knows he's helped me find mine."
He made to write more, but Professor McGonagall spoke up and Professor Dumbledore put down his quill and looked up.
"Potter, Harry."
The room was suddenly abuzz.
"Did she say Harry Potter?"
"The Harry Potter?"
Albus looked over the table to see little black haired Harry edge over to the stool and put on the hat. It was too big for him and it fell low over his eyes. The room held its breath.
A minute.
Two minutes.
"GRYFFINDOR!" shouted the hat. Harry pulled it from his head and gleefully scampered down the isle to sit at the Gryffindor table to cheers and applause.
Professor Dumbledore clapped with purpose.
Albus felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Do you want to see another one?" asked Harry from behind him.
Albus looked down quickly at Professor Dumbledore's plate, but the papers had gone.
"I—"
Professor Dumbledore turned around in his chair and looked right at Harry.
"I think he believes you," said the silver haired man. He smiled coyly and looked vaguely between Harry and Albus.
Harry's heart missed a beat, and he stared. Young Albus looked at Harry and chuckled.
"Talking to yourself again, Albus? Have you finally gone mad?" asked an aged Professor Flitwick from the seat to Professor Dumbledore's left.
"Gone mad?" asked Professor Dumbledore. "I've been mad for years, really." He turned back to Harry and Albus. "So long, chaps," said Dumbledore, blowing a kiss.
Harry turned bright red as they floated up out of the pensive, barely keeping the stupid grin off his face caused by the leaping of his heart.
A/N: Check out my holiday oneshot. It's HPDM, but you can imagine it's HPAD if that makes you happy.
Happy blue moon!
-Moonlight