Chapter 2

"But you must not change one thing, one pebble, one grain of sand, until you know what good and evil will follow on from that act. The world is in balance, in Equilibrium. A wizard's power of Changing and Summoning can shake the balance of the world. It is dangerous, that power...It must follow knowledge, and serve need." Ursula K. Le Guin

Kings Cross Platform.

Dumbledore stood there watching the young man until he vanished into the mists, thinking on the poor boy and what he had gone through.

Sighing he turned to the part of Voldemorts soul that had been left behind, with a frown he looked down on the mutilated soul fragment. Ignoring the moans and cries for mercy he snapped his fingers.

A dark circle appeared beneath the soul fragment, weakly it tried to crawl away from the circle that had formed under it, sensing true death was but moments away.

Dumbledore noted absently as he watched the soul shard struggling, that even in it's pained and weakened state the fragment still struggled and fought against it's end.

After another minute of looking on, he was quite surprised that it still had any strength left as it continued it's weak struggles to try and crawl out of the circle. He couldn't even be surprised at it's futile struggles after what Tom had done to himself in his arrogance. Even then he found himself vaguely impressed at the soul shards will power, even broken into such a small piece it was still fighting so hard trying to cling to life in any way that it could.

Snapping his fingers again tendrils of inky darkness rose from the circle latching onto the soul shard and dragged the Tom Riddle screaming into the abyss. The shard would wait with the other soul shards of Tom Riddle till the last piece was collected so they could all be reintegrated and then judged. He couldn't help but shudder slightly to himself at the thought of Riddles likely fate would be.

Nodding to himself as the blood curdling scream died away as the portal closed, he looked around the mists making sure he hadn't missed anything.

Once he was sure everything was as it should be, Dumbledore moved back towards his original seat. With each step, his form flowed and changed until a beautiful young woman stood in his place, wearing a simple robe that still hugged her curves perfectly, midnight black hair tied back in a simple plat. Fair skin with a button nose which she had always hated, the only thing that made her stand out from any normal mortal were her eyes, staring into them was as if you started into the endless night sky. Gracefully she moved and sat on the bench. A flick of one of her hands and a simple clipboard appeared in her hand. Looking down at the clipboard she tutted at herself. And made a note on the clipboard. That bastard Dumbledore and fate really did a number on that kid she muttered to herself as she looked over all the other time lines for this version of earth. Over 90% of the different versions of Harry Potter went back to finish the job. 'Free will my ass' she mumbled to herself.

She was happy for the kid he would move on and find his loved ones and happiness in the next life.

But now she had a major problem. A time line was without a hero, and of course it had to happen on a time line where the hero still had far to go and much to do. Looking closer at her clipboard she pondered if it was worth the effort to save that particular version of earth or to perhaps cut it loose as a lost cause...

Sighing to herself that she would at least need to try and save this particular time line somehow. Sitting on the bench she went through her notes thinking about how she could try and fix this mess. For several minutes only the sound of her foot tapping echoed in the formless void as she ran over possible solutions. Disregarding most as unworkable or needlessly messy as she worked through several pages of ideas, without success.

Then she remembered something that one of her younger sisters had done to save the galaxy she was in charge of at the time. She had created a saviour using the local's version of magic. It had gone a bit off the rails but had all worked out in the end. It could work with a few small changes. But was a bit risky, The One Above didn't like it when mortal worlds were messed with too much by higher powers. So she would have to be careful in how she went about this or she could end up getting into a lot of trouble.

Thinking about it for a few more minutes, and going over her notes looking for possible candidates, finally after several minutes, her face lit up with a smile as she found what she was looking for. Looking over his profile and double checking his records, he looked like the best possible candidate available at the moment. Thinking over her plan one last time she couldn't see any down sides to this. If he failed then the world would be lost to darkness but still serve the larger balance.

Happy with her choice, she snapped her fingers and a small table appeared in front of her with another seat. A fresh pot of tea and a few small snacks laid out, on the table to help put her choice at ease.

The young lady, snapped her fingers again. Nothing happened for a minute, then a middle aged man wearing a loose white shirt and trousers walked out of the mists looking around confused by where ever he had just found himself.

"Hello ##### it's nice to meet you. I know must be feeling quite confused right now, but I'm sorry to tell you that you died."

The young man continued to look around at the mists, even giving the floor a gentle kick. Sighing the man looked at the woman.

"Yeah, I figured it was something like that. The last thing I remember is being in a hospital, but I can't seem to remember why I was there. Who are you? Why aren't I more freaked out by this? I take it your here to take me where ever I'm supposed to go?"

The young lady stood up and smoothed her robe as she walked over to the man. Gently taking his arm and guiding him back towards the table.

"First off I guess I should introduce myself I'm Nimue nice to meet you #####. No I'm not here to take you on, I kind of kidnapped you from where you were supposed to be going after you died. The reason you're here instead of where you're supposed to be, is because I have an offer for you that I think you'll be interested in. And you're not freaking out because you're dead and we're in limbo at the moment. In this place, all your emotions are muted so you can think things through more logically. We've found in the past that it makes it much easier to deal with mortals when they're not freaking out about their deaths, understandable as that may be."

The young woman looked at ##### sheepishly. As the middle aged man kept looking about his surroundings.

"A friend owed me a favour so they misplaced your paper work so we could talk."

##### looked at her with a puzzled look on his face.

"Why would you do that, I was no one special, in life?"

"Welllll..."

Nimue paused a moment in thought, okay this will be a lot simpler than an explanation. The young woman, letting go of his arm and placed her hands on the sides of his face.

"Brace yourself this will feel weird."

Before the young man could ask what she was talking about, his body went rigid as he received a massive info dump straight into his mind of what had happened since Harry Potter had first awoken here. After a minute she took her hands away letting him slump to the floor, breathing hard.

"Sorry about that, but direct knowledge transfer is a lot quicker than having to explain everything with words. I'm sure you understand where you are now and can probably guess why your here."

Still shaking on the ground, ##### tired to stand, stumbled and fell back down.

"Yes, I have a good idea why I'm here. You want me to finish off Voldemort?"

##### replied shakily. The young woman offered her hand to help him stand. And led him over to the small table, and poured ##### a cup of tea.

"I wish it was that simple. You see in this timeline Harry Potter was supposed to live many more years bring about a massive, renaissance to the magical world which would help prepare it and the non-magical world for the future.

This version of Voldemort left what you could say was a final F##k You to the world. If he somehow lost and was permanently killed."

"What did he do?"

"He cast a very powerful ritual that has started a count down towards the destruction of all life on the planet and in time the whole universe will be consumed.

Killing Voldemort off is fairly simple at this point Harry Potter and his friends have done most of the heavy lifting. What I need you for is what is coming next."

Frowning ##### looked across the table.

"What comes next?"

The young woman waved her hand and the mist cleared enough that he could see a massive cave, a moment later the image moved quickly across the vast cave till he could see a massive disk shaped object that looked like it had been carved into one of the walls. It was hard to gauge it's size but it looked at least thirty feet across from what ##### could tell. As the image moved closer he could see that thousands of some sort of letters? Magic runes he guessed, carved into it. The runes glowed with a soft silver light.

Looking away from the image he looked at the young woman across from him with a puzzled look. Motioning back, the image moved closer to the edge of the huge disk. He noted one of the rune lights was flickering.

"I'm guessing those runes shouldn't be flickering like that. What's it supposed to do?"

The young woman looked at the image of the flickering rune for a moment longer before waving her hand and the image faded away.

"That seal was created by the Atlantians, precursors to what are called wizards today. Along with several other elder races after the last great demon war many thousands of years ago, which ended with all the demons locked out of that universe, and they've been trying to get back in ever since.

That seal has stood for almost thirty thousand years keeping the world safe and the demons locked out from that universe. The ritual Voldemort cast managed to damaged the seal slightly. Originally he planned to tie the ritual to his life force, and in the event that he was ever finally killed then the seal would instantly break letting the demons flood back in destroying everything.

But in his madness instead of trying to tie it to his life force all he managed to do was damage the seal, not much but enough to cause a crack in the dam. Which the demons on the other side are taking advantage of. In time they'll slowly widen that crack to the point where the seal will break completely letting the demons swarm back into that universe again."

##### nodded in understanding.

"If he can't have it, then he'd rather see the world burn. Sounds like Voldemort."

Nimuenodded in agreement.

"Somewhere between ten to fifteen years that seal will fail completely and, demons will surge forth once again into the world and begin consuming all life and magic on the planet multiplying and gaining strength before moving onto other worlds. Eventually they will consume everything until there is nothing is left in that universe. The world as it is now will not survive if the seal fails. The magical and non-magical worlds are but a pale shadow of the Atlantian and the other civilizations that created that seal."

##### sat there for several minutes thinking about what he had been told.

"I take it you want me to become Harry Potter since he left to move on and stop this from happening?"

"Yes."

The young woman agreed. Looking across the table at the man as he mulled over everything he had been told.

It looked like this plan might just work she thought to herself.

"What help can you give me? I'm not Harry Potter I have none of his skills or memory's."

Smiling the young woman reached for the small teapot and refilled both cups. Taking a sip she smiled.

"I can help you in several ways but you have to understand I'm not allowed to interfere directly in any mortal world without my bosses okay. Just sending you there is stretching it. I can give you a copy of Harrys memory's and a powerful Occlumency set which will help with your learning speed and make sure you're not overwhelmed by Harry's personality and memory's."

"So you can't help me directly but while we're here in this place time doesn't pass in that world I take it? Can you tell me where the seal is?"

"No. No matter how long your here for I can put you in Harry's body back in the clearing, moments after Harry Died. Also Fyi I can't give you any direct knowledge like where to find things or what to do to fix things. Stuff like that would affect your free will, and that's a big no, no for the boss.

On a side note you seem to be taking this all very well, I looked through a lot of files till I found you. I honestly thought you would turn this offer down, most would. This is a serious mess to clean up, with a lot that could go wrong."

#### took another sip from his teacup and thought about Nimue question, he was no hero he knew that but this was a literal once in a lifetime opportunity, he had day dreamed a lot about the Harry Potter story's over the years and what he would do if he was him. The Magical world had a lot of problems from what he could see, but he knew with the second blood war ending it was the perfect time for massive social changes to take place. The pure bloods had held a lock on most of the power, and wealth for centuries, keeping innovation and progress to a minimum to maintain their power base. And now their numbers and power, on the light and dark side would have been decimated, by both blood wars. It was a perfect time to step in and make the necessary changes to advance the magical world, without having to wade through an ocean of blood to do it.

He did not doubt that it would still be bloody, many would try and crawl back to their old lives again sure that their money and connections would protect them from any serious consequences in spite of their actions, as it had in the first blood war. He couldn't allow that sort of stupidity to happen again.

And once he started taking a hammer to the status quo even the so called light side would probably come for him.

Those in places of power would never willingly allow others to rise, or allow him to make the necessary changes to the status quo if it meant they would have less.

In the end he mused to himself, a lot of people will probably think he was worse than Voldemort or Grindelwald by the time he was done. Then he remembered a quote from some long forgotten story. 'I ask not for forgiveness, only understanding.' The path would be hard and treacherous, but worth walking. feeling his resolve harden he looked across at the beautiful woman across the table from him.

"It's not so complicated, I'm dead so there's no going back, I'll miss my family and friends once I get out of here I'm sure.

Perhaps one day I'll find a way to be able to visit I mean in a world of magic anything is possible. But who wouldn't want to go to a world of magic after living in a world without for their whole life. I've always dreamed of having magic, Who hasn't. I know the Harry Potter story's well, even if that information won't be very useful now. Why wouldn't I grab onto a second chance like that with both hands.

I'm not foolish enough to think it'll be all sunshine and rainbows. But the chance to matter and make a difference to the world...well who wouldn't want that. Plus I'm sure you can see the plans in my mind, they might have been idle day dreams before, but now they're quite possible?"

Nimue smiled at his answer as she looked across the table at the potential future saviour of several universes. Musing that if he did well this time around then she had a massive back log of problem universes that needed fixing. This could work out quite well for her and maybe, see about getting her that promotion she's been eyeing for a while now.

They both sat there quietly for a few minutes sipping their tea as ##### tried to figure out the best deal he could get from this. He had read enough fanfics in his time that he knew he was unlikely to get anything big or too outrageous. But it would help with his bargaining with a few smaller ideas he had.

"Okay, there are a few things few other things that I could use."

"Go ahead I'll try and help you as much as I can."

#####, smiled as he took one of the biscuits timing his words for Nimue to be taking a sip of her tea.

"How about a Gamer System or a Planes Walker Spark, pre-ret-con of course?"

Nimue almost spat out her drink when she heard what ##### asked for.

"Oh hell no! Do you know how dangerous those things are, to get just one of those powers you would have to save several reality's, not to mention I hate having to deal with the Guild of Gamers they're all a bunch of massive pervs? Ask for something else."

Taking a deep sip from his cup ##### looked over at the young woman with a grin and couldn't help but laugh at the look on her face.

"Okay I figured, but I had to ask. There are a couple of simpler things then. Can you fix Harry's body back to optimal health, undo any bindings on his magic and flush any potions from his body that may have altered his mind or body love/loyalty potions that sort of thing, plus cancel any contracts that any adults may have signed in his name? Not sure what version this time lines Harry is, but every story I've read about him had him at best a tiny half-starved kid most of the time, or horribly abused at worse. The second thing will the Black, Potter, and Peverell if he has it? Will, Harry's houses magic's still recognize me as Harry Potter? Third, The Deathly Hollows, real items from death or just super powerful magical items, and again will I be able to use them to full effect?"

"Yes to fixing Harry's body, you're technically dead at the moment so you come under my purview, and fixing your body to the way it should be if all those outside forces hadn't messed with it is something I can do. I'll talk to Mother Magic so you won't have any problems with your houses magic, also Harry Potter is technically dead at the moment so in the eyes of magic all contracts are void, so no problem there either. The worlds magic will recognise you as Harry Potter. The Deathly Hollows and house Peverell are complicated, I'll have to look into those and get back to you later."

"Good. One more thing then, I need proper training Harry got by mostly because of fate helping him out, Hermione, and a s##t ton of luck.

I figure here in limbo you can call up Merlin and a few others I have in mind to properly train me."

Nimue looked across the table at the young man with a small smile as she put her teacup down.

"A nice work around, I can see who your thinking of in your mind and I'm sure they'll be happy to help. But not Merlin I'm afraid since he's still running around in the land of the living. You'll have to find him yourself if you want his help."

Nodding with a smile. ##### thought to himself, Just knowing that he was still running around in the land of the living helped a lot. If he could find him and convince him to help he would be a powerful ally.

Leaning back in his seat, he looked around the misty surroundings taking his final sip of tea.

"Great then I think it's time I had a training montage."

CMdkelley Well I hope that answers your question, about who'll be taking the driver's seat going forward. Dumbledor is long gone and won't be coming back, from his next great adventure.

3Zandaino-Nova-Ari Thanks glad you liked the last chapter. hope you like this one too.