Reboot of 43k word (which hopefully means it will have a head start on updates, maybe?) story the Beauty Beneath from my old account, only TIME TRAVEL. Also, What We Lost is a third of the way done, and the small but mighty army of betas who are kicking ass through it. Thank you for your patience. Thank you also Sectumus Prince and BlackPhoenixI, read their work, it is addictive.

Acknowledgements: To my close friends and family that this month has been especially hard to, in an especially hard time, and to the people I have never met, I am sorry for your losses and I send all the love I can to yourself and yours who are grieving.

Also, and I mean this from the bottom of my soul, fuck cancer.

A Beautiful Sacrifice

Dyslexia: language disability, there are going to be misspellings and missing words, typos and spell check errors. Get over it, or go buy a book, because I sure as hell ain't getting paid.

Prologue

A chilly breeze that seemed to emanate from the heart of the forest lifted the hair at Harry's brow. He knew that they would not tell him to go, that it would have to be his decision.

"You'll stay with me?"

"Until the very end," said James.

"They won't be able to see you?" asked Harry.

"We are part of you," said Sirius. "Invisible to anyone else."

Harry looked at his mother.

"Stay close to me," he said quietly, as he approached his end.

"I thought he would come," said Voldemort in his high, clear voice, his eyes on the leaping flames. "I expected him to come."

Nobody spoke. They seemed as scared as Harry, whose heart was now throwing itself against his ribs as though determined to escape the body he was about to cast aside. His hands were sweating as he pulled off the Invisibility Cloak and stuffed it beneath his robes, with his wand. He did not want to be tempted to fight.

"I was, it seems . . . mistaken," said Voldemort.

"You weren't."

Harry said it as loudly as he could, with all the force he could muster: He did not want to sound afraid. The Resurrection Stone slipped from between his numb fingers, and out of the corner of his eyes he saw his parents, Sirius, and Lupin vanished as he stepped forward into the firelight. At that moment he felt that nobody mattered but Voldemort. It was just the two of them.

Harry could feel his wand against his chest, but he made no attempt to draw it. He knew that the snake was too well protected, knew that if he managed to point the wand at Nagini, fifty curses would hit him first. And still, Voldemort and Harry looked at each other, and now Voldemort tilted his head a little to the side, considering the boy standing before him, and a singularly mirthless smile curled the lipless mouth.

"Harry Potter," he said very softly. His voice might have been part of the spitting fire. "The Boy Who Lived."

Voldemort had raised his wand. His head was still tilted to one side, like a curious child, wondering what would happen if he proceeded. Harry looked back into the red eyes, and wanted it to happen now, quickly, while he could still stand, before he lost control, before he betrayed fear —

He saw the mouth move and a flash of green light, and everything was gone.

What seemed a moment later, Harry awoke in a clearing. One he dimly remembered from his childhood when he had once had tried to run away, before Hagrid, before Hogwarts, before he knew the magical things he dreamed of were real.

He hadn't gotten far, the police had found him and the Dursleys had…

Harry let the memory go, as he gazed around the clearing, remembering instead the moment of freedom, the hours in which he had thought himself very brave.

Funny how it always came back to the forest, whether outside of Hogwarts or beyond the fields surrounding the park.

"Harry," a familiar voice called softly.

Harry spun and almost sobbed, "Mum!"

He was dead, they both were, he didn't need to be brave anymore, or afraid. She held out her arm to him, her flame coloured hair a beacon against the white sky. She held him close.

He breathed in deeply but when he went to hug her, he pulled back when something wriggled between them.

Harry jerked back from her, "What's that?"

Lily Potter smiled sadly, rocking the swaddled thing in her arms. It was small, but Harry had a sense that it wasn't a baby.

"Come," Lily said, offering her hand out to him once more, "Look and see for yourself."

Harry took the proffered hand without hesitation, "I love you, Mum. And I've missed you so much."

Lily blinked back tears, still a few escaped, spilling down her cheeks, "I love you too, son, more than you will ever know."

Harry stepped closer, peering down at a swaddled thing, and it was a thing. But after the initial shock of its appearance, he noticed the flayed skin.

"Is it sick?" he asked, "If we're all dead, how can it be sick?"

Lily smiled, "It was the evil living inside you."

"Voldemort?" he asked.

She nodded, "Would you help him if you could?"

Harry paused, looking into her eyes, so similar to his own but with a peace he had never known. He glanced back down at the sliver of soul, a babe, fragile and hurt.

It will live a cursed life, a half life.

Harry shook his head, "I wouldn't wish this on anyone."

More figures appeared in the clearing and Harry turned to look at them: An immensely fat old lady wearing an elaborate ginger wig and a brilliant pink set of robes -Hepzibah Smith, a sweet faced woman wearing a worn black dress, a slightly plump woman with greying hair -Bertha Jorkins, another fair faced woman with dark curls whom Harry did not know, and finally, a man who looked like Voldemort but wasn't, Tom Riddle Senior.

All of them, including Lily, were holding what at a distance would have seemed like infants swaddled in white blankets.

"Where is Myrtle?" he asked.

It chilled Harry that his mother was among this number that Voldemort had used to violate his own soul.

"That point in time has passed," Lily said. "Half of Tom's soul has died and there is no turning back from that."

"We are dead," Harry pointed out. "There is no going back, not for any of us."

His mother's smile was brilliant, she let go of his hand to stroke his cheek, "But there is a way back, my son. You are not quite gone yet. You may choose to return. Or you may choose the harder path and save all that you love."

"You don't want me to stay?" he asked, voice breaking.

She shook her head, "Oh, my son, I will always be with you, and I am content to wait. But it is your choice."

"I don't understand," he admitted.

"Nagini lives," Lily said. "You can return to end her or-"

"Or?" Harry asked suspiciously.

"Or you can return to when this one awoke," she shifted the not-baby in her arms, " and allow what remains of Tom's soul to return to him."

"What does that mean?" Harry asked.

"It means you will not have to hunt any more horcruxes and if he attempts to make another," Lily squeezed Harry's shoulder, "his soul is too fragile to break again. He would die if he tried."

Harry narrowed his gaze, "Will he have a body again?"

She nodded.

But no more horcruxes, ever.

Harry looked around the clearing, at all the people who had been sacrificed to Voldemort's fear of death.

It was evil, and wrong, and if he could change that, he should, right? Because it was the right thing to do, even if Voldemort got his body back early; it was the right thing to do.

Harry met his mother's gaze, "I don't want to leave you."

"Oh, Harry, you owe nothing to me, nothing to the dead. You owe only that which allows you to remain true to yourself."

Harry took in a deep, tremulous breath.

True to myself.

He knew the answer. Knew before he could even think through his reasons or all the reasons why this was a terrible idea. He had to do what was right, not for the greater good, or for his parents, or his friends, but because it was the right thing to do.

Right didn't mean easy, nor did it make him a hero. But it was all he had when all he had was nothing.

"If I can change this," he gestured to the fractured soul, "then I have to. I have to at least try."

His mother smiled at him, cupping his cheek, "I am so proud of you, my courageous son. I love you."

"I love you, too, Mum," Harry said, reaching for her even as the meadow began to fade away. The people holding the soul shards let go, able to move on into the next life.

Lily let go of the infant she had been holding into the mist, pulling Harry in for a final hug. The world dropped out beneath them, white fading to a starless black.

Lily kissed his forehead, and let him go. Harry kept his arms outstretched toward her but didn't fight to hold on. She needed to move on, and he had a life yet to live.

As he fell further into the deep, he heard a garbled scream, he turned to see a young man, like the Tom from the Diary, or rather the one he had seen in Dumbledore's pensieve when Voldemort had first spoken to Mrs. Smith. This young Tom looked terrified, and that was Harry's last thought before he slammed back into reality.

Chapter 1 - The Beauty Beneath

He bolted upright in the creaky bed of the Dursleys.

Harry was shaking, and he turned over the bed and was promptly sick. Only there was nothing in his stomach to throw up. He was dry heaving and it hurt.

Merlin, did it hurt.

He laid on the bed, panting, a cold sweat overcoming him. He wiped a hand across his forehead and it came away sticky with blood. But there was no obsessive feel of Voldemort in his mind.

Which is when he remembered what his mother had said, When this one woke up?

Harry scrambled for his glasses, and sure enough, from the light of the street lamp he could see drawings he had on the wall, the books on his desk.

Third year books.

And somehow he knew, felt it in his bones that this was the night that he had the dream about Frank Bryce.

Harry would be saved tomorrow. He rolled off his bed and turned on the light to begin packing. He found the pies from Mrs. Weasley and paused in his packing to eat, which alleviated some of the dizziness, but sharpened his need for a glass of water.

The Dursleys really were monsters, he thought as he shoved everything he wanted to take with him into his trunk. His wand he kept in his hand, a year on the run and he couldn't bring himself to let it go.

Especially as it was his wand, the Holly Wand that chose him. It was warm and welcoming in his palm, and if Privet Drive wasn't his home, this wand perhaps was.

Magic was what made life worth living.

No sooner did he think that then he remembered what else his mother had said, or implied.

Voldemort might have his body back. A young body that looked human, one he could use to lure people to his side like he had in the first war he started.

Anxiety ran high in him, and it wasn't enough to sit here, to wait. He had to tell someone- Dumbledore.

But Harry flinched at the thought. He wasn't exactly sure how much time had passed, not in the time travelling years sense but in the hours he had fought a war on Hogwarts' grounds, walked into the Forbidden Forest, died, and came back to life.

Had Dumbledore really always known?

Suddenly Harry was angry, not just for himself, but for Snape as well. Not because Harry liked the man, precisely, but because he could empathize with how shit their lives had been.

Two shitty lives, miserable childhoods, bleak adulthoods, and Dumbledore had let it happen. Dumbledore had known how bad Harry had it with the Dursleys and had done nothing to change it. Had put Snape in a position where everyone hated him, because a Death Eater had to be hated.

Snape had taken the fall for killing Dumbledore, killing Dumbledore at Dumbledore's request.

That was insanely messed up. Almost as messed up as making Harry believe that Dumbledore cared for him when really he had just been raising him to be a willing sacrifice.

Screw that.

Everyone Harry knew, could trust, including Sirius (who was, Harry realized, also still alive) would go straight to Dumbledore. Snape would too, of course, but at least he would know. He deserved to know. Harry would do anything to help the world, Dumbledore didn't need to keep him in the dark; the same, Harry was certain, was true for Snape.

If they were going to sacrifice their lives, they deserved to know why.

Harry straightened and stood up.

He was an adult, damnit, even if he had the body of a fourteen-year-old.

And he wasn't afraid of the bloody Dursleys.

Harry pounded on the door and shouted, "Let me out!"

He could use magic once out of Surrey. The Knight Bus was an option, but Fudge had found him easily and he couldn't apparrate because of the stupid trace. He had no way of knowing if magic recognized him as an adult or not, but he wasn't going to test it. He had been on the run all year.

He could do this.

He could do this.

It felt surreal to be breathing, to be alive, to know he was back in time.

But he had to keep moving, keep going before it all caught up with him and he crumbled.

The unlatching of the door, and Harry rolled his eyes. One, because he wasn't some terrible beast, and two, magic could have unlocked a countless amount of muggle locks in one go.

Petunia's horse face blinked into the brightness of the room, some of her curlers partially undone. She hissed at him, "Do you have any idea of what time it is, you stupid child?"

Harry said nothing to her, Hedwig and her cage in one hand and his trunk in his other, his wand held between his fingers along with the cage hoop. He walked past her and she stumbled out of his way.

"What are you doing!?" she exclaimed in a harsh whisper.

But he was already down the stairs.

He went to the sink in the kitchen and drank water straight from the tap, opening Hedwig's cage and letting her soar out the kitchen window.

He heard Vernon's heavy foot falls above as Petunia padded down the steps.

Harry acted quickly, grabbing Vernon's wallet, and ran out the back door.

Kicking the back fence open, he bolted through the backyards of sleeping Privet Drive.

It was 3 am; the witching hour, as it happened.

He heard the Dursleys shouting at him. But even with his trunk bouncing behind him, poorly through the grass, none of them were fast enough to catch up. Once he was out of earshot, he disapparated.

He appeared in an alley in the heart of London. He shrunk his trunk and Hedwig's cage and pocketed them. He began walking at a fast pace across the sidewalks, careful to look for a multitude of underground stops and walking to a skummer part of town. A place where 'Who's asking?' and 'Where did the money come from?' wouldn't be asked.

Thank Merlin that Vernon liked to deal in cash. Harry took a taxi to the northernmost station in London. On the way to the station, Harry rolled the window down to toss Vernon's wallet into a river.

Harry tipped the cab driver, boarded the train north, and ordered a full breakfast on the train.

Despite dying and coming back to life, time travelling and Voldemort maybe or maybe not having a body again.

He imagined Vernon would never forget this night. The night he was robbed by Harry Potter.

AN: Yes, this is a reboot/cannibalism of The Beauty Beneath. I know a lot of you think I abandon fics, I like to think of them as drafts for my bigger and better and finished fics, of which I have eleven. Thank you to everyone who follows me, please review with what you enjoyed about this chapter, please?