Desiring Other Times
Chapter 11 – Paranoia
Disclaimer: How could I own Harry Potter if I don't even own one of those little monkeys that clang together those cymbals? Because that's what J. K. Rowling must use as a muse… I mean, why else would she be relying on the oh-so cliché 'We can't stand each other for ten minutes so that means we're made for each other' foundation for the Ron-Hermione relationship? However, kudos to her for making so many possibilities for these absolutely fantastic (in S'Tarkan's, nonjon's and The Professional's cases) Alternate Universes, or the downright stupid… which includes mine.
goes off in search of more plot bunnies
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"I'm not a superman, so I can't say anything big like I'll protect everyone on Earth. I'm not a modest guy who will say it's enough if I can protect as many people as my two hands can handle, either. I want to protect… a mountain-load of people."
I've read stories and watched movies where the protagonists have promised to protect 'everyone' on Earth, even though their conflict (whatever form it takes) occurs in some plain out in the middle of nowhere. Then there are other stories where the writers have tried to be realistic, and the character promises only to do their very best.
But true realism comes when the character is a selfish bastard that won't do anything unless it's big enough, when it's sure to bring fame, money and power.
I have power. I have money. I don't need fame.
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Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. Moody 'clunked' his way across from the door to the 'back' of the room where the Professor's table was. Originally, the table would have been just a few metres in front of you when you entered the room, but it seemed Moody was paranoid enough that he couldn't stand sitting in such an 'exposed' position.
"I hear your first few months of Defence Against the Dark Arts have been… frankly put, a bit of a joke. In fact, I was quite surprised that your parents hadn't pulled you out of the school, with that fool's incompetence." He growled out, waving and pointing his wand at random things in the classroom at frequent but unexpected intervals. They all glowed green, meaning they were free from any sort of magical enchantment. "Anyway! Thankfully, I have at least until the end of this year to make sure you enter the Second Year with a quite thorough understanding of the basics."
"I'd rather conduct practical lessons, but seeing as you haven't had a proper grounding in the essentials, you'll have to make do with those interesting stories your older friends might tell you about their classes." Most of the students looked quite disappointed.
"That isn't to say we won't have a few practicals from time to time, but First Year Defence Against the Dark Arts has been and will always be a theory course."
Moody finally took the roll, his normal, dark brown (almost black), beady little eye moving steadily down the list, while his electric blue left eye swivelled about freely, focussing momentarily on each student as they replied in the affirmative that yes, they were present. When he got to my name, he barely seemed to pause but when his bright blue eye focussed on me, I felt some very thin tendrils of mind magic poke through the first sphere of 'defence' and into the first circle – not finding anything interesting, he continued on with the roll and turned his magical eye on my brother.
First and Second Year Ravenclaw had Potions, Charms and Flying Lessons with Hufflepuff, while we had Astronomy, Herbology and History of Magic with the Slytherins, and Defence Against the Dark Arts and Transfiguration with Gryffindor. I had no idea about Third Year, as we began taking electives then.
"Jeremy Potter…" He murmured, peering at him steadily with both his eyes. For a brief moment, he glanced back at me, but then he shook his head and went back to staring at Jeremy. I wondered what that was about… perhaps he'd just seen an interesting memory of me?
"Take care not to shock your fellow students too much, Mr. Potter." He finally said, and Jeremy looked vaguely confused and slightly insulted. I grinned inwardly – finally we had a teacher who didn't appreciate having famous students but didn't pay them out for it. Too much. At least, not more than was fair.
Eventually, he got to the end of the list (with Ron Weasley), and he took us through the first few chapters of The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection. Some of it Quirrell had, in his few bursts of professionalism, actually taught, so we breezed through the rather limited text. Jeremy looked particularly bored – our parents had taken us through the basics years ago, and moved onto stuff a little more complicated – while his only female companion, Hermione, seemed quite interested to see how Moody could bring an extra dimension to the text.
"Mr. Potter?" Every time I had to share a class with my brother, I tended to pay a little more attention to check if the Professor was talking to Jeremy or me. This time, Moody was looking right at me. "If a group of wizards were to accost you and your friends, what should you do?"
My mind raced through all the possibilities I would actually take in reality, but finally settled on saying the answer he wanted. "I would try to distract them and run away," I replied tonelessly.
He nodded. "Precisely. None of you have the training to take on a group of wizards – or witches – that are fully trained." He glared at all of us in turn. "Do you seriously think that after a few months in this place you'll be able to take on someone that's spent almost seven years in a school like Hogwarts?" He challenged, and many sullen faces turned embarrassed.
The lesson continued in much the same vein, until the bell rang and the Gryffindors had to hurry to Herbology with Hufflepuff while I had to rush to Accelerated Potions.
Snape had seemed to believe we could figure out the all the theory behind Potions after a few weeks of lessons, and had set us to brewing potions for almost all of our classes. Considering we were the accelerated class, this wasn't too hard to swallow. Sometimes he set a potion that wasn't in our textbooks, and wrote the instructions on a blackboard. Today was one such day, and we had been instructed to brew a Dehydrating Distillation that could drain all of the water out of liquids and moist solids. Many people used a little of it to preserve food or save space when storing drinks, to be reconstituted at a later time.
We had to be careful not to let it come into contact with our skin, so all of us were wearing our dragon-scale gloves and the protective lab coats Snape had provided when he realised that if almost all of his class died due to dehydration, things would look really bad for him. And there'd be a lot of paperwork, too.
Snape had provided all of us with a crystal flask each, capped and filled to the brim with water. Our task was to fill the flask with the Dehydrating Distillation without there being any water in it beforehand. A quick spell to check the concentration of the Distillation in the flask compared to in the cauldron would prove whether we had been successful in our endeavour.
Everyone emptied their flasks – no-one was stupid enough to not do that step – and then various strategies of drying out the flask began. Some put their flasks near their fire (they couldn't risk it overheating and shattering), others stuffed a rag down it in an attempt to soak up the last of it. Some tried combinations of all the methods they saw being used in the class.
Smoothly, I poured a little of the Distillation into my flask, whisked it about for a bit then Vanished it when I was sure it had done its job. I filled my flask up again with the Distillation, this time to the top.
By the end of the class, not many people had realised they had a whole cauldronful (those that had brewed it properly in the first place, of course) of potion that could help them. Snape wasn't pleased, but somehow he managed to not to have an apoplexy then and there. "It seems not many of you are capable of thinking, but I suppose that's to be expected of dunderheads like you…" he hissed, and the students that hadn't 'thought outside the box' quivered fearfully.
At lunchtime, I was approached by Neville.
"Harry? There's something strange going on – we need to talk to you." He whispered into my ear and less discreetly he proceeded to drag me away from my meal and out the door to the Great Hall.
"What? What's going on?" I complained, and Hermione and Ron looked at each other.
"You… you haven't spoken to Jeremy recently, have you? Like, really recently." added Hermione.
I shook my head. "No, I haven't. Why?"
They all looked at each other again, sharing worried looks. Even I was becoming a little nervous. "What?" I asked again.
"He's… he's been acting strange…" Ron shifted uncomfortably.
"Like… strange, how?" I tried to drag out the entire situation out of them verbally, while I grabbed all the pertinent details from their minds.
"He's… he just stopped talking in the middle of Herbology and went to the Hospital Wing, saying he had a headache." I frowned a little at this. Unexplained headaches were more my forte, and for my brother to start having them was a situation I hadn't considered. "Then… then he's just been acting weird, like he looks at us strangely, as if…" Neville trailed off.
"…as if we're going to disappear any moment…" murmured Hermione, and my eyes widened.
What was going on?
"Hermione? Ron? Neville?" Jeremy's voice sounded out from behind us and I started – I hadn't even noticed him! Whipping around, I gazed at him in a nonchalant manner. I didn't miss how his eyes seemed to widen but then his face returned to a rather bland expression, the kind of face a person wears when they're putting their all into Occluding their mind.
"Harry?" His voice seemed to waver a little, but it seemed only I noticed.
"Jeremy," I nodded at him.
He looked at me for a little bit. "I'll talk to you later, okay?" I nodded again, mind buzzing as I tried to remember when he'd last been this uncomfortable around me.
That night, Hedwig the owl swooped into my dorm, bearing a small note for me.
"Hey girl…" I ruffled her feathers and pushed the Owl Treat dish towards her. She took a few then flew off again, while I tried to discern if my brother's note had any hidden meaning.
Harry,
Meet me in the Come and Go Room now.
Jeremy
For some reason, his signature seemed a little off. And the Come and Go Room? I puzzled over it, occasionally tapping at the piece of parchment with my wand, commanding it to 'Reveal Your Secrets!', but nothing happened.
I scoured over the Marauders' Map, and followed Jeremy's name until it disappeared somewhere along the seventh floor.
There was only one room I knew of that existed on the seventh floor but the Marauders had been unable to plot onto the map. The Room of Requirement.
"Shit!" Pulling out my Invisibility Cloak, stuffing it into my robes and hurrying out of Ravenclaw Tower, I raced up to the seventh floor. By the time I got up to the Room of Requirement, I was a little out of breath, having been forced to run with a slightly uneven gait due to the cloak.
I checked the corridor to make sure no-one could see the door suddenly open and close, then slipped into the Room. Where I was met with the tip of Jeremy's wand.
"Easy!" I called, gently tugging my cloak off. "What're you doing, threatening me with your wand when you're the one who called me here?" I complained good-naturedly, although my heart was thumping and I had been about to send a couple of Reducing Hexes at him.
Jeremy tucked his wand away. "Just being careful, Harry."
Here, alone with him, I could clearly see that something was… well, off, about Jeremy. The way he walked was suddenly with more grace than I had ever seen him display, silent and efficient. His face was stern, his posture that of a prowling Nundu.
He whipped about and pointed his wand at me. "Legilimens!"
Instinctively, I hurled him backwards before he'd even gotten past the first sphere.
"What the hell are you thinking, Jeremy!" My wand was out and I was creeping along the edges of the room, circling about where he had landed.
"Just… just testing to see if you can protect your mind, little brother."
I scowled. He hadn't called me that in a while.
He raised his wand again and I tensed. "I swear on my life and magic that what I will now tell Harry James Potter will be completely true and factual." A blaze of magic surrounded him, and I winced, covering my eyes with my left arm.
"What're you doing, Jeremy?" My tone was slightly less accusing, much more curious.
Two chairs, a table and some alcohol appeared. This scene was becoming increasingly familiar to me.
"Sit. I… I have a lot to tell you, Harry."
His uncertain tone after his rather impressive show of magical strength put me on guard yet again, and I sat down cautiously, my eyes flickering from him to the furniture to the drinks and back to him again.
"Should I make another oath to promise I won't harm you? Intentionally?" He added.
I paused, then shook my head.
"Okay, now listen and don't interrupt. There's a lot I need to say."
I nodded.
"Good. Once upon a time, a boy called Harry Potter was born on the 31st of July, to James and Lily Potter." I frowned, but remembered how he'd said not to interrupt. "Harry was a happy baby, and he was loved by his parents, his godfather Sirius and his parents' friend Remus. But then a prophecy was made, and the Potter family had to go into hiding, under the Fidelius Charm. After they were betrayed by Peter Pettigrew, Voldemort came to kill the Potters."
I stared him. I knew all this – why was he telling it all again?
"Voldemort killed-" Wait… there hadn't been any killing done by Voldemort that night! "-James first, then Lily when she refused to let him kill Harry Potter."
Cold rushed through me. Our parents dead? And where was Jeremy in all of this?
"When he tried to kill Harry, the curse rebounded, and Harry was sent to live with Lily's sister's family, the Dursleys."
What? The magic hating Muggles? What on earth? I opened my mouth, but he waved my questions away and I remembered my promise.
"Harry was 'raised' by them for ten years, unknowing of his magical heritage or the fact that his parents had been killed, rather than killed by a car crash. When he turned eleven, letters started coming, brought by owls. His aunt and uncle refused to let him read them, and it wasn't until Hagrid came along to tell Harry about his true history that Harry knew he was a wizard." Jeremy paused, then grabbed a bottle of plain old Muggle gin.
"In his first year at Hogwarts, Voldemort entered the school by possessing a professor, and sought to steal the Philosopher's Stone. In his second year, Voldemort entered yet again, but this time as a memory, and re-opened the Chamber of Secrets. In his third year, Sirius Black escaped from Azkaban, where he had been placed after 'evidence' showed he had betrayed Lily and James Potter and murdered Peter Pettigrew and a street-full of Muggles." At Pettigrew's name, I muttered 'Good Riddance', but the rest of it… "Sirius Black was actually innocent, and they almost caught Peter Pettigrew that year, but he escaped to find his master, Lord Voldemort."
Jeremy took a swig if gin, and as he tipped his head back, his hair fell clear off his forehead and I saw his scar. The ring was gone. The 's' was stretching, straightening, and it was beginning to look eerily like mine. What the…?
"In Harry's fourth year, the Triwizard Tournament was held, but Harry was forced into the competition when a Death Eater Confounded the Cup to spit out his name. The other Hogwarts' champion died that year, killed by Pettigrew but with Voldemort's wand. That year, Voldemort rose again, using a potion that contained Harry's blood and a bunch of other things. Harry almost died that year, but he managed to get back to safety and warn everyone of Voldemort's second rise. The Ministry didn't believe him – didn't want to – and they began a smear campaign against Harry and Dumbledore."
He looked at me, and I thought I should see some sort of sign in his eyes of his troubles, but there was nothing. "Sirius Black died in the fifth year, when he came in to save Harry from a trap Voldemort had weaved for him. That year, Dumbledore finally told Harry the prophecy that Voldemort had tried to trick Harry into retrieving. In the sixth year…" Jeremy paused, guzzled from the gin bottle then continued. "In the sixth year, Dumbledore clued Harry into just what exactly was keeping Voldemort alive. They were called Horcruxi."
I blinked, mind racing as I tried to remember where I'd heard that word. "Soul splitting?"
Jeremy seemed pleased that I knew. "Exactly. To tie his soul to the world, he split it into several bits that acted as anchors." He put down the gin bottle on the table. "Harry had already destroyed one in his second year, the object that held Voldemort's memories and allowed him to possess a student to open the Chamber of Secrets. Dumbledore had destroyed another, but at the cost of severely injuring his right hand, his dominant wand hand, in fact."
Here, Jeremy sighed rather world-wearily. "A plot had been hatched by Voldemort, and it resulted in the death of Dumbledore, by the hands of Snape. Many things happened that year, including the invasion of Hogwarts by Death Eaters."
I blinked, swallowed. "Harry planned with his friends Hermione and Ron to forgo their seventh year at Hogwarts-" It was about now that I realised he was talking about another Harry, one who had never known his parents, never had a brother, and had never been sorted into Ravenclaw. "-and go in search of all the other Horcruxi. Long, hard battles were fought, sometimes with the help of the Order of the Phoenix, sometimes but even rarer with the help of Aurors, most times with no help at all. Harry lost everyone by the time the last battle with Voldemort came around."
This time, when he looked at me I could see that his eyes were glinting a little bit more than usual. "Harry couldn't bear the thought of having to go through his life without anyone who had known him and not the Boy-Who-Lived, and now, the killer of Voldemort. So he, along with the help of the 'split personalities' he carried, which were actually copies of Dumbledore's and Snape's minds, managed to find a way to send him into a world where everyone was still alive. Where he could start again."
I blinked. "Just who the hell are you?" I finally asked, and pointed my wand at him.
He held his hands out, palms open. "I'm Harry Potter." Jeremy's eyes narrowed. "But a different Harry from you-"
"Where's Jeremy?"
The boy tapped his mind. "Inside, somewhere. Let me finish explaining, and then you can decide whether or not I deserve to be hexed."
I frowned, but nodded curtly, keeping my wand trained on him. "The incantation involved having to narrow down the person I was going to be sent to through their name, but Harry Potter was… is such a common name and I couldn't risk being sent into a fifty-year old Muggle's body. So I used the words 'the one called the Boy-Who-Lived'. Unfortunately… it seems that your brother Jeremy was called the Boy-Who-Lived, and here I am… if I had been sent into your body, our minds would have actually been able to fuse together, but because Jeremy and I aren't the same person, and because… I am… I was older, my magic… kind of pushed him into a corner."
"So you killed my brother."
"No, no, no! That's not it at all. He's just… been temporarily displaced, but he's still here."
"And… the difference is?"
Jeremy squirmed. "Look! I'm Harry from another world and I can help you!"
"Do I look like I need your help?"
"You do, Harry, you do. You have no idea how strong even Snape is, and Voldemort is exponentially more capable than him. Look, I'm sure I can move 'me' from your brother to you, and he won't remember a thing and we should be perfectly fine. I promise."
"How can I trust you?"
"Do you trust in your Occlumency shields? Do you trust yourself? Because if you do, then you know you can stop me from taking control. And I'm sure that since I can see you and we're both in the same… the same universe, then I can control how I get placed in your mind."
"You're not me. How can you be sure we'll… that I won't have the same reaction as you had with Jeremy?"
He sighed. "Look. Trust me, I made the oath. I'm here to help you. Me. Us. Everyone. This is your chance to leap several years ahead and make a difference."
I looked at him. "No thanks." His eyes widened. "I'm already an Animagus, Harold. I know Occlumency and Legilimency. I can move at greater than half the speed of sound and lift over a tonne. I'm probably magically stronger than most sixth years and I know more than any first year has a right to know. I don't need your help, and I don't trust you."
With that, I made to leave the Room of Requirement but Jeremy's hand swiped at the back of my robes.
"That's only a few years, Harry. How about twenty? Wouldn't you like to know more?"
"Stop trying to appeal to my inner Ravenclaw. It won't work."
"Dumbledore doesn't think you're the Boy-Who-Lived – you're going to miss out on an incredible amount of information."
"You're not even from this universe – what makes you think your information is going to be correct!" I challenged, and the boy in Jeremy fell silent.
"Do you know the prophecy?"
I snorted. "Of course I do: 'The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies. The Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not. The Marked One's brother will light the way and he will become as ash, mourned by the birds of Ra. The Dark Lord and the Marked One are fated to battle seven times, and either must die at the hand of the other.' I bet it's different to your prophecy…" I sneered.
"Hang on. Shouldn't you already know this universe's prophecy? Jeremy knew it…"
Jeremy shook his head. "I haven't had the time to try and pull Jeremy out from the corner he's been shoved into. But… well, my prophecy was a little different, but essentially it's pretty much the same." He peered at me curiously. "So everyone's expecting you to die?"
I shrugged. "Probably."
"Your form's not a phoenix, is it?" I shook my head.
"Then it can't be you." He pointed out.
"I already knew that, idiot."
Jeremy rubbed at his scar. "Look. It'll just be easier for everyone involved if you let me into your mind. Jeremy won't remember a thing and his scar will go back to the way it was, and you can enjoy the bonuses of having the knowledge and magic of a thirty-year old."
"What's the catch?"
He looked puzzled. "Catch?"
"Something this 'good' has to have a catch. The only one I can think of is having to put up with you in my head."
"Er… well, you'll also have to put up with having a Snape and Dumbledore in your head too…" He admitted.
"Forget it!" I strode out the door, disappeared under my Invisibility Cloak and hurried back to Ravenclaw Tower. He didn't follow.
So that was what was wrong with Jeremy. He wasn't even there – it was a really, really weird 'me' in there instead. A 'me' that hadn't had a family, a 'me' that had lost everyone and everything.
A me that had felt it was better to go 'back' and do it all over again.
I sighed, stumbling into my bed.
A few minutes later, Terry's voice called over the curtains of my four-poster. "Harry? There's an owl for you…"
Sluggishly, I went to get the letter from the owl – it was Hedwig.
When I grabbed the letter, the words 'Harry Potter' changed smoothly into 'Do Not Open in Public'.
"Thanks, Terry," I muttered absentmindedly, then returned to the confines of my curtain-encircled four-poster bed.
The letter was surrounded by a lot of magic, and it was with much apprehension that I slit open the letter, protected by a field of general protection runes.
A flash of bright light and I noted that the runes had activated. There, trapped in the circle of magic was a smoky form that put into mind what Voldemort had looked like when he fled. The smoke eventually gathered into a recognisable form – somebody that looked like Father, but had Mother's eyes.
"You don't look anything like me – are you sure Jeremy isn't you just… called something else?" I pointed out, and the Harry trapped by the runes scowled.
"I'm sure. Now you just had to go and…"
"Now you know that I know how to look after myself, dimwit."
"Yes, but if I can't get back into a body within… twenty minutes, I'm freaking dead!"
"You know, you look like Voldemort did. Earlier this year, when he left Quirrell behind." I commented nonchalantly. His eyes widened.
"You've already faced Quirrell? But… It's only second term!"
"Yeah, and it wasn't the Philosopher's Stone, it was the Holy Grail."
If it were at all possible, his eyes bulged even more. "The Holy Grail! He didn't get it, right?" An undercurrent of panic entered his voice.
"Nup. Now, what were you thinking, trying to trick me into letting myself get possessed by you?"
He looked abashed. "Look, I'm sorry, but I really don't want to actually kill your brother."
"So you'd rather kill me, is that it?"
"No, for goodness' sake! There's a lot of things that'll be different from how it happened when I got sent into your brother's body, and… Look, don't you want to show up your brother? Don't you want to be better than him?"
"I already am," I pointed out.
"You're being rather stubborn, you know."
"I'm not stupid enough to let myself get possessed." I retorted.
"You're not getting possessed!" His tone was getting progressively irate as the conversation wore on, and I could see he was fading a little. "Just think of me as an invisible friend, with extra benefits."
"You know, that sounds awfully… disturbing."
"Not like that!"
"And I still don't like the idea of having Snape and Dumbledore in my head."
"It's not your Snape and Dumbledore, it's just… a copy of the one's I know. Knew. Like a simulation program. And if that'll help you deal with how they act, isn't that all the better?"
I sighed. This was getting troublesome.
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Author's Notes: Well, things are getting strange. This is already an AU, and now another Harry turns up?
1. The first paragraph is from Bleach, Volume 6, Chapter 4, page 11.
2. Moody – someone who doesn't dress up the facts and says it like it is. Very paranoid, but still different to how faux Moody acted.
3. Snape – still irrational, in that he believes that everyone should be able to know everything about how to brew perfect potions but fails to teach them it. Probably because he wants to make Potions seems more difficult than it really is.
4. Room of Requirement/Come and Go Room – the latter is how Dobby refers to the room, and Other-Harry uses the name so if the owl gets intercepted, the meaning isn't immediately clear.
5. Jeremy – when Other-Harry was placed into his body, Other-Harry wasn't exactly compatible with Jeremy and his overwhelming superiority in all areas over Jeremy pushed Jeremy into a corner of his mind.
6. Other-Harry – a Harry that experienced everything canon-Harry did, but since canon-Harry isn't expected to go 'back'…
This was more of an intermission chapter, introducing new characters and setting up the events that will be rolling on in the next chapter. Don't forget chapter 12 heralds the change in perspective!
Don't forget the FF authors I just plugged in the Disclaimer – their AU-Harrys are exceptional!