[DISCLAIMER: And by the way, my name is not Joanne Rowling, so unfortunately Harry Potter does NOT belong to me, though it really is such a shame...

A/N: This one might be rather shaky, and I apologize in advance. I can't seem to make my mind on whether he should merge with younger self or not.]

(~ss~ - means something is spoken in Parseltongue;

"blah" - speach;

'ergh' - thoughts;

"ano" - spells;

{book} - letters, howlers, books and the like =)

Chapter Five:

Reality Check.

Opening his eyes, Harry frowned, having no idea where exactly he was. He felt weightless for some reason and that really made him nervous. Suddenly he saw a person silently appear in front of him. It was a woman. She had long red hair, but not Weasley red, more like blood red. Harry looked into her eyes and gasped, for they were his eyes, or rather exactly like his. In that moment he knew who the woman was:

"Mom..." - he croaked, his voice raw from screaming during the ritual - "Did we screw up? Am I dead?"

She gave him a soothing smile and shook her head:

"No, child, you are not. You, son, are at a crossroad of sorts..." - she fell silent, trying to find words that would make him better understand - "Due to the ritual you left your time frame and reality behind, yet you were not specific enough about your destination point, so you were brought here. Look around you, Harry, they are all different worlds at the day you specified."

Harry gaped at his mother's spirit and then slowly turned around. He was surrounded with what looked like windows. Each window showed different things. One showed his younger self being beaten by Vernon, another had him shopping with Sirius, beside it was one where he obviously got dumped at an orphanage and there were Ron and Hermione listening to something Dumbledore was telling them.

Lord Potter-Black turned back to face his mother:

"So you mean I have to pick a dimension."

The soul of Lily Potter nodded with a small smile:

"Yes and rather quickly, or you'll be sucked into some random one."

Harry gaped at the still smiling ghost and hastily turned back to inspect the windows more closely. He knew that if he didn't make his decision then his famous Potter luck would really screw him over. Suddenly one window caught his attention. In it a regular day at the Dursleys was shown. He watched young Harry walk to the garden to pull the weeds, when suddenly he saw an owl flowing to the boy. Potter gulped. This was not something he could remember, but for some reason he felt it would be important. He felt a tug at his navel and then he was bodily flung through the window.

[July 25th 1991; Privet Drive, 4.]

Harry shook his head, trying to clear the ringing out of his ears. He felt something warm and liquid on his forehead and knew at once that it was blood. Having had enough experience with the wonder that was having his head smacked by the cupboard door, he lay back onto the mattress and took a few deep breaths.

'OK, seems like I really made it...' - he thought absentmindedly, as he wiped the blood off his forehead.

"BOY! THE WEEDS WON'T PULL THEMSELVES!" - came the shrill yell of aunt Petunia - "MOVE IT!"

With a small grunt Harry pushed the old glasses onto his nose and blinked in surprise, as the sight became blurry. He quickly pulled the glasses off and to his astonishment the world came back into focus. He then quickly stood up and promptly banged his head on the stairs that were the ceiling of his cupboard.

'OK, now this is not good...I'm in the cupboard so I did merge with my younger self, but how the heck did this happen?' - he thought in total horror. Harry took a deep breath, using his Occlumency to forcibly calm his raging emotions - 'I guess this would be the time to try some glamour charms...'

He had to concentrate very hard for some reason and then his magic came to him. Harry whispered the first charm he could think of: "Celare Specie!" He felt the tingle of magic, as the spell took effect and sighed in relief.

An hour later Potter found himself pulling weeds under the hot summer sun. Of course, since he only looked like a little boy and was in reality older, the chore did not require that much strength. Finally he noticed that strange midnight black owl that he saw through the reality window. The bird flew over him and dropped a parcel into his hands. It wasn't very big, but Harry knew he would have at least some trouble getting it into his cupboard, especially since he could feel shrinking charms on whatever was in the parcel. For a moment he hesitated as he thought about what to do. he had his own shrunken trunk in one pocket and the wand in the other. That left him with the only available option - magic. The green eyed wizard raked his brain for a suitable spell, his brows furrowed in thought and then he grinned, as he recalled the invisibility spell. It was quite useful, but unfortunately it only could be successfully cast on inanimate objects. he placed his left hand on the parcel and murmured: "Invisibilis Facta". And indeed his hand was now seemingly in the air, but the parcel was still there. He picked it up rather awkwardly and after a second of deliberation placed several notice-me-not charms on himself, so that to make sure that he would make it safely to the cupboard.

Ever so carefully he went back to the house, making sure that he did actually finish pulling the weeds, as there was no reason to anger Vernon unnecessarily. However he did not need to worry, since the entire family was busy watching Dudley's favorite TV show. Thus Harry crept to his cupboard, casting muggle-repelling, silencing and locking charms. Now being sure that he was safe from the Muggles for the moment, he pulled out his wand, tapped the parcel with it and watched in amazement as it grew rapidly to the size of a trunk. On closer inspection it turned out to be made of very dark wood, almost black in color. On the lid was a crest. Harry had no idea what family it belonged to, but was fairly certain that it had some connection to him.

Also the trunk had no lock on it, this meant only one thing - blood wards, so he pricked his finger with a transfigured needle and let a drop of blood fall onto the crest. For a moment nothing happened and the wizard thought he made a mistake, but then the trunk glowed brightly and the lid jumped open.

[A/N: Sorry, didn't manage to make it as long as the last one, but I'll try to do better in the future. Like I said at the beginning, I was very unsure as to let him get back in his own body, or in his younger self's body. So then I decided to compromise and merged them but still let Harry to have his adult body. He will obviously go back to Hogwarts, but actually having an adult form will have it's advantages... at least when it comes to private life =)

Next up: The mysterious trunk and fate changing revelations. Here begins Dumbledore bashing...

Poll 2: Main Pairing - can be found in my profile (finally figured out how to display them =)

Ideas about the contents of the trunk are welcome as well...]