It was May 2nd 2197 and Victoria Frobisher was in the graveyard at Godric's Hollow doing research on a report for her History of Magic teacher. Abraham Longbottom was a stickler for getting the feeling of history right. He said that people needed to understand that history was the story of people not just dry empty dates and facts. Everything happened because people felt, and lived, and believed.
Victoria shook her head in frustration as why should she care what happened a hundred years ago. It didn't matter to her life right now. Things like the Mars colony confirming that ancient Martians had existed, the new interstellar mission to Alpha Centauri, project Mersea the colony under the Atlantic ocean, all mattered more.
She stood in front of a stone that held the names Harry J Potter and Hermione J Potter. United together forever and a day. Sighing she kicked the stone grumbling, "What the hell does it matter if I get this report right or not. You'll still be dead."
"Well I'm sure Abraham would be very disappointed." A strong male voice said from behind her.
Victoria spun drawing her wand. She got high marks in the defense class Professor Finnegan taught so should have been aware of someone sneaking up behind her. She froze though when she saw the person standing behind her. A tall male with black messy hair and emerald green eyes. A lightning bolt scar on his forehead was barely noticeable as a faded memory. He wore simple muggle clothes, but outdated by at least a century.
"Hello there." He said with a smirk.
"Uh. Hello." She managed to stammer back.
"Oh I guess that joke is a bit before your time." He laughed.
"Okay. I must have fallen and hit my head or something. Either that or you're really good at transfiguration." Victoria said sitting down on the headstone.
The image, or specter or whatever it was of Harry Potter gave a tsking noise, "Uh if you don't mind. Hermione gets a bit irritated when people sit on the stone. Its rather rude unless you're family."
Standing up quickly Victoria decided to humor the person. If they had gone to the trouble to transfigure themselves into the biggest hero of the wizarding world since Merlin then it was the least she could do. "Okay sure mister. If that's what you want."
"Well I do try to keep her happy. You know the old saying happy wife, happy life."
"Uh except you're dead, she's dead, all of the heroes of Hogwarts are dead." Victoria said trying to subtly cast a detection spell on the man.
"Go ahead and cast away. I don't mind. You can do it openly. Just make sure you get the pronunciation right. Mione is still a bit of a stickler for that." he chuckled.
Victoria shrugged and openly cast several spells. None of them registered that there was a person standing before her at all. She blinked several times then tried again with the same results. She felt a cold chill run down her spine. "You're a ghost."
"Technically no. You see I was Master of Death for a whole four hours. That was enough to let me cross back over under limited circumstances. You, standing on my grave, kicking my headstone, is one of those circumstances." He said crossing his arms.
She looked at the stone with her dirty footprint on the corner of it then back at him with a sheepish expression, "Uh sorry."
He shrugged, "You're not the first person to have kicked it, we did not make everyone happy with what we did. You should have seen what Blaise Zabini did. But then I'm not sure you're old enough to have seen that."
"I'm sixteen as of last week." She defiantly said.
"Oh wow. I almost forgot what it felt like to be sixteen. Anyhow there's a bench just over here we can sit and talk." He said gesturing towards a tall willow tree.
Victoria felt her knees working, even though she wanted to collapse as the surrealness of talking to someone who had been dead for almost a century hit her. She was soon sitting across from him staring as he blinked, he seemed to be breathing she almost reached out to touch him but stopped herself.
"I'm, real, I suppose. Metaphysically if you touched me I would feel warm, solid, you'd even register a pulse."
"Oh." She squeaked as she had no other idea of what to say.
"So what's your problem with trying to understand what happened?"
Victoria was taken aback. She had no idea what to say. How could she explain what she felt to him.
Sighing Potter tilted his head at her with a gentle fatherly smile. "You're a muggle-born aren't you?"
"Uh we call ourselves first-gens now." she corrected.
"Right and you've grown up in a world that knew about magic and wizards and all of that."
"Well yeah your war ripped the veil asunder and revealed the existence of the magical world to everyone."
"Yeah because it almost ended everyone." He said turning his eyes towards the upper branches where a squirrel sat staring back down. "It did end quite a few."
"I know. I've seen the lists. I showed mum and dad the war memorial last time they came to a Hogsmeade weekend." she said.
"Yeah. Names carved in stone. Ink and paper. They don't mean anything to you do they?"
She wanted to be flippant, or deny that they meant nothing but the look in his eyes made her lower her head and say, "No they don't. I never knew any of these people. They don't affect my life today."
Harry nodded softly, slowly. "I see. Well I knew these people. I grew up with them. I sat and ate, and laughed, and joked with them. I had a crush on a few of them. I shed blood alongside them. They were real and meant something. They all had hopes and dreams and feelings." He took a deep breath before holding his hand out.
Victoria looked at it in fear and uncertainty. She looked back up into the verdant pools behind the crystal lenses.
"I swear you will not be harmed. I just want to show you a few things. Maybe help you understand."
Victoria hesitantly took his hand before she felt a cold swirling sensation.
===xxx
The next thing she knew she was standing in the middle of the Hogwart's great hall. Only there was Dumbledore. She recognized him from his portrait. And Snape and McGonnegal and turning to look at the Gryffindor table there they were. The trio.
"Don't worry. We are but the shades here, they can neither see nor hear us." Harry intoned. Laughing when Victoria gave him a curious look. "I married a bookworm. You learn a few things over the decades. Besides Dickens is a pretty cool guy. We play bridge with him and Poe on Thursdays."
"So this is you and Hermione and Ronald Weasley. Which one is Neville?" She asked.
"Wow. Abe will be very not happy to know you can't recognize his grandfather." Harry shook his head. "The tall brown haired guy sitting across from Hermione. He had puberty hit him pretty hard which made the girls finally notice him. Luna called him adorkable though as he never let it go to his head. Ever. I think he was the most well adjusted and level headed out of all of us."
"Oh." She had to admit that if she had been around then she would have tried to get his attention.
"The little ball of spunk on Hermione's right is Ginny. Ron's little sister." Harry said with a lump in his throat.
"She's the one that committed suicide after the war." Victoria asked.
Harry turned with a scowl that made Victoria take a half step back. "She did NOT commit suicide. That bitch Skeeter and her stupid slanders."
"Well there was some question about what happened."
"I knew her. We dated, we loved each other and then I went off to hunt the damned Horcruxes. By the time I got back I was with Hermione and she was, not in the mood for anyone to touch her or love her. Between the echos of Riddle in her head and what the Carrows did she was changed. She was hurt too bad to mend." He said stroking the girl's hair.
"So which story is the true one?"
"None of them. We pushed the one where it was a rogue Death Eater that wanted revenge to give her a warrior's death. An honorable death. To protect her memory. The truth is she crawled in a bottle and never came out. She hurt so bad and none of us could help give her peace and comfort. She got on her broom one night and just kept climbing, higher and higher trying to outrace the pain until she just fell. It was a simple, stupid, tragic, mistake. An accident." He said kissing the top of Ginny's head. "I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I'd come back to her instead of Hermione."
Victoria watched him sigh at the healthy vibrant girl. Flipping her long red hair over her shoulder as she laughed at something the others said. How happy she looked. Victoria couldn't understand how she would go from this to the tormented person Harry Potter had just described.
"We almost lost Ron because of it. He had already lost two brothers and his father. He watched Fred die. He couldn't handle losing Ginny too. He began to live recklessly, drinking, drugs, girls. Throwing himself into all kinds of dangerous sports, until he hit rock bottom. He got lucky though when he hit the bottom he found himself. He turned his life around and rebuilt himself." Harry smiled.
"He helped found the Helping Hands Association to bring people together through laughter, friendship and community." Victoria recited by rote.
"Five points to Ravenclaw." Harry sarcastically said.
"Actually I'm a Hufflepuff." She admitted.
Harry shrugged, "Whatever. You still didn't get it."
"No I understand he was your closest, most loyal friend.." Victoria had started to say more but Harry's derisive snort stopped her.
"No he wasn't. Neville wasn't even that. Hermione was. Ron was a complicated, selfish, jealous, kid who had a prejudicial streak wide enough you could play Quidditch on. He was a mamma's boy who barely let go of the apron strings. He could be insensitive, downright foolish and I loved him deeply because he was the first friend I had my age. Ever."
Victoria opened her mouth to say something but closed it quickly. Harry had moved to stand behind his wife.
"No Hermione was the only one there for me all along. She was the one that stood beside me when everyone else turned against me, even Ron. That's why I wound up marrying her. Loving her. Being loyal to her back. Once I finally realized the truth after a few mistakes." Harry said with a wry chuckle.
"A few mistakes?"
"Well I had a crush on Cho Chang. You knew her probably better as Cho Wilson. Then Luna and I dated for a few. Fortunately we parted as friends. She had a much happier life with Neville. And then there was Ginny." He sighed.
"I never knew."
"Its in the biography Hermione wrote about me. Didn't you read it?"
"Uh no." She admitted.
"Abe made it required for a class project. Each of our biographies."
"Well you see there are these online sites that give a synopsis enough to at least pass the grade."
Harry sighed again but moved on, "This is Colin Creevey. He was a great photographer. Did you ever see any of his work?"
She shook her head with a bad feeling.
"No of course you didn't because he snuck back to the battle to fight with us. To stand up for what he believed in. A giant crushed him to death with his club." Harry's voice had taken on a strange firm tone that wasn't anger but was definitely a close relative. "He never got a chance to have his work publish. Hermione and I had a few of the pictures he gave us on the wall at home. Otherwise it's all gone."
"This is Lavender Brown. She was a beautiful young woman. Her and Ron dated for a year before they broke up. She would have given him some really pretty kids. Mauled to death by a werewolf at the final battle. She at least didn't die a virgin thanks to Ron." Harry gave a sad smile as the Lavender of this time grinned shyly at Ron and winked. The Ron smiled back with a lusty grin.
He went on around the school. Telling Victoria something about each and every student. What they enjoyed, how good they were at Quidditch, who they had loved or cared about. What they had hoped to do when they grew up. How they died for far too many of them. Luna, Susan and Hannah, Seamus, Dean, and even the Slytherins. Harry introduced her to all 400 students. By the end of it she knew more about these people, long dead, than she did about her own fellow students.
"Okay I get it. You were all people. You all had lives. But I still don't see what the big deal is. Why it matters to me."
Harry turned sadly to her. "You don't get it do you? We were all kids. We didn't want to fight. We didn't want to die. We wanted to have a life and a childhood and grow up normally. That was all taken from us so you can sit on your duff, looking at the inter-webs and cheating on your homework. None of us recovered from the war, even the ones of us who lived had ghosts. Hermione wound up in therapy for years. I buried things until I had a psychotic break and wound up in the hospital for a year. Neville always walked with a limp. Sweet little Luna never talked about what happened to her at the Malfoy's. But we knew she was haunted by it all her life. We cared and loved her all the same. My godson Teddy grew up without his parents thanks to this war. A war that if we hadn't fought you wouldn't be alive today to look back and sneer at us. For you to say we didn't matter."
Victoria didn't know what to say. Being lectured by a spirit was a new experience. She looked around at the hall as a great many of the students faded out. "What's going on?"
"Those are the ones who died that day. Over 50 students gave their lives for what they believed was important." More students faded out. "Those are the ones that were physically crippled, injured so badly that even with magic they always bore the scars of that day."
Even more students faded out, including the golden trio, "These are the ones that fought but hid their scars. Who carried theirs inside them. The only ones left are the ones who didn't fight. They were the lucky ones."
She looked at the small handful of specters that remained. She did not see any of the trio, none of the older students either, just younger ones. Only a few of the teachers had faded out. "But. It just. I dunno. I don't understand."
"Look take my hand." He said holding it out again. Victoria looked around the mostly empty hall and with a shudder took it. A shimmer later they stood in a ruined and blasted shell of stones. She could see the sky though the huge empty hole that was the missing roof.
"Where are we?"
"We are in the Hogwarts that would have been if we had not fought. If we had lost."
She stood looking around mouth agape. "What happened?"
"Voldemort took over the wizarding world. He killed the muggle-borns and solidified his grip over the magical community. His war spiraled more and more out of control until it began to affect the muggles. They fought back. Magic versus technology." Harry gave a dark laugh. "Back when Muggles had pitchforks and torches they managed to burn hundreds of witches and wizards, with machine guns, missiles, laser guided bombs the carnage was a thousand times worse. Magical plagues, inferi, curses, wiped out whole cities. The UK was a devastated battleground and the rest of the world was afraid and under attack. Eventually a magically enhanced nuke was launched by the Death Eaters. It wiped out Paris, the muggles responded in kind. I think there's maybe a couple hundred thousand muggles and magicals alive world wide in this reality."
Victoria blinked hard as she looked around. She thought if Hogwarts which seemed as solid as the Rock of Gibraltar had been reduced to this because a group of people had failed. A group of kids had failed. Kids who had done so much more than her. What right did she have to complain about the minor inconveniences of her life. She didn't risk being tortured, or crippled, or killed on a daily basis. She had more than enough food, and her electronic toys sat unused a lot of the time as she had too many to deal with at once. She had a good and easy life because they had had a hard one.
"You're starting to see it now." Harry pointed out softly, "Starting to see how a bunch of people. Changed the world. Changed the way things went. Not names on a memorial, not empty facts but people. People you never met put their lives on the line, some of them paid dearly, for you. Paid for you to be able to be free and live in peace."
Victoria dropped to her knees as the weight of history hit her. When she realized the debt she owed to the people who fought for her, for her way of life. She began to cry at the lives. She felt the hand touch her on the back as the cold shiver went through her.
She opened her tear filled eyes to see she was kneeling before the grave of the Potters. She reached out to clean the dirt off of it she had put there. Wiping her eyes she stood up and looked around. She whispered, "Thank you. Thank you for all you did."
Victoria left the graveyard that day. A breeze ruffled the willow tree as it moved across the land.
To all the warriors who paid the ultimate price for freedom we thank you for your sacrifice so that we might live. To those who struggled against the darkness so that we could walk in the light we thank you. May all of your names be remembered for all time.
===xxx(Review Responses)
Alskan Dracolych: I have to agree with Neville. I know what's inside my head and it isn't very pretty sometimes.
Dennisud: The dreamscape is a very malleable arena.
Katmom: Thank you.
Timekeeper: You're welcome. I figured Ron would see himself as the big damn hero of the story and Riddle though. The ghost of Riddle would be most appropriatrely represented by Freddy.
OfficerDonNZ: Thank you. Yes it was creepy but appropriate as Ron would see himself as the hero. The savior. Harry and hermione's dreams as they are relatively better adjusted (I say relative to the rest otheir freinds) were not as bad and Ginny. Ginny would have echos still of her trauma. Luna understands though.