This chapter really started to extend passed my cut off length so I had to cut it off. I have the tendency to keep going if I don't set hard limits for myself else you guys would be bomb boarded with words with no end in sight. While that sounds great in theory, it's not really. Nothing like reading a chapter book with no chapters lol

This chapter opening isn't talking about gods by the way. It just happened to sound like it when i was writing it. I was trying to go for a yin yang effect with life and death with magic kind of being the blanket that covers both sides. For clarification: magic destroyed the world, Life became eternal and Death wasn't even in the picture until magic exploded.

I have decided Harry is The Witness or if you prefer: he represents History and truth. You can't kill history or truth but you can warp and change it. That is why he is still alive after everything.

Eventually, everything makes sense guys. It's still too early in the storyline to make judgements on my decisions and I am not going for a short storyline where everything is explained in a few chapters.

~Loner

When the end came, Harry couldn't say he was surprised. He had been feeling the scales between life and death tilt for a while in the last few years before Magic couldn't keep up.

Through his connection with Death, Harry knew life was too populated. Fewer and fewer were joining the stream of eternal sleep, which clogged up the wheels of the life cycle. Death was bored and life was gloating over it like it was winning at monopoly.

With his connection through magic, Harry could only laugh at the irritation it was feeling. Humans weren't just finding secrets to live longer through scientific advances but recreating life through a means of artificial magic. If Harry could go back far enough in time, he would have told the whole Wizarding World off for their narrow mindedness. Turns out, non-magical humans could do magic. It just took them longer to figure out how.

Harry was under the firm belief that what really broke the universe was when magic stopped being born. At some point, life started over producing. Magic couldn't keep up. It was so thinly spread that it was unable to touch it's creations anymore no matter how much it struggled, twisted and turned to reach the poor soul it wanted to take in.

Now, magic could have given up, let the soul go and just care for the ones it could reach. Except, it wasn't in magic's nature to give up. Instead, it kept trying until it eventually exploded into a shower of sparks across the universe.

That year, Harry watched the universe burn, and death laughed in the face of life as it finally had something to do.

On another note, it was pretty interesting watching time give birth to a new universe and start the process all over again. Harry had learned what prophecies really were and had a whole new understanding of the butterfly effect.

The only thing Harry didn't understand after was: How was he still alive!

This is ridiculous!

Chapter 6: Random….

Harry Potter was relaxing back into the old worn but well-maintained booth in the dinner located in the little town of Forks, Washington. Harry knew from the rare lucid feeling currently coursing through his body and mind that he was dreaming. There wasn't really a moment when he was awake that he could feel this clean anymore. It's nice, he thought as he closed his eyes, soaking in the calm quiet atmosphere of the diner. He could hear the clanging of the pots and pans in the backroom where the chef was making his order, the jingling of the waitress accessories as she wiped down a surface not too far from him, and the light scrapping of chairs from the few patrons in the area. The air was still and quiet, allowing Harry to clear his mind for once. The bells above the door alerting everyone to the door openings didn't disrupt the harmony Harry had found within the noise.

Harry very nearly fell asleep within his dream when something hit the side of his shoe where his feet rested propped up along the length of the booth. Startled, Harry's instants took over and his foot flew up in attempt to kick the offending object or person. However, his foot didn't hit any resistance, just glided through air.

"Honestly, Harry," a young adolescent voice chided him from across his table, "feet belong on the floor, not the chair."

Frowning at the familiar bossy tone, Harry opened his eyes, lazily casting a glance at the voice. In front of him sat an all too familiar 11-year-old face with horrendously curly hair that bushed up around it, falling down passed thin shoulders and hanging just shy of being caught between the small of the girls back and the chair. "Hermione," Harry breathed, vaguely remembering the girl's name.

It had been a long time since he had seen her face, even longer since he had seen this version of it. He had forgotten how… average she had looked when he had first met her. He knew, given time, this pitiful book worm of a girl would eventually grow into her own. In this form, though, no one would believe this poor unfortunate soul would one day become not only be the smartest witch of the century but, also, rival the goddess of Athena in looks and confidence. "What are you doing here?" he asked, nonchalantly, acting as if her presence in his dream didn't perplex and disturb him.

Hermione rolled her eyes at him. "Where else would I be?" She asked, condescendingly like he had just offended her with his words. "Out there?" She lifted a boney hand to hitch a thumb over her shoulder in a gesture to the window.

Harry's green eyes shifted, following her gesture, peering through the clear glass to see the world outside the diner on fire. Right before his eyes, a skyscrapers not native to the small town of Forks exploded, rubble falling like a shower of fireworks onto the people below. "Huh..." Though he couldn't hear it, he could imagine the screaming so vividly it was ringing in his ears. "Good point." Harry was glad he wasn't out there.

"Here you go, dears," the waitress suddenly interrupted, placing down two plates of food. In front Harry, she sat down a plate of eggs, hash browns and a side of pancakes that looked devine to Harry taste buds. For Hermione, hamburger and fries.

"I hope you don't mind," Hermione started, her form morphing, as if time was speeding up for her, right before his eyes into her young 16 year old self as she talked, "I've been craving a hamburger something badly lately." Her tone had gained an elegant quality with her transformation that only came with time and experience of aging. Her brown eyes develop dark bags from lack of sleep and, despite the current age she took on, wrinkles of stress were beginning to form at the corner of her eyes. The new version forced an extremely old memory of their 7th year of Hogwarts when they were more occupied with surviving than living.

Harry just shrugged, not too concerned with the girl. He was pretty sure even in a dream Harry was rich; so, what did a meal cost in the grand scheme?

Picking up his silverware preparing to dig in, he asked, "So, what do you want?"

Hermione reached for the ketchup from the side of the table near the wall. "What do you mean?" After giving the bottle a shake, she popped open the lid and began the annoying process of splattering her fries with ketchup.

The spitting sound the bottle made as she squeezed out the contents grated on his nerves, making his hands itch to smack the bottle away. However, Harry controlled the urge. Instead, he decided to cut into his eggs with a little more force than necessary to relieve the irritation. This action, of course, caused the silverware to scrape across the surface of the plate creating high pitched screeches that caused the girls eyebrow to twitch. For an unnaturally long time, the two glared at each other as they continued to irk the other with their respective noises.

By the time they both fell into laughter, Hermione's plate was piled high with ketchup, and Harry's eggs were basically grits.

Harry's eyes fluttered open before his alarm went off. For a moment, he just laid in his bed, staring blankly up at the ceiling, tears trickling from the corners of his eyes.

Hermione had visited him.

It was a bitter sweet realization that caused him more heartache than he had felt in a long time. Yet, despite the pain coursing through him every time his heart thumped in his chest, Harry knew today was a good day. Harry couldn't help laughing at the absurdity of it as he sat up. That woman truly only came to annoy him. Somehow, that knowledge alone was a better comfort than any hug he could have ever gotten.

Maybe, going back to school was actually doing him some good?

Shaking his head, Harry reached for his glasses, turning off the alarm as he did, as he stood from the bed. In a gesture Hermione did many times when she was old enough to need glasses for her failing sight, Harry used his lips to open one side then flicked the glasses before slipping them on as he walked into the bathroom.

Skip –

"What are you doing later today?"

Harry spared Jimmy a glance before reaching for the door of the school. "That I know of?" he asked rhetorically, though Jimmy nodded to the question anyways. "Nothing. Why?"

Jimmy followed after him. "My girlfriend wants to go to this swinger's party in Seattle, but I've never been to one before. I thought, maybe if you're free, you wouldn't mind going with us. You know, so we don't feel like complete idiots."

Upon reaching the locker, Harry put in the code and opened it. "Aren't you guys already idiots?" he couldn't help but poke fun of Jimmy. Then he paused, hand hovering over the text book in front of him. "Wait," he turned to Jimmy, "you have a girlfriend?"

"Well, yeah." Jimmy awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck. "Well, no. Actually, she's just a friend…." He trailed off in embarrassment.

"But, you want her to be you're girlfriend?"

Jimmy nodded. "Well, yeah."

Harry nodded sagely, then grabbed his book. "Who is she?" He couldn't help but ask, "Someone I know?"

Jimmy nodded. "You met her. We have math together."

Closing the locker door, Harry turned his attention to Jimmy. "I have? We do?" Harry couldn't think of anyone in his Math Class that may have caught his friend's attention. Granted, Jimmy was pretty popular. Maybe his version of flirting was out of date or Jimmy was just really bad at showing his affection to the girl he liked?

"Yeah." Jimmy rolled his eyes at Harry. Figures, he thought. It was just like Leo to ignore the on goings around him. "You know, Jessica…." At Harry's blank face, Jimmy frowned. "The girl with long brown hair, brown eyes…" Seeing no spark of recognition in Harry's face, he reluctantly continued, "You once said she talked too much…."

"Oh," now, Harry knew who Jimmy was talking about, "You mean July!" he exclaimed, snapping his fingers like he had a brilliant thought. "Is she why you changed your hairstyle?" he asked eyeing Jimmy's head in disgust.

Jimmy reached up, running his fingers through his hair in a sudden spurt of insecurity. "What? Is it bad?" Then, the rest of what Harry said wormed its way into his brain. "Wait. You call her July?"

"Well, yeah." Harry nodded, his expression serious. "She looks like a July."

Jimmy just rolled his eyes at Harry and walked into the classroom.

"Hey," Harry asked, following behind him, "can I call you guys the J.J. couple?"

Skip –

"Why did you invite him?" was the first thing out of July's mouth when she commandeered the front seat next to Jimmy.

"Hey!" Harry exclaimed in indignation at her words, "I'm not that bad."

Jimmy just sighed. If only he had one of those cars with a window separating the front and the back. "Come on, Jessica. Leo's not that bad."

July shot Jimmy a glare. "I thought you said it was just going to be you and me. You didn't even tell me you were inviting him to come along."

Harry glanced between the two bickering teenagers sitting in the front of the car. For some reason, he felt like this was going to be a long ride. He reached into his pants pocket and pulled out his ear buds. Plugging them into his phone, Harry opened Netflix. He'll just finish that one show he had started. If he turned it up loud enough, he could potentially drown them out.

Harry casted the two one more glance. Seeing them still arguing, Harry shook his head. Yeah. Harry didn't see any love between the two. But, then, he didn't see the love between Hermione and Ronald, either, back then. Maybe this was the same?

Skip –

After a long ass ride where Harry had to eventually plug in his phone due to over use. The trio pulled up to a two-story house on the nicer side of town. The front drive was full of cars from all models. The nicer looking ones parked in the driveway, in front of the attached double door garage, while the older models took the street like it was an unwritten rule to park according to social class. The front lawn was freshly done in a static style that screamed to Harry that the owners hired a gardening crew. The front door was open welcoming guest in, but no one stood on the beautifully decorated porch to accept the guests.

"Are we late?" Harry couldn't help but ask his two companions. While the house was nice to look at, he couldn't help but wonder where everyone was. If it wasn't for the multitude of cars, Harry would have thought there wasn't a party at all.

July shook her head. "No, in fact, we are a little early. The actual event doesn't start until around 8."

Harry blinked, but it was Jimmy who asked, "Then, why did we have to rush to leave?"

July sighed and shook her head. Getting out of the car, she said, "Because, this is my friends party and I want to support them."

Jimmy and Harry shared a look, not really understanding.

"Besides," she continued, "this is the perfect time to get to know people."

"So," Harry said as he stepped out of the car after the girl, "we're early because you don't trust your friend to throw a good party."

"Exactly!"

The inside of the house was just as immaculate to Harry. It's walls where a boring off white, which a retailer had once told him was called egg shell white. Pictures of what Harry assumed was family were hung on the wall in an esthetically pleasing arrangement. The people inside the frames, though, weren't esthetically pleasing to look at, subtracting from the overall presentation. Seemingly randomly placed in the short hallway running from the entry way to the open living room was an old end table with a bowl full of keys with small 1-inch round button shape tags. Next to the bowl was a marker and a bunch of loose tags.

July walked up to the end table, pulling a set of house keys from her pocket as she walked. Setting the keys down on the table, she took the marker, kneeled down to scribble something on a random tag. Recapping the marker, the girl tied the tag to her keys and dropped them into the bowl.

Harry and Jimmy just stared, not really understanding the girl's actions.

"Alright," she grinned at them as she stepped back making space for one of them to do the same. "You're turn."

Glancing at Jimmy from the corner of his eye, Harry, seeing Jimmy had the same look of confusion, decided to bite the bullet. "Okay. But, what, exactly, is it we are doing and why?"

July rolled her eyes. With a sigh, she started to explain, "This is a common game," she waved a hand over the bowl, "played at most swinger's party because it's simple and efficient. Basically, you tag a set of keys with your name and status and put them in the bowl. Then, at a designated time, the host sorts the keys into two different bowls if the keys aren't already sorted as the guest come in and passes the bowls around. If you're single looking to hook up with a couple you pick from the bowl with the tags with 2 names blindly. If you're a couple looking for a single partner you pick from the bowl with the single named tags. The same can be said about a single looking for a single or a couple looking for a couple." July took a deep breath, smacking her lips, her throat was dry from speaking so much.

Harry nodded at the simple rules. "Okay. So that explains the bowl and the tags. What happens if I pick a couple hoping for a couple?"

July blinked owlishly at Harry as if she hadn't expected the question. Placing her finger to her lips, she thought about how she had seen the game played before. "Well, I guess that would depend on the party. However, I think for this one, we are supposed to call out the name or names on the tags to get a verbal consent or conformation. If not, you put the keys to the side until your turn is done. Once you got your set then you put the rejected ones back in."

"That seems a little time consuming," Harry deadpanned. "Why not already have people sort at the door? For example, have 4 bowls or something, one for couples looking for couples, singles looking for singles, singles looking for couples and couples looking for singles."

"Some parties do that from what, I hear." July explained, "Some parties bar singles looking for singles or couples looking for singles too. It really depends on the type of party. This one, though, is a mingle party that has swinger elements, which means it's pretty open to anything. It's more work, but, also, means it's more popular."

"Popular?" Jimmy, finally jumping in, asked, "How so?"

July sighed, really wanting to move on but indulged in his curiosity. "It's more popular because more people can come. It, also, allows for the couple or single to change their minds about what option they want for the night. For example, if the single happens to find the couple who picked them attractive. Even though they wanted another single for the night, they can agree to the couple pairing instead."

Jimmy nodded, rubbing his chin in thought. "It seems a little rude, though, to reject all the couples because you want a single partner, only to turn around and accept a different couple."

July shrugged. "Thems the rules, though. It's nothing personal. Think of it as swiping left or right if you will. Now, are you guys going to fill these out or what?"