Latest Update: March 15, 2023
Summary: Harry Potter liked his new life as a professional Seeker. With Voldemort nothing more than a bad memory he thought his life was finally his own. Waking up in an alternate universe where Tommy still ran amok killed what little optimism he'd discovered since the war ended. But he'll be damned if he wasn't going to eek out a life of his own choosing regardless of fate's interference
Link: https://m.fanfiction.net/s/13162660/1/
Word count:147k
Chapters:32
Chapter 1:
A Stolen Hero
Edited/Proofread by Demon Ging
Harry awoke on a surface significantly harder, and significantly more wet than he was used to.
Past experiences with Quidditch-related accidents that lead to him returning to consciousness in uncomfortable positions with debilitating injuries didn't come without a bit of wisdom. He very slowly and very carefully checked his body for injuries, one body part at a time. He closed both hands into fists, wiggled his toes, and from there worked his way inward, testing the ability of each limb and digit to twist, bend, and turn without unnatural crunching sounds.
He kept his eyes closed throughout the entire ordeal, paying close attention to every sensation. It wasn't until he risked moving his neck that the first sign of injury reared its' ugly head.
"Ohhhhhhhhhh wow!" He moaned as his skull swam and the sound of his heartbeat filled his ears.
He tried to remember what he did the night before. As far as he could recall all he did was fly the usual obstacle course and practice the Wronski Feint a few times before turning in for the night. He saw no reason to wake up in a grassy field covered in fresh, sticky, morning dew with his head feeling like he'd arrived for practice flat-out drunk and suffered an accident involving a failed Feint attempt.
He considered the possibility that he may have actually crashed into the ground during a death-defying dive and dreamt about returning home and snuggling into bed; only now regaining consciousness. It sure would teach him not to practice alone ever again. This idea was dashed when he realized that it wasn't the grass of the Falmouth Falcons' Quidditch pitch currently tickling his neck and ears.
The lack of stadium stands and quaffle hoops was the first hint. The cows staring down at him were the second.
"Oh. Hello there." He greeted the especially obese bull pawing at the earth next to him.
Harry wondered if the horned beast could even see him through the mange of fur covering its face. He further wondered if highland cows were originally a pack of golden retrievers or Irish setters that some cynophobic witch or wizard transfigured into cattle and just used for husbandry from then on.
He liked that idea. He'd have to write Xenophilius with that theory. It would make for a great Quibbler article.
He ignored the bull's warning snort as he got to his feet with another groan.
Taking a deep breath he expanded his senses and tried to ignore the splitting headache. He couldn't feel any magic in his surroundings, not even the echoes of a portkey or recently cast spell of any kind. In fact, aside from the bull's internal debate about the merits of trampling him, he could sense no danger and all seemed right with the world.
Deciding there was no benefit to tangling with the beast next to him, he apparated away.
And immediately regretted this decision as a fit of dizziness and nausea joined his migraine in a conspiracy to ruin his day.
He steadied himself against the entrance to Diagon Alley as he caught his breath again. The brick wall was already opened into the familiar archway, which was strange enough, but the intense scrutiny from the red-robed figures on either side of the entrance was fast making this his fourth worst visit to Diagon Alley.
"Ah, the follies of youth. I miss the days when I could risk drinking on Sunday nights and jog the hangover off before work Monday morning," Said the older Auror with a sigh that was both nostalgic and mocking.
"I'm twenty-seven, thank you very much!" Harry retorted, picking himself up. It was a lie, of course—he was really twenty-eight, but with the average Seeker career rarely lasting past thirty, Harry had recently become as self-conscious about his age as Minerva. "I can jog it off just fine. I just don't feel like it."
With his indignation expressed, Harry walked past the two guards into the nearly vacant street intent on visiting Florean Fortescue. Food would do him a lot of good right now. Sugar was great for headaches, especially in the morning. He patted himself down in an effort to dredge up some loose change from his robes and soon held up a fistful of sickles in triumph. The small sense of accomplishment vanished at the sight of a boarded-up ice cream parlor. A sign in front of it explained that, due to safety concerns, all Fortescue dairy products could be mail-ordered from Fortescue and Fortescue Inc.
The sparse crowd he originally attributed to the early hour took on a more sinister vibe. Small groups of shoppers skirted nervously between what few stores were open with nary a conversation or hint of laughter. As he watched, he noticed that those around him didn't bother to greet him, or each other, as they passed. It all reminded him of Voldemort's return over a decade ago.
It was still only his third-worst experience visiting Diagon Alley.
Deciding to catch up on what he missed during his impromptu nap he made his way back to the Diagon Alley entrance and, ignoring the heckling Aurors, entered the Leaky Cauldron. Tom was upon Harry before his bum even hit the chair.
"Anything I can get you?" The normally friendly hunchback grunted. "Sir," He added as an afterthought.
"Beer," Harry demanded simply.
The bald man raised a judgmental eyebrow at this. It was rather early after all.
"Hair of the dog that bit me and all that," Harry explained. "And a plate of bacon, sausage, and eggs. Extra bacon and sausage, please."
Harry placed the loose change from his pocket on the table and Tom was off to the kitchen with a scoff. Since when was Tom so rude? Had Harry done something to offend the man? Was he mad that Harry hadn't eaten there in, what, three months now? That didn't seem like him.
Tom returned with a glass mug of beer and Harry took it with a smile. He motioned for Tom to stay as he practically inhaled the liquid in long, slow gulps. The landlord/innkeeper/barman looked visibly impressed when Harry handed the mug back to him.
"More please," Harry asked with his winning smile.
Tom finally showed off his missing teeth with that grin Harry was used to and returned to the kitchens. He had that ability with people. The power to make them stop moping, no matter what triggered the depression. Twas a useful superpower.
"And a newspaper please," Harry called after him. "Anything other than the Prophet."
Tom waved in acknowledgment as he disappeared behind the counter and through the doors beyond, returning moments later with another mug of beer in one hand, the plate of food Harry ordered in the other, and a newspaper under his arm. Harry thanked Tom again as the man placed everything on the table.
"How much do I owe you?"
"Three galleons."
Harry stared at the man, careful to keep his face blank. He didn't seem to be joking.
Three galleons? For breakfast, a couple of beers, and a newspaper? It wasn't the most expensive meal he'd ever had, having eaten at fancy restaurants charging ten times as much. But still. The last time he'd been here he paid four sickles for dinner. A dinner with much more food and much, much more beer.
"Here you go, sir," Harry said, handing the barkeep a whole fourth of the money on him. "And how much for a room for the night?"
"One galleon."
Harry gave him that too and dug into his food.
Now he knew what it felt like to be Meroped - A euphemism he himself popularized meaning 'ripped off.' Alternatively meaning "date raped." Which he came uncomfortably close to experiencing by the hand of love potion-slinging groupies on more than one occasion.
If that shakedown didn't make this the second worst visit to Diagon Alley in his life, the date on the newspaper certainly did. He had difficulty reading the headline, what with the front page being soaked in the beer and spittle he'd just sprayed it with in surprise. Either Tom had handed him a twelve-year-old newspaper or his life of traveling with groupies as a Quidditch rock star had come to an abrupt end. And judging by the condition of the newspaper—ignoring the damage he himself had caused it—he doubted it was the former case.
Assassination of Amelia Bones Averted
Harry rifled through the pages only bothering to read the headlines of the various articles. Phrases and terms like 'Many Dead' and 'Death Eaters' and 'He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named' jumped out at him, but none as strongly as 'Child of Prophecy.'
"That's a new one." He muttered to himself.
Harry thought he'd heard them all. Boy-Who-Lived. Chosen One. Man-Who-Conquered. These were the titles he knew. Perhaps the article would enlighten him on why they were calling him by the new moniker.
Scenes of Terror at the Ministry of Magic as a large group of Death Eaters attacked the press conference held by our Savior, Neville Longbottom, colloquially known as 'The Child of Prophecy'.
Thanks to the valiant efforts of his Auror guard who gave their lives during the attack, Mr. Longbottom survived the ordeal unscathed.
Harry had to put the paper down as his migraine returned with a vengeance.
Okay. He could rule out time travel.
Thinking things over, he probably could have ruled it out from the Amelia Bones article. In his timeline, which probably wasn't the correct term, Voldemort and his Death Eaters had succeeded in murdering Madame Bones to death by this point. So, what did that leave him with?
He rubbed his temples as he considered his situation, leaving any planning by the wayside as he brainstormed.
Time travel was definitely a part of what was going on here. He was, after all, stuck in the year 1996, instead of hurtling fast toward 2009. But it wasn't his past. How did that make any sense at all?
Maybe somebody else played around with time travel and made some changes further back in time, and he was stuck in this new timeline? That made more sense. After all, if Neville was 'The Chosen One' in this timeline then the odds were Harry wasn't around. Or at least he hoped he wasn't: he'd prefer to be parentless than have to visit his parents in Saint Mungo's like Neville did. The mere idea of growing up in Neville's shoes made him yearn for the days when he slept under a staircase.
He tried to invent a scenario where time travel would have resulted in his current predicament. His history of increasingly unlikely and nonsensical events had gifted him with an active imagination when it came to such things.
Maybe somebody stunned him in his sleep, kidnapped him for a trip to the past hoping to make him watch his own death as a baby? Knowing his luck, he probably fell out of the time machine a third of the way into the trip and wound up twelve years into the past instead of twenty-seven. The hypothetical culprit would have finished the trip and killed him or his parents before he was born. The problem with this theory was the premise that somebody, anybody, could sneak up on him in his sleep after all he'd been through was laughable.
A more likely scenario was that the culprit went back in time without him, performed the dark deed and the Fates decided to transport him to the new timeline instead of letting him be obliterated with the rest of his original timeline. That sounded like something the Fates would do. They sure did enjoy screwing with him.
He went over the wording of the prophecy for what must have been the ten thousandth time.
'Either must die at the hand of the other' could preclude time travel mischief from killing him. Even if somebody successfully prevented him from being born, he'd just jump timelines. This possibility brought up a whole host of questions. Did the prophecy make him completely immune to the consequences of meddling with time? The Marauder in him was coming up with oh so many dangerous and immoral (not to mention highly illegal) schemes involving a time turner.
He had always wondered what kind of terror would be unleashed if he'd used one to give himself a high five. Best not to tempt Fate. Especially since he couldn't be sure it even was time travel that landed him here. Odds were he was missing something.
He went back and properly read the articles in the newspaper as he finished his meal and ordered a third beer. Apparently, Voldemort never fell from power like he did in Harry's original timeline, if the line "as if to commemorate his 32nd year of terror" was anything to go by. His reign of terror had continued nonstop and England was hurting because of it. Especially economically. The import market was one of his favorite targets, which explained the high price of his meal.
If memory served, 1996 saw Great Britain in the grips of a severe drought, which lead to the four countries in one having to import a lot of food—feed for animals especially. The lack of feed for cows meant meat was worth its weight in gold here. Egg and chicken prices seemed steady though. Nice to know ahead of time what he'd be ordering for dinner.
Could he get away with going back and stealing that bull from earlier? Probably wasn't worth the risk. He'd hate to be the first person lynched for cattle theft since the Wild West calmed down.
A lot of the information about this timeline didn't line up and, when he returned to the article on Neville, the mystery of why Harry was brought here became clear.
"Ohhhh blast it all." He groaned as he banged his head on the table.
Neville had no scar on his forehead—or any mark of any kind for that matter. He was very obviously not the child of prophecy.
This new detail explained everything. This wasn't time travel mischief, and it wasn't a fever hallucination. This was an alternate universe: one without a child of prophecy. Whatever powers that were controlling these things decided to reach across the void and steal one from another universe. Him.
"Magic knows no boundaries except those we believe in," he quoted as he banged his head on the table some more.
Just when he thought he'd finally settled into his new life and left the suffering caused by Voldemort and Dumbledore and the Ministry behind him, he'd have to do it aaaaaallllll over again.
This was officially his worst visit to Diagon Alley EVER! The hellacious experience of breaking into, and out of, Gringotts and the bareback dragon ride afterward didn't come close.
He hoped he was wrong. He hoped that this universe, or timeline, had a differently worded prophecy that would only require him to take a minor role. Maybe help train Neville as his replacement?
Knowing his luck though, he wouldn't come close to returning to his own world until after he fulfilled the prophecy. Again.
Deciding to leave worrying about what he needed to do for tomorrow, he flagged Tom back over to his table.
"I'm going to need more beer," he said. "A lot more beer."
Link: https://m.fanfiction.net/s/13162660/1/