SIYE Time:11:37 on 10th December 2024 SIYE Login: no | | |
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Five Things, Harry By muggle_born
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Category: Twin Travel Challenge (2008-3)
Characters:None
Genres: Drama, Fluff, Humor
Warnings: Mild Language
Story is Complete
Rating: PG
Reviews: 41
Summary: ** Honorable Mention in the “Twin Travel” Challenge ** When Lily and James vanish from the Burrow on Christmas Eve, Harry is the only one not frightfully concerned. In fact, he's been looking forward to this for quite some time.
Hitcount: Story Total: 11125
Disclaimer: Harry Potter Publishing Rights © J.K.R. Note the opinions in this story are my own and in no way represent the owners of this site. This story subject to copyright law under transformative use. No compensation is made for this work.
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Chapter | |
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James let out another mad giggle as his body swayed into the Christmas tree for the fifth time. His high-pitched but boyish laughter was mirrored to his right by a similar but decisively girly giggle emanating from his twin sister, who also found herself wobbling dangerously near the top of the tree, her feet kicking furiously despite her mother’s admonitions to hold still.
“Lily!” Ginny yelled, but there was amusement in her voice. “If you keep kicking, how do you expect to stay still long enough to hang it?”
Lily and James shared a smile, communicating silently as twins will do, to acknowledge that this was the point–they didn’t want to hang the baubles yet because it was way too much fun to have Daddy levitating them. They both leaned forward simultaneously but instead of attempting to hang the glass ornaments each of them held in two hands–Lily an emerald green, James a shining red–they leaned their heads forward, sinking their faces into the soft pine needles and shrieking merrily.
From the corner of the living room, the twins’ grandmother gasped and brought her hand to her chest. “Harry, please!” Mrs. Weasley practically begged.
Harry just grinned wider. He stood next to Ginny, his wand pointed at his kids, enjoying the moment nearly as much as they were. He was honestly trying to keep them as still as he could, but they were clearly taking advantage of his offer to levitate them up to place the baubles higher. They had been complaining for the last few minutes about always being relegated to place the ornaments at the bottom of the tree, where Crookshanks could easily attack them while everyone was asleep, so Harry flicked his wand without warning to levitate them up to the top for once. They were ecstatic at finding themselves off of the ground, and at this point it seemed they couldn’t care less about where their ornaments went and were simply having the time of their lives bumping around.
“All right,” he finally called out as Lily just about toppled the tree over, inspiring another gasp from Mrs. Weasley, who became so concerned that she pulled her wand out of her apron. “Ten seconds, you two!”
The twins groaned, but used their ten seconds to the fullest, the whole Weasley family unable to help but join in on their laughter as the twins made quite a show of attempting to reach the tree, running in place in mid air as Harry had moved them too far away to actually reach it anymore. Lily was laughing so hard she looked like she could hardly breathe, which, coupled with James’ intense look of determination as his little legs pumped and pumped to no avail, sent everyone into hysterics. Ginny, who had taken Harry’s arm by now, her head on his shoulder, shook with mirth but smacked him on the chest. “Don’t be mean!” she laughed.
With a slight motion of his wand, the twins steadied and got near enough to finally hang their baubles, then came swooping to the ground where they immediately ran to their father and engulfed his legs in a tight hug.
“Can we do it again?” they asked simultaneously.
“Next year,” Harry said with a smirk, knowing they already knew he would say no.
“Awwwwww!” they complained through their still-huge smiles, then ran off to Uncle Fred seemingly without a care in the world.
Ginny watched them work on Fred, always an easier pushover than George, apparently trying to convince him to let them do something as well, probably equally dangerous, or worse. She looked up at her husband, squeezing his arm tighter.
“You’re the greatest father ever,” she said, repeating one of the twins’ favorite phrases.
“Yes, I know,” Harry replied, smiling down at her, then kissing her soundly on the lips, unable to help himself.
“Kissy Kissy!” Muriel teased with a grin, walking in from the kitchen with Molli, attached at the hip as always. Nine years old, with long, straight jet-black hair and sparkling hazel eyes, they simultaneously brought great joy and frightful worry to their father. Harry pulled back from his kiss and watched his two older daughters grin at him with identically gorgeous smiles as they passed by. They will be the death of me, someday, he thought for the millionth time since the moment they were born.
The girls carried a snack tray over into the sitting room where most of the other kids had set up camp. Nearly too many to count, the Weasley grandchildren far outnumbered the adults, now turning family gatherings such as this one into full-blown parties. Harry smiled, thinking back to the days when many of the kids were babies or toddlers and how quickly chaos ensued whenever they tried to get together. Watching his younger set of twins continue to work on their Uncle Fred, who cast a wary eye at Ginny before smiling broadly at Harry and beginning to whisper conspiratorially to James and Lily, Harry felt a wave of contentment wash over him. It was the kind of feeling one gets when having finally made a tough decision, only to find that it was the absolute right direction to go in. He and Ginny had discussed at length whether or not to have any more children after their second set of twins were born–quite the shock (especially for Ginny) to find out from the healer after having spent the past two and a half years surviving their first set of twins. In the end, they were both of the mind that four was probably enough. Now that they were older, both parents knew that the family they had was absolutely perfect, and each day was another gift of joy.
Harry smiled and kissed Ginny again. “I love you,” he said softly.
She beamed at him. “I love you too.”
They spent some time just smiling at each other contentedly. Harry glanced past her for a moment, and what he saw turned him ghostly white. Ginny immediately caught the change in expression and whipped her head around, expecting to see one of her children either hurt or in trouble, but saw only the twins continuing to talk to Fred, who was shaking a wrapped Christmas present teasingly in front of them. She turned back to Harry.
“What’s wrong?” she asked confusedly.
He barely heard her though as he continued to watch the exchange occurring with Fred. As he saw James look around the room once, not noticing he was being watched in that unlucky way that kids will do, Harry saw him pull a wand out of his sleeve. Harry put his hand over his mouth, but thought enough to look away to the floor lest Ginny see what he saw, yet he couldn’t help but say out loud, “It’s today!”
“What?” Ginny asked as if she hadn’t heard him correctly. “Are you okay?”
Harry didn’t answer for a moment. There were many emotions swirling around inside of him. It had been years since he had felt this kind of apprehension, worry mixed with anticipation, and it threw him for a moment. He already knew that everything was going to turn out just fine, but with his two little ones involved in all of it… he just couldn’t help but to fret… but he knew what he had to do, so he turned to his wife and lied.
“No, just… for a minute I couldn’t remember if we had wrapped the mirrors for the girls, but we did, right?” he finally said.
“No, we didn’t, because we didn’t wrap anything, but I took care of it weeks ago.”
“Oh, right,” Harry said, managing to produce a sheepish smile but chancing another glance towards the twins. “But that’s only because I’m rubbish at wrapping.”
“Which is only because you’ve done it exactly twice in your lifetime,” she replied with a smile.
“But when you’re so good at it, like a mistress of wrapping…”
“Mmm-hmm,” she cut him off, rolling her eyes at him. He continued to smile at her; he needed to hold her attention for a little while longer. He wasn’t sure how much longer exactly, but he knew she would stop it if given the chance, just as he would if he didn’t already know… he couldn’t believe it was finally today. He felt guilty doing this to her, but too much was riding on this moment. Part of him reasoned that he’d need to do nothing special because he already knew it would all work out, but another part of him remembered his third year and all of the effort he’d had to go through to fulfill what needed to be done...
After a few seconds of trying to think-up more conversation to hold Ginny’s attention, his own attention wavered to Hermione, who had just come in from the sitting room, blowing out an exasperated breath from having braved the kids’ room for a while. To his worry, but with no surprise at all, she immediately picked-up on the situation with the twins and Fred, watching them with her brow furrowed, reminding Harry of her prefect days.
He grimaced outwardly, hoping that it would happen soon before she had a chance to intervene, which would leave him with no choice to but intervene in response. He continued to watch nervously as Hermione’s eyes grew wider just as the noise level from the group of three conspirators grew louder, just as Ginny’s suspicions escalated higher and she finally caught sight of what Harry and Hermione were looking at.
“You don’t know how, that’s why!” Lily yelled at her brother as Fred put a hand on her forearm, trying to quiet her down.
“I do so because Daddy shows me things he doesn’t show you!” James shot back.
Lily hesitated just a fraction of a second at that before responding, seemingly worried about such a revelation before dismissing it. “No he doesn’t, but Mommy shows me stuff all the time that boys can’t do!”
Fred started to look back and forth between them, aware now that all of the adults in the house were looking his way and trying to put out the two fires in front of him. Harry noticed the unwrapped package at his feet and the item in his hand, which he was now trying to hide behind his leg.
“I know how to do it!” both twins yelled together.
“Then prove it!” they challenged each other even more loudly.
“Fine!” they finally screamed.
With an alarming sense of anticipation, Harry watched with his heart pounding in his chest as James and Lily grabbed together the hourglass from Fred’s grasp. Harry held tight to Ginny who attempted to dash for the kids as James raised her stolen wand and Lily brought up Fred’s, who was still trying to stop the two children, when they both brought the wands down at the same time onto the hourglass in their hands, and vanished.
* * *
Fifteen year-old Harry Potter stared down at the little person hugging him around the legs. There seemed to be a lot of noise around him, but there was some kind of buzzing in his ears preventing him from hearing anything, and it even took several seconds before any coherent thoughts at all could enter his brain. Just moments earlier, the Sunday night Weasley dinner had been interrupted by the appearance of two small children, halting the chattering talk of Ron and Hermione’s prefect badges having arrived just hours before. Harry, like the others, had run into the living room to investigate the disturbance, expecting to meet something sinister, only for him to be accosted warmly by a small boy, while Ron’s little sister Ginny became likewise entangled by a little girl, each of them rambling about… something. This had to be some kind of joke–Fred and George at work. He looked over to the pair of them, but they looked as nonplussed as he felt. As Harry shifted his gaze back to the little boy in front of him, the words being spoken finally started to seep their way in.
“…and I knew what it was so… I… I was just trying to send it over to you because I knew you wouldn’t like it, and Lily–”
“You are such a liar, James!” Lily shouted, and Harry looked over to the tiny girl with long red hair and one pigtail sticking straight out the side of her head standing in front of Ginny. She took Ginny’s hands and folded them around herself, pushing herself back against Ginny’s legs and wiping at her eyes.
James? Harry thought to himself. Lily? He looked again at the little boy and his mouth dropped open. He was the spitting image of Harry, but with no glasses and brown eyes, just like his father’s had been. Looking back to the girl, she did indeed look just like his mother–there were the green eyes looking worriedly at the floor. Could this somehow be–
“How would you know, Lily? You were touching a wand too so I’d shut up if I were you!” James yelled.
“Now young man,” Mrs. Weasley admonished, still confused at the situation but seeming to not be able to help herself. “There is no need for that kind of talk.”
James looked up at Mrs. Weasley. “Sorry, Grandma,” he said sincerely before ducking his head into Harry’s legs, a frown forming on his face.
This time it was Mrs. Weasley’s mouth that dropped open, and things became very quiet as everyone in the room just looked around at each other in complete confusion. The muffled sniffles and staggered breathing coming from his legs turned Harry’s attention back to the little person hugging him fiercely. Harry could barely hear it, but what James muttered just made him even more confused.
“I’m s-sorry Daddy.”
Harry looked up to see if anyone else had caught that, finding only Ginny’s gaze locking with his. He saw in her expression a reflection of his own complete befuddlement.
“I’m sorry too, Mummy,” Lily said before turning herself around and burying herself into Ginny, crying openly now.
Watching Ginny turn beet red, Harry wondered how close his own complexion was beginning to match. Everyone had heard Lily, and everyone had the same expression on their faces, save for Hermione whose hands had shot to her mouth. Finally, Mrs. Weasley strode forward.
“That’s all right… children. No harm done.” She said it sincerely, but the look on her face told the older people in the room that she was just saying what she thought was best for the moment.
Harry noticed Ginny wrap her arms sympathetically around the girl, rubbing her back while shaking her head in bewilderment. Harry’s own hands hung frozen at his sides, and he looked down at the top of the boy’s head. His mind was still clouded by the absurdity of all of this, stilling him into inaction even if he could have thought of anything to do. Then James spoke again.
“Are you mad at me?”
It was, again, extremely quiet–just above a whisper, but filled with sincere concern. Whoever this was, he was sad, worried, and for some unknown reason was looking to Harry for forgiveness and apparently comfort. Oddly, the first comparison this brought to Harry’s mind was Colin Creevey, who had targeted and worshiped Harry from the moment they met, and Harry had the impulse to brush this kid off and let someone else deal with him. But then… looking down at his unruly mop of black hair, and remembering his face, so like Harry’s, he was suddenly drawn into memories from his own early childhood. Memories from when he had done something, never quite sure what exactly, that had earned him the wrath of his uncle. Times when he had been locked away in his cupboard–crying, his eyes shut tight while he fiercely wished he had someone to care for him, to make him feel better; that his parents would come and find him and comfort him like he’d seen other parents do for their kids, but had never truly felt. As James drew in another sniffle, still wrapping tightly around him, Harry felt a wave of empathy. He could give a child the comfort he'd never been allowed.
Slowly at first, finding his way into how exactly to do it, Harry unlocked his arms from his sides and put them on the boy’s shoulders, sliding around until they were on his back. James gave a great sigh and hugged Harry tighter, responding to his comfort, and Harry found himself feeling an emotion he’d never experienced before and couldn’t name. He finally wrapped his arms around James and hugged him back, his own breathing developing a hitch at the sensation even if he wasn’t sure why. He looked up to Ginny with an almost pleading look, which she shared with him, but as Lily turned her head to the other side and snuggled in tighter, he saw the corner of Ginny’s mouth turn up into a mystified smile, and he couldn’t help but to follow suit.
They stayed that way for a few moments while the onlookers drew slowly nearer, unabashedly gaping at the scene before them. No one spoke until Lily broke the silence, her tone no longer upset but surprisingly normal.
“Hey! Where’s the tree? We just finished it!” Everyone looked around the room in the same confused fashion, and James relaxed his hold on Harry to have a look as well.
“Did we knock it down?” he asked, turning to actually look Harry in the eyes for the first time. For a second he just looked concerned about the tree, but Harry saw James’ eyes roaming all over Harry’s face, becoming more alarmed with each passing moment. “Why do you look like that?” he asked with brutal curiosity. James turned towards Ginny and stared at her, his eyes widening.
“What did it do? Did it make you young???” He seemed scared now and pulled away from Harry, turning to everyone else in the room, looking more concerned and frightened as he took in the appearance of each of them. “Lily!” he quavered. Lily didn’t appear to have caught on as quickly as he did, and turned to look at him questioningly. “Lily, come here!” he said in a slightly warbled but otherwise strong voice.
“What?” she asked.
James looked again at Ginny, his face going pale. “Look at her, Lily. That’s not Mummy!”
Lily pushed quickly back from Ginny, but then relaxed upon seeing her face, only to begin to look frightened and step away again after apparently noticing that she was not exactly who she thought she was hugging.
“James…” she asked in a small voice as she too looked to everyone in the room.
“Lily, come here!” he demanded, and she ran to the middle of the room where he was standing, everyone else forming a circle around them.
“Listen now,” Mrs. Weasley began, getting to her knees in front of them but keeping her distance. Harry felt relieved that someone here seemed to have a notion of how to handle any of this correctly. “I don’t know what’s happened, but… I am Molly Weasley… do you… do you know who I am?”
James and Lily grasped hands. Lily snuggled in against her slightly taller brother’s shoulder and shook her head, looking like a frightened animal as she peered around at Mrs. Weasley. James nodded, but followed it up with a clarification, his voice once again strong but quavering with emotion.
“You… look like our grandma, but you’re not as old as she is. Where’s my mum and dad? Did we… did we make them go away?” he finished, tears starting to leak down his face.
Mrs. Weasley looked worried, opening her mouth to reply but seeming to not know exactly what to say at first. It looked to Harry as if she was holding herself with great effort, wanting nothing better than to scoop these two into her arms and tell them everything would be okay. Finally she composed herself. “Now… you haven’t done anything wrong, you just arrived here and gave us all a surprise, that’s all. Why don’t you tell me your parents names, and we can see if we can find them?”
Both James and Lily looked to Ginny and Harry, confusion and fright all over their faces, before James pulled himself together enough to answer. “They’re named Ginny and Harry Potter. They look just like them,” he continued, pointing at Harry and Ginny, “except they’re older. They look like pictures from when they were kids.”
Ginny and Harry Potter. Once again, Harry felt frozen. Nothing he had lived through as of yet prepared him for how to handle or even feel about something like this. It was like his mind refused to let it all in so instead he just had… nothing. He eventually forced his eyes to meet Ginny’s and they once again shared a look.
“Okay,” Mrs. Weasley continued kindly, seemingly unfazed by James’ revelation. “So what were you doing just before… was there anything… special you might have done with magic just recently?”
“Was it a Time-Turner?” Hermione interrupted loudly. Everyone’s attention turned to her as she strode forward. “Did–were you using a Time-Turner?”
James and Lily stared at her. “Aunt… Hermione?” Lily asked unsurely.
Hermione’s head snapped back just a fraction of an inch and a blush began to creep up her neck. “Erm… yes, that’s right,” she said, trying to play it cool but failing miserably, at least to Harry’s perspective. So if Hermione was their aunt, then… Harry looked to Ron, who up until now had stared openly at this whole ordeal but seemed to be cottoning on to what Lily had just said and closed his mouth, turning to stare at the wall instead, ignoring the looks on Fred and George’s faces.
“You look really different!” Lily exclaimed. “You too Uncle Ron! Where’s your muscles?”
Harry and Ginny shared another look, this time in amusement as Ron’s expression defaulted back into shock. “Bloody mental,” he muttered nearly inaudibly, shaking his head.
“Ronald,” his mother warned with a look before turning back to the children and opening her mouth to speak, but again Hermione interrupted her.
“What year is it, James?” she asked in a matter-of-fact tone.
He furrowed his brow at her, then answered, “2015,” not seeming to understand why she was asking him.
The realization of his answer definitely hit everyone else, however, as there was a collective gasp while the general theory of what was going on seemed to be confirmed. Mrs. Weasley stood up and went to Arthur to being discussing something about the Ministry–a conversation Fred jumped in on and began to argue about, the name “Percy” being used heatedly. At the same time, Hermione started rambling on to Ron about Time-Turners and contacting Professor McGonagall while George simultaneously started in on “Uncle Ron,” who seemed bound and determined to talk over his brother lest Hermione overhear the suggestive nature of what he was saying about “Aunt Hermione.”
Harry and Ginny were the only ones who noticed the effect this was having on James and Lily, who grew more frightened as each second of these heated conversations grew in volume. Seeing this reaction in them bothered Harry on a fundamental level. Ginny seemed to be thinking along the same lines because she had closed the distance between her and Harry and taken his hand. When he looked to her, she gestured with her head towards the sitting room, and he nodded. The kids were watching her now, looking nervous, and she waved them over as she inched Harry across the room. James and Lily both looked torn as to whether or not they wanted to follow their younger parents, turning back to the increasingly loud crowd and then sharing a shrugging look with each other before taking each other’s hands much like Harry and Ginny, and following. As they moved into the sitting room, Harry saw Mrs. Weasley watching them concernedly, but nodding at him as if she approved.
When they entered the room, Ginny let go of Harry’s hand and slid the door closed. The kids kind of hovered in the middle of the room, James rubbing a little fist into his eye and Lily nervously twisting the hem of her dress, staring at Harry, who plopped down into a recliner and stared back. Ginny came to sit on the loveseat near where Lily was standing, and now Lily stared at her for a moment before turning back to Harry.
“You look weird,” she said bluntly.
Harry blinked once at her, wondering if all kids this age would remind him of Luna Lovegood, or if it was just Lily’s personality. “Er…” was all he could come up with in response. His mind continued to spin, and he glanced nervously at Ginny. Ginny–his wife in the future? And these were his actual children?
Lily caught the glance and turned to face Ginny. “You look pretty, Mummy.”
Ginny smiled and turned to Harry with an expression that said, “So there. I look pretty and you look weird.” Harry pulled at face at her in return.
Lily took Ginny’s hand and began playing with her fingers now instead of her dress. James seemed unsure of what to do at first, but eventually plopped himself down next to Ginny, looking up at her and, receiving a smile in return, scooted closer until he was snuggled against her. Lily turned and threw herself up onto Ginny’s lap, nestling herself in until Ginny was smothered with children, grinning sincerely over to Harry but not without a small amount of unease showing in her face.
“Are we… did we go to the past, or did everyone get younger?” James said, breaking the silence that had fallen. The tone of his question made it sound perfectly reasonable for either event to have happened to explain the current situation. Ginny looked Harry’s way and, not knowing what else to say, he answered truthfully.
“I… guess… if you’re really, er… our children,” he hated himself for looking to Ginny and feeling the blush break out all over his face. “Then you travelled to the past because here it’s only 1995.”
The kids absorbed that for a moment, turning to look at each other. “Wicked!” they both finally said, actually smiling at the idea.
“So you’re really young!” Lily exclaimed, turning around in Ginny’s lap to look at her, placing her small hand on Ginny’s cheek.
Ginny nodded. “Mm-hmm. In fact I just turned fourteen a few days ago.” Lily laughed.
“So you’re fifteen, then,” James said to Harry knowingly.
Harry nodded. “So… how old are you?” he asked him.
“Six and three quarters,” the kids answered together.
Ginny’s mouth opened and a breath escaped before she turned to Harry with yet another look of shock. “Twins,” she mouthed at him.
Harry tried to smile, but had to turn away. This was just too much, looking at Ginny and discussing the children they’d had–they would have. Twin babies. And to have babies you have to… to–
“Hey wait a minute!” James practically yelled. Harry looked up to find James watching him with intense eyes and a dangerous smile. He looked back and forth between Harry and Ginny before pointing at Harry. “This is when you didn’t notice her!” he yelled again.
Harry just watched confusedly as James got up, practically dancing with excitement. “This is from when they weren’t boyfriend and girlfriend yet, Lils!”
Lily looked up from Ginny’s chest. “Really?” she seemed to ask James and Harry at the same time. Both twins then looked to him.
Wishing intensely that this would all just end, Harry had no choice to respond as Ginny refused to meet his eye. “N-No, we’re not… we aren’t, uh. We’re just friends,” he said.
“No you’re not,” James said, drawing out the last word. “You don’t even ever talk to Mummy!” He grinned widely as he spoke, an incredibly teasing tone to his voice. “You never even notice her and you’re always running off with Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione and Mummy aaaaaaalways gets left behind.” He said it in such a singsong voice that you’d think he’d repeated or heard it many times before this.
Lily gasped, and spun around to face Ginny, an enormous, embarrassed smile playing on her face. “And yoooooooou have a crush on Daaaaaaaddy!” she said, bursting into giggles.
Ginny’s mouth closed into a tight line, but Lily leapt off of her lap and pounced into Harry’s. She put her face half an inch from his, her breath smelling like hot chocolate and peppermint. “Mummy reeeeeeally likes you but she’s too shy to say anything because she thinks you’re sooooo handsome!” She could barely get the sentence out between her increasing laughter at being able to reveal such information. Like James, she said all of this in a very knowing, teasing, cadence.
Harry was amazed at the new levels of mortification he was being introduced to and couldn’t think of anything to stop it. Ginny was flaming red by now and opened her mouth to speak but closed it a second later.
“Kiss her, Daddy!” James yelled through his own laughter. “Mummy told us that she really really wanted you to–”
But whatever James was going to say was interrupted by the door to the living room sliding open. Harry watched the entrance, ready to thank whoever came through, but no one did. They watched the doorway for a moment, listening to the continued discussions from the living room, before Ginny got up and poked her head through, turning both ways. Shrugging, she slid the door closed again and sat back on the love seat.
“There was no one there,” she said quietly.
In Harry’s lap, Lily let out a yawn. “I’m tired, Daddy,” she said, resting her head on his chest.
“Me too,” James agreed, and made a beeline for the loveseat. He laid his head in Ginny’s lap and from the looks of it, fell fast asleep. Harry suddenly realized that Lily was asleep on his chest as well.
“Well, that was–” Harry began, amazed that they could just doze off like that, but cut himself off at a sudden commotion from the living room, or really, a lack of commotion. The discussions and arguments coming from the room had become background noise, but had suddenly been washed away, leaving complete silence. Harry tilted Lily off of his lap and stood abruptly, leaving her behind on the chair. She didn’t stir at all. Ginny’s eyes widened and she reached down to stroke James’ face, whispering in his ear for him to wake up, but he continued sleeping soundly. Harry turned and more roughly shook Lily’s shoulder, but she too stayed asleep. Something wasn’t right.
Harry’s heart jumped in his chest, and a wave of terror crashed over him. He followed Ginny’s lead as together they silently lifted and moved the twins to the floor behind the loveseat, hidden as much as they could manage, then moved to the opposite wall, taking shelter behind the back of Harry’s chair. Despite the new quiet there was a roaring in his ears as panic flooded his brain, a tightness in his chest. He pulled out his wand then turned to Ginny. “Do you have your–” but she was already shaking her head at him.
He frowned, but used his left arm to shoo Ginny behind him as his right arm held his wand steady towards the door. “Maybe they just cast a silencing charm… so they wouldn’t upset the kids,” he said half to himself and half to Ginny. Neither of them moved to check, however, and rather soon after he spoke, the door to the living room slid open with a bang, making both of them jump. With the door now open, Harry could see George and Mrs. Weasley lying motionless on the living room floor.
“No,” Ginny gasped behind him.
Harry gripped his wand so hard he thought it might shatter. He’d kill whoever it was that was responsible before he’d let them hurt these children. Seeing the Weasleys lying there, he was forcibly taken back to the night just a few weeks ago when Cedric had fallen in the graveyard. It’s him, he said to himself. It’s Voldemort. What was I thinking coming back to the Burrow? I’ve killed everyone. This is all my fault!
He had to shake himself out of the paralyzing dread and try to concentrate on the moment. He watched the doorway intensely, willing himself to see any motion, ready to strike. For several moments, Ginny’s unsteady breathing in his ear was the only stimulus he could make out, until finally he saw a silvery flash in front of him, and he reacted.
“Expelliarmus!"
* * *
Pandemonium erupted in the Burrow upon the twins’ disappearance. The other adults flew everywhere in search of them, while Ginny had her now recovered wand up under Fred’s chin screaming bloody murder at him. Fleur and Angelina had gone into the sitting room to deal with the children, who had become upset at the commotion, while Hermione and Ron flew to Harry. This amused him somewhat, as the two of them entered “battle mode” as he referred to it, something they had become accustomed to during their time working against Voldemort.
Even as Hermione continued to ramble on about the possibilities of what had happened, her face gave way to suspicion as she seemed to realize that Harry was not as concerned as everyone else.
“and if it was, we can determine–wait a minute. Why are you not as worried as the rest of us. Do you know something?”
Harry was a little worried, of course, seeing as his kids were out of his sight–something he rarely allowed, but he couldn’t help but to smile as he replied to Hermione.
“How many times did it get flipped over before they hit it with their wands?”
She looked at him with even more suspicion as Ron interjected, asking what he was talking about, but closed her eyes for a few moments then opened them.
“Sixty-seven,” she answered. “Why? What’s going on, Harry? Do you know where they are?”
Ginny caught wind of that question and stepped quickly away from Fred, but not before kneeing him between the legs, making George grimace in empathy.
“You know where they are?” Ginny asked desperately to her husband.
Harry cupped her cheek with one hand. “Yes, love. They’re perfectly all right, and I’m going to get them right now.”
She closed her eyes and let out a relieved breath, her eyes filling with tears. “Where are they?” she asked, Harry’s assurances one thing but actually having them back quite another.
Harry looked over to Fred, who was standing bent over with one arm on the wall. “Fred, what is that exactly?” Ginny looked disturbed that she was not getting a direct answer, but turned to hear his response.
He cleared his throat before speaking. “Well, it was Ginny’s Christmas present. If I had known they’d had wands on them I never would have–“ he started to add quickly, but Harry cut him off.
“It’s okay, Fred,” he said, holding up his hands. “I know when they are, but I want to be sure I understand the thing before I use it to go and get them. Is it an actual Time-Turner?”
Fred looked confused about everything Harry was saying, but shook it off and answered, even as Ginny’s face grew more concerned with what Harry had said. “No… well, it’s similar of course, and in fact we borrowed the theory mind you…”
“Fred!” Ginny yelled.
“Okay! It’s, I guess it’s like part Time-Turner, part Pensieve. I made it for Ginny… you know how the twins are always squabbling about whose fault it was for whatever trouble they caused, so with this they could play back a recent event and take a look at what really happened. I–I didn’t think you’d actually use it that much,” he added, looking at Ginny. “I just thought the fact that it existed would, you know, deter them from fibbing as much. And I had no idea you could use it like an actual Time-Tuner, I swear!” he put in quickly.
Fred was clearly upset about what had happened, and Harry smiled reassuringly, trying to make him feel more at ease.
“It really is okay. I’m going to get them,” he repeated calmly, but his knowing smile was wiped off of his face when Ginny rounded on him.
“Why do you keep saying that?” Ginny demanded hotly. “Where are they? If you know where they are then why aren’t you telling us?”
“Er, all right,” Harry said, putting his hands on her shoulders and feeling a little less in control of this situation than he had a moment ago. “I can explain it, but I can’t turn the thing sixty-seven and one fourth times, so every second I spend here is another second our kids spend in the past before I can get to them.”
“What!?” Ginny screamed, inspiring everyone who’d been searching for the twins to run or Apparate to her voice. “The past? Harry where are they?” she cried, pounding his chest with her fists, exploding into tears. He took a moment to remind himself of her perspective. She didn’t know where they were, and their past had some truly terrible moments in it. He took a breath and tried to explain what he knew as quickly as he could.
“Whatever spells they used, in combination with what Fred had, it sent James and Lily to 1995, the summer after the Triwizard Tournament.” He paused here to let that sink in, and while there were mutterings and exclamations from everyone, he was watching Ginny, whose mind he could see searching for anything bad that had happened that summer that might pose a threat to the twins.
“The Dementors?” she asked worriedly, but he was already shaking his head.
“No, it was after that,” he answered reassuringly. After she thought some more and seemed to realize that the rest was an uneventful summer, he went on.
“I knew that Hermione would know the amount of times they’d flipped the thing over, and so now all we have to do is perform Prior Incantato on the wands to see what spell those two managed to cast on it, turn it sixty-seven times ourselves, cast the spells, and we’ll be able to travel to right where they were, only this time we’ll take it with us so we can come back,” he finished, pointing at Fred’s mysterious contraption, which resembled an hourglass with one side of it wider than the other, forming a kind of basin.
Ginny looked at him like he was speaking Gobbledygook. “Are you mad?” she yelled again through a sob. “How could you think that would possibly work?”
“Because,” Harry started to explain patiently, a small smile returning. “I remember.”
* * *
"Expelliarmus!"
“ Expelliarmus!"
Older Harry had started to smile when his jet of light met younger Harry’s and locked-up, creating a golden thread between them, but at the look of horror on younger Harry’s face older Harry grimaced and, after quickly stowing his invisibility cloak, put a hand up in a placating fashion towards younger Harry and Ginny.
“I’m not Voldemort!” he said in as reassuring and sincere a voice as he could muster over the noise of the connection, keeping a tight grip on his wand even as younger Harry started to force the bead of light that had formed in the middle of their connection towards him, which he battled against only because he wasn’t sure what would happen to him if it hit his wand on this end. Older Harry realized what younger Harry was thinking, and felt terrible for making him relive this moment so soon after Cedric’s death. In fact, he knew exactly what younger Harry was thinking and feeling, because he remembered much of this day very clearly from the summer of 1995.
Younger Harry held on for dear life, a cold sweat exploding all over his body. After casting his spell and hearing the identical spell cast in return, the last thing he expected was this repeat of what had happened in the graveyard just a few weeks ago, and it shook him to the core. Back then, his companion had died. Now, he was the only thing standing between their attacker and Ginny, so it was with great resignation that he pried his protecting arm away from her and grasped his wand with two hands, forcing with all his concentration to get the bead of light towards the other wand, knowing that it might be their only chance to get away and find help from… someone… Professor Dumbledore, perhaps. In his peripheral vision he could see the Weasleys slumped on the floor, and despite their efforts to conceal them could see the little legs of the two children sticking out from behind the loveseat. He’d do everything he could to save them, his own safety be damned. Ginny now grasped onto him tightly, hiding fully behind him without a wand, but when the man shouted that he wasn’t Voldemort, he felt her peering over his shoulder.
When older Harry caught sight of younger Ginny peeking out at him, he had to suppress a smirk. She was so damn adorable! How could he have not seen it when he was younger? Looking at her now, as a far older man, he appreciated her cuteness much like he did his own daughters’ beauty, but looking at younger Harry, heroic as he was protecting her now, he couldn’t believe what an idiot he had been. Ah well, that’s what I’m here to change, isn’t it? He jumped to the heart of the issue, knowing he shouldn’t waste any more time fending-off younger Harry.
“Harry, I’m you from the future.” He gestured to where Lily and James were hidden. “My children were messing around with something Fred created and were sent back in time. I’m just here to collect them and go back.” He watched their reaction.
Harry gaped at the man standing across from him, who had just proclaimed himself… himself. He felt Ginny peering even further out from behind him, obviously looking the man over just as Harry was.
“He looks like you,” she whispered in his ear. As Harry looked at the older man, who smiled at their exchange for some reason, he saw that she was right. Obviously older, the man really resembled Harry as much as James had, this time with blazing green eyes, despite the lack of glasses.
“I’m going to break off the connection, Harry,” the man said, holding up a hand in seeming surrender. “I only cast Expelliarmus because I knew that’s what you were going to do. Now just,” he pressed the air with his hand a few times, “relax, okay. I know… I’m sorry about this happening, but you see, I’m using your wand–our wand–the same wand, so…”
Looking down, Harry could clearly see his very own wand in the other man’s hand. This, coupled with his resemblance to Harry, coupled with the appearance of the kids, still left Harry feeling only about halfway confident that this wasn’t some kind of trick. Still, the older man didn’t give him a chance to react before tearing his wand upward and to the right with great effort. The lights and sound of their connection dissolved away with a slight echo of phoenix song.
Older Harry made a conscious effort to then point his wand straight down at his side, raising his eyebrows at the young couple and smiling slightly, trying to demonstrate that he was not going to attack them. Younger Harry kept his wand pointed straight at his heart, however, as Harry knew he would, and even though he clearly remembered not having attacked himself, he still felt a bit nervous for it.
“Prove that you’re me!” younger Harry shouted.
Harry smiled. “Okay, but there’s little I could say that I couldn’t have found out through magical means, so why don’t you ask me something specific?” Harry was thinking about Legilimency, which younger Harry didn’t know about yet, but he still wanted to give the boy the chance to feel as assured as possible.
Younger Harry seemed to think for a moment, then Ginny whispered something in his ear again. “What did Ginny whisper to me when our wands were connected?”
This time Harry couldn’t help but smile outright, and even let out a soft chuckle before answering. “She said, ‘he looks like you,’ but I might have overheard that or had something akin to an extendable ear (he enjoyed the raised eyebrows of both kids at the mention of this brand new [to them] invention). So, what no one else would probably know is that, even in the midst of our connection, the feeling of her whispering in your ear gave you… er, just for the slightest fraction of a second, something… of an enjoyable little shiver,” he finished in a quiet voice, embarrassed for his younger self, but only slightly.
Harry and Ginny’s eyes both popped wider at this statement. Older Harry considered going on about how Ginny’s latest whisper to advise Harry to ask about the first thing whispered had been even more enjoyable, but he wasn’t here to be mean. Thoughts of what it was like for him back then– back now– only inspired Harry to be as kind as he could to himself.
“Anything else?” he asked, knowing full well what was coming, and dreading having to relive it from this end.
Harry eyed the man, trying to think of something else to ask that only he knew–something he had never told anyone at all. Amidst his shock of hearing exactly what he had felt when Ginny had whispered so close to his ear, it took him a moment, but then he had it.
“What was my best friend’s name when I was younger?”
The man looked at him sadly, a sorrowful and knowing expression the likes of which Harry had never seen on anyone before. Quietly, he answered.
“It was Alfred, and… he was my only source of comfort… and they took him away from me, probably because they knew that he was just that… and silly as it seems, I never forgave them for that.”
Harry was shocked yet again, and had to fight back a prickling behind his eyes at the look on this man’s face… on his older face, showing that he truly knew something only Harry could know. He’d never told anyone about that stuffed bear. Slowly, Harry lowered his wand, and for a while they all just looked at each other.
Older Harry shook his head sadly, but a smile returned. “You forgot all about Alfred, though, once you made it to Hogwarts,” he said, looking kindly at Harry, then shook his head again, this time seeming to try to clear his thoughts. “But I don’t have too much time, so we need to get to it,” he started in a much more businesslike tone, walking towards them. Ginny flinched behind Harry, who kept his wand lowered but stood up a little taller. Older Harry stopped advancing.
“Er, right, sorry,” he said, apologetically scratching the back of his head.
“Are… are they going to be okay?” Ginny asked, looking at her family.
“Oh– blimey, yeah, sorry. No, they’ll wake up soon enough and won’t remember any of this,” older Harry assured her with another kind smile. “I’m sorry I had to do that, but… well it could really mess up the future if everyone saw what was going to happen. You remember what Hermione talked about from third year,” he added, turning towards Harry. “Not going to go insane or kill me now, are you?” he quipped.
“I might go insane, yeah,” Harry answered, earning a laugh from older Harry.
“The kids I just put to sleep to save them the confusion of there being two of us, and in just a minute the others will wake up, and I’m afraid I had to plant a memory of it being Fred’s fault that everyone got knocked out during dinner. Hidden firework going off. Feel a little bad about that but when you think about it this whole mess is in fact his fault in the future.” He added the last part to himself before refocusing. “Anyway, that leaves me with you two.”
Ginny grabbed tighter onto Harry but didn’t shrink any further behind him. Older Harry watched, remembering how he had just started to realize that her holding him was rather nice when…
“I’m sorry about this, but I’m definitely going to make it up to you very soon,” older Harry said to her, then flicked his wand out of nowhere and Ginny crumpled to the floor.
“What?” Younger Harry gasped, raising his wand at older Harry. “Stup–” But older Harry had already simply grabbed Harry’s wand out of his hand and taken a step back.
“She’s okay!” he promised. “Listen to me. I’m madly in love with her. I’m the last person who’d want to hurt her, so you can believe me when I tell you that she’s going to be fine. I had to do that–I’m sorry!”
Younger Harry’s heart had begun thumping madly yet again, slowing only slightly at this declaration while also adding to his confusion. So… this was definitely him, and he just told himself that he’s madly in love… with Ginny Weasley? But, he also just attacked her! Harry considered rushing at the man and struggling for control of his wand.
“I know what you’re thinking, and I also know that you’re annoyed that I’m telling you that I know what you’re thinking,” older Harry said with a little shake of his head. “And I’m sorry about that, and I’m very sorry about her,” he added, gesturing towards Ginny, who looked happily peaceful with her head resting on her arm. “God, she’s cute.” Younger Harry gave him a look, so he cleared his throat and got down to it.
“I need to go in just about a minute and you’re the only one who’s going to remember this,” he said quickly, advancing again towards Harry and placing one hand on his shoulder. “I could Obliviate you like the rest, take my kids, and get out of here, but for some reason that’s not how we decided to do it.” Harry didn’t remember what he would say to himself word-for-word, but had thought about it enough on and off for twenty years so that he knew what he wanted to say, and just hoped that it jived with what he was supposed to have said. The paradox of it did not escape him, but he had stopped trying to unravel the complexities of it years ago. He was looking forward to returning and discussing this with Hermione now that he could actually talk about it with someone else without messing things up. He took a deep breath.
“There are five things, Harry,” he stated in a clear, practiced tone, slapping younger Harry’s wand back into his hand, knowing that he’d half want to stun his older self but would find the restraint at hearing what he had to say. “Five bits of advice that will change your life for so much the better–that will allow you to have the life you’ve always dreamed of. I could stay here all day and talk about your future, but what you really need to know are just these five things.”
Younger Harry, for his part just stood there, which seemed to be the acceptable response as older Harry went on.
“Number One: Trust Professor Dumbledore…”
Younger Harry cocked his head slightly, wondering why he would ever not trust the man, but Older Harry went on.
“…even when it seems like he’s treating you badly or can’t see the forest for the trees. He’s about a thousand times smarter than you and he definitely knows what he’s doing at all times. Your life and his life depend on it.
“Number Two,” he went on despite such a dramatic statement, holding up two fingers in front of Harry’s face. “You’ll have a hard time with this one, but Snape… is a good guy.” Younger Harry scoffed openly at him, which he knew he would so he continued. “He’s a git, I know, and right now quite possibly as far as a sodding bastard (this earned him a smile from younger Harry), but I’m telling you that I know, for certain, that he is one of the good guys, and has his reasons for the way he is. Now,” he added conspiratorially. “That doesn’t mean you have to put up with all of his crap.” Younger Harry’s smile turned amusedly wicked at this. “If you really want to get the best of him, you have to stop giving him what he wants. He wants you to get upset, to get flustered, to storm out of the room or act offended when he docks you points for tying your shoes the wrong way. This is what feeds him and brings him sick pleasure at the end of the day, so if you really want to stick it to him, you’ve got to do just the opposite.”
Younger Harry was still not completely convinced that what was happening was real, or at least what it seemed to be. So much was being thrown at him at once, but if this really was himself–who knew everything Harry needed to know… he had to take it all in as best he could.
Older Harry enjoyed the look of intense focus on younger Harry’s face–it showed he was eager to learn how to beat that greasy git, and it made him smile. He’d debated whether or not to include Snape in the Five Things, but in addition to what he was telling Harry and the joys it brought him, changing the relationship with Snape had also had a marked effect on his fight against Voldemort.
“From now on, you act like Snape is the best teacher you’ve ever seen–hell, the best person you’ve ever met! You idolize him like... like you’re Hermione and he’s Gilderoy Lockhart.”
“Eghh,” younger Harry spat.
“Okay, not that intense,” older Harry went on, “but you pay rapt attention, only answer with ‘yes sir’ when he docks you points, which he will continue to do, and never argue with him or show any signs of being upset no matter how foul he becomes. Why?” he asked as younger Harry’s face grew more and more disbelieving. “Because I know for a fact that this will drive him absolutely insane.”
Younger Harry smiled at himself again. “Well… all right.” he said agreeably.
“Number Three:” older Harry continued. “And pay attention to this. I’m not sure how I knew to tell you this the first time… well whatever, but…” this was the trickiest thing he had to tell himself, because the event itself was important for the wizarding community to know about, but he had been warned by himself twenty years ago to take specific action and had to reciprocate exactly to keep his future the way it was. “Just listen and remember: When Sirius is fighting his cousin, he’ll get kind of cocky, and she’ll kill him unless you pull him out of the way.”
Younger Harry looked terribly worried by this and opened his mouth to question further but Harry cut him off.
“Don’t push him,” he said loudly. “Pull him.” He felt it was okay to add a bit more information, especially because he remembered receiving it himself at this moment. “This is not until the end of this school year, but it’s obviously something you want to remember.”
Younger Harry nodded, and older Harry went on.
“Number Four:” he paused here and looked at Harry intently, marveling at how young but how burdened he already seemed. “You win,” he said softly, watching the reaction. Younger Harry’s face pulled back a bit, and Harry recognized the polite disbelief. “Look at me,” he told himself. “I’m thirty-five years old now–”
“Really?” younger Harry interrupted. Older Harry opened his mouth to continue but stopped.
“Yeah… why? Do I look older than thirty-five?” he asked nervously.
“No–way younger!” younger Harry answered.
“Excellent,” older Harry said cheerily. “But that’s my age, and clearly I’m alive, and I have two beautiful children… at least two, could have twenty as far as you know... I’ll leave that for you to think about until then.”
Younger Harry felt his stomach give a nervous lurch at this. Mrs. Weasley had had seven children… is that what Ginny expected as well?
Older Harry continued. “But the point is I’m living, and I’m happier than I ever– than you ever could have imagined. Hundreds of witches and wizards and thousands of Muggles alike are alive and happy because of you, Harry.” He put both hands on either of Harry’s shoulders now and looked intently into his eyes. “I don’t like to brag, and I don’t often talk about it, but with you I’ll make an obvious exception. You have help along the way, that’s for damn sure, but it’s you, Harry who defeats him–who kills Voldemort for good–not by accident but with clear purpose. You’re actually, literally a hero, so know it, and do it.”
Younger Harry recognized the sincerity behind the words, but still found it hard to believe. Hearing it said to him like that though, he made a promise to himself to at least try to believe it. His older self looked at him searchingly for a moment, and Harry couldn’t help but notice his eyes grow glossy.
“I want to tell you this because I know Dumbledore’s the only one who’s ever said it and you never took it to heart the way you should have.” He paused and smiled. “I am incredibly proud of you.”
Younger Harry grew a bit uncomfortable looking up into his own face, so like he imagined his father’s to look, hearing these words. He felt a lump in his throat that he didn’t want getting worse right now.
“The things you have overcome and done, and will continue to do–are amazingly remarkable. You should be as big-headed as Snape always makes you out to be… and that’s just another thing to be proud of, that you’re not. I… I know in reality it’s a bit egotistical for me to say, but I am extremely proud of you. Make sure you have faith in yourself because you can, and you will, win.”
Younger Harry just nodded. Older Harry swallowed and squeezed Harry’s shoulders affectionately before letting go of him and continuing.
“Now, Number Five,” he said, and his gaze fell to Ginny. “I promised myself I would be nice to you today because I know this isn’t the easiest time of your life, but a part of me really wants to smack you upside the head.”
Younger Harry bristled a bit at this but continued listening.
“Stop ignoring Ginny Weasley,” older Harry told him succinctly, each word like its own sentence. “It was bad enough that none of you noticed what she was going through her first year and yet continued to ignore her the next year then inexplicably still didn’t include her in your little circle last year and I CAN’T BELIEVE you didn’t ask her to the Yule Ball!” Older Harry stopped for a moment and closed his eyes, taking a couple of cleansing breaths.
“My point that I will say very clearly to get through your thick… so that the point won’t possibly be confused, Harry,” he checked himself. “Is that you will fall madly in love with this girl.” He gestured again at Ginny, and younger Harry looked down at her feeling embarrassed as his older self continued.
“She’s just now moving past the crush she has on you, but she still fancies you. Get to know her,” he pressed on sincerely. “No more running off with Ron and Hermione, leaving Ginny to sit behind feeling like a child. Invite her, include her. She’ll quickly become one of your best friends and as you get a bit older this will turn into something… even better.”
Younger Harry had continued to look towards Ginny as he was too embarrassed to look up at himself, and the longer he looked at her peaceful face, the more he began to see her. She’d always been so shy. He’d heard from her brothers that she was something of a spitfire, but he’d still yet to see that. The few days he’d spent here this summer she’d been a little more open, but not much. As older Harry finished speaking, younger Harry’s gaze fell to Ginny’s lips for some reason and after several seconds… something stirred ever-so-slightly within him–something he barely recognized.
“There it is…” older Harry said quietly, too quietly for Harry to hear him, but he knew what was happening. He nodded to himself in a satisfied way. “I’m going to move her to the other room now,” he said out loud. Younger Harry composed himself and nodded. Older Harry flicked his wand and Ginny gently rose up. He smiled as younger Harry put a hand on her back, making to guide her even as older Harry took care of making sure she made it to the living room floor unscathed. Both of them returned to the sitting room then, and older Harry went to his children, levitating them to the loveseat in a seated position and removing an object from his robes.
“Well, Harry, remember the Five Things. I’m glad to have had the chance to meet you. I’ve been looking forward to this for twenty years.” He smiled at Harry then made to turn towards his children.
That was it?
“Er–wait!” Younger Harry said, not even sure why he should wait. He looked at James and Lily. “Can I… can I talk to them one last time? To say goodbye?” he finished quietly, embarrassed. He’d just realized that he’d have to wait twenty years as well to see them again.
Older Harry smiled sadly at him. “I’m sorry, Harry. I know you want to, but I’m afraid it would just make them sad to have to do so.”
Younger Harry nodded at him, disappointed but trying to understand.
“You will understand, someday,” older Harry said kindly. “Now get over there with your family, and start enjoying your life.” He grinned broadly, squeezed in to sit between James and Lily, holding them each closely. Although the kids stayed asleep, they seemed to instinctively snuggle-in to their dad. “Oh, and… when this happens again for you some day,” he started quickly, seeming to have almost forgotten to tell Harry this. “The twins started arguing over a present Uncle Fred was showing them, and before we knew it each of them had a wand in their hand and started rapping on it. Be sure to ask Hermione how many times this got rotated before they went back, then you use Prior Incantato and you’ll be all set. You’ll figure it out,” he finished with a smile. “See you, then.” Then he tapped the object with his wand, and disappeared.
Harry had only a moment to stare at the empty space before hearing from the living room the first signs that the Weasleys were stirring. He ran in just in time to help Ginny to her feet.
A/N:
Kudos to Domino for an exceptional challenge idea. Seeing as it was Alternate Universe from the start, I took some liberties with the way things panned out after this for older Harry.
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