Chapter Text
Memo to the Minister of Magic and the Heads of the Auror Office and Department of Magical Law Enforcement:
All Unspeakables present at the time of explosion are accounted for. Two dead, three critically injured currently being cared for at St. Mungo’s, and the rest uninjured. However, there is still no sign of Auror Potter.
Signed,
Investigating Officers Susan Bones and Cormac McLaggen.
Clack clack “Hey, Buddy!” clack clack “Wake up! You can’t sleep here!"
“Bwah...?” Harry Potter grunted intelligently as he cracked his eyes open and craned his neck to locate the source of the noise.
The man, who Harry groggily identified as a police officer, looked unimpressed, “You can’t sleep here. Get a move on.” The officer moved off to finish his rounds as Harry levered himself into a seated position.
“Wha...? Where…?” he observed his surroundings finding himself on a bench in what appeared to be a muggle park. Thoroughly confused he quickly checked himself over to ensure the presence of all body parts—arms, legs, ears, ok—and important items—wand, glasses, underwear, awesome—before removing his outer robes, revealing a sensible white button down shirt and black trousers. Attire much more suitable for fitting in in what appeared to be a muggle neighborhood.
He got up and started looking around for a clue as to his location. Passing a church he did a double take. Well, at least he knew where he was—Godric’s Hollow. As he stood looking dumbly up at the church—was it just him, or did it look just a little bit newer than the last time he’d seen it?
There was a newspaper crumpled on the ground by his feet. Picking it up, his eyes were drawn to the date- October 31, 1981.
“Halloween 1981,” Harry whispered to himself, “but…” He had a brief but violent war within his head, pitting his personal desires against the continued existence of the world as he knew it. He promptly decided the world could screw itself. “What time is it?” he asked desperately, looking wildly about. A clock face on the bell tower of the church caught his eye and revealed it to be just after half-past 9.
Before the crumped newspaper could hit the ground, Harry was gone, sprinting down the street the way he knew lead to his parents’ house. He had no idea what he was going to do when he got there, but he was not going to let his parents die, not if there was anything he could do to stop it. He didn’t care if he messed up time or erased himself from existence, he was not going to let the little boy currently playing happily with his parents become an orphan in less than an hour.
Voldemort’s reign of terror ended today—he’d deal with everything else after he saved his family. Now if only he could figure out how, but between the numbness of his pounding feet and the burning of his overworked lungs his mind could not produce more than a frantic need to stop him.
He slowed at the cross street and peered out from behind a large pine tree, spotting a tall, cloaked figure striding up the lane. The gate to the Potter’s front walk lie halfway between them. Harry debated with himself for a moment before casting a disillusionment charm upon himself, deciding stealth would be the better option. He quickly, though silently, strode down the street, vaulted over the Potter’s fence at the corner of the yard, and positioned himself in a defensive stance in front of the door just as Lord Voldemort wandlessly pushed open the gate.
From the corner of his eye, Harry could see James’ head of unkempt black hair through the lace curtains covering the picture window. Voldemort was two steps from him now; he could see the eerie red glow of his eyes and the vicious smirk twisting his mouth from beneath the black hood. His outstretched hand pushed his magic to wandlessly unlatch the door and open it a crack, causing it to emit a creak that caused the inhabitants of the house to freeze.
In the final moment before Voldemort would walk right into him, Harry punched the man square in the nose. The Dark Lord fell to the ground at the unexpected blow, but not before his wand arm shot out, sending a jet of green light straight for his invisible attacker.
But Harry had already dodged out of the way and into the house, slamming the door behind him, and leaning his body weight against it while he released the disillusionment.
James and Lily stared at him in horror for a moment, Lily clutching baby Harry to her chest.
“You need to go! NOW!” Harry yelled. “He’s here! GO!”
And just like that the trance was broken. With less than a backward glance James snatched his wand from the back of the couch, grabbed onto Lily, and with a crack they were gone. Harry sagged slightly with relief until the door behind him shuddered violently. Gripping his holly wand in a slightly sweating hand, he quickly re-latched the door, for all the good it would do, and took up a defensive position in the living room.
The front door was blasted off its hinges into the adjacent wall, and Voldemort, eyes blazing with fury, stepped through the now empty doorway. Upon seeing Harry standing in the living room his smirk returned.
“Well, well, well, James Potter. Prepare to die.” Another jet of green light shot from his wand. Harry sidestepped, while propelling a dislodged hinge from to the door at the back of Voldemort’s head. Tom threw up a shield at the last moment and the piece of twisted metal ricocheted and embedded itself into the frame of the picture window.
“Sorry, just missed him. Suppose you’ll have to settle for me,” Harry quipped with an overly bright grin, and promptly ducked behind an armchair as another volley of killing curses was directed at him. Voldemort’s smirk had turned into a snarl of rage.
“How dare you stand in my way,” Voldemort snarled, sending another barrage of curses at Harry.
“Well, you see,” Harry began with an air of nonchalance as he blocked and dodged every spell fired at him. “I just kind of woke up here, oh, not a half hour ago, and I saw this guy in this menacing black cloak headed right for this quaint family home, and I thought to myself, that looks like a right bit of excitement there, I’ll just pop over and see what all the dramatics are about. And so here I am. Must say, your eyes really are something, are they color contacts?”
With an inarticulate growl of rage Voldemort redoubled his efforts. “You should take this seriously boy.” He conjured metal spikes that pelted towards Harry, and embedded themselves in the wall behind him, stabbing indignant paintings, shattering a mirror, and defacing a majestic old grandfather clock in the corner.
Two or three of the spikes grazed Harry’s arms. With the exhaustion from his breakneck run earlier, and the lack of innocents in the immediate vicinity to protect, he felt his energy draining. He retaliated with a barrage of bone breaker hexes and blasting charms as he retreated through a small hallway into the kitchen and through the back door into a garden enclosed by pine trees.
As he backpedaled, Harry sent blasting charms at the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust that would give him precious moments of cover. He used that time to throw up quick anti-apparition and anti-portkey wards that would simultaneously prevent Voldemort from escaping by magical means and stop his Deatheaters from coming to his aid.
“Very clever,” Voldemort’s voice seemed to come from all directions through the haze. “But you do realize this means no one can come to save you?”
“Who needs help?” Harry shot back flippantly.
“You.” The voice whispered in his right ear. Resisting the urge to flinch and spin toward the voice, Harry ducked and rolled just in time as a green light sailed over his head, ruffling his hair as it passed. He scrambled to his feet, turning a slow 360, keeping his ears open for any sounds of movement.
Suddenly, the remaining dust in the air was pulled to the ground and Voldemort was revealed to be standing at the opposite end of the garden, directing his wand at Harry. At the same moment that Voldemort cast the killing curse, Harry cast the disarming hex.
The spells connected in midair and the Priori Incantatem burst into life between them. Unlike Voldemort, Harry knew exactly what was happening and used that foreknowledge to his advantage. As soon as the beads of light began sliding up and down the golden thread of light he forced them towards Voldemort, as he had done in his fourth year.
Sweat beading on his forehead and hands clenched on his violently shaking wand, slowly, inch by inch, the first bead was pushed into Voldemort’s wand. Harry waited as people began appearing as gray wispy ghosts from Voldemort’s wand. Some he only vaguely recognized from old photographs, and others he did not know at all.
They wandered about the two dueling wizards, whispering words of encouragement to Harry, and hissing at Voldemort. After six men and women had emerged from Voldemort’s wand Harry turned to the man closest him.
“I’m going to break the connection. When I do, I need you all to rush him and distract him for a moment.”
“You got it,” the man replied.
“Now!” Harry yelled, wrenching his wand away as he lurched to the right, breaking the connection.
The shades mobbed Voldemort, distracting him as Harry fired nearly simultaneous summoning and banishing charms at opposite sides of Voldemort’s head. With a nauseating crack Voldemort’s head was forced sharply to the side. The shades dissipated into nothing revealing Voldemort. He wavered on his feet for a second before falling bonelessly to the ground.
Panting heavily, Harry cautiously approached the body. The mouth and eyes were open in a faintly shocked expression. The neck was clearly broken—the spine jutting into the skin, creating a bulge that was quickly becoming bruised as blood leaked from the severed vessels.
Harry picked up the yew wand. He could feel the stain of all the dark magic this wand had cast. He broke it over his knee, and stomped on it a few times for good measure. Trudging back to the house, he allowed his body to fall onto the steps by the door. Wearily he removed the wards and slumped against the stair railing.
Not five minutes later, Harry heard the crack of about five people apparating within the house.
“Out here,” he called, still slumped against the stair rail.
A thunder of steps raced towards him. Albus Dumbledore was the first to emerge from the house, wand held defensively in front of him, gaze scanning the garden. Harry knew the moment he caught sight of Voldemort by his suddenly frozen stance and sharp intake of breath.
“He’s dead.”
Dumbledore jerked his head down to look at Harry. He stepped to the side to allow his companions to flow past him and ensure the garden was secure. Among their number were James Potter and Sirius Black.
“I thought I told you to get out of here,” Harry called, eyes fixed on James.
“I did. And now I’m back. It is my house,” James called back. He and Sirius, along with the three other Order members were gathered around Voldemort’s body.
Sirius cautiously poked it with a toe. “Is he actually dead?” he asked, disbelieving.
“In a manner of speaking,” Harry muttered. Apparently not quietly enough though, for Albus’ twinkling blue eyes were fixed on him again with even greater intensity than before.
“Excuse me, my boy, but I don’t believe we’ve met. I am Albus Percival Wulfric Bri—”
“Yes, yes, I know who you are, don’t go through the whole list, we’ll be here all night.”
Harry heard James snort at his pronouncement.
“Indeed,” Dumbledore said, seeming slightly put out as he stroked his beard. “And you, my boy?”
In one graceful movement Harry got to his feet, standing tall before those present, as though daring them to challenge his following statement. “First of all, I’m not ‘your boy,’” the glare he leveled at the man was truly impressive, and caused the twinkle in his eyes to dim. Harry took that as an accomplishment. “Second of all, I just defeated your Dark Lord for you, so, if you don’t mind, I’d like to go sleep for a month.”
Harry turned on his heel, presumably to re-enter the house, before hesitating a moment and turning back to face the assembled wizards. “Oh, also, you should go arrest Pettigrew, he’s a traitorous bastard. Sirius, you shouldn’t go overboard and get arrested. And someone should bring the Longbottoms to a safe house before a bunch of discontented Death Eaters decide to torture them for information. Got it? Good. See ya round.” He spun on the spot and disapparated with a crack.