Part One
Prologue
-
Red is an entirely underappreciated color, if you think about it. After all, it represents some of humanity’s most cherished ideals. Hate. Love. Anger. Courage. Loyalty.
Life.
Which is rather ironic, Harry mused, considering that the only time you would attribute the color red to life is when it was flowing thickly from your body to stain your bedroom floor.
Even now, he couldn’t blame his family. He could hate them, despise them, certainly - but not blame them. After all, the world of which they wanted nothing to do with was forced upon them without their consent, without being given a choice, and with very little explanation. Really, there were only two people he could place the blame on. Well, one, if he wanted to get technical.
After all, it was Albus Dumbledore’s decision not to put a stop to Tom Riddle before he could become Lord Voldemort. It was Albus Dumbledore’s war-weariness that made him decide to place the world’s salvation on an eighteen-month old baby moments after said baby lost his parents. It was Albus Dumbledore’s decision to place him with his obviously magic-hating relatives. It was Albus Dumbledore’s faith in love overpowering all that stopped him from looking in on said child during his formative years. It was Albus Dumbledore’s decision to keep sending him back there, even with proof that it was most certainly not a good environment for a magical child.
So really, Harry couldn’t blame his family. It wasn’t their fault Albus Dumbledore’s arrogance cost them a normal magic-free life.
Of course, it didn’t make the situation any less bitterly painful.
If it wasn’t for the blackness encroaching on his vision and the utter numbness that was his mind, he would find the look on his uncle’s face rather amusing. It was a strange combination of white, green and purple, like a deformed bruise that was spreading rapidly across his puffy cheeks. His beady eyes were comically wide, almost like in a cartoon, and unblinking. Harry couldn’t decide it was horror or smugness that filled the watery blue orbs, or if it was simply shock. Maybe it was all three.
Then again, Harry wasn’t in the position to care, exactly.
It was funny. He knew, instinctively, that he was dying. He knew nothing would stop it, not even if all the healers in St. Mungo’s were to apparate into his bedroom at that very moment. And by the tell-tale sound of apparition downstairs and his Aunt’s screams, someone apparently just had. And yet, all he could think about was that his schoolbooks were getting irreparably stained and hope that his family, or someone else, would at least have the decency to free Hedwig from her cage. And of course the color red.
Red really was such a beautiful color… but it didn’t matter anymore. Because only the black remained.
-
Part One
-
“Albus! I told you, you senile old goat, I told you!” Minerva’s face was both pale with grief and red from tears and screaming. “They were never fit to care for… for… and now look! He’s dead, Albus, all because you didn’t listen to the warnings! I told you!”
Albus remained unmoved from the position he had fallen into when the news arrived, slumped over the large oak table, his face buried in his wrinkled hands and looking to all the world as though he had been utterly defeated.
Loud sobbing from one corner of room was the only sound for several moments as Hermione and Ginny clutched each other, shaking and crying into the other’s shoulder. Molly Weasley was laying down near them on a conjured blanket, having fainted not long after the news came from St. Mungo’s. Ron was sitting next to her holding her hand, pale and shaking, his eyes on the two girls a few feet away from him. In another corner, Remus sagged against the wall, and if looks could kill, Albus would have been long dead. Snape stood next to him, his face unusually blank.
“You’ll go to hell for this, Albus, I assure you,” Minerva spat loathingly, “and I shall surely see you there for not having thought of checking on him myself.”
Albus flinched, as if struck, and those watching him were grimly satisfied to see the Great Albus Dumbledore break down and cry.
-
“We gather here today to honor the life of Harry Potter, an honorable and noble young man. Though it was but a short life, he has accomplished many great and wonderful things. Here to speak for him, his best friend, Hermione Granger.”
Hermione looked regal and beautiful as she stood calmly from her seat and strode up to the podium. Though her face was pale and her eyes were red, her expression was calm, figure poised and straight, and her chin held high. She carried nothing with her, although those who knew her well knew she didn’t need anything. When it came to speaking about Harry, fancy words on a piece of parchment would never do justice.
She took a moment to take in the small crowd. It consisted on only family and friends, just as Harry would have wanted it. She cleared her throat softly and began to speak.
“Even though he hated the title, and the fame, and the fans, and the articles, Harry was a hero. We could all feel it in our bones, no matter how much he tried to deny it. When we were eleven, he saved my life. I’ll never forget that moment, when he and Ron burst into that bathroom and took on a troll to save a silly little bookworm they barely knew. I never thanked him for that. I never thanked him for showing me that even though I was Muggle-born, I didn’t need to prove myself to show my worthiness to be a witch. I never thanked him for showing me there was more to life than books and learning and cleverness.
“He was strong, with a hero-complex a mile wide. Ron and I would joke with him and call it his “saving people thing”. I don’t think he really understood how strong he truly was. With all of the tragedy he has faced in his lifetime, he always managed to overcome it. He might have lost a bit of himself along the way, but at the end of the day the determination and drive remained in his eyes. I used to think he ran on pure adrenalin, but I know better now. He was able to do all those amazing, wonderful things because he believed in something greater than magic, greater than light or darkness, greater even than love. He believed in humanity. He never stopped believing that despite humanity’s flaws, the pure strength of human will would keep the world going.
“Just as he would want us to keep going. I know that wherever he is right now, he’s happy. He’s probably feeling a bit guilty, as well. If there was a thing such as Perisher’s Guilt, I wouldn’t doubt in the least that Harry would have it. Despite the fact that he never wanted to be a savior, he felt it his duty to be one.
“However, no matter how much of a hero he was, he would want us to remember him simply as Harry. Our friend, our brother, our son. Just Harry.”
-
Death Eater’s Attack Diagon Alley
JorgenBloomsager reports
Six months after the announcement of Harry Potter’s death, Diagon Ally was invaded by dozens of black-robed wizards wearing the recognizable mask of You-Know-Who’s Death Eaters. Half of the ally was destroyed in the onslaught before the Ministry’s Aurors arrived. Many were injured and many more were killed in the ensuing battle.
The Death Eaters were finally driven from the Ally by the Goblins as they failed to invade Gringotts, however the Ally was left with a heavy toll. At least twenty six people have been taken to St. Mungo’s emergency ward, and another forty-five are dead, including ten Aurors, three goblins, and seven Death Eaters. For a full list of the dead, refer to pages five and eight.
We at the Daily Prophet and no doubt yourselves are wondering: Is this only the beginning?
-
Hogwarts, Closed?
Rita Skeeter reports
After the disaster that was the destruction of Diagon Ally in which no less than fifty-three lives were lost and the Ally shut down, many families have pulled their children from the supposedly safe halls of Hogwarts. Some have claimed that they no longer feel their children are safe in a school “that has allowed danger after danger” to befall the young students, including the rumor of a teacher possessed by the spirit of You-Know-Who five years ago.
The great castle, once brimming with laughter and joy, now seems barren and cold with so many students having been pulled from its very halls. It’s been speculated that with the loss of more than half of its population, Hogwarts may be shutting down and sending the remaining students home as well.
Headmaster Albus Dumbledore was unavailable for comment…
-
Gruesome Scene at the Ministry of Magic
Daily Prophet special edition
LionelKristoff reports
Earlier this morning, the employees of the Ministry of Magic arrived to a gruesome scene displayed in the Ministry’s atrium. In place of the Fountain of Magical Brethren, destroyed in You-Know-Who’s duel with Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore during the attack on the ministry only five months ago, were the maimed and bloody corpses of five well-known Death Eaters. They had been strung up in a grisly caricature of the fountain itself, their bodies split open from chin to navel and their innards strewn about the floor.
The Ministry has released this statement: “It is unknown who has committed this atrocious deed and who they are working for or if they are working alone. The Ministry is conducting a full investigation of this matter and Aurors will be on full guard at all hours. The deceased includes Antonin Dolohov, Bellatrix Lestrange, and the once thought to be deceased Peter Pettigrew.” (More on Pettigrew, pg. 4.)
An anonymous source has sent a letter to us at the Daily Prophet that had this to say: “I thought it was a sick joke at first, an effort to boost the awareness of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named presence, but then I saw it myself. Written in the blood of the Death Eaters were the words, “Dark Wizards Be Forewarned.” It makes me rethink the safety of the Ministry and question whether or not I will be returning to work in case it should happen again.”
Is this the work of a rogue vigilante bent on the destruction of You-Know-Who’s forces, or is it a warning to all wizards? Only time will tell.
-
Midnight Vigilante Strikes Again
Jorgen Bloomsager reports
For the past two months since the gruesome discovery in the Ministry of Magic’s Atrium, the one known only as the Midnight Vigilante for his penchant to leave bloody and often brutal scenes in the middle of the night for the luckless wizards of Britain to find has been killing Death Eaters and known supporters seemingly at random. Today, the day that marks the one-year anniversary of the death of our savior, Harry Potter, and the grand reopening of Diagon Ally, is no different.
Black boxes, disguised as gifts, have been circulating all night long, their contents leaving much to be desired. Nearly fifty wizards and witches have already reported to the Ministry with their faux gifts in tow only to reveal that the boxes contain the body parts and organs of several different wizards. It is uncertain for now exactly how many gifts were sent out nor is it known how many wizards have been slaughtered.
The Ministry requests that all recipients of a black box of any size to not open said box and report immediately to the Ministry of Magic’s Department of Law Enforcement.
It has been reported that Minister of Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour, has released a constringent of specially trained Aurors whose sole task is to hunt down the mysterious Midnight Vigilante and bring him in for due justice. “This wizard may think he’s doing us a favor by ridding the world of You-Know-Who’s followers, but the horrible manner of which he has gone about it is getting out of hand,” Scrimgeour claimed. “This sick mockery of justice cannot be allowed to continue any longer, and we will not rest until the Vigilante is caught.”
Loyalties are torn among wizards with this new statement. Many agree with the Minister, however there are those who remain silent when questioned about their opinions on the matter…
-
This wasn’t what he expected Hell to look like. Or even Heaven, for that matter.
He stood in a rather plain room with pale blue walls, a few tall filing cabinets, and a desk. Aside from a large window, the walls were bare. He couldn’t see anything outside of the widow, as it seemed to be tinted, but it was rather bright. Despite the size of the room, easily five times the size of his bedroom, there were only two chairs; a straight-backed metal chair before it, like one found in any office, and a comfortable leather chair behind it.
The chair behind the desk was occupied by a man that looked as though he belonged in a Muggle courtroom. Fancy-pressed suit, slicked-back hair, long black tie tucked beneath the folds of the jacket. He seemed to be working his way through a large stack of papers piled high in the tray marked ‘In’, and was probably doing so unsuccessfully if the emptiness of the ‘Out’ tray meant anything.
The man didn’t acknowledge him at all, and Harry had a feeling he shouldn’t speak or move until the man did so. So he stood there, quietly, for several minutes before anything happened at all. After a wait of what felt like hours, the man behind the desk finally marked something on the paper before him and placed it in the ‘Out’ tray, where it promptly disappeared and explained why the tray was empty. The man took another paper off the top of the ‘In’ pile and had just begun reading it when he spoke up.
“You’re much more polite than the others.” Harry blinked at him and didn’t reply. The man looked up at him and it was then Harry noticed that the man’s eyes were completely black, void of light or color of any kind. The man nodded in approval. “Braver, too. They usually demand answers almost as soon as they arrive.” The man then looked down at the paper before him, marking something off and signing it before placing that, too, into the ‘Out’ tray. He grabbed another paper, but didn’t look up again.
“My name doesn’t matter, so you won’t be getting one. I already know your name so don’t bother telling me what it is. You are, of course, wondering what you’re doing here, why you’re here, and how you got here. I’ll get to that in a moment, but first there are some things I need to explain. If you haven’t already guessed, you’re dead. There’s nothing you can do about it now, so tough shit. Why haven’t you sat down yet?” The man looked at him in annoyance, and Harry quickly took a seat.
“You are currently in Purgatory, specifically the Destiny Department. Every soul has over a thousand paths, otherwise known as Destiny Lines, their lives can follow. Their choices determine what paths they take that will eventually lead them to their deaths. Very rarely does someone have less than two thousand life-altering paths, considering that many people aren’t really all that important in the grand scheme of things. You have twenty-six. Also, on several times, someone else made your choice for you which screwed things up even more. That is why you’re here to see me.” Three more papers went into the ‘Out’ tray and promptly disappeared.
“My job is to fix the Destiny Lines that humans screw up. Unfortunately for you, however, dying at the hands of your uncle actually was one of your Destiny Lines, which makes it even harder to fix and gives me more work to do.” The mad glared at him, blaming him for his increased workload entirely. “This leaves you with three choices.
“One, we can reverse time and make it so you’ve survived, which will return you to your original Destiny Lines. Downside to that, however, is you’ll probably end up back here in another Earth year or two and we’d back at it again.
“Two, you can stay dead, which means that eventually your soul will be recycled and you’ll be reborn into anything from a human, to a cow, to a ficus. Don’t ask about the last one, sometimes the Shapers get really bored.
“Or three, because of your status as a Wronged Soul, you can sell your soul to the highest bidder in return for going back Earth long enough to exact revenge on those who have wronged you. Doing so, however, will mean that you will never be reborn; you will never get to start over with a new life and new memories. You will keep your memories and powers as they are, most likely gaining new ones depending on who “buys” your soul, and serve under your new master for all of eternity. Any questions?”
“What happens to the prophecy that was spoken about me before I was born?” The man looked up at him for a moment.
“Prophecies only exist to prove to mankind that Destiny Lines exist. They don’t actually mean anything, considering that those who find out they are under prophecy make their choices accordingly and end up following that path. Those who ignore their “prophecy” have a higher chance of choosing a completely different Destiny Line. The prophecy you’re talking about has exactly eight hundred and thirteen different interpretations, considering that it involves several different lives. Therefore, nothing really happens to it, per se.” The man behind the desk returned to his papers. “Anything else?”
Harry was silent for several moments.
“How, exactly, does one go about ‘selling his soul’?”
The man behind the desk paused, and slowly put down his pen. He looked up at Harry and scrutinized him with those eerie black eyes.
“Are you sure you want to do that?” he said quietly. “As I said before, very rarely does any one soul have less than two thousand Destiny Lines. The less Destiny Lines one has, the more powerful the alterations their choices make. You only have twenty-six, beating the record by two hundred and eighty-three Lines. Your soul will be highly valued and it will most likely be centuries, if not millennia, before the auction ends. Do you understand the consequences, such as if the one who wins has standards that don’t exactly fit into your moral code that you will be stuck with your choice for the rest of eternity? And that this will only create even more paperwork for me?”
Harry nodded, and the man sighed in a mix of annoyance and resignation before wheeling over to a filing cabinet and digging through the contents of one of the drawers.
“Lucky for you, kid,” he grumbled in irritation as he dropped a thick stack of papers on the desk, “there’s no such thing as time in Purgatory.”
-
After the shock wore off, the rage kicked in. He was almost surprised at how long it had taken, considering how fast he had blown up at his friends not long after he’d turned fifteen. Then again, he surmised, he’d had a whole month to fester in his anger and unease, and not what felt like had only been a few hours since he’d… well, died.
He didn’t know what upset him more: that Dumbledore had completely and utterly screwed his life up, or that the prophecy was actually meaningless in the long run and his godfather, the only part of his family that actually cared about his well being, had died needlessly for misconceptions that could have easily been avoided.
Harry was incredibly pissed off. The room he’d been escorted to by a rather strange, little blue creature, could attest to that. His magic had responded to the overwhelming feelings of rage and despair coursing through him and had lashed out at the closest things available, which happened to be every piece of furniture in the room. Harry surveyed the damage and wondered if he would have to pay for it before he remembered that he was dead.
And then the fear kicked in.
What was he thinking? How could he possibly sell his soul just to go back for a small amount of time to kill Voldemort? He could have gone back without doing so, they could have made it so that he’d survived his uncle’s attack. And maybe he would have returned only a few years later when he died again under circumstances perpetrated by someone else’s decisions.
Would it be worth it? To give up the only chance he would have at a normal life to fulfill a duty he hadn’t wanted in the first place?
The faces of his friends flashed before his eyes. Hermione, Ron, Remus, Neville, Ginny…. How were they taking his death? Were they as frightened as he was, in that moment, wondering how they would live through a megalomaniac’s rampage through Wizarding Britain? Or were they more saddened to know that they would never see him again, that they would never be able to stand at his side, living the rest of their life without the comfort and familiarity their friendship had always offered?
And poor Neville… would he be forced to take Harry’s place in the war? Harry had wondered once what was worse, having parents who were dead, or parents who were so broken that they didn’t recognize their own son. For some reason, he had always thought the answer to that was easy – that Harry was the better off of the two. At least Harry, whose parents were gone from the world, could eventually find closure with their deaths. Neville would never have that, at least not for many years, always haunted by the fact that those he loved so desperately would never acknowledge him, would never really remember that he was there.
No, he couldn’t have gone back, he realized suddenly. It would only mean more of the same subtle manipulations of his life, the same slow destruction of his Destiny Lines as choices were made that were not his own. And there was no way in hell we could leave his loved ones behind to fight a war that should have been stopped before it could begin, despite the fact that it would mean he could start over with a clean slate, with a new life and new memories and a chance to make his own choices, for once.
Selling his soul to highest bidder, even if incredibly risky, would give him a little bit of both. He would be able to go back to destroy a man that had no right to live while at the same time thwarting Dumbledore’s control over his life, even if it meant that he would forever serve under a master that could possibly be worse than both of those men combined. He would have control over his own paths, or at least as much control as his new master would allow him. And really, in the end with everything considered, it wasn’t all that hard of a choice to make.
Now he would only have to live with it.
And live with it he did. The first one hundred years were probably the hardest to get through. He had discovered that it wasn’t that time didn’t exist in Purgatory, it only meant that time was an insignificant factor in a world that could travel to any time period, possibility, and dimension it wished with only a thought. Time was, in essence, merely a tool that kept the mortal world from breaking apart at its very delicate seams. In the first one hundred years, he had met newly dead whom had come from nearly every type of eventuality, such as the woman who was half cat half human, who came from a time where human-kind had evolved differently, and the man who came from the time where not only was spaceflight a definite reality but whom hadn’t even lived on earth itself and in fact had never even been there.
After five centuries of living in Purgatory, Harry had realized that his concept of time was diminishing. Not having any type of calendar to use as a reference, he had stopped keeping track of how long he had been ‘dead’ some time before. In all actuality, it really wasn’t worth the effort of keeping track of something that had no real meaning in the world he now lived in.
Being a Wronged Soul who had chosen the third option wasn’t so much a rarity as Harry had first assumed it was. Hundreds upon hundreds of Wronged Souls had passed through purgatory within the first few hundred years and out of those many only a fourth, perhaps, chose to auction off their soul with the chance to avenge their deaths. Harry had noticed, however, how quickly their soul had been taken compared to his ever-lengthening wait.
He had only seen the man behind the desk once in all that time, when Harry was needed to sign the documents for the auction. Harry had asked the man why the others had disappeared so quickly after signing their much smaller pile of documents, and the answer left him somewhat bemused.
“The more Destiny Lines you have,” the man answered, “the less your soul is worth. Those other souls went through hundreds of paths before they arrived here. They sold their souls recklessly, not truly understanding that if they had chosen to go back they would have had hundreds of more choices to make that could have made their final death a lot better than it was. You are only given three choices when you arrive here, however in most cases they don’t really mean anything.
“Your situation is different, however. Considering you only had twenty-six Destiny Lines to begin with, those three choices would determine the outcome of something greater and more powerful than anything you will find here. The Destiny Line sub-division of the Destiny Department is only a fraction of its entire makeup.” The man looked at him seriously as Harry signed the last page of the document.
“You should feel very honored, kid, to know that your one choice and the outcome of your choice will forever determine how things are run from here on out.”
It was both humbling and daunting to know that he was solely responsible for the change in a power far greater than anything he could comprehend, so much so that he didn’t even bother trying to question why it was him that was chosen to make the change.
It was another three hundred years before Harry asked if he were allowed to see his own auction. Urg, the little blue creature whom had shown Harry to his room so long ago and had since been made his personal chauffeur, took him to the Soul Department of Purgatory where the auctions took place. It was there he learned that the process was more like a game than it was an auction. He wasn’t allowed into the actual room, but he was allowed into an observatory that reminded Harry very much of a movie theater he had gone to once, when he was very young and the Dursleys had yet to alienate him from his peers.
An entire wall was dedicated to observing the auction. It was either a very large screen or a very large window; either way, he could see clearly the room in which there must have been hundreds of beings gathered around a large circle table that was low to the ground covered in symbols and shapes painted in a variety of colors. The beings, deities Harry assumed, threw all manner of things onto the table, which were either left there for a moment or immediately snatched up by another.
Harry spent what felt to him like months (and in fact probably was) trying to figure out how the game was played, or at least some sort of system to it. The most he could figure out, however, is that every player had a certain amount of what looked like dice with numerous facets, and after a series of events that Harry couldn’t quite comprehend, they either lost the dice or kept them. If they lost the dice, they disappeared and someone else took their place; if they kept them… well, then they had more dice. He didn’t really understand it at all, and it wasn’t as though Urg could explain it to him either, seeing as Urg either couldn’t speak, didn’t know how, or didn’t speak a language Harry understood.
It was then Harry understood why no one ever bothered to watch the auctions. Unless you knew how the game was played – which you didn’t, unless you were a player – then it was simply too boring to waste your time with. So he gave it up for a lost cause and decided to spend his time doing something else.
It wasn’t until the end of his fourth millennia in Purgatory that he realized the full extent of his auction, because by then it was finally coming down to a conclusion. He had changed greatly in the thousands of years he had been waiting, growing in awareness and knowledge of his position in Purgatory and the beings and gods that ran it. Each department in Purgatory had dozens of deities running it, and in fact he had met a few whom helped to run the Destiny Department, as well as a few from other departments that had come around for some reason or other.
It wasn’t until after he had learned that his soul had finally been won that he noticed a difference in the way he was being treated in the department. Before, he was simply seen as a soul being auctioned off to the highest bidder in a power play that had been going on for billions of years, even if his one soul was highly valued. After its conclusion, others would move out of his way as he walked down a hall or simply stop and stare at him in a mixture of awe and fear. Even the newly dead would react to his presence, even though they had no idea who he was.
Of course, he was used to staring. He had gotten used to it while still alive, and even though it had been more than four thousand years since that time, it was still something that didn't faze him.
At the moment, however, being stared at wasn't his biggest problem. Once again he met with the man in the black suit whom he had met upon arrival, only this time it was so he could sign the paperwork that came with being "bought". No, his biggest problem was that now that he was "owned" so to speak, he had to give up Urg, the little blue demon that had been his companion for close to five thousand years.
"The Kitork Demons are only here to cater to the souls of the dead who have a long wait in Purgatory," said the man with a scowl. "Now that someone owns you, it is to be recycled to another soul. Haven't you ever heard the phrase, "You can't take it with you"?"
"But I like Urg," Harry protested. "He doesn't look at me as though I'd asked him a stupid question when I ask him stupid questions. Besides, I'm already dead, and that saying only counts if you're alive."
"You gave it a name?" Harry sniffed.
"Of course I didn't give him a name." He twirled the pen between his fingers and looked askance at the wall, his cheeks fairly pink. "I asked Lisa in reception." He then smirked. "I also asked her for your name... Meredith."
The man's breath exploded in a sigh.
"Fine! Keep it! Don't come crying to me when your new owners makes you give it back!"
Harry gave him a smug look and signed the papers.
'Meredith' growled. "You meet with them at four. Now get out!"
Harry left the office with a swagger before stopping halfway down the hall.
"Wait. Owners, as in plural?" He looked down at Urg, who had appeared at his side the moment the door closed behind him. "I think I bit off more than I can chew," he commented plaintively.
Urg only stared at him.