Lightning Strikes Twice (Harry Potter)(Time Travel)

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This is what you guys wanted for Chapter 69, right? Harry having a frank discussion with an old man in his office? Nailed it.

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Albus Dumbledore… is not an evil man. Harry knows this, of course. He’d had a long time to think about his old Headmaster in the years after Albus’ death. The way Dumbledore had died, in hindsight, was pretty damn shitty. The secrets he’d kept from Harry for way too long, even shittier.

But at the same time, he was no Voldemort. Tom Marvolo Riddle was a bastard both literally and metaphorically. He was an egomaniac who would stop at nothing to try to take control. Maybe he would have stopped at just Magical Britain, but Harry doubted that very much. And in the end it didn’t matter because Magical Britain was Harry’s home. He would never, ever let someone as sick and twisted as Voldemort rule his home.

The Dark Lord was the Dark Lord. Albus Dumbledore… was something else entirely. He was old, for one. Too old by far. Magic, especially lots of magic, tended to extend the lifespan of wizards and witches far beyond what a mundane human being could expect. The oldest muggles tended to make it to one hundred if they were very lucky, albeit with dramatically reduced quality of life. Some made it as high as one hundred and ten, and a few record holders throughout history made it even further than that.

But Albus Dumbledore was one hundred and fifteen years old and if he hadn’t gone and gotten himself cursed by the Gaunt Ring, he probably had another few decades of life in him, easily. He was still as magically powerful as ever, and still more than capable of taking care of himself in ways that mundane people his age simply were not.

And yet… in that regard, magic sometimes did a disservice to wizards and witches. Because while it kept the body going a lot longer than it otherwise would, human minds weren’t quite built for lasting that long.

Did Harry think Albus was senile? No, not really. If he did, he would put the old man out of his misery right here and right now just as swiftly as he would if he thought he was evil or malevolent in any way, shape or form. But the older Albus got, the more bad decisions he’d made. And truth be told… the Headmaster had stretched himself too thin for far too long.

Harry comes to a decision right then and there and moves faster than Albus in his enfeebled state can react. His fingers out and wrap around Dumbledore’s gnarled, blackened hand. He grabs hold of the cursed appendage so quickly that the Headmaster barely has time to gasp and shout out a warning.

“Harry-!”

But he’s already working. Drawing on the magic he took from Tom and his Death Eaters, all the power from his Wizard’s Coven and all the might he’d claimed by right of conquest in multiple different ways, Harry focuses on the curse even now trying to kill Albus Dumbledore. It’s not just the hand, of course. Otherwise the older wizard could have just cut off the appendage and ended it.

No, Voldemort has a penchant for soul magic and that’s precisely what this curse is, soul magic. It attacks everything equally. Body, mind, magic… and finally the soul, until there’s nothing left but a barely living husk. Harry imagined in his original timeline, Dumbledore had investigated this curse heavily. It no doubt influenced the decision to die before he could meet such a grisly fate.

In this timeline however, that won’t be a problem. Harry grabs hold of the curse feeding on Dumbledore’s life force and squeezes with all his magical might. He crushes one of the last vestiges of some of Voldemort’s darkest magic in the metaphorical palm of his hand. It takes half a second for effects to start showing, causing Dumbledore to fall into stupefied silence. It takes a few seconds after that before the visual effects of the curse begin receding.

Harry watches alongside Albus as the curse fully vanishes from his arm, leaving an old and weathered, but perfectly healthy hand behind. The Headmaster lets out a shuddering breath, even as Harry finally lets go of him and leans back, standing there in front of his desk somewhat imperiously.

“You old fool.”

There’s mild derision in his voice… but admittedly, there’s more fondness than Harry would have thought possible. Was Albus Dumbledore a perfect man? Far from it. Had he wronged Harry in the past? Certainly. But in the end, the Headmaster was not the villain of this story. He had tried in his own way. The fact that he’d come up short so many times… well, that just meant they needed to focus his energy more specifically, didn’t they?

“Harry… I…”

“I’ve already destroyed all of Voldemort’s horcruxes, Headmaster. I didn’t know it until we talked, but now I can confirm… he’s gone for good.”

Albus Dumbledore looks hilarious with wide eyes and a mouth agape in shock. It’s certainly not an expression Harry is used to seeing on the old ‘wise’ Headmaster. Still, he’s already worked out exactly how to sell this in his head.

“You… how… can you be so sure, Harry?”

Smiling slightly, Harry shakes his head.

“It has to do with what happened when I defeated him this time around. Voldemort’s ego wouldn’t let him kill me outright without a proper fight. He needed to prove to himself that his original destruction at my infant hands was simply a fluke. As such, after he completed his resurrection and freed me, we had a duel. It was during that duel that something… interesting happened.”

Harry schools his expression into one of contemplative remembrance, knowing full well that he has ALL of Dumbledore’s attention at this point. The older wizard is staring at Harry with a fascinated look on his face and hanging off of his every word.

“Our wands… we both cast a spell at the same time, but rather than hitting one another with the magic, it connected our wands together.”

As expected, Dumbledore immediately straightens up, gasping in recognition.

“Priori Incantatem… of course. Your wand, Voldemort’s wand… they share the same wand core. A pair of Phoenix Feathers from the same phoenix.”

The Headmaster shoots a surreptitious look at Fawkes at that, which Harry pretends not to see because he was still busy ‘remembering’.

“Is that what it was? I’ll be honest, I didn’t know what it was at the time. All I know is… it made Voldemort and I engage in a contest of pure magic. We were forced into fighting with pure willpower. At first we were evenly matched. But then something strange happened. My parents… they came out of the magical stream. My mother and father…”

Harry pretends to look confused as he glances at Dumbledore. The Headmaster, of course, is happy to fill in the blanks, to ‘figure it out’ using his admittedly powerful analytical mind.

“Of course… the Priori Incantatem effect is said to sometimes force the wands to replay the last spells cast with it… or rather, their effects. And the last two things Voldemort did with his wand before losing his corporeal form was end your mother and father’s lives.”

Albus at least has the good grace to wince and throw an apologetic look Harry’s way after mentioning that, but Harry just waves him off with a smile.

“They saved me. They gave me the power I needed to overcome Voldemort and turn his magic back on him. If he’d cast anything but the Killing Curse at me, he might have lived… but because it was an Avada Kedavra, when I turned it around on him, he couldn’t survive it. And… I felt it then, Headmaster. I felt connections reaching out through the Priori Incantatem effect. To far away… and to nearby.”

Here, Harry brings his hand up to touch his forehead again in ‘wonder’, causing Albus to let out another shuddering breath. The Headmaster’s wand is suddenly in his hand as he leans forward.

“… May I, Harry?”

The Elder Wand. Coveted and fought over by the most powerful wizards of previous generations. Funny that, given Harry was now so powerful that he didn’t fear or desire ownership over it. Smiling slightly, showing the Headmaster how much he ‘trusts’ him, Harry nods. In reality, he’s ready in case Dumbledore tries anything. The old man doesn’t need to know just how ready he is though.

In the end, all Albus does is cast some basic diagnostics though. And what he reads… it sends him slumping back into his chair. This time though, it’s not from pain or despair, but rather… stark relief.

“You’re right, Harry. Your scar… it’s clean. I always knew it was cursed… and I always wish I had the power to remove it, even as far back as your infancy. But only recently did I start to worry that it was more than cursed. And yet… it doesn’t matter anymore. It’s gone. Tom’s soul fragment is gone.”

Looking supremely hopeful, the old man stares at Harry from across his desk.

“And… you felt this for all of his horcruxes, you say?”

Harry nods decisively, not showing a single ounce of hesitation or uncertainty.

“Yes sir. I felt them die, one after another. The curse that I just cured you of… it was a separate bit of particularly nasty magic from the horcrux it was supposed to protect. I’m confident on that front. Voldemort is well and truly gone.”

Only then does Harry hesitate very briefly.

“Well… mostly anyways.”

That gets Dumbledore’s attention.

“What do you mean mostly, Harry?”

Here was the moment of truth. Here was where Harry really had to sell this, because otherwise Albus would likely go over this whole conversation again in his head later and start to doubt Harry. After all, while Harry has explained Voldemort’s death and the destruction of his horcruxes, he hasn’t really explained the change that came over him. Eventually, Dumbledore’s own curiosity would get the better of him and that might put them at adversarial ends depending on what the older wizard decided to do about it.

Better to let the Headmaster think he’d gotten it right, at least somewhat.

“I think you were partially correct before, sir. About the horcrux in my forehead… leaking. However, I think my mother’s protections were sturdier than anyone could have imagined. I’ve been getting knowledge all year long, new ways of using my magic that I know didn’t come from my studies. And yet… it was all rather gray and emotionless. Like watching a pensieve memory but in book form. Do you think…?”

Trailing off, Harry lets Dumbledore finish coming up with the explanation for him.

“Tom’s knowledge… all of his magically accumulated knowledge up to the point where he tried to kill you as a baby and failed. You’ve gained it all, but without the mind and emotions to go with it. Your mother’s sacrifice allowed you to have the good, but protected you from the bad… from the rot and corruption that Tom shouldered like a badge of pride. Amazing… truly amazing…”

A genuine smile spreads across Albus’ face as he regards Harry from behind his desk.

“Your mother truly was the most remarkable witch of her generation, Harry. Absolutely astounding in every way."

Harry nods in easy agreement. Then, he hesitates again… before finally conjuring up a chair and sitting down in it. Albus raises an eyebrow at the move, but clearly doesn’t take offense.

“It’s not over though, Headmaster. I… I can’t just sit back going forward.”

Here would be another crucial moment. Even if so far Albus had been… amicable, this might be the time where the Headmaster couldn’t be reasoned down. And if that were the case, well… Harry would deal with things himself.

“Voldemort was the symptom. Not the disease. With the knowledge I took from him in my head, I look around and I see the problems of our world all the more clearly. Not in the way he saw them… but they are there all the same and I can’t just ignore them.”

To Harry’s mild surprise, Albus actually looks pleased to hear that.

“I’m glad to hear you think so, Harry. And yes, I’ve seen how you’ve already been taking steps to push forward change with how much of an active role you’ve taken in the Ministry. Even before Voldemort made his move, you weren’t sitting back and waiting anymore, were you?”

No he was not. And while that might make Albus happy, he knew this next part probably wasn’t going to go over quite so well.

“No sir. I can’t and I won’t. It’s time for change in the wizarding world… it’s long overdue. And while I think you’ve done a spectacular job, I also feel like it’s time for the old to be replaced with the new. That’s why… wizard to wizard, I want to ask you to step down from your other roles as Chief Warlock and Supreme Mugwump and focus solely on your position as Headmaster.”

And there it was. Harry has shocked Albus Dumbledore into silence, just as he knew he would. He watches the older wizard carefully, trying to get a sense for where his head is at, to see which way he will go.

“Ah… I see…”

Harry could carry on with this or that reassurance, trying to butter Albus up more to get his agreement with liberal amounts of ass kissing. But… he decides to be honest with the Headmaster in this moment. As honest as he can be anyways… probably the most honest he’s been this entire time.

“You’ve been a pillar of the Wizarding World for a long time now, Headmaster. No one can deny that you’ve done a good job in a lot of ways and helped a lot of people. But you’ve also made your mistakes… and more and more as the years have gone on. I don’t blame you for everything bad in my life or anything ridiculous like that… but I think more than most I have a unique perspective. And that perspective shows me that you’ve stretched yourself far too thin.”

Harry tilts his head to the side and raises an eyebrow consideringly.

“Tell me sir… would things have gotten as bad as they did multiple times over my years at Hogwarts if you weren’t constantly called away to deal with your other responsibilities? Is that fair to anyone? Is it fair to even you?”

Dumbledore, now that Harry had healed him, still had a few good years left in him. Maybe even a couple of good decades. And he would be an excellent Headmaster for Hogwarts… if he dropped the rest of his responsibilities and got the fuck out of Harry’s way. If he didn’t… well, Harry would do what he needed to. Always.

Finally, after a long moment of silence, Albus Dumbledore opens his mouth and gives Harry his answer.

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A/N: Just a heads up, we'll be doing a years-long timeskip into the future next chapter. Brace yourselves.

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The Vote:

[X] Albus agrees to give up his other roles so he can focus solely on being Headmaster - 92%

[ ] Albus cannot agree to cede his roles in the Wizengamot and ICW unfortunately - 8%

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​A/N: Please check out my newest daily updating project The Age of Chaos (Original Fantasy) if you have a moment!

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