He Who Lived

III

"In this world, it is not just one or two changes. It is many, with their snowballing effects, that have led to this present so distanced from the present you know…"

In squalor, that's where they found her.

Bellatrix Lestrange, Britain's Fiercest Woman, panting and hiding out in an aggressively hidden alleyway awaiting the charge and activation of their latest Portkey. Crouching in the dark puddles in the recently rained upon flags alongside her latest team fleeing after their latest operation, overviewing their failures and success.

The mission was successful, they had escaped the Aurors and the Hit-Wizard Squad dedicated to their group. Their failures were, however, far more serious. Deaths, an exposure of their 'should-have-been' clandestine operation.

And the capture of Bartemius Crouch Jr.

The wards dropped with an audible FLUMP and turned Bellatrix away from overseeing the work done on the long shoelace and focussed on the six or seven boys in red.

In the few moments after the confrontation, as she allowed herself to decompress and their broken bodies lay about, she wondered if they were intentionally that shade. The same shade of red as their usual Stunners and Disarming Spells.

"It's certainly not to match the shade of the blood they spill." A snicker off to her side,

"Stay out of my head, Goldstein." Bellatrix snarled, teeth bared as her wand moved in the air and Notice-Me-Nots and Disillusionments flared up once again. The heavy glow of blue behind her was pulsing like a heartbeat, so there wasn't much time left anyway, so she assigned one of the others at the entrance and prayed they would be gone before anymore Auror's came their way, "Hurry it up, Rodolphus!"
"Stop distracting me woman!" The tall, thin and slightly gaunt faced husband of hers sneered, sweat dripping down his pale forehead from the hairline of his neck-length black hair as he slaved over the shoelace with his wand,

"I suppose you should leave your man be, Bella. He looks like he's struggling enough."

Goldstein again, fiddling with the pure gold ringlets of her hair with one expertly manicured hand whilst she whistled her wand through the air and unleashed hot streams of magic that Bellatrix again recognised as more wards and enchantments for their location,

"You're wasting magic, Goldstein. It's probably why the Reds found us in the first place." Bellatrix sighed out, but her violet eyes were firm on Goldstein's soft and mischievous grey.

Merlin, she hated this woman! Golden hair, grey eyes and a beautiful face and figure. She stood out from the gritty and grim lot she stood around (even though she shared their black cloaks and dark uniform) by the simple virtue of her breath taking beauty and aura of innocence. She just looked and handled herself like a prissy socialite.

Even though she was a powerful Legilimens and one of the deadliest in their organisation. Her entire figure begged the world to underestimate her, Bellatrix wasn't anywhere close to that stupid.

Singing, a siren song that Bellatrix both (juxtaposing) recognised it as a truly beautiful sound, one of the most pleasant that would ever grace her ears. Though the other, the other despised that sound with a passion that could scorch the stone under her feet.

The singing came from the necklace, handing between her breasts and being very sharply pulled from its 'hiding place' in unison to all the others around her (an ingrained Compulsion charm on the item, a fact Bellatrix discovered almost immediately after first putting it on all those years ago, to ensure they knew…)

"It appears the Dark Lord is calling us." A gruff male she recognised as the somehow thinner, nigh skeletal and shivering Rabastan, cradling the necklace between ghost white fingers. The triangular symbol (containing the bisected circle that completed their organisations symbol) pulsing a sickly green in his hand and her own,

"Let him call. We are headed back to the Castle in moments." Jerking her head to the Portkey mere seconds away from completion. She missed the few affronted stares at her blasé response to a summons from their Lord, "Get over here grunts, we're leaving!"

'Yes, let him call.' Bellatrix's snide thoughts humming away at the centre of her being as she strode, 'My loyalty has never been to him.'

She snatched up the completed shoelace and held out her arm, watching the other few of her squad crowd around and grab hold just like her.

Yes. Her loyalty had never been to the Dark Lord. It was BARELY to the cause.

Her loyalty was to Voldemort…

...

...

The smell of cleaning chemicals and the bright glare of lights off pale, clean walls overloaded his senses the moment he came to.

Scratchy sheets over his body and the feel of a firm but thin mattress beneath, shifting his weight brought rickety shaking and metal squeaks. He mildly wondered if he could count the few metal springs he could vaguely feel beneath his back, as he lay still, blood pounding in his ears as his mind whirred and his senses lunged out to try and map the room he was in.

There was light, both natural and artificial. The artificial light was from above, there were no visible fixtures, a dulled white light emanated from the ceiling down upon everything in the room. The natural light, however, was simply the sun pouring in from a modest sash window to the right of the bed. The warmth (combined with the heat contained within the sheets) left Harry just a little uncomfortable.

Besides the occasional noise that indicated his movement on the bed, SILENCE. Not a single noise to be heard, muffled, distant or close. Nobody nearby? Or it sounded like that, Silencing charms and wards existed after all.

An assessment left him feeling small and defenceless, there was neither wand nor weapon on his person and 'his person' wasn't quite how he remembered it…

Caution was present, there would never be a day he threw it to the wind, however he tempered it and braced himself for a potential mistake, slipping out from under the sheets and out into the unfamiliar territory of the room.

The floor was so much closer than what he was used to having it.

He'd shrunk.

No. That would have been a… simpler answer.

He was younger. By his estimation he'd say about seven or eight. His hair was a lot shorter than he remembered, but just as unruly and ridiculous as he remembered it from his youth, sticking up at all angles in a mess of short curls. His sight was poor, but not as bad as years of beatings and straining in that dark cupboard would make it, his skin also a little pale but nothing close to sun deprived as he had been at seven.

If he was honest, the healthier sheen and feeling made him a little uncomfortable.

His little form was only covered by a thin, white, linen robe that he felt he may accidentally put a finger through as he examined it between his thumb and forefinger. He briefly put his hands through his hair and recoiled in horror at the greasy state he found it in,

"I need a shower." He croaked aloud with a throat filled with gravel

"Ha-Harry, sweetie?"

"Who…" SLAP. Fury. The warm hands that gently cradled his face were slapped away as Harry staggered back.

His last memory? The Hogwarts Courtyard, atop the fallen body of Voldemort as the dead lay round them both and Death Eaters and his friends huddled around them with their wands still in motion.

"You must think this is really funny, huh? What did you do to me this time?" Harry snarled in fury as heat roared through his veins. Magic bubbling up to the surface as the doppelgangers recoiled from him as sparks of power lunged for them from the waif of a boys body, "Is it a charm? A potion? What in Merlin did you-"

Then…

It was like a hammer swiftly slammed into his brain, a physical pain that made him scream and drove him to his knees.

The memories came with the strike, but Harry didn't notice them until then. Slotting themselves alongside his own actual memories during the pains consisted barrage of his brain

His eyes found them again, the two who had entered the room and endured his lashing out. Now crouched in front of him with panic, concern and Love across both of their faces. He had a hand so gently on his shoulder and those eyes behind his glasses never left him. She was talking, but he couldn't follow, but he could feel the desire to hold him to her as if it were some form of magnetic force.

"M-Mum? Da… Dad?" The croaky, slightly high pitched voice coming painfully up his throat as his eyes took them in, in undisguised disbelief. Those wide green eyes that were just like his with that bright red hair and heart shaped face. The man whose face was identical to his, those brown eyes with those smile lines he remembered from all the pictures.

'James and Lily Potter. My parents.'

What?!

...

...

The heavy heels of a pair of shiny black oxfords somehow echoed loudly over the sound of

Thus, was the presence of the Head of the DMLE.

He was a glorious man, broad shoulders and tall with extremely sharp facial features. Short brown, wavy hair with a greying under shave on his temples.

The Daily Prophet, the rag that it was, gushed about how he was some kind of 'Silver Fox' because of all this. A man well into middle age but still handsome and intimidating enough to turn every head as he enters a room.

His entrance to the Atrium of the Ministry from the side corridor no exception.

Camera flashes, the roaring of more journalists clamouring around the area that had been designated for him to address them from.

An elder wood flicked out of the sleeve of his black and red lined ceremonial robes and conjured a dark granite podium with the Ministry insignia blazed upon its front in gold. Silent and with a nary a movement of his wrist, the item flaring into existence to the mild awe of the assembled. However, his dark eyes not looking at them though, far more focussed on his destination than the crowd.

He clamoured atop it with a single step and span to look upon them with a sharp pivot of his leading foot. His dark blue eyes bore into their very souls as he looked down upon them, silencing them all then and there by that virtue.

"I thank you for your attendance." A level voice that boomed across the space, slicing through any possible noise and quelling it with its regal baritone, "The cowardly assault on the Ministry, this cowardly assault against the children of the brave wizards and witches who defend us day after day is a crime we will not forget nor soon forgive."

His tone was grave as he reviewed the events, the truly vile events.

The attack force Bellatrix Lestrange, Lieutenant of the Death Eaters, lead against the Ministry. Marching into the Atrium and then on to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

How, off guard but valiant, the combined Auror's and Hit-Wizards fought and fell one by one, holding a daring line against the Dark Forces.

How the forces thought they were winning, until they realised that the Lestrange's were nowhere to be seen. Where the Lestrange's had ended up.

And the massacre that had been found in the Ministry Creche…

The hostages were few, including one Harry James Potter. The eight year old Boy-Who-Lived who had put himself between the Death Eaters and some of his fellow children (including his own young sister) and was kidnapped when the Auror's intervened before the boy was swatted aside.

He regaled the crowd with the tale of the Auror's investigation and how they had easily tracked down the hostages and how the Hit-Wizards had infiltrated

The crowd besotted with his tale, drawn up in the excitement of the Lights glorious victory against the Dark. When the DMLE Head called for their continued support, spat in the face of the Dark's despicable actions and rallied the crowd behind his continued fight against the Darkness.

Rallied them to continue to stand against the Dark Lord

The silence fell for less than a second, an eye of the storm that closed as soon as it opened. And the press launched

"Sir Dumbledore!"

"Sir Dumbledore, sir!"

"Dumbledore, sir! Over here!"

Sir Dumbledore, Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement for the last three decades (after Grindelwald's brutal defeat), looked over them like a king would his subjects…

And began the laborious task of answering questions…

…

…

To be continued, sorry if it's a bit short but I decided this is where I wanted to end this instalment.

To PhillyFaze, not to be a spoiler but I'm not willing to drop onto you guys reading exactly where in time this place is immediately (e.g. just dumping all the info and exposition all at once so soon). I just want to slowly introduce you to the world and explore the world and story. Hope you want to keep reading.