The Outsider
Chapter 1: Minor Setback

It really wasn't one of his most thought out ideas.

People always called him rash; Harry begged to differ. Although, in this particular subject, he was quite worried that he might yet live up to his reputation. Therefore, it would be quite understandable that he was having second-thoughts, standing next to the walls of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, directly beneath the tallest tower.

Dumbledore was hiding something. Harry knew that, logically, it was nothing out of the ordinary. So why was he attempting to sneak his way into the Headmaster's office?

Well, he had deduced that Dumbledore was up to something, something that wasn't all that good for Harry.

The basis for this suspicion, however, was not the fact that Dumbledore had that annoying I-know-something-that-you-don't twinkle. He had that on constantly and if he'd look at it as a sign of Dumbledore's treachery every single time, he would end up worse than Mad-Eye Moody. No, it was more along the lines of the 'lessons' that Dumbledore had been giving him throughout the entirety of his sixth year.

What was the point in just teaching him about Riddle's history? Sure, Harry could appreciate that you had to 'know thy enemy' and all that crap, but there was no point at all spending that much of his time with Dumbledore of all people and simply not learning anything more worthwhile. Dumbledore wasn't a highly powerful figure for nothing, Harry could acknowledge that. But why wouldn't Dumbledore share his extensive knowledge? The lessons themselves were useless, really. Harry already knew Voldemort was a fucking psycho. If he actually showed psychopathic signs when he was a child, well, that was hardly important.

And why was Dumbledore sticking to the fact that Riddle's little fetish with trophies was something important? It hardly was, at least to Harry.

But all these points were hardly significant when compared to the last one. Why couldn't Dumbledore give him all the memories in one go? It would be easier, it would take less time, and it certainly would leave a lot of room for something else. It seemed as if Dumbledore gave him each memory as a reward for being a good boy…being completely malleable to his meddling plans…

And Harry wanted to find out what the objective of all these lessons was. Another area of interest was Dumbledore's constant absence. Dumbledore had always favored keeping on eye on his castle. So why was he leaving it now?

All these questions were getting particularly irritating.

But they spurned on his curiosity so much that he forgot his qualms. He drew his wand from his pocket. "Scrateaum!" Repeating the spell four times, he cast it over his hands and feet.

He placed his limbs upon the stone wall and began to climb. The spell he had cast was making sure that he could use his hands and feet to climb up the wall Spider-Man-style. This particular stealth mode, coupled by the black cloak he was wearing, made sure he was not visible to the naked eye in this particularly dark, shrouded night. Steadily he moved, ignoring his nausea at the increasing height. His fear of heights had been conquered long ago; he certainly didn't want a weakness like that. A small part of his brain was screaming at him about all the possible things that may go wrong; one example was the idea that the spell would fizzle out and he'd plummet to his doom…but then, pure logic quite sternly informed that part of his brain that the spell was not time-dependant. He had to use Finite on it for it to stop working.

A simple illusion he had placed over his bed was enough to disguise the fact he was out in the middle of the night, giving him a perfect alibi for any that might suspect him. It should keep the spy Ronald Weasley from informing Dumbledore of anything incriminating, Harry reflected, as he reached the window of the Headmaster's office.

The window was closed. But through the glass, Harry observed the room. A sigh of relief left his mouth when he realized that Fawkes was away. His gamble had paid off; the phoenix went wherever his master went and Harry had chosen one of those days when the Headmaster was away from the castle.

He took off one hand from the wall, digging it into the pocket of his cloak and taking out his wand. He muttered out a spell and waved his wand over the window, trying to detect any wards.

He nodded at the obvious palpable results; well, Dumbledore was certainly not going to let someone in that easily. If he had in fact opened the window without caution, he would have found himself in deep pain, lying on the ground dead with limbs not intact.

Harry decided that it would be better to do it in the less blunt method. His scans showed him that the wards had no alarms linked to them, alarms that might alert Dumbledore to his little excursion, but he did not want to use force to break the wards, because he knew that kind of attack often resulted in alarming displays of magic, explosions of light, mainly.

Hanging from the Headmaster's Tower was hardly enjoyable. He needed concentration to pull this off and being this high above the ground was highly detrimental to his concentration. Dimly, he wondered at the fact that Spider-Man never actually seemed uncomfortable with his wall-climbing, but he chalked that up to Spider-Man being a completely fictional character in a comic. Pushing away such useless thoughts, he attempted to concentrate and barely made it through. He was waving his wand over the window.

"Cranera!" he hissed quietly, jabbing his wand at the wards. The barest amount of pure magic was released from his wand, wrapping tentatively around the protections, finding every crook and crevice, every cleft and fissure, every breach and imperfection.

It was a sign of Dumbledore's craftiness that he could not find any weakness, no, not easily. Harry had no foolish doubts that if the wards were more complex and more powerful, he would not have even had a chance in breaking them. However, it appeared as though Dumbledore was not expecting someone to climb the walls of Hogwarts and so did not take particular care in making sure the wards were the best. It was perhaps a bit of a failsafe.

It was really getting frustrating. His magic was scanning the wards, feeling them, and giving him an image of multiple bright strings of magic, tied beautifully together in a wonderful piece of art. But Harry knew very well that every knot could be undone, no matter how crudely or expertly it was made.

…And finally, he found a place where he could tug, with his magic, on the string, where he could undo the knot that blocked his path. It was a tiring task, pulling, pulling on the magic, dragging it backwards, with sheer will and determined concentration, until it neatly untied, leaving him sagging against the walls, his wand held limply in his hand, and sweat seeping from his black, messy hair.

He gasped wildly in tiredness, the exercise quite exhausting. All that time spent in the Room of Requirement, summoning warded objects, trying to break the tricky wards that the amazing Room had come up with, was not able to fully prepare him against going up against Albus Dumbledore's feats of magic. He had expected this; that was the main reason why he did not want to come through the front door. During his little reconnaissance mission, he had discovered that the office door was inlaid with a variety of wards more complicated than even the one he had went through.

Lying still up on the tower, feeling the cold January air, he managed to regain his energy. Only then did he congratulate himself on his achievement, but only briefly. He did not want to get cocky, especially in this kind of territory. With a bit of a struggle, as he was outside and was only using a single hand, he slid the window open, and quietly, moved to crouch on the windowsill, the spell he had used still in place. He swept his wand in a single clean move, muttering under his breath, "Locomortis dercorpus!" All noises his keen ears had picked up suddenly stopped; snoring and general sounds of snoozing portraits. He had made sure to learn the Portrait Freezing Curse. After all, he had no need of portraits alerting the castle to his presence in the headmaster's office.

This way, when he released his curse, they would not know they had been frozen or that someone had entered the office.

Muttering "finite" to undo his very first spell, he jumped from the windowsill hurriedly. He wanted to get out of here before Dumbledore could catch him; because he had no idea how long the Headmaster would be out of the school. It was this part of the plant that had his heart beating wildly, as one was prone to do in times of danger. Adrenaline was really flowing, at the moment…

Ignoring his anxiety, he walked to the office, sweeping his eyes over the office. It looked as it always did when he visited, nothing out of place except the frozen portraits on the wall, who looked as if they had been already in deep sleep when Harry had cast his curse. Making sure he was unobserved, he quickly shuffled to the desk. He ignored the half-filled paperwork upon the desk, looking instead at the drawers. He skipped the first (he knew from his observations that it was full of candy) and the second (paperwork related to the school), instead opening the third.

It was enlarged magically to fit the multiple files in it, files that had names of students upon them. Now this was interesting; student files. He had no interest in the several hundreds of other students, so he flipped through them, trying to reach the 'P's. Finally finding his name, he slid the file carefully from it's place, and opened it.

Harry J. Potter

Age: 16

Year: Sixth

House: Gryffindor

Mother: Lily Potter

Father: James Potter

Academic Level: Mediocre (NOTE: Student shows obvious signs of holding back in academics.)

Other: Boy-Who-Lived. Famous around the world. Involved in the PS incident, the CoS.2 incident, the DoM incident, and the Triwizard Tournament (Champion)

Special: Potter is very important for the war. As the Boy-Who-Lived, he defeated the Dark Lord at the age of one in the First War. Played an important role in the resurrection of Voldemort.

Horcrux(?) of Lord Voldemort. High Danger wizard.

Gives the outer appearance of mediocre, but is prone to visiting the seventh floor, presumably spending time in the Room of Requirements. Wizard of unknown power.

…That…was lacking. Harry had expected something more, but he suspected this was something that was only for Dumbledore, because it contained classified information. What worried Harry was that Dumbledore knew he spent time in the Room of Requirements. He had covered his tracks, but it would appear as though Dumbledore knew everything that went on in his castle. His spies were the walls themselves…

What was this about a Horcrux? Of Voldemort's? This was not making any sense at all, so Harry, deciding to spare himself the headache, returned the file back to its place, as if he had never even touched it.

He closed that drawer and attempted to open the last one, but he could not open it. There was no obvious bolt or lock, so he traced his wand over it. Ah, yes, it appeared as though it was layered with multiple wards, much more complex than the one he had gone through.

There was no way of opening it, he knew that. Reluctantly, he left the drawer alone, knowing that whatever was in there was definitely important, to be so well-protected.

There was little else he could inspect in this office. But he knew exactly where Dumbledore kept all his secret information, the only thing that actually knew what went in Dumbledore's head. It housed the deepest, darkest memories of Dumbledore, secrets not meant to be unveiled.

His Pensieve.

And unveil its secrets he shall.

The closet that Harry knew the Pensieve lay behind was quickly opened, revealing the bowl-shaped device that one could place his very memory in. Surrounding the Pensieve were glasses filled with a silvery, floating tendril that indicated a memory. He grabbed each memory and began to poor it into the basin, repeating this movement until the Pensieve was brim-full of silvery liquid.

Taking a deep breath, he dove.

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It was nothing but a simple dive. A dive that made him discover who he was, what his purpose was. A purpose that he had never wanted. He never expected what the consequence of such a dive would bring up on him, but he knew very well that this existence would be less pitiful than the fate that Dumbledore had orchestrated for him, the fate that had been planned since he was naught but fifteen months old.

He could not imagine what would have happened if Dumbledore's plans had succeeded. He would have been killed by Voldemort, but he wondered, when the time came when he was supposed to walk to his death, would he do it willingly, or would they have to drag him to his doom, like a pig in a slaughter-house?

It was with therefore a good thing that he had discovered Dumbledore's plans this early. No, Harry valued his life. He was not about to throw it for some idiotic wizarding world who're too half-arsed to do anything about their situation with a certain psychotic Dark Lord. Personally, Harry would want to chase after the Dark Lord for revenge, for ruining his life. He did not care whether or not Dumbledore was the one that sent him to the Dursleys', because Dumbledore would not have sent him there if it was not for Voldemort killing his parents.

If it was not for Voldemort trying to kill him, he would have lived a normal life, with friends and parents. Real friends he would have made, not the supposed friends he had, ones who were mostly interested in his fame. Ron Weasley wanted his fame because he wanted to be something special. Hermione Granger thought that it would be positively fascinating to experience the many adventures of Harry Potter first hand. His fame certainly put major difficulties in his social life.

All Dumbledore's little plans had been utterly laid out to him. Harry tried not to think about Snape loving his mother or something, because that was just disgusting.

Harry had always never trusted Albus Dumbledore. But the manipulations had not been so obvious to see. He knew that all the trials, or most of them, that he had suffered during his life was orchestrated by Dumbledore. But the fact that Dumbledore was just preparing him for his death? No he could not live with that. He despised Dumbledore. He rated second on his list of 'Most Hated', right after Voldemort.

And as he lay there, sitting on his arse, before the Pensieve, panting from the barrage of memories he had been hit with, he knew he could not remain in this castle. He had to leave, before something happened –

"Harry?"

Oh crap.

This is pretty much an AU. A plot bunny bit me in the ass the other day and I couldn't really get it out of my mind. There will be a lot of action in this story, mainly because that's what I look for in a fic.

As you can see, it involves Harry learning about Dumbledore's complete manipulations when he's still alive and before DH. Harry has already been practicing magic on his own and he generally hides a lot of things under his façade of a mediocre wizard. There are also barely existing acquaintanceship/friendship between him and Ron/Hermione, ever since the day they first met, meaning that they were never as close as they were depicted in the books. I'm just clearing that up.

THERE WILL BE ABSOLUTLY NO ROMANCE! Firstly because I think romance is something completely detrimental to a story, secondly because I see it as completely pointless and I don't like fics that get sidetracked by some kind of pairing. And also because I have no idea how to write romance. 3