Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or any of the characters. If I did then Harry would have some serious mental issues from being neglected and actually tried to survive on knowledge not luck.

Prologue

Everything went wrong; so very, very wrong.

Chaos and death. Destruction and manipulation. He had made a mistake; easily fooled by the puppeteer. How wrong he was when he chose this path.

Now look at him. Stuck in a body that refuses to age; seeing the descendants of his betrayers every second of everyday. They had shaped him to become the perfect weapon, too perfect – powerful, beautiful, and one that could never die. He was thought of as a possession, to be used during war and times of need; and then he wasn't the only one to pay the price.

While he couldn't disappear or be rid of - for suspicion would arise and then they wouldn't have their precious savior as a figurehead - any of his friends that gave their allegiance to him rather then that old man and the Ministry, were soon dealt with after the war. There couldn't any loose ends. The old made sure of that. There was nothing he could do to save their lives; they were destroyed while he was stuck in his metaphorical prison that he had let his manipulators build around him.

How he wished to do it all over again. Years went by and he retained that single wish; the only shred of independence left of him; for he was forever the puppet in this realm of 'Light.'

He often wondered what would have happened if he had taken the young Malfoy's hand that day; what would have happened if he had let the hat place him in his true house. He wondered if things would have been worse or better if he had taken Tom's offer. It was a pity he would never know, though for his last thought he was pretty sure he would have ended up dead. Yet, compared to his current existence, death would have been welcoming.

Tom had it wrong. He had sought the gift of immortality. But it wasn't a gift at all. It was a curse. Living longer was great, but only to a point. Then the boredom, the loss, and the regret come. You start thinking of 'what ifs' and what could have gone better - what you wished to change. He wished he was never cursed with such a 'gift.'

Now he was here, some 400 years since that last great battle, waiting for the moment where his path would change; where he would choose his destiny and no one else. The timing had to be perfect. It had taken him the better part of a century, but he had finally found a loop hole. So perfect that even he was surprised, but then he found out why nothing of this caliber had ever been done. One would certainly need to be very special to pull such a task off. Lucky for him, he was.

So he found himself in this dark chamber in the deepest depths of the Mystery of Magic, looking into a pool of swirling colors; the Temporal Room with its Time Window. It would only be minutes now until everything changed. Everything.

Nine more minutes…

He had researched this chamber and its properties for so long that every piece of information had been completely memorized and understood. He could probably get a Mastery in Time Travel just from his research. He would need that knowledge, though, with what he was planning to go through.

Eight more minutes…

After much research came the preparing; preparing his body for the transition. With so many potions and rituals, he had lost count. But in the end, all that tedious and even sometimes painful hard work would be worth it.

Seven more minutes…

Then he had to prepare to infiltrate the Ministry without notice. Something that actually proved to an amusing challenge, he mused. The fools that ran the magical world now were incompetent. They would not get in his way and the only reason why he hadn't been able to escape his confines were the ancient spells placed on him by that manipulative man.

Six more minutes…

Next he had to find the correct time period to correspond to the correct time line he was in. This was the hardest challenge of them all; a time consuming task that took him decades.

Five more minutes…

Unless he wanted to wait another 800 years, this time was the only time slot that he had available. Unfortunately the time he would end up in was not what he originally wanted.

Four more minutes…

Instead of coming back to the point of when he was born, or when he first started Hogwarts, he had to accept the fact that he would be coming back later in his childhood. This had caused him to completely re-do his plans.

Three more minutes…

His Inheritance. Such a pivotal point in his history, even now so many years later.

Two more minutes…

He accepted this time slot though, for while it didn't have the perks of starting from scratch with the people he'd be associating with, it still held promise. People would take him more serious. There is such a difference between a little kid having power and ideals to a powerful young adult pushing for change and seeking vengeance.

One minute…

He would make sure he was a force to be reckoned with. He would bow to no one. Yet, he would not go into the Light. That path had already caused him so much pain. Besides, how good can the Light be when they were so eager to take his friends away? No, this time would be different. He was going to embrace his darker aspects.

He was going Dark.

…and then...he jumped.