Time To Fix The Mistakes: Chapter 3 - Tactics To Win (Part 1)
ZeldaQueen: Terribly sorry for the lack of updates, this fanfic is draining my will to go on. Here we go, in any case.
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Chapter 3: Tactics To Win (Part 1)
Chapter 3: Tactics to Win
X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X
May 17, 1977
ZeldaQueen: "It was a dark and stormy night..."
Harry apparated back to the House of White.
ZeldaQueen: Yep, I'm pretty sure that this is supposed to be a jab at the House of Black. "Oh look, the place that Dumbledore used for his headquarters is all evil and dark while my place is white and good!"
He had just found the time to return for a thorough search. The idea had captured his imagination some time ago and hadn't let up.
ZeldaQueen: He just loves rummaging through places he has no right to be in
The structure looked vastly different in the dark. It wasn't as cruel and insane as Sirius Black's family home had been, but it was close.
He walked to where he'd felt the presence of secret passageways.
ZeldaQueen: How, exactly, does he "[feel] the presence"? He's not an empath or anything like that
One opened just from Harry stepping through it. The room contained a number of tea cozies sized for house elves and a few small beds. A second passage didn't want to open, but Harry had learned cursebreaking from some of the best years earlier. He brought down the wards preventing his access.
ZeldaQueen: Little entitlement whore, isn't he? "Not let me in, will you? I'll show you!"
The room behind the wards was quite something…quite disturbing. It was a divination suite, much like the bizarre tower Trelawney had cloistered herself inside at Hogwarts. But this one had prophecy spheres inside it, too.
ZeldaQueen: And why is this disturbing?
They were obviously very old. Harry reached out and plucked one off the shelf. Instead of breaking or refusing his touch, the sphere came willingly.
ZeldaQueen: Nuts. I was hoping it would drive him insane. Not like there'd be much difference, but at least he'd be locked away
He tapped the thing with his wand.
ZeldaQueen: ...
ZeldaQueen: That's what she said!!!
An ethereal image filled the sphere. Since he was able to view the prophecy, it either pertained to Harry or it was already complete and could be viewed by anyone.
ZeldaQueen: Again, how utterly convenient (those words have been popping up a lot, I've noticed)
The forces of Light falter and cower,
Hiding behind their shields,
None willing to send the first bolt or last.
Fate decides differently, as the old crumble away.
The new one comes from a distant land,
Black hair turned white before its time, eyes gray,
A vicious tongue will lead them to victory.
ZeldaQueen: Oh look, a heavy-handed prophecy which in no way roundabout mocks the Ministry and Dumbledore! Why on earth does the author keep referring to the people who fight Voldemort as the "Light" anyway? This isn't Fire Emblem for crying out loud!
And of course the "vicious tongue will lead the to victory"...three guesses on who that is
Harry found the prophecy interesting, especially as it wasn't about him.
ZeldaQueen: *snorts*
Still, it made Harry wonder if Dumbledore had stalled in dealing with Tom Riddle for so long that fate had moved on and tried to disregard the old wizard.
ZeldaQueen: FATE DOESN'T WORK LIKE THAT IN THE HARRY POTTER BOOKS!
Seriously! Dumbledore himself says that prophecies can go unfulfilled! Stop making up and ignoring canon stuff just to make Dumbledore look bad!
Harry plucked another half dozen prophecies off their shelves and listened to them. It was almost soothing.
He wondered, for a moment, what would happen with Trelawney if Harry had gotten the last horcrux before it was time for her prophecy. The idea was sort of amusing, especially considering Harry didn't like the idea of having to break into the Ministry again to retrieve the same silly locket.
ZeldaQueen: Smug bastard
Harry continued his journey through the house. Two more passages on the first floor revealed little of interest. In fact, it was only when Harry arrived at the third floor did he find the prize of the house.
ZeldaQueen: A brand-new set of luggage
Harry walked into the ritual chamber and stopped short. He'd heard of them, of course, but only the oldest of the pureblood families ever had them - and, given the political climate Harry had grown up in, none had ever admitted it. Rituals of every type had been deemed illegal for the last one hundred fifty years. Harry, of course, had been witness to a horrifying variety of them in his short life, legal or otherwise. But it didn't change the fact that no one ever admitted to knowing about them or performing them.
ZeldaQueen: Rituals? What? Huh? Where did this come from?
He thumbed through a few ancient books detailing the White Family rituals. Nothing caught his eye, but a spark of an idea lodged itself in his head.
ZeldaQueen: And caused him to die.
Seriously though, who wants to bet this idea is going to be used against Dumbledore or the Ministry or Voldemort? Or all three?
X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X
July 17, 1977
Master Auror Janus Wilmot had been easier to get ahold of than Harry expected. The man had been dispatched to a Death Eater raid at the home of a muggleborn Hogwarts student named Robert Billings (rising into 4th year, Hufflepuff). Harry had subdued the Death Eaters and was about to arrange for the entire Billings family to go into hiding when he spied his target.
ZeldaQueen: And still, he's oh-so-casual about wandering around, kidnapping people. What if these folks don't want to go into hiding?
Harry created portkeys to send the Billings family on its way. Then he waited and watched Auror Wilmot.
ZeldaQueen: Perv
The man sent severing curses at two wounded, but not dead, Death Eaters. The man was doing his 'best' sort of work, cowardly and unworthy.
ZeldaQueen: Oh shut up! It was well established that Death Eaters were vile and extremely dangerous. This dude only knows that they're trying to murder a family of Muggles (he doesn't even seem to know that said Muggles are gone). Not everyone has your Stu-knowledge, Harry!
Harry had killed Death Eaters, but only in the heat of battle…this lowly worm of a man was walking through and killing whoever he found. Coldly, without hesitation. It struck Harry as being wrong.
ZeldaQueen: Oh, you think it's wrong to coldly and calculatingly sneak around and killing whoever you think deserves it?
*COUGH*
Harry had to bide his time for Wilmot to move away from his colleagues. Harry finally saw the opening he wanted. He picked up a small stone, turned it into a portkey to a secure cottage Harry used for his interrogations, and sent a number of high intensity stunners at the Master Auror. Harry caught the man unaware as he was trying to kill a third injured Death Eater, and the Auror slumped to the ground. Harry banished the portkey toward the Auror and watched the vile man disappear.
ZeldaQueen: I mean, ye Gods! Harry's going on about how oh-so-terrible the Aurors and them all are, when they're essentially stumbling around in the dark with no knowledge of exactly who is a Voldemort supporter and where actual attacks are taking place and if there are spies in the Ministry and who to trust. Harry does know all of this stuff and is blaming them for not having his foreknowledge and feels perfectly justified in kidnapping and attacking these people! Who, may I ask, is more sinister here?
Harry looked closely at the remaining injured Death Eaters. He couldn't exactly leave them here for the Aurors to massacre them, could he? That wasn't right - and it would possibly change the entire timeline.
ZeldaQueen: Harry you dipwad, you're here to kill Voldemort prematurely and have been saving and killing people as per your own views. You've well screwed up the timeline, I assure you
Harry created a half dozen portkeys and dispatched the wounded Death Eaters to St. Mungo's. There they would get some form of treatment and the Aurors couldn't just let loose with spells…but, given the corruption inside the Ministry, Harry fully expected to see them all 'escape' and make it back in battle. The second time Harry wouldn't be generous.
ZeldaQueen: Okay so wait, does not compute - Harry here will kill the Death Eaters after they make two offenses, but the Ministry killing Death Eaters makes them Evil and Wrong. And now we hear that apparently the Ministry Aurors are so gung-ho for blood that they'll murder the Death Eaters willy-nilly, but then will allow them to escape to cause more trouble. So...the author's implying that the Ministry officers are murderous bastards who'll kill unconscious people, but would rather let them escape Azkaban than drag them behind the woodshed and kill them?
I don't get this at all
He apparated to where he'd sent the Billings family and left a brief note. He promised food and books (especially training materials for the young wizard) and safety.
ZeldaQueen: Yes, only murderous people deserve to live
Then he made his way to the Master Auror.
Harry searched the man before awakening him. He was as paranoid as Alastor Moody: three wands, four portkeys, six different potions.
ZeldaQueen: As I said before Harry, you have no right going on about people being paranoid.
Also, why would someone need four portkeys? Couldn't the dude just Disapperate?
He had a notice-me-not charm on one of the portkeys and some kind of voice activated charm on one of the potions vials. Harry put all the items in a strong box and banished it outside the safehouse.
Harry bound the Master Auror and placed four drops of Veritaserum in his mouth. Harry woke the man and didn't give him any time to think or collect himself.
ZeldaQueen: I wonder if Harry's ever heard of the Geneva Convention rulings on torture?
"How many Death Eaters have you killed?"
"Twenty nine."
Harry nodded. His official count was seven.
ZeldaQueen: Did Voldemort ever actually have twenty nine Death Eaters in his employment at any one time?
"Have you ever entered the Department of Mysteries?" The sole reason Harry had been looking for this particular Auror was to ask this question: Harry needed to determine a way to get inside the Department of Mysteries and recover Slytherin's locket. Damned bureaucrats and functionaries, they had one of vilest creations ever conceived and they just sat around and studied the magic that went into its creation.
ZeldaQueen: That is, of course, assuming that they knew the damned thing was a horcrux. We're only made aware of the fact that they're extremely Dark and dangerous, but it's never mentioned exactly how widely known the things are. In fact, Slughorn implies in the memory that it's very surprising that Riddle would have come across the term at all. So for all Harry knows, the Ministry just figures that they've got an ordinary locket which won't open and he's blaming them for ignoring it, probably in favor of more important matters. Smooth
Some forms of curiosity were dangerous.
The Auror's eyes went fuzzy for a second as he tried to resist answering Harry's question. He was obviously under a secrecy charm of some sort that was warring with the veritaserum.
ZeldaQueen: You know, DW, Rowling did say that it was possible to lie under the effects of Veritaserum if one prepared themselves
Eventually he croaked out, "Yes."
"Where do they keep or study enchanted dark objects?"
He fought the charm again before blurting out, "The Chamber of Unraveling. It's where all the cursebreaking happens in the Department."
ZeldaQueen: Well that's stupid
And wait a second - didn't the books say that only Unspeakables went into the Department of Mysteries? Why would an Auror know what was going on in there?
"Describe how to get inside the chamber."
The man said, "I can't. I know of it but not how to get inside it."
Of course it wouldn't be that easy.
ZeldaQueen: Yes, heaven forbid that canon get in the way
"Have you ever seen a golden locket there with an 'S'…"
"The Slytherin locket?"
"That's the one. The Unspeakables know it came from Slytherin?"
"Yes. It's a fascinating object. No one has the first idea what kind of curses are on it."
Harry knew all too well what the foulest 'curse' was. He wish he didn't have to repeat history in quite this way. He wished the worthless piece of junk…well, he had to stomp on his emotions to keep from wasting time with this Master Auror.
ZeldaQueen: Hah, good luck with that, Mr. I'm-Perpetually-Angsty-And-Angry!
"Why hasn't anyone destroyed it?"
"You'd sooner get an Unspeakable to cut off their own nose than destroy something they hadn't yet unraveled."
ZeldaQueen: Or how about the fact that they just can't destroy it! That's the reason that the seventh book dragged on for so long - you can't just smash a Horcrux! It has to be destroyed beyond all means of magical repair! GOD, DW, DID YOU EVEN READ THESE BOOKS AT ALL???
Harry kept his angry thoughts to himself.
ZeldaQueen: A futile task
"Who works with the locket?"
ZeldaQueen: Mulder and Scully
"I've heard of three teams working on it at various times. The only name I heard was Diricawl."
"A codename?"
"Yes."
"Do you know who Diricawl is?"
"No. All DoM identities are kept secure. We may know that such and such a person works there, but we never connect up street names with codenames…"
ZeldaQueen: So the Department of Mysteries is now the FBI?
And I repeat, most of the stuff that goes on in there is really fucking important and secret! An Auror wouldn't just be able to waltz in!!!
That was all he could get on the most important subject, that of the horcrux. His great clue was a name, the Diricawl, a sort of presumed-extinct bird. A Dodo bird. It wasn't a lot of help.
ZeldaQueen: And Harry just knows that...how?
Alright, he randomly knows the name of an extinct bird and connects it completely randomly to the Dodo. That's certainly not going to be brought up again!
Harry turned the interrogation to another subject. "Do you modify the reports of your subordinates?"
"All the time."
"What specifically do you modify?"
"Anything that brings discredit to the Aurors."
ZeldaQueen: Author please, SHUT UP! And yes, I'm blaming the author for this. There is NO EVIDENCE that the ministry was this corrupt during the first war! The way this is going on, there's pretty much nothing for Voldemort to even do to take over!
Harry kept back his invective. He merely noted mentally that such conduct, 'brings discredit to the Aurors.'
"Have you ever reassigned blame for the killing of a civilian from an Auror to a Death Eater?"
"Of course."
"Does your boss Barty Crouch do anything to the reports?"
"When needed, yes."
ZeldaQueen: Ah yes Barty Crouch, the man who was so devoted to upholding the law that he arrested his own Death Eater son, alters reports
"Have you ever accepted a bribe?"
"Of course." What an attitude to have about the whole thing.
ZeldaQueen: Really! Oh wait, you were talking about the Auror. My bad
"Has Crouch?"
"I don't know."
"Do you know who has been freeing prisoners?"
The Auror grumbled as much as could under the truth serum. "No, but I wish I did."
"Any suspicions?"
"A lot, but none of them have any evidence behind them."
Harry thought about what to do with this vile example of wizardry. "If you were looking for a safer world for everyone, what would you do with a rabid killer who had taken thirty lives?"
The man fought the truth serum for a few minutes. "I'd kill him."
ZeldaQueen: Well gee, I wonder where this is going?
Harry just nodded. "Obliviate."
He had some more thinking to do. He had wanted to handle Voldemort and his followers before dealing with the Ministry - but this Master Auror was easily on par with any Death Eater.
ZeldaQueen: What about you, Harry? How many have you killed?
X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X--X
September 13, 1977
Harry sat in his flat in Manchester and listened to a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix. He'd managed to get listening charms inside the meeting room by enchanting the tea cups used at the Prewett Manor, their temporary headquarters.
ZeldaQueen: How come everyone has a Manor in this thing? Doesn't anyone just have an ordinary house?
Harry listened to Arthur Weasley speak for a while on the security leaks that had led to muggleborns being identified by records from the Ministry. Moody interjected with several scathing attacks on the man's intelligence and dubious parentage.
ZeldaQueen: Bull, I say! Where, exactly, do the books indicate that Moody would ever respond in such a way? Not only is the guy a paranoid old goat who'd take security leaks extremely seriously, he would NEVER make attacks on Arthur in such a way
Harry thought it was frightening that age had mellowed Moody from a near psychopath when it came to security (in 1977) to a mere paranoid delusional (in 1995).
ZeldaQueen: Um Dw? Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. It's clearly stated in the fourth book that Moody was so "paranoid delusional" in his old age because he had earned so many enemies as an Auror, which means that he was normal when he was younger, not psychotic
Harry finally perked up when an old man named Parks began to speak about weird happenings inside St. Mungo's. "We've got four Aurors, including the just promoted Lead Auror Janus Wilmot, in one of the wards. No one can figure it out, but they're alive but not really functioning. It could be Cruciatus exposure; or severe use of Memory Charms; or a coma-inducing potion. We just don't know, but it's definitely a new tactic the other side is using…"
ZeldaQueen: Or a psychotic time-traveling Marty Stu is on the loose
Moody, as usual, was the first to respond. "Wilmot was a rabid beast. Best thing that could have happened, I think."
ZeldaQueen: Again, bullshit. Moody would not say that someone against Voldemort deserved to be comatose in the hospital. Even if he didn't like the guy, it would mean one less person to help in the fighting as well as the possible presence of an unknown enemy
Albus Dumbledore just tutted in response. "No one deserves that, Alastor."
ZeldaQueen: Thank you, Dumbledore. Now let us watch as the author uses his Stu-Harry to laugh at your morals
Harry thought differently. He was the one responsible for their condition after all.
ZeldaQueen: Ta-da! I mean gawd Dumbledore, you don't want to leave a guy comatose? What's wrong with you?
He'd used an old spell that he'd stumbled upon in his quest to finally get some protection from Legilimencers.
ZeldaQueen: "Protection from Legilimencers"? The hell? I believe canon calls that "occlumency" and establishes quite firmly that Harry simply cannot learn it due to his personality and strong emotions
The men were all alive, but Harry had locked their conscious minds away from active control of their bodies. (Harry had used the spell on himself, in a more limited fashion, to lock away sensitive information.) He could restore them any time he chose…but he didn't think he'd do that anytime soon.
ZeldaQueen: Alright, I know you're all going to say "No duh!" to this, but Harry is acting like fucking God here! He decides who lives and dies, he thinks it's perfectly alright to screw with people's memories, and now here he is, leaving people comatose, perhaps forever, unless he feels charitable enough to let them wake up.
DW, author, let me ask you something. HOW IN THE BLOODY HELL ARE WE SUPPOSED TO LIKE THIS GUY?!? HE'S BASICALLY BEING A GRADE-A ASSHOLE AT BEST AND IS LITTLE BETTER THAN VOLDEMORT AT WORST!!! I DON'T WANT TO SEE HIM WIN, I WANT TO SEE HIM FALL DOWN A BLACK HOLE AND GET HIS INTESTINES SLOWLY DEVOURED BY TAPEWORMS!
The four Aurors, including Miles Tavinish, had killed, rather than arrested, sixty two Death Eaters among them. By any measure, they were dangerous people who had no regard for the laws they were paid to enforce.
ZeldaQueen: Harry's also a dangerous person with no regard for the laws. What's the difference? That he's not paid to enforce them? And don't tell me that he has the Code of Harry, he gives people two chances to go straight. We later see that it never even occurred to him that people in the Ministry were being mind-controlled or blackmailed or anything. He's honestly no better than Edward Cullen eating people who are "bad". And he decides that he's the one fit to pass judgment on everyone else. Right
Harry smiled at the concept of 'regard for the law'. He, of course, had broken fundamental laws of time to come back and do this. He didn't have a high moral ground to preach from, but he did have his rules: the corruption had to go from both sides, from Voldemort as much as from Fudge and Crouch and Dumbledore.
ZeldaQueen: Smug asshat. No Harry, you don't have a high moral ground but it's more to do with the fact that you have no fucking right to pass judgment on everyone, not to mention the fact that this almost solely revolves around the fact that you feel like this all adds up to your life being inconvenienced. You said so yourself - you're only doing this for your past self. You called everyone in this world "sheep" and made it clear that you don't care about them. You're no better than anyone else and have no right to weed out corruption in a garden patch, let alone the Ministry.
Death Eaters targeted non-combatants to make a statement. Aurors and the Order of the Phoenix went after the Death Eaters in sometimes disastrous ways. They were tearing the world apart…and they didn't care. Everyone thought in the present, no one of the future.
ZeldaQueen: Maybe because no one things they're going to live to see the future.
That was Harry's burden, it seemed.
ZeldaQueen: OH SHUT UP! See my above rant on how you are just a smug ass who has no right to take on any of this! I wish Ron and Hermione were here to smack you upside the head and shout some sense into you!
A new voice interrupted Harry's musing.
ZeldaQueen: Oh, so he's psychotic. That explains so much
After a while Harry pieced together who it was, Frank Longbottom, Neville's father.
"I asked my fiancee to start recruiting from among the students. She and I both agree that James Potter and Sirius Black would make excellent members…"
ZeldaQueen: What would James and Sirius have done that would have made them so noticeable? I got the impression that they volunteered themselves
Harry smiled a bit. He hadn't caught much on his parents or his godfather since he'd returned in time, but every little bit was a joy. At the same time, Harry wished his parents had refused the Order and moved far away from Britain. He wished they'd gotten away from Voldemort and Dumbledore both.
ZeldaQueen: Because God forbid they make any sort of effort to stand up for causes they believe in and try to save their home and their friends and family. No, they should just look out for themselves to ensure Harry's happiness. What's wrong with them?
It would only happen if Voldemort was dead and Dumbledore discredited by the day they graduated. It was a goal to work for…
ZeldaQueen: I'm sorry, but what does discrediting Dumbledore have to do with any of this? Even if we accept the author's half-assed story about him being a manipulative bastard who let the Potters die so that Harry would stop Voldemort, why would that matter if Voldemort's already dead? Does Harry think that Dumbledore will go and murder them anyway?
Moody, again, had the first retort. "That Black, I don't know how we can trust him… He's Potter's friend, sure enough, but he's a Black. Bad blood will out…"
ZeldaQueen: Again, Moody would never say anything like that. He's not prejudice!
At that moment, Harry's own blood chilled. Marge Dursley had said something similarly revolting about his dead parents years and years ago.
ZeldaQueen: Why would that scare Harry? He just got angry when Marge said it because she clearly didn't know what she was talking about. Why would it be any different for Moody, who by this Harry's account is flat-out nuts?
"Now, Alastor, I've watched the boy for years. I've even been inside his head a few times. He's not like Orion or Walburga or even his younger brother Regulus."
ZeldaQueen: Who said this? Dumbledore? So the author thinks that Dumbledore mindrapes his students for no reason? Huh?
The debate on James' being invited took no time at all. The conversation on Sirius consumed most of an hour. Harry realized why these people never did all that much during the first and second wars: they were always debating with each other. Dumbledore wasn't leading a war correctly; he wasn't even leading a meeting very well. Had the glow from defeating Gellert Grindelwald really made him seem that infallible when, in truth, he was barely competent?
ZeldaQueen: My ass! I'm sorry DW, but I hate you. It's made pretty damned clear in the books that the Order knows full well what they're doing. Dumbledore knows full well what he's doing! Stop making things up! GOD!
Harry wondered if he needed to borrow from Rita Skeeter's bag of tricks and go for some character assassination to lessen Dumbledore's influence in the wizarding world.
ZeldaQueen: When you hear the thump, my head will be lodged in my desk. I have to ask, because I have not a clue - why in the nine hells would Harry start using the tricks and techniques of a woman who he considered extremely annoying at best and outright hated at worst? WHY?
Of all the problems Harry had to solve, dealing with Dumbledore was by far the most challenging, even more so than the horcruxes. He'd loved and revered the man for a long time - even come back from severe doubts about him in his late adolescence - and now he saw more and more of the disturbing truth surrounding the man.
Powerful, smart, cunning; arrogant, complacent, unwilling to wield his power, self satisfied, dismissive of the views of others, a user of other people's trust and lives, and far less competent than he projected. Dumbledore was all show and no substance, Harry finally realized. The man had good intentions or Fawkes would have left him, but he didn't do nearly enough to merit the reverence people held him in.
ZeldaQueen: Yes, Dumbledore didn't do nearly enough. That's it. He's just a lazy bastard. I don't think the author has quite grasped the idea that Dumbledore is not infallible
What to do?
ZeldaQueen: Go back to canon?
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Onward to: Chapter 3: Tactics To Win (Part 2)
Back to: Chapter 2: My Kingdom For A...Horcrux (Part 3)
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Chapter 3: Tactics To Win (Part 1)
Chapter 3: Tactics to Win
X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X
May 17, 1977
ZeldaQueen: "It was a dark and stormy night..."
Harry apparated back to the House of White.
ZeldaQueen: Yep, I'm pretty sure that this is supposed to be a jab at the House of Black. "Oh look, the place that Dumbledore used for his headquarters is all evil and dark while my place is white and good!"
He had just found the time to return for a thorough search. The idea had captured his imagination some time ago and hadn't let up.
ZeldaQueen: He just loves rummaging through places he has no right to be in
The structure looked vastly different in the dark. It wasn't as cruel and insane as Sirius Black's family home had been, but it was close.
He walked to where he'd felt the presence of secret passageways.
ZeldaQueen: How, exactly, does he "[feel] the presence"? He's not an empath or anything like that
One opened just from Harry stepping through it. The room contained a number of tea cozies sized for house elves and a few small beds. A second passage didn't want to open, but Harry had learned cursebreaking from some of the best years earlier. He brought down the wards preventing his access.
ZeldaQueen: Little entitlement whore, isn't he? "Not let me in, will you? I'll show you!"
The room behind the wards was quite something…quite disturbing. It was a divination suite, much like the bizarre tower Trelawney had cloistered herself inside at Hogwarts. But this one had prophecy spheres inside it, too.
ZeldaQueen: And why is this disturbing?
They were obviously very old. Harry reached out and plucked one off the shelf. Instead of breaking or refusing his touch, the sphere came willingly.
ZeldaQueen: Nuts. I was hoping it would drive him insane. Not like there'd be much difference, but at least he'd be locked away
He tapped the thing with his wand.
ZeldaQueen: ...
ZeldaQueen: That's what she said!!!
An ethereal image filled the sphere. Since he was able to view the prophecy, it either pertained to Harry or it was already complete and could be viewed by anyone.
ZeldaQueen: Again, how utterly convenient (those words have been popping up a lot, I've noticed)
The forces of Light falter and cower,
Hiding behind their shields,
None willing to send the first bolt or last.
Fate decides differently, as the old crumble away.
The new one comes from a distant land,
Black hair turned white before its time, eyes gray,
A vicious tongue will lead them to victory.
ZeldaQueen: Oh look, a heavy-handed prophecy which in no way roundabout mocks the Ministry and Dumbledore! Why on earth does the author keep referring to the people who fight Voldemort as the "Light" anyway? This isn't Fire Emblem for crying out loud!
And of course the "vicious tongue will lead the to victory"...three guesses on who that is
Harry found the prophecy interesting, especially as it wasn't about him.
ZeldaQueen: *snorts*
Still, it made Harry wonder if Dumbledore had stalled in dealing with Tom Riddle for so long that fate had moved on and tried to disregard the old wizard.
ZeldaQueen: FATE DOESN'T WORK LIKE THAT IN THE HARRY POTTER BOOKS!
Seriously! Dumbledore himself says that prophecies can go unfulfilled! Stop making up and ignoring canon stuff just to make Dumbledore look bad!
Harry plucked another half dozen prophecies off their shelves and listened to them. It was almost soothing.
He wondered, for a moment, what would happen with Trelawney if Harry had gotten the last horcrux before it was time for her prophecy. The idea was sort of amusing, especially considering Harry didn't like the idea of having to break into the Ministry again to retrieve the same silly locket.
ZeldaQueen: Smug bastard
Harry continued his journey through the house. Two more passages on the first floor revealed little of interest. In fact, it was only when Harry arrived at the third floor did he find the prize of the house.
ZeldaQueen: A brand-new set of luggage
Harry walked into the ritual chamber and stopped short. He'd heard of them, of course, but only the oldest of the pureblood families ever had them - and, given the political climate Harry had grown up in, none had ever admitted it. Rituals of every type had been deemed illegal for the last one hundred fifty years. Harry, of course, had been witness to a horrifying variety of them in his short life, legal or otherwise. But it didn't change the fact that no one ever admitted to knowing about them or performing them.
ZeldaQueen: Rituals? What? Huh? Where did this come from?
He thumbed through a few ancient books detailing the White Family rituals. Nothing caught his eye, but a spark of an idea lodged itself in his head.
ZeldaQueen: And caused him to die.
Seriously though, who wants to bet this idea is going to be used against Dumbledore or the Ministry or Voldemort? Or all three?
X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X
July 17, 1977
Master Auror Janus Wilmot had been easier to get ahold of than Harry expected. The man had been dispatched to a Death Eater raid at the home of a muggleborn Hogwarts student named Robert Billings (rising into 4th year, Hufflepuff). Harry had subdued the Death Eaters and was about to arrange for the entire Billings family to go into hiding when he spied his target.
ZeldaQueen: And still, he's oh-so-casual about wandering around, kidnapping people. What if these folks don't want to go into hiding?
Harry created portkeys to send the Billings family on its way. Then he waited and watched Auror Wilmot.
ZeldaQueen: Perv
The man sent severing curses at two wounded, but not dead, Death Eaters. The man was doing his 'best' sort of work, cowardly and unworthy.
ZeldaQueen: Oh shut up! It was well established that Death Eaters were vile and extremely dangerous. This dude only knows that they're trying to murder a family of Muggles (he doesn't even seem to know that said Muggles are gone). Not everyone has your Stu-knowledge, Harry!
Harry had killed Death Eaters, but only in the heat of battle…this lowly worm of a man was walking through and killing whoever he found. Coldly, without hesitation. It struck Harry as being wrong.
ZeldaQueen: Oh, you think it's wrong to coldly and calculatingly sneak around and killing whoever you think deserves it?
*COUGH*
Harry had to bide his time for Wilmot to move away from his colleagues. Harry finally saw the opening he wanted. He picked up a small stone, turned it into a portkey to a secure cottage Harry used for his interrogations, and sent a number of high intensity stunners at the Master Auror. Harry caught the man unaware as he was trying to kill a third injured Death Eater, and the Auror slumped to the ground. Harry banished the portkey toward the Auror and watched the vile man disappear.
ZeldaQueen: I mean, ye Gods! Harry's going on about how oh-so-terrible the Aurors and them all are, when they're essentially stumbling around in the dark with no knowledge of exactly who is a Voldemort supporter and where actual attacks are taking place and if there are spies in the Ministry and who to trust. Harry does know all of this stuff and is blaming them for not having his foreknowledge and feels perfectly justified in kidnapping and attacking these people! Who, may I ask, is more sinister here?
Harry looked closely at the remaining injured Death Eaters. He couldn't exactly leave them here for the Aurors to massacre them, could he? That wasn't right - and it would possibly change the entire timeline.
ZeldaQueen: Harry you dipwad, you're here to kill Voldemort prematurely and have been saving and killing people as per your own views. You've well screwed up the timeline, I assure you
Harry created a half dozen portkeys and dispatched the wounded Death Eaters to St. Mungo's. There they would get some form of treatment and the Aurors couldn't just let loose with spells…but, given the corruption inside the Ministry, Harry fully expected to see them all 'escape' and make it back in battle. The second time Harry wouldn't be generous.
ZeldaQueen: Okay so wait, does not compute - Harry here will kill the Death Eaters after they make two offenses, but the Ministry killing Death Eaters makes them Evil and Wrong. And now we hear that apparently the Ministry Aurors are so gung-ho for blood that they'll murder the Death Eaters willy-nilly, but then will allow them to escape to cause more trouble. So...the author's implying that the Ministry officers are murderous bastards who'll kill unconscious people, but would rather let them escape Azkaban than drag them behind the woodshed and kill them?
I don't get this at all
He apparated to where he'd sent the Billings family and left a brief note. He promised food and books (especially training materials for the young wizard) and safety.
ZeldaQueen: Yes, only murderous people deserve to live
Then he made his way to the Master Auror.
Harry searched the man before awakening him. He was as paranoid as Alastor Moody: three wands, four portkeys, six different potions.
ZeldaQueen: As I said before Harry, you have no right going on about people being paranoid.
Also, why would someone need four portkeys? Couldn't the dude just Disapperate?
He had a notice-me-not charm on one of the portkeys and some kind of voice activated charm on one of the potions vials. Harry put all the items in a strong box and banished it outside the safehouse.
Harry bound the Master Auror and placed four drops of Veritaserum in his mouth. Harry woke the man and didn't give him any time to think or collect himself.
ZeldaQueen: I wonder if Harry's ever heard of the Geneva Convention rulings on torture?
"How many Death Eaters have you killed?"
"Twenty nine."
Harry nodded. His official count was seven.
ZeldaQueen: Did Voldemort ever actually have twenty nine Death Eaters in his employment at any one time?
"Have you ever entered the Department of Mysteries?" The sole reason Harry had been looking for this particular Auror was to ask this question: Harry needed to determine a way to get inside the Department of Mysteries and recover Slytherin's locket. Damned bureaucrats and functionaries, they had one of vilest creations ever conceived and they just sat around and studied the magic that went into its creation.
ZeldaQueen: That is, of course, assuming that they knew the damned thing was a horcrux. We're only made aware of the fact that they're extremely Dark and dangerous, but it's never mentioned exactly how widely known the things are. In fact, Slughorn implies in the memory that it's very surprising that Riddle would have come across the term at all. So for all Harry knows, the Ministry just figures that they've got an ordinary locket which won't open and he's blaming them for ignoring it, probably in favor of more important matters. Smooth
Some forms of curiosity were dangerous.
The Auror's eyes went fuzzy for a second as he tried to resist answering Harry's question. He was obviously under a secrecy charm of some sort that was warring with the veritaserum.
ZeldaQueen: You know, DW, Rowling did say that it was possible to lie under the effects of Veritaserum if one prepared themselves
Eventually he croaked out, "Yes."
"Where do they keep or study enchanted dark objects?"
He fought the charm again before blurting out, "The Chamber of Unraveling. It's where all the cursebreaking happens in the Department."
ZeldaQueen: Well that's stupid
And wait a second - didn't the books say that only Unspeakables went into the Department of Mysteries? Why would an Auror know what was going on in there?
"Describe how to get inside the chamber."
The man said, "I can't. I know of it but not how to get inside it."
Of course it wouldn't be that easy.
ZeldaQueen: Yes, heaven forbid that canon get in the way
"Have you ever seen a golden locket there with an 'S'…"
"The Slytherin locket?"
"That's the one. The Unspeakables know it came from Slytherin?"
"Yes. It's a fascinating object. No one has the first idea what kind of curses are on it."
Harry knew all too well what the foulest 'curse' was. He wish he didn't have to repeat history in quite this way. He wished the worthless piece of junk…well, he had to stomp on his emotions to keep from wasting time with this Master Auror.
ZeldaQueen: Hah, good luck with that, Mr. I'm-Perpetually-Angsty-And-Angry!
"Why hasn't anyone destroyed it?"
"You'd sooner get an Unspeakable to cut off their own nose than destroy something they hadn't yet unraveled."
ZeldaQueen: Or how about the fact that they just can't destroy it! That's the reason that the seventh book dragged on for so long - you can't just smash a Horcrux! It has to be destroyed beyond all means of magical repair! GOD, DW, DID YOU EVEN READ THESE BOOKS AT ALL???
Harry kept his angry thoughts to himself.
ZeldaQueen: A futile task
"Who works with the locket?"
ZeldaQueen: Mulder and Scully
"I've heard of three teams working on it at various times. The only name I heard was Diricawl."
"A codename?"
"Yes."
"Do you know who Diricawl is?"
"No. All DoM identities are kept secure. We may know that such and such a person works there, but we never connect up street names with codenames…"
ZeldaQueen: So the Department of Mysteries is now the FBI?
And I repeat, most of the stuff that goes on in there is really fucking important and secret! An Auror wouldn't just be able to waltz in!!!
That was all he could get on the most important subject, that of the horcrux. His great clue was a name, the Diricawl, a sort of presumed-extinct bird. A Dodo bird. It wasn't a lot of help.
ZeldaQueen: And Harry just knows that...how?
Alright, he randomly knows the name of an extinct bird and connects it completely randomly to the Dodo. That's certainly not going to be brought up again!
Harry turned the interrogation to another subject. "Do you modify the reports of your subordinates?"
"All the time."
"What specifically do you modify?"
"Anything that brings discredit to the Aurors."
ZeldaQueen: Author please, SHUT UP! And yes, I'm blaming the author for this. There is NO EVIDENCE that the ministry was this corrupt during the first war! The way this is going on, there's pretty much nothing for Voldemort to even do to take over!
Harry kept back his invective. He merely noted mentally that such conduct, 'brings discredit to the Aurors.'
"Have you ever reassigned blame for the killing of a civilian from an Auror to a Death Eater?"
"Of course."
"Does your boss Barty Crouch do anything to the reports?"
"When needed, yes."
ZeldaQueen: Ah yes Barty Crouch, the man who was so devoted to upholding the law that he arrested his own Death Eater son, alters reports
"Have you ever accepted a bribe?"
"Of course." What an attitude to have about the whole thing.
ZeldaQueen: Really! Oh wait, you were talking about the Auror. My bad
"Has Crouch?"
"I don't know."
"Do you know who has been freeing prisoners?"
The Auror grumbled as much as could under the truth serum. "No, but I wish I did."
"Any suspicions?"
"A lot, but none of them have any evidence behind them."
Harry thought about what to do with this vile example of wizardry. "If you were looking for a safer world for everyone, what would you do with a rabid killer who had taken thirty lives?"
The man fought the truth serum for a few minutes. "I'd kill him."
ZeldaQueen: Well gee, I wonder where this is going?
Harry just nodded. "Obliviate."
He had some more thinking to do. He had wanted to handle Voldemort and his followers before dealing with the Ministry - but this Master Auror was easily on par with any Death Eater.
ZeldaQueen: What about you, Harry? How many have you killed?
X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X--X
September 13, 1977
Harry sat in his flat in Manchester and listened to a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix. He'd managed to get listening charms inside the meeting room by enchanting the tea cups used at the Prewett Manor, their temporary headquarters.
ZeldaQueen: How come everyone has a Manor in this thing? Doesn't anyone just have an ordinary house?
Harry listened to Arthur Weasley speak for a while on the security leaks that had led to muggleborns being identified by records from the Ministry. Moody interjected with several scathing attacks on the man's intelligence and dubious parentage.
ZeldaQueen: Bull, I say! Where, exactly, do the books indicate that Moody would ever respond in such a way? Not only is the guy a paranoid old goat who'd take security leaks extremely seriously, he would NEVER make attacks on Arthur in such a way
Harry thought it was frightening that age had mellowed Moody from a near psychopath when it came to security (in 1977) to a mere paranoid delusional (in 1995).
ZeldaQueen: Um Dw? Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. It's clearly stated in the fourth book that Moody was so "paranoid delusional" in his old age because he had earned so many enemies as an Auror, which means that he was normal when he was younger, not psychotic
Harry finally perked up when an old man named Parks began to speak about weird happenings inside St. Mungo's. "We've got four Aurors, including the just promoted Lead Auror Janus Wilmot, in one of the wards. No one can figure it out, but they're alive but not really functioning. It could be Cruciatus exposure; or severe use of Memory Charms; or a coma-inducing potion. We just don't know, but it's definitely a new tactic the other side is using…"
ZeldaQueen: Or a psychotic time-traveling Marty Stu is on the loose
Moody, as usual, was the first to respond. "Wilmot was a rabid beast. Best thing that could have happened, I think."
ZeldaQueen: Again, bullshit. Moody would not say that someone against Voldemort deserved to be comatose in the hospital. Even if he didn't like the guy, it would mean one less person to help in the fighting as well as the possible presence of an unknown enemy
Albus Dumbledore just tutted in response. "No one deserves that, Alastor."
ZeldaQueen: Thank you, Dumbledore. Now let us watch as the author uses his Stu-Harry to laugh at your morals
Harry thought differently. He was the one responsible for their condition after all.
ZeldaQueen: Ta-da! I mean gawd Dumbledore, you don't want to leave a guy comatose? What's wrong with you?
He'd used an old spell that he'd stumbled upon in his quest to finally get some protection from Legilimencers.
ZeldaQueen: "Protection from Legilimencers"? The hell? I believe canon calls that "occlumency" and establishes quite firmly that Harry simply cannot learn it due to his personality and strong emotions
The men were all alive, but Harry had locked their conscious minds away from active control of their bodies. (Harry had used the spell on himself, in a more limited fashion, to lock away sensitive information.) He could restore them any time he chose…but he didn't think he'd do that anytime soon.
ZeldaQueen: Alright, I know you're all going to say "No duh!" to this, but Harry is acting like fucking God here! He decides who lives and dies, he thinks it's perfectly alright to screw with people's memories, and now here he is, leaving people comatose, perhaps forever, unless he feels charitable enough to let them wake up.
DW, author, let me ask you something. HOW IN THE BLOODY HELL ARE WE SUPPOSED TO LIKE THIS GUY?!? HE'S BASICALLY BEING A GRADE-A ASSHOLE AT BEST AND IS LITTLE BETTER THAN VOLDEMORT AT WORST!!! I DON'T WANT TO SEE HIM WIN, I WANT TO SEE HIM FALL DOWN A BLACK HOLE AND GET HIS INTESTINES SLOWLY DEVOURED BY TAPEWORMS!
The four Aurors, including Miles Tavinish, had killed, rather than arrested, sixty two Death Eaters among them. By any measure, they were dangerous people who had no regard for the laws they were paid to enforce.
ZeldaQueen: Harry's also a dangerous person with no regard for the laws. What's the difference? That he's not paid to enforce them? And don't tell me that he has the Code of Harry, he gives people two chances to go straight. We later see that it never even occurred to him that people in the Ministry were being mind-controlled or blackmailed or anything. He's honestly no better than Edward Cullen eating people who are "bad". And he decides that he's the one fit to pass judgment on everyone else. Right
Harry smiled at the concept of 'regard for the law'. He, of course, had broken fundamental laws of time to come back and do this. He didn't have a high moral ground to preach from, but he did have his rules: the corruption had to go from both sides, from Voldemort as much as from Fudge and Crouch and Dumbledore.
ZeldaQueen: Smug asshat. No Harry, you don't have a high moral ground but it's more to do with the fact that you have no fucking right to pass judgment on everyone, not to mention the fact that this almost solely revolves around the fact that you feel like this all adds up to your life being inconvenienced. You said so yourself - you're only doing this for your past self. You called everyone in this world "sheep" and made it clear that you don't care about them. You're no better than anyone else and have no right to weed out corruption in a garden patch, let alone the Ministry.
Death Eaters targeted non-combatants to make a statement. Aurors and the Order of the Phoenix went after the Death Eaters in sometimes disastrous ways. They were tearing the world apart…and they didn't care. Everyone thought in the present, no one of the future.
ZeldaQueen: Maybe because no one things they're going to live to see the future.
That was Harry's burden, it seemed.
ZeldaQueen: OH SHUT UP! See my above rant on how you are just a smug ass who has no right to take on any of this! I wish Ron and Hermione were here to smack you upside the head and shout some sense into you!
A new voice interrupted Harry's musing.
ZeldaQueen: Oh, so he's psychotic. That explains so much
After a while Harry pieced together who it was, Frank Longbottom, Neville's father.
"I asked my fiancee to start recruiting from among the students. She and I both agree that James Potter and Sirius Black would make excellent members…"
ZeldaQueen: What would James and Sirius have done that would have made them so noticeable? I got the impression that they volunteered themselves
Harry smiled a bit. He hadn't caught much on his parents or his godfather since he'd returned in time, but every little bit was a joy. At the same time, Harry wished his parents had refused the Order and moved far away from Britain. He wished they'd gotten away from Voldemort and Dumbledore both.
ZeldaQueen: Because God forbid they make any sort of effort to stand up for causes they believe in and try to save their home and their friends and family. No, they should just look out for themselves to ensure Harry's happiness. What's wrong with them?
It would only happen if Voldemort was dead and Dumbledore discredited by the day they graduated. It was a goal to work for…
ZeldaQueen: I'm sorry, but what does discrediting Dumbledore have to do with any of this? Even if we accept the author's half-assed story about him being a manipulative bastard who let the Potters die so that Harry would stop Voldemort, why would that matter if Voldemort's already dead? Does Harry think that Dumbledore will go and murder them anyway?
Moody, again, had the first retort. "That Black, I don't know how we can trust him… He's Potter's friend, sure enough, but he's a Black. Bad blood will out…"
ZeldaQueen: Again, Moody would never say anything like that. He's not prejudice!
At that moment, Harry's own blood chilled. Marge Dursley had said something similarly revolting about his dead parents years and years ago.
ZeldaQueen: Why would that scare Harry? He just got angry when Marge said it because she clearly didn't know what she was talking about. Why would it be any different for Moody, who by this Harry's account is flat-out nuts?
"Now, Alastor, I've watched the boy for years. I've even been inside his head a few times. He's not like Orion or Walburga or even his younger brother Regulus."
ZeldaQueen: Who said this? Dumbledore? So the author thinks that Dumbledore mindrapes his students for no reason? Huh?
The debate on James' being invited took no time at all. The conversation on Sirius consumed most of an hour. Harry realized why these people never did all that much during the first and second wars: they were always debating with each other. Dumbledore wasn't leading a war correctly; he wasn't even leading a meeting very well. Had the glow from defeating Gellert Grindelwald really made him seem that infallible when, in truth, he was barely competent?
ZeldaQueen: My ass! I'm sorry DW, but I hate you. It's made pretty damned clear in the books that the Order knows full well what they're doing. Dumbledore knows full well what he's doing! Stop making things up! GOD!
Harry wondered if he needed to borrow from Rita Skeeter's bag of tricks and go for some character assassination to lessen Dumbledore's influence in the wizarding world.
ZeldaQueen: When you hear the thump, my head will be lodged in my desk. I have to ask, because I have not a clue - why in the nine hells would Harry start using the tricks and techniques of a woman who he considered extremely annoying at best and outright hated at worst? WHY?
Of all the problems Harry had to solve, dealing with Dumbledore was by far the most challenging, even more so than the horcruxes. He'd loved and revered the man for a long time - even come back from severe doubts about him in his late adolescence - and now he saw more and more of the disturbing truth surrounding the man.
Powerful, smart, cunning; arrogant, complacent, unwilling to wield his power, self satisfied, dismissive of the views of others, a user of other people's trust and lives, and far less competent than he projected. Dumbledore was all show and no substance, Harry finally realized. The man had good intentions or Fawkes would have left him, but he didn't do nearly enough to merit the reverence people held him in.
ZeldaQueen: Yes, Dumbledore didn't do nearly enough. That's it. He's just a lazy bastard. I don't think the author has quite grasped the idea that Dumbledore is not infallible
What to do?
ZeldaQueen: Go back to canon?
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Onward to: Chapter 3: Tactics To Win (Part 2)
Back to: Chapter 2: My Kingdom For A...Horcrux (Part 3)
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