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Sitting at the table and sipping his morning tea, Harry flipped open the newest edition of the Daily Prophet, delivered to him directly by Rita. They'd been collaborating for a while now and had known each other for a solid two years.
He still remembered how he'd met her while crawling through the Daily Prophet archives two Christmases ago.
That collaboration had slowly grown into a tentative friendship. As much as a 30+year-old embittered woman thinking that her counterpart was a 13-year-old child but was actually an embittered 40+year-old man stuck in the body of a 13-year-old child who thought his counterpart was kind of hot could be friends.
He'd promptly sent her the new information he'd received from Snape after having left the Christmas party organised by Slughorn. From a brief overview, this article didn't have anything to do with that.
Ten years after the war: Where are they now?
By Rita Skeeter
To properly forget the horrors of the past, perhaps they must first be revisited. Ten years have passed since the disappearance of You-Know-Who and the ascension of the boy-who-lived into the public eye. However, for all that, it was, by all accounts, a freak accident that caused the end of the conflict; there were many other, more intentional forces fighting against the darkness back then.
They might have fallen into partial obscurity, overshadowed by the mythos of the promised saviour. However, many brave wizards and witches were fighting against the forces of darkness who still live amongst them today.
First and foremost amongst these is perhaps Albus Dumbledore, who secured a safe space for all the nation's children during those trying times of conflict, unburdening parents from worrying about their own children's safety during the school year. Unfortunately, it was not a rare occurrence back then for children to return home and find it empty.
Minister Crouch also contributed greatly to rallying and allowing the use of questionable spells by the auror forces of yesteryear, who are, for the majority, now retired, haunted by visions of the past where their colleagues died in droves, and one could never be sure whom to trust.
In many ways, the wizarding world was broken. It is contentious to say that it is anywhere close to being healed when the halls of Hogwarts echo silently the absence of an entire generation whose parents were killed before they could make a family or those ghosts of possibility who were never born because who would want to bring a child into the world we all collectively inhabited during those years?
The people who fought are still there, and some might refer to them as relics of the past for their persistence, but what kind of society can be created by people who, during times of hardship, choose to run instead of fight?
Albus Dumbledore has already ended the reign of one Dark Lord and endured and provided shelter during the reign of another. Referring to him as a relic seems slightly disrespectful when one considers the value he still provides to wizarding society through his political and academic roles to this day.
Minister Crouch, while perhaps not as fit to lead in times of rebuilding as he was in times of conflict, is historically very invested in not creating the prerequisites for another conflict.
But while these two men were perhaps on the way out, there were also many young people who participated in the conflict whose careers only started after it ended. After all, graduating into a warzone delayed the career start of an entire generation, further making it difficult to create families as early as they might have liked due to a subsequent lack of liquidity.
One such example is James Potter, who joined the Aurors straight out of school back then, newly scarred by the murder of both his parents. He didn't even have the privilege of attending the auror academy, as the institution had recently suffered from a horrifying attack, killing most of its instructors and destroying its infrastructure. He started as a junior and clawed his way up the ranks along with his partner and lifelong friend Sirius Black, who-
"What you reading, champ?" Vernon's loud voice boomed through the room as he sat down next to Harry, nursing a mug of coffee.
"Glazing, a whole bunch of glazing," Harry muttered as his eyes continued scanning the article.
"What do donuts have to do with anything?" Vernon asked in a confused tone of voice.
Harry chuckled and put down the paper as he finished reading. "The elections are coming up in the wizarding world, and there's been a lot of coverage. For good and for bad."
His uncle scoffed. "Bah, politics. Can't stand them. Can't believe you're reading up on it, although, it might be good to know if it all goes…" he paused. "Ah," he tried phrasing it gently, "If it goes, you know…"
"Tits up?" Harry offered helpfully.
Vernon gave him an odd look. "I guess. Crazy people everywhere these days. Can you believe what they did in the Middle East?"
Harry remained silent for a moment. Vernon was referring to the Gulf War in this case, which Harry hadn't known much about before transmigrating but which he now, unfortunately, knew a bit too much about. "I can believe it, actually," he muttered, not having the heart to tell his uncle that the Middle East would remain a point of tension for many decades to come.
"You have that tutoring session today, right?" Vernon suddenly asked, switching the topic.
Harry blew air out of his nose. "Helping Dudley with his schoolwork, now going to do the same for the magical side; I'm starting to feel like a teacher," he complained.
"Those who can't, teach," Vernon said wisely.
Harry threw him an amused look as he finished his tea. "Is that why you'll be teaching others how to repair British antiques starting next summer?"
Vernon blushed. "Hells, it's not decided yet. Let's see if they agree to my conditions. Uprooting the whole family for one job, they better offer something nice."
From what Harry understood, Vernon had already gotten a pretty good salary offer from the get-go. The main issue now was that if he stopped paying into his UK retirement plan, it wouldn't end up paying out enough to take care of the whole family when he retired, even in combination with the half-assed Spanish one. Paying into two separate funds for twenty years each just meant one got the worst of both.
Harry, of course, knew that with the investments he'd have his uncle make, the man could retire in a few years when Microsoft stock sextupled. Then it would be Nortel's turn to go absolutely bonk, then Apple, then Nvidia. Quite frankly, Vernon would probably have to hire a whole team of finance experts, lawyers, bankers, and accountants to manage the money he'd have pretty soon.
But Vernon was still waiting for the Catalonians to commit to paying his UK retirement package instead of the Spanish one.
Harry could have told him it didn't matter, but it wasn't like it mattered anyway and telling other people how to keep their finances never ended well.
He stood up. "Well, I have to head out now," he said.
"Have fun. Teaching is also always good for learning," Vernon said with a chuckle as he opened his own newspaper. The Daily Mail, of course. Harry had long since given up trying to make his uncle read something smarter. The British media landscape hadn't gone quite as downhill yet as it would in a few years.
"Learned a lot about cars teaching Dudley recently," the man muttered as Harry exited the room. "Can't remember ever having to teach you… weird."
Harry, for his part, went up to his room, filled as it was with collectables of all kinds. Amongst the rare records, first edition books, vintage clothes and post stamps, he found himself the ageing potion he'd once again made with Penny. This was the only part of his work at the Dursley household. The rest, like the clothes of his older persona, were all in the cave, which Dobby had redecorated. It wouldn't do for anyone to snoop around and connect the two personas.
Talking about Dobby. "Cavus," Harry said seriously as if he were saying an incantation rather than just a fake Latin word for cave. Wait… Weren't most spells just shitty Latin anyway.
"I am become wizard, destroyer of Latin…" Harry said with a sigh as his form evaporated. He reappeared in the rather comfy cave that he was proud to call his second home.
"How was your school term?" Dobby asked with perfect Queen's English as Harry regained his bearings. His butler course had officially ended now, and the suit fit him very well. Harry had actually had to commission it from a muggle tailor, pretending he was buying it for someone with dwarfism. Crisp white on black, the only splash of colour being a yellow bowtie with pink polka dots.
"Most excellent," Harry replied snobbishly as he promptly undressed himself and cast a bunch of self-cleaning spells at himself before putting on Charon's black hooded robe.
He cast an annoyed glance at the vanishing cabinet of which the fixing was still eluding him while he and Dobby exchanged a series of incredibly nasal:
"Indeed!"
"Hmmm, yes, indeed!"
"Regardless, today I'll be going to Malfoy manor, do you think there's a way for you to bring me inside the wards to surprise Lady Malfoy? Never a bad time to upkeep the persona," Harry said curiously. "No shame if it's impossible," Harry said hurriedly as Dobby's face grew slightly constipated in thought.
"There is a way," the house elf muttered thoughtfully before quickly disappearing.
A second later, he was back. "Lady Malfoy is in the parlour right now. Would you like me to bring you there?" he asked.
Harry considered it for a second, chugging the ageing potion, shifting his body to his adult height and width. Ever since he'd started regularly exercising with the sword, in addition to the running he'd already been doing, his adult form had gained an inch or two in both directions. Interestingly enough, it seemed that the age addition assumed a continuation of the most current exercise routine, which would apparently make him grow a bit taller still and also make him jacked as fucked. He just hoped Narcissa wouldn't notice the discrepancy between himself half a year ago and him now.
Or maybe, considering his abs were popping now, he hoped that she would. It was an interesting conundrum.
"Ready, master?" Dobby asked politely once Harry had settled down from his instantaneous growth spurt.
Harry pulled up his hood, applied a slight spell to make the shadows hiding his face denser and to slightly change the colour of his eyes and nodded. "Yes, Dobby, let's do it."
A pop resounded through the cave.
-/-
Narcissa looked down bitterly into her cold tea from where she was sitting on an armchair inside the parlour of Lord Malfoy.
She'd have been sitting in the chair behind the large mahogany desk, underneath which the ground was just slightly raised, if that hadn't been expressly forbidden in her marriage contract. Although, what use the thing was with a dead husband she didn't know.
"Narcissa I," the old man sitting opposite her, who'd already finished his tea, started before pausing.
Narcissa looked up just in time to see the blue eyes half-hidden behind half-lunar glasses widen slightly.
She froze herself. In all her years, she'd almost never seen the headmaster shocked, and it startled her.
The man wearing the garishly purple robe slowly and woodenly turned his head to the left to look at the desk and chair of her late husband illuminated by the sun streaming from the large windows behind it.
Just that, the chair wasn't empty anymore.
Gently laying on the armrests were two pale, strong hands immediately followed by a rough black robe that was all the more imposing for its simplicity. Someone who didn't care for their image likely didn't do so for a reason.
Sitting in the chair, no, lounging in it as if he were at his vacation home, was a strong male figure with a hood covering their face, shadows hiding everything underneath. Only two pairs of ashen green eyes bored out at the two people in the room from underneath, looking, if anything, disappointed by the scene.
"Dumbledore," Charon said in a low tone of voice dripping with an emotion she couldn't identify. "What a fortuitous encounter," he said.
Dumbledore was silent for a few moments, and if it were anyone else, Narcissa would have believed him dumbstruck. But he couldn't be, right?
"Indeed," the man eventually said in a low voice.
-/-
Harry, meanwhile, upkeeping his mysterious persona, was just trying really hard not to shit his pants.
'Dobby, you motherfucker, I'll get you for this,' he cursed inside his own head. But first, he had to survive this encounter.
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AN: Surprise Dumblefucker! New Ride Motherfucker! The following chapters were a bit controversial on Patreon, where the upcoming arc has already concluded. I wrote some things that might be perceived as a bit of a reach, but I hope you enjoy reading them nonetheless!