Chapter 177: Choices

Chapter 177: Choices

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I would like to thank my beta, Akisu, for his help in this chapter.

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24th January 1995, Hogwarts Earth 2

(Jasmine Sayre POV)

The end of my time here was near. The confrontation with Dumbledore was the spark I needed to light the flames. Finally, my plan was coming together, and I was going home. After leaving the Headmaster's office, I returned to my own and waited for the inevitable to happen.

It was barely an hour later that I felt one of Voldemort's Horcruxes being destroyed. Dumbledore had taken the bait. This, of course, left only the cup, that I was using to scry the other Horcruxes, and Nagini. Assuming that Dumbledore was probably dead by now, the Dark Lord would be coming here soon. With a wave of my hand, I destroy the cup, leaving the Dark Lord with only a single soul anchor.

Now, I needed to prepare the castle for the arrival of a dark lord that was probably mad enough to slaughter every student inside. Fortunately, I was prepared and had arranged for the siege wards to be powered and ready to be activated at a moments' notice.

Finally, after activating the wards, I summoned Harry Potter to my office and started to wait for Voldemort's inevitable arrival to the castle. After all, this was, to him, a great opportunity to take over the castle that he saw as his first home, ever, and formally overthrow Dumbledore.

This was it for him. The Ministry was practically under his thumb anyway, with most of the politicians being either Death Eaters or threatened by Death Eaters. The people probably wouldn't care much about a change in regime, other than the Muggleborns that he's probably planning on killing. I never understood genocide for an ideology. It's just so ineffective in the long run. Maybe vilifying an entire population was a good idea to rile up and gain followers, maybe it was easy to blame someone else for their pains and hardships, but actually executing or imprisoning a chunk of your population was a recipe for either a revolt, or if it was successful somehow, a great way of destroying your economy. And that's ignoring how horrible the idea of genocide was.

I know how much of a hypocrite I was being; I, personally, have massacred whole species in my role as the Avatar of Death, and while I'm not proud of what I did, every single person that I killed in my service represented a grave danger to the world. I'm not happy with my kill count, but I did try to limit how much death I was responsible for, and a lesser man or woman would have let that power go to their heads and start killing for the fun of it.

I heard a knock on my door. Harry had finally arrived, "Come in."

He entered my office nervously, "Professor, you wanted to see me?" nove(l)bi(n.)com

I nod, "yes, I did. Tonight, is likely to be the last time we see each other, Mr. Potter and all my efforts, all my plans, have come to this. I'm here to give you a choice."

Harry was gaping, this time, "Who are you?"

"I am you. Well, I'm your counterpart in another universe. I was fighting someone that was very powerful and accidentally ended up here. I have been trying to get home, and to do it, I needed to use the cosmic backlash of a rejected prophecy to power a ritual to go back to my world, to my family."

I wasn't going to tell him about the cosmic entities and summoning Fate. This was still a teenager, one that was over his head, but he was still not an adult who could handle the possibility of his universe being destroyed by a multiversal event.

Harry looked at me, sadly, "Then the stuff you said about my parents"

"Oh, I was talking about my world's James and Lily Potter. We don't get along much. Something happened during my childhood, and I ended up staying at the Dursleys anyway. Let's just say that my childhood was worse than yours, kiddo. They're not bad people, they just made a lot of mistakes. They're actually pretty good parents for my siblings, but I outgrew them and when I saw them next, I didn't need parents anymore."

"Mum and Dad are alive in your world?"

I snort, "Do you honestly believe that in the infinite possibilities of the multiverse, James and Lily Potter always die on Halloween. Sirius said the same when I told him."

"Sirius knew?"

"Only about my identity, not my plan, don't worry."

Harry started to get angry at this, "So, that's why he trusts you so much. You still killed a lot of people just to get home. That's wrong."

I shook my head, "No I didn't. The only person who died from my actions is Dumbledore and he would have been dead in a year if I hadn't intervened, and Sirius would have died in a few months too. Neville's parents would have stayed in the hospital, that outside of what would have happened when the war actually started. Hundreds, if not thousands of deaths, all averted because of my interference. In the long run, haven't I saved a lot more people for the exchange of a single year of life of a century old man?"

"You still endangered the castle by getting Voldemort to attack here."

I snort, "I warded this place myself. It would take that man child, that calls himself a dark lord, years to actually break the wards. Trust me, every resident in the castle is safe. I took every precaution, kiddo, saw every avenue, there's only two roads forwards. You can give yourself up and die for Dumbledore's greater good, and Voldemort will die, with the prophecy fulfilled. Or, you can reject the prophecy, refuse Dumbledore's plan for you, and let me kill the monster and go home, with you living a long and happy life afterwards. Either way, Voldemort dies, and magical Britain is saved. The only people this decision affects are you and me. I tried to make it as advantageous for you to pick my side, but it is still your choice. It has to be."

Harry looked pensive, "I choose to live. I choose myself for the first time. I want to grow old with Sirius, have a family, have friends and kids. I want to learn magic. I want to live with Sirius outside Grimmauld Place. I want to be happy."

Finally, I gave the boy a warm and honest smile, "Then I guess it's time for me to kill a dark lord, don't you think?"