Chapter 12: Platform 9 And 3/4

[Harry Potter]

The nexus fountain glowed with a very, very, very bright white light.

For hours the fountain sputtered, looking more like a flickering white fire than water.

The stormtroopers at the gates to Coruscant were nervous.

“It’s taking for fucking ever,” one of them remarked intelligently.

“I know, right?” the other one added usefully.

The fountain glowed, but still no Prime appeared.

***

Within the fountain, the spirit of Harry Potter burned, but the form did not appear.

***

[Harry Potter]

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Harry Potter opened his eyes.

He was sitting on a bench in Platform 9 and ¾ in King’s Cross station, only it was all white and clean, and he realized he must be dead again. The Hogwarts Express chugged silently on the tracks.

The wizard yawned, stretched, and cracked his neck. He was dressed in the same clothes he had died in; a T-shirt with a picture of the Costa Del Sol shoreline and a pair of boardshorts, beneath a heavy black cloak emblazoned with a big red ‘A’ in a circle on his left breast. His hands went reflexively to his pocket, and her remembered his wand was gone.

Sitting to his right, his blue eyes twinkling behind his half moon spectacles, was Albus Wulfric Percival Brian Dumbledore.

The ancient wizard dressed as always in his faded grey robes, his overlong beard hanging down past his chest. A warm smile graced his face.

“Albus,” said Harry dully.

“Harry,” Dumbledore said casually, as if they had just passed each other in the halls of Hogwarts.

There was a long silence between the men.

“Why are you here?” Harry asked finally.

Dumbledore sighed. “I suppose it is because you want me here, Harry. Death can be lonely, even for one who has faced it so many times now.”

Harry nodded, his face oddly tight.

“So I’m definitely dead then?” Harry said in that dull voice he could not seem to shake.

“Yes Harry,” said Dumbledore sadly. “About thirty seconds in Dante’s Abyss your collar malfunctioned and exploded. Likely it was sabotage.”

Harry nodded again.

“So, er,” Harry said, staring at his knees. “How long have you known I was here?”

Dumbledore turned to him with those twinkling blue eyes. “For some time now. I did not seek you out, for I knew that if you had wanted my company that I was an easy man to find. I could not begrudge you the chance to live for once in your life while this old man waged another war. But you have been busy yourself,” Dumbledore said leadingly.

Harry scratched at the Avengers symbol embroidered on his pocket. “Bellatrix was my fault,” he said flatly. “I was just setting right what I set wrong.”

“Perhaps,” Dumbledore said slowly. “It is hard to know from which mind any individual secondary has spawned. I think this time, however, the answer is more clear. The Bellatrix Lestrange that attacked you was very much as you knew her in life, down to the very spells she used against you. In this world, as in our own, our darkest thoughts and feelings must be confronted less they fester and spread to the world around us.”

“Right,” said Harry stupidly. “You’ve read the books then?”

A wide smile broke Dumbledore’s face. “Yes Harry,” he said quietly. “The pride that I felt from seeing how you truly thought of me… I daresay I was not worthy of your high opinion.”

“So you think we’re real then?” Harry pushed. “You don’t think we were just in somebody’s head?”

“Ah, Harry,” said the old wizard mysteriouslly. “Just because it’s happening in your head-”

“-doesn’t mean that it’s not real, yeah,” Harry said, refusing to let the irritation creep into his voice.

“Yes Harry,” said Dumbledore quietly. “I lived for a hundred years before I left you on that porch step. I have done many things, met many people, and felt many feelings that are not written in your books. I believe, as do many others in this world, that your experiences were channeled by an author in another universe.”

Harry nodded sharply. He had heard this before, but somehow it made more sense from Albus Dumbledore than Cheese-Doodle the Buddhist Warforged.

Harry look around King’s Cross station as Dumbledore sat quietly with his hands folded in his lap.

“So,” said Harry slowly. “Am I going back? Back to the Omniverse? Primes don’t die, right?”

Dumbledore stared at him behind his half-moon spectacles. “I think that is very much a choice, Harry. I think that if you were to take that train and exit at the next stop, you would find yourself in the fountain of infinity. However, if you were to stay on that train…” Dumbledore trailed off. “Well I wouldn’t know. I have always gotten off at the first stop. But I have done much research into the Omniverse. I think that if you did not get off at the first stop, you would go...beyond.”

“Beyond,” echoed Harry, his voice cracking. “Like, back to England?”

“I do not know, Harry,” Dumbledore said quietly. “I have yet to take that next great adventure. However, I have a hunch that you would.”

Harry nodded and turned away from his old headmaster, wiping away the tears beneath his thick rimmed glasses.

“You know,” Harry said in a choking kind of voice. “You know, after all I’ve been through here, I just wanted to see you again. Like we did after every adventure. I would come up to your office and you would explain everything. You would make all the chaos and all the violence make sense.”

“Harry…” Dumbledore started to say, but Harry cut him off.

“And now you tell me,” Harry says, his voice becoming hard. “That if I stay on the train, I’ll get to go home to England and see everyone I love again.”

“Harry, please…” the old wizard said.

“Bollocks,” said Harry.

The word hung in the air for a moment.

“Have I ever lied to you, Harry?” asked Dumbledore in a hurt voice. “Do you think I would, now?”

Harry snorted. “You kept enough secrets,” he said bitterly. “But I think right now, you would tell me anything I wanted to hear.”

“You don’t have to do this,” said Dumbledore.

Harry reached out a flat palm toward Dumbledore.

When his hand was an inch from Dumbledore’s face, Harry felt the cool touch of silver on his fingers. Harry pushed, and the old wizard seemed to slide sideways in the air, still sitting on the bench, still staring at his hands folded in his lap.

Harry stood up and faced the Mirror of Erised.

✶✶✶

[Harry Potter]

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The Mirror of Erised is a moste potente magick artefact of which Harry actually knew very little, despite having several rather intimate encounters with it. The ornate silver mirror rests on gold legs, and above it is inscribed the ancient runes ‘Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi’ which when translated from it’s ancient code read ‘I show not your face, but your heart’s desire’.

Harry knew from experience that the mirror would show the viewer whatever was their heart’s deepest desire. He knew that the mirror could be used to safely hide things, and that it was so powerful that even Lord Voldemort himself could not take something from the mirror if he was deemed unworthy.

Harry James Potter, the Man who Lived, glared at the reflection of Dumbledore coldly.

The mirror-Dumbledore stood to face Harry, his features inscrutable behind his long beard and half-moon spectacles.

“Why,” Harry started, then took a deep breath. “No. How. How did you get here?”

Dumbledore chuckled Dumbledorishly. “You know that, Mr. Potter. Your heart’s desire is to hear from my lips whatever words would reassure you. ”

“No,” said Harry, controlling his breathing. “How did the mirror get here?”

The mirror Dumbledore seemed perplexed. “I don’t suppose I know, Harry. I am just a mirror, after all. Though I think that here, in the Omniverse, where thought and willpower are manifested and personified with into matter and life, I am more than just a reflection.”

“It is my heart’s desire to know how the mirror got here,” Harry said through gritted teeth.

Dumbledore only smiled sadly. “It might be, but it is beyond my power to know such a thing.”

There was a pounding in Harry’s head.

“Did Dumbledore put you here?” Harry asked outright.

The man in the mirror sighed.

“I think,” the old wizard began, stroking his beard. “That is certainly possible. Albus Dumbledore owns the Mirror of Erised, and there are few people in the Omniverse with the knowledge and power to put me here.”

Harry nodded, his stomach in knots, his face white.

“I think there is another possibility, however,” the mirror-Dumbledore said. “But to understand, you must first truly understand the nature of the Mirror of Erised.”

Harry raised his eyebrows. “Er, it shows you what you want. Your heart’s desire. And I guess, you can hide stuff in it. And if your intentions are good, you can get something back."

The reflection nodded. “Yes Harry, but the Mirror of Erised is more than a party trick. It is a moste potente magickal artefact, created millenia before the founding of Hogwarts, in the time of the creation of The Deathly Hallows or the Sorcerers Stone.”

“I thought Nicholas Flammel made the sorcerer’s stone?” Harry interjected thickly.

Dumbledore shook his head softly. “No Harry, that is a lie. The original creator of the Stone of Immortality is dead, and there will never be a wizard alive to match his power and create another. The man who goes by the name Nicholas Flammel keeps the lie alive to discourage people from stealing it, and encourage them instead to pursue the dead end quest of creating one themself. Yet never again will one be created in that universe, never again will an item be infused with such a vast amount of magical power. Do you understand what I am saying Harry?”

Harry Potter gazed at his own feet for a moment before picking his head up.

“Yeah,” he said slowly, still uncertain. “You’re saying that the mirror is more powerful than Dumbledore.”

The reflection nodded.

“There may be other powers at work here, Mr. Potter,” the old man in the mirror said. “Other magical laws at play.”

Harry stood, thinking.

“There mirror came by itself…” he said tentatively.

The Dumbledore in the mirror just stared at him patiently behind his half-moon spectacles.

The men stood in silence for some time, and Harry thought even more.

He thought of what he had been doing the very moment before he saw Dumbledore.

“You have my wand,” Harry said suddenly.

Dumbledore seemed surprised for a moment, then reach into his pocket and removed the Elder Wand.

“Well,” the old wizard said, gazing at the wand between his fingers. “The wand chooses the wizard, after all.”

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