Innovator; Chapter 19: Two Sides of the Same Coin (Part-1) (Patreon)

Author’s Note: Hello my dear patron family. Here’s chapter nineteenth of Innovator. Hope you like it! Do tell how it was in the comments. Also, Chapters 1-16 are on my fanfiction and ao3 profile.

A very Happy New Year People! May our lives prosper with unbound perfection and we achieve our fantasies and turn them into our legacies. 

Cheers to 2024!!

Author Out!

Less than ten chapters of INNOVATOR are left now, including the Epilogue.

This chapter has a small amount of tragedy (really small amount) and has changed POV. But it won't be a problem for an avid reader. So without any further ado, let me present you one of the best chapters of Innovator to celebrate the NEW YEAR!

“I am Talking.”

‘I am Thinking’

Spells

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it. 

~L. M. Montgomery

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

INNOVATOR

-Dev Sagittarius Black

~~Chapter 19: Two Sides of the Same Coin {Part-1}~~

.

I was floating.

For as long as I could remember.

Everything around me was living in a space that had no concept of gravity or anything like that. There were various objects floating around me. And so was I.

Moving around lazily, floating in the utter majesty that was around me. I didn’t know what it was that was making me move or if I could move myself, all I knew was I was at peace.

More at peace than I had ever been in my fourteen years of active consciousness. I didn’t know what it was that Harry had done, all I knew was that I was finally at peace.

No pain, no headaches, no haziness, nothing. Completely clear mind, clear of all the blemishes that life brought with itself, clear of all the promises that the living made, and clear of all the truths that one needed to survive. As clear as the fresh droplets of water that fall from the clouds, as clear as the morning dew that was present on leaves after a foggy night.

I was at peace.

And I didn’t need anything else.

….but why are there objects around me? What do these objects mean? Why are they floating in the same place as me? What is this place, even? For that matter, why am I here?

The last thing that I remembered was…Harry…my brother, the person I hated more than anyone. For some reason he was fighting me, throwing curses at me. And then I remember waking up briefly before I gulped something that was in my mouth and then…then what?

Ah yes, then I came here. In this zero gravity trap space that was filled with many objects floating around me, just like I was floating around them. Were they people? Were they trapped here like me, or is this place some peaceful land? Did they see me as an object too? Which object did I look like?

A small milk-bottle floated beside me, I remembered this bottle, didn’t I? Yes, yes I did. But where? Where have I seen this milk-bottle again? I grabbed the bottle to inspect it more closely, and the moment I did, the entire world changed around me.

I was standing in a room littered with stuffed toys, some were charmed to move and some lay still. There was a crib in front of me with a small baby in it.  He was playing and drinking milk from the same milk bottle that I held in my hand, it looked a bit new though.

I could see the baby’s innocent brown eyes widen to an excited gleam when a woman came into the room. Her softly bouncing red hair was a perfect match for the rat’s nest that was on the babe’s head. Her green eyes were not.

My eyes widened and I was about to dash towards a sofa so that I could hide myself from her, but then I decided to apologize to her, “Look, I am sorry, I don’t know how I-” She completely ignored me and within a moment, she went right through me! As if I wasn’t standing in front of her! I turned to look at her and found her leaning over the crib.

“Did you miss your mommy, Alan?” The woman cooed as she played with the baby, “Don’t worry little one, mommy is here for you now, I just put your brother, Harry, to sleep. By the gods, your brother is a hyperactive one, he surely takes after his father and his gang of misfits,” She made a face though I could see the sad smile that graced her features.

“James would have loved to play with you two. He always wanted two kids, one to become a world class duelist and the other to become a world class Quidditch Player of all things! Honestly!” She shook her head and laughed when the baby dropped the bottle and laughed at her antics, hitting her face with his tiny hands.

“I am sure that wherever your da-da is, he is watching over you and loving your laughter, just like he loved Harry’s when the boy flew on his toy broom,” She smiled at the baby before she moved his flaming red hair out of the way to leave a loving kiss on his forehead.

It was at that moment that I first saw the ugly red lightning bolt scar that was present on the babe’s forehead and was glaring at me. I took an involuntary back-step at the amount of hatred that scar held against me.

And this scar made me realize that the baby was none other than me…or better, my past self. And the woman here was my mother, Lily Potter. The one I had lost at the tender age-

“Come, it’s time for you to sleep too, little one.” My mother cooed at me before she picked me up and started to sing a lullaby that I remembered from my dreams as we left the room. Again, she completely ignored my presence.

But why? What was this? Was I really invisible? But then how had she moved through me? Was this real even? Wait…was this a memory? Am I trapped in a weird pensieve?

.

The world changed again and I screamed a bit as I was blinded by light, when I opened my eyes, I was again back in the same realm that I had left from. The milk bottle was still in my hand.

“What was that..? A memory?”

No one answered. But I had to find answers, I had to learn more. What happened after that? I knew for a fact that my father had sacrificed himself and had protected me when I was just a few months old. So, that meant that the memory was after my father’s sacrifice.

But my mother had said that the baby’s brother, Harry, was a hyperactive one. Was she talking about the same Harry I knew? The boy that never even smiled? That Harry Potter?

I had to know more. I needed to learn more about all of this. What if this wasn’t a memory but some sort of trick that my mind was playing on me? Or what if this was a trick that someone else was playing on my mind? Oh no..

I looked around to see anything that I could recall. Out of all the things, I saw a Teddy bear that was floating at some distance, its ear was patched with another piece of cloth, and there was some sort of stain around its right paw. I remembered that Teddy too, Mr. Puffy was his name, and he was my favorite toy. I used to cherish him for some reason, and always carried him wherever I went.

Though, I couldn’t remember when or where I had lost Mr. Puffy. I pushed myself in his direction and grabbed Mr. Puffy. Again, the world around me was bathed in brilliant white light and I shielded my eyes to protect them.

The next moment when I opened my eyes, I was standing in another room. The things in my surroundings weren’t that different, so I knew that it wasn’t that far from my previous memory. That is, if it was indeed a memory and not some weird mind trick.

I looked at the boy that stood in front of me, he was a bit older than before but I knew that it was my past. He had messier red-locks than the previous one, but this time his eyes weren't as happy as the last time. They were curious and sad. I looked at Mr. Puffy who was being hugged tightly by the boy.

Why was I sad again? What had happened at this age?

The door behind me opened and an old woman wearing black robes came into the room, she was discussing something furiously with an older man, someone who I immediately recognised as Headmaster Dumbledore. He looked a lot younger physically, but he seemed like he was going through a lot, just like the old woman. Surprisingly, he wasn’t wearing any of his flamboyant robes, his robes were pure black too.

“I still can’t believe this,” The old woman muttered, her voice full of grief, “Why would anyone do something like…this to us?” The disgust and pain in her voice surprised me a bit.

“It’s my assumption, that they were the followers, or acquaintances, of Tom, Dorea,” Dumbledore heaved a sigh and I realized that this old woman was my grandmother, “Things have changed a lot for us, especially since his apparent demise. There have been several good raids, but the dark neither forgets nor leaves us for long. It always comes back to get us at the worst possible time.”

“But we already lost James and Charlus to the dark! My son sacrificed himself!!” Dorea’s eyes filled with tears, “What more could they want from us? Why her of all people? They could have taken me instead, I had lived my life…” She sobbed and Dumbledore offered her a handkerchief, “I had lived my life…”

“They took the ones that were inside the manor at that time, I am quite sure that had you two been here, they would have taken you and Alan both.” The headmaster whispered, “Have some comfort that your grandson is safe.”

“And what of my eldest grandson, Dumbledore?” Dorea cried, “What of Harry?! Do you have any idea where he is? Did he eat? Is he safe? Or…” She broke down again, “Or is he even alive?”

Dumbledore shook his head sadly, “We are trying our best, Dorea,” He released another sigh, “The entirety of magical Britain is under lockdown, thirty search groups are after the boy and posters have been placed on every possible part of the nation, Harry will be with you soon.”

I really didn’t understand what she and the headmaster were talking about, but I had a faint idea. And that didn’t bode well with me. If I was right about the time of this memory, then Harry had never been found. He had then been declared dead by the Ministry and a funeral had been held for him. An empty coffin had been laid beside the area where our parents’ graves were in his honor, and I had cried loads that day.

And a few weeks after that, I had been declared the last Potter alive.

I noticed my younger self take a small step inside the room that the older mages came from, Mr. Puffy still in his arms, and I followed him.

“Alan!” My grandmother cried behind me, her puffy red eyes on my younger self as she took a step forward to pick me up but was immediately stopped by the headmaster.

“Dumbledore he is going in the room, he will-”

“He has to, Dorea,” Dumbledore told her as his eyes followed my younger self too.

“He is too young, he won’t understand what happened to her.”

“Children have their own way of understanding things, dear,” He whispered, “They may not be able to understand everything that a well established mind would, but that doesn’t mean that a child couldn’t perceive the emotions, the feeling, and the aura. On the contrary, a child’s mind is more attuned to feel things than an adult’s mind could ever achieve.”

“What’s that got to do with Alan seeing her?” Dorea muttered, her sadness slowly changing into anger as she pulled her hand out from his grasp.

“Everything,” He told her, “Alan might not understand it completely, but he will know what has happened to his mother. He will know that she won’t be there for him anymore, something that he needs to understand on his own, with his own mental strength.”

I entered the room, it was a large room with multiple chandeliers and large glass windows. There were multiple chairs, all empty and well-prepared for an event of sorts. There were white and cream colored flowers that hung around in the room. I didn’t know their names but the one place that I had seen these were photographs.

Photographs of a funeral home.

Which was quite correct since there was a partially closed coffin placed on a raised dais in front of the chairs. A coffin that had piqued my younger self’s interest. My grandmother and the headmaster came behind me, they were discussing something related to ‘Where Alan should be allocated for his safety’. I ignored them because I already knew that I had been sent to live with the Weasleys.

Instead, I followed my younger self who had reached the top of the dais and was peeking inside the coffin. And that’s when I saw my mother. Her hair was as brilliant shade of red as ever, her skin wasn’t pale, she wore one of her favorite long frocks. She looked as if she would give a small yawn and wake up any moment now. But I knew she wouldn’t. I had been told later that she had left long before the time we had received her in that ugly box.

But apparently, my younger self thought that she was just sleeping. He leaned on the wooden box and touched her cheek, trying to shake her cold face.

“Mama, wake up…”

.

I screamed again as bright light flooded my vision. I closed my eyes and the next moment I opened them, I was back in that weird floating place, Mr. Puffy clutched tightly in my hand.

“What is this?! Who is doing this?!” I screamed as my vision blurred, “If this is some sort of weird fun for you, then let me tell you, IT IS NOT FUNNY!” I screamed as I wiped my eyes, trying to stem the tears that kept filling them.

“COME OUT YOU FREAK! COME OUT AND FACE ME!!”

But nobody answered my call. Nothing moved, not even a single object changed its direction as I glared at everything around me, “FUCKING COWARD!” I screamed out of frustration. This memory had shaken me more than I had wanted to believe.

Maybe it was my frustration, maybe it was my tears, maybe it was the anger that I was feeling, or maybe it was my words. I didn’t know which one did it but suddenly, I could see a white crack in the floating space a few meters above me. It was a small crack and the length of the cleft glowed a dull shade of black.

Like any precautionary person, I did the right thing and immediately flew to the crack. Yeah, sarcasm. It was a stupid idea, I knew it was a stupid idea, but I had to explore this oddity. I completely ignored the fact that nothing around me was simple and sane, and that everything, including my presence here, was an oddity.

I reached the crack and raised my hand to touch it before I stopped and took a proverbial back-step. The crack wasn’t to be touched, I didn’t know how I suddenly knew that, just that I did. The crack reeked of an evil magic. A strong evil magic that was on its other side and was trying to invade this space. Whatever this space was.

It was also the thing that was responsible for trapping me here, and was playing with me.

As an intelligent being, I should have avoided that crack and left it completely. Nothing good ever came from poking a weird crack that reeked of dark magic in an unknown place filled with floating objects.

But I was angry. Angry and frustrated both. And I knew that the crack was responsible for it, or more accurately, the being on the other side was responsible for it. So, what I actually did was scream at it, throwing my frustration at the crack and cursing it with all the words that I had learnt from living with the Weasley twins. They were excellent sources of creative curse words, by the way.

I threw everything at the cleft. I cursed at it, called it weak, a coward, a freak, and all such things. Challenged it to come out and fight me. I even threw Mr. Puffy at the crack and the teddy just bounced off of it. So, except for touching the crack, I had done everything.

And there was no change in the crack. The being on the other side hadn’t said anything in response, it hadn’t opened the crack either. In fact, the crack hadn’t increased in size even. Which meant that all my methods had failed.

I was thinking of some ways to force the being to open the crack when a sudden thought entered my mind. What if it wasn’t the being who could open it? After all, it was already trying to invade this place. If it could do it on his own, why would it trap me here in the first place? Which meant that the being needed me to open the crack. And that meant, I was the one who had the power to open the crack.

But the question was still the same. How? How to do that? How could I open the crack? And, if it wasn’t my words, what had caused the crack to appear in the first place? Questions, questions. Now, normally, I would have been frustrated at the amount of thinking I was doing and the questions that didn’t end.

But, for some reason, I was extremely patient, as if I was thinking about the weather and what dishes Mrs. Weasley would have prepared for lunch. It was as if I had all the time in the world and had no hurry at all. As if I was at complete peace, and knew that this was the place where I belonged.

I looked around myself, the floating objects still floated around me. I knew that these objects had been something close to me at some point of time, and that each of them held a memory of sorts. I had already witnessed two memories and…wait…!!

I looked at Mr. Puffy and the milk bottle. The two objects that had shown me the memories within them…the memories that I had watched before this crack had appeared. Was that it? Were the memories the key to this crack? Will the crack open if I watch more? Should I do it? The answer was the same for all these queries.

Why not give it a try? And to test my weird theory, I left the crack alone and floated towards an ice-cream that was floating closest to me. I grabbed it and closed my eyes as bright light flooded my senses.

The location was different this time. I was standing in a cramped up room instead of the wide open areas of the Potter manor. But this time, I was more familiar with my surroundings. Why? Because it was the place where I had spent most of my developmental years, of course.

I was standing inside the kitchen of the Burrow.

My younger self was sitting on the couch and I could see myself bubbling with excitement, it was understandable too. I remembered why this day was special. This was the day when I was going to buy my first broom. The one thing that had been precious to me until I had joined Hogwarts and McGonagall had bought the Nimbus 2000 for me.

There was rapid thumping on the stairs and I looked in its direction, an excited gleam in my eyes as I sat there swaying my legs in anticipation. The side door which connected the kitchen with the living room opened to reveal Mrs. Weasley. She was in her mustard yellow dress with a flowery pattern and the green beret that she wore whenever she was going out.

“Don’t run on the stairs, RON!” She screamed and then smiled at me, “Just a moment, Alan, I have to tell Bill that we’ll be out for some time and will probably be late for lunch.”

My younger self nodded his head, his attention already pulled towards the direction of the stairs where a younger Ron dashed through the door. Mrs. Weasley smiled at us as she left us to our chat while she went out to converse with Bill, and probably instruct him on certain things.

Soon enough, Mrs. Weasley was back and each of us picked a handful of floo powder. This wasn’t my first time with the floo, yet Mrs. Weasley wanted both me and Ron to leave before she did. Maybe she was worried we might mess it up? Maybe.

The scene changed around me and soon I stood in the Diagon alley. It was the same as I always remembered it to be. It was my first time visiting the alley, or the first time which I could actually remember. Still, the amazement on my face was quite obvious.

Mrs. Weasley flicked her wand and cleaned us of the soot from the floo. She then bent and covered the angry red scar that was on my forehead with my hair. The moment my eyes landed on the scar, I took a step back before I remembered that this was actually a memory and nothing could harm me.

Still, it seemed as if the scar was glaring at me and wanted to kill me with everything it got. I remembered that in the first memory, I had the same reaction to the scar. As if there was something evil inside the scar and it was glaring at me. Yeah, not a good thought, I shook my head to rid myself of it.

I smiled at my younger self as both he and Ron grabbed Mrs. Weasley’s hand on either side and peeped in every shop that we could. I remember wanting four pairs of eyes so that I could watch each and every thing at once and even then I was sure that four pairs of eyes wouldn’t be enough.

The day went just as I had remembered it to be. First, Gringotts to get some money from my trust vault. Then we bought my first broom: a Comet-260. It wasn’t much, but it was my own personal broom. And that meant the world to me. So much that I even bought a broom polishing kit for it.

Then we went to the thrift shop where Mrs. Weasley checked out a few Hogwarts robes, probably for Charlie, and then a few books. She didn’t buy much though, and I remember being confused as to why she was checking when she wasn’t going to buy it in the first place.

Then Mrs. Weasley had gone to finish some of her errands that would get her a few galleons. She had left us with four sickles each for our ice-cream from Fortescue’s. I followed my younger self and Ron as we each bought our favorite ice-cream and then took our seats on the chairs placed on the outside of the ice-cream parlor.

It was a sunny day and we were tired from all the walking. So, sue me for enjoying the ice-cream with my first friend who was my age. It was then that my younger self’s eyes fell on the bundle of rags that was lying on the corner of the shop’s less populated part of the outer area. Within a moment I realized that the bundle of rags was actually a human.

“Hey…” My younger self poked Ron, “What do you think he is doing here? And…and why is he wearing rags?”

Ron looked at the guy and shrugged, “Dunno mate, mum says the alley is home to all sorts of people, I reckon he’s one of them,” He said and went back to his ice-cream.

But I couldn’t. The guy was lying face first in the dirt, his clothes were torn and bloodied. Hell I could still see dirt and caked blood on his thin and small body. The boy didn’t look much older than my younger self, and I knew that back then I had thought that same thing.

My younger self got down from the chair and called out to the boy, he ignored Ron who was calling his name and instead poked the sleeping guy when he did not answer. The boy groaned a bit and slowly got up, by that time I could see Ron leaving his chair too and coming to stand beside Alan.

“Alan, what are you doing?” Ron whispered urgently in my ear, “You know what mum would say if she heard about this, she always told us to stay away from strangers.”

“He’s just a boy Ron, a heavily injured one at that. I don’t think he can do much,” Alan shrugged, “Plus, it’s not like I am doing much for him.”

“Why are you doing something in the first place?” Ron whispered angrily but young Alan ignored him as his eyes were focused on the boy that was now looking at both of them. When I noticed the boy’s face, I took a step back in shock. This couldn’t be possible. The boy could never, ever, EVER be the one person that came to my mind.

“Here, I thought you might be hungry,” Apparently, younger Alan was a bit in shock too which was apparent from his tone. The boy on the other hand blinked at the offered ice-cream, his mind was probably still not able to comprehend that he was awake now. Still, the boy took the ice-cream and simply looked at it.

“Come Alan, you gave your ice-cream, I don’t think you need to be any more closer to this…boy,” Ron pulled younger Alan, “I don’t know why you even wanted to go and poke him,” He muttered as both of them returned to their seats.

“I don’t know…” Younger Alan muttered, looking at the still stupefied boy who was looking at the ice-cream with an unblinking stare, “I just felt like I knew him, for some reason he reminded me of someone.”

“Who could that remind you of?” Ron made a face, and for some reason, neither I, nor my younger self, liked the way he said ‘that’ to the boy.

“My…my brother, Harry.”

Ron paused at that, he blinked and shook his head as if tired with life, “Alan, I don’t know when you will finally accept it. You are the last Potter. Your brother Harry-”

“I KNOW!” Younger Alan said loudly, and blushed a bit when a few eyes turned towards him, he then glared at Ron and muttered in a much lower tone, “I know I am the last Potter and I know Harry was declared dead by the Ministry-” I saw the poor boy’s eyes shot up at that, something which my younger self ignored in his rage, “-and you don’t need to remind that to me everyday, Ron.”

“Then maybe you should stop doing stunts like this, too,” Ron grumbled before he looked at my younger self with something akin to reverence, “You are the Boy-Who-Lived, Alan! A literal celebrity, the most important person and most powerful of our age. One day you’ll be as strong as Dumbledore, maybe more than him!”

I could see my younger self’s eyes gleam and his chest puffed up a bit together with the small amount of arrogance that Ron’s words caused. I knew I had trouble accepting the fact that I was the Boy-Who-Lived, but Ron and the other Weasleys, accompanied with all that fan mail and everything…I had accepted pretty quickly that I was indeed a celebrity.

“You shouldn’t be seen mingling with people of…that sort, you know,” Ron muttered and sneakily eyed the poor looking boy in the corner. Ron was surprised to note that the boy was also staring at them.

“What do you mean by ‘that’ sort?” Younger Alan asked Ron, “This is the second time you used it.”

“Well, you know..that sort..” Ron shrugged and his eyes pointed towards the Knockturn alley, “That one’s the place where people looking like him live, and that’s not a place for any respectable person, much less the Boy-Who-Lived himself.”

“You think he is from Knockturn?” Alan gasped in shock, even more when Ron nodded his head, “But-But he’s just a boy, Ron, just like us! How could he be-” Younger Alan took a sly glance at the boy and leaned towards Ron to whisper quietly, “-How could he be bad?”

Ron just shrugged, and was about to answer, when he was interrupted by the poor boy who now stood near their table, “Are you Alandale Potter? The Boy-Who-Lived?”

Ron screamed in surprise, and almost fell off his chair, while Alan blinked at the boy’s soft tone, “Yes, I am.”

“Alan!’ Ron cried, “Mum told us to not tell anyone who you were, did you forget that already?!” But I could see that my younger self wasn’t even listening to Ron’s indignant cries.

“What did you say about your brother?” The boy asked Alan and Ron, “Harry Potter? Is he dead?”

My younger self gave a defeated sigh and nodded, “Yes, no one was able to find Harry, he has been missing for about three years now. So, the Ministry declared him dead.”

The poor boy’s bright green eyes widened and filled with tears as if he was hurt, he dropped the ice-cream that he held until now, and rubbed his eyes furiously with his rags before he dashed out of the shop’s outer area and ran towards Knockturn Alley. Completely ignoring Alan’s cries of ‘HEY’ and ‘WAIT!’

“Leave him, Alan” Ron told my younger self, “He can’t hear you anyways, he’s already on his way to where people like him live.”

Younger Alan shook his head as he watched the poor boy’s shaggy black hair disappear in the crowd, “I have to stop him, he looked as if my words had hurt him.” He stood up and was about to follow the boy when Ron stopped him again, “Are you barking mad, Alan?! Can’t you see he’s going to Knockturn?! I just told you that ‘NO’ respectable wizard would ever go in that Alley! Much less the DAMNED BOY WHO LIVED!!” His voice had increased in octaves and volume by the end of it.

Before I could have said anything, the last three words from my best mate had been heard by almost everyone near us and just like that the news of the Boy-Who-Lived’s first public appearance had spread like wildfire.

I could see how almost everyone crowded the shop, greeting me, clicking photos, wanting my autograph. It had been the first and last day I had visited the Alley before Hogwarts, and the only day where I shied away from the people who thought of me as a god. Mrs. Weasley had been extremely furious with both of us and had grounded us for the next two months.

The Burrow had been protected more and was put under temporary fidelius so that none of Voldemort’s followers could track our location. I had just had my first exposure with fame and then I had signed story books and fan mail for the next few years.

But all of that didn’t matter to me now. The only thing that actually mattered was the fact that, back then, I had not been the last Potter. How could I say that? Why, of course, because my blood, my family, my brother, Harry Potter, was alive. He was weak, yes. But very much alive. As alive as me, Ron, and any of the Weasleys were.

And then I remembered that it was me who had just told him that he was already declared dead.

“….Fuck.”

.

There was another flash of bright light and when I reopened my eyes, I was back in that weird floating space, the ice-cream still in my hand.

“But why didn’t he say something?” I croaked, “Why did he run away? He could’ve told me that he was Harry and that he was alive. Then why?!” I screamed in frustration as I held my head, “For years I dealt with Mom’s and his death. Then our grandma died when the death eaters destroyed Potter Manor. He could’ve just told me once and everything would be different now!”

My eyes were filling up again. I wiped the tears as memories of crying alone in bed, missing my family came to me. The action of wiping my tears reminded me that Harry wiped his tears like this too. And that made me tear-up more. Why was he in rags in the first place? Why did he look like he ran away, or was fighting someone? He looked worse than a beggar with all those torn clothes and cuts.

Why were there cuts in the first place?!

I screamed in frustration and clenched my fists. The questions never seemed to end. In fact, the more memories I watched, the more I questioned my reality and the life I had lived and known. Why couldn’t things have been simpler?

It was then that I remembered my purpose of viewing the memory. And I looked at the crack, it was larger. And now the crack was open too. Not much, just a bit, but it was open. Which meant that my theory of my memories having the power to open the crack more was actually correct.

I looked once more at the crack and I could see the utter darkness that was on the other side along with the presence that was glaring at me from within the crack. I won’t lie, I was a bit scared, and for a moment, I didn’t want to open the crack anymore than I already had.

But that would mean being trapped here for Merlin knows how long. Floating in this place, no food, no hunger, no thirst , no joy, no friends….nothing. And that scared me even more. Therefore, with a new found motivation and the urge to get more answers to all of my questions, I started watching memories like crazy.

Not all of them were bad, some were good too. Like when I received my first training snitch, the time when Mrs. Weasley baked me a HUGE cake for my birthday, and my first trip to Hogwarts. There were a few sad ones too. All in all, it was a mixed bundle of memories.

And when I was doing it, I realized that the ‘bad’ memories increased the size of the crack while the ‘good’ memories decreased it. It was as if the creature behind it was feeding off of the bad memories while he was in pain whenever I watched a good one.

This gave me a dilemma as to what I should really do.

On one hand, I wanted to enjoy the good memories as watching too many bad memories was both exhausting and painful. But then, I knew that the creature was responsible for trapping me in this place and I’d have to defeat or destroy it to get rid of the creature and this trap. Which meant I had to watch bad memories continuously.

As soon as I had realized that, I also started sensing a weird aura around the objects. It wasn’t something that I had felt earlier. But then, when I went to watch my mother’s memory again, I felt as if the milk bottle was bubbling with joy and love. It was weird to feel the emotions outside my body that I used to feel inside me.

This development gave me an idea too as I waved my hand near the memories that I had witnessed. My eyes widened in surprise when I felt the exact emotions that each of these memories held.

Mr. Puffy held death and loneliness, the ice-cream held sadness, pride, and confusion while the snitch held freedom, joy, and happiness. After this, it was child’s play to find the sad memories and watch them. I just waved my hand over the objects and, if they held a sad emotion, I grabbed it.

I went through a lot of sad memories, interspersed with one or two happy ones to help myself. I witnessed all of my formative years and how bad the fame had affected me. It wasn’t something I wanted to accept. In my opinion, all of my works were justified and I blamed Dumbledore, the Weasleys, and the fan mail, as well as news reporters, for my actions.

But then, I witnessed a memory of Dumbledore in my second year. He had told me that it took him years to realize that he wasn’t invincible and completely right in everything. He called it ‘follies of youth’. He didn’t go into explanation but he did say that human beings have a way to satisfy their ego and their ‘self’ by blaming their faults on the deeds of others.

The moment they start accepting their faults as a part of themselves, the world will change around them, and so too, will their own inner self, as it will become ‘whole’. Complete with the marks of human mistakes and the realization that no one is completely ‘good’ or ‘evil’.

He had told that to me in regard to my Parselmouth nature that had come to light, and everyone in the school, including myself, considering me a dark wizard. I had been unable to completely understand his words back then, but watching myself strut around, posing to cameras, and, overall, being an arrogant, selfish prat.

I felt both humiliated and ashamed of myself. And I had nothing, and no one, to blame except my own stupidity and eagerness to be a ‘famous’ celebrity. Merlin I hated that word now. It made my skin crawl with disgust.

My breaking points were the end of year memories when Harry had saved me again and again.

The first time was in my first year when he had followed Ron, Hermione, and I inside his invisibility cloak and had killed Quirrell. Second time when he had phoenix-traveled into The Chamber and killed the basilisk, getting grievously injured in the process.

And the third time was in my third year when Harry had protected me from Pettigrew, Bellatrix, and two other Death Eaters in the Shrieking Shack while Sirius had held back a transformed Lupin. This last memory had been too much for me as I witnessed how Harry had killed the two death eaters while Bellatrix and Pettigrew ran away.

I gasped when I returned from the memory. My head was splitting apart with a headache and my heart was beating really fast. I tried to control myself a bit. I knew that the one thing I needed right now was a really happy memory to calm down a bit.

My eyes fell on the floating Quidditch cup that gave off the feelings of accomplishment, victory, and freedom. I reached forward to hold it, just in time to suddenly get the feeling of ‘DANGER’ and ‘DEATH’.

I flinched away from the house cup only for it to be obliterated by a purple curse that traversed the area where moments ago my hand was reaching for the cup.

“I don’t think you will have any need for it anymore.”

I flinched at the smooth voice behind me and immediately looked at the crack above me. It was wide open, and there was no darkness, or evil presence, from the creature that was on the other side. I turned to look behind me and took a step back in horror.

The Creature was free. He had successfully invaded this weird area.

“Hello, Alandale Potter,” Red eyes gleamed with unadulterated hate as his face split from ear-to-ear in an ugly grin, “The Boy…Who Lived?”

I stood face-to-face with the creature who looked exactly like me, except that weird grin and the red eyes. He was me in every way. So much that if he closed his eyes and stopped grinning, it would be me standing there. But I knew it wasn’t me. It had only taken my form to piss me off, and piss me off it did.

“Finally we meet after a…really long time…”

He wasn’t me. He wasn’t Alandale Henry Potter, brother to Harry James Potter and one of the two remaining Potters. No, he wasn’t me. Instead, he was something much worse.

He was Lord Voldemort, and, right now, he stood in front of me in this weird place that he had trapped me in.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
Ending note: There you have it fellas, chapter Nineteen of Innovator, hope you liked it.

Liked it? Loved it? Needs some changes? Please, do tell.

I am waiting for all your comments. Constructive criticism is always appreciated.

Those who have joined my discord server, please tell one of the mods or me about it in the server to get the patrons role, I am most active in my server so you can freely ask anything there.
Link: https://discord.gg/Gcbcv4dxGx
Name: Dev Black's Empire

Thank you for reading and comments.

With regards,
Dev Black