Harry Potter AU

Albus Dumbledore sighed tiredly as he observed the people gathered in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place. The people gathered here were some of the bravest people he had ever met. They were all part of an organisation he had personally created and led. They were the Order of the Phoenix, an organisation dedicated to the light that fought against the darkness of this world. Their current (and so far only) mission: to stop the Dark Lord Voldemort and his followers.

Unfortunately, things weren't going too well. While it was true Voldemort had been defeated, and was forced into hiding for over fourteen years when he attempted to kill the Potter's first-born, he had managed to come back using a dark ritual at the end of the Triwizard Tournament. Not only that, but the one destined to kill him for good had been killed shortly after the ritual. Heck, if Dumbledore hadn't had a spy within Voldemort's ranks, then he wouldn't even have known about it.

At the moment, the second war wasn't going well, and morale was at an all-time low within the Order. Several of its members had died already, and they hadn't been able to do anything noteworthy of late. Not only that, but recruitment had dropped to an all-time low, and among the members that were still active, few were willing to go on any of the more dangerous missions.

Dumbledore knew they needed someone they could rally behind. He himself had once held that role, but many of his orders had started to hold him in an impossible high regard. A consequence of such was that many of the orders thought that he could fight the war himself.

Such an image was not as useful as some people may think. It would be better if the leader was someone they could relate to, rather than what they had with him. Besides, his age was catching up with him. While he could still easily take out most opponents, the fact remained that he was getting old, and if he kept fighting, then he would surely die sooner or later.

It was not that he feared death. No, death was just the next step in the grand adventure that is life; he was just afraid of what would happen to the Order if he were to fall. Once he died, they would need a new leader; they'd need someone young, someone they could relate to. Dumbledore had hoped the Chosen One would have been the one to take that role when the time came, but he was dead, and Dumbledore slowly started to lose hope. That was until he was recently contacted by one of his old students. A man by the name of Percy Davies, working as an Unspeakable at the Department of Mysteries in the English Ministry of Magic, had found an old diary of a witch named Minerva Prewett in the Unspeakable archives. The diary described how there was an unstoppable Dark Lord in her time and that her situation was quite similar to the one Dumbledore was currently facing.

She had developed a ritual that was both as brilliant as it was potentially dangerous. The ritual was designed to summon a hero from another world that would be able to beat the resident, Dark Lord.

The next entry in her diary had confirmed that the ritual had worked and that the man had come from a world quite similar to their own, but with some small differences. As it turned out, the man had already fought and beaten the Dark Lord in his own world and, as such, managed to, quite easily, neutralise the Dark Lord in her own due to his experience.

Dumbledore hoped to use this ritual, as described in the book, for a similar purpose to end this dreadful war before it really escalated in the hope that everyone could be steered back to the path of the Light.

Now, some may consider him naïve for thinking the Death Eaters could be redeemed, but he knew better. After all, he was the living example that showed what happened if someone received a second chance. Just look at his youth and what happened with Gellert and Ariana and look at him now. Fate had given him a second chance and, while at the risk of sounding arrogant, he had to say he did good with that, and it was his belief that others could do the same.

Coming out of his thoughts, he cleared his throat to get everyone's attention before he spoke up. ''Welcome everyone, I'm sorry for calling this sudden meeting, but I've gained some key intel from one of my contacts. Thanks to this information, I've been able to develop a plan I wish to share with you.''

''Then get on with it, Albus.'' 'Mad-Eye,' Moody said directly, as his fake eye kept swirling in all directions.

''Ah, yes.'' Dumbledore said. ''I have received information on how to perform a ritual which will summon a hero that will greatly help our war effort.''

There was no way he was going to tell the order that if things went the same way as they had with Minerva Prewett, the hero would likely be their saviour. As then, the hero would be placed on a pedestal that would be worshipped from a distance and not someone they would follow in battle.

''This information comes from a source that is quite reliable, and I have already made the preparations for the ritual. I request that a portion of you assist me with this ritual and when the ritual is finished to stay behind and help me answer any questions the hero might have. So, any volunteers?''

The order members looked rather dubiously toward each other at their leader's idea, but in the end, their faith in their leader prevailed, and hands went up.

XxX

In the end, quite a number of people had volunteered to help and after they had been informed on what their role would be in the ritual, the group moved to one of the larger, unused rooms in the ancestral home of the Black family

As Dumbledore said earlier, he had already converted the room for the sake of the ritual. As such, the room was completely bare except for the complex runic array that covered the room's floor.

As everyone took their prearranged positions, Dumbledore and several others started a Latin chant, which they'd had to memorise before they started.

As soon as the order started to chant, a faint light started to emit from the runes that became brighter and brighter the longer they continued.

Then, after several minutes of chanting, the light suddenly became so bright that everyone had to shield their eyes.

When everyone could see properly again, they saw that a young man, who couldn't be much older than seventeen, was standing in the middle of the runic array.

He was adorned in clothing that screamed wealth. Whatever the material was, it was clear it was of magical origin. Though the same could not be said of his cloak that dangled across his neck. He had black hair that was trimmed in a short, spiked style. He also had two notable scars on his face; one of them was a scar that was located on his forehead; it was shaped like a lightning bolt, the other was straight which started just above his left eye and ended a bit under it.

Another prominent feature on his face was his eyes. His emerald-green right eye was something many of the order thought looked very similar to one of their members.

He also wore several rings, but it was the symbol on a stone of one of the rings that really caught Dumbledore's attention. It was a triangle, with a single vertical line in the middle and with a circle surrounding the line while keeping within the triangle.

XxX

'What the bloody hell was that?' Hadrian thought. He had no idea what happened. One moment, he was just doing his daily routine, and the next thing he knew, he suddenly appeared in this room.

The most logical conclusion would be some kind of time-based Portkey, but that shouldn't be possible. It was barely an hour ago that he had done his routine scan for any foreign magic on his person, and he hadn't found anything, and since then, he hadn't seen anyone.

Then again, the 'How?' didn't matter right now. No, the important issue now was 'Why?' and 'Who?'. Knowing his luck (and his number of enemies out there), there was a distinct possibility that whoever brought him here would want to do him harm.

Thus the moment he became aware of his situation, he immediately started to use his eyes to take in his surroundings while at the same time using his magical senses to check if there were any wards up.

Unfortunately, he immediately sensed several powerful wards surrounding him, one of which he recognised as an anti-Apparition ward. This, combined with the fact he was seemingly surrounded, would normally have at least led to some mild panic.

That would have at least been so if Hadrian hadn't been so utterly shocked by who the people in the room were.

'They're supposed to be dead!' Hadrian thought. 'Does that mean this is the afterlife or something? Am I dead? No, I would have been greeted by 'him' if that was the case. He clearly is not here, given there's no trace of his aura.'

'Okay, calm down and analyse the situation.' Hadrian thought as he mercilessly suppressed any emotions from surfacing by using his Occlumency training. 'Fact; even though I had not immediately drawn my wand, these people haven't attempted to hurt or subdue me. Fact: Somehow, people I know to be both alive and dead are gathered in the same room. Fact; I travelled here by means unknown.'

Thinking about it for a moment, Hadrian came to the only conclusion that would make the most sense given the facts. There was only one way people he knew to be dead could be in the same room as living people … he had somehow travelled in time, and he was in the past where they were all still alive.

Then Harry heard a woman's voice say his name. ''H-Harry,''

Turning his magical eye to the source of the sound, Hadrian saw that it had been the redhead woman whom he had classified as an unknown on his initial sweep of the room.

Now that he had taken more than a brief second to watch her, he realised he, in fact, did recognise her. This was the woman who gave up her life for him, one that had used 'dark' magic to save his life. The brightest witch of her era who could care less about the supposed nature of Magic and did everything that she could possibly due to save her only child, thus creating a ritual to drian her own life force and provide protection to him. But why does she look old? She could not be more than 21 years old. Yet, this woman was at least in her mid-thirties …. yeah, there goes his time travel theory.