Rereading this story the other day, I noticed that in my very first A/N on the very first chapter, I commented that updates would be sporadic as I was gearing up to my finals and would be graduating school soon. That was more than a year ago. Now I'm gearing up for my second year at university... simply incredible (how does time flow so quickly?!). So, many thanks to those who have stuck with this story and with me as I go on this journey with Albus and co.!

Sirius paused for a moment as he looked at the grim, old building that stood before him (pun intended). Outwardly, it had changed quite a bit. The white lettering and accentuation on the window-sills had dulled to a dirty grey, and the previously coal black bricks had turned an ugly mud-colour. The whole house looked as disused as Hogwarts did to muggles.

The last time he had been here was when he ran off from home at sixteen; he ran all the way to the Potters, who welcomed him with open arms. He had sworn never to come back to this place. However, the Ministry hadn't yet cleared his monetary compensation for wrongful imprisonment and his Gringotts vaults wouldn't be freed until he was reinstated as a legal citizen. So Grimmauld place it was.

Ratty suitcase in hand (which held some bare necessities he had managed to get together from a few second hand shops), he ascended the short staircase to the white, or rather, grey door at the front. This house, being a magical one, did not require a key. Hoping that his mother hadn't burnt him out of the wards too, he placed his hand against the keyhole-less space under the handle.

Luckily the wards recognised him as the Head of the House of Black and he was let through. Pushing the door open, he hesitantly took his first step. The only light in the entire hallway was the winter rays of sun that streamed in from behind him. On the floor he could see his own elongated shadow… among the spiderwebs, dead bugs, and scuttling rats.

"Rats. Delightful," he remarked to himself.

"Traitor is back?" came a sudden croaking voice. Sirius jumped in shock and moments later, a limping figure emerged from the dark.

"Kreacher," Sirius said grimly. The elf was still alive. The elf that had brought him so much grief in his childhood.

Their frosty reunion summarised Sirius' entire disposition to this place. He brushed past the elf and into the dark kitchen, which felt so damp and disgusting it made him wonder what the hell Kreacher had been doing all these years. Here, he deposited his leather case on the long wooden table. This had been where the servants had once upon a time prepared meals before bringing them into the lavish dining room. In the distant past of the Black family, when Elf-ownership had become unfashionable in pureblood society circles, muggles had been employed, or rather, enslaved. They had then worked and lived in such squalid rooms as this.

Kreacher trailed in after him, muttering something to himself. Sirius decided not to give him more attention than he was worth.

He spent the next few minutes looking around the cupboards, in search for edible food that Kreacher, maybe, possibly, by chance, kept. Nothing. He was reaching for the last cupboard under the water dispenser, not unlike a muggle sink, when he heard a sound behind him. Kreacher, who had been watching his every move, now launched forwards.

"Master!"

Sirius brushed him off, pulling the cupboard open. Instantly the stench caused him to wrinkle his nose. A makeshift bed lay there, evidently the place where Kreacher slept. Such squalor, he thought, moving to close the cupboard door, when something with a metallic shine caught his interest. Nestled between the pillow and mattress, was a piece of jewellery.

"Well, hello there," he murmured. Kreacher was just recovering from having being pushed to the ground and launched himself at Sirius, intent on getting the locket back into his hands. The Black heir frowned at him and stood up, locket securely clenched in his hand.

On its face was an ornately decorated green 'S'. It hung on a chain which Sirius wrapped around his fingers. He let the locket fall from his hand and watched it dangle on the chain before he fixed his attention on Kreacher.

"Tell me, Kreacher, what is this? Leave nothing out."

.

He felt though he had been submerged into a tank of several metric tonnes of water — that entire pressure seemed to be resting on his mind and shoulders. The voices around him were muffed, as though he were wearing really, really thick ear-muffs. He blushed at the thought of the strikingly pink ones he had owned in his other life.

Slowly, Albus allowed his eyes to open, blinking hurriedly to get the tiredness out. He squinted into the distance as his vision got gradually better. It became then, radically clear that he was certainly not waking up to the physical world. No, he was in a sort of memory:

He saw himself, as Albus Dumbledore, at about nine or ten years of age. He was in the garden in the house in Godric's Hollow where he had lived with his family before his father had been taken away to Azkaban for attacking those three muggles. It was a time before Ariana had begun suffering those intense seizures, before she had been psychologically marred and scarred by her treatment of non-magicals. Before she had become an Obscurus.

Albus, the young boy of his memory, sat in a corner of the garden, legs crossed as he examined the object on his lap: it was a wooden sword that he had managed to carve with his own magic. He was in fact still working on it, transfiguring it with intent alone. Both Albuses watched with fascination as a crooked inscription appeared on the hilt: For Aberforth Dumbledore, love Albus.

This caused Albus' throat to clench up with emotion. He had forgotten that this had also been a time before his fame, when Aberforth had loved him with all his heart, much like Dudley now did. They had not fought then, and speaking of fights…

Aberforth ran out of the house, closely followed by their father, who came out with a book. He propped himself against a tree and began to read, eyes intermittently jumping up to lovingly look at his boys. "Al! Father told me you were outside!"

All of a sudden, Albus remembered this particular memory. It had been Aberforth's birthday, the last one that they had celebrated in peace. The very next year their father would be taken away and Ariana would forever be marred and nothing would ever be the same. Albus could remember that he had left the house early that morning to put some finishing touches on his present for Abeforth. Yes, now looking around, Albus noted that it was late morning. Aberforth must've just woken up.

"Happy birthday, little brother," Albus said lovingly, pulling said brother into an embrace. Aberforth protested, but eventually gave up and patted him on the back a few times. Then reaching from behind his back, Albus withdrew the sword. He knelt down on one knee, bowed his head, and presented the sword to Aberforth.

"My knight, Sir Aberforth Dumbledore," he said dramatically. The boy stared at the present with shock before letting out a loud squeal of delight. Albus got back on his feet and laughed merrily when his brother grabbed the hilt and began swinging it around with exuberance.

"Well come on, then, where's your sword," Aberforth had turned around and was grinning as he settled on a fencing position. Albus grabbed a stick from the ground, also adopting a neutral fencing stance, then eyebrow rising, he gave his brother a small smirk.

"Engarde!"

.

Albus winced as he came to: the sharp smell of antiseptic spells and bright light of hospital rooms didn't quite agree with him. His eyes slowly flustered open, gaining focus as he did so. Looking around, he quickly assessed the room. There was only one other person in the room with him, another boy, about eight or ten years of age. He had an odd haircut and red eyes from crying. His right leg was missing. On his bedside table stood a bottle of Skelegrow, a medicinal liquid designed to, as the name said, grow bones. The boy was sleeping, but his face was contorted into a visage of pain.

Evidently, some change in Albus' breathing or heartbeat must have alerted some sort of ward because very suddenly, a mediwitch came running into the room. She was very quiet in the way she went about her business.

"Good afternoon, Mr Potter," she said kindly in a very quiet tone so as not to wake Albus' roommate. He smiled kindly at her, but was unable to muster very much more than a simple 'good afternoon'. His magical core was severely depleted, he could tell at once; whilst muggles required much to keep them going, wizards required less of it, and depended more on magic. As such they could go more days without eating, sleeping. It was also their magical core that allowed them to live longer lives.

Depleting one's core often meant severe exhaustion and in some cases where older patients were concerned, almost certain death.

"Mr. Potter," the woman said. Albus glanced up at the sound of his voice being called and realised that he'd been lost in his thoughts. The mediwitch was staring at him expectantly.

"Forgive me, my mind strayed," he said quickly. She nodded understandingly and after she had checked his vitals using various spells that Albus didn't fully recognise, she pulled up a chair.

"Do you remember what happened?"

"Yes, the Death Eaters attacked Diagon Alley," he paused, then cocked his head to the side, surprised at his own very raspy voice. "How long have I been here?"

She pursed her lips. "Two weeks, Mr. Potter. Now, do you remember what you did once they attacked?"

"I cast an amalgamation of Protego Maxima, Fianto Duri, and Repello Inimicum against the Death Eaters."

"That was a very brave thing to do, Harry," the woman said. She took a deep breath. "You understand that those spells are very powerful. An eleven-year old's core should not have even been able to cast them."

Albus smiled again, this time weakly. He felt weak, but not enough not to be able to speak or smile. This witch needed to think he was in a more terrible state than he actually was. She was correct, there was no way a child his supposed age, should have been able to cast spells such as that, let alone with as much power. And if he could have, he would have been recovering for a much longer time than Albus seemed to need.

This was starting to feel too much like an an interrogation to him so he yawned in a very child-like manner. Tiredly looking up at the nurse. He was indeed exhausted. And yet, over-exaggerating his tiredness and would only help him project a somewhat more childish and innocent persona. Hopefully his actions in the Alley would be written off as those of a magical prodigy.

"I saw the spell in a textbook," Albus said. He pretended another yawn. "I taught it to myself." Actually there was no way to find amalgamations of spells in textbooks. Such seamless fusions of spells could only be cast by wizards who truly knew magic to it's core. Not that a medi-witch would know this.

The nurse opened her mouth to speak further — interrogate him — in a rather unprofessional way. Albus yawned again. He knew he was pushing his luck and perhaps taking the manipulation somewhat too far.

The nurse seemed to buy it and she bowed her head in slight disappointment. She then put on a smile and patted him on the shoulder. "Get some sleep, Harry. Your assigned mediwitch will examine you when you're stronger."

The next time the door opened, only a short while later, a very worried Petunia and Dudley practically ran in.

"Oh my God, oh my God, Harry!" Petunia rushed to his side, pulling up a chair to sit next to his bed. He was roused from his sleep when Dudley actually sat down on his right leg.

"Ooof," Albus said ineloquently before his face split into a genuine, if somewhat pained, smile.

"Sorry," Dudley said, entirely unashamed as he pulled away and sat down next to him on the bed.

"What happened? The doctors-"

"Medi-wizards, mum," Dudley interrupted with a grin.

"The medi-wizards told us you had a… magical exhaustion?"

Albus pushed himself upright and readjusted his glasses. He felt waxy, tired. "Magical exhaustion occurs when a wizard uses an enormous amount of magic. As opposed to a non-magic user, our souls and our very beings are powered by a magical core within ourselves. Like a generator or a muscle it has to be trained and used. Preferably taken care of. I made the unfortunate mistake of over-stressing it when attempting spells that are quite above my level." He was succinct and to the point as ever — when explaining a concept anyway.

Petunia still looked lost but she nodded. "We were told… there was an attack and you protected…" she trailed off, uncertain of how to proceed.

"Indeed. Draco my friend and I were cornered by Death Eaters, loyal supporters of the Dark Lord Voldemort. I had to protect us, and ideally, help the people attempting to flee the Alley."

"Harry…" she looked lost for words. Her hands overlapped his. "B-but the nurse said there are policemen for this sort of thing!"

Albus licked his lips and sat up somewhat straighter. Dudley jumped off of his bed and wandered over to the other patient in Albus' hospital room. The other boy was now awake and was reading the newest edition of some or other quidditch magazine. A loud conversation over the superior sport (football or quidditch) filled the room.

"There are. The elite task-force known as Aurors could not break through the wards that the opposition had placed, delaying them by mere minutes."

Petunia's eyes brightened in recognition at the term. "Your father was one, I remember my sister saying," she exclaimed. Albus nodded indulgently.

"So he was."

The door burst open again, this time a tall man followed by several medi-witches who were protesting his 'breaking' and entering.

"Sir—"

"Mr. Feuer you are not allowed—"

"Restricted—"

"Nicolas!" Albus exclaimed, elated to see his friend. The alchemist kept brushing off the medi-witches, grinning as he approached the patient.

"You know this man, Mr. Potter?" the medi-witch that had attended to Albus earlier asked. Albus smiled at her kindly.

"Yes, a friend of mine, everything is quite alright." With that dismissal, the three medi-witches distrustfully exited the room. Albus shook hands with Nicolas eagerly whilst Petunia stared at the two of them, presumably musing over their odd friendship. An eleven-year-old, and what appeared to be a mid-twenty to thirty-year-old?

"Petunia, this is my good friend Nicolas Flamel, a french alchemist with whom I have been corresponding for some time," Albus said smiling. The two shook hands. "Nicolas, Petunia Dursley, my aunt." Petunia didn't seem to quite understand their friendship, but accepted it nonetheless, after some probing of course. She wouldn't be a responsible aunt or mother without a rigorous interrogation.

"I came the moment I heard, Al-Harry. The Daily Prophet was quite quick to report on the attack," he smirked slightly. From his breast pocket he withdrew a folded copy of that morning's paper which Nicolas passed to Albus. He winced at the headline and article.

"Potter Strikes Again," Albus read aloud. "Christmas Day, Mr. Potter was enjoying his lunch with Hogwarts friends when disaster struck. Wizards, dressed as the much-feared Death-Eaters appeared to attack Diagon Alley— what a load of tosh!" Albus exclaimed. "It was a Death-Eater's attack, not some fictitious heroic tale!" He put he paper aside, noticing only then that Dudley had decided to join them once more. The boy picked up the paper and stared with fascination as the pictures moved, gaze only finally growing still when his eyes rested upon Albus in the photograph.

Depicted in it was Albus repeatedly casting the same three spells in succession, creating a visible barrier of wispy-like smoke into which all the Death Eater's spells vanished and were dispersed into nothingness. Behind him, people — wizards, witches, children, muggle parents — were fleeing the alley, and if not that, disappearing into shops whose wards instantly sprung up. The photograph had been taken from above, leading Albus to wonder whether someone had willingly jumped onto a broomstick, just to take a damn photograph of him?

"Whoa, Harry," Dudley sounded stunned as he said that. Apparently, he had only just realised what sort of awesome power Albus commanded.

"Whoa, indeed," Nicolas said, smiling at the boy.

"No! No, no, no no! This isn't something to celebrate! Harry, you shouldn't even be in a position where you have to make the choice to protect your classmates!" Petunia was shaking her head viciously, and it occurred to Albus that she must've too, only now realised, the scale of the attack. Her eyebrows drew together. "I knew this school would only bring trouble… That Eton scholarship is still on the table, you know. They wrote—"

"No, Petunia," his tone was cold and brutal. Something very unlike him. He softened instantly and placed his warm hand upon her thin, bony one that was resting on his knee. "I shall stay at Hogwarts." He said it with such finality that Petunia seemed reluctant to even try to argue against this decision. Nicolas was regarding him with a small frown, unused to such assertiveness within Albus; he was usually more eager to see events play out than straightaway interfere.

Nicolas cleared his throat loudly, attempting to diffuse the tension in the room. He smiled kindly at Petunia and Dudley. "Why don't I show you two Diagon Alley. Harry'll be here when you get back, I'm sure of it (that sounded like a threat to Albus). He'll be most likely discharged within a day or two… you can have dinner together tonight. I'm sure the hospital will be able to facilitate that. But for now, he must concentrate on his recovery."

Petunia harrumphed, but eventually (after interrogating Albus a little more about Hogwarts and his studies and friends), she acquiesced. Once the room was cleared, Albus let out a short breath of relief. Glancing over to the boy staying in the same room as him, it suddenly registered with Albus that he hadn't even cared to ask what his name was. No matter, the boy was asleep again, and his leg was looking decidedly more whole than it had been mere hours ago.

Someone had stacked in a neat pile the get well letters he had received, amongst them also bags of sweets (mostly sherbet lemons) that his friends had managed to sneak in, as he knew that it was against St. Mungo's policy for external food to come into the hospital diet. He eagerly dug in, reading a copy of the Quibbler as he did so. Eventually, he fell asleep again.

.

This time he knew he was not awake. And yet, this was an odd sort of dream, Albus mused to himself, because it certainly was not a memory, and his mind was certainly not as creative when it came to dreams. And yet, there he stood, in the middle of a manor hall: it was beautiful, if a little run down.

He wandered around the various rooms, examining everything with muted interest. Why was he here? What sort of dream was this. Eventually, after he had been looking around for some time, he realised that he could hear voiced from somewhere within the building. Up the imperial staircase he went (all marble, he remarked), until he emerged into a large hall evidently meant for ballroom dancing.

It was about the size of a quidditch pitch, with a ceiling which rivalled that of Hogwarts. Paintings and mirrors adorned each wall, all dusty and uncleaned… and decidedly muggle. There was absolutely nothing wizarding about this manor, he suddenly realised. He was in a muggle manor. As his eyes finally adjusted to the darkness, he realised in an instant what was happening, for he was looking directly into the red eyes of the Dark Lord Voldemort.

The Death Eaters had brought in a large table, enough to seat twenty or so people, and it was currently fully occupied by cowering figures. At a small distance, other Death-Eaters, not part of the inner-circle stood to attention, all with their head's bowed, and faces maskless. Albus let out more than a few gasps as he caught glances of more than a few people that he knew, some well, others less. Regardless of the fact, he had always thought them to be good people, honourable.

Clenching his jaw, he approached the table, to hear what was being said. It was evident that he was somehow able to tap into Tom Riddle's mind through the Horcrux-Link that they shared. It was then he noticed that his occlumency walls were down, apparently his magical core was more exhausted than he had thought, if it was unable to even hold that last line of defence.

He gulped as he realised the implications of this meeting. Tom was back. He was back. Physically back. Whatever advantage Albus had had with his renewed life was now over. Tom had caught up.

Nothing was being said at the table. Nothing at all, and yet there was an oppressive silence hanging over them. Albus could feel Tom's magic literally pressing down on all of them, pushing all of the Death Eaters into submission. And it was odd, his magic wasn't as dark as it had been when Albus had known him later in life. He seemed fuller. Could it be possible that he had absorbed some of his horcruxes? He certainly seemed more humane and less snake-like.

He looked like a thirty year-old Tom Riddle, like a sort of version of Dorian Gray. Yet, his eyes betrayed his true nature. They were red as Hellfire and hateful as the Devil.

"How dare you," he spoke finally, voice deceptively neutral and soft. The Death-Eaters leaned in, so as to hear him, he spoke that quietly. Footsteps echoed across the marble floor as another person joined them. It was then that Albus noticed that the chair to the right of Tom was unoccupied. To the right of him, sat the silver-haired Lucius Malfoy.

"Forgive me, my Lord," Severus Snape spoke as he approached Voldemort. His head, too, was bowed. Tom pursed his lips.

"Sit, Snape." Severus did so. "I shall deal with you later." A shiver ran down Albus' spine, fearful of what would happen to Severus. Oh my Gods, he thought, he had sent Severus into this, every time the man had gone behind enemy lines to spy for him?

"You were summoned three weeks ago to celebrate my rebirth and you mark it by disobeying ME?" Tom's tone steadily hardened and became more disgusted. Lucius Malfoy was trembling next to him.

"A full-scale attack on Diagon Alley…" Tom said slowly, eying all of his followers with incredulous disgust, as though he honestly considered them completely beneath his attention.

"My Lord," began one Death Eater at the table, who Albus recognised as an employee of the Unspeakables. By the Gods, they were infiltrated too?! "Malfoy led us into battle, t-t-to celebrate your return. We wanted to make a s-s-statement."

Tom turned to him with a most unreadable expression. He cocked his head to the side and stared at the unspeakable with such intensity, that the man actually began to sink deeper into his chair.

"You shall make a statement when I wish to make a statement, is this clear?" There were quick nods all around the room. Everyone was bobbing their heads in a comical sort of way, yet Albus didn't dare to laugh. The Dark Lord stood up, silk-like robes billowing around him dramatically. He began stalking, much like a panther or some sort of predator, around his inner circle.

"We lost last time, this is undisputed. We attempted a revolution from without." Voldemort clenched his hand in anger. The back of Nott's chair split into two. "It is time to attempt the same from within."

As he said this,Voldemort's eyes turned to the rest of the Death Eaters from the lower echelons. Albus knew that his eyes had fixed on a man standing directly behind him and that he was invisible in this vision, and yet, he shuddered as that blazing crimson gaze settled on 'him'. It was easy, in that moment to tell why the Death Eaters around him cowered in such fear, for that same fear had taken a hold of his soul.

.

He awoke several hours later in such a panic, and now back in the Hogwarts' infirmary wing, that Madame Pomfrey was forced to give him a calming potion, such was his plight.

I hope to communicate the higher stakes with this chapter. It's taken me some time to find a proper direction for this story and a lot of writing. I mean, it's about 60k long now, and not much has happened. This has resulted in a lot of readers simply reading this story. As opposed to the 30-50.000 people reading it at the beginning, there's only about 600 of you now. I don't obsess over statistics any longer, but it is still a little discouraging to see that people seem to be giving up on this story. I love writing it though, so I won't be disappearing any time soon. :) In fact, it is my favourite story (that I am writing/have written) so far, so even if only three of you read it, towards the end, I shall continue it. Thank you to all who have stuck with it up until now. You are all incredible (just alone for reading my mad ramblings!)