The Chamber of Secrets, Hogwarts, 5 years after the Battle of Hogwarts

Harry Potter, The Man Who Conquered

"Are you sure you want to do this Harry?" With a world weariness that most would not believe possible in a young man of only twenty three years, Harry Potter shrugged before looking over at his best friend Hermione, or the portrait of her at any rate.

His mop of messy black hair from his childhood was now a ponytail that reached his upper back, partially as it made controlling the infamous 'Potter hair' easier, but mostly because it meant he didn't have to cut it as often.

Standing at five foot seven inches, Harry had at least fleshed out a little since his teenage years, even if he hadn't been able to fix the stunted growth the Dursleys had inflicted upon him. Two long red scars separated by a couple of inches, made all the more obvious by his almost white complexion, traced from the right hand side of his jawline down to his collar.

"Not like I've a lot left to do here Hermione. If it wasn't for you making a portrait after we killed Riddle, I wouldn't even have you left. You did tell me on the Horcrux hunt that 'leaving a man alone with his scars isn't healthy'." His verbatim quote had Hermione wince slightly, her face twitching into a sad smile as she gestured out of the window.

"You know they will keep looking for you, even after you've gone? The 'Master of Death' and 'The Man Who Conquered', though I suppose... We didn't really conquer anything in the end did we?" Hermione trailed off for a moment, face twisting into a bitter frown as she looked at the books of the Hogwarts Library, leaving Harry to fill the void even as he continued passing magic into the massive runic array he had set up in the Room of Requirement.

"Just as no-one knows where I buried you, or Ron, or..." Ginny's name faltered on his tongue, each and every precious memory he had of the youngest Weasley passing through his mind, eyes moistening for a moment before he steeled himself once more.

"It will be one last great prank, that will have people searching for centuries in the hopes they get their hands on one of these three artifacts, maybe I will even make it into a storybook someday..." Hermione snorted and with a wave of her hand summoned a book to her that she waved in his direction.

"You're already in story books Harry, I am surprised you somehow managed to miss the row dedicated to you and the stories of your childhood whilst we were at Hogwarts. Though, given the shit we went through to try and save the 'Wizarding World', we did have bigger things on our minds most of the time." Squinting through his large rimmed glasses, reinforced and enchanted with several sets of spells and traits, Harry could just about make out the title of the book in Hermione's hand.

'The Boy Who Lived and the Wicked Witch', something that made him scoff and quite glad that he had missed that particular section of the library, it was bad enough that there were at least 6 Harry's in every year of Hogwarts classes... .

"Now, you are going to try and pull a Merlin and disappear without a trace? After taking down three of the most disgusting members of Wizarding Society and their assorted cronies? I think you will make the story books, just not as the hero that we know you are..."

Contrary to popular belief, the Pureblood dogma didn't just go away with the death of Voldemort, just like it hadn't after the end of the First War. Harry found himself understanding Dumbledore more and more as he dealt with the bureaucracy and partisan politics that many of the 'pureblood-lite' members of Wizarding Society resorted to. He had never had a craving for glory and power, so the political games and lobbying exhausted him far worse than any battle or other form of activity.

But where Dumbledore became a figurehead, Harry eventually decided to be more… proactive in his way of dealing with the worst of Wizarding society.

"One person's hero is another's villain, don't worry about it Hermione, it's not as if what they think matters to me anymore. Now, that looks to be enough power, so if you don't mind..." With an exasperated sigh his closest remaining friend put away her current book and wagged a finger in his direction.

"Fine, shrink me down, but if you get us killed Potter..." With a flick of the Elder Wand the portrait was reduced back down to the size it was originally, easily able to fit in his pocket and allow him to continue with what was probably the most foolish thing he had ever done.

Merlin, contrary to popular belief, hadn't died/been imprisoned/whatever else people claimed happened to him after the fall of King Arthur. Instead he had, for the lack of a better word, gotten bored of the other wizards who tried to hail him as a god. He had retreated from the public view for almost 200 years, before eventually trying out some theoretical magic he had devised himself.

How did Harry know this? Because Merlin had in fact been the one to tutor the Hogwarts Founders and help them found their school. Though he had insisted that he never be mentioned publicly in any form, probably because of the already ridiculous myths that surrounded his name by that point.

Thankfully Slytherin was every bit of the consummate scholar that Ravenclaw was claimed to be, making meticulous notes of every piece of work that the Founder's had helped Merlin work on. This meant that when Merlin announced his intentions, to try and find a new dimension and to travel to it as part of a 'Grand Escape', all of their trials and attempt notes were kept in the Chamber of Secrets.

Harry found these notes after retreating to the Chamber of Secrets, in his own attempt to escape from the viciousness and fickleness that was the Wizarding World. To some, he was the solution to each and every little problem they had to deal with, and to others he was the antichrist to their ideals and traditions. And, to all the 'Boy-Who-Lived', the 'Vanquisher of Voldemort' not Harry Potter. Harry had had enough of that particular set of pedestals to last several lifetimes, so solitude and peace were far more preferable.

He had spent 3 months revamping the entirety of the Chamber of Secrets, making sure to uncover every little secret and surprise left by the Founders and Slytherin's descendents, before adding some of his own as well.

The walls, once dank and covered in moss and lichen, were now covered in paintings and tapestries. Many of these were valuable relics he had found whilst researching and cataloguing the contents of the Room of Requirement. After the deaths of his best friend and loved ones, it wasn't like he had much else to distract himself with, so he spent his time learning all that he could.

It was only when he found himself walking the halls of Hogwarts on his way to get food, under his invisibility cloak of course, Harry found himself failing to recognise any of those he flitted and shifted between. Even the teachers were almost entirely unfamiliar, many of them retiring after the battle of Hogwarts.

It was then that Harry chose this final course of action. Powerful artefacts and Relics, which he could see all to easily falling into the wrong hands, were 'liberated' from museums, the Ministry and other areas of import. Those that he could were now stored in the heavily enchanted and expanded

The chances of the ritual working were about 30%, and even then Harry had no control over where the ritual would take him, all he would be able to do was hang on for dear life and wait to see what happened. But he was okay with that. After all, as Albus Dumbledore had said to him almost half a decade before, this was just his next great adventure...

There was a flash of light as the runes activated, the wind rushing and swirling through the area like a miniature hurricane, magical fluctuations disrupting wards and activating all sorts of obscure enchanted items throughout the UK.

And in the next moment, Harry Potter was gone...

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Hamburg Suburbs, Germany, 10:28 pm September 1st 2017

Kumiko Goto, X-Com Trainee 'Delta-4'

"Hilf mir…"

Kumiko Goto knew that she was probably out of her depth at this point, even as she managed to drag her eyes away from the partially melted soldier who had just breathed his last, this definitely wasn't what she had expected when she signed up for X-Com. It wasn't that she hadn't read the dossiers, what little of it wasn't covered in classified black tape, but she had assumed that it was all just a cover for some kind of anti-terrorist organisation.

At 31, and one of the most highly decorated female members of Japan's Self Defence Force, Kumiko had been cherry picked for the X-Com role by her superiors. Given this had happened after passing the training for the Special Forces Group, Kumiko had thought this was another attempt to sideline her by SDF Command.

Only her sense of duty and the risk of dishonour had prevented her from turning down the position, which given her position as an only child was very important to her and the memories of her parents. With a stout figure that had earned her the unflattering nickname 'The Brick', and a burn scar from a training accident almost 8 years before that dominated the left hand side of her face, Kumiko wasn't expecting to bring glory to the family by marrying well..

"...Don't know what this is, but this sure as hell is no satellite." Snapping out of her thoughts as her teammate Delta-3 finished speaking, Kumiko realised that she had probably missed her order to move up next.

Luckily, there was very little in the way of actual cover for her to move forward to, the police car pulled over near to the warehouse being the only place she could probably reach without leaving herself overly exposed.

The rest of the area, an industrial estate on the edge of Hamburg, was reminiscent of the battlefields they liked to show in movies. Cars and debris littered the area, with the armoured vehicles of the German Army some hundred yards behind Big Sky and wrecked by some form of heavy arms fire.

The acrid smell of smoke mixed with the stench of death, something that made Kumiko's breathing harsher than normal. Brushing aside a few strands of the neck length raven black hair out of her eye line, and with a last solemn glance at the German soldier's bloody remains, Kumiko pushed forwards.

"Right, let's get inside this place. Delta-1, go and take a look." Kumiko made it to the police car just in time to see David Jones, Delta-1, move forwards towards one of the large windows that fronted the building.

Out of the corner of her eye Kumiko saw the object Delta-3 was using as cover suddenly start sparking and flashing, the man barely managing to dive to the side and next to Delta-2 before…

*FLASH*

The sudden flash blinded Kumiko completely, and the startled cries made her realise it wasn't just her who had been caught looking at the device when it lit up.

"Delta, what is going on? Feed went dead for a moment." Wiping at her eyes with her free hand, Kumiko strained her hearing as she ran through possible worst case scenarios.

If that had been an alien trap, then it worked brilliantly.

"The device seemed to react to something Control, no sign of alien movement though so doubtful this is a trap, moving forward to the warehouse." Maxim Reuger, Delta-3, gave his report came as Kumiko's vision began to clear.

"Very well Delta, regardless of whether this was an intentional alien ploy or not, you need to storm that building now. Given what they did to these soldiers, we do not want them prepared for us." As she moved forward to take up a similar position to Delta-1 on the opposite end of the wall, Kumiko couldn't shake the feeling that was slowly rising up the back of her neck, the feeling of being watched...Studied even.

It was a 6th sense that had saved her life more than once, but as she peered around one last time she couldn't see anything out of the ordinary. And then Delta-1 burst through the window, and any chance of doing things stealthily went down the koi pond.

Doing her best to ignore her screaming instincts Kumiko kicked the window to her left in before surging through, even as Maxim called in that he had spotted the soldier they had heard calling for help before.

As she settled into cover behind some crates, Kumiko laid eyes upon their new objective as well, stood in an open shaded area of the warehouse armed with both a shotgun and a hand grenade.

"This doesn't scream trap at all..." Her muttered comment was meant to have only been a thought to herself, so she almost jumped out of her skin when she heard a murmur of agreement from behind her!

"Don't..." The feeling of something being pressed into the exposed flesh of the back of her neck made Kumiko regret not insisting harder on the need for head protection, as it meant that she couldn't even warn her team of the trap they were facing as Maxim moved forwards.

Into the jaws of hell...

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Hamburg Suburbs, Germany, 10:29 pm September 1st 2017

Harry Potter, The Man Who Conquered

Harry had expected a rougher trip in all honesty, one second he was stood in the Chamber of Secrets, the next he was stood in the middle of what looked to be a muggle street.

Given the general destruction around him, the corpses and the woman armed with a fairly large gun in front of him, it didn't look like he had arrived at a good time however. Thankfully he had been prepared for an eventful landing and had the Cloak covering him when the ritual activated, meaning that though the woman waved the gun in his direction it was impossible for her to have seen him.

When she shook her head and moved on a moment later Harry followed, if only to try and find out a little bit more about what was going on. There were three others with her, and given their comments Harry assumed they were being coordinated from elsewhere, probably through the complicated headgear they were all wearing.

From the look of how they were moving, they were almost certainly 'looking' for something, which meant these people were unlikely to be the cause of the destruction that made up the street behind him. Which meant that they were probably after who, or what, had caused said devastation.

So Harry followed the woman in front of him, as she moved forward to take position at one of the windows, using the elder wand to silence his feet when she looked around suspiciously once more, primarily to see if he could help in some way. Not to boast, but Harry liked to think of himself as something of an expert regarding this kind of situation.

The team were obviously not used to working together, as the man furthest from him broke through the window and jumped in before the others were ready, but Harry had worked with worse amateurs in his time with the Order of The Phoenix. The rest of the team followed him in through other entryways a moment later, obviously subtlety was not their strong suit as they made enough noise to wake a sleeping giant.

Though given the obvious trap, with the soldier stood in the middle of the room and somehow uninjured, whoever the enemy was were prepared for them.

"This doesn't scream trap at all..." The woman's words in front of him mirrored his own thoughts so perfectly that he murmured a soft agreement before realising what he was doing.

Well trained reflexes were already in action as he saw the woman stiffen, Elder Wand out and pressed to the base of her neck before she could make a sound.

"Don't..." Harry would have continued with a spiel about he was on their side etc, but then one of the men moved forward to check on the soldier and everything went to hell...

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Hamburg Suburbs, Germany, 10:36 pm September 1st 2017

Kumiko Goto, X-Com Trainee 'Delta-4'

Kumiko's life had flashed before her eyes a couple of times in the first ten seconds of the ambush, and given both Delta-1 and Delta-3 had been taken out in the first volleys, the situation could be better.

The aliens, because that is the only thing she could realistically call the small grey bodied things, had obviously been waiting for the soldier to gun down Delta-3 before opening fire. A torrent of green coloured projectiles tore through her cover like it was nothing, several even burning through the wall behind her.

The only reason Kumiko was still alive was her mysterious captor somehow throwing her several feet to her left as hell rained down upon them, which given he had a weapon pointed to her head, should have been impossible with only one hand. Still, given whoever it was hadn't ended her life the moment Delta-3 had gone down, Kumiko had bigger things to worry about.

"Throwing grenade!" She shouted for the benefit of Delta-2, who had shifted forwards to flank the alien who had first attacked her. Delta-2 fired a moment later, taking it down in a hail of bullets even as she unhooked her grenade and threw it as accurately as she could in the direction of the other alien, before ducking out of the other alien's fire.

"Delta-4, there is another alien moving up behind you, get out of there!" Even as the satisfying sound of her grenade exploding and the accompanying pained scream of the alien she had just taken down reached her ears, Kumiko's blood froze at Central's warning.

Kumiko turned, trying to raise her gun, but as she saw the alien pull it's trigger she knew she was already too late.

Shifting to try and avoid the projectiles, Kumiko was surprised when suddenly a force slammed into her from her right, sending her careening to the floor but out of harm's way. The alien seemed almost as surprised as she was, staring blankly at her for a second before raising it's gun, catching three bullets in the face from her assault rifle before it could either dodge or fire again.

Scrambling to her feet as Delta-2 swept the area, Kumiko checked the area where she had previously been stood for signs of her attacker, but she could catch no sign of them.

"Control... I think it's over." Delta-2's comment merely made Kumiko shake her head and raise her rifle.

"Something wrong Delta-4?" The voice of their new Commander surprised Kumiko slightly, but then she nodded her head and tried to work out how to word what had just happened...

There aren't many ways someone can claim to be held hostage without anyone knowing and then saved by their hostage taker, who then disappears without a trace.

Not without sounding completely crazy at least...

A/N: I've rewritten this chapter, and plan on doing the same for every chapter in every one of my stories eventually, starting with this one and my oldest works. I have tried to address all the points raised in various PMs and reviews, but if there is something I have missed in this chapter or any of the others, please let me know.

All credit for this one goes to Malcho1234, who had this idea on his profile and I have with his permission borrowed the idea and given it form. I will admit, this story is just because I think the Ethereals trying to work out what the hell Harry is and how to deal with him will be funny, though of course X-com has to encounter him and get over him first.

This is the original tutorial mission for X-Com, and it is a wonderful thing in terms of plot that you never see anywhere else in the games. Mind controlled enemies and soldiers, kamikaze civilians, the whole 9 yards.

Kumiko 'Delta-4' survived as well, more by luck than any planning by Harry, though she is now paranoid about the whole incident... What happens next? Wait until next time to find out!