The Things You See In A Graveyard

NOTE:
This idea wouldn't leave me alone. Going to give this a shot & use it as a prototype for a voting system too.

1.

"You have been taught to duel, haven't you?" Voldemort mocked.

Harry couldn't concentrate on the words. Voldemort was saying something. There was a flash of a spell being cast. He tried to raise his wand. He could feel it in his hand, but his muscles didn't want to work. His head swam. Even in his confused state he could recognize the Killing Curse when he saw it.

Time slowed as the bright emerald orb connected with his chest. Numbness radiated from the spot it had hit. He could feel the nothingness streak through his body along every nerve. It made the sudden headache so much worse. His skull felt like it was cracking open while the rest of his consciousness simply disconnected.

Then.

It stopped.

Feeling returned to his body, the headache faded, and time began to flow once more. Only this time, in reverse. He watched as the Killing Curse streaked back toward Voldemort. Something that looked like the ghostly shade he had encountered in his First Year after melting Quirrell was attached to it.

Harry felt the pain in his body fade followed by the fugue that had wrapped around his brain. Voldemort didn't seem worried that the spell was on its way back. In fact, the look on his face was triumphant. The Dark Wizards' mouth moved in a strange way as the Killing Curse was absorbed by his wand.

Time hadn't returned to normal; it was flowing in reverse. The world around him increased in speed. He watched the events of the last few minutes rewind. Voldemort walked back to the cauldron and climbed in. The speed picked up even faster. Harry watched as the entire year played back, this time following Voldemort. The time as a homunculus, the reunion with Barty Crouch Junior, and then further on to the years he spent as a shade.

History blurred around Harry as the speed increased further. Years wandering the forests as something less than a ghost. Possessing Quirrell then days, Nights, weeks, months, and years of darkness. The flow of time slowed as something approached on the horizon.

The graveyard had faded away at some point. Harry floated outside of the flow, watching from a distance. Something in him recognized the village that the timeline now approached. A deep ache in his very being told him this was the night his parents died. This had been where they lived.

His trip through time stopped as his consciousness hovered above his baby self. Once more, for the first time, the Killing Curse hung in the air like a frozen ribbon. A gentle breeze tickled his forehead, right where his scar would one day rest.

"Hey, Boss Man," a playful female voice said.

He turned to see a pale woman. She had long black hair, and her eyes had no iris. The rest of her body was shrouded in a cloak that looked like it had been stitched together from pieces of Dementors. It took him a moment to realize she was floating rather than standing next to him.

"Hello," Harry said cautiously. "Who are you?"

"You don't recognize me?" The woman gasped in false shock.

Harry shook his head. Did he have a head? He looked down and was relieved to see his body was still intact. When he shifted his attention back to the woman she was sitting in a rocking chair happily swaying in the motion.

"How did you do that?" Harry asked.

"We're on Dream Time right now," the woman replied.

"What?" Harry wondered if this was what it felt like to go mad.

"Dream time, how time moves in dreams," she hopped to her feet. "Death uses a variation of it as well. You know." Her stitched cloak was swapped out to an elaborate classical dress. "To sleep! To dream! No more! And in that sleep of death what dreams may come!"

Her clothes changed back into her previous outfit.

"Death?" Harry felt the word heavy on his shoulders.

"Yes, boss?" The woman, Death, asked.

"Why are you calling me that?" Harry asked in reply.

"Boss?" She asked as a leather collar appeared on her neck. "Would you prefer Master?"

"No," Harry shook his head. "I don't like that."

"Shame," she shrugged. "You're my boss. Why wouldn't I call you my boss?"

"How am I your boss?" Harry leaned against the crib. "No, forget that. What is happening?"

"Tommy boy here didn't read the fine print," Death booped Voldemort on the nose. "Horcrux's have a failsafe just in. Good old Herpo wanted to have the option in case he grew tired of immortality and wanted to die. Willingly destroying your own horcrux will undo the spell."

"What is a horcrux?" Harry asked.

"Oh, right," she turned to face him. "Your timeline isn't there yet."

"Everything you're saying is just making me more confused," Harry muttered.

Death was now dressed in a white lab coat with thick-frame glasses. She stood in front of a chalkboard.

"This is a timeline," she said drawing a line on the board. "There are multiple parallel lines," she added more. "You are here," she added a dot to one of the lines. "There is a you on each of these and some are at different points. Jumping from one to another isn't technically time-travel, but it's close enough. In one timeline you became the Master of Death. It is a title, similar to death itself, that isn't bound to a single line. As such, you are the Master of Death and always will be regardless of the timeline. You aren't able to truly claim the mantle until you die, so the power is held in good faith."

Harry pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Great," he muttered. "Wonderful. I'll unpack that later. I mean, what's happening with this?"

He motioned to the scene around him.

"Like I said," she repeated. "The horcrux had a failsafe. That little scar on your forehead held one of the nasty little buggers. Tommy hit you with a Killing Curse, destroying it, and triggered the failsafe. You are the Master of Death, and it came with some unexpected benefits."

Death waved a hand and the room around them splintered into multiple shards of space. Each one was a scene where Voldemort created a horcrux. Harry recognized young Tom Riddle and the diary, but the others were a confusing tableau. People he didn't know killed so that seemingly random artifacts could be used become a horcrux. The latest being an old man that Harry had seen in his dreams months ago.

The various scenes shattered one by one until only the two of them remained. Even the bedroom with baby Harry was gone. Another scene formed around them. Harry recognized the Chamber of Secrets in an instant. His life may have been chaotic, but he would never be able to forget anything about that place.

A young Tom Riddle lay dead on the ground in front of a blank diary. The basilisk flicked its tongue in the air, then nudged the body. It turned to look at Death when the wizard didn't move. She walked over to the snake and petted its nose.

"What's this?" Harry asked.

"The end of Tom Riddle," Death replied.

Harry opened his mouth, then closed it when no words came to mind.

"Doesn't this count as time travel?" Harry asked.

"This is where things get a little weird," she turned to face Harry.

Harry raised his eyebrows at that.

"This timeline needs to heal," she explained. "Technically, you are dead, but your death now happens in a future that hasn't happened yet. Tom Riddle is dead, a body without a soul. His death will cause untold shockwaves in not just time, but in magic. Someone needs to step in to balance things. You are outside of time. The Master of Death, unbound. A soul without a body."

"You want me to take his body?" Harry said.

"Got it in one, boss," Death winked at him. "You won't have to worry about the body burning away while you're in it either. Your soul adapted to the horcrux so you can slide right in like you own the place."

"Any other options?" Harry asked weakly.

"Renounce your title as Master of Death and your soul will be placed in the Well of Life," she explained ticking off the options. "Be reincarnated." She paused. "Or you can hang out with me and handle the other side of things."

"The Well of Life?" Harry asked.

"Most people have two options, reincarnation or the well," Death explained. "The Well is the source from which new souls are formed. It's like pouring a glass of water in the ocean. When a new life is made and the glass is filled from the ocean."

"Wow," Harry muttered.

"You would not believe how many people spend their lives trying to figure how that all works," Death laughed. "Need a minute?"

Harry nodded. He was torn. Should he take over the life of Tom Riddle, be reborn, fade away, or see what being Death was all about? Honestly, the third option wasn't something that appealed at all. He still needed to make a choice.