He was 11 years old and standing in the Great Hall together with Anna, Hermione and Ron in front of his Grandmother waiting for the sorting.

When he heard “Harry Snape-Dumbledore”, he went to his Grandmother who put the Sorting Hat on his head.

‘Oh, you again Harry, and a new name again. Oh my, where shall I put you? I can put you in Gryffindor of course, Slytherin would be great as well, but I think you are predestined for MERLIN’

He gave the Hat back to McGonagall and walked over to the Merlin table, where Anna greeted him happily. When he threw a glance at the Head Table, he saw that his parents and grandparents smiled fondly at him.

And Harry was back in the Merlin common room. He put his head in his hands and groaned. Why had this to happen here? Ginny put her hands over his and asked worriedly, “Harry, was that a new memory?”

“Yes”, Harry mumbled, glancing around self-consciously to see if he had again managed to attract everyone’s attention and letting out the air he was holding when he noticed that everyone seemed to be otherwise occupied. “I just watched my third sorting. Sorry, I have to return to our quarters now; will you come with me?”

“Of course, Harry, are you well enough to walk? Should I get someone for you?” Harry slightly shook his head and asked,

“Ginny, I’m sorry; I’ll flash us, okay? Just grab my tail feathers please.” He transformed and flashed them away. In a flash of ice, they arrived in Harry’s bedroom in his parents’ quarters. Harry just lay down on his bed and mumbled,

“I’m sorry Ginny.” Ginny sat next to him and gave him a small kiss on his forehead, before she resumed stroking his cheeks.

“Harry, I’ll go and tell your Grandfather that we’re here, alright?”

“Yes and get the strawberry potion from him please.” She threw him a confused glance and left the room. Needless to say that Dumbledore was stunned when she suddenly appeared out of Harry’s room.

“Sorry Professor, but Harry had a memory vision and felt unwell, so he flashed us back into his room. He wants a strawberry potion or something like that.”

“Granddad, Harry is very warm; I have to get mommy or daddy for him,” Marina announced and was on her way in the direction of the connecting door to her father’s office. Dumbledore and Ginny had to try hard not to laugh. The Headmaster called his excited granddaughter back, fetched a potion from Severus’ lab and handed it to Ginny.

“I can take over though, if you have to return to your house,” he said to Ginny questioningly.

“No, Headmaster, please, may I stay with Harry for a while?” she begged and Dumbledore smiled amusedly. He had not yet forgotten Harry’s outburst in the Hospital Wing 19 years ago when he was delirious from a basilisk’s bite and had claimed Ginny as his girlfriend.

cocoCOCOcoco

“Yes my child, you may – at least until his mother returns and sends you away.” And Ginny went back to give Harry his potion and cuddle him for a while. Harry felt very happy having her here; it was the first time for him to be alone with Ginny after coming back from the past. They talked about several topics, and Harry asked about her family.

“By the way, Ginny, what are the twins doing? They have finished Hogwarts this summer, haven’t they?” Ginny sighed and on Harry’s enquiring look answered,

“Through my father’s connections, they got jobs at the ministry. They are working on wand registration and detection of magic in muggle areas, and on one hand I think they are lucky, because they are able to work together the whole day, but on the other hand I can see that they are very unhappy because they are not interested in their jobs at all.” Harry frowned and she added,

“You see, they have spent a lot of time thinking of jokes and didn’t invest enough time in their studies; therefore their NEWTs were not very good. I don’t know how I could help them.” Now Harry grinned a little and seeing the confused glance she shot at him, he told her,

“Don’t worry, Gin. I know how to help them. In my old time line, they had their own joke shop in Diagon Alley, and this is exactly what I am going to suggest to them the next time I see them.” Ginny was stunned hearing this and carefully asked,

“But to do something like that they would need quite a lot of money in the first place, wouldn’t they?” Harry gave her a small smile and said,

“I helped them in my old time line, and I promise that I am going to help them this time as well. Just don’t tell your other brothers or your mother about it please.”

cocoCOCOcoco

When Lily returned to their quarters, Marina immediately sent her to Harry’s room, and she found Ginny sitting on the edge of Harry’s bed with Harry fast asleep, his head on her lap.

“I’m sorry Professor,” Ginny apologized immediately, and when Lily looked at her inquiringly she added, “…for being in your home uninvited.” Lily shook her head.

“You don’t think I would mind you being here when Harry obviously needed you, do you? As Harry’s friend, you are always welcome in our home. Anytime,” she answered and added, “We are going to have dinner here tonight; would you like to join us?” Ginny smiled at her and said,

“I would like that very much, thank you Professor. But do you think Harry will be well enough to join us?” Lily nodded positively. Dinner took quite a time, because Lily made Harry eat everything she had put on his plate, which was not much, but at least much more than Harry would have eaten otherwise. When he finally finished eating, Harry asked innocently,

“Mom, may I accompany Ginny to Merlin House?” Lily glared at him and said,

“I don’t think you should do such a thing, but we can ask Poppy’s toy. Come; sit here onto the sofa for a moment.” Harry sat down and Lily put the blue thermometer, which looked like a toy under his tongue. When she took it out after a minute, it flared red, and Poppy’s voice could be heard, ‘You can’t go anywhere so go to bed instantly.’ Harry groaned, Lily glared at him, and Ginny threw him a smile and said,

“Come on sweetie; let’s go to your room. Professor, may I stay with him for a few minutes?” Lily smiled at her and said,

“Yes, but only a few minutes; he should try to rest. I will come and throw you out in a quarter of an hour.”

cocoCOCOcoco

Ginny nodded and pulled Harry into his room, made him lie down and tucked him in, sitting next to him on the edge of his bed. Harry enjoyed Ginny’s presence a lot, but he wondered, ‘What kind of relationship do we have in this time line? In my old time line I was about to ask her to be my girlfriend, but in this time line I don’t know,’ Harry thought and – maybe because of the fever not exactly his normal self – decided to ask her.

“Um… Ginny… eh… you see… I don’t remember a lot from this new time line, and…eh…. you know, in my old time line you were kind of my girlfriend, um… but I don’t know about this time line, but…” Ginny interrupted him and smiled.

“It’s not exactly as if you had asked me so far, but…” Now Harry interrupted, her,

“But you wouldn’t mind if I asked you?” Ginny smiled fondly at him and suggested,

“Why don’t you just try and ask me?” Harry sat up in his bed and asked,

“Ginny, I would like you to become my girlfriend. What do you think?” Before he could lie back again, Ginny pulled him in a big hug, gave him a kiss on the cheek and said,

“I would like that very much Harry, thank you!” They were just repeating their hug kissing each other, when Lily entered the room and asked exasperatedly,

“What are you doing here? Do you call this resting?” Harry caressed Ginny and said softly,

“Don’t worry Ginny, everything is alright,” before he turned to his mother and happily told her,

“I’m sorry, mom, but Ginny has just agreed to be my girlfriend!” Lily glanced at them, surprised but also very happy, that her son had found a girlfriend whom she liked very much and said,

“Congratulations, you two, that’s really good news tonight! I am very happy for you. But nevertheless I am afraid Ginny has to leave for tonight; you may come back any time tomorrow to visit Harry.”

cocoCOCOcoco

As soon as Ginny had left the room, Severus came in and sat next to his wife on the edge of Harry’s bed.

“Harry what happened today? Can you tell us what your memories were about?” Harry sighed.

“The first one, this morning, was about a Quidditch game; I was looking for the snitch when someone fell from his broom; the second one in the afternoon was about my third sorting and the third one was about playing with the Weasley kids when I was about three or four years old.”

“Alright,” Severus sighed and seemed somewhat relieved. “So all memories were quite normal ones. You know, there could be memories where you just don’t know who the people are or where you are. In this case it is important that you don’t panic, but talk to Lily or me and ask us, or Granny or Granddad, or even Aunt Poppy, as you used to call her in the new time line; each of them would be able to help you my son.” Harry gave his father a big smile.

“Um… about these memories… Um… is it possible to prevent them? Sorry, don’t take that wrongly, I don’t mean completely, I just mean for example during Quidditch training, or during the night at least for a few hours to be able to sleep.” Severus sighed and said pensively,

“During the night shouldn’t be a problem. With Dreamless sleep potion you shouldn’t get any new memories. Like last night; when you were awake after the first memory, I gave you a dreamless sleep potion. But while you are awake… hmm… Maybe I can develop a potion. Let me think about it Harry. I will try to do some research on a potion like dreamless sleep but without you sleeping. If you are well enough you might be able to help me however.” Harry beamed at him.

“Thank you so much Dad!”

“You are very welcome Harry. Now try to sleep; we are just outside; if you need us, call and we will be here. Good night Harry.” Severus gave Harry a kiss on the forehead and noticed the heat he was radiating.

“Harry, did you take the strawberry potion after each of your memories?” he asked, slightly shocked.

Harry nodded and said sadly, “Yes, at least after the first two memories, but I don’t think it works very well.” Severus threw Lily a questioning glance, and she said,

“He has had a fever practically constantly during the last two days since the first memory in spite of taking the potion twice today.” Severus frowned and asked,

“When did he get the potion for the last time?” Lily shrugged and asked,

“Harry?” Harry thought for a moment and said,

“Justs shortly before you came home, Mom.”

“So that’s about four hours ago,” Lily said and added, “But when I took his temperature after dinner, it was well over 40 degrees.” Severus frowned and said,

“Now Harry, I will give you a strong fever reducer and a dreamless sleep potion, and I’ll stay here with you tonight. If you have any problems, just wake me up, alright?” He left the room and returned a minute later with two potions he handed to Harry, then helped him to lie down and tucked him in.” Severus enlarged Harry’s bed a little and lay down next to him; he stayed with Harry for the whole night, but Harry didn’t even stir, and in the morning the toy thermometer displayed a green number and told him he could go to breakfast.

cocoCOCOcoco

After breakfast Severus came to Merlin table and said, “Come on Harry; Albus is taking over my morning lessons, so that I can spend some time with you. First we will go to see Poppy.” Harry groaned but looked gratefully at his father. When they arrived at the Hospital Wing, Severus told Pomfrey about Harry’s problems and asked what could be done about it and how long and in which intensity she thought these memory visions would occur. Poppy’s face had become very serious and she said,

“As far as I know, these memories could continue to come back until about the next summer, but of course I don’t really know; it is only an assumption. Moreover, as the memories cover a time span of sixteen years, I can imagine that they will become more frequent, and depending on each memory, it will be more or less intensive. But you cannot give him a stronger fever reducer so often every day and over such a long time; he will have to live with the ‘strawberry potion’, and only when his fever is much too high like yesterday evening, you may give him a stronger potion.” Harry moaned and asked,

“But how am I supposed to attend classes with my head in a white dull cloud all the time?” She glanced at him sadly and answered,

“I’m sorry Harry, but maybe you won’t be able to do a lot; although probably it won’t be as bad all the time as it was yesterday.”

“May I attend Quidditch practise?” She sighed and said,

“When your blue toy tells you it’s all right, then you may.” During the next few days, Harry spent much time in their quarters dealing with very frequent and intensive visions about his second childhood. His parents had taken turns staying with him, while Dumbledore was covering their classes. Ginny turned up every evening after dinner and spent the time until curfew talking and even studying together with Harry, who then helped her with her Potions and Transfiguration homework. On Saturday morning, he finally felt better and joined his friends for the meals in the Great Hall.

To keep from getting depressed over his memory problems, he had thought intensively about pranks, and this was exactly the right time to play a prank on everyone. As soon as he entered the Great Hall at lunchtime, he wished himself invisible and contemplated if he should include the teachers in the prank or not.

He immediately went over to Merlin table and quickly wished each single person in the Great Hall as well as everyone entering the Great Hall through any of the doors to become invisible. In spite of the charm, he – and the teachers – would be able to see everyone. At first, he wanted to make everything invisible for the teachers as well, but finally he decided against it in order not to have all the fun just for himself, and to share it with his parents. As soon as they would leave the Great Hall, they would become visible again automatically.

He called Ginny, Anna and Julia to the other side of Merlin table, pulled them over to the seats next to him and whispered to them what he had done. Ginny glared at him and said,

“And you can see everyone and have a lot of fun, right?” Harry grinned, invisible to her of course and whished for Ginny, Julia and Anna to be able to see everyone. Then he quickly walked over to his father and quietly explained to him and Dumbledore what was wrong with the students, who were squeaking, yelping and bumping into each other throughout the Great Hall, so that the teachers were already wondering what was wrong.

The four friends at Merlin table had a lot of fun watching the other students and had to try hard not to laugh too loud. Harry proceeded in telling a joke so that they would be able to laugh properly together with other friends at their table.

cocoCOCOcoco

“Dad, please, may I go to Quidditch practise after breakfast today?” he asked his father on Sunday morning. Severus frowned and said,

“Alright, but I will watch the practise.” Harry threw his father a big smile and beamed,

“Thank you Dad.” After breakfast in the Great Hall, they went to the Quidditch pitch and Harry addressed his two teams.

“I’m glad we can resume our practise today. We need a new keeper for the second team. Therefore, I would like you to bring the keepers of your House team for a keeper tryout on Sunday in two weeks time. Unfortunately, I was sick for the whole week and couldn’t have tryouts during the week; therefore I have asked our Merlin keeper to assist our second team today. But he is not on the team; he is only assisting today, and I can ensure you that he is very good. As you know, we have our first match next Sunday against the Teachers team. During this week before the match, we’ll practise every evening straight after dinner. It may be that I cannot be here for every practise, but from now on Ginny Weasley will be my Deputy Captain, so even if I am not here, she will lead the training. And the last item, before we start: Please excuse my father; he is watching today not as a spy for the Teachers team, but because my medical condition is not very good yet and otherwise I wouldn’t have been allowed to play today.”

It took Harry only 30 minutes to catch the snitch and he gathered the teams for a short break in which he called the second team’s seeker over and told him to train catching the snitch, while he would be observing the practise from the ground. With that, he released the snitch again and sat next to his father in the stands, who shot him an astonished glance. This time the game lasted nearly two hours, until the reserve seeker caught the snitch, but in the meantime Harry had made many mental notes for advising the team after the practise. The Merlin keeper had done very well – hopefully he would win the tryout, but it would be unfair to just keep him without giving the other house teams the possibility of getting their keeper onto the team. Suddenly Ron, who was the first team’s keeper asked,

“Do we have to do tryouts at all? The Merlin keeper, I mean Tobias has done so well today; I watched him, and he is really very good – couldn’t we just keep him?” Harry sighed and said,

“Frankly speaking I think so too. The only reason for me not to decide this from the beginning is, that he is from my own house, and that I don’t want the players from the other houses to think that I favour my own house. What do the others think about this matter?” The Slytherin team captain spoke up,

“He is really very good; Look at the score; he held everything today. I can’t imagine that my keeper would have been able to hold everything. Therefore I think we don’t need tryouts.”

“Alright; thank you, Zabini. Now, what do the Ravenclaws and Gryffindors think?” A girl who looked like a very small second year from Ravenclaw said,

“Why don’t we just vote? Those who think we don’t need tryouts raise their hands please!” Everyone except from the Merlin keeper and Harry raised their hands. Harry sighed contently.

“Thank you very much everyone. Now Tobias, will you accept the position of keeper for our reserve team?” He beamed at Harry and answered,

“Of course; thank you very much everyone!”

cocoCOCOcoco

When Harry finally dismissed the team, it was already lunchtime. Severus put an arm around Harry and said,

“As you know it is Sunday, and on Sundays we always have a family lunch at home. Go and change; I’ll wait here for you.” Harry thought for a moment and said,

“Wait Dad, let me just grab my things, I will take a shower and change at home. Where is Julia?”

“She has already gone to the changing rooms, but we don’t have to wait for her; she’ll be all right.”

When they were sitting at lunch, Harry saw his first memory for the day.

“Don’t wowwy Mommy, Hawwy’s awwight. Daddy’s vewwy funny. Next time Mommy fy wif Daddy too.”

With that, Harry was back to the present, smiled at the worried faces around table and told them about the cute memory he had seen, before his father handed him a strawberry potion. When lunch was finished, Harry went to lie down on the sofa, Marina climbing onto him only a second later. Cuddling his little sister Harry slept for an hour, before he was captured in the next memory.

Toddlers Harry and Julia were running around the living room in their quarters, while Severus and Lily were sitting on the sofa in front of the fireplace discussing what to do.

“Severus, do you really have to work today?”

“I’m sorry Lily, but I have to try to invent a better potion to help Harry as fast as possible; the other potion obviously doesn’t work, although he is trying to hide it; let me work for let’s say two hours; afterwards we can do what you like.”

“All right, Severus. Can we go to Hogsmeade? I would like to go to the book store.” Severus hugged her and gave her a kiss, before he got up, raced after the children only to capture each of them in his arms, and said,

“Be good to mummy; in two hours we will go to Hogsmeade, and if you behave, you will get a new book.”

“Oh, yeah, I want de one of Hawwy wif de dwagon” Julia shouted happily, while Harry said,

“No, I want a book about plants for healing potions, which we can find in the forest.”

“No Hawwy, want book Hawwy can wead to Juia.”

“Harry! Harry, HARRY!” Suddenly Harry was shaken awoke and groaned.

“Oh Marina, get off of me please, my head hurts!” He leaned back and tried to sleep but was startled when a cool hand touched his forehead. When he opened his eyes, his mother was sitting next to him on the edge of the sofa smiling worriedly at him. Now Marina came, a book in her hands and said,

“Harry, I’ll read a book for you – you know my favourite book of the boy called like you and the dragon!” Harry could only groan, and Lily said softly,

“I’m sorry, my sweetie, but Harry is not well enough to have a book read to him; could you get Daddy for me for a moment please?” A minute later Severus rushed over to them with a concerned look and asked,

“Another memory?” But before Harry could even nod, he was pulled in the next memory.

Harry, Anna and Julia were straying through a corridor at Hogwarts, carefully watching left and right, and Julia was reading a parchment. They seemed to be about ten years old, Julia a little younger of course.

“Now Julia, does the map show anyone nearby?” Anna asked and Julia shrugged.

“I’m still looking for Filch and Mrs. Norris, but I can’t find them. Here, maybe you have better eyes.” Harry laughed.

“You don’t have to search for them; you can find them with a spell.”

“And how do you know that?” Anna asked. “And more importantly, how are we going to do the spell without a wand? None of us has a wand yet.” Harry smiled and wished to see Mrs. Norris on the map, and suddenly the map re-centred itself and Mrs. Norris appeared a little ahead of the children.

“Alright. Let’s fix it here, and Harry can charm it to hit her,” Julia suggested, and the girls fixed a bucket filled with ice-cold water to the ceiling. Now Harry wished the bucket to empty itself just above Mrs. Norris, and the three mischievously grinning students ran away. A few minutes later splashing sounds and angry cat’s meowing from far away penetrated their ears. Grinning they ran until they reached their quarters in the dungeons only to draw a very suspicious look from Lily.

Harry slowly opened his eyes and searched for black eyes to ask, “Can I get a potion please?”, and Severus nodded and held out the phial for him immediately.

cocoCOCOcoco

“Severus, let’s get Poppy to check on him; maybe she can do something else,” Lily suggested and floo-called Poppy, who was at Harry’s side within a minute and said,

“I am sorry, but I cannot do anything else. I even went to St. Mungo’s yesterday to consult the healers who deal with people who are affected by memory charms, but nobody seems to have ever dealt with such an amount of memories returning, so they couldn’t help me at all. The only thing I can think of is a potion Severus could develop with the effects of the dreamless sleep potion, but without the sleeping part and without being addictive. I mean something to suppress any emerging memories; so that he could have certain fixed times during the day without disturbing memories and fevers and would have to deal with the visions only during the night, when he is asleep anyway. I am very sorry, but that’s the only method I can think of to make the situation a bit easier for him.” Severus sighed and said,

“Harry already suggested such a potion, because he wants to play Quidditch but is afraid of having memories while he is flying. So I have already started with the research while I was staying at home with Harry, and I hope to have a potion in a few days.”

“Severus, I can take your classes for the week, if you want to stay with Harry and research your potion at the same time. We can talk to Albus about it at dinner.” Dumbledore agreed of course, and while Harry was mostly staying at home except for breakfast in the Great Hall, either sleeping, reading or playing with Marina, Severus worked on Harry’s potion nearly around the clock. On Friday morning, he handed Harry a phial.

“Here Harry, I don’t know if it works, we just have to try. If you tried it now, you should be all right for about four hours I would assume.”

“If I take it now, will I be able to take another one before dinner?” Harry asked hopefully thinking of Quidditch practise. Severus frowned.

“Yes, it would be possible, but you also need your memories to come back, and it would be best to let them come back in the evening or at night.”

“Oh, I was just thinking about Quidditch practise; you know I couldn’t even go once this week.”

cocoCOCOcoco

“Maybe you will be better today just by drinking this potion; let’s wait and see.” Harry downed the potion and gagged. It tasted horrible. But he didn’t get any memories during the day and was even allowed to go to Quidditch training, which was the last before the match against the teachers on Sunday. Of course, the night was horrible, and he had to endure one memory after the next. Fortunately, the memories of his second childhood all seemed to be good memories; there was not even one memory he didn’t enjoy while he was watching. Severus was staying with Harry as he had always done recently, and Harry only had to groan for him to wake up and care about Harry. Unfortunately, in the morning he had not yet recovered from the night and decided not to take any potion that day in order to have a better night without so many memories and be well again the next morning to play Quidditch. Fortunately, this theory worked, and he felt much better on Sunday morning.