Harry Potter: Multiverse Maelstrom: Chapter 6: A Shattered Friendship

The air in the viewing hall was thick with unspoken tension. The last story had ended on a note of chilling victory for the imposter, leaving Albus Dumbledore's reputation in tatters and the audience reeling from the sheer audacity of the manipulation they had witnessed. Lily and James Potter were still comforting the real Harry, who looked pale and shaken from seeing his own trauma so cruelly weaponized.

"Well," Jack said, stretching his arms above his head with a theatrical yawn. "That was a masterclass in political maneuvering and character assassination. Quite the little Slytherin, that one. But I think we've seen enough of him for now."

He snapped his fingers. The dark screen, still displaying the title of the previous story, wiped clean.

"Time to change the channel," Jack announced, his voice suddenly brighter. "The multiverse is vast, and there are infinite stories to tell. The last one was about a stranger taking over Harry's life. This next one..." He paused for effect, a grin spreading across his face. "This one is about Harry Potter himself, pushed to his absolute limit. It's a whole different flavour of chaos."

The screen flickered to life once more, displaying the metadata for a new reality.

Title: Screw Them!

By: White Angel of Auralon

Summary: Harry Potter had enough of the stupidity of the Wizarding World. If they all believed that he was a dark wizard, just because he could talk to snakes, screw them! He didn't need them. And who ever said that all prophecies did come true? (No horcruxes).

Rated: PG-13 (Contains content not suitable for children. Suitable for teens, 13 years and older. May contain moderate violence, coarse language, suggestive material, and/or adult themes such as drug addiction that are contextually justified )

The reaction was immediate, though different from before. The raw, aggressive energy of the title and summary was a stark contrast to the cold, manipulative tone of the last story.

"'Screw Them!'" Sirius Black barked out a laugh, a genuine, appreciative sound. "Now that's a sentiment I can get behind! Attaboy, Harry!"

"Sirius!" Molly Weasley chided, though without her usual heat. The language was still coarse, but the underlying pain in the summary was palpable.

It was the final parenthetical that drew the attention of the room's most powerful wizards. "(No horcruxes)".

Voldemort, who had been observing with a detached, analytical rage, went rigid. His red eyes widened almost imperceptibly. "No... Horcruxes?" he whispered, the words a venomous hiss of disbelief. His very existence, his triumph over death, was built upon them. A reality where they did not exist was an existential threat, a negation of his entire being.

Dumbledore's reaction was just as profound, though far quieter. His face, already etched with the sorrow from the last viewing, seemed to age another decade. Decades of his life—the long hunt, the lonely research, the terrible burden of knowledge, the intricate, soul-staining plan he had built around Harry—all of it was predicated on the existence of those soul anchors. A world without them changed everything. The game was different. The stakes were different. The path to victory was unknown.

"Jack," Dumbledore began, his voice strained. "What does this mean?"

"It means exactly what it says, Albus," Jack replied, his tone unusually serious. "In this particular thread of reality, Tom Riddle either never created his Horcruxes, or he found some other method of prolonging his life. The soul-fragment in Harry's scar does not exist. The prophecy might still be in play, but the fundamental mechanics of your war have been altered. This is a world without Harry's 'destiny' as a sacrificial lamb."

The words sent a shockwave through the room. Lily and James stared at Dumbledore, a dawning, horrified understanding on their faces. Sacrificial lamb? The real Harry felt a cold dread snake its way up his spine, a question he was too afraid to ask forming in his mind. Dumbledore had the grace to look away, unable to meet their eyes.

Before the implications could be fully processed, the story began, the screen showing a dark, dusty, and forgotten classroom somewhere in the upper levels of Hogwarts.

<Chapter 1 Start>

Harry Potter sat in an empty classroom, as far away from the rest of the school as possible. It was just his luck. He had thought that first year had been an exception, that the school couldn't possibly be that dangerous all the time. Now he knew better. If the danger of students being petrified wasn't enough, he could have dealt with that, but now he was shunned by basically the whole school. Even his so-called best friends shunned him. Just because he could speak to snakes.

The atmosphere in the viewing hall plummeted. The audience remembered the Dueling Club, the shock and fear on the students' faces as the snake reared up before Justin Finch-Fletchley. They remembered the whispers, the suspicion. But this... this was a darker reflection of that memory.

"Shunned by the whole school?" McGonagall murmured, her heart aching for the lonely boy on the screen. "Surely not... the teachers, his friends..."

But the text was merciless, and its next accusation was the most devastating of all.

"...Even his so-called best friends shunned him."

A bomb going off in the room would have been less shocking.

"NO!" The cry was a harmony of pure, agonized denial from three different voices.

The real Harry, Ron, and Hermione all shot to their feet as if electrocuted.

"I would NEVER!" Ron shouted, his face pale with horror and fury. "He's my best mate! I was scared, yeah! I was scared of the snake! But I never—I would never abandon him!"

"Never!" Hermione echoed, her eyes swimming with tears of hurt and outrage. "We were worried! We were trying to figure it out! I went to the library to help him, not to condemn him! How could this story... how could it say something so awful, so untrue?"

Harry looked between his two best friends, his heart pounding. "I know," he said, his voice thick with emotion. "I know you wouldn't. This... this isn't real. It's not what happened." He looked at them, his friends, his family, who had stood by him through everything, and felt a fierce, protective love that was a world away from the cold isolation of the boy on the screen.

Ron had accused him of being dark for being a parselmouth. He didn't even know what it meant before Hermione, in her best know-it-all attitude, had declared that she had read in one of her stupid books that speaking parseltongue was a sign of a dark wizard.

The character assassination was brutal and precise.

"A dark wizard?" Ron repeated, his voice trembling with rage. "I told him it wasn't normal! I told him it was the mark of Salazar Slytherin! I was a stupid, prejudiced kid who was scared out of his wits, but I never, ever thought he was dark!"

"And my... my 'best know-it-all attitude'?" Hermione's voice was a whisper of pure pain. "I was trying to give him information! Context! I thought knowledge would help us understand what was happening! The book said it was a trait of dark wizards, yes, but that doesn't mean I believed he was one!" Her composure finally broke, and she began to cry, burying her face in her hands.

Ginny Weasley immediately rushed to her side, wrapping an arm around her. Molly and Arthur looked at their son with expressions of profound sympathy and anger on his behalf. The Weasley family was a fortress of loyalty, and this story was laying siege to its very foundations.

"This is an 'Angst' fic," Jack interjected, his voice soft. "It's a genre of fanfiction that focuses on drama, tragedy, and emotional pain. To achieve that, it often exaggerates conflicts or makes characters act in ways they wouldn't in canon—what the fans call 'Out of Character' or 'OOC'—to isolate the protagonist and maximize their suffering." His explanation, meant to be clinical, did little to soothe the raw, personal hurt of the trio.

Harry was certain that it was absolute rubbish, but of course she had believed the books over common sense and logic. And here she had complained that wizards lacked it just last year when she had worked out the Potions riddle that Snape had set up as a protection for the Stone. The students were really nasty to him and he didn't really dare going anywhere but to classes and eating one or two meals a day in the Great Hall. At least the teachers prevented the worst abuse he had to face.

"He's all alone," Lily whispered, her hand covering her mouth. Her heart broke for this version of her son, a boy who had found a home only to have it turn on him, a boy who had found a family only to be abandoned. It was a parent's worst nightmare.

"The worst abuse?" James repeated, his voice dangerously low. "What does that mean? What are they doing to him?"

The screen painted a grim picture: a montage of scenes showing the alternate Harry walking down corridors, students jeering, throwing stink pellets, and whispering loudly behind their hands. The loneliness was a palpable thing, a gray cloud that seemed to follow him everywhere.

Thankfully he had managed to get his trunk with all his things out of the Gryffindor dorm the first night that his house's members had shown their displeasure with his new-found ability. This classroom and the bathroom next door now served as his bedroom and a place where he could at least wash up.

The Gryffindors in the room—past and present—erupted in protest.

"NEVER!" a red-faced Oliver Wood bellowed. "We are the House of the brave and the loyal! We would never, ever turn on one of our own! Let alone Harry Potter, our Seeker!"

"Our house is a family," McGonagall stated, her voice shaking with a fury she rarely showed. "The idea that my Gryffindors would bully a fellow student out of his own dormitory is a monstrous falsehood! The Fat Lady would never stand for it! The portraits would report it! I would know within an hour!"

"But in this reality, you don't," Dumbledore said softly, his eyes filled with a deep sadness. "In this world, it seems, the entire castle has failed him."

The only showers he had access to, if he was careful and made sure to not be seen, were the ones down in the Quidditch locker rooms. But it was hard to sneak down there without being stopped by a teacher. After all, he was actually afraid to train with the Gryffindor team. While they mostly shunned him, not throwing him from the team because they simply didn't have a better seeker, he had noticed that Fred and George's bludgers were becoming more dangerous than ever before to him. Only his flying skills protected him from really bad injuries.

If the accusation against Ron and Hermione was a dagger, this was a battle-axe to the heart of the Weasley family.

Fred and George Weasley stared at the screen, their faces identical masks of slack-jawed horror. The playful, mischievous light in their eyes was gone, replaced by a look of deep, profound hurt.

"Us?" Fred said, his voice barely a croak.

"Trying to hurt Harry?" George finished, looking as though he might be sick. "With Bludgers?"

"That's the most disgusting lie yet!" Arthur Weasley roared, on his feet now, his face purple with rage. "My sons would sooner cut off their own arms than deliberately harm Harry Potter! He is one of us! He is family!"

Molly was openly sobbing, shaking her head in violent denial. "No, no, no. Not my boys. They love Harry."

"We do," Fred and George said in unison, looking over at the real Harry with desperate, pleading eyes, as if seeking reassurance against the vile accusation they had just heard.

"I know," Harry said, his voice thick. "I know you do. You're the best Beaters in the world. You've saved my skin more times than I can count." His words were a balm, but the poison of the story still hung in the air.

He honestly considered leaving Hogwarts. ... He didn't want to be the target of hurtful hexes and pranks all the time with no teacher helping him. They all turned a blind eye. The only thing they did was reprimanding others when they clearly broke the rules in front of them. Except for Snape of course. Otherwise they gave him platitudes that they couldn't do anything. ... And Madam Pomfrey always looked at him as if he was at fault for all the times he had to go to the hospital wing when the spells were too bad to deal with them on his own.

The collective guilt of the Hogwarts staff in the room was a tangible force. This story was a catalogue of their failures, exaggerated and twisted, but rooted in a kernel of truth they couldn't deny. They hadn't done enough to stop the whispers. They hadn't done enough to support him.

Madam Pomfrey, who had been summoned, looked deeply offended. "As if he was at fault? I have never, in fifty years of healing, blamed a child for their own injuries! My concern is for the patient, always! This is slander!"

Snape's reaction was complex. He was singled out as an exception, which in this context was almost a compliment to his consistency. But the narrative of a suffering, bullied Potter, abandoned by all... it stirred an ancient, buried memory of a dark-haired boy by a lakeside, being tormented while a red-haired girl tried to intervene. He pushed the memory down, his face an unreadable mask of contempt.

The only question was where to go. He would need money and that meant going to Gringotts. ... He had to do all the chores for the Dursleys, so doing them for himself wouldn't be too difficult. ... with twelve years nobody in a supermarket would look twice at him if he bought normal groceries...

The sheer, heartbreaking practicality of the twelve-year-old's plan was devastating. He wasn't dreaming of adventure; he was planning for survival. He was thinking about chores and grocery shopping.

"My son," James whispered, his voice raw with pain. "The heir to the Potter and Black fortunes, and he's worrying about how to buy a bottle of milk without arousing suspicion."

"He sounds just like me when I ran away," Sirius said, his earlier bravado gone, replaced by a hollow sadness. "The same thoughts. Where to go. How to get money. How to survive. No kid should have to think like that."

The one question was how to get away. Well, he had managed to secure his broom and Hedwig had an excellent sense of orientation. She would be able to direct him to Diagon Alley. ... He had a backpack that was large enough for those things. His best bet to not be seen was to fly at night. ... Plan in mind he started sorting through the books he had and left those he deemed not necessary back in his trunk. Like the whole set of Lockhart books.

Amidst the heavy, sorrowful atmosphere, this one line prompted a collective snort of laughter.

Suddenly, in a puff of periwinkle-blue smoke, a wizard with wavy blonde hair, dazzlingly white teeth, and robes of a forget-me-not blue appeared, striking a dramatic pose. Gilderoy Lockhart.

"Did I hear my name?" he asked, his voice booming. "Fear not! Five-time winner of Witch Weekly's Most-Charming-Smile Award is here! No doubt you require my expertise in dealing with some foul creature or another!" He beamed at the assembled crowd, completely oblivious to the grim mood.

Snape looked as if he had just been forced to swallow a lemon whole. Dumbledore managed a weak, tired smile. The sudden, absurd appearance of Lockhart was a surreal moment of levity in a sea of angst.

"We are viewing an alternate reality, Gilderoy," Dumbledore explained patiently. "One in which Mr. Potter has decided to discard your entire published works as... unnecessary."

Lockhart's smile faltered for a fraction of a second. "Nonsense! My books are essential! Required reading! Clearly, the boy is deeply troubled and not thinking straight!" He then spotted his own face on the cover of a book on the screen and began preening again. "Excellent cover photo, though!"

It was one in the morning and Harry had written a letter to the teachers and the students, telling them to basically screw themselves and that he had enough of their abuse. His backpack was filled with bread, a bottle of water, some apples and two slices of meat, wrapped in a napkin. ... He climbed onto the broom and then shot out of the window, away from the place that had proven to be as bad as Privet Drive.

The final scene played out on the screen. A small, determined figure, silhouetted against the moon, flying away from the magnificent, star-lit silhouette of Hogwarts castle. The final line—"...as bad as Privet Drive"—was a gut punch.

The Hogwarts staff looked devastated.

"He sees the school... he sees his home... as no better than the house where he was abused," McGonagall whispered, tears shining in her eyes. "We failed him. In this world, we have utterly and completely failed that boy."

Dumbledore bowed his head, the weight of another reality's failure pressing down on him. Hogwarts was meant to be a sanctuary. For this Harry, it had become just another cage to escape.

Lily and James Potter wrapped their arms around the real Harry, holding him tight as if to physically prevent this alternate reality from touching him. Harry, for his part, looked from the lonely figure on the screen to the faces of his real friends and family around him—to Ron's fierce loyalty, to Hermione's unwavering support, to the Weasleys' unconditional love, to Sirius and Remus's fierce protectiveness. The world on the screen was a nightmare, but it was not his. He had been shunned and suspected, yes, but he had never, not for a moment, been truly alone.

The screen went dark, the image of the boy flying away from the castle burned into everyone's retinas. The silence that followed was not one of shock, but of deep, profound sorrow.

<Chapter 1 End> was displayed on the screen.

PS: the link to the fanfiction is here don't forget to read it for yourself: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10322302/1/Screw-Them