Disclaimer: This all belongs to J.K.Rowling and J.R.R Tolkein- I'm just borrowing them.

A/N: This is very short, amateur and purely for fun.

Chapter One- Down The Plughole

“Hi, my name’s Violette Angelique Gabriella LeLonde!”

For the second time in his life, Harry found himself standing upon the platform of a train station, which was disturbingly reminiscent of Kings Cross. The only difference was that this time the place was considerably busier and he found himself wondering whether it was really just an extended metaphor. He also hadn’t arrived after an epic encounter with an evil Dark Lord.

No, this time it was an exploding cauldron that had defeated Harry Potter, Head of the Department of Aurors and prior to his now very dead state- The Boy Who Lived. It was all very annoying. He hadn’t gone near one of the things for years, and then when he does- “BWAM!”

Years of hard work, defeating Voldemort and surviving the woeful time when his children had been going through the Terrible Twos were wasted. Snape was definitely laughing in his grave, he’d probably mock Harry when he saw him. Great.

He could practically see the headlines now, front page of the Prophet- “Hung Over Saviour Commits Suicide”. It would probably be used as part of an education class on the Dangers of Alcohol at Hogwarts for years after. How embarrassing.

Even though there were plenty of happy groups greeting new arrivals, there didn’t seem to be a greeting party for him. When he was younger this might have given him a twang of hurt and disappointment but now he shrugged it off with no more than a grumbled, “Ungrateful gits”.

There was really no reason to wait around and listen to people laughing, crying or panicking over where they had put their train ticket. So he boarded the train in front of him, which was pleasantly quiet compared to the others. He didn’t give much thought as to why it would be quieter. After all, everyone here was dead so they were all going to same place.

Right?

“Wrong!” said Dumbledore happily. He was sitting on a bench, next to Snape and staring intently through his half moon specs at the paper he was holding.

“What?” snapped Snape, glaring at the brightly dressed wizard. The after life had done nothing to tone down Dumbledore’s dress sense, and nor had it substantially affected Snape’s typically cheerful demeanour.

“That word on the crossword. You got it wrong. Harry Potter isn’t the answer to ‘3 down, someone really annoying”. It doesn’t even fit. It should be Amy Seru.”

“Who?” Snape asked, shutting the puzzle book.

“I’m led to believe they are a strange cult of evil teenage girls.” Albus simply said, as if it answered everything. He settled back onto the bench, which was strangely clean and graffiti free, and folded his arms.

Snape stared at him, certain that after all these years he had finally and completely cracked. Lost all his marbles, they had mercilessly rolled off never to be found again. Any moment now he would start drooling…

“Where is he?” said a motherly looking redhead impatiently. She was wearing simple robes, and her pleasing face was currently cloaked by the concern she was clearly feeling.

“Don’t worry, he’ll be here,” replied her husband reassuringly and with absolute certainty. He didn’t actually feel nearly as calm as he was projecting to everyone else. If his son got on the wrong train…well, he didn’t know what would happen. Was that even possible?

“Yeah, it’ll be fine.” Sirius casually agreed. He turned his head sharply when someone with very familiar messy hair walked onto the train. The one opposite the small crowd waiting for him.

“Oh shit!”

As the train rolled off, Harry was starting to regret his choice of compartment. It had turned out that the train was busier than it looked from the outside and he had ended up walking all the way to the back of the train. The girl already sitting in the last compartment had seemed normal enough despite the way she kept staring into a handheld mirror. So he had sat down and started reading his newspaper.

Which had turned out to be a mistake. She was definitely not normal. And she did not stop talking.

Harry sighed, it seemed he was pre-destined to share his compartments with strange people. It had started with a gangly ginger, Harry snickered when he thought of the outraged look Ron would have if he heard that. Then there was Lupin, who was a werewolf. Nothing strange about that. Now there was her.

“I’m an elf, you know.” She giggled, and Harry inched back in his chair when she fluttered her abnormally long eyelashes at him.

“Really?” he asked, disinterested. She didn’t look like any house elf he had ever seen. Very tall, compared to him anyway and flowing locks of hair so red it had to be charmed. Or possibly made by those muggle dyes he had seen his aunt use. Maybe she was confused and just meant that she really liked cleaning?

It would make sense. After all, she didn’t seem too bright.

“Hi, my name’s Violette Angelique Gabriella LeLonde!” the strange girl said happily, and right next to him. Harry jumped, startled and confused as to when she had moved there. Death had definitely made his reflexes sloppy but what use did he have for them now?

“That’s nice…” He said, folding the newspaper and edging towards the relative safety of the door.

”I have to, you know- use the loo,” he said, gesturing in the direction of the toilet- unnecessarily as the girl had gone back to simply staring at her reflection in the mirror.

Harry shut the door quickly, and leaned against it.

”Wow. She was worse than Gilderoy Lockhart,” he muttered, shaking his head and started walking down the corridor.

Going to bathroom was another mistake, and Harry was shocked he had survived as long as he did if he made bad decisions this often. There was a long line of girls, similar to the one he had left back in the compartment. Although some here were sobbing hysterically on the floor and others were bullying plainer girls. And they all seemed to be going in the bathroom and not returning.

Harry ignored them, and walked in to the men’s that was all but deserted in comparison.

The reflection in the mirror was more mature than it been last time he had been here, his face slightly lined with age although his hair wasn’t greying yet. Harry had thought that people might revert back to when they were younger once they died but apparently not. Unless he didn’t “count” as one of the dead yet. It made sense though, who really wanted to spend, potentially an eternity in an old body?

He turned the tap on and splashed his face with water. Then something very strange happened.

Ultimately, it must have been the droplets of water feeling an undeniable pull back to their original source that cause what happened next. They surely must have conversed, as much as water atoms can with the ones in Harry’s high water content body and ganged up on him. So Harry found himself, against his will being pulled, distorted and twisted to enable him to be moved through the plughole without being…obliterated. That doesn’t mean it was comfortable though, far from it.

More water pushed down upon him, as he arrived in a rather inappropriate and unfortunate place. Disorientated, Harry pushed in the direction that he hoped was up and tried to manoeuvre in the cold and fast water. He broke the surface, gasping and sincerely wishing he had taken the time to learn how to swim. At least the Dursley’s would be pleased, he thought darkly.

The water was about to encompass him once again, when a hand grabbed the back of his robes and pulled him out of the river. He probably would have been more grateful if not for the amount of water in his lungs and the fact that the stranger effectively strangled him with his own clothes. After coughing up most of the water, Harry rolled onto his back and opened an eye blearily to see yellow boots by his head.

“So what does Old Tom find here? A little fish taking a swim in the Withywindle River?” came a cheerful and carefree voice, which then continued, “No, not the river- you come from the Outside, little fish but not like the other. No, not like the other…”

Harry stood up, shivering despite the warmth of the sun through his soaked robes. “I’m Harry, and I’m not a little fish. Who are you?”

"Eldest, that's what I am ... Tom remembers the first raindrop and the first acorn ... he knew the dark under the stars when it was fearless — before the Dark Lord came from Outside as well." The strange…man said.

Harry wasn’t sure that this person really was human but he didn’t know what else to call him. And what the man had just said hadn’t made much sense to him. Harry shuddered, he hadn’t had much luck with any of the Tom’s he had known so far and he was far from keen to stay in any place with a Dark Lord.

He flinched when Tom clapped him on the arm and said, “Come now friend, to the House of Tom Bombadil. We will go to Goldberry and get you some dry clothes.”

Not knowing what else to do, Harry followed. He was still dripping water and didn’t feel nearly as cheerful as the sprightly figure in the blue jacket and yellow boots, who danced ahead singing odd rhymes.

“Keep up, little fish!”

Harry groaned, and started walking faster. He absolutely refused to skip. And if Tom tried to get him to make up rhymes, he swore…

A/N: I've tried to put it all back in the right places after the internet moved my lines around. And yes, I kinda did turn Harry into a grumpy middle aged man. But meh, I think he's entitled.