Harry ran his hands over his newly whole face as he tried to calm himself by taking stock of his body as he did. It was harder than he expected. The scar over his shoulder and upper chest from the dragon tail swipe he got in the first task of the Tri-Wizard tournament was still present.
Every battle and exchange he had gone through after his fifth year of school seemed to be gone, and he had no explanation as to why.
There was a loud hoot from above him, and Harry looked up just in time for Hedwig to drop a rolled up newspaper, that he snatched up instinctively. He looked at the rolled up paper in surprise, it looked new, which was beyond strange. There hadn't been a paper published in almost four years. The Daily Prophet had stopped publishing less than a year after Harry turned eighteen, when Voldemort destroyed the offices in a fit of pique.
"Where did you find this, girl?" He asked, sliding the band off of it and unrolling it.
Hedwig hooted as she landed on his shoulder easily, years of practice had him tilting his head slightly to give her the room she'd want to preen herself on her favorite perch.
The first thing he looked at was the date. "August 22nd, 1994." The front picture on the paper was a rotating 360 degree picture of large stadium with the proclamation that Ireland would be facing Bulgaria for the Quidditch World Cup.
Harry allowed himself a small smile and a brief moment as he flashed back and remembered going with the Weasley and Diggory families, and his first trip by portkey.
Shaking himself from the memory he turned his head and looked at Hedwig with a puzzled expression. "Why bring me an old Daily Prophet?" He asked his familiar.
Hedwig glared at him balefully in a look he'd long ago learned to interpret as "Why would you ask me such a stupid question?" To emphasize her discontent Hedwig lifted her wing and cuffed him on the side of the head.
When the look of confusion remained on her master's face. She gave a hoot that sounded very much like a much put upon sigh, and then lean forward and very deliberately and repeatedly pecked the title on the newspaper.
Harry frowned a little bit, and it took a moment to figure out exactly what Hedwig was pointing at. At the top of the paper, the part he hadn't even glanced at, where he had remembered the Daily Prophet logo, instead proclaimed the paper to be "The Daily Herald."
That brought Harry up short, "What the Hell?"
He knew for a fact that there was no way the Daily Prophet had competition during his fourth year of school. The Daily Prophet had the corner on information in the wizarding world, or misinformation as too often was the case, in Harry's opinion.
Harry needed to figure out what was going on, though none of the ideas currently flowing through his head made any sense. Hedwig shuffled slightly and gave a lift of her shoulders before fixing her master with a brief look, which Harry correctly interpreted as "I brought you the information. Now you figure it out."
Harry sighed, not for the first time wondering if it was possible for Hedwig to be the only owl in existence to have learned to smirk. It was as if she had mastered the look just for him.
Harry frowned again, returning his attention to the paper for a moment before he took a brief self-inventory. He still had his wands that were in their respective holsters, strapped to his wrists, and held in place by more than one sticking charm. He could still feel his trunk on the necklace around his neck. His dragonskin armor and boots were as intact as they ever were. Though they were a little bit baggy and didn't fit right. His boots didn't seem too bad, so he could probably wear them.
Harry sighed again, walking around in ill-fitting armor was likely to impede his movement and could get him killed. After a moment's consideration of his options, he shifted his stance. Hedwig gave an irritated hoot as she was jolted from her resting place while Harry pulled the necklace holding his trunk up and off his head.
He set it on the ground and enlarged it with a slight wave of his hand. He opened the fourth section of the trunk where he kept his wardrobe and dug around until he found a plain grey set of robes. While the robes were still too big for him, unlike the dragonhide he had on, they weren't spell resistant so he could shrink them to an appropriate size.
He glanced up and down the Alley and was grateful none of the muggles had yet taken the time to come down the alley. To be safe he cast a privacy ward, a notice-me-not charm, and a muggle repelling ward, in rapid succession. They weren't his most powerful, and they would decay over the course of an hour or so, but they would guarantee that he wasn't likely to have someone walk down on him half naked as he changed and get the wrong idea… or any sort of idea for that matter.
It only took Harry a minute to get changed. While the grey ensemble looked like it was in much better condition than what he was wearing before, it left him feeling far more vulnerable. He dropped the wards on the alley he was in but kept the Notice-Me-Not charm on himself, before he closed and shrank the trunk and returned it to his neck.
He thought of apparating back to where he had started but the explosion he remembered combined with his physical changes and the newspaper made him cautious enough to get his bearings first.
Harry exited the alley and looked around. He was in Muggle-London, and after some consultation with street signs, realized he was less than half a mile from the entrance to Diagon Alley through the burnt out remains of the Leaky Cauldron.
Harry walked briskly in the direction he knew the Leaky Cauldron was in. He was thankful none of the muggles were taking the time to pay him any attention. He saw above him, Hedwig soaring in the air, flying ahead of him and then circling until he caught up. It was a familiar pattern the two of them had established.
Harry frowned as a thought occurred to him; he'd have to check and see whether he needed to renew the shields and protections on the small pendant Hedwig wore to make sure that she wasn't hit by normal spellfire. If something happened to her he knew he would go spare.
He pushed his thoughts to the side as he got to Charing Cross Road, and it took him no time at all to spot the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron. He noticed the eyes of the non-magicals that walked past. Their eyes seem to flick from the store on the right side of the entrance, to the store on the left, not even seeing the entrance in the middle. Even with the destruction of most of magical Britain hadn't degraded the powerful muggle repelling wards on the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron.