Before anyone says anything about stealing work, I am Nyodrite (if you hadn't noticed, Etirdoyn is Nyodrite backwards). The proof, if you want it, is that our profiles have links to one another at the top called "Sister Profile".
Enjoy the story, now with omakes!
Realization
June - September 2010
I: The Boy Called Harry
June 23 - July 25, 2010
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"Up! Get up! Now!"
Harry hissed softly to himself, pulling his -rather pathetic- pillow over his head to block out his aunt's voice as she rapped on his door and screeched once more, "Up!"
He waited until he heard her go into the kitchen and a frying pan be placed onto the stove before letting himself voice his displeasure, "Oh, yeah, sure, who doesn't love a banshee waking them up- what a lovely way to start the day..."
He got up though, it wasn't worth the abuse his ears would earn to try and rest a little more since his aunt would- "Are you up yet?" she demanded- be coming back.
"Almost!" Harry called, flicking a spider off one of the sock he found under his bed.
He had an odd relationship with spiders, they were around frequently due to him living in a cupboard so he mostly tolerated them but he'd flick them away if they got too close to him or were on anything that he wanted. It was probably silly, but he ensured their goodwill by occasionally capturing a beetle of some sort and depositing it on one of the various webs they'd built.
"Well, get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon. And don't you dare let it burn, I want everything perfect on Duddy's birthday."
Harry let out a soft, irritated huff as he tugged his socks on. Dudley's birthday, how could he have forgotten- it wasn't like each of the Dursleys had been chattering about it since the beginning of the month…
Once dressed, he went to the kitchen, though he took a moment to appreciate actual light beyond whatever passed through the door's cracks, and shot the table- overflowing with the birthday boy's presents, from computer to television- a disgruntled look. There was even a racing bike next to the table, regardless that Dudley hated any form of exercise that didn't include hitting someone smaller then him.
Like Harry, who was small and skinny for his age- looking more so with his clothes being hand-me-downs from Dudley- with a thin face, knobbly knees, black hair, bright green eyes, a very thin scar on his forehead that was shaped like a bolt of lightning and wore round glasses held together with a lot of Scotch tape.
(The scar, coupled with the glasses, irritated him a bit because it kind of tickled at his memory as if it were connected to something he couldn't remember.)
Grease crackled and popped, drawing his attention to the bacon and Harry started flipping it; for all that the Dursleys bullied him into doing chores, Harry really didn't mind cooking because it reminded him of-
"Comb your hair!" his Uncle Vernon barked, by way of a morning greeting as the man entered the kitchen.
This was a frequent occurrence that required no acknowledgement; in fact, once a week, his uncle would declare his need of a haircut and his aunt would come at him with a pair of scissors. It made no difference, his hair simply grew that way - all over the place- and did so quickly , enough for it to be a weekly occurrence.
It was while he was frying eggs that his aunt and cousin entered the kitchen; his cousin looked a lot like Uncle Vernon with a large pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes, and thick blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head.
Aunt Petunia said that Dudley looked like an angel but, honestly, he looked like a pig with a wig to Harry.
He put the plates of eggs and bacon on the table, despite how little room there was, whilst Dudley counted his presents, face falling. "Thirty-six," he said, looking up at his mother and father. "That's two less than last year."
"Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present, see, it's here under this big one from Mommy and Daddy."
"All right, thirty-seven then," said Dudley, going red in the face. Sensing an imminent tantrum, Harry started wolfing down his bacon as fast as possible in case Dudley turned the table over.
Aunt Petunia obviously scented danger, too, because she said quickly, "And we'll buy you another two presents while we're out today. How's that, popkin? Two more presents. Is that alright?"
Dudley thought for a moment. It looked like hard work. Finally he said slowly, "So I'll have thirty ... thirty..."
"Thirty-nine, sweetums," said Aunt Petunia.
"Oh." Dudley sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel. "All right then."
Uncle Vernon chuckled. "Little tyke wants his money's worth, just like his father. 'Atta boy, Dudley!" He ruffled Dudley's hair.
At that moment the telephone rang and Aunt Petunia went to answer it while Harry and Uncle Vernon watched Dudley unwrap the racing bike, a video camera, a remote control airplane, sixteen new computer games, and a DVD player. He was ripping the paper off a gold wristwatch when Aunt Petunia came back from the telephone looking both angry and worried.
"Bad news, Vernon," she said. "Mrs. Figg's broken her leg. She can't take him." She jerked her head in Harry's direction.
While Dudley's mouth fell in horror, Harry's heart sped in excitement because every year the Dursleys went out for the day with a friend of Dudley's while he was left behind with Mrs. Figg- a crazy cat lady with a house that smelled like cabbage and made him look at pictures of all her cats. He hated it there.
"Now what?" said Aunt Petunia, looking furiously at Harry as though he'd planned this.
Intellectually, Harry knew he should feel sorry about Mrs. Figg breaking her leg but he found his empathy withered when he remembered that he wouldn't need to look at Tibbles, Snowy, Mr. Paws, and Tufty again for another year. Also, this year the Dursleys were going to the zoo .
"We could phone Marge," Uncle Vernon suggested.
"Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates the boy." The Dursleys often spoke about Harry like this, as though he wasn't there or as if he couldn't understand what they were saying about him.
"What about what's-her-name, your friend - Yvonne?"
"On vacation in Majorca," snapped Aunt Petunia.
"You could just leave me here," Harry pointed out, hoping for a chance to go on Dudley's computer while they were away. If he had to be left behind while they all went to the zoo- went to see wolves and lions and foxes and all kinds of wonderful animals- then he at least wanted the opportunity to go on the internet.
Aunt Petunia looked as though she'd just swallowed a lemon. "And come back and find the house in ruins?" she snarled.
"I won't blow up the house," said Harry, but they weren't listening.
"I suppose we could take him to the zoo," said Aunt Petunia slowly, "... and leave him in the car..."
Please, please, please! Harry chanted internally, staring down at the table in what he hoped was a suitably subdued manner.
"That car's new, he's not sitting in it alone..."
Yes-..! he cheered, silently gathering up the dirty dishes. If he didn't give them anything to get upset over, then the possibility of him going to the zoo would grow- just a bit. Maybe.
Dudley began to cry loudly, he wasn't really crying- it had been years since he'd really cried- but he knew that if he screwed up his face and wailed, his mother would give him anything he wanted.
"Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let him spoil your special day!" she cried, flinging her arms around him.
"I... don't... want... him... t-t-to come!" Dudley yelled between huge, pretend sobs. "He always sp- spoils everything!" He shot Harry a nasty grin through the gap in his mother's arms.
Just then, the doorbell rang - "Oh, good Lord, they're here!" said Aunt Petunia frantically - and a moment later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in with his mother. Piers was a scrawny boy with a face like a rat. He was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while Dudley hit them. Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.
Half an hour later, Harry, who couldn't believe his luck, was sitting in the back of the Dursleys' car with Piers and Dudley, on the way to the zoo for the first time in his life and desperately trying to seem less excited about the situation and more cowed as Uncle Vernon had taken Harry aside before they'd left.
"I'm warning you," he had said, putting his large purple face right up close to Harry's, "I'm warning you now, boy -any funny business, anything at all- and you'll be in that cupboard from now until Christmas."
"I'm not going to do anything," Harry defended but it was ineffectual, given his uncle didn't believe him- not that anyone ever did.
It was because strange things happened around Harry; once, Aunt Petunia had cut his hair bald except for his bangs- to hide his scar- only for it to be exactly as it was the next day. Another time, his aunt tried forcing him into a horrible old sweater of Dudley's but the harder she tried to pull it over his head, the smaller it grew until it was about the size of a hand puppet's- his aunt had decided that it must have shrunken in the wash, though so he wasn't punished. He did, however, get in trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens when Dudley's gang was chasing him once.
Today, though, Harry was determined to be good and very much hoped no strange things happened to cut the visit to the zoo short.
While he drove, Uncle Vernon complained to Aunt Petunia. He liked to complain about things: people at work, Harry, the council, Harry, the bank, and Harry were just a few of his favorite subjects. This morning, it was motorcycles.
"... roaring along like maniacs, the young hoodlums," he said, as a motorcycle overtook them.
"I had a dream about a motorcycle," Harry remembered, biting down the rest of it though he thought it, It flew.
Uncle Vernon snorted derisively, "Of course you'd have a dream of one." But, given that he did say about how it acted unnatural , that was it even if Dudley and Piers laughed at him.
It, being a sunny Saturday, was crowded with families at the zoo and the Dursleys bought Dudley and Piers large chocolate ice creams at the entrance and then, because the smiling lady in the van had asked Harry what he wanted before they could hurry him away, they bought him a cheap lemon ice pop.
It was , Harry thought as he quietly followed the four to the Gorilla- they look very much like Dudley though with less blond- Enclosure, actually pretty tasty.
He spent as much time as he could savoring the ice pop, following a bit away from the Dursleys so he would come to their attention, and trying to imprint the entire experience into his memory since he had a feeling that he wouldn't be allowed back for a long while. Harry dutifully read the information plaques of the animals he was interested in- he was, perhaps inappropriately, amused about the coyote named 'Wiley'- and asked questions whenever a zookeeper was nearby.
That was a difficult task, asking questions when the Dursleys were far away enough not to hear yet close enough that the keeper wouldn't try to 'escort' him to his family and thus get him in trouble, but he managed.
They ate in the zoo restaurant (tiger-themed), and when Dudley had a tantrum because his knickerbocker glory didn't have enough ice cream on top, Uncle Vernon bought him another one and Harry was allowed to finish the first. Afterwards, they went to the reptile house where all sorts of lizards and snakes were crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone behind their glass enclosures.
Dudley and Piers wanted to see huge, poisonous cobras and thick, man-crushing pythons and Dudley quickly found the largest snake in the place. It could have wrapped its body twice around Uncle Vernon's car and crushed it into a trash can, not that it looked as if it would at the moment- it was asleep actually.
Dudley stood with his nose pressed against the glass, staring at the glistening brown coils and whined at his father, "Make it move."
Uncle Vernon tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't budge.
"Do it again," Dudley ordered. Uncle Vernon rapped the glass smartly with his knuckles, but the snake just snoozed on.
"This is boring," Dudley moaned before shuffling away.
Harry moved in front of the glass, peering intently at the snake and feeling great sympathy for it- if he lived in a glass cage and had to deal with people gawking at him and annoying him by tapping the glass, he'd go bonkers for sure.
The snake suddenly opened its beady eyes. Slowly, very slowly, it raised its head until its eyes were on a level with Harry's.
It winked.
Harry stared- he didn't even know if snakes could wink. Then he looked quickly around to see if anyone was watching but they weren't so he looked back at the snake and winked too.
The snake jerked its head toward Uncle Vernon and Dudley, then raised its eyes to the ceiling. It gave Harry a look that said quite plainly: I get that all the time.
"It must be really annoying." Harry murmured through the glass, though he wasn't sure the snake could hear him.
The snake nodded vigorously.
"Where do you come from, anyway?" Harry asked.
The snake jabbed its tail at a little sign next to the glass. Harry peered at it.
Boa Constrictor, Brazil. This specimen was bred in the zoo.
"Oh, have you thought about going there? To Brazil, I mean?" He wondered and the snake nodded vigorously once more.
A deafening shout behind Harry made both of them jump. "DUDLEY! MR. DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!"
Dudley came waddling toward them as fast as he could. "Out of the way, you," he said, punching Harry in the ribs.
Caught by surprise, Harry fell hard on the concrete floor and what came next happened so fast no one saw how it happened- one second, Piers and Dudley were leaning right up close to the glass, the next, they had leapt back with howls of horror.
Harry sat up and gasped; the glass front of the boa constrictor's tank had vanished. The great snake was uncoiling itself rapidly, slithering out onto the floor. People throughout the reptile house screamed and started running for the exits.
As the snake slid swiftly past him, Harry could have sworn a low, hissing voice said, "Brazil, here I come... Thanksss, amigo."
The keeper of the reptile house was in shock. "But the glass," he kept saying, "Where did the glass go?"
The zoo director himself made Aunt Petunia a cup of strong, sweet tea while he apologized over and over again. Piers and Dudley could only gibber even though, as far as Harry had seen, the snake hadn't done anything except snap playfully at their heels as it passed- by the time they were all back in Uncle Vernon's car, Dudley was telling them how it had nearly bitten off his leg, while Piers was swearing it had tried to squeeze him to death.
Worst of all, for Harry at least, was Piers calming down enough to say, "Harry was talking to it, weren't you, Harry?"
Uncle Vernon waited until Piers was safely out of the house before starting on Harry, he was so angry he could hardly speak. He managed to say, "Go- cupboard- stay- no meals," before he collapsed into a chair, and Aunt Petunia had to run and get him a large brandy.
Later, Harry was wishing for a watch because he could sneak out to the kitchen for food until he was sure the Dursleys were all asleep.
Ten years, well almost , he'd lived with the Dursleys; ten miserable years of living in a cupboard with too little food and too much chores and too many punishments while at school he was orchestrated because everyone knew Dudley's gang hated him and no one else wanted to become a target.
When he had been younger, Harry had dreamed and dreamed of some unknown relation coming to take him away, but it had never happened.
And it never will, Harry thought, not really angry but more resigned.
But, hey, if his hard work paid off, then he'd get a scholarship to a boarding school and deal with the Dursleys for only a couple of months throughout the year until he was the age of majority.
The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned Harry his longest-ever punishment; by the time he was allowed out of his cupboard again, the summer holidays had started and Dudley had already broken his new video camera, crashed his remote control airplane, and, first time out on his racing bike, knocked down old Mrs. Figg as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.
As glad as Harry was that school was out, it meant that Dudley's gang were free to visit all times of day and partake in their favorite hobby: Harry Hunting.
His solution? Be out of the house as often as possible.
July 16, the day after Dudley knocked over Mrs. Figg, took the opportunity to explore farther then he had previous summers and spent much of the day eating free samples at a larger market a few streets beyond Mrs. Figg's house. The next day, after a mid-morning snack of free samples to supplement missing breakfast to avoid the Dursleys, Harry found a public library three streets in the opposite direction of the market with a park not too far off.
July 18 gave birth to how he spent his days; leaving the Dursleys' early and taking breakfast in the form of free samples at the market, holing up in the library until hunger pulled him away from whatever he was reading for another round of free samples and spending the afternoon at the park- making a few tentative friends- before heading back to the Dursleys' in time to make dinner.
It was the makings of a perfect summer; even being sent to Mrs. Figg's while his aunt took Dudley to buy his Smeltings uniform on July 23 didn't hamper it since she fed him chocolate cake- albeit stale- and let him spend the day watching Boomerang (which consisted of Looney Toons, Tom and Jerry with a few appearances of DreamWorks Dragons).
That evening, Dudley paraded around the living room for the family in his brand-new uniform; Smeltings' boys wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers, and flat straw hats called boaters. They also carried knobbly sticks, used for hitting each other while the teachers weren't looking- this was supposed to be good training for later life, for what, Harry had no idea.
As he looked at Dudley in his new knickerbockers, Uncle Vernon said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life while Aunt Petunia burst into tears and said she couldn't believe it was her Ickle Dudleykins, he looked so handsome and grown-up.
Harry had to chew on his tongue to keep himself from laughing, even so, he imagined that he broke a rib or two trying to suppress his laughter at her comment.
The next morning was also a deviation from his routine when he woke to find his Aunt Petunia already up, stirring a foul-smelling concoction of dirty rags and grey water. He had to pause and ask, "What's this?"
Her lips tightened as they always did if he dared to ask a question. "Your new school uniform," she said.
Harry looked in the bowl again. "Oh," he said, "I didn't realize it had to be so wet."
"Don't be stupid," snapped Aunt Petunia. "I'm dyeing some of Dudley's old things gray for you. It'll look just like everyone else's when I've finished."
Harry seriously doubted this, but thought it best not to argue and left the house without further comment. While he had his usual free-sample breakfast, he missed his lunch when the book he was reading- Warriors: Into the Wild by Erin Hunter- drew him in enough that he had to finish it before he put it down and left the library.
He did make it back to the Dursleys in time, but that seemed not to matter to Uncle Vernon, who seemed angry for some unknown reason, snapping, "Take your stuff to Dudley's second bedroom."
"What? Why?" Harry asked, bewildered.
His uncle's face, already red, turned purple. "Don't ask questions! And you're not to go wandering off like you've been- who knows what trouble you've been up to…"
He opened his mouth to say something- to argue because, maybe he ate a bit too many free samples but he hadn't done anything wrong - but snapped it closed once more, obediently moving his things even as he heard Dudley bawling to Aunt Petunia. With any luck, whatever angered his uncle would blow over before summer ended and he'd be able to re-establish his routine.
For now, there was an entire shelves of practically new books for him to occupy his time.
The next morning, breakfast was quiet. Dudley was in shock; he'd screamed, whacked his father with his Smelting stick, been sick on purpose, kicked his mother, and thrown his tortoise through the greenhouse roof, and he still didn't have his room back. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia kept looking at each other darkly, Harry was trying to think of anything he'd done to anger his uncle but came up blank.
When the mail arrived, Uncle Vernon, who seemed to be trying to be nice to Harry, made Dudley go and get it. They heard him banging things with his Smelting stick all the way down the hall. Then he shouted, "There's another one! 'Mr. H. Potter, The Smallest Bedroom, 4 Privet Drive-' "
With a strangled cry, Uncle Vernon leapt from his seat and ran down the hall, but Harry was frozen in his seat in shock until his aunt hissed, "Go to your room!"
Harry sat on his bed, absently flipping through pages of one of the books- No More Dead Dogs - as he thought.
A letter, it was a letter for me that angered my uncle. He realized, but who would send me a letter and why would it anger Uncle Vernon so much?
...and why… Harry thought, something like irritated horror building in his stomach. Do they know which room is mine?
Omake - Boa Consssstrictor
If there was one benefit to being raised by humans, it was being able to understand them and the strange things that made up their world; he knew about 'maps' thanks to humans who carried around maps and inspected them before knowing where to go and he had, over the years, learned some of their language- written and spoken.
It is why, following his escape from the zoo with the help of the little mageling Speaker, he had...encouraged a small feline to find a map for him- he would recognize the word 'Brazil' and a map would tell him where it was.
It was the first step to going to Brazil, to his homeland.
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Omake - Cartoons
"But..." Harry blinked at the woman, "You have a TV- a huge one at that and cable- how can you not watch it?"
Mrs. Figg waved at him, "It's a gift from my son and it's not as if I've never used it- I sometime put it on to watch the news. You can use it if you want." With that, she bustled away to fuss over her cats.
Well, Harry wasn't complaining so he settled on the couch- it had cat hair in places where Mrs. Figg's cleaning did quite get- and, once a cat jumped up to claim his lap, grabbed the remote and started flipping through channels until he stopped on Boomerang that was playing DreamWorks Dragons.
"What the- oh no, not again." Hiccup said as he fell off Toothless, "Uh, hey, Toothless!"
The dragon whirled around, breaking off from his ascension to dive beside a falling- and now deadpanned- Hiccup, "Hey."
Toothless made a grumbling-growl that could have been a greeting or question and Hiccup glanced away to look up at the approaching ground, "So just plummet or, uh...any ideas?"
Harry whirled when he heard a crash, finding Mrs. Figg staring at the TV, a large- but thankfully not broken- bowl on the ground. "That's-" She sucked in a shocked breath, "That's a dragon."
"Uhh...yeah?" he said, hurrying to pick up the bowl from the floor. "It's a cartoon- DreamWorks Dragons- that's kinda about, well, dragons. That one's Toothless."
"Oh, of course." Mrs. Figg said faintly, sitting heavily on the couch. "An what kind of dragon is, uh, Toothless?"
Harry sat down again, "He's a Nightfury- you should really watch the movie, How To Train Your Dragon, if you want to know about him and Hiccup and their meeting."
"Right..." she mumbled.
Harry glanced at the TV then her, "Do you want me to change it?"
"Oh, no," Mrs. Figg said, "It just startled me, seeing a dragon on TV...since they're not real." It sounded like a lie but she went on. "In fact, that 'Hiccup'- what an odd name- doesn't look real either or any of the people."
He blinked. "Of course not, they're cartoons-" he got a blank look. "Basically people drew a story that was animated and wrote a script for actors- called voice actors since they only do voices not actually be in the show- to make the character speak and put the two together to make a cartoon."
"Amazing..." she breathed, "And mu- people make these often, these 'cartoons'?"
"Yeah, they're really popular and they're all different kinds of cartoons," Harry shrugged, "Not to mention Anime- which features different drawing styles and are from Japan." She looked interested but like she still didn't get it but he really had no idea how to explain it more. "Do you want to watch with me?"
Mrs. Figg nodded after a moment, "Yes, I believe so."
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A/N: An SI/OC Main Character with kinda dismal knowledge of the series they're now a part of because I wanted to poke at Harry Potter.
Why is everything twenty-ish years later, you ask? For various reasons, many of them spoilery, but one is this: due to the series' that are released after the time Canon took place which would have an impact- minor or major- on the Main Character.
