Disclaimer: I own only the plot... and the words I make I up. Lol. The rest is J.K. Rowling's, who I am not.

Extraordinary Pasts

Harry Potter was quite an extraordinary boy. And, as with most extraordinary people, he had had a remarkable past. He had nearly killed You-Know-Who at the delicate age of one. He had fought He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named more times than any other person on the planet (with, perhaps, the exception of Albus Dumbledore), and had stumped the Dark Lord's plans many times. He had endured 16 years of negligence and abuse at the hands of his dreadful relatives, the Dursleys, and had, through everything, remained a well-mannered, responsible human being.

Though, perhaps the most extraordinary thing about this remarkable child was his knack for finding trouble…

It was an ordinary Tuesday near the start of Harry's sixth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Harry woke up, took one look at his alarm clock, and jumped out of bed. He had only twenty minutes until his first class started and it was all the way on the other end of the castle! Even if Harry were to sprint all the way there, using every secret passageway he knew of, he would never make it in time. Worse still, was the fact that this particular class happened to be taught by Severus Snape, one of Harry's least favorite people in the school. Harry considered just skiving off, but the thought of detention with Snape made him reluctantly decide that he must go. He sighed, and hurried to get ready.

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Twenty-eight minutes later, a very out-of breath Harry arrived at the corridor outside the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. He paused for several seconds, trying to get some desperately-needed oxygen to his brain. Once his lungs were once again under control, he braced himself for the worst and pulled open the door.

Snape paused in the middle of his lesson and glared up at Harry.

"Ah, I see Potter has decided to grace us with his presence today. That will be twenty points from Gryffindor." He sneered one last time and continued on with his lecture. Harry sat down, and was thinking that he was extremely lucky for getting off so easy when…

"Potter! Get up here. Since you seem to be so fond of the lime-light, why not help me demonstrate the conjunctivitis curse to the class." He turned back to the class and explained, "The conjunctivitis curse causes the temporary blinding of the subject it is cast on as Potter has now volunteered to demonstrate."

Harry was not particularly eager to be unable to see with Snape in the same room, but he could tell that it wasn't a request. He grudgingly got to his feet and made his way to the front of the classroom.

"Now, Potter, you are not to try to stop or deflect this curse in any way," Snape sneered. Harry thought that Snape was enjoying it just a little too much. Harry was disappointed but he was determined not let Snape beat him. He stared up into those cruel, cold eyes and refused to look away.

Snape's sneer suddenly slid off his face and Harry saw an emotion flit across his features that he had never seen before. Snape looked… sad? No, that couldn't be right. Why would Snape be sad? Especially while looking at him, his most hated student?

It was gone as soon as Harry saw it. Snape's face was now a cold, indifferent mask. He decided that his eyes must just have been playing tricks on him, already malfunctioning at the thought of the blindness they were soon to experience.

Before Harry could think much more of it, Snape addressed the rest of the class, "Now, look closely. This curse is extremely useful when dueling an opponent. It takes away one of their most useful senses and gives you an advantage, but you must move quickly because the curse usually wears off after about twenty minutes, but with more experienced or powerful wizards, it can take up to several hours to dissipate completely." Harry had no doubt that Snape's would include himself in the experienced/powerful category, and that he was in for a rather long day. Then, Snape turned to Harry and cast the spell.

"Conjunctivitis."

Everything went dark. Though he had been expecting it, Harry panicked when he could see nothing. He forced himself to stay absolutely still and instead strained to hear.

"You may sit down now, Potter," Snape snarled, enraged by Harry's lack of a response. Harry reached out blindly and fumbled around until he felt the smooth wood of a desk. He moved up the row until he felt the back wall, and collapsed into his seat at the rear of the classroom.

Snape must have still been in a foul mood because for the rest of the class he had everyone split up into partners and practice dueling. Usually, Harry would have been happy about this, but his newfound blindness and the fact that he was paired with Neville Longbottom really made him wish he had just skived off DADA when he realized he would be late.

It started out okay; Neville went easy on Harry, staying directly in front of him and only using a disarming charm, but that all changed when Snape walked past. He watched (glared at) the pair and decided that Harry was getting it too easy. He shoved Neville out of the way, and took his spot.

Harry tensed, listening with all his might. He knew this was not going to be pretty. He sensed Snape's movement as he sent a furnunculus jinx at him. He moved his wand up to defend himself, but was a fraction of a second too late. The jinx hit his stomach and he immediately felt his whole body break out in boils. Snape made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a snicker, and ordered Neville to escort a blind, boil-covered Harry to the hospital wing.

Once Neville had guided Harry out of the classroom and up the corridor, Harry turned to him. "Neville, there's really no need to take me to the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey has more important things to do than get rid of boils. Just take me back to the common room, and we'll get Hermione to do it after class gets out."

The truth was that Harry was embarrassed. He was sure he looked in a right state, but he didn't want to admit to anyone who didn't already know, that Snape had bested him. He was blind when it happened, but still, his pride would not allow it.

"Harry, come on, you're blind and covered in boils! I'm not just going to desert you like this." Neville paused for a second, thinking and then suddenly an idea hit him! "Hey, Harry, you think a vanishing spell would work on those boils? Can I have a go? I've been practicing my wandwork with Gran all summer!"

Harry hesitated. The last time he had let someone other than Madam Pomfrey treat one of his injuries, he had ended up losing the whole bone in his right arm. On the other hand, he really didn't want to have to go to Madam Pomfrey…

Besides, what's the worst that could happen?

"Well… I guess you could… Just, please try to concentrate really hard on the spell," Harry nearly begged.

"Yeah! Okay… Well you've got this really nasty boil right on the tip of your nose; I'll do that one first." Neville pointed his wand at Harry's nose and firmly said," Evanesco."

There was a pop and suddenly Harry was no longer there.

"Oh, no! I've killed Harry Potter! Again!"

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Meanwhile…

Harry Potter opened his eyes and was momentarily gripped with panic before realizing that it was just the conjunctivitis curse making him blind. He wasn't sure how he ended up on the ground, but he pushed himself up into a sitting position. When he stood up a few seconds later his head pounded painfully, and he gingerly felt a large bump on the left side of his head. He also realized that the boils were still there and the ones on the left side of his face seemed to have burst when he hit the ground. It bloody hurt!

He was going to kill Neville! Speaking of which… "Neville?" Harry called. He received no response.

'He must've gone off to get Madam Pomfrey when I collapsed,' thought Harry sourly. Well if they thought he was going to go without a fight, they would be sorely disappointed.

He stuck out his hands and felt his way along the wall. Six years in the castle had given him extensive knowledge of the layout. He slowly made his way back to the Gryffindor common room.

He felt blindly for the portrait and heard the Fat Lady yelp when she took in his appearance. "Oh, dear me! Shouldn't you report to the hospital wing? You look horrible!"

"Fat chance," he responded icily. "Just open up, okay? I'll have someone fix it for me in the common room."

"Well, if you're sure…" She swung forward, and Harry stumbled into the room beyond.

He could hear several people talking, which was strange because everyone was supposed to be in classes then. He wondered about it briefly, but when he collided with a soft chair and gratefully plopped into it, all thoughts left his mind. He laid there with his eyes closed and waited for classes to be let out so that he could get someone to fix his face.

Just as he was contemplating sleeping for the rest of the hour, the voices that he had heard earlier increased in volume as their owners walked towards him. It seemed they hadn't yet spotted him and were having a rather heated argument.

"….Come on, James! We still have twenty minutes until class gets out! That's more than enough time to set up a nice prank for the Slytherins when they get out of Potions!" said a smooth voice.

"I told you, Sirius! I'm not gonna do anything that might make Lily cross with me!" said a new voice. "She just started talking to me again and I really don't think she'd be happy if all of the Slytherins turned up for lunch with red and gold hair! I was in the hospital wing for a week the last time I pulled a prank! I don't know where Lily learned that spell, but I'd really like to be able to sit on a broom for the quidditch match tomorrow. There's no way we are giving up the Cup to the Slytherins because Lily crippled the best chaser on our team!"

"I have to agree with James here," said a third voice. "That girl is terrifying when she's angry! Remember that time James proposed to her in front of the whole school? She hexed him so many times, you couldn't even tell he was still a human being…"

"I'm not sure I still was human…" said the one Harry took to be James. They were nearly upon him now. He didn't know of anyone in Gryffindor named James or Sirius, though… Sirius… He didn't want to think about that name… It hurt too much. They didn't sound like first years, but since Harry didn't know them, he figured they must have been.

He heard someone gasp and knew he had finally been spotted. Harry was sure he looked horrible and he really didn't need anyone else to comment on it, so when the first voice said, "What happened to you? You look bloody terrible!" he snapped.

"Oh, really? I hadn't noticed! I just decided to blind myself and cover myself in blisters so I can skive off class!" he said angrily. Harry knew it wasn't the best comeback in the world, but his head still ached and his eyes hurt from straining to see when he knew it was futile.

"Whoa, mate. Chill. I just meant that you should probably go to the hospital wing and get yourself checked out. You look like you could really use some of Madam Pomfrey's help," replied the smooth voice.

"I'll take you there. My name's Remus and I'm a prefect," said 'Remus'. "Come on," he called to the other boys in the room.

'Remus' pulled Harry out of the chair and started guiding him forward. Harry's face hurt too much for him to argue. He stumbled along with the other boys, thinking of the strange encounter he'd just had.

He didn't know of anyone in Ginny's year named Remus, James, or Sirius. The only people he knew of with those names were either dead or far away. These people couldn't possibly be them.

He'd just come to the conclusion that he must have hit his head rather harder than he'd thought, when they reached the hospital wing. "Oh, dear!" he heard Madam Pomfrey exclaim. "Set him over here."

He fell onto a bed and listened as Madam Pomfrey bustled about looking for the proper potions.

"Ah, yes. Here we are. Conjunctivas and Furunculars." Madam Pomfrey lifted his head and had him drink from three goblets. The first two potions tasted horrible, but the third he recognized as a sleeping draught. He laid back and gratefully embraced the darkness.

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The first thing Harry realized when he woke was that he could see again. The second was that the boils were all gone. The third… was that something was terribly wrong.

Author Note:

I know, I'm evil! Lol. The good news is that I will post the next chapter once i get a review. This is my first story, but I've read so many HP fics it's not even funny! Lol. Well, I guess it kinda' is. I really want some feedback on this chapter. Is my writing okay? Is is OC? Or just plain bad? Try going for constructive critiscism, but I've never gotten a flame before, so I don't really mind either way. lol. And just to clear things up, Harry is delirious, otherwise he would have put the puzzle together faster. Still, I hate how in some fics the characters just accept these really bizzare things, so this story isn't gonna be all, "OMG! It's young James! I'm in the past!", or all "Hi, Harry. I'm Dumbledore. You're from the future, arent you?" lol. Nope. Not like that. lol. So, review! :D