I'm back, people !
I've got around 2 dozens works in progress, mostly in HP and Magi fandoms, but I never felt I could put them on site, because nothing is finished so far.
Screw this! I'm posting my stories. And I hope you'll enjoy them!
Disclaimer: I do not own anything
Rating: T for many things, mostly body horror and minor slash pairings. Rating may go up, but I don't think it will.
Chapter 1: Childhood
The stove incident was the first time Harry started to realize he was different.
He would theorize later, that, in his thirst to be accepted, in his craving to belong with the Dursleys, his subconscious had simply refused to face the truth until that point. It did not mean that he could not notice what was happening around him, but he did not call it into question.
When he was locked in his cupboard, shut away from the outside world, he never wondered how he could always know precisely the moment the sun would set and rise. It was among the obvious things everyone knew and never bothered to talk about, like the shift in temperature between the kitchen and the living room or the acrid scent of bleach when he was scrubbing at the bathroom tile floor.
He never wondered why the constant hunger and thirst stopped clawing at his stomach whenever night fell, and his uncle and aunt went to sleep.
He never wondered why he could see better when there was no light, the deep shadows like a second skin pressing against the walls.
He never wondered why his nails could not be trimmed by scissors or clippers, leaving him to gnaw at them to keep them an acceptable length. His aunt did not let him near the sharp tools anyway. Those were for respectable people, not freaks like him.
He never questioned that aunt Petunia would sneer at him and call him cruel names but gently pat his head, whenever he brushed past her. Neither did he question why his cousin shunned him and made boasts to beat him up, but always renounced his goal at the last second. He never examined why his uncle could angrily throw objects at his head whenever the man needed someone to blame, but never hit him with his fists, no matter the number of times he had threatened to.
It was just how things were and he left it at that.
Until the stove incident burst his bubble of blissful avoidance.
It was a morning like the others. He was cooking breakfast for the Dursleys with, as per usual, his aunt keeping a close eye on him for any attempt to snatch some food from the pan. He was adding a new slice of bacon into sizzling oil, when his cousin barreled into the kitchen with his usual brash carelessness. Dudley rushed passed him, hands aiming for the warm waffles piling on a plate next to the stove… and knocked the stool Harry was standing on.
He lost balance and his momentum knocked the pan away from the burner and into the sink. He landed hands first into the blue gas-fueled fire.
There was a beat, during which he processed the slight pain where he had knocked his knuckles too hard against the metal, before the shrill, horrified cry of his aunt snatched his attention. The shock written on her face smoothly transitioned to disgust and Harry swiftly lowered his eyes…
…Blue flames covered his hands.
It felt warm.
Huh, he dazedly thought, my hands are on fire.
He raised his fingers to his face, examining the rippling flames licking his skin. They were slowly reverting to their usual red and orange tint. His nails seemed to be glowing in the shifting fires, like what he suspected heated iron would look like.
"You, monster."
The voice of his aunt brought him back to the present situation.
Shame washed over him, and he turned to the sink to put out the fires. He did not need to, however, as the flames rushed to the tips of his fingers and vanished.
"I'm sorry, aunt Petunia, I…"
"You go to your place, you disgusting little freak!"
More than the promise of punishment gleaming in her eyes, it was the revulsion in her tone that made him bolt for his cupboard. Hearing the heavy steps of his uncle behind him, he almost jumped inside and did not even have the time to turn around that the door was slammed behind him and he was in the dark. He breathed slowly in the cramped space, letting the cool shadows soothe his wildly beating heart and curled on the thin mattress.
The wood of his door muffled the voices, but his aunt and uncle were arguing loud enough for him to understand a few words, 'freak' and 'monster' being the most recurrent.
In the thin ray of light given by the half-closed metallic shutters on his door, he observed his hands, wondering why they were not burned.
His nails had darkened. In place of their pale rosy hue, there was now a light ashy grey and, as he noticed when he gnawed at his left thumb's nail that was growing too long, they now held an odd sour taste.
Harry was five. And he was different.
Ω
By the time he was six years old, Harry had realized and accepted that he was fireproof. A discarded lighter at the top of a street-bin – after aunt Petunia had finally let him out of his cupboard to go to school – allowed him to experiment. A week of dedicated night testing led him to realize he could move the fire on his skin and, about three weeks later, he could keep a flame steady in the palm of his hand.
He tried often to create the fire – which would make for a very nice soothing presence in his dark cupboard – and failed every time. A part of him seemed absolutely convinced that he could, and he liked to listen to that voice which always filled him with confidence. Until he could conjure his own fire, however, the lighter was his most prized possession.
When, after a month, the oil fueling it went out, Harry was understandably devastated. That is, until he found out that he could produce flames from the sparks – oil or no oil – allowing his lighter to retain his place of most cherished possession.
Then, came the night of his seventh birthday, and with it, the strangest experience in his life so far.
Even as exhausted as he was by the day's chores, he could not find sleep. He turned and rolled around his thin worn out mattress, tired but restless. There was a constant prickling sensation in his eyes, like tiny worms crawling inside his eye sockets, and horrible pains in his backbone, as if his spine and ribs were splitting from an inside pressure. His scalp burned, especially the top of his head, and his tiny cupboard suddenly felt too cramped, almost suffocating. It was as if there were too many shadows for the small space and he felt them pushing at the confining walls as if to force them apart.
On the following morning, the stairs collapsed under his uncle's weight, neatly annihilating his 'room' in the process. Luckily for him, he was cooking breakfast and the only object that truly mattered to him was in his pocket.
For the duration of the reparation works, he was relocated to Dudley's second bedroom, which his cousin very reluctantly shared with him. As was to be expected, Dudley made sure that all of the old toys were either broken or taken back to his now surcharged bedroom. It did not prevent Harry from liking the new sleeping arrangements very much. When the stairs were back to their pristine condition a few weeks later, he politely – but without much hope – mentioned to his aunt that he did not like sleeping under the stairs and that it made him nervous and agitated.
Petunia never told her nephew, or anyone, that the carpenter had taken her aside and shown her a few planks from the inside part of the devastated staircase, asking, a bit jokingly, if they had kept a frenzied chainsaw-wielding maniac underneath.
Harry only knew that he was allowed to keep his room.
It was only a few months later that he noticed his sight improving. The blurriness induced by the light was slowly receding and, for the first time, he made the connection between the dead leaves on the ground and what up until now had been a fuzzy mass of changing colors on top of the trees trunks. By the time his eighth birthday came around, he no longer needed glasses.
It was around this period, that the Dursleys started acting a lot friendlier towards him. Not only the Dursleys actually, but their change in behavior was the most noticeable. Most adults he crossed on the street nodded in his direction with a smile or said hello to him when had been completely ignored until that point. School was a bit easier – if stranger – and he started being invited to play at break times. The most surreal was that, by the time he was nine, countless of his female – and sometimes male – playmates had offered him flowers, or a candy, or asked to hold hands. One daring little girl even tried to kiss his cheek. Gross.
It took him until he was ten to realize he was the source of these odd behaviors and he worked relentlessly to control his bizarre… aura of friendliness. He quickly learned that it shifted depending on his moods, expanding when he was lonely and shrinking when he felt crowded. He was not really in command of it, but he still had enough control over his own emotions to avoid being swarmed by the whole school.
At home, though, he always managed to feel lonely enough to keep his family contented with him. He did not really want to know if they would go back to being mean to him without his aura.
Despite that slightly unsettling question, life was good.
Then, the letter came.
Ω
Creature fic ahead ! I know it's not most people's cup of tea - too many clichés and a**pulls - but I'm trying for something specific, with lots of plot and character interaction.
Any feedback (fair criticism included) will be very much appreciated.
Sincerely,
Claywind