Rough Draft – 1/20/07
First Revision – N/A
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters from Harry Potter. I write this for my amusement and for others to enjoy, not for profit.
A/N: Please let me know if the number of He's or I's are affecting the quality of this chapter.
His Next Destiny
by MingShun
-o-o-o-o-
Chapter 3: A Day at Hogwarts
-o-o-o-o-
He twitched once before jerking awake and upright. For once, he had been blessed with a dreamless sleep, the nightmares held at bay by some unknown force. He did not, however, wake up with a smile. Instead, a feeling of unease and wariness pervaded his very being.
Today was not going to be a good day, Harry predicted with a sigh. What he wouldn't give for seer abilities. The ability to make wrong predictions WITH exceptional confidence would be such a godsend right now.
After a few more moments thinking about his bad luck, he finally regained enough of his wits to take in his surroundings...
...there was a rumpled dark green cover draped over his body. A silver shimmering curtain shielded him from the outside world. A slight peek outside revealed the stone blocks of an ancient structure. And it reeked of magic in the air...
...He was in Hogwarts, and it wasn't hard to guess which house. Mechanically reaching for the pillow behind him, he brought it to his face and moaned loudly into it. It looked like he was still…here, for lack of a better word.
For a brief moment, he entertained the thought of going to Dumbledore for help, but a memory of last night and Dumbledore's unfriendly gaze popped up. No, he wasn't going to get any help from his old mentor.
Not willing to find out what could possibly go wrong, Harry fell backwards as he made a silent resolution to stay in bed today. It might be childish and he would be punished later, but he was 12 now, how mature did he need to be?
That was when there were footsteps from outside of his bed. Without fanfare, the curtains protecting his privacy were ripped away.
"Go away" he shouted from under the fat pillow.
"Get up Potter," came the voice of his tormentor. "You're going to breakfast."
"No I'm not," Harry disagreed loudly as he stuck to his resolution. A moment later, he found himself jerked out of bed and floating through the air. One hand holding the pillow firmly in place, Harry muttered the countercharm as he waved his other hand, but nothing happened. Since he wasn't holding his wand that was to be expected. Pulling the pillow off of his face in frustration, he was greeted to the unwelcome sight of Draco Malfoy. Ugh, not even five minutes into the day, and his prediction was already coming true.
He couldn't help it, he started to laugh.
Draco stared at the obviously daft boy in confusion before, with a flick, he cancelled the floating charm.
There was a thud and a short gasp. Regaining his senses, Harry sat up from his tumble and glared at the smirking blonde boy. He could throttle the blonde boy, he really could. However, Malfoy's stance conjured images in his mind, a battle between Malfoy aged five years and him, also five years older. It wasn't an epic battle seeing how one of them had to fight unarmed, but the situation was so similar that even if this wasn't wasn't the same Malfoy, he was reluctant to throttle the other without a wand in hand for backup.
"We'll be waiting for you upstairs, Potter." Draco snidely commented before stepping out of the room.
'Yes, today is off to a great start,' Harry glumly thought as he picked himself up from off the ground. He stared mournfully at the open curtains and inviting bed before he turned around and left the room.
-o-o-o-o-
It took Harry a good bit of time, several dorm rooms, and the common room before he found the bathroom. Stepping around Crabbe, Harry entered the bathroom and...
...stared into the shower room. Of course, there was the normal gunk that one would find in any shower, but that was it. No slimy trails or disgusting creatures wandering amongst bloody entrails. The silver and green patterned tiling lacked the off-color stain of something potentially gross. He was disappointed to say the least...it was relieving to see that the bathroom obviously wasn't crawling with snakes and covered with demonic runes, but where was Ron with the sickle that he now owed him?
Stepping away from the showers, he raised his wand and proceeded to use magic to clean himself off. 'Hey', he muttered to himself, 'even if the shower was normal looking enough, Malfoy was one of the last few to use it...'
Crabbe was standing by the door when a fresher looking Harry stepped out of the bathroom. Harry walked past him again.
And then Harry went and got himself lost again. 'Bloody Fantastic.' When he finally found the exit to the Slytherin dungeon after searching through what he thought was the common room, twice, he turned around to glare at the oaf behind him.
"Alright, what are you up to?" he demanded. He had no idea when the large boy began, but Crabbe had been following him for some time now. Breakfast had already started and Harry was fairly certain that Crabbe wouldn't normally miss a breakfast for the fun of it.
The large boy merely shrugged, before brushing past Harry and heading up the stairs. Before he followed, Harry had a vague thought that the large oaf trekking upwards was Malfoy's guarantee that he would arrive in the Dining Hall before breakfast was over. Funny, he was pretty certain that he could turn around and run off without Malfoy's bodyguard noticing. Blimey, maybe he should holler that he was attempting to escape too. He finally decided not to do it, he was hungry.
-o-o-o-o-
The Dining Hall was quite crowded and filled with hustle and bustle from students. Crazily enough, some were eager to begin schooling he thought glancing at the Gryffindor tables where a bushy haired girl was frantically reading through a large textbook.
Harry found himself an open spot at the Slytherin table, while Crabbe took up his usual position next to Malfoy. He was uncomfortably aware that the other Slytherins had ceased their conversations to stare at him. His reply was to ignore them in favor of slowly heaping a pile of bacon and eggs onto his plate. Conversation resumed again.
"My parents gave us a new set of brooms, Nimbus 2001s. We played Quidditch with them" Zabini bragged, breaking the silence.
"My parents also got me a new broom. It's not as fancy but it's not the broom that wins the game but the rider," Nott replied.
"You barbarians don't understand the value of a good book,"
"A book? I don't suppose you received one for Christmas have you?"
"As a matter of fact, I have. 100 Legal Curses to use on your enemies,"
"I've read that book. I especially liked the gut-spilling curse. Can you imagine the look on their faces when you use that curse on them?"
Harry choked slightly on his breakfast when he heard that. Weren't these kids a little too young to know about spells like those?
His reaction drew the attention of the others. "How about you Harry, what did you receive?"
"I uh...don't remember."
"It must be bad if you conveniently forgot what you received."
"I bet his parents sent him a lump of coal again,"
Harry was indignant, "They wouldn't do that," he defended.
"They did it last year. Speaking of which, why do you care so much about a worthless piece of rock?"
Harry opened his mouth before closing it again. Didn't they know that lumps of coal were often sent as jokes or insults? Must be a muggle thing then.
"Looks like he still doesn't want to say. I can't believe this, those imbecile parents of his are ruining another respectable Slytherin."
"Pretty soon he'll be kissing Dumbledore's arse like all the other muggle lovers,"
"That's disgusting," someone shouted. The others nodded in agreement.
Harry chose to remain silent for the moment.
"What are we worried about? The Heir will deal with those pests soon,"
'The Heir? Who are they talking about?'
A chime sounded, signaling the end of breakfast and the beginning of classes. While it ended this conversation, Harry was certain that this was far from over.
As he stood up to leave with the others, he paused as he realized something. He didn't know what class he had next. "What class do we have next?" he demanded rudely.
"He talks," someone sarcastically commented.
"That's right, it's been a while since you were here hasn't it?" Blaise asked.
'Didn't the students' Christmas break end yesterday? Why was Blaise asking double checking the facts? Was he gone for longer?'
He quickly filed this small piece of information away as Draco continued where Zabini left off, "All of us are going to Transfiguration."
"All of us?"
They looked at him strangely. He was pretty certain they didn't quite understand what he was asking.
"All of us have Transfiguration next," someone impatiently repeated as the rest of the group began to break away.
It was then that Harry remembered, extracurricular courses didn't come into play until third year. For now, all of the younger students had classes with the rest of their housemates.
"Oh, sorry. I was confused for a moment there." He quietly said. There were a few curious looks, but the rest were already making their way towards the Transfiguration classroom.
-o-o-o-o-
"Class, today we will continue to transfigure doves into gloves. As you may recall, this task builds upon the knowledge gained when we transfigured mice to mittens. You will find it difficult to accomplish this transfiguration if you lack the knowledge and practice gained from our previous exercise."
Harry winced internally when she paused for a moment to look pointedly at him. At least, he was fairly certain she was looking pointedly at him. There was no one seated behind him after all.
With that, Professor McGonagall swished her wand and with an incantation proceeded to demonstrate the transformation to the class. After a rather interesting – so what if he forgot, it had been a few years already – explanation of the theory behind the transformation, she stopped lecturing and started walking around the classroom observing her students' attempts as she began her practical session.
The raven haired boy himself slowly gave his wand a few flicks and swishes before he attempted to change the white tightly bound dove. He could feel the wand channeling his magic, but it felt like shoving a marshmallow down a drinking straw. His attempt ended with a dismal failure. The dove was still there, unchanged, and cooing mockingly at him. The bloody wand was still fighting him! Angrily, he forced his magic into the wand on his second attempt.
There was a gasp, prompting the entire class to stop. Harry made an uncomfortable glance around the room and observed that the rest of the class were displaying varying degrees of shock at his transfiguration attempt.
What was the problem? A small glove was sitting in front of him. It had a few feathers attached to the fingers, but there wasn't anything remarkable about it. What was so surprising about it?
"Mr. Potter, see me after class," Professor McGonagall finally ordered after a moment of silence. He cursed under his breath, the first day back and he was already in trouble. At her sharp command the class started moving again, and the rest of class continued without further mishap, although several of his classmates came up to him and badgered him for help on their project. He tried the best that he could to help them, but McGonagall's sharp eye limited his movement. He finally started to turn them away, afraid to land in further trouble.
The chime finally sounded, signaling that class was over. As the other students filed out, Harry walked up to the front desk where his Professor was seated.
"Professor, I..."
"Mr. Potter," McGonagall interrupted, and, with a swish of her wand, conjured a mouse. "I would like to see you transfigure this mouse into a mitten."
He looked at the mouse in confusion. It returned his look with a blank expression of its own. Taking a moment to recall the incantation, he waved his wand. He grinned upon seeing the requested object sitting on top of McGonagall's desk. A bit coarse, but much better quality than the glove he created in class.
"Excellent!" the normally stern professor said with a small smile. She looked into the raven haired boy's eyes, "You are aware that you have not been in class for two months, correct?"
He could only nod at that, matching the information to an odd tidbit filed away earlier. So he really had been out of Hogwarts since before break. Why? He quickly stored his train of thought away to listen to what Mcgonagall had to say.
"I had been worried that you would be far enough behind by now that I would need to hold you back for a year. However, your demonstration today has shown me that your parents have done a marvelous job in keeping you up to date with the coursework that you missed. Please thank James for me.
In addition, please see me after class tomorrow. Until then, I will be lightening your make-up work seeing how your current progress was significantly better than I had hoped. Dismissed."
With a thank you to the Professor, Harry left the Transfiguration classroom. Once outside, he gave a small sigh of relief. It might have worked out in the end, but next time, he needed to hold back a little to avoid getting in trouble like this again.
-o-o-o-o-
And that was when he froze as a thought occurred to him. Having been kept after class, he had no clue where he had to go for his next class, since none of the other Slytherins had waited for him.
His mind was taken off his worries when he someone bumped roughly into him.
Turning around quickly, he was greeted to the backside of a short redhead that quickly disappeared into the crowd. Ginny...
He quickly shook his head to remove the dullness that had overcome his senses. He shouldn't be thinking about her. Even with another chance, it still hurt too much right now. He quickly focused his mental thoughts on a solution for his current predicament. It soon came to him, a trunk. They might contain one. After all, he reasoned, where else would a timetable go once a student learned a schedule?
With that, he entered several hidden passages as he made his way towards the Slytherin dungeon. The crowds were thinning out, it was best not to be caught in the hallways between classes.
He finally stopped in front of a blank wall.
"Purity," he said in a mocking tone.
Without so much as a sound, the entrance to the Slytherin common room appeared in front of him, granting him access to the Slytherin dormitories.
After losing his way once again, Harry finally entered the deserted second-year boy's dormitory. He glanced around, looking at all of the available trunks that he could rifle through. His eyes fell upon the trunk lying at the foot of his bed. The one that he had brought to Hogwarts. Best to check that one first, it wasn't trapped last time he checked. It opened easily, and buried under the first layer of clothes was a timetable with a green frame and silver face. A Slytherin timetable. Success!
He frowned as he looked at it, H. J. Potter was written next to Name. Was this coincidence? Maybe, he concluded, the timetables magically fit themselves to the user. So if Ron were to pick up this timetable, R. B. Weasley would appear. Looking further down the parchment, Harry quickly learned that Charms was next. He didn't need a time spell to know he was late.
He started to stand up and leave before he glanced down at the open trunk. Now that he thought about it, he hadn't actually looked through the contents of this trunk yet. Even if he went to class, he would receive a detention anyway. So wasn't now as good a time as any to see what he had available?
He sat back down and began to rummage through the contents of the trunk. Clothes, books, some candy – surprisingly the kinds that he liked -...he started to get an uneasy feeling as he continued to look. While he had discovered this trunk by accident, the contents of this trunk were...not. Now that he thought about it, he hadn't needed to resize the robes contained within this trunk. He gave the one that he was wearing a slight tug on the sleeve. It fit perfectly fine. He hadn't needed to borrow books because the ones that he needed were already inside of this trunk...
...and the timetable. Addressed to H. J. Potter. Those didn't magically change their appearance based on the one holding them, did they?
He felt sick. The trunk that he had stolen was not. It was his. He was a Slytherin.
He shot up in determination. He was a Gryffindor!
He renewed his cataloguing with renewed vigor, desperately seeking some sort of proof to signify that his fears were unfounded and that this was all just coincidence. He couldn't possibly belong to this world, could he? Where were his memories?
Near the middle, he came upon an old newspaper. Curious, he started to browse through it.
Daily Prophet November 1, 1981
You-Know-Who Defeated
After a decade of darkness, the light has finally prevailed with the defeat of You-Know-Who at the hands of the Simon Edward Potter.
The son of James and Lily nee Evans Potter, this one-year-old along with his twin brother, Harry, were left in the nursery last night when Voldemort suddenly struck Godric's Hollow, the town where the Potter's home had been hidden under the Fidelius Charm. Rose, Simon's maternal grandparent, was inside watching over the two children while the parents were away attending a ministry function. Unfortunately, Voldemort had claimed her life before he was defeated. Her body was found inside of the nursery room, resting between Simon and a pile of ashes. She had heroically stood up against You-Know-Who until the very end.
Harry looked up from the newspaper to think about what he had just read. Bloody hell, where was he?
-o-o-o-o-
So Mum and Dad survived because of his grandparent. 'This is unfair,' he viciously thought. Then he deflated, 'maybe it was for the best.' He struggled to find any valid arguments to support that claim, but his mind came up blank.
A low grumble pulled him from his thoughts. His stomach was growling. He picked up the wand lying next to him and gave it a slight sweep.
Tempus
11:35. Charms was ending soon. It was almost time for Lunch. He stared at the beckoning trunk for a moment before he started to return the items that he had removed. Right now, he did not want to continue exploring the shoddy trunk. His mind had enough think about already.
Harry never made it to the Great Hall. Halfway there, someone decided to block his path. Looking up to identify the obstacle, Harry soon discovered that it wasn't a single person but a small crowd. All of them had red hair and a grim face. His protest died in his throat since they had a number of wands pointed at him, and three of them knew higher level spells.
Ron and Ginny broke from the group and stepped forward to confront him.
"What's this about?" Harry asked while giving a forced smile in an attempt to hide his unease.
"Slimy Slytherin. You stole our sister's first kiss," Ron shouted. Ginny's expression morphed from the red of anger to the pale white of mortification.
"That wasn't my first kiss!" She shouted in outrage.
"It wasn't?" Ron asked, turning equally white. The other Weasley boys also started to stare curiously at Ginny. His face reddened again as he rounded on her, "who was it then?"
It was rather embarrassing watching the two bicker like that, but Harry took advantage of the distraction to step backwards. Before he had a chance to turn around and run, something pointy started to poke him in the small of his back.
Great...was his last thought before there was a shout. Blackness overwhelmed him as his body started to go limp.
-o-o-o-o-
Harry's groggy eyes opened to take in the pristine white of the hospital wing. It took a moment before he could recall what he was doing in here, but when it did, an annoyed thought popped to the forefront of his mind.
He frowned as he thought about how the supposed Gryffindors of this world seemed to prefer shooting spells into someone's backside. He quickly reeled in his annoyance as another thought occurred to him. This should not do. Surprise or not, he should have been able to defend himself anyway.
"Glad to see you are awake Mr. Potter," came a voice that he knew rather well. It was from a younger Madame Pomfrey. It was strange hearing her greeting. There was a coldness in her normally friendly voice.
"What time is it?" the bedridden boy mumbled out.
"10 in the evening," came the crisp reply. "Now if you'll excuse me Mr. Potter, I have other students to attend to. You are well enough to leave."
It was strange to hear such a professional tone coming from the normally friendly hospital matron. Sensing the dismissal and eager to leave, Harry crawled off of the cot to leave despite the odd pain plaguing his joints and limbs. It seems that Poppy wasn't as thorough as she normally would be.
As he turned to leave, he was met with a strange sight, three unmoving students, eyes wide open with a glassy gaze. Harry had seen this before, and old memories filtered to the surface.
These students, they were petrified.
The Basilisk. The Chamber of Secrets.
Oh my god. Ginny...
...He had to get that diary away from her. But, how?
His anguish quickly disappeared when he spotted the petrified form of Mrs. Norris. He blanched and unclenched his hands. Then he clenched them one more time just to make sure. A frantic search through his pockets later, he groaned as his thoughts were proven true; Madame Pomfrey had not given him a pass. It was past curfew too. He was tired, sore, and hungry. Now this? The last thought in his mind before the first member of the night watch, Filch, started to chase him: The ferret was going to pay for pulling him out of bed today.
-o-o-o-o-
A/N
It occurred to me that my Harry is sarcastically humorous. I guess living through one war-torn battlefield can do that to you.
I do the betaing myself. I don't like it because I make the same mistakes repeatedly and it takes up a significant amount of time. Anyone willing to help? I'm not going to shove the whole workload on you because it's my story. But I need you to offer tips and advice. You also need to remind me to add your name.