Harry Potter and the Alternative Universe
Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to the books by Mrs. Rowling, kay?
Pairing: I am a strict Draco/Harry fan meaning that Draco tops Harry kay?
Chapter 3: Predators
The smell of freshly cooked fish awoke Harry's senses. Dumbledore was up. Groaning Harry pushed his feline friend off of him and walked towards the door. Hedwig always left for the nights, still wary of Kit's presence but Harry knew he would see her downstairs begging Dumbledore for food. A new installment that Dumbledore finished not three years ago was a restroom that was located between their two rooms. It held a tortoise shell sink with running water taken up from the ground level where it was drawn from a well.
The 'toilet', as Dumbledore called it, was made out of a simple clay pot with a lid that would hold their waste until a lever was pulled that would let go of the false bottom. The waste would then travel down a pipe that was made out of rusted metal, clay and plaster that Dumbledore fashioned from the ship that left him marooned on the island 70 years ago. It would then be taken a safe distance away from the tree house to a specially dug pit. It was dirty work keeping the toilet clean and functional but it was a small price to pay for such a luxury.
Instead of taking the platform down to the kitchen Harry took the rope net, which he himself fashioned for when he wanted to get down the tree quickly. The platform was really more for Dumbledore who could not use the rope ladder in his old age.
"Harry, just in time, would you grab a coconut from the pantry?" Harry nodded, as he climbed into the room, walking straight towards a closed door that held a small store of fruits, vegetables and other miscellaneous items that didn't need refrigeration. Dumbledore was truly a genius. The kitchen was a marvelous example of Dumbledore's skills, most of which he had passed on to Harry with his teachings.
Even though Harry didn't come from the civilized world like Dumbledore had, he was still receiving an education that would have made any man jealous. For if Harry had grown up in a normal civilized world he would have known that by the age of seventeen Dumbledore was considered the greatest inventor of his time and that any apprentice under him would be given an education to make the king jealous of.
"So," Harry began the morning conversation as he sat down at the table in front of Dumbledore's coconut shredder, "Is there any ship?"
"When I woke up, I took note of the burnt brush. There was no ship that I saw. Either they didn't see the signal or they are somewhere on the island as we speak. The rock outcropping would hinder them from trying to enter this particular harbor but there is one further down about a day or so's walk from here that is safe to enter."
Harry nodded as he shredded the outer bark of the coconut with his knife and finger's. He then placed the hard circular fruit onto a stand and clamped it in place. Attached to the stand was a bar that was pulled back onto a spring. At the end of the bar was a sharp needle that would pierce the outer shell once the spring let go of the bar. "I see, so I guess I'll just go about my day as if it were any normal day. I'll check the traps; gather another supply of coconuts from the beach maybe…" Harry let the coil go and the needle launched itself into the coconut. "Dumbledore however did you managed without these contraptions?" Harry asked as he pried the needle from the coconut before pouring out the small amount of milk it held.
"It was messy…bloody but I managed with what I had." Harry handed him the milk, which would be used to cool down the fish. He then took the coconut and strapped it to a log in the corner of the room. Taking a blunt instrument he had fashioned from a sharp rock and a piece of scrap metal Dumbledore had no need for, Harry cut the fruit open the rest of the way.
In order to pass the time both Dumbledore and Harry developed a contest two years before that they played every now and then…the looser had to clean the toilet. Every seven days each of them would make one meal, one would do breakfast and the other would do dinner. A recipe would be made from scratch during the process of gathering ingredients and what ever meal they both liked the best would be the winner. The recipe Dumbledore decided to use that morning was one of Harry's that had won about a year or so ago. Coconut milk fish with a side of cress stalks, which were a kind of vegetable Dumbledore said tasted like butter potatoes that his grandmother used to make.
Harry sliced out chunks of the meaty fruit and handed them to Dumbledore to dice up and then fry with the fish. "You know what I've been craving. Some of your famous Sashimi and Sushi. You think we could have that for dinner tonight? I'll even gather all the ingredients." Harry smiled up at Dumbledore, pleading with his eyes in a way he knew the old man couldn't resist.
"If you gather fresh ingredients…and I mean you catch the fish five minutes before dinner then yes we can." Harry laughed, hugging him from behind. The old man made the dish only so often and that was only because sometimes the ingredients were so darn hard to find. The fish was easy as well as the spicy stuff that Dumbledore put in the middle of the sushi pieces, which was just a seed that grew inside of a spiky fruit that they would mash into a paste but the substitute for what Dumbledore called 'rice' was the difficult part. There was a certain root that only grew in a shady and damp place that Dumbledore found tasted and worked well enough as a rice substitute. But it only grew every so often and never in the same place.
The 'nori' or seaweed as Dumbledore told him would have to be dried and pressed for an entire day in order to serve as the wrap that held some of the sushi pieces together. Dumbledore made this dish the first night of the contest and Harry had to give it to him. The so called famous Japanese dish was one of his favorites.
"You know Harry, back in England…it's easier and faster to find or make sushi…just a thought." Dumbledore hummed to himself as he served the coconut fish.
'Tricky bastard,' Harry thought to himself.
Harry hunkered down on the jungle floor pulling up the white and yellow roots that had taken him two hours to find and placed them into his makeshift satchel. The seaweed he had already brought back to the tree house where Dumbledore promised to press it for him and the spiky fruit grew on a tree not too far from the tree house so he had picked those up first. The only thing he needed to find was the fish as well as to check his traps for any game that they would keep for the next day's meal.
Once all the roots were in place Harry stood, dusting the moist soil off his knees. It was barely noon and the sun was already beating down harshly on his back. For 18 years he lived with the uncomfortable weather but it still got to him how hot it truly became once the sun reached its zenith. Shouldering the pack, Harry picked his way through the dense foliage towards the traps he had laid. Most likely a few of them would contain something palatable.
The first one was clean as well as the second but the third contained something of interest. Harry threw down his pack and approached the hole. His traps were simple. He dug holes and covered them leaving no trace of human contact in the area. This hole contained an animal that Dumbledore said looked and later on said tasted like a wild boar. It was dirty brown and covered in coarse hair. Its squeals of discomfort reverberated around the wooded area causing Harry to recoil in distaste. It must have been hurt when it fell. Harry un-strapped the spear that was on his back and took aim. The hard part was always getting the carcass out of the hole and disposed of but it was still the easiest trap to manage.
He let loose the spear and barely blinked an eye when the boar gave one last horrific shriek before keeling over. Harry hopped into the hole, extracting the spear and pulled out a knife. He would cut the pieces he wanted out and wrap them in saccrine leaves before placing them in his pouch. It was best to let blood seep into the ground and create a scent for more predators to find.
Once the last piece of meat was wrapped in the special saccrine leaves, which Harry found kept the meat that much fresher before he got back to seal it into the refrigerator, another of Dumbledore's unique inventions, he stood up preparing to climb up and out of the hole. But a sound stopped him. It was the crunch of undergrowth under a booted heal. Someone was close by. He knew it couldn't have been Dumbledore for in his old age the man could barely walk without tripping over something. These feet were treading carefully, almost as if they were stalking and did not wish to be heard by their prey.
Climbing quickly out of the hole, leaving the carcass for the moment in order to check out the area, Harry picked up the satchel and stashed the meat inside. Looping the band across a low branch and plunging the spear into the ground, Harry set off with only a dagger in hand. The noise was getting louder. What sounded like one pair of feet now sounded like many. Wiping off the pigs blood with a leaf, Harry stashed the knife in the band of his loincloth. It would be easier to see who or what was traveling in his woods if he were above the potential danger.
Effortlessly he climbed up the tree, hiding only a few feet above the ground. He waited…and waited, and waited. The seconds turned into minutes and Harry could no longer here the rustling sound. He let out a shaky breath unsure if he had only been hearing things or if Dumbledore had been right in saying that a ship could have seen their signal and was in fact on the island searching for them.
Just as he was about to hop down and resume his day the sound came again. Taking out his knife, Harry leaned further against the tree. A man then suddenly came into view. Or what Harry thought to be a man. The figure was dressed head to toe in black, which must have been awfully hot as indicated by the glistening of sweat all along the man's head, plastering his graying and stringy hair down onto his bony scalp. In his hand was a machine Harry had never seen before but with the way the man was holding it he could only assume it was a weapon of some kind.
The stranger walked into the small clearing, a prominent limp causing him to hunch further towards the ground. He peered over the edge of the hole, wrinkling his nose at the stench of blood and baking carcass. Harry inched closer to the edge of the branch, intrigued by this new person. The only other human being he had ever been in contact with was Dumbledore so he was entitled to a little curiosity.
Unfortunately his toe put pressure on a branch that was not strong enough and it snapped. Harry's body seized up, hoping against hope that the stranger hadn't heard. Unluckily he had and Harry silently cursed as the stranger in black whipped about, brandishing the shinning metal object in front of him menacingly.
Harry bite his tongue from making any noise for when the man had turned around he noticed that not only was the man haggard but his face was distorted almost painfully by a grotesque instrument that covered his wide insanely alert eyes. Never before had he seen something so…hideous.
The creature, for that was what he resembled most, turned his head frantically searching for the origin of the sound. When he found none and seemed content to move out of the clearing he paused. Harry wasn't sure what the stranger was looking at for a large branch covered him completely. And unless Harry wanted to make another noise and alert himself to the man's presence again, he'd wait until he knew for sure that he was gone.
After only a few minutes, Harry heard the man move again, his footsteps sounding further and further away. A couple more minutes later, Harry deemed it safe enough to climb down the tree. Shouldering his satchel and grabbing his spear, Harry made a run back towards the tree house. If that was an example of what the men on the ship looked like Harry would rather not be rescued. Dumbledore would need to hear about this new development.
Convinced of what he had to do, Harry ran swiftly through the woods making scarcely a sound. Dumbledore had once tried to convince him that he ran as quietly as a deer, which made Harry laugh, for why would a predator like Harry like being told that he was prey. No, he ran with the fleetness and grace of a panther.
It would take him roughly an hour to get back to the tree house, which made Harry nervous. What if the stranger had heard him and was following him back? That thought alone, halted Harry mid step. What would happen then?
Gulping in air, Harry wildly looked around, searching and listening for any sign that he was being followed. When he was assuaged and his breathe had returned, Harry vaulted into action, but before he could so much as pick up his old stride he was taken down hard. Something had pushed him to the ground, something heavy.
Both the satchel and the spear were lost in the frantic tumble as Harry and his assailant rolled on the ground. He pushed and clawed at the person on top of him screeching in pain when a rock lodged itself in his back. Finally he was taken over. The other's strength far surpassing his own. His face was pressing into the dirt and his arms had been pulled behind his back brutally.
He then felt the roughness of rope being twinned about his wrists tightly as the person on top of him grunted out curse after curse. When the man was done, Harry was pulled up by his wrists, and placed upon his knees. Voices were yelling all about him in a language he could almost identify except for the heavy accents that were so unlike Dumbledore's. But then two voices chipped in, speaking in a language that he did understand.
Cautiously he looked up through the fringe of his hair. All around him were men, dressed in such strange attire, most of them were covered head to toe in finery he had never dreamt of and others wore simple trousers and shirts like he did on fancy occasions.
"What are you doing young sir you could have been killed by that savage and then where would we be?" A stuffy voice spoke in an irritated manner. Harry directed his eyes toward the young sir and stifled a gasp. The man that had trampled him was like nothing he had ever seen. Of course Dumbledore spoke of other people and described them but never had he described 'him'.
The 'young sir' was looking towards the man who chastised him and smirked. "He was no trouble at all." His voice was lyrical and rich a sound Harry had never heard before. "This could be the person who sent up the signal…we needed to catch him before he got away and since all of you are to slow I did it myself."
He was dressed some what less stuffy then most of the others but none the less fine. His golden hair was pulled back into a pony tail at the back of his neck with only a few strands hanging haphazardly about his face most likely from their tussle. His clothing consisted of a pair of rich brown trousers, a cream shirt that was slightly smudged with dirt and grass and a velvety green vest that took most of the brunt of their brawl.
"None the less Draco. Let the men handle things like that from now on. It's what we hired them for anyway." The stuffy man sniffed down at Harry, eyes widening when he noticed he had been watching the exchange. Draco also looked down at him, his sneer smoothing out when he stared at the boy. He barely even looked like a threat, kneeling there in nothing but a slip of fabric and long unbound hair.
Draco slowly lowered himself to the ground, preparing to flee if there was the slightest show of aggression but Harry stayed still unsure if those strange weapons trained on him would be let loose if he so much as breathed heavily.
"Do you understand what were saying?" Draco said slowly, intrigued by the boy. Besides his exotic appearance there was the fact that the beautiful boy was practically half naked in front of him. All that came together to create quite a stirring problem.
Harry gazed deep in the pools of quick silver noting the way those eyes traveled over him. 'Most likely sizing me out in case I attack,' Harry thought guilelessly. For surely he didn't understand all there was to know about sexual encounters between two people.
Tilting his head to the side in a show of submission, for he was the one in the position to do so being that his arms were tide, Harry nodded his head. Hopefully these strangers wouldn't treat Dumbledore as roughly when he brought them to the old man for surely he would be able to fix the problem he now faced.