Disclaimer: I own nothing but the obvious, the rest belongs to JK Rowling and Square Enix.
Author's Note: I'm glad you liked the previous one-shots! Please enjoy this as well, and hopefully review at the end!
Crossover: Harry Potter & Final Fantasy X.
Pairing: Tidus/Harry
Warning: AU in the Potter-world after OOP, and possibly slight deviations from canon in the FFX-world.
Rating: R (just in case)
One-shot #3: OtherworldIt was… too much, Harry decided as he wandered through the empty corridors of Hogwarts. Voldemort's machinations, Dumbledore's secret-keeping, the fight in the Department of Mysteries which had led to his friends getting seriously injured, the stupid prophecy that hung over him, Sirius' death… It was all far too much!
How the devil did the entire wizarding world expect a fifteen-year old child to save them from a megalomaniac with decades more experience? Especially when, instead of giving Harry the necessary training, they kept secrets from him and told him it was for his own good, that he deserved to have a childhood. Honestly, they were simply setting up a lamb for the slaughter at this rate.
Harry entered a random door, only to stop up in slight surprise when he found the Mirror of Erised in the room. The large mirror was half-way covered with a previously-white sheet, though the moths had made a sizable attack on said sheet. The entire room and everything in it was covered with such a thick layer of dust and spider web, that one was liable to think it had been abandoned like this for over a century rather than simply four years.
'I wonder what I would see if I looked in the Mirror now?' the green-eyed teen mused to himself as he walked towards said peace of furniture. 'Just one peek and I'll be gone.' He pulled off the large sheet, and ended up in a coughing-fit as the inch-thick layer of dust all around him was disturbed. Brushing the rest of the dust and spider web off of the mirror, Harry took a deep breath and stepped forwards.
He didn't see his family this time. Rather he saw himself dressed in muggle clothing, surrounded by passing people who nodded to his mirror self, shouted to him, waved, smiled, and other variations of a friendly greeting. What was notable that no one was staring at the famous scar, they were staring at Harry. Just Harry.
The mirror-Harry waved and smiled and shouted greetings back, a peaceful, relaxed and happy look on his face. Then the mirror-Harry turned back to the real Harry and grinned.
Harry watched his mirror self, and suddenly understood what the Mirror of Erised was showing him. Harry simply wanted to be left in peace until he felt ready to take up the fight with Voldemort. It may be selfish, but after everything that the wizarding world expected of him, he was entitled to being slightly selfish.
'The mirror-me looks so happy, so relaxed.' Harry thought to himself, his hands rising to settle on the cold surface of the mirror. 'I just wish to go somewhere where I can be simply me for a while. Until I have had time to think things through, until I feel ready to fight Voldemort. I just want to be left alone in peace.'
Harry was, by now, leaning his forehead against the mirror's surface. A song begin to sound softly through the room, calm and warming, and for a moment Harry thought that Fawkes had showed up. However, he discarded that notion when he noticed that the Mirror of Erised was glowing softly, and that the song seemed to come from his own mirror-self. The Harry in the mirror kept on singing, the words not really distinguishable, and he smiled happily at the shocked real-life Harry. The surface of the mirror rippled like water, and Harry could suddenly put his hands through – it felt like pushing ones hands through a thin, jelly-like substance.
The green-eyed teen stood indecisive for only a minute before he took out his wand and stepped through the mirror. For once in his life he just wanted to be selfish and do something for himself. He would be back, he knew that instinctively. It was his destiny, and the prophecy bound him to Voldemort, so they would meet up again. But right now Harry wanted peace and time to grieve and to come to terms with things, and he wanted to be just Harry.
'Hopefully Ron and Hermione will understand.'
-x-x-x-x-
Zanarkand was as close to Eden as human society would ever come. A very sci-fi and high-tech paradise, at that. The buildings, the roads, the houses, the everything in this strange city was high-tech. Most things could be recognised for what they were at once, some took a bit more imagination, and yet others one needed an instruction manual to explain, but they were never too hard to use once one understood the trick to them. Yet, despite this superior technology, the people of Zanarkand still seemed to appreciate the more old-fashioned way of doing things, like doing dishes, vacuum cleaning, ironing clothing, and so on. It was an odd mix of new and old, and it gave a rather charming feel to it all. Of course, bad things still happened, and people got killed, robbed, etc, but it didn't happen all that often. Actually, it hardly happened, and that was the one thing that freaked Harry out more than anything else. Human society needed both the good and the bad to function properly, and yet here Zanarkand was doing splendidly with a minimal dose of the bad.
Harry had been wandering the city for almost a year and a half now. The weather never got too bad or too cold, and he had had no trouble sleeping outside in one of the numerous, beautiful parks. And when he got hungry he had quickly learned that he could simply walk up to a bakery or an inn, and as for some food – and perhaps a bath as well – in exchange for helping out with various tasks before opening time. Most people were very kind and helpful, and before Harry knew it he had developed a reputation amongst the inns and bakeries for being a nice and honest young man, always willing to help out for practically nothing.
It did help, of course, that he was the only one in the entire city of Zanarkand who knew how to make butterbeer. Harry had learned to transfigure water into butterbeer thanks to Seamus Finnigan's obsession and numerous attempts at turning water into whiskey, and one night he had introduced the drink to the citizens of eastern Zanarkand. Though the butterbeer wasn't up to the real-deal's standard, the people at the inn had loved it, and it had quickly become the most popular drink. Bartenders, businessmen, brewers, all kinds of people tried to get the recipe from Harry, but he refused to give it away mostly due to the fact that one needed a wand to create butterbeer, and none of the people here had an ounce of magical power in them.
"Though the success of butterbeer does explain why I'm still working at the same inn for the past two months," Harry mused to himself as he cleaned a glass. He looked at the piece of glass critically, before putting it down amongst the other dry glasses and picked up a new one, starting the process over again. "Though Nochura and Lalia are very kind to me, and have given me good accommodations and even a salary."
"Talking to yourself again, Hari?" Lalia teased as she came out from the backroom. She was helping her husband, Nochura, to carry a large barrel of butterbeer to the front for easier access.
"You should know that I am very weird by now," Harry smiled at her. "And how many times do I have to tell you that it's pronounced Harry?"
"You know that no one here can pronounce your tongue-tying name correctly," Nochura muttered, groaning happily as he stretched after putting the barely down. "Hopefully this will hold up tonight. There'll be big celebrations after the blitzball game – which, of course, the Abes are going to win!"
"Men and your obsession with blitzball! Honestly! Now, Hari, are you sure you want to work tonight?" Lalia asked the teen. "You remember what happened the last couple of times you worked."
"Yes, I was hit on by at least a score of drunken men," Harry grumbled. "It wasn't my fault."
"We know that, lad, but you have to admit that you do look… er… feminine." Nochura coughed slightly into his hand to hide his grin. "Perhaps if you cut your hair to shoulder-length and started wearing more manly clothes you wouldn't be mistaken for – how should I put this? – for free game."
The green-eyed teen glared. It wasn't his fault that whatever forces that had brought him here to Zanarkand had decided to give him a slim and elegant and, as Nochura had pointed out, rather feminine physique. And Harry absolutely refused to wear the clothes that were so popular with the Zanarkand men – the tight, long-necked and sleeveless shirts were uncomfortable; the various shapes and sizes of vests were a bit to revealing, and there was no way in hell that Harry would walk around with a bare chest. Sure, he had filled out since coming here to Zanarkand, but he knew he didn't have anything worth showing off – at least not in his own opinion.
Lalia hit her husband on the shoulder. "Shut it you, you're making the poor boy embarrassed. Go watch the reruns of previous blitzball games until opening time. You have two hours, so you should be able to get in a game or two before the pre-game rush starts."
"Yes dear!" Nochura practically sang and almost skipped out of the room.
"How's about this then," Lalia had turned back to Harry. "You keep working in the bar, and me and my idiot husband will walk around and sever the costumers. You would be sheltered from some of the more aggressive suitors then, Hari. It's not that I think that you cannot defend yourself – everyone knows that you can after what you did to Icco last week – but I still worry."
Harry nodded and smiled. "I can do that. Thanks."
The woman settled down at one of the tables. "If you don't mind my asking, Hari, but why don't you ever take on a lover? You're certainly old enough, most definitely pretty enough, and I know of many people of both sexes that would be more than eager to, ahem, show you the ropes."
The teen simply shook his head. He would be going back to his own world at some point in time, he couldn't take on a lover and then simply up and disappear on them one day. Besides, that one date with Cho had been horrifying. "I can't, and I have no interest at the moment."
"As you wish, but don't be surprised if hopeful mothers start showing up with their single boys and girls, and offering them to you."
Harry threw the wet rag at the laughing woman, and grumbled.
Two hours later the little pub-slash-inn was filled to the brim with people wanting a drink before the blitzball game. Men and women, young and old, big, small, tall, thin, came in all colours of the rainbow. The chatter was loud, the excitement could almost be cut with a knife, and in one corner was a group of Barbie-like girls with too much make-up, bleached blonde hair, and too little in the clothing-department plotting another scheme to get the star player of the Zanarkand Abes to fall in love with them.
"Those girls give me the creeps." Nochura shuddered comically as he came to fill up his tray at the bar. "I can simply thank the gods that Lalia never was like that."
Harry nodded sagely. "Fangirls are dangerous creatures and should be avoided at all costs."
The few people standing at the bar snickered at the statement, several of the men nodding in agreement.
"Stop slacking off!" Lalia ordered as she joined them, though her eyes were twinkling.
"Yes, ma'am!" Harry mock-saluted her.
"Brat!"
-x-x-x-x-
Harry felt rather proud of how far he had come during his almost-two-year long stay in Zanarkand. He had learned a great deal about many things, especially himself, and he had been able to start working through Sirius' death and to start accepting the prophecy, but it was slow going. Sometimes he got so incredibly homesick, wanting to have Ron and Hermione by his side again, and wishing for all he was worth that he hadn't stepped through the Mirror of Erised that night. Those times he would always have a dream about his two best friends, talking to them, explaining why he had to go and asking for updates on the wizarding world. At first he thought it was simply a figment of his imagination and want to see the two again, but as time passed Ron and Hermione changed – and so did the news they told him.
"The wizarding world and Dumbledore were in such panic over your sudden disappearance, Harry," Hermione kept on reminding him, as if trying to make him feel guilt for what he had done. "We had to play ignorant as well to keep them from suspecting us. Luckily, you didn't contact us until after they had questioned us under veritaserum, so it didn't matter."
"On to more important things," Ron would usually break in at this point and get to the real news. "You-Know-Who's done it. He's taken over the Ministry for Magic, and he's made his name a Taboo. Anyone who mentions it is taken away immediately. Dumbledore's gone into hiding, and there are groups of Snatchers roaming the countryside. Snatchers grab anyone and anything that the new Ministry has deemed as a threat."
"How is everyone?" Harry asked always.
"As fine as can be. Snape's the new headmaster at Hogwarts, but he isn't as bad as many feared he would be. The resistance is still going strong – in secret, of course – and Neville's being a surprisingly good leader."
"And what about those horcruxes you two told me about? Have you found and destroyed any of them?"
The conversations would usually run in this manner, and when Harry woke up he felt both happier from having seen his friend, and more and more worried about the wizarding world. However, it seemed so incredibly difficult to worry about anything else but blitzball and the small day-to-day things when one lived in Zanarkand. Everything else seemed to be so far away.
-x-x-x-x-
"This is what we call a gunblade," Nochura explained as he showed the ancient piece of equipment to an eager Harry. "It can be used for both shooting and like a sword. Cool, ne?"
Harry was in awe of the weapon. "Where did you find it?"
"Ancient machina like this are to be found certain places where archaeology has revealed that the old civilisations thrived particularly." Lalia explained. "Nochura found this one while travelling as a young man. He cleaned it up, figured out how it works, and is a passable fighter with it."
Green eyes burned with determination as Harry turned towards the older man. "Will you teach me? Please?"
Nochura looked from the gunblade to Harry a few times, then finally nodded. "But it won't be easy, so you better be prepared!"
"Yes sir!"
-x-x-x-x-
One day before the pub opened up, Harry was standing in the bar again, drying glasses and making sure that no one wandered in through the open front and backdoors. Lalia had decided that the pub needed airing that day, and the weather was nice and warm, so there was nothing against it really. Someone just had to keep an eye on things, and since both Lalia and her husband were going out to stock up on things, that task fell to Harry – not that he minded. The bar was nice and quiet, and the only sounds that came was from the air conditioning or the slight sounds Harry made with the glasses and his humming.
Then something strange happened. A yellow and blue streak ran into the pub, jumped over the counter and managed to wriggle itself into the only free space underneath the counter. Said streak of blue and yellow was followed by approximately twenty Barbie-girls, all of which looked slightly deranged, their manicured hands all holding opened heart-shaped boxes of chocolate, eyes in various shades of blue and purple looked wildly around the pub, before the entire group focused on Harry and stalked over to him.
"Where is he?!" the girl at the front demanded, and several others echoed her.
"Where is who?" Harry asked, because he was quite sure that the yellow and blue streak couldn't have been anything human.
"Who? What do you mean who?!?!" the girl shrieked. "What rock have you been living under, girl?!?! Tidus, of course! The star player of the Zanarkand Abes!" the other girls echoed her again. "Now! Where did he go?!?!"
"Out the back door." Harry squeaked, and the horde of fangirls ran out again. "And I'm a guy." He added once he was sure that the monsters were far, far, far away. Then he hunched down on his heels, and stared at the blue and yellow ball he assumed to be Tidus. Then he poked him.
Sky-blue eyes peeked out from the ball. "Are they gone?"
"Yes. Comfy in there?" Harry smiled.
"Not really, no. Mind helping me outta here?" a tanned had was stretched out.
For a moment Harry contemplated on simply leaving the other teen there to get out on his own, but in the end he sighed and grabbed a hold of the other's hand. It was larger and stronger, tanned golden, and callused from hours of playing blitzball. Harry started pulling, and there came a few groans from the bar, and for a moment the green-eyed teen was afraid that the bar would collapse, but it held and with a mighty heave Tidus popped out. The suddenness of it all made Harry lose his balance, and Tidus landed half-way on top of him.
"Um, would you mind getting off of me?" Harry asked. Tidus had been staring at him from the same position for about a minute now, and Harry was getting a bit awkward.
Tidus grinned roguishly. "I kinda like it right where I am." One of his hands crept along the other teen's waist, and down, and then pinched the other's arse.
Harry squawked in shock, then roared in fury and proceeded to do his best in stuffing the blond idiot right back into the hole they had just gotten him out of.
-x-x-x-x-
Nochura poked his head into Harry's room after knocking. "Hari, there's a guy down there saying he's a friend of yours."
Harry looked up from the book he had been reading. "Ah, thanks, I'll be right down."
"No prob!" the older man grinned and disappeared.
'I wonder who it might be.' Harry mused as he walked downstairs into the pub – the living quarters were located just above it. He looked around, trying to spot the person. Lalia was behind the bar, making sure that everything was ready for tonight. And Nochura had gone back to cleaning the tables.
Then Harry spotted the person he was looking for, and paled. "Oh no, not him!"
Tidus grinned at the shorter teen. "Hallo Hari."
The green-eyed teen had never before wished for Voldemort to show up and try to kill him, but right now that seemed like a good idea.
-x-x-x-x-
"A butterbeer please, my emerald." Tidus ordered with a grin.
"I am not your anything!" Harry shouted as he put the tankard down on the table harsher than necessary.
"You will be!" the blond declared with his usual grin, and took a drink.
The green-eyed teen glared. "Not in your dreams, bucko! Don't you have anything better to do than harass unsuspecting, innocent people? Isn't there a blitzball game, or training, or something you have to go to that will take you as far away from me as possible?"
"Nope! My day is all yours!"
"ARRRGH!!!!"
Harry really felt like taking out the gunblade and using Tidus as shooting practice.
-x-x-x-x-
"Please Hari."
"No."
"Just once."
"Nope."
Tidus pulled out his greatest weapon. "Pwetty please with cream and sugar on top?"
Harry's eyebrow twitched, and he swatted the other teen with the dishrag. "Puppy-dog eyes don't work on me, so stop it. Besides, trust me when I say that my godfather was a master of puppy-dog eyes, and I have probably grown immune to them by now."
"So you agree to go out with me on a date then?"
"Keep on dreaming."
"I do!"
The green-eyed teen froze, then grimaced. "Eeew! I didn't need to know that, you dolt!"
-x-x-x-x-
"Hari, your boyfriend's here!" Lalia called to the green-eyed teen, chuckling when said teen started swearing and cursing and promising revenge upon a certain star blitzball player.
Harry stalked to the front of the pub, headed straight towards a grinning Tidus, and – to the great amusement of everyone in the room – grabbed the taller teen's ear, and pulled him out the door and into the darkness. Some of the more mischievous regulars decided to embarrass the green-eyed teen even further, and started to wolf-whistle and catcall only to laugh when Harry started cursing up a blue streak.
The black-haired teen pushed his taller companion up against the wall in the alley right next to the pub, and – with arms crossed – demanded an explanation. "What the hell are you doing here? I thought you had a game this evening?"
"I do," Tidus replied. "I just came to invite you to the game. Actually, the words would be 'force' and 'blackmail' you into coming to the game and then a date with me afterwards."
An eyebrow twitched. In the past few months Harry really had understood the way Lilly Potter nee Evans must've felt like while she was chased by a very hormonal James Potter. Not that Harry couldn't admit that Tidus was a really nice example of the male race, but his cocky attitude left something to be desired – or that's what he had been telling himself ever since he caught himself in thinking that Tidus was cute and that he grew upon you. Harry forced himself to focus. "And how, exactly, do you think you will manage this extraordinary feat?"
The grin turned positively evil. "I have pictures of you drunk out of your mind kindly provided by Nochura."
Harry yelped in horror. The damn traitor Nochura had promised that he had destroyed those incriminating pictures, dammit!
Tidus smiled normally again. "Tell you what, you come to the game and go on a date with me afterwards, and if you honestly don't like it then I'll stop chasing after you."
"Pinky promise?" Harry demanded after studying the other with suspicious eyes.
"Pinky promise." Tidus confirmed, and hooked his pinky with Harry's.
-x-x-x-x-
Harry focused on the book. It was really interesting, describing the history of Zanarkand. Really good.
Or it would have been if Tidus could leave his neck alone.
"Dammit you blond dolt! I'm trying to read here!"
"U-hum." Tidus replied, tightened his hold on the smaller teen and continued with adorning Harry's neck with hickeys.
The green-eyed teen twisted around in the grip, deliberately letting the book connect with the other teen's head. "Just because you managed to convince me to be your boyfriend, doesn't mean that can't be terminated if you don't behave."
The blond grinned, resting his forehead against Harry's. "You're cute when you're angry."
Harry gave him a dry look, then promptly pushed him off the couch.
-x-x-x-x-
Harry couldn't believe that he had allowed Tidus to corrupt him so much that he was willing to go to one of the blond's blitzball games. Usually he had to be blackmailed and forced into it, but this time he had simply gone on his own. He should've gone to the library to deliver a book, but instead his feet had led him towards the large stadium, through the doors, and into the stands. The crowd around him cheered when the first team entered the sphere pool, and practically went wild when the Zanarkand Abes entered as well. Green eyes followed each player around the suspended pool, but then caught and lingered for a long while on a certain star player.
When Tidus spotted Harry in the stands, he blinked in surprise, then grinned and waved wildly. Several of the girls around Harry sighed dreamily, and one even fainted, but Harry simply looked away, a slight blush staining his cheeks.
'What am I doing here?' the black-haired teen wondered. 'I can't stay in Zanarkand forever. I need to go back to the wizarding world, and help getting rid of Voldemort. I shouldn't be having a relationship with anyone, let alone the star player of the Zanarkand blitzball team! This can only end with heartbreak for both of us. I should pull out as soon as possible!'
The game started and Harry couldn't help but feel slightly awed. The players were very competent, and extremely competitive, but they never went outside the rules. This certainly wasn't like a Gryffindor-Slytherin match. Though the violence in blitzball could give the violence in professional Quidditch a good run for its money. People were flung out of the sphere pool, they were tackled, the breath they held was knocked out of them, and a number of other violent acts were committed.
"I have never seen Tidus play that good!" a girl a few rows in front of Harry squealed, then cheered loudly when the Abes scored again.
"He seems to be showing off!" her friend commented.
"And he was looking this way and waving wildly just before the game started!" a third girl added her two cents in.
The three girls all looked at each other, then suddenly squealed loudly, their faces covered with bright blushes. "KYAAAAH!!!!"
Those little bimbos were talking about his boyfriend, dammit! Harry's eyebrow twitched, and he desperately tried to ignore the possessive feeling that rose up in him. 'I am not jealous. I am not possessive. And I certainly am not either of those things when it comes to Tidus.'
When the game ended, Harry attempted to hurry out of the stadium before Tidus could catch up with him, but the goddamn crowds and fans simply refused to leave and move out of the way. And when they did start moving it was towards the locker rooms in order to catch the players when they exited. Harry was swept with the flow, until he finally managed to get away right before the crazed masses reached the locker rooms. The green-eyed teen stumbled slightly as he made his escape, feeling somewhat amused at having finally found something that was more scary than Voldemort.
He hadn't gotten far when a pair of arms wrapped around him, and lifted him off the ground and swung him in a circle. Once he was put back down onto terra firma, Harry had to hang on to his blond attacker until the dizzy feeling passed. Then he glared up at Tidus, and poked the taller teen in his still-wet chest. "What do you think you're doing, dolt? Now I'm wet as well!"
Tidus simply laughed, pulled Harry flush up against his wet clothes and kissed him silly.
-x-x-x-x-
Ron and Hermione stared at Harry. It had been a long time since the trio had met up in their dreams, and Harry couldn't help but feel slightly uncomfortable under the other two's harsh scrutiny.
"You've gotten shagged." Ron finally declared rather bluntly.
"What?!" Hermione blushed.
"E-excuse me?!" Harry squeaked. One wasn't supposed to say things like that so bluntly, dammit! It gave him no time to prepare for the following conversation.
"You've popped your cherry, Harry. Done the nasty. The horizontal tango. Made love. Had wild monkey sex. Experienced an orgasm. I can go on."
Harry and Hermione stared at him.
"What? I'm a hormonal teenage male. That should explain everything."
"I'm a hormonal teenage male as well, but I don't speak like that." Harry muttered.
Hermione rolled her eyes, but then turned back to the black-haired teen. "So, did you?"
Harry blinked. "Did I what?"
"Pop your cherry!"
Green eyes widened. "I thought you were supposed to update me on the situation in the wizarding world!"
"We have time for that later. I want to hear all the juicy details!" Hermione settled down in the mindscape. "So, was it that blond menace you were complaining about?"
For the first time Harry wished he could will himself awake. There had been a lot of firsts lately.
-x-x-x-x-
Harry sighed and made himself more comfortable in Tidus' embrace. They laid on the couch in Tidus' home. It was one of those days when it was simply too hot to be doing anything. There was absolutely no wind, the temperature was higher than normal, and all sane people kept inside as much as they could. The entire week had been just like that, and Zanarkand had seemed to fall into a lazy-spell, only waking up once it got colder during the night.
"I think someone just entered the house, Tidus." The green-eyed teen mumbled sleepily to his humanoid pillow.
"No one sane is out in this weather, Hari," the blond replied in the same lazy voice. "You must've been dreamin' or somthin'."
"Hmm." Harry agreed on principle, not having bothered to follow what his blond companion said.
The two eighteen-year-olds regretted their decision to ignore the incident only two minutes later when a pitcher of cold water was poured onto them both. Although the cold was a welcome relief from the scorching heat, the shock of its sudden disappearance made them both jump up with yelps, attempt to grab the closest thing that could be used as a weapon, and consequently ending up on the floor in a tangled heap of limbs.
"Now this is interesting," came a deep voice from somewhere above them.
A tall man stood in front of them, dressed in red warrior-monk robes. He had shades, his hair was black and spiky, and the collar of his robe covered the lower half of his face. As he returned his rarely-used want to its hidden holster, Harry had to wonder exactly how the man managed to stay so goddamn cool in those thick clothes.
Tidus was the first to react. "What the hell are you doing here?"
"What does it look like? I'm visiting of course," the man replied, then turned to Harry and simply raised an eyebrow.
The blond grumbled, but did the introductions as he pulled himself and Harry off the floor and back onto the couch, forcing the smaller teen to settle in his lap and winding his arms possessively around him. "This is Hari, my boyfriend of a year and four months. Hari, this is Auron. He's a friend of my old man's."
"Pleased to meet you." Harry smiled politely and stretched out a hand. Auron simply nodded, ignoring the hand, his eyes never leaving the green-eyed boy.
'For some strange reason I suddenly get the feeling that my time here in Zanarkand is about to end.' Harry shivered at the thought, and felt cold right in to the bone despite the sweltering heat.
-x-x-x-x-
"Tidus, please don't play tonight." Harry begged of the blond.
"The team's counting on me, Hari," the taller teen replied as he continued getting ready. "I have to play. Besides, you've seen a blitzball game before. You know that there is no other danger to me than perhaps a broken bone. Relax."
The green-eyed teen couldn't follow the advice. "Something bad's going to happen tonight, Tidus! Can't you feel it? It's in the air, in the ground, in everything. It's all humming with anticipation!"
"Yeah, anticipation for tonight's game."
Harry tried one last attempt at making his lover change his mind. He reached out and grabbed Tidus' wrist and pulled, forcing the blond to turn around. Then he pressed up against his long-term boyfriend and started kissing him wildly, grinding his hips suggestively against the other. Tidus responded wonderfully for a few minutes, but then seemed to manage pulling himself together and backed off.
"What's wrong with you, Hari? You've never been like this before."
"I told you! Something's going to happen, and it isn't good! Tidus, please listen to me and don't go!"
Tidus seemed like was about to listen to Harry, but then the shouts of the fans outside the house caught his attention and his stubbornness to see things through to the end reared its head. He straightened, checked his gear, and then headed towards the door. "I'll be back as soon as the game's over, Hari. There's nothing to worry about!"
Harry simply stood there and watched as the blond walked out of the house, and listened as the cheers of the fans grew to unimaginable decibels once they spotted the star blitzball player. For a while the green-eyed teen simply stood there in the empty house, then he suddenly realised what he was doing and hurried out of the house. He ran full speed back towards the pub where he lived and worked, some instinct inside him screaming at him to get the gunblade, to get ready.
He reached the house surprisingly quickly and dashed up the stairs and to his room. Here he packed a few pieces of clothing, some pictures and, of course, the gunblade that Nochura had gifted him with, and ran out again, this time heading for the stadium. But he wasn't even halfway there when a giant wave of water rose beyond the city and crashed down upon it. Along with the wave came the feeling of an overwhelming darkness, and Harry was sure that he saw the contour of some fish-like creature in the wave. Then the water reached him and he was far too busy trying to stay alive to notice other things. The water carried him on a wild tour through the city streets, and all Harry could do was make sure that he didn't hit any building or debris.
Finally managing to pull himself onto one of the higher-built roads that weren't destroyed, Harry proceeded to cough up what felt like both his lungs and his kidney. He did a quick check to make sure that his backpack, his gunblade and his wand were still where they were supposed to be, and then got to his feet in order to orient himself. the wave of water had destroyed much of the city, and if that wasn't enough the large fin that belonged to the contour he had seen and stuck out of the water, shook slightly and let several scales fall onto the piece of road where Harry currently found himself.
"Oh dammit!" Harry cursed when the scales turned into monsters. He didn't have too many bullets for the gunblade, so he pulled out his wand and got ready to curse the annoying little critters to kingdom come. However, he shouldn't have bothered. He didn't even get to shoot off one measly spell before someone interfered.
"Having fun without me, Hari?" Tidus joked as he cleanly slashed through one of the creatures with a reddish-tinted sword he had procured from somewhere.
Harry glared at the blond. "I told you something would go wrong. I told you! But do you listen to me? Of course not!"
"Yeah, sure, a little help would be appreciated!"
"Well, you're not getting it from me!"
"Less talk and more chopping," Auron cut into the banter and took out two monsters at once. "See that piece of debris over there at the edge? Make it explode Hari, while I and Tidus take care of the Sin Spawn."
Harry nodded and hurried over to the place that Auron had pointed to. Once there he discretely waved his wand, retreated a good few steps and then counted to five in his head. At this point the entire thing went KABOOM!!!! and all the Sin Spawn and half the road were taken out. It gave the three of them a chance to move on, and Harry and Tidus blindly followed Auron through the destroyed city since the older man seemed to be the only one who knew where he was going.
Sometimes during their mad run through the throngs of panicked people, fights with Sin Spawn and everything else that went wrong, Tidus had grabbed a firm hold of Harry's wrist, only letting go when they were forced to fight and making sure that Harry was well out of harms way. Although Harry felt somewhat happy at this treatment, he was mostly annoyed. The blond dolt had seemingly forgotten about the gunblade strapped to Harry's thigh, and had also forgotten just how good a shot the green-eyed teen was with it – which was weird because Tidus had, on more than one occasion, been the target.
They reached a high-rise on the road, and Auron stopped suddenly and looked up. Above them the clouds started twisting and twirling, and a great vacuum started pulling the three into it. Auron grabbed a hold of Tidus' collar, while Tidus himself had both his arms wrapped around Harry in a deathlike grip.
"Are you sure?" Auron said out of the blue, still looking up into the twirling mass of clouds.
"Hang on!" Tidus shouted through the winds as he felt Harry slip slightly in his grasp. The vortex was getting stronger and stronger, and the blond was tired from first having played a blitzball game, and then fighting those Sin Spawn.
"What do you think I'm doing?!" Harry shouted back, tightening his hold as much as he could.
Auron didn't seem all that affected by the vortex, his grip on Tidus never wavering. "This is it," the warrior monk muttered. "It all begins here. This is your story." And with that, he let go of Tidus and the three of them disappeared into the vortex.
Harry wasn't quite sure what happened in the following seconds. All he could remember was being torn violently out of Tidus' hold, and flung away into the darkness. He thought he heard Tidus shout his name, but he couldn't be certain. All he knew that when he next woke up Zanarkand was gone, Tidus was gone, and he was again standing in the dusty room with the Mirror of Erised, said mirror smoking slightly. He was back at Hogwarts.
-x-x-x-x-
The hunt for the horcruxes was long and tiring and dangerous. The trio spent weeks apparating from one end of Great Britain to the other, camping out in the wizarding tent Hermione had acquired. The hunt for them had escalated, as had the Ministry's laws against muggleborns and halfbloods and various magical creatures. Voldemort had more or less won the fight, but he still didn't have an iron hold on everything and everyone, and that helped Harry, Ron and Hermione greatly as they searched for the other horcruxes and how to destroy them.
Then things suddenly picked up. One after the other the horcruxes were found and destroyed, and the Dark Lord got more and more worried. And with the guidance of a very ill Dumbledore, the trio managed to destroy all horcruxes but one. The last horcrux was Harry himself – unknowingly made – and for Voldemort to die Harry had to die. Hermione and Ron and everyone else ranted and raged and tried to find a way around that minor detail, Harry had long since accepted this – heck, he had almost been expecting it ever since learning about the horcruxes. So when the time came, Harry went to meet with Voldemort alone and, as expected, got a face full of Avada Kedavra.
For a second he hung in limbo, a place that seemed totally composed of hundreds upon hundreds of firefly-like motes of light. As if reacting to Harry's thoughts the motes of light banded together to form a weak image of a grinning Tidus, before dispersing again. But seeing the blond sent a twinge to Harry's heart. He hadn't had much time to think about Tidus and Zanarkand lately, but gods how he missed them both.
"He will be with you soon."
Harry whirled around and stared at the young boy that had suddenly appeared. The boy was dressed in clothes that were originally from Zanarkand, and the green eyes widened slightly. "E-excuse me?"
"Tidus will come for you soon." The boy repeated.
The teenager blinked.
"Don't worry," the child smiled slightly. "All will be fine in the end."
The motes of light started swirling around Harry in a wild dance, blocking his view of the mysterious little boy. Then Harry felt firm ground underneath himself again, and heard the cheers and jeers of the Death Eaters around him. He had gone and done it again, and had survived the Killing Curse a second time. The rest of the fight against Voldemort was surprisingly easy. Harry summoned his gunblade again, stabbed it through the Dark Lord and fired it at the same time. Bye-bye Voldemort.
Now Harry was walking through the hallways and corridors of Hogwarts again. And once again it was night. His feet unknowingly took him back to the room with the Mirror of Erised, but when he entered the mirror was no longer there, the room was clean and seemed like any other regularly-used classroom. The green-eyed teen sighed sadly, and headed towards the Astronomy Tower. Sure, he was more than happy that Voldemort was finally gone, but did the damn wizarding world have to make such a big deal out of it? And did they have to hound Harry day and night, asking him to tell the story of Voldemort's defeat for the nth time?
Harry stared a the stars, for once really admitting to himself that he missed Tidus' annoying presence. The blond had managed to annoy his way into Harry's heart, and the green-eyed teen hadn't realised until they were parted just how much he liked having Tidus around. He missed the other's grins, the wild hair, the strong arms that would trap Harry in an embrace at all times. And he especially missed the way Tidus paid special attention to Harry's neck, the blond having some sort of fascination with it. The memories of these things were so strong that Harry could physically feel them.
"How long do you intend on standing there like a statue, Hari?"
The shorter teen's eyes widened impossibly and a whirled around, only to come face-to-face with a well-known person. Harry raised a hand carefully, just barely daring to touch Tidus' cheek, hair, clothes, afraid that the blond would disappear.
"What? No welcome-back kiss? I'm wounded. Do you know what I had to go through in order to get back to you?" " Tidus grinned, his hold on Harry tightening. One hand slid south and pinched the smaller teen's arse.
Harry squawked and automatically lashed out, whooping Tidus on the head. At this point he realised that Tidus was really there – no hallucination had such a thick skull – and Harry let out a shout of joy, attacking the blond with kisses and hugs and even more kisses. "You're here! You're here! You're here! You dolt! I'm going to kill you for not listening to me! You're really here!"
Tidus simply grinned at the things Harry babbled between kisses. "You're cute when you're like this." He pinched the other's butt again.
"I told you not to do that, you idiot!"
Another pinch.
"One more and I swear I'll use you for shooting practice!"
The taller teen couldn't resist apparently, and repeated the action.
"Right! That's it! Where's my gunblade?" Harry struggled. "Oi! Let go of me, dammit!"
A fourth pinch was delivered with a devilish grin.
"AARGHH!!!!"
-x-x-x-x-
There you go. Please tell me what you think.
My beta doesn't like slash, so please excuse the mistakes you find.
Just so you know, this was written in a snapshot-way!
I based this Tidus on the way the character acted while in Zanarkand and the earliest stages of the FFX-game, so please keep that in mind. You know, the cocky star blitzball player and all that jazz. And I know that there was next to nothing about Harry coping with the loss of Sirius and the prophecy, but this is the way it turned out.
Thanks to:
Lady-of-the-gray, Adnexus, Really Frozen Phoenix, firefantasy88, ron-and-dragon-lover, Toki Mirage, Morrolan, polabear, lildevil425, Firehedgehog, Hikari Kaiya, Fullmetal Angyl, The Morrigu, Blades of Silver, Wraith, Lyrashin, and White Ivy.