Chapter 8: Sir Dudley

Vernon sat at his desk at work, skimming over newspaper ads during his first coffee break of the day. He was scanning for a deal on his next vehicle, as he was currently stuck carpooling and grumbling about 'wild hit and run hooligans' to his subordinate, Paul Newcomb. He wasn't much surprised when he caught himself looking instead for second hand children's furniture. Something compact, sturdy, in good condition and most importantly, without sharp edges. He'd been going over the idea of fixing up the spare bedroom for his nephew for the past two days and he now felt fairly committed to following through.

The first night that Harry had slept in the guestroom, Vernon had looked in the cupboard. He hadn't wanted to but it would have been almost superstitious not to, and certainly it would have been impractical. If wishing weren't both those things too, he'd wish to have not looked. He didn't want to know that what had seemed serviceable for a small child, what had been a space as clean as any other in his house, was somehow changed to a filthy nest of rags and spiders. The crib mattress set upon an army cot had looked comfortable enough two years before. He supposed it still did, for a boy Harry's size. He could simply clean it out, if Petunia wouldn't, and perhaps add an extra blanket and call the job done. Harry was still the same little menace, after all.

Instead, he'd looked up having safety bars put on the window of the spare upstairs bedroom. The boy wouldn't be crawling out of it again if he had any say in it. He was considering getting them for all of the upstairs windows, just in case Harry got determined to break his own neck. Considering cost, he was leaving it as an option dependent upon the boy's future tenacity in the pursuit of trouble. He supposed it was possible that he'd learned not to jump out of windows the first time around but that wasn't something he'd bet on.

He wanted to bide his time in getting any furniture. It would work best if he could convince his Pet that it was her idea. He was still working on her taking the boy clothes shopping, so the chances there were slim. If it came to it, he'd do the same thing he had when Harry first came into his house and Petunia had wanted to keep him on a pillow in a laundry basket; he'd lay down the law about what was normal and do just as he wanted whether she squawked or not. He could do it now, but she was horrible when her dander was up, a right terror to rival Vernon's own mother. The last thing he wanted was to walk into weeks of fighting with his wife when it wasn't necessary.

The easier matter was convincing her of the importance in short-term consideration of the boy. She herself said that they needed to feed him up and do it well. Paying him some niceties to keep his spirits up while he was ill was a matter of course as well. Continuing to treat the boy well was something which he thought required a significant precedent, a new rule of conduct which Petunia would be hard-pressed to go against once Harry was well again.

The date was July twenty-third, and Vernon had his arguments ready.


Harry looked up as his Aunt Tuna nudged the door to the guestroom open with the toe of her shoe and came in carrying two stacked trays. She stopped as she saw him and frowned for a moment before stepping up to the side of the bed and handing both trays to Dudley. "Careful," she said warningly, and as Harry eyed the four full glasses on the top tray he felt like echoing her. Then she lifted the top one off and gave it to Harry, making his eyes widen at the thought of what would happen if he spilled everything. That would get me back into the cupboard real quick. She took one of the taller glasses, filled with something pink-red and slushy looking, and passed it to Dudley, followed by a glass of chocolate milk, which left Harry with his own pink slush and a glass of regular milk. Looking between their two trays, he saw that while this was not the only difference in what she'd given them, there was less of a gap in how much food they'd been allotted than what he would have expected.

As he tried working out just how many more chocolate and raisin biscuits his cousin had than him, and Dudley scowled at the sliced apples and sandwiches in disgust, they both failed to notice the pinched frown Petunia wore as she looked between them speculatively.

"What's this?" Dudley asked as he poked the tall glass of slush, causing it to wobble ominously for a moment.

"Fruit smoothie, Duddy dear, and please be careful. I don't want anything spilling up here, and try not to leave any crumbs," she said with an indulgent smile, and then she reached out and petted his hair affectionately.

Harry tried his best not to pay attention to them. He didn't know what it was about Dudley that kept him from getting into trouble but he'd decided a long time ago that it didn't make enough sense for him to be able to figure it out. He'd be charming secrets from cats before he worked out how to keep from getting into trouble with his aunt.

"No rough-housing," she told them, and Harry nearly rolled his eyes. "Remember what I said about not wearing Harry out."

"Yes, Mummy," Dudley answered in a bored tone.

Harry stared after her as she left, wondering again just what was wrong with his family.

"Dummy," Dudley muttered under his breath.

He glared at him, wondering if he could kick him out of the guestroom without getting kicked out himself.

"It's because you look like you've been crying, you baby," Dudley snidely explained, "that's why she said not to wear you out."

"I wasn't!"

"You were!"

"I wasn't! And if I was, it would be your fault anyway, you twit!"

"Don't you call me names when I'm being nice to you!" he snarled back.

"You're not being nice to me!"

"I am too. I haven't stolen anything off your plate yet, have I?"

Harry pouted. "Yet."

"Well, I won't. So shut up." He then picked up three biscuits in one hand and dunked them all into his chocolate milk at once, so that it sloshed over the sides and onto the tray. Thankfully, there were raised edges and it didn't end up all over the bedspread.

He did roll his eyes then, knowing that his cousin simply couldn't resist the lure of food for very long. It even disturbed his telly-watching, when he got to the bottom of a bag or bowl and knew there was more of what he wanted in the kitchen.

Picking at his own plate, he wondered if Dudley even knew how to be nice. "I thought you said you weren't going to call me names anymore."

"Pssh," Dudley scoffed, spewing crumbs, "that's not what I said." He looked down then and mumbled, "I'm just not going to get you into trouble anymore. Least not for things you haven't done."

"Oh. Okay." That's still a good deal. And being name-called is, at last, something normal in the world. Satisfied with this middle-ground, he took more interest in eating, happy once more just to have a full meal in front of him. He lifted the tall glass of pink slush and took a cautious sip; his eyes widened and he tipped it towards him for a bigger gulp. So sweet! "Wow."

Dudley scrunched up his nose. "What? It's just fruit."

Harry started to shake his head at his cousin, then stopped and just took another large swallow of the syrupy drink.

Giving his cousin a doubtful look, Dudley eyed the repulsive slush speculatively. He really didn't want to touch it. Fruit was always either too bitter or too soft and it never made him feel full; he nearly hated it. Across from him, Harry closed his eyes and hummed in appreciation. Decided, he picked up his own glass, holding it before himself for a moment in hesitation and then quickly taking a drink of it. He nearly choked but was pleasantly surprised by the taste. "It's like candy!"

Eyes snapping up in attention, Harry asked in an excited tone, "It is? What kind?"

"The hard stuff you've gotta suck on. And some of the cream-filled ones." Like his cousin, he then abandoned talking for further tasting.

Only ever having had candy on rare occasions, as he was apparently 'already too energetic for his own good,' Harry quite liked the idea that he was getting something which was at least like the forbidden treats. As accustomed to getting into trouble as he was, it was a thrill for him to think that he was finally getting away with something.

The boys ate in amicable silence, Dudley absorbed in his food and Harry cautious of breaking the strange peace between them. When they finished, Harry passed his second sandwich over to his cousin, who had cleared his own plates, and approached the question that had been swimming in his head for the past quarter hour. "Earlier, you said something about angels, didn't you?"

The corner of the last remaining sandwich in his mouth, Dudley froze with wide eyes. He stared for a moment, then gathered himself together and bit off a piece of his sandwich. Harry got the feeling that he was only chewing so much to buy time.

"My Mum and Dad are angels," he volunteered to get the conversation started. "Aunt Tuna said so. They're up in heaven."

"They are? Angels, I mean?" Dudley sounded a bit shaken at the idea. "Are you sure?"

"Well, yeah." His brows furrowed. "Why wouldn't they be?"

"I dunno. Just - maybe they don't..."

"What? Fly?"

Dudley went pale. "They can fly?"

"It's what the wings are for, Dudley."

"Oh. Right. Okay."

"Well?"

"Well what?"

Harry sighed quietly. "What were you saying about angels earlier, Dudley?"

"Oh. Well, you know how they saved us in the car, right?"

I get the feeling that this is going to be another one of those long, long talks. "What? No, wait. When?"

"When the truck hit us," he said in surprise, "when you got sick. I guess you were already sleeping then," he added thoughtfully.

Harry cast his mind back, trying to recall. Aunt Tuna went to the park with Dudley and I slept in the car. She was real happy when she told me so. We were still riding when I woke up, though. Then he remembered the most distinctive part of the evening for him; his Uncle Vernon had snapped at him and Dudley. "The roads were slick," Harry said quietly, repeating the warning that had alarmed everyone in the car. He closed his eyes, trying to force his last memory of that night to resolve into something more than fear. I was looking for something. No, listening. There was so much yelling and - He opened his eyes. I don't understand.

For a moment, muffled by terror in the backseat of the car, he thought that he had understood. Everything. I was trying so hard to hear...too much screaming. But I felt it - I felt... Everything. He heaved in a deep breath of air, not having realized that he'd stopped breathing. It was ridiculous, with as much time as he'd spent in the dark of his cupboard just trying to find something. Sensing the secrets living beneath the surface of a plant or animal - or Dursley - was one thing but this had been...his imagination? I felt Aunt Tuna. Uncle Vernon. Dudley. Trees and grass and wildflowers and mice and owls and - Everything. So worried. Scared. Strong. Sleeping, breathing, swaying, peaceful, hunted, hunting. So busy, so quiet in the woods. I wasn't trying to listen to them; I just wanted to hear...I wanted to find what could hurt us. Danger, he recalled vaguely, that's what I was looking for. I wanted to see it coming. The screaming got so loud.

"Harry?"

He looked up and saw that Dudley seemed a bit worried.

"You're not scared to remember, are you? Mummy said not to bring it up." Then he bit his lip, either out of worry for his cousin or that he'd be told on.

"No," he breathed, "no, I'm not scared, Dudley." I've never been less scared in my life. "Tell me what happened after I went to sleep."

"Well, the truck hit us and the windows broke and then there was all this light and Mummy screamed and the car spun around and then we hit a wall or something but the car just kind of bounced. Everywhere, stuff was all lit up and we were lit up, 'cept you weren't, and I was the brightest one. At first it was too light to see anything but then it wore off real slow and it turned out to be some sort of dome all around the car, like an alien force field. If you were secretly an alien, you'd tell me, right?" he asked with suddenly narrowed eyes.

"Sure," he agreed easily. If nothing else, it might scare you. 'Beware my wrath, for I am actually Gletchimarre, Prince of the Martians, and I might just zap you with my mind.' Yeah, that could be handy.

"Oh. 'Kay. And you're not?"

Ruin my fun... "Nope. Or if I am, I don't know it."

Dudley looked thoughtful at that. "Yeah...you know, maybe you are." He looked his cousin over closely. "It would make way more sense. Then you'd just be sick 'cause you're tired from using your alien powers up on that force field."

That...actually makes sense. Only it would be monster powers, wouldn't it? Maybe, if I really am getting monster powers, the others will come for me soon. He felt a thrill run through him, heightening his joy at the idea of having done what he was nearly sure he had. If he could find a friend because of this...

"But that's not what Mummy says it was. She says we were saved by angels. That good people get protected like that, when they can be."

Harry's eyes widened at this thought and he leaned back against his pillows, absorbing the notion. Angels, like his parents. He ran over what he knew had happened. He'd been frightened, desperate for his family's safety and seeking in the shadows for things that could hurt them. Somehow, he had wound up sensing more of the world than ever before; he'd never been so aware in his life. Dudley said a light came next, some barrier that had guarded them all from the crash. I was already sleeping then, though. Maybe...if I could feel everything, then maybe it wasn't just monsters I could have talked to.

He focused his eyes on Dudley, since the other boy knew more about what had happened than he did. "Do you think, maybe it was my parents?" His heart was racing at the thought. Could he have spoken to them? Can I do it again?

Dudley seemed alarmed by the thought, at first shaking his head, looking horrified. "No, no. I don't think they'd, well..." He trailed off as he held his cousin's gaze, seeming to lose whatever arguments he had as the seconds ticked by. "Yeah, I guess. Maybe." His voice was weak and terribly unconvincing, but Harry didn't need much affirmation.

"Yeah," he said with a dazed smile, "they must've." My parents protected me. He grinned as he stared off into space.

Shifting uncomfortably, Dudley wondered if he should feel guilty about saying that yeah, it had probably been Harry's parents who'd made him sick, or relieved, because he was doing it to be nice, which was supposed to mean he was good. He settled for ignoring the subject. "Want to play war?" Harry snapped out of his dream world and stared at him in shock. "I can bring my men over from my room, if you want. We can set them up on the bed."

Harry's jaw wavered up and down for a moment. "I - uh - yeah, sure. That'd be...are you an alien?" He narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

"No!" Dudley snapped in annoyance. "Have you ever seen me in a flying saucer?"

"You've never seen me in one either. You still said I was."

"Well, yeah," Dudley said as he got off the bed with his meal tray in his hands, "but you're weird." He carried his tray over to the chair against the wall and set it down on the seat, then came back to the bed and retrieved Harry's, stacking the glasses together and putting it on top of the other. Then he walked out to the hall and into his room, shutting his door behind him.

Harry shook his head, unsure of what he should make of that. Was his cousin coming back? Would he really bring toys and play with him? Had he been possessed by an alien?

Then he thought of another explanation for the world he'd woken up to. Dudley said that he and Aunt Tuna and Uncle Vernon were glowing, but I wasn't. Dudley glowed the brightest, and so far he's the weirdest. I wasn't glowing at all, and I feel normal, except for being tired. If it really was my parents who protected us all...

Suddenly, the world made sense again. It was a sort of sense which no Dursley would understand, but he was quite familiar with it. A marvelous trick had been played, a great mystery had been woven into the world and he knew the secret. He relaxed completely for the first time since he'd woken up.

His parents had given him a gift. This Dursley mystery was the trick of angels. They'd done something to them...

Dudley's door opened and he came back into the room, carrying an armful of toys to the bed.

Harry's Mum and Dad had made it so the Dursleys would treat him better. For all the world, he wasn't going to question the gift. He'd enjoy it for as long as it could last.

Shoving the pile of toys into the center of the bed, Dudley clambered up and sat down in front of it with his legs crossed. "Right," he said with a nod, "first thing's the captains." He held up two figures which were much larger than all the rest, clad in cloth and plastic knight's armor. "This one in white is Sir Dudley-"

"Dudley?"

"Sir Dudley," Dudley corrected. "He's the white knight, so he's the leader of the good guys. And this is Sir - um, he doesn't have a name. He's the black knight, so he's in charge of the bad guys."

"'Sir Um He Doesn't Have A Name?'"

"Well, he doesn't. He's the black knight anyway. Who cares what he's called?"

Harry looked at him for a moment before nodding. "You totally named him 'Sir Harry,' didn't you?"

Dudley opened his mouth to protest, and then snapped it shut and looked a bit put out. "How'd you know?"

He shrugged. "It just makes sense."

"Then you wanna play with the bad guys?" He sounded rather hopeful, tightening his grip around Sir Dudley.

Eyeing the pitch black attire of Sir Um His Name Is Harry, he nodded eagerly. If the rest of the guys were split up this way, he'd end up with an army of shadow men.

"Good," Dudley said as he passed the dark knight over. Harry fingered the smooth cloth of the body suit showing between plates of armor and curiously bent the knight's knees and elbows.

"Now, you get all the other black knights, the aliens and Kong. I get the white knights, the army men, the dinosaurs and Leopold."

Harry looked between his men and Dudley's. He'd gotten six black knights which were about half as tall as Sir Harry, three on horse back and three on foot with shields and swords; this was just the same as what Dudley had in his white knight brigade. There were three aliens, two of them skinny, short and olive colored with great big eyes and heads shaped like light bulbs. The third alien was a girl with scaly blue skin, but she had six tentacles, so that was alright. Against the aliens were three human army men in camouflage, two of them toting guns; he really wasn't sure if that was fair or not. Then he had Kong, a big hard plastic gorilla who seemed to be frozen mid-scream, set up against two small T-Rexes and Leopold, a big stuffed lion.

"Ready?"

Glancing between Sir Harry and Sir Dudley, Harry nodded. "Ready to win."

Dudley snorted. "You can't win, Harry."

"And why not?"

"'Cause the good guys always win and you've got all the bad guys. You have to lose. You just get to fight first."

Harry narrowed his eyes. "We'll see about that."


Petunia was considering getting her son a puppy. He was apparently fond of looking after and playing with pitiful creatures. Surely a dog would be more appropriate than Harry. Stop. I've promised Vernon that I would try. If my Duddy dear wants to spend time with his cousin, it's likely good for both of them. He'll get tired of playing with him eventually. I certainly don't want to get him a puppy anyway - one wild beast in the house is quite enough.

Still, Dudley's behavior was confounding. Her baby had insisted that he sit and stay with Harry that morning, no matter what entertainments she'd tried to lure him away with. Really, the boy had been sleeping the first few hours, and her Duddy was not known for his patience. Now, he'd apparently been playing with his cousin for two and a half hours. It was unheard of for her Duddy to have such tolerance for Harry's 'babyish' behaviors. She couldn't understand what new appeal Harry held.

He was such a strange little thing. He'd seemed so soft and vibrant the night before, so painfully like a sulky Lily - then he'd gone and asked her if she was alright. An odd duck, just like his mother. He'll go to ruin, just like his mother. Petunia indulged herself and lay down on the couch, bringing a hand up to try to rub the headache from her temple. She could not afford to invest in the boy. Civility, she would manage with some practice. She'd provide for him a bit better, as Vernon kept encouraging. If nothing else, Harry wasn't worth a fight with her husband; at least not when she already agreed with him in theory. They did owe a debt and she felt much better writing it off with a checkbook than actually becoming involved with the boy.

Shrieks of laughter echoed down the stairs and her son's deeper chortles followed.

None of them could afford to get involved with Harry.

Dudley was practically cackling as his cousin giggled.

The boy was poison, to himself if not everyone around him. He wouldn't last.

Her home hadn't sounded so happy in years.

Petunia found herself irrationally fighting to keep her headache.