Harry sighed and put down the book. He was in a purple library, on the softest chair he could remember, working on one of the many texts Vernon had provided. Coming back to his world had seemed like a great idea at first, since time moved so differently here... until Jim started making idle suggestions.
He rubbed the bridge of his nose again. It wasn't that he didn't like the company of the duck, not at all. But Harry had things to do, and all these breaks were really becoming annoying. Still, he had already studied for a very long time here, and had learned some interesting things.
Harry replaced the math book on one of the near shelves, and watched the books sort themselves. Having accidentally done something similar to the pantry, he had taken the memory of the accident and studied it for a few hours. Jim had suggested this would save time since his mental library would always be ready and sorted.
He snorted. Well, it should THEORETICALLY save time. Except it had taken a few internal DAYS to get all the bugs worked out. After dozens of tries where nothing happened at all, the shelf had actually sorted JIM into the shelfs too. Harry rubbed his elbow. Stupid duck had REALLY sharp fangs. And thin feathers. Not like he was sorted on purpose or anything, although Harry probably should have stopped laughing sooner. Or not fallen over.
He decided a break was needed. His reading level had quickly improved after memorizing all those books, although a couple had words blocked by his hands and he had to exit his inner world to fix them. After another glance at each page, he had came back in, molded the two memories together, then squished them back into books, THANKFULLY complete books this time. In any case, he had learned an important (if obvious) lesson: If he never saw it, he couldn't remember it.
Wandering out of the purple library, he entered the white wood hall. He glanced at another featureless wall of the corridor and couldn't suppress a smile. He had made another door inside the green room, which he now heavily suspected was his magical core. He was building a model of number 4, Privet Drive. Even a half day ago he would never suspect that he would hold any form of sweet memory of the place. This model was already being filled with memories of his very first hug, the first smile he could remember from anyone, a pat on the shoulder, and someone planing a party JUST for him.
He wandered upstairs to the grasslands. As he viewed the duck facilities, he sighed. Jim had increased his forces due to the larger number of rooms Harry had asked him to patrol, and had requested raw materials. After Harry had provided memories of the wood in his room (The walls, and so forth), the tiny duck had ordered squads to get going. Harry had been asked to add several new rooms to Snail Quarters, including a room that operated one of his ropes for "Cloud Control" as they put it, the sorting and control of the local memory weather, and a room which allowed memory duplication so that clouds could be properly secured and still allowed to float in the sky if desired.
Now that they had good quality memories of wood, apparently Jim had them duplicating it as well as using memories Harry had gathered from Vernon fixing things. He still couldn't get used to watching tiny ducks hammering away on tiny wood houses.
At this rate there would be an actual village.
Harry was desperately trying to not question the whole thing. He felt that there was a high chance most normal people... Heck, most wizards in general, that they would not have duck villages in their minds. Then again, he had been different his whole life, so why not here too?
He sat on his bench and watched gamma squad arguing with delta squad about how close dwellings should be on a civilian extension of a militarized duck base. At this distance he couldn't tell who was winning, but they were clearly very enthusiastic about their own point of view.
Harry was debating intervening, considering the number of ankle bites he may gather on both sides, when he noticed Jim sitting next to him on the bench. He was unaware a duck could try to act casual.
"... Quack."
Harry snapped his attention back to the ongoing argument. Feathers would probably fly soon. "I don't know Jim, ok? I guess I am fine."
Small feathery eyes watched as an excellent right wing smacked some sense out of another recruit. He glanced up at the human. "Quack?"
He sighed and ran his hand through his hair. "I just... I don't want to betray my real family. They didn't leave me or anything, not on purpose. They did what they could to save me."
A small yellow head nodded. "Quack. Quack."
Harry slumped into the bench. "I know. And to be honest, I know that I am already considering them family. It is why I have this guilt inside, as if it was all too easy or that I should feel worse somehow."
Jim winged Harry's wrist, giving it soft pats. "Quack."
He took a deep breath, and nodded. "Yeah. And I guess if I am going to really treat them as family..." His eyes shifted, the green piercing through like fire. "I suppose I should treat them how I would my own parents. That black daemon did a lot of damage to them, you know?"
"Quack."
He stood up and stretched. "Thanks Jim. And hey, if I could fix myself, it can't be too hard to help them, right?"
Jim waddled away toward a group of VERY in trouble construction teams as Harry began planning. Tonight would probably be an interesting time for cloud watching. Assuming these teams finished the long list of punishment drills about to be laid on them.
~~~Core Threads~~~
The night was thick and dark in Vernon's bedroom. Petunia was asleep, deeper than she had been for months, maybe years. And Vernon was having an odd dream, the first one since a few days ago.
He was strapped to a table, hurt. He felt so much weight on him, his neck seemed so tight, his arms pinched and sore from the heaviness. From the shadows someone came to his side.
Vernon should have felt terror, he should be screaming... but everything felt so warm. The bed was soft, the night was only pierced by the sounds of crickets, and the person only stood near. He couldn't see a face, but he could feel as the man pressed one hand on Vernons shoulder.
Liquid relief spread quickly, wrapping around his throat, reaching into his lungs, around his spine. He could feel his bones cooling, as if just removed from a freezer, but the coolness only seemed like a glass of lemonade on a hot day. As he lay there, he felt his throat clear, his neck loosen, and he began to breath deeper and less often. Each breath seemed to somehow reach deeper inside, and took less time to fill his body.
Suddenly his heart was wrapped in coldness. As soon as he felt a sharp sting, suddenly the warmth flooded back more than before, as if fire flooded his veins. As the fire burned through him he could actually feel his heart slowing, resting, as if a heavy load had suddenly lightened.
Vernon fell into a sleep so deep he never heard or felt a young hand in the awakening world move away from his body.
Harry watched for a few moments. He knew he couldn't do too much, unlike him Vernon was a very public person, going to work each day and such. Most of his changes had been internal. Cleared lungs, that now took in much more oxygen than usual, his neck slightly restructured to allow better air flow, his bones strengthened and major muscles relaxed. The surprise had been his heart. Harry hadn't expected him to be so close to heart attack, and had to use considerable power to rebuild the weakened muscle and clean it of gunk. Only a few threads had been required to clear out the major arteries and veins of build up.
It was mostly internal things, but already Harry knew this had been a good idea. With his luck, the first birthday could have had become Vernon's funeral. Turning to Petunia, he gripped some ropes and touched her shoulder.
He felt a tug as his bright green threads touched her light blue ones... and he fell into her world.
Petunia was on a beach when she heard a splash. Her calm instantly broken, she twisted on the sand and quickly began searching the waves.
A sopping wet Harry Potter was sputtering in the water, only a foot or so from shore. "THE BLOODY HELL WAS THAT!"
Petunia's horror was quickly replaced with righteous annoyance. "HARRY, watch your language!"
He snapped his eyes over to her, and she almost giggled at how large his eyes were. "Uh... oh hi. Lovely day, isn't it Aunt Petunia?"
She stood tall on the beach and tapped her foot. "Apologize young man, language like that is NOT acceptable or polite behavior."
Harry absently wrung his shirt out and walked from the water. "Sorry Aunt Petunia, I uh... didn't know I would be enjoying the water just then."
Petunia could FEEL how different this was from normal. She had had nightmares before, she had had calm rest recently, but this time, this person was different. Her world was mostly gray, and her new charge was vibrant with color. "Apology accepted. Now, what are you doing here?" Her mind began to work faster. "Wait... you... You are supposed to be in bed. How did you even get... where are we?"
The boy gave an awkward shrug. "I seem to have fallen into your mind when I was trying to heal you. Apparently your blue threads have a bit more power than I thought. Vernon's gray stuff didn't bother me at all when I fixed him up."
She raised an eyebrow and gave a firm stare. "Fixed?"
He nodded, a bit sad. "Well, you two had been under the daemon for a while. He took up over eating and I was worried that his health was suffering. I fixed what I could without changing his outward appearance."
She hesitated. She really didn't like remembering the past, especially now that it seemed to really be behind her. Still, her husband came first. "What exactly did you... fix?"
Harry raised a hand and seemed to count off. "Made his neck better able to breath, cleaned his lungs and made them more efficient, reinforced his bones, strengthened a couple of major muscles." He seemed to turn a bit dark. "He also had a very weak heart. Fixed that up, cleaned out the clots and stuff that had been forming."
Petunia held back a gasp. She had suspected, watching how red her husband's face would get, that his health could be pretty bad... but suspecting and knowing were two separate things. She took a ragged breath. "Was... do I have the same issues?"
He shook his head. "From what I can tell your blue threads helped preserve your health, although they have been working for so long that they can't easily keep up with your body's demands. I was just going to do the bone and muscle thing on you, before I was pulled here." He looked around. "Speaking of which, I love what you did here. Never saw the ocean myself, mind you, but it is pretty."
She felt old feelings surge back, ones she thought long gone. "Harry... you... blue threads?"
He nodded, apparently too busy watching the waves to see her face glow with faint hope. "Yeah, you and a couple of people living around here have this incredibly light blue thread system. Most of it seems compressed into a tight ball though, not flowing or warping like mine does. Not really sure what the color means."
Petunia took a deep breath. "So... what do you mean by... I mean." She took another breath and tried again, focusing on the feeling of sand as she sat down. "Harry, you said something about what I did here? This place is just from when I was a girl and we visited the beach."
He nodded pointing at the waves. "Yeah, it looks like your memories are the wave peaks. It is kind of a nifty way of storing your past really, each memory can roll over you this way."
She turned to the ocean and really examined the waves. As she got closed to one, the wave seemed to pause, and the rush of ocean water turned into quiet voices as a little girl... HER, as PETUNIA played house with her dolls. She stepped back, watching the wave break on the shore and go back to the sea.
Harry laid back on the sand. "Anyway, I guess I can't get away with helping you since you saw me. Just don't tell Uncle what I did, ok? I just wanted to make sure you two were alright, I didn't want to make a big deal out of this."
Petunia picked up a hand of sand. Each grain felt like an emotion, many of them mild like the heat of the sun or the feeling of cat fur. "Harry... are we in my mind?"
He looked at her oddly. "Of course. You were here before I accidentally soaked myself trying to heal you. Haven't you been here before?"
She looked into the blue sky. "A couple of times. I just assumed it was a really nice dream."
Harry nodded. "It is one, sort of. Time passes faster here, or at least it does in my mind. I even built things there to hold back the bad stuff and protect my most precious moments. It helps me keep calm. Although I should warn you that you should avoid making any memories into living things." He rubbed his elbow. "I made a creature, and he has a bit of a short temper. Thank goodness I didn't make a zoo or anything."
Petunia couldn't really handle that conversation right now, so she ignored it and focused on the world. "How... how do you change it?"
Harry reached over and grabbed her hand. With his other hand, he reached INSIDE HER PALM. Before she could properly freak out, she saw him pull a light blue thread out. "Use this. You don't seem to have nearly as many as I do, so it will probably take you longer... but that blue thread is similar to what I do."
He waved a hand and THOUSANDS of huge, green cords of light arced into the sand. As her eyes cleared there were two beach chairs and a table with cold juice drinks on it. He settled into one. "Obviously it is easier to use your threads here, since you can actually see them. In the real world I can see them by putting a thread into my eyes, but your power seems lighter, thinner. It would probably hurt you to do that. Practice here instead."
Petunia couldn't look away from her own light blue thread. When he had pulled it out, she had felt a sudden and sharp pain... but now it felt so warm. her whole arm felt like a hug was wrapped around it. She absently fell into the chair besides Harry.
He watched as her thread began moving around, like a child trying to draw her first tree or finger paint. He guessed her lack of magic had to do with the sphere inside her. Unlike his, hers had some sort of hard shell made of light holding it all in. It had actually stung his fingers a bit pulling that tiny thread out of her, but the happiness he could feel from her at holding at tiny piece of magic was worth it to him. He stood, getting ready to leave. "Aunt Petunia, I will see you later. If you ever want to get here on purpose, just use that thread and connect it to your brain. It is how I do it."
She looked up at the boy from her chair, and he pretended to not see the tears. "But... it is all a dream, right?"
He grinned. "Dream world, not a dream. Practice here, learn to get here on purpose, and become great at it. When you can control that thread without thinking, maybe I can get a second one to come out."
Her smile warmed him as he left. He wished he could do the same for Vernon, but his threads felt so cold, like stone. He was worried that any adjustment would break them, not turn into threads.
He may not have helped heal her body, but maybe she could now work on her mind.
Harry retreated to his world, then back to reality. Moving away from the sleeping, crying form of his Aunt, he headed to Dudley's room.
Frankly he was a little stunned at how clean it was. Sure there was some pirate toys scattered on the floor, but that was the point, he could see the FLOOR. The huge heaps from only a day or two ago had vanished, although he probably shouldn't be this shocked having recycled most of it.
The room without piles of crud felt completely different, like a new room entirely.
He reached the bed, and quickly repeated the actions he had done on Vernon. After a second of thought, he also strengthened the boy's heart, his legs, and increased his metabolism a bit. Training someone to eat less was really hard, especially without emotional support. The faster metabolism would make everything a bit easier for the boy... no, for Harry's soon-to-be brother.
Dudley barely moved, but already his skin didn't seem as pale as blood pumped more easily through his body.
Harry retreated downstairs. He hadn't intended on stopping a heart-attack or helping someone reach their threads, but then again when had any of his plans gone as scheduled? At least he felt like something had gone well.
He got into his covers and touched the wall, the glowing light dimming as he prepared to go back to work in his mind. As he fell asleep, he couldn't help a small grin. Jim had been right, helping his family had made him feel great inside... just thinking about calling them family made his heart happy. His mom wouldn't have hated that.
He drifted asleep as his magic moved him back to his purple library. Pulling a science book out for review, Harry sighed and sat back in his chair. Break over, back to the 'joys' of education.