Azure Light

~A~

Harry gasped as Tsu'tey grinded against him, and then got very confused when the usual pleasant sensation was replaced by distinct discomfort. Frowning, he tried to mentally unwrap whatever weird thing was currently making his brain bounce against the walls of his skull.

The first thing he realized before another round of electricity fried his circuits was that Tsu'tey still had his finger inside the liquid ball of light in between Harry's hands. Pulling his magic painstakingly back into himself, the connection very abruptly short circuited.

Tsu'tey's glazed eyes blinked into focus and then looked down at Harry in abject horror. 'Feeling' in his head that Tsu'tey planned to tear their queue's apart again, Harry grabbed his wrists and tried to convey calm down the bond, sending memories of how much it had hurt like a bitch the last time it happened. Tsu'tey wasn't having any of it though, fighting back with every ounce of strength he had as a warrior of the Omaticaya clan. Quickly gaining the upper hand, he pulled their queues apart and blinked when suddenly the water closed in around his face and made it impossible for him to breath.

However, instead of pushing away to the surface, he grabbed a dazed and pained Harry by the arm and dragged him to the shore. With a snarl, he tossed Harry down onto his back and crouched over top of him.

Unfortunately for Harry, the mix of being magically and psychically blown open in the space of a few seconds on top of the abrupt disconnection of a spiritual link of that level was like mixing hard liquor. Usually you ended up puking.

Which Harry did. Thankfully for Tsu'tey, he turned his head to the side as all of his dinner came erupting out of his mouth. Once he was pretty sure he'd finished, he let his head loll the other way. His head felt like it was going to explode. The aching pain behind his eyes refused to go away, and the back of his brain felt as though someone had stabbed a pike into it.

~-ri? Harri?~

Oh, Tsu'tey was talking to him. He opened his mouth to answer, but he couldn't seem to form any words with his lips. Blinking bleary eyes, he stared dazedly up at the blur of coloured lights. Ooh, pretty.

A hand gently slapped his cheek, but Harry just blinked and tried to get his eyes to focus.

~Harri?~

"Harry isn't here right now, but if you'd like to leave a message after the beep. Beeeep." Harry giggled and then promptly started dry heaving again. This time, gentle hands turned his head to the side and his body as well. It was hard to puke when your neck was twisted after all.

Once the remaining bile had left Harry's stomach, he closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep. Unfortunately, those gentle hands turned demanding and kept poking and shaking him. Opening his eyes again, he tried to glare, but couldn't seem to find his assailant's face amongst all the pretty lights.

~Harri. You must stay awake.~

"Bu' I wanna shleep, capt'n."

~Stay. Awake.~

"B'tomorrow we hava go plant- blow up s'mines. Y'know 'm no goo' with explosives when 'm this hungover." Harry thought he saw his old Captain Briggams just now, but he frowned when his old Captain's face turned blue and yellow-eyed. What? Wasn't he in a camp five miles outside of- where the hell- what the hell- what had he been drinking? He couldn't seem to focus.

~What is wrong with you? You shouldn't- this shouldn't have happened.~

Harry smiled. "That language sounds real pretty. What's it called?"

The blue man stared at him for a moment. ~It's Na'vi. You can speak it too.~

"I dunno. I dun think I can speak somethin' that pretty."

~But you understand what I'm saying.~

Harry blinked, slowly. "Hey, you're right. That is weird. Why is that, Mr. Blue Man, sir?"

An irritated look crossed the nice blue man's face. ~My name is Tsu'tey.~

As if it had been a switch, Harry's brain started spinning again. Closing his eyes against the assault of lights, he tried to reorganize his mind but only ended up re-confusing himself. Frightened and frustrated, he shoved the blue man off of him and scrambled away. He didn't know what was wrong with him, but he thought it had something to do with the strange being standing in front of him.

Scrambling to his feet, he slipped into a defensive stance. "What did you do to me?"

The blue man now looked less angry and more confused. ~I did not initiate the bond. I just touched…~ He trailed off, looking almost as confused as Harry.

The wizard glanced around himself at the strange scenery and the sheer amount of life he could feel around himself. "This isn't Earth. Where are we?"

The blue man frowned. ~I believe you- the Sky People, call it Pandora.~

Harry gripped his head. Yes, that sounded somewhat familiar. Why couldn't he remember? Last he recalled he was on Earth working on three doctorates at the same time in Science, Botany, and Micro-biology. The crystal structure he'd designed to wipe out technology had failed two years ago, and he'd been trying to occupy himself with other things ever since.

"What happened to- to my head? Why am- why are my memories all jumbled up?" Pain kept fracturing his thoughts every time he looked at the blue man, and it was beginning to drive him crazy.

The blue man's frown deepened as he grabbed a long braid that extended from the back of his head and brought it forward. When he held it up to the light, long pinkish tendrils began to dance in the air from its tip.

Harry's eyes widened and he took a step back. "What the fuck is that thing?"

~It is a queue. It allows minds to bond.~ The blue man pointed at him. ~You have one as well.~

Harry tensed. Reached behind his head. Flinched at the feeling of a braid. Pulled it over his shoulder and in front of him and grabbed its end. When he held it up to the light, it started dancing too.

The world turned to black.

~A~

Harry sat up in what he thought was his bed and cursed when his head crashed into what appeared to be a very low hanging bunk. Scowling, he opened his eyes and gaped in horror at what appeared to be the top of a coffin. Banging on it with both fists, he was surprised when it opened without much resistance.

"Bout time you woke up. I was about to send a search and rescue."

Harry's head snapped in the direction of the voice, taking in what appeared to be a set of scrubs or casual military dress and the man wearing them in a wheelchair. Immediately, he relaxed at the sight of familiar human technology, clothes, and most importantly, humans. Rubbing his forehead and his eyes, he wondered what the hell that psychedelic dream had been all about. Blue men? Glowing trees?

"Hey, you okay? I know coming out of link can be disorienting, but you look like someone just smashed your head against a wall."

Harry turned his attention back to the soldier. There was genuine concern in his voice, that much was obvious. He also seemed to know Harry, which was odd considering Harry had absolutely no idea who this man was. Of course, asking for a name was one of the dumbest things he could have done. He needed to blend in until he figured out what was going on.

"Yeah, sorry about that. Just have a bit of a headache." Harry smiled and did his best to make it convincing.

The soldier grimaced in sympathy. "Want to head to the infirmary? I'm sure they have some meds for a headache."

Harry shook his head. The last thing he wanted was doctors looking at him. "I'd rather just get some food in me, you know?" he said, gripping his suddenly grumbling stomach with a half-grin.

The soldier laughed. "Oh, do I know that feeling. Come on, let's head to the mess. Hot food finished serving a couple hours ago, but we can always eat the cold stuff." He wheeled away, navigating the row of coffins with familiarity. Harry followed closely behind, ignoring the tech in the white coat that was examining his own… coffin. What were those things for, exactly? They looked a little too high-tech for sleeping in.

"So, what was with that fight earlier, anyway?" the soldier asked.

Harry's mind blanked. Fight? What fight? "I'm sorry?"

The soldier gave him a look. "You know, that fight with that Tsootay guy. Naytiri wouldn't translate or explain anything to me, and then she just dragged me up to bed."

Harry kept all expression from his face. Tsootay? Naytiri? They sounded like foreign names. "What about it?"

The soldier was now giving him an irritated look. "You never told me you could fight. It would be helpful to know, for future missions, since usually scientists don't know how to handle a gun let alone toss a full-grown Na'vi like you did."

What in the world was a Na'vi? "Sorry. I… well, I haven't done much fighting in a long time. Been focusing on… science." Harry barely knew anything about science. He'd only just started studying it, since all of his magical attempts at saving the planet had failed so spectacularly.

"Jake! Harry! Wait up!"

The wheelchair-ridden soldier stopped and turned around. Harry, who had already turned towards the voice, frowned at the sight of yet another unfamiliar man who knew his name.

"Oh hey, Norm. What's up? We were just heading for a late dinner."

The man, Norm, stopped running and heaved air for a moment, making himself look rather pathetic. He was probably a scientist, if Harry wasn't the only one in this… facility. "Dr. Augustine wanted to talk to Harry before he goes to bed tonight."

Harry was beginning to wonder if it wasn't the world that had gone crazy, but if he had forgotten something significant. One, this was too real to be a dream, and two, there was a hell of a lot of mounting evidence that pointed towards memory loss on Harry's part. It wasn't the first time he'd ever dealt with it, either. Perhaps someone had tried to obliviate him? But no, they… were all dead. His thoughts paused. When had that happened?

"Well, we're getting food first, so she's just going to have to wait."

Harry frowned. "Norm… tell Dr. Augstine we'll have to meet first thing in the morning, okay? I'm really not up for having a semi-intelligent conversation right now. I have a headache like you wouldn't believe." Was this Doctor a PHD in medical science or something else? And was it a man or a woman? God, this was so fucked up. What had happened to his mind? He needed to meditate. Asap.

Norm frowned. "I'll tell her, but she won't be happy. Hope you're feeling better in the morning." With that said, he walked off with a wave, snubbing Jake for the most part. Was there something there that he was missing?

"Don't mind him, he's just a little pissy right now that I got a date with the chief's daughter and you get to learn all about their culture." The soldier in the wheelchair, Jake, grinned and started wheeling away.

This was going to be a long night.

And it was. Harry had had to ask Jake to walk him to his rooms, blaming his headache for the way he was turned around. Thankfully, Jake hadn't made a comment about it, merely looking up its location in some sort of nearby computer database. Harry was completely unfamiliar with this level of technology. He'd thought it weird before, and dismissed it, but now he knew with absolute certainty that there was something wrong with him.

Plopping himself down on the uncomfortably hard bed provided by the facility, he crossed his legs and assumed his usual meditation posture. Taking in long, deep, calming breaths, he entered his mind.

The disaster he came upon nearly stopped his heart, besides the fact that his body here was merely a construct and not actually real. His mind hadn't been this fragmented since- he remembered now. Earth. The muggles had destroyed it. Magic was dying, the sentience of the planet- it had attacked him. No, not attacked. It…

Frustrated with his lack of understanding, he searched through the tears in the fabric of his mind for the memories associated with Earth, completely ignoring the particularly confounded bundle of memories of green forests and glowing water.

Earth… had been dying. He'd been able to feel it, too. But he couldn't feel it now, which was odd. No, he couldn't feel anything at all. It was as if someone had shoved a cork in his magical senses. Actually… his entire magical core was out of whack too.

What the fuck had happened to him?

Settling himself down for the long haul, he slowly started piecing the fragments of his mind back into some semblance of logical order. It was strange how his mind had adapted to the trauma of… whatever it was that had caused this. Anything connected to magic and that corner in his mind with the glowing trees had been affected, leaving him with only half the circuits in his brain functioning and keeping him lucid. If it had affected his entire mind, he had no doubts he would be insane at this moment. If he were anything other than a wizard, he wouldn't have been able to piece this mess back together, either.

Once he'd finished sewing everything back together and using a bit of cocking here and there to seal the leaks, he finally turned his attention to the mangled ball in the corner of his mind. Taking a mental deep breath, he took the plunge.

And promptly opened his eyes. Only, it wasn't his bunk that he saw. No, he was back in the psychedelic world of coloured lights.

Well, shit.

~You are awake.~

-Toki Mirage-

Another chapter within a 12 hour period? Oh mon dieu! Hahaha, hope you guys liked the chapter. In answer to some questions about what game – it was football. Er, American football. And yeah, right now I'm procrastinating homework. Surprise. :P