This chapter may also be a short one, I don't know. We'll see how it goes; it randomly occurred to me yesterday that although Harry knows a bit of what James' life was like, James won't know a thing about Harry. So! On with the story!
Also, about last chapter: some of the stuff Harry was guessing wildly and it happened to pay off. He doesn't really know that much. Hopefully I'll fix that in subsequent chapters.
This chapter is written now mainly because of the two reviews I got. Thanks shob-vce-zloby-zdoxliand Myrek. :)
James collapsed in a heap and stared around him.
Alarm bells began to ring softly in his vicinity.
Where... is... Sirius?
And just why was he in the library?
With Madam Pince hurrying over to presumably stop him from talking, no less. She was frowning. His glasses had nearly slid off his face, so James shoved them back on, hiding his eyes for a moment.
As his hand moved away from his face, Madam Pince stopped still. All the colour drained from her face. She was staring at his eyes.
"Potter," she breathed, "what have you done?!"
James stared at her. "I - I - "
"Change them back." Her voice was once more shrill, only he detected a note of desperation. "Now!"
"I - I don't know..." He couldn't remember stammering this much since Snivellus had first hit him with a Tongue-Tying Spell. (Ever since, of course, Remus - the nerd - had discovered how to instantly counter it.)
"Your eyes," she said in a slow, patient tone. He'd never heard her speak like this before. Maybe because he'd only been in the library once in all of his schooling. (She'd not liked the fireworks. Said they'd damaged some books. Sirius thought it was a laugh, though.) "They're the colour of your father's. And you know you look the spitting image of him."
James was now very confused. "What do you mean? I don't."
"Harry!" A redhead hurried towards him. He looked similar to the Prewetts. "Why are you in here studying?"
James shrugged. He didn't know the boy in the least. "Why not? It'd be a great prank."
Now the boy looked puzzled. "Wait... what happened to your eyes?"
What's up with my eyes? "Nothing?"
"Come on. Hermione's probably waiting for us now."
Who's this Hermione? He could feel a panic attack slowly coming on. He reached for his wand...
It.
Wasn't.
There.
"Where's my wand?" He began frantically searching. Surely this spell hasn't taken away my wand too?!
The boy was giving him a very odd look now. "You alright?"
"Sure, fine, I just need my wand!"
James hurried over to where he'd been before Madam Pince accosted him. To his relief, the wand was lying on the ground. He reached to put it in his wand holster, but it was gone.
Wait a moment. Everything of his was gone. Sure, he still wore Gryffindor robes, but anything that would identify James Potter was gone (that he could see; he wasn't about to take them off and check the name tag) except for his wand.
Then his gaze fell on the book lying open and ice dropped into his stomach. There was only one thing on the page: the spell that he himself had used. What's going on?
The boy was waiting impatiently. Deciding to puzzle everything out later, James hurried after him, glad to see that everything was as normal around him. Except the people. He didn't know any of them.
Wait, was that McGonagall? He stared at her in relief. Perhaps she could explain everything.
But she turned and looked at him, and her expression changed. "James..." she whispered, soft as soft. He barely heard.
Finally, someone knew who he was?
Then McGonagall crossed the space between them and said rather unsteadily, "Mr Weasley," must be a cousin of those Weasleys he'd heard about; hadn't Arthur or someone just married Molly Prewett last year? James shut down the speculation and listened again to McGonagall. "Please continue on. I need to have a talk with Mr Potter."
James let himself be ushered ahead of McGonagall to her (very familiar) office. She seated herself at her desk and looked straight at James.
"Mr Potter, please explain."
"Explain what?" Hopefully she meant, 'explain how you mysteriously got here'.
She sighed impatiently. "Your eye colour. Why did you change it?"
"Well, I..." He hesitated, uncertain how much to reveal. "I tried a spell."
"Did you know what it would do?"
"No."
Her anger was clear. "You tried a spell you didn't know anything about, on yourself? Harry James Potter, how could you?" She ended with a shriek. James' ears were hurting now. "Detention, Mr Potter, until the end of term."
Normally he'd feel victorious about it. But right now, not knowing much at all, he didn't. And where was Sirius anyway?
"But - "
"We need to fix it," she said, ignoring his protests. "Come here." When he did so, she muttered a spell and tapped his head with her wand. Then she frowned. "What did you do? It's not reverting properly."
"I - I don't know." He suddenly realised what she'd called him. Harry James Potter. But his name was James Fleamont Potter. Where was this Harry bit from and... He just didn't understand.
She sighed. "I'll just have to give it a colour change. We can't have all the teachers thinking you're James. Especially not..." Her lips tightened. A moment later she said, "I think that's right. Detention every Saturday night until the end of term. Also you lose forty points for playing with an unknown spell."
Forty points? Disappointment surged through him. Detentions were all right, but points?
Suddenly it occurred to him. If he'd suddenly become someone else, did he have his broom? "Where's my broom?"
She tsked. "We'll tell you when it's all checked out properly, Mr Potter. We're almost finished. If we don't get anything wrong with it, we'll give it back. Now, go outside and enjoy the sunshine."
Even more confused than ever, James went out of her office. He had a broom, but they were checking it? Why?
What is going on?!
There were students everywhere outside. Looking around for a redhead (the boy McGonagall had called Mr Weasley seemed to expect him to be his friend) he spotted one, but she was a girl who looked like a second year. Their eyes met, but hers slid away instantly. She strongly reminded him of Evans, though somewhat similar to the Weasley boy. Maybe she was another Weasley.
Not seeing Weasley anywhere, he headed towards her; she was talking with probably another second year, one with light blond hair and a serene look. The girl looked up at him, startled, then said in a strained, breathless voice, "I've got to go." She bolted.
Leaving him alone with the blond. Who was also a Ravenclaw.
"Hello, Harry," she said serenely. "Why are your eyes the wrong colour?"
"Hi, uh..." He trailed off. "What do you mean?"
"They're a kind of hazel-green, not emerald green," she replied. "Have you forgotten what my name is?" Her gaze focused on him.
James remained silent.
"I suppose Ginny is more memorable. I'm Luna Lovegood."
"Oh, yeah, of course," he said faintly. "Should've remembered that."
"It's all right. I'm used to people not knowing my name. Most people call me Loony. Ginny's nice, though. She stops people calling me that."
He didn't know what to make of this girl. "Uh..."
"She's nicer than Ronald. He can be a bit mean sometimes."
I wish I could ask this Luna girl what's going on. "Um, Luna?"
She leaned forward and suddenly swatted at something next to his head. He raised his eyebrows.
"Nargles."
"...Right." Suddenly Lovegood made sense: that crackpot Xenophilius had talked about Nargles too. Perhaps she was his sister. "Um, I was wondering if I could ask you something - "
"Harry!" A bushy-haired girl was standing nearby, looking surprised. Next to her was Weasley. Whose name might be Ronald. Or might not. Who knew.
James scrambled to his feet. "Oh, right. I didn't see you. Bye, Luna."
As they headed away from the girl, Weasley said, "You were talking to Loony Lovegood? Way to pass the time, mate!"
"Her name's Luna," he answered sharply. "And, uh, Ginny was there at first." Hopefully he wasn't putting his foot in it again.
Weasley smirked. "Did she run for it?"
"Uh, yeah."
"Imagine what she'd've done if you hadn't fixed your eyes. No more eyes 'as green as a fresh pickled toad'." He was evidently quoting something.
"Ron!" said the bushy-haired girl reprovingly. "And, wait, what's this about getting your eyes fixed?" She turned a curious, worried glance on James.
"His eyes were the wrong colour. Apparently they were hazel." Weasley - Ron Weasley, apparently - shot him a possibly-nervous glance. "The colour of his dad's eyes."
James had given up trying to correct people's views. "Yeah, well, I wanted to see how my dad looked."
The girl gave him a startled look. "Oh, Harry, didn't you see him during first year, in the Mirror?"
"Well, yeah, but I wanted to see him again."
She came and hugged him. James tensed a bit, then relaxed. He wasn't used to girls hugging him - though he wouldn't say no if it was Evans. "Don't you like your mother's eyes, Harry?"
This conversation was really weird. His eyes were just the same as his dad's. Well, were until they were changed.
What was going on?
"Yeah, but..." He shrugged. "I just wanted to see."
The girl looked concerned. "Are you sure you're all right?"
"What did McGonsie want?" asked Ron at the same time.
"Ron," the girl said reprovingly. "Her name's Professor McGonagall."
Ron dismissed her concern with a brief, "Not like she's here, Hermione. You don't care, do you, Harry?"
Unsure how he was meant to answer, James said, "Uh..."
The girl, Hermione, looked at him in surprise.
Then James distracted them by saying, "She wanted to change my eyes back."
"Did she?"
"Yeah, with a colour changing spell."
"Is the colour right?" Hermione scrutinised his face thoughtfully, then pulled out a mirror and showed him.
My eyes are almost like Evans' now, he thought in shock. Deciding to go with it and get her eyes (the greatest prank ever, Sirius would be proud) he said, "No, not quite." After a few moments of change and corrections by the accomplished Hermione, James was satisfied.
"Did you get any punishment?"
He rolled his eyes. "For using an unknown spell. Detention for the whole term, Saturday nights. And, probably for scaring her because of the colour, forty points off."
Ron scowled. "You'd think she wouldn't want to take points off her own house."
"Ron," said Hermione. Was that all she did in life? "She has to be fair. Or else the others won't be."
Ron scowled again, darker this time. "Snape isn't fair."
"Professor Snape."
...Snape?! Some Snape was a teacher?!
Hermione's voice was suddenly startled. "We've got Potions now. Come on!"
"Talk of the devil," grumbled Ron. "Or in this case, the bat."
James bit his lip. Sounds like he'd get an answer to just who this Snape was in a moment.
I have a bad feeling about this.
I don't know when in canon Arthur and Molly married, but I chose during James' second/third year so that he'd know about both the Prewetts and the Weasleys.
In some ways each of the two perspectives is harder: we know more about where James is, which is both easier and harder, but then it's hard to keep Harry believable in that he knows more about James and thus is able to guess the truth more quickly and adapt. James doesn't know a thing. Which makes him easier and more fun in some ways to write. He has no act to keep up because he doesn't know what said act must be.
