Disclaimer: This is for the entire story - I do not own the world of Harry Potter or any of the works in the series. I have also been inspired by the works of Diana Wynne Jones, J.R.R. Tolkien and Neil Gaiman, and again, own nothing. The only things I can lay claim to are the original characters in this story.

This is a non-autobiographical self-insert - Bess lives solely inside my mind.

Extended summary: Bess has been transported into the world of Harry Potter. Healers say that she's been 'obliviated', but she still remembers her whole previous life, and lots of information from the Harry Potter books. Once she realises she's definitely here to stay and starts to grow attached to the 'characters', she'll begin a journey of love, both romantic and platonic, to try and remember even more information in an effort to change the game and stop the events from 1981 from occurring!

xXx

Falling asleep was, to Elizabeth – Bess to her friends – one of the hardest things.

Whether her body was exhausted, aching, desperate for sleep or not, her mind would race.

It would quickly create worlds for her to explore, stories to jump in to, people to meet. The possibilities were endless as tales began and ended within her own head. When a story overcame her mind, she was a slave to its narrative – unable to concentrate until the conversation had been concluded, or the battle won.

And yet, with her incredible imagination and love of many genres of fiction, there was one story which Bess found herself drawn to above all others – the world of Harry Potter. The possibilities were endless, as the fandom knew, and Bess would regularly find herself in the minds of students passing the Golden Trio, of people close to the Marauders, or she would find herself gallivanting across the castle with the Next Generation.

It was during one of these fantasies - laying in bed in the middle of the day, imagining what she would eat first if she were to find herself in Honeydukes - that it happened.

Bess felt her eyes drift shut, her breath calm, and her mind stop racing as she fell in to a deep and dreamless sleep. A weightlessness came over her body and a fuzziness overtook her thoughts, calming her and making her feel as if she were floating above the clouds.

Though when Bess awoke, she would not be in her twin bed. There would be no lumpy pillow. The ache in her lower spine from bending over books in the university library wouldn't be there anymore. The bags under her eyes would unfortunately be darker. There would be a scar running down her right arm – puckered and dark pink against her light golden brown skin, as if incredibly new. Her throat would be hoarse and burnt. She would have the word 'Mudblood' carved in to her arm.

She would not wake up in her own time – January 2016, but in January 1976 with a slightly different name, no recollection of how she came to be in St Mungos, and memories of a life that the Healers said she did not live, but somewhat crucially, amongst those memories would be a strong but flawed recollection of the Harry Potter universe.

For example - she would remember Horcruxes and be able to push herself to list their locations during Harry's search for them, and would know how to destroy them, but she would have forgotten what 'Mudblood' - meant.

In short – Bess would wake up to find herself just a little bit screwed.

xXx

When she opened her eyes, Bess found herself confronted with a brilliant white ceiling, bright light, and silence.

The first thing to alert her to her change in circumstances was the ceiling above her – it was free from any imperfections – no cracks, no cobwebs, no marks, nothing.

Bess frowned as she tried to find the specific dark splotch in the corner of the room that had been the bane of her existence for the last two weeks – the only remnants of the mould she had had to get rid of. The mark had annoyed her because once she sent photos of it to the landlord, he had replied that he would have to repaint when she left and so the painting costs would be taken out of her deposit. She was still angry.

If the absence of the mark confused her, the dull pain in her arm did so even more. Her normal aches and pains were missing – this was different. It was as if both of her arms had been on fire, and were now smouldering. The pain grew with every second that she focused on it.

Frowning deeply, Bess tried unsuccessfully to move her arms.

They felt as though they were lead – keeping her weighed down. Eyes widening, she realised she couldn't move them at all. She began to panic. She pushed up, arching her back and realised that she could move this fine. She tried to move her legs and again, this worked, though they were sluggish, and she felt too weak to move them more than an inch to the side.

She opened her mouth, ready to shout to her housemate – a lovely girl called Eloise – to come and help her, but when she tried to shout nothing came out. She tried again, and that was when she felt it – the pain in her throat.

It felt as though she'd been screaming for hours. Her voice was so hoarse that she was barely able to manage a whisper even though she was shouting with all her might. This panicked her further.

She she tried to look around to see if she could see any signs of where she was, but was confronted with white curtains.

Only one thought went through her mind – where the fuck am I?

Finding herself unable to speak, and unable to move her arms, barely able to move anything else, and in pain, was terrifying.

Trying to not have a full blown panic attack, Bess began using her breathing techniques to calm down enough to think – breathe in for four, breathe out for eight.

For the first 375 iterations of her breathing technique, Bess stared at the ceiling.

After a while, she began to stare and focus on what she imagined was the doorway to her little unit. She realised that she was in a hospital of sorts after around 548 rotations of focussed breathing, when someone passed by her bay in a hurry asking for a burn remedy, and then another passed by at a running pace, shouting about Blood-Replenishing potions. It wasn't lost on her that these were foreign terms, but she couldn't do anything about that right now.

Finally, after 900 iterations, or roughly three hours, the curtains opened to reveal a middle aged woman in a long lime-green dress with an odd mark stitched on the chest – it looked like a bone and a stick.

The woman, who was looking over her shoulder, saying, "I'm just taking vitals! Be over in a second, Hols," was brandishing a stick in her hand. When she turned to look down at Bess and they made eye contact, she began to shout, "Oh. Oh my. You're awake. HOLS! HOLS SHE'S AWAKE! We didn't think-"

Bess just about managed to whisper, "Help me. Please."

xXx

By the end of January, Bess had finally come to terms with three things:

First (and this was probably the most important): something very bad had happened to her here.

Second: she had the distinct impression that she was… well… inside the Harry Potter books

Third: she most definitely was not in her own time, though she had yet to get a specific date or year out of any of the Healers, who seemed intent on keeping conversation as light as possible.

Once she'd reached these three realisations, she'd found it easier than she'd imagined to cope - she just kept telling herself that this was a dream, and that she should make the most of it while she could.

It was a weird dream - having to lie in a bed all day, listening to idle chatter and being visited multiple times per day by Healers - and she probably would have been panicking more, had it not been for the multiple calming draughts given to her at the first sign of an elevated heartbeat. Like the time when they'd told her she was on a children's ward she'd complained, saying that she was 20, and they'd replied that she was a 16 year old girl.

Not been able to control the panic that rose in her, they'd poured a rather strong double-strength calming potion into her mouth, and she'd ended up asleep for two days.

Not willing to risk another 48 hour sleep session, Bess had found herself trying to think through the positives of each situation which confronted her. For example, her age - she realised that she still had the memories and knowledge of her 20 year old mind, which was a big positive.

Another positive - magic was real here.

As she'd adjusted to her surroundings, she'd found herself excited at the sight of the moving pictures in the Daily Prophet. Though this feeling had been short lived as the Healers refused her copy after copy, until at last, someone told her about the hospital library and she'd begun to send Healers off for books to read, beginning with A Standard Book of Spells: Book One.

Once she'd realised that there was a strong chance that she wasn't dreaming, as the sixth day of her recovery dawned, she had challenged herself to try and learn as much as she could, to keep her mind distracted from her rising panic.

She quickly began to devour information. Under normal circumstances her university degree, which covered both English and History, had her reading over ten books per week, picking out key pieces of information.

Now that she had the added motivation of a distraction from her predicament, and finding it a fun and relaxing way of disassociating herself from the white walls around her, and having access to core syllabus of magic from the Harry Potter universe (something she had only dreamed of learning), she had taken to memorising spells, and practicing her pronunciation and wand movements using a brush she was thrown by the bemused six year old in the bed next to her.

xXx

Exactly sixteen days since Bess had woken up in this strange world, she found herself sitting on her hospital bed, now reading her way through the O.W.L level books, Intermediate Transfiguration and The Essential Defence Against the Dark Arts. She had finished A Standard Book of Spells: Book Four that morning.

"How're you doing this morning, Miss Coulson?" Came the deep booming voice of the ward's Head Healer, a rather tall man with greying, thinning hair, a large smile and a joyful demeanour. The only indication that he had a tough job were the severe frown lines etched into his forehead.

He had taken to calling her by her surname first, as he did with all of the other patients on the ward, before then addressing her by her name in this world – Daphne.

She still wasn't used to her new moniker. However, as she was still getting the lay of the land, thought it prudent not to rock the boat and try to have her name changed. They did, after all, get her surname right.

"Feeling a little better... and wondering when I'll be allowed out of this bed... I haven't been able to feel my butt in a while, would be good to stretch my legs beyond the loo!" Bess managed to force out a small giggle while the Healer let out a tremendous laugh that echoed around the room. She asked the same question every morning during his rounds, and was yet to have a definitive answer.

"I wager you'll be in bed for just a little longer, m'dear, but we'll get you out of here eventually," he said, moving to sit on the side of her bed, facing her but at a respectful distance.

Bess wondered where the other Healers were. During Fenrose's morning rounds there had always been at least three young witches or wizards crowding the end of her bed, staring at her as if she were a zoo animal.

She forced another smile and said, "Sooner rather than later would be good!"

"Yes, well…" the older gentleman began, looking around before leaning in closer, as he said in a quieter tone, "you're going to have some visitors today. We've held them off for as long as we could, but you're much more awake and alert now, and your injuries are healing as well as they can be, so…"

"Who... who is it?" Bess asked in an equally quiet tone, as she wondered if she might be getting a visit from an Albus Dumbledore soon - she was of Hogwarts age after all...

Fenrose pursed his lips before he said, "Aurors. Our… How did Jenkins say to put it? Ah yes, our version of the Perleez." Bess had realised a few days previously that the Healers were all trying to describe things to her in terms of the Muggle world, and had therefore quickly deduced that she must be either a Half-Blood or Muggle-Born, if she had any magic at all...

"Police? Oh. Of course," Bess replied with a frown.

"Were you expecting someone else?" The older wizard asked, raising an eyebrow.

Bess wanted to say no, but found herself unable to lie to the man. "Well... Yes. I mean... you keep calling me Daphne... so someone must have told you... I just thought maybe someone from my family might have turned up by now?" She had been ashamed to admit it, but the lack of visitors really was alarming her. Did she not have anyone who cared for her in this world?

Fenrose grimaced. "Ah. Well, you see, that's what the Aurors are going to talk to you about as well... How you got here, and what you remember."

"But I don't remember anything," Bess replied quickly.

Fenrose nodded. "Yes. Well. They need to verify that. I think- I think this conversation is best left for their arrival."

"But please? Healer Fenrose, please tell me something? Anything?" Bess pleaded, leaning forwards once more, her right hand coming to rest on her left forearm, where she began to subconsciously run her nails forwards and backwards over her bandage.

Fenrose's eyes followed the movement, before he looked away suddenly, sighing heavily. "I'm sorry Daphne, but we were told not to tell you anything for the moment. After the Aurors have been… We'll try and fill in any gaps for you, but for now I'm unable to share any information."

Bess frowned deeply and continued to rub her arm as she looked down at the bandage. "Can I at least see my injuries? Healer Jones keeps covering up the mirrors in the bathrooms and bandaging my left arm while I'm asleep. She's wrapped my right when I'm awake, but keeps saying the left one is quite gnarly."

Fenrose sighed, and shook his head. "Again, I- I really think that's one to confront after you've had a chat to the Aurors. I'm sorry, Daphne, but I really can't tell you anything right now. Please, trust me when I say that I would like to, but it really would be best for you to wait."

"I can't say I'm not upset but…" Bess sat back, emitting a deep sigh, "when will they be arriving?"

"Sometime this afternoon... I've told them when your lunch is, and they'll be coming round to speak to you sometime between then and five."

Bess managed to choke out an, "Okay," and swallowed thickly.

"I know you won't feel like eating anything now, I'm sure you'll have a lot on your mind. But at least have this," Fenrose said quickly, as from a pocket in his bright robes he pulled a rather large bar of chocolate. Breaking off a slab, he handed it to Bess, before snapping some off for himself, "I give chocolate to all of my patients! Well, the special ones anyway!"

He winked before popping the small piece in his mouth and pocketing the rest of the bar. She felt a little comforted, and oddly reminded of Remus Lupin.

"Do you treat all children, Healer Fenrose?" She asked, curiously.

"Ah no… I have the unfortunate pleasure of treating those of you with the… more difficult injuries. A tough job at times, yes, but one I enjoy..." he said, trailing off, and Bess grimaced as she thought of the little boy who'd come in screaming the previous day, with what looked like a rather nasty burn on his hand. She watched Fenrose as he frowned at the floor, before looking up and smiling serenely. "Seeing the look on the faces of children and families when they are reunited in good health is my utter joy."

Bess nodded and tried to smile back as she asked, "How old are your patients when they transfer to an adult ward?"

Fenrose's eyes focussed on Bess once more, and he sent her a sincere smile. "Don't worry, you won't be leaving us for a little while longer, but I'm sure that you won't be of age by the time you do."

Bess looked down and began to play with her bedsheet, as she asked, "When will that be?"

"You don't remember your birthday?" He asked, frowning.

She shook her head quickly. "I- I think it's October the 23rd, but I can't be sure."

Bess looked up to see Fenrose smile as he replied, "Yes, that's the date we have as well."

Bess was instantly grateful that some things hadn't changed significantly, though there was still the issue of her name... she had been working towards the topic of Daphne for a while. Was this a girl who she'd replaced in this world? Or was inhabiting the body of?

"Healer Fenrose?" she asked quietly.

"Yes m'dear?"

"Can- can I tell you something important? Something secret?"

"Yes. Of course." He replied, a serious expression settling on his face.

"I think my name is actually Bess. Well, Elizabeth... not Daphne," she whispered, unsure of how the wizard would take this particularly weird confession.

He nodded solemnly. "Ah yes, we weren't sure on what you would go with. Your full name was listed on your birth certificate – Miss Daphne Elizabeth Coulson – but on the envelope it was kept in, it just said 'Bess' documents'. I could call you that if you'd like? Elizabeth? Or do you have another nickname?"

"Could you try calling me… Bess?"

"Bess? Yes, I could call you that! Shall we try it out now? How are you this fine day, Bess?"

However, hearing it being said in this world was too jarring. Bess had grown comfortable already – her incapacitation had enabled her time to think, to adjust, and to enjoy. But suddenly she felt overcome with nausea and weakness again as the reality of her situation began to sink in again - she had spent sixteen days in this world now, with no end in sight.

Her familiar name had turned from a safety blanket into a harsh reminder that she was now alone – far away from her friends and anyone who loved her. Far from anywhere or anyone that made her feel truly safe.

She shook her head sharply and said, "On second thoughts. Please don't. I'm sorry, I just- I think Daphne would be better for now. Easier to- to- to- I'm sorry, I just-"

Fenrose shook his head and smiled at her kindly. "Of course. Daphne it is."

She frowned deeply. "It- It's not the way you said it, really, I just- It's... it's jarring."

"You've been through an emotional and physical trauma worse than I have seen in a decade. You still don't have answers about why you're here, and where here is. You have been thrust in to a world that is not your own," Fenrose reasoned, "I would be more worried if you were stoic and infallible in the face of all of this. The fact that you look sick at a personal nickname is good. It means that there's a part of your brain which is fighting. I just hope that you still enjoy my company once you find out what happened to you."

Bess, who had found herself comforted beyond words by Fenrose's speech, frowned as he said his last, and looked up sharply. "What do you mean?" She asked, as Fenrose ducked his head and stared intently at his hands.

"I'm in charge of your care, so it stands to reason-" Fenrose sighed deeply. "Daphne… I did everything I could to try and rectify the damage you suffered. We did everything that we could. But there are still limitations to what we can heal," he sighed again as he reached over to place a calming hand on Bess' right forearm. "The Aurors will explain everything to you, and ask you some questions. But I'm afraid that some of your scars will remain."

Bess smiled at the Healer. "I could never blame you for scars you didn't give me."

"Yes, well, there's a reason we haven't let you look in the mirror yet," he said, before he patted her forearm again. After a few moments he stood and stepped away, drawing his hands back to cross his arms. "I am sorry, Daphne."

"Don't be," she replied quickly.

He nodded. "They're not too bad at all, considering… I just feel awful that I couldn't do more."

"Please don't feel bad for any of this," Bess said, offering him a small smile.

"I really should get back to my rounds. I can only apologise for having to leave like this," he said, sending her an apologetic look.

Bess nodded and thought of all of the things she wanted to say. She wanted to thank him for saving her life, or for doing everything he could to heal her and her scars. She wanted to apologise for the fact that he had to deal with injuries like hers on a daily basis and feel guilty for not being able to heal kids completely. But she didn't. Instead, she just replied, "Really. I'm fine. Thank you."

He nodded. "I'll return once the Aurors have left to check on you."

"See you later," she replied.

"Miss Coulson," he said as Fenrose left. As the curtain around her bed moved, her eyes were drawn to the Healer's station, where three young Healers stood, staring over at her. They quickly looked away as they saw her looking.

As she watched Fenrose rejoin the group and usher them to another bed, she couldn't help but feel relieved that he'd warned her of the impending Auror visit on his own.

Falling back in to her pillows, she tried to shake away her thoughts of home – of her own world – which had brought tears to her eyes, and a lump to her throat.

Wanting to distract herself once more, she picked up two books – a small notebook given to her by the Healers, which she had taken to writing spells and wand movements in, and a well worn copy of A Standard Book of Spells: Grade 5. Flicking to the first page, she began to read.

xXx

A/N: So... that's the first chapter! I've not been able to get this idea out of my head, and so decided to put fingers to keyboard and write this up! Hope you like it! Any questions, let me know via PM or in the reviews!

Edited: 01-03-2021 to make the descriptions flow better.