Into a new world
Disclaimer: None of the characters you recognise or the Harry Potter world are mine. All belong to the fantastic JK Rowling.
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Chapter 5: The health assessment
The day before Harry's Birthday, he finally found out what his potions master (or his old one anyway) and his mother talked about the big talk night. He was hanging out with his little sister Megan. He found her fun to be around and very helpful to be filled in on what was going on in their lives (although he did have to be careful to not give anything away). Thankfully he had no prior relationships in this world. To his knowledge (or his sister's knowledge), no one had feelings for his that they knew about. This gave him one last thing to worry about in adjusting to the new world. He was standing in the family room, throwing a muggle football (the English one, of course) across to Matt.
"What have I told you, boys, about throwing that in the house?" Lily fumed, waking into the room.
"Dad doesn't mind!" Matt defended, pointing to his father, who was not responding to the current situation (he was reading a newspaper). Harry gave up and got a book to read instead.
"Your father grew up with Uncle Sirius." She reminded him. "What have I told you about the rules?"
"Follows yours, not dads," Matt grumbled, clearly annoyed.
"Exactly. Now come on, Harry, we have a date with Uncle Sev." Now it was Harry's turn to groan, but Matt perked up, knowing that once his mother left, he could throw the ball around again. Lily saw this going through his mind, "Don't think about it, Matthew. I will get it out of your father if I find out you used it again, in here." This warning seemed to get through to Matt, who collapsed on the sofa and took to hitting James in the face with it, who was still ignoring him. Harry obediently walked over to his mother and followed her to the fireplace.
Within a few moments, they were stood in the Snape's summer house. It was large with 8 bedrooms, and the family room, kitchen, and dining room were all open planned like the Potter's house. The wards on the property recognised them both straight away, as they were such frequent visitors to the house. Lily led Harry straight to Severus's study. The Snape children were currently in the family room, leaving to go to the Potters house. Harry and Lily thankfully didn't see them on the way to Severus' office. This would have posed more questions that couldn't be answered unless they decided to be honest with the kids).
Once they arrived, Lily knocked and waited for Severus to admit them. Normally she would have just walked in, but he was slightly more unpredictable with this new Severus and was clearly not used to being so open.
"Come in." Came Severus' cold voice.
Harry immediately felt like he was at Hogwarts, and he was in trouble for something and knew Snape would give him a detention. Alas, he followed his mother into the office. It was wooden (like everywhere), and there were huge bookshelves on either side of his large desk. Behind the desk was a window that ran the length of the wall.
"Hey, Sev, you ready?" Lily asked, leading her Eldest son into the office.
"Yes, come in," Severus responded as calmly as he could. "Right, Pot, err, Harry, we will be doing a scan on you, but I will also need to do a visual inspection."
Harry became anxious at the thought of this but tried to hide it the best he could. "Yes, sir."
"Come and stand in the space over there," Severus instructed, pointing to space on the room's opposite side. He waved his wand in complicated motion, and a piece of paper and quill appeared.
Harry looked at it suspiciously. He had heard of these from Ron, especially the quill the journalist Rita Skeeter used.
Severus saw this cross his mind so clarified, "Heard of the one Skeeter uses?" when Harry nodded, he continued, "This isn't one like that. This is a medical quill. It just writes down my medical observations and the scan results."
"Are you talking about Rita Skeeter?" Lily asked, clearly confused.
Severus nodded, "Is she not a journalist in this world?"
"She was, but she was charged with being a death eater supporter in the wizarding war. When she got out of Azkaban, she disappeared into the muggle world, or that is what people say. Others say she has just changed identities."
"What do you think?" Harry asked, partly curious, partly wanting the focus to be off of him.
"Nice try, Harry." Lily smirked, "You forget I grew up with your father, and am mothering his children. I know every trick in the book used to get me off of task."
Severus also smirked and turned back to Harry to finish the scan. "Right, now I need to strip down to your boxers. Lily, would you mind stepping outside?"
Lily nodded and quickly left the room. When Harry didn't move, Severus added, "I know it's embarrassing, but the quicker it is done, the quicker you can get dressed."
Harry nodded and finally obliged. Severus inspected his back and winced slightly at the welt marks. "I need you to face away from me and pull your boxers down so I can see if there is any damage."
Harry pulled them down quickly and pulled them back up after a couple of torturous seconds.
"Okay, you can get dressed now, and then we can let your mum back in."
Harry dressed and then spoke up, "Does she have to know, sir?" Harry looked terrified.
"About the abuse?" Severus clarified; Harry winced but nodded, "I have to, as you're younger than 17. But Harry, you don't need to be embarrassed by this." He was surprisingly gentle when he spoke. Severus waved his wand to send a Patronus to get Lily.
Within a few minutes, Lily was back in the room.
"Okay, so Harry, there are some things in your scan that I need you to explain. Please don't lie, as I know what I am looking at, and I know what causes these injuries." He said this with a slight edge to his voice, the gentleness gone. This was because he was angry about what had happened to Lily's son. Unfortunately, Harry misread the situation, and Lily could tell.
"Sev," Lily warned.
Severus nodded and took a deep breath, "Okay, so you have a break on your arm that didn't set properly, a few cracked ribs, a break on your nose."
Lily gasped and screamed, "What!"
Now was Severus' turn to warn Lily, "Lily, I know this is hard to hear, but this is hard for Harry too. If not more so. If you can't control yourself, you'll have to swap places with Potter."
"Which one?" Harry asked innocently.
"Your father," Severus replied shortly, looking at Lily.
"Okay, sorry. Go ahead." She said finally.
"Okay, let's start with the break on your arm. How did you get it?"
"Harryhunting," Harry mumbled as quickly as he could.
"I can't hear you, speak loudly and clearly," Severus instructed.
"Harry, Harry hunting."
"Pray, tell, what is 'Harry hunting,'" Severus asked with his eyebrows raised. This was not what he expected.
"My cousin Dudley and his gang would chase and hunt me down and then beat me up. Sometimes, they would be too rough and break a bone."
"What would your Aunt and Uncle do when this happened?"
"They would ignore it and punish me with more chores."
"Did they ever take you to the hospital?"
Harry shook his head.
"Speak, please," Severus demanded quietly.
"No, they say they wouldn't waste their money on me."
"But they have the NHS." Lily interrupted, very confused, "Muggle healthcare is paid by tax payer's money. If they took you, they wouldn't pay outright."
"What?" Harry said, equally confused. "They never told me that."
"Is that what caused all of your breaks?" Severus asked, trying to bring the conversation back to the topic at hand.
"Most of them, the cracked ribs are from Uncle Vernon."
"How did he cause them?"
"He hit me too hard a few times."
"Is this what caused the welts on your back and bottom?"
"Kind of, that was the belt. He would only hit me if he got really drunk and if I really annoyed him. This didn't really happen often."
"What was their main punishment?"
"Before Hogwarts, my cupboard with no food for a week or month."
"Cupboard?" Severus repeated, thinking it was a spacious cupboard at least.
"Yeah, you know the one under the stairs?"
"That's where you slept?" Lily broke in, horrified.
"For my first 11 years, yes. After that, I moved into Dudley's second bedroom."
"My nephew had two rooms, and you lived in a cupboard?" Lily surmised, sounding deadly.
"I'm sorry, mum," Harry said, looking terrified and broken.
"What on earth for?" Lily was confused by his actions, but Severus would recognise an abused child anywhere.
"For, for being a burden."
"Harry, you are my son. You are never ever a burden."
"I'd recommend," Severus started cutting in, "a nutrition potion every morning and every evening. You can put it in your pumpkin juice. And to start a training programme, to build up your muscle, and your ability to do quidditch should improve. You also need to take some potions to set your bones right, and some cream to heal the welts. Once you arrive at Hogwarts, you will need to continue your nutrition potions. You can take them in the morning and in the evening, with discretion if you need to. You will also need to continue your training, and I also think you should start therapy."
Harry could understand all of the previous 'recommendations,' but this one, he didn't know how it would even be possible. "How can I do therapy when I can't exactly explain my situation? Plus, what will the cover story be? It's going to look odd if I go from being healthy and fine to needing potions and therapy."
"Well, as for who I think I know who would be perfect," Lily said ominously.
After a few seconds, Severus took the bait, "Okay, I'll bite, who?"
"Kathleen, of course," Lily responded as if she was the most obvious choice in the world.
"Really?" Severus asked, clearly surprised. "Why?"
"Because she has some training in muggle psychology, she took an advanced training course on it years ago. Plus, she knows the situation and is very discrete. In the school year, you can just come to the family's quarters and have it there."
"Will, my siblings not find out?"
"Probably eventually. The trick is to keep it as tight a secret as possible, but we can also bluff and come up with something." Lily reasoned.
"When can I start quidditch training?" Harry asked, hopefully.
"Well, as tomorrow is your birthday, we can do some flying. After that, we will be starting from the ground up, which means 10 minute runs a day and not much else."
"Wait, you're training me?" Harry asked incredulously. He didn't think his day could get any stranger.
"Yep, and as Draco has asked me about training, you will be training together." Okay, it just got stranger.
"Me and Malfoy training together? We are on opposite teams, that will give all our secrets away. Wait, I am on the team, right?" Harry hadn't even thought about that.
Lily just laughed, "Yes, of course, you are, you are your father's son, and before you ask, you are the seeker. Draco is the Ravenclaw seeker." She added as an afterthought but wasn't sure Harry even heard her.
"YES!" Harry yelled excitedly, causing Severus to jump. He had never seen him excited before, which was a depressing thought.
"However," Severus cut in, "We do not know if there will be any effects from jumping into a different reality. So Remus and I will monitor the pair of you. If it seems like there are complications, your health comes before quidditch. Do I make myself clear?"
Harry was surprised that Severus seemed to care about his health at all to respond to the warning (or veiled threat, depending on how you viewed it). "Yes, sir." Harry nodded.
"I know this is weird for us, but try and call me Uncle Sev or at least Severus outside of class."
Harry never ever thought in a million years Severus would utter a sentence like that to Draco, never mind him.
Lily was also surprised, "You like that?"
Severus shrugged, "I'm warming up to it, especially when I get called it 50 times a day. Behind called Dad is weirder, at least Draco used to call me Uncle Sev, and still does."
Lily stood up, sensing the conversation was drawing to a close. "Is there anything else, Sev?"
Severus shook his head, "Not right now, no."
"Great, can you be at ours for 9 please tomorrow?"
Severus nodded, "I'll be there. I'll bring Draco with me, and Tanya will bring our kids over a bit later."
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Authors note: I am sorry for not uploading for a while (I have no idea how long it has been). I have been super busy, with being my best friend's bridesmaid, cat sitting for a week, my laptop breaking again, job hunting etc. On top of that, I wrote a chapter that was meant to go up instead of this chapter, but I decided to use that a bit later. Therefore I had to then write the chapter that replaced it, and I found this chapter and the next one so hard to write, but they are necessary for the story progression. Next chapter: Harry's birthday.
