Time must have been escaping him since he travelled through it. One second he was closing his eyes, welcoming the idea of not having to think for a few hours, and the next he was being awoken by a mediwitch coming in to check his vitals and make sure that he was alright. She also went into the potions bag and removed a few for him to take before the elves brought him breakfast. He quickly swallowed all six potions that would be a part of his regimen for the next couple of weeks. They weren't as bad as the ones he'd taken the night before since they had hurt as they worked. He looked down at the table and noticed his glasses were sitting there still, completely unused from the day before. He looked away, testing that his eyes were actually working without the use of glasses as he gaped. The healer of the day came in and greeted Harry letting him know that Healer Geoffry had filled her in the evening before on which potions he would take as well as his overall situation.
She introduced herself as Healer Barnes. She looked about middle age, fairly pretty with fancy glasses that reminded him of snitches as they were gold with silver wings on the sides. She had huge curly hair that reminded him a lot of Hermione, he wondered if it ever sparked like hers did when she was emotional.
"How are you feeling this morning? We have it noted that you ate a fair amount of your meals but not all of it. You'll need to work on increasing your appetite. Young witches and wizards need a lot of calories to help your body adjust to its growing magic levels as well as to help you grow as all teenagers do. Older wizards and witches still eat more calories than our muggle counterparts would and maintain a healthy weight."
"I'll do my best, I never knew that it was so important to eat so much. I'm still trying to adjust to about what a muggle eats since I wasn't given much growing up. Why did I tell you that? I don't normally just blurt things out."
The Healer looked him over, then asked him to look at a bright lumos while she checked his eyes. "I believe you're having a reaction to one of your daily potions, it could be causing you to say things that are true but not something you'd generally share. If you'd like I can test it to make sure how deep the compulsion goes, though that would mostly be answering increasingly embarrassing questions and cataloguing how you're feeling as we do that?" She had an innocent grin on her face as she offered this solution. He didn't believe that look.
"Err. No. Thank you. I'd rather not have someone prodding at my thoughts while I'm effectively dosed up thanks." Her face slid into a pout as she conceded his point. She finished her examination of him and left him to his thoughts.
In what seemed to be no time at all, Dumbledore was poking his head through the door again. Harry hadn't really expected him to be popping in that day, he thought it might take a couple to work through all of the things he'd wound up writing for the Unspeakable. He waved the headmaster in, a small smile on his face. Harry glanced quickly at the clock, it was so easy to lose track of time in the unchanging hospital room. "Good afternoon, headmaster."
Albus Dumbledore entered the room with a warm smile. He asked Harry how he was holding up, and whether there was anything he could do for him before the Unspeakable came by to continue their work, hopefully finishing so that the headmaster and hospital staff could decide what to do with Harry. Just as Harry was declining needing anything more than was already promised, the Unspeakable entered the room. Dumbledore said a few pleasantries even though the Unspeakable didn't bother responding.
Instead, they brought out the book Harry had written in the day before. Apparently they needed a bit of clarification, as the spell was set only to take in everything Harry experienced which didn't necessarily include outside information that he didn't directly see or feel. After a lengthy explanation about the first end of the war, as well as all he knew that happened behind the scenes leading up to Voldemort's resurrection, the Unspeakable declared him free to go. They didn't really care what others had planned for him, which was a relief to Dumbledore as he'd been working on getting Harry into Hogwarts. All that the Unspeakable asked Harry to be careful of was jumping the wand with people he knew or knew of from his previous timeline, as there was a clear divide which, no, they would not be explaining so he'd better not ask.
Knowing he was free to go, after being declared well enough by his Healer team, was a relief to Harry. He was already itching to get out of the hospital and to do something, anything that wasn't just laying in bed all day. Before he'd even noticed, the Unspeakable was gone and Dumbledore was talking with Healer Barnes.
"Very well Mr. Dumbledore, you can collect him tomorrow morning. But I will not see him leaving this room a moment before then." Having said that, Healer Barnes turned to Harry and gave him a gentle smile. "Mr. Potter, your professor here has been campaigning for you to be sprung much earlier than we had been anticipating. I will be sending you off with a list of recommended potions, a diet plan, an exercise plan, and a contact list of Mind Healers that I'd like you to get in touch with."
"Am I not all better, Healer? I don't understand why I'd be able to leave if I'm not healed or why you'd be sending me off with all that if I was better?" Harry cocked his head at Healer Barnes, he'd never needed any sort of plan or extra potions when he'd been released from the Hogwarts hospital wing.
"Mr. Potter, Harry. You just went through a seriously traumatic magical incident. Even if you decide you're feeling fine right now, that doesn't mean that symptoms won't be cropping up as you recover. And there will be a period of recovery. You'll find when you try to get up that you're feeling weak and dizzy, that the world is tilted slightly so and you will have a time of adjusting to that. That's what the recommended potions and regimes are for. We may not be able to speed your healing any further but you do still have healing to do."
"Oh." Harry sat in silence after that revelation, he'd thought magic could do just about anything. Could heal any illness at the snap of the fingers or, in the case of vanished bones, overnight. To be told so bluntly that that was not in fact the case was eye opening. He'd have to work hard, but getting into tip top shape would be worth it.
The Healer and headmaster said their goodnights. Dumbledore promised to be there bright and early tomorrow morning to pick Harry up, and would he mind terribly if they went straight to Hogwarts even though term wouldn't start for a few weeks? Of course Harry agreed, seeing the castle again would be good for him. Seeing it without any Umbridges or Inquisitorial Squad would be lovely.
After dinner that night, Harry read over a first draft of the treatment plan his Healers were putting him on. It was going to be a lot of physical therapy and work, with the help of a few nutrient potions as well. But he began to think of how he could achieve the results he was hoping for, at the castle. He promised himself that he'd be traversing the stairs and jogging laps around the Quidditch Pitch, eating what he could handle, and generally taking much better care of himself. He fell asleep planning, drifting off to images of himself running around the Room of Requirement.
The next morning was a flurry of excitement for Harry as, even though he hadn't been there that long, he'd finally be getting out of the hospital. By the time Dumbledore showed up to retrieve him, Harry was sure he'd managed to annoy the Mediwixen caring for those in his hallway. He'd asked several times if he could just go downstairs to meet the headmaster, so that they could just go whenever the wizard arrived. He'd also double, triple, and quadruple checked that the final copy was right for his treatment plan. In the end, they'd taken to sending in the elves, just dropping by with something for Harry to drink before the Mediwixen would come through to check in on him. That way he was either too busy drinking or just ready to go to the bathroom with only that on his mind.
Thankfully, the headmaster did wind up coming in fairly early. They completed Harry's discharge paperwork and bade everyone farewell. The duo had to take the Knight Bus, other forms of magical transport were expressly forbidden as they might aggravate the strain Harry was under physically and magically. Unlike the first time Harry had ridden the contraption, there was no Stan. It was just Ernie and a smiling older woman who took the fare from Dumbledore and introduced herself as Doris to Harry.
He could tell she had a bit of an accent, as she was pointing out which beds were free for Harry to be secured on. It wouldn't do for him to survive Voldemort several times as well as time travel just to be done in by a sharp turn on the bus. It wasn't until she was raising her voice to yell, "Take it away Ernie!" That Harry really recognized the older woman. He couldn't stop himself from gaping at her obviously not yet shrunken head, which drew the attention of the headmaster.
"Harry, did you happen to take the Knight Bus much in your own time?"
"No professor. I only went on it once, in my third year. But it was just Ernie and this man called Stan by then. But I did hear a shrunken head yelling at Ernie that I could swear… It sounded just like Doris!"
"Ah yes, not a choice I'd personally make but having your head shrunk can be a helpful reprieve, or so I hear. The ones at the Hog's Head are quite talkative. I rather think it'd make it very difficult to have too many big thoughts, it may help simplify things."
"I hadn't realized that they were actual people, sir. I thought it was just a charm or spell, like the hat."
"Who's to say that the Sorting Hat was never a living being. As neither of us were there when it was created, we'd have a difficult time saying either way."
"I suppose, sir." Thankfully the duo reached their stop not long after this, allowing Harry a break to process the information. They pulled up near where the express was stationed. It would be waiting there for a few more weeks, heading back to London the day before September 1st. At least that's what Dumbledore said when Harry asked why they had the train here if it would be leaving from London fairly soon. Apparently the platform only stayed at King's Cross for a couple of days every year. It travelled to other countries providing them with a secret means of accessing transportation to their own schools. It was an agreement set up between the nations many centuries ago, before there were even trains and they had to use other means such as the carriages Beauxbatons still used.
Speaking of carriages, Harry had just climbed aboard one of the thestral-drawn ones that went between Hogsmeade and Hogwarts. It looked pretty much exactly the same as when he'd ridden in it each time before, in the future. Harry was growing more and more appreciative that he was on his way back to Hogwarts. Even just the past few days had shown him that things would be changing immensely over the following years, so getting back to something timeless like his school, his home, was something he was greatly looking forward to.
Granted, he wouldn't have his friends beside him as he normally would. Ron making jokes and cheering him up, Hermione scolding him and Ron for playing instead of doing homework while secretly enjoying their banter. He missed them already. But he was so glad that he'd made them stay at Hogwarts, the thought of them stranded at the Ministry while he was stuck here would have been torture.
Dumbledore led Harry to some guest quarters near the Great Hall. They were quite plain but were infinitely better than any room Harry had lived in before, sans the Gryffindor tower of course. The room was more of a suite with a small sitting area, desk, and bathroom as well as the bed he was expecting. Dumbledore explained to him the rules he would have to abide by while living in the castle. It basically amounted to him agreeing to not go wild, to eat well, to do his exercises, and to get some rest. He was given permission to put the library to good use, even without Madame Pince's watchful eyes on him. He was also told to just head down to the kitchens for meals, as there were only a few teachers that remained in the castle year round and they'd all long agreed that the Hall was a bit much for just them.
Harry, of course, asked for permission to use the Quidditch pitch to get some flying in. The headmaster even agreed to let him use the practice snitches should he please. So all in all, Harry was quite looking forward to the following weeks spent mostly alone at Hogwarts. With those promises secured, the headmaster said his farewells and promised to stop by soon to update Harry on what was happening with Sirius and Severus.
After Harry was left alone, he decided to go through his pouch. Luna wouldn't have made absolutely certain that Harry had it unless it was very important. With a cautious peek inside, he saw a small note that read off two incantations and instructions for how to best remove the contents of the pouch without ruining something. Following those instructions, he set the whole thing on the floor in an open area, then he incanted "foris" which the note said would bring the objects out.
There was an explosion of items that came rushing out of the minuscule pouch. There was a small trunk that seemed to be shrunk, a sack that had the Gringotts emblem on it, and several other bits and bobs. He specifically noticed that the album Hagrid had gifted to him his first year was strewn among the mess. Harry decided to start with the trunk, since it was definitely not the one he'd left behind in his dorm. After tapping it with his wand to make it expand, then opening it, he saw that it was a wizarding space trunk. His eyes wide with shock, he took the first steps down into a lovely little home. While exploring he saw that Luna had painted some beautiful murals along the walls and ceiling of his trunk-house. There were two bedrooms, a tidy kitchen, a stunning bathroom with a deep tub he was looking forward to trying, and a sitting area with a fireplace and a desk sat in the corner.
As he wandered, he also saw that Luna had taken the time to put certain spells on things, since she had left little notes like the one he first saw in the pouch all over the place. They said things like, "ever fresh cupboard, with stasis charm for all foods" and "to use the bath with healing potions, tap the tap with your wand".
Having left the trunk, he looked into the Gringotts bag, sitting on top of what looked like an impossibly large stack of money there was another little note. It told him that Luna had withdrawn all of his gold for him and placed it in the sack, she had also gotten his assets from other vaults he may not have known about which likewise are now in the sack. She only asked that he enjoy the money and to use a bit of it to buy her some pudding after she's born, if he didn't mind terribly much. She had also included in this sack a compilation of bank statements from the different accounts she had drained. He set those aside to read later when he could really comprehend them, seeing everything so far had been overwhelming. He'd known Luna knew more than she ever let on, but to see real tangible proof of that, to see her setting him up for an entirely new future made him so grateful they had become friends.
Having gone through the two larger parts of the contents, he gathered all the smaller pieces, resolving to look through everything carefully when he returned from getting some dinner. He made his way down to the basement, near the Hufflepuff common room where the portrait to get into the kitchens was. It was a slow trek, especially considering the last time he was up and moving on his own he was running through the Ministry, but he made it all under his own steam.
He entered the kitchens the same as normal, thankful that nothing had really seemed to change yet again. After all, he would feel rather silly to go crawling up to the Headmaster's office just because he couldn't find food. The elves greeted him with as much enthusiasm as always, though he was missing Dobby, normally the little elf would be chattering his ears off by the time he'd set one foot into his domain. He'd definitely try to keep an eye out for him, preferably to free him long before the Malfoys ever got their hands on him. The elves that were there set him up with a large, for him, meal that was chock full of healthy but tasty foods listed by the Healers' program he would be following.
He ate slowly, watching the house elves going about their work and trying to force himself to eat more than he normally would. 'This is going to be difficult,' he thought, but he had to try. Getting better was at the top of his list, he had so much to learn about the time he'd landed in. Being held back by his body wouldn't be very helpful for figuring out what he can and should do. Harry had decided already that he would be changing things.
There was just no way that he could sit back and watch people suffer. Not to mention, watching his parents grow up and then die without doing anything. Never going to happen as far as he's concerned. He'd already begun to make moves on helping to change the timeline. After all, no one knew about the abuse Snape and Sirius went through until it was too late to really do anything. Snape's father was already dead by the time anyone knew, and Sirius had basically become a Potter.
As he ruminated on the issues he would be facing, Harry managed to finish as much as he could of his dinner. After thanking the house elves, he made his way back to his rooms. When he arrived he realized that his day had been much fuller than he'd thought. Frankly he wasn't sure he could keep his eyes open long enough to take care of his nightly rituals, never mind processing whatever else Luna had stashed away for him. He quickly tidied everything up, setting most things on the counter or coffee table, just so they wouldn't get stepped on or otherwise ruined. Harry then went about his evening, very quickly winding up on the comfortable Hogwarts bed. Even without being in the tower, Hogwarts still managed to feel like home.