A/N: You're still reading? Really? I suppose a real disclaimer might be in order, then, as you're obviously serious.
This is NOT benefiting me in any way at all. JKR certainly did not sanction this, and probably does not share my rather odd theories as to how phoenixes behave.
I do guarantee, however, that you'll be morbidly interested in the theory I put out. Sort of.
2 – And Again
Waking again was harder. Harry had crashed spectacularly into the darkness, cool, numbing darkness that did not ask him why he had red-and-gold wings, and sounded like a –
No.
"Harry."
He tried not to start as the sharply concerned tone of Madame Pomfrey lanced through him, so he couldn't feel his w– good god, they weren't his, they were an aberration, and they would be removed. Harry squeezed his eyes shut.
Dumbledore can remove them. He can, and he will, or I'll – I'll rip his heart out –
And with that thought came a frighteningly detailed image of how exactly he would go about it, where precisely in the chest he would dip his claws, and twist, and wrench – wait…claws. Claws?
Harry abruptly found his eyes were open, and he was staring at something that looked very much like – like claws.
He closed his eyes again, very quickly.
"Harry, we need you to stay calm," Pomfrey was saying soothingly. "We can't help you if you don't stay calm –"
"Can oo ta' 'em off?" Harry tried very hard not to scream – his voice was even higher now, oh god, like a kid's –
"We can't do anything if you aren't awake, and we can't examine you if you're not awake, and calm," Pomfrey urged him, voice sounding closer by as soft footsteps clattered around him. "We need you calm and awake to help." Harry nodded miserably, wondering why his neck felt so bloody stiff. "Albus, Severus, you can lift him now –"
"No –" Harry said sharply, wondering why it came out so damn high – like a squawk, nearly, but hands were already gently turning him and folding him oddly onto the bed, so that his feet were dangling and scraping the floor. Why they were scraping, he did not know, and knew better than to ask, or even open his eyes as gentle hands seemed to drift carefully over his – now that he thought about it, painfully tender back. "Nor Schna'e –" he stubbornly persisted, hissing sharply as one of the hands pressed at a particularly tender spot near the base of his skull, meaning to tell them he didn't want Snape touching him anywhere, or even –
"Albus…?" Madame Pomfrey's voice seemed oddly forced, wavering somehow as she addressed Dumbledore, who had to be nearby, because Harry could smell an odd, whimsical scent that somehow recalled the irritating old bastard for him – "Shall I – should I let him sleep now, while –"
"No. There is no purpose in that," Dumbledore's voice said wearily. Harry shifted uncomfortably, wincing as he did so – he felt so stretched, as if he'd been strung up somewhere by all his limbs, or been, well, stretched on one of those torture machines he still hazily remembered from his primary school in Surrey.
A rack, that's what it was –
"Harry," Dumbledore said, a chair scraping close by, the scent of wood flaring suddenly in his nostrils as he wondered who was sitting down. "We have…unpleasant news…" Harry lifted his head clumsily, wondering why on earth he still felt so rubbery, and tried to open his eyes.
A minute of the weirdest colour scheme for the hospital wing he'd ever seen convinced him that he'd be best off looking at his hands, or – wait – he blinked twice, and somehow things seemed to stretch and contort into normalcy, before his very eyes. Harry carefully turned his head in Dumbledore's direction, so he could really see what the old man thought of whatever the fuck was going on, and, after a sharp, odd-sounding breath (the timbre of which he carefully shoved into a rapidly filling box of Things Not To Question Right Now in his mind), spoke again, or tried to.
"'M lisenin'," he said carefully, trying unsuccessfully not to bite himself. What is wrong with my mouth? And my – my voice –
Things Not To Question Right Now! He needed to be calm for them to get the fucking wings off, because they weren't his, and he didn't want freakish wings on his body, no matter how well he could control them, and – how on earth was I doing that? Was I really –
Things. Not. To Question. Right Now.
"The last thing you remember is eating, isn't it, Harry?" Dumbledore said kindly, face seeming to swim in and out of focus now that Harry tried to focus. Things. Not to Question. He nodded, feeling suddenly miserable with how cold he was.
"'M col'," he said miserably. Highly.
"I understand," Dumbledore said, voice a little sharper than before. "In a minute or two, you won't be – just stay calm." He rearranged his – green? Red? It looks like both – robes slightly, in jerky movements, before continuing. "You have been poisoned, Harry –"
"Headmaster," Pomfrey said warningly, as heat seemed to flare gently through Harry's stomach. "He's –"
" – contained," Dumbledore said, cutting her off. "Calm. Without distraction," he added fiercely, and Madame Pomfrey moved a little away – was that her? She looks smaller, or something – "You were poisoned, Harry, and you would certainly have died, if not for –"
"B'wha' does tha' mean?" Harry said, the heat swimming deliciously up his arms. This certainly wasn't worse than death, if the weirdest thing that had ever happened to him –"
" – your transformation," Dumbledore finished, colour seeping slowly into the pale – didn't see they were that pale – cheeks of the headmaster. "It saved you – you must remember that –"
It.
That was it – something was growing in him, growing on him, and he was damned if he wasn't going to see what it was –
"Miwor," Harry said, urgently, fear coursing through him as the warmth spread. "Nee' – miwror –" He stared helplessly at the old man, willing him to understand, wishing he could shove the knowledge into those dimmed blue eyes –
A dizzying sensation of flight and falling passed over him, and Dumbledore started violently in front of him as he crumpled to the bed, a headache knifing into his skull.
"Albus, I told you –"
"Mirror," Dumbledore whispered, very very quietly. "He – he wants one, Poppy…"
Silence crashed into the room, and Harry felt a trickle of horror between his shoulder blades. What could possibly be so wrong with him that they didn't want him to see himself? The wings hadn't been that bad, had they?
As long as they can take them – and it – off, there's nothing wrong, is there?
"Potter," the brisk, contained voice of Professor Snape penetrated abruptly through his daze. "H-here." Harry stared at the pallid – too pallid face of his professor, wonder buzzing dully in his head as the man delicately set a medium-sized mirror in his lap, face down.
Despite his dread, he stretched out a hand and picked it up.
Preview of Chapter 3: Ugly Realisations
Harry tried not to scream.
His face was – god –
He dropped the mirror abruptly, heat flaring up his arms and torso as tears of horror began to pool in his eyes, splashing hugely onto the sizzling back of the mirror –