Dudley finally comes to his senses one mid-afternoon and it was accompanied by bloodcurdling scream of pure terror. Poppy prayed that she will never ever need to listen to a child so young screaming in such a manner, it was utterly heart rending!

But everyone was glad that such a state for a child ended quickly…. However, they soon come to realise that no spell could heal what happened to his mind. Albus' reasoning was that because what happened before Dudley was so terrifying, not even an Obliviate could erase the scars in his heart. Severus frowned, "Surely by Obliviating the boy, we can spare him the night terror?"

Albus shook his head, "There were studies where patients with traumatic experience being Obliviated to help them heal backfiring. The reason was that no matter the strength of the spell, the trigger will always break through it. Obliviate is to separate a memory, not to erase it completely. It is like an amnesiac patient. They may forget an event but the sheer emotion related to the memory can still render them to behave as they would as if they remember it when they come across something similar to the lost memory. Or like our physical memory, the mind may forget but the body will remember,"

"It is the reason that a strong enough influence can break through an Obliviated subject and trigger the memory. The worst case would be the physical memory. I believe that this will be the cruellest thing for a person to go through," Albus sighed, "How could we subject such a young child to a fear without a name? Fear of the unknown is more terrifying than the fear toward something that we could learn to understand and cope with,"

Petunia sighed with a heavy heart, "Then my son must come over it on his own?"

Albus nodded, "Unless his own mind decided to forget it, or what we call selective memory lost. It is much more effective than Obliviate because he forget with his own will and with it the chance that the after effect that comes with the body remembering it won't be so terrible. Most that have gone through selective memory lost does not even react badly toward a trigger though maybe getting a strange sense of deja vu. If we force him to forget via outside mean, it might make it worse,"

But the bottom line of the discussion remained to be seen. Will Dudley have to face the terror of what his father had done day after day knowing that he was part of the reason for the horror that unfold before him or will his mind decide that it was better to forget that than to remember?

Harry woke up one day to find his cousin who staring out a window with hollow eyes, the bags underneath his eyes dark as bruises and his face becoming sallow and haggard. It wasn't a face that any child should have. Harry cocked his head to the side and climbed onto the bed, facing Dudley. He didn't blame Dudley; the boy was as much victim as his aunt was. Both meant good and had done all they can in such a situation that no one can understand no matter how sympathetic they are unless they suffer through similar fate.

He then place one small and pale hand over the boy's head. A second past and Dudley suddenly fell back onto his bed, his eyes closed. Harry gave a small sad smile and looked at his hand. He had done the only thing he can; desensitize Dudley enough that he can get over it…as Alice put it…before falling back to sleep. No one noticed his awakening and return to healing sleep.

So it was to castle's delight to find the boy asking for his mom. He gave her a haunted look but also gave her a small sad smile before hugging the stricken woman. The two then had a long, private talk. It baffled Petunia how easily Dudley surmised what had occurred; his dad wasn't the nice man he thought he was.

Dudley murmured against her; "It's okay mummy, he won't hurt any of us anymore. Don't cry, please?"

Petunia sobbed, not realising the torrent of tears sliding off her cheeks as she held her baby boy tight against her. Somewhere deep inside, she blamed herself for her weakness. She had agreed to marry Vernon because she had thought him to be her long awaited prince, regardless of how he looked like. She was so desperate for recognition and acceptance that she had immediately jumped into marriage…only for her to be a prisoner of a man so good in hiding his true features that not even her son would believe her had he not gone through what he did.

Petunia was alone, so completely alone in a marriage so wrong she felt death would be preferable to what she had to go through. And worst of all, Vernon had been grooming up Dudley to be just like him! Oh, she knew that because no matter what she do, it was never good enough for Vernon. Before Dudley, he would play the simpering patient husband whose wife wasn't up to standard but behind the door was where the real 'lecture' begins. All in all, to Dudley his mother was a failure who should be grateful that she has such an understanding man for a husband and that his father can be no wrong.

Petunia was only lucky that Dudley was still too innocent to really follow all that his father had 'hinted' at him at every meal time or family time.

She hugged him tight, "Oh Dudley, I'm so glad you are alright,"

He looked up at her, "Where's Boy?"

She gestured at his sleeping cousin and walked shakily toward the bed containing a still comatose Harry. He touched the boy's small hand and looked at his mother, "He helped me…I was in the closet and there was a demon just outside. I was so scared, he was doing something bad…real bad. I thought I was…I thought he was going to take me to hell because he was all burning you see. Then you came, you were an angel Mummy! With the wings and the white dress but you are all beaten up, your wings broken and all…"

Petunia covered her mouth at his words and she watched as the others looked at each other. Severus' face was passive but his eyes bored at her son. Dudley continues, "And then, he turned and-!" Here he broke into tears, "It was Daddy and he hurt you, he kept hurting you! You were screaming for him to stop but he won't. He took out a whip and started to whip you bad! You were on the floor, bleeding and all! Then…then Alice came…" He turned to Harry, "She was holding Boy's hand and she opened the wrong side of the closet and…there was this pretty garden behind her with a castle. She said that she'll take me home but…but my home's gone to hell like…like a real Hell like the one the parish told us at the church!"

He sobbed into her lap, "She took my hand and…I grow wings, pretty butterfly wings. I remember Daddy told that fairies aren't for boys but Alice said that it'll be okay because…because Boy will be there. Then the closet disappears and then we walk,"

He sniffed, "Alice said that my dad's a bad man, a really, really bad man and that he has been lying. She told me that someone did the same to her too once and she trusted him with her memories but he was planning bad things for her. She told me sometime people we trust don't always keep their side of the promise. She said that people do bad things for many reasons but it was mostly greed and pride that make them do bad things, most of the time greed," He then touches Harry's little fingers, "And Daddy does really bad thing to Boy,"

He worried his bottom lip, "Boy then took a pretty flower out from my chest. It doesn't hurt but the flower got hurt. It was hurt real badly and I wanted to cry because the flower got hurt. Then Boy makes the hurt flower go away…"

He turned to his mother, "Mummy is Boy really my cousin? Aren't cousins' family? Why did Daddy do…do that…to family?" He cried, "Why must he be the Devil?!"

She let her son cry but something told her that she has to let him let it all out. She caught Albus' eyes and he nodded, understanding her need to talk to him after her son calm down some. So she waited until Dudley cries himself to sleep before joining Albus on a walk to the lake.

She turns to him, "What just happened?"

Albus shrugged, "I'm afraid the mechanism of Alice's magic wasn't something I could grasp entirely but from what I could tell, Alice and Harry took the worse of the pain from the memory. Dudley still has the memory but for some reason, his heart and mind does not react as badly as he had before today. Perhaps Alice has somewhat desensitise him from the trauma of the incident and Harry had taken a part of the fear clouding his mind. Or as Dudley said; took a flower from his chest which I assume was an interpretation of his heart and make it disappear. In a way, his heart has been healed but the scar remained. What should have taken years to get over with was done overnight, a true miracle indeed!"

That evening Poppy conveyed her relief for Dudley does not need to be checked into a mental health hospital or need to take all the necessary potion to help him cope with the horror and the pain of betrayal that usually will take at least, the shortest, a decade to heal. Petunia could finally sleep without worrying about whether Dudley will be able to grow up as a normal child should or will he be committed to an asylum…

Now all she needs was for Harry to wake up and kick-starts his journey to health…