Saving Harry

WARNINGS: Religious Fundamentalism, Sensitive Subjects Mentioned, Future Lemon - things of varying sexual nature until that point, homosexual/slash relationships, intense bullying, varying degrees of abuse. If this puts a stick in your ass and offends you, turn back now.

Concept and Story heavily influenced by premise of Steven King's "Carrie". I heat chicken nuggets on review flames

I did just change pen name [DementedWitch is now Audacia's Quill]

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter [Warner Bros. do] nor do I own Yu-Gi-Oh! Or the great concept of Carrie by S. King

Chapter Six

Isis had initially been quite angry when she had to call the school to say the all of the teenagers in her care were not attending, but after Odion pulled her away and relayed the conversation that happened that night, she softened. The next call she ended up making was to the local hospital after digging it out of the phone-book to see if Harry Potter had been checked in.

"You should have told someone sooner about what was happening to your friend," she said, after she put the phone down.

Ryou and Yugi then turned to Marik, who had been the one to insist on their silence.

"I know, but we thought it was just a school thing, if we'd have known the extent of it, we'd never have let him go back home to that place," insisted Marik - which had been true - as evidence began to point to awfully convincing hunches that Harry hadn't just been treated horribly at school, but at home as well.

"Remember when he first came in with those bandages around his hands and fingers?" said Ryou quietly as they had all gotten into the car and driven out.

"You don't think it was a kitchen accident, do you?" said Marik rather flatly.

"No, I don't," sighed the albino "-maybe we'll get some answers when we get there,"

"I just hope Harry's okay," said Yugi worriedly "-he jumped from a second story window!"

"I want to know why," spat out Marik bitterly "-but I think we've guessed it already,"

With that, they'd finally pulled up at the hospital. Isis wasn't sure if she should be angry at her younger brother and friends for their chosen course of action in the first place, sorry for the burden they had, or proud that they were maturing. Even if it was through forced and unfortunate means and circumstance. Odion had felt guilt for his brother, and a twinge sad that none of them - especially Marik - had mentioned it sooner, as far as the Teenage Problem's Scale went, this one ranked up impossibly high. He - they - should have been able to tell someone, and Isis made the clear throughout the whole painful car-ride. Odion couldn't help but silently agree, but didn't voice it due to the heaviness on the shoulder's of the teens already and the uncharacteristic shine of regret in Marik's eyes.

William had come in smiling, saying the work for his temporary - at least for now - placement had been sorted, and that he could stay with the Brodericks. It had been amazing to see the teenager's face light up the entire room with a face-splitting grin. The doctor's had also looked at his hands and said they were getting better!

"You're going to love it, my mum cooks the best, it's why I haven't moved ou- er, let her stay with me," coughed William, making Harry snicker.

"And guess what? You have some visitors, it's your new friends from school. I guess they're wondering why you're not in or heard something," said William after a moment.

"They live on the same block," sighed Harry "-I probably have some explaining to do,"

"You don't have to, and I can shoo them off if you want," said his English teacher worriedly.

"No... no, I'd like to see them," those awful butterflies came in his tummy again as he quickly rubbed the tiredness out of his eyes and tried to fix his outward appearance. It had taken a long shower in the hospital's facilities before he'd been able to wash the smell of petrol out and soothe his aching skin, he felt sleepy because of it. But he didn't want to miss out on a visit from actual friends. Friends. Could you believe it? Friends visiting him in the hospital - he'd never had visitors even when he was well, so the whole thing began to feel that little extra bit real.

"I'll leave you to it, I'm going to nip out and get you some non-hospital food," he smirked.

Harry blushed and murmured his thanks as William left.

The nurse had directed a nervous mess of teenagers into the children's ward, warning them to behave. They drew the curtain around his bed and let Harry sit upright and compose himself. There had been a moment of pause before the shortest one spoke, and all three of them being as thick as thieves, Harry resigned himself to all of them probably discussing him behind his back. In a good way of course, they were showing some concern, the surprise that they were was slightly overwhelming.

"Is - are you alright?" asked Yugi, wide-eyed "-you haven't been in school and the last we saw, you were bundled up in an ambulance and there were sirens and everything by your house,"

Harry looked at them through his bangs and tamed the discomfort in his stomach.

"It's all over," he said with a half-shrug, leaving a question in the air - 'what was 'all over' ? '

"-and...thank you, for coming to see me, I really didn't expect this," he gave them a weary smile.

"Of course, you're our friend," said Ryou with a light frown "-we were all worried and nobody could get hold of you,"

"What...happened exactly?" pressed the albino, and as he said this, Marik sat in the reclining chair beside the bed - usually reserved for parents. He had an inkling he'd need to sit down to hear whatever Harry had to say.

"Sorry for worrying you," said Harry before he could stop himself.

"Stop apologizing," sighed Marik "-you've nothing to be sorry about,"

"I...I'll tell you," he looked at the covers he fiddled with in his hands. He felt the sweat gather and his throat desire to tighten, though he refused it and forced himself to relax. "-But you have to promise that no one at school ever finds out," he felt worry put a note of strength in his voice "-ever!"

"Of course," assured Ryou, and they all nodded and all swore that they would never tell a single living soul at school. Part of Harry felt ashamed, while most of him from being contained so long, wanted to tell his story over and over again until the years of pain were learned by others so that he could no longer bear the cross of his horrid life.

"Well...first... thank you, if it wasn't for you guys, this never would have happened, actually, it's the best thing that's happened to me my whole life,"

That sentence was baffling - ending up in hospital, his family being taken in by the police, was somehow linked to something they'd done and it'd been the best thing to happen to him? It didn't make sense, until Harry began elaborating.

"You found me - they did," he glanced at Yugi, who hadn't been there "-in the art closet, at the end of my tether. I thought... I thought nothing was worth the amount of crap I had to endure. I mean, lots of it was school, but," he struggled "-a lot of it was at home too, in fact, it was worse there,"

It was easier to tell the story if he pretended he was telling it to thin air, so he looked down at his fidgeting hands as he spoke.

"I had to earn my food, but they kept telling me I didn't deserve it. Aunt Petunia and my Step-Uncle... Reverend David, they were very strict people. Angry, even. Angry at me all the time because I was a freak and I couldn't change it, but they made me try hard to every day," he ignored the murmured input from the others, who had to force themselves still to listen.

"He told me I wasn't supposed to eat, I wasn't supposed to bother the normal people with my problems, and said the only way anyone could ever accept me was if I tried to be a good person who prayed and suffered for my sin. I suffered lots, but I don't think it worked at all," he forced himself to look up into the eyes of the closest person to him - Ryou, who was sat on the end of his bed.

"-and I did try!" he sounded like a child trying to justify stealing cookies "-I did try, I tried hard to be good, and not tell no one, not make a fuss and do everything they wanted - and what everyone at school wanted. But it kept spilling into each other, home 'n school, on weekends they worked me day and night and not let me sleep until Sunday. I never had no energy, 'cause 'm stupid, slow, Harry," he spat, voice filled with resent.

"-and sometimes weird things happened around me, like... impossible stuff, that seems like a big prank or just odd 'n they kept saying I did it on purpose! Then Reverend David would get angry, so angry," he winced and shut his eyes, letting it all spill out from his lips. Everything.

"-then..." he glanced at his hands, he didn't have to clarify what he had to go through for his failings as a person. He was hurt for what he was and for all that he did, he suffered for his mistakes.

"-your hands-" Marik could not stop himself from interjecting. Harry let out a hot blush, he would not tell them why David had done it, but simply nodded to the fact that he did.

"-sinned with 'em," he mumbled, embarrassed "-if I said something he'd disagree with, he'd say he'd hurt my tongue next, if I listened to him talking at dinner with other neighbors he said he'd cut off my ear. If I see him do something wrong I had to pretend I never did, you know how it goes. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil," he said humorlessly.

"After you and Marik," he had looked at Ryou "-saved me from...what I was going to do, I realized how much it meant to be alive, happy too. I could never be happy being their version of normal because I tried so hard to be for many years, and all it did, was end up killing me slowly," he murmured the blasphemous statement.

"Everything was suffering, their love meant suffering," he admitted "-and it might be selfish but I don't wanna do that anymore,"

"So you told someone, those bastards got arrested?" Marik sat up eagerly as he said this.

"They yelled at me and...I yelled right back," said Harry, a little proudly "-but he got so angry, this look in his eye like he wanted me dead, actually dead,"

Yugi let out a gasp, his expression completely betraying every thought passing through his mind as he listened.

"-and I knew it was live or die, and thanks to you all I picked...live, but it meant telling," said Harry softly "-Reverend David blamed my rebellion on the devil, a-and all the weird stuff - 'cause it was un-explainable, he blamed on the devil too, and thought of me as it's minion or something," he heard Marik snort.

"-and what else could he do but call it witchcraft?" his voice turned bitter "-and we all know what happened to people accused of Witchcraft,"

Silence.

"They were burned at the stake," said Yugi softly. A pin drop silence had followed before Harry gathered himself and plowed on, listlessly. He knew it was a story he'd have to tell again, again and again. Just as he'd done with police, just as he'd done with Broderick and now with his friends - he was certain things were not over. It couldn't be, not that quickly, not that easily.

"-he threw petrol on me - he was d-downstairs to get the matches so I rammed the window and I ran," his broken voice turned into a croak as he found his throat suddenly become as dry as a desert. The words that had come pouring out had dried up like an oil well, he hadn't the strength to recap all that he had suffered but from the expressions of his friends, he did not have to.

There were no words of comfort that any of them could pull out because the situation was so alien, so horrible and so alien.

It seemed like a significant amount of time passed through the tense silence when in reality it had been very little, before one of them spoke.

"Is it over now?" - Marik had asked, and from the pain that had radiated from Harry - he sincerely wished it would be.

Harry seemed just as bewildered about the future as they, and now the sense of relief he had clinging onto was replaced with worry.

"I don't know," he said.

More silence.

"Will you be okay?" - Yugi asked, setting everyone's eyes on him.

He gave the question some thought - would he be? Could he be? Would it be peaceful now? Would living hurt less? Would his stomach never clench from hunger again and keep him awake at night, would he never ache, bleed and burn for his mistakes again? Would there never be a time where his breathing becomes labored as his lungs filled with water, or worse, blood - from the punishments he would receive? Suddenly, school - a place of torment which had seemed secondary and somewhat minor after the grand scale of everything that had occurred, began to worry him. Suddenly, he did not want to go back - if he was (would he eventually?).

"I don't know," he replied - and this time, he sounded scared.

They stayed until William Broderick came and thanked them for seeing Harry, and for spending time with him, being his friend - and all of those times in school where they'd walked to classes with him. He even thanked them for bunking off that one day and taking Harry with them for a day of fun that he never would have experienced. Potter had told William it all, and all the English teacher could do was thank his students profusely.

Had it not been for them, he was sure he would never have seen Harry smile a proper smile. It alleviated a fear too - a fear that one day Harry would not be able to take all of his pressures and there would be a memorial assembly at school, a bleak staffroom meeting, and waves of guilt. Or that he'd be on the six o'clock news as a tragedy, that nobody saw coming. Or that his name would appear in the local paper, if he was lucky, he would have gotten two pages and the flowers from someone who cared would have probably only been his alone - had it not been for them.

He thanked them for saving Harry in a way that so many failed.

William had snuck in a McDonald's meal too - Harry's second ever. He beamed at his teacher and got the embrace that he'd been too wary to ask of from his friends. They enjoyed each other's company and the hospital television, something somewhat alien to Harry. They talked as they nibbled on burgers with the bed curtains drawn shut around them.

Then, William has to say something that made his spine freeze.

"There's a man in the children's empty play room waiting to see us Harry," said William.

"Is he from social services?" asked Harry.

"No, I already saw to them, but he says he knew your parents Harry - and after being contacted about what happened, he needs to see you," he added "-us, -I'm sitting in on this, I'd rather you not be alone with this stranger,"

"O-okay,"

Truthfully he was as bewildered as Harry was.

Harry had to take a minute to observe the man in the beanbag chair. He was sinking into it and was far, far too old to be sitting in it. He had half-moon spectacles, a withered and yet kind face coupled with a rather impressive beard. The kind of beard that you'd see sold as a fake Santa beard at Christmas except it looked one-hundred percent real and Harry had to stop himself from mentally referring to him as such.

"Hello Harry," said the man. He had a nice, warm, soothing voice - Harry even noticed William un-tense, the man seemed relatively docile and now any sense of being worried had been replaced with curiosity.

"My how you've grown up, you were such a small baby," there was a certain gangliness and forced look of maturation about him, about his face.

"I'm Professor Albus Dumbledore," he said, eyes twinkling.

Harry flinched, he knew that name, Aunt Petunia had cursed that name as had David. His reaction had not gone unnoticed.

"You're the one who kept sending all those letters! Those owls!" shrieked Harry.

"Indeed. You see, I'm the head of the school your parents attended - and when you reached eleven you were supposed to come. Your parents - may they rest in peace, had arranged for this before the tragedy," said Dumbledore.

"I couldn't. I had normal school!" growled Harry, thinking of all the times those letters had got him in trouble.

"Now, due to extenuating circumstances I was led to believe you wanted to complete muggle - pardon, 'normal' school so that you would have the best opportunities in life. Yes, this was what all of the replies to your enrollment letter were, and I was going to send someone to talk to you myself," the man reclined in his beanbag, sinking deeper.

"Curiously though, no magical being could get in as it seems your desire to stay away from magic had warded the area for many years. I eventually began to believe you were safer - for the moment, and that it was your wish and that you would attend when you finish," his expression turned grim.

"Now it seems there is more to this then I am aware, especially as all of this has come to light. I have a few questions my dear boy,"

The only thing was was running through William's mind, was - Magic! Really?