Identity Merged

AN:

Oni: Well this was fairly fast.

Eridan: The first chapter alwways followws the prologue fairly quickly.

Oni: True, true! Also, thank you to those who have already favorited, followed, and reviewed! I only put this thing up a couple hours ago! You people are AMAZING!

Eridan:: As usual, Oni does not owwn Harry Potter nor Homestuck, howwevver this idea is her own.

Oni: And ONWARDS!

Eridan found irony in the fact that his memories awoke at the same age at which his life was taken. Considering there was no calendar on the meteor, September 1st might as well be the anniversary of his death. He could hear the muffled sounds of people above him, but his mind was in disarray after his sudden memory flood. He pulled out Harry's wand (it was his as well though, wasn't it?) and began to clean up the place that he used to stay in just to have some semblance of normalcy whist on the meteor.

Harry was probably in such a state of confusion that he never noticed his surroundings until he and his past had become one again. Teal wood walls rose high in the recreation of the place he used to call home all those sweeps ago, back when there was no Earth, no Sgrub. A brilliant chandelier hung from the center of the ceiling, giving the room a vaguely violet tinge. Bookshelves from his private library filled every nook and cranny, all sorted away by his photographic memory. There were copies of books he had read, which he put back in their place with a quick tap of his wand, books that dictated what he knew about people and places, which he put back much slower, pausing at a few and sighing.

Then there were the books that have never been sorted, simply because of the fact that his reincarnated self did not know how to access this place. Storybooks and textbooks that Dudley had refused to read, Harry's Hogwarts books, the books on everything and everyone that Harry had ever seen, met, spoken to, knew about. This all had to be sorted manually, as Eridan had to go through each of the memory books to make sure he could sort them properly. He used this time to refamiliarize himself with his life as Harry Potter, Boy-Who-Always-Gets-Into-Mountains-Of-Trouble-And-Has-Hyphenated-Names. Flipping through one book, he called up the memory of Harry talking with Dumbledore about his House placement, and the fact that Tom Riddle had told him that they were very much alike.

Tom Riddle was more right than he could ever imagine. If one were to put together Harry Potter and Eridan Ampora, the present and the past, then they would be the closest to emulating the so-called Dark Lord. Harry had grown up an orphan and despised by his relatives until he was saved by Hogwarts. He knew Parseltongue and was almost sorted into Slytherin. Eridan Ampora was a highblood from a society where killing was a normal happenstance, where bloodthirst in people like him was encouraged. He was genocidal, had built machines of doom. He had murdered in own friends in self-defense, and was killed for it. The history of one and the personality of the other would have made a very passable copy.

But Eridan didn't want to be a copy of someone else, no anymore.

He was tired of having his life compromised by the rules he had placed on himself simply because he was following the footsteps of another. They told him magic wasn't real, so he found something else to hold onto in his pitiful existence as a child. Orphaner Dualscar, his ancestor. He emulated the man as best as he could, trying to be a carbon copy of the great warrior. But that was the thing, a warlord like that was not who Eridan was.

Eridan Ampora was a quiet, studious troll who holed himself up in his hive for weeks at a time reading about military and Alternian history and the odd magical theory book. He was an excellent fighter, don't get him wrong, but his intellect outweighed his capacity to fight. Unfortunately, wits were not something that Dualscar had. So he pretended to be someone he wasn't and everybody seemed to just hate him more for it. It confused Eridan to no end. Who did they want him to be if it wasn't himself? He had lost any semblance of friendship from any of the others, his social ineptness making him come off as 'creepy', and he was cut in half with a chainsaw by someone he used to discuss fashion trends with over grubjuice.

Harry Potter was also quiet, but not as studious as his past identity. Since he had no idea what his parents were like, he couldn't emulate them at all. He was slacking in school because of the trouble he constantly got into during the year and therefore was falling behind on most of his classes. Though to be fair, Eridan had always considered 'falling behind' to be when he never tried hard enough. Harry was, in fact, an average wizard, but with the impending reemergence of his new arch nemesis and Dark Lord Voldemort (what an idiotic name, thought Eridan as he read through the man's file) 'average' wasn't going to be good enough.

He needed to be stronger, smarter. He needed to be able to pick out enemies from the friends and vice versa. He needed to be able to remember spells and curses and jinxes. He needed to have a good head on his shoulders and know when and when not to run into the face of danger. He needed to study hard in his work so that perhaps he could build a future for himself outside the Dursley home. He needed to understand that the world was going to use him anyway, so he might as well twist it to his own gain as well.

What he really needed right now was to be Eridan Ampora.

And that was what he was, is, and will be forevermore.

Sure, he was Harry Potter, but the past had an understanding of the world around him that seamlessly merged in together. But that also began to beg another question.

Who was he, Eridan or Harry?

Who was he more of, as they were now both of equal age? Both were of the same mind, body, soul, but not of thinking and personality. Would one become the past and the other the future? Could they bleed into each other until red and violet made something more comprehensible? Will they become some sort of patchwork soul? Will one dominate the other or will they take turns?

Or was he thinking all wrong?

There was no Eridan Ampora and there was no Harry Potter. There was only him, an individual with both those names and both those memories. They were interchangeable not because they were separate, they were never separate, but because they were always the same.

He decided he liked that.

Finally all the books from his new life were sorted, and lamented at the fact that Harry Potter had a significantly smaller selection than Eridan Ampora. Oh well, he thought, he could fix that easily enough. They were going to a magic school, after all. Even though he had been so for two years now, he felt his heart leapt. Magic, oh how he missed using that term. How he missed being the intellectual troll trying to learn magic, even when his later years were dedicated into calling it fake. But this was real, it was all real, and he was going to make to most of it.

He examined the rest of the room, righting things that had fallen, before he realized something rather strange. The room was not how he remembered it last, and tried to pinpoint what was different. A cozy rug covered most of the floor now, which was violet with gold lining, and a fireplace crackled where there had only been wall before. Some plush chairs that were originally a violet hue had changed into red and gold, Gryffindor colors. The mindspace had merged his most coveted places in either life – Eridan's Library and the Gryffindor Common Room. He smiled at this. It truly felt like home, the place in his own mind.

Something shone on top of one of the desks that sat around the edges of the room. He walked up to it and picked the object up. It was his old Sylladex. A quick examination of the contents showed that it still held all of his belongings. Ahab's Crosshairs was still thankfully tucked away in its Strife Specibus, and his husktop still had everything on it. Not expecting anything, he checked Trollian. No one was online. He didn't expect there to be any, but one would never know until they checked. He set the Sylladex to 'Hands-Free' mode so that none of the people outside could access it as he didn't want to have to explain why he was carrying a sniper rifle with him.

A door that was never there before stood near the back corner of the room. It was pitch black with something nasty oozing from the cracks. He felt the negative energy that was behind the door, and locked the thing tightly, putting a couple of chains around it from good measure.

Looking around, he saw that he was done for now, and allowed himself to be pulled to the surface.

"Harry! Harry! Are you all right?"

Someone was slapping his face.

"W-what?"

He opened his eyes. There were lanterns above him, and the floor was shaking. The Hogwarts Express was moving again and the lights had come back on. He seemed to have slid out of his seat onto the floor whilst inside his mind. Ron and Hermione were kneeling next to him, and above them he could see Neville and Professor Lupin watching. How long had he been inside? He felt rather sick, as if he had all the joy sucked out of him by some sort of emotional vacuum cleaner. Small violent spasms came over him, and he realized that he was shivering. What had caused this?

It was then that he remembered the creature that started this chain of events, causing Harry to remember who he was. Ron and Hermione heaved him back onto his seat.

"Are you okay?" Ron asked nervously.

"Yeah," he replied, looking quickly toward the door.

The hooded creature had vanished.

"Wwhat happened? Wwhere's that… that thin?"

Drat, his voice was taking on his old wavy accent, this certainly would not do. Hopefully they would just chalk it up to some stuttering. Eridan looked around the bright compartment. Ginny and Neville looked back at him, both very pale. A loud snap made them all jump. Professor Lupin was breaking an enormous slab of chocolate into pieces.

"Here," he said to Eridan, handing him a particularly large piece, "Eat it. It'll help."

Eridan took the chocolate but didn't eat it, his emerald green eyes (wouldn't Kanaya be proud, he now had the same shade of green she did) regarding the candy critically.

"Wwhat wwas that thin?" he asked Lupin.

"A Dementor," replied Lupin, who was now giving chocolate to everyone else, "One of the Dementors of Azkaban."

Dementors? They looked more like those dratted Wrath Angels back on LOWAA, with their grey rotting skin and their ability to make you feel like you would never be happy again… And the others had said that killing them all was wrong. Everyone stared at the man. Professor Lupin crumpled up the empty chocolate wrapper and put it in his pocket.

"Eat," he repeated, "It'll help. I need to speak to the driver, excuse me…"

He strolled past Eridan and disappeared into the corridor.

"Are you sure you're okay, Harry?" asked Hermione, watching Eridan anxiously.

"I'm…fine. Could someone explain wwhat just happened?" he said carefully, wiping some sweat that had formed on his face at some point during his trip down memory lane.

"Well…that thing…the Dementor…stood there and looked around, I mean, I think it did, I couldn't see its face…and you…you…"

"I thought you were having a fit or something," picked up Ron, who still looked scared, "You went sort of rigid and fell out of your seat and started twitching…"

"And Professor Lupin stepped over you, and walked toward the Dementor, and pulled out his wand," said Hermione, "and he said, 'None of us is hiding Sirius Black under our cloaks. Go.' But the Dementor didn't move, so Lupin muttered something, and a silvery thing shot out of his wand at it, and it turned around and sort of glided away…"

Silvery thing? He had to learn what that 'silvery thing' was. If it could keep away those Dementors, Eridan would be just fine. A murderer bent on killing him was easier to deal with at the moment than those creatures. After all, those things didn't look like they could be killed easily…perhaps he should introduce Ahab's Crosshairs to them?

"It was horrible," said Neville, in a higher voice than usual, "Did you feel how cold it got when it came in?"

"I felt weird," said Ron, shifting his shoulders uncomfortably, "Like I'd never be cheerful again…"

Ginny, who was huddled in her corner looking nearly as bad as Eridan felt, gave a small sob. Hermione went over and put a comforting arm around her. He heaved a heavy sigh, contemplating their words. If what he could gather was true, only he was greatly affected by this Dementor attack, considering that he had fallen out of his seat.

"Did any of you fall out of your seats?" he asked carefully.

"No," said Ron, looking anxiously at Harry again, "Ginny was shaking like mad, though…"

Perhaps the Dementors called up one's worst memories? Eridan, even as Harry Potter, had an overload of horrible memories. It would explain why some were more affected by others - Ginny was probably forced to relive the nightmare of Tom Riddle's diary. Eridan's attack was so bad it called up memories from his past life, though perhaps that was a good thing.

Professor Lupin had come back. He paused as he entered, looked around, and said with a small smile.

"I haven't poisoned that chocolate, you know…"

Eridan took a bite and to his great surprise felt warmth spread suddenly throughout his being. Chocolate was an antidote for Dementor attacks? Curious, very curious, why was that? If those things were going anywhere near him anytime soon, he might just become a chocoholic.

"We'll be at Hogwarts in ten minutes," said Professor Lupin, "Are you all right, Harry?"

How did the Professor know his name? His memory dictated that he had never really seen the man before during his years with the Dursleys or anytime in the magical world.

"I am better, thank you." he intoned.

Eridan saw a flicker of confusion run through the man's amber eyes, before Professor Lupin simply smiled kindly at him. The smile was like that of greeting an old friend, which sent Eridan into a frenzied search other whether he had actually met the man before. Nobody talked much during the remainder of the journey. At long last, the train stopped at Hogsmeade station, and there was a great scramble to get outside. Owls hooted, cats meowed, and Neville's pet toad croaked loudly from under his hat. It was freezing on the tiny platform and rain was driving down in icy sheets.

"Firs' years this way!" called a familiar voice.

Eridan turned and saw the gigantic outline of Hagrid at the other end of the platform, beckoning the terrified-looking new students forward for their traditional journey across the lake. Poor children, they had to pass through the lake in the freezing rain. Eridan was grateful that Harry's journey was much drier, which was rather ironic coming from a person that used to have fins and gills.

"All right, you three?" Hagrid yelled over the heads of the crowd.

They waved at him, but had no chance to speak to him because the mass of people around them was shunting them away along the platform. Eridan, Ron, and Hermione followed the rest of the school along the platform and out onto a rough mud track, where at least a hundred stagecoaches awaited the remaining students. Each were pulled by a creature that Eridan would have assumed came from a child's nightmare. They were completely fleshless, their black coats clinging to their skeletons, of which every bone was visible. Their heads were dragonish, and their pupil-less eyes white and staring as if they were dead things. Wings sprouted from each wither — vast, black leathery wings that looked as though they ought to belong to giant bats. Standing still and quiet in the gloom, the creatures looked eerie and sinister.

Eridan wracked his memory, and tried to remember if he had seen those creatures the first time around. Pulling a memory to surface, he realized that Harry saw them as being pulled by invisible horses. Why were they visible now? What had changed? Could a Dementor attack allow him to see these creatures? He turned to Ron and Hermione, gauging their reactions. Their eyes passed over the strange horse beings, as if they couldn't see it. So a Dementor attack was out, what else had changed?

Quite a bit, really, now that he had his memories back. He stared at the horse creatures and they stared back at him. They did not give off any aura that suggested malicious intent, (wait, aura? He could sense those again?) so he gave them a pat on the neck and joined Ron and Hermione inside the coach.

The coach smelled faintly of mold and straw. Eridan felt better since the chocolate, but still weak from whatever else the Dementor had done to him. Ron and Hermione kept looking at him sideways, as though frightened he might collapse again. As the carriage trundled toward a pair of magnificent wrought iron gates, flanked with stone columns topped with winged boars, Eridan saw two more towering, hooded Dementors standing guard on either side. A wave of cold sickness threatened to engulf him again, and he leaned back into the lumpy seat and closed his eyes until they had passed the gates. The carriage picked up speed on the long, sloping drive up to the castle. Hermione was leaning out of the tiny window, watching the many turrets and towers draw nearer. At last, the carriage swayed to a halt, and Hermione and Ron got out. As Eridan himself stepped out of the coach as smoothly as he could, he heard a drawling, delighted voice in his ear.

"You fainted, Potter? Is Longbottom telling the truth? You actually fainted?"

Draco Malfoy elbowed past Hermione to block Eridan's way up the stone steps to the castle, his face gleeful and his pale eyes glinting maliciously. Eridan, with his personality and memories back, smirked.

"At least I had the decency to faint. I heard rumors about you screamin like a little girl."

Malfoy's face turned beet red, and Ron began to laugh from behind.

"Ah, so it's true then, you did scream. Tut, tut, wwhat happened to bein the strong pureblood scion?" Malfoy sneered at Eridan, his face still redder than Karkat when he found that Terezi had scribbled on his rom-coms.

"At least I'm not stuttering like Professor Quirrell did!"

Stuttering? Oh, his accent. It seemed that since his defenses were down, he couldn't stop talking with it. Maybe when he was better he could go back to speaking like all the other humans.

"Is there a problem?" said a mild voice.

Professor Lupin had just gotten out of the next carriage. Malfoy gave Professor Lupin an insolent stare, which took in the patches on his robes and the dilapidated suitcase. With a tiny hint of sarcasm in his voice, he said.

"Oh, no…er…Professor." then he smirked at Crabbe and Goyle and led them up the steps into the castle.

Hermione prodded Ron in the back to make him hurry, and the three of them joined the crowd swarming up the steps, through the giant oak front doors, into the cavernous Entrance Hall, which was lit with flaming torches, and housed a magnificent marble staircase that led to the upper floors.

He was back at Hogwarts, and this time nothing would be standing in his way.

AN:

Oni: And that's all for now, folks!

Eridan: If you wwant to see more, simply revvieww. More revviewws, more updates.

Oni: He's right, but thank you to those who already have!

Eridan: And wwe shall see you next time...

Oni: My Pretties!