You are running down the path as fast as you can. The wand in your hand is useless because your magic does not work here. You do not like this. There is no control in this for you. You cannot make yourself wake up. Your chest burns from all the running, but from what, you don't know.

Things had started out peacefully. You had been taking an aimless stroll through a nameless town. It did not worry you that no one was on the streets or that the buildings looked empty from the outside. You had a whole new world for yourself to explore. Things could not get any better.

That is, until for no reason at all, things around you started to catch on fire. The drapes on the windows had started first, and from there it moved to the furniture in the room. The shelves that held all the fascinating little trinkets were now being burnt up. The flames were melting and twisting them from their original shape.

You run from that building following the worn stone path to the center of the town. There stands a fountain. The fire is all around you, the buildings, the trees, and now, instead of water shooting from the fountain, there is fire. The fire is consuming you. Burning you from the inside out.

You throw your head back and scream.

You come aware at that moment. Your heart is beating hard and fast within your chest. Your clothes are soaking wet. The peace that your silenced bed drapes gave you before is gone and now you feel paranoid. You need to get out.

You get out of your bed and cast a quick Tempus spell. Its only 6:15 in the morning, so it is not too early.

You begin to prepare for your day. You take out your photo album. The picture of your parents and Sirius fails to make you smile.

You see that you have only three wafers left. It is time that you invest in making more.

Taking all three at once, you put them under your tongue, and then you head towards the shower.

You need this. The dream has left you shaken."I need this." You tell yourself. Fuck.

–

Harry hadn't stayed in the dorms after waking up this morning. The nightmare had left him shaken. It was making him think.

The drug was getting weaker. He was building a tolerance to it. Not only that, he needed a less conspicuous delivery system. Ron's experimenting had told Harry one thing. He needed to get it away from those who couldn't handle it. No one else needed it. Not like he did.

Harry had spoken to Ron during a lucid moment in his high. It'd been a month since he'd been released from the infirmary. Their conversation had told Harry many things.

Ron complained to Harry that he felt that he was being left out. That meant to Harry that given the chance, Ron would try it again. He hadn't learned his lesson, even though he said he had. He'd only been scalded. The run in with the Whomping Willow hadn't been enough to get the message into his body.

Harry's mind kicked back over to delivery systems.

He hadn't given it much consideration, but, a solution had been staring him in the face for the longest time. The muggle world called what he was doing Tripping.

He'd read about it in the muggle library near Number Four. Tripping was the result of taking hallucinogens. Hallucinogens such as acid.

He'd been at Honeydukes the other day with Luna when the idea had hit him. Acid Pops. He could turn the liquid that he rendered from the process into a sugary candy. Not only did it cover the awful taste of just letting it dissolve, it also gave him a reason to have it in his mouth all the time.

At this moment, he'd been making his way to the kitchens. He needed sugar so that he could make the lolly-pops. He was sure that Dobby would be more than willing to give him some.

His musings were cut short when the ominous potions master, Professor Snape interrupted him.

"And just where do you think you're going, Mister Potter."

"To the kitchens, Mister Severus." Said Harry. His interrupted thoughts made him forget what his original mission had been.

Snape was giving him sufficient replacement. The sharp features of the man's face, mainly his nose, appeared to Harry as though it was trying to attack him.

Every time Snape moved his head to speak, it would move forward, like he was some rooster bobbing his head.

This made Harry laugh.

Snape, who at the time had been lecturing Harry on the proper etiquette that a student was supposed to uphold between student and teacher, stopped short.

"And just what is it that you're laughing at, Potter? I don't think anything here is as funny as you're making it out to be. Unless that is, you take into account those ridiculous colored muggles lens you have on your face. Take those off when you're talking to me, I want to see your eyes."

Harry, who had been trying to tell Snape what it was he thought was so funny, at that moment finally burst out laughing even more.

"Forgive me, sir, but honestly, was the rest of your family born with the same stick in their ass?"

Snape face started turning red. He snatched the sunglasses off of Harry's face, and was trying to spit something out over top of his rage, when he paused.

Harry kept up on his tangent about sticks in peoples asses skipping a few generations. Harry had started to tell Snape that his mother must not have loved him enough as a child, when Snape spoke.

"Look at me, Potter." he snapped while grabbing Harry's chin and locking eyes with him.

Snape looked at the heavily dilated eyes of Harry, and he knew he had him. He had the needed evidence to warrant Potter's expulsion.

Harry's eyes roved over Snape's face, his hand keeping him immobile.

"You and I, Potter, have an appointment with the Headmaster."Said Snape, as he hooked his hands under one of Harry's arms.

Snape dragged Harry all the way to the front of the Gargoyle, spat out the password, and then hauled Harry up the revolving staircase.

At the time, Harry didn't much mind the dragging. He'd been intending to go talk to Dumbledore anyways, and as much as he'd have liked to make it there on his own, now was as good a time as any.

Snape's hand digging into his arm was a major mood dampener. He'd been about to ask him to remove it when he was thrust through Dumbledore's door without much announcement.

–

On the inside, Dumbledore was, like always, sitting behind his desk in the regal fashion that people with power always seemed to adopt.

He'd been warned by Fawkes that Harry was coming, he'd figured it had been about time that the boy had decided to come visit him. He'd been getting really worried reports from all his teachers about how Harry had been losing focus during class.

They didn't know the reason why, and if anything Harry's grades seemed to improve. Minerva had said that when she had called on him in Transfiguration one day, he'd been totally out of it.

Lost in thought, she'd assumed. She also mentioned that Harry had been able to outdo even Miss Granger in successful object to animal transfigurations. Several other teachers had said the same thing about Harry.

So, he had little doubt when Severus burst through the door, Harry in tow, that things were bound to be interesting.

--

Harry had a grin on his face when he made it through the door. Snape had let him go, and so he made his way over to a seat.

"Hey! Professor Dumbledore," said Harry, rather jovially.

"Shut up, Potter," said Snape, cutting across Harry. "Headmaster, it has come to my attention that our favorite student here has been dabbling in intoxicants."

"Alcohol, Professor Snape?" Asked Dumbledore, while looking at Harry. He didn't appear drunk, and everything except the large framed glasses on his face seemed to be in its right place. Harry didn't have the look of a drunken man.

"No, Headmaster, something potentially more dangerous. The boy has been using morning glory to induce highs! We cannot tolerate this among the student body. I'm sure if this leaked out, we'd have teenagers freaking out everywhere for taking the wrong dose. I think the only course of action from here is that you expel Potter, and put him on a course of detox potions. There's no telling how long he's been using."

At that point, Harry cut him off. "Since sometime in the summer, Professor. And if you feel that concerned about my well being, you know, some flowers would have made me feel a whole lot better rather than a face to face chat. You know what they say, Professor, a well-meaning symbol is worth a thousand words. Much nicer on the ears too."

Snape cast a silencing spell on Harry to prevent further interruptions. This caused Harry a lot of amusement as he sat in his chair mocking Snape and his sense of dress.

The two adults seemed to talk forever to Harry, but in all reality it was only about five minutes. In that time Harry had went from mocking, to cussing, to now singing old show tunes he'd remembered from when he was younger.

Dumbledore eventually told Snape that he had heard enough and that he would handle it. Then, he'd made sure that he knew where the door was, directing him out it, before turning to Harry and removing the spell on him.

Harry, who had been in the middle of a soda jingle, stopped singing, once Dumbledore started to talk to him.

"Well, that was eventful, wasn't it, Headmaster," said Harry, getting up and walking around the room touching and moving anything that interested him.

Dumbledore didn't quite know how to handle what Harry was going through at the moment. He figured he knew why Harry was doing what he was doing, and he just couldn't find it within him to say something bad to Harry.

"Besides," he reasoned with himself, it wasn't like his grades were falling. And it wasn't like there were harsh regulations about the use of hallucinogens in the wizarding world.

He decided he'd leave it up to Harry.

"Harry, sit down please." Once Harry was seated, he continued on, "Now, Professor Snape does pose an interesting point. It would not be good if word of this was to escape to the student body. So, I would like you to take into consideration, this: You're not in trouble. But, if you continue down this path, there will be possible problems for you in the future. You cannot go about your daily life like this all the time. It's just not meant for a person of your nature to do so. If you agree to cut back on your usage, then I will not say anything further to you. But, should you continue I'm going to have to take action against you."

Dumbledore's words seemed to sober Harry a bit, because the grin on his face seemed to falter a bit.

"Of course, Headmaster," said Harry.

"Since we are of an understanding, Harry, you can leave. But, I also want you to consider this. Talk to your friends about your issues. Don't let them build up. Because eventually it's going to do you more harm than good to not talk about it. You can only cover something up for so long."

"Yes, Professor," said Harry, as he walked out the door.

"Dumbledore is a really old buzzkill," thought Harry, as the Gargoyle moved from in front of him.

--

He had just stepped out of the staircase and into the corridor proper when there in front of him stood Luna.

A large grin split his face.

"The Nargles tell you I was in trouble again?" asked Harry.

"No... I believe it was Professor Snape walking down the hallway cursing Potter's and their addle-brained children. I assumed it was you he was speaking so lovingly about."

Harry's stomach rumbled a bit, telling him that it was hungry. Rubbing at it idly, he remembered what he had been intending to do before he'd been taking hostage by Snape.

"Care to join me for some lunch in the kitchens, Luna? Then, maybe later, you and I can make some lolly-pops. I've got this recipe that I've been meaning to make.

–

Harry and Luna had been making candy for a few hours in a room provided by the Room of Requirements. It had all the things any candy striper would need.

Lunch had been an extremely amusing affair. Dobby had the elves performing like clockwork, and with each one of them offering him something to sample, Harry and Luna both quickly had a plate to nibble at. They talked of nothing in particular, and the conversation remained pretty one sided with Luna giving her observations on which teachers were in love with what animal.

She was under the impression that Snape had a bat fetish, and she was doing her best to convince Harry.

His mind back on the candy making, Harry focused on pulping the seeds and drawing out what was going to give the kick to his candy. Luna hadn't asked many questions, other than requesting to pour the sugar into the molds she'd made.

Some of the suckers he'd made already, had highly detailed Crumple-Horned-Snorkack faces detailed into a decently sized serving. By the time these dissolved fully, Harry would already be well off on a good trip. The extra size only adding to fuel how long he was under the influence of the candy.

After making a good batch of them, Harry cast a spell that made wax paper wrap around each one of them, so as to keep it fresh and keep other nasty things, like pocket lint from building up on it.

At the end, he'd given Luna a sucker, and told her that should she eat it. She should come find him. That way he could limit the area of effect.

Harry knew Luna was smart, and by giving this to her, he would be eliminating whatever curiosity she might have picked up during the process of making them.

She had smiled a bit, once they were outside the Room, and gave him a half hug and a peck on the cheek, while saying, "You're a nice person, Harry. I can see why the Nargles would be concerned for you." before walking off.

–

Back in the Gryffindor common room, Harry was playing with Crookshanks, Hermione's cat.

He'd seemed a bit grouchy earlier, so Harry had given him some catnip. Just to perk him up a bit.

After about half an hour of play, Crookshanks seemed to be in a much better mood. If the half-eyed look he was shooting Harry was anything to go by.

Harry had been entertaining himself by talking to Crookshanks, telling him some of his plans and worries. The cat really seemed to understand what Harry was going through.

Harry went to bed that night, a bit satisfied that some of his problems had been fixed, namely, the bag of sweets he now had in the drawer. There had been only a few people in the common room when Harry came back, and there was no one in the boy's dorm, it was pretty early in the afternoon still.

He'd been lying in bed when he had realized that he'd missed today's classes. Hermione was sure going to scream at him tomorrow when she found out what he'd been up to.

But, that was tomorrow, and what happened tomorrow didn't concern Harry at all.

Despite this morning's nightmare, things seemed to have become pretty even keel throughout the day.

Harry drifted off to sleep in the middle of a large nimbus of colors that were shining in with the afternoon sun.