Summary of the last chapter:

While Harry slowly adapts to life in Hogwarts, Professor Quirrell complains to Professor Snape that Harry won't look him in the eyes. He finds it disrespectful. Harry explains his problem, and Snape tells Harry about Legilimency. He also admits that he was friends with Harry's mother and didn't like his father. He suggests Harry talk to Professor McGonagall about his parents, which Harry does. He's given a photo to keep, learns that his dad was an Animagus and gets an apology from Professor McGonagall for never checking in on him.

A/N: I complained last week that fanfiction keeps doing funny things, like giving me no stats and often not showing a new chapter in the chapter count, although it's there. The issue is ongoing. This made me wonder: Did you all get my replies to your reviews? I ALWAYS reply to them personally (except with guest reviewers like Frank and Amber, because I can't), but recently, there seem to be no mail notifications and nothing that signals an incoming message on the dashboard. Please check your inboxes for my replies to your reviews!

Scary Encounters

When Harry left Professor McGonagall's office, he felt like he had fit a few more pieces into the puzzle that was his life. He now had faces to put on his parents and a rough idea about who they were. He understood a bit better Professor Snape's reaction to him and his attitude, though he still couldn't comprehend why he seemed to be searching for reasons to dislike Harry. What he still couldn't understand was the headmaster's role in all this. Who had given him the authority to decide about Harry's life – and to top it all off, single-handedly? He had seized the responsibility but had failed to live up to it. Putting a child into the hands of strangersand not once checking in on him? Denying him even the knowledge of who his parents were and basically forgetting that he existed?

It was difficult to find answers to these questions, especially since Harry wasn't given opportunity to speak to the person responsible. And admittedly, life in Hogwarts held too many distractions to keep pondering the circumstances that had led him here. Many classes were interesting and demanded his attention, and those that weren't demanded that he educate himself on topics barely scratched on. There was homework to do and the extra reading Harry continued on subjects of interest, like wizarding culture(about which he still lacked basic knowledge in comparison with his mostly pureblood house-mates) or the books on Occlumency Professor Snape had compiled for him. There was Hagrid to visit so he could speak to Marvolo, and regular visits to the owlery, though Harry still had no idea who to send letters to.

He and Tom spent most of their free time with Hermione in the library, continuing their research on the wizarding worldin general and anything to do with souls and minds in particular. Hermione just couldn't get over Harry's peculiar habit of always having two books in front of him.

"You do realize that it's totally weird, right?" she demanded, a spark of jealousy and a healthy portion of scepticism in her admiration. "I still can't believe you're really able to absorb information from both books that way!"

"I guess I just have a weird mind. At least, that's what my relatives always said."

"Why are you researching soul-bonds?" asked Neville, who had joined them a while ago and was looking at Harry's choice of literature dubiously.

"I'm not – at least not specifically. What I'm looking for is a wizarding book on psychology and paraspychology, but so far, I've had no luck."

"On what?"

"The science that deals with the mind? A study of mental processes and disorders and psychic phenomena such as telepathy, extrasensory perception and the like."

"Sorry mate, you lost me there," said Neville, staring at him with a perplexed expression. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"For Muggles, telepathy or telekinesis is something that borders on magic," Harry tried to explain. "I thought that wizards would have tons of books on the subjects."

"Telepathy is talking mind-to-mind and telekinesis is like levitation, just without the wand," explained Hermione. "There's also pyrokinesis, which is the ability to control fire with one's mind, or psychometry, the ability to 'read' an object by touching it and gaining knowledge of its history."

"Muggles can do such things?" asked Neville, who now looked shocked and a little scared.

"Well, there are people who claim to be able to do all this, but there are many others who say that's all rubbish and not real. Given that those who believe it's all a hoax would claim the same about magic, ghosts and poltergeists, I'm not so sure if they're right."

The fact that ghosts and poltergeists were real had come as something of a shock to Harry. The Hogwarts ghosts were friendly enough, but Peeves, the poltergeist, was a menace and a nuisance.

Harry was still a bit scared of him, as there was nothing they could do to defend themselves against him. And he loved nothing more than scaring the wits out of 'ickle firsties'.

"You might want to look up books in wandless magic," suggested Neville. "Some wizards are able to do silent spellcasting, though I don't know if it's possible with levitation. Controlling Fiendfire takes a huge amount of mind control once conjured, but that borders on dark magic and is something only the most powerful wizards are able to do."

Well, controlling fire was not primarily what Harry was looking for, but doing magic wandlessly sounded interesting enough, even if it wouldn't help him find out why he had Tom in his head.

"You should ask Madam Pince if she knows of any such books," Hermione added helpfully. "But if they have any, they might be in the restricted section. You need the permission of a teacher to even go in there."

Harry and Tom kept this in mind for some other day. It had gotten late and they would have to leave to make it to their dorms before curfew. They put their books on the return table and exited the library.

On their way towards the main staircase, however, they had the great misfortune of running into Peeves, as if thinking about him a little earlier had summoned him. The poltergeist was juggling eggs, which for several reasons didn't bode well. They quickly turned and ducked into an alcove, hoping that he hadn't seen them, but no such luck. He cheered happily on having found new victims and promptly came at them, throwing eggs.

Neville, who was really jinxed, was hit first, straight on the head. He yelped and started running the other way. Harry and Hermione followed on his heels. Cackling maniacally, Peeves set after them, firing more fragile missilesand making a right mess, with eggs dripping down from the walls and forming slippery puddles on the floor. Once Hermione slipped and fell, only to be hit by the next egg that came her way. It caught in her hair; the result wasn't pretty. Harry had been lucky so far, managing to duck out of a missile's way right in time.

They thought they had shaken Peeves off one or two times by turning into another corridor or briefly hiding in an alcove, but Peeves always found them. By now, they had lost all sense of direction and were just running down another corridor, which appeared to be a dead end. A door blocked their way, and it was locked.

"Oh for Christ's sake!" cried Hermione in frustration, then pulled out her wand and waved it at the lock. "Alohomora!" It was one of the spells she had mastered before everyone else, and she had performed it perfectly. The door opened and, out of breath, the three kids slipped inside. Quickly, they pulled the door shut, hoping that they had finally managed to lose the nasty poltergeist.

Neville raised a hand and wiped the dripping egg yolk off his face with his sleeve. He stopped his movement abruptly and stood rock still. "Oh no!" he muttered and turned chalk white under all the yellow smudges.

Wondering what had scared him so, his two friends turned around and found themselves face to face with the largest dog they had ever seen. Worse yet, it had three heads that were at eye-level with them. Three heads with large snouts that were half open, dripping saliva and revealing innumerable sharp teeth. Three pairs of eyes looked at them, and a deep and scary growl came from each of its three throats.

"What is that thing?" asked Hermione faintly, as even when in shock, she could apparently not help asking or answering questions.

While Harry's brain was busy with being scared and processing what was right in front of him, Tom's part of his mind had some free capacity to remember certain facts, make necessary connections and draw conclusions.

"I think that's Fluffy," said Harry weakly, when Tom's conclusion popped up in their shared mind. They were in the forbidden part of the third floor. Where nobody should trespass who didn't have a death wish. With the three-headed dog they shouldn't know anything about.

Neville looked at him as if he'd lost his mind.

"It liked music," Tom supplied, almost as dazed as Harry, but still calling up potentially relevant information.

"What do you want me to do – sing to it?" asked Harry in disbelief, forgetting do so silently in his agitated state.

"I didn't say you should…" protested Neville, clearly thinking that his friend was off his rocker.

Hermione, however, had picked up on the general idea. "Shhh …It's alright, doggy, shush …" she tried to soothe, slowly stepping backwards and fumbling blindly for the door handle somewhere behind her back. "We'll be out of your way in a second …"

Yes. Retreating. That's what they should do. The three kids stumbled out of the room as soon as they were able to, quickly drawing the door shut behind them again. They sagged against it in relief, the fright that had made them flee from Peeves all forgotten after the fear they had just experienced when coming face to face with a real monster.

"Fluffy?" Neville asked Harry, his voice still shaking. "Why in Merlin's name did you call that beast Fluffy?"

"Because that's Hagrid's dog, and it's his name. No kidding."

"But what's it doing in here? Shouldn't it be chasing cats or something in the forest?"

"It's obviously guarding something," said Hermione. "I wonder what."

"Something that used to be with Gringotts before the break-in," Harry answered. "Dumbledore had Hagrid remove it and bring it here, though I've no idea why. It must be important. But we're not supposed to know about the dog, so let's forget we ever saw him, okay?"

"Truly, Harry, I don't think that's possible," said Hermione, making a face when she pushed her hair back and found the remains of the egg splattered all over it.

"Well, then at least don't talk about it to anyone."

"You bet we won't," said Neville. "I don't want to die a painful death!"

"Or worse, be expelled!" chimed in Hermione with huge eyes.

"She really needs to sort her priorities", said Tom, who would have shaken his head in disbelief if he'd been able to.

"Let get back to our dorms if we can, before Filch catches us." Harry got moving again, taking the nearest shortcut back into the 'allowed' part of the third floor. Neville and Hermione followed close behind. They separated on the staircase, with both of them heading up to their towers and Harry going down to the dungeons.

Their bad luck seemed to have run out; at least Harry made it back to his dorm without encountering Peeves or Filch. He managed to slip in unnoticed and was happy to retreat to his bed right away.

"I can't believe they put that thing in a school full of children!" said Tom, who was still shaken over the incident. "Behind a simple wooden door! Which any first year could open with a simple Alohomora!"

"Just what is this thing that Hagrid pulled out of the vault and brought to Hogwarts? It was rather small. Was the dog guarding a box or something?"

"No," said Tom, "it was guarding a trap door."

"He was?" Harry hadn't noticed any door, but he'd been too busy figuring out how to stay alive. "I didn't see it. But I noticed something else. In situations like today, when I am totally freaked out and can't focus on much of anything, you somehow seem to keep your cool. Your brain doesn't seem to freeze, but keeps working – observing, analysing, coming up with information. How do you do that?"

"I don't know. While I experience physical pain just as if this was my own body, I don't feel your emotions as strongly. The physical pain is ours, but your fear or excitement is still yours. We are sometimes experiencing different emotions, too. Like when you took off on that broom. I was scared shitless, while you were ecstatic."

"But you were scared today, too, I could feel it. Yet you kept your cool."

"I think I am less emotional than you are, Harry. All your feelings are quite intense, you feel much more strongly about everything. I feel – lacking sometimes. It's difficult to describe."

"Maybe you're just way better than me at functioning under pressure."

"No, I don't think that's it. There's something missing …"

"We'll figure it out, Tom, whatever it is. It might just take a while. I'm just glad to have you with me. I really wouldn't know what to do without you."

"Me neither. Sleep well, Harry!"

"Good night, Tom!"

PS: You might be interested to hear that I have basically completed book two about Harry's second year and just started on the third book. Some question in case you'd like to give some input:

Will this Harry's Patronus still be a stag? If not, what would be a good Patronus for Harry?

Which electives will this Harry choose? Still Divination? Ancient Runes? Arithmancy?

And just an idea I'm tossing around in my head to go with my intended plot line (as Hermione is not in Gryffindor): Can you imagine that Neville might have bought Crookshanks if he happened to see him in the store with Hermione?