Legal Disclaimer: I own my stuff, but not the original source material. That belongs to whoever. Also, the opinions and interpretations I use here may not reflect the same in said whoever that owns the source material. Look, I'm just a poor college librarian. Suing me isn't going to get you anything but tears.

Warning: This work may be offensive to some readers. There is also a lot of self-deprecation in this fic, even though it isn't warranted. Abuse is a hell of a drug. Feel free to back out if need be.

Author's Note: Couldn't sleep. So wrote this.

Submitting Info:
Stacked with: Hogwarts (Term 15); MC4A (Year 4)
Individual Challenges: n/a
House: Slytherin
Assignment No.: Term 15 – Assignment 03
Subject (Task No.): Psychology (Task#2: Write about someone who may be different but looks the same.)
Other Hogwarts Challenges: 365 [189](Neville Longbottom); Fantastic Beasts [26](Someone who likes to blend into the background); Auction [D17-A1] (Polyamorous)
Other MC4A Challenges: Ship (Heroic Shadow)[BIngo](5A - Getting Together); Chim [Dextrin] ("Wait for It" from Hamilton); Fire (Smasher); Garden [Such a Kidder](Hugging)
Representation(s): Desi Harry Potter/Luna Lovegood/Neville Longbottom/Blaise Zabini
Primary & Secondary Bonus Challenges: n/a
Tertiary & Generic Bonus Challenges: HoSE (Schooner; Obscure)
Word Count: 1003 words

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Polycule
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Harry knew that he wasn't really the kind of person that someone ever really wanted. He knew that he was only ever really good for what he could do for others. At the Dursleys, this had been simple things even if the standards had been impossible meet and ever shifting. Cooking and cleaning were such small things, and pretending that he didn't exist was perhaps the easiest thing he ever did.

He was exceptionally good at being quiet, after all.

At Hogwarts, things had been harder. What people wanted from him wasn't always clear and a lot of the time conflicted with other people's desires. The solution was to lean into the persona that they had built for him long before he had boarded the train that first year. And if Harry didn't understand what they had wanted, he had Ron right there beside him both as guide and critic.

Later on, Hermione had also kept Harry going in the right direction. It might have been a bit stifling to continue pretending to be bad at schoolwork just he had at the Dursleys, but at least Hermione wasn't as bad a student as Dudley. It made making sure that her grades were always better than his much easier. He just wished that she would stop disregarding the length instructions so that she would stop being marked down for it.

So, yes, Harry knew that no one truly wanted him as himself. He couldn't imagine a world where that bit of truth extended to whoever was his soulmate, the one person that had been connected to him by destiny. Occasionally, the words on his wrist would shift. Harry could always feel the twisty slide of the change, even if he never looked to see where he was supposed to go to meet his soulmate this time.

They would be better off without him.

Learning about the prophecy and the lengths that Dumbledore was willing to go to in order to ensure that Harry was the one who faced Voldemort only confirmed everything that Harry already knew about his own worth. He just wished that he wasn't quite so alone in dealing with everything. Sirius' death only compounded the emptiness growing within him.

Which was how Harry found himself sitting on the end of the dock beneath the castle proper. It was the same one that the boats had moored to back in his first year. The boats had been run ashore along the pebbly beach that arched around the dock and away from the stone stairs leading up to the next floor. He had summoned his patronus, just for the pleasure of watching the stag prancing playfully over the dark waters of the Black Lake.

Idly, he wished he could draw like Dean or Luna.

Suddenly, there was a silvery hare with antlers running alongside his stag. Harry looked up just in time for Luna to drop down beside him. Her long legs folded out gracefully with their ankles crossed. Under the lights from the patroni, she appeared to glow. Nonchalantly, she wrapped an arm around his shoulders and pulled him until he was leaning against her.

"You shouldn't have hid from us," she said in the same almost-flat tone that she tended to use when she was tired. Harry just nodded, even though he didn't understand what she was talking about. The thing with Luna was that she either explained completely (and sometimes in more details that anyone needed) or it made sense eventually. "We've been very confused, you see."

"Luna," Neville scolded lightly as he dropped down on Harry's other side, "he never takes the covering over his soul mark. He might need a bit more information than that to understand."

"Get Blaise to do it, then," she commented, laying her chin atop of Harry's dark curls. "He needs to stop lurking in the shadows of the stairs anyway or Harry is going to think he doesn't like him."

Neville sighed but made a beckoning gesture towards the stairs. Only a few moments later, Harry felt another person settling down behind him and Luna. A pair of arms wrapped around both Harry and Luna.

"Is it really so hard to simply say that he is our soulmate and that we only desire to love him for the rest of our lives?"

"Really?" Harry asked, twisting within the arms holding him to look into the faces of all three of them. It seemed impossible to believe that anyone would ever want him even a little, let alone want him enough to keep him forever. "You don't have to. Even if we are soulmates, it doesn't guarantee that you have to be stuck with me. You've already got each other."

"And the universe says that you belong with us, too," Luna said earnestly. "She might be wrong, but I don't think that she is this time."

"Even if the universe happened to be wrong," Blaise picked easily, "it wouldn't matter. You still deserve to be loved. Who better to do that than us?"

Harry looked at Neville, unsure if the other Gryffindor would be upset at hearing his partners confess to loving yet another person. Neville gave a weak smile and a helpless shrug as if to say what can you do? to all of that. Harry felt the start of a frown pulling at the corners of his mouth.

With the swiftness of a falcon diving, Neville lunged forward to leave a brief kiss on Harry's lips.

"I'll just start doing that every time I think you're doubting," Neville declared. "Maybe someday you'll get it."

Maybe someday Harry would believe that they were there to stay like they claimed. Maybe someday they'd wise up and leave him because he had finally fulfilled whatever thing they had actually wanted him to do. For right now, though, he was content to bask in the feelings of love and support from those people whose souls were intertwined with his.

For right now, he was only loved.