I'm back and as inconsistent as ever.

Did I ever mention how much I hate writing Umbridge? I am really struggling with this. I might need to get rid of her early just to be able to survive this year. My muse, the picky bitch that she is, is writing her under protest and will likely strike.

Also, I tried my best to express why someone who had been abused might not want to tell an authority figure. Especially one they had just started building trust with. That being said, this is something outside my scope of experience. It might be bad. Sorry in advance.

O~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~O

The house he was standing in was old, smelling of rose oil and mold. The walls were covered in tchotchkes and elaborately framed photos. Old hardwood was covered with worn rug which matched the heavily patterned furniture. He was standing in what was likely an office, or maybe a study. He dragged his fingers lightly over the large oak desk.

"Madam doesn't like people to come in here." Harry jumped as a young girls voice startled him. His chest pounded as he turned to the sound. She was very young, maybe seven at the most. If it wasn't for the bright eyes and flushed cheeks she would have looked a fragile china doll, not a person. Her face was serious, and frightened.

"Who are you?" He asked, hand still pressed to his chest. His racing heart had failed to slow. In fact, the pounding only seemed to become more painful.

"You can't be in here." She stated. "Madam won't like it. You don't want her mad at you. She will punish you." With that warning she turned and walked out of the room.

"Wait!" He called out but when he crossed the threshold of the room he was alone in a hallway. The hallway was dark but there was a light at the end. He started to walk forward. He hear was still beating, the heavy pound taking a sharp edge, like a knife point being repeatedly pushed through his ribs. His panting breath was starting taste of blood as the effort burned his throat.

He stumbled.

"Hello?" He turned back but the door was no longer there, instead the hallway continued, fading into black nothingness. So he turned to the light and tried to move forward. He fell to the ground as his foot never hit the floor. He stared in horror as his leg sat to his right, limp on the ground like a dead fish and severed cleanly at the thigh. He tried to push himself up, only to hear the loud thump of his other leg hitting the floor. There was no pain but horror bubbled up in his throat with burning acid. He raised his hand to cover his mouth to stop his stomach from coming up. But his hand never met his face, remaining mockingly on the floor.

He groaned in pain as his head hit the floor. His final limb disappeared and his torso hit the hard tile floor. His whole world began to twist as his body changed. There was no pain but he felt him stretching and morphing with rising dread. When it stilled his whole perception was different. He glanced up the hall, no longer the heavily laden walls of a house but the white tiled walls he had never seen before. He tried to shake his head as he tried to refocus his eyes. The world seemed to be toned blue and green, reds deadening close to brown. Not that there was a lot of color to see.

He began to slither forward. He was irritable and sluggish, the cold of the tiles against his scales making him uncomfortable. Still he moved forward as he was ordered to. The progress was slow and laborious. He moved down the endless hallway until he reached a door. It was large, black, and unmarked. He scanned his eyes over it but saw no handle. A flash of anger boiled through him and a sharp pain bolted through his head

"Shit!" Harry cursed, jolted from his sleep with the pain. He groaned, pressing the heel of his hand to his forehead. His skin felt hot and tight, uncomfortably tacky with cooling sweat. Another nightmare then. A weird one at that. For some reason he had felt more scared and agitated as he stared at the door than he had in the B horror movie beginning or even as he was dropping limbs. He sighed as he sank back into his pillows.

Nightmares were normal. He had been reassured that many times by Snape and Mr. Dawsen. He had tried his best to avoid them finding out in their home but he was not that successful. A normal response to trauma, they explained. Stress, anxiety, changes in pattern, recent tragedy. All reasons a person could start having nightmares and he had the annoying honor of having all of them within the last four months. Snape had told him to come to him if he needed help with sleep. So far he had not. He was not some baby who could not handle a few scary dreams. It was probably just a response to the stress of his detention. Umbridge had scheduled his detention during the quidditch try outs. Which lead to a lot of drama.

Angela, who had just become captain, tried to ream him out in the common room for not considering the team. That cause Hermione to jump to his defense and start going after her for the fact that she was blaming Harry for something he could not control. It had turned into a shouting match between the two girls, with the crowd trying to mediate (or occasionally joining in). Ron was also pissy, because he was planning on trying out for the keeper position. They were still not close friends but he had been disappointed and was turning that into petulant anger.

Fred and George were not helping much either. They had started testing their products in full force. It did seem to be a way to lighten the mood. Unfortunately it had the opposite effect. Hermione was on a war path to make them stop testing on other students. Which led them to try and hide it. At first Harry had been on the twins side. Hermione however made her point very clearly. Children could not consent to what was the equivalent of medical testing. This was not a matter of handing a teenager a toy that turned into a chicken when you waved it. They were consuming untested potions that were supposed to make them bleed uncontrollably, vomit continuously, or even deliberately make them unconscious. They were asking children to take something untested that was supposed to injure them. In the muggle world they would not be allowed even if they had parental permissions which the parents DID NOT. Under the weight of the logic and the frankly exhaustive list of the potential life changing affliction that can come from medicine that was made to heal and was approved, let alone something made by seventeen year olds who were still in school. He felt rather nauseous with the descriptive stories of Sanarelli's yellow fever experiment, the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, and the experiments of Unit 731. So, to their disappointment, he was stopping them when he saw it as well.

It seemed like each new thing was just another level of crazy and critical to add on top of the pile of shit to be dealing with. Harry supposed that it was to be expected. Even outside the shit-show that was the world right now in politics; this whole place was like the perfect starting place for wildfires. Dozens of children, living in close proximity, in different stages of puberty. All this with, admittedly limited, adult supervision. Now there was a new enemy in their midst, throwing cats among the manic pigeons of the students of this school.

"Like we need another spark in this fucking powder keg." He grumbled as he got ready for class.

O~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~O

"Come in Mr. Potter." The saccharine voice called from the office. Harry opened the door and blinked in surprise.

Pink. That was the only thought that came when he walked into the office. The walls had been papered in alternating pink stripes. On the paper hung dozens of plate with kittens in bows on them, batting dust motes or licking their paws. Dozens of lamplight eyes focused on him and he had to stop himself from shuddering. Gone were the books and gadgets that had been around the room when Lupin or Moody/Crouch had been in the office. All the table tops had been covered instead with light pink doilies and vases of dried carnations. Harry wondered if Umbridge had ever heard of Hello Kitty.

"No greeting, Mr. Potter? Where are your manners?" Umbridge tutted from behind her desk. Harry raised his eyes to her. She looked smug, as she sat behind her desk like it was a throne.

"Good evening Professor."

"Madam Umbridge." The sharp reply came.

"Good evening Madam Umbridge." He used a purposefully dull tone. For some reason that made her smile.

"I see you are still defiant. Do not worry Mr. Potter, we will work on that." She motioned over to a desk that was in the back of the room. On the desk was a sheet of parchment and a black quill. He tried not to react as he sat down and waited. "Today you will be doing lines. I would like you to write 'I must not tell lies'. Harry's brow wrinkled, wondering why that phrase would be chosen. However, he asked something else.

"How many times?"

"Until the message sinks in." Her smile was wide and ominous.

"I do not have any ink." Harry stated, pointing out the obvious.

"You will not need it." Harry shrugged, guessing it was an Ever-fill quill. He touched the quill to the parchment and began writing. As he dragged his quill nib across the page, a burning pain tore across the back of his left hand. He watched in muted horror as the letter 'I" in his handwriting dug itself into his skin. Just as soon as it was there, it healed over leaving the skin red and raw. His eyes flicked up to Umbridge and he saw that she was staring at him with a manic grin.

"A problem Mr. Potter?" A rush of anger burned over him. How dare she? She wanted him to carve into himself. Perhaps she wanted him to whine or cry. He could tell she was enjoying his pain, the heavy blanket of her silent satisfaction was suffocating in the quiet of her office. Her eyes looked the same way his uncles hungry eyes did when he made some excuse to beat his nephew. Harry's pulse beat in his ear as the rage seemed to buzz through his head like static.

"No ma'am." Fury roared through him like a dragon, making him hot and irritable. Blood pounded and he could feel his fingers clench in its rhythm. He loathed sadists. So many people in his life wanted him to hurt. They enjoyed his pain and reveled in his misery. From the time he was a baby there was always someone trying to make him miserable. It wasn't fair. It was never fair.

He placed his quill back to the parchment and wrote out the rest of the line in bright red ink, blood. The words appeared on his skin, disappearing by the time he went back to the front of the page to start the new one. He would not give her the satisfaction. The same way he never cried to Uncle Vernon. The same way he refused to bow to Voldemort. Showing your pain to a sadist only ever made them worse. It only gave them what they wanted and he refused to do so.

After a few lines the sting stopped being as sharp and was starting to turn into a heated burning sensation. His body was trying to heal, fighting against the pain. He had to stop himself from grinning in perverse satisfaction. If she thought he was going to whine about this little pain she was sorely mistaken. He had survived so much worse. What was this pain, when compared to the cruciatus? What was a little paper cut to having a slicing curse take him down to the bone through tendon and muscle. What was a repeated cut to the many lashes he had taken in his life time. This was child's play. A poor attempt from someone who thought they were dealing with a normal child.

Harry was not a normal child and he was going to make his point very clear. So he kept going. Not a noise of complaint was going to escape his mouth. He was not going to look up at her, because she could take that as pleading. His will was stronger than hers and he would make sure that she knew that without a doubt.

Eventually the pain was so constant, it fell to the background. Time clicked by, until the page was filled with the requested words. Blood was dripping down his wrist, dotting the page. As he wrote it took longer for the words to disappear. Finally the clock chimed nine and Umbridge cleared her throat.

"Come here, Mr. Potter." He stood up, standing in front of her desk. He looked her in the eyes, and let a little smirk creep through. She glared, grabbing his injured hand. She looked it over with false interest. "I believe this is sufficient. Perhaps now you will be more careful with what you say."

"Yes ma'am." He hummed. "I will make sure that I am very clear when I speak the truth." He stated. He watched as the anger flashed in her eyes with a wave of gratification. She thought him easy to break. He made it clear he was not.

"Dismissed Mr. Potter."

By the time he returned to the tower the skin had healed over without a scab. However, there was still blood from where it dripped across his skin. The skin was red, hot, and new. He was rubbing it as he clambered back through the portrait hole.

"Harry!" Hermione called. The room was empty, it was a bit early for that.

"Where is everyone?" He asked, approaching where she sat.

"The twins were trying to do more experimenting." She sneered. "Things got . . . loud. Most of the room decided it was late enough to clear out." She huffed. "How was detention?"

"Fine." He then made the mistake of dragging his hand through his hair.

"Harry, what is that?!" Hermione yelped, leaping from her seat to grab his hand before he could hide it.

"It's nothing Hermione." He tried to pull it back but her grasp on his wrist was too tight to do so without making it aggressive.

"You were bleeding." She hissed. "What did she do?"

So Harry told her. He explained that he had to do lines. How the quill copied what he wrote into his skin. How it made ink from his blood. How it dug into his skin over and over. How it healed once he had given it a couple of seconds.

"Hold on." Hermione ran up to her room. When she returned it was with a wash rag from the bathroom and a bottle. With jerky movements that belied her pique she opened the bottle, poured it onto the rag and pressed it to the back of his skin. The liquid was cool and immediately felt soothing on his skin. She pressed it there, her hands shaking as she held his. He glanced at her face. She was looking at his hand with a murderous mien. He felt a rush of affection. Hermione looked like she was seconds away from breaking ever law, magical and muggle, to go and curse Umbridge right now. It reminded him that he had a friend who cared. Who was willing to stand up from him, protect him, or get revenge for him. It was something he was sure that he would never have and had been told he didn't deserve. Yet here he was, with her hands on him, healing him, being angry for him.

"You need to tell someone." Hermione said, lifting the rag to drench it again. "Tell the Headmaster."

" I cant."

"Why not?"

"The headmaster won't even look at me when we are in the same room. I doubt he will make the time for this." Harry waved his hand. He had come to terms with the dismissal of the headmaster to his pain. Better to not even try and save himself the disappointment.

"What about Professor Snape?" Harry shook his head. "Why not?" Here Harry paused, trying to get his thoughts together.

"It's just. I kind of did this to myself and it doesn't seem fair to bother him with it." He shrugged.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean . . . I know I should have done something. Stormed out or refused to do it." He scratched the back of his head, feeling nervous under Hermione's piercing gaze. "But . . . I mean, I knew I was going to get in trouble in Defense. And when she made me write those lines, all I could think about was not letting her get one over on me. He might get mad that I stayed. That I knew I should have left but didn't. Plus, he almost got in trouble with her last year. I know he would have done something but if he got in trouble for protecting me when I could have done it myself."

"I don't think he would do that Harry." She said.

"I can't, Hermione. I just cant." He stressed the words, trying to get his feeling across when he couldn't find the words. He didn't want to admit it but he just did not want to confess that he was weak in front of Snape. The man had done so much to protect him, especially last year. He had also spent time trying to protect Harry from his own self destructive tendencies. Harry did not want to go whining like a child when he had he had done exactly what he was not supposed to do. He was a grown man and he could take the consequences of his own actions. Hermione watched his face as his thoughts raced. He felt his face heat up in a blush under the scrutiny. Whatever she saw in his expression made her sigh.

"Fine." She huffed. "I think you are wrong but fine. Wait here." She stood and left the room again. When she returned she had a quill (a normal white one) and some parchment. She handed him the items expectantly.

"What?"

"Write down what happened. Date and sign." She pointed at the paper. "I am going to do the same. You might not want to say something now but we will be making a record of it. That way, if it happens again or you want to tell someone we will have proof." Under her stern eyes he wrote down what had happened. He signed and dated. Hermione pulled the page to herself. In her normal crisp writing, she wrote down what he had told her, that she saw the blood. She signed and dated. With a tap of her wand the ink was dry. She folded the sheet, placing it in her bag that had been beside the seat.

"Thank you." He said in a quiet tone.

"Let me make this perfectly clear. I think you should tell someone immediately. However, this is your choice. But if it get worse, I will tell someone myself."

"Yes ma'am."

O~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~O

Don't worry. Snape will come to the rescue. There is just a lot going on in his world, not just Harry. So with Harry deliberately hiding this from him and all the other children he is taking care of, it will take a little bit.