Chapter Text
When Harry opened his eyes it was to the familiar sight of a plain plaster ceiling, plain white plaster walls, bleached white curtains over windows and the slight skin tingling sensation of serious sterile-field charms. He relaxed for a moment, knowing he was in a hospital ward somewhere and waited for his memory to catch back up to him.
Unfortunately it did.
The last day, week, month and twenty years came back in an agonizing and unstoppable flood. He dimly realized he was sitting bolt upright in the bed, and was breathing louder and louder, gasping like a dying fish. Around him charms and alarms whistled, twittered and generally went berserk
“Easy there man, calm down! Slow deep breaths now!” a middle aged man spoke to him, a strong hand held his shoulders. In front of him the other hand expertly twirled and flicked a wand. The alarms silenced.
Harry forced himself to think only of smooth white stone, and the ocean waves. After a few moments of this concentration his panic eased and with a wrench of effort he forced his whirling mind into the familiar patterns of occlusion.
More calm, Harry looked around himself. In addition to the healer who still watched his face intently, was a mediwitch at the potions rack and another hovering in the doorway. He could just see the shadows of other people outside the door, but no sound. Without a doubt there was a heavy duty silencing charm on the ward. The room looked like most hospital rooms he'd ever seen, and he thought bitterly, there had been more than his fair share. The Healers uniform though proclaimed him to be at St. Mungos.
But St. Mungos had fallen years ago, its enchantments worn away and the whole building abandoned to Muggles. Who in their turn abandoned it as well, when the feeble electricity failed and the last gasps of civilization fled London.
A wild feeling of elation and sadness gripped him. If he was in St. Mungos, then they had succeeded. But if he was here, then all the others were gone, and he the only hope for the future.
“There you are now. Better?” The man asked him, smiling.
“Calmer. Er... where am I? Who are you?” Harry thought quickly. Best to avoid official notice of his travel.
“Senior Healer Arbitrage Muntgo. You are in St Mungos Mysterious Ailments ward. You've been here some weeks.”
“Weeks?” Harry gaped. Really weeks? The trip must have been worse than they thought.
“Well you were found unconscious right outside the main entrance on the summer solstice and we're heading into August. There was an amazing tangle of charms and hexes and old spell damage on you. Do you remember how all that happened?”
Harry weakly raised a hand to his forehead. His wrists and hands were wrapped in thick white bandages. “Frankly sir its a bit of a blur. I think I was fighting. There were ...giant serpents of fire? And I think someone throwing potions... but that's it.”
“Well maybe more will come back in a bit. If not I'm sure one of the Mind Healers may be able to help you a bit.”
Harry made a noise of agreement. Mind healers were the last thing he needed rummaging around in his brain.
“In the mean time, we do have all your belongings, safe and sound. Some very impressive charms and wards on them.. The aurors were impressed. We thought it best to leave them until you could disarm things yourself.” Healer Muntgo indicated a table with a battered leather robe, pile of neatly folded ragged clothing and a tiny, heavily sealed chest.
“Thank you. And my wand sir?”
“I have it.” Another man said from by the door. “Or rather whats left of it”
“Oh no!” said Harry. Harry mourned the loss of that holly and phoenix wand sincerely. It was his first wand and always felt like home to him.
“I'm afraid so son. Seems that however you got yourself here was the last gasp. The wand exploded. Poor healers were quite some time picking the bits out of your hands.”
Harry looked at his hands, swaddled in white cloth. “I'm sure the phoenix feather didn’t help”
“Oh was that the core? It had been burned to ash so we weren't certain” An indefinable tension suddenly left the Auror, for that's what the other man was, judging by his heavy navy blue robes.
“To destroy a phoenix feather like that .. you must have apparrated a long long way.”
Harry paused to pretend to think for a minute, face screwed up in concentration. “Honestly I don't remember much at all … fire like I said and puddles of potion and glass all over.” Harry was recalling a particularly long and awful battle from several years ago. Well from his perspective. He'd found that when telling a whopper of a lie, the truth was always the best foundation.
“Wait. There were old buildings with orange tile roofs and .. lemons? A tree with lemons had fallen and the lemons were rolling all around and getting into the potions and one of them turned into a chicken. I remember that.” The chicken had been especially memorable... right up until it burst into peach colored flame and exploded in a smell of curry.
The Healer chuckled. “Sounds like a blinding potion.. if fresh lemon juice did that.”
“Orange tile roofs and lemons, sounds like Greece or maybe Spain. There was bad fighting in Spain a few weeks ago. I'll have a look for you in reports. Whats your name son?”
“er.”
“I won't be in the hall of records. “ He forces himself to look down at his hands, as if he was ashamed. “My name is Dexter Eades Potter.”
The mediwitch sucks in a small gasp and the Healer glares at her. Harry was glad of the handy excuse created by pureblood tradition. Born on the left hand side of the blanket, and Dexter you were. Nobody could blame a bastard for not wanting to talk about it, and a grand excuse for having no records.
“So an … offshoot .. of the Potter family?” The Auror is surprisingly kindly
“From America sir. Well my mum was American. One of the Eades-Yves from Boston. We moved to Britain after the Fire” Harry mutters at the blankets.
“Well young man. I'm sure the aurors will have some more questions for you, and we will want to keep you here under observation for at least a few more days.”
Harry resigned himself to waiting out the Healers. It would only be a week, two weeks. And after the last forty years, he had had a lot of experience waiting.
*******
Harry was looking forward to his release with amazing anticipation. It wasn’t just the boredom of the hospital routine, it was that urge to move that had been engrained into him after so many years on the go, and the burning need to get started on his mission.
Healer Muntgo had just bustled off with the last set of test scrolls and was due back any second with a clean bill of health for Harry.
A firm hand rapped on the door frame. Startled, Harry looked at the door. He was seated at the small table in the room, wearing the plain white hospital robes over a set of plain white loose cotton trousers and shirt. Soft white slippers rounded out the bland ensemble and Harry frankly couldn’t wait to be quit of it.
Waiting at the door was a middle aged man with a mane of wild black hair and sparkling hazel brown eyes. He was wearing long formal dark red robes, trimmed in black fur over plain black robes belted shut over what was undoubtedly a gold shirt and black slacks. If that wasn't clue enough already, the crest on the outer robe, the tall pointed hat of a sitting Wizengamot member and of course the Potter House ring on his right hand.
Harry's heart sank.
“Good afternoon. I am reliably informed that your name is Dexter Potter, of America?”
Harry rose from the desk chair and bowed, mind whirling frantically. This was the encounter he had been hoping to put off indefinitely. Bother. He had sort of been counting on disappearing into obscurity right away and never encountering his ancestors.
“I am indeed Dexter Potter. And whom do I have the pleasure... ?” He trailed off politely. Thank you Draco for all those etiquette lessons. Shame manners didn’t help when the muggles cornered you at last. But you took down more than your share at least, Harry thought bitterly.
“I am Charlus Potter, Lord of House Potter. I believe that you and I need to have a conversation at some time in the near future.”
“Sir, I am due to be released today, this very afternoon in fact.”
“Splendid, splendid!” Charlus exclaimed. “Then I can wait a bit, and you can accompany me to an early supper and we can have our chat.” He does looked thrilled at the thought. Harry began to have a dim glimmer of hope, though really he should know better by now.
Charlus leaned in confidingly “You must be desperate to get away from the food here. I know I was, last time I fetched up in St. Mungos.”
“Trying to ride a hippogryph wasn't it Lord Potter?” Healer Muntgo rapped out sharply as he entered the room.
“Oh I'll get the hang of it one of this days, Bungo old man.” Charlus laughed and slapped Healer Muntgo on the back. Obviously they knew each other.
“Well judging by your performance on a broomstick, I'd better warn your staff to polish up their Cushioning charms.” They both laughed, and Harry smiled faintly.
“Well Dexter, it seems all your tests come back fairly well. We have you down to see Mind Healer Spritz Thursday next, if your memory doesn't clear up any more.”
“Thank you sir.” Harry smiled
“So can I spring him from your tender care, Bungo?”
“Certainly, Chuck.” Said Healer Muntgo with some relish
Charlus makes a sour face
“You reap what you sow. Chuck.” Says the Healer, frostily. “Now make sure you don’t get the poor lad sozzled. He has lots to do yet today.”
“Here is your list of potions prescriptions, the apothecary in Diagon should have most of those already made up and be able to owl that tricky memory stabilizing one.” He hands Harry a scroll. “You can wear those robes for now, just have them laundered and owl them back when you have a moment.”
“Wonderful!” Charlus beamed. He flicked his wand at Harry, who suppresses a full body flinch. A mutter of a few spells and Harry's shiny white ensemble is now a plain and non fussy black robe and suit. “There those should hold till after supper at least. Can’t have you going about looking like a sainted virgin, Dexter.”
Harry looked down at himself, and thought 'well a dementor is hardly better', “Thank you sir”
Harry allowed himself to be bustled out of St Mungos with the bundle of his belongings and bustled in to and out of a floo grating. Rushed through a small antechamber, up a set of quiet stairs and into a small private sitting room with an already set luncheon table, before he could catch his breath.
The heavy stifling feeling of privacy and silencing spells, gave Harry a foretaste of the near future. Mentally sighing, he seated himself after Charlus, making sure to keep an eye on the door and the small heavily glassed window nearby.
The room was small and cozy, white trimmed powder blue walls rising to a tall and cloud bedecked ceiling. The furniture is all pale wood and blue satin, very french in feeling.
After the waiter shimmered in and out on seemingly oiled feet and took their orders, Charlus suddenly lost his air of joviality.
“Well Dexter, I think it's time that you explained yourself..” Charlus leaned forward, one elbow on the table and one casually holding his wand. “I can see you are a Potter. That hair doesn't lie”
Harry self consciously smoothed his hair back. It never did want to lie down, but after growing it to shoulder length at least it didn’t stand straight up any more, but arranged itself into wild locks and waves.
“So I nicked some blood of yours from old Bungo last week and ran it through a Heredity potion.”
Harry suddenly freezes. Blast. Damn and blast. The one thing he thought he had successfully avoided.
“So. Harry James Potter. Son of James Merlin Potter. Grandson of Charlus Potter, which would be me, much to my surprise. Would you like to explain this?” Charlus asked, deadly serious as he carefully placed a parchment on the table. Harry could see his name at the bottom and the familiar stop stutter stop start of his life lines recorded in a tangle of dates.
Harry took a deep breath.
“I was sincerely hoping this wouldn’t happen Sir.” Charlus nodded and gestured for more,
“As you can tell, my name is Harry Potter. I have traveled here from the year 2050. I have an urgent and most important mission and Grandfather”,
He leans forwards, “If I think you will jeopardize my mission I will kill you right here.”
Charlus' eyebrows raised.
“I take it that your not being born will not bother you if your mission fails?”
“Not in the least. In fact it would speed up everyone's release from suffering that much quicker.” Harry’s voice is bitter and dark, the memory of too many fallen friends and enemies redolent in his tone.
“End of wizard kind?”
Harry nods
“Muggles too?”
Harry nods.
“Well bugger.” Said Charlus
“Yes, pretty much.”