Twisted

Chapter Two: Nightmares

Harry was running. Always running…but he couldn’t breathe. The thing in his chest was crushing him. It was crushing him from the inside. He couldn’t stop though, or the thing that was following him would catch up. He stumbled through the corridors of Hogwarts, panting, his ragged breaths echoing off of the stone walls. A wind was tunneling through the passageway…no a torrent of whispers—
“You can’t run forever, I’ll find you…” the words surrounded him, battering into him until he stumbled through a door to escape.
He was in Dumbledore’s office. Harry sighed and sagged against the door.
“Oh, my dear boy, you don’t belong here.”
Harry gasped, his head jerking up. A pair of twinkling blue eyes were staring coldly down at him.
“What? Professor?” he stammered.
The portrait hung behind the desk, which was covered with odd, shiny, movable instruments. They went on ticking.
“You don’t belong here, Harry. Not anymore,” Dumbledore said, with a slow shake of his head.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
“But, Professor, I need your help…”
“No, Harry. You disappointed me so greatly, I thought that you would understand your great task…”
“What task?!” Harry screamed, anger rising and burning in his throat.
The ticks grew louder, more urgent. Tick. Tick. TICK.
He trembled with rage. “You knew from the very beginning that I was the last Horcrux!” Harry hissed. The ticks were thundering, no they were footsteps.
They were coming for him, but his fury didn’t care. He watched as Dumbledore surveyed him and finally nodded. “That is true, I had my theory.” Thump. Thump. Thump.
The heat rolled inside of him, “What was the matter, old man? Couldn’t you kill me yourself? Or didn’t you want to dirty your own hands?”
The portrait hung silent as Harry accused it. It spoke gravely, all the benevolence gone from its face, “You made your decision Harry. Now you must live with it.”
Thump. Thump. Thump! Thump!
His insides exploded in boiling fury as he raised his wand, ready to shout the curse.
Arms wrapped around him, crushing him to a thin chest. “Found you,” the words hissed hotly into his ear—
……………………………
Harry shot up, tearing the bedclothes off of him. He fell off the thin mattress and onto the cold floor, his legs still twisted in the sweat-soaked sheets. He lay there for a moment, gasping into the splintered wood. It scratched into his hot cheek, but the pain helped him push the dream away. With an effort, Harry pushed himself up and rubbed his face with his hands. He let his fingers tangle in the roots of his hair.
The same nightmare, every night, but he always woke before he saw what was chasing him.
“Bugger,” he breathed before standing up and stretching the kinks out of his spine. They stayed stubbornly in place. Harry grumbled and looked at the calendar he’d made. He had charted out the moon phases. Tomorrow night would be the full moon. As he looked at the handmade calendar, it reminded him of his summers at the Dursley’s and an unexpected pang raced through him. Not that he really missed the Dursley’s, but he remembered how simple things were. Everything was black and white, good and evil. He had known exactly where he stood.
“Shite,” he muttered, and ambled into the tiny bathroom to run some cold water over his face. That forced him to look at himself in the grungy, cracked mirror. Without his glasses, his eyes seemed overly large, but he’d tossed them because they were too recognizable. Of course, the spell to fix his sight had been difficult, and he supposed it was a miracle he hadn’t spelled himself blind—especially since his magic had gone a bit off.

Harry chuckled bitterly to himself and turned away from his reflection. A bit off was a bit of an understatement. He had a horrible habit of accidentally blowing things up. Not that blowing things up wasn’t fun in its own way. The smirk was already on his lips before he could hide it. He didn’t know who he was trying to fool.

His stomach rumbled ominously, and Harry tried to recall when he had last eaten. It was probably a bad sign that he couldn’t remember.

“Right, dinner first,” Harry murmured to himself and set about trying to find his pants. He had flung them somewhere before he had collapsed onto the mattress. Not that he had been in his right mind last night. Surprising how often that seemed to happen lately…he tried not to dwell on the fact.

They were under the room’s only tattered chair. Harry struggled into the torn and ragged jeans, his toes wanting to poke out of all the various holes. They weren’t his, needless to say they were too big, and hung awkwardly off of his skinny hips. His belt was in a sad condition, but it succeeded in keeping his pants from sliding off at an odd moment. The shirt had also been made for someone far larger. The neck had been stretched out so that it hung off of one thin shoulder and the sleeves fell well below his fingertips. None of this troubled Harry overly much, though. He was used to wearing Dudley’s tent-like hand-me-downs.

Harry was on his way out, but stopped just as his fingers touched the rusty knob. He chewed on his lower lip before spinning around and opening the drawer in his nightstand. Inside were three things: a picture of his mum and dad, something they had never managed to get off of him. Or maybe they just let him have it. He pushed it aside, along with his thoughts, and pulled out the long thin object, while ignoring the other.

For almost ten minutes, Harry stood, spinning the Elder Wand between his fingertips. He had no other, since his wand had been destroyed in the fight with Voldemort, but…he didn’t want to go around unarmed. Especially since he had decided to go around making enemies last night. Harry shook his head, and mentally smacked himself. He could be a real moron sometimes. Hermione would have told him to think before he started waving his wand around.

Harry shoved the wand in his back pocket and headed for the door. It slammed behind him, and he didn’t bother to lock it. There was nothing in his cruddy apartment worth stealing.

……………………………

Dead Dave’s was pretty empty and Harry enjoyed his hamburger enormously. It was huge and served as rare as he wanted it—which meant it was almost mooing on his plate. The man behind the bar had eyed him suspiciously before he had asked for the coronary on a bun. When he didn’t try for any alcohol the large man let it slide. His name was Luther, Harry later learned, and decided that his general shape reminded him forcibly of Uncle Vernon. Admittedly, though, his Uncle would never have been able to wield a cigarette between his lips like that.

When the bar was pretty quiet, Luther stood in front of him, polishing a glass with a spotty dishrag.

“Where you from, kid,” the man asked, the cigarette dancing on his lips. For a second, Harry waited to see if any of that precarious ash would fall. It didn’t.

“England,” he finally said, around a mouthful of hamburger and chips.

“Eh? So watcha doin’ here? You in school?”

Harry shook his head and swallowed forcefully. “Finished school,” he said.

The man raised a brow. “You don’t look old enough to drive.”

“I’m eighteen,” Harry said, affronted.

“Yeah, and I’m a pole dancer,” Luther chuckled, the cigarette burning close to his large lips.

Trying very hard not to imagine that, Harry shook his head. “You don’t have to believe me, doesn’t make it any less true.” He was so used to people not believing him about anything, that the comment slid right off. He knew that before it would have bothered him, but Harry really didn’t care anymore.

The statement, however, seemed to take the beefy man back. He was silent for a minute before he grabbed the back of cigarettes in his pocket and deftly lit one off the butt hanging out of his mouth. He took a deep drag before eyeing Harry again.

“You never answered me. What’re you doin’ so far from home, huh, kid?”

Harry stopped chewing for a minute, trying to think of a reasonable lie.

“You visiting family, or something?” the bartender supplied, wiping down the bar with that same spotty rag.

“Something like that,” Harry mumbled, and put down the rest of his burger. Cold dread was slowly seeping into him. Why was this man asking so many questions? Why wasn’t he bothering anybody else?

After a quick look around, the latter question was easily answered. The only other patrons were hopelessly drowning in their after-work misery.

Merlin’s beard, Harry thought, it’s only half past six.

The feeling however, was only growing worse. He decided it was time to get out of there, but that’s when the temperature plummeted and the lights flickered.

“What the—“ Luther cursed, throwing the rag down on the counter. He didn’t get very far before the electricity died.

There was silence for a minute, in the complete darkness, before drunken shouts filled the air.

“—the fuck, Luther? What are you—“

“Hey, who cut the lights?”

“Damn, why’s it so cold…”

Harry didn’t bother to speak. His eyes were wide in the dark, searching for any trace of light. He knew that there would be none.

“Quiet!” he hissed, trying to silence the drunks’ and Luther’s angry voices.

They continued to argue on. What was that? That rattling sound? Harry was afraid that he already knew.

“Shut the fuck up!” he screamed. Silence followed and the loud rattling could finally be heard. It was coming closer, and there was more than one.

Even before he heard his mother’s screams, Harry knew that there were Dementors coming through the door at Dead Dave’s.

There were several groans as Harry stood up, and pulled the wand out of his pocket.

He conjured up the happiest memory he could think of and—“Expecto Petronum!”

A thin silvery vapor shot out of his wand tip. It illuminated three gliding, hooded figures.

~No, no, please! Not Harry!~

Several of the more sober drinkers screamed and began to scramble around, but there was nowhere for them to go. The Dementors were blocking the exit. Sweat began to bead on Harry’s forehead as he tried to keep up the silvery vapor, which was succeeding only in keeping the hooded figures where they were. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that Luther was pulling a bat out from under the bar. The thought of someone trying to beat a Dementor with a bat was rather funny.

As the spell dwindled, Harry tried again.

C’mon, something happy, something happy…

All right, he was at the Burrow, before seventh year…he was eating dinner with the Weasleys, and Hermione was there. The food was going to be delicious. Everyone was talking and laughing. Harry had just caught the feeling of happiness when someone let out a scream.

“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” Harry cried, and the silvery stag erupted from his wand and went charging after the Dementors. Two of them fled immediately, the other, who was leaning over a quietly sobbing man, was more stubborn.

“Quick, that one too,” he told his Patronus before it charged head long at the rattling Dementor. In an eerie movement, the black-cloaked figure flew back and disappeared.

The lights suddenly came back to life, and warmth spread through the room. It was then that Harry saw that Luther was right behind him, bat poised, ready to strike.

“What the hell are you, boy?” the man asked, an edge to his voice.

Harry held up his hands and backed up a step. He smiled politely. “Er,” he muttered, but immediately gave up on any kind of explanation. Harry took another step back and squeezed his eyes shut before there was a loud crack!—and he disapparated.

…………………………..

I was at the office, not enjoying the feeling of my Firestar digging into my back. It really was too bad that I didn’t have a nifty shoulder holster for it like my Browning Hi-Power. It still hurt a little to think of my favorite gun’s fate. It would be a few days before I could replace it. I sighed again, looking over my schedule for the night. Only two raisings, it was going to be a light night. With any luck, I would be able to get a good night of sleep tonight.

As I stood up, the phone rang. I stopped and debated on whether I should pick it up or just keep going. No, what if it was one of the boys in trouble?

I let out a groan before I picked up the receiver, “Animators, Inc., Anita Blake speaking, how may I help you?”

“Anita?” a deep voice wheezed. It took me a moment to place it.

“Luther?”

“Yeah…”he paused, and I heard his throat click as he swallowed.

“What’s up? Did something happen?”

“Look, I know something. The vamps have got anyone looking out for anything ever since some shit at the Circus last night. I guess it’s not a stretch to suppose that it involves you, huh?”

“You found something out?” I asked, my heart was like a trip hammer in my chest. It seemed almost impossible, last night was like a bad dream. Luther was bringing it crashing back into reality. I remembered why the sawed off shotgun was in my trunk and why I was wearing three knives. Two of them were in wrist sheathes on my forearms; the other was down my spine, hidden by my jacket.

“Hell, yeah,” Luther huffed. “It ate a burger in my bar and did some freaky magic.”

“Luther, when can I talk to you?”

“How about right now?”

“I have clients…can you still be at the bar in three hours?” I knew I was stretching, because Dead Dave actually ran the night shift.

Luther must have been really spooked because he answered right away. “I’ll be here.”

He didn’t say good-bye, just hung up. Huh, so I wasn’t the only one with bad phone manners.

My heart was still pounding as I headed for the door. I both wanted to get these raisings over with, and never wanted them to end. Both feelings were a bad sign. It’s a bad idea to perform magic with such conflicting emotions.

I clenched my fists. Somehow, I’d make it through. Then I’d find out about my new nightmare.