Asylum

A special thanks to my beta, Saeadame.

Asylum

Chapter 4

Dr. Trevoli opened the sliding door with ease and led the group into the small courtyard. The courtyard had a few picnic tables as well as some wooden chairs to sit on. There were a few trees and perfectly cut shrubs and flowers. As the group looked around they noticed only two figures in the courtyard. A woman that looked to be in her mid thirties in a pair of nurses scrubs, and young man lying under a tree on his back, his long black hair spayed around him like an angel's halo, playing with something they could not see on his chest. He wore a pair of gray sweatpants, sandals, and a navy blue T-shirt.

"Harry." Trevoli called towards the young man. The boy looked over and got up from his comfortable spot on the ground and walked towards the group. The nurse that was watching Harry also strode forwards towards the group.

"I've got Harry from here Martha." The girl nodded her head and strolled inside.

Harry finally reached the group and smiled shyly at everyone there.

"Hello." He said, smile never faltering. "Who are you?"

Dr. Trevoli let out an indulgent smile. "These people are here to meet you Harry."

Trevoli glanced at the others, urging them to introduce themselves. Albus took the hint.

"Hello Harry. I'm Headmaster Albus Dumbledore, and these," he motioned to the others with his hands, "are my friends and coworkers." He pointed to Minerva, Severus, and Remus.
"This is Minerva McGonagall, Severus Snape, and Remus Lupin, teachers at my school." McGonagall and Lupin smiled while Snape raised an eyebrow and smirked at the youth.

"On my left is Hermione Granger, a student." The bushy haired girl smiled and gave Harry a small wave that he shyly returned. Dumbledore moved over to the remaining three. "And lastly these two are Arthur Weasley and Kingsley Shacklebolt who work for the Ministry, and Sirius Black a close personal friend." Dumbledore said genially.

"Hello, Harry." Sirius said happily, beaming with happiness.

"I'm Harry, Harry Potter, but I guess you already know that." He said about to shake their hands, then thought twice about it as his hands were cupped securely together as if trying to keep hold of something.

Dr. Trevoli noticed, and let out a sigh of exasperation. "What do you have now?" He asked as if this was an everyday occurrence, which it very well might be for what the order knew.

Harry opened his cupped hands and lifted them up to the doctor's face. A small baby toad sat there.

"I've named him Kermit." Harry said in a small voice. "Can I keep him?" Giving the doctor a puppy eyed look that had the entire order practically cooing. Well, everyone but Snape who let out a small snort of amusement.

The doctor sighed again. "Harry, you know the rules. No pets are allowed here. I've told you thousands of times. Now would you please put the toad back where you've found it? It might have a family to go back to."

Harry bowed his head in disappointment before heading to the other side of the courtyard to put the small toad back.

Dumbledore twinkled. "Does he ask that often?"

The doctor glared at him. "Only every chance he gets. He wants to be a veterinarian. He loves animals of all sorts. Two weeks ago he found a small dog and had managed to keep him in his room unnoticed for three days. Before that it was a Bluebird with an injured wing. He always asks if he can keep them, but he knows he can't. This is a hospital, we can't have animals running rampant."

Sirius smiled. "Well he can have all the pets he wants when he comes to live with me."

The doctor frowned a bit. "We're going to miss him here. He is always such a delight. As you know the courts decided that I would be the one in charge of when he is discharged. I've felt for quite some time now that he is no threat to society, but we've had no where to send him. An orphanage wouldn't know how to handle a former mental patient, one wrong move and he might snap again. Not to mention, who would want to adopt a 17 year old, especially with his history? Just promise me Mr. Black that you'll take good care of him."

"Don't worry, I will. James and Lily were my best friends. I'm only sorry that couldn't find him earlier." Sirius said rather forlornly.

At this time Harry bounced back up to the group. "Kermit is now hopping his way back to his family." Harry reported. It was then that he noticed Sirius's rather sad expression. "What's wrong Mr. Black?" Harry asked curiously.

"Nothing. Everything's fine." He stared at Harry. The boy really was the splitting image of his parents. He had James's athletic frame, a swimmer's build to him. Lily's height, who had been rather tall for a girl, an impressive 5ft 8in. It meant he was still shorter than the rest of the men in the group, but taller than all of the girls. He had Lily's green eyes, high cheekbones, and plump pink lips - but the mop of black hair on Harry's head was definitely a Potter gene. Not a single Potter in the last century has escaped that awful head of messy black hair, even if Harry's was longer than James's had been, reaching mid back. And if Sirius wasn't mistaken, he also had James regal looking nose that set off his high cheekbones rather nicely.

His head had the dreaded lightening bolt scar that the world had spoke of, but that wasn't the only scar that littered the boy's face or body. Several small scars ran across his face, one from just above the end of his left eyebrow running across his nose and his right cheekbone ending at his jaw. Another much smaller one was under his left eye lying horizontally on his cheekbone. Both were thin and mere white lines on his tanned completion, but were still quite noticeable. They didn't diminish his beauty, but they did add a rather rugged look to him. Sirius could also see some faint scars on his hands and arms and was sure there were larger ones on his back, unseen under Harry's shirt.

They were all reminders of what his godson had been through and what he couldn't prevent.

Sirius shook himself from his thoughts. He may not have been able to prevent this, but he could prevent something like this from happening again.

At this point Dr. Trevoli decided to tell Harry the good news. "Harry, these people are going to be taking care of you from now on." Trevoli said with a small smile.

Harry's head snapped up, a cold hard glint in his eye, "What?" He asked frostily.

Everyone but Trevoli was taken aback by the sudden attitude change. Harry had been acting rather shy and sweet before. Almost as if he was a little kid before, now he seemed as if he was about to attack someone.

They all looked over to Dr. Trevoli who looked both nervous and sad at the same time.

"Harry, this man is your godfather." Trevoli pointed to Sirius, who only looked confused at Harry's attitude.

Harry's eyes immediately lost the cold hard glint and instead glittered with surprise, "I have a godfather?" He asked almost childishly.

Trevoli smiled, indulging Harry just a bit. "Yes, Harry. He's been searching for you for a while now. He couldn't find you since it was never released where you were being kept. He's a very nice man."

"Really?" He asked, once again in a childish voice.

"Really." He glanced to Sirius then back to Harry. "How about you go and pack to leave while I take Sirius to fill out some paperwork?" He suggested.

"Okay." He said in a high-pitched voice, obviously excited. He turned and practically ran back inside, to what everyone assumed was his room.

Trevoli sighed. "We have some things to discuss, and you have to fill out his release papers." He turned around. "Follow me." And he went inside.

They all followed him, passing a few more odd patients before entering a spacious office. Trevoli sat behind the desk asking Sirius to sit across from him while the others took seats in surrounding chairs or the sofa along the wall.

Trevoli cleared his throat catching everyone's attention. "Mr. Black, before you take Harry I need to make sure you are aware of what you are getting yourself into." He stared pointedly at the black haired blue-eyed man.

"What do you mean? He's my godson and he belongs with me. I won't allow you to talk me out of it." Sirius said face flushing with anger.

Trevoli held up his hands. "That is not my intention, Mr. Black. I just need to be sure you know how to take care of Harry. As you can see, Harry isn't exactly normal. He never has been. His relatives did far to much damage to him for him to ever be normal again."

Severus snorted in distain. "That much is obvious."

Sirius glared at Snape. "Shut up, Snivillus."

Severus narrowed his eyes but said nothing.

Trevoli cleared his throat once more. "If we could continue?" He shot both men dark looks, a particularly frosty one to Severus. "Harry has certain tendencies that make it hard to control him. As you have seen today, Harry suffers from dramatic mood swings and partial Multiple-Personality Disorder."

Hermione gasped.

"Unlike some other patients, his MPD is not as dramatic as his mood swings. Some days like today, he tends to act more like a child, though he has the brain function of an adult. He simply reverts to act more like a child. His relatives never allowed him to act like a child when he was one, and now he has the opportunity to do so, though he is still aware of who he is and what age he really is."

"What do you mean, exactly? I thought people with MPD acted like a completely different person than who they really are?" Kingsley asked, a bit confused at the situation.

Trevoli sighed. "It's a bit hard to explain as I have never had a case like this before. When he is in a mood like he was, it's like he is a six year old. His excitement, his high-pitched voice – these are all very child-like - but when you ask him his age he says he is seventeen and is able to remember anything he has learned from his tutors over the years. He still calls himself Harry."

He looked them all in the eye. "I believe it has more to do with his moods than anything. When he is happy or content, he is more likely to slip into his child persona. When he is angry or frightened of something, he is more likely to become cold and calculating and lash out. That is why I only call it partial MPD, as I have no other name for it. He is still Harry; he just changes dramatically with his moods. Most days he's just an average teenager, but others he acts like this."

He tilted his head as if thinking of something serious. "Actually, you were in luck in coming today as you could see some of his more dramatic changes, and understand the sort of thing he goes through. Another thing I must warn you about is that he is obsessive compulsive. It could be worse, but don't be surprised if your house is a lot cleaner in a few days."

Severus gave him an odd look, and then raised an eyebrow. "It didn't look like he was obsessive compulsive." Severus thought back to dirt stained sweatpants and messy hair of the young man he had seen.

Trevoli nodded his head. "I know, but that is easily explainable. His relatives often forced heaps of chores on Harry when he was little. They obviously had a problem with dirt and like everything to be sparkling clean. They didn't clean the house themselves, and whenever there was something dirty in the house, he was severely punished. He was often forced to go days, sometimes weeks without a shower, and had worn dirty and oversized clothes at his relatives. They didn't care for his appearance as they thought him lower than dirt, so he looked like dirt. Harry doesn't keep himself presentable because he wasn't trained too. To him, he will always be lower then everyone else. It doesn't matter what he looks like, because he thinks himself less then them, almost unworthy."

"We've tried to break him of this habit. At least to the point where he baths and eats normally, though sometimes we have to be more forceful. Sometimes he just forgets he has to eat, as he was trained to eat only when someone offered him food. We try to convince him that his room doesn't have to be impeccable, he is a teenager after all, but he won't hear of it. He's so accustomed to everything to be neat and orderly that he refuses to even let the tiniest mess occur in his room. We've actually had to ban him from going near the storage closets because he was grabbing cleaner at least once a day to spray down his whole room sanitizing and making sure the window is absolutely clean, and furniture polished. So when he leaves with you, you have to be sure to monitor these activities and make sure he knows that he doesn't have to clean the entire house, all the time, everyday."

Everyone nodded.

"You said that he was severely punished?" Sirius asked.

The doctor nodded. "I've already told you what occurred in that house."

"Is he jumpy? Will he flip out if I accidentally touch him? If I put my hand on his shoulder or bump into him?" Sirius asked in concern. Harry is his godson. He needed to know what his boundaries were. He didn't want to set him off over a small bump in the hallway.

Trevoli shook his head in the negative. "No. He was really skittish to begin with and was always expecting to be hit, but over time we broke him of this habit. He actually enjoys affection. I wouldn't be surprised if he starts to hug you for no reason, or even hold your hand. He never had any sort of affection or friendly touch when he was growing up and now he revels in it. He's a good kid."

Sirius smiled in relief.

"That brings me to the issue of school." He looked up at the old headmaster and the current teachers of Hogwarts. "I assume you are here because you wish to have him enrolled?"

The headmaster nodded, eyes twinkling. "Yes, it is a nice private institution that his parents went to. He will attend there most of the year."

Trevoli looked a bit troubled at this. "Mr. Dumbledore, you must realize that Harry will need some stability in his life. He has lived most of his life in this institution, changing his routine and living with Mr. Black will be hard enough, switching his place of residency again so soon might do him more harm than good."

The headmaster's twinkle dimmed and then returned. "Would it help if Sirius was allowed to stay in the castle as well, perhaps they could both live in private quarters away from other students?"

Trevoli thought for a minute, and then nodded slowly. "Perhaps. I'm not too sure. Harry has never really been around people his own age. A public school might be too much for him as he has only ever received tutoring from special teachers that come here."

He then looked thoughtful. "Then again, it might do him some good. Being around other kids his age might show him how to act and get him to let go of his childish persona. It might make him feel more normal. Though, I would suggest allowing him to have some constant contact with some people around his age this summer, I don't want him to be overwhelmed by so many people."

"Good, good." Dumbledore said, smiling. He glanced to both Hermione and Arthur.

"I would be happy to help. I already have my summer work done. I just need to check over my essays to make sure they are thorough." Hermione said.

"I can get my boys to come over as much as possible. Ron is his age, I'm sure they'll make fast friends." Arthur said, ignoring Hermione's look of distaste when he mentioned Ron's name. He happened to be one of Hermione's most hated tormenters. He was worse than the Slytherins.

"Excellent." The aged headmaster said, beaming with happiness. He hoped Harry made many friends. He didn't want the poor boy to be lonely, he needed all the support he could get.

Dr. Trevoli smiled. "Alright. Now, Mr. Black, I need you to sign a few forms for Harry's release. As his godfather you will now be responsible for him in the eyes of the law. It will be your duty to seek help if you think Harry gets out of control." He pushed a few forms in front of him.

Sirius quickly looked over the forms and signed in all the appropriate places.

Harry was now officially his, in the muggle world anyway. He was legally an adult in the wizarding world, though he wouldn't be telling the doctor that.

At this point Trevoli smiled and got up, causing the others to follow his lead. "Now we just need to go get Harry."

He then walked out and the others followed. They arrived in a nicely lit room with two beds in it.

"Hello, Alan. How are you doing today?" Dr. Trevoli said, smiling at the 24 year old lying on one of the beds, reading. He had two bandages, one around each wrist.

The man sighed. "Hello, Dr. Trevoli. I am fine. How are you?" He said in a flat indifferent voice, not even looking at the man.

They had put Alan in Harry's room, hoping to bring him out of his depression by staying with such a happy teenager. He had only been there three days.

"Just fine. Now where's Harry?" He asked politely.

Alan pointed towards the closet. Not saying one word.

That was when they heard a rustling in the closet, before Harry came out of the closet holding a rather large bag, holding all his clothes and possessions in it.

Harry saw them and his eyes lit up. "Hello again!"

Dumbledore chuckled. "Hello again to you too, Harry." He smiled at the exuberant youth.

"Do you have everything packed and ready to go?"

Harry nodded enthusiastically. "Yup." He chirped.

Harry then walked over to Sirius's side. "So I'm going to live with you now?" He asked.

Sirius beamed. "Umhm, yes you are."

Harry then turned to Trevoli, dropped his bag and launched himself at the man. "Thank you, Dr. Trevoli. I'm going to miss you." Harry said, not releasing the man from his hug.

"I'm going to miss you too, young man. And remember, if you ever need anything you can always call me." He said as Harry let him go.

Harry then turned to his rather unfriendly roommate and beamed at him. "BYE, ALAN!" Harry yelled, causing the 24 year old to jump in surprise and glare at the younger male.

"Goodbye, Harry." Alan said through gritted teeth.

Trevoli hid his smile. Harry was the only one able to get some kind of emotional response from the man, even if it was anger and hate. Harry had definitely helped him on his path to improvement, even if it wasn't in the way they had all expected.

"So Harry, are you ready to go home now?" Sirius asked, well, seriously.

Harry nodded and grabbed his godfather's hand.

And they were off.


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A/N: I do apologize for the lack of updates. *Sighs* But it could always be worse right? I know of people who write less then me and have over a two month wait between updates.

You know what really bothers me? Multiple stories. I mean, I know of plenty of people who update all of their stories regularly even though they have more than one. Kudos to them, their awesome. But we all know the ones I’m talking about. There is a person, I love her stories and have her on an author alert list. I always look forward to her updates, but I have noticed a pattern. She has 68 Harry Potter stories (plus other fanfics besides those that I‘m not even counting). And I was in awe, then I looked at how many are finished. Zero. Not one. And she has been writing for over 4 years. Every time she makes a new story, which is every couple of months she says that she is not abandoning her other stories but she just couldn’t get this new plot bunny out of her head. She then proceeds to write 3 or 4 chapters, and then she has a new plot bunny…never returning to her other works. When it has been 4 years and you have not finished one story past 4 chapters…that’s really bad.

It is also very saddening, as every one of those stories has sooo much potential. Her ideas are so fresh and original. I honestly think she should hand some of them over into more capable hands if she can’t even continue with one of them.

Sorry for ranting, but I do believe that people like this should just stop writing. It’s not that she is not good at it, she’s amazing, but if you have a two month wait between chapters and then you don’t have the gall to finish what you’ve started, then just stop writing. Or at the very least DON’T promise to not abandon a fiction and then do that very thing. And I’ve seen so many authors do this…it is just so disappointing.

Anywho…thanks to all those who reviewed…you know who you are. You all are sooo awesome and absolutely wonderful people who should give yourselves a huge pat on the back as an audience applauds you!!!! *Claps for awesome reviewers*

Would you please review again? I do so love them! Review!!!