A revamp on my girl!Harry story
Jun. 19th, 2011 11:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drownedinlight Sadly, at nearly forty-thousand words, that other one died. This is the revamp, which may be rewritten itself.
Harriett Katherine Eleanor Potter knew a great many things. She spent almost all of her time in the library reading, because she desired something to do, and her parents, who were busy devoting all of their time to her brother, could not oblige her in such a respect. The elves carried for her much from the time she was five on, but only in the simple ways, such as bringing her meals and making sure she bathed. She had already learned the basics of reading and writing and could teach the rest to herself from there.
One of the very first things she had concluded, when she was about five, was that she did not like her name. Harriett Katherine Eleanor Potter was a long name, and it resulted in unfortunate nicknames like “Harry,” when the adults took to calling on her, which was not very often. She tried many different name combinations, going by her second or third name, but nothing seemed to work. Finally she settled on initialism, calling herself HKE in her head.
The second thing HKE concluded, many years later, while lying awake at night thinking about a possible arithmetic/calculaic combination: something happened to her when she was five-years-old. She could not remember what, for when she tried to filter through her life that year; there came a point where an ache began to gnaw on her brain. But HKE felt certain something occurred that year, because she knew that before then, she had not been nearly as smart. She had been above average certain, she had learned to read and could do basic arithmetic; given time she could have worked to become very intelligent.
But this was a different sort of smart rolling around inside her head. For one thing, often times she could make connections before she even realized how things worked. She would have to work backwards to find those connections and previous steps. She read quicker than either of her parents, and their much smarter friend Remus. HKE broke codes, learned languages, and wrote new arithmetic principles. She studied lost experiments left behind by her fore-fathers that turned up in a blank, black book, the only one left after she had devoured the whole library. None of this would have been possible, until shortly after her fifth birthday.
HKE concluded her third finding much too late: Albus Dumbledore had something to do with forgetting the moment which made her different. The grandfather had always sent shivers up her spine, but mostly she stayed away from him, which was how they both liked it. She ignored the headache that always got around him, in favor of returning to the sanctuary of her library.
When he came to her one day, with her parents, and told her she would be taking a trip, and that she should pack a small bag, another ice cold shiver ran down her back. But HKE did as she was asked, and packed a small carpet bag with her book that showed her more books than the manor library had, a few clothes that she liked, though resisted taking her notebook, because her parents did not know what she was up to in the library. Her parents bade her cheerful good-bye, and Albus Dumbledore raised his wand. That was when she realized it. She was not sure what he had done to her, but she knew he had done it.
At her neck was a pendant she had always worn, ever since she could remember, which was only before she was five. She had always had it and at moments of unclarity, when she could not solve a problem, or break a code, she would study her pendant. It was a tarnished, silver color and in the center, there was a five-point star inside of a triangle, encircled in a wreath, and held up by a dragon which had once been red, and a bird which had once been black. Around the edges of the pendant was an encryption of Welsh, which HKE had never translated.
But all she needed was one moment of clarity, because she knew what was coming.
“Obliviate!” Dumbledore cried.
Harry was always teased at the home. If it was not because of her name, it was because she was so smart. After all, who calls a girl Harry? And what kind of ten-year-old can figure out higher level physics equations just by looking at them? Harry was a freak, with the longest of drawn out vowels. Mrs. Welsh, the home caretaker finally took pity on her and wrote to a school for the gifted. Apparently, she was worthy of some attention, because a man from the school came.
“Now, Ms. Potter, I would like you to solve these puzzles,” he said. So she did. Some of it was science, some of it was math. Some of it was puzzles. She solved everything. Then, he had her take a test. When she finished with the test, the man smiled at some of the results and told her, “Yes I think you’ll be able to come to the academy.”
The man assured Mrs. Welsh that everything would be fine, and had her sign some papers saying that Harry could stay at the Academy year round, where she would be much, much happier, getting to work with students just as smart and gifted as she was. He was very persuasive, for soon, Harry and her one bag of belongings were with her on the way to this mysterious academy.
The Academy was not so much a school, as…well, Harriet was not sure what to call it. A think tank maybe. There were a lot of smart, gifted children, who did smart gifted things. Every day, everyone awoke at dawn for physical education. They were all sectioned off into groups and made to do every kind of exercise imaginable. The children like Harry, who came in a little scrawny, had to put on some muscle before they could be taught other things, like how to defend themselves, or take five mile runs through the woods.
Once they were done with physical education, everyone had their own set of problems to solve for the day. Harry usually finished hers by lunch, and when you were finished, you were allowed to do extracurricular activities, like learning language or music. At night, they were all given dinner and sent to bed at ten. No exceptions, not even for the older students.
Harry liked the academy. She had her own room—rooms really as she had a room to sleep in, and a room to work in—and the others her age were nice enough, when she had the time to get to know them. The first month or so was such a blur that she did not meet another child her age until she had already been a t the academy for thirty-four days. He was a dark skinned boy, with a flat accent, who wore long hair in a braid.
“So you’re Ach-kept?” he asked. It took Harry a moment to realize he was pronouncing her initials.
“HKE,” she said, wondering why such an initialism felt familiar to her.
“Cool, I’m CS,” he said, shaking her hand. “It stands for Cub Shaker, but everyone really prefers we use our initials.” By everyone, she guessed he did not mean the students, as the Academy printed their initials on everything which was theirs, right next to their ID numbers. She smiled though at his attempt at humanism and wiggled her finger for him to lean in close.
“Harriet Katherine Eleanor,” she whispered.
“I’ll stick with HKE,” he replied, making her laugh.
From then on, she and CS were almost inseparable. He was a little older than she was, being that he was born on the spring equinox (why was that day important?), but he was just as smart as she was and told her interesting stories during rare moments of down time, or during whispered moments during their work time.
“They don’t mind if we work together,” he said. “Sometimes I think they prefer it when we do, especially if we get results. But they don’t like it if we goof off. Besides, it’s not like Coyote is going to burst in here and rescue us.” HKE giggled at that, but quietly, because the thought of needing to be rescued made her think that maybe they were prisoners here. Lock smart children up and teach them to be soldiers and you win lots of wars. But that did not make sense.
CS related a story of being unwanted, much like her own, minus the amnesia, but there were plenty of people their age alone who went home for holidays and at their parent’s request. They were even allowed to take some of the other children with them. But some of the unwanted were always made to stay. MP, a girl their age who HKE had been getting to know asked if she could take HKE home for fall break, but her request was denied. It was on the grounds that Mrs. Welsh would not allow it, but HKE knew the academy had legal authority.
So what was the difference between those who got to go home, and those who did not? HKE mentioned her observation to CS.
“We need more data,” he muttered to her one morning as they exercised.
“Agreed,” she told him later in the line for lunch. It was painstaking, and even in a school full of geniuses, it was hard to get data from one person to another. And even when they obtained a small sampling, they could not find anything that stood out between the two groups. Everyone was almost completely unique. It was frustrating, but maybe parents and guardians really would not authorize them to leave. Maybe the academy was doing the right thing.
Maybe. But the whole thing reeked of Albus Dumbledore.
HKE gripped her head, a white hot pain, flashed through her head.
“Are you all right?” CS asked. She shook her head and squeezed her eyes shut, forcing the light out which only helped a little bit.
“Headache,” she gasped.
“HKEP, please report to the med bay for assistance,” called a voice over the intercom.
“Thank you, Big Brother,” some of the older students called back.
“You’re welcome,” the intercom voice replied. HKE waved to CS, packed up her materials and left.
“No idea what brought it on?” asked one of the doctors in the med bay.
“No,” she replied.
“Hmm. We’ll do some scans, but some people become sensitive to pressure as they get older, and we do have a storm passing over head. After this, we’ll give you some pain killers and you can go and try to sleep it off.” The scans were fairly quick, and HKE was escorted back to her bunk, where she was made to take two pills, one for the pain, and one so she could sleep. The pain was not that bad, but it had made her a little but tired. She laid in her bunk, trying to remember what happened that day, something she often did to get to sleep. That’s when she thought of the name.
Albus Dumbledore. Albus Dumbledore.
Every time she thought the name, a small sharp pain thought up in her head. It was enough to keep her awake if not totally lucid. She reached under her bed, and pulled out the bag she had brought with her. She did not often look through her old things, but now she felt like she had to. There were a few sets of old clothes she did not need, because she always wore the Academy uniforms. But there was a book in there, and a pendant. The book was blank, so that did her no good, but the pendant seemed familiar. Odd, but familiar, like something from before she had arrived on the orphanage steps with only her name and birthday in her memory. Something about the pendant.
It made her head hurt, so she slid the book back in the bag, and then under the bed. She kept the pendant under her pillow now. Something about it was making her remember.
Harriett Katherine Eleanor Potter knew a great many things. She spent almost all of her time in the library reading, because she desired something to do, and her parents, who were busy devoting all of their time to her brother, could not oblige her in such a respect. The elves carried for her much from the time she was five on, but only in the simple ways, such as bringing her meals and making sure she bathed. She had already learned the basics of reading and writing and could teach the rest to herself from there.
One of the very first things she had concluded, when she was about five, was that she did not like her name. Harriett Katherine Eleanor Potter was a long name, and it resulted in unfortunate nicknames like “Harry,” when the adults took to calling on her, which was not very often. She tried many different name combinations, going by her second or third name, but nothing seemed to work. Finally she settled on initialism, calling herself HKE in her head.
The second thing HKE concluded, many years later, while lying awake at night thinking about a possible arithmetic/calculaic combination: something happened to her when she was five-years-old. She could not remember what, for when she tried to filter through her life that year; there came a point where an ache began to gnaw on her brain. But HKE felt certain something occurred that year, because she knew that before then, she had not been nearly as smart. She had been above average certain, she had learned to read and could do basic arithmetic; given time she could have worked to become very intelligent.
But this was a different sort of smart rolling around inside her head. For one thing, often times she could make connections before she even realized how things worked. She would have to work backwards to find those connections and previous steps. She read quicker than either of her parents, and their much smarter friend Remus. HKE broke codes, learned languages, and wrote new arithmetic principles. She studied lost experiments left behind by her fore-fathers that turned up in a blank, black book, the only one left after she had devoured the whole library. None of this would have been possible, until shortly after her fifth birthday.
HKE concluded her third finding much too late: Albus Dumbledore had something to do with forgetting the moment which made her different. The grandfather had always sent shivers up her spine, but mostly she stayed away from him, which was how they both liked it. She ignored the headache that always got around him, in favor of returning to the sanctuary of her library.
When he came to her one day, with her parents, and told her she would be taking a trip, and that she should pack a small bag, another ice cold shiver ran down her back. But HKE did as she was asked, and packed a small carpet bag with her book that showed her more books than the manor library had, a few clothes that she liked, though resisted taking her notebook, because her parents did not know what she was up to in the library. Her parents bade her cheerful good-bye, and Albus Dumbledore raised his wand. That was when she realized it. She was not sure what he had done to her, but she knew he had done it.
At her neck was a pendant she had always worn, ever since she could remember, which was only before she was five. She had always had it and at moments of unclarity, when she could not solve a problem, or break a code, she would study her pendant. It was a tarnished, silver color and in the center, there was a five-point star inside of a triangle, encircled in a wreath, and held up by a dragon which had once been red, and a bird which had once been black. Around the edges of the pendant was an encryption of Welsh, which HKE had never translated.
But all she needed was one moment of clarity, because she knew what was coming.
“Obliviate!” Dumbledore cried.
Harry was always teased at the home. If it was not because of her name, it was because she was so smart. After all, who calls a girl Harry? And what kind of ten-year-old can figure out higher level physics equations just by looking at them? Harry was a freak, with the longest of drawn out vowels. Mrs. Welsh, the home caretaker finally took pity on her and wrote to a school for the gifted. Apparently, she was worthy of some attention, because a man from the school came.
“Now, Ms. Potter, I would like you to solve these puzzles,” he said. So she did. Some of it was science, some of it was math. Some of it was puzzles. She solved everything. Then, he had her take a test. When she finished with the test, the man smiled at some of the results and told her, “Yes I think you’ll be able to come to the academy.”
The man assured Mrs. Welsh that everything would be fine, and had her sign some papers saying that Harry could stay at the Academy year round, where she would be much, much happier, getting to work with students just as smart and gifted as she was. He was very persuasive, for soon, Harry and her one bag of belongings were with her on the way to this mysterious academy.
The Academy was not so much a school, as…well, Harriet was not sure what to call it. A think tank maybe. There were a lot of smart, gifted children, who did smart gifted things. Every day, everyone awoke at dawn for physical education. They were all sectioned off into groups and made to do every kind of exercise imaginable. The children like Harry, who came in a little scrawny, had to put on some muscle before they could be taught other things, like how to defend themselves, or take five mile runs through the woods.
Once they were done with physical education, everyone had their own set of problems to solve for the day. Harry usually finished hers by lunch, and when you were finished, you were allowed to do extracurricular activities, like learning language or music. At night, they were all given dinner and sent to bed at ten. No exceptions, not even for the older students.
Harry liked the academy. She had her own room—rooms really as she had a room to sleep in, and a room to work in—and the others her age were nice enough, when she had the time to get to know them. The first month or so was such a blur that she did not meet another child her age until she had already been a t the academy for thirty-four days. He was a dark skinned boy, with a flat accent, who wore long hair in a braid.
“So you’re Ach-kept?” he asked. It took Harry a moment to realize he was pronouncing her initials.
“HKE,” she said, wondering why such an initialism felt familiar to her.
“Cool, I’m CS,” he said, shaking her hand. “It stands for Cub Shaker, but everyone really prefers we use our initials.” By everyone, she guessed he did not mean the students, as the Academy printed their initials on everything which was theirs, right next to their ID numbers. She smiled though at his attempt at humanism and wiggled her finger for him to lean in close.
“Harriet Katherine Eleanor,” she whispered.
“I’ll stick with HKE,” he replied, making her laugh.
From then on, she and CS were almost inseparable. He was a little older than she was, being that he was born on the spring equinox (why was that day important?), but he was just as smart as she was and told her interesting stories during rare moments of down time, or during whispered moments during their work time.
“They don’t mind if we work together,” he said. “Sometimes I think they prefer it when we do, especially if we get results. But they don’t like it if we goof off. Besides, it’s not like Coyote is going to burst in here and rescue us.” HKE giggled at that, but quietly, because the thought of needing to be rescued made her think that maybe they were prisoners here. Lock smart children up and teach them to be soldiers and you win lots of wars. But that did not make sense.
CS related a story of being unwanted, much like her own, minus the amnesia, but there were plenty of people their age alone who went home for holidays and at their parent’s request. They were even allowed to take some of the other children with them. But some of the unwanted were always made to stay. MP, a girl their age who HKE had been getting to know asked if she could take HKE home for fall break, but her request was denied. It was on the grounds that Mrs. Welsh would not allow it, but HKE knew the academy had legal authority.
So what was the difference between those who got to go home, and those who did not? HKE mentioned her observation to CS.
“We need more data,” he muttered to her one morning as they exercised.
“Agreed,” she told him later in the line for lunch. It was painstaking, and even in a school full of geniuses, it was hard to get data from one person to another. And even when they obtained a small sampling, they could not find anything that stood out between the two groups. Everyone was almost completely unique. It was frustrating, but maybe parents and guardians really would not authorize them to leave. Maybe the academy was doing the right thing.
Maybe. But the whole thing reeked of Albus Dumbledore.
HKE gripped her head, a white hot pain, flashed through her head.
“Are you all right?” CS asked. She shook her head and squeezed her eyes shut, forcing the light out which only helped a little bit.
“Headache,” she gasped.
“HKEP, please report to the med bay for assistance,” called a voice over the intercom.
“Thank you, Big Brother,” some of the older students called back.
“You’re welcome,” the intercom voice replied. HKE waved to CS, packed up her materials and left.
“No idea what brought it on?” asked one of the doctors in the med bay.
“No,” she replied.
“Hmm. We’ll do some scans, but some people become sensitive to pressure as they get older, and we do have a storm passing over head. After this, we’ll give you some pain killers and you can go and try to sleep it off.” The scans were fairly quick, and HKE was escorted back to her bunk, where she was made to take two pills, one for the pain, and one so she could sleep. The pain was not that bad, but it had made her a little but tired. She laid in her bunk, trying to remember what happened that day, something she often did to get to sleep. That’s when she thought of the name.
Albus Dumbledore. Albus Dumbledore.
Every time she thought the name, a small sharp pain thought up in her head. It was enough to keep her awake if not totally lucid. She reached under her bed, and pulled out the bag she had brought with her. She did not often look through her old things, but now she felt like she had to. There were a few sets of old clothes she did not need, because she always wore the Academy uniforms. But there was a book in there, and a pendant. The book was blank, so that did her no good, but the pendant seemed familiar. Odd, but familiar, like something from before she had arrived on the orphanage steps with only her name and birthday in her memory. Something about the pendant.
It made her head hurt, so she slid the book back in the bag, and then under the bed. She kept the pendant under her pillow now. Something about it was making her remember.
