Chapter Text
July 15th, 2003
The tiredness penetrates every inch of his body to the point that it feels like a physical ache. His feet lead him out of the camp on autopilot. Major Findley gives him a brief nod, and Harry nods back with the fake confidence of someone who’s just vomited the whole caboodle of his PTSD over the entire room full of strangers.
His legs feel like they’re made of cotton wool when he abruptly pulls out his phone to set up an emergency session with Diane. She probably won’t be happy with him, but it’s her fucking job to give him tools to deal with this shit.
It’s not even about the pain; Harry’s been through much worse, and it’s not like these people are sadists who entertain themselves by actually torturing their recruits. After all, said recruits are mostly kids who have never even been in the field; traumatising them too much at this point would be rather counterproductive. So to Harry, who’s already traumatised, it’s more like a walk in the park. That’s not the problem. The problem is accepting his inability to fight back. And even though he can rationalise to himself perfectly well that the whole point of this exercise is to keep his mouth shut and endure, some very primal instinct deep inside his body disagrees. There’s something in that feeling of impotence that turns his brain right off, and all that is left is that instinct telling his magic to defend. Which it does. With vengeance.
It’s simply exhausting, staying conscious enough to rein it in while his mind is disconnecting. It’s a miracle that he’s managed to bullshit his way through it so far, but he can’t count on being lucky forever. During the last attempt, he had to forcibly knock himself out before his magic did something irreversible, and now everyone thinks he fucking fainted. Which gives him flashbacks to third year but is still better than breaking the Statute of Secrecy or accidentally hurting the muggles unfortunate enough to supervise him. It’s a standard part of the course, and it’s not even that awful. There’s no reason for him to nearly dissociate over it. His mind should be aware that it’s a simulation and there’s nothing to fear. It should be dispatching clear instructions to his magic to not interfere because there are muggles present. Or rather, his magic shouldn’t be doing anything without his explicit say-so, no matter if he’s scared or mad or being interrogated. He’s not thirteen anymore.
And it’s not just a training problem. If he’s ever captured by muggles—doubtful—without his wand—even more doubtful—then the wisest course of action strategically might be exactly what they’re trying to teach him here: to keep his mouth shut and endure. But his stupid magic would probably put on some crazy wandless display like it’s trying to do during those exercises, which he then wouldn’t be able to wipe out of the muggles’ minds, because obliviation is a touch too intricate to attempt wandlessly. And leaving muggle criminals unobliviated seems like a bad idea. That’s the definition of a cocked-up mission, and it’s all because his control is still shit, and his mind is still an unruly, wild thing.
He should have listened to Snape. He should have learnt how to clear his fucking mind back then instead of lounging around twiddling his thumbs and complaining about how unfair his life was. He should be listening to Ben now with his ’Every concept can be conquered’ instead of making fun of his meditation techniques like an arsehole. Only he doesn’t really think they’re stupid; he gave them a fair shot just to discover that his feelings about meditation haven’t changed in the slightest in the last eight years. He still despises it, or he despises that he can’t do it, and since he can’t do it, it must be stupid.
He knows he’s being too hard on himself again. Another issue to bring up with Diane. It feels like their work is never done. Good thing she’s just confirmed she can see him tomorrow; that gives him the entirety of today to unwind. Get some sleep. Fuck his boyfriend. Not to worry about this shit.
He stops his march when he thinks he’s got far enough to safely apparate, resting his hands on his knees. The forest is pleasantly cool, but it still might be the hottest day of the summer, and he’s sweating like a pig. He runs his hand over his freshly cut hair, pushes his glasses up his nose, and apparates straight to his bedroom. They figured it was the safest option after Ben moved in and Zoe started to visit even while Harry was out.
He’s immediately accosted by Ziggy, who is dancing in circles around him and whimpering at the closed door. Harry frowns and bends over to pet his side. “Hey, buddy. Where’s your dad?”
Ziggy whines even louder in response. Harry is about to open the door but figures Ben must have his reasons, so he hushes the dog and slips to the hall, closing the door behind him.
“Bee?” he calls, running down the stairs. He can hear the water running in the bathroom.
“In here!” Ben calls back, confirming his whereabouts. Harry takes off his shoes and is about to demand to know what’s going on when he adds, “Can you get in? I’ve got a situation.”
Uh-oh.
The bathroom is drenched, but Harry’s not very clean himself, so he shrugs it off. Ben is standing by the sink, wrapping something small and squirming into a towel.
“What the fuck is this?” Harry blurts, staring. All thoughts of coping mechanisms for possible future torture sessions immediately flee from his head.
Ben sends him a tired look. “It’s a cat, Harry.”
No, it’s not. Harry’s seen cats. Whatever this is, it has bulging eyes and ears that are way too big for its head that immediately remind him of Dobby. Its skin is mostly pink, hairless and slightly wrinkled, but red and crusty around its head, ears and nose. Harry’s face falls. Cat or no cat, he’s pretty sure it’s not supposed to look like that. “What’s wrong with it?”
“She got sunburnt,” Ben tells him calmly. “Can you hold her like this?” He passes the bundle over without waiting for an answer, so Harry takes it gingerly. She’s twitching in his hands and looking around skittishly with wide eyes, but she still sends Ben a flat look when he presses a compress to the top of her head.
She only expresses her discontent once Ben starts to apply something to her seared ear. Her whole body twists, and all the claws of her front paws dig into Harry’s arm. “Keep her still,” Ben murmurs. Harry’s trying, but he’s terrified he’s going to squeeze her too hard. She feels fucking tiny under the damp towel. “Okay, you can let her go,” Ben says after making sure that the bathroom door is shut close.
The cat launches from the towel straight behind the tub. Oh, wow. She looks like a roast chicken.
“Where did she come from?” Harry asks, frazzled after an unexpected ordeal, because there shouldn’t be a cat resembling a roast chicken in their bathroom.
“I found her at a gas station,” Ben says, at least sounding equally stumped by this fact as Harry is. “I took her to the clinic. She’s not chipped, and she didn’t have a collar.” He bends down to move a water bowl closer to the tub. “Wash your hands,” he instructs Harry absently, and only when they both scrub their hands very thoroughly does he turn to him fully. “Hey.”
Harry lets him cup his face and tilt it up without protests. He keeps his eyes blissfully closed as he’s being kissed slowly and refuses to open them once Ben pulls back. “Are you okay?”
“Mhm.” He doesn’t need to look to feel Ben’s sceptical gaze. He happily ignores it. “Missed you,” he murmurs instead.
Ben hums with mild interest. He’s not usually distracted by pretty words. “You can take a shower upstairs. I’ll handle everything here.”
Harry opens his eyes reluctantly. “Is that to imply that I stink?” he grumbles.
Ben raises an eyebrow, doing nothing to hide his amusement. “Were you under the impression that you don’t?”
Instead of listening to him, Harry settles on the tiles with a grunt of protest. “I wanna be here when she comes out.”
“Then be a dear and keep her cool, would you?” Ben asks him, starting to put the bathroom back in order.
Harry gently lowers the temperature of the whole room, peeking into the gap between the tub and the wall. Huge, grey-blue eyes stare back at him warily.
The cat flinches and retreats even further at the sound of a light crack indicating that Kreacher has joined the party. “Food for the little urchin,” he announces solemnly.
“Great, thank you, Kreacher,” Ben tells him kindly. “Go ahead; she likes you.”
Kreacher carefully fills the second bowl with wet cat food and puts it next to the water bowl. Ben must be right, because the cat slowly crawls out, keeping her body close to the floor. She looks ready to flee back behind the tub at any sign of danger and keeps sniffing with suspicion for ages before she finally settles by the bowl and starts to eat. Kreacher seems to be trying to hide the look of deep satisfaction on his face at being the one who’s made it happen.
Harry watches the little battered thing nibbling shyly at the pieces of meat covered in jelly, and it makes him feel like crying for some reason. Ben fixes the most immediate damage to the bathroom before sitting cross-legged at his back. “Are you sure you’re okay?” he asks quietly.
“Yeah,” Harry breathes out. It’s the best euphemism for ’I don’t know’ he can think of. “I have a session with Diane tomorrow,” he adds, and it seems to be enough for Ben.
“Okay,” he whispers, pressing his lips to Harry’s hair.
It’s always difficult to decide how much of it is exclusively his own thing and how much should be their thing, but Ben doesn’t need every tiny detail. He’s content with knowing that even when he can’t be there for Harry, someone else is. Which is good. He knows that what he has on his mind today would be a touchy subject.
“You know what,” Ben says out of the blue before moving towards the cat once it’s clear she’s done eating. His hands look huge around her body when he keeps her from scratching her ear and strokes her back softly until it arches. When she seems fully sold on what’s going on, he picks her up gently and deposits her on Harry’s lap.
He blinks down at her as she circles several times before plopping down, curling up into a little ball and promptly starting to purr. Whatever this magic is, it’s working.
“So what do we do now?” he whispers so he doesn’t disturb her after several minutes of distracted petting.
“We look after her while the doctor puts her back on her feet, and in the meantime, we search for the owners,” Ben tells him, looking smug by the way Harry’s whole body has sagged under her spell. “She’s way too friendly. She must be domesticated.”
Harry can’t even express how much he hates this plan. “If we can’t find them, we should keep her,” he says immediately so there are no doubts regarding his stance on the matter. “Actually, we should keep her even if we find them. They’re clearly irresponsible.” Ben gives him a knowing, indulgent look and is about to protest, but Harry continues, “We need to introduce her to Ziggy.”
“We’re most certainly not going to do that,” Ben says firmly. “She’s only been here for an hour. Let’s try not to retraumatise her already.”
Harry shrugs, conceding. Ben’s probably right. He wouldn’t trust himself to be put in charge of a damaged little thing like her, but Ben’s a pro at taking care of damaged things. He’s got this, and in the meantime, Harry can just sit here and pet her.