Power He Knows Not

Distracted Dissonance

Harry felt horrible; his muscles ached, his head was pounding, and his scar was throbbing so badly the feeling was pulsing across his right eye.

There were whispers all around him as well,

"...could've died..."

"...lucky the ground was soft..."

"...lucky Dumbledore was there..."

"...why'd they have to turn up?"

"Most likely in their nature. The horrid things..."

Harry became aware of the deep cold that was filling his insides, chilling his core.

He tried to remember what had happened.

He had been in the Room of Requirement... that strange 'vision' of the two Riddles... he had woken briefly, filled with that unspeakable pain like last June... he recalled stumbling from the room, across the hall, and into a small passage that would take him past the infirmary... then nothing.

Well, not exactly nothing; he had strange memories of a greenhouse, and a familiar voice speaking to him soothingly. Encouragingly. He found an odd safety in the voice, though he did not remember to whom it belonged.

Refocusing on the voices currently speaking, he listened; finally recognizing most of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, as well as Hermione. From the snippets he heard, it sounded like he had fallen off his broom during a thunderstorm, and Dementors had turned up?

It hadn't been storming Halloween.

Harry struggled to open his eyes, which were heavy with exhaustion, the right one still aching.

"Guys, he's waking up!"

Harry shifted, feeling the stiff, but comfortable, mattress that was in the hospital wing.

The voices hushed, as he finally pried open his eyelids.

The slender blob topped with red was Ron sitting next to his bed, Hermione's recognizable blurry orb of brown hair next to him. On the other side a wash of red and gold was the Quidditch team, standing close enough that they blended together into one mass of colors.

The blur of Ron shifted as Harry slowly pushed himself upright, a fuzzy hand shape offering him the blurry form of his glasses.

Harry starred at the offering for a solid minute, before it registered in his brain, and he accepted the glasses, sliding them on.

His friends came into focus, the white, barren hospital wing recognizable behind them.

"How are you feeling?" Hermione asked gently, a worried frown knitting her eyebrows together.

He felt strangely empty, like something was missing, but he didn't know what.

"I'm alright, a bit achy. What happened?"

They all shared a look, before Angelina spoke,

"Dementors showed up to the game. It was raining so hard we almost missed when you fell. The Hufflepuff beaters were close enough, they managed to catch you while Dumbledore drove the Dementors off."

"We were all so worried when you wouldn't wake up!" Katie Bell burst out, pale beneath the mud that covered her head to foot, "Madam Pomfrey only just let us in to see you. She insisted we let you rest, but we had to make sure you were alright."

Harry frowned, unconsciously tilting his head as he thought about what they'd said.

Game? Flying. But the first match wasn't for another week. How could he have flown in a game that hadn't happened yet? Unless he'd hit his head when he fell. But he felt he should at least remember something of the past week, had a week really passed. And the first match of the year was nearly always Gryffindor vs. Slytherin. Why would they be playing Hufflepuff?