Harry managed to push his featureless head through the roof, but his shoulders got stuck. He thrashed, but there was a supporting beam of wood blocking Harry’s path out. He sank back down and grabbed the wooden beam tightly with his strong arms and unhinged his jaw. He closed his mouth onto the beam and began to shake his head to saw away at the beam with his sharp teeth. After a few seconds of violently whipping his head from side to side, Harry’s jaws closed with the crunch of splintering wood.
Harry twisted and pushed his shoulder through the gap he had made in the ceiling. It was still a little tight fit out, but with a few more tugs Harry freed himself so he lay sprawled on the shattered stairs. There was a creak at the top of the stairs and Harry’s featureless gray head snapped around. There standing at the top of the stairs was a trembling Dudley, something wet running down his leg.
Harry decided to get some payback for all the years of bullying. Luckily, Dudley’s soul was pitifully small, so Harry didn’t even have the smallest desire to consume it. Harry extended himself to his full height so he had to hunch to not hit the ceiling. He took a step forward up the stairs, his long legs closing the distance between him and Dudley in almost a single step. Dudley shivered, but seeing Harry moving, he started screaming and turned to run. Harry took another step and wrapped his hands around Dudley’s fat torso and lifted him into the air.
Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia emerged from their bedroom and froze in fear as they saw Harry unhinge his massive jaws and bring Dudley up to Harry’s head as if he was going to take a big bite out of a sandwich. Harry put Dudley inside his mouth and carefully closed his mouth so his teeth were just around the thrashing and screaming boy. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia started screaming and running for their lives, leaving Dudley to die.
How in character.
Harry kept Dudley hovering there unharmed between his jaws for a few seconds before opening his jaws wide again and pulling Dudley back out. Harry carefully placed him back on the ground. Dudley was white as chalk and he was still trembling as he kept his eyes on Harry. He was a little slimy from Harry’s saliva, Harry hadn’t even realized he still salivated in this form. But he hadn’t even left a bruise on Dudley from what he could see.
Harry thought him and Dudley were probably even now. All of Dudley's years of bullying Harry had come due with one big payment of fear. But with his revenge done, it was time for Harry to escape. Harry fell to all fours and charged back down the stairs to crash through the front of the house in a shoulder tackle with an explosion of cracking wood and cloud of wood splinters. There was an unfamiliar wizard standing there in the street pointing his trembling wand at Harry as Harry shook off bits of wood and made his way to his feet.
“Lu-Lumos!” The man cried and Harry hissed as the light somehow burned him. Was this one of his weaknesses in this form as a, undead? Or whatever he was. Harry turned and dashed down the street at his full loping speed. Harry passed through the barrier and felt it trying to press in on Harry’s mind, to put him to sleep. But Harry’s body was able to resist it now, so Harry kept pushing through and continued his full charge speed. After a hundred meters, the force went away.
A trio of souls much larger than Dudley's suddenly appeared in front of Harry in the distance. Harry mentally squinted, but he couldn’t see the bodies they were attached to. A red stunner suddenly shot from the spot where the center soul floated. Harry threw himself to the side to avoid the spell and rolled across the ground a few times as he failed to redirect his momentum.
More spells came from the invisible trio as their souls suddenly shifted positions to surround Harry on all sides. Harry realized that the souls must belong to the wizards that had been guarding him and keeping him prisoner. The fourth apparated directly behind Harry and Harry hesitated for a moment before dashing in between two perfectly manicured lawns and picturesque white houses.
Harry kept running until he reached the road on the opposite side of the houses. This town was heavily built up so there was no forest or woodland for Harry to hide in. Only roads and more white houses and manicured lawns. Harry turned and began running off.
This process happened four more times, Harry running forward at his top speed until the group apparated directly in front of him and cast a barrage of spells to damage him before Harry managed to redirect himself and run in another direction. Harry was taking damage bit by bit as he went and knew he would eventually go down if this continued. Harry… would have to fight.
Next time they blocked Harry’s way, he didn’t stop moving. When they apparated into a circle around him, Harry shifted to the closest soul floating in the air. It didn’t move for a second, fast enough for Harry to clasp his hands around the woman’s small form. She raised her wand to cast a spell as her invisibility disappeared as soon as Harry grabbed her. Harry shook her hard and she dropped her wand on the ground in surprise before she could cast anything. Harry lifted his foot and crushed the wand laying on the ground under his heel with a burst of magic sparks.
Harry looked at the woman and realized something very important. Salazar’s translation ritual was still working. Harry could communicate even when in this form. Harry felt the switch, and he moved his undead mouth a little opened and closed sort of like a fish with its gills for a few moments. But somehow Harry’s words still came out in English.
“Stop attacking me,” Harry said, “I don’t want to kill any of you, but I will if you force me to.”
“Se-sentient undead?!” The woman said. She raised her voice and screamed to her three supposedly invisible companions in desperation, “Run! Call the Ministry, screw the mission! It is a sentient undead!”
Harry shifted his grip on the woman so he was only holding her legs. He swung her body low and whipped her sideways so she spun in the air. Harry thought it was similar to skipping a stone on a pond. The woman hit the pavement and bounced and rolled as she went the opposite way that Harry was going. Hopefully one of the wizards would go back to treat her wounds, taking another of them out of the fight. At the woman’s words one of the souls had disappeared, to alert the Ministry no doubt. That left two wizards left until Harry could make a clean escape before they returned.
Harry tried to dive in and catch one of them the same as he had done to the woman to snap their wands, but they knew he could see them now so effectively dodged Harry’s clumsy grabs. The longer that Harry stayed here the more likely the ministry would descend on this place with full force to kill Harry.
Just as Harry thought all was lost, a comforting coldness washed over him as the others shivered and their disillusionment charms wore off. Two beings came floating down from the sky wearing big black coats to conceal what Harry could see underneath were skeletal gray arms. Harry leapt forward and pounced on what he realized was a wizard as he lifted him into the air and shook him hard the same as the woman from before. The man made a better attempt to hold his wand, but even he dropped it when Harry shook him from side to side violently. Harry wound up and tossed the man behind him and watched in satisfaction as he skipped off the concrete road. Harry hunted around for the wand on the ground for a few seconds before stomping it in fragments as well.
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“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” the last woman bellowed as Harry turned to her. A blue glowing eagle shot out of her wand and launched itself at the two figures that had been floating towards her with their large cloaks. It flew forward and struck at one of the figures, and it was forced back. The cloaked figure let out an angry screech as the second one rushed towards the woman, skeletal gray arms extended towards her as it flew forward.
The glowing eagle tried to turn back, but it was still too busy fighting off the first creature. Harry turned to run, as the cloaked figure and the woman began grappling with each other for a moment. But then the woman’s soul shifted in her body in the corner of Harry’s vision. He turned in confusion to see the woman spasming weakly, her blue eagle dissipating. The cloaked figure was latching its lamprey-like circular mouth to the woman's lips. Harry saw the cloaked figure twitch and the woman’s soul shifted upwards until it was now slowly climbing her esophagus.
Was this thing another one of the soul eater, like Harry?
Staring at it, the language this creature used was very strange compared to even the languages of the Phoenix or Basilisk.
Harry opened his jaws and spoke.
‘What are you doing to her? Why are you here?’ he asked.
The cloaked figure stopped extracting the woman’s soul and drew back and turned to Harry. The hood of its cloak fell back and revealed a featureless stretch of unbroken gray skin much like Harry’s own head. But where Harry’s mouth was long and thin, this creature had a circular mouth covering most of the lower portion of its face. It casually let go of the unconscious woman and she fell to the floor limp as her soul snapped back to its proper position in her chest.
‘You speak?! What are you?’ the figure replied as the other one floated down next to the one that had been attacking the woman.
‘I’m Harry Potter,’ he replied, ‘Look, I have to get out of here. The ministry is coming soon and I have to flee before they find me. I’ve been locked up for a while. Do you know anywhere I could go?’
The one that attacked the woman turned to the other one briefly before looking back.
‘Come back with us! Can you fly? We have a nice little island where the humans give us some snacks as long as we don’t eat them all at once,' the one that attacked the woman said.
Harry shook his head, ‘No, sorry. I can’t fly.’
‘Oh, okay. We’ll lift you!’ it responded, ‘C’mon, 104. We can lift it if we both do it.’
Another deeper voice echoed in Harry’s head, ‘Grrrrr, 235. You know we’re supposed to bring it to the humans. You shouldn’t have tried to eat that snack, you know how upset the humans get about it.’
‘I know, but just look at it,’ 235 replied, ‘It’s so pretty, we can’t let the humans just kill it. You know how they are.’
Harry listened in confusion at the conversation and inspected himself. 235 thought that he was pretty? Well, he supposed he did look similar to these creatures. That reminded him,
‘Sorry, but what species are you two?' He asked, 'I’ve never met another creature that can eat souls like I do.’
‘We are Dementors,’ 104 said, ‘You eat souls? Prove it and I’ll help you get out of here. Here, consume the human there…’
104 gestured to the unconscious woman. Harry shook his head, ‘I don’t want to, she didn’t do anything to me. Well, not anything worth murder. I shouldn’t just kill her for no reason.’
‘Grrrrrrr, like humans,’ 104 grumbled, ‘So picky. 235! Go find a really tiny snack.’
‘Sure, 104! Oh, look there’s one sleeping in a tree!’
235 darted forward and stuck its gray hand into a snarl of branches and retrieved a thrashing squirrel from inside. 235 floated over to Harry and presented the animal to Harry, who accepted it instinctively in his large hands.
104 and 235 floated there and stared at him for a moment as Harry just held the thrashing squirrel in place.
‘Go, eat it!’ 104 said grumpily, ‘look at its soul, so tiny. Even stupid humans wouldn’t feel bad about eating that one.’
Harry looked down at the squirrel and saw that its soul really was tiny. Even smaller than the soul that had been attached to Tom Riddle’s diary. Harry glanced between the two dementors and the dark street. The ministry would be here at any moment, and Harry would likely be killed. Or he could go with these Dementors, who seemed friendly to him, if a bit ruthless, and survive.
Sorry, little buddy. Harry thought as he put the squirrel in his mouth and crunched down. After a second or two, Harry swallowed and the squirrel’s soul was swallowed the instant it touched his stomach.
‘Wow! A real soul eater!’ 235 cheered, ‘You’ll like our island. We’ll make sure to keep you away from humans, it will be a lot of fun to introduce everyone to someone new.’
‘Worry about that later, 235,’ 104 scolded, ‘Let’s lift it.’
Harry considered turning back into his human form so he would be smaller, but quickly rejected the idea. Who knew how tasty Harry’s massive soul would look to them if he looked like a human? They might attack him like they had that woman.
Each of the dementors grabbed under one of Harry’s armpits and with a grunt Harry lifted into the air with them. Harry tried to not look down as they rapidly ascended into the clouds. The ground was very far away right now. There was some jostling as the two dementors bickered with each other on the best way to hold Harry aloft, but after a few seconds they started flying quickly and the ground below them started to blur. The wind whipped at Harry’s body but without physical eyes he wasn’t forced to squint. Harry opened his unhinged jaw wide and enjoyed the sensation of wind running over his black gums as they flew.
This… was kind of fun. Better than even the feeling of being on a broom. Although still a little nerve wracking as the Dementors could drop him at any point if they wanted to. Hopefully the dementors island was as nice as the babbling 235 seemed to think it was. Although Harry still wasn’t sure he liked soul eating. Eating the book had been fine, especially after Harry had heard how evil it was. But that squirrel hadn’t done anything wrong. Even if it was tasty… Maybe getting the opinion of the dementors on ethical soul eating wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.
After all, not all of them could be happy feeding on sentient creatures, right?
Right?