Harriet Potter: Galar Adventure

The energy within the castle seemed to increase as each day in October saw them steadily marching closer to Halloween. October had never held much significance for Harri outside of it being the month where she met Ghost. During her time in the Wild Area, what the actual date was was meaningless and the years before that weren’t even worth thinking about. Her time in Ballonlea had changed that. Their Halloween festival was a sight to behold; lanterns, fairy lights, and glowing mushrooms adorned the streets as pop up stalls sold themed treats and trinkets. People and pokémon in costumes were everywhere having a fun time trying to guess who was who. Harri appreciated that, even though it was a fun festival, they had an altar set up to remember those that had passed. Opal had explained to her that Halloween had originally been a celebration of the summer harvest being finished and that the costumes and bonfires were to ward off ghosts. Over time, it had morphed into the celebration it was in more modern times and the warding aspect had shifted into remembrance of the departed (what better time to think fondly of missed friends and relatives then a day when the barrier between the living and dead was so thin).

It was a bit of a culture shock to learn that the rest of Galar (outside of Ballonlea and Stow-on-Side and a few other places) treated the holiday as a celebration of the defeat of Purity V, Team Purity’s leader. Halloween became a slightly toned down version of the frenzied revelry that had occurred when the news had broken. To the adults that had lived through a terrifying and bloody war the holiday was an anniversary to be celebrated and to the younger generation it an excuse to host or attend large festive gatherings and stuff themselves with sweets. Harri missed the cozy atmosphere of Ballonlea more and more each day her fellow students bombarded her with candy and well wishes. She did her best to ignore it, but her normally non-existent temper was starting to be worn thin. It didn’t help that she’d gotten a message from Mr. Grimly to inform her that the start of a new wave of letters and ‘gratitude gifts’ had arrived and been promptly stored into the very large storage vault that she was dreading having to sort through. Her friends were being supportive, they all assumed she was in a mood because the anniversary of her parents being killed was coming up and she was surrounded by people excited to celebrate and thanking her for something she’s readily admitted to not doing (because how ridiculous is it that practically all of Galar believes she somehow managed to defeat Purity V as a literal baby). It was nice to have them by her side, but it was the occasional pitying looks she got from them and from many of the Professors that further chipped away at her patience.

Yes, she was sad that she’d never get to know her parents, but at the same time it wasn’t them that she missed. It would be different if she’d actually known them, but as it was she had no memories of them. The void they left was impersonal, an ache of missed opportunity more than anything else. Harri had people she cared about, people that had stepped in to fill the void left by her parents. Allister and Marnie were her siblings, Arcturus was a Grandfatherly figure, Riley was an older cousin, and Opal meant more to her than she could ever describe. It was hard being so far from them for the first time since they’d become her family. She wanted to distract herself from her mopey feelings, but didn’t want to be around people. Thankfully classes were over for the day (why they just hadn’t been canceled was beyond her, no one had been paying attention to anything in their excitement for the imminent Halloween Feast) and she was free to wander the vast castle grounds. Earlier exploration had resulted in the discovery of an out of the way training spot part of the way around the Black Lake and just within a copse of trees on the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest. It was out of the way enough to keep most people from stumbling on her while still being close enough to see the castle (and as she was still on the grounds and wasn’t technically in the Forbidden Forest she wasn’t breaking any rules).

Harri warmed up with Ghost, Dreepy, and Ponyta before settling into training. They were working on Dreepy’s speed and evasion (something he’d need for when they started competing in Pokéringer matches) and Ghost and Ponyta’s battling experience. While they participated in a mock-battle, Dreepy would fly around their attacks and try to grab a bandanna that was tied around their neck and horn respectively. They’d been training for a little more than an hour when a Crobat flew in and circled them once before heading back in the direction of the castle. Harri returned Dreepy and Ponyta, after complimenting them for their hard work, and started walking back towards the castle with Ghost. They were part of the way back around the lake when the Crobat swooped back into view with Professor Snape not far behind.

“What, precisely, do you think you’re doing out here, Potter?” His dark eyes boring into her like they always did.

“Training, Sir.”

“Training.” He drawled. “Loose track of time did you? How else could you have managed to be missing when the rest of the House gathered to head up to the feast.” She scuffed her foot while glaring at the ground. “Well? What do you have to say for yourself?”

“I was trying to avoid having to go to the feast, Sir. Everyone’s been staring at me and coming up to shake my hand and the bank’s been sending me weekly reports of all the ruddy thank you and condolence gifts or whatever that people won’t stop sending me. And it's ridiculous! I didn’t even do anything, but people don’t wanna hear that and I …” She’d been getting more and more worked up as words Harri hadn’t meant to say continued to pour out. “I miss Ballonlea.” She ended in a miserable whisper as Ghost leaned against her.

“I did not realize you were feeling like this.” Her teacher finally spoke.

“I don’t want anyone’s pity.” She mumbled. “People are allowed to be happy and celebrate if they want. I just wanted some space and to not have to deal with people for a while.” Harri avoided his eyes while focusing on petting Ghost.

“You do not have to attend the feast. Take the evening to relax with your team; I will arrange for dinner to be brought to your room.” She gaped at him for a moment before Ghost nudged her.

“Thank you, Professor.” He nodded at her before turning with a dramatic swish of his cloak and started leading her back to the castle. While he quickly entered the Great Hall, where the thunderous noise from the feast was billowing out, she quickly walked past only to have to stop when Ghost veered to go down a side hallway instead of down towards the dungeon.

“Ghost?” His ears were twitching in the way they did when he was detecting something instead of hearing it.

“Umbreon.”

“Alright, lead the way.” Ghost confidently made his way through the castle and after a brief direction check brought her to a girls bathroom.

“Um umbreon.” He confirmed. With a shrug Harri opened the door and walked in. A sniffling sound immediately cut off as her presence was noticed by whoever was hiding out in here to cry.

“Uhm, are you ok?” Harri hesitantly asked.

“Go away!” a wobbly sounding voice snapped back. “Just leave me alone.” She gave a hopeless look to Ghost, but he just made himself comfortable.

“I would, but it seems my partner has decided that this is where he wants to take a nap and making him move feels mean.” There was a kind of confused silence that Harri desperately searched her mind for a way to fill before it got awkward (or more awkward than it already was). “Are you feeling homesick too? I didn’t want to deal with the feast because it’s just so different from how we celebrate Halloween at home, so I snuck out to train and I was going to go back to my dorm, but then Ghost brought me here and now I’m talking too much.” She finally got her babbling under control, ears burning in embarrassment. By Arceus, she didn’t know what she was doing, but it looked like something she said worked because the closed door stall unlocked and opened to reveal a tear-stained face nearly hidden within a very recognizable mane of curly hair. “Granger, right?”

“Yes. What did you mean when you asked if I was also feeling homesick?” Harri rubbed the back of her neck and focused on Ghost.

“Oh, well, Halloween isn’t as much of a party back home. We do have a celebration, games and costumes and treats and things, but there’s also an altar to remember loved ones who’ve passed. And everyone here was staring at me or acting like I was the guest of honor or something. It just hit me how different things were and I didn’t want to deal with it. What about you?” The other girl scowled.

“I tried to assist Weasley in class and he blew up at me, said some very unkind things, and I don’t know why I thought things would be different here. I didn’t have friends in Primary, too focused on learning about pokémon and doing well, but it was supposed to be different at Hogwarts. It’s a top trainer school! I figured everyone would be just as driven to learn and do well as I am, but it's the same as before.”

“I didn’t have friends in Primary either.” Harri admitted into the tense silence.

“You- but how? You’re Harriet Potter! Who wouldn’t want to be your friend?”

“I was the weird kid in a small town. Pokémon were easier for me to be around than people. I spent all my free time studying for the license test and playing with wild pokémon.” It was uncomfortable sharing this much, but Ghost had brought her here for a reason and she was going to do her best to help the other girl. They were actually a lot alike. She jumped up so she could sit on the edge of one of the sinks and kick her legs back and forth.

“But it seems like everyone wants to be your friend.” Granger said suspiciously.

“Yeah,” Harri felt her mouth twitch towards a grimace, “but they want to be friends with Harriet Potter, the ‘Girl-Who-Lived’, and I’m just Harri. I know Millie’s, Millicent Bulstrode’s, cousin. She told us both about the other, so it was easy for us to bond once we finally met. Millie and some of the other Slytherins have been helping me parse out who actually wants to be friends from who just wants to get close to me because of my ‘status’. ”

“Oh. I never thought of it like that.” 

Harri snorted. “Most don’t, but enough of that. What did Ron say to make you want to spend the evening holed up in here?” A dark look returned to Granger’s face.

“He said I was a nightmare and that I didn’t have any friends. I know I don’t have friends, but I was only trying to help him!” 

“Ron has, uh, issues, when it comes to getting help with schoolwork.” Harri admitted, hoping Ron wouldn’t be too mad at her for sharing this. “He’s got five older brothers, see, and they’ve all done great things, but Ron is the one who’s going to take over the gym. He feels like if he doesn’t do everything on his own, prove that he’s just as good as, if not better than, his brothers, that he’s failing. It’s not an excuse for what he said, that was totally uncalled for and he should know better, but it might explain why he exploded on you.” She took a deep breath before continuing. “I know that I sometimes miss social cues. A friend from home thinks it's because I spent so much time alone or surrounded by pokémon. Ron might have been trying to subtly tell you to back off and you missed it maybe? I don’t know, people are weird.” Great, now her ears were burning again. At least Granger was looking thoughtful instead of insulted.

“That could be possible, but I don’t know how to go about making it so that it doesn't happen again.”

“My friend said that ‘real world experience’ with people around to help explain social cues so you can start picking them up yourself is the best way to learn. My friends and I have been thinking about starting a study group to help me get more comfortable with being around more people. I could ask if you could join us?”

“Oh, would you?” Granger practically beamed.

“Sure, it shouldn’t …” she trailed off as Ghost suddenly jumped to his feet. His entire body was stiff and focused at the door and she could easily pick up on his rising tension. Something was coming, something big. “Granger, we should go. Somethings-” And then the bathroom door exploded inwards.

*             *             *             *           *            *

Hermione had been so excited the day she’d received her acceptance letter to Hogwarts Academy of Pokémon Training and Aura. Only the best of the best, and of those only the ones with a decent potential to have and use aura, were accepted (outside of legacy students as it turned out, but even they had to work to maintain a certain academic success) into its hallowed halls. School, although interesting, had been lonely for her. The prospect of being surrounded by high achieving academics and learning to be top trainers together, to actually have friends, had been all she could think of since receiving her letter. But it turned out that even a top trainer school was still just school.

Most of the kids in her year already had friends that they’d known for years (and new students were quickly absorbed into groups) and a majority of her peers were put off by her intelligence and eagerness to learn. Hermione didn’t even have the benefit of being able to boast about being the best in all their classes like she could in the past. Neville was the best in their year with Herbology, Harriet Potter was so far beyond all of them in Aura Use and History it was almost scary, and all of the kids who were related or connected to gyms and the gym leaders in some way were advanced in parts of B.A.S. and Pokémon Care and Biology. Hermione was constantly pushing herself to do better and just couldn’t understand why her year mates weren’t doing the same. She’d try to help and they’d blow her off or get mad. With Ron Weasley’s mean words today it had all gotten to be too much and she’d locked herself in the first floor girls bathroom. She hadn’t wanted to face the rest of the school during the feast, everyone was going to be celebrating while all Hermione wanted to do was go home.

Hermione wasn’t quite prepared for the bundle of sincerity and awkwardness that was Harriet Potter attempting to comfort her (and wasn’t it interesting that the books and news reports always painted her as highly open and charismatic, a real people's person as it were). She hadn’t been expecting Harriet to invite her to join a prospective study group and she certainly hadn’t been expecting to suddenly get tackled to the floor when the bathroom’s door exploded inwards.

“Granger, get down!” A powerful beam burned into the stone above them. “Ghost, Snarl!” Harriet’s Umbreon, blue rings shining brightly, leapt in front of them with a sinister snarl aimed at the hulking figure forcing its way through the already damaged doorway. Harri jumped to her feet and started shouting battle commands to her pokémon. Umbreon was performing admirably, dashing back and forth while firing off attacks, but the giant pokémon was so enraged that nothing was phasing it. Hermione could only get glimpses of it through the smoke, glowing lights, and energy bursts, but what she could see was what looked like blue gray stone and strange red glowing markings.

“Gol!” It bellowed before a fist as large as she was just barely missed slamming into Umbreon. The sudden change in air pressure blew the smoke filled air away and finally revealed the face of their attacker.

“That’s a Golurk!” Hermione shouted.

“Yeah, but what’s it doing here!? And why’s it attacking us!? All I can feel from it is rage!”

“The seal on its chest is missing!” she gasped. Harriet cursed. Apparently the other girl was just as aware of how bad that was (it was well documented after all that the seal was necessary to contain Golurk’s massive power).

“Dreepy! Fly around its face to distract it.” Her second pokémon appeared and immediately started making a nuisance of itself by harrying the Golurk. “Ghost, use Psychic and seal up that crack!”

“Umbreon!” The dark type glowed as it compressed some of the knocked loose rubble into a rudimentary seal. With Dreepy keeping the Golurk’s attention it wasn’t long until the perfect moment to attach the seal presented itself. The moment the seal hit Golurk it froze before slumping to the ground.

“Go lurk…” Its body glowed as the seal slowly shifted from patched together rubble into the proper seal normally seen on Golurk and the red patterns on its body faded into the usual light yellow. They both stood there panting into the sudden silence. Hermione shivered as the oppressive power she hadn’t realized had been pressing on them lifted.

“Is it …”

“It’s just asleep. You alright, Granger?”

“Yes. Your pokémon?” The other girl took a moment to run her hands over her partners.

“Tired, but not hurt. We got very lucky.” Before Hermione could respond, footsteps echoed from the doorway and several professors appeared.

“Oh my goodness! What in Arceus are the two of you doing here?” Professor McGonagall yelled. “Tell me you weren’t so stupid as to seek out an out of control Golurk instead of returning to your dormitories with the others like Headmaster Dumbledore ordered!?” Hermione shared a confused look with Harri.

“I’m afraid you’re mistaken Professor, the Golurk was the one that found us in here. Professor Snape gave me permission to spend the feast in my dorm and Ghost brought me here because he sensed that Granger was feeling homesick and could use some company.” Hermione nodded vigorously to confirm what Harri said.

“I will be confirming this with Professor Snape to–” she started, only to cut herself off as the man himself suddenly appeared.

“No need, Minerva. Potter is telling the truth.” He fixed the girls with a hard stare. “It seems as though they were merely in the wrong place at the wrong time.” Hermione slumped in relief; they weren’t going to get in trouble.

“Very well. 5 points to each of you, for sheer dumb luck.” The professors gathered around the unconscious Golurk and began discussing what to do with it. Hermione flinched as a weight settled on her head. Looking up she noticed it was Harriet’s Dreepy.

“Sorry about him,” the other girl gently plucked the ghost dragon up and held him close with one arm, the other was resting on her Umbreon’s head. “If you’re still up for it, I can let you know when the study group gets up and running?” Hermione blinked at her for a moment. After all of that, she was still able to think about the study group? Maybe they were more alike than Hermione had thought.

“I’d like that.” She smiled.

“Excellent. Feel free to call me Harri.”

“Only if you call me Hermione.”

*             *             *             *           *            *

Harri had meant what she’d said to Hermione about having trouble understanding other people, especially those her own age. It was easy with pokémon as thanks to her abundant and overdeveloped aura she could feel what pokémon felt and receive impressions from them to aid in communication. Humans also have aura, but compared to her pokémon friends it was much more difficult to read except for particularly strong (and relatively simple) emotions. There was also the fact that she’d spent so little time around people her own age, both before and after going to live in the Wild Area. It was different with Opal. She had clearly understood that Harri was different from other children (not many kids ran away at the tender age of 7 and succeeded in not meeting an untimely demise) and had done her best to make her feel at ease. Even after Harri had grown used to Opal, the woman had made sure to slowly decrease her grandmotherly persona around her until she could recognize when it was being used (if Opal had suddenly dropped the persona Harri knew she likely would have panicked and fled). Her mentor also never treated her like a simple child. She valued Harri’s opinion and respected her intelligence. Riley was similar although he definitely treated her like a younger sibling outside of their lessons. 

Allister and Marnie had been her first human friends. Allister had been the one to suggest that Harri had trouble recognizing social cues because she hadn’t been exposed to them for so long (something that was relatable for him as he avoided people whenever possible) and Marnie had taken it upon herself to try to explain and point them out to her (something made difficult by Allister being just as strange as Harri herself was and Marnie, like them, wasn’t eager to expand their circle to include more people). Harri was beyond thankful that Marnie had had the foresight to mention what she’d been trying to do with Millie. Now her new friend had recruited some of their year mates to assist and while her recognition of subtle signals was still spotty she was getting better at responding to the ones she did catch. It had been rather spur of the moment to invite Hermione to the study group she’d been planning on starting, but it felt right after hearing that the other girl might be having similar troubles.

“Do you think we should have set days to meet?” she asked the small group around her.

“I think we need to determine what we want the study group to accomplish first.”  Daphne suggested. “If we only want to review for tests and end of year exams then we’ll not be meeting very often. On the other hand if we want to finish homework together then we might as well just stay in the common room for a few hours each evening.”

“But students from other houses can’t get into the common rooms of other houses without being invited in, so if we want to expand the pool of talent to draw from we can’t expect to meet extremely often or in a location not accessible to students from other houses.” Blaise drummed his fingers on the table in contemplation.

“We could try for weekly meetings with at least one member from each of the other houses.” The blond girl looked thoughtful. “That way we won’t be monopolizing anyone and if something difficult comes up the non-Slytherins can invite someone from their house to assist.” Harri shared an amused look with Millie. It seemed like Daphne and Blaise were going to plan the entire thing for them.

“Who do you want to invite Harri? This entire thing is kind of your party and out of all of us you’re the only one who’s had any real friendly interactions with our year mates in the other houses.” Tracey chirped. Harri felt her face twitch as it struggled to choose between a grimace and a smile. While it was true that she’d had rather good luck in making a friend out of Hermione and maintaining a tentative friendship with Ron, the other students had mixed feelings about her. There were several who only saw her fame and wished to get closer to her for it and there were many others that knew nothing except for rumors about what she was like and found the actual her lacking (she’d even had some people be angry that she’d been sorted into Slytherin instead of Gryffindor like her parents, they treated something that wasn’t their business like it was a personal betrayal). 

But despite her mixed bag of luck, it was still more than her year mates in Slytherin could boast. It was extremely common for ‘old’ families to try and forge associations with each other and use their children as tools in that endeavor (that and old friends introduced their children in hopes of continuing old alliances into new generations). She’d learned from Ron that different political factions tried to keep their groups strong by having their children bond. Her friends in Slytherin had known each other for years before attending the school, but for those same reasons they had been slightly isolated from the rest of their peers. Being related to a gym family meant they were all aware of who each other was, but opportunities to really connect were few and far between if their families weren’t already connected in some way. So in addition to her friends not having had the opportunity to get close to the others in their year, they also suffered from the biased belief that Slytherin produced ‘evil inclined’ trainers. Harri was their best bet of finding someone from the other houses to join their group.

“I want to invite Hermione Granger from Ravenclaw and Ron Weasley from Gryffindor. She seems smart, very research inclined, just needs a little push to consider different methods and points of view. Ron has a rather large desire to accomplish things to put him above his brothers; that kind of drive could be helpful.”

“What about Hufflepuff?” Millie asked.

“They tend to travel in large groups,” Daphne mused. “It might be difficult to isolate one to ask.”

“I was thinking about Neville Longbottom actually. I know he and Ron know each other and Hermione helped him out on the ferry ride. Ron could ask him to join us and he can bring other Hufflepuffs if he wants to. Neville seems too nice to tolerate anyone that’s judgmental.” The others seemed to think about what she’d suggested before nodding in agreement. They spent another few minutes discussing details before they had to head back to the common room before curfew.

*             *             *             *           *            *

Harri breathed heavily while wiping sweat from her forehead before it could drip into her eyes. The Slytherin Royal Raid team certainly didn’t pull their punches while training. Each of the Royal Raid teams had their own unique strategies: Gryffindor was about overwhelming strength (their current captain, Oliver Wood, apparently had then operating like a well kept machine), Ravenclaw was all about tactics (combination moves and special or secondary effects were their speciality), Hufflepuff focused on defense (keeping their pokémon’s health high while taking advantage of their opponents and the dynamaxed pokémon wearing each other out), and Slytherin had perfected the art of bending the rules (wide area of effect moves and carefully practiced techniques allowed them to damage other opponents besides their intended targets). She and Draco were the youngest ones at the practice and ended up in a tentative alliance (even though she found his arrogance and sense of entitlement annoying and he was frustrated by being unable to get a rise out of her) in order to not get taken out by the older and more experienced students. In a typical Royal Raid battle there were four max battlers, who could only attack the dynamax pokémon, two beaters, who could attack everything except the dynamax pokémon, and one flex battler, who could attack the beaters and the dynamax pokémon and were the only ones allowed to capture the dynamax pokémon.

The Slytherin team took things a step further and trained specifically to do as much damage to everything in their surroundings as a ‘side effect’ of their attacks. Beaters couldn’t attack the dynamax pokémon, but their attacks could hit a target and then go ‘off target’ to also hit the dynamax pokémon and flex battlers could use the same tactic to ‘accidentally’ do damage to the max battlers. A move could come from anywhere at any time, so keeping a sharp eye out was a must. The first few practices were hard. Harri and Ghost, while skilled in evasive maneuvers, hadn’t had to deal with the sheer volume of attacks being thrown around and had never tried to ‘scatter’ the effect of their attacks before. It took time, but they were starting to get the hang of angling their moves to ‘burst’ the attack. 

Pokéringer practices were less intense, but just as satisfying. While not as fast as some of the flying types yet, Dreepy more than made up for it with the classic unpredictability of movement inherent to ghost types. Even though pokéringer wasn’t a team sport the practices were still held separately by each house. Hogwarts typically held two pokéringer tournaments each year, one in the end of november and one in early april, for which each house would conduct matches until they had a top four to comprise the school’s top 16. Harri didn’t think she and Dreepy would be taking first place anytime soon; they always gave it their all, but the upper years had the advantage of higher leveled and more experienced pokémon. 

It was all great training though (and thank Arceus for that, B.A.S. was still proving to be mostly useless) and between the practices and the study group Harri found herself decently occupied. The moments of downtime she had were often spent in the secluded clearing she’d visited on Halloween just spending time with all her pokémon. Sometimes she just needed to be alone with them and nature. November practically flew by (she and Dreepy came in second in their 4v4 Pokéringer elimination bracket) and as they muddled through December (Harri did not appreciate how cold it was getting) everyone turned to eagerly anticipating the winter holidays. Despite hearing about how magical the castle looked during the break, Ballonlea and the Glimwood Tangle were calling to her. This was the longest Harri had been away from home and she was more than ready to go.