V-023, homunculus-adjacent lab experiment (Harry Potter)
I am an unnatural being. A construct of magic and will instead of flesh and bone.
I bleed red blood, and I have the muscles humans tend to have - I am completely identical to a human being. My form ages of typical human ranges, and my form will fail me at typical human ranges.
But I am not human.
Even if it wasn't instinctive knowledge - once upon a time I was a real human. A human, with flesh and bone and will and dreams and ambitions and family. This new existence is different.
I feel my blood flowing through my body at every moment. I am hyper aware of the ins and outs of my nature. I can feel the chemical reactions as they happen. Every pain - even the tiniest kind, such as a bed bug on my back - I feel it.
I've woken several times over the course of many summers to being bitten by bugs of various kinds. My pain tolerance never grows - I am as sensitive as a newborn babe. This will never change.
I do not have most hormones. Not exactly. I have no need for food or drink either - if I truly needed to, I could live through the rest of my existence without ever eating again.
This I am sure.
My existence is..
...Okay yeah fine I've run out of things to complain about. God talking creepy like that for so long is going to ingrain bad habits into me.
Anyways for those wanting the proper backstory; Once upon a merry wonder a universe or so down the street a few cities over - one Seraphina Lovecraft - and no I am not related to the much more popular Lovecraft. Unfortunate coincidence, that. Kids used to bully me about it in middleschool. Anyways I got off-track -
One Seraphina Lovecraft died. Dropped dead. Tragically. Horrifically. Traumatically.
You aren't figuring how it happened yet though. Reliving trauma sucks and no offense but I don't really think you're worth that, honestly.
That aside, if you hadn't put it together already; I'm a reincarnator.
..I think.
Listen that melodramatic monologue I started with - while dull - was somewhat true. I'm literally a fucking magical construct. Sort of like a homunculus I think, if that makes it easier to visualize.
I still have feelings and shit though, probably being born in a jar doesn't change that.
That aside; I'm pretty sure my...father? Parent? Creator? Ah I don't know, Scientist guy whatever, intended to grab an outer god or something instead of an anxious teen.
Hah. It's the Lovecraft thing all over again.
Anyways yeah he seemed pretty disappointed when I didn't turn out to be part-cthulhu or hastur or something. Tough luck man, gotta say though - my existence borderline sucks.
I'm like...7? I think so anyways - and I don't even have a name yet. Can you believe that? I certainly can't. It kind of sucks actually. For my entire current lifespan all I've been is V-023. No guesses on the V meaning, but I can make the rational deduction 023 probably means I'm the twenty-third test.
Quick topic change, I was thinking about it today and - I've technically never seen the sun before.
Seraphina has - V-023 has not.
Isn't that just a fucking travesty? A chance to live childhood again - wasted. Rotting away in a lab in the depths of the earth. I've been fucking robbed, that's what this is!
Okay I'm being melodramatic again. It's not that bad - but ah, theater was my calling a lifetime ago.
Am I forgetting something? I feel like I'm forgetting something.. Ah. I should probably expand on that lab stuff yeah?
I don't really remember a lot about my birth - babies typically don't - but I'm going to take a wild guess and say that instead of typical infancy amnesia my vessel was just being prepared at the time.
Ew. Okay sorry for saying it like that, I feel gross now too.
Anyways, ages 3 and up I've been pretty lucid. My tentative (un?)willing-father / pseudo-creator / oddly-enough-summoner knew from the get-go I was reincarnated and could not give less of a shit. Apparently dragging unwitting souls across dimensions isn't his particular brand of mad scientist. Go figure.
That aside he's a pretty okay guy. I'd say we've bonded over the years. Perhaps I've even grown on him. I made my first word Father at like six after years of selective muteness just to see the eye-twitch thing he does - and instead all he did was laugh about it! Good progress, probably.
Also he's not like - evil. He's never experimented on me or anything. He seemed pretty disappointed about my lackluster past life though. Like those relatives that expected you to already be married and have a stable job and then you show up to the family reunion for the first time in years to tell them you live in a depressing apartment and work at a mcdonalds.
Honestly the name thing - I genuinely think he expected me to name myself. He's just been calling me V. I'd be flattered about his consideration for my comfort and acknowledgement of my independence; if I didn't have the strange feeling he'd probably expect the same thing of a real child as well.
My father is a brilliant, brilliant man - but he probably hasn't touched child development/care with a ten-foot pole.
The sun thing is a similar issue - he probably expects me to be forthcoming if I ever desire to leave the depths of the earth. Again, I would be flattered if I didn't feel like he would treat a real seven year old the same way.
Why have I never mentioned this to him before despite my obvious confrontational nature?
Crazy fact - may have left this out by the way - I uh....haven't been alive?
That sounds bad. Backtracking actually.
Uh, so I guess the best way of saying it is that I haven't been..all there? So far my soul and vessel have been trying to settle themselves together in tandem with the help of magic supergluing them together. That creepy empty talk at the start? Kind of how I usually talk actually.
What changed? I don't really know either. I've just...aligned myself. Somehow.
Quick change of conversation; You know I have got to say, being able to actually think things through is pretty cool. Usually I just act on impulse. Like that first word thing I mentioned earlier? I thought it'd be funny, so I did it. My father has accounted for my spontaneous choices a long time ago.
Of course - I probably still gave the man a proper heart-attack when I walked up to him the single most expressive child he probably has ever come in contact with asking for a name and the sun and my age and my height.
Apparently, my name is now Varian - I'm going outside for the first time tomorrow - yes I am indeed seven, today would mark my 'birthday' if 'creation day' and 'summoning day' (they overlap, who knew?) could count as that - and I'm 4'9" (rather tall for my age, according to him).
After some light checkups - it seems that my soul, mind, magic, and physical being have finally intertwined. I probably ruined the moment of that dramatic reveal by calling myself a 'complete person soup' but Father didn't seem to mind.
For the next few hours we started catching up. Apparently - talking to someone half-alive isn't very good for getting a grasp on personality.
Father is a genius. That term - it's thrown around loosely these days - but genuinely, he is. Who else do you know in this day and age that can accidentally give dead souls new life? It's insane to me how smart he is. Beneath that - as a person father is enjoyable too. He's patient , if not socially awkward - and I can tell he cares for me a great deal. I'm definitely still throwing him several books on child care though.
Anyways admiration aside - apparently yes we do have a house, I've just never been taken there before. I'd be offended - if it wasn't necessary. Listen, creepy hollow children are hard to explain away with just me being a "little ill."
So yeah. We started heading to the house right away - because father had down time and no mad-scientist things to do. Apparently for years now he's claimed to have a child that has been deathly ill and didn't go out into the daylight because it burns their skin - and like ouch? Hello did you just characterize me as a vampire?
And oh. The entire lab was literally under the house.
I tend to try and not question my father's choices in life. I've only been alive for thirty minutes now and I've already set up policies for this sort of thing.
Never let it be said I'm inefficient.
Anyhow - The house looks really nice. The official story is that I finally made enough of a recovery due to the medicine my father makes - apparently his cover story is a pharmacist.
Today though, I'm doing the thing I should have done a long time ago.
Befriend the outside sources.
Oh ack - I'm sorry for saying it like that, that sounds awkward.
Anyways, I meant I wanted to make friends with the kids of my neighbours. Apparently the only house that has kids on our street is actually next door - how coincidental is that? We're going to be best friends. It's fate. Probably.
Listen this is the first time in the last seven years I'm speaking with someone who isn't father, I really want this to go over well okay?
So after a quick shopping trip to actually decorate my room - as I'm now actually using said room - we went to meet the neighbours.
Weirdly enough though - the moment we walked up to it I had a weird sense of foreboding. Like - existential dread but on a more stressful scale.
I didn't realize what it was until I started to actually pay attention to the lecture my father was giving me.
"-they took in Petunia's nephew roughly five years ago. I was quite busy with you at the time, however the neighbourhood gossip caught up with me eventually. Apparently his mother and father died in a car crash and he was left on their doorstep. Petunia woke at least half the neighbourhood when she screamed at the time. I think his name is.. Harry? I am not sure, I have never personally met the boy-"
I froze up immediately in alarm. I looked at the mailbox as he spoke and saw the address there, sure as rain. 4 Privet Drive
"Father."
I'm sure if it was possible I'd be white as a sheet - unfortunately that's just how I usually look, so I don't think it was very effective. Something must have been shown on my face though, because he paused immediately and looked down at me in mild alarm. I don't think he really expected what I said next though.
"Father, I think I know the future."