Have you ever have one of those times when you don't want to get up from your bed? You know, one of those times when your position on the bed is really comfortable and optimal for going to sleep. But then something comes up that requires you to get out of bed and you know that if you get up now and return to bed you won't get back to that level of comfort.
Well if you are familiar with that situation, then you know how I am feeling now. I am in total bliss laying in the comfy bed and covered by an unbelievably soft duvet. Right now, I just want to curl up and go back to sleep, but I can't because an offending ray of sunlight is falling right on my face making me uncomfortable and hindering my ability to go back to sleep.
After trying to ignore the offending ray of light, I gave up and decided to fix the problem by covering the window and stop the light from leaking inside. With a sigh, I forced my eyes to open and sat up on my bed. Automatically my eyes move towards the light, and I instinctively squinted my eyes to protect them from the harsh glare.
I move myself to the corner of the bed and swing my legs off the bed, but the feeling that I was waiting to experience didn't come. I looked down, and instead of expecting to see my feet land on the ground, I saw a pair of small legs dangling off the side of the bed. Okay, that wasn't right, my legs shouldn't be like this, thinking that I should still be half asleep, I move my hands to touch my knees, but the moment the hands entered my sight, I froze.
What I saw was a pair of surprisingly young hands. My first thought was that these shouldn't be my hands, but then a stray thought hit me and made me think, 'Huh? What did my hands look like?'. The second that line of thought got to an end, an onslaught of panic struck me, and I started to look around and saw myself in an unfamiliar room, but at the same time, I couldn't recall how my bedroom looked like or could remember the room where I had gone to sleep. Scratch that I couldn't remember anything about myself before waking up. The more I thought, the more terror filled my body, I couldn't remember my name or recall anything about his own identity.
With that revelation, fear emerged from within the already peaking panic, and I found myself pushing myself back till my back found the backboard of the bed, and my eyes began to roam around the room. I saw the walls covered with wallpaper-type patterned wallcoverings. A tiny part of my panic-free mind found that weird as I associated walls with painted walls.
I took in the old ambiance that the room presented with its wallpapered walls, old-styled cupboards, and victorian era furniture that decorated the room. The next moment I remembered something and looked down as my heart thumped so loud that I thought it would burst out of my ribcage. I saw the unfamiliar body that could only be described as a child's, and the dam of emotions broke. I started to hyperventilate, and sweat emerged all over my body.
I grabbed my head, trying to remember anything at all; anything about my identity, how I got here. Anything that could help me with my current situation, but nothing worked as I couldn't pull anything out of my brain, and then it happened. A terrible headache emerged at the back of my head, spreading throughout my head, it grounded my temples, and an electric pain burned behind my eyes. Not being able to endure the pain, a guttural scream escaped from my mouth.
Within a couple of minutes, I had gone from feeling comfy in my bed to once in a lifetime level panic attack. After screaming for not knowing how much time, I saw the door to the room open, and a man barged into the room and it looked like he was saying something with a worried look on his face, but I couldn't hear anything because my ears were ringing and finally, I guess my body couldn't take it anymore and I blacked out.
(Scene Break)
When he opened his eyes, he saw that he was still in the same room, tucked into the duvet. Without making a sound, he sat up on the bed and looked around the room, but this time he didn't feel any panic, fear, or confusion as something had changed. That something had helped him make sense of this whole situation. He looked at his hands, which were still of a child's, and felt his legs underneath the duvet, which were similarly child-sized.
As absurd as it sounded, he had somehow transmigrated into a child's body and had lost his sense of identity while doing so. He couldn't recall anything that would point to who he was before transmigrating into this body, and the reason he wasn't going into another panic attack was that even though he had lost his memories regarding his identity, he had gained knowledge that would replace that loss. The new knowledge that he had come into was the identity of his current body.
He leaned back on the backboard of the bed, and looked at the ceiling, and sighed, "Quinn West, so this is my new name, huh."
Quinn West, boy, born in 1979, and currently four years old. Son of Adam and Aria West, born and raised in England, second and the youngest child of the pair with an older sister, named Lia West, who was ten years older than Quinn.
Unfortunately, both Adam and Aria West were no longer in the world, died in an accident when Quinn was one year old. From then on, both Quinn and his sister Lia were raised by their grandfather, George West.
But, the one thing that stood out in Quinn's memories and that left him stunned. It was the presence of magic. Yes, you heard it right. Magic, with a capital 'M', and finally, Quinn's memories had revealed something of utmost importance.
"I am in the world of Harry Potter."
In Quinn's memories, he had seen wands and witnessed the frequent use of the cleaning spell Scourgify to clean after the mess that infant Quinn had made. He saw the mess cleaned in an instant after a single use of that spell. He had seen cutlery floating around at dinner tables and multiple other feats of magic, but more importantly, Quinn's older sister was attending Beauxbatons Academy of Magic. A name that only the real deal would use.
Quinn continued to sit on the bed and took all of it in. Despite the absence of panic of being in an unfamiliar environment, he was still uncomfortable with being in this body. The realization that he had taken over a child's body had left him with an uncomfortable feeling in his heart. Quinn put his arm over his eyes and thought about the original Quinn's last memory.
'He had found his way to an open window ledge and tripped out.'. At that moment, the original had experienced his first feat of accidental magic and bounced off the ground like a balloon, but the next moment the original fainted.
"And, then I took over.", Quinn concluded with the guilt of possessing someone taking over him, torturing him from the inside. He looked outside and saw that it was already late in the day, and the sun had already set, and the night was about to take over the sky.
"How long I have been out? I guess I should let them know that I am up.". Quinn removed the duvet and was about to get out of bed when the door to his room opened, and the man who Quinn had seen just before blacking out entered the room.
"Young master Quinn! You must not get out of bed. You are in poor health. Please, lay down. I will inform the master that you have woken up.". One thing Quinn might have missed mentioning was that the West family was rich, and by rich, he meant old-money rich and successive generations of successful business prosperity, which had not only maintained the family wealth but had seen a steady increase in the family business.
The person in question was the West family's butler, Elliot Dalton. Elliot here held a special place in the subordinates employed by the West family as Elliot was the personal butler of Quinn's grandfather and was his close confidant. Elliot wore standard butler gear, and even though he didn't look like it, Elliot was already over 70 years old.
Wizard kind or magicals lived a lot longer than their muggle or non-magical counterparts. The average life span of a magical was two to three times that of normal people, and thus they aged slower, so it came to no surprise that Elliot looked like a middle-aged man rather than an old aged-man
Breaking out of his thoughts, Quinn tried to talk to Elliot, who was putting the duvet back on him, "Uncle Elliot, I am fine. Can I get some water?"
Elliot stopped trying to get Quinn to lay down and observed him for a second before nodding, "Yes, of course. How forgetful of me. You must be parched" He looked just past Quinn's bed and called out.
"Polly.", two seconds might have passed before a creature appeared, literally popped into the room, and spoke in a squeaky voice, "Yes?".
Polly, as Elliot had called her, was a West family elf and had all usual house-elf features and wore a toga instead of a pillowcase that was adorned by the poster elf of the Harry Potter series, Dobby.
'So, this is a house-elf.', Quinn despite having seen house-elves in the original's memories, was still surprised to see the elf with his own eyes, 'The movie CGI doesn't do the real thing justice.'
"Polly, please get a glass of water for the young master. And, please inform the master that the young master has woken up.", as soon as Elliot spoke the tasks, Polly snapped her fingers, and a tray with a pitcher and a glass appeared in the room. Quinn watched with wonder as the pitcher of water floated and poured the water into the glass. The set floated gently and landed on his side.
Quinn nodded towards Polly, who popped out of the room, possibly to inform his grandfather about his status. Quinn picked the glass to quench his thirst and then turned to Elliot to ask,
"Uncle Elliot, what happened to me?"
Elliot looked at the four-year child explained the whole incident that had taken place today, "Young master, earlier today you fell out of the window. You somehow managed to get the window open and then slipped out. We had no idea when you had fallen, but when I was passing by, I saw you unconscious on the ground and immediately called for the healer.", Elliot's expression showed concern and grief regarding the matter, but the next moment, his expression turned bright and joyful as he continued, "Young master, I must congratulate you. You finally performed your first feat of accidental magic. You fell unconscious because you exhausted your magic. Unfortunately, it came in these circumstances, but all's well that ends well."
Quinn was about to respond, but before he could speak out, another man entered the room, and Quinn immediately recognized the man as it was Quinn's grandfather, George West.
Just like Elliot, George West was also old and was pushing 80 and was a couple of years older than Elliot, but both of them looked like middle-aged men. George West stood with his back straight and moved with conviction, he had a few grays in hairs, but his eyes were bright and full of vigor and life.
From what Quinn could gather from his new memories, George West was a strict man and was a man of few words, but at the same time, he had heard from Elliot and some other people that George West had a way with words when needed that had been cultivated from years of doing business. He used to travel all around the world's magical communities to do business and used to run a tight ship on the family business, but then his wife, Maria West, passed away from a magical disease which caused him to drown himself in his work to avoid grief. The business prospered but that came at the cost of his relationship with his son because he had ignored the parental side of his duties.
After years of a rocky relationship, Quinn's mother had taken steps to make sure that her husband and father-in-law got along better and repair their relationship, and it had been successful to a degree, but when things were looking on the upside, tragedy struck and claimed the lives of both of Quinn's parents. This caused George to focus most of his focus on raising his grandchildren, Lia and Quinn, to make sure that the past didn't repeat, so he mostly stayed in Britain and now conducted his business from his home country.
He walked to Quinn's bedside and took out his wand and waved it to perform some charms that Quinn could guess were diagnostic charms to check his current health status, and then performed another spell that conjured a chair beside him and sat on it.
"How are you feeling, Quinn?"
Quinn was unsure how to interact and converse with his grandfather as he wasn't his original grandson and the current Quinn was a completely different person, so when Polly was sent to inform George, he began to think about how to approach the coming conversation and the answer he came up with was,
"I am sorry, grandfather.", acting like a child who had done something bad was the way Quinn had chosen, combined it with his first accidental magic, which was a big event of a young magical's life, and the fact that he had fallen unconscious twice in a single day would result in Quinn needing to speak less as it would seem that he was regretting his actions that caused everybody to worry and he hoped that George or anybody else won't question him taking his health into account.
Quinn's approach was indeed correct as George replied with, "You don't have to worry, little Quinn. It was not your fault. I hope you won't think much about what happened today.", a hint of a smile made its way on his face as he continued, "You performed magic today, little Quinn. I am very proud of you."
He ruffled Quinn's hair and spoke, "Let's write a letter together to your sister to tell her that you did magic. She will be so happy when she hears about it."
Quinn nodded while smiling, it might be because he had no recollection of his original identity and him having the original's memories that Quinn felt positive emotions when George ruffled his hair and when he thought about his older sister, Lia who was currently studying at Beauxbatons Academy of Magic.
After that, a medi-healer came to check on Quinn, and the conclusion regarding Quinn's scream incident was that even though his magic had saved him from the impact, but his mind still thought he was falling and it was just a psychological reaction from the fall.
That night, Quinn fell asleep quite quickly because of all the life-changing events that had taken place today that had left him dead tired mentally. Before going to sleep he thought about what his life would be like from now on. He was in the world of Harry Potter, a world where magic was real and he had the magic in him. He wanted to see what this new world would offer him.
