But Harry, Harry wanted change. He wanted it so desperately he could taste it on his tongue, and whatever this was, whatever made the Dursleys think him a freak, he was willing to grab it with both hands and run with it if he could. With that in mind Harry slowly made his way back down the hallway and into the small bathroom set by the laundry room on the other side of the hallway from the stairs.
Trembling slightly Harry closed the door, wincing at the slight click when the catch caught despite his best efforts. Thankfully the hinges were well oiled, something Harry had been ordered to do a few weeks ago. With the door closed, Harry pulled off his shirt stuffing it into the area directly underneath the door in an effort to keep the light from showing just in case. Then he turned on the light, and stared at himself in the mirror.
Harry's face was thin, just this side of malnourished. He had huge spectacles on his face, which barely fit his face and Harry knew that they didn't actually help his vision all that much these days, if they ever had. His green eyes stared at his reflection, and Harry absently brushed the hair off of his forehead so that his lightning scar was visible.
He stared at it for a moment as he always did at times like this. Petunia had told him he'd gotten it in the car wreck that had killed his drunkard parents, but Harry didn't believe it. Oh, the scar might've come from something like that, but he didn't believe his parents were drunkards.
He sometimes remembered their voices, though whether from dreams or memories he no longer knew, nor cared. A deep baritone and light feminine voice laughing and someone else barking, either a dog or someone whose laughter was like a dog's bark Harry could never tell. Sometimes, those memories were accompanied by flashes of color, red, brown, and sometimes green, though those memories were never good ones.
But right now Harry was a boy on a mission, and he shook his head from those thoughts, staring at his hair in the reflection. How do I do this? Harry had no idea, so he simply stared at his hair, trying to will it to change trying to imagine it a deep purple or green, but it didn't work, he couldn't keep the image in his mind. Then he tried something simpler, simply trying to imagine it longer, concentrating on that idea while gritting his teeth.
It took forever, the image wavering in his mind as he stared at the reality in the mirror, but slowly the hair actually changed, becoming longer, now falling past his eyes. "Oh wow!" He whispered excitedly, using all of his self-control not to shout or jump around in joy. Yet the moment he stopped concentrating on it his hair quickly shifted back to normal, shrinking as he watched.
But even so, Harry knew he had done it and knew it was possible to do it again. He took a step back, grinning so widely his mouth hurt from the unusual exercise. I might be a freak, but at least I can control it a little! Am I, am a mutant then? Or is this something else?
In the comic books mutants normally had one power, or several connected ones like Susan Storm. But Harry couldn't see a connection between being able to grow his hair, or possibly do more to it than that, and being able to teleport from one place to another.
Harry went to bed that evening still thinking about that, and the next day at school stared in shock at the answer directly in front of him in the book he was reading in mandatory reading. The teacher had innocently suggested it to him a few minutes ago. It was the Sword in the Stone, a book that was quite a few levels above Harry's known level, but the teacher had an idea that Harry's reading level was actually quite a bit higher than he let on.
"Magic…" Harry murmured, so low no one else around him heard it.
That evening Harry made notes again in his little notebook, as usual his small neat writing using every bit of space, frowning thoughtfully. If it's magic, can I do other things? Best not to test that idea. Maybe try to control the hair first, then the teleporting?
That evening and for the next few evenings Harry snuck out of his cupboard into the bathroom and began to try to manipulate his hair. He found that some changes became easier with time. After a week Harry was able to change the color of his hair yet he couldn't change the style without concentrating on it. When Harry stopped concentrating on his hair color, it tended to stay for a time, but he couldn't change his hairstyle and couldn't even make it grow without his concentrating on it. He wondered why, and made notes on this bit of research in his little notebook.
After two weeks of experimenting with his hair however, Harry was prepared to branch out. But he didn't have nearly as much luck in this area as with his hair. There was a huge difference between imagining his hair being somehow different to trying to imagine himself somewhere else than he currently was. He couldn't keep the image in his head long enough, couldn't concentrate hard enough to make the magic come out, or whatever.
This all changed when one day Harry was walking to the library. He was intent on looking up anything that could possibly help him figure out a way to concentrate more when he heard a voice behind him. "Hey Harry, guess what time it is?"
Harry turned quickly, staring as Dudley, Piers and a few of their friends came up behind him. "It's Harry Hunting time!" Dudley said, his piggy face smirking maliciously at his cousin. "But we figured we'd give you a head start this time, you've got 10 seconds to run, then we're coming after you."
To one side of Dudley, Piers laughed with all the malicious happiness a young bully could contain. "Better get a move on freak!"