They entered the Dursley's house without much incident. Ed remained quiet the entire way, much like Dudley. The woman who held him up kept talking in a low voice, but Ed's mind refused to focus, turning instead to vicious circles of guilt.
At the moment, there wasn't much he could do. His strength seemed to be just gone. And the aches in his ports made him limp, though his pride refused to let much of that show. The woman in curlers walked him to the couch. He looked up and saw the faces of the Durlseys, and they looked first at him, then to Harry. Nausea rose from within, and he covered his mouth with his left gloved hand, careful to keep his right in his coat pocket.
"Oh dear. Bathroom! Petunia, dear!?" Mrs. Figg said.
They made it just in time, and Ed hung his head gratefully before the porcellin god. He looked up and saw the two women hovering over him, as though he were some sort of fragile creature. He blinked at them stupidly.
"Damn that Harry. You're in as bad a shape as Dudley. We should take you to the hospital." Mrs. Dursley said.
"Petunia, lets give the boy some room." Mrs. Figg said.
Ed didn't so much as twitch at that word. Somewhere his mind was still offended, but the battle with his stomach interferred before it could rise to the occasion. He hurled again, coughing dry heaves into the water before him.
Once the Dursley woman was shooed back to the livingroom, Mrs. Figg gingerly crouched down before Ed. He rested the side of his face against the cool surface of the bowl, and watched her. She reached for his right hand, still in the coat pocket, but he moved it away from her before she could touch it.
Mrs. Figg sighed.
"It's alright. I told you. I'm a squib. You don't have to keep it from me." She whispered.
Ed blinked.
"Vhat's a squib?" He managed to croak out before another wave of nausea hit. When he turned back to the woman, she was looking at him sharply.
"You mean...you didn't..?" She whispered, then blinked. She looked over her shoulder quickly, then back to him. She got back to her feet, and before he could react, (not that he wanted to at that moment anyway), she backed out of the bathroom, and closed the bathroom door. Ed closed his eyes and focused on just breathing. The side of the cool bowl making the throbbing headache a little easier to bear.
Easier that is, until the Dursleys began yelling at Harry. At least he thought it was them. Something about being kicked out of a school. For underage something or other. He didn't think people could yell that loud or for quite that long.
While I'm down here, may as well look. He thought.
He took his right hand out of his pocket, resting it on his right thigh. With some effort, and a considerable amount of will to control his stomach, he sat up. It didn't last long, and soon he was slumped against the nearby wall. He looked at his right hand. The automail was now completely exposed. Glove cut clean through, and just gone. He blinked. A short blade barely reached his knuckles. He pushed up his right sleeve a short way.
'Those marks...unmistakable. The equation worked. Guard plate was transmuted.' He thought.
"But why...? How...?" He asked softly to no one. Then he snorted and held up his forearm to look at it some more.
'Not my best work', he thought. Eying it critically.
"Wonderful. First successful transmutation on the other side of the gate. Now I've just got to change it back." He whispered.
He reached up and grabbed a towel from the towel rack, and stuffed it to the crack below door. Satisfied no reaction light could be seen, he sat back, and took a steadying breath. The yelling continued in the livingroom, so he was certain he wouldn't be disturbed for the time being.
'If this works...one step closer to home', he thought.
Without further hesitation, he clapped his hands. He pictured the equation, beautiful in his minds eye, and he felt the warmth of the energy as it ran down his arms, then circulating throughout his body. The blue archs shined before him from his hands, and the blade on his right arm retracted to it's original position. He smiled as smile somewhere between a smirk and a frown.
A smile that disappeared, as, once again, he found himself clutched to the porcelin bowl and heaving.
The Dursleys had left with Dudley a few hours ago, and Harry found himself fuming, pacing his room. His snow white owl, Hedgewick chirping in alarm at his agitation in her cage.
'Expelled!!?' Harry thought. 'What am I gonna do now?!?'
He threw himself onto his bed with a boneless flop, and turned over to regard the ceiling.
'As if it could tell me what to do', he thought as he listened to the sounds of the empty house.
:::
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