Harry groaned as he rubbed at his painfully concave stomach. He hadn't had a full meal for several days now, and with the full moon tonight he doubted he'd be able to stay here much longer.

"Dammit! Why does my animagus have to be so weird!" Harry growled to himself as he dug his fists into his hair. For a moment they sharpened into paws with claws and Harry was forced to pull them away lest he scratch himself. Instead, he turned to stare into his reflection in the river beside him. Silver, moon touched hair hung down in smooth strands. It was longer on one side than the other where he had tried to cut it himself a few weeks ago. His eyes were an eerie shade of gold that would look more at home on the face of a great cat.

Harry grimaced. Though he had slowly become accustomed to the new face that stared back at him, it was still off putting to see something other than the features he was born with. Even now, he felt a pang of unease as he looked into his own inhuman eyes.

Ever since he fell through the veil in search of Sirius, Harry's animagus instincts and features had become more prevalent. Upon waking in this new world, Harry had been startled by his new appearance. At first, he had thought traveling between world had somehow bleached him. It wasn't until he went through a forced transformation on the next full moon that he realized otherwise.

Harry had assumed he was merely feeling restless due to sleeping inside (he had found himself outside a small village and the local orphanage was kind enough to put up with him for a night or two). When the moon rose however, he quickly realized that was not the case as energy flooded into him. It felt as if he was being filled with raw magical power. His body filled to the brim, Harry transformed into animagus form without any sort of thought or choice in the matter. Thankfully, it was only his animagus form and didn't truly hurt. He was a good bit larger than he remembered being the last time he transformed however. His instincts were also very much more present as well. Harry, being surprised by them, ended up destroying the chicken coop before he realized what he was doing. Thankfully, Harry caught himself before eating any of the birds.

It was just awkward transforming in front of the orphanage that had offered him shelter. Needless to say, Harry quickly moved on. Over the next coming months, Harry learned of the other side affects of being bonded closer with his animagus form.

The first thing was obviously his looks while in human form and being forcibly transformed when in the presence of full moon light. Apparently, his animagus form had always been susceptible to absorbing moon magic and Harry had just never noticed due to his separation from his inner beast. Now that it was closer to the surface, Harry was drastically affected by the phases of the moon. On new moons, Harry could barely be bothered to wake or do anything. On Full moons he was full of energy the day before and went through a forced transformation each night.

The second thing was the instincts. While in animagus form they were loud and pervasive; it was often hard to keep himself from acting on them. When he was hungry they became even louder, to the point he had gone after livestock and eaten it raw before he realized what he was doing. Thankfully, this only happened when he was particularly hungry. When he had eaten beforehand, Harry found himself much more in control. However, even in human form, the instincts were still there. Harry found himself having odd urges, like growling when someone disrespected him, or wanting to chase and stalk birds or other small animals. Luckily, these were never very strong, more like passing thoughts than anything else. However, he did find himself drawn to water and taking long naps in the sun during mid-day. Though slightly odd, Harry found swimming and napping in the sun to be enjoyable and didn't mind these instincts half as much as the others.

Now as he gazed at his reflection, Harry once again wished to go swimming. He pushed it down with a frown. He was in the middle of a city, the water was likely dirty, and he had more important things to do. Like find some food before the moon rose.

So far Harry had been lucky on his search for Sirius. The townsfolk and villagers he had traveled by weren't averse to sharing a meal in return for a day of hard labor in the farm. So while Harry was most definitely not eating as much as he would have liked and knew was healthy, he hadn't exactly been starving to death. Here in the city however, there were no fields of unskilled labor waiting to be worked. Instead, most jobs were steady jobs that only paid after a week or two and normally didn't hire unskilled laborers. At first, this wasn't too much of a problem. But now, with full moon once again approaching, Harry needed to find food or risk hurting someone with his out of control animagus form. For a moment he had to give an ironic smirk at the similarities between himself and his werewolf professor. He wondered what Remus would thing if he could see Harry now. Would he still care for him? Or would Remus condemn him for getting Sirius tossed through the veil and his now rabid other half? Harry didn't know and he couldn't be bothered to care as his stomach rumbled again.

Looking to the water, Harry pondered his predicament for a moment before his eyes widened in shock. Floating down the river, as if a fish or boat, was a pair of skinny legs sticking into the air. Every second or so they would twitch and jerk. Harry watched the legs float for another second or two before diving into the river. With a few strong kicks (just because he was starving it didn't mean he wasn't very muscled from hard work) Harry reached the drowning figure's side. He plunged his head under and dragged the man's (for that is what he was) head to the surface by gripping his shoulders very tightly and pushing him to the surface. Then he draped the man over his front and began to kick back to shore.

By the time he got them both onto the embankment, they had floated quite a bit farther down the river than Harry had intended. When he finally dragged the man from the river he felt exhausted. His small reservoir of energy from the coming full moon was completely spent. Now, his hands shook with fatigue and a lack of energy attributed purely to those in dire need of sustenance. He sat there on his hands and knees panting as if her had run a marathon full sprint. Harry truly wondered if he had the strength to stand. And then, the body he had dragged from the river (it hadn't been breathing, he would have felt it) moved. First, the rust colored eyes rolled open with a gross squish like that attributed to raw meat or fish. Then, its rose to a sitting position. However, it did not prop itself up like a normal body. Rather, it was lifted as if there were invisible strings connected to the torso and abdominal cavity, like a marionette or puppet. It moved like the undead.

Harry jerked away with a swiftness he had not known he possessed. Still not quite sure if the IT was actually undead or not (with all the odd characters Harry had met over the years he felt like judging people based on first glimpse wasn't something he could even pretend not to do anymore) he tried talking to IT.

"You were floating down the river... Are you okay?" For a moment the figure just blinked dumbly as if in shock.

"I made it," the man (Harry supposed if the man could talk then he couldn't be an undead, right?) spoke slowly. He appeared quite surprised and Harry wondered if he needed to find a doctor in case the man was going into shock.

"Damn." The man's voice was petulant, like that of a child being denied its toy. Harry jerked his head around to stare fully at the figure.

"Damn?" Harry questioned in shock and irritation. Harry had just used the last of his energy (which he needed to find food) to save this man's life and all he got was a 'damn'? The ungracious man began to stand.

"Are you the one who interrupted my submersion?" He asked. Now his tone was lofty and slightly irritated, as though Harry were an errant child caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Harry rolled his eyes and looked away from the arrogant drowner.

"I was just trying to help." He defended, irritation leaking into his voice and accent. He whipped his head around. "Wait, submersion?" Had this person tried to-

"You don't know what I mean by that?" The man had walked a few feet away and now turned back to Harry. "I was trying to commit suicide." The man spoke glibly, as though his words were no more important than the weather.

"S-suicide?!" Harry gasped out in horror. He jerked upright and stared with wide eyes at the trench coat wearing man. Why in the world would he-why would anyone- try to suicide? The man was skinny but Harry could tell by his nice tan coat and formal wear that he was no hopeless hobo. He obviously had money. Maybe he didn't have any family? Was he lonely? OR maybe mentally ill?

"Yes, I was trying to kill myself." His tone was lofty before it darkened as his expression soured. "But you just had to interfere." His rust colored eyes glared into Harry's own golden orbs. Is he blaming me? Harry struggled not to growl at him and only barely fought the urge down. By this time, the man was continuing on. "Still, my priority is to commit a clean suicide without being a burden to anyone. Yet I did burden you, so the fault lies with me at this point. I should apologize in some way."

Harry grimaced at the man. It was just his luck to find a deadset, flamboyant type of suicidal rich person when trying to save someone from drowning. Still, he couldn't very well allow the man to go try again elsewhere. Life was life. The man may not realize or particularly care but his own life was a precious thing. People only lived once. Even discounting the pain of those left behind, each person had the potential to do great things. If they died, they would never do them.

Harry was going to stand and tell the man this but felt himself go faint midway up. He stumbled about for a moment before finally getting his balance back as his stomach let out a rather demanding growl.

"Are you hungry, boy?" The suicidal man asked in surprise. Harry straightened slightly and looked at the man rather sheepishly. How could he expect the man to listen and value what his words of encouragement when he was moments away from passing out?

"Well... I haven't had anything to eat for a few days." Harry admitted truthfully. As if understanding what they were talking about, Harry heard the man's stomach give an even louder growl.

"How odd. I'm actually hungry. Unfortunately it seems I have lost my wallet in the river." Harry sighed in distaste. He wouldn't have actually taken food from the man (he was already suicidal, no reason to add broke to the list) but he did feel sorry for him. Maybe the wallet had washed up somewhere along the shore? They could try to look for-

"There you are, you blockhead!" Harry startled in surprise as a very loud and very angry male voice sounded out from across the river. The suicidal man waved happily.

"Nice work, Kunikida-kun!" He called gleefully. Harry turned to see the figure of a very irate man standing on the other river bank. Though Harry couldn't make out much from the distance, he could tell that the man was wearing nice, formal clothes and long blond hair. He also appeared quite put out. His arms were folded across his chest and he rested his weight on one leg. A book was held to one side.

"Nice work? And just who caused all this work, you suicidal maniac?!" The 'Kunikida-kun' shouted back. "I've had enough of you disrupting my schedule!"

"Oh right, I have a great idea!" The aforementioned 'suicidal maniac' interrupted with a bouncy tone as he turned back to look at Harry. "He's a colleague of mine from work. Let's have him treat you to a meal."

"ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME?!" Harry flinched when the colleague entered back into the conversation. He covered his (now even more so thanks to his animagus) sensitive ears. The other man, the one Harry had pulled from the river, completely ignored his colleague however, to zone in on Harry.

"What is your name?" Harry turned back to him in surprise. For a moment his mind floundered.

Here in the new world, most names were different in terms of what was accepted as the norm and what wasn't. 'Harry' could easily be replaced with 'Hari' but 'Potter' was something he didn't want to carry due to how foreign it sounded.

"Harry. My name is Harry." Harry grimaced and hoped he wasn't asked for a last the suicidal man either didn't notice or didn't care because he continued on regardless.

"Well come along, Hari-kun." He said happily. "What would you like to eat?" Harry almost told him no but a glance at the sky stilled his tongue. The sun would set soon. He still hadn't found anything to eat and if he transformed as hungry as he was now, Harry was worried he could hurt someone. It wasn't like he had to pick something expensive, and he'd saved the man's life anyway. Even if the man wasn't thankful, there was morally no harm in accepting some food. Especially since it was something that was more related to public safety and than feeling a bit peckish or wanting to go somewhere expensive on someone else's dime.

Harry thought for a moment. Rice was cheap and would keep him full for a long time. Thanks to his animagus side he could even eat large quantities of it and not feel hungry for days. Some meat was needed too, for protein... and it couldn't be too expensive, he didn't want to put anyone out...

"Um... if it's not too much trouble... I'd like to eat tea on rice and chicken." The man looked at him for a moment before snickering and breaking into laughter.

"So a boy on the brink of starvation wants to eat tea on rice?... Very well, Let's have Kunikida-kun treat you to thirty bowls of that!" At the end of it he raised his voice to carry across the water to his friend. The reaction was rather instantaneous.

"Don't get all generous with my money, Dazai!" He shouted angrily. It made Harry want to cringe before he steeled himself. He needed to eat. If he didn't his animagus form would take its hunger out on anything nearby and somehow Harry doubted it would wait to find some livestock before hunting for some prey.

"Dazai?" He questioned instead.

"Yeah, that's my name.I am Dazai. Dazai Osamu."

So... This wasn't supposed to happen. Really. But I think my new Literary comp class is getting to me. I just can't stop writing! Its getting in the way of doing my homework but I just can't stop! Anyway, I forgot Author Notes in both of my previous chapters for Claws and Magic that I posted so you're only just now getting the big news

I'm in college! On scholarship! I made a 30 on the ACT! Its AWESOME! Like, I LOVE college life. I have to go home this weekend but I wish I could just stay instead. College life is weird in that its not weird. Truthfully, life here fits me like a glove. And the food is great. They have gluten free pizza that actually tastes good! (there's also the fact I've lit jello on fire before. I blame it on the gas stove)

So yeah, just had to blurt all that out there. I'm just so excited!

Anyway, currently I've got a sort of update schedule figured out but its not really all that concrete considering I'm posting this. Its supposed to be

1. Claws and Magic

2. Rewrite the Rescue bot fic

3. Rewrite with the digimon/alex rider xover

Mostly I want to get my claws and magic fic to at least the next arc before giving it a break. then I want to go back and rewrite my little fics, they could be a lot better than they are and they are easy to do cuz they're small. As for this new one... idk? I just had to write and didn't feel like Claws and Magic. So yeah... you'll probly see me again soon. Bye!