You Listen to Me Explain

"You... why are you chopping wood?"

Kane scratched his head. "Didn't I say I'm afraid of the dark? It's for making a fire."

"..."

Having thought about it all day, Dumbledore had also guessed why Kane burned a campfire at night instead of turning on a light.

It was most likely related to the shadow that had attacked him by the Black Lake that evening. Just as only magic could defeat magic, perhaps only light tainted by shadow could drive shadow away.

"Kingsley told me that on the day you stayed at the Motel, there was a dark magic fluctuation that lasted all night. It was this campfire, wasn't it?" Rather than foolishly making all sorts of wild guesses like most people would, Dumbledore asked directly.

"You guessed wrong about that. That was something else." Kane was naturally referring to Charlie, who had pursued him from the Eternal Realm. Burning his own shadow could only stop Charlie from attacking him; if she wanted to, she could still hide in the darkness and keep watching him.

Compared to that, the campfire was much more useful.

"I look forward to the day you return to Hogwarts." Dumbledore watched Kane leave the office.

After leaving Hogwarts, Kane first went to the Forbidden Forest to chop a stack of wood, then dug up a stack of stones by the Black Lake. Finally, he arrived at Hagrid's Hut and went with Hagrid to the Leaky Cauldron.

"Tom, the pub owner, is a very good man. You can ask him for help with anything. If he can't solve it, write directly to Dumbledore. He'll deal with those problems." Hagrid instructed Kane, then seemingly pulled a cake from behind his back like a magician.

"Today's Harry's birthday. I thought that, with a family like that, maybe nobody's ever celebrated his birthday for him. So I took it upon myself... could you deliver this for me?" Hagrid said, his huge face turning red.

"I will." Kane raised an eyebrow. Well, there was dinner taken care of.

Carrying the cake, Kane found Harry's room and tapped on the door with the tip of his shoe. Harry opened it quickly, and the first thing he saw was the cake.

"Whoa, is that for me? Why is my name still spelled wrong?" Harry asked in surprise.

"Ask Hagrid later. Maybe Hogwarts doesn't teach language classes." Kane set the cake on the table in the room, found his own bed, then began pulling several stones and pieces of firewood from his pockets. With a wave of his wand, shadows swept up the materials and, in a flash, dropped them onto the floor, where they ignited into a burst of flame.

"This... the thing you mentioned was this? A campfire?" Harry stared at the scene in shock. At that moment, not even the cake could have drawn the expression now on his face.

"What else did you think it would be?" Kane looked at Harry in confusion. What strange things had this kid been imagining now?

"I thought your lighting setup over there would be something like a big oil drum with wood burning inside it. Living off a campfire for warmth... after leaving the Dursley Household, you've really had it rough, haven't you?" After hesitating for a long time, Harry decided to put it a little more harshly.

He knew he couldn't stay at this shabby Leaky Cauldron every time school was out or whenever he left Hogwarts. Sooner or later, he would still have to return to the Dursley Household.

And Kane was the same. He couldn't keep sleeping under bridges whenever school was out, could he? Rather than that, Harry might as well say something that stung and knock some sense into him. Then, when school was out, Kane could go back to the Dursley Household with him.

It was still emotional abuse, but at least there would be a place to live. He wouldn't need to use a campfire like this for warmth and lighting.

Look at poor Kane. Who knew how many days he had spent roughing it outside to end up with PTSD? Now he probably couldn't even sleep without staring at a campfire.

Meanwhile, Kane had no idea what Harry was thinking. He sat on the bed, pulling out one thing after another from his pockets and tossing them onto the floor.

Wood.

"Please stay away from the campfire. If the wood catches fire later, we'll have to pay for this room."

Stone.

"If you smash the floor, we'll have to pay for that too."

Two pieces of gold.

"That would be enough to pay for it, but honestly, it's not worth it."

Kane looked at Harry helplessly. "You should just eat your cake."

With that, he pulled out his wand and gave it a light flick. Shadows surged from the tip, sweeping up all the materials on the floor and turning them, in the blink of an eye, into an incredibly crude Science Machine with belts and a lever.

"Huh?" Harry's eyes widened at the sight. "No, man? When did you learn Transfiguration?"

Kane raised an eyebrow. "This isn't Transfiguration. I made it myself from materials."

Harry's mouth hung open, and he had no idea what he was supposed to say. Should he say that was awesome? Or ask who Kane thought he was fooling?

In the end, he said nothing. A mature person had to tolerate a friend's strange little quirks.

After fobbing Harry off, another person appeared. Maxwell stroked his chin as he looked at the Science Machine Kane had made. "What did you make this for?"

"Hmm... to make an Alchemy Engine?" Kane gave his answer.

"I understand. You're making an Alchemy Engine so you can make a Spirit Particle Disintegrator, right?" Maxwell said helplessly.

"Pretty smart, Old Max. No wonder you became the Lord of Eternity." Kane dismissed Maxwell as he spoke, casually ate two little cakes, brushed his teeth, lit the fire, and went to sleep in one smooth sequence.

"Wait."

Kane sat up in bed. "What is it?"

"Won't this fire give us carbon monoxide poisoning by tomorrow?" Harry asked hesitantly.

"Poisoning is unlikely, but if I didn't have this fire, then when you woke up tomorrow, you'd most likely see a skeleton." Kane said as he covered himself back up.

In the blink of an eye, it was the next day.

"Ugh, feels like my SAN dropped again. Probably because of this wand." Kane looked at the wand in his hand helplessly. He had to find a way to restore his SAN.

Restoring SAN was simple. One option was to turn into a bottomless-eating Ryoko and stuff himself with delicious food. The other...

"I wonder if Diagon Alley sells Garlands." Kane nudged the sleeping Harry helplessly and asked in a ghostly voice, "Where's your money?"

Still half asleep, Harry dug a glittering object out of the bedside table. "Vault key. Go get it yourself."

Holding the key, Kane looked at Harry with wholehearted approval and kept nodding.

"Now this is a real good brother."

Gringotts seemed to operate twenty-four hours a day. Less than half an hour after entering, Kane came back out with five Galleons.

After all, he was only buying a Garland. Was he supposed to empty Harry's vault?

Anyone who had that idea could be called utterly conscience-free.

But when Kane put the Garland infused with his own shadow atop his head and sat at the bar downstairs, feeling his SAN recover, he suddenly thought of a serious question.

As a totally straight man, wearing this Garland felt... kind of gay.

"Would you think so too?" Kane looked at Tom across from him, who was always polishing cups, and asked this profound question.

"You're young. Young people can do no wrong." Tom comforted him.

"That's good." Kane breathed a sigh of relief, jumped off the stool, turned around, and saw a dumbfounded Harry.

"Listen to me explain, I'm totally straight, bro!"