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Bunny combo! NEW MEETS OLD!
GATTAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!

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Hmmm... does this belong under Fanfics That Should Not Be? I'll let you decide.

Three guesses what RPG I've been playing to excess recently.

This does require a small change to HP events before Salazar's wards take effect - the tunnel into the Chamber collapses more thoroughly after Harry crawls through so he and Ginny have to leave without rejoining Ron and Lockhart, planning to send Fawkes or one of the adults back after them later. To tell the truth I'd thought that was how it worked in the first place.

It could also be fairly easily adapted to serve in the continuity of my old Adeptus Harry bunny, since that really only covered first year except for how end-of term exams tallied up. The more I think about it, the more I like this idea - I'm going to append that after the new material, though further adjustments to the HPMM bunny are required to make it fit... probably switching Ginny with Hermione since this Harry is not a big fan of Weasleys.

- CD

Later: Wow, around two dozen Kb of prose popped out to fill in the outlined beginning and first year of Adeptus... I really don't need another project right now, dang it. I've already got Bubblegum Disaster, Team Explosive Youth, These Crazy Dreams, and Phantom of the Hellmouth bouncing around in my active memory, Surfing with the Alien and Sirius Black's Bogus Journey won't freaking stay dead, and the never-yet-posted Naruto/Transformers: Galaxy Force/BTVS fusion called Tritium keeps wiggling now and then too. Plus I've still been accumulating pseudocode and graphics design sketches for the RPG I've been talking about writing for the last ten years, and playing games too damn much besides.

ANY way, all of the new text is included here, for comment and for offsite backup purposes - pretty much anything anyone cares to say (well, not "Cor, what a stupid concept!" but I think everyone here realises that) will help me either get these out of the hutch and done with or whack 'em on the head and be stunned enough to let me be for a while.

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Salazar Slytherin, it must be said, was was a very crafty man. It's right there in the values the students of his legacy are selected to uphold after all: ambition and cunning. He was also a very powerful wizard, and made full use of his magic to plan for even the most unlikely of circumstances... such as, oh, his secret hidden lair, far below the grounds of Hogwarts, being penetrated by one of those horrid flaming turkeys, intent on harming his precious basilisk familiar. Unfortunately, the contingent enchantments were over a thousand years old before the detection wards were triggered by the entry of a pheonix into that most hidden of chambers, and over such a span even the spells of an archmage must fade... His pet was already dead before they could charge enough to carry out their purpose, a youngster from his rival Godric's House having rescued his younger compatriot and destroyed a vile artifact.

In fact, bird and humans alike were about to leave again when the spell finally took effect. Now, there is not much in this world that can be done to permanently harm a pheonix, nor to contain or exclude it - so after much thought, Salazar decided to simply banish any such intruder to another... one where the creature's ability to instantly transport itself in a swirl of flame simply would not exist, and hence it could not return.

And in a flash of blinding light, Harry Potter, Ginny Weasley, their wands, Fawkes, the Sorting Hat, and the Sword of Griffindor vanished. Just like that.


Harry groaned and tried to move, jerking to full consciousness in alarm when he found himself pinned in place. The ground was softer than the stone floor of the Chamber of Secrets had been, and he could smell dirt, the ocean, crushed greenery and the spicy scent of Fawkes all but overwhelmingly strong, but couldn't see a thing due to whatever was on top of him - something large, and very warm, and yielding like flesh, but he couldn't think of anything alive he'd ever seen that was so big and wouldn't have crushed him utterly. With difficulty, he shifted his head so the frames of his glasses weren't pressed so uncomfortably against his nose, which also made it just slightly easier to breathe. Squirming around he managed to slide his arms between whatever it was and the ground - the feeling was soft and ticklish, like feathers - and found someone else's hand, small and smooth. It twitched and then clasped tightly around his own as the owner roused and discovered a similar situation, and all he could do was squeeze back, the weight on his chest too great to risk yelling and then not being able to refill his lungs.

Remembering his wand at last, he painstakingly shifted his right arm back to his side and fished around for the pocket of his robes, then pulled it out, grateful beyond words that it still felt intact. He tilted it as much as he could towards the thing on top of them, concrentrated, and incanted as strongly as he dared, "Wingardium leviosa!"

The pressing weight lessened, but even pushing as much magic as he could manage into the spell it lifted barely an inch or two. The hand holding his left hand squeezed angain, and then he could hear Ginny's muffled voice asking, "Harry! Is that you? What happened?"

"Don't know," he gasped. "Trying to levitiate this thing, can't hold it..."

Just before he lost his grip on the magic a flash of brilliant yellow-white filled his vision for the second time that day, and the boy flinched against the ground in reaction. The spell was instantly broken by his lapse in concentration but rather than fall back onto him the huge animal vanished with a "shoom" sound, leaving nothing but a small round object that fell painfully onto his stomach.

Sitting up at last, he grabbed the thing and looked at it, a fist-sized ball of painted metal, half white, the other half black with a golden, U-shaped mark. A translucent white button set in an indented equatorial groove was flashing red in time with mechanical sounding bloops for a few seconds until it clicked and a few golden sparks shot out of it.

"What in the world..." he wondered, staring at the odd device for another long moment before realising he should really be trying to find out where they were, and hopefully that they weren't in any more danger. Ginny had already climbed weakly to her feet and was clutching the somewhat flattened looking Sorting Hat to her chest, despite its muffled protests. He spotted Griffindor's sword lying just out of reach from where he'd have felt it with his right hand before, so the only thing still missing was... "Fawkes?" He looked around, but the headmaster's pheonix was not in evidence. "It felt like the thing holding me down was covered in feathers... but... that was way too big," he thought.

The day was bright and clear, there were fairly modern houses scattered about like a small and relatively pastoral village, and a few people in modern clothing were scattered about, the closest being a white-haired man in a blue vest, holding another of the metal balls and looking rather surprised.

"Oh, bugger," he thought, "Muggles! If we use any magic..." Not wanting to suffer whatever punishments the magical world might impose on people who broke its secrecy, Harry quickly put his wand away then rolled to the side and grabbed the sword again, holding it up in what he hoped looked like a posture that seemed like he knew what he was doing with it and wasn't about to take any guff. He hung onto the ball - perhaps some sort of experimental grenade? - that had hit him for now, since it hadn't exploded when the timer stopped beeping, and he could always try throwing it back if it started again. "Who are you," he demanded. "What's going on here!?"

Shaking himself out of his shock at finding a pair of children trapped under the huge bird that had fallen right outside his laboratory, the man shrank his unused Ultraball and stuck it back in a pocket before waving his hands calmingly. "I'm sorry! Was that HO-OH yours, young man? Truly an amazing specicimen, even more brilliant than the rumors said! Fire/Flying type, how rare... Odd, the ball shouldn't work if it was already claimed, though. No matter, simply recording its data is all that I am interested in!"

He looked more closely at the boy, and realised he was covered in dirt and bloody all down one arm. "My goodness, you're injured! Of course, you must have been in a tremendous battle to reduce such a powerful creature to unconsciousness, though it managed to get you here... well, NURSE JOY will be able to fix that right up. Come on, the Pokecenter is right this way."

He'd bustled over and brushed the two youngsters off, and now waved the crowd aside as he shederded them towards a red-roofed building nearby, where a woman in a nurse's outfit with bright pink hair was peeking curiously out the door. "Wotcher, Prof," she greeted, before remembering she was on duty and putting on her business attitude. "I mean, welcome to the Sandgem Pokecenter, Professor Rowan, how can I help you today?"

A man with a stuffy-looking suit and a pinched expression made a dissaproving noise and scribbled a note on his clipboard in the lobby beyond, but Rowan merely grinned affably and directed her attention to the blood-stained arm Harry was trying to hide behind himself in hopes avoiding a stay in hospital, at least until someone from Hogwarts came to collect them.

Blah blah blah fix 'em up and discover it's a completely different world, with different continents and all. Segue into game-start speech, modified with the object being to find a teleporter strong enough to get them home being the object rather than League championship for its own sake. During explanation of why wild pokemon are a danger:

Harry leaned over to Ginny's ear, while keeping most of his attention on the explanation. "Hagrid would bloody love this place," he whispered with a grin. Ginny giggled and nodded, the troubled look fading from her face for a moment.

Blah blah blah he has a RALTS hatchling, too young to do more than growl at threats and hope to scare them away, but with time and a bit of battle experience that species is one of the few who learn to teleport. Blah blah SORTINGHAT doesn't seem to have any combat skills, HO-OH Fawkes too dangerous to show off in public with these Galactic chaps running around, here pick one of these young Pokemon my assistant Dawn brought back recently and we'll register you both as trainers.

Later, as they go out the door, having had a bit more help and in a less impersonal way from Tonks than is strictly in accordance with League pokecenter employee directives:

"NURSEJOY Tonks, your attitude and demeanor are entirely unprofessional! The League has had numerous complaints about you already, so you'd better shape up!" The pinch-faced man flourished his clip board as if to show off a stack of complaint forms, though nothing was on it but his own narrow, spidery-looking handwriting.

"Shape up? Shape UP!? Blow this for a game of soldiers! I've had enough of your stuffy League and their shiny corporate image. 'I hope we'll see you again' my arse. I'm out of here!"

"Out..? But... you can't just... quit!"

"I'm as much a person as any full human, and I bloody well can. Hah, maybe I'll register as a trainer and do the gym circuit, how's that frost your socks?"

"I! I! Well, I never...!"

"What, never? Well you should try it, might not be so uptight afterward. Oi, Harry, Ginny, Wait up! Mind a little company on your trip?"

Having set out, one of the kids asks why they kept saying "Nurse Joy" like it was one word and her first name at that. She changes her hair around, flustered, which Ginny notices and asks hestitantly if she's a metamorphagus, figuring that it must be some kind of magic and even if not it's a whole different world so the Statutes of Secrecy are safe.

"Well, there's this type of pokemon called a Ditto," Tonks explained, hair color shifting to a deeper red in embarrassment. "Trainers who get into breeding their own pokemon like them because they're... compatible... with anything... Um, well, you see, sometimes a wild Ditto will transform into a human without being found out, and... they're still, er, compatible, and apparently really smooth talkers, so they have half-human children... and if you don't know how that works, I'm not telling for a few more years."

"If ever," she muttered under her breath, before continuing, "That's us, NURSEJOYs and OFFICERJENNYs, depending on whether the human parent was a man or a woman. Most of us JOYs aren't all that interested in fighting and are happy enough working for the Pokemon League, but I guess I've just got the wanderlust, you know? Since we're mentally human, the law says we're to be treated just the same... so there's really nothing they can do about me leaving. Pokeballs don't work, either, even if someone was willing to commit slavery and try it."

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So yes, Fawkes has beconme a 'shiny' Ho-oh, all reds, orange and golden yellow instead of the 'normal' coloration of yellow, orange, and green. Since Ho-oh doesn't learn Teleport, Fawkes can't fire-swirl anymore, and hence can't return them to their own world... Abra, Natu, and Ralts, their evolutions, and even Claydol aren't strong enough teleporters to breach the dimensional barriers, and the only legendary that DOES learn Teleport is Deoxys, which is freakishly strong and hard to find as well.

A DC of Luna really belongs in this too, somewhere, but I'm not sure where. Maybe she can be the rival trainer just ahead of them on their journey, rather than the annoying blonde boy in the game? Since GInny is going to continue traveling with Harry instead of taking that spot like the short team-up at the beginning of Diamond and Pearl. Oh, wait! Maybe Luna actually comes here during the summer with her father to look for their odd beasites! Meeting up would then become a major arc event, and either they wouldn't need to travel to Hoenn after all to find a Deoxys when word of the ultra-strong telporting type that briefly invaded that region reaches Sinnoh, or else whatever form of travel the Lovegoods use is regulated and designed to insure no foreign-dimensional creatures (from bacterial diseases to snorkacks to pushmepullyous to yes, stranded wizards and witches who got there through other methods) can be brought back, accidentally or intentionally.

The idea here is that Rowan gives them the intro spiel from Diamond/Pearl and sets them up with a (male) Lv1 RALTS (eventually to become a GALLADE) and a D/P starter, since the psychic type SORTINGHAT doesn't seem to have any combat techniques and there's been rumors lately about some unscrupulous sorts calling themselves Team Galactic who are hunting for legendary pokemon and would make using HO-OH Fawkes publicly dangerous. Tonks can translate for Fawkes, who is very surprised by having grown so large, and explains about the suddenly-not-able-to-teleport thing, Rowan notes that there are a few types of pokemon able to teleport but they'll have to search them out as they're usually quite elusive. The trip then is not so much about gym battles for the sake of it but because gym leaders are the best people to get information on local types of pokemon from, and are generally fiercely competetive types who want to try their teams against newcomers regardless, plus the world is overflowing with dangerous wild pokemon that make traveling a hazard.

Tonks goes with as semi-adult escort since they're younger than even the usual novice trainers, and to translate for the more intelligent but still speechless pokemon they might meet. (Harry can talk to Arbok, Ekans, and any Dragon type, for that matter, in parseltongue, and many can understand him even if they can't reply) She has the ability to cure status afflictions and heal with a bit of time, in game terms the moves Heal Bell and Wish, plus Transform (essentially used the same as canon Tonks generally but even more versatile when the chips are down - she can turn into a bloody DRAGON, right?) and Confusion - however, with fully human intelligence she'd be quite able to learn wand magic and spells rather than being limited to the four moves of a pokemon. Of course, Ginny and Harry are only first and second year students themselves, and only have their own wands, so it's not like they can do much in they way of teaching her about it.

Could the Power the Dark Lord Knows Not be a half-dozen Legendary pokemon? It would be better than beating the Seven Plot Coupons of Immortality with the Three Plot Coupons of Uberness... Kashira, kashira, doko kashira...

Since Harry is gone from just before end of term until a few days into the next, the wards fall at Privet Drive, and he doesn't have to go back again. Yay! Abuse and neglect: not amusing.

Disclaimer: Harry Potter and related characters are the creations of J. K. Rowlings, while the Pokemon setting is the property of Nintendo, Game Freak, and Creatures, Inc..

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Old bunny: Adeptus Harry (recently expanded considerably)

As a warning to diehard Rowlings fans: I am not one of you. I skipped the middle third of OotP because it was so damn drawn out and pointless, concluded that HPB wasn't as good as half the fanfic I'd read, and haven't even looked at Deathly Hallows since the information on the internet is all I need to know it'll only annoy me even more. Therefore, there are NO HORCUXES, the cloak is just a cloak not one of the Three Plot Coupons of Uberness, and I will be throwing canon away as I see fit otherwise. Complaints about my doing so are pointless, flamers will be summarily ignored as too stupid to read a plainly written notice. I do, of course, welcome feedback that actually has some basis in what I'm doing rather than what I'm ignoring, and while I'll do my best technical catches for grammar and spelling are also welcome.

That said... I thought the setting itself held a lot of promise in the earlier books, and will do my best to explore some of that.

Ginny/Harry and Ron/Hermione shippers are also out in the cold, as are slashers of all description. Ron's a right arse in this version, and neither Harry nor Nee like him a whit. As for slash, the characters I'll be following are straight and I'm not interested myself so I see no point in changing them, even if I have no problems with it as such.

The official listing what what has been discarded as of fic start:

Anything in Deathly Hallows, except that Snape had a huge crush on Lily Evans and the real core of his hatred of James Potter was that he got the girl and Snape didn't, not the infantile teasing (though that certainly didn't help.) Second, that Lucius Malfoy counts family first even before Voldemort; he picked the side he thought would win and stuck with it but will jump ship if it becomes obvious that conclusion is in error.

Most of the things from Half Blood Prince are similarly out the window, as previously noted there is no such thing as horcruxes and HP/GW is not in the running, so all that's left is the possibility of Snape as DADA teacher and the return of SLughorn in Potions. Malfoy is probably not going to be so eager to join the Dark Tosser either, but another patsy can easily be found in his place... and for reasons which will become apparent, Harry isn't too likely to actually be there anyway.

The BACKGROUND material from OotP, that is, Sirius's family, the nature and makeup of the eponymous Order, the stupid prophesy and so on are in, at least as I remember them at present. The 'current' events of that book are likely to be greatly different, of course.

Goblet of Fire and earlier didn't have a whole lot of background material, beyond general setting information, all included as far as I can see.

Finally, Rowlings seemed to think she was writing mysteries rather than fantasy or adventure stories, I however am not - whether the characters know what's going on or not, narration will usually explain it for the reader.

(00()00)

I usually include a short scene or two before the titles, but all I'd be doing here is reprinting the first chapter of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, so go ahead and reread that if you like. If you don't have a copy handy:

Dateline: November 1st 1981

The Dursleys are an agressively 'normal' family, overweight husband on salary, gossipmionger housewife with a year-old bratty son, the only skeleton in their closets the wife's sister and husband who aren't "their sort." One day Vernon notices a lot of oddly dressed people around town and a pecuiuliar cat in his yard, that night baby Harry is left on his doorstep by Dumbledore over McGonagall's objections because his parents have been killed and year-old Harry somehow bounced an evil wizard's power back at him when he tried to kill the little guy.

Right, that's that, then. On with the real show!

Harry Potter and the Way of the Adeptus

an attempt at HP fanfiction that goes in a different direction

by ClassicDrogn

Disclaimer: Harry Potter and related characters are the creations of J.K. Rowlings, not me. You can tell because I wouldn't need to write fanfic if they were mine.

In the five years since the Dursleys had awakened to find young Harry on their doorstep, nothing of significance had changed at Privet Drive. Harry and Dudley had started full-day school that fall, and already he'd had a haircut practically every week, sometimes two in one week when Aunt Petunia would get particularly uptight about the way his straight, wiry black hair would spike up and stick out at odd angles regardless of trimming, gels, or conditioner. Finally, tired of paying out of her Bridge Club money for endless trips to the barber the woman grabbed a pair of kitchen shears and hacked away until all that was left was a half-inch fuzz, except for long bangs "to hide that horrid scar on your forehead," as she put it.

Dudley had laughed himself silly at the sight, but for Harry the night was filled with dread of what would happen at school the next day, when he was already teased for his taped glasses and being smaller than the other kids. It was a great relief to him when he woke, then, to find it had grown back overnight, at least until his relatives found out about it.

Petunia's shriek at the mere sight of him brought her husband at his fastest waddle to see what was the matter, and the rotund man stood gaping and sputtering, his face progressing from pink through red and well into a rather fetching russet purple as he tried to put words to the outrage he felt at such sheer unnaturalness... right up until he started clutching his chest, at which point his skin faded to a sickly pallor.

"Oh... my... Dial 119, Pet... my heart..." he gasped out. If anything, Petunia's face went whiter than his, and she rushed to the telephone to call for an ambulance. Watching from the top of the stairs, Dudley burst into tears at the sight of his daddy in pain, and Harry did likewise, not so much because he liked his uncle as because it seemed like it was his fault, even if he didn't know how his hair had grown back. He wished with all his heart it was just normal hair so this never would have happened, because if there was one thing he'd learned it was that anything that was his fault would be punished severely. How bad would it be if he was the one who made Uncle Vernon get sick?

Sometimes on Aunt Petunia's soap operas, people died from heart attacks... if Uncle Vernon died, would he be sent to jail? Would it be like the orphanage they'd threatened to send him to if he didn't behave? He didn't know, and Harry cried harder, for once rivaling Dudley's wailing where he was usually quiet even in tears.

Petunia and Dudley rode in the back of the ambulance as it carried Vernon to the Surrey Emergency Surgical Hospital. Harry had to ride with one of the policemen who'd been called in to help lift Vernon onto the stretcher, which just made the boy even more scared even when the officer tried to distract him by pointing out the radios and things and offering to let him turn the lights on.

"Poor kid," the bobby commented to the Emergency Room receptionist, with one last glance at the sniffling waterworks on two legs being led to the room his aunt had been put in after needing to be sedated. "He's all cut up about his uncle. Didn't stop crying long enough to say a word the whole trip."

(00()00)

Some hours later, Vernon had been delivered to the same recovey room, and the doctor who'd seen him arrived not long after. He cast a thoughtful eye over the two boys, Dudley having gotten over his tears and now trying to get his cousin to stop huddling in a boring ball by repeatedly jabbing him in the ribs with a finger. Even after dealing with the two nominal adults for only a short time, however, he figured he'd have a better chance of getting through to them if he didn't send the children out of the room. Sometimes you just had to be tough with people for their own good. He set aside the clipboard and cleared his throat, drawing everyone's attention.

Dudley looked for a moment like he ws considering crying some more, but it didn't look like the doctor had any sweets in his pockets and he'd already been promised a bag of his favourites if he behaved, so he kept quiet.

"Mr. Dursley," the doctor began, "It seems you've actually been quite fortunate. There's no such thing as a minor haert attack of course, but as these things go you seem to have escaped any permanent damage this time."

Vernon patted his clinging wife's cheek and comforted her, "There there, you see Pet? I'm fine, hardy as an ox!" He laughed, but not very convincingly.

Petunia certainly wasn't having any of it, she'd focused on the qualifier in the previous statement. "This time? This time? What does that mean, doctor!?" she demanded.

Here it comes, he thought to himself. "It means," he replied, "that unless your husband starts eaating better and taking excercise, you can expect more of the same. I'm going to be blunt, Mr. Dursley: if you want to live to see your boys graduate from schooling, you're going to need to get in shape."

Vernon started to sputter and steam, but Petunia stilled him with a hand on his shoulder. "Vernon, no. Don't you remember your father? He barely made it to our wedding, and when we got back from Majorca..."

The big man sighed and leaned his head against her pointy shoulder. "I suppose you're right, luv," he admitted. "Where ever am I going to find the time for excercise, though? And I shudder to think what the neighbors will say about it, you'll probably not hear the end of what's happened already for a year."

Resisting the urge to palm his face, the doctor cut in smoothly to apologize, "I'm sorry if that was a bit harsh, but I'm glad I made you see reason. As much as they pay me to be on call at all hours I'd far rather no one ever needed my services, so if I can get you to keep yourself well I count it a job well done. As for the neighbors - this is the eighties! Fit is the fashionable thing! Nothing to worry about there. It only takes an hour or so each day to build some tone, if you got a stationary bicycle or stair-climber for your sitting room you could knock that off while watching the news."

Resigning himself to his healthy doom, Vernon held out the arm not occupied by his wife. "Come on, Dudders," he called, pulling the boy in tight to his side. "Er, you too, Harry," he added, mindful of appearances, though he was satisified when his runty nephew came and sat by his knee. "It'll be alright," he said, looking earnest. "Your old Dad will be around for some time yet, we'll make sure of that."

The next day, when Vernon was released from the hospital, they stopped by a department store intending to get a stationary bicycle as suggested, but ordered a Twelve In One Deluxe Home Fitness Gym instead, a contraption of black enamel and chrome that looked to Harry like someone had tied a lot of bricks to the monkey bars at the playground with thick wires strung on little wheels and things. The attendant promised to have it delivered and assembled for them the next day.

In the larger crisis, the episode with Harry's hair the previous morning had been quite forgotten, and by the end of the month it had grown in a bit finer - it still tended to disorderly spikes, but they were at least more regular and could be said to have a certain style after a fashion, a sort of windblown pageboy cut rather than simply looking like a bird's nest. Harry hadn't forgotten though, and he was glad of it.

(00()00)

The next few years also saw little meaningful change at Number Four Privet Drive, despite all resolutions to the contrary. True, the health bee had well and truly nested in Petunia's bonnet, the kitchen was filled with All-Natural Organic produce, ingredients for whatever the latest fad diet might be, and various herbs and homeopathic remedies. The coffee table was covered in articles with titles like "Crunch Yourself Lean in Just Minutes a Day," "Power-Walk to a Lighter Future," and "Ten Steps to a Healthier You" clipped out of fitness magazines.

On the other hand, consuming massive quantities of all-natural organic food is no help in losing weight. The various leaves and roots and whatnot to be ground and shredded and brewed into homeopathic medicines end up just as expensive as the more conventional sort with a lot more effort expended for debateable results. The excercise machines lost their proud place in a corner of the sitting room for ignominious exile to what had previously been Dudley's second bedroom as soon as a new one came along. The fashionable twelve-step programs rarely progressed beyond the second or third before Vernon and, as time went on and he was included in them, Dudley lost interest.

All in all, father and son saw little real difference in their mass, at best resembling overstuffed seals rather than walruses.

Of course, that didn't mean HARRY got out of them - especially the equipment. Vernon somehow got the idea into his head that if he just found the right combination of all-natural foods and remedies and a lot of good, old fashioned workouts, and even the Tai Chi Chu'an excercise videos that were the sole use Harry was allowed to make of the telly and VCR (and that only when none of the Dursleys wanted to watch anything, which generally meant early in the morning before he had to begin making breakfast) he could sweat the magic out of his nephew. And, of course, all that tedious grinding and chopping and so on involved wih herbal remedies was soon enough passed off to the young boy as well.

Then, the Sweater Incident occurred. Around two years after the heart attack, Petunia decided that Dudley had outgrown the sweater Vernon's sister Marge had given him the previous Christmas (which was true, if only horizontally) a particularly revolting affair in undistinguished brown with little orange puffballs, and as with any of her 'Dinky Duddums's castoffs that didn't actually have tears or holes worn through the fabric she meant to pass it on to Harry.

Horrified at the thought of being seen in such a getup (which Dudley himself had never worn, merely held still with a sour expression while his mother held it up to his chest for Marge's benefit when it was recieved) Harry had resisted the idea, and as she tried to force it on him the awful thing shrank and shrank until it might have fit a puppet, but certainly wouldn't fit Harry. Petunia almost persueded herself that it had simply shrunk in the wash and she hadn't noticed how much until then, but Vernon had been watching, sitting on (but not actually using) the shiny new Air-Flo Breezistance Recumbent Excercycle that was that month's latest fitness machine.

Steaming, he barked out, "BOY! I won't have such... such abnormality! You get in that cupboard, and ... WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING, BOY!?"

Wiping angrily at the tears leaking down his cheeks, Harry spun back from where he stood, halfway up the stairs. "I'M GOING TO WORK OUT! You said it a dozen times, Uncle Vernon, to sweat the freakishness out of me... well it's not like I want to be a freak! I'm going to work out, and keep on doing it until that... whatever that makes strange things happen is GONE! Until you can look at me like you look at Dudley!"

Then he ran up the stairs, and the only thing to be heard was the slamming of the small bedroom's, now a weight room's, door, the clank of weights and the gentle creak of pulleys as the equipment got put to use.

Vernon and Petunia looked at each other, amazed - it had never actually occured to them that their troublesome nephew might not WANT to be like his good-for-nothing parents. Since Dudley was visiting his friend Piers that afternoon they could let the boy's cheeky reply pass, just the once.

That evening, Vernon opened the door to the weight room and peered in, seeing his nephew still going at it with the Twelve In One Deluxe, currently set up for fly presses. He didn't fume. He didn't sputter. He didn't order Harry back into his closet under the stairs for a few days without meals. All he said was, "It's getting late, boy. I don't need to hear you clanking and banging those weights all night long."

Harry stopped, and wiped off his face with a towel. "Okay," he replied, turning on the bench. He lifted up the weight he was using (just a single ten pound plate - he was only eight, after all) and stuffed the towel in between it and the rest of the stack. "That should keep it quiet for you," he said, turning back to his uncle.

Vernon looked at it for a long moment, then nodded, slowly. "Good," he said, and closed the door.

Harry began another set of repetitions.

(00()00)

Magic is fueled by willpower and belief, and shaped by ritual. The ritual of excercise with the intent of stopping accidental magic through physical exertion bent the boy's magic to the task of making his body more capable of such excercise rather than more blatant displays. It didn't happen immediately, but he saw more benfit and none of the cartilage wear and skeletal strain that a child his age really should have had from such extensive workouts, and the minimal baby fat on his frame was filled out with an underlying layer of compact but dense muscle. As the number of strange incidents dropped, his grudging family became just a little bit more accepting of Harry. Sometimes, if Vernon or Petunia were in a particularly good mood, he'd even get a momentary smile, or a gruff "good," or even "well done."

Not that they were any less ready with punishment for the slightest infraction, couldn't let the boy backslide when he was finally showing a spot of promise after all, but it was not altogether a horrid childhood even if at the end of the day he still ended up in the cupboard under the stairs. When Dudley and his friends got the notion to try a new game on the way home from classes hunting his whipcord-thin cousin the smaller boy ran away too fast for them to even keep in sight, let alone catch, and they quickly lost interest.

snake thing - leaves quickly when the snake seems to understand him, not wanting anything to do with freakiness when his life is finally getting a little better.

letter arrives, Dursleys turn on Harry as if he's betrayed them and brought such freakishness back into their lives - events much the same but Harry goes with Hagrid out of resentment at this, throwing himself into what he'd tried to deny because someone is actually showing open approval and wants him there.

"Hagrid," he said quietly, "I think you must have made a mistake. I don't think I can be a wizard."

To his surprise, Hagrid chuckled.

"Not a wizard, eh? Never made things happen when you was scared or angry?"

Harry looked into the fire. All this time, thinking he was some kind of freak of nature, all that work trying to be rid of it... and when it showed up again anyway, the family he'd actually started to feel close to turning on him as ifhe'd planned it all along. Now someone actually wanted him for it?

Harry looked back at Hagrid, seriously, and saw that Hagrid was positively beaming at him. "I used to," he admitted, but then... I made it stop. Focused on training my body so it would go away, so I wouldn't be a frerak any more..." He began to feel a little giddy, actually thinking about the secret he'd so carefully hidden form his relatives, always making sure to change the settings on the machines, never doing his real workouts but in the dead of night or when they were otherwise occupied. "But then, that plan turned out just brilliantly, didn't it?" he muttered, half to himself.

"Tosh!" said Hagrid, ignoring the muttered comment. "Harry Potter, not a wizard -- sweating away magic like some kind o' fever? Ridiculous! You wait, you'll be right famous at Hogwarts."

With a slightly hysterical giggle, Harry hopped up and grabbed the rifle, still tied in a pretzel where Hagrid had tossed it in a corner a few minutes before. "You might be right about that," he said, "but only if something like this counts as magic..."

Then he pulled the knot apart, though the overstressed metal broke before he could try getting it somewhere close to straight. He dropped it and blew on his hands for a few seconds, complaining, "That gets really hot fast!"

The huge man was wide eyed and stunned, and took a few tries to find his voice. "Merlin, Harry! You did that wandless!? Softenin' metal, that's Transfiguration! You don't get taught that kind o' thing even with a wand for weeks! Or a strength charm? And you thinkin' yer not a wizard!"

"None of that, I'm just really, really strong... all the time. And fast, and I don't get hurt much... but I haven't made anything strange happen around myself in almost two years, not since I really focussed on stopping it..."

"Don' you worry Harry," Hagrid assured him. I never heard o' anybody who borke their magic, 'cept by breakin' a magical oath, and without a wand you couldn't go makin' one of those in the first place. Just wait and see, like I said, you'll be a crackin' great wizard with a little trainin', and do yer parents proud!"

In Malkin's Draco talks about how marvelous it is to be in Slytherin, to learn to be strong so you command the respect of others and can respond if they attack - Harry not knowing about Hogwarts or Quidditch or aught else because of being "stuck with my bloody horrid relatives, who're afraid of magic" comes up this time instead of being glossed over, because he's still angry about the way they turned on him and is all too ready to complain to a willing ear. Draco agrees it's practically criminal for him to be stuck with a bunch of filthy muggles and denied a properly magical upbringing, and grudgingly accepts that even Hagrid must have his uses if he at least got Harry away from there. Sullen Harry goes out to get his ice cream.

Wand fitting, only the pheonix/holly wand does anything, and that but a few fitful sparks. Potions shop is "just like the apothecary... but there's so many more things!" gets a mortar, calcinator, fractionator, and alembic as well as the standard cauldron and lots of extra ingredients, because everything is of much higher quality than the ones available at the usual shop. Additional Potions books, as well.

Decidedly antisocial from dealing with his rellies for the remaining days of break Harry follows the Weasleys but doesn't make contact to find out how to get onto the train, and while the Twins cheer him up a bit Ron is a right arse, so when Malfoy comes by Harry leaves with him (Some wizards are better than others after all, Potter, you wouldn't wan't to fall in with the wrong sort." "Yeah... I can see that.") 2nd encounter with Hermione and Neville is in the hall, Draco sneeringly demonstrates the Point Me spell, when houses are mentioned Harry notes that doing your best to learn magic is probably more important, with which Hermione agrees in principle but still thinks the Headmaster's old house must be best.

Nee to Ravenclaw or Gryf, Harry to slytherin. Nee gets picked on for having a freind in the 'bad' house, while Harry does also to a lesser extent due to having a muggle upbringing even if both his real parents were magical, esp after it gets out that his mother was muggleborn. On the plus side, he's a potions genius from all that time spent messing about with stinky weeds and studying the potions books before term started. Fair at Herbology too. Casting subjects he struggles with, but studying with Nee helps there. Nee in gryff, gotta have those double classes.

Snape looks like he's discovered half a worn in his apple when Harry is sorted into his House, the rest of the hall goes still for just a moment - Draco breaks the monment, clapping and waving Harry over. DUmbles looks concerned but carries on, thoguh with less of a twinkle.

Flying lesson, Harry sees the renembrall first and grabs it - Draco jokes about Nev's ineptitude and Harry is quiet since his broom was almost as sluggish. He passes it to Nee later to return to Nev.

"You know Draco, Longbottom has a hard enough time on his own without you picking on him. Besides, isn't he from one of your old 'pure' families?"

"There's a word for old families that lose their power, too, Potter - 'thinbloods.'"

"I still really don't see why you lot feel the need to put labels on people like that, but think of it this way, if you leave Longbottom to his own devices, you have more time to concentrate on the truly deserving."

"Like the Weasel, you mean? I suppose you may have something at that..."

Nee is increasingly put upon, regularly having her things taken and getting tripped or hexed, and called 'hiss-kiss' - Draco also studies with a vengeance trying to keep ahead of her to preserve his notions of pureblood superiority.

Anyway... Harry isn't capable of magic beyond what a moderately talented second year can do, but he's ridiculously fast, strong, and durable. So kicking troll ass isn't hard on Halloween... Slytherins are sent to the Library rather than their common room since the troll is supposed to be in the dingeons, Harry realises Nee wasn't in their classes after Ron's insulting comments and overhears Lavender as per canon, hangs back to warn her in the mentioned restroom since it's on the way. Draco follows out of curiosity and contributes a tripping jinx to occupy the troll when it lands a hit and sends Harry flying.

The next day the taunting is especially bad so Nee blows up at the Gryffs and goes to sit with Harry at the Slytherin table, Malfoy's "Purity is counted in power, not the other way around" speech gets them to somewhat accept her. Plus she covered all those Gryff tossers in pumpkin juice and pudding, and anyone who does that can't be all bad in his book. Condemning them as a bunch of vicious, awful rotters who haven't a thought between them beyond Quiddich and pranks and even less respect for their studies probably helped too, and telling McGonagall that she'd bloody well had enough of Gryffindors to last a lifetime when she's told to return to her proper table. Snape is torn between hatred of mudbloods and gloating at the win over Minnie, but lets gloating win for the nonce. Dumbles is very dissapointed in the lions.

Nee gets set detentions in place of canon Ron for that evening, for her outburst and backtalk. Long term, she's a much harder person, since she's surrounded by enemies in her dorm. Insert rant about barbaric, centuries out of date wizards who sometimes make her wish she'd never heard of magic, but usually just inspire payback. She becomes a dab hand with a shield or hex, and situational awareness verging on paranoia.

christmas break - Draco sends a request to his father to invite Harry along, so he doesn't have to stay in the school or worse, go back to those MUGGLES, but is told not, and that further discussion will need to take place in person.

Christmas day, Harry still gets the cloak, since D can track him in Hogwarts despite it and ewants to see what he'll do, to judge his character - he at least realises that Slytherin House != evil automatically. Sasme deal with the mirror, he wants to find out what the boy wantsout of life. Harry is still harry even with the twists so far - his family is still all he really wants, so that's as good or inconclusive depending on your poitn of view as canon. He also gets a delivery with "House Malfoy" on the sender's tag and a letter inside on top of a box - the letter explaing that the box will only open under pure moonlight, as silver bladeed knife inside has never been exposed to any other light, to better collect certain plants for potions ingredients that have their most potent effect when harvested under a full moon.

He finds the concept interesting but is confused by it not being from Draco personally, or even his father - someone (probably Draco himself after break ends) explains when asked that it's a pureblood tradition thing, a sign of interest in a possible political, social, or business alliance between two of the old families. Polite refusal would be a similarly high-quality but not intrinsically magical tool or device sent on the next major occasion, a minor enchanted item would indicate interest in further negotiations. Since niether of them have sisters a social alliance isn't it, ewhich means Malfoy Senior either wants to float a business proposal or political alliance, and since Harry is a minor that pretty much means politics. It's always about politics anyway with the old families, whatever else it's dressed up as - Lucious is simply looking to make an ally that can help keep his family at the top of the social structure, like any other Old Boys network.

No one except Quirrel actually knows that Voldie is angling for a return at this point - Lucius has the old diary, but doesn't know what it is per se, just that it's a dark artefact and hazardous to the unwary. Giving it to Nee the following year is his idea of removing an unsuitable person who appears to be trying to attach herself to his son or his son's favorite peer - either it'll do her in directly somehow or she'll get caught with it and expelled for bringing dark artefacts onto school grounds. If she somehow manages to deal with it... well, Draco wasn't totally off with his "purity measured in power" speech, if the old families REALLY didn't marry new talent in every now and then they'd have bred themselves out centuries ago, and most so-called "muggleborns" actually have an unacknowledged squib two or three generations back anyway, which blood line testing will reveal.

Hee, Luce's gonna have his tail in a twist when Voldielocks actually returns! Let some schoolgirl read his diary, making alliances with his most hated enemy, son doesn't want to be anyone's lackey, it's not looking good for our boy Lucius from Tom's perspective. What EVER will he do?

("Dear Diary - that overbearing halfblood Hagrid showed me up in Care of Magical Creatures again today, going on and on about the properties of acromatulas. Why did I ever take that stupid class anyway? I'm always too busy with the real magical subjects to do more than glance over the readings for it. I'd reserve a special scorpion pit for the giantspawn after conquering the world, but he'd probably enjoy anything involving horrid beasts with claws, fangs, and poison, so I'll have to think of something more creative. Yours and yours alone, Lord Voldemort" ... No, I just can't see it.)

Of course, Harry's in danger of getting pinned with the "Thinblood" moniker himself, until it comes out that he's getting instruction from no less a figure than Nicholas Flamel himself - rumors have the boy a genius at Potions, Runes and Arithmancy, the three cornerstones of true alchemy - obviously he's concentrated everything on learning that most arcane craft if he's attracted the attention of Nicholas Flamel before even finishing his first year at Hogwarts. Early fourth year, a "loveably innocent" shot of Harry (confused as to why someone wants to photograph him, actually) on the cover of Teen Witch Weekly with the headline "Teen hearthrob to be next creator of the Philosopher's Stone?"



anyway, back to plotting. Hagrid's dragon - he'd probably still try to stay in touch with Harry, to keep him from turnin' into one o' them slytherins that give snakes a bad name, so the invitation to the session ewhere they find the egg is still likely... Nee would go, Draco would proabbly wrikle his nose and make some comment about assosciating with the servants and or the odd smells the gamekeeper seems to always have, then be overcome by the urge to know what's going on when they keep going to meet him and come peeking in time to see it hatch as usual... how to dispose of said dragon is the real question, since weasley backup is not available. Lucius could probably come up with something, but a favor asked is a favor owed and illegal dragon smuggling is not the kind of favor you want to owe a person like Lucius Malfoy. Maybe Gred and Forge could call in Chalrie instead? Assuming they'd stayed neuteral in the Gryffindor vs. Hermione thing, since she limits herself to retailiation in kind and Harry and Draco don't seem all that bad for Slytherins (yes, Harry has been quite the poitive influence already!) or if she presents it to them in the form of a challenge to get past authority figures, if she fouhnd out about Charlie some other way - maybe just Hagrid mentioning how much Charlie Weasley would love to see such a sweet little tyke, sein' how he loved dragons and all - even went to work at one of the big preserves over in Romania.

Swapping Ron in for the spy is tempting where he's cast as the antagonist, but Ron has less subtlety than a rampaging hippogriff and would be of to the owlery like a shot to let his father know, who as a Ministry employee would then have to alert the appropriate departments and there's be aurors and axe-dude down on the place the next day.

Still not sure what to do with the quidditch and Snape-hunt threads - the plan is to de-antagonize him some with Haryr's gift for potions, making him see the Lily in his eyes rather than the James in his body, and being one of his little snakelings is another mitigating factor - so Harry isn't so immediately ready to believe the worst of the man, even if they don't like each other per se...

For end of year, either they don't go after the stone at all and Dumbles fights possessed-Quirrel, or Harry physically fights all the chessmen, and Quirrel himself. Harry has magic resistance? His own spells have to overcome it... could work.

Anyway, the Stone isn't destroyed because Flamel recognises the signs in young Harry of being an Adeptus, like himself, and insists on training him.

?? No Tai Chi earlier, Flamel is French and teaches Harry Savate

Anyway... first year, Harry does well. Second year, not so much. Third year, he's unconscious and misses final exams, fourth year he's excused from all of them due to the tournement, fifth year ... he fails it. Hard. Except of course for Potions, Herbology, Arithmancy, and Runes - the non-casting oriented subjects. (ArM and ARun instead of CoMC and Divn ... maybe keep CoMC, but Hagrid is really down on Slyths, at best backpedaling halfheartedly when he remembers which house Harry ended up in.)

The Power the Dark Lord Knows Not? Why, it's a Venomous Tentacula under the influence of a strength potion and sitting in the center of a power-draining rune array energised by a dragon line nexus, possibly infested with winkiepops.

Without horcruxes, Voldemort's immortality is actually achieved by tying his life force to his fololowers through their Dark Marks - essentially, as long as any of them are still alive he can't be killed without some method to completely sever magical connections between him and them. Being in a different dimension might work, which would actually bring the Pokemon sidetrip at the end of Second Year into the main plot arc. Yay!





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One more little scenelet, since I mentioned Bubblegum disaster, and this one is so far from where I am now that it'll probably be a decade before it sees the light of day otherwise. Where "season one" covers the OVA timeline for the original series and sticks pretty close to teh Knight Sabers directly, Season Two will be a bit more global, dealing with the Polar War as well as who ends up with what from the KS/Genom arms race that just took place in Tokyo (including the bits of alien overtechnology derived from the Guardian unit) and whether and how they spread it around. Preliminary plans put this scene at a secluded campus in Venuzuela or Argentina belonging to Tyrell Biogenetique, S.A., but as written it's on the generic side.





As researchers trickled into the room for the monthly department meeting, conversations died out, casual or work-related, squelched under the glower of Director Needsaname, and the projected visual of a passage form their standard contracts related to information security. A pair of security officers standing on either side of the doors lent added point to the looming unpleasantness.

Needsaname was giving everyone that same measuring look as they came in, and apparently keeping track of faces because he knew as soon as everyone had arrived, and nodded to the guards at the entrance. They didn't acknowledge the signal ecept by each closing the doors on their side, with a muffled click that sounded uncomfortably final to the unnerved scientists and technicians.

They had no time to dwell on it further, however, as without further prelude he began to speak. "I suggest thqat you all review and become very familiar with section five of your contracts," Needsaname said, in a calm, rational, yet supremely threatening tone of voice. "as it seems Mr. Otherguy neglected to read it as closely as he should. Gentlemen, please."

Ignoring Otherguy's shocked protests, the two guards swiftly yanked him up of his seat - displaying clearly inhuman strength for their builds - handcuffed the twenty-something man before hustling him out the doors and closing them after themselves. the muffled protests turned into screams for just a moment before a short burst of gunfire, achingly loud even with the doors closed. Many of his obviouslty now former collegues were in shock, others shouting protests and a few simply screaming hysterically, milling aroundf in a tiught cluster at the far end of the table from Needsaname.

For his part, the director simply grimaced and reached for the intercome on the meeting table, then klooked up beofre pressing the talk button. "QUIET!" he bellowed, cutting through the angry, fearful babble like a knife. Pressing the button, he ordered, "Have Maintainence send someone to clean up in the hall by Meeting Room Two, and someone tell those two idiots that 'outside' means outside the building, not outside the room," taking advantage of the silence after his outburst. "Everyone else is excused from work for one week and confined to the residence hall while further investigations are ongoing. I trust there are no questions?"

One daring soul spoke up, though without actually stepping forward from the group. "How can you possibly justify that? Even if Otherguy was some kind of, of industrial spy or something, what gives you the right to kill him for it!?"

Raising an eyebrow Needsaname replied, calmly again, "I see Mr. Otherguy wasn't the only one who should have looked things over more closely before signing them." Turning around, he read aloud from the projector screen, "Disclosure of information deemed by the Company to be Protected Information may be met with punitive actions including suspension, fines, and or immediate termination. Not 'termination of employment,' you will note, *termination.* Mr. Dewey from the legal department will be setting up a temporary office in one of the unused apartments this week in case anyone whould like to discuss this or other sections of their contract in detail, and Dr. Headshrinker will also be available for consulation. I suggest leaving by the western doors for now if there's nothing else, since the other direction is likely to still be quite unsightly."

As if his nod at the far doors broke some kind of barrier, the shocked and terrified technnicians streamed out and and away, most under their own power, thoguh a handful were leaning on companions and one or two had to be dragged off. When the last of them were gone, he stood, walked over to and closed the west doors, then went around the table again and out the east side. wrinkling his nose a bit as he went. Leaning out that entryway, he waved to Otherguy and the two "guards," looking over their work and commenting, nice placing one the bullet holes in the wall, but don't go overboard with the blood stains. We're not making a slasher movie after all, and some of these geeks are knowledgeable enough to tell if it's overdone."

"Please, sir, I think I've probably been at the sight of more murders than you have," Notreallyotherguy said. "One more big splash at head level and that's it, boys," he told the other two before looking back at their employer. "Too bad I have to stay gone for this to work, a week here was just enough to get me all excited about what you're working on," he commented.

Needsaname smiled, or at least bared his teeth. "I'll make sure you recieve a brochure, and perhaps a few samples when it's ready for the market," he replied, "as a professional courtesy, or course."

"Of course." Notreallyotherguy's smile was easily just as predatory.







END OF LINE
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"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows