Harry and his trouble-finding ways.

Disclaimer: I know nothing, James Norrington.

Chapter 1: Getting out of Privet Drive, like nobody's watching you.

#O#


Spacebar-Spacebar-Spacebar

"You're here." Harry's aunt spat as he closed the door behind him. "Go to number 17, they want to speak with you." She added, pursing her lips when she saw the new muggle clothes Hermione had forced him to buy at Christmas.

Harry nodded without speaking and went back out, his trunk still in his hand. Seems the Dursleys hadn't forgotten how the twins had freed him from jail last time, he thought, shrugging. The boy walked along the houses of Privet Drive until he was at number 17. Now a bit nervous, Harry tried to rearrange his hair before ringing at the door. He might be able to perhaps guess why he had been called here, but it didn't make it easier.

After a few minutes, a man opened and immediately glared, seeing who was at the door. Harry cursed inside, Mr Simmons had never liked him and now, it looked like he knew what Harry would have liked to stay hidden all his remaining time in the Dursley Penitentiary.

"So you're here, at last." The man stated darkly. "Come inside, don't dawdle." He ordered, towering above Harry. Warily, the boy entered the house, doing his best to put the trunk between Mr Simmons and him, his wand was already in his pocket, ready to be drawn. "Go sit in the living room, I'll call Marlene."

Harry went into the living room and dropped down on the sofa, trying to make himself the smallest he could on the couch. Harry heard some noise and the man quickly came back with a woman who had a baby in her arms. The woman sent Harry a quick glance but seemed more interested in the baby she had in her arms.

"Now, first thing, Olivia is dead." The man said stiffly. Harry's eyes widened and he half-stood.

"What!?" He shouted in dismay. The man gave him an unimpressed glance before his wife asked them to keep it down for the baby.

"As I said, she died, in January, while giving birth to this brat." The man said hatefully. Harry's glistening eyes went to the baby, quickly taking in the wild black hair, the blue eyes, little nose and cute face … shit.

"You know." Harry uttered painfully.

"We know, and we disapprove. She was too young, it killed her." Olivia's father stated icily. "We've got the papers here, you take the brat, you move, there's money too, and we never see you again for the reminder of our lives." He explained, showing what he had brought with him when he had been back with his wife.

Harry sent the man a piercing glance, his grief at hearing about the death of his only friend in Privet Drive ruthlessly suppressed for the moment.

"I see." Harry said sharply, his eyes having crossed Olivia's mother's. "Then I won't take more of your time. I just want to know where you buried her." Harry asked as he began doing the paperwork necessary to him becoming the sole caregiver of Rose Potter, his daughter. It didn't even matter, he was a wizard, any child of his would be brought to him by the goblins if he paid enough gold, even if they had to attack half the muggle governments in the world and wipe out their memories. Goblins just wanted gold.

"Not that you have any business to know that but she was cremated and the urn crushed in a bin lorry." Harry's fists clenched as he finished. Knowing any kind of magic would be detrimental right now, his situation having changed from slightly shitty to completely fucked up. He took his daughter, and he could barely even believe he was thinking that, from her grandmother's arms.

"She didn't want her to go to an orphanage, she said you would take her." Olivia's mother whispered, Harry nodded, not trusting himself to speak. The twelve year-old then left the house, eyes blazing and his magic barely holding back. Accidental magic would bring the Ministry and that asshole who had sent Hagrid back to Azkaban just to be seen doing something at Privet Drive, he couldn't lose it right now.

Like hell he was going to let them even see his daughter. Same for the Dursleys, Dumbledore or anyone else, he had no one who, he was sure, wouldn't make the mistake of trying to separate him from his daughter …

Before he was even at number 4, Hedwig came on Harry's shoulder and sent an inquiring hoot at the sleeping baby in his arms.

"I'll explain later." Harry told one of his only trusted companions. "Dobby!" Harry then called out in a flash of brilliance. The elf had told him he just had to call, no matter where or when, and he would come, ready to help with whatever Harry needed. He would be his most important ally in this.

"Mr Harry Potter Sir already called for Dobby!" The exciting elf cried out as he appeared. Harry, having hidden himself between a neighbour's car and hedges, told Dobby to lower his voice. Harry didn't want to wake up his daughter, and he also would like to avoid someone seeing him with a baby in his arms, talking to a Yoda-lookalike.

"Sorry Dobby, can you take a message to my friend Hermione, it's really urgent … or not. Do you know a way to travel that I could access right now without anyone aware?" Harry asked, a London – New York ticket on top of the pile of papers he had with him. Seeing the ticket had given him an idea.

Hermione would certainly try to get Dumbledore or McGonagall involved. With their medieval mindset, they wouldn't like the fact that the child had been born out of wedlock and all this garbage. Ron wouldn't be useful, the twins wouldn't know how to react, Percy would ask Dumbledore, his father or even someone in the Ministry. Neville? He didn't know him enough … Seamus, Dean, Charlie Weasley … he really didn't know a lot of people, having just begun socialising and learning how to talk to others in the two years he hadn't been confined to his cupboard or harassed by Dudley and his gang.

"Dobby can go with Mr Harry Potter Sir anywhere! And elveses are best to go with babies! Bad Master always said so!" Dobby told Harry. Usually wouldn't really care about something Lucius Malfoy said. But if there was one thing that seemed important for the man, it was his son, his heir. So the man would probably know best how to care for his pampered heir.

"You can? Then, I guess … to Gringotts." Harry asked. The elf nodded before taking Harry's hand and making him, his daughter and his owl disappear from Privet Drive to never return … hopefully, he thought fiercely, he would try everything to get out of having his daughter spending a single second at the Dursleys.

"Mr Potter." The goblin teller saluted Harry as he came up to the counter, raising an eyebrow at seeing an elf at his side, a baby in his arms and an owl on his shoulder. Harry had the impression it looked like the beginning of a bad joke.

Harry thanked Whoever could have helped him as he saw that there wasn't any customer he knew and barely a half-dozen wizard all in all in the lobby. He had a plan, and this plan wouldn't be approved, he wagered, by anyone he knew. Well, it wasn't as if anyone had really his best interests at heart or could really help him on their own.

"How long to get a shitload of money, an untraceable portkey to Hong Kong – and when I say untraceable, I also mean untraceable in your own register – legit papers, muggle and magical, for me and my daughter, a way to carry my owl safely, and the deed of a completely furbished house in Durban, South Africa?"

Judging by the size of the goblin's eyes, it wasn't always that people asked for this kind of things. Harry put the fifty galleons he still had in his pocket on the counter.

"Ten times that if you're faster than I am in taking everything I need for my upcoming travels around the world, double if you swear not to squeal to anyone on your magic and life." Harry promised sharply before turning on his heels and stalking out of the bank, the counter he had been in already having a 'closed' sign. Harry would spend a lot of money in the coming month. But it was worth it, and Harry had seen before his second year that he wasn't really hurting for money.

Harry didn't use the portkeys or tickets he bought. He had read about how to cover his tracks to run away. If Hagrid hadn't introduced him to the magical world at his eleventh birthday, Harry knew he would have run from the Dursleys in the year.

He would have had to abandon Olivia, but at the time, she had only been a very good friend, his only one … and they wouldn't have gone to the same school. They had only been intimate after Harry had discovered why his 'family' called him a freak for ten years. Play doctor, she had called it, to do a so-called examination of what could be different between a wizard and a muggle.

Harry's endgame was to take a ship from Aberdeen, in Scotland, to Trondheim, in Norway. Twenty-five thousand pounds convinced the captain of the fishing boat that he would like to see the Norwegian fjords.

Then, he asked Dobby to teleport him to Leningrad, the only city Dobby had already seen in Eastern Europe since the Malfoys had a house in the magical district. From there, he took a portkey to the magical district of Vladivostok. Finally, he took a plane to Tokyo, bypassing the Soviets easily with Dobby's help and his magic.

During all this travelling, his daughter only woke up thrice. Dobby assured Harry Rose was just a calm baby and that nothing was really worrying. Baby slept a lot, had said the elf.

When Harry had travelled by portkey, however, the elf had chastised the young father before taking Rose with him, saying portkeys were bad for the magical development of the baby. It brought home to Harry that he would have to be really careful.

The thirteen years old was still having a difficult time to reconcile with the fact that he was a father. When Olivia and he had … done it, they hadn't even considered the possibility. Diseases, yes, briefly, but they were new to all this and neither of their 'guardians' had ever bothered to tell them anything about that.

So coming back and having to mourn a girl he realised he had liked, more than he liked Hermione or Ron for sure, and having to learn how to care for a baby, a baby that was what he had been to his parents. It was frightening. Even more frightening than Quirrellmort, the Basilisk or a furious Severus Snape. Even all of them together were still a path Harry could envision as better with the amount of mistakes he could do with his daughter.

Harry had so many questions running around his mind, most of them involving the future and what it entailed. Was he good enough to care for a baby? Would he manage to keep her from any danger that could pop up? Would he be successful in blending in when he would be at his final destination? Would he be found out? Was Dumbledore already after him? Did Voldemort know how to search for someone in the muggle world? Would he be back easily now that Harry wasn't there to counter him? Would Dumbledore be able to handle Voldemort or would it be the same as his first and second years or the first war?

#O#

Author: Mainly Harry in Astarotte's Toy as Naoya, with changes already made to the two timelines.