Steamy: So, apparently I am a masochist, as I have started another colossal fic that will without a doubt kill me from the burden of it, but maybe I'll be able to do both this and Naruto: Player 2 as the main reason I have had trouble continuing that story is because Harry Potter was on the brain.

Also, quick warning, this story is going to be... interesting.

Harry isn't so much going to be OP as he is going to be extremely curious and determined, he has a natural want to learn in this story and that means absolutely everything he thinks would be useful, you'll understand more later, and also, this story is going to have, very scant, traces of an American TV show called Leverage, which is a show of a ragtag team of thieves who steal from corrupt business people in order to help others (I recommend it, it's really good) I'll explain more at the end of the story.

Now, onto the story.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Harry Potter cast or books/movies and anything that might belong to other people

Thief

Prologue

Harry James Potter wouldn't have had much to live for before he received his Hogwarts letter.

He was, after all, viewed as nothing more than a slave, worse even; according to the Dursley's, Harry was less than everyone and everything else, a Freak, nothing more and everything less.

Harry was well aware of this fact, after all, every time he tried to do something nice for the Dursley's or to garner their affections they would always turn him down in the most cruel way they could; like that time his Aunt tore up his Valentine's Day card that he had worked so hard on right in front of him, or that other time when he had tried his hardest to get the best grades in class, thinking that maybe they would be proud of him.

But, of course they weren't. Dudley even went as far to say that Harry had done it to make him look stupid and Harry had gotten one of the worst beatings of his short life.

So, Harry didn't try hard anymore, he just tried to keep out of everyone's way and remain unnoticed, just like a slave should.

But staying quiet and out of the way was boring and led to a lot of time spent thinking and honing the only abilities he had, which were, of course, cooking and cleaning and gardening and being extremely light on his feet so that he wouldn't be unnecessarily detected by his relatives or anyone for that matter. He also worked on his other skills, the ones that his relatives didn't quite know about, like his reading level or the fact that he was actually teaching himself how to speak French and German, or how he would sometimes offer his services to people in other neighborhoods which led to him having quite a bit of money hidden safely within his cupboard.

His life wasn't much, but he just kept on telling himself that one day, when he was of legal age, he would do his best to make something of himself, be more than what his parents were and what his relatives have told him he is.

That all changed, however, when he was seven.

He had been at school and his class was just about to head out for recess, when, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted something on the floor.

He crouched down and picked it up, looking it over and recognizing it as a toy Dudley had "borrowed" from one of the boys in the class a few days beforehand.

Knowing that Dudley, and by extension his Uncle, would have his hide for even touching the toy Harry swiftly placed it in his bag so that he wouldn't be caught with it. He resolved to give it back to his classmate later.

And then, just as he was entering the playground someone rushed by him, and something else caught Harry's eye, namely a pair of gloves in the child's back pocket. Out of curiosity the green-eyed boy reached out and took them, not realizing that this was happening within a single second, or that the other child was running pretty fast as he was doing it, and took the gloves and examined them.

They were black and green and were made from what felt like to Harry from wool, they looked comfortable and warm, but Harry daren't put them on, not wanting to get in trouble, so, he made to put the gloves back where he got them when he paused, blinked a moment in confusion, then snapped his neck up when he realized that the owner of the gloves were already on the playground, completely oblivious to the fact that their gloves had been stolen.

Harry didn't know what to do with himself, internally freaking out and coming up with all sorts of horrible scenarios that would occur when he was found to have taken the gloves, which then led him to stuffing them in his bag out of sight, calming himself down and telling himself that he would return them after school.

The rest of the day went by normally, the only difference being that Harry felt a lot more anxious than usual. Then, the last bell rung and everyone left the building.

Harry slowly made his way to his and Dudley's things, already knowing that Uncle Vernon was there to pick up the larger boy and take him home while Harry had to lug the larger and heavier backpack with him back with him to the house.

Harry sighed and looked inside the bag, knowing that he would find stolen snacks inside and stealthily made his way to the teacher's lounge and put all of the stolen snacks back, thankful that this was the one thing Dudley never called him out for as he couldn't justifying stealing from the teacher's or the school, at least he thought he couldn't, though Harry had no doubt his parents would gobble it right up and somehow make it right (probably by blaming Harry) and allow for him to continue on.

Harry shook the thought from his mind and then made his way to the Dursley household, planning on making two quick stops on the way.

First he dropped off the toy, which he carefully stuffed into the other boys' bag while he was distracted then he made his way to the house of the owner of the gloves.

Harry carefully took off the backpacks, hid them, and then crawled up to the house. After looking around a bit and listening to make certain no one was nearby, Harry then crawled through the doggy-door attached to the bright red wooden door.

Once inside Harry heard the voice of an adult and child talking to each other, the child sounded distressed and Harry was fairly certain he knew why; so, without further ado Harry swiftly located the child's school backpack and placed the gloves inside, then, he left the way he came.

Just as he walked down the steps Harry heard the happy exclamations of the child as they announced that they had found the gloves.

Harry smiled to himself before grabbing his two backpacks and made his way back to his relatives' house.

It wasn't until he was lying in his cupboard that he realized what he had done.

He had successfully infiltrated and returned something without anyone discovering him; it was like he was a thief! Or a reverse thief in this case as he hadn't taken anything.

He was suddenly struck with the idea that he should become a thief! After all, he reasoned with himself, it wasn't like he had much else to do, nothing to do but slaving away under people who would never appreciate it and would even punish him just because they felt like it, and, according to his Aunt and Uncle, his parents had been good-for-nothings so why not flip the trend and become something worthwhile?

That night, something within Harry James Potter changed, and, he became a thief.

As if it would be that easy.

First he had to learn how to hone his aptitude for stealth, and his knack to steal things without being noticed, after that, he decided, he needed to be able to swiftly get away and be able to blend into a crowd and be able to climb things and, and-!

He took a breath and let it out slowly, no, he needed to be calm and logical about this; if he panicked then he could just throw this idea right out the metaphorical window, no, he needed to think with a clear mind, he needed to-

*Crack*

He was startled out of his thoughts both from the noise and from the fact that he was now lying on his back when he had just moments before been sitting upright, leaning against the back of his cupboard.

Blinking his eyes in confusion for a moment he forced his body still as he let his eyes take in what was around him. The first thing his eyes took in was the ceiling, which looked partially jagged,' the stairs,' his mind helpfully supplied, but the rest of it was wooded-and dusty-and looked to be the support flooring of the second floor with an occasional wooden beam helping to hold it up.

A cough was soon followed by a groan as Harry pulled himself up so that he could take in the rest of the small space.

The ground was concrete and just as dusty as the ceiling; the walls were also made of concrete; coughing again Harry brought his shirt up to his nose to cover it so that he wouldn't suffocate from the overabundance of dust floating around him as he looked around some more.

A bit more of searching led to him finding a rather large hole in one of the walls, and, after using a shirt to cover the opening and grabbing a torch that he had stashed underneath the cupboards floorboards he ventured further into the house.

The hole was larger than he was, it could probably hold his cousin Dudley and his Aunt Petunia, if she slouched down some that is, and maybe a third of his Uncle Vernon, though he wasn't sure on that one, he was fairly small after all so it was likely that it only looked large to him because of that. Shaking his head of such thoughts Harry continued on, making several turns here and there before, *Bam*, he hit something metal.

Rubbing his head Harry used his torch to shine light on the object and realized that it was an air vent, specifically, it was the air vent that was attached to the parlor near the front door; it was just behind a settee so no one would be able to see it! With a grin the boy started to push at the grate, hoping that it would give and that he would be able to get out-he was lucky that the Dursley's had decided to eat out that night as he no doubt would have been detected already and severely punished for breaking the wall, even though no one would have ever seen it.

A couple more minutes of pushing and the grate jiggled open, allowing for Harry to push it up and crawl out of it. He had to crawl under the settee as well but after that he was free and standing in the middle of the parlor.

Harry stood there for a moment, smiling in contentment and peace for a little but, then, he took a deep breath and then started to attempt to hack up his lungs, as he had quite forgotten that he was covered in dust. After coughing for about a minute he was able to regain control of his lungs and calm his beating heart, thinking,' I'll need to clean up so that nobody finds out about this,' he let out a short sneeze then made his way over to his cupboard, looking at the lock on the door, wondering if he would be able to pick it open... Well, only one way to find out.

He made his way around the house in search of something he could use to pick the lock, knowing that the actual key was somewhere on his Uncle's person and so he wouldn't be able to use that. After some searching he was able to find a small crochet hook and a small pocket knife (which he found in Dudley's room; that was a scary sight for sure) and then made his way back to the cupboard and attempted to pick the lock.

It took him awhile, but, finally, he was able to unlock it. A small noise of excitement sounded from Harry's throat as he heard the lock click and fall open; he then opened the door and gathered the cleaning supplies but before he cleaned up the mess of dust he went into the kitchen and cleaned himself off so that he wouldn't trail dust everywhere. After that he went about cleaning everything of dust finishing within the little room right inside the cupboards wall; after that he went over to the grate covering the air vent and fiddled with it so that it wouldn't make any noise when he opened it; he also moved the settee a couple inches forward so that it would be easier to open the grate, then he fixed up the hole in the cupboard so that it couldn't be seen but also made it easily removable and then finally he put everything back in the cupboard where it belonged and closed and locked the door.

He was just about to go through the vent to get back to bed when his stomach growled loudly.

A soft sigh left his lips; he hadn't eaten anything since four days ago...

Making up his mind Harry headed into the kitchen and made up a quick, small, meal that he ate quickly, didn't want to be caught out of the cupboard after all, and, with a sigh of content, he finished his food and made his way to the vent.

Only to stop dead in his tracks at the sound of a car pulling into the driveway.

Harry's eyes widened to the size of dinner plates and his breathing suddenly became labored, no! He couldn't be caught! Not now! Acting quickly he made a dash for the parlor and crawled under the settee and opened the grate and pulled himself in, his heartrate quickened as the lumbering footsteps of his Uncle sounded up the walkway.

He moved through the tunnels as quickly and quietly as possible, forcing his breathing to remain steady so that he couldn't be heard-the front doors lock was just clicking open-then, he was in the small room-the door opened, loud voices echoing off the walls-Harry jumped over to the cover on the hole and carefully made his way through-loud footsteps were getting closer to his cupboard-then, finally-!

The cupboard door opened with a loud bang," get up, freak, and make us some cake!" Vernon's voice boomed out.

Harry carefully crawled out of the cupboard, relief washing over him that he had been able to get back in time.

After he finished feeding the family of three and after going back to bed for the night Harry sightlessly looked at the ceiling, thinking of everything he would need to do in order to become a competent thief.

First, he needed to get better at sneaking around; second, he needed to heighten his senses so that he was completely and fully aware of what was happening in his immediate vicinity; third, he had to work on his pick-pocketing skills; fourth, he had to know how to break into places properly and how to get out without a trace-a trip to the library was in order-fifth, being able to make a fast getaway was always good, and, lastly, he needed to be able to blend into a crowd at any given time.

After coming up with this list Harry went to sleep, looking forward to the day to come.

From the next day onwards Harry worked every moment he had to spare on becoming a thief, he tended to compare himself to Robin Hood in a way, he wasn't going to steal from just anybody after all, he had to be careful with who he stole from and when he did the stealing, which then led to a lot of time spent looking up various wealthy people, blueprints to different buildings (like the library and his school), seeing if there was anyone that was within the list of wealthy people that had multiple people that had a bone to pick with them, and whether or not it was justified.

It took several months of planning; trying and failing before Harry finally got it.

His first intentional, and successful, heist was against an old antique shop, which just so happened to be stealing random heirlooms from people's homes and claiming that they hadn't done anything, having a lot of money to back you up is quite useful.

But, unfortunately for them, Harry targeted them, and that meant that they wouldn't be keeping that money.

He visited the shop a couple times over the course of several days, mapping out the place and conjuring up plans on how to infiltrate it. He found several people who had just been stolen from and were about to sue the shop, and so he was careful to factor that into the plan.

Then, three days later, he broke in.

He took all the money from the vault and several pieces that had been stolen (of course not everything was stolen) before making his way off, but not before leaving the present of the most recent steals being center stage.

The owners were forced to explain why the pieces weren't noted down in the items ledger, like they said they were, or why they had the insignia of the family that was accusing them of theft on it, even though they had sworn that no such insignia existed.

Soon, the combination of having no money and being heavily investigated for multiple accounts of theft, the place had to close and the owners were sent to prison. After that Harry kept most of the money to himself, but he did make sure that all of the stolen heirlooms were returned to their rightful owners, some of which had to be reimbursed as their own pieces had either been sold to some unknown person too long ago or they were damaged/destroyed, Harry just kept most of the money, not all of it.

But that was only Harry's first heist.

From there, Harry continued to do bigger and bigger jobs, never being heard or seen, no one would ever know why things were disappearing from certain places, or who was behind it, but, Harry was fine with that.

He didn't particularly care about recognition, he was used to being ignored for the things he did, and all he cared about was honing his skills and getting better and better, swiftly becoming the best thief in the world.

Stealing was fun, but, to Harry, the best part was when he completely destroyed a corrupt business or group and gave back to the people they hurt; Harry Potter, after all, even under all of that cunning and sarcasm, was an incredibly pure person who hated others hurting, as he knew what it was like to be in pain and have no one to care.

But enough of that; the Dursley's were off vacationing at the beach and other touristic places for several weeks, the house would be nice and quiet with no one to disturb it.

It was time for Harry to go on his next heist... in India!

Steamy: the end of the prologue and so on to the first chapter.

All I have to say is that Harry as a thief is based on the "Master Thief" character from Leverage, who is a woman by the name of "Parker" she's a bit crazy, and so will Harry be, but for different reasons, you'll just have to wait for the rest of the story, as it will show you what I mean throughout the rest of it.

I'll get back to you guys next week.