Standard disclaimer: I'm not JKR. Any characters, events, etc. that come from her books are hers.

Other important info: This ignores everything from Fantastic Beasts/anything published after Deathly Hallows. Any resemblance to information presented in those is purely coincidental (I haven't read/seen them).


March 2009

Harry shuffled through his files once again, re-reading for the umpteenth time the information he'd put together on the Auror training program in Great Britain and glancing at the reports on the few other programs they'd set up in other countries. He was used to this by now, and he knew the program was successful—the reports could vouch for that. But for some reason he couldn't explain, he had a weird feeling about this time.

Harry had been to America once before, about two years after the war ended, to tour a speak at a Wizarding school and give them a photo op with the boy who lived, but that was easy: smile a bit, wave a bit, tell the students to stay in school and the job was done. This time, he'd be in meetings all day, helping to supervise the construction of any necessary buildings, discussing safety and security measures with the American Wizarding President, and evaluating the performance of their already-employed Aurors.

Harry shook his head and put the papers away in the briefcase Molly had given him when he was promoted to Head Auror nearly five years ago. She'd offered to get him a new one when he was promoted two years ago to head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, but he had declined. One working briefcase was enough.

"Sir?"

Harry looked up. A flight attendant was standing over him, pointing to the little fold down table that came out of the chair in front of him. "Please raise your tray-table. We're landing soon."

Nodding, Harry finished putting his things away and the woman moved away. Everything would be fine, he told himself. The weird feeling in his gut wouldn't go away, but he figured it was just nerves and homesickness. He'd be back home with Ginny and their kids soon enough and in the meantime Molly and Arthur would help her with whatever she needed done. Everything would be ok.

When the plane landed, it took Harry some time to find the separate customs area for traveling Witches and Wizards, and he actually groaned when reminded of the hour-long drive between the airport (far enough outside of the city that the Muggles wouldn't worry too much about magical attacks on the city) and his hotel.

Harry had been too tired to explain to the taxi driver why he wanted to be dropped off at an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of Washington D.C. at 2am. He knew how weird it looked, sure, but he simply didn't care. The large tip he handed over seemed to satisfy the man well enough, and off he went.

Harry would have flooed to the hotel — disguised from muggle eyes, much like St. Mungos and Hogwarts — but he had grown to despise the feeling and didn't want to risk apparating in his present state of exhaustion. Besides, his first meeting wasn't until 11am later that day; he would still be able to get enough rest.

After checking in at the front desk and tipping the elf who brought up his luggage ("We American elves are not slaves like in England, Mr. Potter, sir. We are paid labor, Mr. Potter, sir"), Harry was ready to fall down in his traveling clothes. Remembering to send a quick message to Ginny regarding his safe arrival and love for her and their two children, he passed out onto the bed and immediately fell into the deep sleep of the jet lagged and travel-worn.


Draco Malfoy was stressed out. No, that was an understatement. He was in a downright frenzy. His three-year-old twins were both home from preschool with some muggle virus — strep, they called it — their usual babysitter was still in school, their two house elves had the week off, and his wife was nowhere to be found. Ok, that's not entirely true either. He knew she was at work and that she was trying to wrap things up and come home early to help, but she wasn't there yet and he didn't like it.

Draco was currently in the kitchen of their suburban home, heating up cinnamon oatmeal for Carina and cooling down some tomato soup for Caelum. Their six month old, whom he had finally agreed to name Oliver on the condition that his middle name was Thuban, was bouncing happily in one of his many playpens, a number of protective charms hopefully keeping him occupied and unexposed to the twins' germs. For that, at least, Draco was thankful.

Piercing cries suddenly came from the upstairs bedrooms where the twins were supposed to be sleeping and Draco sighed. When he got the call from the preschool this morning, he felt immediate dread and wished for a moment that he didn't work from home. Miranda, their oldest, had gotten strep last year and it had been hell. His wife had been 3 months pregnant at the time and had gone to stay at a friend's house with the twins so that they wouldn't get sick. He figured she might have to do that again. There was absolutely no way he wanted to deal with a sick 6 month old, and it would be him dealing with it since he was the one who didn't technically have to be anywhere during the days.

Carefully levitating a tray of soft foods and medicine, he walked up the stairs and into the third bedroom on the right. His son's loud cries softened into teary sniffles when he saw the soup.

"Cammie was crying," Carina informed her father, padding into the room and climbing up onto Caelum's bed. In a feat requiring what he considered to be epic parenting skills, Draco held the no-longer floating tray in one hand, conjured a folding table with his wand-hand, and sat so that his daughter could crawl into his lap — all in one move.

"Yes, Carina, I heard him," Draco kissed her forehead — both to comfort her and check her temperature (a trick he'd learned from his wife) — and handed her a small potions vial from the tray. She sniffed it and then drank it in one gulp.

Draco held a similar vial of potion up to his son. Unlike his twin sister though, Caelum immediately turned his face. He didn't like potions.

"Cammie, you need to take your potion. It will help you feel better," Draco pleaded. The little boy shook his head fiercely, squeezing his lips shut. "Cammie, I put a new ingredient in it, so it won't taste bad. Just try it." Still, nothing.

Draco decided to try a different angle. "Carina, love bug, did your potion taste bad?"

His little girl shook her head, blonde curls swishing lightly around her cheeks and neck. "It tasted like strawberries!"

Caelum's face soured. "I don't like strawberries!"

Draco nodded, "Which is why your potion tastes like blueberries instead. C'mon little man, give it a try."

With a suspicious glance at his sister and then at his father, Caelum unhappily took the vial from Draco and put it to his lips. "Promise it won't taste bad?"

Draco gave him a stern look, "Cammie, if you keep expecting it to taste bad, your brain will trick you into thinking it actually tastes bad." His son's face registered surprise and he glanced at the vial again, thinking perhaps it was in on this trickery. "Pretend it's blueberry soup and drink up."

After three stories, two empty bowls, and the promise of ice cream, Draco tiptoed back downstairs. He had charmed the twins' pillows to stay cool, since their fevers would bother them until the potion kicked in, and they had fallen right back to sleep. Oliver had fallen asleep too, and suddenly Draco felt an overwhelming urge to join them all in slumber.

The adrenaline of the first two hours had subsided and he was calm enough now to get some shut eye. He cast a scourgify over his entire body, aimed some germ-killing spells at his clothing and hands specifically, and then picked up his sleeping baby from the playpen. Oliver made a few cooing noises as Draco lay them both down on the living room couch and the two of them drifted happily into a temporary sleep.


Hermione drummed her fingers on her desk, glancing at the clock in her office for what was probably the 10th time in 2 minutes: still 10:45 am.

She had sent an interoffice memo to her boss, the Secretary of Intergovernmental Communication, explaining that she needed to leave early, but she hadn't heard back yet.

She wasn't worried. Matthew Branford was an excellent boss: stern, but fair, challenging his employees to produce their best work but offering motivation and kindness in any given situation. He would be fine with her leaving early, but she was supposed to be meeting with some government officials from the UK this afternoon and she didn't want to leave without ensuring her absence wouldn't be too problematic.

Hermione first met Matthew almost a decade ago, when she was an intern and he was still an assistant to an assistant. They had become friends quickly and had stayed friends when she got a job in a different department, supporting each other as they climbed the bureaucratic ladder that was the American magical government. When he was appointed last year to be the Secretary, he immediately hired Hermione to be his Deputy. She still couldn't quite believe it. There had been a bit of an uproar when the news broke: a British woman serving as Deputy Secretary! And a 29 year old British woman at that! It was unheard of.

Yet here she was.

And here, finally, was Matthew's reply: a little paper airplane flew in through the open door and landed on her desk. Hermione practically tore it open and sighed in relief when she saw the message.

Jeanie -

Ick. That sucks! Go home. We'll reschedule for tomorrow.

- Matt

Hermione smiled at the nickname. When she first got to the states all those years ago to attend a muggle university, she had been in a bad place. She was traumatized by the war, horrified that she had been able to magically wipe her parents memories, and desperate to shake off years of hidden self hatred. Her mother had talked about university as a means of starting over, so at orientation, when it came time to introduce herself, Hermione spontaneously said her name was Jean. The name stuck and now everyone who knew her from that time - muggle or magic - called her Jean or Jeanie, never mind that she confessed after about a week that Jean was actually her middle name.

"Jonathan!" Hermione called to an assistant as she quickly packed up the remaining documents and items she'd need to finish at home.

A blonde man of about twenty-two poked his head inside her office.

"I'm leaving," she explained, "the meeting with the UK officials has been rescheduled for tomorrow. If Mr. Branford needs anything, tell him he can reach me on my cell phone."

A look of confusion passed over the young man's face. "Cell phone?"

Hermione mentally slapped her forehead. Jonathan was new to the department - part of a new recruitment effort to hire promising witches and wizards from the wizarding universities. He was entirely pureblood and entirely unused to the hybridity of muggle and magic devices that permeated the offices.

"He'll understand," she said quickly, adding, "Head over to tech before you leave today; if you're going to work here, you need to get a cell phone of your own and get used to the Muggle way of doing things too."

Jonathan nodded and ducked out of her way as she darted out of the now automatically locked office. She made her way down the hall of cubicles and smaller offices toward her boss's much larger office. She was Hermione, after all; a note wasn't enough to cure her of any trepidation regarding a rescheduled meeting.

She gave a few cursory knocks on the door and pushed it open when she heard Matt's "come in."

At the sound of the door opening, Matthew Branford looked up and sighed when he saw his Deputy Secretary standing in the doorway.

"Strep, huh?" She nodded glumly. Matt gave an exaggerated shudder. "I hate strep. Beckett brought it home from school a few weeks ago. Within hours Emily was complaining of a sore throat too. I thought Maria and I were going to lose our minds the way they were carrying on."

He paused to offer another dramatic show of physical disgust. "Kid diseases! You'd think, with how many of us send our kids to muggle elementary schools now, the potions masters would have found a cure already."

Hermione offered a sympathetic grimace, but added a slight eye roll at this exaggeration. "At least our medicines are a thousand times better! Are you sure you're ok with me heading out?"

Matt's demeanor immediately changed and he nodded enthusiastically, waving his hand as if to shoo her away. "Yes, absolutely. I'll give the guy a tour of the city or something. Not a problem. Go. Get out of here. Get home."

Hermione smiled. "May I?" she asked, pointing to the fireplace in the corner of the massive room. It was so much easier to floo home from the private office network than to go all the way up to the lobby. Matt replied with a brief "Of course. See you tomorrow" and Hermione made short work of it.

Just as she felt the whooshing of green flames begin, she saw Matt get up and greet someone by the door. Maybe she'd been mistaken, but it sounded like he'd said "Come in, Mr. Potter. We've had a slight change of schedule."


Harry had to admit, he was impressed by the US version of the Ministry of Magic. While his own ministry's departments were all housed in one building in London, it seemed as though the various departments of the United States Government were housed in their own buildings all over the city. It also seemed that they had departments for just about everything.

When Minister Shacklebolt had asked him to initiate contact with the US government, he'd been warned that it was a bit complicated.

"The Americans like to do things their own way," Shacklebolt had said. "They do it decently well most of the time, but sometimes it's just too much trouble. If you think working with our Muggle counterparts here is difficult, just wait! It's all politics over there."

Harry hadn't been entirely sure what he'd meant, and had insisted it would be fine. That had been four years ago.

Harry's first contact had been the Head Auror at the Magical Department of Defense. He proposed the idea and didn't hear back for a year. When he did hear back, a new Head Auror — Auror Smithson — told him he liked the idea, but that he'd need to go through a different department if the British Ministry wanted to be involved in any way. And so it began again.

Every time he got through it was budget-ceiling this and voting session that. Finally, a year ago, a man by the name of Matthew Branford got in touch with Harry, now the Head of Magical Law Enforcement in his own Ministry.

The man had just been appointed Secretary of the Department of Intergovernmental Communication and personally apologized for the lack of enthusiasm in his department in previous years.

"The Magical and Muggle Governments of this great nation are very closely intertwined, you see," Secretary Branford had explained apologetically. "So much so that policy and political sentiment in one often directly affects policy and political sentiment in another. But we have a new President now, and it just so happens that improving national security and fostering relations with our British counterparts are both top priorities! We'll have this Auror Training Program up and running in no time!"

Harry had been relieved at the time, but he was definitely nervous now as he walked into the massive stone building. It was very conspicuous. Not at all like the charmed and warded hotel he was staying in.

He passed through some basic security checkpoints and signed in at a front desk, where he was told to just go directly to the Secretary's office. Of course, that didn't exactly help, and an intern was called to help him find his way.

On an upper floor, they walked through a few halls filled with cubicles and passed a variety of offices too quickly for him to notice the names on the doors. Finally, Harry stood alone in front of a great oak door with two big name plates: "Secretary of Intergovernmental Communication" above and "Matthew Branford" underneath. The door was partially open, and he could hear voices inside.

He knocked gently and seconds later, the door swung open. Standing before Harry was a tall man with broad shoulders and a huge toothy grin plastered onto his face as if he had just heard a piece of spectacular news. The man's own tousled brown hair matched Harry's mess, and both heads seemed a bit out of place compared to the Secretary's extremely neat and expensive looking suit. Branford's lapel flaunted a pin picturing an American flag layered underneath a wand editing gold sparks.

Harry stuck out his hand, wondering who was already waiting inside the office. It was only 10:55. He certainly wasn't late.

Branford was speaking and leading him into the office with a grand sweeping gesture. "Come in, Mr. Potter. We've had a slight change of schedule."

There was no one else in the room, but Harry did notice a fireplace in the corner to his left and the hand-sized bucket of floo powder was still swinging slightly.

"Sit, sit! Can I offer you some water?" Harry sat, but politely declined the water.

"A change of schedule, you said?" He was trying his best to be professional, but the weird feeling in his gut was back along with a healthy dose of Bureaucrat-induced intimidation. Harry still wasn't quite used to working with politicians and bureaucrats, preferring the more familial style of the Auror Department.

"Yes, just a slight one," Branford explained casually, magically refilling a water bottle that was already on his desk. "We were going to have a preliminary meeting today before showing you around and getting you settled in, but my Deputy Secretary had a family emergency and needed to reschedule. We'll all meet tomorrow morning, if that's alright with you — before the meetings and presentations with the D.O.D. of course."

"Oh, alright," Harry responded, reminding himself that the DOD stood for Department of Defense — the US equivalent to his own department. "That's not a problem."

The man stood up again, despite just having sat down. "So I figured I would take the day off and give you a tour of the city if you're up for it," he suggested, cocking an eyebrow at Harry. Harry was still tired, but not nearly as tired as he'd been earlier that morning, and he'd never been to Washington, DC before.

"Sure! Why not?"

As they were setting out to leave the building through a back exit, Harry once again felt shock and a bit of discomfort at their conspicuousness. If American wizards were so out in the open, they would have to significantly change elements of his training program. Or at least, that was how he justified commenting.

"You Americans don't care much for International Statute of Secrecy, do you?" he asked, chuckling nervously when he was met with confused silence and trying to explain. "In London, our Ministry is entirely underground, and"

"Ah! No," Secretary Branford apparently caught on and quickly interrupted "The citizens of DC are extremely used to government buildings and classified information, so there's really no need to hide in that manner. Of course, we do have precautions. Do you remember walking through a set of metal detectors on your way in? Yes? Well they also detect the presence of magical blood and security clearance levels. If you don't have access, you don't see it. Literally."

Harry must have looked a bit confused, since Branford continued:

"Ok an example: you are a wizard, which means when you walked in, you could see our interoffice memos flying around. If you were a Muggle — specifically a Muggle who doesn't have a certain security clearance — the metal detectors would recognize you as such and charm your eyes. Those memos would have been invisible. And if you'd seen someone carrying a wand, it might have appeared to you as a rather large pen instead."

Harry nodded, trying to mask just how impressed he was. Muggle technology doing magical work in a government agency was something Britain had barely even attempted. Of course, Great Britain's Ministry of Magic wasn't nearly as closely associated with their Muggle Counterparts as the governments seemingly were in the States. Still though, it would be interesting to attempt in places like St. Mungos.

For the next few hours, Secretary Branford showed Harry all around Washington DC, pointing out buildings where they'd have meetings, taking him to famous tourist sites — both magical and muggle — and listing off additional places or activities Harry "really should do before heading back across the pond." Branford even offered to have Harry to his home for dinner, but Harry declined. It was a bit much for one day and he was feeling jet lagged again. He took a rain check, intending to go back to his hotel, eat something ordered from room service, call home via cell phone or magic mirror (whichever Ginny saw first) and go to sleep.

The first part of his plan went swimmingly. He got back to the hotel with no fuss at all but, upon his arrival, was informed that the kitchens had been closed. Suppressing thoughts that were positively anti-elfish rights, he asked where a nearby carryout place might be and begrudgingly apparated to a safe space near the location.

The little restaurant was a muggle-owned business, but Harry guessed that a lot of witches and wizards frequented the place as well. It seemed a large portion of this suburban area was magical and he wondered if there were many more mixed neighborhoods in the area. As he walked inside, the smell of Americanized Chinese food immediately filled his nostrils and his stomach began to grumble hungrily. He was silently debating which items he wanted to bring back to the hotel when a bell chimed behind him, indicating that someone had entered.

At that same moment, for some inexplicable reason, the memory of a swinging pail of floo powder came to mind and he turned instinctively to see who had entered.

What he saw nearly made his knees buckle. His stomach dropped to the floor and it was as if the wind had been knocked out of him.

"Hermione," he finally gasped, as though his voice was trapped somewhere deep down. "You're — I —" he couldn't quite find the words. He hadn't seen this woman in 10 years. He had given up on ever seeing her again. His best friend.

"We thought you were dead."


A/N: So? What do you think? Let me know! (p.s. I don't have a beta so please excuse any typos/etc. that made it through my own editing.)