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Undo

Chapter 1: Taken

"By the Gods above, Albus, that boy must be moved!"

McGonagall's words from two hours ago echoed in Dumbledore's head. She was the one in-charge of the routine check of young Harry's well-being and for reasons he has yet to figure out, she had returned with her mouth fixed in an uncharacteristic scowl and had started shouting at him as soon as she saw him, outraged. Her words came out as quickly as a train moving at high speed and through her entire incoherent one-sided shouting match, Albus could only make out "unsuitable", "absolutely unforgivable" and lastly the sentence which has been stuck in his head for two whole hours.

He sighed deeply. Not many things could make Minerva lose her temper and even lesser things could make him go into as deep a thought as he currently was in. He had firmly believed that he had made the right decision in sending Harry to his blood relatives and he stood with it even as many a people had warned and told him that it was a bad choice. Blood ties could protect Harry, and he still stood by it. He just didn't understand why others don't see it as he sees it.

He stood up, deciding that a walk would clear his head up a bit. Harry would be safe with his relatives, he was sure of it. No harm can be done to him if he just stayed with his relatives. His mood lifted up, he popped a sherbet lemon into his mouth and went jovially for his walk.

Back in his office, Fawkes stared at the chair where his master had been sitting. His human was making a big mistake. Even with many warnings, he still believed himself right. He was a great wizard, yes, but he was still human. Human makes mistakes and this one was probably his worst.

Blood ties protected young Harry from external threat, but what about internal threats? Who's to say that he was protected from the very relatives that were supposed to protect him? Fawkes may not be human, but he understood every single human word spoken and from the many talks, he could easily guess what was happening. Albus may be an accomplished man, but he's blinded. Fawkes would have sighed if he could. Let's just hope that his master's blindness would not lead to far more serious consequences.

Meanwhile, in the Order of the Phoenix Headquarters, seven people were gathered around a table with grave expressions. They were the people who had seen how young Harry was treated and had given more than enough unheard warnings to the famed Headmaster. They simply could not stand for it anymore, hence the secret meeting. They were McGonagall, Lupin, Mad-Eye Moody, Tonks, Mr. Weasley and surprisingly Malfoy Senior and Snape. Malfoy and Snape were double agents for Dumbledore and they had found out Harry's living conditions by accident.

They were supposed to raid the Dursley's house when Harry was three but they managed to convince the other Death Eaters that waiting a few years more would probably gain them an ally considering how he was treated by his muggle relatives. Luckily for them, the Death Eaters had been none the wiser and agreed after much suspicion from some loyal Death Eaters, pleased at the prospect of gaining a strong ally for Voldemort when, not if, he rises again. It was also that time that the two felt sympathy and justified anger for their enemy's son.

"So," started McGonagall, "what do we do? It's obvious that Albus isn't going to do anything about it and we've waited for too long. If this drags on, Harry will become the next Dark Lord and may far surpass Voldemort after proper education!" Whispers of agreement indicated that the thought was mutual. "We've let it drag too long. Far too long. We need to do something about it and now," Moody scowled. He wasn't the type to let something that serious drag. "Let's start with what we see at the house."

Lupin raised his hand and angrily started without waiting for permission to speak, "Harry is six, he should have been taught how to read, write and speak by now. But the Dursleys," he sneered at the name, "refuses to teach him anything and I've watched him teach himself to do those things by watching others do them and by trial-and-error. He truly is Lily's son."

Snapping himself out of the short-termed walk down memory lane, he continued, now angrier than anyone in the room has ever seen him. "They call him a freak! A freak! He didn't know that his name wasn't boy or freak or bastard child when I met him on the streets for Gods sake!" Then he simmered down, more on the verge of despair now. "He didn't recognise me. I was no more than a perfect stranger to him. When I offered to take him home, he said that he was a burden and didn't want to waste my time and contaminate the air I breathed." During his rant, he had placed his hand in his hands, clearly in despair.

With a comforting pat on the shoulder of the student she had once adored during his time in Hogwarts, McGonagall turned to the rest of the group, each wearing similar angered expressions on their faces. That was no way to treat a child and they knew it. What disturbed them more was that they knew that the bad treatment didn't stop there.

Moody grunted deeply, a sound he made when he was displeased. The deeper the grunt, the more displeased he was. From the tone, it was obvious that he wasn't one bit pleased about the way the child was treated. "I saw his 'room' on one of my routine checks. It was an old walk-in closet with cobwebs in the corners. With some magic, I saw that he only had a bed. His pig of a cousin has a room bigger than the master bedroom of a luxurious house." He heard a sharp intake of breathe from Lupin. He obviously didn't get to see where Harry's room was. Behind him, Snape and Malfoy shared equally ugly sneers.

Tonks, who were being unusually quiet about the child abuse, finally spoke. When she did, everybody in the room felt the temperature drop several degrees. "This is unforgivable," she stated a little too calmly and very coldly, "we have to get him out of that hellhole immediately." Everybody shared knowing glances. It wasn't a secret that only child abuse could make her snap.

Neutrally, Snape spoke up for both Malfoy and him. "He doesn't do anything but chores while the three pigs sleep and get beaten. Honestly speaking, he would have been better off with Voldemort." Some of the people in the room looked alarmed while the rest just looked plain shocked. To have been better off with the Dark Lord who was known to have no mercy even to children than blood relatives said a lot.

Mr. Weasley stood up suddenly, his face filled with fury. "That's it, we are going in there right now." Murmurs of agreement were followed by the shifting of chairs. Malfoy sighed. They were acting too rashly, too like Gryffindors. "Calm down," he ordered, "we have matters to settle before that." Lupin angrily turned to him and glared. "Matters? Calm down? What are you talking about? Harry could be suffering there for all we know! We need to go and we need to go now! Don't you care at all?" Sneering much like the werewolf he turns into at every full moon, he said coldly, "of course you wouldn't care. He's James' son. You hated James so it would only be right that you hate Harry as well. Tell me, why are you here at all?"

Malfoy remained unfazed and answered with a glare of his own. "Lupin, your anger is blinding you. I probably don't care for him as much as you do but it's there. You were always the smarter one in the Marauders so what's clouding it now, when it truly matters? Have you ever sat down to think, what happens after we busted him out? What then? Who's going to take him and take care of him? Then there's that problem about trust. You yourself said that he didn't recognise you. In his books, you don't exist. Are you really that stupid to think that he will immediately trust and believe you?"

"I…" Lupin was at a lost for words. Not only had he wrongly doubted Malfoy but he had let his anger and despair blind him and his judgement abilities. Snape muttered something about typical Gryffindors snidely. Everyone realised what Malfoy said was true and they went into deep thought. In their anger, dismay and despair, they failed to notice somebody else. Somebody else who had heard everything.

Somewhere in Privet Drive, Harry was ready to drop dead anytime as long as it's soon. He had been working on his chores before dawn begun and he was still washing the dishes after night has fallen. "Bloody Dursleys," he thought as he scrubbed the plate. He hoped that this was the last chore left. He was seriously going to drop soon. The sound of the TV reached his ears and he cursed quietly (what, you expected him to the innocent six year old after all those times spent listening to his uncle swear and curse?).

"Boy, I don't hear scrubbing in there!"

He scowled. He wouldn't when the kitchen was so far from the living room and the TV was on maximum volume. That made him scowl again. The least they could do was help once in a while. It would do the two male Dursleys good to exercise sometimes and the only female in the house to do something other than gossip and be a busybody. "Boy, you had better be doing work!" Harry resisted the urge to do something as childish as sticking out his tongue at them.

As a sort of belated reaction, he realised with a groan that his aunt had a whole long list prepared for tomorrow. It was so long that in order to finish everything on the list by night, he had to start at dawn. He was having little sleep as it was. Through all his scrubbing, deep thinking (and cursing) and the loud TV volume, it was only normal that Harry didn't notice a figure by the kitchen window appearing and disappearing in the blink of an eye.

"Hokage-sama, it is almost as bad as you said it was."

The Yondaime Hokage looked up from his paperwork to look at the ANBU Captain in front of him. Trust his captain to find the location of 'Harry' so quickly. Putting down his pen and turning full attention, he waited for the captain to elaborate. The captain took the hint and continued, "I have seen a small part of his life. He is treated as a master would his servant." The Yondaime scowled. There was no need for the captain to say anything else. That sentence was enough to tell him what he needed to know and what he needed to know was if the boy was being treated as badly as he had heard. Thank Kami-sama that he had learnt English when he was younger.

In a moment of unusual seriousness, the Yondaime ordered, "gather three of your best ANBU. I want you to retrieve the boy." The ANBU Captain wordlessly bowed to the Hokage and moved to carry out the order.

That night, while everyone slept, Harry Potter disappeared mysteriously from his bed.

End Chapter