Hogwarts a History – Bright lights and the big city
Chapter 01 – Breakout, Breakdown

…

#4 Privet Drive, a perfectly average house in a perfectly average neighborhood, thank you very much. For the residents of the perfectly average house it was simply, home.

For Harry Potter, it was the lockup, hoosegow, the slammer. Never had this felt more true than since his encounter with the house elf Dobby. He had to give Vernon credit, the bars were a nice touch. If there was one thing his uncle was good at it was making his point clear, to Harry anyway.

It wasn't helping his state of mind laying there and thinking about it. But since he couldn't sleep there wasn't much else for him to do. The door locks on the outside of his door made sure of that.

"Harry."

He definitely wasn't going to acknowledge the voices in his head.

"Harry."

Even if the isolation was driving him insane, he refused to abandon his dignity just because he was abandoning his sanity.

"Harry!"

No matter how insistent they were.

"Harry, wake up mate."

He was awake. The voices in his head should bloody well know that.

"You sure this is the right window Ron?"

Ron? Wait a minute!

Tossing his covers aside he raced to his window.

"Harry!" three voices exclaimed.

"Shhhh!" he shushed.

"Well that's a fine hello" said George.

"You'll wake the Dursley's" Harry whisper shouted.

He was about to ask what they were doing outside his window when he realized, they were outside his window, on the second floor.

"How are you…"

The twins grinned at his befuddlement. There was a pop and a click and the car they were sitting in appeared out of thin air. But not very thin air, it had to be sitting on something.

"Woah!"

"Nice isn't it?" said Ron, "belong to our dad."

Harry couldn't help grinning like an idiot till he remembered, "What are you guys doing here."

"Breaking you out."

"Seriously?"

"Course. Grab your trunk, we'll get the bars."

Excitedly, Harry scrambled around the room gathering up his things, humming as he went.

He wasn't sure which part he was happier about. The fact he was leaving his own personal Alcatraz, or that there were people in the world willing to break him out.

"Hang on, we're taking em' off!"

The engine revved, the vehicle lurched, and the bars tore from the side of the house. Harry cringed. That was bound to have woken someone.

"Boy! What was that noise?"

"Oh shite!" they needed to go, and they needed to go now.

… One daring escape later

"Blimey Harry. You actually live with that guy?" exclaimed Ron as they flew away from Privet drive and a very angry walrus.

"Most of my life" not like he had a choice.

"Think he'll be alright?" asked Ron, "fallin out the window like that."

"He's well padded, I'm sure he'll be fine" mad as all hell though. Good thing he'd have several months to get over it before Harry saw him again.

"Charming fellow" said George.

"Like a badger down your trousers" said Fred.

"He wasn't in such a bad mood before that elf ruined his big meeting" said Harry, "I still don't understand what he wanted, or why 'I' got a warning for using magic when it was him."

"That's how the trace works" said George.

"It's just a big sensor they point at your neighborhood" said Fred.

"But, what about magical families, it'd be going off all the time?"

"We don't have it" said the twins.

"Seriously!" exclaimed Ron, "we can use magic at home."

"Sure" said George.

"So long as mum doesn't catch you" said Fred looking back at them with a Cheshire grin.

"Oh."

Harry snickered at Ron's expression. His mirth vanished when the car suddenly jerked and shook.

"What was that?"

"Bloody hell."

Up front the twins fiddled with the various levers and knobs.

"Invisibility just cut out."

"We're losing altitude."

"Hang on!" they shouted.

Clinging to the door Harry felt conflicted. He knew he shouldn't complain, but as prison breaks went, this one was not off to a great start. Or maybe it was the 'end' that was going to be the problem.