Harry didn't meet up with Hagrid, and so didn't know Slytherin was bad, and so Slytherin!Harry, along with that I've tried to write this Harry with more Slytherin aspects along with a more pragmatic look on life.

This was originally planned by me to be a oneshot quicky of a way Harry could have been in Slytherin but I found a way to make it more interesting so I slightly rewrote it to allow myself more room to maneuver.

Hope you all enjoy.

Harry Potter and I'm bad at titles

Chapter 1: Wait there's actually plot here?

Harry woke up with a start, his hand flying to his face, no blood. He thought back to what must have been a dream, the flash of green light was familiar, but the strangest part was that after the light went away, he had felt a stream of warm liquid worming it's way down his face, that was new, he assumed that was from the car crash, it made sense he supposed, that if he had a scar there would've been some blood.

His scar was prickling as he was making breakfast at his aunt and adoptive guardian's request, or should he say order. He noticed the scar's prickling and had a strange idea that it knew what he'd been dreaming about, but that was absurd and he put it from his mind, focusing instead on not taking the pan and knocking Dudley over the head for complaining about having 36 presents instead of 37, after all, scars don't have minds.
Harry was enjoying the trip to the zoo. Yes Dudley and one of his cronies were almost unbearable, but he managed to make it to there without anything going wrong. Once there he managed to slip away after a few exhibits and he wandered around for awhile before going back to the reptiles area, they'd passed by a huge snake before and though it had been asleep Harry thought it might have woken up. He walked up to the glass and looked in, it was lying on the rock under the main lamp in its habitat. He was about to walk away, thinking it was asleep, when he saw it twitch a little before lifting it's head up and looking at him. He was in awe of how big it was, it looked like it could fit his whole head in it's mouth.

After awhile he just started talking to it, about his life, how he'd grown up, after it stayed still through all of his talking and then opening it's mouth like it was talking he asked if it could here him, the snake nodded and Harry was amazed by it. He started asking questions with yes or no answers and the snake answered with a nod or a shake of it's head, he could tell it was intelligent enough to answer him and he wondered if it was him or the snake that was allowing them to talk. He really wanted a snake of his own now if it was him.

Dudley had was waddling along as fast as his short legs could carry him, trying to get to the food court he could see, when he saw Harry, in front of the snake habitat, the one he had had his father smack the glass to wake up the snake, he looked around to make sure his parents weren't around and walked up behind Harry to smash his face against the glass, when he heard some hissing, he thought it was the snake before he saw Harry's mouth moving in turn with the hissing.

Dudley asked him why the hell he was hissing and Harry turned to ask him what he meant when he realized he was hissing instead of speaking and had to physically force himself to speak English. By the time the boy with glasses had grasped English again, the boy without a neck had called him crazy and was leaning on the glass to look at the snake. Harry resisted the urge to laugh as his cousin's likeness to a pig increased with his nose being pushed up by the glass. He saw how he was resting on the glass and thought it would be funny if the glass wasn't there and he fell on his face.

Dudley was looking at the snake through the glass when the glass disappeared, he fell on his face and almost started to cry. He was scared as hell though when he saw the snake come out and slither over his leg, he was frozen, not moving, every bone in his body was telling him to kick it away yet he couldn't even twitch, and then the snake did something strange. It slithered up to Harry and lowered his head to the ground before hissing at him, Harry looked freaked out and hissed back at him. He wasn't talking with the snake was he?

Harry saw the snake seem to bow to him before it looked up and said
/Thank you my Prince/ Harry was freaked out, before he heard himself hissing, except this time he understood himself as he said /Any time/. He hauled himself up as his aunt ran up to her little pig-angel and asked for someone to get her a towel for him.

The ride home was in silence except for his aunt, who was still fawning over her son. At home Vernon grabbed his ear and threw him into his room before slamming the door and telling him he was going to lose meals for this. Harry didn't care too much, as he had something, the snake had also told him to look in its cage for a prize, and before he had been dragged away he saw it, a small snake, barely seen in the grass.

He had picked it up and carried it home with him, after being pushed into his "room" he set the snake on his dresser, it had been curled up but now was uncoiling and looking around for something, Harry's mind flashed back to a class he'd had in biology on reptiles, that they were cold blooded and needed light to stay warm, so he turned on the small desk lamp he had to study by so the little snake could stay warm.

Tentatively, Harry asked the snake /Are you hungry?/ the snake didn't seem to find it strange that a human was speaking snake, and so replied /Not now, enjoying warmth/. And that was how most of their conversations went, the snake hardly ever initiated their talks, mostly it was Harry asking if it was hungry, or needed more light, or anything like that. And the snake would reply with little to no grammar his answer of yes or no.

Harry had some ideas on why this was, it was possible that snakes didn't normally use grammar, or maybe the snake was just like that since the mother seemed to understand grammar, or maybe it might have been the snake was just young and hadn't developed his language skills enough.

Harry after some time and effort, managed to focus enough on talking that he could say words and sometimes even phrases of the snake language without the snake needing to be there. And by doing this he noticed things like how it had a subject-object-verb rather than English's SVO (Harry Ron found rather than Harry found Ron).

He also found that some translations weren't perfect. One example was with Harry asking the snake /What is your name?/, our definition of a name isn't the same as theirs, the closest way to say that in English with our grammar rules would be "What is the sound-your-family-calls-to-you-by?" as in the sound that his family would call out to find him if he had gone away. So while Harry and the snake (whose name sounded like gibberish to Harry; like if someone said aggshlibft you'd wonder what they'd been taking, and the closest Harry got to an English pronunciation would be Slashyirintin, or as Harry would refer to him by, Slash) could have this conversation in Parseltoungue, Harry saying it directly to English would sound very weird.

The letters appeared in a few days. Coming in in the weirdest places possible. Some even appeared in eggs. Harry's crazy uncle eventually boarded up the place. Harry realized though, that because the letters had started becoming addressed to his new room, the way he could get a letter would be to somehow get out of the house and sleep somewhere new. He did so that night, jumping with a pillow, his alarm clock, and some blankets; into some bushes. He crawled to an oak tree in the forest nearby, and then went to sleep.

He was rewarded with about 5 letters in his lap at 6:00 when his alarm went off. He jumped up and tore one open to read the contents.

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Guess that's it, he's getting into a school, but what do they mean by witchcraft and wizardry? Next was the headmaster's name, along with some titles, most likely to show off, yet presented in parenthesis instead of right after, maybe not. Next is the actual letter.

Dear Mr. Potter,

We are pleased to inform you... Blah blah come here at September 1st, that's so far away, by July 31st he should have sent them an owl? Guess that's their version of calling on the phone.

He rather accepted this all as fact easily enough. Perhaps it was him being able to talk to snakes. He didn't know. But if he was a wizard, he'd have to keep this from the Dursley's as long as possible, they were sure to ruin it in some way. Wait, what if they already knew, yeah the bastard read the letter and kept him from reading it. Guess they didn't want him to know he was magic. It'd make sense they kept him from having an imagination if one wrong thought could make him throw a car into the air. He was just assuming about magic of course. Well he'd just go by himself to this Diagon Alley it mentions here and become a wizard just to stick it in their faces.

He left his pillow and blankets back there, along with the letters buried in them. He climbed into his room, standing on the bushes and jumping to catch the window sill and pull himself inside. He had just made it inside and under his covers before there was a violent knocking on the door and it slamming open. Vernon looked around the room, saw the open window and assumed the wind had opened it and sharply closed it.

Vernon was making a big deal out of the post, the fact that there was no post on Sundays and that meant no letters. Harry his his smile in the cup of tea he had made for himself after handing out breakfast. Slash now went with him everywhere he went. The little snake was now big enough to circle his arm, yet not big enough to do any real damage. He talked with him under his breath, snakes had a very different point of view than humans. Even with things directly involving them they always remained objective. And with Slash's increasing size, his intelligence increased as well, or at least his speaking ability increased. He not only used grammar, he also initiated conversations, and in some cases even asked questions, showing he was gaining curiosity. The snake was rapidly becoming a vast part of Harry's life, and he would protect him if he could.

The day of July 15th came around swiftly, it wasn't too special for the Dursley's except that Dudley had to go to the dentist. This gave Harry the time to go into London. He got on Dudley's old bike that had become his after Dudley had started to crush the seat. This was before Dudley really ignored exercise. He had at one point actually enjoyed it, until he discovered he enjoyed food and being an assface better.

The bike into the city wasn't too bad, he stayed in the bike lanes and almost got run over only once, the tires popped before it could actually hit Harry, Harry got a feeling it was his fault. Harry found himself at where the letter said to go. A pub that he passed through with his head down. Conveniently missing a turban headed man that was sitting at the bar seemingly talking to himself.

He picked up a stick from the ground and tapped the bricks needed to open the entrance and watched in wonder as the bricks pulled aside and a, for lack of a better word, magical place was revealed. He shook himself and checked what he'd need first, when he realized he didn't have any money. He searched through the letter and it mentioned that muggleborns could go to Gringotts to exchange muggle money for wizard money. He decided to see if he had any Wizarding blood by seeing if there were any vaults in his name.

If Harry had to some up the bank in one word, it'd be complex. Because that's what it was. When he had introduced himself and asked if he had any vaults in his name, he soon discovered he had some, his parents' personal vaults and his inheritance vault. He asked them to retrieve for him some money, they insisted that he give a key, and when it was made clear he did not have one they instead got a blood sample from him.

The blood was proven a match and he received in a small bag, a number of gold, silver, and bronze coins. He thanked them and received it in return for being polite when many others weren't. He wondered why.

He looked over the list and tried to decide what he'd need first. He figured that if he was correct that using an owl was like a phone but with paper, then the school would likely have one, possibly a lot, yes a lot would make more sense. Yet he thought hard and decided he'd get an owl, a Northern Hawk Owl if they had it, one of the only diurnal owls. It'd be less likely to be thought of strangely that way.

He headed to the Owl Post Office and requested the cheapest owl possible for a letter, time not an issue. He was given a small little ball of an owl and handed it a simple letter of acceptance and addressed it to the deputy headmistress that signed the letter, Minerva McGonagall.

He then went across the street and down a few buildings to the pet store. He didn't look much at the other pets, besides a passing thought that Slash might like to hunt a mouse, he decided that it'd be better to find one in the house then buy one from here simply to be eaten. He walked up to the counter and requested a Northern Hawk Owl and the attendee said they had a few in stock, he walked to the owl section and handed Harry a striped bellied owl with piercing yellow rimmed eyes. He spent 5 seconds looking into it's eyes before shaking himself and saying he'd take it.

Harry stopped outside Ollivander's Wand Shop. It was the only one he could find. He stepped inside and was standing still for a short while before an old man he assumed was Ollivander walked out of the back. He introduced himself as such and went on about how he knew I was Harry Potter, I wonder what he meant by that. The old man went on to talk about his parents' wands and then found him some bad wands, and finally a perfect wand for him. He thanked him politely and paid before leaving before he could say anything more, the old man gave him the creeps. You almost expected him to say that he loved wands of flesh most and he'd either be a pedophile or a satanic murderer.

He made his way to a number of stores, getting everything he needed. There was a surprising lack of students getting anything done, did every one already get everything or did he get here early. He didn't know. He found a book that interested him at one of the stores. A small edition called Wizarding Duels with the subtitle Tips And Tricks To Help You Get On Top. The summary on the back went on to say that the book was full of simple ideas using simple spells that used what is supposed to be the core of duels, hindering your opponents ability to cast spells at you, in a number of simple ways. He opened it and the first trick was one of using the common Accio spell to grab your opponent's wand. Since spells cast on a wand influence any magic that comes out of it; most wands aren't Accio resistant, allowing for this easy trick. He shut it and bought it at once.

He decided to practice magic once, he thought it'd be an easy spell, the book said it was a shrinking charm and he wanted it to be able to carry everything, before he even tried to cast it he also looked up the reversal. A simple counter spell called Finite. He tried to cast the shrinking spell and it didn't take, nothing shrank. He tried again and everything got slightly smaller. He finite'd it and that worked easily. He tried the shrinking spell again and got similar results. He managed to get a reasonable amount of shrinkage, but judging from his trouble with an easy spell it was likely it was supposed to be smaller, but either way it was shrunk and he fit it inside a bag they were selling, bags that were bigger on the inside, he'd have to learn that spell. He thought about it and exchanged some of his remaining Wizarding money, which he now knew were called Galleons, Sickles and Knuts, for muggle money, and then deposited the rest of it. He also questioned quickly if they had something resembling a savings account. They did, and though they didn't have one open in his name, they were able to open one. He did so and requested half from each of his parents' vaults to be put into the savings vault. When this was done and he had the muggle money, he politely said good bye and left the bank and Diagon Alley.

He returned to his home and entered his bedroom to try out some of the spells. Since the Finite spell seems to work fine, he instead tried the one that the book said would be good in a duel. He rather thought the word duel was pretentious of them, but hey, what did he know? He found it in one of his school books, you said the spell and then whatever you said after would come flying at you, he thought it was a very good strategy to use Accio in a duel.

"Accio Wand" He said, and his wand flew toward him but hit the ground. It took him a few seconds to realize what he'd done, the spell had done what he'd expected, either bring the object to him slightly or do nothing at all. Except he didn't use his wand for it.

He quickly searched through his books, looking for mentions of wandless magic. Except there weren't any. He tried to make sense of it. If accidental magic, like him jumping onto the roof of his school, could be done without a wand, then it's possible that normal magic could be done without it, but why do they want him to use a wand then? He focused and thought about it. He figured that it was either some form of tradition that the Wizarding community had kept going, making them extremely short sighted, or using a wand was in some way more powerful.

He picked up his wand and pointed it at his pen. "Accio Pen" And the pen moved just as his wand had, slightly towards him, even falling off the desk. So if that wasn't it then it only left tradition, unless there was some unknown factor. He decided it was more likely tradition, he'd like to think the government was idiotic more than manipulative.

He tried out different spells and enjoyed them immensely, even if he didn't get adequate results. He kept this up until the Dursley's returned, which he then stayed in his room until they had him make dinner. No sweets though, as Dudley had three more cavities and needed to stop having things with so much sugar.

Harry needed a place to practice magic without fear of being caught. He decided he'd need a place out in the woods. He found a tree with a y shape and set a little toy house made of marble in his room. The house was only there because Dudley had grown too old for it. He set it upright and cast an enlargement spell on it. It grew somewhat, now about the size of a dollhouse rather than for an ant. He adjusted it as well as he could since when it grew it had tilted. He cast the same spell and it grew again. He repeated this process until it was big enough for him to work well in it. He had started to need to use magic to adjust it. Now that it was big enough and steady, he casted a sticking charm so it wouldn't fall out, and then climbed inside.

It was a cold, single room house, with no furniture, simply a little accessory. But it was great for him. He had read about the different branches of magic and what interested him was Transfiguration, which would allow him to conjure furniture. He set up the cage he had gotten for his owl, who he now calls Congelo after the state he went into when he first saw it's eyes. He had to make sure it wasn't a spell due to the obvious connections between Latin and spells. He said the spell, and even after a few tries nothing turned to stone. He was satisfied and the name stuck. The cage was set in one of the windows, and after a tentative first flight and seeing the bird return before dark, he decided to let the animal stay there and leave as it pleases. He did make a comment to Slash, asking if he was able to talk with the bird, he was not.

September 1st came around too early but also too late. Too early because he was unable to master even a single spell, and he'd like to have that done. Yet too late because of how much he's been expecting it. He wakes up at 6:00 and packs his stuff, getting everything but the cage for Congelo, who he hopes will have finished his morning hunt. He slams his trunk closed and writes up a note on a scrap of paper with his quill, which he's been practicing using in preparation. He sticks it to the door with a sticking charm and then silently leaves the house, shrinking the trunk on his way there so he can carry it easier when he's walking to the train station. He walks the short distance to the house and climbs up, finding Congelo, presumably back from a meal, happily sitting in his cage.

He sat down and thought about what time he'd need to get there to get a ticket from whatever kind of magical train they have there. He decides since the train is leaving at 11 he can get there at 10:00 and sort things out, and to walk to it from here should take about half an hour so he should be able to leave at 9:30, that leaves two and a half hours of waiting. He decides to try out the summoning charm again. It's a harder spell and he wants to be adequately good with it, he enjoys the uses of it.

He focuses and points at a leaf on the ground, "Accio Leaf". The leaf flies up about 7 feet but falls back down. He tries again and it gets close enough that he could grab it if he reached for it. He's so close to mastering it since it's one of the spells he's used the longest.

His time is spent trying out the spells on different objects, mostly leaves, around him. He eventually reaches out the window and tries the summoning again and it flies into his hand, he's happy that he's extended his range to this. He brings it inside and tries one of the spells he's been putting off using, the fire creating spell. It's one that he thinks could be useful in a number of ways. He says the spell slowly and a tiny spark flies from his finger to the leaf, it hits and starts to burn, but loses energy and only a tiny burn hole is there. But he's happy he got a reaction at all.

When he checks his watch for probably the 100 somethingth time it says that its 9:27 and he gets up, startling both Congelo and Slash, who were quietly resting while he casted spell after spell. He picked up the cage and held it one hand while Slash waited by his leg. He lowered his hand and let Slash slither up it, circling his arm a few times in his length of about a foot. Harry thinks that at this size he can keep him well fed, but he'd have to learn of a way to get him enough food if he gets bigger. He considers his option and thinks that enlarging the food might work. He climbs down with the cage in his hand, sets it down and then climbs back up to grab his stuff and shrink it down to put in the bag. He has his stuff and starts walking into London towards the train station.

He reaches the station and politely asks the guard where the train leaving at 11 is. The guard replies that he must have the time wrong, since there is no train leaving at 11. He nods and says he's going to ask his mommy for the time again. He walks away and starts looking for anything that resemble a magical entrance. He notices a strangely dressed family walking purposely for a part of the station, he is about to dismiss them when he notices that the child has a cage with an owl in it. He thinks its worth a shot and catches up with them to ask where the train leaving at 11 is.

"Oh do you not know? I guess the letters don't tell you. Hi, I'm Dannus Wolf, this is my wife Anneria, and my son Garrett"

"Hi I'm Harry, Harry Potter" The look of awe on their face was confusing to him. "You seem to know my name, is there something I don't know?"

"Wait, don't you know how famous you are?"

"For what? I haven't done anything"

"Not done anything, my boy, when you were a baby you defeated He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named"

"Who's that, some bad guy right? I'd guess that's why my aunt and uncle have me, instead of my parents."

"I'm not the right person to tell you about this, and we have to go, here simply walk through this column right here, it's not really there"

"Alright" He walks through and comes out into a large side of the building filled with staff and students alike. He walks to the nearest wizard and asks to know how to buy tickets. He gets directed to a ticket booth and buys a student ticket and pays in the leftover muggle money he has, not having had a chance to get more from Gringotts. He gets his ticket and walks onto the train.

Looking at the boxes as I'm walking by, I see one with the kid who's dad helped me, Garrett, in. I open the door.

"Mind if I sit here, I don't feel like sitting alone"

"No problem"

"So can you explain why I'm famous apparently?"

"He-Who-Must-"

"Yes, He-Who-We-Act-Like-A-Bitch-Around-His-Name, how did I defeat him, did I kill him? Does he not have a name or something?"

"His name is... Voldemort"

"Ok. Anything more human?"

"Not that we know, and nobody knows if he died that night or not"

"What night is that?"

"Halloween"

"Ok. So I'm guessing my parents are dead"

"Yeah, sorry I had to tell you that"

"It's fine, so I don't know too much about Hogwarts besides our courses, mind filling me in?"

"Well the founders were Salazar Slytherin, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Godric Gryffindor, they each formed a house based off the trait they thought was most important, Slytherin; Ambition, Hufflepuff; Loyalty, Ravenclaw; Wisdom, Gryffindor; Bravery, and then you get sorted into one"

"I'm going to ignore the alliterative names for a minute, but why is a school sorting you based on your personality, and one personality trait to boot, shouldn't we work together, that'd give us some diversity"

"I don't know why, it was there choice"

"Well I don't know which I belong in since I as a human being, have multiple traits"

"Well there's a way they tell you which you belong in"

"What is it?"

"A magical hat that reads your thoughts"

"So if I was the most backstabbing person in the world, but I thought of loyalty could I get into Hufflepuff?"

"I think it goes deeper than that"

"Alright, then what about invasion of privacy then? Aren't there laws against that?" The discussion continued as people passed by their box. Eventually a girl poked her head in "Has anyone seen a rat? Neville's lost one"

"No we haven't sorry" Garrett said.

"Do either of you know the summoning spell well? Because we could use that, I don't know it well enough to pull him to my hand, I could pull him towards me though"

"You know the summoning spell? That's a grade 4 level spell"

"Huh, and who are you?"

"Hermione Granger"

"Well Hermione, I'm Harry Potter, and this is Garrett Wolf"

"You're Harry Potter?"

"Yeah, and I learned I was famous about 5 minutes ago"

"Well... Wow, can I see your scar?"

"Oh right, yeah, I guess it wasn't from a car crash" He holds up his hair to show the lightening bolt.

"Wow, you're one of the most famous wizards in the world"

"Uh-huh, well it really hasn't sunk in I guess because I still feel the same, but yeah, I guess I will use the summoning spell" He gets up and walks out into the hallway. "Accio Neville's toad" Their was a loud bump from down the hall, and a confused door opening with some red headed kid saying "Is this anyone's toad, because it just slammed into my door". A kid who was apparently Neville, ran over and picked up the toad. Harry nodded and went back inside.

"Found the toad"

The next hour or so was full of talking as Garrett and Hermione tried to explain the basics of Hogwarts. He nodded and understood most of it. When the train stopped and they walked outside, a giant man stood over away from the train yelling "Firs' years, this way, firs' years" They followed him and sat in one of the boats along with the boy Neville who mostly stayed quiet and was holding a bucket.

As they hit the shore and walked inside they had to wait for the Deputy Headmistress to come and get them. Harry sat with his friends and marveled at the feeling, having little to no friends while in school due to his cousin. McGonagall opened the door and brought them into the Great Hall.

So how was that? I think I set up the Pre-Hogwarts setting of this Harry Potter one well enough, well yes they do get to Hogwarts but there's no lessons yet. I know a lot of this seems heavy handed, with to much tell, and not enough show, and I'm trying to fix that, so I'd like you all to criticize it to your heart's extent, I'll take what advice I can to make this better.

I don't see a definite end to this fanfic so unless I come up with one along the way this story will spiral into abandonment, but I won't let that happen for at least 10 chapters and then we can go from there.

I hope you all enjoyed this, I'll see you in the next two weeks (probably), favorite if you liked it, follow if you want to see more, and review if you have anything to add, or comment on, or criticize me for. Until next time

-WhatTheFAQ