"Character Speech"

Inner thoughts/ Emphasis

'Quotes or references'

Spells

Since this is an AU story, it may have new or changed elements, characters in it. Terms used in the canon may hold different meaning here. In such cases, brief explanations or a character list may be provided at the end of the chapter. Updates should be within two or three days.

Chapter 1

A Wise Choice is Made

Privet Drive is a thoroughly ordinary street with thoroughly ordinary occupants. Ordinary, normal, conventional, usual people. To the point where an observer might even find the place and the people… awfully boring. Yet the man that appeared there so suddenly and silently at the dead of night was far from ordinary, even by extraordinary definitions.

Nothing like this man had ever been seen on Privet Drive. He was tall, thin and very old, judging be the silver of his hair and beard, which were both long enough to tuck into his belt. He was wearing long robes, a silver white cloak that swept the ground, and high-heeled, buckled boots. His blue eyes were light, bright, and sparkling behind half-moon spectacles and his nose was very long and crooked, as though it had been broken at least twice. This man's name was Albus Dumbledore.

Albus Dumbledore didn't seem to realize that he had just arrived in a street where everything from his name to his boots was unwelcome. He was busy rummaging in his cloak, looking for something. But he did seem to realize he was being watched, because he looked up suddenly to a tabby cat, which was strangely enough, glaring at him from the other end of the street. For some reason, the sight of the cat seemed to amuse him. He gave a wry chuckle and muttered, "I should have known."

He found what he was looking for in his inside pocket. It seemed to be a silver cigarette lighter. He flicked it open, held it up in the air, and clicked it. The nearest street lamp went out with a little pop. He clicked it again, the next lamp flickered into darkness. Twelve times he clicked the Put-Outer, until the only lights left on the whole street were two tiny pinpricks in the distance, which were the eyes of the cat watching him. If anyone looked out of their window now, they wouldn't be able to see anything that was happening down on the pavement. Dumbledore slipped the Put- Outer back inside his cloak and set off down the street toward number four, where he sat down on the wall next to the cat. He didn't look at it, but after a moment he spoke to it.

"Fancy seeing you here, Professor McGonagall."

He turned to smile at the tabby, but it had gone. Instead he was smiling at a rather severe-looking woman who was wearing square glasses exactly the shape of the markings the cat had had around its eyes. She, too, was wearing a cloak, an emerald one. Her black hair was drawn into a tight bun. She looked distinctly ruffled.

"How did you know it was me?" she asked.

"My dear Professor, I've never seen a cat sit so stiffly."

"You'd be stiff if you'd been sitting on a brick wall all day," said Professor McGonagall.

"All day? When you could have been celebrating? I must have passed a dozen feasts and parties on my way here."

Professor McGonagall sniffed angrily.

"Oh yes, everyone's celebrating, all right," she said impatiently. "You'd think they'd be a bit more careful, but no, even the Muggles have noticed something's going on. It was on their news." She jerked her head back at the Dursleys' dark living-room window.

"You can't." She gave him the stern glare she was so infamous for among her students.

"We do not have any other choice." His smile died into a frown. "Once young Harry is accepted by Petunia, I can raise protections that would rival that of Hogwarts. He will not have such protections, coupled with the anonymity elsewhere."

"Dumbledore, you can't." cried Professor McGonagall, jumping to her feet and pointing at number four. "I've been watching them all day. You couldn't find two people who are less like us. And they've got this son...I saw him kicking his mother all the way up the street, screaming for sweets. To think that Harry Potter come and live here!"

"It's the best place for him," said Dumbledore firmly. "His aunt and uncle will be able to explain everything to him when he's older. I've written them a letter."

"A letter?" repeated Professor McGonagall faintly, sitting back down on the wall. "Really, Dumbledore, you think you can explain all this in a letter? These people will never understand him! He'll be famous...A legend! I wouldn't be surprised if today was known as Harry Potter day in the future there will be books written about Harry...Every child in our world will know his name!"

"Exactly." said Dumbledore, looking very seriously over the top of his half-moon glasses. "It would be enough to turn any boy's head. Famous before he can walk and talk! Famous for something he won't even remember! Can you see how much better off he'll be, growing up away from all that until he's ready to take it? Besides," he continued. "I am afraid that the boy may be targeted after this. If they cannot find him, they cannot harm him."

Professor McGonagall opened her mouth, changed her mind, swallowed, and then said, "Yes yes, you're right, of course. But how is the boy getting here, Dumbledore?" She eyed his cloak suddenly as though she thought he might be hiding Harry underneath it.

"Hagrid's bringing him."

"You think it wise to trust Hagrid with something as important as this?"

"I would trust Hagrid with my life," said Dumbledore.

"I'm not saying his heart isn't in the right place," said Professor McGonagall grudgingly, "but you can't pretend he's not careless. He does tend to...What was that?"

A low rumbling sound had broken the silence around them. It grew steadily louder as they looked up and down the street for some sign of a headlight; it swelled to a roar as they both looked up at the sky, and a huge motorcycle fell out of the air and landed on the road in front of them.

If the motorcycle was huge, it was nothing to the man sitting astride it. He was almost twice as tall as a normal man and at least five times as wide. He looked simply too big to be allowed, and so wild, long tangles of bushy black hair and beard hid most of his face, he had hands the size of trash can lids, and his feet in their leather boots were like baby dolphins. In his vast, muscular arms he was holding a bundle of blankets.

"Hagrid," said Dumbledore, sounding relieved. "At last. And where did you get that motorcycle?"

"Borrowed it, Professor Dumbledore, sir," said the giant, climbing carefully off the motorcycle as he spoke. "Young Sirius Black lent it to me. I've got him, sir."

"No problems, were there?"

"No, sir. House was almost destroyed, but I got him out all right before the Muggles started swarmin' around. He fell asleep as we was flyin' over Bristol."

Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall bent forward over the bundle of blankets. Inside, just visible, was a baby boy, fast asleep. Under a tuft of jet-black hair over his forehead they could see a curiously shaped cut, like a bolt of lightning.

"Is that where...?" whispered Professor McGonagall.

"Yes," said Dumbledore. "He'll have that scar forever."

"Couldn't you do something about it, Dumbledore?"

"Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in handy. I have one myself above my left knee that is a perfect map of the London Underground. Well give him here, Hagrid. We'd better get this over with."

Dumbledore took Harry in his arms and turned toward the Dursleys' house.

"Could I...Could I say good-bye to him, sir?" asked Hagrid. He bent his great, shaggy head over Harry and gave him what must have been a very scratchy, whiskery kiss. Then, suddenly, Hagrid let out a howl like a wounded dog.

"Shhh!" hissed Professor McGonagall, "You'll wake the Muggles!"

"S-s-sorry," sobbed Hagrid, taking out a large, spotted handkerchief and burying his face in it. "But I c-c-can't stand it...Lily an' James dead...An' poor little Harry off ter live with Muggles..."

"Yes, yes, it's all very sad, but get a grip on yourself, Hagrid, or we'll be found," Professor McGonagall whispered, patting Hagrid gingerly on the arm as Dumbledore stepped over the low garden wall and walked to the front door. He laid Harry gently on the doorstep, took a letter out of his cloak, placed it over Harry's blankets, and then came back to the other two. For a full minute the three of them stood and looked at the little bundle; Hagrid's shoulders shook, Professor McGonagall blinked furiously, and the twinkling light that usually shone from Dumbledore's eyes seemed to have gone out.

"Well," said Dumbledore finally, "that's that. We've no business staying here. We may as well go and join the celebrations."

"Yeah," said Hagrid in a very muffled voice, "I best get this bike away. G'night, Professor McGonagall, Professor Dumbledore, sir."

Wiping his streaming eyes on his jacket sleeve, Hagrid swung himself onto the motorcycle and kicked the engine into life; with a roar it rose into the air and off into the night.

"I shall see you soon, I expect, Professor McGonagall," said Dumbledore, nodding to her.

Professor McGonagall blew her nose in reply.

Dumbledore turned and walked back down the street. On the corner he stopped and took out the silver Put-Outer. He clicked it once, and twelve balls of light sped back to their street lamps so that Privet Drive glowed suddenly orange and he could make out a tabby cat slinking out of sight around the corner at the other end of the street. He could just see the bundle of blankets on the step of number four.

"Good luck, Harry," he murmured. He turned on his heel with a swish of his cloak, and then abruptly stopped. He turned to look at the baby, tucked in the blankets and sleeping, peacefully oblivious to the events around him.

And there he stood standing, motionless till the first rays of of the sun began to shine on the quiet place. Suddenly his slowly drooping eyes opened wide alert, and he took out a long, thin, wooden stick that was beautifully carved with clusters of elderberries running down its length. He waved it over himself, rapidly fading from view as footfalls could be heard from inside the house.

Petunia Dursley opened her door to see if the newspaper had been delivered yet, only to find a baby comfortably nestled in a basket, a letter atop the sleeping form. Her curiosity overrode her other emotions, and she plucked the letter and unfolded it.

Her face slowly gave way to expressions of incredulity, then turning purple the more she read. "Never!" She exclaimed with rage as she tore the letter off violently. "This, this...freak will have no place at my house!" She shrieked, only to stop as if the thought had just appeared in her mind. She craned her neck around, sending furtive glances to check if anybody had seen her.

For once I'm glad the newspaper is late. She glared at the baby. Damn those freaks, bastards can't even take care of one of their own. "It's the orphanage for you, boy. Can't have filth like you around. The idiots would never check up on you, I'm sure. Vernon can't know either, he'd kill you." She said coolly as she took the basket. "I can't have that. But the money I get for your safekeeping" she sneered the word, "will help me take care of Dudley better." She made haste to take him in, only to stop as she saw the china vase beside her door floating.

She slowly turned to face the enraged expression of Albus Dumbledore. "I'm disappointed that you are Lily's sister." He cooly told her as he pointed the white glowing end of what she knew was a wand.

She never got the chance to scream for Vernon. Obliviate.

Minerva McGonagall was a stern woman, but she couldn't help but wipe her eyes as she walked up to the gargoyle. "Sherbet Lemon." She muttered. She had had a restless night, tossing and turning on her bed as she pondered over the decision they had taken. Or rather let the Headmaster make. I must convince him that this is a bad idea. She thought as the gargoyle stepped away from it's pedestal, revealing a slender staircase spiraling up to the Headmaster's office.

She stopped at the massive ornate double doors, hesitant to knock. She steadied herself, fixing her posture. She lost composure again as she heard the muffled cry of a….a baby?

"Ah, Professor McGonagall, come in. I'm in quite the dilemma here." Dumbledore's voice could be heard.

She pushed the right door open, to find little Harry cradled in the old Headmaster's arms. The old wizard was making, or attempting to make soothing noises, only for Harry to cry even harder.

"I think he might be hungry." He frowned.

"But..." She spluttered, lost for words.

The headmaster offered Harry to her with a sigh at his failed attempts. "I almost made the biggest mistake in my life." He told her as she took the baby.

"What happened?" He detected curiosity and a hint of rage in her voice. "Did they..."

"It doesn't matter now." He said as he looked at the face of the crying child. "He will live here, in Hogwarts."

He paused to let her process the information.

"But others could apply for his guardianship..." he held up a hand to her objections.

"I have never had a son of my own." He eyes twinkled merrily at her shocked expression. "Why so shocked Minerva? Can I not hope for the Dumbledore name to live another or, more generations? Can they not do this old man this small favor?"

She wordlessly handed him the baby, and then promptly fainted.

He sighed as he looked at the crying baby. "Let us go to the kitchens. Maybe the elves can set us up with a meal, hmm?" He chuckled at the passed out form of his deputy headmistress. "After we wake her up, of course."

A.N. There's the first chapter. If you want to point out any problems or have any suggestions, please give a review and let me know. And if you liked it, let me know by favorite/following this story! :)