A/N: Well, here is the first chapter of my story. Again this is Unbeta'd, but I hope it goes over well. Hope to maintain a consistent, somewhat fast update speed, but my muse is being uncooperative and already wants a vacation. Anyways, on with the story.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 1: Realizations

Harry Potter sat basking under the rays of the rising sun. He had returned to the Dursley's three weeks ago and was just now getting the hand of 'the flame and the void.' By now he had cut down the time it took him to reach a state of calmness to thirty seconds and it was really helping with his anger issues. He'd barely even reacted to hearing that his aunt Marge was coming to visit. The funniest thing was that he just smiled and his uncle, who had started turning purple in preparation of screaming at him, had stopped with his mouth open is shock as Harry walked away.

Dudley had been angry when he couldn't even make fun of Harry's friends not sending him any letters. He had been in steady communication with Hermione and Luna; Hedwig was ecstatic about the workout. Hermione was on vacation with her parents in Europe. She was having trouble with Occlumency because she couldn't clear he mind, she was always thinking of something; she even said she couldn't get rid of the thought that she wasn't doing it properly.

Luna was with her father in the colonies, looking for a jackalope in a placed Yellowstone National Park. It was apparently going to be the feature of the next Quibbler. She too was having trouble with the Occlumency, but she confessed that it was mostly because she had seer blood from her mother's side of the family. It was interesting talking to her. Her gift wasn't necessarily about seeing the future, but about seeing things that were going on in the present; just not what was always visible.

Standing up. Harry walked towards his school trunk. Reaching in, he retrieved a long scroll of parchment. On it were his notes about the exercises in the Occlumency book. Since he couldn't remove any of the books, he had spent the last two weeks of the term transcribing the notes on the more interesting topics contained within Slytherin's Library. Another topic he found fascinating was the art of combining charms and transfiguration. While he couldn't actually perform any of the spells, he was fascinated by the concept. He had read about duels where in a single incantation, mages were able to transfigure debris into a lion and animated it to defend him from his opponents spells.

After having read the various examples, he was disappointed that Lockhart's was such nonsense. If it had been different, maybe they could have learned interesting ways of combining the spells they had already learned in new and creative ways. Getting back from his tangent, he opened the scroll further, till he reached the second exercise. It was interesting in and of itself. He was supposed to reach his state of calm, then working backwards from the present, he was supposed to review his experiences.

As his last thought crumbled into the flames, he remembered starting the calming technique, the next thought was reading about the second exercise, then his recollection of what he had read from the library. As he kept reviewing his memories, he eventually reached the ride home from Hogwarts. Luna and Hermione sat next to each other laugher at a joke Neville had just made. Ron was in the next car having a rematch from the chess tournament. It was almost unheard of, but Su Li of Ravenclaw had destroyed Ron's winning streak, and had taken first place in twelve moves. Ron had been sulking since his defeat and as the Express pulled out of Hogsmeade Station, he had stormed out in search of a rematch.

Coincidentally, Susan Bones, Terry Boot, Ernie Macmillan, and Millicent Bulstrode were with here, also looking for rematches. He wouldn't be surfacing any time soon. In a short time, Neville and Luna had begun to seen as if they'd been on the train in Harry's first year, and had been good friends for years. As Harry remembered, he felt himself smiling and chuckled quietly. He opened his eyes as he heard his relative s begin moving around and stood up and exited the room. He did his usual morning routine, then headed towards the kitchen to begin cooking breakfast. Recently he had been watching some cooking shows online, especially Top Chef. He imagined the rashers of bacon he was crisping as being a succulent stuffed pork shoulder and the eggs as being a delicate Hollandaise. He was so into his thoughts, he begun humming tune, but he really didn't recognize the source. But he did remember it involving the dismemberment of a man-sized purple and green dinosaur.

Harry's musings were interrupted by a small, localized earthquake, as his uncle Vernon and his cousin Dudley lumbered down the stairs. Seemingly running on autopilot, the sat down at the table, both occupying a side of the table each. Their eyes still half-lidded, Dudley even had a line of drool running for the food, and they grasped their utensils. As Harry was placing the finishing touches on the meal, his aunt strode in and sat on the third side of the table, her lips pursed in almost annoyance. She did not understand how her freak nephew was a better cook than her, when she toiled over long months she was at school and couldn't entice the same interest from her husband as the freak could.

Vernon and Dudley immediately began to gorge themselves on the scrumptious food, while Petunia dug in at a more sedate, if hurried pace. Occasionally, Vernon would mutter things "about freaks earning their keep" and "finally being useful," before continuing to devour the meal. Harry was content, thinking that maybe he should cook something for his friends when he got back to Gryffindor Tower. When his relatives were done, Harry having eaten right before the hippos came down, he placed the dishes into the new dishwasher before heading upstairs and returning to sorting his memories.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the Montana region of the Yellow Stone National Park, a man in startling lime-green robes stood behind a cluster of bushes. His long, ginger colored hair was slicked back, and he wore a pair of movie theatre 3-D glasses: the lenses in an odd dual-shade of fuchsia and teal. Next to him, a young blond girl in periwinkle blue floral print sundress crouched down and peered out of a gap between the leaves. She wore large medallion glasses, and had what appeared to be radishes in place of earrings. Around her neck was a necklace made of strange bottle caps, and a polished stick was holding her hair up in a bun. Xenophilius and Luna Lovegood were on the prowl and they were getting closer to their target.

Over the crest of the next hill, a group of horned, German Sheppard sized jackrabbits were grazing on the dense shrubbery. As Xenophilius slowly extended the telescopic lens on his camera, he slightly tapped a hanging branch and an acorn was knocked loose. The strange, oversized hares scattered at a surprisingly brisk pace, and Xenophilius was only able to snap a shot of a few fluffy tails.

"Blast! Foiled again!" Xenophilius exclaimed.

"We were so close daddy. It was the wrackspurts that made them flee. You know they cause a sudden need to go somewhere else. It's what the Ministry uses to stop muggles from going into Diagon Alley and St. Mungo's," Luna replied."

"We'll get them next time. I guess we'll go with the articles about Fudge's army of heliopaths and Stubby Boardman."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hermione huffed impatiently as she heard the magical portrait of the Mona Lisa ramble ad infinitum. She had come to France with her parents, who were in Paris for a masochistic interrogator's, umm… Oral surgeon's conference. On the way to a reception with their fellow dentists, her parents had dropped her off at the Louvre. While looking around, she had noticed an area that people seemed to avoid, and remembering how her parents acted around the Leaky Cauldron, had gone to investigate. She had apparently stumbled upon the magical section of the museum, where the magical versions of the famous artworks.

The statue of the Venus de Milo, which was animated, would alternately try to cover up, and tease passing wizards. The Thinker just sat there stoically, but would randomly spot philosophical one-liners and return to brooding. The Mona Lisa was the worst. She was a horrible gossip monger. She never seemed to shut up and kept making rude comments about 'Delacour's,' whoever they were. She was viciously muttering about 'scarlet women' and 'blond airheads.' Hermione wanted to pull out her hair, and was considering expulsion to cast a silencing spell.

The painting, hearing her accent, did warn her about an escaped convict named Sirius Black, and she somehow knew it involved Harry in some way. She hurriedly left towards the reception next door, so that she could return to the hotel and send Harry a letter to warn him about it.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After watching a program on the telly involving a very flamboyant man in purple sparkling spandex and being highly traumatized, Harry had started exercising. He had started with simple push-ups and sit-ups and was hoping that becoming more fit would help him with Quidditch. I the beginning, he had been exhausted and could barely do more than a few dozen. He could now do a hundred of each and had started doing pull-ups using the door frame of his room. He would have done some running around the neighborhood, but the weather had been horrendous since news of that prison-break.

He had continued watching his cooking shows and even his relative ad begun to notice a distinct increase in the quality of the food he cooked. His aunt, Marge had come and gone, and even she hadn't been as abusive as usual. She was glad the Vernon had finally found a use for 'the useless freeloader.' All of his relatives had been surprised when Marge a stared insulting his parents, but she had stopped when Harry showed almost no reaction, he had only smiled and tilted his head. In his mind, Harry had been supremely vexed. He was furiously practicing the flame and the void technique, destroying all the expletives he wanted to hurl at Marge.

As he kept his violent reaction under control, his anger latched onto a mental image floating around the flames, of Marge shrinking and growing fur. Harry watched is shock as a small pug poked its head out of the pile of closed that were lying on the chair his aunt once occupied. Ripper, his aunt's favorite dog, came bounding into the kitchen, clearly in head, and bounded onto the new pug and proceeded to mount her. Everyone in the kitchen could only watch in shock, at the spectacle before them.

As they stood there in a daze, what sounded like popcorn cooking sounded from the back yard. Harry reached for his wand as a group of red robed individuals rushed into the dining room and proceeded to establish a perimeter.

"DMLE! Put your wand on the ground," one of them screamed.

Remembering Hermione commenting on Susan Bones' aunt, the head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Harry slowly placed his wand on the dining table.

"We've detected a large surge of magic in this area, Mr. Potter are you alright?" The apparent leader of the now identified Aurors inquired.

"Yes sir, everything's fine. I think I just performed some accidental magic, though," Harry replied.

"Really, at your age? I though Hogwarts was supposed to teach you how to control that?"

"Well you see, my aunt Marge got me really angry, she started insulting my parents and…"

"I see, no need to be alarmed. This happens often with magical orphans, it should be no problem clearing this up. Heaney!"

"Sir!"

"Call in the obliviators and the accidental magic reversal squad. Tell them code gamma, and step on it!"

"Sir, yes sir!" Heaney replied as he scampered out of the kitchen.

The leader of the Auror contingent turned to harry and said, "I'm sure you've heard by now but Sirius Black has escaped from Azkaban."

"Who?" Harry replied.

"Oh! Well, you know the man who sold your family out to He-Who-Must-Not Be-Named…"

"What!" Harry roared in outrage. "Why didn't anyone tell me!?"

"Almost everyone knows. Didn't any of your friends tell you?"

"No. Well, not yet at least." Anything further Harry was going to say was postponed as Hedwig flew into the window and landed on his shoulder. Checking Hedwig's leg, he found a letter bearing Hermione's familiar tidy scrawl. Reading over it quickly, Harry laughed silently as Hermione described the conference of super villains her parents were attending. As he read over her adventures in the city, he read over the news about Sirius Black, after being shocked that there was a magical Mona Lisa, and appreciated the fact that Hermione tried to warn him. He could only laugh at her insinuation that he would actually go looking for a deranged psychopath killer, but welcomed the sentiment.

"It looks like I have one true friend at least." As harry said this, to more owl's flew into the room bearing missives from his friends. Neville and Luna had also sent warning about Black, and he was grateful that they cared, even though he hadn't been real friends them for long.

"We will be placing you into protective custody Mr. Potter. A room at the Leaky Cauldron is waiting for you, and there is too much traffic around both the pub and Diagon Alley for Black to make a viable attempt on your life. Tonks!"

"Sir!" a blue? Haired Auror replied from by the door.

"First, what have I said about the hair color?"

Auror Tonks sheepishly changed her hair to a dull brown and Harry gawked in shock; she hadn't even used her wand! "To keep it neutral sir!" she replied.

"Trainee's these days," the leader muttered hopelessly. "Standard protocol dictates that you maintain as inconspicuous as possible. Blue hair!? Follow Mr. Potter and help him assemble his belongings, we'' discuss your lapse in judgment when we return to base."

"Sir!" Tonks replied, then followed Harry into to hall. When they got to the hall, she directed Harry to gather his belonging. Making sure to retrieve everything from his hidden storage places, such as under the loose floorboard, Harry was about to start folding his clothes when Tonks jabbed her wand at the pile and said, "Pack!"

As he got over the surprise of seeing his things spontaneously began to arrange themselves into his school trunk, Harry turned to the Auror Trainee and asked, "How did you do that down there?"

"Do what?"

"Change your hair color?"

"Oh! I'm a metamorphmagus. I can control certain features of my body." To demonstrate, she wrinkled her forehead in concentration and slowly changed her nose into a pig's snout and back.

"Coll. Can I learn?" Harry said excitedly, and was almost bouncing up and down in excitement.

"Unfortunately, you have to be born with the ability, so no dice."

"How do you know if you have it."

"Well. Have you ever done something strange with some part of your body?"

Uh. One time my aunt shaved my head but left the piece of fringe covering my scar. My hair grew back overnight, and I haven't had to cut my hair since. Does that count?'

When was this, last week?" she replied.

"I think I was six or seven.'

"Really, even I have to focus to stop my hair from growing. Maybe you to have the ability. The only way for sure is to try something. Try making your hair change col…"

They were interrupted by a scream from downstairs. "Tonks! What is taking you so long. I've seen paint dry faster than it's taking you to pack a few things together. Hurry up!"

Tonks looked sheepishly over at Harry before levitating his trunk and heading out to the hall. Grabbing Hedwig's cage, Harry scampered after her."

"You should try changing the length and color of your hair first. Here should be some books in Flourish and Blotts. Send me an owl if it turns out you are a metamorphmagus too. I've been dying to find another for ages."

"Thanks. I'll be sure to," Harry responded as they reached the dining room.

"It took you long enough, Grab onto this shoe Mr. Potter, it's a portkey to the small garden bend the Cauldron."

Harry was reaching for the old boot that served as the portkey when he remembered the Hogsmeade permission slip. Bounding over to his uncle, he thrust his form under his uncle's nose, and his uncle, mindful of the group of freaks still in his house and eager to get rid of the freak early, hastily signed it. Harry returned to his luggage, and while reaching for the portkey, he speculated about two things. Why none of the Weasley's had tried to warn him about Sirius Black, and that he hadn't gotten a letter from Mafalda Hopkirk about underage magic use. He speculated that the Aurors only came because they were monitoring his relatives house incase Black tried to harm him. Harry smiled, and as he felt what seemed like a hook behind his navel, realized that the discovery, that wand-less magic was possible, promised a very interesting summer.