A/N: I'm afraid this is mostly a filler chapter. Harry/Neville bonding, the introduction to the teacher and some of the students…don't worry, the OCs mentioned here probably won't feature much in the story. I just needed to introduce Neville. As I said, this is a filler chapter.

…Well. Mostly.

Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter and/or the Empire of Man. They are owned by J.K. Rowling, John Ringo and David Weber, long may they reign.

Chapter Two

"Hi, Harry," said Neville.

Harry grinned at him. "You wanna play?"

Neville looked shocked. "M-me?"

"See anyone else?"

"But why would you wanna play with me? 'M no good at playing." He pointed to a group of boys laughing together. "They'd be funner."

Harry remained resolute. "Don't want to play with them. I want to play with you." He pointed at Neville, emphasizing his position on who would be more fun to play with.

"Do you wanna?" repeated Harry firmly.

Neville shrugged in bewilderment, defeat and an unfamiliar pleasure in being picked out in a good way.

"Okay. What do you wanna play?"

Harry considered this question with great care for about five seconds. "Tag!" he declared brightly. He darted forward and tapped Neville on the shoulder before darting back, giggling. "You're it!" he called over his shoulder as he ran through the crowd.

Neville grinned and started after him.

They weaved through the crowd, Neville running in pursuit of Harry but not quite managing to tag him. They were both enjoying themselves, and neither of them were looking to see where they were going.

Suddenly, Harry stopped. Startled, Neville couldn't stop himself in time, and ran right into Harry, knocking them both over.

"Ha!" he exclaimed triumphantly. "You're it!"

"Mmf," commented Harry, his face on the ground.

Neville immediately got off his new friend. "Sorry, Harry, I should have been more careful. Are you okay?"

Harry sat up and spat a bit of dirt from his mouth. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just got a bit of dirt in my mouth. Don't worry about it, honestly, Neville," he added upon seeing the expression on his friend's face.

A hand reached down and grabbed Harry's shirt, lifting him up. Neville had accidentally knocked him into the group of boys who had been laughing before.

They weren't laughing now. The boy who had picked up Harry was the biggest of them, half again Harry's size.

"Watch where you're going, runt," he growled.

"Hey," said Harry, "I was going to apologize, but clearly you don't deserve it."

Neville winced. He'd have to teach Harry about not annoying guys much bigger than him.

The brute's fist pulled back and he hit Harry hard, knocking him back two feet. "Mmf," said Harry, rather woozily.

The brute advanced upon Harry, a dark look on his face. "You'll pay for that, brat," he snarled.

"Leave him alone!" shouted Neville, then immediately turned white. Forget Harry, he thought, clearly I need a reminder lesson! Even so, he knew, he couldn't just let Harry get beaten up like that. As sappy as it sounded, Harry was his first real friend, and he couldn't just abandon him in his time of need.

The bully paused. "Yeah? Watcha gonna do, brat?"

Neville blinked. "Um…" He hadn't actually thought about it.

He smirked. "Yeah, that's what I thought." He turned back to the boy on the ground.

Neville winced. Harry was still woozy, and he wouldn't be able to get away in time. He muttered a word his Grandmother would have castrated him had it been said in her hearing, then sighed. He really didn't have much choice.

He crouched down, then scooped up a handful of loose dirt. Here goes, he thought, and, pulling back his hand, he let fly.

It was, in one sense, a beautiful shot. In another sense, he'd been very unlucky. It had been a direct hit, striking the boy squarely on the side of the ear. It had the desired affect; the bully whirled from Harry towards Neville, a terribly angry look on his face.

"Did you just throw this dirt at me, slimeball?" he shouted.

Neville gulped, but scooped and threw some more dirt. It hit the bully's formal shirt, ruining it. Gathering up all his courage he spoke.

"I'd say you're more of a dirtball than I am a slimeball!" he shouted.

The bully snarled. "What did you say?"

"You heard me!"

"I'll fix you!"

The bully, forgetting all about Harry, charged at Neville straight on, but Neville had anticipated this and was running to the side. The bully was strong, but Neville was small and quick, and weaved through the crowd with much more ease than his pursuer. He searched for a place to lose the bully. Where…where…there! He darted through a gap in a group of adults, but his enemy, too enraged to pay attention to where he was going and too big to fit through, charged right in, nearly knocking an adult down and finding the grown-ups looking down at him curiously. Ha! Three cheers for me, thought Neville gleefully, and then, grateful for his narrow escape, went to find Harry.

By now, Harry was standing up, no longer woozy.

"Thanks, Neville," he said gratefully. "I owe you one."

"It's no problem," said Neville earnestly. "You would've done the same for me."

"Thanks anyway,"

"If you really wanna thank me, how about no more tag?"

Harry grinned, all his mischievousness returning.

"What's life without a little trouble?" he asked rhetorically, and then, tapping Neville on the shoulder, shouted, "You're it!" again, and took off.

Neville groaned, and started after him.

They played like that for half an hour as the stream of people dropping off their kids slowed to a trickle and finally stopped altogether. At that point, a large bell rang, and people quieted down. A woman climbed a podium that Harry hadn't noticed earlier and began speaking.

"Hello, everyone. I am Ms. Taylor, the Principal. I run this school. I am going to call the teachers up here, and then divide you into your classes. Mrs. Slater, will you please come up? Students, I will call some of your names. When I am done, please follow Mrs. Slater into your classroom. Amelia Torrin; Robin Smith; Jacob Deveraux…"

"I hope we're in the same class," whispered Harry to Neville. Neville nodded earnestly. "Me too," he whispered back.

"…Mrs. Foster, will you please come up? Robert Yorin, Julie Webber, Natalie Sorrington, Harry Potter…"

Harry held his breath.

"…Tory Nickelson, Giovanni Torano, Kora Davids, Neville Longbottom…"

"Yes!" hissed Harry triumphantly. He gave Neville a high-five.

"Will the students I just called please follow Mrs. Foster to their classroom, please," said the principal.

They did so.

Mrs. Foster was a short black woman in her mid-forties. She grinned at her students. "Hey, guys," she said. "You can call me Jacky. When we get to the classroom you can tell me your names, okay?"

They followed her along the corridors of the school. It was bewildering, and Harry wondered how he'd ever get the hang of it.

"Don't worry," called Jacky from up front. "I know it seems confusing now, but you'll get used to it. After all, I did, and anything I can do, you guys certainly should be able to!" Her grin flashed white against her face.

Harry, decided, right there, that he liked her.

It took a while, but they finally arrived at the classroom. "Alright, guys and gals, this is it!" she called over her shoulder. She fished in her pocket for a key, tried to fit it in the lock, grumbled when it didn't fit, reached back in her pocket for the right key and, finally, opened the door.

"Come on in," she announced. "Room 138. Have a seat on the cushions."

They filed in and looked about, curious. There were, indeed, cushions, arranged in a circle. Harry made straight for the biggest one, easily three times bigger than the rest, and waved for Neville to sit next to him. Jacky closed the door and swooped down on him. "Nuh-uh, little guy," she teased, this one's mine." He grumbled, but obeyed, moving to sit on Neville's other side.

"Alright," she said. "Let's introduce ourselves; our likes, our dislikes, our hobbies and our favourite colour. I'll start. Hi, I'm Jacky Foster, I like kids and I like teaching them, I dislike people who threaten my students, I like knitting and my favourite colour is orange. Your turn," she added turning to Neville.

"Umm…Hi, my name's Neville Longbottom," said Neville. Someone sniggered, and Harry sent him a glare. "Er…I like plants and my new friend, Harry, I dislike bullies, I like gardening and my favourite colour's blue."

Harry grinned widely. "My turn! Hi, my name's Harry Potter, and I like chess and my new best friend, Neville, and I hate bullies, and I like pulling pranks and my favourite colour's green." All this was said at top speed, tumbling from Harry's mouth like bricks.

The girl next to him started to introduce herself. "Hello. I'm Julie Webber. I like vanilla ice-cream. I don't like people who colour outside the lines or chocolate ice-cream. My favourite colour is pink."

Once the introductions were done, Jacky got up and passed around colouring books before putting a basket of coloured pencils and markers in the middle of the circle. "Now, I want you to share, okay?" she said warningly. When she received mumbled 'yes'es, she grinned. "Good, cause if you don't, you know what that means, right?" At the shaking of peoples' heads, here grin became wider. "I'd have to…tickle you!" She cried, pouncing on Natalie and tickling her till she giggled herself out.

Lily grinned as she pulled the hovercar to a stop. She couldn't help but wonder how he'd enjoyed his day—had he been happy? Sad? Had anyone bullied him? Had he made any friends?

She searched the multitude of students for a head of messy black hair. Was that him? No, he was—there!

"Hey, Harry," she called out.

"Mummy!" An enthusiastic five year old landed on her, hugging her as tightly as he could.

She grinned down at him. "Hey, Harry, the car's this-a-way. How was your day?"

She listened as he chattered on about his day, shaking her head at the account of how he'd annoyed the bully—it was so like Harry—and smiling as he recounted his adventures with his new friend, how his new teacher was completely awesome, how he couldn't believe that some people didn't like chocolate ice-cream, for Heaven's sake, and on and on.

"School's really great!" he finished enthusiastically as they entered their house.

She grinned at him again. "Sounds like it," she agreed.

"Hey, mum, can I invite my friend over for the weekend?"

"Sure," she agreed amiably. "What was his name again?"

"Neville Longbottom," answered Harry, already heading towards his room.

Had he been a little less hasty, and lingered just a little longer, he would have seen the colour drain from his mother's cheeks as her hands gripped the table tightly.

"No," she whispered. "Impossible."

Everyone knew that Augusta Longbottom and her two-year-old son, Francis Longbottom, had died in the fire, that night. Longbottom wasn't a common name, to be sure, but even so, it had to be coincidence.

It had to be.

She ignored the voice in the back of her mind, for it whispered something she didn't want to hear:

'They never did find the bodies, did they?'