"So what are we gonna do?"
Harry looked expectantly up at Sirius as the older man paced back and forth within the small space the tent allowed. The sun had risen barely an hour before, casting light through the blue fabric of the tent, yet they could both already hear the sounds of the muggles moving around outside.
"I can't think of anyway to get back home, if that's what you're asking," Sirius glanced down to where the boy sat on the bed, "I think the only thing we can do now is stay here, safety in numbers and all that, and survive."
"What about our magic? Do we let them-" Harry gestured vaguely in the direction of the main camp, where the muggles could still be heard talking among themselves, "- know about it?"
"No," Sirius shook his head like a dog, "they'll go expecting us to solve every problem they have with magic, until eventually they may get angry when we're unable to bring their dead loved ones back. Plus, they might freak out, or turn out to be like your aunt and uncle, you know how some people are. It's best they don't know."
"I guess. We do have an advantage over them that could be more than slightly terrifying."
Sirius hummed in agreement, "we best check at some point if we are still able to apparate. I can still change into Padfoot, which is another bonus, I checked last night while you were sleeping."
"Why didn't we try apparating yesterday?"
Sirius had the decency to look sheepish, "I wanted to have a better look around the city, maybe see if there was anything that might tell us how everything happened. Besides, I'd need to know where we were apparating to, and I don't know this city." He looked down at Harry in concern, "I know this isn't an ideal situation, but we're gonna have to work with what we got. And pray that we're still alive at the end of it. As of right now, you are my primary concern."
"Blimey, Sirius, I haven't seen you act this grown up in a while."
Said grown up did the mature thing and stuck his tongue out, "cheeky brat," but quickly turned serious once again, "speaking of concern, are you gonna tell me what happened to your hand?"
Harry looked down at the mentioned limb, which he had been unconsciously rubbing, "it's nothing. Just cut myself, that's all."
He tried to subtly hide his hand behind his back, but Sirius grabbed it. The older man's eyes darkened when he took in the words carved there, and although he spoke calmly, Harry could hear the barely contained anger in his voice, "Who did this to you?"
Harry winced at the tone, but knew better than to lie to him, "Umbridge made me write lines with this quill during my detentions with her."
Sirius looked ready to kill someone, "I'll kill her. Why didn't you say anything? You've been having detentions with her since the start of the school year."
"I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of knowing she got to me. Besides, she wanted me to go to Dumbledore. I couldn't let her win."
"You could have told me. Or any other member of the Order."
"I was worried that you would do something that could risk you getting caught. You've the only family I have left, I didn't want that."
Sirius' expression softened a bit, although he still looked like he wanted to punch something, "don't hide stuff like this again, Harry. If someone hurts you, I want to know, regardless of the circumstances. Do you understand?"
Harry nodded.
"Good. Now, let's go and see what they've got for breakfast."
Breakfast turned out to be cold cooked squirrel from the night before and some kind of canned fruit that Glenn had brought back from the city, poured into bowls by the brunette from the night before, Lori.
"I hope you guys are OK with more squirrel," she greeted, "it's about the only thing we don't have a shortage of round here." She sounded rather annoyed about it.
"You should be a bit more grateful, Lori," spoke up Jacqui, "Daryl goes out into the woods every morning before the rest of us wake up to hunt food for us, risking his life every time," she explained to the two wizards.
"Just wish he would bring back something else every now and then, that's all," Lori said rather defensively, "maybe he would if he took his brother with him when he does," she gestured towards the tent that Buzz cut and Crossbow had disappeared into the night before."
"I don't see Merle doing much in the way of help. Daryl can't help what animals are in the woods, he gets what he can, and as I said, we should be grateful."
Harry zoned out the two women's bickering as he turned to watch the other muggles making their way around the camp. Dale and Jim were both talking to each other as they poked about in the front of the RV, which he was pretty sure they had been doing the day before. Amy and Andrea could be seen in a tiny boat out on the water at the bottom of the quarry. Carl and Sophia were running around with two other kids from one of the other smaller camp fires the night before. Sophia's mother, a woman with short grey hair named Carol, was at the waters edge cleaning some clothes, her husband watching her. Shane wandered around at the tree line, but made a beeline for them the second he realised they were awake, "Sirius, hope you don't mind helping out straight away on patrols?"
"That's fine."
"You ever used a gun before?"
"I can learn."
"All right. I'll show you the route after you've eaten."
"Is there anything you need me to do?" asked Harry.
"Nah, you don't worry about anything right now. If we need something, we'll let you know."
"Are you sure. I'm an all right cook, and I did the washing at my aunt and uncles house all the time." Harry didn't particularly want to be stuck doing nothing, preferring to have something to do. Otherwise he would having nothing to do other that brooding and feeling useless, both of which he knew he was often guilty off back home.
"Don't worry, there are plenty of people around here to do those jobs."
"Maybe you could hang out with Carl and Sophia," suggested Lori, "Carl was talking about you last night. You're a little older than him, so naturally he automatically thinks you're pretty cool."
"Really? I don't think many people have ever considered me cool before," Harry muttered dryly, thinking about all the first years who looked at him in awe at the beginning of each school year until the excitement of being at school alongside the famous Harry Potter had worn off.
Sirius heard him and quickly disguised his snort of laughter as a cough.
"Well to a twelve year old, you're cool," said Lori, not catching his sarcasm.
Harry shrugged, but thought he might as well try to get to know the other kids, he was going to be around them a lot anyway.
Once Sirius had disappeared towards the tree line with Shane, Harry had quickly found himself dragged over to where the kids were playing, although they stopped almost immediately so that they could interrogate him.
"What's it like in England?" questioned the young, dark haired girl, Eliza. She was rather small, probably around ten with pretty Hispanic features. Her younger brother, Louis, was glued to her side, watching the conversation.
"Err… well, it's colder than it is here," answered Harry awkwardly, "and, err…"
"Mrs Grimes said that Sirius isn't your real dad. Where's your real one?" piped up Louis.
"Louis, it's not nice to ask those kind of questions," scolded his sister.
"No, it's OK. He died when I was a year old. So did my mum."
"How?"
"Car crash," said Harry, remembering the lie the Dursley's had used when he was younger.
"Oh. Who is Sirius then?"
"He's Harry's godfather, like Shane is for me," said Carl to the younger boy, before turning to Harry, "I sort of know how you feel. My dad died at the start of all this. He was a cop, but he was shot and put in a coma. Shane said he died during the evacuation."
"I'm sorry."
Carl shrugged and kicked at the stones and dirt on the ground, "s'alright. I've got Mom and Shane."
Sophia remained silent throughout the conversation, but Harry noticed a look on her face that looked strangely like envy. While Carl was talking, she looked down the quarry to where her father stood with a mixture of anger and fear. Thinking back to how the man had quickly remained him of Uncle Vernon the night before, Harry dreaded to think of why she would look at her father that way.
"What's that on your head?"
Harry was once again snapped out of his thoughts, this time by Louis' voice, "a scar. I got it from the car crash." Harry lifted up his fringe to show the younger kids the lightning bolt carved into the skin of his forehead.
"Weird shape."
"Yeah," Harry glanced around him at the adults moving around the camp. Sirius had yet to reappear, "so what do you guy's normally do around here?"
"Nothing really," said Eliza, "Sophia helps her mom with chores sometimes, but we are mostly left to do whatever we want, as long as we stay where our parents or Dale can see us. And we can't leave the camp, in case a walker shows up. We can't go near any of the weapons that the adults use either, in case we set them off or something. Glenn brought us back some board games though, we can play one of them if you want."
"All right."
The only board game that Harry ever really played on a regular basis was wizards chess, which he was pretty sure they didn't have. They didn't have muggle chess either, it turned out. However they did have various other muggle games. They ended up playing Cluedo, or Clue, as it was called there, where Carl proceeded to beat them spectacularly, figuring out that Miss Scarlett was the culprit with the candlestick in the Hall long before any of the others.
It was the sound of shouting that drew the kids away from the game and towards the main camp. Shane and Buzz cut were both standing in the middle of the camp, spitting insults at each other. They were both practically incomprehensible at the speed they were talking, but from what Harry could make out, Buzz cut had made some kind of comment towards Andrea, who had returned with Amy a few minutes before, and the older blonde had been quick to take offence. The man with the crossbow, Daryl, Harry remembered, was standing watching the shouting match with a mixture of annoyance and long suffering, not unlike the look Mrs Weasley would get on her face when Fred and George caused some kind of trouble, although Buzz cut clearly caused a completely different kind of trouble than the twins did. When Buzz cut took a step towards Shane, Daryl quickly jumped forwards and practically dragged the older man towards the tree line.
"What's the matter, man, we were just having a nice little chat?" Buzz cut drawled, he sounded slightly drunk and had the same glazed look in his eyes as the night before.
"Merle, will you shut the hell up," Daryl practically growled the words out, his southern accent just as pronounced as his brothers.
Merle just laughed, but allowed himself to be pulled away and out of sight.
Harry looked around and caught sight of Sirius approaching him, "what happened?"
"That Merle guy made some racist comment towards Glenn, and when Andrea tried to stand up for him, he called her a whore."
"He says stuff like that all the time," said Amy, who had wandered over, "he gets high, tries to pick a fight with someone and ends up being dragged into the woods by Daryl to cool off."
"Why not make him leave?"
"It was considered, but then Shane pointed out that Daryl would leave with him, and he's the only one around here who knows how to hunt," she noticed the frowns on their faces, "I know it's not nice, but it is the truth. If he thought we could get by without Daryl and the supply of fresh meat he brings in, they would probably be gone. And at leased I does help out, he hunts sometimes and will take watch and patrol. Which is more than can be said for Ed," she jerked her head towards the Uncle Vernon like guy, "the only reason he is still here is because he has a wife and daughter."
"Why not threaten to kick Merle out until he stops?"
"Because he knows we need him and Daryl right now. If they do leave, they will still be better off than us, they have experience in survival. They were practically made for this world."
Sirius didn't look happy about it, but seemed to accept it. Harry could understand why. Merle seemed like a loose cannon about to go off, a bigoted one at that. One that had all the skills to keep everyone alive.
"Anyway, Glenn is going to go on another supply run in the city, he said he'll try to collect up a couple changes of clothes for you. If you need anything else, just let him know."
"OK, thanks," the two wizards watched he walk away before turning back to each other, "lets try not to get on the wrong side of Merle. I don't want to risk hexing him," Sirius suggested.
"Fine by me. You were on patrol for a long time."
"Oh, he showed me the route pretty quickly. He really just wanted to interrogate me, make sure I'm not like Merle, you know."
"Well, lucky you're the complete opposite to him."
"I should hope so. There are many things I hate, and racists are near the top of that list. Never mind about that, what have you been doing while I was gone?"
"I was interrogated myself," Harry gestured towards the other kids, who had started another game of Cluedo, "and then I lost at a board game."
"Sounds fun," Sirius glanced at the tree line in time to see Shane disappear again. About half a minute later, he was followed by Lori, who glanced back to make sure Carl was OK before disappearing also. Knowing that Lori was most definitely not one of the ones on patrol, he didn't need to be a genius to figure out what was happening there, "come on, lets see if there's anything else Glenn can bring back for us. At least let him know out sizes of something." He had a feeling that between Merle, Shane, Lori and the zombies, there was going to be a lot of drama soon.
A/N, sorry for the long wait. Afraid this chapter is mainly filler, but things will speed up soon.
Also, does anyone know if chupacabra's exist in the HP universe.