A/N: See you back on February 1st.
Al had become accustomed to his extended family encroaching on his life as he grew up. Someone was always trying to be involved in what everyone else was doing. It was a normal part of such a large family, specifically a family that went through the hell they had. But when Al "went Muggle," as his Grandma Weasley called it, things quieted down considerably.
For one he was harder to contact. He didn't have an owl and wasn't home for long periods throughout the day, causing any owls who were sent to have to wait for him - something none of them thanked him for. Another thing was his heavy course load kept him from the big family gatherings outside of the Christmas ones. And it made it harder to connect with some of his more traditional family members. Uncle Percy, for example, couldn't seem to get his head around Al's reasoning for going Muggle, let alone half of what Al talked about from the Muggle world. So over the last nearly four years, Al had grown accustomed to the distance growing between him and his extended family. It was probably why he felt so at home with El's family, they filled that void a bit for him.
Given all that, Al's jaw nearly fell to the pavement when he pulled out his ringing mobile to see Uncle George's contact card.
"Have you pulled that old brick back out?"
"Hello to you too, my favorite nephew."
"No," Al might have put too much force into his voice, but Uncle George only called you this favorite when he wanted something.
"Now, now, let's not be hasty," George laughed, "Ron and I are in your neck of the woods and thought we'd see if you'd let us stop by."
Al paused about fifty feet from his building door, momentarily debating if he wanted to turn around. But ducking Uncle George had always ended in unpleasant ways.
"What do you mean by my neck of the woods?"
George sighed, "Fine, we're in the shop but we want to talk to you. Can we come visit our dear Muggle embracing nephew?"
Al rolled his eyes as he climbed the stairs to his flat door.
"Sure, my flat is connected to the Floo network and I'm home for the day. I might have company later tonight, but I'm free for the next few hours."
"Hosting unspeakable parties, are you?" George's voice was almost hopeful.
Al set his bag on his desk in his room and rolled his eyes. "If it helps you sleep at night, sure, assume that I'm hosting crass parties as I juggle 22 credit hours."
"I will, but we sell much better juggling balls than those hour ones. Want me to bring you some?"
Al laughed at the seriousness in George's voice. "Maybe another time, see you in a bit."
After disconnecting the call, Al pulled a bag of crisps from his kitchen and three glasses of water before sitting down at his table to wait for the Wheeze duo to arrive.
It was only a few minutes before the fireplace burned green and out walked his two favorite uncles.
"This is why you're my favorite," Ron grinned as he dusted himself off. "It's as clean in here as it is in my home."
"All thanks to your wife, I'm sure," George ribbed.
Al knew better, Uncle Ron was rather good at keeping his home clean and functioning when his entire family wasn't looking over his shoulder all the time.
"So what's the surprise visit for?" Al cut in.
"We can't just want to visit our nephew?" George reached for the crisps.
"I told you he'd see through it. He's too much like Hermione." Ron chuckled.
"Fine," George grumbled, "ruin all my fun."
He turned to Al, "We're here about your box thing."
"Box?" Al gave Uncle Ron a perplexed stare.
"Your mum called it the Potterbox," Ron chuckled. "You realize your dad had to suppress his desire to tell you not to use your last name. Hermione talked him out of bringing it up with you. Pointed out that it would be good to put the focus back on Potter's being inventors rather than world-saving heroes."
Al blinked as his brain caught up. "Mum and Dad told you about the phone case?"
"They told him," George pointed to Ron, "and he told me. We think this has some serious potential for you and the Wizarding World and we want to look into the possibility of getting you into production."
"But they aren't done," Al protested. "They only protect the phone from magic. They don't let you use the phone and magic at the same time."
Ron shrugged, "Fine, show us what it does now."
Al briefly considered telling them no, but quickly realized he was fighting a losing battle. They'd only argue it couldn't hurt anything to show them, and they'd be right. So he swallowed the rest of his objections and pulled out his phone and his wand.
"Shut off your phones," he stood and retrieved the safe box from his room.
George frowned, "Should I have brought mine?"
Ron shook his head as he handed over his, "You'd break yours if you took it out of the Muggle room."
Al chuckled, after Ron, George was definitely the most Muggle wise of the lot, but Ron was right, George tended to ruin his Muggle technology.
"Right," Al picked up his wand, "the case protects the phone from magic entirely."
He levitated it up off the table and grinned as Ron's eyes widened in surprise.
"I can Apparate and use the Floo network with my phone in this case and it still works."
Ron reached out and turned Al's phone to see the screen, lit up and displaying the time.
"So what's the problem?" George frowned at him.
"Here," he handed Ron the bag of crisps, "Levitate this and I'll show you."
Ron took it one step further and started levitating crisps toward George's mouth; who happily crunched on them as they came within munching distance.
Al turned the phone to show how he couldn't connect to WiFi or data; he couldn't get a signal and so the attempted phone call to Ron's mobile didn't go through, and neither did the text message.
"See," Al shook his head. "It doesn't do anything but protect the phone from magic killing it."
George and Ron shared a long look before George grinned.
"I'm in. We could call it the Potterbox Protector. It'll be the base model and then as he gets the kinks worked out we move on to the one that lets you make calls and whatever else. Then we introduce the new Potterbox, the Potterbox Communicator."
"We need something better than Communicator," Ron shook his head. "Protector sounds brilliant, we need something even better when he gets the next iteration done."
"Have you heard nothing I've said?" Al interrupted.
"Yeah, it's not what you want it to be, but what it is right now is still brilliant and I want to sell it." George pulled out his wand and conjured a pen and paper and started jotting down notes.
"But…"
"Al," Ron slid his wand back on his holster and reached for the safe box. "If we sign you on for the Protector then when it's ready for the next phase we'll have production down and ready to move right onto the next, plus we can still sell the Protector as a base model. This case of yours has a lot of potential and we can reach your target audience."
"But…"
"We'll need you to come by and show us your procedure for enchanting the cases." George interrupted. "Ron you're in charge of getting that setup."
"Right," Ron retrieved his phone and stood with George. "I'll text you and we'll find a time around your classes."
"But…"
"You're a right genius, Al," George folded his paper into his pocket. "You'll be as well known as your great-grandfather."
"But…"
"We'll be in touch," Ron pulled Floo powder from his pocket and with a step over the grate, he and George were gone.
Al blinked.
If the half drank glasses of water weren't on his table, Al would wonder if that hadn't been a very strange dream.
His door opened and he spun around to find Ellie walking in.
"Hi, love," she stopped in the doorway, "Is everything alright?"
Al plopped down on the couch with an 'oof'.
"I have no idea."