author's note: This site has a "no RPF" rule, whatever that means. Just in case this chapter would otherwise qualify, I've removed the end of it, and the chapter title. You get a summary. The full version is on The Archive, if you must read it. (I wouldn't say you're missing that much.)
Chapter One Hundred Fifty-Six: [removed]
"I don't know if anyone's told you this," Sirius said, "but they say there's three kinds of lies: 'lies, damned lies, and statistics'. I think that's a quote, actually, but it's something one of my muggle professors liked to say. I just thought I would say that, in case you felt the desire to expand your horizons."
Sirius was having entirely too cheerful of a Christmas. This was almost worse than Slughorn's idea of a Christmas party. Hermione and Ron had somehow managed to both be insufferably sappy with one another, and Slughorn had acted as if he had one over on Harry, because he'd agreed to look over what Harry'd translated of the notes of how to make that deaging potion.
And Ginny had flitted about the room, full of energetic cheer, as Harry had found excuses to stay out of the limelight. Even talking to Krum was preferable. Slughorn had been unable to induct him into the Slug Club, but had somehow prevailed upon Krum to attend nonetheless.
Fewer people were impressed by Krum's presence than might be expected. Then again, he'd stayed here at Hogwarts for half a year, only two years ago. Perhaps, he was old news. Krum couldn't talk about Order business, but he and Harry both played quidditch, and even talking about that was preferable .
At some point towards the end of the party, the new Minister for Magic appeared. Harry knew that he was the Minister only on account of Hermione keeping up to date with politics. Harry wasn't sure that there was any point in paying any heed to current politics, given his realisation that whoever was in charge was an idiot. Those safety precautions!
He was less than polite to Scrimgeour, mostly because this was the sort of person Harry ought to respect. It made it more difficult to accomplish this that he seemed to have no grasp of tactics or how to handle threats. This was the former head of the auror department, and Moody's successor? Why didn't he even understand how pointless a security question usually was? If they're close enough that you can hear them, they're close enough to hex you…put you under the Imperius, kill you….
There were circumstances where a security question might be useful, Harry granted, but they were not as common as Scrimgeour seemed to think. If you answered the same security question every time you encountered someone, to prove your identity, that just gave any would be attackers plentiful opportunity to spy on you and learn those passwords, and then….
On the other hand, it wasn't as if most people knew how to perform legilimency, or occlumency, or had an endless supply of veritaserum (and they'd have to be close enough to dose). The Imperius Curse would bypass most security measures, not just the password system. He supposed that passwords had their place, but that place was where they would seldom be spoken, and would remain unknown.
Those security measures were probably just a means of calming the masses, preventing mass hysteria. They worked well enough at that, Harry granted. Scrimgeour was a shrewd enough politician.
But, Harry still couldn't see how he'd been an auror. Maybe if he ever saw the man in action, he'd change his mind. He extended that offer in silence, and fended off the Ministry's attempts to turn him into a poster boy.
"Dumbledore's man through and through, aren't you?" Scrimgeour seethed, with marked calm. "Had to come here at Hogwarts just to speak with you, get past the guards, elude Dumbledore's notice—but you're off the grid wherever it is your godfather is—"
Harry silently lauded Sirius's choice in houses, despite knowing how much Sirius hated The Place. Off-the-grid to the extent that even the Ministry had trouble finding him was definitely good for Harry, although he rather suspected it had been much worse news for Sirius.
"No, not really," Harry said, leaning against the stone wall of the outside corridor. He almost appreciated being called away; it was much cooler out here. But, he still was not on speaking terms with the Ministry, and he said so.
"I don't have to be Dumbledore's biggest fan to disapprove of the Ministry. You want me to tell the people that the Ministry has their best interests at hart, that I should trust you, that they shouldn't panic—"
"People are dying!" Scrimgeour snapped, and Harry's voice leveled out into something cold and smooth as ice.
"Oh, I know. Good people are dying. Good people whom you might have saved, had the Ministry not spent the past year slandering us who attempted to warn them, and sending vile women like Umbridge to crush any spirit of resistance, and any knowledge that might have protected us."
Rufus Scrimgeour turned his glare into a full-force glower. "Now, look here, Mr. Potter. I am not to blame for my predecessor's mistakes. I am doing the best I can to salvage the situation—"
"I'm not going to tell the people the lie that the Ministry suddenly cares about them. I will work to protect them, myself. I don't trust you, or any other person in your corrupt government. You want me to tell them how to defend themselves? You want my advice?
"How about you start by letting them know that it's acceptable for them to defend themselves against an attack on them, or those they love. An apology for the actions of Umbridge, whilst she worked here. A public denunciation of her methods and message. Have you even given a public apology for putting me on trial for defending myself, before fifth year? That would also go a long way towards showing the people that you are different from Fudge, that the Ministry was wrong, and they are fully authorised to act in their own defence in wartime."
"Now, look here—"
"I have said what I felt needed to be said, Minister. Unless you change your tactics, you will end up much the same as Fudge. Act like an auror, not a politician, and make your own path. People will respect you the more for it. If you'll excuse me, I have a Christmas party to attend."
Nothing else but the need to avoid the corrupt Ministry would have driven Harry back inside. But, it was an imperative.
Harry would never be big on Christmas, in general. At least this time, he cornered Ron to ask what he made of the holiday. In typical Ron fashion, Ron ignored the history and religious background of the holiday.
"It seems to be a day that brings people together, and brings them cheer. That is the most important aspect of it."
Ron's opinions were sometimes incomprehensible to Harry. How could that be his opinion? It was as if he didn't even understand what the big deal was—as perhaps he didn't.
"Sulking and hiding again?" asked Sirius, with an easy grin. Good food and plenty of bed rest, combined with the healing Harry had put him through, went a long way towards restoring even his old looks. It was a rather alarming thought.
Sirius had gone from being a bit hasty and scatterbrained to sharp as a knife. It felt as if Harry couldn't get anything by him anymore. Probably how much time Sirius had spent around Loki. Was this another case like Stephen's, of turnabout being fairplay?
"I'm not hiding," Harry said. "Or sulking. I wish you'd at least tell me where I found to hide in this house, and whether or not it's still available."
"I much prefer not having to go look for you," Sirius said, leaning back against the wall. "This house is still my worst nightmare in domicile form. But, it seems closer, now, and further away at the same time. I think we could build something new, within the confines of this house. It would be the ultimate way to piss off my parents. I'll take everything Death Eater out of it, and leave the rest of Reggie's room as a tribute to him. No more dark magic in this house. But maybe, a future, with light and love…hope. I'd forgotten what hope felt like, and dreams. I think you know the feeling."
"Torture does that to people, too," Harry agreed. "And mind games."
"Hmm. I don't think you mean what most people do when they say that. I don't get it. Where do they come from, those stones of ultimate power.? What happens if something happens to them?"
"They're pieces leftover from the creation of the universe," Harry said. "They're not little microcosmic models of the things they control. They're essence. Raw energy, with a certain inclination."
"A bit like wands," Sirius said. "Except really powerful. Maybe the Elder Wand."
Harry frowned, not wanting to be reminded of the Ring again. He'd done his utmost to forget about it, thus far, but it felt as if the thing could move on its own. He found it all sorts of places he hadn't expected it. It was just as well that he'd never read The Lord of the Rings. It would have made him truly paranoid.
"What's wrong, kiddo?" Sirius said, with that new, sharper gaze fixed on Harry. Sirius must have been alarming even in his schoolboy days.
"Nothing," he said, which was not the most opportune lie at his disposal. He was trying to decide whether or not he wanted to tell Sirius about this one at all. Sirius raised an eyebrow, which arched into a point. "Trying to figure something out. It's a perennial thing."
"Okay. Well, if that's how you're going to be, then you have nothing else to do, do you?"
"You mean, like prepare for Christmas? Wrap presents, or something?"
"Why do you do Christmas at all?" Sirius asked, with a shake of his head. "It makes no bloody sense!"
Sirius was in one of those moods. "Ron does it, too. It's the sentiment of the thing, he says. That's as good a reason as any, I suppose—"
"I didn't ask why Ron did it. I asked why you did. He's got it enough to be a habit, growing up in a Christian household. But, the Dursleys only worship themselves. What's Christmas to you?"
A headache, Harry thought. He shrugged. "An excuse," he said. "A way to tell myself that I'm like everyone else. A lie, I suppose."
"I didn't want anything to do with it," Sirius said, nodding, as if to himself. "Not with my parents. Well, since you're not allowed to take revenge on people this day, I've something to show you and Ron."
Alarm bells would ring for anyone at such an announcement, Harry thought. But if Ron were also involved….
"I'd wait until Hermione reappears before bothering Ron, if I were you," he said, with a smile.
"I found a box of my old belongings that I hid in a sort of expanded space under my floorboards before I left home. Forgot I put them there, if I'm honest." The breeziness of Sirius's voice did not bode well, particularly not when combined with the way in which he'd introduced their current venture, or the fact that he'd shooed away Hermione, and dodged Remus by careful use of corners and furniture. What was it that he didn't want Hermione and Remus to know about? His behaviour said that there was an injoke attached to all this, and that Sirius thought himself hilarious.
"I didn't remember them at all until after you did…whatever that was," Sirius said. "But don't think this means I don't appreciate what you did for me. You're the best, Harry. It's just…well, I thought you might get a kick out of this."
He paused outside a room with a nondescript door like any of the others in the same hallway, and turned to Ron. "You're raised in the Wizarding World, so maybe it doesn't mean as much to you, I dunno."
Still with an alarming amount of cheer. Sirius turned that cheeky grin on Harry, next. "You read any comics, growing up?" he asked, and Harry blinked, mystified at the sudden change of topics.
"…No. I didn't have the opportunity to read much of anything not related to school. I did some research when I was ten, after my dreams of the past drove me to desperation. I wanted to know—well, never mind. But, Dudley read some comics, I know. He didn't stay with any of them for very long. I don't know most of them."
He glanced at Sirius askance. "May I ask why you have brought this up?"
Sirius's grin widened, and he somehow ratcheted up his "smug" by a few notches. "Did he read any Marvel comics?" asked Sirius.
Harry sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I don't—oh! He tried that one about the tapdancer, I think. He said that it was boring."
Sirius turned to stare at him. "That just goes to show he has no taste. Still, I suppose I should be impressed that he tried reading at all. He looks as if putting together letters into words is beyond him."
Harry was on the verge of begging Sirius just to reveal his big secret, already, which meant that Ron must be ready to explode. But Ron was staring down at his scuffed-up trainers, and looking self-conscious, for once. Prolonged embarrassment was mostly beyond him. Had Ron read comics, back before he'd known? Wizards had their own fairytales, and their own literatures, and apparently their own comics.
"You're showing us your comic collection?" he asked Sirius, making his best guess.
Sirius smirked a smirk that turned into a good-natured grin after a second or so of gloating. "Nah. Not quite. I remembered what you and…Ron said about the future. The Avengers."
That didn't seem to connect with anything at all. Harry glanced at Ron, as if he'd have more of the answers, but Ron seemed even more perplexed than Harry was.
Sirius turned the handle, and threw the door open wide. Harry and Ron followed the unspoken cue, and entered a room untouched by time (or Kreacher), walls covered with pictures of girls with no sense of modesty (if Harry could judge this at all, which he doubted), and books and muggle magazines on auto repair and motorcycles. Among other things.
One incongruous thing was a box laid out on a bed with brightly coloured racecars on it—a children's bedsheet resized to fit Sirius's much bigger bed. It was an ordinary, muggle moving box, all brown corrugated cardboard. It stuck out like a sore thumb.
summary: Sirius shows Ron and Harry his collection of Marvel comics, and you learn a bit about how the brand fared in #47.'s universe. Unfortunately, the graphic novels he wanted to show the two are of Captain America. Ron has a moment. Harry is almost nice.