A/N : Sorry it's been so long, however as I've said before I've been doing my exams, I finished a few days ago. So I should have more time to update now. Horray! This is quite a long chapter, for me!
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros, Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Summary: Post OotP Harry receives a 'what if' stone for his birthday and gets thrown into an alternate reality where Sirius was the potter's secret keeper imagine a world with an alive Lily, James and Sirius, and a rather confused Harry. (As usual this will not be slash…I don't write it.)
What if
Chapter Fifteen
Warrant
The next few days were all similar, Harry would get up and go to the vault usually with Sirius and Remus, then his parents would join them as soon as they got home from work. Every so often Dumbledore would pop in to check what they had found, yet after a few days Harry wondered if they would ever find anything.
"Harry!" Remus called out from across the creepy dark library, his voice echoed oddly.
"Yeah, what is it?" Harry said dropping a small metal backed book on the floor with an odd clanging noise.
Harry ran along the corridor of books he was currently on and bumped into Sirius. "Hey, come quickly Remus has found something!" Harry followed his godfather to the werewolf. He was crouched over a large hexagonal book.
"Harry, look I've found some really important stuff on travelling through dimensions."
Harry grinned and knelt down by his former teacher (in his world) "Does it say how to stop the hallucinations?"
Remus frowned, "No unfortunately, but from what Albus told us there isn't much that can be done about that anyway. It seems at the moment its either get home or get worse."
"Great- thanks for reminding me. So does it say how to get home?"
Remus smiled, "Ah well yes that's the good news, it gives a set of instructions on how to create a weakness in the dimension barriers so you can pass harmlessly through to the correct universe."
"Sounds like a piece of cake," Sirius said sarcastically
"Well it's not gonna be easy, we knew that from the start, it doesn't help that its written in middle English, I know some but I'll need some help deciphering the ingredients listed to make the potion."
"Woa, what potion?" Sirius asked.
"Well if I'm reading this funny word right, then Harry'll have to drink a potion to make him able to pass through the dimensions."
"But a potion could take months to brew." Harry said remembering his experience with Polyjuice in his second year.
"Well let's hope our esteemed potion maker can be snappy about it."
Harry snorted, "He'll probably poison it."
"Harry, Severus is really not that bad, he can be an okay bloke when you learn to get on with him," Remus said.
"Yeah, I suppose I'm still not used to Snape being…nice."
Sirius pulled a face, "I wouldn't go as far to call him 'nice' but I guess he could be worse, what annoys me about him is the way he acts as if he has a wand shoved up his--"
"Harry!" Lily's voice called out shrilly, interrupting Sirius. She appeared at the end of the corridor of books looking very flustered. "Harry, Sirius, Remus, are you ok?"
"Yeah, what's up Lil's?" Sirius said worriedly getting up.
"Thank Merlin, I was so worried when I saw the house, I came straight here when you were no where to be found." Lily said in a rush.
"Mum, slow down, what's happened?" Harry said.
"It's the house, Its been broken into, it looks like it's been ransacked." She said fiddling nervously with her hair.
"Has anything been taken?" Remus said closing the hexagonal book and standing up.
"Not that we could see, James is still there looking to see if anything of value has been taken. Albus should be there by now, we should probably get back to the house." She said.
"Wait, what if whatever did that to the house, is still there?" Remus said.
Lily thought for a moment, "Good point."
Sirius quickly spoke up, "In that case I'll go first, don't follow till I get back and say it's ok."
"Ok, be careful," Lily said.
Sirius then left Remus, Lily and Harry by Floo (incidentally the only way to get in or out of the vault.)
"Don't look so worried Harry, I'm sure whoever or whatever it was that did that left fairly sharpish, and if they didn't then James Albus and Sirius will easily take it on."
Harry smiled at his mother, "I know."
"Oh hey Lily I completely forgot, look what I found." Remus showed Lily the new information they found on dimension travel in the hexagonal book.
"That's brilliant, Harry soon you won't be having anymore hallucinations."
Harry had had a few more minor hallucinations in the last few days, but nothing as bad as the first. "Yeah, but then I'll be back in my stupid reality were everyone's dead." Harry said bitterly.
"Yes but it's--"
"--For the best yes, I know, I know." Harry finished off Lily's sentence, slightly irritated.
At that moment Sirius tumbled out of the fireplace. "Yeah everything seems fine at the order HQ, Harry you have to go last as usual to lock the vault."
"Okay," Harry watched the others use the Floo powder, before taking out the key and using the Floo power so the Vault would lock automatically behind him. (A/N thanks Gilthas! Sorry I forgot to mention it before)
Harry felt the familiar swirl before stopping at what he now regarded as 'home'. James put a hand out to stop Harry from falling out of the fireplace. Harry felt quite shocked when he looked around the living room. Just as his mother said the house looked like it had been turned upside down.
There was parchment strewn across the floor, one sofa was lying on its side. Harry stepped forwards and heard a crunch, he looked down and saw a picture of himself at about four years old, he was crying and James was trying in vain to calm him down, the glass in the picture frame was smashed.
"Do you have any idea who did this?" Harry said to his father who was waving his wand frantically repairing things.
"Not yet, but I'll tell you now, when I find out who did. I'll kill them." James said ferociously, Harry felt quite shocked. James looked quite frightening for a moment, Harry suddenly realised how his evil counterpart could be so dangerous, if he used the power his father and he possessed in a negative way then surely he could do great harm.
Then Albus walked into the room.
"What I don't understand Albus, is what they were after? There is plenty of expensive Wizarding equipment in the house, which was left untouched," Remus asked.
"It appears they were after something money cannot buy, has each of you checked your rooms?" Albus said.
"Yeah," James said repairing the picture frame, which Harry was just looking at, "nothing has been taken from any of them."
"Well this may well be one of those mysteries--" Dumbledore started, when James suddenly interrupted.
"Wait, I've just thought, we never checked Harry's room."
Harry realised to his horror that all the dark arts books they'd taken from the vault was in his room.
"The books!" Harry said and rushed with the others up to his room. Inside the room the place was trashed, the stuffing from his bed was everywhere; there was pages from his school books littered all over the floor. The dark arts books were nowhere to be seen.
"Oh god," Harry heard his mother say behind him.
"It's okay, Harry said to her, "I'll still be able to get back, we've still got Remus' book. We didn't need the others too much anyway."
Lily shook her head, "it's not that," she said
"What is it Lil's?" James said putting his arm around her.
"They've taken the 'What If' stone."
As Harry looked around he realised she was right. The stone too had disappeared.
"But what would anyone want with the 'What if' stone and a load of dark arts books?"
James snapped out of his reverie "Oh, Harry this isn't good. Those books cannot be simply purchased anywhere. Not even in somewhere like Knockturn ally. They are extremely old and can be pretty dangerous. Also the 'What if' stone is extremely rare, so rare that they have been dismissed as a myth in the last few hundred years. And as far as we know there are no others in the world. They were said to be a tool for a very dark wizard."
"Ah, so let me guess some dark wizard broke in here to make himself stronger and more powerful with the books and the stone? Hopes he might be the next Voldemort." Harry still found it weird that no one flinched when he said Voldemort, and said in a hushed voice to 'call him you-know-who.'
"That's certainly one theory, all I know is this is not a good thing." James said solemnly.
"Thanks for that Mr Cheerful," Sirius said sarcastically from the hallway.
"Alright then, " Dumbledore said, "I think we better go outside to put up some stronger wards around the house, it's obviously not as security tight as I thought. Harry I think you better stay inside since your room was the one that was robbed, you are probably the most at risk here."
Harry grit his teeth but said nothing. Despite the urge to shout "Aren't I always the one at risk?!"
"You can use magic to help clear up the house if you like," Lily said "The wards on you allow you to do magic outside of school.
This cheered Harry up a bit and he went around smashing things then repairing them again just to take out a bit of frustration.
After a while the adults came back inside and sat down exhausted on the newly repaired sofas.
"I just don't see how they did it, there was no disturbance to the wards; it's almost like they just walked in.
"I think I had better go back to the Ministry and check if anyone knows anymore about this there." Dumbledore said walking to the fireplace and disappearing into its fiery depths.
The group sat in a nervous silence; Lily had her arm around Harry. Sirius entertained them while they waited by flicking his wand at his glass of water, (on the newly repaired coffee table,) and making it change colour.
Then Dumbledore's head suddenly appeared in the fire, James knelt down by him. "Have you found out anything?"
"Yes, unfortunately it seems the Unspeakables are mainly responsible." Albus said grimly.
"What! The Unspeakables are part of the Ministry, they should have had your permission to search the house."
"It seems a team of them have been working on this since the Feverius outbreak at Hogwarts three years ago. They knew I would not allow a search warrant, because it was to find more incriminating evidence against Harry. So they got their evidence together and persuaded a large number of high officials to sign it so it can bypass the Minister, even."
"That can't be possible, why would so many sign the search warrant?"
"James, Harry is your son and understandably you love him, so it may be hard for you to see that he has done many unlawful acts. This has lead to a lack of faith in the public eye towards him. After so many students were killed by the outbreak of Feverius Harry has become a scapegoat. Harry's actions and attitudes since then have just made the matter worse. I may be the minister but I cannot go against clear, solid evidence and a huge majority vote. If I did it could lead to a re-election of my post as the Minister, and that way I won't be able to do any good." Dumbledore said tiredly.
"Okay…I understand. I guess you better go if they come for him then you better not be here."
Dumbledore nodded, then turned to Harry, "Good luck Harry I'll do what I can for you, but it may not be much." Dumbledore then disappeared.
There was a silence where Harry tried to work out what the man who was his headmaster was talking about.
"James" Lily said tentatively "Does this mean what I think…"
James nodded sadly, "I think so," Sirius put an arm around her.
"We'll figure something out, Lily it's gonna be alright."
Lily looked close to tears, finally Harry spoke up… "I'm not sure I understand."
"Harry, whatever happens you need to know, it'll all be okay in the end." James started.
Harry was starting to feel irritated, "Just tell me straight."
Just as Harry said this there was a loud banging noise coming from the next room. Suddenly a house elf 'Popped' into the room.
"Master, there's lots of wizards---" the house elf's sentence was cut off by the door slamming open and around ten Ministry officials and Aurors poured into the room. The House elf squeaked and disappeared with another 'pop'.
The one at the front Harry quickly recognised as Cornelius Fudge. He had a large scroll in his hands and was looking extremely smug.
Immediately James, Lily, Remus and Sirius sprung up off the sofas and James walked straight up to Fudge.
"Fudge, why are you here? What's going on," He said.
"James Potter, we," Fudge gestured to the crowd assembled behind him. "Are here to arrest Harry James Potter, on account of suspected murders of 21 students and 2 teachers three years ago this September. Also he is suspected of practicing the dark arts and in possession of a dangerous object known as a 'what if' stone. On top of that there is the suspicion of the murder of Peter Pettigrew and several other offences which are listed on this piece of parchment." Fudge handed the parchment to James who took it wordlessly.
After a moment Fudge signalled to the Aurors who descended towards Harry. Harry felt like he was in a dream state, surely this was not real? 'This could not be happening, these were not really Aurors, they were actors all playing a big practical joke on him, any second now they would turn around and say "FOOLED YOU!" and they would all laugh.' He thought desperately. However no one was laughing, the world felt like it was moving in slow motion. His mother was crying silently on Sirius' shoulder, Remus was gripping onto James' upper arm to stop him from lashing out at the Ministry officials who looked gleeful. They had obviously been waiting for this for some time.
"Wait!" James called out almost hysterically, "Where's your warrant for arrest, if you don't have one you can't take him, that's the law." There was an air of desperation to his voice.
Inches from Harry the Auror turned around and took a piece of parchment out from inside his robes and Harry's fathers face fell as he handed it over. The Auror then turned back to Harry and raised his wand. Harry's hands were forced together by an unseen force. Silver ropes came out of nowhere and bound themselves tightly around his wrists, they were icy cold and so tight they cut into his skin.
Harry fought against the silver ropes to no avail. "Help," he said as the Aurors surrounded him and pulled him away from his family he'd just started to get to know. It was no good, a Portkey was pulled out and Harry was forced to touch it. The last thing Harry heard was Harry's Mother
"Please, don't take him there, anywhere but Azkaban…"
Before everything dissolved into a familiar spinning sensation.
A/N : Reviews…
Darknessallover : Thanks! School may be over for you but sixth form students have still got a month left…Gurrr! I'll try to review more often though now my exams are over.
unknown() : Huh? Harry and Ginny…I'm not sure I quite get you!
snowman1400() : Here you go!
gaul1 : next chapter all will be revealed.
lost angel92 : Yes weird sums it up, but then again, so am I.
Padfootlet : Sorry HP3 came out in the UK first! He, he I got to see it before you! Sorry, I said it would not rub it in!
Silvercrystal77 : Thanks, I can't promise anything, he is a little bit stabby! Watch your back.
eruve tinwen : Very funny! "mwahaha i just had the most amusing image of harry running round with a tail and a pair of ears, slobbering on snape's robes :D"
Abluebird225() : The Werewolf, I didn't mean he turns dark just that he is dark!
Gilthas : Hey, I thought I'd reply to two of your reviews here coz I didn't know where to put my reply to your e-mail! Ok this is the reply to your e-mail…
Good I'm glad you think Bush shouldn't have gone to war, because I can prove my friend wrong now. (She thinks that all Americans are in favour of war, coz they've been indoctrinated by bush! Her views tend to be Stereotypical.)
I'm not sure if fuel has gone up dramatically here, it did a few years ago, its about 90 pence per litre…I don't know what it is in gallons, we buy it by the litre. I don't think we get our fuel from the Middle East…not sure anyway! I'll have to check.
Apologise to your Dad for me quitting History, British history is boring!
Hey with the Boston Tea party thingy, did the sea turn into salty tea? Or at least turn an odd colour? I don't think Americans are really violent; just they tend to jump in with both feet!
Okay second reply…man this is taking long! I better make this one short! This reply is to the last chapter. Yes I have seen HP3 in the cinema. As you probably read in my last review of HRI! I thought it was excellent, as usual there was one or two things which were different to how I imagined them, but that's to be expected. Yes I will hit you…both if you do not update HRI immediately, there's only so much a fan can take!!! Sara gets out comically large hammer, and starts wielding it around in a crazy fashion, to scare Gilthas into updating I sure hope that worked!
A/N : Oooh! I'm sorry but the ministry would never let evil Harry get away with all he's done in this world, he had to be punished! Even though they're punishing the wrong person! Anyway I'll try to update soon.
Please Review!