Revised 04/07/10

~*~*~*~*Harry Potter and the Secret Link*~*~*~*~
~*~*~*~*Capricious Purple Clarity*~*~*~*~
~*~*~*~*Chapter One*~*~*~*~

Albus Dumbledore didn't know what to expect when the door opened, but he was pleasantly surprised nonetheless. The black-clad youth that came into his office studied his surroundings with stunning intensity, his attention captured by the instruments clattering on his table. His mouth hanging open in silent awe, the boy moved closer to the table and leaned forward for a better look.

Albus took the time to study Duo Maxwell in equal measure, unable to divine much about the youth by outward appearances. He was very curious about the long rope of hair that trailed down the boy's back. It wasn't unusual for a male wizard to grow his hair that long, but the style wasn't as acceptable in some parts of the muggle world. It was the very same world in which, by all accounts, Duo Maxwell had been living his life for sixteen years.

Duo straightened his posture and swept his gaze across the rest of the room before settling on the Headmaster, who smiled in greeting once he had the youth's full attention.

"Ah, good evening, Duo Maxwell. I've been expecting you for quite some time."

The youth's eyebrows shot to his hairline. The response the Headmaster was given was not at all expected.

"Is this the part where you call me Ring-bearer, recite some fancy poetry at me, and then send me off to Mordor to destroy the One Ring of Power? Because I think that's liable to get you sued for copyright infringement."

It was Albus' turn to raise his eyebrows before he chuckled softly. "I assure you, Mr. Maxwell, that this isn't that kind of adventure. My name is Albus Dumbledore, the Headmaster of this school." Before the boy could speak again, he waved his hand to the chair situated across his desk. "Please have a seat. I believe we have much to discuss."

The boy seemed to consider the offer for a brief moment before he swept forward and made himself comfortable. Waving his hands in a sweeping gesture, the boy said readily, "Then let's discuss. Me first. How do you know me?"

Ah, a very direct approach. Albus settled back in his chair, but left his hands clasped on the desk. "I was one of several present when you were born."

The boy's violet gaze was piercing. Albus considered using Legimancy on the youth, but dismissed the notion as quickly as he thought of it.

Not yet, at least.

"Okay," Duo said finally, relaxing his shoulders a little. "So what's the deal with this school? What makes it so private that you don't even bother advertising?"

"Magic."

Albus Dumbledore smiled benignly, a certain disputable twinkle in his light blue eyes as he looked over the rims of his half-moon spectacles at the boy languidly sprawled in the chair on the other side of his desk. Now the boy with the long, plaited hair was finally reclined before him, his eyebrows raised delicately as if to say "dude, what have you been smoking?" as he looked Dumbledore over with more than a little doubt.

"Well," Duo said airily, but still with an amount of doubt in his voice; he sounded as if he was soothing the ranting of an old, senile man, which, Albus thought with amusement, was a tone that was often adopted when addressing him. "That's all well and good, but what's that got to do with me?"

Albus blinked, thrown off. "I apologize if I haven't made it clear, Mr. Maxwell. You see, you are a wizard."

Duo's laughter was pleasant and almost childlike. "Of course! That explains everything. Now if you'll excuse me, Mr. Dumbledore, I'm sure you have better things to do..."

"Please sit, Mr. Maxwell," Albus requested, genteel. "I can assure you, this is not a joke. Though most do regard me with a certain air of uncertainty, I do not joke when it comes to magic."

The boy returned to his seat, his eyebrow still raised in skepticism. "Right." He leaned forward suddenly, grinning. "Prove it."

When Albus pulled his wand from the folds of his sleeve, he found himself blinking once again when, in an instant, the boy vaulted out of his seat and pulled a curious thing from his deep pocket and pointed it directly between Albus' eyes. The thing was cold, black metal and had strange grooves marked on either side. The barrel was small while its trappings were quite large; Duo's palm and fingers were wrapped comfortably around the handle, and one finger extended around a curved piece of metal protected by another ring of metal that extended from the barrel to the handle.

"What is that?" Albus questioned curiously, tilting his head to study the instrument, no doubt of Muggle origins.

The boy's eyes widened from their previously narrowed state, but he didn't lower the barrel one inch as he replied flatly, "You're kidding." Duo's eyes went to the wand grasped in Albus' hand, and he relaxed minutely. "A stick? You have me freaking out over a stick?"

"Not a stick, Mr. Maxwell." Albus smiled. "A wand."

"Wand." Frank disbelief weighed in Duo's voice as, very slowly, he lowered his curious instrument. "Right. A magic wand. And apparently, you don't know what a gun is. Fantastic."

"Gun?" Albus questioned, intrigued. "What does a gun do?"

The multitude of expressions that passed over Duo's face were interesting and, more times than not, disporting. Finally Duo's expression settled on amusement, and he replied swiftly, "It's a weapon. Inside the handle is a clip of bullets -small projectiles filled with gunpowder with metal tips that are strong enough to penetrate bone. If I had pulled the trigger, a spark would have ignited the gunpowder, and the bullet would have traveled down the barrel at such a speed that it would have... well, blown your brains out. You really shouldn't be pulling anything from anywhere around someone like me, Mr. Dumbledore. I have a feeling Mr. Hagrid would have cheerfully squished me to paste for killing you."

Albus' eyebrows rose fractionally. "Indeed he would have, Mr. Maxwell. I apologize." He watched as the boy flipped a button on the side of the gun and easily replaced the thing in the waist of his pants before sitting back down. "I think I would like to see a demonstration of this... gun... later. As of now, however... do you mind if I demonstrate magic?"

The boy grinned wildly. "Are you going to pull a rabbit out of your hat?"

Albus had to laugh. Such an odd question! "I don't keep rabbits in my hat, Mr. Maxwell, and I suspect that if I did, it wouldn't smell pleasant at all." He raised his wand. "Lumos."

Duo's eyes widened fractionally when the tip of Albus' wand erupted into a bright, white glow. Eyes narrowing slightly, the boy calmly asked if he could examine Albus' wand. With a casual cancellation of the spell, Albus handed the boy his wand easily enough.

The boy continued to examine the wand thoroughly, studying from hilt to tip before giving the handle an experimental squeeze. He repeated the motion Albus had used with no error, murmuring the spell under his breath.

One of the glass bobbles on Albus' desk exploded into a million, tiny pieces. The boy started, blinking rapidly for a moment. He handed the wand back to Albus absently, switching his gaze to the area the little bobble had once sat, now glittering with the dust of glass shards.

Albus clucked casually. "My wand is only compatible with me, Mr. Maxwell, just as yours will be."

"What?" Duo said sharply, his eyes flying back up to Albus' face. "There are a dozen things that could explain away that light and your paperweight breaking. Magic is at the bottom of the list." The boy snorted. "The very bottom. We're talking about leagues here."

Albus managed to stifle a sigh. "If that is what you believe. Reparo." When the glass disappeared and the rounded globe was once again whole on his desk, he smiled absently at gaping American. "Is there any way I could convince you otherwise, Mr. Maxwell?"

Duo's eyebrows were raised once more, and he glanced over the glass globe critically before slowly saying, "There's at least one way to explain how that thing got there again."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah," Duo said brightly, grinning again as he fell back into his seat. "Magic. So, Mr. Dumbledore -you said something about me getting one of these wands, right?"

Albus smiled, but before he could say much of anything, there was a sharp rap at his door. "Ah, that would be our esteemed Potions Master now. You may enter, Severus."

When the old man's Potions Master -whatever that was- swept in with billowing black robes and a dark glower on his face, Duo let out a near-silent sigh of relief. Oh, good. Dressing in the dark didn't seem to be a wizard trait at all. He'd wondered, what with Albus Dumbledore's dazzling orange and cotton candy pink... er, outfit. At first, Duo figured the old man was color blind. After about five minutes of talking to him, the braided boy revised his original thought. The man clearly dressed that way to off-set those that would underestimate him.

At least, that's what Duo hoped it was.

This new guy had a sharp eye and, by the looks of it, an even sharper tongue. He wore black robes that buttoned all the way to the collar and had oily black hair bound tightly at the nape of his neck, sallow skin, and a rather large nose. Duo figured with a little work involving a tan and a bottle of shampoo, this guy had the potential to actually be something of a looker. It all depended on how he looked under that black dress. Robe, Duo corrected himself silently.

Duo grinned suggestively when he caught the man giving him the old look over. "Like what you see?"

The man snorted and turned back to the Headmaster, dismissing Duo almost instantly. Score! Man, I love it when presumptuous jerks mark me off as a total idiot.

"Headmaster," the Potions Master addressed the man stiffly. "I hope this doesn't take long. I was working on a very volatile project."

Duo raised an eyebrow. Call him crazy, but he didn't think normal people really talked to their bosses that way. Going by the almost amused expression on Dumbledore's face, Duo surmised that the relationship between them might have been a bit more than just employer to employee.

"I'm afraid you're about to be very cross with me, Severus," Dumbledore said cheerfully.

"And somehow I didn't expect it to be any other way," the man said smarmily. Duo figured Dumbledore made it a habit to irritate other people. In other words, his kind of guy.

"I suspect it involves your... guest," the man continued, flickering another dismissive glance toward Duo. "He's not one of mine, nor is he Minerva's."

"Mr. Maxwell was just recently enrolled here, Severus," Dumbledore said airily. "Mr. Maxwell, this charming gentleman here is Professor Severus Snape. Severus, this is Duo Maxwell."

Duo narrowed his eyes suspiciously when Snape glanced at Dumbledore sharply, catching a brief surge of surprise and trepidation behind those coal black eyes before the man quickly and efficiently hid away his emotions. Well, two could play at that game. By the time Snape turned his attention back to Duo, the braided boy was smiling guilelessly once again, a sparkle of mischief in his amethyst eyes.

"Call me Duo," the Gundam pilot said cheerfully. "'Mr. Maxwell' makes me want to look for a responsible adult for you to talk to."

"Indeed," Snape said coolly, staring at Duo as if the man was completely reevaluating his previous thoughts of the boy.

Duo blew him a kiss. He couldn't stop the snicker that slipped passed his lips when Mr. Tall, Dark, and Scary frowned at him.

"A new student at his age is... unprecedented," Snape prodded cautiously, his face pinched in a way that implied there were a lot of other words he would like to replace with unprecedented. Like unwanted. Unappreciated. Un-bloody-do it. "May I ask what has spurred this sudden development?"

"You may," Dumbledore said, his blue eyes twinkling again. "Perhaps at a later date. In the meantime, Severus, Duo needs someone to escort him to Diagon Alley for his wand, scales, cauldron, parchment, ink, and quills. How much knowledge he'll be able to retain within a short period of time will determine what year he will be in. I'm sure our excellent team of professors will be able to catch you up to your age level, Duo. You seem to be an extremely quick young man."

"Sweet of you to think so," Duo said in good humor.

"I presume you've volunteered me for this errand, Headmaster?" Snape said wearily.

"You sure do presume a lot," Duo pointed out with a smirk, ignoring Snape's acidic glare.

"Quite right, Severus," Dumbledore said blithesomely, also ignoring the obvious tension set in Snape's shoulders. The old man reached into one of his cluttered desk drawers and brought out a small key the size of Duo's pinky.

"Duo," the wizen old man said kindly, "this is the key to the vault of your mother's inheritance, now yours. She left it with me for safe keeping shortly before she disappeared. If I recall correctly, you were three and a half hours old at the time." Dumbledore served the American a sad smile. "Her remains were declared two weeks later -complications due to childbirth. You were nowhere to be found."

"My mother?" Duo repeated slowly. Why it had taken the concept so long to really sink in was a mystery. Of course Dumbledore knew his mother; why else would the man be present at his birth? "She was like... you people?"

"Ah, yes. Dear Angelica Proud," Dumbledore murmured tenderly. Duo almost missed the Potions Master's flinch, but whatever had affected him to the point of temporarily losing his disdaining facade was effectively hidden by the time Duo glanced again for a better look.

"She was an American girl. Many American students were brought to Hogwarts after Ilvermorny was destroyed in the summer of AC 177. She was going into her sixth year when she enrolled -Slytherin, if I remember correctly. A charming young woman -you have her eyes."

"That's..." More than Duo knew about her, actually. He always assumed his mother was an L2 prostitute who either couldn't afford an abortion and didn't have the nerve to terminate her own pregnancy herself, or was too green and naive to even consider abortion an option. This whole 'your mother was a witch' thing brought up a lot of unasked questions.

"... cool. So, Sevy, ready to take me on a tour a la Potions Master?"

The man's eyelid ticked ominously. Score! "That's Professor Snape, Maxwell."

"That's Duo, Sexy."

"Sexy!"

Dumbledore put a hand over his mouth. Duo supposed that was an effort to cover his amused 'cough'. "Well, have fun, you two."

"Always." Duo smirked at Snape. Snape glared hot death at Duo.

This is the beginning of a beau-ti-ful student-teacher relationship, Duo thought gleefully, mentally rubbing his hands together and cackling ominously.

-*-*-*-*-*Players gonna break, break, break, break*-*-*-*-*-

It was a rainy day on Privet Drive, and it was especially dark at Number 4 Privet Drive. The air there seemed thicker with electricity, the clouds so dark above the beautiful if not mundane home of the Dursleys. A tarp covered their top-of-the-line sports car, and comic books and handheld video games carelessly left about on the front porch were hurriedly brought in by the mother of the household, if only because her son refused to preserve his belongings of his own volition. The first bolt of lightning seemed to strike near their home, and the thunder clapped almost an instant after. It was the yard of Number 4 Privet Drive that experienced the first drop of fat rain, and the second, third, and fourth. Soon all of Privet Drive and neighboring streets were experiencing the sudden rainstorm.

This did not soothe Vernon Dursley. In fact, the sudden rainfall seemed to irritate him further.

Vernon Dursley was a muggle. He was, in fact, about as muggle as anyone could get, and he rather wanted it to remain that way. He wore his most boring ties to work, and sat with his back to the window. He had a good day when he had the opportunity to yell at people, especially those who worked under him at his company, Grunnings, where he ran drills. It was all about appearances to him; he refused to tolerate anything out of the norm, and judged everyone by their car or home.

Vernon Dursley was a rather overweight man, not exactly morbidly obese like his son once was, but he could stand to lose a few good pounds. He had almost no neck and a mustache that would lose a tuft here and there from his nature of pulling on it hard enough to yank the hairs out when he was agitated. Vernon was also the type of person to find something to complain about. At the moment of the rainfall, he was complaining about weathermen and how their predictions were wrong. Even if they were wrong only sometimes, to Vernon, sometimes was just too much. Another thing he liked to continuously gripe about was his nephew Harry.

Harry Potter had always been thin, but he had grown even more lanky in his years. His ebony hair grew jagged and uneven, no matter how many times he would be forced to go to the barber to have it cut even. It would be exactly as it once was the day after a haircut. Glasses adorned his bright green eyes, and his wild hair hid a scar on his forehead that was shaped much like the lightning outside. Harry's clothes were always too big for his too thin frame because most of his wardrobe consisted of hand-me-downs the Dursleys' son had grown out of.

In respect to school, Harry wasn't like other children. In one way, he liked being at school way more than he liked being away. At least at school he didn't have to put up with family that hated him. Another thing that set him off from other children was the kind of school Harry went to. Under the grumbling protests of his uncle (who once vehemently denied that Harry should go, but was persuaded otherwise by a certain half-giant named Hagrid) Harry attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Harry was an aspiring young wizard.

He missed a lot of things about Hogwarts. One was his opportunity to be away from the Dursleys, but with a family like them, who would want to be around? He also missed his friends and how freely he could practice his magic within the safe walls of the prominent school. He missed Quidditch, a wizard's game that, he had to admit, he was quite good at. He missed talking about magic, which was something Vernon fanatically prohibited from being spoken of inside or outside his home. He longed for hearing about magic, breathing magic, seeing magic; anything to do with magic, he yearned for with a passion.

Harry was taken out of his thoughtful mood when his aunt Petunia began to bring heaping bowls and ceramic pots to the dinner table around which the family had gathered.

Petunia was taller and much thinner than Vernon. She had a long neck that she craned over her shoulder in order to catch the latest gossip. She was horribly horse faced and blonde, with small eyes, a large nose, and a mouth that seemed to always thin with distaste whenever she spared a glance at Harry. Petunia was his mother's sister, and she was deeply disgusted when her sister began attending Hogwarts. For a while, she and Vernon went as far as to pretend she didn't even have a sister. When Harry came to the doorstep of Number 4 Privet Drive, the two made up quick, horrible lies about Harry's parents, going as far as to claiming they were layabout drunks without jobs and filthy habits. They even went as far as telling him they died in a car wreck he was a survivor of. Usually that was as far as they would go about Lily and James Potter.

Petunia had received letters of concern from the nurses at the school the youngest Dursley attended.

Dudley Dursley was a classic example of a glutton in more than one aspect of the word. Dudley loved to eat and still maintained a fair amount of pudginess despite the muscles he built during his previous year on his school's boxing team. He was a glutton for material objects, too. He always wanted the latest craze, the newest games, music, and entertainment; and with a little wheedling at his parents, he often got exactly what he wanted. He had a large pink face, not much neck, thick blonde hair, small watery blue eyes that he shared in common with his mother, and an attitude that was rank. Dudley had many favorite pass times (TV, video games, Mega Mutilation Four, toys, ect.), but there was none as high on his list as his two favorites: eating and beating on Harry, not in that respective order. Or at least, those were things he used to do. Ever since Harry began going to Hogwarts, Dudley had voted not to be around the thinner boy for fear of having a hex of some kind cast on him.

Petunia stonily fixed Harry's plate for him, giving him the smallest amount of the least appetizing parts of the meal she prepared. He ate it anyway, trying to look properly put out so that his aunt wouldn't take it away because he looked too appreciative. It had been done before.

It was when he entered his small bedroom (a large improvement over the cupboard under the stairs) that he received a letter from Ron. Pig whirled around the room in frantic excitement, and Harry hushed him with quick words before he opened the parchment Ron had sent him. It was a clipping from the Daily Prophet, a prosperous wizarding newspaper that had apparently passed through Hermione's hands before going to Ron. With red, Hermione had underlined the headline of the front page and had quickly scribbled "READ!" in large letters.

HOGWARTS ACCEPTS TRANSFER STUDENT!
Sources Say: "He's an abundance of energy!"

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, to date, has only once opened
up to transfer students in the past, writes reporter John Tobbs for the
Daily Prophet. In light of extenuating circumstances, Hogwarts
opened her doors to foreign students in need. There is no law, nor
is there a rule that states it cannot be done and, as usual, Headmaster
Albus Dumbledore has accepted the task of breaking the mold.

Due to the transfer student's minor status, Hogwarts is
withholding his name from the media. However, sources within
Hogwarts have confirmed that the student is male and will be
entering Hogwarts at a sixth year level. He is currently
spending his summer at the school so the teachers of Hogwarts
can be sure he is up to standards.

Rubeus Hagrid says, "'e's a good lad, 'e is. 'E wanted to stop
and play with the critters when 'e 'eard 'bout 'em, bless 'im."

When asked about the transfer student, Filius Flitwick bounced on
his heels. "I've only seen him once, but he's an eager student
with many interesting questions."

A source who wishes to remain anonymous says, "To tell the truth,
I don't understand half of what he says. He talks about
holes that worms make, mutters things about transitional reality
and improbability factors... Honestly, his nonsensical speech
must be an American attribute."

Whatever the case may be, it seems the students and faculty of
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry are in for a very special
treat this year.

At the end of the article, a quickly scrawled message, "Wild, huh?" was followed by Ron's signature.

"Yeah," Harry murmured thoughtfully, tilting his head as he slowly put the clipped article on his desk. "Wild." With the appearance of this new boy, something told him that this year was going to be a little different from every other adventure-filled year at Hogwarts.

*-*-*-*-*-We will take their body parts and put them on the breeeaaak*-*-*-*-*-

Hogwarts saw a lot more action than the resident staff was used to during the summer. Teachers weren't normally required to stay at the school during the holidays, but they attended to Duo's learning with all the aplomb due to a teacher's calling.

Herbology with Professor Sprout was an absolute disaster, as Duo in no way possessed any sort of green thumb. Still, he managed to glide through the written work with envious ease. It was only when he actually had to put in some practical work with the plants that things went off-kilter in the worst ways possible. He could kill grass if he tried to care for it, and his friends forbade him from ever paying any more than a passing thought to gardens and houseplants after the first few disastrous incidents. Magical plants, it seemed, liked him even less.

Somehow, Duo managed to destroy a few of Sprout's greenhouses. Even he was scratching his head for days after, at a loss as to how he had managed this feat. He thought maybe putting the wind whistlers next to the fire flowers might have done it, but he didn't dare ask the Herbology teacher afterwards.

Sprout had been absolutely distraught. "My greenhouse!"

Duo had tried to placate the woman by saying cheerfully, "Well, at least the other six are-" Shatter, rumble! It was the sound of the neighboring greenhouse crashing to the ground. Duo had winced. "Spoke too soon."

Sprout had been sobbing at that point. "My begonias!"

Charms, however, was something Duo found fascinating, and the diminutive teacher was ecstatic in the American's enthusiasm for the material. The little man (troll? Goblin? Duo thought it would be in his best interest if he didn't ask) patiently bore the brunt of his singular student's questions at full force, and sincerely attempted to provide answers and alleviate any concerns Duo had over the material. Unfortunately, it became evident very early on that Duo had an overwhelming lack of control over his magic when he set fire to the Charms classroom... along with Flitwick himself.

Whoosh!

"Ack!" Flitwick had squawked, slapping at the flames licking at his robes and his hair before he managed to gather enough of his wits about him to summon a large amount of water that doused the flames.

Duo, having hidden the wand behind his back, had smiled a little sheepishly. "Um. I'm pretty sure eyebrows grow back. Eventually. Er, Professor Flitwick, sir."

"Indeed," the little Charms professor had choked out, dazedly touching his bald face.

Potions was eerily similar to chemistry, which Duo excelled at to a degree. The comparison made Duo feel at ease with the class, as he likened it to a familiar reminder of the time when he thought he knew everything science and the world had to offer. In the end, Potions was his favorite class; he had a lot of fun despite the fact that Snape had a tendency to be a spoilsport.

Unfortunately, as with chemistry, Duo always had an itch to experiment with volatile ingredients. He had impulses. Strange, sometimes dangerous impulses. Impulses that encouraged him to mix a little of this with a little of that for the sheer joy of finding out what the end result would be like for himself. The results more often than not had gotten the privileged use of many bunsen burners stripped from him.

Poor Snape didn't know that. Not until he found out for himself, anyway.

"Just a pinch of asphodel, Maxwell... I said just a-!"

Duo had ducked under the table just in time to miss his potion explode, which had been his goal all along. Snape had not been so fortunate, as he received a face full of the mixture. Almost immediately, the dour man fell bonelessly to the stone floor.

Once he deemed it safe to move, Duo had crawled out from under the table and approached the unconscious man hesitantly. "... Er, Sev? Sexy? Professor Snape?" Worriedly, he had nudged the professor with the toe of his shoe. "Um, Sexy...? Damn, how long does this Draught of the Living Death stuff last, anyway?..."

Transfiguration came so easily to him that he suspected he might have been able to do it in his sleep. The theory was a little more difficult to comprehend -how can you change something inanimate into a living, breathing thing? What happened to a mouse when you transfigured it into a goblet? Did it hurt? How did it work? He couldn't stop himself from voicing his questions to Professor McGonagall, one after another while barely giving the stern woman any time to answer.

"You're looking at it with the wrong frame of mind, Mr. Maxwell," she reminded him primly, though Duo thought she approved of his enthusiasm. "I've had my fair share of muggleborn students question the practice of transfiguration before. The closest I can summarize it is by saying magic is like a branch of science with an entirely different set of rules. Anything can be done with magic -but that doesn't necessarily mean you should do anything you want to do without worry of repercussions." With that, she gave him a long, particularly unmitigated stare before she had him transfigure a pin cushion into a hedgehog.

Duo did so, but made it a point to transfigure the pink pin cushion into a zebra-striped hedgehog. McGonagall took points off his assignment for taking the liberty to do so, but she added half of them back for managing the dual pigmentation on his first attempt.

Despite not being about to stay out of trouble, by the time he completed the fast track to sixth year, he was proud to claim a decent competency in what Hogwarts could offer him. Although magic still left him ill at ease and questioning the laws of reality on an hourly basis, the world left him feeling invigorated and eager to learn more.

On August 31st, he finally decided to give the magic world a chance. It wasn't like he had anything better to do, anyway.

"So, Headmaster! Are you going to Sort me now, or Sort me with the first years?"

The Headmaster smiled stiffly, which probably wasn't a good sign. "Yes, well. About that, Duo..."

Dumbledore didn't have to spell it out, though Duo wasn't hurt. He figured out early on that his outgoing nature would be too much for the professors with weak constitutions to handle. "Yeah, I suspected some of the House Heads wouldn't want me. Did you know Professor Sprout actually called me a hellspawn yesterday? I didn't expect it from her -Sexy, maybe, but not Sprout. So who's the unlucky guy who gets stuck with me? I hope you give him a compensation raise."

And then the evening of September 1st fell upon Scotland...

The Gryffindor house discovered something unusual when all years but the first years, who had taken the traditional boat route to enter Hogwarts, began to file into the large dining hall. In the dining hall there was a total of four long rows of tables filled with empty plates and silverware. On a plateau at the head of the hall was a smaller horizontal table. Most of the teachers and the headmaster had already taken their seats. The most spectacular feature about the dining hall was the ceiling, or in this case, the lack thereof. Lit candles free-floated in the air, suspended by magic alone. Other than the candles, though, the ceiling was an exact replication of the current sky. The night was clear, alight with bright stars twinkling and winking down on the planet Earth. The moon shone full at the far corner. Students paused momentarily to watch a shooting star tendril across.

When the Gryffindor house began to sit around their designated table, they found that one had already joined the them. His face wasn't familiar. He had long hair twined in a braid, and transfixing blue-violet eyes that caught the attention of the ladies, Gryffindor and Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw and Slytherin alike. A glittering trinket shone against his black robes, and further looks found it to be a Christian cross.

Coincidentally, Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger found themselves either sitting beside him or in front of him. Hermione, a fifth year with wild untamed hair, and Ron, a freckle-faced redheaded boy with a nose a little too big for his face, sat across from him, much to the disappointment of many onlookers from the other houses. Harry had taken the empty seat to the right of the handsome young man without really noticing he was there.

That is, until the young man grinned so cheerfully in a manner that Ron later claim made his skin crawl for how eerily he was reminded of his twin brothers. Suddenly Harry felt he should know the young man.

"Hey," the braided boy said in a clear American accent. "Sit here often?"

It didn't take a genius to figure out that this boy was the new transfer student the Prophet had raved about nearly month ago.

Before Harry could answer the new student's question (and ask a few himself, including "what's your name?" and "where'd you come from?"), Professor McGonagall began to lead all the first year students into the hall. All tables grew quiet, and all but the braided American and Harry watched their path slowly carve down the isle.

"What's your name?" the American asked instead, and Harry blinked.

"I'm Harry. Harry Potter."

The boy was completely unmoved by his name. Usually he couldn't mention his name without someone going at least a little batty on him. Instead he reached out his hand for Harry to accept. Harry took it, absently noting the many calluses the boy had gathered.

"Cool to meet you, Harry. I'm Duo Maxwell."

End Chapter One

Also pretty sure Zanne had a hand in this one, too. Yay! More props to Zanne!