A/N: I don't own Harry Potter or any of the relating characters. I do own the ex-girlfriend of Sirius, but that's it.

Thanks to ponychick. This is only the second fan fic I have written and your review boosted my confidence.  Thanks a lot.

A loud knocking on the front door woke Harry in the morning. Still groggy, it took him a minute to figure out what was going on.

"I'm not going away, Dursley! I can stay out here all day screaming at the top of my lungs, if you wish. Your neighbors are going to love this! Ha ha ha!" a familiar voice boomed.

Harry sat up, confused. Where did he know that voice? Not the muggle world, to be sure. A cold chill ran down his back, what if it was a death eater? Harry bolted to the window and looked out. Relief washed over him, it was Kingsley Shacklebolt. Harry smiled and waved. Kingsley grinned mischievously for a moment and started yelling again.

"I really could go at this all day, Vernon. Would you like me to tell everyone peeking out of their windows your dirty little secret?" He looked around, sure enough; almost everyone was looking out of their windows, watching this strange black man yell.

The door opened and Uncle Vernon stepped outside. "Okay, come in, but make it quick."

Harry was elated. He was almost definitely going back to Number twelve Grimmwauld place. He raced to pack. Things were spread all across his room, but it didn't take him long. The only problem he had was figuring out how to store the penseive.

Kingsley strolled into his bedroom, looking pleased with himself. "Hello, Harry. All finished packing? Well, let's get going."

Harry showed him the penseive. "What do I do with this? I don't know how to pack it." Kingsley stopped and muttered a spell to seal it and went down stairs. Harry shoved it in with his robes in his trunk and dragged the trunk down the stairs after him.

"Now, now, now, Mr. Dursley," Kingsley was saying, "I didn't want to cause such a scene, but I've been sent to pick up Harry and you were getting in my way. Here, it's not much, but all I have in repayment at the moment is this bag of candies. I was going to give them to Harry, but we can pick up some more on the way to my house." He held out a big bag of candy and Dudley grabbed it hungrily as he came in the room.

Harry watched him open it and start stuffing the little brown candies in his mouth. He smiled as Dudley gloated; knowing Kingsley had given them Cockroach Clusters. "Yeah, right." Harry thought, "He brought those for me. I'll bet Fred and George set him up with this."

"Well, Mr. Dursley, Harry and I must be going. We have a lot to do before we even think of heading home for the night. Thank you for taking care of him this summer. Again, I'm sorry. Mrs. Dursley, it was lovely meeting you. Dudley, don't eat all of those at once, you'll get a horrible stomachache. It's best to eat only a few a day. They're somewhat of a delicacy." With that they turned and walked out the door.

Making their way down the street, Harry noticed how heavy his trunk was. "Uh, Kingsley? Where are we going and how much longer do I have to drag this thing?" He had started sweating from the exertion.

"Oh, I reckon that alleyway over there will do nicely. We have a portkey to diagon ally." He strode over to the alley helping Harry with the luggage. "Now, we have a few minutes, so would you like some questions answered?"

Harry thought for a minute. He had a lot of questions but it seemed like he never had enough time to get all of them answered. "What is Voldemort up to? How are the Weasleys? Why are we going to your house?"

Kingsley laughed. "Wow! A lot of questions! Okay, um, you-know-who is killing people, wreaking havoc, and gaining supporters. Generally falling back into his old routine. The Weasleys are fine; you'll be seeing them tonight as a matter of fact. We aren't going to my house; we're going to headquarters. I just didn't want to say that in front of your relatives." Harry nodded, taking this all in. "Well, it's time for the portkey. Here we go Harry." Kingsley handed him a beat-up canteen, which he grabbed. There was a familiar yank and Harry found himself in the middle of the Leaky Cauldron. Kingsley apparated in with Harry's trunk in tow. "I'll go put this some place safe, you go on out and start looking around and I'll catch up, okay?"

Harry wandered out into the array of shops and headed for the one he'd been looking forward to, Weaselys' Wizarding Wheezes. He smiled as he entered the shop. The twins were doing well. All kinds of products lined their walls and shelves set up on the floor. "Oy! Fred, it's Harry!" George yelled in the back room. "Harry! Glad you came in! Come see what we've developed." Fred said, wiping his hands on a rag as he came into the shop.

Harry grinned, he hadn't been this happy in a month. "Alright, but I'm not playing test-subject!" The two men showed Harry everything they had come up with. There were the new skiving snackboxes. Some gave the consumer horrific gas, some made you belch loudly and often, and some even turned all of your extremities blue. All of these were for the student who wanted out of class. Harry wanted to give the Gas-Gummies to Dudley to try.

To go along with their headless hats, they now had severed hands, a glove that when worn made it look like your hand had been chopped off, and leopard loafers, the shoe for the person on the go. There were a large variety of other things they showed him. Harry was impressed.

"So, have you told your mum where you got the money for all of this?" Harry asked. "Or are you saving that so I get yelled at, too?"

Fred looked up from his inventory paperwork that he was going over. "Oh, we haven't told her yet. We're waiting for her to ask us again."

George pulled out an assortment of glasses and began to sort through them. "Yeah. Honestly mate, we expected her to ask again a lot sooner. I mean, we're not going to have you sit through all of that, too. We've gotten used to it over the years. You haven't."

Harry cringed, she was sure to ask sometime during the summer. He wasn't looking forward to that. He sighed and began inspecting what looked like a rubber chicken. As soon as he touched it, though, it turned out to be much more. It shrieked loudly and began flopping around, purple powder jetting out of it each time it hit the floor. Harry was very amused by this little spectacle, until he realized the powder made him dizzy and he had to sit down to avoid falling.

"Whoa! Here mate!" Fred said trying to get him to sit up properly. George stilled the chicken and got rid of the powder in the room. "What do you think of it? A beauty, eh?" Harry just nodded and said his good-byes as he saw Kingsley standing outside laughing at him.

They went to a good number of shops that day, getting all of Harry's new books and new robes seeing as he grew two or three inches since he was last fitted for robes. They went to a lot of other shops before deciding to call it a day.

Heading back to the Leaky Cauldron they thought of all they purchased that day and the enormous amount of money spent on it all. They went in and had butterbeers and got Harry's trunk ready so they could leave. Harry had mixed feelings about going back to headquarters. He wanted o see everybody, but he didn't want to think of all of the memories that would come flooding back to haunt him in that house. With a sigh he heaved the trunk out into the main room and looked at Kingsley. "I'm ready."