By the next day, Amelia had decided to wait and see. She was already swamped with the Black case on top of her regular work. She would find Potter at Kings Cross and evaluate his guardians there, maybe even introduce herself to him. If she got any weird vibes she would look into things during the school year. Hopefully by then they would have caught Black.

That plan went out the window when Auror Lightfoot came into her office. He was an annoying suckup, but he had his uses. Such as telling her that a call had come in that a woman was floating around Surry. When they got her down she claimed that a boy named Harry Potter did it. He had left the woman with his partner while he checked with Mafalda Hopkirk to see if Potter had been doing underage magic, and to grab an obliviator since the woman didn't seem to be aware of magic before this.

It would seem that fate had intervened, she might figure out the mystery of Potter's guardians sooner than she hoped. Sending Lightfoot to go collect an obliviator, she headed over to the improper use of magic office. She should have thought of it sooner. Potter had to have had a few bursts of accidental magic growing up.

To maintain the statute of secrecy, the IUMO kept a map of England in their office to monitor magic used in dense muggle areas. Magic used around Diagon Alley was usually ignored unless the power level/ type of the spell triggered the map, then aurors were sent out. When a wizard moved into a muggle neighborhood they were required to register with the ministry so they could key the location to the same level of monitoring as Diagon Alley. If a certain level of magic was used anywhere else, the map would alert the aurors to investigate.

"Mafalda, I heard that there was some kind of trouble with Potter, what can you tell me?" Amelia asked as soon as she entered the office. She wasn't fond of the gossip and wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible. Hopefully, she could catch Lightfoot before he left.

"No need to worry Amelia, The Minister has already been notified." The gossip said while puffing up her chest. "I'm sure this is just Potter looking for attention. I mean he blew the woman up like a balloon, but Dolores told me the Minister wanted to know of anything having to do with Potter so I sent a message off as soon as I got the alert."

"Right" It would seem that Fudge had recruited the rest of the departments to pass along information since she was keeping the Black case close to the chest. Amelia knew that anything she told Fudge would be in the papers the next day. "Is this the first time you have had to send someone out for what I am going to assume is accidental magic?"

"Oh on Amelia, Potter's file is thicker than most. We have had to send obliviators out a few times while he was growing up, and just last year I had to send him a warning. I don't know what he was thinking using a hover charm in front of muggles, but I set him straight." Mafalda said, sounding self-important.

"I was just on my way to meet with The Minister, do you mind if I took a copy of Potter's file? I'm sure he would be interested in seeing it." Amelia asked, pushing down her disgust for the woman. Really, what kind of person got their kicks out of setting a 12 year old straight?

Excited at the prospect of helping the Minister, Mafalda ran to the back of the office where they kept their records. When she returned she had a thick folder in her hand. "Here you go Amelia, please let the Minister know that I am always here if he needs anything."

"Yes, of course Mafalda, have a good day" Amelia said, swiftly grabbing the folder and leaving the office. She had thought Lightfoot was bad, but at least he had a little dignity when brown-nosing.

XOXO

An hour later Amelia found herself in a completely different situation. Instead of dealing with suck-ups, she had her hands full with hostile muggles. After leaving Mafalda, she gave the Potter file a quick perusal before joining Lightfoot. By then the obliviator was just finishing up with the muggle woman. He gave a few care instructions to a man who turned out to be Potter's uncle and left.

She quickly sent the two aurors off and insisted on speaking with Potter's uncle and his wife. She was reluctantly shown into the house, introduced to his wife, and then quickly ushered into the living room. Knowing that this was her opportunity to get the full view of the situation. Amelia started her interrogation with an important question. How did they get custody of Harry Potter?

Between her honed skills of interrogation, acting, and her sensitive bullshit meter she was able to convince the hateful muggles that she too disliked Harry Potter, and sympathized with their situation. That she was willing to be their ally in the enemy camp and could help them. That seemed to open the floodgates and all their sins spilled out. She could honestly say she had never dealt with muggles like this.

As a pureblooded witch from a light family, she had taken up this view that muggles were to be treated like helpless children. Especially after dealing with the atrocities committed against them during the war by Death Eaters. Now she was beginning to understand how some purebloods could look at muggle with disgust. She had to continuously remind herself that the actions of a few should not be held against the many.

"So Potter overreacted to a few comments made by your sister and inflated her like a balloon." Amelia summarized, thankful they had finally gotten to the events of that evening. She wasn't sure if she could stop herself from hexing these people if they said the word "freak" one more time.

"Right!" Vernon exclaimed. "I have half a mind to press charges, I do. My poor sister, how will she ever be the same?"

"Yes, well I have your statements if you even need them" Amelia said lifting up her notepad. "Now before I go I think it best if you show me Potter's room. I'll make sure he didn't leave anything dangerous behind. If he was angry enough to blow up your sister, I think it is wise to make sure he didn't leave any unpleasant surprises for you."

That seemed to shake them out of their reluctance. "Do you really think he would do that?" Petunia asked, clutching her husband's hand.

"Well after everything you told me about him I think I had better check. Especially after hearing about your son's unfortunate tale incident." Yep, that did the trick. Petunia was already on her feet and headed towards the stairs.

Seeing Potter's poor excuse for a room made the head of the DMLE want to curse the muggles six ways from Sunday and take her chances in front of the Wizengamot. The Potter heir was living in squalor and being worked like a house elf. Not to mention the verbal and probably physical abuse he was subjected to by his "family". Amelia took a quick reading of the room and sent the information to her office. Remembering the letter from the day before she turned back to the hallway and asked Petunia "Is there anywhere else he might have stashed something. Or did he keep all of his magical items in this room?"

Well that got an interesting reaction. The woman paled and started to fidget. "Well, he might have put something in the downstairs broom cupboard. But the door is really hard to open. Would you be able to check without opening the door?" So she had something to hide in the cupboard, interesting.

"Of course, let's go take a look. I'm done up here." Amalie did a quick check that she had asked all of her questions, and had gotten as many scans of the house as possible. Well, all of the major areas that is. She was glad the woman had pointed her to the small cupboard under the stairs. She did a quick scan of the space and sent it off to her office. Turning back to Petunia she gave her a deceptively innocent smile and said "Since you have been such a big help to my investigation I would like to do something for you. Alohomora."

Reaching for the door, she started to explain that she had fixed the sticky lock when her brain processed what she was seeing.

I want to thank everyone who has followed or favorited this story! :)

Here are some recommendations while you wait for the next chapter. "Strange Reflections" and "Harry Potter and the Last Chance", both by LeQuin.