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Story: [A Weird Family] (Harry Potter)/(Ranma½) X-Over
Summary: Harry was raised in a very different family, in a strange little precinct in Tokyo Japan, called Nerima. Obviously, things get a bit weird.
Genre: Friendship, Family, Humor
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Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
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Harry had learned from an early age that his family was weird.
As much as he loved them, it was rather hard to refute the undeniable proof in the weirdness of having a dad-that-was-a-woman, and a dad-that-was-a-bird.
His two dads usually argued with each other a lot about the strangest things, and with the most peculiar of arguments.
Harry had more people in his family than just those two however. He had a cousin called Ranma, an eccentric aunt called Nodoka, and a panda that seemed to have settled down in their backyard.
Ranma said that the panda was a good friend of an old man who sometimes visited to play shogi with it. The old man had three daughters and a wife who liked baking things.
Ranma studied martial arts, and Harry learned a little bit himself, mostly just so that he'd be able to actually stand a chance in winning against his cousin whenever they played any physical sort of game.
His dads had argued about that too, but it seemed like they'd come to an agreement fairly quickly, and there'd been a lot of promises between them on some kind of agreement that Harry honestly hadn't been paying attention to.
The old man's three daughters were nice.
The youngest also studied martial arts, and kept getting into fights with Ranma, because she refused to admit that he was just plainly better than at her at physical stuff. Harry wasn't sure why it upset her so much, since he was perfectly okay with Ranma being better than him.
Then again, he could turn Ranma's hair strange colors if Ranma got too annoying. And Akane couldn't, so that might be the reason.
Akane couldn't really cook, and her mom had mostly banned her from the kitchen since she kept ruining the food with her 'help'. Still, Ranma wasn't allowed in there either since he kept eating the ingredients, so it was unlikely that that particular thing upset her overly much.
She was really strong though, easily stronger than Harry, possibly stronger than Ranma. Not that his cousin would actually stand still long enough for her to land a hit on him.
They were a strange family, extended as they were over three families with five parents divided between them in an uneven pattern, but they were all happy.
Sometimes, his dads spoke a different language than normal, but Harry had learnt that quickly, so he didn't have to worry about that, and dad-that-was-a-woman was sometimes a cat-person because he couldn't run away from the evil feline devils fast enough. And other times, dad-that-was-a-bird would stop and talk to snakes that they met, and the snakes would talk back.
Ranma hadn't believed that snakes could talk until Harry had introduced him to a snake that slept in the grass. Then he said that Harry spoke a different language that sounded like hissing, and that the snake hissing back at him oddly didn't actually prove anything.
Dad-that-was-a-bird ended up explaining to Ranma that snakes could indeed talk, but that they were rather boring conversationalists and their language was something you had to be born with to understand.
Ranma didn't believe him until dad-that-was-a-bird convinced a nearby snake to do tricks, then he thought that it was kind of cool, but sounded pretty useless beyond that.
Dad-that-was-a-bird smirked at that, and told dad-that-was-a-woman that speaking to snakes was totally useless beyond looking cool. Dad-that-was-a-woman blushed rather prettily and immediately told Ranma that he was too young to learn exactly why it wasn't useless at all, and that dad-that-was-a-bird should shut up about stupid stuff in front of kids.
Dad-that-was-a-bird later told Harry that it wasn't a bad thing to be able to speak to snakes, but that some people were unsettled by it because they were stupid idiots, so he shouldn't scream it from the rooftops or anything.
Harry made sure that he nodded sensibly and didn't promise his dad anything.
The first rule in life was that actual commitment to a promise meant that he couldn't break it for the heck of it at a later date. And shouting stuff from rooftops sounded like an awesome thing to do.
Dad-that-was-a-woman said that he got that from her.
Dad-that-was-a-bird said that it was probably smuggled into him from his godfather, because he was the kind of guy who'd find some way of figuring out how to do something as pointlessly stupid as that for no other reason than because he thought that it'd be funny.
Ranma wondered if they'd ever get to see Harry's godfather.
Dad-that-was-a-bird looked really sad then, and really old, and told them that Harry's godfather had run afoul a bunch of really mean people and wasn't around anymore. Then, when the children gave him heartbroken looks, he forced a smile and pulled out a photo-album.
And there he was, as old-looking as the old man with three daughters, yet smiling mischievously up at them as he ruffled dad-that-was-a-bird's hair from behind, making it look even more disheveled than normally.
There were more pictures, of pranks, of moments, of silly poses, and of a few other people who could be found within the pictures. All happily smiling back up at them.
The tall boy with red hair was an old friend of his, so was the girl with the frizzy hair. The girl with pink hair was a distant cousin of his, and a closer cousin to Harry's godfather.
It was a wonderful collection of people that he'd never seen before, that he'd never met, and that must've meant the world to dad-that-was-a-bird. But all of them were gone. Disappeared through encounters with nasty people, leaving only him behind.
Dad-that-was-a-woman interrupted his stories then, a gentle hand on his shoulder and a warmly sympathetic smile washing away the heart-aching sadness from his other dad's face.
XXX
Harry's dads didn't have names. Or, well, they didn't have names like most people had names.
They'd lost their names in a war, they used to say. And though Harry wasn't sure how you could lose a name, he knew better than to push the question.
They'd taken new names of course, because nobody could actually live without a name.
Dad-that-was-a-bird had decided to call himself 'Daniel Regulus', saying that it was partly in honor of a very brave person, but refusing to elaborate. Dad-that-was-a-woman had chosen 'Kappei' because he'd always kind of liked that name.
Apparently, they hadn't been able to agree to an actual family name though, and had been arguing over it for a long time when they'd had an encounter with the Tendo family. Then the old man's wife – the woman who enjoyed baking – had decided that if the two of them honestly couldn't agree, then she'd just force her husband to adopt them into their family, because this argument of theirs was too ridiculous to be allowed to continue.
Kappei usually blushed a lot when he was reminded of this, but always looked indescribably happy about it at the same time. Daniel would usually just snicker and smile and say that there were definitely worse surnames to have.
So, technically, Akane and her sisters were Harry's cousins. Even though he always considered Ranma to be closer, since the boy would always come over to spar with Kappei.
Daniel said it was because they were both obsessed with being 'the best', and that it was both funny and annoying, depending on the situation. But that at the same time, it meant that neither of them would allow the other person to beat them, even if Kappei had a few decades worth of experience and techniques more than Ranma.
Both of Harry's dads looked really young, but they weren't. They were nearly as old as the old man, but they aged a lot more slowly. Kappei said it was because of his training, and Daniel said that it was a quirk of his genetics. They were both talking about their own reason for aging slowly though, so they didn't disagree, even if they did give different answers.
XXX
When Harry turned eleven, he received a letter, delivered by an utterly exhausted owl.
Ranma thought that it was a strange way to send mail, Akane thought that it was a pretty bird, and his dads looked at each other and sighed.
The letter was about a school of magic in the UK, and merely told him that he'd been accepted and what he ought to bring.
There were no information, no explanation, nothing.
Daniel sighed and said that it was because wizards were in general rather stupid. Kappei said that it was because they were all stupid, eying Daniel meaningfully, most likely because dad-that-was-a-bird had recently been caught selfishly emptying the cookie jar all on his own.
Harry didn't know why he would want to go to a school of magic in a different country, since he was already enrolled in a school in Nerima and was finally starting to get a good grasp on how to consciously turn people's hair different colors whenever he felt like it.
That was really all the magic he needed in life, everything beyond that sounded like a hassle.
Kappei looked oddly proud of him when he said that, but also vaguely guilty. Daniel looked amused, but also strangely sad.
Akane thought that it would be like learning how to be a fairy godmother, Ranma wondered if it could be used in martial arts, Kasumi wondered what wonders of healing could be worked through magic, and Nabiki asked why the letter was addressed to 'H. Potter'.
Harry didn't know, but Daniel said that it was because the name that they lost wasn't always considered gone.
None of the children could figure out what he meant by that, until Kappei explained that Daniel had lost too much to continue carry his name and go on with his life, but that according to the wizards, he'd never formally denounced it, which meant that they didn't accept that he'd taken on a new one.
Everyone agreed that that was very rude of them.
XXX
Harry stared at the giant trunk that he'd filled with everything he could imagine needing for his time at school along with the things that he and dad-that-was-a-bird had acquired on a shopping trip into a place that Harry hadn't been aware existed.
Akane was a bit jealous, but comforted herself with the thought that she would be able to mooch off of the fairy-godmother-ness that he was obviously going to be learning at his new school. Ranma was sad to see him go, undoubtedly not in any small degree due to that this would leave him alone with only girls their age, but believed that it'd be good for him to learn magic-stuff since he obviously couldn't be as amazing as himself in martial arts.
Nabiki and Kasumi wished him luck and said they were going to miss him. Nodoka hugged him really really tightly and made him promise not to do anything dangerous. The panda waved goodbye with that sign that he always carried around that said "I'm just an innocent panda". The old man and his wife also decided to hug the stuffing out of him, and made him promise to eat properly.
Dad-that-was-a-woman hugged him and told him to be careful and to make friends and to write home once a week and not to get into fights, but if he got into fights to win them always. Dad-that-was-a-bird was going to be the one leading him to the Platform, so he simply smiled and waved at everyone, asked to make sure that he'd packed everything he needed, and then they were off.
Towards London, and Platform 9 ¾.
XXX
Daniel crouched in front of him, staring seriously into his eyes.
"You are a Tendo. Don't ever forget that. But everyone has a mother." He paused, looking faintly embarrassed, as if remembering something. "And your dad was never big on the idea of becoming pregnant."
Harry nodded, recalling dad-that-was-a-woman having said something to that effect at one point or another.
"Well, James was family, and you kind of fell into our laps, and suddenly we could actually maybe have kid of our own." He smiled, looking wistful.
Harry patted him on the arm, knowing the story and knowing better than to interrupt his dad, because he always got emotional when Harry's biological parents were mentioned. Much in the same way that his other dad got emotional when marriage or their adoption into the Tendo family was mentioned.
"Regardless. Your father was a reasonable bloke, a bit slow to grow up, but generally not a bad person. Lily was a nice girl, gave you her eyes, like we said earlier, she'll come up in conversations a lot." He made a face, looking both disgusted and sad. "She wasn't a bad person, but she wasn't a saint. Also, she had a temper that was impressive as all hell, and knew how to hold a grudge like you wouldn't believe." He smirked. "Akane is a pushover in comparison."
Harry allowed a properly skeptical eyebrow to rise at the idea of there being someone with a worse temper than Akane. The girl was nice enough, sure. But she got pissed over the strangest things.
That doll had been stupid anyway.
It's not murder if the doll was stupid to begin with.
That was his story and he was sticking to it.
"Anyway, she killed off a really bad person by sacrificing herself through some magic-stuff." He made a face that spoke of a headache. "It was complicated-ritual-magic-stuff, so don't go thinking it's normal. However, since it was so extremely unusual to survive the guy, there'll be a lot of people pointing fingers at you when they realize who you are."
Harry frowned, already knowing the story, having gotten a run-down before he accepted the acceptance letter, but still not liking the insinuations.
He wanted to be famous on his own merits, like Kappei, who'd built up quite the reputation in the martial arts circles. Or the Saotomes, who'd become famous for having a tame panda that refused to leave their backyard; and that hated water with a passion, apparently believing that even ice-cold water was boiling hot.
Kappei was always rather solemn around that panda, but the panda didn't seem to share his solemnity, appearing rather cheerful, though it sometimes challenged his dad to a spar.
The only time that panda had ever gotten upset had been when some people who wanted to help take care of it had tried to take away its booze, setting off a series of events that revealed to the world that not only was the panda tame, but that some crazy idiot had taught the thing martial arts. Advanced martial arts.
Harry had always suspected Kappei to be responsible for that somehow, but he had in turn always insisted that it'd been Ranma's father that had taught the creature, and that he'd only been responsible for making it watch over and protect Genma's remaining family once he had disappeared.
Harry didn't push the subject, since the panda was obviously quite content with its Kappei-determined mission in life, often being found teaching or sparring with Ranma. Always with that strange sign proclaiming it as a perfectly innocent panda.
"I know. Are you done?" Harry asked, staring up at his dad.
Daniel looked thoughtful for a moment, before shrugging. "And if any of your teachers are nasty to you, write about it, and we'll come fix it. Because me and Kappei have had a lot of shitty or crazy teachers over the years, and it's not very good for your schooling to have one of those around, trust me on that."
"Shouldn't I deal with my own problems?" Harry asked innocently, wanting to get it out of the way.
"Not if a teacher is involved in the problem. Let grown ups deal with grown ups, and all that." He smirked. "We're way better at dealing with old people than you are, since we're tall enough to properly punch them in the nose."
Harry grinned up at him, as his dad finally rose to his feet, having finally determined his son to be ready for departure.
"Now, let's go catch that train."
XXX
Smiling and waving enthusiastically from the window of the empty compartment he'd found for himself, Harry said a second round of goodbyes to his dad.
Then the train was moving, and his dad's last piece of advice echoed in his ears in a slightly befuddling way.
'Expulsion doesn't matter. Only important stuff matters.'
Because that went without saying, didn't it? It wasn't like he couldn't go to a different school, or wouldn't be allowed to return home and continue pranking his family by turning their hair into strange colors whenever he felt like it.
Crazy parents, not making any sense in their worrying.
"Um, excuse me, the other compartments were full, can I sit here?" A slightly nervous voice came from the door as a redheaded boy poked his head in.
Harry stared at him for a moment before replying like he did to all potential-friends that he'd ever met, on Kappei's orders. Daniel had looked slightly pained when he'd been told of his son's method of making friends, but hadn't tried to get him to stop.
"Are you in league with cats and their evil plot to take over the world?" A shake of the head was registered from the redhead, so he continued. "Is your family name 'Kuno'?" Another shake of the head. "Are you planning on abducting and/or physically inflict harm upon me or my family?" The boy once more shook his head, eyes slightly wide in panic.
Harry smiled happily at him.
"My name's Harry." He introduced himself, holding out a friendly hand. "Nice to meetcha'."
"Ron." The other boy echoed, still looking rather stunned by the smiling boy's earlier questions, but taking his hand and shaking it anyway.
It was the start of a peculiar friendship.
XXX
"Red-hair and poor, I don't even need to ask your name to know you're a Weasley." The rude boy retorted after Ron snickered a bit at the boy's name.
Now, Ron might've had that coming for laughing at another person's name – something nobody could really have any control over, unless they were Harry's dads – but he was still a friend, and friends fought back-to-back.
"Um, Malfoy, was it? Are you colorblind?" Harry asked in a rather politely curious tone.
Malfoy turned around to glare at Harry, indignant to have such assumed of him.
"Because, I mean. His hair is obviously blue." He gestured towards Ron, looking apologetic.
Malfoy glanced back towards the Weasley and found that... indeed, the boy's hair had turned blue.
"I would've thought you should know the color red." The boy continued, still not looking smug, but rather wearing that expression that spoke of nothing but hesitant curiosity. "With your hair, I mean."
Malfoy blinked, Ron's hands suddenly jumped up to cover his mouth and hide some of his mirth, and Crabbe and Goyle both stared down at him dumbly.
Malfoy slowly let a lock of hair fall down in front of his eyes, only to find it a blazing red.
He screamed.
He ran.
As the compartment door shut behind him, Ron finally started to laugh, not being able to take it anymore.
Finally though, he was able to catch his breath enough that he could ask the question that he wanted to. "How did you do that?"
Harry smiled, amused and nostalgic. "It's the only way to cut Ranma down a few pegs, and he most definitely needs that every now and then." He shrugged. "First, it was mostly by accident and frustration with him, but then dad started classifying it as training and after a while I learned to replicate it."
"You can do wandless magic?" Ron gaped at him.
The boy shook his head. "No, but I can change people's hair-color."
"But that's wandless magic." Ron insisted.
His nose crinkling slightly in annoyance, he again shook his head. "Even if it was, the only thing I can do with it is change hair-color. I can't change the color of other things and I can't make their hair become different in any way but color. It's useful at times, but really nothing to go boasting about."
Ron looked ready to argue, before relenting with a sigh.
XXX
A boy passed their compartment looking for a toad, a few moments later, a girl passed their compartment looking for the boy's toad.
Harry would recognize that super-frizzy hair anywhere.
But she looked a lot younger than she looked in his dad's pictures, being rather obviously his own age.
Ron answered the girl, a tad rudely, and Harry was too caught up in the dizzying possibilities presenting themselves to him as he stared at the girl.
His dad had lost everything, and yet here stood what must be the daughter of a very good friend of his. It made him wonder if his dad knew, if he'd been unable to find this link to his past name, or if perhaps she was merely a relative to that same girl.
Two muggleborns might appear from the same family tree after all, and who's to say that his dad's friend didn't have cousins that got married and had a little witch all on their own?
Then the girl continued on, and the two boys returned to their earlier conversation.
XXX
A gigantic man called for the First Years, and so Harry and Ron followed along with the rest of the children their age.
They took care to avoid a certain rude boy with brightly red hair and his two human-type gorillas, though Ron did end up having to fight down a smile.
All of them were guided to boats, and settled in fours as by the man's instructions.
The girl who was probably a relative to his dad's friend joined them along with the boy who'd lost his toad. Ron's hair remained blue the entire time, he seemed to enjoy it.
The prow of the boat began to glide through the mirror-blank waters, causing a fascinating ripple to spread amongst the reflected lights of the great castle looming hugely above them.
There was beauty in all things, his dads used to say, the trick is to notice and not notice it when appropriate. The beauty of a falling star is not important when you're supposed to keep your eyes on the road, the beauty of an angry snake is not something to encroach upon... there were many kinds of beauty, and some of them were good and some of them were bad, and some just were.
Hogwarts was beautiful. Breathtakingly mysteriously wonderful as it stood with its towers stretched towards the darkened heavens, its many windows glowing invitingly against the background.
Harry noted all of this, because he knew that this was the moment of introduction between them, and everyone was a little bit vain, everyone wanted to impress people on their first meeting. So, he was polite, and took the time to silently marvel at the castle's majestic crown of slowly emerging stars.
The other First Years did much the same, and so the ride passed in awed silence. Just as Hogwarts would've wanted it to.
XXX
A strict-looking old woman ushered them inside, speaking of the Houses that they were apparently about to be Sorted into.
Then she left them to shuffle uncomfortably around inside of a room, where they could hear the muffled murmur of the other students already waiting in the Great Hall, telling them to wait.
So they waited, and had their waiting interrupted by ghosts.
Harry had never actually seen a ghost before, so he was a little bit shocked. Daniel always told him that ghost couldn't hurt him – but that he shouldn't try walking through them unless he wanted to catch a cold – and Kappei kept mumbling something about cat-spirits.
His dads were weird, but they'd lived longer and more interesting lives than he had, so he listened to their wisdom, except when they were telling him not to do stupid things. Stupid things were too fun to avoid doing.
The woman returned, and again they followed her. This time into the Great Hall, with its ceiling somehow mixing with the sky outside in a way that was probably really unpleasant on hot summer days when there wouldn't be any shade, but that looked just as amazing as Daniel had told him that it would.
The woman placed an old hat on top of a stool, and then the hat started to sing, for it was a Sorting Hat.
Harry wondered what manner of House he might end up in, not entirely sure himself.
Slytherin sounded sneaky, which he could do; Ravenclaw sounded book-related, which he didn't mind awfully; Hufflepuff sounded friendly enough, and in his family nobody was truly adverse to hard work, except maybe the panda; and Gryffindor made him think of adventure and stupid stunts, which was usually fun.
So he stood there and waited until that name, that his dad had lost when it'd ceased to matter to him, was finally called by the strict woman.
Many of the students craned their necks to see him better, and whispers were everywhere, but Harry was a Tendo, and the Saotomes had a martial-artist-panda living in their backyard. He was used to getting funny looks.
Not particularly bothered with the attention, Harry walked to sit and waited patiently for the woman to place the hat on his head.
"A disregard for rules, a comfort within books, a willingness to work hard when it can't be avoided, and a tendency to consciously decide to leap before you look." A voice mused within his head, sounding a bit as if it was smiling. "Ahh, I think it'll have to be GRYFFINDOR!"
Harry carefully removed the hat and returned it to the woman, before turning to the table that was cheering so loudly.
And though it was amusing to see the identical redheads cheering loudly over how 'they got Potter', he found a small frown knotting his eyebrows together. His name was Tendo. No matter who his birth-parents were, or what anyone else said.
Still, he waited patiently for the rest of the Sorting to continue, noting with amusement how there were some curious whispers at seeing a Weasley without the distinctive red hair.
When the Sorting was finally completed, and the Headmaster had spoken a few peculiar words, Harry found himself a bit bombarded by questions from the other students, but was more interested in Ron trying to explain his newfound hair-color to his older brothers.
There was a lot of hand-waving, some comments on various people being daft, a few accusations in both directions, and a final agreement in between all of them.
Ron would hereby be claiming the position as the Weasley hair-stylist.
He seemed rather happy with it.
Harry shook his head, smiling to himself. People were strange.
XXX
Harry knew the instant McGonagall had appeared from the cat that had been sitting calmly at the front of the classroom, that this was not a woman to ask for help from. She was a woman to be avoided at all costs. Even if it meant that you had to leap over the railing of the constantly-moving stairs.
She was a cat!
It was one thing if someone liked cats. That was weird, and not a good basis for friendship, since they liked cats, and that obviously wasn't a good thing.
But actually being a cat themselves? That was just plain evil.
This woman that was their teacher was obviously going to teach them wrong somehow in an evil plot to take over the world.
Because she was a cat. And that kind of evil sneaky thing was the sort of stuff that was just like what a cat might do.
Ron thought that he was being weird, Hermione was outraged at him declaring a professor evil, and most other people who heard his theory ended up laughing themselves sick.
Harry merely shrugged and continued explaining it to everyone who asked. Silly-sounding or not, that didn't make it any less true.
XXX
The doors to the Great Hall opened, causing the students to turn in their seats to see who'd entered in such a dramatic display.
His long, unkempt hair was black, he wore glasses, his clothes were muggle ones, and his partially burnt-scarred face was a blank mask.
Harry shrank in his seat, suppressing the urge to shudder. "He's mad." He whispered softly to himself, eyes fixed on the unknown person.
His friends glanced over at him, wondering why he looked so instinctively uncomfortable by the man's anger, when he'd so easily weathered the anger of every grown up they'd seen so far with such polite apathy.
"Mister Snape." The man said as he reached the staff table. "For the harassment you have seen fit to expose my son to, I challenge you to a duel, with the conditions that you may take it or be dismissed from your position effective immediately."
"That's quite enough, young man. Snape is a valued Professor here, surely we can solve this in a more peaceful manner?" Dumbledore interjected.
The man's eyes turned to Dumbledore, and he dumped a large folder that hit the staff table with a solid thud.
"I did my research, mister Dumbledore. And if the six-hundred-and-four complaints on mister Snape's conduct in a classroom that have been either ignored, or peculiarly buried, are to believed, then no. We cannot solve this peacefully, because clearly, you do not wish to resolve this through the rules that keep the peace."
His tone was calm, polite, and horribly unsettling to those who heard him. It was as if he'd removed all of his emotions, leaving nothing but a serenely logical self in their wake.
"I trust Professor Snape-..." The Headmaster began.
"Mister Dumbledore, who you do or do not trust is of no concern in this matter. Because of your actions in ignoring or outright working to make these complaints simply disappear, it has become clear that peaceful solutions cannot reach mister Snape, and that he must therefore be reached through violent solutions, it is really quite simple."
"I am-...!" The Headmaster began again, puffing himself up.
"Mister Dumbledore, do I need to repeat myself?" The man raised a single eyebrow at the elder man, his voice carrying a suddenly lethally sharp tone to it that caused several of the staff around the two to wince visibly.
The Great Hall stared in awe as Dumbledore fumbled for an answer, and the man once again turned towards the reason for his visit at the school.
"Now, mister Snape, your choices are clear. What say you?" The man inquired, sounding just as calm as previously.
Snape sneered at him. "You don't have the ability to enforce the conditions." He admitted, glancing meaningfully towards Dumbledore.
"On the contrary, mister Snape. I have more than the ability to enforce the conditions. Apparently, there're quite a number of supporters for the idea of permanently removing you from the school, both in the Ministry and on the School Board."
By now, a small smile had appeared on the man's face. It was a polite one, most certainly, but it was also completely lacking in humor, and looked deceptively dangerous for the small quirk of his lips that it was.
Snape spluttered, face slowly beginning to turn an angry red.
"No, mister Snape. I can fulfill the conditions for the duel without much issue at all."
The Great Hall froze in silence as several students forgot to breathe. Because this man had just declared that there was a high chance that they would be released from Snape's Potions classes. Possibly even permanently.
"Now, again. I would hear your answer, mister Snape." The man's voice cut through the silence.
Sneering furiously at the man, Snape responded. "I accept."
XXX
In hindsight, Harry concluded that his dad was the greatest dad ever. Even if it was slightly embarrassing that he'd been forced by his dads to seek aid in them if there was a problem with the teachers, the result was still somewhat shocking.
Harry didn't enjoy being belittled and mocked for his fame, he didn't enjoy hearing the greasy-haired man insult his biological father and the name that his dad had given up all those years ago.
But he honestly hadn't expected this kind of reaction to the problem when he followed his solemn promise and wrote home about it. It was an adult-problem, and so he'd promised to at least attempt to let the grown-ups handle it.
The answer to his plea for assistance, well... the man clearly wouldn't be teaching at Hogwarts any time soon.
The latest news from St Mungos said that they'd finally managed to extract the man's wand from his posterior. There'd been mentions of permanent scarring.
Gryffindor was celebrating, Hufflepuff was celebrating, Ravenclaw was celebrating, and Slytherin glared petulantly at people. The other professors seemed rather comfortable in taking Snape's incapacitation in stride, whilst Headmaster Dumbledore had been spotted walking around with a distinctly constipated expression.
There'd been attempts at making inquiries about Daniel's appearance, especially why he looked so much like Harry's late father – if said father had been attacked by a firestorm at some point in his life – but also what his relation to Harry was and why Harry wasn't with some people called 'the Dursleys'.
Daniel had stated honestly that none of that was any of the Headmaster's business – since it had no impact on his performance in classes – and that the only reason that nobody had been informed of the adoption was because Daniel had paid the goblins not to mention it since he didn't want to deal with bloody politicians hounding his son.
He'd then told Dumbledore that if he heard even an inkling that such hounding was committed by the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, the Headmaster of Hogwarts, or the Supreme Mugwump of the ICW, then he would be taking steps to ensure that Harry received his educations elsewhere, along with several charges being levied at the one responsible for the harassment of a minor.
Someone had pointed out that Harry couldn't be a minor since he was the Last Potter, and that meant that he ought to be considered an adult by default, upon which Daniel had smiled happily at them and told them that he would be the 'Last Potter' over Daniel's dead body, literally.
Daniel had after all, once been a Potter himself, and – since he'd never technically renounced his claim on the name in all the fiddly bureaucratic stuff that was necessary for such a thing to be considered legitimate by them – that meant that there was still an adult Potter around, meaning that Harry was still very much a minor.
There'd been even more arguments, until Daniel had produced a contract from the goblins stating that he was indeed a Potter by blood, and asked them with a polite smile if they were honestly planning on kidnapping his only heir.
Several of the adults paled and hurriedly backed away at that. There were after all, some ancient laws about line-theft that got right nasty about such things.
Finally, the adults had given up on posturing and complaining about all those silly things that adults talked about, and Daniel was allowed a few moments to greet his son and his new friends.
XXX
"Ah, you must be Miss Granger." Daniel said to the girl, looking nostalgic and sad, but also a little bit happy. "Yes, you look a lot like her."
"A lot like whom? If I may ask, sir?" Hermione asked, staring curiously back up at the man who'd just removed an authority figure from his position of power.
"A friend. A dear and very old friend." He smiled sadly. "She died a long time ago. Long before Harry was born, even." He paused, considering the girl and then his smile turned a little bit happier. "You'll grow into a beautiful young woman some day." He told the frizzy-haired, buck-toothed bookworm, speaking nothing but the truth.
Hermione blushed lightly, looking torn between being happy and being embarrassed.
Satisfied that the girl had accepted his assurances, he turned towards the boy with neon-green hair, his smile suddenly taking on a distinctly more amused tone. "And you must be Ronald. I've heard a lot about you, I wish you luck with your career choice. The hairstyles around here are in fact dreadfully dull."
Ron grinned up at him, always enthusiastic at hearing someone praise his chosen profession.
"Oh, and a tip. Girls know a lot more spells about cleaning hair and similar things than boys do. They're also suckers for cute kids looking like a kicked puppy, so if you want advice, ask the older ones and look miserable until they give in." He grinned happily back down at the green-haired boy, before turning to catch his son's eyes. "And Harry, do try and help him out with replicating your wandless prank-trick, he's the one trying to go professional with it, after all."
"Yes, dad." Harry agreed, having already started attempting to help, which was why Ron's hair had spent the last few days switching colors erratically in between their lessons.
Daniel beamed a smile at him, looking happily warm at being called 'dad' – something that had always been an odd quirk about both of his dads – and said his goodbyes to them all, giving his son a brief hug before disappearing out through the doors of the Great Hall.
Then they went back to doing what they'd been doing before dinner had been interrupted by an overprotective dad, namely, trying to convince Hermione that homework didn't need to be done immediately, and most certainly not nearly as thoroughly as she was suggesting.
Because even if they weren't adverse to studiously learning magic, doing homework is always a pain.
XXX
Harry listened to the laughter of the Halloween feast, not entirely comfortable with the celebration on a day that was considered... quiet, in his family.
It was after all the anniversary of the deaths of his biological parents, people who were close to one of his dads. It wasn't a... depressing holiday, but it was a day that always ended with Daniel toasting silently to people long lost.
It was the only day of the year, on which Harry was allowed to drink alcohol to a toast.
Still, he didn't dislike that people could laugh on this day. Perhaps because it meant that... memories would fade. The world would carry on, and even a day of mourning would one day become just another day.
So, he sat with his glass of alcohol, procured on request by the Weasley twins, and he finally raised it high.
"To fading memories, and life continuing in the wake of tragedies." He intoned solemnly in the sudden silence. Then he, along with many of the staff members and several other students, drank.
Then the feast started anew.
XXX
Ron gaped at him.
"What? We've got space. And I don't think you can actually out-eat dad, so really, don't worry about it." Harry pointed out reasonably.
The twins exchanged curious looks, before turning to him. "Is it normal-" "-in your family-" "-to randomly invite people-" "-that they barely know?" They asked in their usual, odd way.
"My dads got adopted into auntie's family because they couldn't agree on a shared surname." Harry agreed, looking amused. "Besides, you're good people." He defended his parents' message of acceptance of his plan on inviting the Weasleys for Christmas.
He was going to be going home for Christmas, and it felt a little uncomfortable to leave the brothers alone in the castle because their parents had run off with their little sister to visit one of their older brothers in a different country. So, he'd asked his dads if they could spend the Christmas holiday with them in Japan.
"Even Percy?" Both of the twins blurted, looking stunned.
"I don't think following rules makes you a bad person." Harry argued, sounding just a tiny bit hesitant, as he'd also been caught on the wrong side of the rules by the strict Weasley.
"You know what this means." Ron finally interrupted their discussion with a serious expression.
"What?" Everyone turned to look at Ron.
"We're going undercover!" He declared, grinning widely. "Which means-...!"
The twins exchanged the briefest of glance, then took off running. "Not our hair! Not our hair! Not our precious hair! Have mercy!"
Ron cackled evilly. "You're going to have to sleep sometime! And when you do, I'll be ready!"
Harry wondered briefly what it said about his life, when such insane behavior made him feel nostalgic. Then he was too busy laughing to worry about it.
XXX
Four Weasley brothers with black hair and many freckles, waved down a slightly bewildered Daniel as he arrived at the Platform.
"They're undercover." Harry explained.
It should be noted that it didn't necessarily speak of the saneness of his life when Daniel accepted that with only a raised eyebrow and an amused smile, before telling them to hold on to the piece of rope – which was technically an international portkey – that they'd procured for their way home.
Understandably, by the time the horrible horrible experience that was international portkey travel finally ended, they all landed in a gigantic heap of tangled limbs and hopelessly nauseous males of varying ages.
The predictability of such an event however, didn't stop Ranma and Kappei from laughing at them.
Heck, it didn't stop the panda from laughing at them, before hurriedly holding up a sign declaring its innocent panda-ness when aunt Nodoka turned to look at it.
No, they were most thoroughly mocked for their inability to stand up straight after having been bodily hurled through a wormhole halfway across the world.
Harry, from where he lay pinned underneath Percy, quietly swore unholy vengeance upon his family for this travesty.
XXX
It'd taken the Weasleys a bit of time to get used to the panda, despite already knowing about it, which was probably understandable. Sure, they lived in a magical school filled with strange creatures, but this was a panda that knew martial arts and communicated it's undisputed panda-ness through the usage of signs.
Of course, most present were surprised to find that it was a bilingual panda, as it started writing its signs in English once it realized that the Weasleys didn't understand Japanese. But then, once a martial-arts-panda learns to communicate by writing signs, the idea of disbelieving its ability to speak multiple languages – or even design a space rocket – takes too many hits to the teeth and just surrenders. However, Harry was fairly sure that the panda couldn't actually design a space rocket, mostly because he was sure that it would've come up in conversations by now if it could.
Beyond that, Nabiki was rather talented at English, having diligently studied the language in an effort to be a successful businesswoman in the future. Kasumi wasn't bad either, her studies in medicine carrying over into foreign languages at times.
Akane was crap at it, and spent a lot of time sulking whenever she couldn't understand, which Ranma – who'd spent enough time around Daniel to at least pick up the basics – began to cheerfully lord over her as he was only very rarely better at anything academically than the girl.
Neither of his aunts knew English, and Soun was barely comprehensible in it, but Kappei was fluent – if oddly accented.
All in all, it became a bit of a chore to keep everyone informed of what was going on at any given time, but the complication was more than made up by the twins being more than happy to dissolve their language into charades, and Ron had hurriedly mastered certain individual words – colors, hairstyles, food, and come a long way on mastering the clock – that were important to him.
There'd been many complaints from the Weasley brothers over their 'undercover' hair-colors, and Ron finally gave into the opportunity of actually being asked to do something about their horrid hair within the second day.
Percy's was now pink, Kasumi's had also volunteered and was happily matching him with a cheerful purple, and the twins had received a rainbow of mixtures between the House colors of Hogwarts's various Houses.
Akane and Ranma had screamed something about there being two of the hair-changers, and fled for the hills.
Harry had, when pressed, reluctantly admitted that changing his childhood friends' hair had been the only way he could actually get back at them for beating him in all of their physical games.
The Weasleys considered this for a moment, before shrugging. They'd grown up with a big family, and they knew that you tended to clutch onto whatever weapons against your siblings that you had.
Ron, for example, could usually guilt-trip the twins for all their pranks on him in order to avoid anything particularly nasty. And Percy was still refusing to give up his place as 'the good boy' that had kept him safe and protected by their mother whenever any of his siblings decided on vengeance against him.
Then, finally, Christmas arrived.
"Is it really normal for snow to fall this far south?" Percy stared up at the snowflakes slowly settling to join the endless sea of white that already covered the ground.
"Only in Nerima." Kappei answered, grinning mischievously.
Percy frowned. "How would that even work?"
"It's amazing the kind of tricks you pick up, if you live long enough." Kappei explained mysteriously, still grinning widely.
Percy continued to look confused.
"Short answer is 'magic'." Daniel interrupted before the martial artist could confuse the poor pureblood any more than he already had.
Pouting to himself, Kappei frowned at the other man. "Do I piss on your parade?" He asked him.
Daniel grinned. "Only if you think you can get away with it."
Kappei opened his mouth to argue, before pausing in thought. In the end, he simply shrugged. "Anything Goes." He admitted.
"You can control the weather?" One of the twins stared at them intently. "How?"
Kappei grinned, happy to return to gloating over his awesomeness, and began explaining how he could change nearby temperatures through a technique, and how with a little bit of practice, and some innovative use of magic, a person could begin to do a manner of localized 'coaxing' of mother nature, into performing what you wanted her to.
Harry tuned it out, having heard his dad brag about it so often that he could probably recite it himself.
No, instead he focused on something much more important.
Getting back into the swing of things by picking a fight with Ranma and Akane.
He had magic now, and technically the British Ministry didn't have the authority to enforce the Trace in Japan, so there was no way he was going to lose.
Unless, of course, the other two cheated better than he did. Anything Goes, after all.
XXX
Presents, Harry decided, were amazing things.
In many cases they were edible this Christmas, meaning that they'd probably be silently cursing each other's names over giving them too much candy and making them feel ill. But that was alright, because being kids is nearly entirely about how much candy you can scam your friends and family into letting you eat yourself sick on.
It was probably why Hermione was so desperately trying not to be a kid. Her parents were phenomenal at keeping her away from sweets, so she was losing the game of childhood by default.
Harry had found another of those porcelain animals for his dad-that-was-a-bird, expanding the by now rather large collection of such that had originally started with four animals. And his dad-that-was-a-woman had received a Remembrall, because it was a cool thing that glowed. Kappei had snickered and put it with his lava-lamp collection.
Why did he have a lava-lamp collection? Harry didn't think anyone knew, not even himself, but he seemed to get an inordinate amount of pleasure of seeing the moving lava-lamps slowly grow cold and dead.
He kept saying that it reminded him of someone, but Harry didn't understand why lava growing cold would remind anyone about anyone, nor why it would make him look distinctly vindicated at times.
His dads were weird.
Harry himself had received a pleasantly insane amount of candy, a book from Hermione, a huge pile of brightly colored socks – Daniel sometimes gave presents more for the sake of annoying others than for making them smile – and a manual for how to play innocent when you're actually not – Nabiki could give very interesting gifts, if she felt like it.
Then there'd been the presents that arrived from Hogwarts, with the strange package to him, that Daniel had commandeered with the words, "I'm not letting a famous child touch a gift from someone whose intentions neither of us know."
It was a sensible thing to do, even if it annoyed Harry to be bereft of the gift.
The Weasleys didn't actually end up bringing a lot of chaos with them to the celebration. This was after all Nerima, and chaotically crazy things happened there all the time. The Saotome pet panda was just one example of many, if a little more obvious than most others.
It was a fun way of spending the holiday, with pranks going off in all directions, people becoming too sick to move from consuming candy, and children running around all over the place with the strangest of hair-colors.
But all good things must come to an end, and soon it became time to return to Hogwarts, and all the homework that came with it.
XXX
It took a letter to her parents, asking them to learn about Nerima from the muggle side of things, before Hermione finally relented to the Weasleys' insistence that they'd seen a panda.
She was slightly bewildered by her parents declaring that Nerima was nearly impossible to get information on, since it was apparently something of an unspoken rule that the craziness that went on in Nerima stayed in Nerima. The only reason they learned as much as they did about it, was that they could explain to them that their daughter went to school with a Tendo.
Then Hermione rounded on Harry and begun scolding him for deliberately changing people's hair colors in open view of muggles.
To which Harry laughed and said that his dad was a muggle, and if he could make tornadoes without any complaints about exposing magic to the world, then Harry ought to be allowed to play around a little with colors.
Hermione refused to believe this too, until the twins gleefully joined the conversation in order to regale her with their new idol's ability to manipulate the weather, with Harry every now and then filling in a few facts that he'd apparently memorized more clearly than the twins from his repeated exposure to his dad's bragging.
Hermione finally let it slide, but did so mostly because she was getting a headache from being forced to not only follow two different people finishing each other's sentences, but a third person randomly interjecting themselves to expand on those sentences.
Ron made a mental note to learn how to copy the effect, as it was quite rare indeed for the boys to actually defuse Hermione's righteous rants whenever she decided to scold them for something that they'd done.
After that, classes picked up once again, with Quirrell still walking stiffly and speaking perfectly, unlike his stuttering in the beginning of the school year. Supposedly, he'd mostly recovered from the terrible scare he'd received over the summer. He'd even stopped walking around smelling like garlic, though he still insisted on wearing his turban.
XXX
XXX (Omake, moments outside of Harry's PoV)
XXX (The Background)
In Nerima, the craziness surrounding the Nerima Wrecking Crew finally came to a head when the Amazons and the Kuno family got into a pissing contest over who actually had the right to claim Ranma for themselves.
Normally, this would've been solved by the Kuno family getting blasted off into the sunset, and everyone would've continued on with their day, but due to the circumstances of this particular fight, the insane family decided to take it to a national level.
They had an army marching on the Amazons within the week, and that army didn't particularly care about collateral damage when it started dropping bombs.
By the time Ranma returned from his two-day training trip that had been remarkably quiet, he found a crater where the Tendo dojo had once stood.
In the end, it'd been a kind of mutual annihilation for the entirety of the crazies of Nerima, which left a heartbroken Ranma alone to bury the bodies of his friends and family.
He left Nerima the moment the final funeral was over with, determined to never allow such a tragedy to happen again, even if it would mean giving up his Art.
At the same time, half a world away, a young man finally bore witness to the end of the most feared Dark Lord in recent history.
Harry didn't join the half-hearted celebrations of the rest of the Wizarding World. There were barely enough of them left to create a society, and most of the ones who still lived were the terrorists and murderers who'd fled the scene before they could be prosecuted for their horrible crimes.
Dumbledore had had a plan, Harry knew that. He also knew that something had most likely deviated from that plan rather severely after the man's death, because he was sure that their victory 'for the Greater Good' or not, shouldn't have the number of casualties even remotely this high.
Everyone he knew were dead, everyone he didn't know were mourning the deaths of – at the very least – a few of their family members.
Voldemort might've lost the battle and died as a result, but the war had left them too crippled to continue onwards.
In the end, in order to get away from the few well-wishers who appeared, Harry left the country.
Two wary souls, with different yet similar lives, crashed into each other in a bar in the middle of nowhere where they both tried to drown their sorrows.
Instead, they started talking. And one thing led to the other, and suddenly they found themselves in the middle of a scheme of theirs. A scheme of their own, to force a different result from actions that had already been finalized.
Time-travel, no matter how harsh the conditions for fulfilling it might be, was such a handy little thing.
XXX (Kappei and Genma the Panda)
Ranma sighed. "You wanted me to become the greatest martial artist ever." He explained to the recently-turned panda that had been wrapped in chains. "I don't mind that part. Not really. But you-... Anything Goes isn't some style that you can just learn the forms of... the student has to be pushed, to be prodded, to be forced to move when they shouldn't even be able to consider moving."
He shook his head as the panda finally quieted down, listening intently to the strange young man who'd for some reason called him 'father'.
"You made some mistakes in picking styles for me to assimilate. I can let that slide. A lot of other people probably couldn't, but you were everything I had, and I was just a kid, so I adapted and forgave. No, the reason that I'm stopping you is quite simply... you stopped being my parent long before that training trip finished. You're a good man, some of the time, even if you've got too big of a stomach and too small of a brain. But before the end of that trip, you stopped being my father, and became my Master."
The panda frowned at him, looking confused for a moment, before it suddenly stilled in horror.
Ranma nodded as he saw that Genma was understanding. "Yes. That Master. You became to me, what Happosai was to you. I would like to spare you of that fate, just as I'd like my younger self to be spared of that fate."
Genma made a worried sound.
"Don't worry, I'm not planning on hurting you." Ranma tried to reassure him. "I'm simply going to keep your son safe from truly losing his father, and to keep yourself safe from doing something that can't be taken back and losing your son as a consequence. Which is why you're a panda. A panda that knows martial arts, and has been given the mission to take care of his family as the caring Genma Saotome set out on a dangerous journey by his lonesome knowing that he might never return."
Genma stared up at him for a long moment, before with a final nod, seeming to resign himself to his fate.
He was a good man, after all.
XXX (Harry and His Scar)
Harry smiled as he rocked the tiny form of his own infant self, glancing over to where Ranma – they really needed to decide on new names to go by soon – snored contently after his ordeal.
No Killing Curse would be necessary for this Harry, because chi was the projected life-force that lay within every living thing, and it was apparently not nearly as impossible to manipulate the life-force of Voldemort's horcrux directly, in comparison to try and heal it through magic.
Lily's sacrifice, Dumbledore's attempts to set blood wards based on that sacrifice, Voldemort's reflected Killing Curse, Voldemort's horcrux, and the infant's instinctive usage of magic in an attempt to fight off the invasion of the foreign soul-shard, had all come together to form a kind of chaotic mess that kept the horcrux safely contained, but at the same time made it impossible to remove it without running the risk of releasing all of that pent-up magic in a glorious explosion that may or may not be capable of taking out the entirety of downtown London.
In that way, it was perfectly understandable why Dumbledore would conclude that Harry had no choice but to die for the cause, in order to make Voldemort remain dead. But that didn't mean that Harry in any way approved of the old man's plans, especially now that he'd seen how easy – though draining – it'd been for Ranma to simply rip out the foreign soul-shard from the scar and let Harry blast it to bits.
Not that Dumbledore's plans would ever really be an issue for this Harry. He'd make sure of that, at least.
XXX (Daniel and Quirrell)
It'd taken him so much practice to develop the spell-technique needed for this particular moment, but it was more than worth it when he saw Voldemort's soul rip itself through Quirrell's turban and disappear into the tiny piece of amber he was holding.
Quirrell yelped, turning towards him with a kind of terrified wonder.
"If you only believe in power," Daniel started, remembering the speech Quirrell had held in front of the Mirror, all those years ago. "then believe in this: I will never let Voldemort touch my son, and if that means that I'll have to sink Britain into the sea, then I will do so." He smiled politely at the shocked man. "And when that time comes, I hope for your sake that you're sane enough to stand aside and let the most powerful one emerge victorious without needless interference."
It might not be the best of speeches, and it might not be enough to fully turn Quirrell away from the Dark road he'd set out to travel in Daniel's own time-line, but it would give him a push.
And everyone deserved at least that much.
XXX
A/n: Amusing to note is that this is probably the first of my stories to feature slash, even if only indirectly (Old!Ranma and Old!Harry). This is even more amusing when you know that I've been meaning to at some point write slash for several years now, due to me wanting to 'compensate' for the sheer mass of fem!slash that I've written.
As for Voldemort and the future chaos of the Nerima Wrecking Crew? I don't know, I'd imagine that they wouldn't be able to cause nearly as much problems with an actually competent and non-Headmaster adult walking around and keeping everyone in line.