Beta: None

Original Release Date: 8/29/16

Disclaimer: I do not own anything in the canon Harry Potter universe or any other universe.

Chapter Fifty Two – Welcome to The Warding Program

Arriving at home, Sirius calls out as Susan and Harry climb the stairs to their respective bedrooms, Sirius calls out, "Harry, will you stay down here for a few minutes, please?"

Halting his ascent, Harry turns around and follows his godfather into the living room, taking a seat across from Sirius. Breaking into a smile and laughing, Sirius finally says, "Sending a Hippogriff here…a prank worthy of James. However, that was very reckless of you. Had Buckbeak been aggressive, Amelia and I could have been maimed or worse, so don't do it again."

"Understood" responds Harry before pausing and then asking, "Can I go with Ron and the rest of the Weasley's to the Quidditch World Cup this summer?"

Musing for several moments, Sirius answers smiling, "As long as you take this with you", before lightly tossing Harry his watch/PRT back to him.

"So…what happens to Buckbeak?" inquiries Harry uncertainly.

Sitting back in his chair, Sirius answers, "Considering the fact that he will not be staying in our house, we build him one of his own in the backyard and go from there."

"I think he should get a platform in the air to be able to fly off from and land on" suggests Harry with a smile.

"Hmm, I like the idea. But let's design this on paper or parchment before building Buckbeak's new permanent home" replies Sirius.

Several seconds pass in relative silence before Harry speaks, "Am I free to go?"

"You certainly are. Thank you for sitting down and speaking with me about matters" answers Sirius.

Harry grabs his shrunken trunk off of the floor and proceeds up the stairwell to the bedrooms. Taking the now empty chair, Remus eases himself into the chair and sighs before asking wearily, "Have you begun preparing the lesson plans for our lone warding student?"

Eyes widening in surprise, Sirius barks out laughing seconds later before wiping his eyes and answering, "I did in fact do as you requested. If you look under 'Lesson Plans' on your Omni Play, I believe you can peruse what I have created thus far."

"It'll have to do until tomorrow. Although Miss Clearwater is from Ravenclaw so we might have to adjust our plans based on her learning speed, which could be quite promising" remarks Remus.

"Are we going to have any required reading materials, or perhaps a better question is, are there any books that have any kind of significant value for us to use while teaching?" inquiries Sirius.

Shaking his head, Remus answers, "Not that I'm aware of. We're just going to have to go with what we have and write our own material. Assuming we're successful, that is."

"Remus, we'll be fine. Sure, we've never done this before, but you've just taught students Defense Against the Dark Arts, and this is a smaller class size, even at max. Even teaching and helping construct a warding scheme for one person is better than not teaching and helping others protect themselves" remarks Sirius comfortingly.

"You're right. But we honestly need a more permanent set of staff members, especially as we grow so many facets of our business. Do you have any suggestions on either any individuals or how we might go about such a thing?" answers Remus.

Putting his fingertips together, Sirius muses silently for a few moments before speaking, "I think that the best way is honestly to hold interviews and see who is honestly interested in working. However, to do that, I think we need to create a list of positions that we are looking for and what kind of qualifications are needed for each position first. Agreed?"

"Completely. But to be clear, we are leaving the manufacturing of our items to ourselves, correct?" inquiries Remus.

"If by 'ourselves' you are also including Harry and quite possibly Fred and George, then yes" answers Sirius.

"I am of course including Harry, as he does seem eager to follow in James's footsteps and cause mischief, just like we have" replies Remus with a smile.

"Then I suppose we have several things to attend to, from seeing if the Weasley twins are still interested in running their own business to constructing several more servers for the upcoming Quidditch World Cup live stream. We've already sold several dozen tickets, and I'm fairly certain that we will sell several more" remarks Sirius before glancing down at his watch, "Maybe tomorrow we'll start bright and early to make certain everything is in place for Monday."

"It looks like having a family has done you a lot of good; you've matured greatly compared to our younger days. Keeping on top of things, following through on things, etc" comments Remus with a smirk.

"All true. But how about you Moony, any potential mate for yourself? Is there a family of your own in the future?" asks Sirius in a more serious tone.

"It is being dinner time sirs" comes a squeaky voice from about armrest height.

"Oh good, I'm quite famished after such a long day" remarks Remus standing up from his chair.

Sitting down at the dining table, Sirius absentmindedly eats his food while Harry and Susan talk about their year at Hogwarts in detail. Half an hour later Sirius is shaken out of his musing when a voice calls out, "Sirius!"

"Huh?"

"I've called out your name several times to no avail. Something must be seriously on your mind" remarks Amelia, the only other at the table.

"I'll admit that I have several things on my mind, but I'll be fine" admits Sirius unusually quiet.

Pausing for several seconds for a response, Amelia gets up from the table, places a hand on Sirius's shoulder and remarks gently, "I'll be here if you change your mind."

"I appreciate that" answers Sirius, giving Amelia a half smile.

/*a few days later, on Monday, in Hogsmeade */

Clearing his throat, Remus begins, "Welcome to the warding program, Miss Clearwater. To begin with, this program will be part theory and part practice, with a gradual increase in difficulty until you finish such program. Unfortunately, due to a lack of written material, we will be using our own material, and perhaps in several years a more definitive volume will be written based on our work. Before it gets too warm out, would you like to see the field where the practical portion will be done?"

"Yes, please" answers Penelope nervously with a hint of curiosity.

Exiting the room and then the building, Remus leads Penelope over a vast grass field, surrounded by hills steeper than normal, but much smaller than a mountain off in the distance. Minutes later the pair arrive at a small but fairly rectangular house-like building.

"And this is the first practice house for the program, with several others with ever increasing difficulty" indicates Remus with his hands to the other eight lots, before opening the door to the first house and lets Penelope enter.

"Professor, can you tell me why there is furniture in here?" inquiries Penelope looking around the ground floor kitchen.

"With any warding scheme, the overlap of spells could potentially interfere with spells commonly used in a household, and therefore we have included furniture and spells such as heating and cooling spells to help watch for any possible interaction between spells. While there isn't too much furniture here, it is all useable for our purposes" answers Remus with a smile.

Taking mental notes, Penelope asks curiously, "To clarify, these buildings are able to be lived in, correct?"

"Uh, that would be correct. I have charmed most of the buildings to have cooling charms in most of the building, with separate areas to have heating charms, in addition to fully functional plumbing. To make these buildings more homelike however, one would need an extremely cooled container, very similar to the muggle refrigerator, to keep any perishable food items from spoiling. And not to forget towels, amongst other such items" answers Remus caught off guard.

"Then does anyone live in any of these houses?"

"No, no one lives in any of these buildings. Since our entire plot of land is warded with various spells from your standard muggle wards, to privacy/secrecy, amongst others, there are few people authorized to enter this area. The badge you have with you allows you to access this portion of the campus" answers Remus puzzled.

"If I may be so bold, I'd like to propose an idea to you, to perhaps build a small grouping of these styled houses, and rent them out at a low cost, if possible. I know muggleborns are generally looked down upon in magical society, and therefore may not earn as much as others. So affordable housing would be very appreciative, especially as my family is concerned about me still in school, although the pricing is far more affordable compared to Hogwarts, in addition they are concerned about my job prospects and earning ability" states Penelope with a hint of despair in her voice.

"I want to make this perfectly clear to you; if you, or someone else are ever in need of housing, food, don't be afraid to ask us for assistance. We will take care of you. In regards to your proposal, I like your idea. Sirius and I will work on it and see if there is truly a need, and how we can best fill it" says Remus calmly and with a smile.

"Thank you. Back to the reason why we are here, you say that the houses increase in difficulty to ward, can you elaborate on that a little bit more, please?" responds Penelope with a smile, relief evident in her voice.

"Of course. They become more difficult based on house size, dimension, and overall area to ward. Some houses are oddly shaped in the wizarding world and can be trickier to properly ward and anchor. Which is why we suggest using our more durable warding stones to help anchor any spells, as we've charmed our anchors to hidden, in addition to more durable when hit by spells. Although anyone could charm their own stones to be similar to ours, so whatever way suits you the most" answers Remus.

"May I see an example of an oddly shaped house, please?" requests Penelope.

"Certainly. This way please" answers Remus, leading the way out of the house and over several marked out fields, to a towering structure with rectangular rooms sticking out in each of the cardinal directions, several floors high.

Gasping at the complexity, Penelope exclaims, "And this is what we are expected to be able to ward before graduation?!"

"With a lot of teaching and assistance, yes. It looks more daunting than it really is. Part of the trick is to break it up into steps and take care of the process one step at a time. Don't look at the end goal and get discouraged when you have so much more to experience and learn before having to get to the goal" Remus reassures Penelope.

"Y-you're right professor. Thank you so much" replies Penelope with a small smile.

Several hours later, Remus sits down at the dinner table and asks, "How did interviews go today, Sirius?"

"I'll say that more interviews will need to be held before making any final decisions" answers Sirius around a mouthful of mashed potatoes.

"It was only the first day, so it was to be expected. Did Fred and George handle running the store well while you were doing interviews?" inquiries Remus.

"They seemed to enjoy the lack of oversight from me. Gave me some more time to continue manufacturing some of our products for the upcoming school supply rush later this year. Apolline believes that sales will be increasing in a potentially exponential rate, so some time to prepare would be wonderful. How goes teaching for you?" answers Sirius.

"Miss Clearwater seems intrigued and seems to be enjoying our program. She had the idea of possibly creating a small wizarding village of some of our model homes, to rent out at a lower price than what most other landlords would, to help give muggleborns and others without as many economic opportunities a safe and enjoyable place to live, without such a large financial burden on their shoulders" replies Remus with a thoughtful look on his face.

Pausing, Sirius remarks, "I like the idea. But the location would be hard to work with, there isn't a lot of space in the cities for such a large operation. But…if we were to build a conglomeration if housing units, decently spaced apart of course, there would be plenty of space around Hogsmeade, assuming the current citizens would want such a thing nearby. It might make their cozy little village less quiet and cozy. I'd say let's make some inquiries before we go committing such a large amount of resources to a grandiose project like that, despite the merits it would have."

"Tomorrow we can begin such an inquiry, but now it is time to continue our meal and converse with the others" comments Remus looking at the three other members at the table staring at them with bemused looks on their faces.

Author note: Thanks to all who have read, reviewed, followed, and the likes! This might be a lengthy note, just to warn you. After a guest reviewer reminded me that Ron and Harry were written to be close friends, I decided to take a step back and re-evaluate my plans. If anyone noticed that Harry got headphones with the ability to speak and hear things around him in addition to only him/the wearer hearing what came through the headphones, there was a plan for him to lead Hermione down to see Buckbeak while Fred and George watch the map and help stop him from running into a professor. As that wasn't fleshed out, I also decided that I need to focus on writing QUALITY chapters and not worry about my self-imposed timeline to release chapters instead.

Next set of questions, should I mark this fanfiction as AU/Alternate Universe? Also, let's hear some pairings for Harry! I've got down Harry and Ginny and Harry and Luna as quite possible. I suppose it'd be AU if Harry and Luna…hmm.

Thanks for bearing with me for such a long time while I work on maturing my writing a bit more. :)
Edit: There is a poll at the top of my profile where you can select your pairing (Harry and Ginny, Harry and Luna, and Harry and another girl). Final decision rests with me, but your vote heavily influences my decision. :)