In the early morning sun of what promised to be another scorching day on Privet Drive, a thin face poking its nose through a gap between the curtains of the very ordinary looking house at number four was the only person to be seen anywhere on the deserted street at that early hour.
While most of the occupants of the almost identical houses were spending the rapidly fading coolness of the morning staying in bed, Harry Potter was apprehensively awaiting his visitor.
Peeking through the daintily curtained window of his bedroom again, Harry tried to watch both ends of the street at the same time, waiting for Percy to arrive. The method of Percy's arrival had been left out of the letter, possibly for security reasons, so Harry was also looking up into the sky as well, scanning everything in his field of view for any sign of magical transport.
So far the only thing he had seen that was the slightest bit suspicious were the Dursley's sprinklers turning on and running for much longer than the water bans dictated, although that could hardly be called unusual.
At the exact time indicated in the letter, a long, black car suddenly zoomed down the street and squealed to a halt in front of the house.
Rushing down the stairs as fast as he could without imitating a herd of rampaging Centaurs, Harry's elbow collided with a tall stack of empty cardboard boxes at the bottom of the stairs. Only his quick reflexes averted a disaster as he managed to grab the slowly toppling tower before it crashed to the floor and straightened it back up. The top box refused to cooperate however and tried to escape the second after Harry removed his hands. Running out of time and patience, Harry put the misbehaving box on the floor next to the others of its kind that lined the hallway. He managed to get the front door open just before Percy could ring the bell and wake the other occupants of the house.
"Hello, Harry," said Percy stiffly.
"Hiya, Percy," said Harry brightly.
A formidably large man wearing a dark, pin stripped suit and black sunglasses stood next to the car managing to convey a very alert appearance, as if waiting for something. One of his hands was tucked inside his immaculate jacket, probably holding a wand, Harry thought.
"Harry, what was the name of my pet rat?" Percy asked.
"What? Oh, I understand, Scabbers. You called your supposed rat Scabbers," he answered.
"Your turn," said Percy, ignoring Harry's emphasising.
"Er, look, do we have to do this? Just get inside before people see. Nobody else would be expecting you to be here so I am satisfied it's you, okay?"
Percy let out low harrumph and turned to give a brief nod at the man in the suit who was still standing perfectly still. Without a word, the man climbed back in and the car immediately zoomed off at high speed. Harry heard the echo of a dist loud bang that sounded like a peel of far way thunder.
Harry looked around to check nobody had been watching, then closed the door and hurried Percy up the stairs and into his room. He noticed cardboard boxes similar to the ones that nearly caused a catastrophe earlier, were in every room of the house, but was more concerned with getting Percy into his room without running in to any of the Dursleys.
The tent was gone, packed away in Harry's backpack along with the trunks and everything else Harry owned. Nothing remained in the room except the run-down furniture and shabby clothes supplied by the ever-generous Dursleys.
"Right," said Harry to the ruffled Percy. "This is your room, you are not allowed in any other part of the house, except the bathroom, and even then only for a few minutes. You are going to have to spend most of the time that you are not at the Ministry here, so you had better get comfortable. Where is your stuff?"
Percy took several miniature trunks from his pockets.
"Okay, expand them now since once I leave you are not going to be allowed to use magic."
"But I am of age!" protested Percy.
"Yes, but I am not, so when you are here alone, pretending to be me, you are not."
Harry felt a bit guilty at the twinge of satisfaction he got when he saw the dismay on Percy's face, but not much. He was not going to tell him about the modified wards - let him suffer without magic for a while.
"Now, how long do we have until the car comes back?"
"Fifteen minutes."
"Good, plenty of time. What arrangements have been made for my mail?"
"All of your mail is being redirected to the Ministry, except for your own owl. Did you know there was already a Redirection charm on you?"
Harry didn't.
"Yes, we found it when we were casting the new one. It appears that somebody arranged for all of your mail, except for anything from Hogwarts, the Ministry, and a few other people, to be returned undelivered if you were here or sent on to Hogwarts if you were at school. Presumedly Dumbledore set it up and maintained it."
A hot bubble of anger rose in Harry's chest threatening to explode in an angry tirade. He knew it had been Dumbledore without having to be told; it was exactly the sort of thing he would have done. There would of course have been some reasonable sounding justification. 'Protecting Harry' he would have called it, or 'for his own good', but it still amounted to a serious violation of his rights, especially after he had started at Hogwarts and had discovered the magical world.
"Anyway, all of your letters will be delivered to the Ministry where they will be checked, sorted, and forwarded here for you to collect," Percy continued, either not recognising or ignoring Harry's internal struggle to remain calm.
"Who is doing the checking and sorting?" Harry asked tersely. The idea of the Ministry getting into all of his mail was not something he had really wanted, but it solved a lot of issues for them both.
"That will be one of my tasks while I am taking your place," answered Percy, not sounding too pleased at the prospect.
Harry nodded. That wasn't so bad. Not ideal, but not unacceptable and it made sense since Percy was going to be playing the part of Harry anyway.
"You realise I take my privacy very seriously, right?" he asked.
Percy looked offended.
"And I take my job very seriously, Mr Potter," he told Harry, in a firm voice. "I will never read your mail beyond what is necessary to determine its contents, and I will not divulge the contents to anyone that does not have a legal right to them."
Harry was instantly suspicious about that specific exclusion, but it was too late to do anything about it now. He would have to make sure anything 'important' was addressed to either Ron or Hermione and not him.
"Of course, Percy, I am sorry to insinuate anything different," said Harry, apologetically. He needed Percy's cooperation, not his antagonism. "The news of the old mail redirection has just upset me a bit."
Percy seemed mollified by his sincere apology.
"The Minister has asked me to inform you that the process is underway to temporarily remove some of the underage magic use restrictions, and that many of the other measures you discussed are also 'in the pipe'. He does want to point out that these things take time however, since there is a fair amount of paperwork that needs to be completed to make sure everything is done properly."
Harry snorted with laughter.
"You mean he can't get anything done without a hundred bureaucrats arguing with him against any form of change for the better whatsoever."
Percy was ready to defend his beloved Ministry of course.
"It is important to make sure the correct procedures are followed!" he insisted.
"Yeah, just like my farce of a trial and Umbridge's decrees, eh, Percy? Did you ever wonder how Fudge managed to pass a few dozen laws without anybody stopping to 'follow the correct procedures?" said Harry, unable to stop himself from have a dig at Percy's blind faith.
"Those were only educational decrees designed to raise the professionalism and quality of teaching at Hogwarts. Making Hogwarts a better place to learn hardly needs a full independent review," answered Percy dismissively.
"Make Hogwarts better? Are you kidding Percy?" said Harry, slowly loosing his fight to stay calm. "How can disbanding every club or organisation including the Quidditch teams, putting a lifetime playing ban on me and your two brothers, and confiscating our brooms have raised the professionalism? How can allowing Death Eater children to hit Professor McGonagall with four stunners when she objected to them attacking Hagrid in the middle of the night raise the quality, Percy? What about forbidding students, even N.E.W.T. and O.W.L. years, to practice D.A.D.A. magic? Do you think that helped them learn better, not being allowed to do a single spell when the exams are half practical?"
He held his hand up to show the scars.
"Tell me Percy, how can she have been allowed to torture every student she wanted to in detention by making them write lines in their own blood without a full independent review?"
Percy was staring at Harry's hand, his mouth hanging open in a mixture of shock and surprise. Harry suddenly felt very weary. The anger slid away as he waited for impossible answers to impossible questions that he had asked himself a thousand times in the year since the toad woman was ousted.
"Is there anything else we need to cover now?" Harry asked, putting his back down and breaking the spell his rant had caused Percy to fall under.
"There is just the matter of you, er contribution to the Polyjuice potion," said the redhead, clearing his throat.
Harry was a bit stumped. Did they want him to supply the Polyjuice? He certainly had enough, but how could know about it? Unless-
"Oh, right!" he said sheepishly. "Hair, skin, blood, toenails, what's good for you?"
Percy crunched his face up in obvious distaste at Harry's suggestions.
"Hair will be fine, Harry," he said, taking a pair of scissors and a small box from one of the expanded trunks.
Harry took them from him, made a few shallow snips, and put the resulting hair into the box. Then it was time to go.
On the way down, Harry took more notice of the boxes. It looked like the Dursleys were going to be doing some painting, since they had been packing everything away, leaving the walls bare. The furniture had been moved out as well.
He was quite happy at the thought that he would not be asked to do it this time, although Percy might be in for a bit of a shock if Vernon got it into his head that Harry needed to earn his keep this summer, despite their little discussion when he first arrived back from Hogwarts.
So far, Vernon had completely ignored Harry, not even confronting him about his run-in with Dudley in the garage. He suspected Petunia and Dudley had not told the highly strung and easily provoked man about the incident, possibly fearful of provoking Harry and having more of his unnaturalness to be used against them.
"What's going on here?" Percy asked, as they approached the front door. He must have also noted the boxes and disarray.
"Looks like they are repainting everything," answered Harry.
Percy looked thoughtful.
"Dad would be beside himself to see how Muggles tackle a job like that," he said.
It was the first time Harry had heard Percy mention his father, and it surprised him a bit since he thought Percy was still getting shunned by, and was still himself shunning, the whole Weasley family. For the stubborn and proud man to be mentioning his family while in Harry's presence spoke volumes, although Harry wasn't one who could read them easily.
So he didn't say anything, in case it was still a sore point, but smiled in agreement while secretly considering warning that he might be forced to find out exactly how Muggles did the backbreaking task, by having to do the long and arduous work himself to pay for the squalid room, should Vernon get his courage up enough to insist.
They had only just stepped outside into the fresh morning air when the car arrived seemingly out of nowhere. The door flung open by itself and Harry and Percy hurried inside, barely getting it closed behind them before the vehicle shot off again.
The inside was enormous, much bigger than it could possibly have been without magic. Instead of normal car seats, they had six comfortable lounge chairs arranged in a circle, there was a mini bar in one corner, and the cabin was tall enough for Harry to stand upright without ducking. A small window provided a view of the driver. A second black suited man sat impassively in the passenger seat of the car, dark glasses betraying no sign that either man had even seen their two passengers.
"Is this how you are going to be coming and going each day?" Harry asked Percy, rather impressed with the transportation.
"No, this is the Minister's private car he has lent to you for today. Tomorrow I will be in a more, um, fitting, car."
"Oh," said Harry. "Might as well make the most of it then." He opened the fridge and grabbed two butterbeers.
Percy looked set to object, but Harry reminded him that he had to start acting a bit more like Harry, and bit less like Percy, or the charade would be up very quickly.
Percy sullenly accepted the drink and they sat in silence for a few minutes. Harry, feeling the silence was getting a bit uncomfortable, tried to start up a conversation, and suggested it was unlikely many people would notice his fake presence in the Ministry anytime soon anyway.
"Don't you get the Daily Prophet?" Percy asked, rather too smugly for Harry's comfort.
When Harry shook his head, Percy reached into a compartment and brought out several days copies of the wizarding paper. He shuffled through them before extracting a particular issue and passing it to Harry.
The headlines, taking up half of the front page, were 'Has the Chosen one joined Ministry of Magic?' The rest of the page was completely taken up with a picture of Harry shaking hands with Penelope in the entrance hall of the Ministry.
Harry groaned and turned the page to read. Mostly it was just speculation and repeating his history, but one line caught his eye.
Ministry sources confirmed that Mr. Potter did indeed meet privately with the Minister of Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour, and that as a result of the long meeting, Mr. Potter will be returning to the Ministry on a regular basis.
"Are you the Ministry source?" he asked Percy.
Percy frowned.
"No, we are not sure exactly how they came by that information."
Harry closed the paper and tossed it back into the compartment it had come from.
"Looks like you have a few leaks you might want to try and plug Perc," he said grinning. The newspaper articles had been expected, just not as soon, and not as big.
"The Minister is using the publicity to announce a raft of new measures to combat the terrorists, including more regular patrols of Aurors in Diagon Alley to keep the area safe," Percy explained.
That made sense to Harry. The manipulated media were probably just blowing things out of proportion again, making his visit into a huge deal to get approval from the general public. The Minister had promised not to use Percy/Harry to overtly promote his policies, but since this had actually been Harry himself visiting the Ministry on his own initiative, Scrimgeour had possibly taken it as 'fair game' and made sure it was front page news.
"What did Penelope think about making the front page of the Prophet?" he asked.
A slightly pained expression crossed Percy's face.
"She was very excited, at first," Percy explained. "But she quickly tired of the constant attention and frequent comments."
Harry laughed, knowing exactly how she felt. A sneaking suspicion entered his mind.
"What does she think about your 'Secret Ministry work' that is going to keep you so busy and out of site for the next few weeks?" he asked innocently.
Percy did not look happy.
"She has made it clear that she is less than pleased by the suddenness of the assignment, but is of course supporting me completely."
Harry decided to let the matter drop, not really that interested in Percy's private life and realising he was the cause of what could be a very difficult situation for any relationship.
Unable to stifle a yawn, he decided to catch a nap on the way to the Ministry, since he and Ron had stayed up half the night playing with the pack of Super Exploding snap, only stopping when Tonks was woken from her impromptu sleep on the couch by an enormous explosion that has cost Ron one eyebrow (the one he had not lost in his first apparition test) and the game.
Some time later, he woke up with Percy shaking him.
"We are almost there," Percy said, as Harry wiped the sleep from his eyes. "Are you sure you want to get out here and not at the Ministry? It would seem rather dangerous to just go walking around unescorted."
"It will be harder to find me this way," Harry said. "I'll mix in with the Muggles and disappear for a while."
Percy frowned. "The Minister would still like to know where you will be staying, Harry. He asked me to see if you could be persuaded to keep in closer contact, although I told him you were unlikely to change your mind. If you are recognised elsewhere while I am at the Ministry, it could undermine the whole operation, but I understand your commitment."
Not answering, Harry changed his hair and glasses and pulled off the robes he had purposely been wearing when they left the house, revealing his Muggle clothes underneath.
"You do realise that is a rather poor disguise?" asked Percy, watching Harry cover his scar with the make-up.
"Don't worry about me," answered Harry. "You should be getting ready too."
Percy nodded and took small box that held Harry's hair and a bottle of Polyjuice potion from a pocket in his robes.
"On second thoughts, maybe you could wait until I have left," said Harry quickly, realising what was about to happen.
Percy looked at him curiously then put the hair in the bottle and drank the concoction.
Harry stared fixedly out the window and tried to ignore the retching sounds Percy made as he transformed. Once the noises had finished, Harry turned back to be once again facing a replica of himself.
"What about your robes?" he asked the second Harry.
Percy shrugged and pulled his wand out.
"No, no," said Harry smiling and waggling his finger. "Underage Magic, remember?"
Percy looked slightly angry for a moment, and then defiantly and expertly shrank his clothes to fit anyway.
"Well you did say I had to start thinking and acting a bit more like you!" he said at Harry's questioning look, earning a laugh.
They slowed to a stop a few blocks from the Ministry and Harry slipped out. He was barely out of the door when the car sped off again headed towards the Ministry, and Harry joined the unobservant crowd of Muggles walking down the street too engrossed in their own existence to take any note of another teenage boy in their midst.
He had scarcely gone ten metres when an older lady sidled up next to him and slipped her arm into his.
"Wotcher, Harry," said Tonks.
"Hey, Tonks. Been waiting long?"
"Not too long," she said. "I've been having fun watching the Muggles. Cracks me up the way they run around, head down and eyes not seeing anything, and some of the clothes they get about in are a right laugh. You ready to go?"
Harry shook his head.
"Nope, but I guess we have to anyway?"
Tonks laughed and led him off down a quiet side street.