A dull oscillating whir like a low, distant siren interrupted the festivities. It was the kind of sound that wouldn't have begged the attention of anyone else. Harry had ignored it at first too. When it broke the air the third time he was forced to hold a hand up to halt the celebration. Moments later there was an explosive crash that shook dust loose from unseen parts of the old flat.

In a blur of red hair and freckles, Ron and Ginny were at the window knocking their chairs away in the process. Harry pressed into the space allotted for him, jostling Ron to the side slightly in an attempt to catch sight of what had caused the sound. On the opposite sidewalk what looked to be a blue phone booth smoked and hissed. Above it a blue light blinked slowly.

There was a man in the street looking at something in his hand. He checked the street and talked to himself in a tone almost loud enough to be heard from their perch on the windowsill. Hermione took her time getting reaching them and pushed her way up under Ron to see. She was the first to speak.

"That's never been there before…I thought they stopped making them ages ago."

"Them? What is it?" asked Ron.

"A police box—I know you don't read anything, but you could at least bother to flip through a book and look at its pictures…" she trailed off.

As Ron and Hermione began to bicker, Harry kept his eyes on the man in the street. There was no one else in the lane, even at six in the evening.

The Muggles of Grimmauld Place had a knack for not noticing things—even things that were right in front of them, though this man was probably right there with them in that respect. He seemed absentminded; the way he flailed about the street with his flashing green stick. For a Muggle even, he was oddly dressed with the bowtie and pressed tweed jacket.

Harry's eyes strayed back to Ron and Hermione, the two of them now away from the window and into an open altercation. This was nothing serious or unusual—they'd only been doing it since they were eleven.

"Harry—"

Ginny's voice caused him to snap back to the window.

"Does he see the door?" she paused. The man in the lane turned to look directly at the door, he glanced up the side of Number Twelve taking it in. "He sees the bloody door."

It was silent. Harry's gaze whipped from the window, to her brown eyes and then back to Hermione and Ron. In a flash he was thundering through the upstairs drawing room and out the door into the narrow hall. He took the steps two at a time, drawing his wand. Behind him the footfalls of his companions could be heard clambering to follow him. He reached the last landing and ran the length of the hall out into the entry room. Checking the peep hole, he could see that the man had stalked closer and was unarmed. His long pale face was almost at the door now.

Harry threw the door open to find the man on the step with his fist raised to knock. Before he could say anything Harry aimed his wand into his chest. "Who are you?"

With a casual chuckle the man pushed the wand aside. "I'm the Doctor. Who are you—what kind of person goes around threatening people with twigs?"

Taken aback, Harry faltered his aim slightly. He could feel Hermione, Ginny and Ron behind him in the door now. "It's a wand," said Harry.

"Doctor?" Ron glanced at Hermione. "That one of them Muggle-nutters that goes around cutting on people?"

The Doctor pushed Harry's wand aside and flashed him with the little blinking light on a stick as if checking for something. "What kind of Doctor are you—and how did you see this place?" Harry asked lowering his wand.

"I just looked," he pocketed the small tool and glanced up at the flat. "Takes more than a simple perception filter to pull one over on me—though I am impressed. Year Two Thousand…where did you get that technology?"

"What's this loon talking about?" Ginny asked. "How can he see this place?"

He glanced to Ron and Ginny. "Gingers. Had a couple of ginger friends a while back—always wanted to be ginger myself," The Doctor paused backing away from the door to survey the apartment again. "Maybe next time…"

Harry and Hermione advanced out of the door, Ron took the threat of being dissected seriously and hung back. "There's spell used to disguise this place so that Muggles like you shouldn't be able to see it," Harry said.

"A what?" the Doctor said staring at him. "I'm not a Muggle. Muggle's a kind of plant farmed on the planet Clom—how do you know about them?"

"What—no—a Muggle is what we call non-magical people. Humans," Hermione explained.

"Who says I'm human," the Doctor smiled, his lanky arms down at his sides. The prospect of magic didn't seem to strike him as odd in the least.

"If you're not human what are you?" asked Ron from the door.

"I'm Time Lord."

"Time what?" said Ginny. "You look human to me."

"You look Time Lord—we came first," the Doctor said making his way toward Hermione. He aimed the same blinking tool at her and plucked at the back of her bushel of brown hair examining each tendril as if it were his first time seeing hair. She clamped her arms down to her sides glancing at him nervously.

"What is that thing?" asked Harry.

"My wand," the Doctor said with a smile. He stepped away from Hermione staring at the side of the 'wand' and nodded. "Seemingly nothing abnormal about you lot…"

Hermione grimaced. "It doesn't look like any wand I've ever seen."

"Not really a wand—it's a sonic screwdriver. Okay then. Other than your obvious cover story about Muggles and Magic, how do you explain elusive Number Twelve Grimmauld Place?"

"S'not a cover story—it's really magic," said Ginny stepping into the lane with Ron.

The Doctor slipped the sonic screwdriver back into his pocket and ruffled her hair. "Sure it is. If you want to believe in such silly things, that's your business. A lot of people don't believe I exist," he paused. "But something inside of your flat its wreaking havoc on my TARDIS," he pointed back to the blue police box over his shoulder. "And I can't get out of here till I figure out what it is.

Before they could protest he was running for the door and dipped his head inside glancing around. "What's a TARDIS? And—hey, get out of there!" yelled Harry pulling him back.

"Mmm," the Doctor turned to him with a smile. "Smells like you're having custard and fish—they wouldn't happen to be in the same dish, now would they?"