Disclaimer: I own a pomegranate. Which I will not own much longer, for I am eating it. I don't own Harry Potter, the Dursleys, or Sirius Black, though. Unfortunately.

AN: 1. Thank you for your patience, my faithful readers. My school schedule is proving very demanding, so I highly doubt that I'll be updating on any sort of consistently quick schedule. At some times, regularity may prove a challenge too - I will try my very hardest, however. My best estimate is at once every other week as an average...
2. Some parts of this chapter are straight out of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. It's one of my favourite moments, and so it just felt right to piece it back in here.
3. Oh, and about the last chapter, no, I did not give Harry the Lament Configuration – no crossovers with Hellraiser…though, that does make an interesting idea..
Those who were thinking along the line of the Pandora pithos myth were on the right track…think Pandora + Dementors ;)

Chapter 33: Of Dursleys and Dogfathers

Harry sighed as he stood before the whitewashed suburban nightmare that was Number 4 Privet Drive, the domicile where dwelt the dreaded Dursleys.

Earlier that day, Harry and the Boots had arrived back at their estate via international portkey; it was then that Harry bid his farewells, refusing any offers to escort him home – he did not fancy having the Boots meet his bigoted, rude muggle relatives, not after the Boots had been so kind to him. Harry knew impeccable manners were not a quality he had in abundance, but he knew well that such decent people should not have to be put through being chastised as 'freaks.' Thus, Harry had used his own portkey, arriving at Jean's hollow, picking up the owl post that he had arranged to be dropped there, and then walking the rest of the way to Number 4 Privet Drive, not at all minding the sweltering summer heat.

He had arrived but a few moments ago, but upon his arrival, he he had frozen – for there was one glaring addition to the usual, monotonous exterior of the Dursley household, an extra automobile in the driveway; one extra automobile that he recognized to belong to one Marge Dursley. Splendid. Absolutely splendid. What was the fat old cow doing there? Would he be able to sneak in without her noticing? He gritted his teeth – he hadn't seen her in years, but he remembered well that the woman was absolutely infuriating. As a child, he had taken her abuse with a straight face, doing what he could to hang onto what little pride he had by refusing to give in to her taunting and cruelty, but these days, he found his temper ever so close to the surface – he certainly did not want to have to deal with her, of all people.

He sighed again, reaching into his pocket, fingering the small, glowing cube that was sitting warm and comfortable in his jacket. He and Terry had taken the entire night before their arrival back in Britain to try and figure out the workings of the strange puzzle-like object. It was the oddest thing – they would touch, twist, and tap parts, and the puzzle would shift, gears and contraptions turning to morph it into a new shape; and somehow, they would just know when they were getting closer to solving it, and when they weren't. Anticipation would build and bring them into a profoundly excited state, or fall and drag them into a hopeless, depressive feeling of absence. Needless to say, both boys were loth to part each other and the new amusement they shared, and would have much rather spent the rest of the summer together with the puzzle – in the end, Harry agreed not to try and solve the puzzle on his own until both of them could work on it together at Hogwarts.

He smiled as he fondly recalled the holiday, idly shuffling through the various flashes of the best and brightest memories...

He shook his head – enough stalling. He marched up the garden path and left his trunk right outside the front door, entering the house carefully and quietly, cringing when he heard the boisterous voices coming from the kitchen, subconsciously surrounding the door with his magic so that it didn't squeak. But then he halted, frowning – why the hell was he sneaking around? He wasn't eight-years-old, and he had nothing to be scared of. Sneering, he threw the door shut, and before a second passed, the most irritating sound he had ever heard met his ears – the frantic yapping of Aunt Marge's dog Ripper. A moment later, the fat, nearly hairless bulldog came barreling down the hallway, skidding to a halt when it caught a glimpse at the vicious glare Harry was sending his way.

"Who's there!" Vernon's voice suddenly bellowed, and Harry grimaced at the sound.

Carefully blank-faced, he made his way into the kitchen, where, sure enough, Aunt Marge sat at the table, enjoying tea with Vernon, Dudley, and Petunia – who looked very out of place indeed, being thin as a twig, while her husband, son, and sister-in-law were very nearly morbidly obese.

"Good afternoon, Dursleys," Harry said casually, striding straight to the refrigerator and pulling out a pitcher of milk.

"You!" Vernon sputtered angrily, while Petunia and Dudley went white beside him.

"Yes, me," Harry stated blandly, downing the glass of milk he had poured himself in one go.

Meanwhile, Marge seemed utterly oblivious to the nervousness the other three Dursleys were exhibiting, and attempted to sneer at Harry – but after two years of passively (and sometimes not so passively...) enduring Severus Snape's malicious facial expressions, Aunt Marge simply looked nauseous and slightly constipated to Harry. "Back from detention already?"

Harry's eyebrows rose, and he cast a not-so-subtle questioning glance at Vernon.

"Yes, summer detention at St. Brutus's Secure Centre for Incurably Criminal Boys," Vernon ground out, clearly labouring heavily to steady his voice.

Harry gave a tight smile with a maligning edge to it. "Yes, of course, just got back."

Marge harrumphed pompously, turning to Vernon with a condescendingly pitying look on her face. "You know, Vernon, the first time I laid eyes on this one, I knew for sure; rotten to the core. One's got to wonder where it comes from – bad blood, I suppose." She glanced at Petunia, "Not to say anything about you, or yours, dear, but your sister…well, there's always a bad one in the bunch, isn't there?"

Harry turned away, pointedly ignoring them, and beginning to search through the cupboards for a snack, much to Petunia's barely-suppressed ire. Unfortunately, his search was soon interrupted by Marge's snapping,

"Look this way, boy! Ignoring your betters, very rude! You should show some respect to my brother, you sniveling brat; my brother, who so kindly took you in. Had it been me, I would have tossed you right back onto the street."

"No need to state the obvious."

"Clearly," Marge said distastefully, "St. Brutus's has done nothing for that wretched tongue of yours – it should be cut off. Tell me, boy, do they use the cane there?"

Harry stifled a smirk. "Of course."

"Excellent," said Aunt Marge. "I won't have this namby-pamby, wishy-washy nonsense about not hitting people who deserve it. A good thrashing is what's needed in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred. Have you been beaten often?"

Harry could not help but grin at that; and he could certainly not keep the mocking out of his voice. "Oh yeah, loads of times."

"I still don't like your tone, boy," she barked out. "If you can speak of your beatings in that casual way, they clearly aren't hitting you hard enough. Petunia, I'd write if I were you. Make it clear that you approve the use of extreme force in this boy's case."

Petunia nodded stiffly, her face going even whiter.

Vernon, however, who had been watching Harry carefully, seemed to notice the far away look in the boy's sparkling green eyes, glimmering with the turning of the cogs of his devious mind, and attempted to change the direction of the conversation. "Heard the news, last week, Marge? How about that escaped prisoner, eh?"

Harry perked up slightly at that, watching interestedly as Marge turned her attention to Vernon, nodding. "Mass murderer, escaped after 12 years, isn't that right?" She sipped her tea, and then placed the cup on the floor for Ripper to drink out of. "You know," she said, her eyes returning to Harry in a pitiful form of a glare, "That's what you'll end up like, if you don't smarten up, boy – rotting in prison somewhere, while your useless little life dwindles away."

"Tragic," Harry drawled flatly.

"Don't take that tone with me, boy," Marge snarled, making to rise to her feet before Vernon stopped her.

"There, there, Marge – not to worry, I'll punish him thoroughly later."

Marge nodded stiffly, casting a smug look at Harry. "You do that Vernon, make sure he cries."

Vernon nodded contritely.

"You mustn't blame yourself for the way the boy's turned out, Vernon," Marge continued, "If there's something rotten on the inside, there's nothing anyone can do about it."

All three of the Dursleys made sounds of agreement, but as the green fire in Harry's eyes began to burn even brighter, they quieted, shifting awkwardly.

But Marge paid no mind. "Bad breeding," she concluded, glancing at Petunia, "Say, who was he? The wastrel your sister ran off with?"

Petunia started. "Oh! Potter!" she squeaked. "James Potter."

"This Potter," Marge mused, "You never told me what he did?"

Vernon and Petunia were looking extremely tense, at this point, beginning go paler than was healthy, Harry noted. Dudley had even looked up from his pie to gape at his parents.

"He — didn't work," stammered Vernon, with half a glance at Harry. "Unemployed."

"As I expected!" said Aunt Marge, a triumphant look glimmering in her eyes, "A no-account, good-for-nothing, lazy scrounger who —"

"You shouldn't speak of things you know nothing about," Harry said suddenly, his voice stiff and frigid.

Vernon looked alarmed at this, torn between placating his potentially volatile nephew and saving face with his sister. "That's enough boy, have things to unpack, don't you –"

"No, Vernon," interrupted Marge smugly, holding up pudgy hand, once again trying to intimidate Harry with her tiny eyes. "Go on, boy, go on. Proud of your parents, are you? They go and get themselves killed in a car crash (drunk, I expect) —"

"Shows what you know," Harry retorted coldly, "They didn't die in a car crash at all."

Marge barked out a derisive laugh. "Perhaps he should be sent off to the asylum, Vernon - the boy's clearly delusional. He could be dangerous you know -"

If only she knew how right she was, Harry thought as his glare hardened.

"- and the last thing your family needs is the burden of a mentally unstable delinquent. The little mongrel should be should be locked up-"

"Perhaps you should be the one locked up, Marge," Harry suddenly hissed, eyes alight with fire; he couldn't quite place his finger on why, but the thought of being locked away like a caged animal was...unbearable, "I'm sure there's a way they can connect your obvious insecurity, weight problems, and childish bullying with mental retardation!"

The woman's face went red, but as she opened her mouth, Harry continued,

"And until you've got a clean bill of mental health, I suggest you refrain from taking about me, or my parents, who most certainly did not die in a car crash."

"They died in a car crash, you nasty little liar, and left you to be a burden on their decent, hardworking relatives!" Marge screamed back at him, swelling and reddening with fury. "You are an insolent, ungrateful little swine, and it's all their fault, don't you know! It's the first rule of breeding – if there's something wrong with the bitch, then there'll be something wrong with the pup –"

At that moment, the air in the room completely transformed, the vitality being sucked out of it and replaced with biting cold, as the glass door behind Marge shattered, the shards flying every which way, several cutting her across the face and the hands. The woman almost fell out of her chair, letting out a horrid shriek. She had not yet recovered when she looked up to find Harry standing before her, his face dark, eyes aglow with the colour of the Killing Curse, and his magic crackling like static on his skin.

"My parents were good people – hard working, honest, kind, and brave. They were murdered, they died protecting me!"

Marge opened her mouth, but Harry cut her off, his voice sharp and ragged with fury. "You're wrong, you know – breeding has nothing to do with it. My parents were good people, but I'm not – I'm not good, I'm not kind, and I don't forgive. And I'm this close to ripping out your throat and bathing in your dirty blood, you hideous, pathetic, filthy muggle whore!"

The woman was frozen in outrage for only a second, before a look of unbridled rage washed over her face, boiling with rage. Stiffly, she held an accusing finger up, beginning to screech, "How dare you –"

But suddenly, her impending rant came to an abrupt halt when the strangest thing happened. Harry was well aware of the strange physical attribute all Dursleys seemed to possess – they swelled, literally grew (usually sideways...) when angry. At least, that was how it seemed. Sure enough, Marge was swelling with inexpressible anger — but even when her words ceased in a bout of internal shock, the swelling didn't stop.

Her great red face started to expand, her tiny eyes bulged, and her mouth stretched too tightly for speech — next second, several buttons had just burst from her tweed jacket and pinged off the walls — she was inflating like a monstrous balloon, her stomach bursting free of her tweed waistband, each of her fingers blowing up like a salami…

"MARGE!" Vernon and Petunia simultaneously cried out as Marge's whole body began to rise off her chair toward the ceiling. She was entirely round, now, like a vast life buoy with piggy eyes, and her hands and feet stuck out weirdly as she drifted up into the air, making apoplectic popping noises. Ripper came skidding into the room, barking madly, following as she drifted out the large window Harry had broken a few moments prior.

"NOOOOOOO!"

Uncle Vernon charged out the back door and leapt forward to seize one of Marge's feet, trying to pull her down again, but was almost lifted from the floor himself. A second later, Ripper leapt forward and sank his teeth into Uncle Vernon's leg, causing him to let go of Marge and fall flat on his ass.

All three Dursleys watched in horror as Marge rose up into the sky, screeching loudly as she began to drift away. It did not take long, however, for the awful noise to melt into the distance, leaving a silence so hollow that the Dursley's panicked mannerisms seemed to freeze. That is, until Vernon turned to him with fearful anger in his eyes.

"What have you done!" the man cried out wretchedly, "Bring her back, bring her back now! You put her right, right now, boy!"

Silence, as the Dursleys watched with bated breath for Harry's response, Vernon's adrenaline-inspired confidence draining away by the second.

Harry had been watching the whole affair with wide, expressionless eyes, tempered only with a glimmer of vindictive fascination. When the stark silence that followed Vernon's outburst was broken, though, it was broken by Harry's giddy bellows of laughter.

"Wow!" he exclaimed between chuckles, "Just wow! I didn't even know I could do that!"

His laughter grew even more raucous when Vernon, Petunia, and Dudley gaped at him in horror. "Brilliant! I feel just great now! Like...like it's Christmas morning! Brilliant, just brilliant!" he said happily, internally marveling at how fulfilling it was to put the nastiest Dursley of them all in her place.

But suddenly, he sobered, causing the Dursleys to tense instantly. "Uh-oh…" he said thoughtfully, remembering something very, very important, "I really shouldn't have done that…" The Ministry might not notice his smaller, more routine not-so-accidental bouts of accidental magic, but they wouldn't miss a Marge-balloon flying merrily over the normally quiet residential streets of Surrey. "Great, just great."

The anger, the frustration, and the defeated, depressing feeling that had originally fueled his outburst came rushing back, along with anxiety. His face whitened, and he was barely able to resist the urge to knock the table over, or lash out at the Dursleys. Taking a deep breath, he finally turned to face them with dead eyes, causing them to flinch away from the indignant disappointment radiating off him. He didn't know why he still had it in him to be disappointed with them – why he would even subconsciously consider the possibility that the Dursleys would be decent enough to prevent the slandering of his parents in his presence. He shouldn't anymore – they were nothing to him, and judging from the looks in their eyes, cold and fearful, and frantic, as though they didn't even recognize him, he was nothing to them as well.

"I'm going now," he said quietly, he didn't miss the shock and relief flooding their eyes, along with the firm agreement.

You're not welcome here. The words went unsaid, but were nonetheless as clear as day.

"And I'm not coming back."

They didn't make a sound; they didn't even dare to move.

He turned away, making for the front door, before pausing, looking over his shoulder with a reassuring – for all the wrong reasons – smile. And if anyone comes by, don't forget to tell them it was an accident."

And with that, the Dursleys were left alone with the feeling that they had missed something very, very big – and wondering why on earth, during the terrible ordeal, Harry's eyes had flashed crimson.

Harry was swinging back and forth, listening to the creaking of the decrepit old swing set in his neighbourhood park, humming quietly to himself a guitar riff he couldn't quite place.

He had left Number 4 Privet Drive, and he had not looked back, dragging his trunk behind him. He had no idea why it had taken so long for it to click, and why why it was just clicking now – the Dursleys didn't hate him. He was not, as he had once thought, stuck at the lowest end their scale of love and hate. The one with themselves at the top and Miss Pickins, their annoying neighbour at the bottom. They didn't even see him as human – he never even made it on the scale. It had hurt – the long nights alone, the painful punishments, the unreasonable amounts of chores, the verbal attacks and intimidation – but it had always, for him, just been an obstacle he needed to overcome, a struggle that he always took the slightest bit of pride for coming out on top. A game, of clear cut him-against-them. He thought they hit him because they were angry with him, they called him a freak to try to provoke him, to try to make him feel small, in a meager attempt at victory – but that wasn't it at all. They didn't want to win; they didn't need to win. They thought, they knew that they were right. That he was a blemish on their otherwise perfect life, that his very existence was an abnormality that shouldn't be in the first place. They thought themselves to be normal, and therefore right; correct, belonging. Everything else was an abomination, including him.

Disgusting muggles.

And then there was that. He hadn't used his advantage to play with, to taunt Marge; he hadn't gotten his revenge in a humiliating, purely amusing, and basically harmless way. At some point, it ceased to be a game. The human body wasn't meant to be stretched like that; Marge would be lucky to survive. Vindictiveness and playful cruelty all came naturally to him, but not to that degree, and not in that way. He had thrown back at her the same kind of condescending bullying that she had dished out to him so many times. He had sunk to her level. What was happening to him? He rubbed his itching scar, recalling with a sinking feeling that he had not taken his sleeping draft in two nights.

Damn it.

He knew he had sounded frighteningly like Tom – in fact, the whole fiasco seemed like it had come out of a 'What Would Tom Do?' manual. He shook his head and snorted deprecatingly. He would have to be far more careful from now on. He was angry at himself, and for the first time in his life, he felt truly pathetic, weak, and dirty – he wished he could reach into his mind, tear Tom out and rip him to pieces. Or rip him out, and then practice fiendfyre on him. Or pick him out with a mental toothpick, piece by agonizing piece. Or torment him until he threw himself willingly into oblivion…

Harry's vengeful thoughts, however, were interrupted but the strangest sight – a sight that made his eyes bulge in a way he didn't think possible. He had vaguely noted the presence of a black, skinny, scruffy mongrel watching him hungrily from across the park. He had expected that the half-starved creature would eventually plod up to him and begin to beg him for a snack. What he certainly did not expect was for the dog to inch toward him slowly, cautiously, before collapsing on the ground – and a moment later transforming before his very eyes, into a human being.

Startled, Harry immediately fetched his wand, and then sprang forward, eager to get a closer look at his shape-shifting company. Once he got closer to the figure, he slowed down cautiously, carefully taking in the shape before him – it was a man, though one Harry would have thought dead if it wasn't for the laboured heaving of his chest. The man was tall, but emaciated, his face gaunt and sickly – he looked as though he had not eaten in months. His limbs were lanky, no fat on them, the muscles long-since atrophied, and the bones jutting out at every crook and joint. His hair was limp, ragged, and uneven, a soft black peppered with grey; his fingernails were bloody, and his teeth were yellow. But perhaps most shocking was the fact that he was covered in tattoos – some looked like the normal sort, girls' names and that sort, but then there were the others, the runes and the letters and the clear marking that betrayed the man's status as a criminal of the wizarding world. And if Harry was reading right, the man had not escaped from just any prison, but from Azkaban.

He sucked in a deep breath, panicking for a moment – most prisoners of Azkaban were former Death Eaters or the like; even in such a pitiful state, the man could be dangerous. But as he considered this, something else caught Harry's eye – a set of tattoos on the man's arm, which looked startlingly familiar…but where were they from…?

Sirius Black's mugshot! Harry gasped, dropping to his knees to get a closer look at the man's face. It was just barely there, but sure enough, the man bore traces of Sirius Black's handsome, aristocratic features. Harry could barely believe it – this was his godfather! His godfather had escaped from Azkaban! All of a sudden, he felt happy, relieved, proud, and victorious all at once – and he could not stop the brilliant grin that spread over his face. The criminal the muggle police had been warned about, the one that had escaped from a mysterious prison after 12 years - it was Sirius Black!

But that was when the reality sunk in. Sirius Black was a wanted fugitive – an alleged Death Eater and mass murderer, who the Ministry of Magic would stop at nothing to find. Perfect. So on top of explaining away his violent burst of not-so-accidental magic and finding a way to avoid getting sent back to the Dursleys, he had a wanted man to harbour.

He looked down at the unconscious face of his godfather. He was ecstatic that the man had escaped the inhumane hellhole that was Azkaban, but things just got so much more complicated – it would be much harder to build a case for Sirius Black's innocence while he was subject to a manhunt. Even if his godfather did manage to stay out of the hands of the authorities, Wizengamot would be much less receptive to the idea of giving him a trial – and if he was caught…well, Harry was fairly sure that the aurors were given orders to 'kill on sight.'

He sighed. There was nothing to be done about it now. Silently sending a quick prayer to the Fates, asking them for mercy, he rose to his feet, calling for the only person he could trust at the moment.

"Kreacher!" He grimaced. "We have a problem."

So, yeah, sorry that the chapter's, you know, dwarf sized. Weeeellll, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but still, I wanted it to be longer. I have a feeling the next chapter will have a little more content, what with all the messes Harry has to deal with now...

So, what do you think? BTW, any suggestions for third year are welcome...