A/N: I mentioned the inclusion of a crossover character at the end of the last chapter but that he wouldn't be seen until Christmas in the story. He still probably won't be seen till then, but recent news prompted me to include references to him. Oh, and I don't own anything but the plot bubbling in my brain.

Chapter 3: Dumbledore, Dorms and Revielle

"Come in, Harry"

Harry walked into the Headmaster's office. Dumbledore rose as Harry entered and waved for him to sit. "Please have a seat Harry. Lemon drop?" he inquired.

"No thank you sir," replied Harry as he sat down in front of Dumbledore's desk.

"I am rather disappointed in you, Harry, though I am glad to see you attending Hogwarts," said Dumbledore, his blue eyes twinkling.

Harry looked at Dumbledore, nonplussed. "Sir? I'm confused. I have been in this castle for less than six hours and for the life of me I can't think off a single thing that I've done that could make you disappointed in me."

"I'm disappointed that you left the protection of your family."

Harry wanted to scream. 'First he says he's glad I came to Hogwarts then he says he's disappointed that I left the protection of my family! I wish he'd make up his mind. I know a kid is safer with their family but he makes it sound like it's not safe for me to leave home even to come to school!"

"You seem to be contradicting yourself, Headmaster. I know Mom and Dad were kinda sad that I was traveling thousands of miles to go to school and worried that they couldn't protect me, but they realize that I know how to defend myself," replied Harry.

"I refer to your maternal aunt's family, Harry. Your true family," replied Dumbledore. If anything his eyes began twinkling even more and Harry felt a tickle in his head.

'He's a Legillimens!' Harry had never felt gladder that Pappy insisted that Harry learn Occlumency than he did at that moment. He gave a mental push and suppressed a grin as he saw Dumbledore wince as he was thrown from Harry's mind. "Horse hockey!" Harry shouted as he stood and pulled a sheet of parchment and a sheet of Muggle paper from the back pocket of his jeans. He slapped the parchment down on Dumbledore's desk. "Look familiar, Headmaster? No? It's a letter from you, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, addressed to one Petunia Evans Dursley asking her to take me in." Harry tossed the piece of Muggle stationary onto the desk. "This is a letter from Mrs. Dursley saying that they don't want anything to do with her sister including quote, 'her freakish brat,' unquote. My true family is the one back in Chicago that raised me and cared for me, not someone I happen to be related to who didn't even want me when her sister was killed."

"Who taught you Occlumency, Harry?" asked Dumbledore angrily.

"Pappy taught me. Said it was one of the most useful skills he ever learned, that it kept him from going crackers during the wars. He also encouraged me to find out as much as I can about my birth parents. If there's nothing else sir, I'd really like to get to bed," said Harry with a yawn.

Dumbledore waved his hand in vague dismissal. Harry grabbed the letters and stuffed them back in his pocket before hurrying out of the office. 'Who does he think he is?' thought Harry angrily as he made his way back to Gryffindor Tower. 'I need to write Pappy and thank him for teaching me Occlumency. The nerve of him! I wonder if using Legilimency on a minor is as illegal here as it is in America.' He gave the Fat Lady the password and hurried through the empty Common Room and climbed the stairs to the first year boys' dorm. He found that Dean and Seamus had waited up for him, as well as Ron and a chubby, round faced boy that Harry remembered was named Neville Longbottom. "I wish I could sic the Feds on that old coot," grumbled Harry as he opened his trunk and pulling out a pair of sweatpants and his lucky basketball jersey. "They'd give him 5 years in Alcatraz for what he tried to do," he said as he started changing for bed. He heard Seamus call his name.

"Harry? You all right, mate? What did the Headmaster want?"

"Bastard starts off by saying how disappointed he is in me. Oh, but then he's glad I came to Hogwarts."

"But that doesn't make any sense!" blurted Ron.

"He didn't say why he was glad I came to Hogwarts but apparently I disappointed him by being adopted and raised in the States when my only blood relation didn't want anything to do with me. He called them my 'true' family."

"That's crazy!" shouted Dean indignantly. "You were only a baby! Bad enough that your relatives were heartless bastards but to act like it's your fault?"

"Then what happened?" asked Ron.

"And what are the Feds?" asked Seamus.

"And what's Alcatraz?" asked Neville.

"Time out!" yelled Harry. "One at a time! Now, Feds is slang used mainly to refer to either the Muggle FBI; they're kinda like Scotland Yard, or any member of the Magical Law Bureau of the Department of Magic. The Department is kind of like your Ministry though unlike your Minister the Secretary of Magic is a full member of the President's Cabinet. There're even a few witches and wizards in Congress, not that they advertise that fact though. Alcatraz is our Wizarding Prison, like Azkaban but without the Dementors."

"You don't have Dementors?" asked Neville.

"Oh, we have Dementors in America, just a few rouge colonies in the Rockies and around the Alaskan oil fields though. Nasty things." Harry shuddered in revulsion at the thought of the soul sucking monsters. "As for the Headmaster, don't look him in the eyes unless you want to risk him tiptoeing through your thoughts.

Neville gasped. "Professor Dumbledore is a Legillimens? I'm glad my Gran taught me Occlumency. I don't like the idea of a teacher being able to read my thoughts."

"That's exactly what the old man tried to do. He tried to be subtle about it but I'm good enough at Occlumency that I felt him trying to worm his way into my head and I threw him out. If he had tried the brute force approach I still would have felt it but I'm not strong enough to repel brute force. Pappy says not to worry though. He told me to keep practicing and my shields will get stronger as I get older."

"Is Pappy a member of your family? Your adopted family I mean?" asked Dean.

"As far as I'm concerned they're my family, period. But yeah he's my mom's, mom's dad, my great-great grandpa. But enough about me, tell me a bit about you."

The boys traded stories for a while before they crawled into bed and fell asleep.

-000-

Gryffindor first year girls' dorm

Lavender Brown sat gossiping with her best friend Parvati Patil. They briefly expressed their disappointment that Parvati's twin sister Padma wasn't with them, but consoled themselves with the knowledge that they had at least one friend in another House. They were both obsessed with fashion, makeup and especially boys. They first discussed some of the older boys before turning their attention to those of their own year.

"Can you believe it, Parv?" bubbled Lavender. "No one's heard from the 'Boy-Who-Lived' in almost ten years and then he shows up here at Hogwarts looking just as handsome as the stories said he was."

Parvati just sighed. "Lav, you do know those stories are all fiction? You said it yourself, no one's heard from him in ten years. He's probably nothing like he is in the stories."

"Well, he obviously isn't exactly poor; did you see the clothes he was wearing?"

"Money isn't everything you know. Just look at the Malfoy's. They're loaded and Draco is one of the biggest plonkers I've ever seen. Don't get me wrong, Potter's got good taste in clothes, but I think I'd rather wait and see what kind of person he is first."

-000-

Slytherin Common Room

"Potter's going to pay for not accepting my offer of friendship," growled Draco Malfoy. He looked around at the rest of the Slytherin first years. "That miserable half-blood needs to be reminded of his place."

-000-

Gryffindor first year boys' dorm Sept. 2, 5am

Harry woke up early the next morning. He pulled on a pair of socks and his Air Jordan's before grabbing a notepad and pencil from his trunk and heading down to the Common Room to write a letter to Pappy.

Dear Pappy Sherm,

I know you're probably wondering why I'm writing when I've only been here one night, but what a night! I hadn't even seen my dorm room when I was summoned to the Headmaster's office. Boy am I glad Mom and Dad gave me copies of those letters. He tried telling me that the Dursley's are my 'true family' just because one of them is Lily Evans Potter's sister. Thanks again for insisting that I learn Occlumency, by the way. Turns out Dumbledore is a Legillimens, a pretty good one too, but he tried being too subtle about trying to riffle through my thoughts. The man reminds me a bit of that gooney bird General Bartford Hamilton Steele in one of your old war stories.

I met someone here at Hogwarts who says he knew my birth parents pretty well. His name's Hagrid, he's the Gamekeeper here. He's HUGE! He's either half-giant or he got hit with an overpowered growth charm. I hope to get a chance to talk to him and learn something about the Potters.

Over and out,

Harry

Harry folded the letter and stuffed it in one of the preaddressed envelopes he had gotten from Gringott's before he left. The envelope would be taken to the London branch of Gringott's and sent via goblin portal to St. Louis, then USPS to Hannibal. 'I'll take this up to the Owlery after my run,' he thought to himself.

He headed back up the stairs to his dorm and met Dean coming out of the bathroom, yawning.

"Morning Harry, you're up early"

"Wanted to write a letter to Pappy. I was just going to drop it in my trunk and then go for a morning run. Care to join me?"

"Sure. Just give me a few minutes to get dressed and I'll meet you down in the Common Room."

Harry put his letter in his trunk and went down to the Common Room to wait for Dean. After about ten minutes Harry was about to go back upstairs to see what was taking Dean so long when he came down the stairs, followed closely by Seamus.

"Sorry we took so long, Harry," said Seamus. "I woke up while Dean was getting dressed and he told me the two of you were going for a run and Dean asked me if I wanted to join you. I said yeah but I needed to use the loo."

The three boys headed out, breaking into a light jog as soon as they were outside, deciding to run to the Quiddich pitch and do a few laps around the pitch before heading back to Gryffindor Tower for a shower. They finished their showers and went to get dressed. Neville was just finishing getting dressed while Ron was still in bed, snoring away. They quickly dressed and debated whether to wake Ron or not. Harry dug in his trunk and pulled out a battered looking bugle with several runes etched into the bell and mouthpiece. He smirked a he raised the instrument to his lips. He began to blow through the bugle and it began playing reveille at a window rattling volume. Dean, Neville and Seamus started laughing as Ron flung himself out of his bed with a yell, scrabbling wildly for his wand before landing on the floor with a thump.

"Rise and shine, soldier!" barked Harry.

"Bloody hell, what was that?" Ron looked up as Percy burst in the door.

Percy looked around the room and saw his brother lying on the floor in his underwear while three of his roommates stood off to the side laughing hysterically, with that brat Potter at the foot of Ron's bed holding a bugle and struggling to contain his own laughter. 'What did Potter do to my brother? Just who the HELL does he think he is, attacking him on the first day of school?'

"Potter! What do you think you're doing? Detention for attacking another student!" bellowed Percy.

Harry turned and smirked at Percy. "I don't think I'll be serving a detention for attacking another student since I didn't attack another student. Ron was still asleep, so I decided to give him a wakeup call with this." He held up the bugle. "I played reveille, like this…" He lifted the bugle to his lips but Percy yanked it away before he could start playing.

"You do know that charming Muggle artifacts is illegal, don't you?" he said, pointing at the runes etched into the instrument. "You're in trouble now, Potter." Percy turned and walked out of the dorm muttering, "Walking rules violation indeed. Hypocrite."

Harry was furious. "Looks like I need to add a bit more to my letter," he said.

A/N: This chapter is dedicated to the late Harry Morgan AKA Col. Sherman T. Potter AKA 'Pappy'

"The man didn't have an unadoreable bone in his body." – Alan Alda