Chapter One: The Plan

The plan had arrived in his mind fully formed.

He finally flicked his eyes up to the calendar tacked to the wall, September the first ringed in red, stars every three days showing when Order members would visit the house, sit through a strained cup of tea before leaving again. He was due a visit today he noted, feeling the kindling of excitement in his stomach, a foreign feeling to him now that left him almost angry with himself. Sirius is gone, and you're feeling excited his mind screamed at him.

He shook his head and climbed to his feet, looking around the small room that was still cluttered with Dudley's rejects. Instead of hating his prison, now he surveyed it with the excitement even his alter ego couldn't rid him of. A whole room full of salvageable trinkets, everything had its use.

"HARRY!" shrieked his aunt's voice suddenly, causing him to give a massive start.

He hurried onto the landing and looked over the bannister, "Yes?"

"Tidy yourself up," she said impatiently; flapping up at him with a pair of marigolds, "they'll be here in ten minutes."

"Yes, Aunt Petunia," he said wearily, already traipsing back to is room.

"And comb your hair!" came her yell from the kitchen.

Harry snorted to himself when his door was safely closed, not one of the Order members would be fooled by a head of combed hair or newly ironed clothes. Nevertheless, he changed his clothes from those he'd been into bed in, pulling on a pair of his newly shrunk Dudley jeans and a thick jumper, it was unusually cold out and the heating had been protesting loudly. Not nearly as loudly as his Uncle to the plumbers he thought dryly and he surveyed himself in the mirror, not liking the pale face that stared back or the dark smudges under each eye.

He sighed and turned his gaze away from himself and sat down at his desk with a thump. He stared unfocused at the scraps of parchments on its top, postal order forms for the Daily Prophet, The Quibbler and his latest acquisition Balls, a Quidditch bi-monthly the twins had introduced him to. They thought he may have appreciated the range of blonde witches draped languidly on different brooms. He gave a small smile, trust the twins.

He couldn't hold the feeling long, sensing the piece of parchment that lay under them all staring up at him. One of his last letters from Sirius. With fingers that obeyed no instruction from the rest of him, he pulled it out, staring for a long time at the signature at the bottom. He felt the ache in his stomach grow again, the pain eating him away.

All he could think about was the fact he'd never see him again, never hear his light-hearted banter with Professor Lupin, never see his serious side as he explained to Harry about the latest part of Voldemort's plan, never see him angry at Mrs Weasley for mothering him. Never again.

"Harry?" came a voice that broke him out of this reverie.

He looked over his should to see the worn face of Remus Lupin looking around the doorway, "Can I come in?"

"Sure," said Harry, finding himself unable to slide the letter away from him, he needed to keep it in reach, where he could feel it.

"How are you?" asked Remus once he sat on the edge of Harry's bed, "Tonks told me about yesterday in Diagon Alley."

"I'm fine," said Harry, attempting to slowly push the letter away, as if to limit the suddenness that would come from dropping it.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked gently, fixing him with a particularly searching stare.

"No, I'm fine," he said in his best, most normal voice he could muster, "I was just being stupid; I didn't have much sleep the night before, so, you know."

He gave a helpless shrug, finally letting go of the letter.

"Hermione said you left pretty sharpish," he prodded, and Harry couldn't help but begin to feel angry at the man sitting in front of him.

Remus knew Harry wouldn't want to talk to him, but he was still pushing.

"I realised I had to be back here for dinner," said Harry tersely, fingers closing around one of the random scraps of parchment.

"I see," he mused, watching as Harry began to rip the piece of paper to shreds, "they're very worried about you, you know. Keeping things bottled up won't help you, Harry, you've got to -"

"I know," cut in Harry angrily, "you've told me all this before."

"Then you must understand that I'm telling it you for your own good," said Remus, batting away Harry's anger.

"Yeah everyone does stuff for my own good," he said bitterly, climbing to his feet and messing with the papers on his desk, hoping to stop Remus' imminent lecture from the beginning.

"Harry, I understand how you must be feeling," he began, and Harry rolled his eyes.

"No, you don't," he said, much more harshly than he'd intended.

"Sirius was my best friend for 24 years," he said flatly, "I think I do."

Harry didn't say anything for a while, continuing to shuffle the papers. The silence was deafening, and Harry wished Remus would just take offence like any normal person and leave him alone.

"We're beginning to get very worried about you," said the man eventually, and Harry stared at the wall in front of him.

"Why? I'm perfectly fine," he replied after a few moments, "I just don't feel like being chatty and pretending that nothing's happened."

"Your friends are just trying to make you feel better."

"Well they can't, ok?" yelled Harry suddenly, fists balled up at his sides as he whipped around to Remus, "Nothing they can do or say is going to change the fact that Sirius is gone and it's all my fault! So just tell them not to bother. I don't want to be around them, and they don't want to be around me, so will you all just stop plaguing me, and leave me alone!"

Any other person would have been angered by his outburst and lack of gratitude, but Remus merely sighed heavily and climbed to his feet. Harry was breathing deeply, the anger and the pain rushing through his veins, forcing him to turn back to the wall.

"I'm sorry you feel like that Harry," said Remus slowly, walking towards the door, "I'll be along in three days to check in on you."

Harry wanted to yell 'don't bother' to the man, but found his throat was too tight to speak, he reached for the letter, his lifeline, and clung onto it tightly.

Remus knocked on the front door of Number 12 Grimauld Place and waited patiently, head still full of his earlier meeting with Harry. He heard Mrs Black shrieking in the corridor and realised it must be Tonks answering. Sure enough a few seconds later the door was wrenched open and a blue-haired girl stuck her head around the corner, grinning widely and inviting him in.

Once they were in the corridor Remus tried unsuccessfully to calm Mrs Black, trying desperately to block out her curses from his mind, thinking to himself that Sirius would be so angry that she was still about.

"How is he?" asked Tonks quietly as the headed towards the kitchen.

Her hair had slowly changed to black to mark the sombre mood Remus seemed to be in, and as they entered the kitchen he gave a heavy sigh.

"I don't know," he finally said, dropping into one of the chairs, "he's very angry..."

"Really?" said Tonks, sounding quite surprised, "at Diagon Alley he was so... I don't even know the word to describe it; anger was not featuring there anyway."

"Well you must be used to Harry's mood swings by now," said Remus, gratefully accepting the tea she placed in front of him, "he was just getting angrier and angrier with me. All I tried to do was understand, offer support or guidance..."

"Remus," began Tonks uneasily, before sliding into the seat next to him, "I don't think you should do things like that. Have you thought that Harry might seem it like you're trying to replace Sirius, you know, trying to become the guiding figure?"

"But I'm not," he said, sounding quite anguished for a second, "I just want him to know that although Sirius might be gone, it doesn't mean he's alone now. I want to be part of his life like Lily and James intended but he doesn't seem to want me."

"It's the wrong time to be trying to remake ties like that Remus," said Tonks softly, as if trying to limit the amount of damage her sentence may cause, "the time will come when he'll appreciate you, turn to you even, but it's not right now. Sirius has only been gone for less than a month, what he needs now is time and space."

"Perhaps you're right," said Remus heavily, pinching the bridge of his nose wearily, "I should probably tell Dumbledore what's going on."

"Ok," said Tonks, getting up with him as he walked over to the floo network, "I'll see you later this evening, I guess? Molly's coming over to cook us dinner."

"Yes perhaps," he replied, knowing already he wouldn't come, "goodbye."

Tonks gave him a small wave and then he was gone. She turned back to the empty kitchen and scowled at it, she hated being stuck in this place when there was nobody about. This placed felt as much a prison as Sirius had described and she couldn't imagine what he felt knowing that he couldn't even go outside, no wonder he turned to the bottle.

Tonks let her memories rest on Sirius for a while longer before she squared her shoulder and walked down the corridor, wiping her eyes as she went.

"Right let's see what we can do about you," she said, staring at the curtains covering Mrs Black with a determined look in her eye.

It was approaching midnight and Harry gently pulled open his window, being careful not to create any shadows or sound. He raised himself to his elbows and looked over the window ledge into the back garden. Slowly reaching for his luminous clock he watched the seconds tick away until it was 11:54:47. If his calculations were correct in around thirteen seconds there should be a-

Crack

He grinned to himself, slowly easing the window shut and creeping hunchbacked over to his desk. He pulled out a piece of parchment that had a complicated-looking table drawn up. Picking up his biro, he travelled down the 'Mundungus' column, finding the 'Monday' line and carefully wrote 11.55 pm.

He'd calculated that there were always two guards on the house; one at the front, one at the back, and the ever random wanderings of Mrs Figg. Every four nights Mundungus was on duty, and Harry had noted that on every single occasion he had left duty 5 minutes early. This, he later realised, coincided with the docking times of large consignments of potions at the Floo Station in London. Obviously, Mundungus had a little business to attend to of his own.

Like clockwork, grinned Harry to himself, looking along his column. Friday was his day, his window of opportunity.

From the room next door Harry heard Dudley give another great hacking cough that set Harry's teeth on edge. Dudley had been in bed a day already with the flu, unnatural for this time of the year. But although Harry was kept awake by the snoring at night, he didn't mind, this was actually of huge benefit to his plan.

In the five minutes he had until his next guard came along, Harry leant of his window and using the snooker cue that he'd found on top of the wardrobe, prodded Dudley's window open as far as it would go.

Grinning to himself and feeling slightly wicked, he crawled back into his bedroom, and it wouldn't hurt to keep Dudley sick for the next few days. An open window in the chill of the night would see to that.

The next morning Harry awoke, plan ever-present in his mind.

His nights' sleep seemed to have worked out the coming day down to an impressive amount of detail. He went downstairs and got a piece of toast, smiling inwardly as his Aunt moaned to his Uncle about Dudley's flu getting worse overnight, especially when his Uncle was accused of leaving the windows open in his room. For once they didn't even suspect Harry, they knew, quite rightly, that Harry had never even been in his room.

Uncle Vernon quickly left for work, swinging his suitcase importantly and fiddling with his tie and Aunt Petunia made him clear away the breakfast table while she took Dudley his breakfast, a dinner tray loaded down with the full English breakfast swimming on so much grease Harry was surprised he didn't need a spoon to eat it.

Harry was just doing the washing up when he caught sight of Tonks walking past the fence at the bottom of the garden disguised as a middle-aged woman. She gave him a cheery wave and after a few moments, he gave her a half-hearted nod of the head, the smile slipped off her face and she gave him a worried look.

"I don't want you under my feet today do you hear me?" came his Aunt's piercing voice a few moments later right beside his ear making him jump, "I'm shampooing the carpets and I don't want you traipsing muck everywhere."

"Ok," sighed Harry, wiping his hands on the tea towel.

For a moment his aunt looked surprised he wasn't arguing with her as he would have done last year, but the expression was soon wiped off as she caught him looking outside still. Tonks had disappeared sharpish, but Harry was sure his Aunt knew who he was looking for, she must have realised the house was under constant watch. She turned her sour gaze to him, lips pursed tightly. He turned away silently and went upstairs moving quickly into action, he could hear his Aunt moving into the lounge and turning the hoover on, above the din Harry raced around, gathering supplies.

Just as he was diving into the recesses of the wardrobe, he heard a tapping at the window. He straightened up and looked out, suspicious to see an unfamiliar owl there. He pulled the letter off the bird's leg and let it drink from Hedwig's dish before scrutinising the letter - it was from Hermione.

Dear Harry,

I didn't really know how to write this letter, so I'll just say what's on my mind.

I'm very worried about you, we all are. The other day at Diagon Alley was a big shock I know, and I can understand why you thought what you did. But you shouldn't have left like that, we wouldn't have thought any less of you and we could have helped you get past it. That's why we're here you know, friends are supposed to support each other, good times and bad.

Please talk to me ok? Sirius's death has been hard for you I know, it's been hard for all of us. But we're going to get through it, together. We'll always stick by you, no matter what. Please write back and tell me you're ok,

Love Hermione

Harry dropped the letter to his knees, feeling torn between two conflicting emotions. He felt ashamed, that he was willing to give up Ron and Hermione to save himself, that he was going to leave them to their fate while he was going to get out. They didn't have the option of escaping now.

He also felt anger; anger at her words that it had been hard for all of them as if Sirius's death was affecting them in even a quarter as it was affecting him. They didn't know, they didn't understand what it was like. They had only ever had to duel for their lives once, once and they'd all escaped unhurt, they hadn't even been there - seen Sirius fall backwards. It's not like their parents had been taken away from them, it wasn't like they'd had to endure 16 years of the Dursley's, it wasn't as if they'd lost the closest thing they'd ever get to a father.

They couldn't even see Threstrals!

So how are they say they understand, how dare they been upset! They haven't seen anything yet!

Harry was suddenly aware he was scrunching up Hermione's letter in his shaking fist and he tried to release the pressure, unclenching his teeth and relaxing his shoulders. When he felt like he'd properly got his emotions under control he tossed the letter onto his desk and turned to survey the room.

He walked over to the window and fixed the nets of the curtain so that they obscured the view into the room, then placed his pillows and a couple of old school robes under his quilt, trying to make it look like a sleeping lump before dimming the lamp. Then he pulled on a pair of unaltered Dudley jeans and a few tee shirts, before pulling on another three jumpers. He was getting uncomfortably hot as he picked up his dress robes and shoved them under his jumpers.

He regarded himself critically in the mirror - he didn't look fat, he just looked lumpy. Looking around the room thoughtfully he had a sudden idea, diving into the wardrobe and pulling out a black coat. After throwing it on he looked much more natural, all that was left was to pull a woolly hat over his black hair.

Feeling quite proud of himself, Harry folded a few notes of muggle money into his pocket and crept out onto the landing, backpack on shoulders.

In a sudden flash of inspiration, he headed towards the room when Dudley was lying comatose, intent on getting something he could carry to make him look definitely muggle; a walkman perhaps.

He pushed the door open silently and looked inside, Dudley was asleep, the snoring was a testament to that. He stayed on the threshold, looking around the room, it was crammed with gadgets and clothes, CDs lay all over what was probably meant to be a desk, clothes across the floor and a stack of videos and DVDs almost as tall as he was stood in one corner. He almost forgot what he came for in light of so much stuff, how could one person own so much junk he wondered vaguely. He looked around for Dudley's walkman before his eyes clapped on something much, much better.

His mobile phone.

Harry reached in and silently removed it from the stand, shutting the door and slipping it into his pocket self-consciously. He liked the feeling of weight as it lay in his pocket he decided before leaning over the bannister and listening to his Aunt. The noise would be more than enough to cover his exit and he began to feel the familiar rush of excitement his adventures used to give him as he crept stealthily down the stairs.

When he got to the front door, he pulled his woolly hat down over his forehead, tucked in his hair and pulled off his glasses, stowing them in his pocket. He glanced into the mirror in the hall, smiling at how ridiculous he looked, exactly like Dudley.

With a gulp he reached towards the door handle, expecting a shrill scream at any moment of his aunt or the crack of an apparating Order member who'd been spying on him. The door swung open and there was nothing, he stepped across the threshold, nothing. He passed the garden fence, onto Privet Drive before heading down Wisteria Walk - nothing.

He was about to congratulate himself on a job well done when he became aware of a set of footfalls behind him. His heart sped up, but he continued of his way, concentrating on mimicking Dudley's rolling gait, kicking a coca-cola can along for a bit before slipping out the mobile phone. He pretended to dial a number and began chatting quietly to the silent phone.

As soon as he reached the bus stop, he leant nonchalantly against the shelter and checked the coast, it was clear. He could see Tonks middle-aged woman walking back towards the house and the Number 93 bus coming into view.

All around him the old ladies were pulling out their bus passes, slowly pulling themselves out of the seats and waving their arms hopefully at the bus, which pulled into the bay. Harry let them all get on first before stepping on. He'd never caught a muggle bus before, Aunt Petunia always turned her nose up at public transport that was used by those 'common working-class types', so it was time for a bit of guesswork.

"Are you heading into town?" he asked the bus driver in his best impersonation of a local teenager like those of Dudley's gang.

"Isn't that what the sign says?" asked the old man grumpily, grimacing at Harry.

"Return please," he said, holding his breath.

The man punched a few numbers into his machine and out popped a ticket.

"Two ten," said the guy and Harry pulled out a five-pound note and slapped it on the tray.

"Have you not got the change?" asked the man as Harry shook his head, "Fine, fine..."

He grumbled away, counting out Harry's change purposefully slowly and Harry tried to check it, squinting through his bad eyes wishing he could put his glasses back on.

He finally walked down the aisle and the driver sped off, leaving Harry to career down the bus and fall into his seat with a thump. The girl who was sitting next to him gave him an evil glare and tried to shuffle along. Harry gave her an apologetic smile before settling back.

If his memory served him it would take about twenty minutes to get into town from where they were, so he waited another ten minutes before he dared to dismantle his disguise.

He pulled off the stupid woolly hat, his hair falling everywhere, even more out of control than usual. He pushed it into the backpack, before putting his glasses back on, allowing the world to flood back into focus. After unzipping his jacket, he began to take the jumpers off, stuffing them all into the bag until he could breathe more easily.

"Cold out?" asked the girl next to him suddenly.

Harry looked at her for a few seconds, surprised she was talking to him, before realising he should perhaps answer back.

"Warmer than I thought," he replied, throwing the scarf into the bag.

"You looked ready for the Antarctic," she said, looking friendlier than when he'd first boarded the bus.

"Yeah well, you know the English weather," he shrugged, and she laughed.

He turned back to the bag, forcing everything in and zipping it up, trying to look around and figure out where he was. Dudley's phone went off twice, but Harry left it alone for fear of deleting some important message that would give his robbery of it away.

After another few minutes, he became aware that the girl was watching him closely when he wasn't looking, and he felt the first prickle of suspicion. This went on for another few minutes before he turned to her and gave her a challenging look.

"Sorry," she said instantly but still staring at him, "but I feel like I know you from somewhere."

The suspicion turned to anxiety now; she knew him. She must be from a magical family, a Daily Prophet reader maybe. He tried to flatten his fringe against his forehead and the girl watched him, clearly thoughtful. Her eyes followed his movements until her face suddenly lit up in recognition and Harry's heart sank.

"Is it...Harry?" she said, sounding shocked, "Harry Potter, right?"

He thought about denying it, but she'd seen his scar and you couldn't mistake that. He looked around desperately; his plan had crashed to the ground at the first hurdle; so much for incognito.

"Yeah, that's right," he said slowly, getting ready to have to stop whatever she was going to say next.

"It's me, Kitty," she said, hand on her chest, "Catherine Earl, remember? We went are St Paul's; I used to put glue in your hair in crafts?"

It was Harry's turn to study her closely now, as his memory served up the image of a young girl at his primary school. Kitty had changed beyond all recognition in the intervening years. She had wild dark hair, which was twisted into dreadlocks and piled into an ungainly bun on top of her head and was regarding him with electric blue eyes alight with excitement.

He guessed he ought to say something and tried to get his brain back into gear.

"I thought you moved away to Birmingham or something?" he asked her in confusion.

"Yeah, I went with my mom when my parents divorced," she explained, grinning widely at the encounter, "but she was offered a job in America, so I'm staying with my aunt for a while now."

"Wow," said Harry, feeling quite speechless at this blast from the past, "I can't believe I bumped into you. Small world."

"Tell me about it, I haven't seen you for like 8 years or something," she said excitedly, before realising how she sounded, "What have you been doing with yourself? Stonewall I guess?"

"No, got packed off to boarding school," he explained, a pang in his heart as he thought about Hogwarts.

"Oh really? Bad luck man. You lived with your prick cousin Dudley, right?" she had a frown on her face now and Harry couldn't help smile dryly.

"Yeah, it was a blessing really, I hated living here and my school's brilliant," he explained, feeling the knife twist in his heart a little more.

Hogwarts, once the shelter from the pain of living with the Dursley's now only reminded him of even worse times. Nothing good had ever come from living there, only near-death experiences and loss.

"Well it's Stonewall for me now I guess," she said, not a trace of enthusiasm left in her voice now, "I'll have to retake my GCSE modules from last year; flunked out of my old school."

"Oh, sorry to hear that," said Harry, feeling sorry to think of anyone being stuck in a hellhole like Stonewall, "I'm not going back to my school this year either."

"Oh no, why not?" she asked him.

Harry racked his brains trying to think of a way he could dig himself out of the hole he'd just created for himself as she regarded him curiously.

"Ran out of money," he blurted out, before testing the theory in his head and liking it, "the fees are too high."

"Really?" she asked, "So what are you gonna do now?"

Harry shrugged and she frowned slightly, before dropping it. He was silent for a few moments, he'd told her a lot more than he'd intended to, or than was smart to, and she obviously sensed something strange was going on.

"Hey, do you want to go get a McDonalds or something when we get into town? You know, catch up or whatever?" she asked him suddenly.

He had every intention of saying no, he didn't have the time and he'd already made too many mistakes but found his mouth replying quicker than he could stop himself.

"Brilliant," she said, looking quite relieved, "Hey look, here's our stop."

Harry stepped off the bus and walked towards the town centre with Kitty whose sunny disposition seemed to blot out some of the pain he was carrying around with him. While they ate their McDonald and she rambled on about things Harry had no clue about like music and films he tried to figure out what it was. Why was being with this stranger making the loss of Sirius a little easier to handle, and his plan a little more realistic?

He finally realised that maybe it was because she was a stranger. She had no connection to the magical world, she knew him only as Harry Potter, the boy who sat next to me in crafts when we were little, rather than Harry Potter; Boy-Who-Lived, Gryffindor Seeker, Nutcase. Everyone he cared about now was so intricately woven into this mass of pain, of war and evil that it had become part of their everyday life, there wasn't one person he knew who wasn't connected to Voldemort in some way now. And here was Kitty, sitting in the middle of a fast-food restaurant chatting about how she much preferred horror movies to comedy.

"Anyone can slip on a banana peel and make it look amusing, can't they? What's that got to do with real life?"

He wanted to just tell her how lucky she was, shake her and tell her he wished more than anything he could have had her life free of horror, that Voldemort would be nothing more than an odd name to him, that his apparent destiny wasn't to be a murderer.

Harry's stomach gave a horrible lurch and for a second he thought he was going to lose his McChicken sandwich. He tried never to think about the Prophecy, but when he did it made him sick to his stomach because whenever he thought of that, he thought of the Department of Mysteries, the Veil, Sirius...

"Hey, Harry? You ok?" came Kitty's voice, breaking him from his reverie.

"What?" he asked, feeling slightly spaced, "Yeah, sure, I'm fine."

"You just looked a bit upset?" she asked, before noticing his expression.

She picked up the box her meal came in and pulled something out, regarding it critically.

"Ok, so I know it looks slightly like some kind of innocent woodland animal that got mangled in a paint factory, but I'm reliably informed that it's some kind of child's toy," she said handing it to him, "may it give you happy dreams."

Harry grinned as he took the toy and studied it for a few seconds.

"That is quite horrifying," he said as she began to giggle, "If I was given that as a child I'd be scarred for life! No one has ever given me something so terrifying before, thanks."

"No problem," she laughed, "glad I can keep the therapists of our fine country in work."

Harry gave the first genuine laugh he'd felt for many weeks as he watched Kitty trying to chase the last of her milkshake out of the cup with the straw with loud slurps. She looked over to him with a mischievous smile that put him in mind of the twins, and he couldn't help but grin back. He tried to think of the last time he'd done something so normal, so light-hearted, without having to worry about guards or protecting himself or possible attacks.

He didn't think it'd ever happened to him before.

"So, what's your plan for the day?" she asked him, plucking the toy lightly from his fingers and beginning to mess around with it.

"New eyes," said Harry, laughing at the way she gaped.

"What?"

"Contacts," he replied rolling his eyes, "sick of these things."

He pushed his glasses up his nose slightly and took a sip of his drink.

"You wouldn't be you without your glasses though Harry," she said with a smile, "that and that hair of yours."

"Exactly," he said, popping a chip into his mouth.

"Tonks, can you hear me?"

Tonks smiled to herself and lifted her inner wrist to her mouth, "Loud and clear, sneak up on me why don't you?"

"What's happened over there?" barked the voice again, obviously not in any mood for chit chat.

"Harry's been in the kitchen, got some breakfast, ate it in his room, then went back to sleep," she said in a bored sounding voice, staring at Harry's window which was still dark.

"Again? That boy is so lazy, if I were in charge of him, I'd have him-" began the gruff voice before Tonks cut him off.

"What Moody, have him doing stretches?" she asked.

He gave a mutter of irritation that sounded distinctly like 'subordination', but he didn't continue with his rant.

"Any visitors to the house?" he began again.

"Milkman at 8 am, postman at 9 am," she said, peering through the bushes again, "Dursley left at 8.30 am. Aunt's washing the carpets and Dudley's gone a-waddling down the street to catch a bus; I think he must be in town."

"Right," said Moody, apparently satisfied with her thoroughness but irritated that he didn't have anything to reprimand her on, "keep up the good work. Report back to HQ as soon as you've finished."

"Aye aye captain," muttered Tonks into her wrist, causing Moody to mutter even more before she closed the connection.

She shifted the cloak around her shoulders and tried to find a comfier patch of dirt, performing another quick sweep of the area for magical signatures. Nothing but Dumbledore's charms on the house, the guard at the front and Mrs Figg's background hum from her various gadgets and gizmos in her house.

Tonks sighed deeply; she'd almost wish for a bit of action if it meant she could get up and rub some life back into her numb bum.

The McDonalds ended sooner than Harry found himself wanting, and they headed out onto the High Street. It was thronged with crowds of shoppers and Harry turned to face Kitty, aware this was probably goodbye.

"So," he began awkwardly, shifting his bag on his should

"So indeed. I'm off to see a man about a dog," she said with a grin, looking around the crowds, "I guess this is it; the last waltz, the big goodbye."

"I guess so," said Harry, feeling almost sad about it.

"Let's not let it be another eight years eh?" she laughed, "God, we'll be like, 23 then; scary thought."

"Yeah," he agreed, the sudden painful thought coming to him that he probably wouldn't even live to see that birthday.

"So, see you around Harry," she said, surprising him by pulling him into a quick hug.

"See you around Kitty," he replied, watching her turn away and wander off into the crowd.

He stood rooted to the spot, watching her crazy hair bob and weave out of sight with an unnamed feeling coming over him. The darkness and pain that seemed to have disappeared during the time he'd been with her was returning.

Harry sighed and turned away thinking about everything he'd told her; that he wouldn't be going back to school this year. He never wanted to go back. Hogwarts was no longer the home he could get lost in, marvelling at the magic of the place as the suits of armour wandered round and the paintings insulted you. No, now Hogwarts seemed to him to be a prison, looming ahead of him, a place he'd be dragged back to, put through all manner of humiliations and tests, taught to fight.

He knew that Dumbledore would be preparing him for the destiny the prophecy had in store for him and he didn't want it; there was no way he could fight against the Dark Lord, he'd seen him battle with Dumbledore in the Ministry of Magic and he couldn't compare to that.

"Big Issue mate?" came a voice next to him and Harry startled.

"Sorry?" he said, looking at the man who had a magazine thrust in front of his face and a small mangy dog at his ankles.

"Big Issue? £1.20 to help the homeless?" asked the guy, grinning through his magnificent beard that reminded Harry of Hagrid.

"Oh sure," said Harry quickly, digging into his pocket.

"You're a gentleman and a saint," said the guy, doffing his hat and handing Harry the magazine.

Harry wandered away, looking from the magazine to the man; was that how he was going to end up? Dressed in battered clothes selling magazines on the street for a living, some small dog all he would have for company?

He shook his head from the thoughts when he saw a large, clinical looking shop on the corner called 'Specsavers' and headed towards it, squaring his shoulders slightly. Once inside, he booked an appointment in an hour and wandered back into town.

He looked around, feeling slightly lost, never having been shopping here before. He decided to wander down the main street for a while and see what took his fancy.

The first shop he went into was camping shop called 'Millets' where he wandered around with a basket, picking up a waterproof coat, small sleeping bag, Swiss army knife, thermos flask and a torch. He was quite tempted by the pop-up tent but had a sudden image of sitting in the middle of some random street in London in his tent while the business people walked past and decided against it.

In one cabinet he saw a range of hunting knives and again was tempted to buy one; he'd need some sort of protection if he'd be travelling and unable to perform magic. However, there was a small sign on the glass that demanded identification to prove you were over 16; muggle identification Harry didn't have so he forgot about it.

In the queue, he was sandwiched in between a young couple who were buying the tent he'd seen, and a man that stank of mildewed clothes and asked him incessantly if he'd ever hunted and skinned a rabbit before.

Next stop was a small market where the stalls were crammed with random, overpriced rubbish. However, the bag stall came in handy and he got himself a deep rucksack and he came across a small, dodgy-looking weapons stall that didn't bother asking for identification when he purchased a knife from them. He severely doubted he'd ever actually be able to use it against someone, but it never hurt to have something threatening at hand.

The time had come for his appointment and he headed back to the shop, laden with shopping and unconsciously scanning the crowds for the brown and blonde dreadlocked hair. He didn't see her again though and he trudged into the shop, waiting on a squeaky leather seat to be called through.

The eye test took about ten minutes as Harry was fitted with various bizarre-looking contraptions which lenses of different strengths were placed into, as he read our glowing letters on the wall.

"Your vision seems to have declined slightly since your last visit to us... eight years ago?" asked the man incredulously, consulting his notes and looking over to Harry, obviously demanding an explanation.

"Oh really?" he asked innocently, "I never realised otherwise I'd have come back."

"Indeed, you should keep regular check-ups," reprimanded the man, before examine Harry's glasses, "you seem to have kept them in excellent condition though."

Harry wanted to see the man's face if he was told that it was five years' worth of repairing charms that were the reason, not his careful use of them.

"So, you want contacts then?" asked the doctor, reaching for a prescription pad, "well I'm glad to say that that will be possible with your prescription. If you come back in four days, I'll get the reception to give you an appointment, and we'll fit them for you and show you how to clean them."

"Excellent," said Harry, feeling immensely pleased with himself, "could I just ask if it would possible to get them tinted a different colour? I saw in a magazine somewhere that was possible?"

"Of course," said the man, not interested at all why Harry might have wanted that, "just have a look at this chart and pick your colour, we've also got several designs you might like; spirals, snakes eyes, St George's flags, Union Jacks, pure white, red."

Harry's heart gave a lurch of fear. Red eyes? Snakes eyes? In his mind, he could vividly see those evil red eyes staring back at him through the gloom of the department of Mysteries and he shuddered.

"Just brown, thanks," he said in a tight voice, aware he could feel his heart thundering.

"Great. Take this through to the reception and I'll see you in a few days," said the man, handing him a piece of paper and waving him to the door.

Harry gave his thanks and organised a second appointment, wondering wildly if he'd even be able to make it back outside for a second time.

His great adventure outdoors was officially over, he had to get back before Aunt Petunia realised he was gone. It wouldn't be such a big problem if she did, she didn't know he wasn't allowed out this year, but he just didn't want to mention it to the Order members; there would be awkward questions.

When he got to the bus stop, he scanned the waiting queue, feeling quite saddened when he saw Kitty wasn't there before shaking himself slightly; what was wrong with him? He was getting so easily distracted by someone he hadn't seen for eight years, known for about five only vaguely and whom he'd spoken to for about an hour today? Despite this he spent the rest of the time wondering whether she was living anywhere close; maybe he'd see her around Little Whinging?

He reassembled his disguise slowly, jumping off the bus and heading towards home, noting with dismay he couldn't find today's guard, whoever it was, they were sure well hidden.

He re-entered the house with no problem and managed to sneak past Aunt Petunia, who was preparing a chicken in the kitchen, to get up to his room. He prised the floorboards away from his secret hiding place and put all his new things into it and climbed onto the bed.

He lay there for a few hours until he heard Uncle Vernon come home and the noise level increased with dinner being prepared and the TV blaring away, then made a big show of getting up, standing in full view of the window so his guard could see he'd just risen.

He moved over to his school trunk and pulled out a small cloth bag whose contents tinkled as he lay it on the desk. He pulled the wooden board he'd salvaged from the shed towards him and the tube of superglue he'd stolen from the kitchen before tipping out the content of the bag onto it.

Hundreds of tiny shards of glass littered the surface and Harry squared his shoulders, pulling the biggest piece out. He examined his reflection in the dirty mirrored surface of it for a few seconds, before flipping it over, the words 'in yours. Jame' was clearly visible written on the back. He placed it in the centre of the wooden board and began to search the other pieces for the 's and I used' piece.

He let his fingers work away as he went into autopilot, as he thought about the mirror and how stupid he had been. He had been so sure he was protecting Sirius by not looking into the package he had been given at Christmas; but obviously not. This would have been the only thing that could have saved him.

If only he'd looked into the mirror and not spoken to that traitorous Kreacher, if only he had known Snape had checked on his Godfather, if only he didn't have a stupid 'saving people thing'. The pain of all the missed opportunities was more than he could bear, they felt like they were suffocating him where he sat.

After an hour or so had passed he sat back and looked at his progress, 'need to speak to me'...'just say'...'James and I used'...Almost half the inscription was there now. His throat tightened slightly as he became to rearrange the letters, hoping to make more sentences, his fingers shaking at the one that he had created.

If you need...just say my name...speak to me...I'll be able...to...appear...