Slytherin common room, Hogwarts, 18th November 1991 (Monday)

"How was Founder's day?" asked Sally.

"Pretty good. We had a lot of music, dancing and ten times more food than at the welcoming feast. I would have preferred if Mrs. Jackson didn't strip down to her underwear while dancing on the cake table, but Sir Harold found it funny and no one wanted to interrupt his fun."

Harry ignored the confused look of his friends, pulling out a few things from his bag.

"I didn't have a lot of options when it came to gifts, but I managed to grab something for you. I hope you find something you like."

Theo's hands immediately darted towards a small pile of Action Bill's Danger Squad comics, eagerly opening them and started reading.

Sally and Daphne got their hands on a few Pangloss cosmetics Harry had absent-mindedly shoved in his bag. He had absolutely no idea what those things were, but he knew girls liked them, so he hoped his two friends would too. He saved up an old religious book about the Triatic Wyrm for Hermione: with the girl's passion for reading, he had to give her a book, and this one was pretty much the only one available.

"You said Sir Harold was there? My parents would like to meet him." commented Theo.

"I can ask, but he's pretty busy. I know he's going to meet minister Fudge for Christmas, so it'll probably have to be next year."

Theo nodded, returning his attention toward his comics.

"How does Sir Harold look like, by the way? Do you have a picture?"

"No pictures, sorry. Apart from a large burn scar on his left eye, I'd say he looks pretty normal. Short brown/black hair… oh! He's got red eyes that glow every time he uses Passion."

"Passion?" asked Sally, pocketing a bright red lipstick.

Harry shrugged. "It's a… thing sir Harold's clan can do. He taught me the basics to help with our research, but it's really difficult to use."

"He has bloodline magic? I thought he was a muggle." asked Daphne, her attention peaking.

Harry almost laughed.

"I can assure you Daphne, Sir Harold is not a muggle. He calls himself a Malkavian, whatever that's supposed to mean."

The trio nodded, not really understanding but determined to ask their parents about it.

"So, what does this 'Passion' thing do?"

"Either amplify or dull the emotions. He told me that if we can get Hagrid in a mood to talk about cerberi, with this we can learn about them without needing the Magizoology books. Or we can convince a seventh year that's in a generous mood to let us borrow her own book. That is, assuming I get it to work."

"Interesting. Can you teach us?" asked Sally.

Harry stared at her in concentration. After a few moments, one of his eyes flashed red for a split second.

"Do you still want to learn?" asked Harry.

"More than before." confirmed Sally.

"Dammit! That was supposed to dull your curiosity, not increase it! - He sighed. - Let me learn how to use it first."

Manhattan Valley, New York, 25th December (Wednesday)

Cornelius Fudge was patiently waiting to finally meet with this mysterious Sir Harold Zettler. He looked out of the window, admiring the majestic view of the muggle city before dawn. While he wasn't the type to simply sit idly by and wait to be summoned, Sir Harold's 'practical joke', as his secretary had eloquently put it, had shown that the man was more than willing to spend tens of thousands of Galleons just to make his annoyance known. Someone willing to toss away that amount of money wasn't to be taken lightly and after he had spent an entire afternoon alternating between signing receipt and swearing he would remove the ban on Self-Writing Quill within the ministry he didn't really wish to learn the extent of the man's pettiness.

After a moment, a pair of glass doors disappeared into the wall as a mechanical voice called.

"Minister Fudge, Sir Harold Zettler is ready to receive you."

Fudge got up and marched in the room. If nothing else, this meeting had given him the inspiration for his own office in London. The idea of automatic doors was genius and not even that complicated to do. A simple rune with the Alohomora spell would suffice, he just needed a way for the rune to differentiate between people who could enter and people who could not. Probably something to ask one of the Unspeakables, they were good with runes, right?

As he stepped into the office, Cornelius's musings were interrupted by the grandiosity of the office. While the rest of the building was dominated by the steel and glass aesthetic that was so popular with today's muggles, Sir Harold's office was entirely made out of stone, a single, massive block intricately carved to offer a large room, almost as large as his own office in Britain, with multiple rows of rack and a massive desk. The racks contained all sorts of paraphernalia, from modern muggle binders to ancient tomes brimming with magic, from a terrifying witch hunter uniform looking like it came straight from the infamous Salem witch trials to a german doctor uniform from the Nazi period, swastika and all, all the way to jar of pickled eyeballs that seemed to follow the man with every step he took.

Fudge slowed down, with the realization that the man currently staring him down, his devilish grin displaying long fangs and blazing red eyes digging deep into his soul, was most certainly not the muggle he had expected him to be.

Before Fudge had the chance to do anything, the man had moved with otherworldly speed, traversing the entirety of the office to stand in front of him, finger pointed at his forehead. Fudge's eyes turned white as the vampire spoke.

"You have never met me before. But from now on, you will know that I was the one to shill out for your election campaign. You owe me your title and your whole career, minister Fudge."

Cornelius' eyes returned to their normal brown as he smiled at the vampire.

"Sir Zettler! I'm so happy to meet you again after so long. I wish I had brought a present to thank you once again for your electoral contribution, but I must have misplaced it. I hope this little mistake on my part won't compromise your support for my upcoming re-election."

Sir Zettler smiled. This could prove to be entertaining.

Great Hall, Hogwarts, 25th December (Wednesday)

Hogwarts woke to find itself covered in several feet of snow. The lake froze solid and the light illuminating the Slytherin dormitories and common room was suddenly much dimmer. The few owls that managed to battle their way through the stormy sky to deliver mail, with the notable exception of Harry's owl, had to be nursed back to health by Hagrid before they could fly again.

No one could wait for the holidays to start. While the Slytherin common room and the Great Hall had roaring fires, the drafty corridors had become icy and a bitter wind rattled the windows in the classrooms.

Worst of all were Professor Snape's classes, where their breath rose in a mist before them and they kept as close as possible to their hot cauldrons. The man had refused to heat up the room, citing that 'cold builds character'. Harry had smiled, since it was the same thing that Instructor David said whenever they had to run around in the snow.

The majority of the students, a list that included Theo, Daphne, Sally, Blaise and Hermione, had left the castle two days before to spend Christmas, or Yule as Theo and Daphne insisted to call the holiday, with their family. Since Christmas wasn't a recognized holiday in the religion of the Triatic Wyrm, Harry had nothing to go back to celebrate and with Samuel off to Mongolia for Sir Harold's secret project, he didn't really feel like going back to Park Royal.

Harry was spending a lot of time either in the library, reading up some of the more obscure books available to first year students or practicing his Passion. Sir Harold had suggested using snakes, but since dangerous or poisonous pets were only allowed to students of third year or older, he had instead sent Harry a couple of rats and told Harry to practice reducing their feeling of hunger.

Since the number of students was so slim, they had all opted to move to the same table, where Harry had been introduced to Ron's horrible eating habits. Although he had to admit that with the amount of times the Weasley twins had tried to either spike his food or steal from his plate, it was probably a habit born out of necessity rather than a lack of proper manners.

Regardless, the younger of the Weasley had proven to be a surprisingly good chess player, and was currently beating Harry 7-1. Which, if the current game was anything to go by, would soon be 8-1.

"Got anything from Christmas, Harry?"

"We don't celebrate Christmas, Ron. I was out of Hogwarts on the 17th of November for Founder's day, remember?"

"Yeah, I know that. But didn't anyone send you a gift or something?"

Harry shook his head.

"They said they'll give me something in person when they get back to school."

"Have you at least checked the fireplace in the common room?"

Harry raised an eyebrow, moving his pawn in the wrong spot and opening a road for Ron's tower to take his queen.

"You know you don't need to distract me to win, right?"

Ron snorted.

"Nah, mate. Mom said she'd send you a gift as a thank you. For the Troll incident, ya know?"

"Well. - Harry tilted his king, surrendering the game - I might as well go check out. Wanna come?"

Ron paled.

"In the Slytherin's common room? Am I even allowed in?"

"Of course not. Do you know where I put my weights?"

"Yeah. Fred and George told me about it."

As Ron packed up his chess set, Harry waltzed back to the Slytherin common room where, to his surprise, there were actually three packages addressed to him.

When Harry and Ron met up, the Weasley snorted, pointing at a very lumpy pink parcel.

"My mom's. I told her you didn't … oh, no - he groaned, as Harry opened it up to reveal a thick, hand-knitted sweater in emerald green and a large box of homemade fudge - she's made you a Weasley sweater. Every year she makes us a sweater and mine's always maroon."

said Ron, pointing at his own.

"That's really nice of her." said Harry, trying the fudge.

His next present also contained candy: a large box of Chocolate Frogs from Hermione.

This only left one exceedingly light parcel. He unwrapped it. Something silvery gray sloshed to the floor where it lay in gleaming folds. Ron gasped.

"I've heard of those - he said in a hushed voice - If that's what I think it is… they're really rare, and really valuable."

"What is it?"

Harry picked the shining, silvery cloth off the floor. It was strange to the touch, like water woven into a solid state.

"I think it's an invisibility cloak." said Ron, a look of awe on his face.

Harry threw the cloak around his shoulders and Ron gave a yell.

"It is! Look down!"

Harry looked down at his feet, but they were gone. He dashed to the only mirror in the room. Sure enough, his reflection looked back at him, just his head suspended in midair, his body completely invisible. He pulled the cloak over his head and his reflection vanished completely. Impressed, Harry folded the cloak, only then noticing a note pinned to it.

Your father left this in my possession before he died.

It is time it was returned to you.

Use it well.

A Very Merry Christmas to you.

Harry turned the note, but he could find no signature.

"I'd give anything for one of these" said Ron with starry eyes, before spotting the note

"What's the matter?"

Before he could say or think anything, the door was flung open by Fred and George Weasley.

"Merry Christmas!"

"Hey, look! Harry's got a Weasley sweater, too!"

Fred and George were wearing blue sweaters, one with a large yellow F on it, the other a G.

"Harry's is better than ours, though."

"She obviously makes more of an effort if you're not family."

"What are you two doing here?" asked Ron

"We overheard you."

"And we were curious."

"About the gifts that Harry Potter."

"The Malfoy puncher."

"The good Slytherin."

"Got from mom."

Harry raised an eyebrow "The Malfoy puncher?"

"You like it?"

"If you want to have a list."

"With all of your accomplishments."

"You gotta start from the most important."

Harry sighed. "Sure, I guess. If you don't mind, I'll put these away and then we can go back to the Great Hall."

Manhattan Valley, New York, 20th January 1992 (Sunday)

Sir Harold Zettler placed Harry's Invisibility cloak back into the boy's package. He had to all but bribe Harry with a booklet full of his personal tricks and discoveries on Dementation in exchange for the item, but as it turned out, the trade hadn't been worth it at all. Not that he minded Harry learning a few more tricks for his Discipline, but it was the principle of the thing!

He analyzed the items, using both mundane as well as supernatural means, but the results had been… disappointingly useless. The item seemed to defy logic: despite its obvious magical nature, none of the tests showed it to be anything more than a cloth weaved from spider silk, aciniform silk from a Argiope picta type of spider to be precise, and anything done to identify the magic that made it work failed to spot a single spell, or even an inkling of magic. While the fabric itself was highly unusual, it was nothing he himself couldn't get his hands on if he really wanted to.

Frustratingly, it also seemed to be completely different from other Invisibility capes, which he discovered were usually crafted from the hair of a Demiguise, a magical creature native to Korea, Japan and the eastern regions of China, and were empowered with Disillusionment Charms and Bedazzling Hexes.

Having abandoned the idea of replicating Harry's unique cape, Zettler had instead opted to replicate those ones, but after a relatively short research had revealed that Demiguise were not only on the verge of extinction, but also notoriously difficult to catch, the vampire's vision of an invisible First Strike team fizzle away.

Ghouling the entire team and forcing all of them to master Obfuscate, would be more cost-effective.

With a deep sigh, the vampire leaned against his chair. While this particular line of exploration had failed spectacularly, at the very least the first steps to subtly integrate wizarding Britain into Pentex were proceeding rather smoothly. If his market projections were accurate, and they almost always were, within a couple of years this new subsidiary would expand into the other wizarding nations and, due to the highly specialized nature of that work, will have a dedicated class in every wizarding school before the end of the century, allowing a Pentex employee to start his work on impressionable children.

If you want to indoctrinate people, after all, you gotta start doing it when they're kids.

Diagon Alley, London, 12th March 1992 (Thursday)

News about the new shop were making waves across Diagon Alley. Someone had bought the old dusty building at the corner with Knockturn Alley and completely wrapped it up in some kind of painted over cloth, with no indication about what they were going to sell except the mysterious sentence plastered in giant letters across the building:

Bringing magic to the 21st century.

No one was really sure what that was supposed to mean, but everyone seemed to have their own idea. Some said it was an alchemy shop. Others a library. Some were sure it was a clothing shop and that was why they wrapped the building in cloth. Some even said it was a new bank.

Arthur Weasley ignored all of them, apparating inside the half demolished building just as the workers were taking a coffee break.

A coffee machine had been one of the first things the crew had installed, and one of the first things that Arthur had to familiarize himself with. The thing it produced, Arthur refused to call that slob 'coffee', was vile but the workers seemed to like it.

"G'day Arthur. Here to inspect the new merchandise?"

Arthur had been working with this construction crew for about a week by now, and their team leader was something he'd never get used to seeing. Barnaby Jackson was a giant of a man, almost as big as Hagrid, with enough muscles to lift a whole car with a single hand. He and the rest of the crew, between the gray skin, the pointed ears and the nose that looked more like a rhino's horn than anything else, made the entire group look like some kind of unknown magical creature rather than a human.

"You know how it is. Have to make sure everything is up to code. We can't have some wizard bewitching one of them and lose them among muggles."

"Yeah, yeah, you already explained it. We agreed to put that… How ya called it? Trace?"

"Something like the Trace. For a few years at least."

The man smiled, casually picking up an electric stove and handing it to the Weasley inspector.

"Wanna me to hold it up for ya?"

"Thank you, but that won't be necessary." said Arthur, waving his wand around and causing the stove to start floating.

"Ya know, that never ceases to amaze me. I thought me and me brothers were magical, but this… - he pointed at the floating stove - This is something else."

Arthur thanked the man and started his job.

Turns out, placing advanced tracking charm to an object with a spirit bonded to it wasn't an easy task. Neither was using any other magic on the object, if he had to be honest. On one hand, that made his job easier: since applying magic to them was a lot more complicated, it meant less bewitched objects. On the other hand, those objects that end up bewitched would need to be really powerful and were sure to cause a huge mess.

He absolutely needed to present his draft for the Muggle Protection Act before this shop opened.

Notes

Harry learns his Discipline! and surprise surprise... it's Dementation! Scary stuff

Zettler takes control! Dementation is one hell of a Discipline... I mean, you just saw the Sword of Malkav (Dementation 7) rewriting Fudge's memories!

Surprise! Harry's Invisibility Cloak is special! As if that wasn't blatently obvious already. Anyone wants to take a shot as to what are Hallows?

As Head of the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office, Arthur Weasley's whole job is to check 'muggle artifacts', he would be the perfect (and most likely the only one qualified to) check Power Potter's products before putting them up for sale, hence his inclusion

Meet Barnaby! He's going to be a recurring character and, as you might have guessed from the description, he is not human. Can you guess what he is?

Answering PM/Reviews

Animalism or Vicissitude? That's an... intersting set of Disciplines for a Malkavian to teach. Sure, Zettler has more than the standard Malkavian antitribu clan Disciplines of Auspex, Dementation, Obfuscate, but giving a non-Tzimisce Vicissitude doesn't feel right.
Now, if I had to give Hagrid a Discipline, I would 100000% give him Animalism, but that's besides the point.