Reactions: Year 1; Part 1

Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling. I do this purely for enjoyment.

Congratulations to my beta on his new, beautiful baby girl!! :)

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"Well, that was a bit of a rocky start," said Remus, a little more calm now that Hagrid had dealt some revenge on Vernon.

"Yep, now onto the Hogwarts years, kid!" said Sirius happily, but still curious to know about that jinxed broom...

Harry winced a little and wondered, 'Is it possible for me to get grounded over something that happened three years ago?'

--------Reactions: Year One; Part One----------

"Alright, so, um, should I start with when Hagrid and I went to Diagon Alley?" Harry asked with something akin to hopefulness in his voice. Nothing really important had happened at the Alley, but it would be better to lay off on the dangerous stuff until he absolutely had to.

"Sure, Harry," said Remus.

"I would have wanted to hear about it anyway. I've always wanted to see the look on your face when you saw something magical," Sirius said with a wistful smile.

Harry laughed and said, "Well, I was pretty surprised. I kept on looking everywhere, and I couldn't take my eyes off the goblins when we got to Gringotts."

"I bet," Sirius said, looking at his godson fondly.

Harry blushed slightly and continued, remembering that this was actually quite a pivotal point in the story. "Anyway, so Hagrid had the key to my vault, and we went down in the carts..."

"Were you scared?" Remus interrupted curiously. "I remember James telling me about his first time, and he said he was absolutely terrified, especially since there had been rumoured to be dragons there."

Sirius looked up sharply at that one. Apparently he had not heard about the dragons. "Harry, you didn't see any dragons, did you?" he asked, trying not to let his over-protectiveness get the better of him.

Harry looked as though he didn't know quite what to answer but settled with a, "No, I didn't see any dragons that day. Hagrid mentioned that he really wanted one, though," he added as an afterthought.

"He was the same when we were at school," Sirius recalled with a laugh, a lot calmer knowing that Harry had not been in any danger at Gringotts. "Thank goodness he never got one."

Harry winced slightly as he remembered a certain Norwegian Ridgeback that would appear later on in this story. He was not looking forward to the reactions of his guardians during that part at all.

"Um, anyway, so I went to my vault, and then we had to go to another vault because Hagrid had to pick something up for Dumbledore," Harry continued, wanting to get off the uncomfortable topic for now. Uncomfortable for him, that is. His two guardians were completely oblivious. Harry really wished he could keep it that way.

"What did he have to pick up?" Remus asked curiously.

"We didn't figure it out until ages afterwards," Harry answered. "It was Vault 713, and a top-security one too. But all Hagrid got out was this grubby little package, maybe about the size of a fist."

"Wait, so Hagrid didn't know what it was?" Sirius asked, confused.

"Yeah, of course he did," Harry answered, just as confused by his godfathers question.

"But then why did you say that 'we' didn't figure it out for ages," Sirius said.

"Oh, I was talking about me, Ron, and Hermione," said Harry, comprehension dawning. "But I'll get to that part later."

"Yes, your shopping adventures next," Remus said, leaning back in his chair and taking a sip from the cup of tea next to him.

"Not that much of an adventure, truth be told," Harry admitted. If only I could say the same for the rest of the year! he found himself thinking. "Um, we went to Madam Malkin's first where I met another guy in the same year as me."

"Make friends?" Remus asked.

"The kid was Draco Malfoy," Harry answered in disgust towards the blond.

"Never mind," was Remus' only response.

"Well, he let slip about Quidditch and some of the Houses, which I had no clue about back then of course," Harry continued. "But he reminded me so much of Dudley, acting like he was better than everyone else."

Sirius felt a surge of hatred towards Harry's so-called relatives.

"So what happened next," Remus asked, wanting to get out of dangerous territory. He was not about to let Padfoot go and hex Harry's relatives. Not without him there to help.

"Hagrid and I went for ice-cream where Hagrid enlightened me a little more about Quidditch and Hogwarts," Harry answered. "After that, we went and got my school supplies. Oh, and Hagrid gave me Hedwig, my first real birthday present," Harry added, his eyes glowing with happiness.

"Harry," Remus said with a raised eyebrow, "just what do you mean by 'your first real birthday present?'"

Harry instantly realized his mistake. How was he supposed to get out of this one without the result being his relatives grave bodily harm? "Well, what I meant was that Hedwig was the first gift that I actually liked."

"Why, what sort of gifts did you get beforehand?" Sirius asked with a raised eyebrow.

Harry mumbled something incoherently. At least it was supposed to be incoherent. Remus' enhanced werewolf senses meant that he was able to hear it. He narrowed his golden eyes and said, slightly coolly, "What do you mean they gave you socks on your birthday or just ignored it?"

"What?" Sirius said sharply.

Harry shied away slightly and said in a soft voice, "It really doesn't matter. The point is I got Hed...mmph!" The second part of his sentence was incomprehensible because Sirius had gotten up and crushed Harry in a hug.

"Um, Sirius?" came Harry's muffled voice from where his head was nestled in Sirius' strong chest.

Sirius drew back, muttering something about Muggles and Azkaban being too good for them with the way they had treated his precious godson.

"Sirius?" Harry said again, fearing for his godfather's sanity.

"Don't worry, Harry, I'm fine," Sirius said with false cheerfulness. He started fussing over the blanket again, as it had come loose while Sirius had been hugging (or suffocating, depending on the way you looked at it) Harry.

"Sirius, I'm fine," Harry objected after Sirius had been fiddling with the blanket for a good few minutes. "I'm not cold! If anything, I'm hot!"

That was really the wrong thing to say as Sirius immediately started feeling Harry's forehead for any sign of fever. "Honestly, I'm fine!" Harry half-begged, trying to get his godfather to stop fussing.

"Hmph," was Sirius' only response. It took at least five minutes for the dog Animagus to be satisfied that his godson was not sick and was not going to get cold. Sirius then went back to his own couch and made a mental note to completely spoil Harry come July 31st.

"Keep going, cub, I believe it's only your wand left," Remus said encouragingly.

"Oh, right, we went to Ollivanders after that, and I got my wand. Ollivander completely freaked me out though," Harry added as an afterthought.

"What do you mean, freaked you out?" Sirius said with a low growl.

Harry groaned almost imperceptibly. He loved living with Sirius and Remus a lot more than he did living with the Dursleys, but really, this protective thing was getting ridiculous! "He was just sort of scary," he said, rolling his eyes. "And he was really weird when he told me that my wand is the brother to Voldemort's."

Both Sirius and Remus looked disbelieving that this was why Harry had been 'freaked out', but let it go and nodded to show Harry to continue.

"So that was my first trip to Diagon Alley," Harry concluded that part of his story. Now came the hard parts.

"So, Hogwarts next!" Sirius exclaimed happily. After all, nothing too bad could have happened with Dumbledore there, right?

"Right. So obviously I stayed at the Dursleys for the rest of the summer, and they took me to King's Cross on the first of September," said Harry.

"That was kind of them," said Remus, sounding rather surprised.

Harry just nodded, not mentioning that the only reason they had taken him was because they had to go up to London anyway. That would just mean that his guardians would be hell bent on revenge... even more than they were now, that is.

"Yeah..." Harry said, trailing off slightly. "Anyway, I had absolutely no clue how to get onto the platform..." Here, he was interrupted once more.

"You mean Petunia didn't tell you? Because she was there when Lily was dropped off and walked through the barrier," Remus said; his eyes, flecks of gold evident in them, were narrowed.

"Uh, no," said Harry, wincing slightly. Unfortunately, Padfoot saw the wince and immediately thought that Harry was in some type of pain.

"You okay, Pronglet," he asked, getting over to Harry's part of the couch in less than a heartbeat. He felt Harry's forehead with his hand and added worriedly, "You seem a little hot."

"I'm fine," said Harry through gritted teeth.

"Anyway, so I ended up asking the Weasleys for help," Harry said loudly, hoping that the continuing of the story would stop Sirius from going about the cold. He shuddered (not literally. Sirius would probably give him about another five blankets if he thought Harry was cold) to think what would happen when they found out about the fact that he had been starved by the Dursleys.

"Did you know the Weasleys back then?" Remus asked curiously.

"No, I just ran into them, and I asked Mrs Weasley how to get onto the platform," Harry answered, "She was really nice about it."

"I bet Mrs Weasley just couldn't resist those big, innocent, green eyes and the..." Sirius rambled on fondly, making his godson blush.

"So!" Harry said loudly, making Remus laugh a little and Sirius stop his rambling about just how cute his godson must have been at eleven.

"I got onto the platform and, with some help from Fred and George, got my trunk into a carriage. Um, afterwards I sort of eavesdropped on the Weasleys," Harry continued, looking down at the last part.

He needn't have worried. Sirius' only reaction was, "My little marauder!" and a proud sniff.

Maybe that's the reaction I'll get when I get to the serious rule-breaking later on, Harry thought to himself hopefully. However, the other part of him said, With the amount of times you could have gotten killed? Not a chance.

"So, did you make any friends on the train?" Sirius asked.

"Uh, yeah," Harry said, snapping out of his previous thoughts. "Ron asked if we could share the compartment, and we ended up talking heaps and made fast friends."

"Did you have lots of chocolates and lollies?" Sirius asked mock sternly.

Harry laughed and answered, "Yes, Sirius, I had lots of stuff off the trolley."

"Good," said Sirius, satisfied.

"What about Hermione?" Remus prompted.

"Er, well, we met her," Harry admitted. "But she was acting all know-it-all, so Ron and I didn't really like her much. Not yet, anyway."

Sirius and Remus exchanged a knowing glance. The same had actually happened between James and Sirius as they hadn't bothered to look beyond the last name. That had changed when Sirius had been sorted into Gryffindor, and then when James had stood up for Sirius when a few Slytherins started to tease him because he was a 'blood-traitor'.

"Then when we got to Hogwarts – oh, no, wait, I forgot, Ron also mentioned that there had been a break-in at Gringotts," Harry added suddenly, having just remembered this fact.

"Wait, there was a break-in at Gringotts?" Sirius asked in surprise.

"Yes, I remember reading about that," Remus said, nodding. "Come to think of it, it was on your birthday, wasn't it?"

"Yeah, it was, but we didn't find that out till later," Harry said.

"So, you went on the boats with Hagrid up to the castle – wait, you didn't fall in, did you?" Sirius said, the first part casually, but the second part in what Harry had recently dubbed 'overprotective Padfoot voice'.

"No, Sirius," Harry said, rolling his eyes.

"Good," Sirius said, nodding.

"And then Professor McGonagall informed you about the Houses and gave her normal speech, right?" asked Remus.

"Yeah," said Harry. "Ron kept going on about having to fight a troll."

Remus tried (unsuccessfully) to stifle a snicker and said, "James and Sirius tried to do the same thing and ended up terrifying everybody."

"Says the one who said we were going to have to do magic and made everyone have nervous breakdowns," Sirius retorted.

"So, I'm guessing you were surprised when you found out about the Sorting Hat," Remus said, looking over at his surrogate nephew and completely ignoring what his best friend had just said.

"That's an understatement," Harry laughed. "Well, like you know, both Neville and Hermione got sorted into Gryffindor, and Malfoy into Slytherin."

Both of his guardians nodded, and Harry bit his lip, wondering how much to reveal about what the Sorting Hat had said to him.

After a pause, Remus said encouragingly, "Harry? Keep going, cub. What did the Sorting Hat say?"

"Well," Harry said, hesitating and biting his lip in worry.

"Come on, kiddo, Remus and I always want to hear what you've got to say," Sirius said, comfortingly.

"Um, well, the Hat sort of wanted to put me in Slytherin," Harry mumbled.

Sirius and Remus exchanged a look of surprise, and then Sirius went over and kneeled down in front of Harry so that they were eye to eye. "Hey, Pronglet, it doesn't matter if the Hat wanted to put you in Slytherin. Nothing would ever make me or Moony stop loving you. Even if you were a Death Eater, we would still love you. We would be mad at you, but we'd love you," he said sincerely, putting a finger under Harry's chin and using it to tip his godson's chin up so that Harry was looking him in the eyes.

Remus also came over and gave Harry a reassuring hug.

Harry smiled and, after a few seconds, drew back. Remus returned to one of the sofa's closer to Harry so that he would be close in case his cub needed more reassurance.

Sirius, on the other hand, stood up from his position in front of Harry and then sat down next to him on the couch with one arm around the boy.

"So, kiddo, you've been sorted! What's next?" Sirius asked cheerfully, but also inwardly vowing to curse whoever had made his godson so insecure.

Harry smiled and thought to himself, Maybe the protective guardians thing isn't that bad. No, wait, scratch that. Death defying stunts is next.

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