Disclaimer: I don't own the dystopic world of Harry Potter, where the government can imprison people without due process; JKR owns that. I also don't own the Dark Wizard Containment Act, rhyejess came up with that in the fic "Sirius Black: Innocent?" If someone can come up with a different but still appropriate name for that, I'll edit this chapter and give credit for the new name. Edit: My flash drive stopped working and while trying to reconstruct my files, I realized that Moody and Dumbledore were a bit OOC in the final scene; that combined with the new info on Pottermore about the Potter Family has led to my revising that scene slightly.

Chapter 1: The Boy-Who-Lived

Night enveloped the town of Godric's Hollow, the houses only dimly lit by the streetlamps. The still, quiet night was abruptly shattered when a motorcycle with a sidecar came tearing down a street, finally screeching to a halt in front of one of the houses. The rider, a dark-haired and grey-eyed main, practically leapt off and ran towards the house. His name was Sirius Black and he was a wizard.

"PRONGS!" Sirius called out, "PRONGS!" Then, as he got closer, he noticed that the front door had been blown off its hinges "Oh, no! NO!"

Sirius stopped suddenly when a veritable giant of a man emerged from the house, carrying a small bundle.

"Hagrid?" Sirius said, wondering how the half-giant had managed to get here so quickly; Sirius had tried apparating but had bounced off an anti-apparition spell, placed by whom he didn't know though he suspected Voldemort. That had forced him to use his motorcycle the rest of the way. There was no way that Hagrid, who didn't even know how to apparate, should have gotten here sooner, or for that matter even known to go here in the first place. Sirius only knew that something was up because he'd checked Pettigrew's hiding spot and found him missing with no signs of a struggle. Sirius had immediately tried to contact James—both by Patronus and by mirror—but had gotten no response. "What's happened? Are they—?"

"'fraid so, Sirius," Hagrid said, "Both Lily an' James are dead, only little Harry here survived."

Sirius felt like he'd been punched in the gut. "No..." he said softly and Hagrid wrapped an arm around Sirius as he mourned "No, they can't—this is my—no..." Sirius finally got ahold of himself and turned toward Harry, still peacefully sleeping. "Give Harry to me, Hagrid."

Hagrid pulled back. "I'm sorry, but I can't."

"I'm his godfather," Sirius protested, "It's my responsibility to take care of him."

"Professor Dumbledore says otherwise," Hagrid replied, "I'm to take Harry ter his muggle relatives."

"Petunia?" Sirius blinked. What was Dumbledore thinking? Sirius had only met her once, at Lily and James' wedding, but once was enough. "But why? She hates magic."

"I'm sorry, but I have my orders," Hagrid said. Sirius scowled. Lily and James' bodies hadn't even cooled yet and Dumbledore had already decided where Harry was going to live? That was…suspiciously fast, especially for Dumbledore. But there was no point in arguing with Hagrid for as far as the half-giant was concerned, Albus Dumbledore's word was gospel and woe to anyone who dared disagree. Sirius was guiltily aware that up until a few months ago both he and his wife Karen as well as Lily and James hadn't been all that different, but Dumbledore's recent hiring of Snape of all people to replace old Slughorn as Potions Master—coupled with his refusal to return the Potter Invisibility Cloak—had caused them to start questioning the headmaster's judgment. Those were the reasons, in fact, that they hadn't told him the truth about the Secret-Keeper situation.

"Go ahead and take my motorcycle, then," Sirius said, "I won't be needing it anymore."

Hagrid nodded, "Thank you, Sirius," he said, "I'll be sure to return it to you after I'm done."

After they were gone, Sirius turned and started walking. He didn't know exactly where Lily's relatives lived, but he did know the town; it shouldn't take him long to narrow it down. He sent a Patronus message off to his wife, Karen, to bring her up to speed and so she wouldn't get worried.

The following evening Sirius finally found Harry sleeping on the doorstep of Number Four Privet Drive, in Little Whinging. Sirius, who had watched in his animagus form as Dumbledore, McGonagall and Hagrid just abandoned the baby with a letter, changed back and hurried over after the others had left.

"Any last illusions I might have had about trusting you, Dumbledore," Sirius muttered to himself as he picked up the basket containing his sleeping godson, "are definitely gone now. How could you be this careless?"

Sirius spun his heel and apparated back home. Karen was waiting for him; she was a beautiful woman with long blonde hair and sea-blue eyes.

"You're finally back," she said, "I see you managed to convince Dumbledore."

Sirius shook his head and set the basket down on the kitchen table. Karen picked up Harry and began cuddling their godson. "Not...exactly."

"What do you mean?"

"Dumbledore," Sirius spat the name, "had Hagrid pick Harry up and then just abandoned him on the doorstep of Lily's muggle relatives."

"What?" Karen exclaimed, "he truly has lost his mind. What kind of a person abandons a baby on a doorstep? Especially at this time of year?"

"The same person who sees no problem with hiring a Death Eater to teach children." They both scowled at this.

The next morning after breakfast Sirius left to go rat hunting. After hours of searching, Sirius finally caught up with Wormtail on a muggle street near the Leaky Cauldron.

Sirius drew his wand and approached the traitor. "Did you really think you could hide from me, you rat!"

Wormtail looked briefly panicked for a moment but then he yelled out, "You're the traitor, you betrayed Lily and James." Sirius open his mouth but then was knocked off his feet when the street in front of him suddenly blew up. Sirius hit the ground awkwardly and felt his wand snap; he had finally managed to get back on his feet when a group of Ministry Hit-Wizards arrived and stunned him.

(*)

While Sirius was out rat hunting, Karen dropped her own daughter, Elizabeth, off at the Tonks and took Harry to St. Mungo's hospital for a full checkup. Finally after hours of waiting, far longer than should have been necessary, Karen's name was finally called to meet with the Healers. The Healer who called her up was an older man with the nametag "Winston".

"Is everything alright?" Karen asked Healer Winston, who'd been conducting the checkup.

"In almost every way," Winston replied, "your godson is the perfect model of health for a child his age. But there is one potential problem."

"Problem?" Karen frowned. "What problem?"

"We found an unhealthy amount of dark magic concentrated in that odd scar on his forehead," Winston explained, "We finally had to bring in a cursebreaker specialist to figure out what it was."

"And?" Karen asked, starting to get concerned.

"And we believe that Harry's scar may contain a…soul fragment."

"A soul fragment?" Karen repeated, "What is that supposed to mean?"

"The cursebreaker described it as an ancient and obscure piece of dark magic called a 'horcrux', apparently it was first invented by the ancient Egyptians as a method of cheating death."

"Can this...'horcrux' be safely removed?"

"Well that's the real problem." Winston sighed. "According to our cursebreaker, most normal methods of destroying a horcrux are very dangerous to use on a living person. However, there may be a solution but it isn't exactly...safe. There's a specialized spell known only to cursebreakers that could remove the soul fragment, but's it's never been used on a living person before and so carries some element of risk. As the boy's guardian, we will need your consent before we can proceed."

Karen thought about it but quickly decided that carrying around a horcrux in his head could not possibly be safe or healthy for Harry in the long term, and she nodded, "I'll take the risk, do what you can to remove it."

"Very well," said Winston. "Please wait here, this shouldn't take long." And indeed it didn't for ten minutes later, Winston emerged with a sleeping Harry and gave him to Karen. Cradling him in her arms, Karen took a really close look at him and noticed that the scar on Harry's forehead had faded a bit from the last time she saw it. "It's done," said Winston," the fragment was removed safely and Harry is, by all appearances, perfectly healthy and no worse off.

Karen nodded, thanked Winston for the excellent work and left to pick up Elizabeth at the Tonks. It was there she found out about Sirius' arrest.

(*)

"NO!" Karen slammed her fist down on Mr. Crouch's desk. "I swear, Sirius is innocent. He was not the Potter's Secret-Keeper, that was Pettigrew." Crouch's only response was to sneer at her.

"Even if I believed you, which I don't, he's still guilty of thirteen murders."

"I can't believe that Sirius would do that," Karen said, "it's just not him."

"I've got a score of muggle witness who all swear that Sirius was pointing his wand at Pettigrew at the time of the explosion and even in the very unlikely event that you are telling the truth, that merely gives Sirius a different motive."

"What about his wand? Have you even bothered testing it?"

"We can't test it," Crouch retorted, "it was broken in the explosion, but it doesn't matter; the eyewitness testimony alone will put your husband behind bars for the rest of his life."

"Will you at least give him a trial, then?"

"Trial?" Crouch snorted. "And give you the chance to find some technicality to get him off, I don't think so. Sirius Black has been detained under the Dark Wizard Containment Act, which means that trials aren't necessary in his case."

Karen's scowl darkened. The Dark Wizard Containment Act had been passed in the aftermath of the Hogsmeade Massacre of 1979 and allowed suspected dark wizards to be detained indefinitely by the DMLE. But it had never been intended to be used to circumvent trials entirely.

"I won't let you get away with this!" She snarled

"Give it up, missy," Crouch sneered. "Your husband is as dark as his name, you're just in denial."

"No," Karen repeated, "I will find a way to fight this; that is a promise!" And with that she turned and stormed out. Once outside the Ministry, Karen apparated to the Tonks house.

"I take it," Andromeda said, "that you didn't succeed."

"No, I didn't," Karen sighed. But she had meant every word she'd said to Mr. Crouch. Somehow, Karen thought as she held the two babies in her arms, feeling her daughter's dark hair and looking into her blue eyes, I'll find a way to get your daddy out of prison.

(*)

Alastor Moody sat next to Albus Dumbledore in the Wizengamot court room, watching as Igor Karkaroff reeled off the names of every other Death Eater he knew in a desperate attempt to buy his own freedom, and occasionally interjecting his own comments to Dumbledore about various names. Nearly all of them were Death Eater's who'd already been captured or killed, though Karkaroff did finally hit gold when he mentioned Augustus Rookwood of the Department of Mysteries. The last name Karkaroff provided was Severus Snape, which got Albus rising to defend Snape, claiming that he'd "turned spy for us, at great personal risk" and was "now no more a Death Eater than I am." Moody scowled and grunted skeptically at this; he didn't believe that, not for one moment, mainly because—from the rough timeline he'd worked out from Albus's hints—it seemed that Snape had turned "spy" at about the same time that the Order's casualties suddenly started climbing dramatically, which couldn't possibly be just a coincidence.

"Why did you vouch for that filth, Snape?" Alastor asked Albus as Karkaroff was taken away, "It just doesn't feel right to have him walking about free, and teaching children, with only your word that he was secretly helping us. And meanwhile Sirius Black sits in Azkaban without even so much as a trial."

"Sirius Black is a traitor," Albus insisted, "He betrayed the Potters to Voldemort and murdered thirteen people, including Peter Pettigrew. The evidence against him is clear."

"His wife continues to insist otherwise," Alastor retorted.

"She is an unreliable source," Albus replied, "or do you think that she wouldn't lie to get her husband off, even if she knew that he was guilty?"

"No doubt she would," Alastor agreed, "but it's still odd that you went out of your way to clear Snape, but you won't even talk to Sirius."

"The situations are different."

"Oh, of course they are," Alastor said promptly, "Completely different. Because while Snape joined the Death Eaters right out of Hogwarts, Sirius Black joined us. And whereas Snape spent the last several years torturing and murdering muggleborns, Sirius Black married one and has spent the same amount of time fighting against the Death Eaters. So, obviously, Snape deserves a second chance while Sirius Black does not."

"I do see your point," Albus admitted with obvious reluctance, but then shook his head, "But it's too risky. Too many other accused Death Eaters have managed to get off on claims of the Imperius curse and, though we can't prove it, a few well- placed bribes. If Sirius Black is brought to trial, I have no doubt that he and his wife would try the same tactic; and even if they didn't get that idea, one or both of his grandfathers might."

Alastor stared blankly at Albus. "Sirius Black was disowned from his family."

"Or so we were told," said Albus, "It may even have been true at one point in time, but Sirius is now his family's only remaining male heir. That combined with certain…youthful indiscretions of his has left me with little faith in him, his judgment, or his loyalties."

If Sirius Black was guilty, then Albus simply could not afford to take any chances that he might get off; and if in the very unlikely event that he was innocent, well it was still in Harry's best interests to be raised by his muggle relatives. It was unfortunate that Harry would have to be raised by muggles—and Albus knew full well from what had happened to Arianna that the Dursley's were unlikely to truly love the boy, however grudgingly they might take him in—but the need to ensure Harry's safety trumped all other concerns and in the long run a harsh upbringing would keep the boy's inevitable fame from going to his head as well as build the character Harry would need to play his part in fulfilling the prophecy. Moreover, the taint of being married to a traitor would also prevent Karen Black from gaining custody of the boy.

Little did Dumbledore know that at that very moment, Harry Potter was nowhere near Little Whinging or his hateful muggle relatives who barely even knew that he existed. And because of Dumbledore's three full-time jobs—Headmaster of Hogwarts, Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, and Supreme Mugwump of the ICW—it would be many, many years before Dumbledore even realized that his plans for Harry Potter had gone off the rails before they'd even begun.