Disclaimer: I've never been to Hogwarts, Beacon, or Oxbridge, and can claim no influence on any of the students or staff.

June the fifteenth was an ordinary day for the inhabitants of 4 Privet Drive house in Little Whinging. Dudley Dursley, a somewhat overweight young lad, was busy playing with his toys-the armored warrior was heroically decapitating the evil sorcerer, again. His father, a bloated figure by the name of Vernon, would occasionally look over his paper to check on the lad, but was honestly more absorbed with the articles in his newspaper; a few were actually quite interesting, although only a few. His wife of thirteen years, one Petunia, was pottering about in the kitchen as she planned a cake recipe for her Duddikin's upcoming eleventh birthday. Their family wasn't quite normal, but that was only due to the lack of another boy and girl for Dudley to riff off of and, on the whole, his mother quite preferred it that way. As much as she loved her baby, every woman had her limits.

And then... there was a knock at the door. It wasn't the polite knock of door-to-door salesman, nor was it the frantic knock of those running for their lives, or even a simple pound of anger. No, it was the over-enthusiastic knock of an american cousin, come to spend the holidays in a 'foreign country' whilst presumably flirting with every fine lad/sweet lass as per appropriate and shedding money like a dog in spring. This was rather odd, as neither Vernon nor Petunia had any relatives in America they knew about; as such, they did not recognize the knock.

"I suppose I'll get that," sighed Petunia, putting down the flour and walking to the foyer. "I do wonder, who could it be?"

Vernon snorted. "I do hope it's one of those girls who has cookies to give us."

Petunia opened the door-and was promptly assaulted by a pair of surprisingly powerful arms wrapping around her and lifting her off the ground.

"OH MY GOSH IT IS SO GOOD TO FINALLY MEET YOU!" Her captor squeezed the air out of her lungs for a moment, before plunking her gasping back on the floor. "You know, I really should have visited earlier. So irresponsible of me. Oh, Harry! This is your aunt Petunia! I mean, you are Petunia, right? I didn't get the wrong house again, did I?"

"I... yes, my name's Petunia," she managed, looking at the strange red-headed woman who had just nearly killed her. "What do you-?"

"That's great!" The woman grinned, picking up two very large suitcases-a strangely familiar young boy with a backpack and suitcase of his own followed her as she entered the house. "You would not believe how embarrassing it was over at 4 Prince drive, although I'm pretty sure they laughed it off. And who are these two fine gentlemen?" she asked as she strode into the living room.

Vernon Dursley stood, scowling at the strange lady and her entourage. "Miss, I don't know who you are or why you think you can just stride into my home uninvited-"

"My name's Ruby Rose," she replied breezily. "I'm a world renowned troubleshooter."

"She means assassin," clarified the young boy.

The woman glowered at him. "Harry Potter, be polite. This is our family." She sniffed disdainfully. "And not every contract I have is about killing people, thank you very much."

"No, some are about killing animals."

At that, the woman dropped her suitcases and lightly bopped him on the head. "Just for that, I'm sending you to your room." She smiled at Vernon. "By the way, which one is his room?"

"I-I shall have none of this!" declared the head of house. "Random visitors dropping in and claiming rooms for themselves-It's complete balderdash, I tell you!"

"You mean you didn't get the notice?" The woman sighed. "Well, this is awkward then. Don't mess with that, nephew," she added as Dudley reached for one of the suitcases, "there's a dangerous weapon in there, and I don't mean my panties."

"Notice?" Vernon asked, confused.

"Nephew?" Dudley added, nonplussed.

"Weapon?!" Petunia shrieked, suddenly rushing into the room.

"PANTIES?!" Harry shouted, leaping back with mock horror on his face.

Ruby Rose rolled her eyes. "I see I've got some explaining to do." She unzipped part of her suitcase and pulled out a plastic baggie. "Anybody for cookies?"

The cookies had calmed the Dursleys, somewhat. Dudley was happy to accept them without question, and both Vernon and Petunia had been mollified by the offering-although Petunia was still holding hers, warily glancing between it and the redhead that was even now inhaling her fifth.

"So... how do I explain this?" Ruby swallowed the last of her food, adjusting her red hood. "You see, Harry here has been accepted into a prestigious academy, one that will provide lodgings-well, except during the summers. Part of the deal is that we had to find someplace to hunker down while school was out, and the deputy headmistress did mention Petunia was his aunt so... here we are." She shrugged with an awkward grin. "She did say they'd send you a notice about the whole thing, but I guess there's a paperwork delay or something. Really, we'd only be here between June and September... and on holidays, if you're up for that. I'm willing to pay five hundred a month while we're here, of course, and we can negotiate over price-"

"Excuse me," Vernon interjected, "but I believe you must be confused. My wife has no siblings."

"Well, not anymore," Ruby replied. "Miss McGonagall told me Harry's birth mother was... ah, murdered." She coughed. "Which is... tragic, and if I'm opening old wounds I apologize-"

Dudley frowned. "I thought aunt Lily died in a car crash?"

Harry rolled his eyes. "Sometimes grown-ups think we're too young to handle the truth, so they say things that are only kind of true."

"Oh. Like how every time I ask where babies come from, the teachers at school-"

"Dudley," Petunia ground out, "I would like for you to go to your room. Now."

"But mother-"

"Now, young man!"

"It's alright," Harry assured his cousin. "They just want to talk about things they don't want us hearing about. You have any games we can play?"

"Well, there is this thing called Monopoly..."

Petunia watched the two boys wander upstairs, fingers digging into her cookie for a few seconds, before turning back to Ruby. "What school, exactly, has Harry been accepted into?"

"Oh, it's... Fog wars? Hedge warp?" Ruby snapped her fingers a couple of times. "Sorry, I only just heard about it two weeks ago-Hogwarts! That's the name, Hogwarts. I understand his parents both attended."

"I see." With utmost calm, Petunia put her teacup down. "Miss Rose, I don't know if you're familiar with the classwork of that particular institute, but I can assure you that from what I saw of my sister's time there it is simply... vulgar. If you want my advice, you would be better off finding a normal school for Harry to attend."

Ruby frowned. "Are you talking about the whole magic thing? Cause yeah, that's a little weird, but I wouldn't call it vulgar."

Petunia rolled her eyes. "Yes, miss Rose, I am in fact talking about magic. I think I'd have had a little more experience with it than you-unless you're a witch yourself?"

The redhead waggled her hand. "Ehhh... apparently I do have some magic, but I didn't ever attend a school for witchcraft so... Miss McGonagall thinks maybe I was overlooked because of everything that was going on back then. I'll be attending with Harry, remedial lessons in basically everything."

Petunia blinked. "Back then...? Miss Rose, how old are you?"

"Oh, I'm twenty five." She chuckled wryly. "Yeah, I know, a little young to have a kid-I found Harry on a doorstep when I was fifteen and I was actually going to take him to an orphanage but, well, one thing led to another and in the end I adopted him myself. That was quite the adventure, let me tell you-"

Vernon cleared his throat. "To return to the point at hand... Magic is an unnatural and incomprehensible thing, and we are quite frankly unwilling to house anyone with that sort of... freakishness."

"...Freakishness." Ruby Rose was, technically, still smiling. But her silver eyes now glinted dangerously. "I see."

Very calmly, she got up, brushed her skirt off, and walked into the kitchen. She picked up a large knife, held it in her hands... then in full view of the Durselys, snapped it in half.

Vernon jumped to his feet. "How dare you-!"

"Metal. Forged by machines, made by man. Unnatural." With extreme calm, she unplugged microwave oven and held it up. "Circuitry. Grains of dust, perfectly arranged and aligned."

"Don't-!" Petunia cried, too late, as Ruby smashed the thing over her knee.

"Incomprehensible," Ruby continued coolly. She reached into a cabinet, pulling out a tumbler. "Glass. Sand, pressed in heat, and shaped by breath."

The thing shattered in her fingers.

"Freakish."

Vernon growled. "You monster."

"Monster? Come on." Ruby rolled her eyes. "I'm a world reknowned troubleshooter, I've been cursed at in more languages than you've ever heard of. If you're going to insult me, be creative about it!"

"You come in here, demand a room, and smash our things when you don't get your way!"

"Oh, I'm quite willing to pay for replacements. And honestly, I don't see why you're complaining-you get an extra thousand pounds a year at least, a live-in extra set of hands to help around the house, and you-" She pointed at Petunia- "get the chance to reconnect with your nephew. If you're really that worried about the magic thing, fine, no magic in the house."

Her eyes narrowed. "But if there's one thing I've learned in all my travels, it's that considering anything freakish, or unnatural, or incomprehensible-that's a first step. The next is not listening. And then not caring. And before you know it, you've become the sort of person who will shove somebody off a bridge just to get home faster." She took a breath. "So, if you really don't want us here, fine, we'll find a hotel or something. But if you ever say anything is just unnatural again... if you refuse to listen to people who are just a little different..."

Ruby Rose gave them a sardonic smile. "Well. Let's just say I know quite a few people and leave it at that."

Petunia glanced down, wringing her hands nervously.

"...A thousand."

Vernon turned to her in confusion. "What?"

"A thousand pounds. A month." She looked up. "And that's on top of replacing what you've broken."

Ruby nodded. "Done."

"Petunia-"

"Vernon, please. I don't like this. But..." She looked at her husband, flicking her eyes toward their 'guest.'

"...Feh. Alright." Vernon turned back to Ruby. "But you'd better make sure there's no funny business!"

"Okey doke!"

"And I don't just mean magic, either, I mean... men, o-or wild parties, all that stuff you young folk get into!"

"Alright, alright. Uh, sometimes my work follows me home, are you alright with me whipping out Crescent Rose if somebody's trying to kill you?"

Petunia blinked. "Crescent... what?"

With a grin, Ruby hopped over to one of her suitcases and popped it open, taking out the largest gun either of them had ever seen. "Meet my baby girl!"

Vernon stared for ten seconds, and then fainted dead away.

Ruby Rose rested on the roof, looking up at the half-darkened moon above her. In total silence, she reached into her pockets, pulling out a small pane of glass bracketed by grey plastic. Her fingers tapped at it for a moment, a simple pattern done many times before, dispelling the now all too familiar message and flicking through a few images. A sigh escaped her lips as she browsed through them.

Then a grunt caught her attention. With a roll of her eyes, she pocketed the device and stood, carefully walking to the raingutter.

"Harry, what have I said about climbing on top of buildings?"

The black-haired boy smirked, even as Ruby grabbed his arm. "Never do it without supervision. And here you are, unsupervised."

"I resent that! I can supervise myself!" She took a second to ensure he was stable. "I'm an adult, you know!"

"An adult that broke a microwave over her knee." Harry brushed his knees off, his expression growing serious. "What was with that, anyway? You've never done that before."

"I might have!"

"No, you've never done it in front of me, you've never done it when you were showing off to clients, and I've certainly never heard of you doing it on one of your contracts." Harry crossed his arms. "I'm worried about you, sis. This isn't like you at all."

Ruby frowned, sitting down beside him. "You don't need to worry about me, Harry. I'll be fine."

"Just because I'm a kid doesn't mean I can't be worried about you." He sat down himself. "If you don't tell me, I could always ask Petunia."

"Aunt Petunia," Ruby corrected him.

"Potential Aunt Petunia," Harry countered.

"Biological Aunt Petunia," Ruby reminded.

"You're diverting the conversation," Harry accused. "What happened with the microwave?"

Ruby let out a long, slow sigh. "They... Vernon. He said some things about... magic." Her eyes drifted to the grass below. "Called it freakish."

"So he's a bigot. Alright." The boy shrugged. "I'm totally fine finding somewhere else to live."

"Harry, this is your family. Family is important."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Ruby, you're my family. These are just people that happen to share some genes with me."

"I should never have stolen you away from them."

"You didn't know that they existed back then-"

"Well now I do," Ruby snapped. "And I'm going to fix my mistake. Or at least try, because..."

She trailed off, arms crossed.

Harry stared at her for a moment. Then he gently put a hand on her shoulder. "Alright. We'll try it for a bit. Just... don't break any more appliances, alright?"

Ruby managed a small huff of amusement. "You have my solemn oath, mister Potter. You need help getting down?"

"I'm good. It was just the gutter giving me trouble, I can climb the rest of the way down." He stood, turning to go.

After a few steps, he glanced back to see Ruby staring at the moon again.

"...It was today, wasn't it? Ten years ago. It was today."

"...Get some rest Harry." Ruby didn't turn her head. "We're going wand shopping tomorrow."

The boy opened his mouth... and after a moment, shut it, backing off and clambering back down to ground level. Ruby kept an ear out until she heard the door shut below her.

Her hand went back to the glass pane in her pocket, bringing it back out. Again she dismissed the 'no signal' message, browsing through the images once more... until she stopped on one particular picture. A far younger redhead, with a tall and busty blonde wrapping an arm around her shoulders and making rabbit ears behind an unamused white-haired young lady whose left eye sported a scar, while a bow-wearing raven-haired teen paid more attention to the book in her hands then the camera.

"Heh." A small tear trailed down her cheek as her fingers rested against the picture. "Hey girls..."

Her eyes drifted back up to the half-darkened moon.

"...I guess... I guess this is my life now, huh?"