Hello all! This is in response to a lovely little challenge by Demonabyss, who wanted a story about a Harry who ain't afraid of no ghosts. I can't promise to hit all the points they raised, but hey, I'll do my best, and it should be pretty damn funny either way. No schedule to how I put these out, either, so sorry about that, but I do really want to finish it, so we'll see what happens.

That being said, I don't own anything here. Enjoy!

Prologue: In Which Harry is Adopted

When Grunnings Drills sent Vernon Dursley to New York to finalize several papers on a large sale, he was happy to bring his wife and son with him.

He was less happy to bring along his nephew. But even he couldn't justify leaving a four year old on his own for a week, so Harry found himself strapped into the car, plane, and taxi before they reached the hotel they'd be staying in.

Honestly, the trip wasn't very exciting. Harry was confined to the hotel room for the whole trip, but he did get to look out the window and see the incredible view while the Dursleys were out. That was pretty interesting.

All in all, it was a pretty quiet vacation…

Until, on the way back to the airport, all hell broke loose.

Because this was fucking New York.

HP/RGB

"Gooper at 4 o'clock!"

Ray Stantz was forced to dive to the ground as a pair of proton streams shot over his head to wrap around the ghost behind him. "Hey! Watch where you're shooting those things!"

"Sorry, Ray," called Winston Zeddemore, even as he fought to hold the ghost in place.

Next to him, the one who had shouted, Peter Venkman, looked slightly sheepish. "My bad. Egon! We could use a trap over here!"

The final teammate, Egon Spengler, clambered over the cars on the bridge they were forced to all but shut down as they worked to clean up the infestation. "Here!"

With a practiced throw, the trap was thrown, opened, and after a moment, sealed, trapping the ghost inside.

"Clear!" Winston called, holstering his thrower.

Peter cupped his hands around his mouth. "We're all good, folks! You may resume normal activities!"

Ignoring the litany of profanity being thrown his way, Peter whistled cheerfully as he moseyed to the sidewalk, next to the Ecto-1, where the rest of the ghostbusters had congregated.

"That's it, right?" Ray asked Egon, who was fiddling with his ever present PKE meter. "I mean, there weren't any more calls, were there?"

"No, that was it," Winston agreed.

"You look awfully interested in that PKE meter, Egon," Peter said, waggling his eyebrows. "Something you want to tell us?"

"Yes, actually," Egon said with a frown, not looking up. "I'm picking up a strange residual reading. I think we should check it out before we go."

"Really?" Peter groaned. "Can't we just leave it? I was hoping to get a nap in today."

"If we don't, we might have another surge of ghosts here in a few weeks," Egon warned.

"So we come back in a few weeks," Peter said with a shrug. "Another paycheck for us." He shot a grin towards Ray and Winston. "And you guys say I have no planning skills."

"Not in this case, Peter," Ray said, shaking his head. "This place would still be under a ghost-free warranty."

"Damn it, I knew adding that clause in our contracts would come back to bite me," Peter moaned. "Okay, Egon. Weird readings. Lead on."

Egon did so, leading them all the way down the bridge before turning slightly off of it and coming underneath it. It was there that they found the boy.

It wasn't particularly cold out, but autumn was setting in and the t-shirt the kid was in clearly wasn't enough to keep him warm. He was curled up against one of the metal struts of the bridge, shivering.

Also, he looked to be about three.

Something was seriously wrong with this picture.

"Holy shit," Peter said as he realized the age of the kid. He leaned down. "Hey, kid, you alright?"

The boy looked up at the four and nodded hesitantly.

"What are you doing out here?" Winston asked. "Where are your folks?"

The boy looked confused at that.

"Your mom and dad?" Winston clarified after realizing the boy didn't recognize the term.

"Dead," the boy said softly.

The four exchanged a glance.

"Well, where do you live, kid?" Peter asked, squatting down so he was closer to eye level. "We can't just leave you here."

"My aunt and uncle did," the boy said softly. "They said I had to be causing the attack on the bridge. Because I'm a freak."

"That's just ridiculous," Ray said immediately, shaking his head. "No one can control ghost attacks, and your aunt and uncle would know that if they had any sense."

"Come on, kid, we'll take you to the firehouse," Winston decided. "We can at least get you cleaned up and a decent meal there."

"That's a terrible idea," Egon warned, still fiddling with the meter. "The firehouse is not safe for children. We're still not sure of the long term effects of ectoplasmic exposure, the containment unit currently holds enough spiritual energy to blow the entire east coast sky high, and I-"

He abruptly cut off, suddenly casting strange looks from the boy to the meter in his hands.

"Oh, no, don't stop now, Egon," Peter said dryly. "You were really on a roll there."

"I changed my mind. We definitely need to get him to the firehouse."

"Egon?" Ray asked.

"The residuals I'm picking up are coming from him. With that in mind, it's probably safer for him at the firehouse, where we can stop any complications."

"It's decided, then," Winston declared. He knelt. "Hey, do you have a name?"

"I'm Harry," the boy informed them.

"Nice to meet you, Harry," Ray said cheerfully as Winston picked the boy up. "We're going to go get something to eat. Would you like that?"

Harry nodded slowly.

None of them had any idea exactly how much this would change all of their lives.

HP/RGB

Egon had never been good with children. Really, he was extraordinarily bad with children. It wasn't out of any malicious intent, he just didn't tend to remember to censor himself when it came to bad news and his bedside manner in general was rather abhorrent.

Which was why Ray was sticking close as Egon ran his tests.

"This is fascinating," Egon said as he stared at the readout on the screen. "I've never seen anything quite like it."

"So I am a freak?" Harry asked.

He was currently perched on a stool with a metal helmet that looked more like pasta strainer than anything else perched on his head. He was also clutching a stuffed toy-a small Stay Puft Marshmallow Man Ray had pulled from his bed. (1)

No one had bothered to comment on the fact that Ray still had a stuffed toy.

At Harry's question, Ray smacked Egon upside the head. Egon let out a sharp, "Ow!"

"That's not what he means, Harry," Ray said quickly. "It just means you're… unique."

"It's not actually him I'm referring to," Egon corrected, shooting Ray a glare. "Harry, you have what appears to be a partial possession taking up residence in your scar."

Harry blinked. "I… I what?"

"He means that there's a ghost in your head," Ray explained. "Which we should probably fix. Egon? Any plans?"

"I have a few," Egon explained. He stood, pushing himself back from the computer. "Harry, you may want to set your stuffed toy down."

Harry looked disappointed, but slowly placed the toy down and stood up from the stool. He removed the helmet and set it next to the toy.

"You can have it back in a minute," Egon said quickly, noticing Ray's look. He turned to pick up a device from one of the tables behind him. "I just didn't think you'd want to be holding it for this."

"For what?" Harry and Ray asked simultaneously.

Their answer came as Egon turned around and fired what at first glance appeared to be a weapon at Harry. But instead of any small projectiles, a wave of pinkish yellow tinged slime emerged from the barrel. (2)

Within the span of a second, Harry was drenched.

He coughed as Egon turned the device off, before yelling and clamping his hands to his head as a black smoke rose from his scar. Ray was quick to react, snatching a trap from another table (they'd learned enough to keep those laying all over the firehouse), pointing it at the smoke, and activating it.

"Got it," he cheered as the light cut off. "Harry, are you alright?"

Harry took his slime covered glasses off and blinked. "...Yes?"

"Excellent," Egon said, placing the sliming gun back on the table. "Now let's get you cleaned off. I want to do one more scan to make sure we've gotten every-"

The door slammed open, and Peter and Winston stood in the doorway.

"We heard yelling," Winston said. "Is everything alright?"

"Geez, Egon, if you were just going to slime the squirt, couldn't you have had Slimer do it for you?" Peter asked, taking in the slime covered Harry.

"I'm not sure that would have worked," Egon said cautiously. "The psycho-reactive slime here was able to amplify Harry's own emotional waves to force the partial possessor out, and-"

"Nevermind, I'm sorry I asked," Peter decided.

"It was so cool!" Ray enthused.

"So, you've been slimed," Peter said to Harry. "Welcome to the club."

That made Harry smile. He couldn't hold it back, and really the guys were so welcoming, even if Egon was a little stiff.

"I'll take him to the shower," Winston decided, shaking his head, and holding a hand out to Harry. "This way, little buddy."

Harry hurried after.

"I'm going to take some scans of this thing," Egon decided, taking the trap from Ray. "I'm not sure what it is, but I don't like the look of it."

HP/RGB

Harry sort of… settled in over the next couple days. Janine had taken to him immediately, as had Slimer.

It was while he was studying the spirit that had come out of Harry, trying to nail down exactly what it was, that Egon had his epiphany.

Dropping everything, he snatched his PKE meter and ran to find Harry. He took a quick scan, on a different frequency than he normally looked at, and, upon finding what he'd suspected, immediately ran to find Ray.

Harry was left blinking and holding a popsicle in his hand, watching Egon running off. He glanced towards Slimer, who floated next to him, three popsicles in each hand.

"...That's normal, right?"

"Eh," Slimer commented, making a so-so motion.

"Right. You know, I kind of like him."

"Egon nice," Slimer agreed, before swallowing three of his popsicles, sticks and all.

Meanwhile, Egon had found Ray.

"Ray!" he shouted. "Ray, you won't believe this! Harry's magical!"

Ray looked up in surprise from where he was reading a copy of Spates Catalog on the couch in front of the television. "Is he? Well, we'll have to get him registered with the covens, then." (3)

"Ray, think about it! We have a boy named Harry with black hair, green eyes, and glasses. His parents are dead. He's magical. And, most damning, he had a partial soul stuck in a lightning bolt scar on his forehead!"

Ray nearly dropped the book. "You don't think?!" He shot up. "There's no way! We would have heard something out of Britain by now!"

"Unless they weren't paying attention to him," Egon said.

"But… but Egon, there were signs of neglect! There's no way that he'd-"

"Ray, it makes sense! We've got to at least follow up on this!"

Ray shook his head. "Yes… yes, you're right. I'll contact my aunt, see what she knows. She keeps tabs on the European stuff."

"I'm going to contact my family," Egon decided. "My mother knows people back in Britain. She might be able to figure out how the hell he ended up abandoned in New York."

"We should get Peter to put out some feelers, too," Ray agreed.

"Are you sure we want to extend those feelers?" Egon asked slowly.

"It should be fine," Ray said, waving a hand. "And we need information. Does Janine have any contacts?"

"Just her coven," Egon said slowly. "I'll have her check. And I think Winston has magical cousins."

"Right. We'll figure this out," Ray decided. "In fact, I'll call Aunt Lois right now!"

Egon watched him go. "...but we haven't figured out how a partial soul got stuck in Harry's scar."

HP/RGB

A meeting was convened after Harry had gone to bed.

"So, what have you guys found?" Peter asked.

"I got that Harry was sent to live with family after his parents were killed," Egon informed them. "The wills of his parents were sealed. His godfather is apparently in prison for mass murder."

"I got a tip off that's a bust," Peter added. "But who knows, really?"

"Aunt Lois says that the guy who killed Harry's parents might not be all dead," Ray added. "There are some theorists… They think he's made horcruxes."

"What are those?" Winston asked.

"Bad news," Peter said firmly. "Like bad bad news."
"They're soul receptacles," Egon explained. "They contain a portion of the soul so when the physical body is killed, the soul remains anchored to the physical plain. It certainly would explain why we found a partial soul in Harry's scar. The practice has been traced back as far as-"

"Thank you for the history lesson, Egon, but I don't think we need one," Peter spoke up.

"Yeah, I get that splitting your soul is a bad idea, but there's something more to it than that, isn't there?" Winston asked.

"Yes," Egon agreed. "To split one's soul, one has to commit an act of cold blooded murder. Hence Peter's they're bad, bad news."

"I got nothing, but most of my coven are first generation magicals anyways," Janine said with a shrug.

"And my cousins were less than forth coming," Winston agreed. "You know we've never really gotten along."

"So, not as much information as we'd like," Peter mused, scratching his chin. "Well, what are we going to do with him? He's a national hero, we can't just throw him to the dogs."

"He's also four," Winston added, glaring at Peter.

"That too," Peter agreed.

"I say we keep him here," Janine suggested. "Goodness knows you guys would be better for him than some ass who wants to use him."

"Yeah, that's a great idea!" Ray enthused. "We can teach him magic and all sorts of ghostbusting!"

"I don't know," Egon said slowly. "I'm not sure this would be the safest option for Harry. What is he going to do while we're out on busts? Especially ones in the middle of the night? We can't just leave him alone."

"Well, maybe I should move in, then," Janine offered. "I could take that room off the lab. It'd be cheaper than continuing to rent my apartment, anyways."

"Maybe we should renegotiate your salary, then," Peter said with a grin. "I mean, if you're going to be working for room and board-"

"Stop it before I hurt you, Dr. V.," Janine snapped.

"I think it'd be cool to raise Harry," Winston said slowly. "Good practice for if any of us ever manage to have kids."

"Ah, what the hell," Peter said with a shrug. "I kinda like the little squirt. And the spud's taken a shine to him, too."

"That just leaves you, Egon," Ray said, looking towards the blond, who was staring straight ahead and not saying anything.

In fact, Egon's mind had short circuited somewhere around Janine's suggestion to move in. Ray hid a snicker as he kicked Egon's foot.

"Wha-? I-" Egon shook his head, trying to clear it. "This sounds like a brilliant idea."

It really may not have been.

HP/RGB

As it turned out, the ghostbusters were, as a general rule, really really irresponsible. (4)

This led to moments of both danger and amusement. And sometimes both.

Harry was given his first proton pack when he turned five, and Janine had just about thrown a fit. (She did threaten to make all the guys sleep on the couch for a week. When Ray had pointed out they only had one couch, she'd snapped that that was their problem.)

Egon had ended up telling Harry the whole story about how his parents were murdered when Harry was six. He'd also mentioned casually how there was an excellent chance the dark wizard was still out there, and that he was probably targeting Harry, before going on and explaining what horcruxes were.

That actually had earned him a week on the couch and a long lecture from Janine (with occasional barbs from Peter, Winston, and Ray). Egon wasn't good with children, but the hope was that with enough yelling, he'd eventually get there.

It was no surprise, really, that Harry had eventually started calling Janine "Mum Janine". When he'd first called her this, Janine had hugged him tightly and cried about a minute.

That was also the moment the others realized that the title "dad" was probably also up for grabs.

What followed would go down in history as one of the funniest weeks of Harry's life as the four tried to compete for the title without Harry realizing exactly what they were doing. In fact, Janine informed him exactly what was going on in the minds of the men after the first day, so instead he just sat back and enjoyed the chaos.

The officially-non-official-competition-for-Harry's-love came to a close after Harry finally called all of them "Dads!" in an exasperated tone. Following that, each had gained the title "Papa", and were quite pleased with the compromise.

Slimer didn't gain a title, but he was really okay with that.

And so things continued, in the slightly mad manner they always did, until about Harry's eleventh birthday.

A/N:

(1) Yes, Ray actually has this. As does Slimer. Though I half think he stole it from Ray. It does get passed back a forth quite a bit.

(2) Okay, so in the movie, the mood slime was pink. And in RGB, it was yellow. (They used it in the episode "Partners in Slime", where Peter coats himself with it to disguise himself as a ghost. It... doesn't really work.) So I've kind of combined the two.

(3) A reference book mentioned in the movie, when discussing where to check up on Zuul in.

(4) No, seriously. They are really, REALLY irresponsible. Possibly most noticeable in the episode "Three Men and an Egon", where Egon starts aging backwards. So they take a kid who barely fits into a uniform out to bust a ghost. And yeah, Peter has to wrench the proton pack away from him, but they leave him alone in an alley with a ghost trap to trap the ghost when they chase it in there. And then act all surprised when he gets distracted by a stray cat. And that's not even getting into what happens when he reaches infancy.

So, our story begins! I have a couple chapters written, so I'll be posting them before too long, and the rest as I get them done. Please review if you like it! (Seriously, I'm not quite sure where this is going, so I'd love ideas.) Thanks so much!