The Shadow Doctor

- - - A. U, Post DH, ignores parts of the epilogue (like HP/GW for a start!)! Slash! Future Lemon, M rating for that, and for the following: bleak/black-humor, death, desecration of the dead and much more. (also, this is like my "tea time update" story, I'll do it when on my breaks, when bored and have no inspiration for anything else, so I don't even know if it'll go anywhere, should it not, I may even make it adoptable in the future)

HP/YGO [Pairings Undecided]. Summary: Harry Potter has a most unusual job, involving dead people and curses, mainly dead people though. When his job takes him to Japan, he takes on a whole new brand of magic, testing just how far he's prepared to go in his field.

Chapter One

"Oh Merlin Harry! That's disgusting - how can you work around those all day?" Hermione said, as both she and her husband Ron caught up with Harry in Hog's Head, for their yearly catch-up.

"With ease, I can drown the smell out with my dinner if I leave the door open," Harry shrugged, "-it's not as bad as you think," he insisted as he pointed his wand at the mug of butterbeer in his hands and cast a cooling charm on it.

"They're dead!" said Hermione with a sickly look "-when you said 'Cursebreaking' I thought you meant what Bill does, with wards and such,"

Ron nodded "-yeah, gotta say mate, we didn't think you'd be doing this. I mean, you could be one of those millionaire playboy types-" at Hermione's frown, he quickly added "-or a professional Quidditch player, an auror - hell, I heard the division of Hitwizards was hankering for you!" he slugged down his own butterbeer in an animal-like fashion that made Hermione wrinkle her nose in distaste.

"Oh Ronald," she muttered, Harry resisted an urge to smirk, some things would never change about his friends, it's why he liked to catch up, it kept him sane in his line of work.

"Bill was dead excited for a bit, thought you'd be working in his division," said Ron, wiping foam from his lip with his sleeve, making Hermione grimace.

"Sorry 'bout that, I do see him sometimes though, sometimes he's the one bringing the stiffs in," laughed Harry lightly.

Ron shivered "What exactly is it that you do with those dead blokes?" he asked.

"Well, it starts with the occasional muggle archaeologist cocking up and having themselves caught in some ancient curse, so sometimes they're brought into me alive," shrugged Harry, who then straightened at the serious look he got off his two friends.

"Sometimes I break the curse in time," said Harry quietly "-sometimes I don't,"

"Now the goblins have me doing that and some bloody mortician-like work," he grimaced "-can't say I wanted it, still don't, that said - it's not as horrifying as it sounds,"

"Well, what kinda stuff is it, if it isn't ward-breaking?" asked Hermione.

"Well generally it's breaking the curses around sarcophagi, - err - mummy cases, Ron," elaborated Harry "-which means working around the stiffs, so they can be sent to the museum-shippers,"

"Sometimes the cartouche - err, the thing with the mummy's name on it Ron, is too damaged to tell who it was. The body gets moved over to the Japanese, they have better muggle technology to help identify the stiff, but I gotta make sure the actual body doesn't have a protective curse on it," Harry finished his drink with a final slurp.

"Tricky bastards, them Pharaohs," he stretched his arm and back out against the old chair and ordered another round.

"So I hear," said Hermione, disproving of his tone, but didn't mention anything of it.

"If them lot can't identify it, they call me in again and I gotta do a month's worth of magic on the body so they can get a DNA sample," said Harry.

"Dee- Ennn- Aaay?" said Ron with a frown of confusion.

"I'll explain it later," sighed Hermione.

" 'Course sometimes I have inferi on my hands or some other undead nasty thanks to either a twat of an archaeologist who can't read warning signs, or a wizard that bites off more then they can chew. If done properly, they shouldn't need me at all," snorted the ex-war vet.

"-and you literally break the reanimation curse down?" said Hermione, catching on.

"Pretty much,"

"Blimey, that's why the papers are calling you 'Potter the Necromancer'," laughed Ron.

"I preferred 'Doctor Death' had a nice ring to it - surprised 'doctor' came into wizard vocabulary though," shrugged Harry, who was used to healers.

"Times change," said Ron wisely.

"Indeed they do,"

The start of the following work week had not been a particularly great one, firstly he nearly got to his apparition point to Gringotts late. He was pretty sure that the on-site healer, Healer Bryan was the one stealing his lunch out of the fridge, he also had the last pot of coffee and did not make a new one. There was also the tiny matter of the fact that he was being dragged out of his usual work areas that pulled him between England and Egypt, to go all the way to Japan. It wasn't entirely extraordinary, seen as some of the stiffs Harry had to deal with had been sent there, but rarely did the Usada Research Facility need to call for his help after the bodies were sent over.

It turned out, that it was not the Usada Research Facility.

"The Tomb Keepers have been shipped an unidentifiable Pharaoh," Shanktooth, his goblin superior had said to him coldly, part of him gleeful that Potter was so irritated.

"Why aren't the Usada Research Facility dealing with it?" snapped Harry, the only person in his division that showed any lip to the goblins, which was probably why they liked him, he never stood down to them, except when absolutely forced too in the presence of foreign nation figures, which came rarely.

"Because the body is reanimated," said Shanktooth "-not fully, not sentient, but enough that it cannot be handled by muggles,"

"So what, twitching every now and then? Like a magical cadaveric spasm?" he said, locking up his case of personal belongings, his work had him living out of an enchanted trunk a lot.

"Yes, and as it's been rotting for a few thousand years, it cannot speak," sneered the goblin "-you need to do whatever it is you do and either make it acceptable for muggle testing, or identify it yourself. It's a big project that I expect may take months, and as most of the upper KV area in the Valley of Kings is done, the digs will be taking a year break while the SCA does it's annual checks, and we sort the appropriate funding to continue. Everything is now in the hands of the Cursed Objects division, and sorting out the dregs of the last project," said the goblin, tired of explaining things to Potter, who was a rather renowned ball-buster when it came to demanding the facts of where he was going.

Not that Shanktooth could blame him, goblins made a habit of screwing wizards over for sheer amusement alone.

"You have your usual office with a lab - it's all been set up close to the museum, the appropriate Tomb Keeping family has also kindly offered to help in anyway they can," the goblin gave him a terse look "-and it's their Pharaoh, so please be nicer to them, then you were to the last muggle lot,"

Harry was surprised 'nicer' was in Shanktooth's vocabulary.

"I'll see you next year then at most, boss," said Harry, stepping to the Japan apparation point.

"I'll see you if you're alive, Potter!" said Shanktooth, as cheery as a goblin could manage.

It was a pretty standard 'goodbye' between the two, and considering Harry's history, was rather appropriate.

They had expected someone older, someone with a beard and with experience, wrinkles and snappishness equal to that of the goblins. To their surprise, they only received someone filling one of those categories. Unfortunately due to the timezone, Harry had arrived as the sky was darkening and was cursing all the way to his regular Japan-situated office. Bloody loud gamer-kids outside by his window as usual, and he had to go to the local museum before closing time and have his brief overview talk with the Tomb Keeping family. Harry snorted, he didn't envy them - protecting a stiff that hadn't been important for thousands and thousands of years hardly sounded fun.

He showed his identification badge that Shanktooth had given him earlier on, at the museum guard, who looked incredibly bored.

"Oh you're the guy," he said, in Japanese, which made Harry glad he paid the thousand galleon fee to swallow a language bottle for Japanese as opposed to painstakingly trying to learn it. The guard nodded him in and let him pass, as the museum had actually just closed up for the evening.

The woman - matriarch of the Tomb Keeping family had not expected the bumbling boy to be "The Guy," that was supposed to be the amazing cursebreaker and dealer with the dead, but it turned out it was.

Especially when the hot mess that stumbled in had got straight to the point before even introducing himself.

"-I'm here for the Royal Stiff!" he said cheerily, the woman - who had a long conservative gold-lined plain hooded dress and long black hair, looked at him skeptically.

"Oh where are my manners?" said Harry after a minute, feeling eerily like Ron being stared down by Hermione.

Good question, thought the woman wryly.

"I'm Potter, Harry Potter," Bond. James Bond, thought Harry inwardly, resisting the urge to burst into a face-splitting grin. He was here for a corpse, after all.

"Isis Ishtar," said the woman in a serene voice that reminded him of a serious version of Luna Lovegood, as she shook his hand delicately.

"Yep, the one and only Harry Potter, Doctor Death, Necromancer, Cursebreaker extraordinaire here to help, at your service," he said in a fake-bragging manner, hoping to ease the tension. He was never good at this sort of thing, it's why he hated the social aspect of his job. It made him prefer the dead bodies. The ones that only let out the occasional moan and would maybe try to take a solid chunk out of your arse with their teeth. Much easier to deal with.

His colourful introduction seemed to work because the woman let out a laugh that didn't sound forced. Good.

"I'm unaware as to how much you've been told, please, follow me to the back," said the lady, turning around and beckoning Harry with her. Harry quickly relayed what Shanktooth had said, finding it much easier then actual small-talk.

"Isis, I don't know how much longer we can keep him in the back before the cleaner starts asking questions," came the voice of someone that looked directly related to his client. He had longish sandy-blond hair, bored expression and a shamelessly toned up body with no query about showing it. Which made a nice change from conservative wizards and witches he was used to, who's most sexual thing was perhaps going commando under an amazing mess of black robes. In short, the bloke was rather fit.

"Didn't Odion take care of it last time?" queried Isis.

"Yes, but now they're starting to get on me about not being able to vacuum in here," sighed the teenager "-and the moaning noises aren't really helping, wasted fifteen minutes convincing them it's the creaky boards,"

"Thank you, it won't be a problem from here on in,"said Isis appreciatively "-oh and, this is my younger brother, Marik," she said fondly of the seventeen year old.

Marik, whom Harry dubbed as "Fit Marik," in his head, seemed to survey him just as he'd done when he came in the room. The cursebreaker - Harry Potter as his name-tag read - seemed a little on the young side. Barely older then his sister, maybe the same age even - fresh out of whatever schooling he'd had, was the "expert help" they'd been promised. It seemed a little far-fetched, until he saw the business-like gleam, steel itself in the depths of the man's tired eyes. He wasn't bad looking either, rather, he qualified as a 'hot mess' in terms of appearance. Part of him was disappointed, he expect a mad-scientist looking bloke, another part of him was delighted it wasn't an old fart though. He'd had enough of uppity older folk intruding in on his home, culture, and swanning around with the ancient Egyptian stuff as if they were the shit. Professor Kanekura had driven him up the wall, personally he wondered why he bothered helping out. Since Battle City he was a free man, but he couldn't leave the lump load of work to his family, and on the upside, it was no longer confined to his underground home in Egypt.

Harry Potter had a mess of curl-tinged hair that fell just past his earlobes, handsome bangs that seemed to naturally fall over a faded scar on his forehead, and bright green eyes. So green, he let his own stare linger there a minute - as it wasn't a common trait. He had full-lips, but not unusually so, it seemed to fit his overall aristocratically structured face. You could tell that he used to be far thinner then he was now, he seemed to have a lithe build, but a strong one. There was a rather endearing way to way he pinched the bridge of his nose with irritation as the sarcophagus in the room let out a little knocking sound.

"Shh!" he snapped before he could dwell on the fact that telling off a previously-worshipped Pharaoh corpse may or may not offend the family around him.

"Silenco!" they watched curiously as a little blast of magic emitted from the tip of his finger and blasted the sarcophagus quiet.

Marik really wished this guy had came sooner, he'd silenced the pharaoh with such ease that it nearly made his eye twitch.

He had rectangular framed glasses which seemed to irritate his eyelashes, but only amplified his eyes, which Marik did not realize he'd been staring rather gormlessly into.

"I have a device which will teleport the old fella straight to the labs," said Harry cheerily "-so you don't have to worry about that, now, you're welcome to come with us and we can conduct the overview on what I'll actually be doing with your Pharaoh there, because I think the cleaner is getting annoyed," he said.

Isis agreed, and with that, Harry got out his galleon-shaped portkey, which seemed to almost glow, and the three of them linked with each other and the sarcophagus as they were pulled from the back of the museum.

A moment later, a man armed with a vacuum and a yellow hat came in, happy he could finally enter, looked around for any other exit door and scratched his head. He swore there were other museum workers in here a moment ago.

He shrugged, and switched on his Dyson and decided he probably needed more sleep.