Yo, Hi-Tek, you think you can fokk with somein' like dis?

By which I mean this story is... Different.

That being said, go forth and conquer the written word.

PROLOGUE:

A dark room.

Shadowy figures lean back in creaky old leather chairs.

Too little of the harsh sunlight filters through the shutters, casting somber patterns in the cigar smoke that obscured the faces of the sitters.

"When will it be ready?" asks one of the men excitedly, in unaccented Portuguese.

The man at the head of the table tilts his head slightly towards the speaker. He removes the cigar from his mouth and exhales the thick smoke slowly. He replies in slightly accented English.

"My people are working on it as we speak, Number Five. Your impatience is... Disturbing."

"My apologies, Number One," says Number Five hastily, ever so slightly scooting his chair back from the table with a creak.

Number One finishes his cigar regretfully.

"Meeting adjourned. My project- Operation Dead or Alive- is well underway. The... Subject in question is acquiescing to our wishes without even knowing it. He should be arriving in England within days aboard the Turkish vessel MV Gazze. I've contacted my people in the Ministry. The wheels are in motion. Please follow through on your own projects- the day of reckoning draws near. I do not wish to be delayed further by your incompetence."

The other men stood quietly and left the room.

Number One lifted himself to his feet regretfully, then walked out the door and into the harsh South African sun.

"Go, Ziad..."

He flexed his hands as if he were pulling a puppet's strings.

"Go and do my bidding!"

Ziad Jarrah entered the Room of Requirement, and immediately regretted it. For starters, it appeared he was late for the meeting of the DA. More importantly, there was a couple engaged in a rather wet kiss. The kiss lasted longer than it should have, and Ziad just sort of stood there awkwardly, unsure of whether to leave or interrupt.

This sort of behavior was not really something he had experienced much of where he came from.

Two months ago, he had been in his cramped apartment in Beirut, going to school, doing military training with the other boys on Saturdays at the Hezbollah camp, and generally being a normal Lebanese teenager. Until his Dad was killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza strip, along with a dozen other Hamas operatives. His mother, who never really liked his father and his extremist views, brought Ziad with her to live with her brother in London.

Later on the evening of their arrival, a rather flustered owl had interrupted their dinner by crashing through the window and depositing a letter on Ziad's plate. The owl nipped a piece of his mother's food and flew out into the cold night.

Ziad was, to say the least, rather nonplussed. The letter was made of thick heavy parchment, with "Ziad Jarrah" written in flowery script on the outside.

To make a long story short, a week later he was bundled off to Hogwarts (his mother's motivations for the rush being "free" and "keeps Ziad out of my hair so I can get a job"), sorted rather hurriedly into Hufflepuff (the sorting hat mentioned something about "quotas" and "still an extra bed after last year's debacle"), and pushed into bed before he could gather his wits.

It was, to put it mildly, rather too much for the poor boy to handle.

He was, due to his lack of magical education, put into classes with the first years. This was "pretty damn awkward," as one of them so eloquently said in their first potions class.

Ziad immediately recognized Umbridge as a worthless teacher. She reminded him of his dad's flunkies in Hamas and Hezbollah. Rooted to their beliefs, cruel, and unable to think rationally about anything counter to their world view. He heard from another Hufflepuff about a shadowy collection of renegade students, who looked to a boy named "Harry Potter" to teach them Defense, and figured that outlaw learning beat no learning.

And so, one night in December, Ziad asked his erstwhile-friend Justin Finch-Fletchley when and where the next meeting would be.

It seemed that Ziad had misheard the time as an hour later than it really was.

"Uh... I guess I got the wrong room?"

Ziad mentally kicked himself. That was probably the most ridiculous thing he'd ever said. The couple engaged in a cry-kiss clearly agreed.

"Who the bloody hell are you?"

"Um... I'll just leave, yeah?"

The girl, who looked asian, and would probably be quite attractive if she took a shower, brushed her hair, and got a good night's sleep, extricated herself from the boy (a tall, black haired guy with glasses askew) and angrily pulled out her wand.

Ziad was confused. Why was she so angry?

She flicked her wand up and shouted, "Stupe-"

The world went black.

A minute later, the world was still black, but at least he was conscious. He heard muted whispering above him.

"Why'd you do that?"

"Oh... I don't know, I just panicked. Sorry!"

Ziad groggily opened his eyes and winced at the pain from the large bruise on the back of his head, where he'd hit the ground.

He cursed and glanced around the room, messily festooned with mistletoe. Then he saw the two figures kneeling beside him. They were the two who had been kissing.

"Oh shit."

He jumped to his feet and looked wildly for the door.

"Please don't kill me please don't kill- where the hell is the door?"

He pulled out his wand and faced his attackers, knowing it was futile.

The girl sheepishly pocketed her wand and said, "Sorry about that. I just sort of panicked! You could have been a Slytherin and reported to Umbridge!"

Ziad rubbed the back of his skull and pocketed his own wand.

"I suppose I shouldn't have barged in on you in an... ah... intimate moment?"

The two shuffled sheepishly and looked at the floor while blushing.

The black haired boy thought about it for a second and extended his hand and said, "I'm Harry Potter. I suppose you were coming for the DA meeting?"

"Yeah... I must have gotten the time wrong, or something. I'm Ziad Jarrah."

The girl said, "I'm Cho Chang. I've never seen you before, how is that? You look old enough to be a sixth-year."

"Well... It's a long story. Maybe I'll tell you sometime. In the meantime, if there's no meeting, I need to go take care of something."

And that's how Ziad Jarrah met the "great" Harry Potter.