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Harry Potter (Modified) - Book 1 by Shades of Grey
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Harry Potter (Modified) - Book 1

Shades of Grey

AN: By now I'm sure you all know the story of Harry Potter's life, up until the fourth year, as told by the marvellous JK. However, in this story will be MY version of Harry. I suppose it's sort of an alternate reality story but it's not TOO different from the books we all LOVE. Basically what I've wanted to do for a while is write the book again only with Harry as even more of a hero ( I plan on making him ridiculously cool and magically powerful!) and to add the obvious Hermione/Harry romance (Okay well it's obvious to ME!).

As this is my first fic please be kind in your reviews but don't hesitate to tell me what you think needs to be changed and how.

Important:

The first two chapters of this story really suck. Or rather they're quite good, but they're mostly just a repeat of the actual books. You still need to read them, but the story isn't really my writing until chapter three.

Disclaimer: I don't own a damn thing. Not the characters not the copyrights or even the basic plot. I'm stealing it all from the Goddess 'Rowling'. What're ya gonna do? Sue me for all I have? Hmmm...... Let's see I've got some buttons, some baseball cards and a bit of lint.......

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Nearly ten years had passed since the Dursleys had woken up to find their nephew on the front step, but Privet Drive had hardly changed at all. The sun rose on the same tidy front gardens and lit up the brass number four on the Dursleys' front door. Only the photographs on the mantelpiece really showed how much time had passed. Ten years ago, there had been lots of pictures of what looked like a large pink beach ball wearing different-colored bobble hats (AN lol! That's Dudley alright!) - but Dudley Dursley was no longer a baby, and now the photographs showed a large, blond boy riding his first bicycle, on a roundabout at the fair, playing a computer game with his father, being hugged and kissed by his mother. The room held no sign at all that another boy lived in the house too.

Yet Harry Potter was still there, asleep at the moment, but not for long. His Aunt Petunia was awake and it was her shrill voice which made the first noise of the day.

'Up! Getup! Now!'

Harry woke with a start. His aunt rapped on the door again.

'Up!' she screeched.

Harry heard her walking towards the kitchen and then the sound of the frying pan being put on the cooker. He rolled on to his back and tried to remember the dream he had been having. It had been a particularly bad one this time, with a woman screaming and cruel laughter in the background. Harry didn't know how he knew but he knew that the woman in his dream had been his real mother. Harry was used to these kind of dreams by now and had learned to wake up without screaming as he had when he first started having the dreams. If he did that the Dursleys got mad...

His aunt was back outside the door.

'Are you up yet?' she demanded.

'Nearly,' said Harry

'Well, get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon. And don't you dare let it burn, I want everything perfect on Duddy's birthday'

Harry groaned.

'What did you say?' his aunt snapped through the door.

'Nothing, nothing...' Dudley's birthday - how could he have forgotten? Harry got slowly out of bed and started looking for socks. He found a pair under his bed and, after pulling a spider off one of them, put them on. Harry was used to spiders, because the cupboard under the stairs was full of them, and that was where he slept.

When he was dressed he went down the hall into the kitchen. The table was almost hidden beneath all Dudley's birthday presents. It looked as though Dudley had got the new computer he wanted, not to mention the second television and the racing bike. Exactly why Dudley wanted a racing bike was a mystery to Harry, as Dudley was very fat and hated exercise - unless of course it involved punching somebody. Dudley's favourite punch-bag was Harry but he couldn't often catch him. Harry didn't look it, but he was very fast.

Perhaps it had something to do with the martial arts lessons that Harry had been taking for free ever since he was seven. (AN Okay this is the first change in the story line and you will begin to see why I said I'm making Harry TOO good.)

The reason the lessons didn't cost anything was for several reasons the first being that Harry had never had any money of his own (even if he did the Dursleys would have taken it to pay for his 'room and board'). Another reason is that the Dursleys would never THINK of spending more than necessary on poor Harry and these lessons certainly weren't necessary but Harry had always stayed away from 'the house', as he called (certainly it wasn't a "home"), as much as he could ever since he was old enough for the Dursleys to make him walk home on his own, and on his way home each day he would stop in front of a small Kenpo Dojo and watch the other children train. After two years of seeing the same boy watching his pupils from the window everyday (Harry was forced to walk home at the age of 5), the teacher (sensei) approached Harry to ask him why he didn't join the Dojo so that he wouldn't have to stand outside.

-----------Flash Back--------------

"Hello son. My name is Mr. Osakawa. What's yours?" Mr. Osakawa asked the seven-year-old Harry.

"It's Harry sir." Harry replied clasping his hands in front of him and bowing as he had often seen the kids in their training do.

Now, Mr. Osakawa hadn't really expected to get an answer from this mysterious little boy as all children are taught not to talk to strangers from a very young age (The Dursleys had never told Harry this as they were most likely hoping he would be kidnapped and then they'd be rid of him with no blame to them. (AN They really sound like criminals huh?)).

"Well Harry, I've seen you outside my window before. What is it that interests you so much about watching my classes?"

Harry was used to the kind of sympathetic voice that adults often used with him. He just didn't understand it. Most people he talked to knew that he was somehow mistreated but not nearly the full extent of his 'abuse' and so nothing was ever suspected of the Dursleys but people still treated Harry as somewhat of an invalid. Harry however had no idea that he was being "abused" as his life had always been the way it was for as long as he could remember. He simply took it as being only natural when Dudley received loads of presents on his Birthday and Harry was surprised if someone mentioned his. So when this person that he assumed was some sort of teacher like the ones at school he responded the same way. With his eye on the floor he replied with the honest truth in a quiet voice.

"It looks like fun."

Now most children's idea of fun is playing with their friends and eating candy and all sorts of other childish things. Harry, however was not 'most children'. His ideas of fun were running and reading. Or to simplify it, he liked to learn and he liked to exert himself (as most small children do when not sleeping). And he told Mr. Osakawa so.

" Fun?" Mr. Osakawa chuckled in surprise. " Well now I can see why you'd be interested in what we do here. So why aren't you in any of my classes then, hmmm? It would be a pleasure to teach you."

"I don't have any money sir."

Now Mr. Osakawa hadn't expected such an answer from so young a child but he had taken an instant liking to this boy with eye's that shone like emeralds when Harry spoke of things he enjoyed. So he rather wanted to teach Harry.

"Well why don't you ask your parents to sign you up then hmm? I'm sure they've got some money." As soon as he had said this however he regretted it. If the state of his clothes was any indication, Harry's family must have to get their clothes from charitable donations and the like, as almost everything Harry was wearing was at least two sizes too big for him and if his parents couldn't afford to drive to school to pick up their son then there was no way they'd be able to afford to enrole their son in a Dojo.

While Mr. Osakawa was thinking what he could do to get this kid into his class (something in Harry's eyes told him Harry would be a dedicated student, and therefore a pleasure to teach), Harry was having a sort of mental breakdown. Ask the Dursleys for something?! It didn't make sense. He had never asked for anything from them for as long as he could remember. He thought that the only people you were supposed to ask for things from were teachers... it just didn't make sense.

Fortunately for Harry's poor brain Mr. Osakawa came to his rescue. "Ya know what kid? You can forget the money, it would be my pleasure to teach you for free!" He said with a big grin while thinking, < It's just one little kid. It's not like I'm in desperate need of money...>

His kindness was rewarded when Harry's eye's lit up with excitement at the thought of being allowed to join the kids inside the Dojo in their training. All Harry could do was stare at Mr. Osakawa with his mouth hanging open a little and pure joy in his eye's.......

--------------End Flashback----------------

So Harry had never been a very good 'Punching Bag' for Dudley although he never fought back as it never occurred to him to hate his "benefactors" the Dursleys (AN don't worry he will! ;-] ). He was, however quite small and skinny for his age. He looked even smaller and skinnier than he really was because all he had to wear were old clothes of Dudley's and Dudley was about four times bigger than he was. Harry had a thin face, knobbly knees and black hair. He wore round glasses held together with a lot of Sellotape because all the times Dudley had been able to catch him he (Dudley) had always broken them to stop Harry from running away very well. The only things Harry liked about his own appearance were his pure black and naturally messy hair, which he liked because it made him different, and a very thin scar on his forehead, which was shaped like a bolt of lightning. He had had it as long as he could remember and the first question he could ever remember asking his Aunt Petunia was how he had got it.

'In the car crash when your parents died,' she had said. 'And don't ask questions.'

Don't ask questions - that was the first rule for a quiet life with the Dursleys.

Uncle Vernon entered the kitchen as Harry was turning over the bacon.

'Comb your hair!' he barked, by way of a morning greeting.

About once a week, Uncle Vernon looked over the top of his newspaper and shouted that Harry needed a haircut. Harry must have had more haircuts than the rest of the boys in his class put together, but it made no difference, his hair simply grew that way- all over the place.

Harry was frying eggs by the time Dudley arrived in the kitchen with his mother. Dudley looked a lot like Uncle Vernon. He had a large, pink face, not much neck, small, watery blue eyes and thick, blond hair that lay smoothly on his thick, fat head. Aunt Petunia often said that Dudley looked like a baby angel. Harry often thought that Dudley looked like a pig in a wig.

Harry put the plates of eggs and bacon on the table, which was difficult as there wasn't much room with Dudley taking up three places. Dudley, meanwhile, was counting his presents. His face fell.

'Thirty-six,' he said, looking up at his mother and father. 'That's two less than last year.

'Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present, see, it's here under this big one from Mummy and Daddy'

'All right, thirty-seven then,' said Dudley, going red in the face. Harry, who could see a huge Dudley tantrum coming on, began wolfing down his bacon as fast as possible in case Dudley turned the table over.

Aunt Petunia obviously scented danger too, because she said quickly, 'And we'll buy you another two presents while we're out today' How's that, popkin? Two more presents. Is that all right?'

Dudley thought for a moment. It looked like hard work. Finally he said slowly, 'So I'll have thirty... thirty...'

'Thirty-nine, sweetums,' said Aunt Petunia.

'Oh.' Dudley sat down heavily and grabbed the nearest parcel. 'All right then.'

Uncle Vernon chuckled.

'Little tyke wants his money's worth, just like his father. 'Atta boy, Dudley!' He ruffled Dudley's hair.

At that moment the telephone rang and Aunt Petunia went to answer it while Harry and Uncle Vernon watched Dudley unwrap the racing bike, a cine-camera, a remote control aeroplane, sixteen new computer games and a video recorder. He was ripping the paper off a gold wristwatch when Aunt Petunia came back from the telephone looking both angry and worried.

'Bad news, Vernon,' she said. 'Mrs Figg's broken her leg. She can't take him.' She jerked her head in Harry's direction.

Dudley's mouth fell open in horror but Harry's heart gave a leap. Every year on Dudley's birthday his parents took him and a friend out for the day to adventure parks, hamburger bars or the cinema. Every year, Harry was left behind with Mrs Figg, a mad old lady who lived two streets away. Harry hated it there. The whole house smelled of cabbage and Mrs Figg made him look at photographs of all the cats she'd ever owned.

'Now what?' said Aunt Petunia, looking furiously at Harry as though he'd planned this. Harry knew he ought to feel sorry that Mrs Figg had broken her leg and that it might ruin Dudley's birthday, but somehow he just couldn't seem to care.

'We could phone Marge,' Uncle Vernon suggested.

'Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates the boy'

The Dursleys often spoke about Harry like this, as though he wasn't there - or rather, as though he was something very nasty that couldn't understand them, like a slug.

'What about what's-her-name, your friend - Yvonne?'

'On holiday in Majorca,' snapped Aunt Petunia.

'You could just leave me here,' Harry put in hopefully (he'd he able to watch what he wanted on television for a change and maybe even have a go on Dudley's computer).

Aunt Petunia looked as though she'd just swallowed a lemon.

'And come back and find the house in ruins?' she snarled.

'I won't blow up the house,' said Harry, but they weren't listening.

'I suppose we could take him to the zoo,' said Aunt Petunia slowly '... and leave him in the car...'

'That car's new he's not sitting in it alone!'

Dudley began to cry loudly. In fact, he wasn't really crying, it had been years since he'd really cried, but he knew that if he screwed up his face and wailed, his mother would give him anything he wanted.

'Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let him spoil your special day!' she cried, flinging her arms around him.

'I... don't ... want ... him... t-t-to come!' Dudley yelled between huge pretend sobs. 'He always sp-spoils everything!' He shot Harry a nasty grin through the gap in his mother's arms.

Just then, the doorbell rang - 'Oh, Good Lord, they're here!' said Aunt Petunia frantically - and a moment later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in with his mother. Piers was a scrawny boy with a face like a rat. He was usually the one who held people's arms behind their backs while Dudley hit them. Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.

Half an hour later, Harry; who couldn't believe his luck, was sitting in the back of the Dursleys' car with Piers and Dudley, on the way to the zoo for the first time in his life. His aunt and uncle hadn't been able to think of anything else to do with him, but before they'd left, Uncle Vernon had taken Harry aside.

'I'm warning you,' he had said, putting his large purple face fight up close to Harry's, 'I'm warning you now, boy - any funny business, anything at all - and you'll be in that cupboard from now until Christmas.'

'I'm not going to do anything.' said Harry 'Honestly.'

But Uncle Vernon didn't believe him. No one ever did.

The problem was, strange things often happened around Harry and it was just no good telling the Dursleys he didn't make them happen. In fact strange things happened so often around Harry that it was strange if nothing "odd" happened for more than a week.

Once, Aunt Petunia, tired of Harry coming back from the barber's looking as though he hadn't been at all, had taken a pair of kitchen scissors and cut his hair so short he was almost bald except for his fringe, which she left 'to hide that horrible scar'. Dudley had laughed himself silly at Harry, who spent a sleepless night imagining school the next day, where he was already laughed at for his baggy clothes and sellotaped glasses. Next morning, however, he had got up to find his hair exactly as it had been before Aunt Petunia had sheared it off. He had been given a week in his cupboard for this, even though he had tried to explain that he couldn't explain how it had grown back so quickly

Another time, Aunt Petunia had been trying to force him into a revolting old jumper of Dudley's (brown with orange bobbles). The harder she tried to pull it over his head, the smaller it seemed to become, until finally it might have fitted a glove puppet, but certainly wouldn't fit Harry. Aunt Petunia had decided it must have shrunk in the wash and, to his great relief, Harry wasn't punished.

On the other hand, he'd got into terrible trouble for being found on the roof of the school kitchens. Dudley's gang had been chasing him as usual when, as much to Harry's surprise as anyone else's, there he was sitting on the chimney. The Dursleys had received a very angry letter from Harry's headmistress telling them Harry had been climbing school buildings. But all he'd tried to do was jump behind the big bins outside the kitchen doors. Harry supposed that the wind must have caught him in mid-jump.

But today nothing was going to go wrong. It was even worth being with Dudley and Piers to be spending the day somewhere that wasn't school, his cupboard or Mrs Figg's cabbage-smelling living room.

While he drove, Uncle Vernon complained to Aunt Petunia. He liked to complain about things: people at work, Harry, the council, Harry, the bank and Harry were just a few of his favourite subjects. This morning, it was motorbikes.

'...roaring along like maniacs, the young hoodlums.' he said, as a motorbike overtook them.

'I had a dream about a motorbike,' said Harry remembering suddenly. 'It was flying.'

Uncle Vernon nearly crashed into the car in front. He turned right around in his seat and yelled at Harry his face like a gigantic beetroot with a moustache, 'MOTORBIKES DON'T FLY!'

Dudley and Piers sniggered.

'I know they don't,' said Harry. 'It was only a dream.'

But he wished he hadn't said anything. If there was one thing the Dursleys hated even more than his asking questions, it was his talking about anything acting in a way it shouldn't, no matter if it was in a dream or even a cartoon. They seemed to think he might get dangerous ideas.

It was a very sunny Saturday and the zoo was crowded with families. The Dursleys bought Dudley and Piers large chocolate ice-creams at the entrance and then, because the smiling lady in the van had asked Harry what he wanted before they could hurry him away they bought him a cheap lemon ice lolly. It wasn't bad either, Harry thought, licking it as they watched a gorilla scratching its head and looking remarkably like Dudley except that it wasn't blond.

Harry had the best morning he'd had in a long time. He was careful to walk a little way apart from the Dursleys so that Dudley and Piers, who were starting to get bored with the animals by lunch-time, wouldn't fall back on their favourite hobby of hitting him. They ate in the zoo restaurant and when Dudley had a tantrum because his knickerbocker glory wasn't big enough, Uncle Vernon bought him another one and Harry was allowed to finish the first.

Harry felt, afterwards, that he should have known it was all too good to last.

After lunch they went to the reptile house. It was cool and dark in there, with lit windows all along the walls. Behind the glass, all sorts of lizards and snakes were crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone. Harry loved it. It was quiet and dim, which he enjoyed and he had always liked snakes and such.

Dudley and Piers wanted to see huge, poisonous cobras and thick, man-crushing pythons. Dudley quickly found the largest snake in the place. It could have wrapped its body twice around Uncle Vernon's car and crushed it into a dustbin - but at the moment it didn't look in the mood. In fact, it was fast asleep.

Dudley stood with his nose pressed against the glass, staring at the glistening brown coils.

'Make it move.' he whined at his father. Uncle Vernon tapped on the glass, but the snake didn't budge.

'Do it again,' Dudley ordered. Uncle Vernon rapped the glass smartly with his knuckles, but the snake just snoozed on.

'This is boring,' Dudley moaned. He shuffled away.

Harry moved in front of the tank and looked intently at the snake. He wouldn't have been surprised if it had died of boredom itself - no company except stupid people drumming their fingers on the glass trying to disturb it all day long. It was worse than having a cupboard as a bedroom, where the only visitor was Aunt Petunia hammering on the door to wake you up - at least he got to visit the rest of the house.

The snake suddenly opened its beady eyes. Slowly, very slowly, it raised its head until its eyes were on a level with Harry's.

It winked.

Harry stared, then he looked quickly around to see if anyone was watching. They weren't. He looked back at the snake and winked too.

The snake jerked its head towards Uncle Vernon and Dudley, then raised its eyes to the ceiling. It gave Harry a look that said quite plainly: 'I get that all the time.'

'I know' Harry murmured through the glass, though he wasn't sure the snake could hear him. 'It must be really annoying.'

The snake nodded vigorously.

'Where do you come from anyway?' Harry asked.

The snake jabbed its tail at a little sign next to the glass. Harry peered at it.

Boa Constrictor Brazil.

'Was it nice there?'

The boa constrictor jabbed its tail at the sign again and Harry read on: This specimen was bred in the zoo. 'Oh, I see - so you've never been to Brazil?'

As the snake shook its head, a deafening shout behind Harry made both of them jump. 'DUDLEY! MR DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!'

Dudley came waddling towards them as fast as he could.

'Out of the way, you,' he said, punching Harry in the ribs. Caught by surprise, Harry fell hard on the concrete floor. What came next happened so fast no one saw how it happened. One second, Piers and Dudley were leaning right up close to the glass, the next, they had leapt back with howls of horror.

Harry sat up and gasped; the glass front of the boa constrictor's tank had vanished. The great snake was uncoiling itself rapidly, slithering out on to the floor - people throughout the reptile house screamed and started running for the exits.

As the snake slid swiftly past him, Harry could have sworn a low hissing voice said, 'Brazil, here I come... Thanksss amigo'

The keeper of the reptile house was in shock.

'But the glass,' he kept saying, 'where did the glass go?'

The zoo director himself made Aunt Petunia a cup of strong sweet tea while he apologised over and over again. Prers and Dudley could only gibber. As far as Harry had seen, the snake hadn't done anything except snap playfully at their heels as it passed, but by the time they were all back in Uncle Vernon's car, Dudley was telling them how it had nearly bitten off his leg, while Piers was swearing it had tried to squeeze him to death. But worst of all, for Harry at least, was Piers calming down enough to say, 'Harry was talking to it, weren't you, Harry?'

Uncle Vernon waited until Piers was safely out of the house before starting on Harry. He was so angry he could hardly speak. He managed to say 'Go - cupboard - stay - no meals,' before he collapsed into a chair and Aunt Petunia had to run and get him a large brandy.

Harry lay in his dark cupboard much later, wishing he had a watch. He didn't know what time it was and he couldn't be sure the Dursleys were asleep yet. Until they were, he couldn't risk sneaking to the kitchen for some food.

He'd lived with the Dursleys almost ten years, ten miserable years, as long as he could reneember, ever since he'd been a baby and his parents had died in that car crash. He couldn't remember being in the car when his parents had died. Sometimes, when he strained his memory during long hours in his cupboard, he came up with a strange vision: a blinding flash of green light and a burning pain on his forehead. This, he supposed, was the crash, though he couldn't imagine where all the green light came from. He couldn't remember his parents at all. His aunt and uncle never spoke about them, and of course he was forbidden to ask questions. There were no photographs of them in the house.

At school, Harry had no one. Everybody knew that Dudley's gang hated that odd Harry Potter in his baggy old clothes and broken glasses, and nobody liked to disagree with Dudley's gang. The only person that he could really consider a friend was Mr. Osakawa at his Dojo.

AN- I'm sure everyone now understands what I meant in the note at the top. This chapter was practically straight from the book, and the next one is much the same. Chapter three and up are actually entirely my writing though so I hope you'll continue on at least to chapter three to see if you'll enjoy my writing.

H/H FOREVER!

Bye!