A muggle barrister walked in to the shabby office used by his next target. He took out some papers from his briefcase and presented them to the man at the desk. "This is a court injunction against claiming ownership of the intellectual property of on JK Rowling and Warner Brothers Studios." Dunuelos replied, "But I never said I owned it! You ever hear of Fair Use and artistic license?" The barrister shook his head at the very worried man and walked out the door. Dunuelos sat at his desk and stared at the injunction. "Damn. Now I'm going to be so worried I'm going to develop writer's block!" He moaned at the casual indifference of the establishment. "Fan fiction writers: You can't stop them but you can have fun making their eyes bulge out," was the barrister's thought as laughed his way down the road in his shiny new car.
The next day, Harry and his growing entourage visited the local wizarding shopping district. As it was a Sunday, it was uncommonly quiet and that suited them right down to the ground.
Hermione and Remus were interested in the bookstore, while Sirius and Harry were drawn to the local quidditch supply shop. There were a few Nimbus and Firebolt brooms as they were international standards, but there were no Cleansweeps. However, what really interested them were the Italian brooms that were available. Robert was just as fascinated and wanted to see a quidditch game.
Tonks was interested in the store that carried wand holsters and other accessories for Aurors and others. Emma was interested in the apothecary and potions and the different herbs and ingredients witches and wizards used for potion ingredients that were used in healing. It was all very fascinating for her. She was surprised to find out that there was very little about dental health in the wizarding world. While it was true that wizards and witches had fewer issues in that area, it wasn't as though they never needed to take care of it. The truth was dental specialty became more common in the mid-nineteenth century and the wizarding world hadn't reached that point yet.
A visit to the local Gringott's branch and transfer point gave Hermione more fodder for her plans for the future. She found that in other countries, Gringott's had locations in every wizarding district to be portkeyed or to floo to the Main Branch in Rome. In Britain, however, treaties forbade Gringott's from the practice as goblins could not control their own floos there and goblin portkeys could not be regulated. Hermione could see that Britain, controlled by the British purebloods, was very repressive to other magical creatures. However, they moved past that, with Hermione noting it as cause for a future campaign.
To really round out the day because Harry figured it would be fun, Harry had gotten tickets for the late afternoon and evening to see a quidditch game in Italy-- the Milano Maulers and the Toscana Thrashers. Robert had been enthralled.
Harry had insisted on Remus joining them for the last week, until they returned to London on the next Sunday. Sirius had been overjoyed by spending time with one of his oldest friends.
On Wednesday, when Emma, backed up by Tonks and Hermione, had outvoted Robert as to a day on the beach versus more sight-seeing, Harry had enthusiastically backed the women. Emma had convinced Robert that it would be worth his while but not to interfere. Robert pouted a bit, knowing his wife.
Harry, who remembered Tonks and Lupin in the last life, was determined to work to get them back together. He knew how much Tonks loved Remus in the previous life and he was damned if he didn't get his godson back. So, Harry figured, throw Nymphadora in a bikini on a beach with Moony and at least he would start getting it in his head. However, he knew that he would have to get Sirius's help to work on Lupin's "picked upon Dark Creature" mentality. He had plans for that which would come to fruition around his birthday. Lupin would never even think of abandoning Teddy if Harry had a choice in the matter.
Little did Harry realize that Emma and Tonks schemed with Hermione's enthusiastic but embarrassed backing.
Emma had drawn Hermione to the side and talked to her about the alternate beach customs. Hermione had blushed, but appreciated her mother helping her with her plans to break Harry of some of his residual shyness and blasted nobility that she found so inconvenient. Her mother had promised to control her father.
Hermione and Harry had explored only lightly and Hermione found that she was getting more and more hormonal as the days passed. Apparently, Harry had a will of iron when it came to his concept of what was "proper and respectful". She had talked to her mother in private as this was something that she, in her previous bookish ways, had never made plans for. She couldn't really seduce him -- they weren't really old enough for that, not really. But she decided that the level of intimacy needed to be raised a bit as their next step. Harry, though apparently mentally closer to 18 than 15, was far too reserved for her growing interest.
They arrived at the beach at around 11:00 in the morning and the women sent the men down the beach to get refreshments from the local vender while they set up.
When they returned to the location, the men were stunned by what they encountered. Emma, who was an attractive 37-year-old woman with long thick hair, was sitting on a beach recliner wearing dark blue bikini bottoms, sunglasses and that was about it. Tonks herself was wearing sporting pink hair, pink bikini bottoms and sunglasses in a recliner as well. Hermione, with her long bushy hair, was wearing light blue bikini bottoms and sunglasses and sitting in her own recliner. The women were applying suntan oil while chatting away as though this was the most natural thing in the world.
Harry only had eyes for Hermione. She was, in his mind absolutely stunning. He almost didn't notice the other two. Then he remembered Hermione's father was standing next to him and he gulped nervously.
Moony was a bit stunned. He had spent the last three days getting used to the group dynamic and he had been teased by Nymphadora whom he found an attractive young woman, if a little young for him. But, he was male and he was breathing, so he was quite taken by the sight.
Sirius was both astounded and amused. As far as he was concerned, Emma was married, Hermione was a teenager, and Tonks was related. Still, also as far as he was concerned, it was an interesting sight. He almost laughed out loud at the expressions from the other males. He'd have to go and find a woman to chat up that night again.
Robert was torn between admiring his wife and wanting to drag Harry off to threaten him within an inch of his life. His wife, he decided, was very much for pushing their daughter and her boyfriend right where they were headed if things continued.
As the men (on the surface) got over their surprise, they continued moving toward the women. Tonks said something and Emma turned and said, "Ah there you are! Time to relax! Robert, want to do my back?" She smirked a bit as his attention seemed to become fixed.
Hermione was forcing herself to be nonchalant. She and Tonks had helped each other with the suntan oil. She wasn't QUITE ready to rub her change in costume in her father's face. But from what she could see, Harry was very appreciative.
Tonks was just amused. This was the most fun she had had on an assignment since she started Auror training. As a metamorphmagus and an Auror working in a male dominated environment, she had long ago lost self-consciousness about the human body. Still, causing reactions in the male half was always fun. She was so looking forward to teasing Harry and Remus until they got back to England.
In the end, it had been a fun day. Harry had finally settled down, and Hermione had gone swimming with him and used to opportunity to display her growing assets to Harry. Harry had blushed but had finally overcome his reticence and, with Hermione's guidance, had his first feel of a female's upper anatomy without clothes getting in the way. They didn't do too much as this was in public and Robert had tried to keep a close eye on them.
Emma considered the day a success. After (mostly) calming her husband down, she had amusedly witnessed the dance of teenage romance.
Sirius, Tonks and Remus had also enjoyed themselves. Sirius, old dog that he was, had taken every opportunity to ogle the assets of every woman on the beach, Remus and Tonks had pretty much kept to each other. Remus was bright red most of the time, but as he had practice calming himself, he wasn't totally flustered.
That night, Hermione finally got Harry to put his hand UNDER her top as opposed to over it. She was very happy.
Finally, Sunday morning rolled around and everyone in the Villa had packed for their return to Jolly Old England. Winky and Dobby had popped all but a small amount of luggage back to the Granger's home. Souvenirs, robes, and books that Hermione still collected at every opportunity were included.
The next day would see Harry getting back to work on destroying Voldemort. From the goblins, through Dobby, Harry knew that several death eaters had made a nuisance of themselves with the goblins and as a result, several death eaters were now residing courtesy of the DMLE sans a large portion of the family wealth which had been re-appropriated.
Lucius Malfoy had found himself in Azkaban after a failed attempt to move the Malfoy vault contents to Argentina. The goblins had left a portion for Draco Malfoy to reclaim, but the name of Malfoy had all but lost all of its influence. Couldn't happen to a nicer guy was all Harry could say.
Amelia, Harry found, had spent the time cleaning up the Ministry. There was still a large pureblood faction but their powerbase was dwindling. Corruption had spread widely, and several Ministry workers had been sacked and replaced. There were a few Wizengamot members not affiliated with Voldemort that had been arrested when records turned over had included the random crimes. She had messaged a request to Sirius to take a Wizengamot seat.
Dumbledore had made enquiries at Gringott's as to Harry's location. After the wards had been set up at the Grangers, Harry had had the goblins remove him, with the Grangers approval, from the access list for the property. Dumbledore had finally cottoned to this when he had tried to visit Harry in the second week of the vacation.
The goblins had a lead on Voldemort's location, and they would contact him through Dobby as soon as they located him. There was no indication he was informed at all about what had been happening in the magical world. The goblins had some indications that he had inspected two of the horcrux locations, but that was about it.
Augusta Longbottom had used her influence in the Wizengamot to help Amelia quash the corruption. Even though she was not herself involved, she was sharp as a potions knife and had been invaluable in digging up death eater activity it the Wizengamot. Harry would meet with her when they traveled to the Longbottom Manor for Neville's and Harry's birthday.
All in all, everything looked promising.
But then again, Harry did now know the storm brewing that he was about to fly in the face of. The storm had a name. And its name was "Weasley".
A/N: OH NO, Another CLIFFY! Hate me yet?