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thelaststranger · 4 years ago

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So I got inspired by this and wanted to try my hand at Percy’s side of the au. Hope you enjoy :)

Despite Moody's attempts at getting Harry into the tournament, Harry Dursley continues his Hogwarts education relatively uninterrupted. Harry Potter (formerly known as Cedric Diggory) does compete in the Triwizard Tournament and he does make it into the maze where he is teleported into a mysterious graveyard.

Crouch-Moody does manage to knick Harry Dursley with a knife and take a few drops of his blood, bringing them back to Voldemort, who does get revived, but much weaker than anticipated. Consequently there is no big split between Percy Weasley and his family. Sure, he still wants some independence and sure, he's still a pompous prat at times, but he does love his family and tries his best to keep connecting with them even when he has to take an absolutely horrid position at the ministry.

("Perfect prefect Percy has another job at the ministry. Yippee"

"It's not like I'm happy about this job. Umbridge makes a troll look like a good time; honestly, I'm a bit worried about her taking the DADA position."

Ron gapes at his older brother. "Wow Perce. That's the first time I've ever heard you complain about someone in authority."

"I won't always be at Hogwarts, so just promise me if anything happens, you'll owl me. I'll take care of anything you need."

"Geez," swears George. "How bad can this old bat be?")

Listen, after finding out that your boss had a secret son who turned out to be a death eater in disguise as a professor who then controlled your boss and killed him, you become more suspicious and Percy was no exception. He knows that there's something fishy at the ministry and while he isn't willing to completely give up his political ambitions and quit, he does realize that he might have to rethink some of his previously held conceptions of the world.

Percy may be a semi-important Ministry of Magic assistant, at least that's what he tells himself, but he isn't too important to help clean up Grimmauld place. (Percy keeps all thoughts about how scrubbing dirty cupboards are undignified to himself because he cannot refuse his mother's requests to help out the family.) It's while he is scrubbing that he finds a mysterious locked locket and as soon as he sees it, feelings of hatred for his family and self-pride for his job well up. It feels natural yet unnatural and Percy doesn't mention it to anyone as he takes the locket back with him to his tiny apartment nearby. In the middle of the night, after hours of tortuous thrashing, Percy remembers that this locket is making him feel the exact same way as he did when Ginny had the cursed diary and suddenly, Percy realizes that something is wrong.

With the semi-helpful hints from Dumbledore, Percy destroys the locket and swears that Ron, Harry, and Hermione will not get anywhere near those dark artifacts, not if he can help it.

("Professor Dumbledore, what is this thing? It's- it's," Percy swallowed thickly, holding up the locket. "It's making me hate my family."

"Percy, please call me Albus. And do not feel ashamed for your hatred, this locket is a horcrux. Greater men than you have succumbed to it's madness and dark desires before."

This was not making Percy feel better at all. "Professor, what do you mean by horcrux?"

Dumbledore sighed and took off his half-moon glasses. "There is much I have to tell you.")

Percy is Umbridge's assistant, splitting his time between Hogwarts and the Ministry in the fifth year. It's not assistant to the Minister, but it is a good job even if he cannot stand Dolores and he'll keep it even if he can help just one student and it allows him to search for horcruxes. (Percy doesn't see the explicit abuse when he's around but he hears plenty from his siblings and plots with them to spy on her) he can't allow much, but sometimes Umbridge's schedule is dropped and sometimes snacks make it into her lunch. But Percy spends a lot more time in Hogwarts and he happens to make the acquaintance of one Helena Ravenclaw who ends up telling him about the diadem.

("He was a handsome prefect too. Ambitious."

"It needs to be destroyed." Percy doesn't comment on how easy Helena had read him. He doesn't want to think about his ministry ambitions are now likely destroyed.

"You're Weasley's older brother, the friend to the Chosen One."

"Yes."

She studied him. "So young to be taking on such a burden."

"They're even younger.")

After destroying the diadem, thanks to the advice of Helena who told him to cast Fiendfyre in the Room of Requirement, he turns his attention to other potential horcruxes. While he isn't technically allowed access to certain files or spaces in the ministry archives, Percy finds that no one really wants to mess with Umbridge and dropping her name, however much he hates doing it, really speeds along the bureaucratic process.

Percy remembers vividly how the diary would make him feel on the occasions he was with Ginny (terrible about his lack of quidditch prowess, his feelings about Penny) and he remembers that Dumbledore told him that Tom Riddle was the diary and how Ginny and Harry swore it was Voldemort. While Dumbledore refused to go into any specific details, the name does strike a bell and Percy remembers the name from his prefect's book. Now, Percy's never been one to look into the dark arts, but he has done extensive research into the history of magic and he knows when to ask for help, so Percy's knowledge coupled with Bill's slightly more gray knowledge of curses, Krum's knowledge about the dark arts (and consequent hatred of them) and Fleur's spell mastery makes Percy connects the dots. After extensive research in some of the less-accessible corners of the ministry archives, Percy has an address for a house that is (probably) connected to Voldemort. The four of them go to the Gaunt shack and they destroy the ring there.

("I'll do it."

"Perce, are you sure? I could-"

Krum steps forward and blocks Bill from taking another step. "It has to be him."

Fleur hands over the basilisk fang and Percy takes a deep breath. For his family. For the wizarding world.)

Things turn crazy when Scrimgeor takes office and Percy is forced to keep his horcrux hunt on the side. Fleur, Krum, and Bill are running all around England searching for leads, but none of them could have predicted the invasion of Hogwarts and Dumbledore's death.

Suddenly, Harry, Ron, and Hermione are on the run and no one has seen them in ages (Percy suspects the Dursley's are doing more than their fair share of keeping the trio hidden in the muggle world.) Muggle attacks become more frequent and Hogwarts is officially under Death Eater control.

Ron keeps up constant communication with Percy who is becoming more and more stressed because his little brother dropped out of Hogwarts before his seventh year to look for Voldemort? The three oldest Weasleys are already hunting Voldemort! The Weasleys need at least one person to be able to survive and live a semi-normal life and Percy does not want to pin all his hopes and dreams on Fred and George. Ginny could be the saving grace of the family, but it's probably better for her mental health if the survival of the Weasleys doesn't rest solely on her shoulders. She is doing a wonderful job of making the Carrow's job horrid at Hogwarts, Percy is very proud of that.

The horcrux search isn't going well at all until Percy receives an unexpected tip from an old friend. Funnily enough, it's Harry Potter (the man formerly formerly known as Cedric Diggory) who clues Percy in onto the existence of the cup and it's Harry Potter who ends up destroying the cup thanks to a very dedicated search of Percy's, who finds out the cup is deep in a Gringott's vault. Bill, Harry Potter (formerly known as Cedric Diggory,) Charlie, and Fleur end up breaking into the vault to steal the Hufflepuff Cup. With their combined skillsets, the cup is retrieved and Charlie manages to unleash the chained dragon that had been locked up.

("Fleur told me about your quest. I think I know of another object that could be a horcrux, if you can find it."

"Cedric, I-"

There's a reproachful stare and a tsking of a tongue.

"Sorry. Harry. I don't know what you're talking about-"

"Don't lie to me, Percy, and stop being too proud. If you're going after Voldemort, you'll need all the help you can get.")

When Voldemort invades Hogwarts, he brings his snake with him against the student rebellion. The Order of the Phoenix is there to rally against the dark lord and Percy is right next to his family on the frontline. Spells fly around, smoke is everywhere, and nothing is coherent to Bill except the image of the terrible, terrible snake named Nagini. The same snake who is about to strike his little sister. No, not while Bill was around.

(The snake is hissing in the courtyard, looking like it's about to strike Neville and Ginny, and Bill hears nothing except a great rush of blood to his ears and his vision narrows to a point.

Distantly, he can hear Percy's words "It's a horcrux! Use the fang!" and Bill realizes he dropped the basilisk fang ages ago.

His vision goes dark, something slips over his eyes, and Bill pulls the heavy Sorting Hat off his head and lifts up a gleaming sword. The weight feels natural in his calloused hand.)

Harry Dursley still dies in the Forbidden Forest at the hands of Voldemort, but he comes back to life. The last horcrux had been destroyed and Voldemort and his followers are beaten. No one is quite sure how or why everything happened the way it did, but no one can deny the results. The haze of information flying around after the Battle of Hogwarts is immense and the Order of the Phoenix does its best to clear up the details on how Voldemort was defeated.

While some of the more ambiguous details are omitted, like breaking into Gringott's and possibly illegally creating a basilisk (Percy still isn't sure to this day where or how Charlie found a basilisk fang nor does he want to know), the general public still hears about how Percy Weasley spearheaded the efforts to find and destroy all the Horcruxes.

It is an interesting Order of Merlin ceremony after the war. Percy, along with the other Weasleys, Fleur, Cedric, and Krum, all receive Orders of Merlin for contributing to the safety of the wizarding world, and they elect Percy to give the speech. It's an inspiring speech, one that Percy gives with a bashful smile, and it receives a boisterous standing ovation that doesn't die down for several minutes.

("'The key to finding anything is a good understanding of bureaucracy?' Really? How do you make hunting pieces of Voldemort's soul sound so boring?"

"Am I entirely wrong?"

Fred's reluctant to let Percy win this point. "Well… not exactly."

"Maybe when you spend several years of your life hunting down dangerous dark magical artifacts and balancing a ministry job, you'll understand, Fred.")

Harry spends a few years in the wizarding world tying up loose ends (marrying Ginny, paying respects, making sure the last of the death eaters are gone) before retiring to the boring yet oddly peaceful Privet Drive. He does still sometimes pop into the wizarding world (to look at the joke shop and then anonymously cheer on student quidditch matches, dinners with friends and family, Ginny's quidditch games) but he's content to let the rest of it fade away. Petunia begs for a grandchild (and so does Molly) and Ron and Hermione grab a house next door (Hermione always did want to live in the muggle world so that she could be closer to her parents and it's a good step for her according to Percy as she is a muggle-wizard relations advisor.)

("When are we going to have another grandbaby to spoil?"

"Petunia is right! Wouldn't family gatherings be more fun if there were more children underfoot?"

"Mum, you already have several grandchildren and so do you Petunia! And James loves playing with Victorie and Teddy." said Ginny, not unkindly.

"Love, why don't we stop teasing them and tell them already?"

"Tell us what?" squawked Molly and Petunia.

Ginny smiled at Harry and placed a hand on her stomach.

"Well…")

Ron ends up running the joke shop for a few years with Fred and George who were sadly not identical anymore- George has a missing ear and Fred has a nasty scar down the side of his back from a nasty curse that just barely grazed him (Percy had been making Fred laugh for years and Fred was not distracted during that crucial moment) but they do still confuse people- before accepting a defense against the dark arts position at Hogwarts. He'll help Madame Hooch with some of her duties (and help act as a buffer from Oliver Wood) and ends up helping coach the Gryffindor team. His students tease him relentlessly about his loyalty to the Chudley Cannons, but not his loyalty to the HolyHead Harpies where his sister plays. Ron has the last laugh because some of the more competent and adept players do end up playing for Chudley (because they heard Coach Weasley talking about them so much) and they do transform into a respectable team at least for a little while.

("I told you, Hermione! The Cannons are going to have a great year! Mendoza made the team!"

"You aren't supposed to be using your teaching position to bolster your favorite quidditch team."

"I know, I know. I'm supposed to enjoy teaching for the sake of teaching, but c'mon. This is a fun bonus!"

Harry grinned. "The Cannons will finally be good!")

Hermione starts to climb up the political ladder at the ministry, making waves with her hard work ethic and her pure talent. Percy is there to help guide her, but even he has to admit that she doesn't need much guiding. Starting as a muggle-wizard relations advisor, Hermione fulfills all her duties and then some. People start to talk and take notice and before she knows it, Hermione Granger becomes the Minister for Magic in 2017 with a landslide majority, thanks in no small part to her campaign manager. It's a momentous occasion for the first muggleborn Minister for Magic and she quickly uses her position to fight for non-human rights, eliminating some of the wizarding world's most outdated laws.

("Hermione, don't forget you have a meeting with the head of the Department of Mysteries today at three and before that, you have a meeting with the education committee about the safety of time-turners."

"What I wouldn't give for a time-turner right now. I might actually be able to get some sleep." Hermione smiled wearily at her brother-in-law turn turn campaign manager turn advisor.

"You and Ron don't have to have dinner with me and Audrey tonight if you're not feeling up for it. Audrey would actually welcome a break from socializing a bit.")

when petunia evans is eleven years old, her mother dies in a car crash. this changes very little for her, and very much indeed for the wizarding world of great britain.

little lily was only eight at the time and so stubbornly insistent and afraid that a mistake had been made somewhere, she sat on the steps of their house every night for a year with the front lights on, just in case their mother came stumbling home.

(“what if she comes home,” lily sobbed, “and she thinks we’ve forgotten all about her, tuney? she might decide to find a new family.”

and she sounded so heartbroken and frightened and petunia swallowed her own sadness and anger and grief. she said “alright” and made them both buttered toast and let lily keep calling her ‘tuney’ even though it reminded her so much of mum she wanted to start crying again and never ever stop.)

dad wasn’t much help. he didn’t know how to cook or clean or do anything much other than go to work. so petunia rolled up her sleeves, dug out mum’s old recipe books, and got to work.

(mum had written all sorts of things in the margins of those books. petunia liked to think of them as coded instructions just for her. after a while, she learned that they were more like the ghost of her mother, little memories left behind to help them. after that, she and lily started to write their own corrections and notes for the next generation. it came in handy fifteen years later, when a sniffly post-nightmare harry decided he wanted to learn how to cook.)

so 1971 rolled around and, with its summer, a revelation about the world. petunia dursley had spent very nearly three years putting her little sister’s feelings first, so she did her best to smile through her heartbreak and longing, did not let herself become bitter, and worried terribly about how lily was faring, all alone at a new school.

on the other hand, petunia finally had the time to spare to apply herself in class, much to the delight of many of her teachers. to avoid her worry, she threw herself into her books with abandon, quickly gaining the upper hand in mathematics.

the years pass and lily remains close to her sister until the war separates them. petunia insists on letters as frequently as possible, clutches her own baby tight to her chest whenever they are late and wakes up, one bright morning, to news worse than she could have ever imagined.

(there is a saying that we have the word ‘orphan’ because the pain of losing your parents is manageable, something you can recover from, and that this explains perfectly well why we do not have a similar word for parents that lose a child. petunia dursley’s first son she had at the age of twenty three and named dudley. her second she received in a basket at the age of twenty-four, already named harry. but her first daughter had once been her sister, and losing her hurt more than anything in the world.)

harry grows up with a great many stories about his mother, and as many as petunia knows about his father. remus lupin is an occasional presence, forging a fragile peace with his auntie pet, who couldn’t help but blame him just a little bit for harry’s mum. (he had once called her auntie tuney and learned not to. her choked sobs had been worse than angrily slammed doors ever could be.)

just before harry turns eleven, a letter arrives for him. auntie pet recognises the stamp on the back and has to go and lie down. harry finds her glassy-eyed and not quite crying and resolves not to open it. it goes straight in the outdoors bin and doesn’t come out, no matter how curious he and his brother-cousin are. ('brother-cousin’ was invented when harry and dudley first started school. brother came first because it was closer to being right.)

the letters keep coming and harry keeps throwing them away. auntie pet tells him not to, but she’s getting all sad-frightened and harry hates it and he hates the people doing it, too.

when an old lady that can turn into a cat arrives on his eleventh birthday (at the seaside because harry thought it might help with auntie pet’s nerves) he shouts at her on the beach in front of everyone and doesn’t stop until she turns into a cat, at which point he is too surprised to say anything and dudley takes up the mantle.

“you scared my mum!” is enough to make witches apologise, apparently, and 'professor minerva mcgonagall’ does, very much. auntie pet greets her like someone she’d been dreading ever seeing again and suggests that they go to the chippy.

a month later, harry packs up for hogwarts, hugs his auntie and brother-cousin, and offers his uncle the firm handshake he’s been practising.

much to his surprise, vernon dursley pulls him into a rough, awkward hug and mutters “you stay out of trouble, son. don’t want your auntie getting worried, now, do we?”

(he thinks, privately, that his uncle vernon might also be getting worried, but he’s always been the sort to cover it up, so harry doesn’t say anything. he resolves to stay out of trouble entirely, for his uncle’s struggling heart.)

in his first year, one of his housemates discovers the mystery of the third floor and compiles a dossier. she brings it to the headmaster, thoroughly scolds him for storing something so dangerous and tempting in a school full of children, and is very put out when it isn’t moved.

hermione granger can keep a secret. she cannot, as it turns out, be beaten in a duel by an evil spirit that she knocked over with a gigantic antique mirror.

(harry dursley is the one to discover her plan and warn headmaster dumbledore, who is treated to half of another scolding before the poor girl passes out.)

(she thanks harry three days later, very begrudgingly. he privately admits to being very impressed with her quick wit and bravery. she seems pleased.)

two and a bit years later, 'harry potter’ is selected for the triwizard tournament. petunia dursley arrives at hogwarts in time to give the minister for magic a public bollocking. the students are thrilled.

(“psst, diggory!”

“who are you?”

“hermione granger, have you considered legally changing your name to harry potter? only, harry’s last name is dursley, so this isn’t legally binding for him.”)

thus, voldemort does not return to life, and everyone lives happily ever after.

(it is, funnily enough, percy weasley that finds voldemort’s horcruxes. he’s awarded an order of merlin for his contribution to the safety of the wizarding world. he smiles rather bashfully upon accepting it and cites that the key to finding anything is a good understanding of bureaucracy. he’s not entirely wrong.)

(he is hermione granger’s campaign manager in 2017. she wins by a landslide majority and becomes wizarding britain’s first muggleborn minister for magic. harry dursley celebrates with her at number four privet drive, officially retired from magic entirely.)

#Harry Potter #Percy Weasley #Ron Weasley #Hermione Granger #I used the plot shop #Percy Weasley is underrated and I will die on that hill #Don't ask me about the timeline #Harry Potter au

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