Harry Potter What If: Wrong Date (Prisoner of Azkaban)

What If: Wrong Date

Summery: What if Sirius had meant to come into the castle on Halloween, but being in Azkaban and on the run in the wild for so long made him lose track of the date, he breaks into the castle November 1st instead. During PoA obviously.

POV: Sirius

Today was the day. I was going to go into Hogwarts and give that filthy traitor of a friend, Wormtail, a piece of my mind. And it is the perfect day to do it too: Halloween, the day James and Lily died because of that traitor. It was also convenient that all the kids would be in the Great Hall for the Halloween feast.

Maybe after I get Wormtail, I'll will be free, then I can get Harry. Oh Harry, I miss him so much.

I turned into my dog Animagus form and walked into the castle. Quickly and quietly I made my way to the Gryffindor common room. The Fat Lady was still guarding the door. I turned back into a human.

"Let me in." I said.

"What's the password?" the Fat Lady said.

"I don't have time for this. Just bloody well let me in!" I said.

"No password, no entry." the Fat Lady said.

I lost it, I took out my knife and slashed the painting. The Fat Lady screamed and disappeared. But the door slowly opened.

POV: Harry

Ron, Hermione, and I were the only ones in the common room tonight. Everyone else was either studying in the library, or finishing supper. Personally, Ron and I would have been too, except Hermione pretty much forced us to come up here and work on our homework.

"I can't believe Snape gave us this long of and essay. I mean, can he even assign us this!" Ron said.

"He's a teacher Ronald." Hermione said.

"But he is not the teacher for this subject!" Ron said. "I mean, why aren't you complaining, you probably have like four other essays if not more with all the classes you're taking."

"Ron does have a point." I said. "And why did we randomly jump to werewolves of all things?"

"He's a teacher, Harry. If he tells us to do something we have to do it." Hermione said.

"What if he told you to go jump off the Astronomy tower?" Ron asked.

"Really, Ron?" Hermione asked.

Our conversation was cut short by the portrait hole opening. Not that the act of it was strange, but because of who walked in. It wasn't a Gryffindor student, it wasn't a teacher, it was…. 

POV: Sirius

I was not expecting that. I walk into the room and there are three students. One I could easily tell was Harry, another was a bushy hair girl, and the last, the ginger, was one of the boys in the newspaper, the one with Wormtail!

Of course the girl had to scream, while the ginger jumped up and backed up with fear in his eyes. Harry looked like a mixture of confusion and panic.

"Why are you up here?" I asked. Seriously, no pun intended, shouldn't they be at the feast?

"We could ask you the same question." Harry said.

"Isn't it Halloween?" I asked.

"No that was yesterday." the girl said.

I nearly muttered a curse, until I noticed the ginger boy clutching his rat that was squirming. He was clutching Wormtail. I approached him and he looked like he was either going to faint or wet himself out of fear.

"Look, just give me the rat." I said, wanting to hurry this up, the girl's scream certainly alerted someone, and another student, perhaps even a teacher, would be up any moment.

"Why should I?" the ginger said.

"Because he is a wizard posing as a rat." I said.

"Why should we trust you?" Harry said. "You're a mass murder."

"I am not! He is." I said pointing at the rat.

"How could Scabbers be a murder?" the ginger asked.

"Don't make me say it again." I said. "Just hand over the rat. I'll perform a spell. If I'm right he will turn back to his wizard form. If you are right, and he is just an ordinary rat, it won't harm him."

The ginger, with some coaxing from Harry, he called him Ron, handed over Wormtail. I muttered the spell and…

POV Harry

I couldn't believe it. One second Scabbers was there, the next moment it was a fat balding man, that had mousy features.

Sirius Black laughed triumphantly. "Well Peter, do you want to explain to Harry why he doesn't have any parents or should I?"

What is he talking about? Voldemort killed my parents not him?

The rat turned man, Peter stuttered something, then fainted.

"I guess that means me." Sirius Black said. He turned to me. "Harry before well, Voldemort killed your parents," he seemed to get chocked up here, but why would he? "They knew he was after them, so they went into hiding. Since I was your father's best friend," Wait he knew my dad? "We decided to perform a special charm that the only way someone could find them was if I told them. But since everyone knew James and I were best friends I thought I would be the obvious Secret Keeper." I figured 'secret keeper' was the term for the only person who could tell. "So last minute, we switched to Pettigrew." He pointed to Peter laying on the ground, still out cold. "Turns out he worked for Voldemort, and told him where your parents were hiding."

"He's the reason they're dead?" I asked.

"Yes." Sirius Black said. "I would've been there for you Harry, as your godfather I would have taken you in. But I couldn't stand they idea of him," gesturing towards Peter, "being on the loose. So I went after him. He shouted for the whole street to hear how I betrayed your parents, then he cut of his finger, blew up half the street and turned into to rat that he is ane went to hide, apparently as his pet." he gestured to Ron. "Of course I was blamed for everything, and sent to Azkaban without a trail."

Thoughts flowed through my mind. Godfather? Does this mean he can take me with him? Certainly this is enough proof to show Sirius was innocent, then he would be able to stay with him.

At that moment Professor McGonagall walked into the room.

POV: Sirius

When my old head of house walked into the room she seemed surprised of course. A seemingly escaped dangerous prisoner, alone in a room with three third years, and a supposed to be dead wizard would have surprised anyone. It came as no surprise when she hit me with a body bind curse.

But Harry quickly stepped in and explained everything, retelling the entire story. She had a few seventh years who had walked in close behind her drag Wormtail to a spare class room until they could figure out what to do with him, she then promptly released me from my invisible binds.

"I could never believe that you would have truly betrayed James and Lily." McGonagall said.

"Will my name get cleared?" I asked.

"Most certainly." McGonagall replied.

"Is there anyway I could get custody of Harry?" I asked.

Harry seemed almost too excited.

"The Ministry will have to approve, but it should be no problem and be done by Christmas." McGonagall said.

If possible Harry got even more excited. "You mean I never have to go to the Durselys again?"

"Not if you don't want to." I said.

"Of course I don't!" Harry said. He ran over to me and hugged me, which took my greatly by surprise, not that it mattered, Wormtail would be going to Azkaban, I was going to be free, and I had Harry, nothing else mattered. I was totally lucky that I had gotten the date wrong.


End file.

Harry Potter