A Soulless Angel

The plane made touchdown in LaGuardia Airport, and the moment Harry got off, he mentally added America to his growing list of places he had visited so far. After asking for directions to where the luggage could be picked up, Harry went to get it. After he did, he took a brief look out of the windows which showed a fraction of Manhattan.

Seeing the vast metropolis was impressive, but it would be even more impressive to see it up close, and Harry hoped to do a little sightseeing here. With a little bit of luck, if he played his cards right, then he would be staying here permanently before his long-term plans were fulfilled, with luck, he would never walk into the halls of Hogwarts again.

Harry looked around for any signs of his American family, and he hoped to just rest. He was exhausted after changing planes over in Jamaica, which had taken over two hours; one of the reasons why he had decided against using international portkeys was because he still wasn't used to travelling that way, but also because he didn't want every ministry knowing where he was going, and he wouldn't have put it past Fudge to try to use what political power he had left to hold him prisoner in Britain now he was out of Azkaban.

Okay, granted, while he didn't like muggle travel that much either, as it was slow and the processes of booking tickets and finding the right plane was a living hell, it meant the Magical World would not know where he was, and Harry wanted to keep it that way. He had plans to check out Brazil and Africa and the magical communities there to get an idea of what they were like and to see if they were as stupid as the one he was familiar with, before school started again, although it would be easier and simpler to just go to Ilvermorny.

He had told the American Potters to expect him today and he had made sure they knew that, but when he had learnt that New York had three airports, he had made sure to send them a drop of his blood via a House Elf to use as a tracker just in case he got on a flight and it went out to one of the other airports.

As usual for him now, some people stared at him as he walked past, taking in his white hair; some even muttering to themselves. Harry ignored them while he stopped for a second to get his bearings. Making his way through the terminal, he saw a small group holding up a white sign with his name on it.

Harry slowly walked towards them, seeing there were two men and a woman holding up the sign. As he got close, he saw they were well dressed in expensive muggle - No-Maj, he reminded himself, wishing that magical Britain adopted that name for the muggles, as it was less of an insult - clothes.

"Hi," Harry greeted them, studying them closely.

"Harry?" The woman asked, gazing at him and looking up and down.

Harry nodded. "Yes, it's me," he said, "It's lovely to meet you at last, Aunt Miranda." He felt odd about calling somebody his aunt. The only aunt and uncle he had ever had were two muggles he would have preferred never to meet. One of the reasons why Dumbledore had wanted him to remain with Vernon and Petunia wasn't for his protection, it was to make his childhood identical to Tom Riddles. Dumbledore had hoped that by coming to pick him up then Harry would see him as a hero, unfortunately, the fact he kept sending him back to the Dursleys, back to being beaten, enslaved and treated like an animal, only for the cycle to repeat itself.

Miranda bit her lip, looking like she wanted nothing more than to hug him. Miranda Potter was a beautiful woman who looked like she was in her thirties, but from what Harry had learnt about her and her husband, she was at least a decade older.

"The last time we saw you was when you were a baby," she said sadly, "Fleamont and Charlus and James were oh so proud of you when they showed you off over the mirror, and when we visited during our family get-togethers before the war really heated up."

"So do I," Harry gave her a bittersweet smile at that. He was upset that while the MACUSA Potters had arrived and seen him as a baby, they hadn't been allowed anywhere near the country to get him out when James and Lily had died. Since James's own sisters had joined Voldemort and became Death Eaters, he was the only Potter left. However, Harry did wonder if the loyalty James's siblings had to the family would have outweighed whatever fanatical loyalty they had for Voldemort. "I….I honestly thought I was alone," he went on, remembering all the times he had laid in that blood-stained, moth-eaten thing the Dursleys thought would be enough, wishing for someone, some relative to arrive and whisk him away to pastures new. He remembered his outburst when he discovered he did have relatives and friends of his parents, but some of them in Britain had washed their hands of him. At the same time, only the MACUSA Potter branch and the other branches of the family kept clamouring to take him in, sending him gift after gift after gift to gain dust in some fucking vault in Gringotts that Dumbledore arranged, "but the branches of the family out there I found were a surprise."

Miranda's eyes watered. Only the trolley Harry had his luggage on stopped her from rushing and hugging him. She turned to the two men beside her, who looked just as emotionally swamped as she was. "Harry, this is my husband, Isaac, and my brother-in-law Jasper."

Harry turned his eyes to the two men. They were definitely Potters; they had the famous signature messy hair, which had been a trademark for generations. "It's nice to meet you," Harry greeted them.

"It's nice to meet you as well, Harry," Isaac, the man standing close to Miranda said. "How was your journey?"

"Long and tiring. I had to change planes over at Jamaica before I could board a flight to New York," Harry said.

Jasper looked ready to say something when one of the two men with them interrupted. Harry had noticed them as he'd approached, but his focus had been on the Potter party, now he could see they were dressed in immaculate dark suits. To No-Maj's, they resembled the type of men you'd consider to be government agents or bodyguards. To Harry, their postures screamed career Aurors.

"Excuse me, Mr Potter," one of them said, "it's time we left."

Isaac nodded at him. "Yes, you're right, Ishmael," he turned back to Harry, "we'd better get going, Harry."

Harry nodded back and followed them out of the airport terminal when an old-fashioned but extremely well-maintained car picked them up with a purr of its engine. After putting his luggage in the boot, Harry climbed inside. Harry looked around the interior of the car as it sped away from the airport, speeding through the traffic and along the roads like they weren't even there, and he guessed the car used the same enchantments as the Knight Bus back in the UK, only the driver here was competent.

Miranda sat next to him. "Are you sure your flight was okay?" She asked.

"Yeah, it was fine, just a bit boring, and the seats were bad; years ago, No-Maj's had aircraft you could move around in, and you could do things while stretching your legs. But today, you're just sitting down for hours with nothing to do."

Miranda wrinkled her nose. "Sounds boring."

"It is."

"You said that you'd be travelling for a while, so where did you visit?" Miranda asked.

"I travelled through Europe; I visited France, Germany, Spain, and Italy. I took some recipes and brought some souvenirs," Harry smiled back at her, "and I've just visited the Caribbean."

"That sounds amazing."

"It was. I spent a lot of time sightseeing, especially in Jamaica. I visited the rainforest, and it was amazing," Harry smiled, thinking about the life he had seen. "I'm hoping to see Brazil and Africa before the year ends."

"You want to see more of the world, huh?" Jasper asked.

Harry sighed, remembering his childhood promises to leave Britain and just explore the world…and if possible, just move away. He had gotten the idea when he was a kid, and he had seen pictures of countries like France, China, Japan, and the rainforests of Brazil and Africa. Compared to Britain, they were exotic, and he hadn't lost those hopes and ambitions. Ambitions that Dumbledore and Fudge had very nearly snuffed out.

Now, he was just biding his time before he could pack everything up and just leave Britain behind forever.

"I've spent my whole life in Britain. I would like nothing more than to make a change," Harry replied solemnly.

The elder Potters sobered. While they didn't know exactly what he had gone through despite him showing them a few memories of his childhood and what they had heard after the trial when Fudge finally declared him innocent, and couldn't keep him prisoner and made himself out to a Minister interested in justice despite not knowing what the word meant, they knew enough to know his life had been the opposite of what a magical child should have led.

"When do you want to leave Britain, Harry?" Isaac asked.

Harry hesitated. He had decided to sound the elder Potters out, find out from them how they would feel about him changing his name, only to adopt him formally when he went through the essence transfer process. If they were receptive to both ideas, then he could leave Britain pretty much the moment he returned and he could finalise the details there before making his way back.

Dumbledore's plans be damned, he was only concerned for himself.

"As soon as I can," Harry replied.

The rest of the trip was spent with Harry staring out of the windows of the car as it sped through the streets. Harry had always wanted to see New York. The only city he had visited was London, but this place was in a totally different league. He wanted to visit the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty, Times Square, and Central Park…but he knew the stance of MACUSA relating to No-Maj's. They'd had several near misses, the worst being the Dorcas Twelvetrees incident when some stupid witch let a No-Maj take her wand, and decades later, in 1926, when Grindelwald tried to manipulate an obscurial into committing all kinds of devastation in the city; if it wasn't for Newt Scamander's Thunderbird which spread a potion in the air that removed all memory of the incident, then the magical world would have been revealed.

Harry had no intention of getting on the wrong side of the MACUSA. He'd just left Magical Britain after leaving Azkaban, he did not want to go to prison for some stupid mistake. But he did want to go sightseeing. He would just need a moment when there weren't any Aurors in earshot to find out.

"So, what happens now?" Harry asked.

"You'll need to register your wand, and your magical signature," Jasper leaned forward. "Do you have your wand?"

Harry nodded, and he flicked his wrist, and the enchantment on his wand holster he'd brought for this trip to properly hide his wand from prying eyes didn't see it. His wand appeared. "Yeah, here it is," he showed them his wand for a moment before he flicked his wrist, and the wand was retracted back into his holster.

"A wand holster?" Isaac smiled. "Very good, but you'll still need to register it with the wand registration office," her went on, "but we've arranged an appointment."

"That sounds good," Harry didn't like the thought of anyone touching his wand, or recording his magical signature, but if it meant a new life for himself then he would take it, but he was wary. He didn't know these people, or if he should even trust them with what he was going to ask them. That was why he planned on getting to know them, and seeing if he could trust them. If he couldn't, then he would just go through with his plans without them being any the wiser.

Jasper was staring out of the window and Harry noticed the car was starting to slow down. "We're here," he said.

Getting out, Harry stopped and helped his aunt step out, earning a grateful smile and a look of appreciation from Isaac before he turned to the building where the car had stopped. It was impressive, with dozens of ordinary people stepping inside. Harry frowned a little bit, wondering where MACUSA was.

Jasper tapped him gently on his shoulder and led him to the doorman. He dropped his voice and whispered something, and the doorman nodded and gently waved his hand.

"After you, Harry," Miranda said after Jasper led the way inside.

Harry dubiously followed, but as he did, he realised he wasn't in any No-Maj building. He was inside MACUSA's Headquarters.