Chapter 2
“So you find anything interesting?” Asked Coulson.
“Kind of. He owns a motorcycle driving license, and he’s a black belt Jiu-Jitsu which is some martial art apparently. But what’s really interesting and weird in my opinion is that I could barely find anything on him from the years 1991 to 2001. I mean we’re talking no middle school or high school diploma. Also, he doesn’t have a single social media account which I honestly find very weird and creepy, I mean who doesn’t have a single social media account.”
Everyone shuffled uncomfortably and looked at the ground.
“What about his family,” said May changing the subject, “anything interesting about them, any criminal records?”
“Well, his parents were killed in a car crash, driving drunk apparently, so he went and lived with his aunt and uncle who have a son of their own. Aunt’s unemployed and uncle recently retired from a drills business. Their son, and that’s the weird part, has a diploma and everything from a school for spoiled children and is a boxing coach at the same school. Guess violence runs in the family,” said Skye, “and no criminal record on any of them.”
“So either his aunt and uncle hated him and didn’t send him to school, or he just erased the fact that he went to school for some reason,” said Fitz, “Great.”
“Umm if you don’t mind me asking sir,” said Simmons, “why are we wasting our time and resources gathering information on a coffee shop owner, when we could be tracking down Garrett and Ward instead?”
“Because ordinary people who have simple, boring lives don’t just casually stand up to generals over his customers, who could be criminals, and the way he did it was almost like he had experience, like he had stood up to bigger authority figures before. Also, if we’re going to rebuild SHIELD we’re going to need to start recruiting new people, and that’s exactly how we all got recruited,” said Coulson.
“I mean, don’t you think he could be secretly Hydra or something, I mean shouldn’t we be extra careful when recruiting people who probably have had parts of their lives deleted from every database?” asked Trip.
“Last time I checked every part of our lives are deleted from every single database right now, so we’re kind of technically more suspicious than him,” said Coulson.
“Trip, Skye we’re heading out to recruit him tonight when he’s closing his shop, the rest of you are staying here just in case anything happens,” said Coulson, “but now while we wait keep on looking for hints on where Hydra could now be stationed.”
***
Stupid. He was stupid. There was no other way to describe what he did.
The moment they had left the shop he could hear a fight going on outside. But, he just tried to ignore it as he continued working. Maria, Kyle, and his customers did not. Their eyes were practically glued to every window, just watching everything that was going on. And the moment that that had cleared, all the attention switched back into him, and they were all staring at him with either awe or disgust. There was no in between. Except for Maria who just raised her eyebrow at him and then went back to work. Maria and Theo, who was not present at the moment, were his first employees, and were used to weird things happening around Harry and just tended to raise their eyebrows at him, and then carry on doing whatever they were doing.
Usually, when things happened to him, it was after or before the shop opened. Like that one time where someone tried to rob him and he stopped it, without using his wand, all while Maria and Theo were watching.
But now, it happened in front of his customers, and most of them had their phone on while it happened so half of them would show their family and friends when they got the chance, and the other half would probably post it online, and the next thing he knows the video will go viral, and his coffee shop will probably be filled with people staring at him, giving him all the attention he hated so much.
After finally locking up his shop, he went up to his apartment only to find Theo, who he let his second apartment to, smirking at him from the top of the stairs.
“Disrespecting the military now are we Harry?” He said laughing while showing a video from his phone.
Harry just groaned. The video showed the entire scene playing out until the military left his shop. Thankfully all their faces were blurred, but the person who blurred the faces apparently got bored and forgot to blur out the coffee shop’s logo and name. The caption above the video read ‘Coffee shop owner disrespects military and kicks them out of his shop’
“Aww don’t worry, most of the comments are pretty much just laughing about it, if anything I think we’ll be getting more customers.”
“Well that’s just what I wanted to hear!” said Harry sarcastically
“Man, I really don’t get you, I can open the coffee shop for you tomorrow if it bothers you that much.”
No, it’s fine that’ll just make everyone more curious anyway,”
“Alright then, goodnight.”
“G’night.”
***
It was not as bad as Harry expected to be totally honest. Apart from the occasional teen trying to sneak a picture of him every half an hour. And the suburban mom every couple of hours yelling at him about respecting the military and the government. And the old men telling him to go back to his country. And of course better than all that was the kid who came up to him and asked him for tips on standing up to annoying adults …. It was an interesting day.
And of course, that wasn’t apparently enough, because just as he finished up cleaning he was about to close his shop when Coulson and two of the people who came with him yesterday started knocking at his glass door.
He quickly let them in before anyone could see them.
“You know, if I were you I wouldn’t be showing up at the same place I almost got caught in the day before,” he said glaring at them, “and besides I don’t want to get into any trouble I’ve only barely avoided it yesterday.”
“We’re really sorry about that, but we wanted to thank you for your help.”
Harry arched his eyebrow, “you already did that yesterday.”
“Well yes, but we also wanted to speak with you about something, so if you don’t mind could we go somewhere with less glass around us, so we don’t attract any unwanted attention.”
“What makes me think I can trust you,” he said crossing his arms.
“The same reason you helped us get away yesterday,”
Harry uncrossed his arms, glared at them some more before guiding them to the staff room.
Harry sat at a chair while the rest of them sat at the couch, “well?”
“I’m agent Phil Coulson, this is agent Skye, and that’s agent Antoine Triplett and we’re agents of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division.”
“S.H.I.E.L.D.?” Harry asked, “weren’t you the ones who turned out to be a terrorist group Hydro or something?”
Skye snorted, “it’s Hydra actually.”
“Whatever it is, you’re not denying that you aren’t them.”
“We’re not Hydra, in fact, we’re trying to take down Hydra, and we need all the help we can get, our numbers have gone way down after the whole hydra fiasco. Many good agents died, and we want to stop them before they kill anymore,” said Coulson.
“That’s what a Hydra agent would say.”
“Nah, if we were Hydra, which we’re not, we’d come in here talking about world domination or some shit and saying hail Hydra this and hail Hydra that,” said Trip.
“And why exactly is it that you want me to join your agency, I mean - have you lowered your expectations that you’d just ask some random coffee shop owner who stood up for you?”
“But you’re not just some coffee shop owner now are you. You’re a black belt Jiu-Jitsu, and that’s not very easy, it takes commitment to become a black belt, doesn’t it?” Asked Coulson.
“So what, I never knew learning self-defense guarantees you employment by agencies. If I knew that I never would have learnt it,” he said, “besides that was years ago. I’m sorry, but I’m not joining your agency.”
“Thank you for your time Mr. Potter, I really hope you consider our offer, you’ll be saving many lives if you join us. And I’m sure you have the potential to do far more than just brew coffee,” Coulson said, “But, you also need to know that our agency technically does not exist and you will become a fugitive the moment you join us. But, I think that the outcome of what we do outweighs any disadvantage we may face. I hope you consider our offer, we’ll be on our way now, we’ll come back tomorrow in case you’ve changed your mind.”
They got up and started heading towards the door.
“Wouldn’t you rather go out through the backdoor,” Harry said motioning to the door on the right.
“Thanks,” they said.
They left the coffee shop and Skye sighed in defeat. “That was a waste of time,” she said.
“No, I actually think that it didn’t go too bad,” said Coulson smiling his mysterious smile.
***
Harry tried sleeping on it like he always heard people say when they couldn’t come to a decision. But, he woke up to nothing.
He didn’t know what to expect if he were being honest. Just suddenly waking up to the perfect answer. Life was never that easy.
So, he did what he always did when he didn’t know what to do. He waited for the perfect time, took a break from his shift and went upstairs to his apartment, and got out his two-way mirror.
He called out for Ron and Hermione’s names, but there was no answer. He should’ve expected it as today wasn’t Saturday, which is when they usually call each other, but just as he was about to lose hope, a young voice practically screamed from the other side of the mirror.
“UNCLE HARRY!”
“Hey there Rosie,” said Harry smiling, “how are you?”
“I’m fine, but I miss you so much”
“I miss you too, Rosie, you’re becoming really grown up, I barely recognized you. How old are you now?”
“I’m almost 8. I’m turning 8 in two months.”
“Wow, almost 8 already, you’re becoming bigger and bigger every day,” said Harry, “are mummy and daddy around?”
“Yes, do you want me to call them?”
After Harry gave her his confirmation, she ran out of the frame yelling for her parents. Harry couldn’t believe he’d forgotten how loud children could be. It seemed like it was only yesterday when Teddy was as young as Rose was. But his thoughts were interrupted when two figures appeared in the mirror.
“Harry! It’s nice to see you mate,” said Ron.
“Yes Harry it’s very nice to see you but you usually don’t call unless it's Saturday, is something wrong,” Hermione asked blunt and worried as ever.
“Hey there Hermione nice to see you too I’m fine what about you,” Harry said jokingly.
Hermione only rolled her eyes in response.
Harry told them about the past few days, and they’ve given him some rather excellent advice. By the time they finished an hour had passed so Harry went back to his shop and they went to their children.
While he was taking orders and preparing drinks Harry thought over what they told him. It was true that he was getting slightly bored of what he was doing, and that the only thing saving him from dying of boredom were his chats with his employees and his chatty regulars, the letters he got from the Weasleys and Teddy, and of course calling Ron and Hermione.
Also, he did like saving people deep down no matter how much he denied it. The reason he quit the auror department, wasn’t in fact because he was tired of saving people like he told the press all these years ago. But, it was because he was tired of being the ministry’s poster boy.
And above all that, it was nice to know that people still thought of him as being good in defense despite not knowing that he was the boy who lived or that he was even a wizard.
But, he would miss his coffee shop. He was proud of how he built this business from scratch and how successful it became, and that it was all him. The shop was like his baby, and he didn’t want to get rid of it.
Also, he didn’t want to become a fugitive as he quite liked living in an apartment with its conditioning, heating, food, and furniture. Becoming a fugitive again was not something he was looking forward to.
He still didn’t know what to decide His brain was telling him something while his heart was telling something else. So, in typical Harry Potter fashion, he pushed all that to the back of his mind, focused on serving his customers, and didn’t think about it again until he was closing his shop, and heard a knock this time coming from his backdoor.