Harry read Dumbledore's letter in surprise. Here was big news. Dumbledore had written to tell him about what had come out regarding Sirius Black, the supposed right hand man of Lord Voldemort and the betrayer of his parents – except that none of it was true. Sirius was innocent of everything he'd been imprisoned for. He'd never even had a trial. His name was cleared now with the capture of Peter Pettigrew, the real traitor and the man who had given his parents to Lord Voldemort.
Pettigrew's trial will be soon Dumbledore had written to Harry, there's no doubt that he'll be sent to Azkaban for the rest of his life. The question now is what does Sirius Black's release mean for you? Right now he's spending some time in St. Mungo's Hospital for physical and mental rehabilitation from the lingering effects of both long term dementor exposure and very rough living since he escaped from Azkaban. However I'm sure that as soon as he's recovered he will ask about you again. He first did so almost as soon as he saw me after he was cleared. I told him that you were safe and we would talk more when he was fully recovered. He was the first person on your parents' list of potential guardians and once he is released from St. Mungo's he will want to see you. He doted on you when you were a baby and I believe the two of you would be good for each other. How much should I tell him about your situation? I know you're happy where you are and I think you should stay there. I think Sirius will agree but he may need to know more than I can tell him without permission from you and Charles.
Harry leaned back in his chair as he thought over the headmaster's letter. He hadn't really thought all that much about Sirius Black beyond what he'd heard at Gringotts and from mentions of him in letters from his friends. If he'd been at Hogwarts this year it probably would have gotten more of his attention but what with his move to America and between the X-Men and Ilvermorny he didn't have all that much time to dwell on it.
And things were changing quite rapidly for the X-Men. It had only been two weeks since their fight with Magneto but during that time word about them had spread like wildfire across the country. In hindsight Harry realized that he should have seen it coming. Cape Citadel was a major military base and the whole incident had a been a high profile one. In stopping Magneto the X-Men had potentially averted a large amount of destruction and saved a lot of lives. The commanding general of the base had been full of praise for them when he was interviewed by the press and pictures and video footage of all six of them in action had been made available to the media from base surveillance cameras. That had brought the X-Men a storm of media attention. Everyone had questions: who were they? Where did they come from? How did they get their powers? And so on. More than one journalist had wondered if they were a junior team affiliated in some way with the Avengers (Harry liked that). In short, they were suddenly famous.
Harry gave a snort of rueful amusement. It seemed that no matter what he did he couldn't escape from the public eye for very long. At least this time it was Lightning who was getting the attention and not Harry Potter. He was okay with that. The best part about the X-Men becoming famous was that soon he'd be able to go flying in public and it would be okay. As long as he was in uniform when he did anyone seeing him would know that he was Lightning of the X-Men and accept him as just another New York superhero out doing some flying. He was looking forward to that.
Harry shook his head and brought his attention back to Dumbledore's letter. He didn't know how to feel about it. He got up from his chair and went in search of Professor Xavier whom he soon found in his study. He knocked on the open door to let the professor know he was there.
"Harry" said the professor looking up from his desk, "come in. Did you need something?"
"Some advice maybe" said Harry as he entered the room and approached the desk. He held out Dumbledore's letter for the professor to take. Professor Xavier gestured for Harry to take a seat and then read the letter in silence.
"I see" said the professor when he was finished with the letter, "so how may I help you?"
"Well" said Harry as he gathered his thoughts, "I don't know how to feel about this. Until today all I'd ever heard about Sirius Black was what we learned from the goblins and my friends' letters. We all thought he was the man who betrayed my parents to Voldemort and got them killed. Now I find out that everyone was wrong and he was innocent the whole time. He never even had a trial. I knew he was my godfather before now but according to Dumbledore we were quite close when I was baby and he doted on me. He's the first person on my parents' list of potential guardians for me and he's already asking Dumbledore where I am. What if he demands to get custody of me?
"You know I've had a less than happy childhood with the Dursleys. They never wanted me. It sounds like Mr. Black does want me. On the one hand that's wonderful. I've always wanted real family and he may be as close as I can get to having one. On the other hand I'm happy here. Happier than I've ever been – and that includes Hogwarts during my first days there. I want to stay at your school, and Ilvermorny, and especially with the X-Men."
Professor Xavier looked at Harry with compassion.
"Harry" he said, "who says you'll have to leave here?"
"What?" said Harry, not expecting that question.
"It's a long way" said the professor, "from Mr. Black asking Albus where you are to you leaving here to go live with him. First of all he's recovering from over a decade in one of the harshest prisons in the world. No court, mundane or magical, will summarily grant him custody of a minor under those circumstances, not even the Wizengamot. He'll have to prove that's he sane, competent, and capable of looking after you. All that will take time. Secondly, you're not a little kid anymore. You're 13 and your desires will be taken into account before any decisions are made.
"Lastly the two of you need to meet if only to see if you can get along. We don't know what Mr. Black actually wants. If he's a reasonable man – and Albus seems to think that he is – he'll want to know what you want." Harry thought about this.
"Could he" Harry asked in a slow manner, "come here? Would that even be possible without him learning about the X-Men?"
"I'll deal with that" said Xavier, "I'll talk to Albus about this. If you'll allow it I'll meet with Mr. Black first and find out what his intentions are. I can also determine if he's someone who can be trusted to know about the X-Men. If he is we'll discuss his possibly coming here in the future. If he isn't – well we'll take that road only if we have to. For now try not to worry about it."
"I'll try" said Harry.
"Good" said the professor, "instead you should worry about the concert you're going to tomorrow night." That made Harry smile. Warren had obtained tickets for Nirvana's show at the New York Coliseum. He, Harry, and their four classmates would all be attending the show. It would be the first time Harry had ever been to a rock show and he didn't really know what to expect. In addition, they would be spending the night in Harry's penthouse in Manhattan instead of driving back to the school from the show. Harry had finally gotten a chance to see his penthouse and it was a very nice place indeed. It covered the whole top floor of the building it was on although about a third of that was taken up by an outside terrace large enough to hold a party on. There was room enough for all six of them to stay there without any crowding.
The next day, Sunday November 14th, they got to the penthouse in the early afternoon to get settled in and then sent for take out before they headed out in the early evening. Harry now had his first experience with New York City Mass Transit. He'd expected they would drive to the venue but Hank had explained to him that New York City was rather notorious as a city where people didn't drive (which Harry thought was odd considering how many cars he saw on the streets). Mass transit in the city was widespread enough that you didn't have to drive if you didn't want to.
The six classmates walked up to 86th Street where they took the crosstown bus from the Upper East Side of Manhattan through Central Park to the Upper West Side. They got off on Broadway, crossed the avenue and walked down the stairs to catch the downtown 1 train to the 59th street stop. That was Columbus Circle and the Coliseum was right there.
Harry didn't exactly enjoy experiencing New York's mass transit system. The subway in particular was loud and hardly the cleanest place in the world, but it did get them to where they needed to go in a reasonable amount of time. Also they wouldn't have to worry about being out too late because unlike in many other cities the New York system, though it might be slower late at night, never actually stopped running.
They arrived at the Coliseum right as the doors were opening, which was very early for the show. Warren had insisted on that but wouldn't say why. He revealed the surprise once they were through the entrance when he told the others that he'd gotten backstage passes for them all and they were going to meet the bands.
"How did you manage that?" asked Bobby.
"I have my ways" said Warren with a smile causing Harry to roll his eyes but he didn't say anything. He knew very well that Warren had done it through his family connections. What's the point of being part of one of the world's richest families if you can't have extra perks now and then? Harry might do the same thing some day.
They went backstage and met the members of Nirvana. Harry thought they were all nice enough. Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl were friendly. Kurt Cobain was too but Harry thought he had a greater intensity than the others. It was here that Harry's own experiences with fame were very useful. As a celebrity himself (in the magical world anyway) he knew how not to behave. He knew what not to say, not to ask intrusively personal questions, and not to fawn over the band members or act obsessed with them. Instead he acted like they were regular people. He did say he liked their music – there was nothing wrong with that and artists always like to hear that people like their stuff – but didn't ask them to play specific songs during the show or not to play certain ones as he figured that was their business.
He also briefly met the members of the other bands playing that night. The main supporting act was a band called The Breeders and the opening act was called Half Japanese. He'd heard of the Breeders but didn't know all that much of their stuff and he'd never heard of Half Japanese. According to both Warren and Hank this was normal at a show of this kind where there would be one headliner that everyone was there to see, a main supporting act who would have a respectable following of their own, and an opening act (sometimes two) that might be early in its career and just looking for exposure or it might be an older band that just didn't have the same kind of draw as the headliner. To Harry, for whom all of this was still quite new, it did make sense.
Not too long after that they all went out to the main floor of the Coliseum where the crowd was slowly filtering in and stood near the back of the room. Harry made to walk towards the front but Bobby stopped him.
"If you've never been to a mosh show" he said, "you should stay here until you see what a mosh pit is like."
"Sage words my intelligent teammate" said Hank, "if you have no knowledge of proper slam dancing behavior you could easily sustain an injury."
"Really?" asked Harry.
"Yes" said Warren, "the first time I went to a show like this was about a year and a half ago. I made the mistake of going all the way up to the front and leaning on the barricade. As soon as the headliner came out the crowd turned into a human wave that was constantly pulling back and then slamming forward into the front barricade right where I was. Eventually I had to be lifted out of the pit or I would have passed out. My chest was sore for a week."
"Do a lot of people get hurt at shows like this?" asked Harry with some concern.
"Actually" said Hank, "you'd be surprised that the number of bodies that get injured by the moving masses of humanity is as low as it is."
"In other words" said Warren, "nowhere near as many as you'd think. Believe it or not the people in the crowd look out for each other. If you're in the middle of the pit and you fall down you should expect about a dozen hands to reach down and pull you right back up."
"I'm going to crowd surf" said Bobby.
"What's that?" asked Harry.
"You'll see" was the reply, "it's fun. You should try it."
"If we get separated during the show" said Jean, "we should have a meeting place for after."
"Right" said Scott, "how about right near the main exit?" Everyone agreed to that.
The first two bands performed. Both Half Japanese and the Breeders had followings of their own but the Breeders' following was definitely the bigger one which Warren said was appropriate as their newest album was selling well and its lead single (a song called "Cannonball") had gotten a lot of airplay. When they started playing the mosh pit started forming. Harry was glad that he had been stopped from going to the front as he saw people moshing for the first time. The fans in the crowd were jumping up and down at a frenetic pace (which was odd since a lot of the Breeders' songs weren't that fast but they were loud and they did make people want to move), and pretty quickly they began banging into each other more and more until it all seemed to merge into a big slamming mass. Amazingly people weren't getting hurt. As Warren had said when someone fell down all the people around him reached down and pulled him (or her) back up.
What was most surprising to Harry were the crowd surfers. He watched as now and then a fan would either grab someone's shoulder and hoist themselves up or another person would be helped up by a friend. The result was the same either way. The surfer was pushed up on the crowd and, lying flat, was supported by the hands of all the people under him who passed him forward until he reached the barricade where a security person would grab him, bring him into the space between the barricade and the stage and then direct him to one side or the other so he could rejoin the crowd.
Bobby entered the crowd pretty quickly and soon he was crowd surfing. When he returned some minutes later from his first trip he was grinning.
"That was fun" he said to Harry, "you should try it."
"Maybe later" said Harry who, despite being a Gryffindor, wasn't sure if he was really brave enough to do that.
Between each band there was a break period where the stage crew broke down the old band's equipment and set up the next one. For the crowd it was an intermission where people could relax, recover, buy drinks, etc. It was some time after nine o'clock when the Breeders finished their set and after about fifteen minutes for the changeover Nirvana finally took the stage.
The crowd had been intense for the Breeders but when Nirvana began playing all bets were thrown out the window as the intensity of the crowd shot up a lot more.
Harry had been listening to Nirvana's music for a few months now. He'd been a fan ever since he'd borrowed Warren's copy of Nevermind back at the beginning of August and he'd bought In Utero when it had come out in mid-September. He knew and liked most of the songs that were played that night, starting with set opener "Radio Friendly Unit Shifter" which was followed by "Drain You" then "Breed" and so on, and so on. At first he tapped the rhythm on his leg with his hand, then he started mouthing the words to the songs, before long he began to jump himself as he began to get caught up in the scene. Someone tapped his shoulder. Bobby was motioning him forward.
"Go" he said and Harry went. He entered the crowd and was soon jumping and banging into people like a show veteran even though most of the crowd was bigger than him. It was an all ages show, however, so there were some younger fans. As time passed he started to sweat. A lot. And he wasn't alone. He looked around and saw that some people were taking off their shirts and soon he was seeing a number of sweaty, shirtless fans dancing and singing to the music.
Late in the show Nirvana cranked out "Smells Like Teen Spirit" at long last and Harry decided that it was time to try crowd surfing. He motioned to someone next to him and pointed up. The person understood and made a stirrup with their hands. Harry stepped onto it and the fan pushed him upward. Harry helped him by using just a little bit of telekinesis, not enough for anyone to notice but enough to make it easier for the guy to lift him. Harry shot up until he was lying on top of the crowd getting passed from hand to hand. The view was very different up there as he rode the sea of hands all the way to the very front where a bouncer grabbed him, pulled him off the crowd into the space between the barricade and the stage and sent him off to one side.
Harry took a deep breath as he walked back to where his friends were. What an experience! He reached the others and Bobby gave him a hug.
"Cool!" he said to Harry, "how did you like it?"
"I enjoyed that" said Harry, "I could do it again but not right now. I'm soaking wet!"
"You and me both" said Bobby who turned away and went back into the crowd. Harry turned and saw Warren was also sweaty.
"You danced too?" Harry asked him.
"Oh yeah" said Warren, "I'm taking a break now." Harry saw that Scott, Jean and Hank were not sweating so much.
"I don't go into mosh pits" said Hank, "I'm too big. I might hurt someone and the crowd would never be able to support me if I tried crowd surfing."
"And if I went into the pit" said Scott, "I might lose my glasses. That would be bad." Harry acknowledged that yes, that would be bad.
"I just like to listen" said Jean, "I like Nirvana but I'd rather leave the show without any bruises." Harry nodded and grabbed part of his shirt and began wringing it out. He wasn't surprised to see water falling to the floor when he did this.
"That's disgusting" said Jean making a face." Harry laughed.
"I'm going to have to shower again when we get back" he said.
"So am I" said Warren, "Bobby too."
The show ended not long afterwards and the six friends headed back to Harry's penthouse. When they got there Harry immediately went to take a shower. He felt much better after that and soon went to bed. It had been a fun night and Harry looked forward to attending other shows in the future.