Heroes Assemble!

Yeah, Right, Like I'm An Alien!

Minerva tapped the large iron gates that guarded Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry to find seven individuals standing in a loose semicircle before her. The fact that four of them wore hoods or masks that covered either their entire faces or only part of it simply made her sigh.

"These are your friends, Mister Potter?" she asked the man in the blue-grey cloak that she recognised.

"Yes, Professor," Potter's unmistakable voice replied.

Once again, she raked her eyes over the group. The fact that one of the unmasked men clearly carried weapons, judging by the sheath of arrows on his back and another simply carried a large metal muggle case, while a third carried one of the largest hammers that she'd ever seen worried her slightly. But then, the others were masked, and one, the only female, clearly had a tail of all things.

"They are muggles?" she asked.

"Yes, Ma'am, well, most of them, that's why I asked for the pendants," Harry replied.

"Hmm. Very well," she finally conceded. "You may enter, but be warned, Mister Potter, I will not tolerate any tomfoolery any more than I did when you were a student."

"Yes, Ma'am," Harry replied.

"Tomfoolery?" the man in the muggle suit asked, amusement clear in his voice. "You been holding out on us, Gandalf? I want the stories."

"Later, Tony," Harry sighed and Minerva smiled a small smile.

Yes, there were many stories that one could tell about Harry Potter, although not as many amusing ones as there were for his father and his friends.

"Is there a reason that so many of you are concealing your faces?" she asked as they began the trek towards the castle.

"The good that we can do in the ... non-magical world would be greatly reduced if people knew who we were," the one in the dark red suit replied. "And I understand that you have a large number of students with ties to the non-magical world who attend here."

"Not to mention that when we're wearing these suits, we're rather recognisable and famous," the one in the red and blue body suit replied.

"Gotta love those fangirls," the one called 'Tony' remarked wistfully.

"Aren't you practically engaged?" the girl asked.

"I am not," Tony replied vehemently, then, after a beat, added, "and Pepper doesn't mind me looking, just so long as I don't touch."

"You just keep telling yourself that, Stark," the archer chuckled. "Maybe one day she won't smack you around the back of the head for 'looking'."

"Is that where you went to school?" the red and blue one gasped as they rounded the bend and Hogwarts came into sight.

"Yep," a proud-sounding Harry replied and Minerva preened at the awed looks the ancient castle was eliciting.

"Damn sight better than Midtown," the red and blue one stated.

"Sure is," the girl agreed.

As they continued their walk, Harry pointed out various features of the castle and grounds to his friends – Gryffindor Tower, the Astronomy Tower, Hagrid's Hut, the Black Lake, the Quidditch Pitch. Questions and comments washed over and around the Headmistress and she listened as a new group of people – these ones decidedly not first years – saw the castle for the first time.

The group had barely entered through the great oaken doors when a young missile with electric blue hair gave an excited shout before leaping down the last half dozen steps of the Grand Staircase and practically flew at Harry.