"Alrigh alrigh firs years in the boats comeon comeon hurry now." The giant proclaimed and he urged the students into the, already cramped, boats.
Harry found himself stuck with the shy boy from before, a bushy-haired girl, and another brunette.
"I can't wait to start learning! Have all of you done your pre-class reading?"
The other two in the boat nodded, although the boy's was hardly noticeable. Harry merely shrugged.
"No? But it is so very interesting! I can't wait to look through their library!"
"Excuse me, why is your owl on your shoulder?"
All three sets of eyes were now turned towards the boy, who tried desperately not to roll his own. "She doesn't like being in a cage."
"B-b-but that is against the rules!"
"I never read any of the rules, so how would I know that?"
"But you know now!"
"I didn't buy a cage for her, she likes to be with me."
"B-but the rules…"
By this point Harry had tuned her out, glancing out over the waters at the castle looming before them.
...
The ghosts were a neat trick, if a bit much for those not used to magic. The enchanted ceiling… not so much. Sure it was pretty but compared to what they could have done with it… Harry glanced around the main hall with little interest at the older students and floating candles. They were all neat tricks but seemed rather silly to him.
"Settle down please, settle down students" A bearded man proclaimed before gesturing towards a stool positioned at the front of the room. "I would like to welcome everyone to another year at Hogwarts, for those of you starting this year I can only wish you the best in your studies. Now we shall begin the time honored tradition of sorting new students into the houses, Minerva if you please."
After a brief song, apparently sung by the hat itself, the woman lead the first student up to the stool, and placing the enchanted hat upon their heads.
A few seconds later and it would proclaim one of the four houses, before said student would be lead off to a corresponding table. Once again Harry grew bored, and glanced around the hall at the professors.
The older man gave him a nod, and raised a cup to him, odd.
A greasy haired man glared back with an unusual amount of animosity, not as odd.
A turban clad man stared, very odd considering that he appeared to have two different magical auras around him.
"Harry Potter!"
Apparently it was his turn, and the boy took the offered seat before the hat was dropped onto his head.
...
Monster
That was what the Sorting Hat saw upon being placed upon Harry Potter's head. The boy was a monster . The Hat had sorted Tom Riddle mere decades earlier, and yet even then there had been hope for the child who would become Lord Voldemort. Even then the Sorting Hat believed he could be redeemed, could be changed with time and love.
Harry could not.
It wasn't just how powerful he was, but by Merlin was the boy powerful. It wasn't just the manipulative tendencies or the intellect that he already possessed, either would be prized by Ravenclaw and Slytherin. No, it was his utter lack of empathy towards virtually all people.
The boy would kill children without a second thought.
They had to be warned, Dumbledore had to be warned. If it hadn't been for a young girl centuries ago then it would be a simple task. Back then the Hat could speak about what it saw in the mind's of those it sorted… that is until a young girl had been sent to Hufflepuff, while the rest of her family was in Gryffindor. The question had been raised, and the answer simple 'her sexual orientation will not be accepted in Gryffindor, she will do best in Hufflepuff.'
The girl hadn't returned after the winter holidays, and it was later discovered that her father had killed her in a fit of rage.
After that the Founders were split between removing that Hat altogether from the process, and ignoring this as a one time incident. Finally they came to the agreement that secrets had to be kept. That children had to feel safe in the school. Yet they also had to be sorted to where they would be thrive.
Thus the Sorting Hat was modified so that it could not speak secrets, nor could the information be extracted.
They still had to be warned, otherwise this boy could doom them all, but how? As the Hat went through its options he remembered the current state of Hogwarts, and the answer came to it. If the boy's fate could not be directly revealed, then perhaps it could encourage others to look more closely at him. To find his faults, and perhaps even stop the rise of a Dark Lord before it began.
"It must be… SLYTHERIN!"
Please notice Albus, please see what is wrong here. A half-blood boy with happiness in his eyes and not a hint of cunning, please…
Yet despite the silent begging the room was filled with applause, and the boy smiled and gently set the hat back onto the stool. As he did so his smile turned feral. "Clever" the boy whispered out, and for the first time ever the Sorting Hat felt fear .
...
"Welcome to Slytherin children. For those of you who are new to our school this will be your common room for the next seven years. The male dorms are on the left side, the females to the right. My office is before the door to the common room and is marked as such. I expect you all to behave as per the rules listed on the wall behind me. Remember that you will be treated far more harshly than the other houses and so we must provide a strong front. For that reason I do not want to hear of any arguments in public."
With a nod to his prefects the students were thus divided and taken to their rooms to unpack.
A few minutes later and Draco Malfoy had already claimed the 'best bed' in his specific dorm room before addressing another issue.
"Something wrong with your bed Potter?"
The green-eyed boy glanced up, noting who was addressing him.
"Not at all, why do you ask?"
"I don't see you unpacking anything."
Harry returned a smile, "Oh I didn't have time to go school shopping before classes started. Hopefully I can pick some things up in the next week or two. But with my lack of money to use I am not sure how that will…"
The room practically erupted into laughter, and the boy tilted his head in curiosity.
"Having money problems Potter? I thought with all of that fame money you would be parading about already."
The boy shrugged before a white owl came flying in through one of the charmed windows to land on his shoulder. Due to their underground location magic was applied to various windows to allow for a viewing of the outside weather, along with having owls enter and exit for mail delivery.
"What do you expect from a Half-blood Draco? He probably doesn't even know what a 'Wand' is."
Again more laughter flooded the first and second year dorm at Nott's verbal jab.
Harry merely smiled once more, as if enjoying a joke that only he understood.