A/N: Apologies for the horribly late update. Life happened and my hard drive died, along with the chapters I had written up *sobs*. Good news is, everything is all fixed and I have the entire story mapped out. Yay! Hope you enjoy the chapter, it's over four times longer than the prologue.

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter

Warning: There is very very mild language (as far as I'm concerned), and my third POV writing is kind of rusty. I'm used to first person, but third POV is necessary for this story.

No Beta

Chapter 2: Scourgify

The only man in the room flinched at the shrill sound of a baby's cry, shattering the imaginary world he had created for himself to escape from reality. He found himself doing that a lot lately, and wondered briefly if he was slowly driving himself mad. It certainly wasn't healthy for one's psyche to constantly pine for a better life he had undoubtedly lost. In his dream world, he was free to do whatever he pleased, with his sibling and mates by his side. He wasn't shackled to a duty he hadn't really understood when he dedicated himself to it, he certainly didn't have a wife, and she most definitely wasn't giving birth to their first born child. Or rather, just gave birth to it.

'Oh Merlin, it looks exactly like its mother.'

It was rather quiet for a newborn, only having given one scream before immediately quieting down. The nurse had finished wiping away the repulsive fluids that clung to it and quickly shoved it into the weak arms of its mother. She smiled weakly at it and cooed, caressing its soft cheek. He grimaced and looked away, escaping once again into his mind. It was simply too much to take in.

If someone had asked him where he would be in five years, he would, beyond a sliver of a doubt, say it wasn't here. If they told him he'd be in the middle of such a farce, he would have laughed at them before hexing them into oblivion.

A son. He didn't want children, at least not yet, and certainly not here, not now, not with that woman. Maybe he could pretend it was a nephew, or a guest in the house. 'Or a troll,' he mused. It certainly looked like one.

A harsh gasp broke his thoughts and he looked again with exasperation plainly written on his features, before they shifted quickly into confusion. The woman had shifted the baby in her arms and appeared to be bracing herself for something while the nurse was swiftly moving and murmuring that they were almost done. It almost looked she was preparing to give birth... again. It couldn't be. He was fairly certain he would have noticed if the mediwitches had diagnosed his... wife with another baby.

Apparently not, he realized with dawning horror while cursing his inattentiveness. The nurse was making encouraging noises and preparing to catch what he desperately wished was a quaffle at the foot of the bed, while the woman made grunting noises and pushed. 'Please Merlin, let it be a quaffle she's birthing...'

Alas, his desperate pleas did not magically change the laws of nature, and out popped another shrieking baby. Only in this case it did not seem to want to calm down, and continued screaming at ear-damaging levels.

'Spectacular,' he thought dazedly as the nurse thrust the crying baby in his arms. 'Twins. That is simply spectacular.'

"Quiet down, lovely, you're meeting your father," the nursemaid said in a strained voice. Surprisingly enough, that seemed to quiet it down.

He blinked down in shock at the equally astonished baby. Familiar eyes blinked back up at him and he recoiled with a wince, an unflattering noise escaping his throat. He thought he saw hurt in her eyes for a second before they flattened out in a very unamused expression. He almost laughed at such an absurd look on a newborn. There was no way it could have connected his reaction with the appropriate emotion. It simply didn't have the mental faculties to recognize that.

"The baby," he almost dropped the baby at the weak voice. "I want to see..."

Obligingly, he none-too-carefully pushed the baby into her mother's arms while she shifted the other baby to make room. He realized belatedly that he didn't catch the older twin's name, then shrugged and retreated back into his corner, watching the once again surprised baby.

"Valeria," she rasped, her face twisting into a mockery of a smile while his froze. "You're name is Valeria."

The man's expression was a mix of horror and shock at the eerily familiar name while he watched mother connect with daughter. He felt the sudden need to apparate far, far away from this heart-warming scene. The woman continued cooing at her daughter.

"Valeria, my sweet daughter..."

Watching with detached interest, he felt a spark of amusement as the baby's face seemed to parrot his own, first freezing, then morphing into shock and horror. A heartbeat passed before her loudest scream yet erupted from her tiny throat, breaking supersonic levels. He covered his ears with his hands and the nurse quickly fled the room in the wake of such a painful scream.

This time the man did laugh.

It was with great determination that the newborn girl attempted to dodge the flying punch from a weak fist. Unfortunately, Valeria's little body didn't allow her to achieve such a task and only managed a weak wobble in the other direction. She would have been completely understanding of the other baby's need to move its feeble little limbs, had she not been forced to share a crib with him.

The baby girl briefly considered hitting back, but quickly dismissed that. It seemed a little cruel to her to hit another baby, even if the little bugger was a piece of work. Besides, he gave her something to do in the hours of boredom that came with lying in a crib. When she wasn't frantically attempting to roll away from him, she was silently cursing the cosmos for landing her here.

She glared morosely at the constellation screen above her. It was beautiful and changed every few hours, but it seemed a little excessive for the parents to hang a damn TV over the crib, not to mention hazardous. What if the screws were loose and it toppled over her and her...brother. She'd much rather have them play the news so she could have some idea of where she was.

Valeria reflected on the situation she found herself in. If she had to make a guess with the evidence given to her, she would have to say she was reincarnated. It was the final explanation she had come to after so many months of this new reality. Whether it was a glitch in the system, or simply her fantastically bad luck, she could recall most of her past life. Especially the Mack truck. It was, after all, very hard to forget one's own traumatic and bloody death.

Valeria's past life hadn't been extravagant. Granted, it wasn't the dullest life one could have. She had two parents, four sisters, and a dog. Her parents weren't the nicest ones around, but they weren't the meanest. They were simply distant.

Not that they didn't love their children, but it certainly felt that way to the sisters growing up. As a result, they looked to each other for support and comfort, and when they fought with each other, they sought out the dog's unconditional love. There wasn't anything she wouldn't do for her sisters and vice versa, and it absolutely boggled her mind whenever other siblings hated each other. She was firm in her belief that siblings were always there for each other, through thick and thin, they always came first. Blood over water, and whatnot.

So, when the comforting walls she had found herself in began to contract and Valeria was dreadfully and disgustingly pushed out into the world, she had hoped to find a family she could depend on. Old or new.

It was hard to ignore the obvious signs of a dysfunctional family, especially when, Valeria noted with a dark humor at her own expense, it was very similar to her first family.

It became increasingly clear to her, however, that this new family was even stranger. It couldn't have been more obvious that her... father wanted absolutely nothing to do with his children. What she did see of him appeared to be painful 'bonding' sessions mandated by his wife at what she guessed to be about once a week. Her... mother was his extreme opposite. She smothered them with attention so much, it was suffocating and almost off-putting after a while, although Valeria was a little biased. How many nineteen year-olds would really be able to enjoy such blatant intrusion of their personal space? 'The breastfeeding was bad enough,' Valeria thought, feeling a little green.

In the first few months following her second birth, her eyes were too weak to make out much of their appearances. Her mother's face had been thick, mismatched and lopsided blurs, while her father's was a blur of delicate shapes. As her eyesight sharpened and her locomotive functions became less restrictive, she began to take note of the oddity that her parents were even a couple. They were extreme opposites in everything Valeria could think of, her mother simple and brazen and her father snarky and reserved. They always went about their days in what Valeria guessed to be companionable silence, and when they did speak to each other it was always in disagreement. Her mother was content and her father stressed. Their affections towards their children was decidedly different, and their aesthetic appearances were like night and day. There really is no kinder way to put it: her mother was hideous and her father was handsome.

Her mother's face was very thick, had no neck and had stringy black hair. Her dark eyes- which were very much like her brother's and Valeria was anticipating she had as well- were deep set into her face with slightly sallow skin and a nose squished lopsidedly into her face. Her smiles curled up into something sinister, but Valeria dismissed that as an unfortunate happenstance. They probably just appeared that way due to her unfortunate genetics.

In contrast, her father's features were aristocratic, pale, and smooth with a straight nose. He had messy black hair and a brooding face, with the most morose and striking grey eyes Valeria had ever seen. He never smiled, so Valeria made it a point to never smile at him.

'They are the kind of couple you can't help wondering how their children would turn out,' Valeria thought dryly. 'And I suppose I get to find out.'

Theirs seem like quite the love story. It was a little heart-warming and nice to see one could find love pretty much in anyone, even ones who's personalities clashed like oil and fire. Love knows no bounds had never rung truer, and Valeria was looking forward a little to asking her mother how they met.

'Or maybe it's the whole opposites attract thing,' Valeria mulled. 'Goodness knows I have next to no experience when it comes romance and all things gushy.'

After getting to know her family after a while, she had quickly decided she was fond of her brother- Vinnie as their mother called him- and her mother despite the two constantly encroaching on her personal space. Vinnie was a baby after all, and she was simply a doting mother.

After only her first meeting with her father, she instantly labelled him an insufferable and immature jerk. The argument he had with his wife at the time went something along the lines of: "But I don't want to touch them," and, "But they're your babies!"

She had never, not once in her past life met any father, or adult for that matter, unwilling to grow and own up to their responsibilities and act their role.

'What an assbutt,' Valeria thought vehemently and eloquently. She took a sick pleasure in staring soulfully and mournfully into his eyes when he had picked her up. It made him fidget uncomfortably, maybe even a little guiltily.

Unfortunately, all that seemed to be the most normal thing about her family.

The twins' caretaker was heaps weird. After mind-numbing months of being in her crib, she still couldn't tell which gender it was. It was bafflingly short with batty ears and enormous eyes. It always suddenly appeared in their nursery with a mysterious crack, and hopped up on the rails of their crib- which freaked Valeria out the first couple of times- to get a good look and snapped its fingers at them. She still couldn't figure out what the snapping was for, but it seemed to get the job done of changing their diapers and cleaning them. One day she was going to catch how it managed to accomplish this without ever laying a hand on them.

It's behaviour was also stunningly bizarre. She discovered it was quite the masochist when it started to violently bash it's head in after realizing it forgot to carry out one of its mistress's orders, scaring the living daylights out of both her and her brother. Which, of course, drove it to punish itself again for frightening the 'little babies'.

It yammered in third person, which was confusing at first because Valeria thought it was trying to tell her what another person's thoughts and chores for the day were and couldn't understand why that would have anything to do with her. It said things like, "Binky must make sure today's dinner for the houseguests is perfect, or mistress will be angry," or, "Binky has to take the best care of the little babies, or mistress will throw Binky to the Dark Lord." Now that Valeria was thinking on it, that last comment was stupendously disturbing. She shuddered.

Her parents also seemed to be a little unhinged. At first when her mother mentioned the importance of blood purity in her vicinity, her father grumbling in the background, Valeria hesitantly agreed that, yes, it was very important that her blood was free of artificial hormones, preservatives, and whatnot. The most crucial part of life is one's health after all. Then they started to delve into crazy talk, like magic and elves and witches and wizards and the like, as if it was the most natural and common thing to talk about, and Valeria hesitantly began to consider the possibility that her parents were, in fact, insane.

Her mother seemed to have a penchant for gore. She would often regale them with stories of her curses and fierce battles against the wretches of the world, which is admittedly very strange to be telling her infant children. She even once bemoaned a failed curse that was supposed to have a mudblood- whatever that was- bleeding from all her orifices, which left Valeria gagging a little. Her mother had strange tastes in video games and perhaps had the delusional tendency of thinking they were real. If Valeria was going to be a little honest, she was a little resentful that her mother hadn't brought her and Vinnie to play with her. She hadn't touched a video game in ages after all.

The words be careful what you wished for came into a play a little over a year after their birth.

By that time, both infants graduated from crawling to walking and uttered their first words. Vinnie's first word was 'papa'. Seconds later, Valeria took the opportunity to say the word 'go', which was quickly followed by 'away'. Ten points to whoever guesses the person she was talking to.

It was late in the night when a loud bang woke up Vinnie who, in a fit of annoyance, slammed his fist into Valeria's face and woke her up. There wasn't much lighting, but she instantly recognized the voices.

"…Move now!" That was Mother. "Binky? Binky! Get in here you damn house-elf!"

A mutter of lumos filled the room with light, and an irritated growl followed her voice, "No need for that! We're staying right here."

"No need?! You fool, we have no choice!" Mother bellowed at the baby-hater, Valeria's favorite substitute name for Father. Her ears perked up and she wrapped her meaty fists around the bars of her crib to lift herself up and peer at the couple, a light emanating from an incredibly skinny flashlight in the baby-hater's hand. This was new, most definitely different from the inane chatter she constantly heard.

"Of course we have a choice. We lie, simple as that."

"Lie? Lie?! What you're suggesting is traitorous, blasphemy! The Imperius Curse? I will not have our names sullied!" She screamed at him and shoved her face in his. "He will come back, and he will know we always stayed true to him."

There was a large crack and Valeria's huge eyes widened in surprise as the masochistic caretaker materialized right in the middle of the freaking room! She sat back on her little bottom and took the scene in, not hearing much of what they were shouting about as the little elf hastily packed suitcases of baby clothes and knickknacks.

That was... impossible. People, humans, didn't just pop out of nowhere. The laws of physics and nature did not allow for that. But was Binky the Masochist really human, Valeria realized with a dawning revelation, didn't Mother just call it a house-elf?

Valeria's mind whirled as she remembered clues she was too dense to piece together. Mysterious short caretaker that did mysterious things and was an actual house-elf, check. Known spells and curses like lumos and the Imperius Curse, check. Obsessions with blood purity, check. Known terminology like- and Valeria winced when she thought this- mudblood and Dark Lord, check. And... her face tensed from a shocked expression to one that was very unamused and very irritated as she tilted her head to look up into the ever changing screen of the TV that hung over her crib.

Valeria almost wanted to slap herself for being so stupid. What kind of idiots wasted a perfectly good flat screen TV by hanging it on a damn ceiling! No one, that's who! The goddamn ceiling was enchanted!

Harry Potter.

She was in the bloody Harry Potter series! Valeria wanted to throw something. She wasted a whole year in blissful ignorance of a magical world!

"So that's it then? You're suggesting we live the rest of our lives on the run for a dead man?" Baby-hater's voice snapped her attention back to her parents and she looked at them in a new light. Who were they talking about? Who were her parents?

"He is not dead, and he is the greatest wizard who ever lived!"

"Was, Victoria, he was the greatest wizard that ever lived, and he's not coming back!"

There was a choked gasp, then a sob. "Valere Crabbe, don't you dare say that again. The Dark Lord will rise again-" Her words were cut off by several more watery sobs, but Valeria stopped listening to their argument again.

'Wait…what did she just call my father?'

There were several things about her words that should've raised red flags in Valeria's mind, but she could only focus on one thing. She didn't care that her parents were most likely racist Death Eaters. She didn't give a rat's ass that Mother was threatening to raise them on the run. She couldn't even care less that she seemed to have a one-sided love affair with bloody Voldemort! No, the one thing Valeria zeroed in on was that one little name she called the baby-hater...

'Oh, oh god no, anyone but them! Please god no! I'd rather scourgify my own blood then have them for a family! I would take the Malfoys- no, even Voldemort over them! At least they weren't notorious for their stupidity!' Valeria's blood roared in her ears and she was shocked into a frozen state, until Vinnie started to cry. Oh, Vinnie…

The sudden, striking realization of who she was sharing a crib with made her finally snap from the shock and too many realizations. One of the two insufferable characters that literally no one liked or cared about, especially her, was in her crib! Valeria pushed away from the toddler and screamed, screamed loud enough to stop the argument the two adults were having.

'How could I have been so naïve, so clueless! I should have instantly made the connection between the nickname Vinnie and Vincent Crabbe!'

Seconds later, a pair of hands snatched Valeria up and she was staring into striking grey eyes. In a moment of hysteria, Valeria had the sudden urge to blame Valere Crabbe for not being Sirius Black. He most definitely could have passed as him, with the aristocratic features, grey eyes, and black hair. Sirius would've been a cool father to have.

Instead, he was glaring straight into her own eyes and commanded in a very loud voice, "Valeria Irma Crabbe, stop your unbearable screaming! You're a pure-blooded lady, the youngest of the Crabbe family line, and it's high time you start learning how to act like it!"

So Valeria, of course, screamed, screamed louder and harder than she ever had, past life included.

A/N: And so,Valeria's new and slightly traumatizing life with the Crabbe's begins. I know, it could be worse. Could be Umbridge or Filch. Or both. *shivers* If you haven't noticed already, Valeria is stupidly naive about a lot of things.

How many of you thought her dad was some twisted AU version of Sirius or Regulus Black? I'm betting you're mad, it was an incredibly dickish move to pull. If you did think it was one of them though, I promise that's the meanest thing I'll do to you.

And finally, thank you so much to the people who reviewed, favorited, and followed Scourgify. You've inspired me to keep writing and I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Look forward to the rest!

Though I am curious. How many of you expected it to be the Crabbes? Or some other family? I did put quite a few red herrings in there.

-Fiction