A/N: Once again, thank you to everyone who reviewed, followed, and favourited this story. Feedback is like gold to a fanfiction author, so I can't thank you guys enough.
Anyways, from here it gets darker, then lighter, then darker again, then lighter, then there's the ending, which is still a major work in progress. We'll see how that turns out.
"Grab the fork," the dog instructs, titling his head up to the lowest sign on the fork in the corridor. Fears and Nightmares. This ought to be good.
Gingerly, George and I reach out and wrap our hands around it. Much like a Portkey, I feel the familiar though not particularly comfortable pull of an invisible hook behind my navel. I'm jerked through space, spun through the fibres of Fred's mind, and dropped on my face in a dark, dreary room.
"What is this place?" George wonders, pushing himself to his feet and looking around the dank room. It's small, claustrophobia-inducing, and barely lit. I'm half-expecting cobwebs in the corners of the charcoal grey walls.
"Where'd our guide go?"
"Oh Merlin," George sighs. "Could've at least installed a light switch, Fred," he mutters.
"It's dark because this is a side of himself Fred never liked to face. He was quite proud, your twin. Hated admitting fears; preferred to push them aside where he would never have to consider them," a voice informs us.
"Who's talking?" George demands.
"Down here."
A long, dark green snake slithers into view, twining itself around my feet. George shrieks and jumps back, flattening himself against a wall with heaving breaths and widened eyes.
"You're afraid of snakes?" I ask, raising an eyebrow.
"They both are, then," the snake answers. "I'm the guide for this section; the object of one of Fred's simpler fears. He's got more complicated ones-I'm not going to hurt you, you know," he says to George, who appears to be holding back a panic attack of epic proportions.
"Relax, George, you're fine," I comfort him as he inches away with his back against the wall. I suppress the insensitive urge to roll my eyes.
"Well, let's get moving," the snake says. "This way, if you please."
Before George can object, I grab his wrist and pull him across the creepy room, following close behind the curving path of the serpent.
"Fred's worst nightmares and fears," the snake explains, pointing in the direction of a black chest with five narrow drawers. "The one at the top is the worst, so I'd suggest picking that one last. Each one reveals a situation in which one of Fred's fears or nightmares occurs. Care to try it out?"
Taking exaggeratedly wide steps around the snake, George makes his way to the drawers, crouching down to the bottom one. We lean in, watching a scene unfold at the bottom of the empty drawer, like watching a movie.
"This is just disgraceful!" Molly shrieks, slamming a frying pan down on the Burrow's kitchen counter. The sound sends a metallic ring echoing through my head.
"We're sorry, Mum! But we just don't see the point of going into Ministry work when we're doing fine with the shop!" one of the twins protests.
"I didn't raise you two to be pranksters!" Molly yells.
"We run the most successful shop in the Alley!" the other twin shouts back. "Maybe you could be proud of us for following our dreams or something-"
"Ron helped defeat You-Know-Who! Bill is a curse breaker, Charlie is a dragon handler, and what have you two done? What have you ever amounted to? Nothing, absolutely nothing! How I raised five wonderful children and then somehow you two, I have no idea!"
"We're successful in the way we think is best for ourselves!"
"Is that so bad?"
"Maybe I was stupid to think you would turn out well."
"We turned out fine!"
"Maybe in your own heads; not the way this family sees 'fine!'"
Fred and George look shocked, like they can't even think of anything to come back with, like they're starting to think Molly's right. In the silence, Molly crosses to the part of the room where the clock stands, the one with each family member's face on a spoon, indicating location. She wrenches the twins' spoons off the clock's face and throws them across the room. George slams the drawer shut, shaking his head.
"Next one," he squeaks, pulling out the second drawer from the bottom.
"I always knew they'd end up together," Ginny says dreamily, to no one in particular. She's in beautiful lilac dress robes, not unlike the dress I wore to Bill and Fleur's wedding.
"Yeah," a hollow voice responds. The voice belongs to Fred and he sounds choked up and miserable. The scene moves to a couple spinning joyfully around the floor, twirling and laughing together in their flawless dance.
Merlin's pants. I see myself in a stunning wedding robe, hair sleek and twisted up intricately. And I'm dancing with none other than Ron Weasley, who I decided was no better boyfriend material for me than Harry. But of course, how would Fred know that? In his own mind, he had already missed his chance, so the impossible situation unfolding in front of me is still possible, and probable, to him.
"They look so happy together," Luna comments. She's decked out in bright yellow and orange, colours only she could pull off. Her white-blonde hair is adorned with a wreath of large, colourful flowers.
"They're perfect for each other," Ginny replies, sounding giddy and overwhelmed.
Fred sighs heavily, moving away from the happiness, off on his own.
"So you've got his bullocks in your pocket and you didn't even realise," George laughs, shutting the drawer.
"She doesn't even know the half of it," the snake comments.
I roll my eyes and pull the next drawer.
Ginny's POV
I creep back up the stairs as quietly as I can, with a bag of chocolates in one hand and a photograph in the other. I found a picture of seven-year-old Ron teaching six-year-old me how to tie shoelaces. We're sitting on the living room floor, him on one knee, walking me through the steps, and me with my chubby six-year-old legs in front of me, staring at him blankly, like he's demonstrating the most complicated hex in the world.
The twins have always been protective of me, much kinder to me than to the rest of my siblings. Maybe it's because I'm the youngest, or because I'm the only girl. It's not like they never pranked me or made fun of me, but they were much nicer about it. I remember them fawning over me when I was younger in a way that reminded me greatly of Mum. I nicked the photo so George could put it up on his ceiling. After all, he was the one that took it.
I glance over at the clock. It's nearly five in the morning, but there's a much more interesting thing that catches my eye.
Everyone's home, of course. Eight spoons are all pointing the same way. I look for the missing one and find Fred, who is, according to the clock, lost. Lost? What's that supposed to mean? Dead lost? Lost in his mind, lost in some other world? I run back up the stairs, feeling the panic set in.
