A Twist in History, Chapter 10

AN: Look! I'm actually alive! Anyway, I'm going to try and speed up this story, as somehow real time has passed up the book, so here's a new chapter.

Side question, how do you feel on yaoi? It won't effect how the story will go, I just want to know my fan base. (If you don't know what that is, never mind)

Disclaimer: I would hope a real author is more on time with writing, and I would also hope you can all tell that I'm not one.

Several days later, Senri went outside to find Cooro looking out at the snow. Silently, he walked up behind him and simply gazed across as well. Neither of them said anything.

Finally, Cooro looked up at him, grinning happily.

"Isn't this nice, Senri? We get to spend Christmas together! Without having to worry about paying for food." He added the last bit as an afterthought, laughing. Senri smiled lightly, then pulled him back towards the house behind them.

"In a minute, I want to look at the snow a bit more." Senri hesitated, nodded, and went inside. Nana looked up from where she sat mending something of Remus'.

"He's outside then?" When he nodded, she looked back down at her task. "OK. Thanks, Senri." Husky walked into the room at that moment, looked around for one moment, then laughed.

"You two look like some married couple!" He fell into another round of laughter, which only got worse when Nana turned bright red.

"W- we do not!" Husky couldn't answer, he was still chuckling. Remus walked in, raised an eyebrow at Husky, then sat down on the couch across from Nana.

"You didn't have to do that, you know." She glanced at him, still rather red.

"It's fine, I like-" At that moment, the door opened and Cooro ran in, giggling. Behind him, the door momentarily revealed thickly falling snow before the door slammed shut. Cooro slumped against the door, panting. When he looked up, the rooms occupants were staring at him in a bemused way.

"It was all nice and peaceful, and then WHAM! Snow out of nowhere! Couldn't see a thing!" He leaned back against the door. For all of three seconds. Then he jumped back up and ran over the others.

"Let's play a game!" Grinning a bit at his antics, Nana set aside her mending and looked up at him.

"What should we play? Nothing with teams, remember." Cooro didn't even pause to think.

"Hide 'n' Seek, of course! We haven't played for forever!" After a bit of bantering with Husky, it was decided they all would play. The children were surprised when Remus agreed to play as well, and knew the rules to boot.

"I'm not a Pureblood (1), I know a few games." This was accompanied by a rare grin, one that looked more like Cooro's than anything else.

Cooro, for introducing the idea, was It. After muttering déjà vu, Husky reluctantly ran to hide under the couch, where he knew Cooro wouldn't look. It was too obvious!

… Turns out, it wasn't. Husky was the first one found. Grumbling slightly, he sat down on top of his former place of concealment and waited for the others to be found.

Christmas Eve. That was the date, he supposed. Holidays hadn't been big for him in the palace, and were non-existent during his stay at the circus. He shuddered slightly at the memory, before sighing, leaning back onto the couch and closing his eyes.

A loud banging sounded from upstairs, signaling that it was time to head up and see what Cooro was doing.

Upstairs, Husky found Remus barely able to keep himself standing, he was laughing so hard. He edged around him to find Cooro sitting on the floor, looking very confused and sporting a lion's mane and tail. He glanced behind him to see the closed doorway at the end of the hall. Cooro looked up, tail swishing.

"You have no idea how odd that feels." Husky burst out laughing, and joined Remus near the wall.

Nana poked her head out of whatever room she'd been hiding in to see what the commotion was. Spotting Cooro, she giggled. Cooro stood up, and glanced at the door behind him. He let out a surprised cry.

On the door, glowing red and gold letters stood out against the wood. They certainly hadn't been there before.

'This Room and everything in it is the Property of one messr. Padfoot.' Below it was an animated picture of a hand. Flipping the bird. Remus seemed to have calmed down, until he saw the writing and began all over again.

Senri eventually emerged, and seemed to be the only one concerned that the crow boy now theoretically would have an urge to eat himself. Walking over, he scooped him up and ran downstairs. The others followed, sobering up a bit.

Remus walked over to where Senri was setting Cooro on the couch, pulling out his wand.

"Don't worry, it's relatively simple to fix. Just give me a moment…" It took several moments, with Remus becoming steadily more amused and annoyed. Finally, Cooro was back to normal, though his hair was slightly golden. He grinned sheepishly as Nana voiced a query.

"What did you do?" They were all sitting around the living room again, game forgotten, drinking hot chocolate that Remus had conjured up.

"I tried to open the door at the end of the hall." Husky shook his head.

"What is in there, anyway?" They looked over at Remus, who grinned.

"Couldn't tell you. It was Pad's room, and he spelled it when he started staying here." He grinned, though it looked a bit sad, and then continued.

"Funny story, that. See, that particular spell was rather infamous in our class because, back in third year…"

Remus walked down the hall as slowly as possible, hoping that, if he was lucky, James had forgotten his plan.

No such luck.

Arriving at the Common Room, he found James standing at the bottom of the Girl's Dorm stairs. Again. Being egged on by his supposed best-friend, one Sirius Black. Remus had a suspicion he was trying to get the Potter boy killed.

James noticed him come in, and practically ran up to the stairs, quickly adopting the strange scuttle that was required to make it up the stairs safely. Remus sighed as he reached the spot James had vacated only a moment ago. Sirius looked over at him and grinned in a maniacal way.

"Hey Moony! I didn't see you at lunch-"

"Pads."

"- And we thought you might be in the library, but Peter said you weren't…"

"Sirius."

"… But then again, Pete said he wanted to go to the kitchens, so he might not have even made it to the library…"

"BLACK!" Sirius looked up, a bit startled.

"What?" Remus sighed again, wondering why his friends were so thick.

"What did you convince James to do to Lily this time?" Sirius's grin faltered a bit. The last time Remus had looked that angry, he'd had green hair for a month.

Not that the spell should have lasted that long, but Remus had somehow found a stronger one than the one taught in class, and used it the first chance he had.

"Heh…well, I caught him writing poetry in class," Remus had to stifle a chuckle at that. "And it was about Evans. Again. So I told him he should give it to her." Remus wasn't convinced.

"And how-" Sirius cut him off

"Hush, now, I ain't done! So anyway, he thought it needed work, one thing led to another, and now he's going to serenade her in her dorm room. With flowers, I think." Remus stared at him.

"Are you trying to get him killed?! You remember last time, don't you?" Sirius blanched. Evans didn't appreciate the flowers last time, apparently. She'd chased James down the halls cursing for over an hour.

"And besides, she isn't there…" Whatever he had meant to finish with was cut off by a loud screeching, followed by a couple of thumps, and James then came tumbling down the stairs. He hit the bottom, groaned and slowly stood.

"I don't know why I try sometimes… And I'm never listening to you again, Pads." He turned to look at them.

"Hey, I just said to read it…" He broke off in the middle of the sentence, presumably due to his loud barking laughter at their friend. Remus covered his mouth, barely concealing a smile.

James' head, instead of being covered with messy back hair, instead had a thick skin of green scales, like a hood. He was staring at them, bewildered.

"What's so funny?" Subconsciously, he reached up to brush back his hair. Eyes widening, he slowly felt his head, then glanced at them in fear.

"She didn't…"

"… And that was about when she came in. I don't think any of us had seen her laugh that hard. Ever." Remus grinned at the end, obviously seeing the whole event in his mind's eye. The children were giggling at the story, wondering how long it took to get the snake skin off.

Remus suddenly straightened as the clock in the hall struck eleven.

"Time to sleep, its Christmas tomorrow." Ignoring their complaints, he ushered them up the stairs to their rooms, laughing.

Next morning, like so many winters before it, was rather dark. The snow hadn't stopped, or had stopped and started again while they were sleeping. Regardless, the thick wall of snow was steadily growing anywhere they could see through the haze of falling flakes.

Not that this bothered any of them. All four children were in the kitchen, making breakfast on Nana's commands. Remus was presumably still asleep, though no-one knew for sure and no-one wanted to check and risk waking him up.

However, with the food nearly done, it became necessary to find him. Cooro volunteered immediately to go up. Husky suspected he wanted to check out the cursed door again. However, no-one objected, so he went happily up the stairs while Husky sighed and listened to what Nana was saying about pancakes.

Cooro walked to the end of the hall, straight to the door at the end. The one that he had tried to open yesterday. He stopped in front of it, thinking. He hadn't told the others about a few things from the incident. One was that Remus had come out of that room when he had heard Cooro hit the floor. Another was that Remus had gone into that room every night.

'Is there a secret to getting in? Knock three times or something?' Cooro didn't think that was likely, but this was the Wizarding world, almost anything is possible. He reached forward and knocked on the door carefully. Nothing happened, and he was about to try again when the door opened, revealing Remus with a rather confused expression.

"Cooro… what…" Cooro, a bit surprised that the door had opened, had jumped backwards. Now he took a step forward and hugged remus around the waist.

"Merry Christmas! We made breakfast! Well, mostly Nana, but we helped! It's all done now, so we wanted to wake you up before it gets cold." Remus nodded, looking a bit tired, and Cooro noted his eyes were a bit red.

"Are you alright?" Remus frowned in confusion, then nodded, smiling a bit.

"Just a bit tired, that's all. Now, we wouldn't want to keep the others waiting, would we?" Cooro shook his head, excited again, and they went down the hall to the stairs.

"Hey, Remus?" He looked over at him, wondering how to ask this.

"Yes…?" Remus was rather hesitant to answer him. He recognized that tone of voice, and didn't feel like explaining the situation.

"How'd you get into the room? Is there a trick to it?" Remus blinked. Well… that wasn't quite what he had been expecting.

"Not quite… he just cast the spell to allow certain people in is all." Cooro looked disappointed at the simple answer, but left it at that and they descended the stairs in silence.

The kitchen was full of delicious smells when they entered. Bacon, coffee, pancakes, burning batter… wait…

Cooro blinked at the last smell, and looked around to find a plate of scorched something on the table. He looked up to see Husky glaring at him, and bit back the question of what it was. They sat and ate, with the children jumping and twitching in their seats as they slowly got antsy for the pile of presents under the carefully decorated tree in the other room.

Finally, they all were done eating and sitting around the tree, opening the carefully-wrapped gifts that had lain below it. Remus had gotten them all books; Senri's was about potions, Cooro's on flying creatures, Nana's on household charms, and Husky's on the history of Hogwarts. Remus himself had gotten a small carved charm from Senri, a scarf from Nana, and a bottle of potion from Cooro and Husky. He regarded this last oddly.

"It was Husky's idea… We thought it might relieve the pain from transforming every month." Remus looked over at them in mild surprise.

"What is it, exactly?"

"Kind of like a pick-me-up, made with a focus so it can combat the worst problems of that species…" He trailed off, looking awkward. The potion was a bit of an oddity, pieced together back in their world and altered a bit when they came to Hogwarts. Remus whistled, causing Cooro and Husky to look up at him.

"You developed your own Potion in first year? That's some skill there." He grinned at them, and Cooro smiled happily. Husky laughed a bit at his face, sitting back and looking out the window.

The children had given each other hand-made gifts, as they had for many other holiday's before, though Husky somehow produced a flower pin with real gems for Nana. He claimed he'd gotten it before they'd come through the portal. Nana was flipping through her book and Cooro was explaining how he had made the potion to Remus when two things happened.

One, an owl tapped on the window, which got Cooro's attention immediately. He ran over to let the poor shivering creature inside.

The other was a voice called "Remus!" From the fireplace. While Cooro tended the owl, the others looked for the source of the noise and saw a head floating in the fire.

Well. That was certainly different.

However, Remus didn't seem to find it strange at all, walking over and addressing the disembodied head.

"Hello Alastor. Happy Christmas." He sat down in front of the flames, looking at the face within that they could now see had only one normal eye; the other was spinning crazily around centering on them while the other focused on Remus.

"Happy Christmas. Those them?" The man, Alastor, had a gruff voice, and his face almost resembled one of the logs he floated over, scarred and rough. Remus nodded at his query.

"Yes, would you like me to introduce you…?" Alastor was already shaking his head.

"No, that's all right. Mind if I drop over there? Need to talk to you, and this isn't a great way to do so." Remus nodded once again, and the head disappeared with a small pop.

Cooro was still tending the bird, untying the letter on it's leg and drying off it's feathers as carefully as he could. The owl was staying completely still except for a few small shivers. Remus picked up the note, and the owl hooted half-heartedly at him before closing it's eyes. He looked over the letter and was about to open it when a CRACK! filled the room and the man from the fire appeared in front of the front door. Remus smiled at him.

"No time like the present, eh Alastor?" He grinned, setting the letter down and walking toward their guest.

"We don't have much time, Remus. I need to see them now, if you don't mind." Both turned to look at the children who, with the exception of Cooro, were watching them suspiciously. Husky moved slightly in front of Nana.

"Jumpy bunch, aren't you?" The newcomer walked forward, watching as they stiffened and chuckling.

"You didn't mention I was coming, did you, Remus?" Remus shook his head, before turning to the children.

"Don't be so panicked. This is a friend of mine and Dumbledore's, Alastor Moody. He's simply here to see whether there are traces of magic left on you from the portal." Moody looked them over.

"Not a bad idea to be cautious, Remus. Constant vigilance; that's how I survived." He walked towards them, glancing at Cooro.

"You wouldn't have lived." Nana gasped and Husky looked at him startled, but Cooro looked at him.

"If Remus trusts you, then it would be silly of me to be scared. And the owl is cold; I didn't want to startle it." Nana giggled a bit, stifling it when he looked back at her. He frowned at Cooro, then glanced at Remus.

"I can't see any magic on them. Do you want me to look deeper, or are you satisfied?" Senri walked over to Cooro, passing Moody in the process, and the crazy eye followed him. He stopped and stared at it, confusion clear even on his face. Moody turned to look at him closely.

"There's something on you eye-patch…" He reached forward, but Senri stepped backward quickly, and Cooro dove in front of him, somehow settling the owl carefully on the chair he'd been in before launching himself across the room. Nana and Husky were tensed again, standing in between Remus and the situation.

Moody raised an eyebrow at their reactions. Remus stepped forward slightly, trying not to startle the paranoid children.

"The patch keeps him from… ah…" he hesitated, before another voice finished the story.

"From going on a murderous rampage and killing you all." They all turned to look at him, and Husky sighed.

'This is going to take a while…' And it did. It was nearly two hours later when their entire story had been told, with slight altercations. Such as leaving out all of the incident with the stolen Animas and Blanca. Moody stopped them often to ask questions, frowning most of the time. Remus was silent. When Husky finished with how they got there, he finally looked up.

"You left something out." It was a blunt statement that made Husky stare at him. Cooro looked up at them, then down at the floor he was currently sitting on.

"Remember how we said turning in Animas was common in our world?" Remus looked over at him, eyes widening a bit.

"I was brought to the main government lab for observation, or something like that. The man in charge was creating an 'angel,' who he called Blanca. He wanted her to have all Animas, so he developed a way to take them out of people.

"Most were happy. They saw it as a curse. But others wanted it, so he found ways to give them to people. It was temporary, though. That's just not how it works.

"The man in charge wanted mine, but he instead asked me to go out and get more Anima. When I came back, I'd give him mine…" Cooro didn't really want to finish.

"So, did you escape?" Husky looked over at Moody, raising an eyebrow.

"He went back. And gave him his Anima." Now all eyes were on Husky, and Senri quietly took Cooro upstairs.

"We don't know what happened to the man, or Blanca. They went flying and disappeared. Cooro left right after the procedure and went to the village where he was born." Moody was frowning.

"Didn't you say that you need to be in danger to get an Anima? How's the kid still got one?" Husky shook his head, and Nana cut in.

"We don't know. The wings sprouted out of his back when we found him. He was surrounded by crows… I think he got the same one back, but it isn't exactly a common thing, we can't ask anyone if they know what happened." Husky watched Moody closely. Despite Remus' assurances, he didn't trust him at all. Remus sighed.

"Well, I am sorry that you had to go through that story. No doubt it was horrible enough without us asking about it." He looked over at Moody.

"I don't suppose I can convince you to stay for dinner, can I?" Moody shook his head.

"I have a few other places I need o be. Sorry to have interrupted your holiday." He was about to leave the building when he turned around a bit.

"Say goodbye for me, will-" He was cut off, as people tended to be anywhere near their little group.

"You're leaving already?" Cooro leaped down the last few stairs, followed by Senri. He walked over to him. Moody nodded, both eyes centered on the boy. Who smiled at him happily.

"Merry Christmas!" Moody gave a surprised "Merry Christmas" in return, nodded at the room, and walked out. His eye examined all of them as he left, and noted that they looked almost like a family.

A bizarre one, anyway…

And he left, pondering the strange tale they'd told.

Wow! Can't believe I actually wrote a chapter. Well, I could have done this better, but on the whole, I like it. Didn't want to end on a note like that one, but that's what happened.

Have a nice weekend!