AN – I know in CC Rowling specifies that at some point they have a female Potions professor with smoky eyes or some BS, probably with Albus making wanton faces at her LOL, but I'm ignoring that. Here's my reason why: first, there's no characterization for this person nor a name, and I don't really fancy making one up. It's not an important aspect of anything in canon so far as I could see, so I'm going to use Slughorn still. I like his character better, and I also prefer to write guys, even though I'm not one. Not to mention there's way more plot and development opportunity with Slughorn. Agonizing over this is what slowed the chapter, my apologies! And now onto the good stuff.


Chapter 10

Hogwarts Redux


Professor McGonagall had decided that the best way to see where he was at in all his classes was to have each professor test him. After all, it was quite clear you could not compare the curriculum across his worlds. Each presumably taught a lot of things differently as well as instructing in things the other did not. It seemed as good an idea to Sev as any. He had already been bored in a lot of his classes in his own world, and he surely did not want to be even more bored.

Whether thankfully or not, Potions was the first the headmistress thought to start on considering the professor was also his Head of House.

He's ancient! Sev thought as he took in Professor Slughorn when they entered the classroom. He barely kept a straight face. I'm actually taller than someone…

The aging professor was quite short and portly. Easily three times Sev's weight. Perhaps four. It was hard to tell with the professor's choice of robes. They looked at each other on eye level.

"My but do you definitely look like both your parents!" Slughorn said, his eyes moving from this feature to that feature without any sort of remorse for the open wonder as he did it.

Sev, for his part, blinked and then seemed unsure how to respond for a moment. Finally, he settled on, "Thank you, sir," whether it had been a compliment or not. In his world nobody knew both his parents, so it was odd to him. He was more used to comments of his similarity to his father, even if he realized the thankful bit of softness his mother's features gave him and the curse of her extraordinarily thick hair.

"I thought you said he was a 4th year?" the man then said to McGonagall.

In Slughorn's defense, he was small for his age. "I am, sir. Was?" he replied. It felt strange to think of it in past tense.

"Well then, I'd imagine with your father, 4th year potions would be rather easy." He still seemed to eye Sev's size. One might have thought he'd be taller. His father was not precisely short.

Sev shrugged, "Most potions are rather easy for me, sir." In his world, it had been a very long time since anyone had somehow insinuated him more delicate because he was under-average in size. The raised brow staring, innocuous though Slughorn seemed, had Sev raise both his eyebrows in return, rather pointedly.

Slughorn did not seem bothered but thankfully stopped looking at him strangely. "What is the most difficult potion you know how to brew then?" That would surely narrow down things.

"That depends on your definition of difficult, sir, but I can make Veritaserum and Wolfsbane."

"Merlin's Beard, can you really?" Slughorn had to hold his belly for a moment.

Sev did not bother to hide the amusement from his face. There was little point in exerting the effort here, and it seemed everyone else was horrible transparent. "Yes, sir, and I did quite frequently."

Never mind that his father was almost always there. Sev could do it by himself if he needed to; that was a good portion of the point of learning was being able to stand on his own. Unfortunately, the quantity was not conducive to one person brewing.

"Well then, why don't you make me the most difficult thing you can make in three hours?" Slughorn said, figuring that would be significantly challenging and revealing.

The elderly Potions master looked to the Headsmistress and raised a white brow. In a whisper, he said, "If he can brew Wolfsbane, there's not likely much he will learn from me."

"It must be strange for him to be around potions but not…" his father.

"Mmm," Slughorn agreed.

"But it's familiar to him at least. Severus always was escaping into his potions and his research." She watched as the boy went about setting himself up and gathering what he needed, not paying them any attention at all. "Apparently, he helped his father with all sorts of potions for the school and elsewhere. At your age, you could use a little help if he's up to it." Her eyebrow quirked meaningfully. Normal socialization was more the immediate goal of his education at this point.

"He would be very bright then, what with Severus and Hermione?"

"Very, Horace." She eyed him. "Don't scare him off or we might end up with another hermit."

"Pfff," he tittered. "Minerva, I'm very used to Slytherins and knew enough how to deal with his father." He had learned how to deal with all sorts of tendencies from the various houses; the best of the best did not just come from Slytherin. A time-twisted wizard was interesting enough, even a wee one.

"I'll come back in a few hours, see how it went."

Horace nodded her out and then hummed a bit as he watched the boy start to brew. He walked a bit closer. The boy began preparing ingredients. He was not distracted a bit which was a far cry from the nervousness of most young people being tested alone.

It was just more than two hours later than Minerva returned. Sev was brewing away. She smiled at him, but he didn't notice. Horace have her a little wave from the desk but didn't get up himself. It had become crystal very quickly that he did not need to watch too carefully.

"So?" she asked, after she joined him and sat down. "Is he about done?"

Horace leaned in. "Haven't the foggiest."

"What do you mean 'haven't the foggiest?'"

"I haven't the first idea what he is making, Minerva. It's nothing in our curriculum or anything commonplace." He made an ugly face and said, "Unless I am truly becoming that old and I'm disremembering. I do hope not." His eyes were quite buggy.

She sighed and watched their new Mr. Snape a few moments. "Kingsley had said that he knew spells that we do not have or know, and with how inventive Severus could be, there may be any number of things that only the two of them know as well."

"Well, that'd be a cheek, to make something he knows we won't know," Horace said, amused more than perturbed.

"It's not like he can know whether we know something or not in this world, so he might not realize."

"Whatever he's making, he's doing it very well. His knife skills rival mine, very quick and exacting. Gets harder when your older, you know. His timing is impeccable too."

Minerva watched, but she had no real appreciation of potions skill to pipe in much. "Yes, Severus always had that sort of intense focus."

"Bizarre to see one so young so proficient." Slughorn mused. "Severus himself was nowhere near that good at that age, though had the promise for it."


Albus kept trying not to glance at the newcomer, but he was not very sly about it. Scorpius was fiddling with and biting his lips. At least Scorpius did that in this world too.

They were supposed to accompany him from the Headmistress' office to the common room to get him settled in. It seemed a bit odd. It's not as if he did not know how to get there. Nor did he know either of these two, other than Scorpius having the same face and genetics of his former best friend. They might know more of his situation than he did of them.

The silence was so thick with awkwardness, Sev was forced to break it.

"I don't bite, you know. If there's something you wish to say, you can just say it…or ask it." Perhaps it helped that this Scorpius at least looked like his Scorpius, or Sev might not have said anything. He had never been overly loquacious, but the thought of being lonelier here in this bizarre place than within the horrors of his home world was unpalatable.

"Did you ever meet, erm…" Albus trailed off when Scorpius gave him a look.

"Meet? Meet who?" Sev turned his head and arched a brow. "You might as well finish." There was no accusation to his tone, merely bluntness. His eyes went to the portraits. Some of them were different from his world, and it was a bit curious, like his mind was being overwritten.

"Did you meet…Voldemort?" Albus had thankfully opted not to use Moldy Voldy this time, but it made the question little better.

Sev's head snapped back to Potter. That was not the question Sev had anticipated. Who asks that?

Scorpius looked mortified.

"Yes," Sev replied, with a stiffness in his jaw following. It didn't dissipate until he swallowed a few times.

The other two did not seem to know what to say to that for a moment. Even after Sev's, he thought, somewhat difficult reply, it seemed that Potter inherited some Gryffindor in there somewhere; it seemed since he'd started, he might as well continue.

"Were you afraid?" was the ridiculous follow-up question.

"Yes." Sev clenched his fists down at his sides, trying his best not to call attention to it. Those memories Potter was tweaking at were not pleasant ones. Yet, he was a pragmatist, and he knew he was going to have to depend upon them to answer many of his, for their world, idiotic questions.

"Did you…Do you…have…you know?" Potter gestured to his arm.

Sev looked down at his arm and contemplated the inside of his forearm. "The Dark Mark? No, I would not have been considered worthy of it." He probably would not have lasted long enough to ever be, so he'd never worried over it, but it mattered little now. No Dark Marks to enslave people here.

"Albus, that's all not really something you want to talk about," Scorpius finally said, not as aggressive in this world. "None of it is."

Sev shrugged, "Better than if everyone were to whisper about it." He looked at a picture of a very drunk monk singing. "It's probably unavoidable with where I come from."

"Nobody should find out it was all Dark. We're not supposed to talk about it around anyone else," Scorpius said. Although there would always be wild rumours; he knew firsthand the wizarding world was full of such. He looked like a Malfoy and people still went on about him being Voldemort's son.

"What did you get for a timetable for your extra classes?" Scorpius asked.

That was far more the sort of question Sev had been anticipating to begin with. "It's a bit odd, but it's what the headmistress wanted to do given the differences between both Hogwarts."

He handed the piece of paper over to Scorpius. Albus looked over his best mate's shoulder.

"Odd? What classes do you actually take with the rest of us?" Albus asked.

"She stuck you in with the 6th years for Arithmancy and Runes?" Scorpius almost looked envious.

"Wait, where's Potions, Defense, and History of Magic?"

Sev blinked at all the questions at once and then said, "Not many, I don't think. I don't have to take either of those three." He was not used to this much conversation at once.

"Not at all?" Albus asked.

"The professors tested me some in their subjects, and with all the things I had to learn with defense, Dark Arts, and Potions in my world from my father, there was little point in having me do them here. So far as History of Magic, I need to learn more about your contemporary history than the common far past."

"You're going to take Muggle Studies?" Scorpius asked, looking up again once he'd come to that bit.

"Really?" Albus echoed, glancing at the parchment again.

"Yes, well, a 'Go to Hell!' to the worst parts of my former life made me feel radically deviant and vindictive in a good way." He paused when he noted their laughter at his spontaneous and emotion-laden declaration. "Besides, I'm far from as pureblooded as either of you. I have three Muggle grandparents, not even Muggleborn, and I know absolutely nothing about any of that."

"Makes sense, actually," Scorpius said. "Hmm." He played with his lips again, obviously thinking about something.

"Nothing at all about Muggles?" Albus asked.

"Not at all. In my world, there wasn't any mixing like that. Nobody spoke about Muggle things other than to deride them or plot their murder…"

Albus looked a bit sick at that thought. Scorpius nodded, coming out of his thoughts. "I told you, Albus, I was bloody happy to be back. That's why I nearly drowned you. It was bad." He paused and looked down at Sev. "Erm, sorry mate, but it was."

"Sorry? It was, so there's nothing to be sorry about. Now I can find out things I was always curious about, at least." It became easier not to feel emotional over the loss of his parents, and there was little redeeming about that world other than he had been happy and had parents there. The world, itself, was horrid.

"Glad I missed that one," Albus mused.

Strange to be thankful for being tossed into non-existence. Sev could easily imagine it now, though.

"You were temporarily blinked out of existence and I was blinked into it. Odd to think on, that." Sev pushed a piece of wavy black hair that had escaped his braid back behind his ear. "It certainly wasn't a blink to me, and I'm sure it felt like an instant and not days to you."

Ever since this had happened, his mind was pricked by a strong desire to learn more about the nature of time. He wondered if the wards on the Restricted Section were the same.

After a silence where they were all musing, Scorpius randomly said, "I wonder if Old Slughorn will let me take up Muggle Studies…"

Thankfully, they arrived at the door. Sev didn't want them to feel like they needed to do something for him. He genuinely wanted to know more about Muggles.

An odd thought to have while stepping into the common room of Slytherin House. At least in his world. The space was the same but different. Lighter. There was music and someone with a very loud Wizard's Chess set, and it was worthy of jaw-dropping if that were Sev's style. Instead he looked about a bit mesmerized for a moment and then feigned indifference.

"Not smelling of blood is an improvement," he said, under his breath.

Scorpius snickered and Albus had to make a 'gross' face again.


Thanks to Duj and HermioneHotchner1 for their reviews!