Twice Over

Wow! I want to thank all of you for sticking with me! This chapter should be quite interesting… I think some of you guys are catching on to a bit of the plot line. You are all very smart- I must learn to be sneakier.

Disclaimer- I know how we all love writing these little things! They surely are so much fun to read too… NOT. I don't own Harry Potter, so don't go around flailing your arms and thinking I'm J.K. Rowling. Cause I'm not.

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Chapter 18- Identity

Alicia walked down the stairs, her small bag on her back and her cat in her arms. She stopped at the front door beside the Butler and waited for her mother. After fifteen minutes, her mother still hadn't arrived. She rolled her eyes and looked at the clock- her mother was probably planning to let the Hogwarts Express leave without her purposely.

Just then, Miss Spinnet turned the corner and walked down the elaborate staircase. She reached the bottom and looked at her daughter from left to right, the corner of her lips twitching.

"Hello mother, I have to leave now," Alicia said as she held out a hand.

Her mother coughed slightly and nodded. "Take her bag to the car," she ordered the butler.

He did as he was told.

"I don't want you going back to that school, Alicia! It is no place for a young woman such as you! You have proved to me that one day you will make an excellent business woman for the fashion industry, and a-…" she lowered her voice and looked around for maids that could be listening in, "a wizarding school is no place to get the education for that!" She shuddered.

"Mom I don't want-…"

"Enough of that! You should stay here other than some wretched place where aliens walk about and do black magic. Something like that should have never been invented… its terrible, just the thought of it!" Her mother said sternly.

Alicia clenched her fists slightly. Charm jumped out of her arms and ran out the door as thoughts raced through Alicia's mind. She was a wizard- her friends were wizards. They were not 'aliens' and she was not doing 'black magic', or so her mother had said.

"Look," Alicia said with anger in her voice, "they aren't aliens and we are not doing black magic. The place is like my home, and I am not going to work in the fashion industry one day so get that out of your head!" She turned and walked towards the door, but then stopped quickly to look at her mother who wore a shocked expression. "Oh, and if you would like to contact me, send an owl from one of the posts around here… we don't get them hand delivered at Hogwarts."

Alicia didn't quite remember what happened afterwards, all she knew was that she was sitting in the limo, Charm comfortably on her lap and the trees whisking by the window.

…………………………

George rubbed his eyes as the sunlight entered his room. He stretched and pushed around his already messy red hair with his hands. As he sat up in bed, he realized Fred was fast asleep but that Lee had left. Making his way down the stairs, he looked at his gold wristwatch. It was quite early in the morning, he expected Angelina to be sitting in the common room.

He was right.

Angelina sat with her legs crossed on one of the many couches surrounding the fireplace. The ashes were still simmering, letting off a light steam that evaporated into the morning air.

"Hey," she said without even looking up, "I didn't expect you up so early."

George shrugged as he sat down beside her, "yeah, well, neither did I."

"I don't know what is with you boys," she commented.

George looked over to her. "Hmm?"

"Well, you usually sleep a perfectly good morning away. But Lee was up real early rushing off somewhere and acting weird-…"

"Lee was acting strange?" George asked.

Angelina shrugged, "yeah. I decided not to put too much energy into finding out what that was all about… I know how you and your boy's are…"

George bit his lip on the inside of his mouth. He looked over to the painting on the wall; the beautiful woman in the large grey and white dress had now left her elegant painting. Instead, she was over by the jester, smashing him on the head with the small baton he carried, her mouth moving wildly in silent curses.

"Hey…" George mouthed, but nothing quite came out. He cleared his throat and looked to Angelina who was watching him, "um… that painting reminded me of something," he said pointing to it.

"The woman whacking weirdly dressed guy over the head?" She asked with a smirk.

He nodded, "yeah…" He gave a wide smile that Angelina took to be nothing, when he replied with certainty, "Alicia's coming back today."

…………………………

Alicia couldn't say that she hadn't realized how much she missed Hogwarts. She was actually thinking about Hogwarts almost every second of the day, and now that she was on the train, her stomach was churning with a burning excitement.

"Hogwarts, here I come," she whispered to herself. The faces of her friends swam through her face, and the faces of her teachers who had become like parent figures to her passed by quickly as well. She closed her eyes and imagined herself, standing in the wide corridor of Hogwarts.

She could see herself now. She was a standing, arms by her side and her fingers spread out as she looked up across the large grey stone's that formed the walls of the hall. Water was slowly sliding down the walls, the silent trickle of the drops hitting the floor all around her. Someone was standing in front of her.

It wasn't Angelina, nor Lee or Fred. No, this stranger was no stranger at all. It was George Weasley. She could tell by his stance, the facial features he wore, and the small things she could notice about him. She didn't smile; his presence didn't feel at all right at the moment.

He took a step forward and Alicia heard the slosh of his shoes going through the water on the floor. She hadn't noticed how the water filled the hall so much as for it to reach past her ankles.

Then there was a scream. It wasn't shear or piercing, and it wasn't low or forbidding. It was muffled and strained, hard to hear and its sound rung slightly against the walls with a throaty echo.

"George…?" She asked with uncertainty.

He took another step forward and gripped his stomach. His mouth opened slightly with a soundless plead for help. He was kneeling over, his knees slowly falling deeper and deeper into the water. His eyes closed and a look of pain crossed his face.

Alicia almost screamed as her arm shot out to help him. She was too far away; he wasn't reaching back for her. She went to call his name but found that she couldn't. He wouldn't have been able to hear her anyways. The current by her feet seemed to be pushing her farther from him than before.

She watched as he fell over slowly, disappearing between the depths of the water. She shook her head and began to run towards him, the water preventing her from picking up speed. She slowly waded towards him when she realized she no longer stood in water… she was now standing in a pool of blood.

The scream was now capable of escaping her lips and it shattered her own ears. She didn't care. With a quick dive, she had moved about beneath the blood without the aid of eyesight. Her hands frantically moved around her, until she felt his wrist.

Not delaying for a moment, she moved forward and gripped him beneath his arms. With a sudden tug, she lifted herself out of the water, and with difficulty, the weight of his body followed.

She pushed her hands across her eyes, wiping the blood away from her face before opening her eyes to look at him…

White faced and rotting, he didn't stare back at her. His eyes were closed, mouth gaping, clothing hanging on by a couple threads. His cheeks were now hollowed and it looked as though the sockets of his eyes were hollowing too.

She screamed at the sight.

Her screams must have scared the creatures inside of him, for at his stomach there was a large hole and piles of white, small, maggots fell out and crawled along his corpse towards her hands. She had no choice but to drop him. He then floated back down to the bottom of the blood soaked corridor.

Alicia tried to back away, millions of maggots surrounded her, floating on the top of the water, drowning and trying to grasp her flesh for safety. As tears escaped her eyes, she shivered and let out another frantic scream.

……………

"Lee!" George called after his friend. He rushed to the boys' side, grasping his forearm to slow him down. "Lee, what are you doing?"

Lee didn't answer. Instead, he stood there staring off into an open space, his dreadlocks falling into his face.

"Lee," George said as he stared at his friend, "why are you ignoring me? Talk to me!"

"Can't."

"Well you just did," George smirked.

WHACK.

George fell to the ground.

"What the hell was that for?" George asked, a large gaping cut across his forehead, just above his right eyebrow.

Lee stared and rubbed his fist, his large gold ring gleaming in the light of the hall. He moved it on his finger so that the red gem was in the centre once again, and he let a small smile spread across his lips.

George couldn't say anything at all. His friend had just punched him, and now he was laughing at him.

Lee didn't stick around to allow George to open his mouth. He looked around him to see if there were any onlookers, and then he sprinted down the hall and out of sight.

George got up, mouth gaping. There was a large stinging in his head, and he lifted his hand to lightly graze his fingertips overtop of the cut. He put his hand down to look at it, large drops of blood clinging to his hand.

He wiped them on the bottom of his shirt.

"Whatever that was, it was weird," he said to himself. "And I'm going to get to the bottom of it."

………………

"And he just punched you? Just like that?" Asked Fred.

George nodded and Angelina didn't say anything at all.

"Then what happened," Fred inquired, his mind racing. This wasn't like Lee at all. Lee was usually a softhearted and levelheaded kind of a guy. Hilarious and kind, Lee was the one who always held the twins back from beating up other people that were bothersome.

"Well, he just looked at me, rubbed his wrist, adjusted his ruby gold ring and left," he replied. There was a silence as his two friends took it all in, and then he added, "but he didn't leave before smiling at me… like he was laughing at me…"

Angelina shook her head. "Adjusted his ruby ring?"

"Yeah," George said, "but he was almost laughing in my face!" He moved his hand to his cut again and cringed, "Ow, damn…"

Fred shrugged and leaned back in the chair he was sitting on, looking around the common room for any sign of their friend. Lee was nowhere to be seen.

"He adjusted his gold ring…" Angelina said to no one in particular. A long silence followed before she said again, "his red ring."

"YES, Angelina. He adjusted his ring, okay? Didn't think it was that big a deal!" George said getting slightly angry.

"It is a big deal!" Angelina said, standing up. "If you didn't notice, Lee only wears one silver ring on his right hand, on his second-last finger! He doesn't like jewellery much, he only wears that and a silver chain necklace."

"I'm glad you took in the scenery of Lee," Fred said suddenly, with attitude in his tone. "You must watch him all day to find out these sorts of things," he replied crossing his arms.

"Oh, shut it Fred!" She snapped as she looked to him before continuing, "I only know this because it's what Lee told me one day when I had asked him about his ring… I thought it was nice. It was thick and silver and looked wonderful with his skin tone."

"Everything looks wonderful with his skin tone," Fred mocked.

George gave his brother a confused look and then turned back to look at Angelina, who hadn't seemed to notice Fred had spoken at all. Instead she was deep in thought.

"He had said that it was annoying at first but he got used to it. He didn't like rings much at all," she spoke as her eyebrows furrowed, "and the only reason he wore it was because it was of importance to his family… I think it was his father."

"Okay, so what?" George asked.

"So it wasn't gold, it didn't have a red ruby on it, and he had no ring on his right hand! He's right handed, so he would have punched with his right hand. And knowing Lee, he wouldn't just go and buy some god-awful ring that didn't match him, and wear it around even though it annoyed him!"

She looked at the faces of the twins. Both wore different expressions across their face; Fred seemed annoyed and angry and George has his eyebrows raised.

"Okay, Angelina… it all makes sense, Lee shouldn't have the ring, but he did… okay?"

Angelina frowned, "you're not getting it! THAT WASN'T LEE."

………………………

"Alicia!"

Alicia's eyes shot open and she looked into the eyes of Joe Hardyment. She blinked several times and shook her head, leaning forward and putting her elbows atop her knees. She then put her face in her hands.

"I'm sorry, Joe," she said as she looked up at him, "I was thinking about stuff and I must have passed out."

He smiled and stood up, his arms open wide. "No problem, Alicia Spinnet," he replied with a coy smile, "do I get a hug?"

Alicia smiled and stood; moving into his arms and feeling him wrap himself around her. He held her for a small while until he released her and sat down on the seat across from hers.

"You kind of scared me there, you know," he said as he leaned back and crossed his heels.

Alicia was now sitting, pushing her hand through her hair. "What do you mean?"

He shrugged and looked lazily out of the compartment window. "I came to sit with you," he said as he watched the tops of students heads go by, "and you were asleep. I figured you wouldn't mind if I just set myself up in here, but by the time I had put my luggage up overtop of the seat, you started screaming."

"I started to what?"

"Scream. You were screaming, Alicia. I was worried so I went over to you. That's when you grabbed my wrist, pushed me away and woke up. I think you might have been having a dream," he said looking back to her. "Do you remember anything?"

"No," she answered, knowing full well that she was lying. "Nothing that I can recall."

"That's okay," Joe said, "I never remember my dreams either."

She smiled. "What a way to greet you…" she whispered as she looked at her reflection in the windowpane, ignoring the scenery of trees and farmland flying past her, "I cant remember a thing…"

……………………………

Lee stumbled around in the dark until he found a circular object. Pulling it up and pushing against the wall in front of him, he stumbled out into the light. He blinked a few times and looked around, taking in the sights of the corridor.

"Where am I?" He asked himself.

"Ooo, little black haired boy lost in the cold? Looks to me as though you're about five years old!"

Lee turned to whoever rhymed. In front of him, floated an odd little man with curly shoes and a wide and scary grin across his face.

"The names Peeves!" He said with a little twirl. In his hands he held pieces of the suit of armour beside him. "Heard of me?"

"Oh, I've heard of you!" Lee said as he backed away steadily, still looking at the little man, "George and Fred told me about you…"

"THEN YOU BETTER WATCH OUT!" Peeves screamed as he threw metal pieces at Lee's head.

Lee ducked and his arms flew up to protect his face. He ran blindly down the hall and turned the corner just in time to miss another flying object. As he ran, a pain in his side grew. He didn't stop until he was sure he had gotten away from the poltergeist, and he panted until the pain had subsided.

"Why are you hear, my dear boy?"

Lee looked up into the face of an odd and stringy woman. She had large glasses and a pointed nose, bushy and wild hair and a lot of jewellery. Lee recognized her to be the rarely seen divination teacher. He couldn't recall her name.

"Um…" Lee closed his eyes and thought back to what had happened before. He remembered waking up in the darkness, but before that… oh yes… "Um, I got lost."

She smiled. "Well do you know where you are?"

"Not really," Lee said after taking another look around.

"You're by my class of course," she said.

He nodded. "Which way to the Gryffindor common room?"

Her bony hand pointed down the hall.

"Thank you."

Lee ran all the way to the fat lady portrait. Chanting the password, he stumbled through the hole and fell on the couches. There, three glaring faces greeted him.

"I haven't seen you guys all day," Lee panted, "I've got something to tell you…"

"You bet your ass you have something to tell us," Fred said angrily, "what was up with you and George today?"

"Me and George? Today?" Lee asked.

Fred nodded furiously. "You punched him straight in the face, unless you don't remember," he said with sarcasm.

Lee sighed, "oh damn, that's what I have to tell you guys…"

"WAIT!" Angelina said as she jumped from her seat and walked up to Lee. He flinched back slightly as he hand shot out and grabbed his wrist, pulling it up to her. She then dropped it and looked at his other hand. "See?"

Fred looked at his hands, "she's right…"

George frowned. "What happened to the gold ring that conveniently gave me this large gash this morning?"

"What red ring?" Lee asked.

"The one that you swiped me with!"

"I don't have a red ring!"

"You do so! It was on the hand you punched me with!"

"No, wait! You have to listen to me!" Lee put up his hands in defence, "it wasn't me, and I swear it!"

"Who else could it be? The tooth fairy perhaps? Santa Clause? You're old pal, the Easter bunny?" Fred asked.

"No," Lee said grumpily, "the Easter bunny couldn't make it, he was in Florida for holiday."

"Well what's your excuse, Lee?" Asked Angelina as she sat down beside him.

"It was Flint. We kind of ran into each other, the other day. He was in the mood for trouble. I had just finished spending some time with Carrie, when he pushed me against the wall. Told me I was messing with one of the prettiest girls and that he wanted her. Well of course, I was royally pissed off, so I challenged him. He told me to meet him this morning, at eight am, to settle it. I wasn't about to back down," Lee said as he got right into his story.

"So Flint has something to do with all of this? I should have known, he always has something to bug us about," George interrupted.

"Well that's not all," continued Lee, "when I went to the corridor where we were to meet, he wasn't there. Instead, I was there, staring back at me! It was so confusing… that's when I realized it was Flint in my body. His clothes were hanging off of him… or me, that is. I asked him what the hell was going on and he told me that he had nicked some Polyjuice Potion off of Snape. It was on one of the shelves he had to clean for detention… trust Snape not to double check everything is there after one of his precious Slytherin students were doing a little extra cleaning up."

"Well, why did Flint want to become you?" Asked Fred.

"To get to you guys, mess up my relationship with Carrie…" He trailed off.

Angelina stood, "aren't you worried about Carrie then?"

"No, there's nothing to worry about that. I hadn't worried because I had just left Carrie to go visit with Professor Sprout. They had some stuff they needed to work out about some assignment for extra credit I think," Lee said. "So I knew he couldn't get to her and that by the time he did, the potion would wear off. I guess he went looking for George to ruin my life in some other way."

George sighed and got up to pat his friend on the back. "Well thank god it wasn't you," he said, "but I have a feeling we haven't heard the last of this."

"No, I have the same feeling." Fred said, "sorry about the third-degree, Lee."

"I would have acted the same way," Lee said checking his watch, "but shouldn't we be greeting a certain someone at the station in about half an hour?"

"Oh, yes!" Angelina said as she grabbed Fred by the hand and pulled him from his chair, "lets go wait for Alicia to arrive back!"

George and Lee nodded and followed a red headed- and red faced, Fred, who was still holding hands with Angelina as she dragged him from the common room.

………………………

Alicia moved her pawn forward one space. She smiled at Joe's next move, "nice," she commented.

He laughed. "I'm improving… I spent Christmas honing my skills."

Now, it was her turn to laugh. "Honing your skills just for a rematch with me?" She joked.

"Yes," he replied.

Alicia looked up to him, but she couldn't catch his eyes. He looked down at the board, preparing for his next move, his black-brown hair falling around him slightly. He didn't look as prim as he did at school at the moment, he was wearing a loose brown sweater, a new pair of jeans, and a wide smile.

"Checkmate."

"What?" Alicia said as she snapped out of her trance, "checkmate?"

"Yes," he said with a smirk.

"Alicia pushed the board aside and smiled at him, "I've had enough of chess for now."

He nodded, "me too." With that, he leaned back in the chair and his eyes settled on her, as he looked her over.

Alicia felt like saying something. She thought over all of the things she could say, but found that none of them really brought on much conversation. The silence was slightly uncomfortable for her. She wondered if he was feeling the same thing as her.

"Your hair looks very beautiful today," he said.

"Sorry?" She asked.

"Your hair- it's beautiful."

"Oh… thank you," Alicia said, she couldn't think of what else to say. Your hair looks beautiful too? For some reason, that just didn't feel right.

"It really is," Joe continued, "it's a wonderful red colour."

"Its auburn," she said.

He smiled. "Yes, and its amazing. It curls in all the right places, and your bangs make you look mature."

"It's wavy and can get really annoying… and I think the bangs make me look childish," she said.

Joe laughed, "You know, this would be so much easier if you would just take the compliments."

She smiled sheepishly and looked down at her shoes.

"You know, I like your eyes too."

She looked up.

"I like it when you look at me."

"Um…" her mouth gaped wordlessly, so she closed it and gave him a smile.

He looked down and felt his eyes on her. He was acting strange, though she didn't even know him well enough to know when he was strange or just being himself. Serving all of these compliments about all of her faults… it was strange, but it made her feel good. She hated her hair, she thought it was repulsive- but he seemed to love it. It made her feel like a goddess.

"You excited about getting back to Hogwarts?"

Alicia almost jumped at the conversation opening. "Oh, yes! I can't wait actually… Hogwarts is like my family. I really love it there… with my friends."

He smiled. "Yeah, me too." He played with his thumbs slightly and then looked up at her again. She had turned her head to look out the window. He leaned to the right to try to catch her eye.

"We're close," she commented.

He nodded, "want me to take down your bags?"

"No. I mean, no thanks. I can do it myself," she said, slightly defensive at first. She gave him a reassuring smile and stood up, pulling her heavy bags from the top shelf and pulling them down to the floor.

Joe did the same to his.

"Ladies first," said Joe as he opened the compartment door.

Alicia smiled, "thanks." She walked through the doorway and began walking towards the exit of the train as it slowed down, entering the station. Joe jogged up to her and walked by her side, his bag in his right hand.

As they walked off the train, Alicia put her bag with Joe's by the pile of other luggage. It was to be taken up to the castle by the house elves.

"It's been nice seeing you again, Alicia," Joe said as he brought her into a hug. "I'll see you around, okay?"

She nodded as he broke the hug. "Yeah, I'll be seeing you," she said.

………………………

Angelina was pacing around the castle doors until she let out a scream, "ALICIA!"

Fred, George and Lee all turned their heads to see Alicia appear out from the crowd of students, looking flushed, but fine otherwise. She looked over to the right and gave her friends a small smile when they met eyes.

That was their signal that it was okay to stampede to her.

All four friends rushed to her side and crowded her with questions. Angelina was the first to shove herself in, to receive a hug. Alicia gracefully accepted. When her friend let go of her, she was almost toppled over from a forceful hug by the impressive Lee Jordan, who lifted her off her feet, spun her around quickly and dropped her from his bone-crushing embrace.

Fred pushed Lee aside with a laugh and messed up Alicia's hair. Then, he hugged her for a moment and then let go, walking back to his place beside Angelina.

George stood uncomfortably over in the corner.

"Thank you for the gift," Alicia said as her friends began to talk amongst themselves.

He nodded and noticed she had given him an odd look for a moment, but then she flashed him a small smile. His eyebrows rose as he watched her smile at him, it was defiantly a first.

In Alicia's mind, she was retracing the steps of her dream. She had noticed she was giving him an odd look when she remembered the horrific parts of it, so she gave him a reassuring smile.

George stuck out his hand.

Alicia gave him a firm handshake as a greeting. He smiled, and it reminded her of the first time she had met him. Sure, he would have looked marvellous shining in all his glory after rescuing her, but it was too cliché and not fair to her. She was no damsel in distress and needed no rescue by some redheaded, tall and freckled young boy.

"How was your Christmas?" He asked as she pulled away from the handshake.

"Horrible," she replied simply, pushing him with her left hand and whisking past him, leaving him to smile after her.

As Angelina ran to meet up with her friend and talk about the holiday without each other, Fred and Lee met up at either side of George.

"So she dropped you just like that?" Asked Fred.

"Huh," George wondered aloud, "what do you mean?"

Lee smirked and the boys soon found themselves following two giggling girls through the halls of Hogwarts.

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And there you are, another chapter! Hope you enjoyed it! Here's a little sneak prievew of the next chapter:

More of the mystery behind Alicia's dreams, something strange is drawing her into doing things that seem right… Joe Hardyment can't seem to stop popping up in the most random places, now that Alicia knows him she realizes he hangs around a lot of the same places she does, and what is up with Flint and Lee? Seems they're having a little bit of a quarrel, but when can Flint ever get out of the business that involves the twins and their friends?

All that and more to come, in the next chapter of 'Twice Over'.

Please, read and review!

-Kit