Author's Note: This chapter is dedicated to one of my reviewers, Alorkin, who writes very helpful and nice reviews of my chapters and was the one to point out that Snape could see things as Sirius being in Snape's debt in regards to being set free and that Harry Potter being James Lydell can be considered as a great prank.

November arrived, and so did the first Quidditch match of the year. The very first one was between Gryffindor and Slytherin. The Gryffindor team was very good, thought its Seeker, a fourth year named Grace Jasper, could use some work. While she was a graceful flyer like her name suggested, and could dodge Bludgers fairly well, she wasn't that great at looking for the Snitch. Terrence Higgs, the Slytherin Seeker, was first to spot the Snitch, and Grace noticed two seconds later and followed him. As Higgs had a head start, he caught the Snitch, ending the game at one hundred seventy points to ninety.

The next match was Ravenclaw versus Hufflepuff. With James being such a great Seeker, he naturally caught the Snitch and won the match for Ravenclaw, two hundred thirty points to fifty. Sirius and Remus were there, under the excuse to see Dumbledore regarding the search for Harry Potter, and 'decided' that as long as they were at Hogwarts, they might as well attend the match. Actually, they had planned this all beforehand, for they wanted to see James play.

Ravenclaw was very delighted over their win and James found himself the target of much popularity in his house. As it was for his Quidditch abilities, he didn't mind, for it was much better than being popular over an event he didn't remember, besides a flash of green light and an evil laugh.

The Monday after the match, Draco Malfoy, having discovered that James was best friends with Mari, decided to get back at the girl that had 'stolen' power from him by trying to goad James. "Malfoy, your pathetic attempts to annoy me aren't working," said James. "Just go away and annoy your fellow Slytherins."

This served to enrage Malfoy and he turned on Mari, yelling at her for stealing his position and disgracing Slytherin. Snape had to intervene. After speaking with Malfoy in his office, he called Mari in. "Miss Kishi, what exactly are you doing? Mr. Malfoy is under the impression that you are disgracing Slytherin rather than changing its reputation for the better. He also says that you have gotten most of the Slytherin first-years, other than Mr. Wealsey, whose famiy already has a reputation of being Muggle-lovers, in befriending Muggleborns, and that you and your friends are the ones responsible for the inter-house cooperation."

"Professor Snape, it is true that my friends and I started inter-house unity, though my friend Kyle Melling is the one that came up with the idea," replied Mari. "As for befriending Muggleborns, what is the harm in that? Slytherin has the reputation of hating Muggleborns and Muggles and turning out Dark witches and wizards. If we befriend Muggleborns, it'll show that our reputation is changing for the better. Haven't you ever befriended a Muggleborn?"

That question took Snape aback and he recalled the friendship he had with one Lily Evans, later Potter, until the incident at the end of fifth year when he accidentally called her "Mudblood" in a fit of anger. An odd look came to his face and he said slowly, "You have a point, Miss Kishi."

Mari regarded her head of house for a moment, then said, "You've been friends with a Muggleborn once, haven't you, sir? From the look on your face, that person was probably female, and you might have had feelings for her, though she didn't return them."

Snape gave a start at Mari's perceptiveness. "Yes," he admitted reluctantly. "We lived in the same town and I told her about the wizarding world when I saw that she could do magic, which was a couple of years before our Hogwarts letters. We remained best friends until the end of our fifth year, when in a fit of anger I called her the derogatory term for Muggleborns. She had rescued me from two boys that had been bullying me and I was embarrassed."

Mari raised a brow, but then remembered male pride. James had been very annoyed that time when she had done better than him on a math test, for example, and had said boys were supposed to be smarter than girls until Stella and Mrs. Draper had set him straight. And there was the time she had defended Kyle from teasing and he'd gotten mad and told her that he could stand up for himself. It hadn't helped that the boy doing the teasing had said mockingly, "Oh, are you now so pathetic that you need a girl fighting your battles, Melling?" It was only natural that Snape would have felt angry and embarrassed at being rescued by a girl, even one that was his best friend, and say or do something that he normally wouldn't do.

"But you apologized, didn't you?" asked Mari. "My friends always apologized after they'd done something wrong towards me and we made up."

"I did, but Lily refused to accept the apology and so our friendship ended. It didn't help that I was being influenced by certain of my housemates into being their friends or supporting the Dark Arts at the time. Our relationship was already somewhat strained, and calling her that word was - was-"

"The final straw," said Mari helpfully, as Snape couldn't seem to come up with the expression or idiom. "Who was this Lily, if you don't mind telling me?"

He stared at her, then answered, "Lily Evans, later Potter. Please don't tell anyone else about it, Miss Kishi."

Mari exclaimed, "So you were best friends with James's -" She broke off as she realized that she was about to say 'mother'. "I mean, with James Potter's wife. And Harry Potter's mother. That's interesting. Don't worry, Professor Snape, I promise I won't spread it around."

"All right, Miss Kishi. You may continue what you are doing in changing Slytherin's reputation and your group of first-years, called 'Unity', I believe? Just be a little more circumspect and avoid Mr. Malfoy. You may go now."

Mari, as promised, did not spread what Snape had revealed, though she did tell James, after swearing him to secrecy. He was surprised that Snape had been friends with his mother, though he had thought that the Potions professor probably had known her somewhat, since Sirius had said Snape had gone to school with the Marauders and Lily. James wondered what would happen if Snape found out his secret. On the one hand he could keep it, because of his old friendship with Lily, but on the other, he could decide to tell because of the enmity he had towards James Potter. James Lydell sighed and hoped that he would never have to find out. He wondered if Snape was beginning to suspect, though, since the Potions teacher kept glancing at him during class and had strange looks on his face whenever he checked James's potions.

The third and final match of autumn was between Ravenclaw and Slytherin. Unfortunately, the only member of the Slytherin team that participated in inter-house unity was Higgs, so when James caught the Snitch, Slytherin was not happy, to say the very least. Sour over the fact that they'd lost to a first year, especially one who was best friends with the girl responsible for what was going on in Slytherin, made one of the Beaters hit a Bludger at James right after he'd gotten the Snitch. By the time he noticed, it was too late to dodge out of the way and he got hit in the head, knocking him out and making his glasses fly off and break.

When he came to, he found the entire Ravenclaw team, some other Ravenclaws, and all of Unity gathered around him. A short distance away, Madam Hooch was heard telling off the Slytherin Beater. Stuart handed James his glasses, which had been magically repaired. "You'd better go see Madam Pomfrey, James."

"Who's she?" asked James, putting on his glasses and sitting up.

"The Hogwarts Healer," answered Stella, helping him stand up. "I'll take you to the hospital wing."

"I'm not going there!" exclaimed James. "You know I hate doctors and won't see them unless it's absolutely necessary."

"But James, you just got knocked out with a Bludger," protested Kyle. "You need to make sure that you're all right."

"And Madam Pomfrey's a Healer, not a doctor," added Neville.

"She's the wizarding equivalent of one," pointed out James. "So I'm not seeing her unless it's an emergency."

Mari rolled her eyes. "Since you have no problem with nurses or people that have some knowledge of medicine but aren't doctors, how about if I ask Professor Snape to check on you? He knows some stuff about healing due because some of the potions he makes are used for healing."

Stella and Stuart escorted James inside the castle. Mari went to get Snape, who reluctantly agreed to check James and make sure he was all right.

In his office, Snape looked James over and then took out his wand. He started to do a spell, then stopped and asked, "Mr. Lydell, are you a Metamorphmagus?"

"Er, yes, Professor," said James slowly, wondering what it had to with his check-up.

"Well, I can't do spells or anything else to determine how you are unless you are in your natural form. And it seems that this isn't your natural appearance."

James shot a panicked look at Stella, who put her arm around him. "You're saying that you want James to revert to his natural appearance, sir?"

"Yes, Miss Lydell," responded Snape. "Mr. Lydell, please do so."

"I can't!" exclaimed James, grabbing Stuart's hand.

Snape raised a brow. "Whyever not? Mr. Lydell, you can rest assured that I won't tell anyone what you really look like."

"I think Professor Snape can be trusted," said Mari quietly. "So you can show him what you really look like, James."

James swallowed, then said quietly, "Professor Snape, you had better not tell anyone what I really look like." With that, he concentrated and reverted to his real appearance. "See? This is why I've altered my appearance to look like Stuart and Stella's younger brother."

Snape gave a start. "So you're really Harry Potter? But that means you've been under everyone's noses the whole time!"

James nodded. "And I hope it stays that way. I do not want to be treated like a celebrity for an event that ended in my parents' murders and I hardly even remember."

"Hmmm, you're more like Lily than James, even if your new first name is the same as his and you look almost identical to him," mused Snape. "Your father would have reveled in his fame. Well, Mr. Lydell, your secret is definitely safe with me. Who else knows besides your foster siblings and best friends?"

"Just Sirius Black and Remus Lupin," answered James. "They were my father's best friends and my godfathers, even if one is honorary, and I thought they deserved to know the truth and could be trusted. They're keeping my secret and are going through the motions of looking for Harry Potter. I think Sirius sees this as some wonderful and big prank."

Snape gave a snort. "Figures. Even all that time in Azkaban didn't make Black grow up. Why did I ever turn in Pettigrew in to the headmaster?"

"But Sirius did tell Professor Dumbledore to pass on his thanks, didn't he, sir?" At Snape's nod, James continued, "And look at it this way, he's now in your debt. Yes, he does owe part of his freedom to Mari, or rather her cat, and Thesus for doing that spell to reveal Animagi, but he also owes it to you for handing Pettigrew to Dumbledore."

At that, Snape looked as if Christmas had come early. James smiled. "Now you can pay him back for some of the stuff that he and my dad did to you in school. While I don't mind harmless pranks, the Marauders went too far in regards to you, Professor, even if you did fight back. Sirius and Remus wrote to me about some of the stuff the Marauders did."

Snape looked even happier. "Thank you, Mr. Lydell. Now, let me check your condition." He did the spell and said, "You'll have a nasty bump on the back of your head for a few days and will probably get a headache shortly. Here's a potion to help with that, and another that will help you sleep tonight. Don't take too much of the latter potion unless you want to sleep until noon tomorrow. If you suffer from anything else, come to me and I'll give you a potion for it."

"Thanks, Professor," said James. "Could you tell me about my mother? Sirius can only tell me about her when she dated my father and then married him, and Remus has some stories about when they were prefects together, but they can't tell me about the years before that, other than that she was good at Charms and Potions and told my father millions of times that she wouldn't go out with him. You would know more about her, since you seem to have been on friendly terms with her."

Snape looked taken aback and glanced at Mari, who said, "I haven't spread it around, but I did tell James since he has a right to know."

"All right, Mr. Lydell, I will tell you some things about your mother," said Snape. "Report to my office on Monday after dinner. Tell the rest of Unity that you have detention with me, scrubbing cauldrons, if they should ask. That will be all."

James thanked him and then he, Mari, and his adopted siblings left the room. Several minutes later, James did feel a headache coming on, so he took the potion for that and then went to take a nap, deciding not to take part in the party celebrating Ravenclaw's win, though he did drink some juice and had some cake before sleeping.