Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Kudos to J.F.C. for allowing me to adopt his ideas and allowing me to bounce ideas off him as well as suggesting or improving quite a few of the ideas that are going into this.

Chapter 7

Harry could hear the shrill whistle of the train that would take him to Hogwarts, away from everything he had known for as long as he could remember. The billowing clouds of steam that issued from the train covered bits of everything, leaving mysterious shapes in its wake. Harry truly did not want to know what lay ahead. He wished that he could have stayed as he had been previous. A normal teenager around the end of high school and worrying only about getting good enough grades to get into university and not making a fool of himself in front of the girl he was crushing on.

He was probably never going to see her again, being away at Hogwarts for the next ten months or so. Harry wondered how he was going to be able to finish lessons and be unable to look forward to Aunt Carina's wonderful cooking, or even not be able to rummage in the fridge for something to eat in the mornings on a Saturday or Sunday when Aunt Carina went out to visit the neighbours. Harry doubted he would be able to practice his cooking either.

Hogwarts was probably going to cause more problems than it would actually solve but there hadn't really been much of a choice there. Most of the other wizarding schools did not accept students as old as Harry was that had not prior magical education. Aunt Dorea and Uncle Charlus had tried everything they could think of, nothing had worked. Somehow Harry had expected the result. Realistically with Albus Dumbledore, as a headmaster with as much political power as Harry was told he had, had probably sent word to the other schools not to accept him anyway. The reason Dumbledore would have used would not matter as long as he got what he wanted.

So as Harry boarded the Hogwarts Express, lightened and shrunken trunk in his pocket, he turned around to look at what he was going to be missing for the better part of the next ten months. The letters they exchanged would never be enough to fill the loss of their constant presences by his side for many years. Aunt Carina was crying softly into her handkerchief with Aunt Dorea, Uncle Charlus looked a little worried but as soon as he noticed Harry looking their way he prodded Aunt Dorea and Aunt Carina, before he began waving to Harry. Aunt Carina and Aunt Dorea soon joined him and Harry found himself waving back, tearing up himself.

The train began moving, slowly at first but then it gathered speed and the platform was merely a speck in the distance. Harry sighed and turned to look for a compartment to spend the rest of the journey, hopefully one that would be empty so he could spend the journey in peace. Harry had read that the Hogwarts Express increased and decreased size according to the student population that year in Hogwarts: A History. There had not been any specifics as to the how but Harry simply assumed that the train was created with similar magic to Hogwarts as Hogwarts was able to adjust its dorm sized according to the number of students in that dorm. It was either that or the names were somehow listed somewhere that had a charm to tell the train how many people it should hold, but that would not cover how many students would sit in each compartment for the duration of that particular ride.

Harry managed to find an empty compartment near the middle of the train. He only managed to put sit down before the door slid open quickly to admit someone else into the compartment then slammed shut. Harry sighed and looked up to see who had chosen the compartment he was inside to barge into.

Harry's eyes were met with a mass of huffy, freckled Weasley. The boy looked to be around Harry's age. Harry watched carefully as the boy stood with his back against the door as he breathed hard as if he had been chased by someone. Harry waited patiently for the boy to acknowledge that there was in fact another person in the compartment.

The boy's eyes opened to show twin blue irises. The boy looked startled to find someone else in the compartment and did not move away from the door. The boy looked suspicious, almost as if he could not believe what he saw seeing. The boy watched Harry carefully for a couple of minutes.

"Gabriel?" the boy whispered questioningly.

Harry shook his head. That was the reason why the boy looked so shocked then. The other boy must have mistaken him for his brother. Harry guessed that it would have been quite startling to see someone who was supposedly back from the dead.

"No, I'm Harry," Harry replied shaking his head slightly.

The boy looked thoughtful for a couple of minutes before a light of understanding flashed through his eyes. He had obviously only been told whatever he had been told about Harry recently or had barely given it any thought. The boy did not seem very used to the idea of someone looking so similar to Harry's supposed brother. It was either that or the other boy had been close to Gabriel, and was not quite over his death yet.

"Okay then, I'm Ron Weasley," the blue-eyed boy said, moving away from the door for the first time. "You're Gabriel's … twin? Right?"

Harry regarded the boy, Ron, carefully. There was something in the way he had said 'twin' that had raised Harry's suspicions. It was almost as if Ron doubted his own words or did not completely believe them at the very least. The idea of Harry being Gabriel's twin seemed to be a foreign idea to this Ron Weasley. Harry wondered who had told him, no more than that, Harry wondered what this boy had been told about him. Harry would have to find out as soon as he possibly could or he would be at a major disadvantage, something he did not require at this moment in time. Harry had to face more than enough disadvantages as it was.

The door slid open once again and Harry resisted the urge to sigh. At this rate, the compartment could be full by the afternoon.

"Ronnikins, how lovely to find you here," came twin voices. The owners of the voices followed, entering the compartment without invitation. From what Harry could see, the twins and Ron were probably siblings. If the nickname hadn't given it away, the hair and freckles would have. The twins wore wide grins

Ron sighed and slid a few inches down his seat, looking defeated. "Not in front of … Harry, please."

The twins paused in their advance.

"Harry? Harry who?"

They looked around and caught sight of the other occupant of the compartment. They looked at Harry carefully, regarding him and taking in every little detail of his appearance.

"Looks similar to Gabriel, doesn't he?"

"Indeed, he does. Extremely similar."

"That's because he is Ga-" Ron blurted out before looking horrified.

"He is what, Ronnikins?"

"Yes, dearest Ronnikins, what is it you are not telling us?"

"Harry is Gabriel's twin," Ron said, some of his earlier mortification still clung on to his expression.

"Well I think that much is obvious."

"I mean, we know a twin when we see one."

"How could we not?"

"Indeed, we cannot."

It would take some time before Harry got used to that kind of speech. It had given him a slight headache following the speech without even trying to comprehend what was going on. Harry had only barely managed to follow the conversation but it seemed like the twins could somehow recognize a twin. It still felt a little strange to be considered a twin after basically being treated like an only child his whole life.

"Harry Potter."

"It's truly wonderful to meet you."

"He's Gred."

"He's Forge."

"Now would you mind if we continued our business?"

Harry shook his head wordlessly, finding himself increasingly amused by the twins' antics and the slowly growing desperation on Ron's face at Harry's answer. The twins grinned once more.

"Thank you," they said in unison before turning back to Ron, who shrank back into the seat looking like he wished he could just disappear through it. The twins whipped out their wands and began casting various spells quickly, somehow their spellwork was perfect so that one twin's spell wove precisely into the other's previously laid spell. When they were done, Ron's face was covered in make-up and it looked like he was wearing the female version of the Hogwarts uniform.

Ron had closed his eyes at some point, not willing to see whatever the twins had decided to do to him this time. Even as the twins finished casting, Ron did not open his eyes. It was only when the twins moved away a little that he opened his eyes. One of the twins, ever so graciously transfigured their brother a mirror so that Ron would not be denied the ability to see their complete work. Ron let out a loud yelp upon looking at his reflection and immediately turned to the twins to demand they remove everything when the compartment door slid open again. Ron froze in horror.

A bushy-haired girl was looking annoyed as she stood at the door.

"What exactly is-"

The girl took a moment to take in what she was seeing before turning slightly green. "I congratulate you on your prank but for the good of the entire population of Hogwarts, please replace that skirt. It's the stuff of nightmares and is probably going to scar the first years."

The twins hi-fived each other while Ron looked reluctantly grateful when the skirt was transfigured back into a pair of trousers. He still rubbed his face in an effort to remove the make-up from it but it seemed like the make-up was permanent.

"There have been rumours of a boy that looks like Gabriel spreading through the train like wildfire. I understand now what they meant. Anyway, I'm Hermione Granger. Nice to meet you." The girl spoke quickly, and her voice almost made it sound like she had memorized every word she had said from some text book or the other. She had already changed into her robes and stood patiently waiting for his reply.

Despite the past month, he still preferred to think of himself as he always had. He had always been Harry Black, now he was supposed to be Harry Potter. It was almost as if he was expected to have some kind of identity change or something to match the change in surname, in the person he was supposed to be, but he felt exactly the same as he always had been. He had always been happy with himself, granted he was not the best, but he was good enough. His standards were his own, and he did not want that to change. He did not want to have to change his standards to match what other people expected of him, and he knew that there would now be a fair amount of expectations placed unfairly on him.

Because of a person he had never known. To become a person he did not know.

"I'm Harry. Harry Potter now, I suppose," Harry said.