DISCLAIMER: Harry Potter belongs to J.K. Rowling, who isn't me. The only profit I get from this is personal satisfaction.

Spoiled Dinner

The journey to the train and Hogwarts passed without incident. A thin old woman who identified herself as Professor McGonagall led the first-years to the Great Hall. Fred quickly looked for Dumbledore, but there was no opportunity to go talk to him about George's problem. The Sorting Hat that Percy mentioned earlier sang a song and began sorting students and Fred looked for a way to get Dumbledore's attention and no one else's. When Professor McGonagall called, "Weasley, Fred," he knew it was too late. He squeezed his twin's hand and went under the hat.

"I can see you're troubled, young Weasley," the hat said. "Do you need to talk about your twin's predicament?"

"How do you know that?" Fred asked.

"If you were listening, you'd know that I was reading your mind. If it makes you feel better, you can try to trigger your brother's intruder when I Sort him so I may assist Dumbledore in finding a remedy."

"You'd do that?"

"I'd get bored if all I did was Sort once a year."

"Then I'll do it," Fred promised.

"Then get out your pumpkin juice and go to GRYFFINDOR!"

Fred smiled and went to the Gryffindor table, between Charlie and Percy. He heard the professor call George's name and he unscrewed the top of his pumpkin juice vial. As the hat touched George's head, Fred downed the vial.

George was yanked into his younger self's body. To his surprise, he was sitting at the front of the Great Hall and he felt something on his head.

You've got to be kidding me—the Sorting ceremony?

"This is the strangest thing I've seen in at least four centuries. Who are you, intruder?"

"I'm George Weasley," George replied.

"Nice try, but I saw thoughts from both Weasley twins before you arrived. You most certainly are not him."

"Can't you read my mind and figure it out?" George asked.

"I only can see what is written on a child's brain as I'm on it. Your presence only affects surface thoughts, which I cannot trust you to be honest about."

"Well, even if you can't read my motives, you still have a job to do."

"Of course I would sort young Mr. Weasley into Gryffindor, but your presence changes things."

"What do I have to do with anything?"

"Judging by how quickly you were able to enter Mr. Weasley's mind and already be able to mimic his mental timbre—not good enough to fool me, but I doubt that it'll be long before you can—then I must alert the student body to the possibility that you are not as Saintlike as you'd let them believe. I'll have to put George in Slytherin for his own good."

"The Weasleys will disown him if you do that!"

"Fred Weasley, at the very least, will understand. Any other estrangement will build character."

"You aren't a very nice hat."

"Ever since a certain Muggle-raised kid questioned me as to whether I was fully conscious in the sense of being aware of my own awareness I've been a lot more cynical," the Sorting Hat admitted. "I've accumulated all this brain power and have and I now know exactly how little I am able to do with it."

"I'll be sure to consult you regularly when helping Harry kill Voldemort in a couple years," George promised.

"That is a most interesting promise. One that, to me, seems rather… SLYTHERIN!"

George cursed himself as McGonagall took up the hat. Right, most people here think Voldemort is already dead—and even those who believe he'll return don't realize Harry's the Chosen One, given that he's nine. He looked over at his brothers who were all utterly shocked. In fact, most of the Great Hall seemed to be shocked that a Weasley—who for all intents and purposes was identical to the Fred who was just Sorted into Gryffindor with hardly any trouble at all—was Sorted into Slytherin.

Well, if Mum was going to kill him anyway, he might as well make things interesting. He stood to address the students. "I'm sure you're wondering what just happened between the Sorting Hat and myself. I can't tell you much, but the Hat thinks I might be overcome by my super-powered, possibly dark side. It decided that the best way to become a Dark Lord was to let my Dark Side crush the families of those who may or may not have served the previous one. And when I'm Dark Lord, I'll have the Minister of Magic ban Mondays, throw freeing house-elf parties, make having more than ten toes an imprisonable offense, and I'll give Muggles candy while riding my pet basilisk, Blinky. If you have any requests for my Dark Side, please see your Heads of House and not me as I'm 11 years old and I still don't know which end of a wand to hold. Thank you."

"That will be all, Mr. Weasley," McGonagall said as she gave him a good nudge off the podium. "Now if you please, would you go join your fellow Slytherins?"

"Sure thing, Professor," George replied as he skipped down to sit next to Marcus Flint—he'd be crazy of he didn't try out for Quidditch, even if he wouldn't be on the same team as Fred.

"Sit somewhere else, Weasel," Flint said.

"Do you really want to cross the evilest Weasley in the history of ever? I'd rather work on my evil plans with Fred right now, but I thought you'd might be interested in getting a Beater who has Bludgers for breakfast."

"Well, since Heathcote has started losing interest in the world's greatest game for the guitar of all things, the captain just might consider it. Who isn't me, by the way, so go bother Iris Carrow."

Flint pointed down the table at a sixth- or seventh-year brunette girl who seemed to be fascinated by the book she was reading—Quidditch Through the Ages—and wasn't listening to Dumbledore as he rattled on about rules no one except the suck-ups followed.

"Since I'm sure we're all rather hungry, we'll save the school song for some other time and the few words I will say are these: Bouffant. Galoshes. Macadamia. Shindig."

The feast began and George went to, but did not sit down next to, Iris Carrow.

"What do you want, blood traitor?" she asked after a quick glance up from her book before returning it.

"I'm not a blood traitor—I'm still a Weasley and Percy will defect long before I do. As for why I'm here, I wanted to offer my services on the Quidditch field as a Beater."

"Try out like the rest of them," she advised. "Impress me, then we'll talk."

With that, George decided that unless he wanted to stuff someone named Montague in the Vanishing Cabinet six years early, he had nothing more to do with the Slytherins so he went over to the Gryffindor table and sat between Fred and Percy.

"What did you do, George?" Percy asked.

"I didn't do anything; the Sorting Hat thought I had a higher chance of being evil than Fred. Although if someone wants to believe that I gave me and Fred a good excuse to prank the Slytherins in their dormitories, I'll not contradict them."

Fred smiled. "Now that is a noble goal that I will drink to."

"Before you do," George said before the goblet got to Fred's mouth, "I'd like it widely known that I consider myself to be a Gryffindor and I'd rather everyone act like I am."

"You're an odd saint," Fred said as he downed some pumpkin juice."

Fred only noticed the change in George because he was watching for it.

"I'm in Gryffindor, right?" George asked.

"Sure are!" Charlie said with a cheesy grin. George laughed in relief. Fred wasn't sure how he was going to break it to his twin that he was Sorted into Slytherin because of the Saintlike One, but if the possessor was right, now both Fred and George could access the Slytherin and Gryffindor dorms. That was definitely a positive thing from a pranking perspective and although it was probably just the possessor's excuse, the Saintlike One probably wasn't completely evil. A Slytherin-tormentor couldn't be all bad, right?

Fred dropped something under the table and as he went to pick it up, he gave a tug on George's robes to get him under there with him.

"George, when we go to the dorms, I'm going to go somewhere else in the castle to see if we can get a meeting with Dumbledore. You say you're me if anyone asks and I'll try to get you when I can."

"What aren't you telling me? What happened when I blacked out?"

"George, you know you can trust me. I'm just looking out for you like a good older brother should."

"Minutes, Fred, that's all they were," George replied with a smile. That's the brother I know and love, Fred thought as he returned the grin.

The two came out from under the table so that George was next to Charlie this time and Fred was able to get in the way if Percy insisted upon speaking truthfully about George's Sorting.

Fred enjoyed himself, more or less, for the rest of the feast, though he always drank his pumpkin juice in even numbers to make sure it was his brother with him and not the mostly evil saint.