Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/212172.

Rating: Archive Warning: Category: Fandom: Relationship: Character: Additional Tags: Series: Stats: Teen And Up Audiences No Archive Warnings Apply Gen, M/M Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling Harry/Ron Harry Potter, Ron Weasley AU Part 13 of Two Households Published: 2011-06-15 Words: 7294

The Come & Go Room

by mad_martha Summary

Two worlds collide for just an hour, and two Slytherins meet

Notes

Crossover between my Two Households and Checkmate series. Please note that for all intents and purposes this is AU to both series; for obvious reasons this could not and does not happen in the 'real' timelines. It's set maybe a couple of months before Reparations in the Two Households universe and probably up to six months or more before Earthy Pleasures in the Checkmate universe, so in other words Harry and Ron are both still at school during the Spring Term of their final year. This story was written for Esporamor, who asked for it.

See the end of the work for more notes

Harry Potter returned to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry on the first of February, almost exactly three months after he had left it to travel to his ill-fated Confirmation vigil at the Church of the Holy Bones. His health was still far from robust, his body somewhat frail and his strength inclined to come and go unpredictably. But his healer felt that he had reached a point where more might be gained by him returning to a

semblance of normal life and so Harry did so, albeit with some modifications to his daily routines in order to accommodate his continuing recuperation. One subject was dropped from his timetable entirely, and the others were rearranged to make it possible for him to rest more; he had to give up Quidditch entirely. The other pupils had to accustom themselves to seeing him walk the corridors with the aid of a cane - if he wasn't sitting down in a moment of physical weakness, or leaning against something to catch his breath. The castle itself seemed to make an effort to be of assistance to him, with the temperamental staircases showing unusual cooperation when he approached and every portrait and ghost keeping a discreet eye on him as he went about his business. These latter details might have explained a curious incident that was to befall Harry one wet and stormy day at the beginning of March. It was Thursday morning and he had just left Herbology with the firm intention of returning to his dormitory and spending the empty lesson before lunch resting on his bed. The rest of his class hurried off either to their next lesson or to study, but Harry had no intention of wasting his strength hiking from the greenhouses all the way up to the library, especially not in this weather which, when it wasn't raining and thundering, was trying to blow him clean across the school grounds. Instead he sought out a hidden side door into the castle that he had discovered a while ago on the Marauder's Map, which provided a shortcut to a set of stairs down into the dungeons. It was a route he had been using ever since he returned to school, so it came as more than a surprise that day to open the familiar little door with its blackened iron studs and big ring handle only to discover a tiny stone room behind it containing a plain wooden bench. Harry blinked and closed the door again without entering. He checked it same old iron studs and varnished oak, the same iron ring with the worn patch underneath where the ring had bumped the wood with repeated use. He found the Map and consulted it, turning his back into the wind to stop it flapping; there were his footprints by the ingress into the castle wall and there was the little name label declaring that he was standing next to the dungeon shortcut as usual. The only slightly odd thing was a second label beside the door with the cryptic words Come & Go on it. Harry tapped a finger on the Map thoughtfully. "Come and Go" was one of the names the Hogwarts house-elves used for the Room of Requirement on the seventh floor. As titles went, this was perfectly logical; the Room did have a habit of appearing and disappearing, depending on the needs of its users. But Harry knew there was another room which fitted the title of "Come and Go" somewhat better, a room that had rather different characteristics. This room was much smaller and didn't take on the features most required by the user; instead it could move around the castle at will (and even around the grounds, apparently) and would take the user to the place he or she most needed to go. This didn't always conform to the person's own ideas of where he needed to be, however. Harry's last encounter with the Come and Go Room had been a year ago, when he'd burned his hands in Potions and the room had appeared as he

left the dungeons. For some reason it had decided he needed to go to Hagrid's Hut and had promptly delivered him there, which was a little odd but at least Hagrid had known what to do with him (which was more than Harry could have said for himself at the time). Harry felt a certain wariness of it today, mostly because he was tired and really wanted to go to the dungeons rather than wherever the room thought he should be. But as his options were limited to trusting the room or walking halfway around the castle in bad weather, he reluctantly turned the iron ring again and stepped inside, pulling the door shut behind him. He slumped down on the bench, letting his book bag slide to the floor. Darkness and quiet enveloped him for a while. An unspecified period later the door was pulled open from outside. "There you are! I've been waiting for ages!" Ron Weasley paused, his eyes flicking over the small space Harry occupied. "What are you doing in there anyway? And where the hell did it come from?" "Who knows why this room does what it does?" Harry grumbled. "Give us a hand out, would you? And anyway, why aren't you in Charms?" Ron's brows snapped together in a frown, but he took Harry's book bag from him and grabbed his outstretched arm, helping him up. "What happened to you? And why would I be in Charms? I've just come from Herbology and now I've got a free period. You should know, it was all your idea! And by the way, can you not do that thing you did with the seed drill when old Sprouty's only two feet away from me? I nearly snorted half a packet of Mustwort seeds down the back of her robe." Harry stopped in the entrance to the Come and Go Room, staring at him blankly. "It's Thursday. You have double Charms in the morning. Besides, you can't have just come from Herbology because I've just come from there!" "Did someone knock you on the head or something?" Ron demanded. "Of course you just came from Herbology, didn't I just say so? I only see you there - oh! like twice a week! I don't have double Charms till tomorrow " His voice trailed off as he looked Harry up and down, and his half-smile faded. "What's with the walking stick?" "Are you being funny?" Harry would have been indignant, if it hadn't been for the sudden sense of wrongness about this situation. He looked around; they were in a high-ceilinged room with bookcases, chairs, a couch and a fireplace, but although it all looked vaguely familiar he couldn't quite place it. And he didn't understand why Ron - his Ron, the Ron who fussed over him like an anxious father-to-be half the time - was talking so roughly to him and pretending he'd never seen Harry exhausted or using a walking stick before. "Where are we?" he asked softly, and he surreptitiously gave his right wrist a tiny shake to make his wand slip down into his palm. "The Room of Requirement," Ron said readily enough, but now there was a look of suspicion on his face. "It was your idea, remember?" It was about the right size for the Room of Requirement. But something was

not right and as Harry stared at Ron some inkling of what that something might be began to dawn on him. "Why are you wearing one of my ties?" he asked, fighting to keep his voice level. Ron took a step back from him, and Harry's book bag went clattering to the floor. They stared at each other for a tense moment. "Why are you wearing one of mine?" Ron retorted, and his voice went oddly flat. Tired or not, Harry's reflexes were still good. His wand was levelled at Ron if it was Ron - before the echoes of the question had died away. And Ron's wand was levelled on him too. This didn't surprise Harry as much as it evidently surprised Ron; after all, they had been duelling against each other all the previous summer and had faced down Voldemort and more than a dozen of his most trusted Death Eaters together at the end of October. He expected Ron to be that fast. Ron clearly hadn't expected it of Harry, though, and that was completely bizarre. And yet this surely couldn't be Ron, so just who the hell was it? "Okay, which one of you is it?" Ron demanded softly, echoing Harry's thoughts eerily. His face had turned hard and menacing. "Malfoy? Nott? Zabini?" "Funny. I was going to ask you that," Harry retorted. "Not that Zabini would do something like this, but if it's you, Nott, you are just going to love what'll happen when Snape finds out you've been making Polyjuice." 'Ron' seemed less impressed by this than he should, although his brows were lifting higher and higher. "Since when does Zabini chicken out of anything?" he asked coolly. "For that matter, why Nott and not Malfoy? And who's Snape?" "What do you mean, who's Snape? " Harry demanded. "And Malfoy? Isn't fleeing house arrest a bit of a risk just for this? Zabini wouldn't risk his family name by betraying me, especially after Hallowe'en." "We are talking about the same Zabini, right? The one with the mother who probably knocked off seven husbands?" Ron's lip curled in an unfamiliar sneer. "I'd say this is right up Malfoy's street, though " "What part of 'house arrest' do you not get? He's in London with his mummy! He's not going anywhere!" "Well that's odd," Ron drawled, "because he was asleep in the next bed when I woke up this morning, snoring his ferrety little face off! Like he always is." They seemed to have reached an impasse. Harry stared at him, utterly incapable of processing what was happening. This had to be someone Polyjuiced to look like Ron; there was no other possible explanation. And yet

he couldn't shake the feeling that this was, somehow, Ron. A Ron. Not his Ron. Some other Ron from some other place, and the idea was so completely insane that he realised he must have passed out somewhere and was even now hallucinating all of this. At least he hoped he was. "I need to sit down and take a potion," he muttered shakily, putting his wand away. "And then I reckon I need to see Madam Pomfrey." Feeling weak and trembly, Harry shuffled over to the couch and crawled into it gratefully. If this was an hallucination, at least it came with comfortable furniture. "I don't s'pose you could go get her for me, could you?" he threw over his shoulder at the person-who-could-not-possibly-be-Ron. "Probably not," he added to himself under his breath. "And you'll do what while I'm gone?" Ron asked sarcastically. "Oh, I don't know - have a nervous breakdown, maybe? Wouldn't be the first time." He really needed one of his Strengthening Draughts, but they were in his bag. He managed to get his wand out again, but all of his energy seemed to be draining out of his feet into the carpet and his accio was feeble. He didn't blame his bag for not responding to it. "What's the matter with you anyway?" Harry suppressed a long-suffering sigh with an effort. "What does it look like? I'm ill. I need a potion from my bag." There was a rustle and Ron appeared a couple of feet away from the arm of the couch. He held up Harry's bag but he was carefully out of reach and didn't actually offer it to him. "You want this?" Harry looked up at him. It was the weirdest feeling, staring into this face that was just like his Ron's face but seeing the same shuttered look in those blue eyes that he had worked so hard to cultivate in his own. That expression was the one he saw in the mirror sometimes. He said nothing. After a moment Ron put his wand away and went to perch on the arm of the nearest chair. He propped Harry's bag on his knees and unbuckled the front flap, flipping it open. He peered inside. Harry fought to stay calm. He hated people poking around in his things he'd never got over the way his cousin Dudley would raid his cupboard under the stairs and break or steal anything he found. And he tensed when he saw Ron taking out the Marauder's Map, for he hadn't bothered to shut it down before he'd put it back in his bag. In the hands of any of the other Slytherins Ron stared at it silently for a moment, then he looked up and his face seemed to have lost a little colour. "Where did you get this?" "I nicked it," Harry said, with perfect truth. "Yeah, but who did you nick it from, arsehole?" The anger in his voice surprised Harry. "From your brothers actually. But

they nicked it first, and anyway it rightfully belongs to me. My dad and godparents made it." Ron stared at him for a long moment as though he couldn't think of anything to say. Then to Harry's even greater surprise he put the Map back into the bag quite carefully and pulled something else out. Harry's Herbology notebook. He tugged the leather tie around it undone and flipped it open, and stared at the inside of the front cover. "Henry J. Potter," he said finally. "Henry?" "That's what Harry's short for," Harry said with weary aggravation. "Look, if you're going to poke around in my stuff, could you at least give me one of those glass vials from the inner pocket - the ones with the blue wax seals wrapped in lambs wool. I'm going to pass out any minute if I don't have my potion." Ron gave him a suspicious look but perhaps something in Harry's face convinced him that this wasn't a ploy, for he fumbled the inner pocket open and pulled out one of the little bottles. Probably, Harry thought dourly, he really looked as though he might pass out. He was well aware that when his strength left him he tended to look quite spectacularly unwell. Ron apparently didn't trust him too far all the same, though, for he studied the vial carefully, holding it up to the light, before he floated it over to Harry on a charm. Harry broke the seal off the vial and drank the potion neat. It was vile but he was used to that by now and waited in grim silence, fingers digging into the arm of the couch, until the shiver-inducing draught did its work. He could feel Ron's eyes on him and closed his own until the humiliating tremors in his limbs eased up.

~~~

Ron Weasley watched the other boy warily for a moment or two, but he had to admit to himself that he did look quite ill and therefore unlikely to enact any funny business. What Ron didn't get was why. That mattered far more to him than the who. If it was one of the other Slytherins then there would have to be a reason for the charade and some sort of pay-off at the end of it. He knew he wasn't the most popular person in his house, but he was good at Quidditch - which mattered a lot to Slytherins - and didn't get into any more trouble than anyone else. His friendship with Harry notwithstanding, he was a team player for Slytherin and generally accounted reliable by their standards. He didn't like Draco Malfoy much and the feeling was mutual, but that was a private thing and neither of them let it get in the way of joint interests. He didn't think he'd done anything recently, or even not so recently, that would merit a trick on this scale. And he was beginning to think that this couldn't be Polyjuice anyway. For

one thing, however much this boy looked like Harry there were subtle differences - he had an odd lightning-shaped scar on his forehead, for instance. Polyjuice produced an exact physical copy of a person; Ron had seen Harry less than half an hour ago and his friend had been in his usual robust good health, so anyone Polyjuicing themselves into him would be in the same pink condition. Not ill enough to need potions and a walking stick, and certainly not as thin, haggard and shaky as this person was. But if he wasn't Harry, then who was he? He had the Marauder's Map in his bag, a fascinating document that Harry had only shown him recently. The name on the bookplate inside the Herbology notebook wasn't just Henry J. Potter - which was bizarre in and of itself - but was written in Harry's familiar sprawling handwriting. But the bookplate was a Slytherin one, identical to the ones inside Ron's own books. And the wand he had pulled on Ron looked just like Harry's wand, but he was wearing a Slytherin school tie and the bands on his sweater and the badge on his robe were Slytherin. Keeping one eye on the other boy, Ron rummaged a little more and found a folded letter. When he opened it, it was addressed to Dear Harry and signed your loving godfather, Sirius. Sirius was the name of one of Harry's uncles. Ron put it back and pulled out a couple of textbooks, each of them with another Slytherin bookplate and Harry's name inside the cover. Parchment rolls had Harry's handwriting all over them. His quills were nibbled in the same way on the ends. There was a distinct absence of Harry's favourite sweets, but there was a monogrammed handkerchief with an unfamiliar family crest in one corner that was wrapped around something that turned out to be a small diptych-style photo frame. Ron flipped it open. On the left a wizard and witch holding a small dark-haired baby; on the right two wizards in their thirties, one dark-haired and handsome and the other one with brown hair and a warm smile. Ron could name all of them; he'd met Harry's parents and uncles the previous summer, after all. The only one missing from the pictures was Peter Pettigrew. This was entirely too much detail for this to be a hoax by one of his housemates, Ron realised. This was too much detail for a hoax by anyone. Which meant what? He put the photo frame back in the bag and closed it, putting in on the chair. When he looked up at the other boy he noticed how grey and exhausted he looked, and felt a stab of concern. He did look awfully like Harry, after all - could even be Harry, perhaps. Not Ron's Harry, but some other Harry from somewhere else. Which was such a completely barking mad idea that he wanted to kick himself, but Merlin's balls, how else was he supposed to explain it? This was the Room of Requirement after all. As far as Ron could tell, nobody knew exactly what the Room's limits were. As bonkers as it seemed, who could say if doing something like this wasn't within its range of abilities? Not that this had been at all the thing he'd been thinking of when he arrived here. Studying might be the euphemism he and Harry used for their trysts here, but they usually aimed for something a little more cosy than this rather strange study-like set up. And he certainly hadn't asked the Room for a parallel-universe version of his Harry. He liked the Harry he already

for a parallel-universe version of his Harry. He liked the Harry he already had, thanks very much. And that begged the question of where his Harry was right now. He was over twenty minutes late for their assignation. Ron had a sudden and very unwelcome idea. He got up and went to sit at the other end of the couch, and the-person-who-couldn't-be-his-Harry opened his eyes and looked at him warily. "Just out of curiosity," Ron said, keeping his tone casual, "what am I going to find when I open that door there?" He nodded towards the big door that usually led out of the room. "What do you think you're going to find?" Harry asked. His blank expression was as good as Ron's own, which was a little disconcerting to see on a face that was usually open and cheerful. "You're not Harry Potter," Ron said coolly. "Not the Harry Potter I know, anyway." "Doesn't look like it, does it?" "So that means I'm not the Ron Weasley you know." The corner of the other boy's mouth twitched in a not entirely humorous half-smile. "No, you're really not." That was interesting. But Ron would tackle that detail in a while; for the moment he was pursuing a more worrying question. "So - one of us isn't where he should be. Or maybe both of us, right?" Harry shrugged and nodded. "Looks that way." "So if I left the room now, where would I be? In my Hogwarts or yours?" "What makes you think I know?" A flash of irritation crossed Harry's face. "This is a big surprise to me too, you know. I was heading for the dungeons and ended up here instead! Believe me, this is not where I want to be." There was a long pause. Ron wasn't sure what to say next and he thought Harry wasn't either. "So you're ill," he said finally. Harry chose not to answer this. "You look like my Uncle Gideon when he had pneumonia. Why aren't you in the infirmary?" "Obviously because I don't have pneumonia," Harry said, and now the irritation was overt. This was something new for Ron to witness; he had seen his Harry looking rather peeved more than once, and occasionally he would get annoyed at something, but nothing like this with real anger so close to the surface and such stiff and resentful body language. Every muscle in this Harry's body was constantly tensed, as though he was waiting for someone to attack from any direction at any moment. Perhaps he was. Ron maintained a similar level of wariness as he went about his day to day business at school, partly because he never knew if someone was going to jump him - the Gryffindors, usually - and partly

because not being cautious in Slytherin inevitably ended with you being at the bottom of the pecking order, which was somewhere no Slytherin ever wanted to be. "So what's wrong with you?" He could be very persistent when he liked. Harry turned green eyes on him that were clouded with pain and held a world-weary expression far beyond his seventeen years. "What's it to you?" he asked. Ron shrugged. "Just curious. When I saw you at breakfast this morning you were jigging about like a spring lamb. It's a bit weird to see you curled up like an old man now, you know?" For a second Harry looked wistful. "It'd be nice to jig about again," he said. "Again? Well, at least you weren't born like this." A tired smile crossed his lips. "No." "So how did it happen?" The smile widened reluctantly. "Anyone ever tell you you're a nosy git?" "All the time," Ron said, beginning to grin. "So what happened?" "I tangled with a certain Dark wizard," Harry said. "And lost?" That earned him a sharp look. "And won. He's dead." "Looks like he tried pretty hard to take you with him," Ron observed, but he kept the snarkiness out of the comment. The fact that the other wizard was dead told him how serious an encounter it must have been. "He nearly did. I was in a coma for a month afterwards." Harry gave him a mirthless smile. "This is an improvement!" "Yeah? Well, at least you're up and about then. Shitting on his grave'd be even better, of course, but ..." He surprised a laugh out of Harry, and just like that most of the tension seemed to leave his body. He relaxed back against the sofa cushions and some of the pain lines around his mouth and eyes smoothed out, making him look more like his actual age. "He doesn't have a grave," he remarked. "I sort of disintegrated him ... or so you told me afterwards. I don't really remember much about it." "Nice job," Ron said respectfully. "You'll have to teach me that one." "Why, are you likely to need it?" Harry's expression turned vaguely anxious. "Is he still around?" "Who?" Ron asked.

"Voldemort!" Ron raised his brows, perplexed. "Who's he?"

~~~

A world without Voldemort. The thought actually made Harry feel a little dizzy and he slid down in his seat until his head was resting on the back of the couch. No Voldemort? Christ. There had to be a mistake ... "Are you okay?" Ron asked him warily. "You don't know who Voldemort is," Harry said flatly. "Name's not ringing any bells, mate. Should I know him?" "We've only lived in fear of him for over twenty years. Him and his Death Eaters." "Death Eaters? You mean those idiots who tried to take over the Ministry just after I was born? They're all in Azkaban." Harry looked at him. He looked so much like Ron - he even sounded like Ron, and that grin he'd worn a few moments ago tugged painfully at Harry's heart - but Harry wasn't fooled anymore. No matter the similarities, this Ron was not his Ron at all. They were two very different creatures. "In Azkaban?" he asked. "So there are Death Eaters then?" "Past tense. The Aurors nabbed them all, so Dad says, and the bloke leading them ended up dead somehow." He sounded so matter-of-fact about it. Harry stared at him blankly for a moment, trying to process the idea that Voldemort had got himself killed in a fight with the Aurors. Then Ron said something that really shook him. "I thought your dad told you all this stuff?" His dad. His dad. Harry heard the words coming out of his mouth without quite being sure how he managed to shape them: "My parents are dead. Voldemort killed them when I was a baby." There was a split second of shock on Ron's face before his expression went blank again. "I've met your parents," he said. This was almost worse. Harry stared at him for a long time before he could think of something to say, and when he finally did he wanted to kick himself

for saying it anyway. This Ron didn't need to see more of his weaknesses. But he couldn't help himself; he had to ask. "What are they like?" Ron stared back at him and blank face or not, he was clearly at a loss. "They're nice," he said eventually. He seemed to struggle to find the right words. "Your dad, he's ... well, I don't know him very well but he seems really clever. And your mum's really pretty - she's a total hippy, and she's always running around doing stuff and being late for everything." The description might be inadequate, but in a very real sense this was irrelevant to Harry. He had few if any reference points for the behaviour and personalities of his parents, after all. Hearing from an objective witness like this Ron that his mother was pretty and his father clever was in some ways more meaningful to Harry than hearing people in his own life say so much more. Then it really hit him: the Voldemort of this Ron's world was dead and his parents were alive. This Ron's Harry had grown up without fear, without the repression of his relatives, with his family intact and around him every step of the way. He had probably been happy for most of his life. The sick, resentful feeling this gave Harry wasn't something he was proud of, but he couldn't help it; it was one thing to know that life was unfair but another entirely to have his nose rubbed in it in such a personal way. It made him feel queasy and unwell all over again and he closed his eyes wearily, trying not to think for just a few moments until he got his composure back. "Are you okay?" Ron asked quietly. "No," Harry said, not caring at the moment how this might be received. "Don't tell me any more about my parents, all right?" "Oy, mate, you asked!" "Yeah. It was a bloody stupid thing to do." Silence. When Harry finally opened his eyes again, Ron was watching him with a halfwary, half-amused expression. "What?" "You're not much like him," Ron commented. "Big shock," Harry muttered. "You'd look more like him if you weren't so skinny and - " "Feeble?" "Whatever you like," Ron said dryly. "But you don't talk like him at all. He's ..." His voice trailed off warily and Harry felt a touch of sour amusement.

"Go ahead, say it. He's a nicer, happier person than I am." "You said it, not me." Ron folded his arms, a mildly defensive posture at odds with his expression of neutral interest. Harry managed a little shrug. "You wouldn't be the first person to tell me I'm a prickly, miserable bastard with an attitude problem. I don't have a problem with that either." "Why would you?" Harry raised a brow at him and Ron shrugged, smiling cynically. "People say that about me too." "Does it work for you?" Harry asked, momentarily interested. "Well, yeah!" Harry grinned at the cheerful scorn in his voice. "Yeah, me too." "Bollocks to anyone who doesn't like it," Ron added. "Does he like it?" Harry shot at him. Ron grinned. "'Course he does! I mean, okay, sometimes he tells me to fuck off as well, but then he snogs me so it must be all right. I reckon it's a turn on for him," he confided. "Too much information, Weasley!" Harry said, torn between amusement and dismay. Ron snorted. "Come off it! You mean you wouldn't snog yours if he had a go at you?" An image of Ron, his ears red with annoyance, laying down the law with righteous wrath and stabbing a finger wildly in the air, floated into Harry's mind, and he couldn't suppress a tiny rueful grin. "Thought so," Ron said smugly.

~~~

He needed to smile more, Ron decided. His moods were too dark even for Ron's liking and while he could appreciate why that might be (the near fatal encounter with a dark wizard - how the hell had that happened? - and hearing that this Harry's parents had been murdered when he was a baby had come as a nastier surprise than he liked to admit), he thought it did Harry a world of good just to relax and grin for a moment. "So what's he like?" he asked, unable to resist asking any longer. Harry's bright green eyes flew to his, startled. "What - my Ron?" "No, your Malfoy," Ron said dryly.

"He's a total arse," Harry said at once, and Ron rolled his eyes. "Not really Malfoy, you prat! I could guess that he's an arse!" Then he saw Harry's sly grin and could have slapped himself for being an idiot. "Gotcha!" Harry said, clearly amused. Ron expressed his opinion of this in a few pithy and unrepeatable words, which seemed to delight Harry even more. "You kiss your mother with that mouth, Weasley?" he taunted, eyes dancing. "Yeah, and twice on Sundays!" Ron retorted. Harry laughed until he was limp and Ron watched him, smiling and wondering if he had somehow hit upon another similarity with his doppelganger. Apparently they could both make this Harry laugh, which reassured him a little; at least he wasn't always as grim as he seemed. "Go on," he said, when the paroxysm was over. "What's he like?" "Gryffindor," Harry said after a moment, and he raised his brows at Ron's resigned nod. "Not surprised?" "Nah. My whole family have been Gryffindors." "Some things don't change then. How did you end up in Slytherin?" Ron shrugged, remembering the moment when the Sorting Hat had dropped over his eyes. He'd had to be determined; the Hat had been a little taken aback by a Weasley who didn't want to be a Gryffindor although it hadn't exactly argued with him. "I told the Sorting Hat I didn't want to be in the same house as the twins," he said. Harry got an odd sort of little half-smile when he said that. "What?" "I did something similar." "Yeah?" Harry's smile became rueful again. "I said I didn't want to be in the same house as you!" It was hard not to feel affronted by this. "What did I ever do to you?" Harry waved him off, grinning. "We had a row on the train," he explained. "Malfoy was involved ... it was stupid, but I was steaming mad by the time we got to the Great Hall. And you didn't help, you stiff-necked arsey git!" "Well if you're going to let Malfoy get involved in stuff ...!" "I said it was stupid, didn't I? Took me ages to get around you after that." "You're lucky I let you," Ron pointed out, but he was intrigued. "How long did it take?" Harry squirmed a little, making him grin slyly. "Come on, Potter, cough it up! How long?"

"Nearly six years," Harry admitted, and it was Ron's turn to roar with laughter. "I s'pose you should tell me what yours is like," he said when Ron had recovered. "Don't you want to know?" Ron asked, detecting the reluctance in the other boy's voice. "You've already told me he's had it good most of his life," Harry said with a twisted smile. "I'm not sure I can take much more good news on that front." "He's a Hufflepuff," Ron offered, and he laughed at Harry's incredulous expression. "Does that even make sense? Except in a really daft way ..." "Nah, it makes sense, believe me. He's hard-working, honest, trusting " Harry made gagging sounds. "Loses his clothes at the drop of a wand ..." "In your dreams!" "Straight up." Ron grinned. "Best day's work I ever did was teaching him to play Strip Chess." "You could never have pulled that one on me," Harry told him. "Would you even have tried playing chess with me?" "I don't even try to play chess with my Ron!" "There you go then!" Ron smirked. "You should try it sometime. Live a little." Harry let out a tiny breath of laughter and let his head tip back against the back of the sofa again, closing his eyes. "Yeah - I should definitely live a little." Ron eyed him, concerned. His face had lost some colour again and the lines of exhaustion were back around his eyes and mouth. "Are you okay?" "Yeah. I'm just permanently knackered these days." His voice was fading out too. "It gets old, you know?" "I'll bet." Ron bit his lip. "You should sleep it off. Nobody's going to bother you in here I'll keep watch if you like." Harry opened his eyes a crack and produced a weak facsimile of a grin. "You nick the Map from my bag and I'll hunt you down somehow," he murmured. This didn't sound entirely like a joke to Ron, which he approved of. He wouldn't trust himself not to pinch something that useful either. If it came to that, he knew he wouldn't normally trust this Harry not to pull some trick on him, but under the circumstances ... "You're a Slytherin," he told him gruffly. "All the usual rules are suspended." Harry managed a nod and his eyes slid shut again, and within moments Ron

could tell that he'd fallen asleep. He watched him a little nervously for a while, not because he suspected a trick but because Harry really did look drained and unwell, then got to his feet. His own Harry still hadn't turned up, which perhaps was a good thing under the circumstances (two Harrys in the same place - entirely too mind-bending for Ron to even contemplate), but he thought perhaps it was time to investigate what lay behind the doorway out of the Room. For all that this encounter had been interesting, Ron sincerely hoped that he would find his own Hogwarts there.

~~~

Whispering voices woke Harry up and dragged him back into the real world. "He's in here " "Oh thank goodness! When the portraits said they hadn't seen him all morning, I was really worried." "His book bag's here too. Why did he come all the way up here?" "I wish I'd walked up to the castle with him now." The sofa dipped a little as someone sat down beside him. "Harry mate, are you okay?" That was Ron's voice. Harry was half afraid to open his eyes, but when he did it was to see Ron's familiar, worried face above an untidy Gryffindor tie and sweater. That had been another weird thing about the Slytherin Ron, he mused as he drifted on the edge of full consciousness. He'd been entirely too neat and tidy, albeit that he had obviously been wearing a hand-medown robe. "Harry?" Ron slid a hand into the nape of Harry's neck and squeezed very gently. "Come on, mate, wake up. Are you okay?" "Hm ..." Harry said. Four other concerned faces were hovering in front of him - Hermione Granger, Amy Snodgrass, Blaise Zabini and Tony Goldstein. "It's lunchtime," Blaise told him. "We've been looking everywhere for you." "Do you feel poorly?" Amy asked anxiously. "I'll get Madam Pomfrey - " "'M okay," Harry managed. He made a vague attempt to sit up, but was foiled by a cloak that seemed to have been tucked around him very firmly. Hermione tugged it free for him and she and Ron helped him to sit up a little. "At least you picked a quiet place to rest," she remarked, folding up the

cloak and draping it over the arm of the sofa. "Didn't walking up all those stairs sort of defeat the purpose, though?" "Didn't walk up the stairs," Harry said. "Was going to the dungeons ... Come and Go Room appeared and brought me here instead." "Come and Go Room?" Tony asked, confused. He looked around. "Isn't that another name for this place?" Harry shook his head, waking up a little more. If nothing else, the Marauder's Map had finally laid that detail to rest; the Room of Requirement and Come and Go Room were two separate entities. "It's like a cupboard," he said. "Takes you places ... sort of random, though. It was pretending to be a side door." "Great!" Ron said irritably. "Just as I thought this castle couldn't get more weird, it does." Harry reflected that it was just as well Ron didn't know how weird. Although he was pretty sure he'd been dreaming the whole Slytherin Ron thing, and if that was the case maybe he needed to speak to Madam Pomfrey anyway. He hadn't realised any of his potions could cause hallucinations and whatnot, and he didn't want it to happen again - intriguing though this episode had been. "I've seen it before," he told Ron instead. "It took me to Hagrid's once." "Why?" "No idea. It just takes you places. You can't control it." "That doesn't sound very useful," Blaise observed, his tone very dry. "Don't think it's meant to be," Harry admitted. "Like the staircases, really." "Well, at least it brought you here," Amy said philosophically. "You could have ended up anywhere ... like the Hufflepuff common room." "Or the Astronomy Tower," Tony added, grinning. "Or Snape's bedroom," Ron suggested, which provoked some horrified and amused sounds from the others. Harry snorted. "I don't reckon he has one! I bet when he's finished for the day he goes and stands in a corner and switches himself off." "Honestly!" Hermione said in a disapproving voice, but there was a smile lurking at the corners of her mouth. "Harry, Blaise is right - it's lunchtime. Do you feel well enough to come down to the Great Hall, or do you want one of us to run down to the kitchens for you?" "I'm all right. I'll come downstairs." With an effort, and some help from Ron, Harry got to his feet. Blaise passed him his walking stick and Tony matterof-factly picked up his book bag. Harry felt an odd twinge when he saw this. "Hang on a minute, Goldstein ..."

He took the bag and rested it on the arm of the sofa while he opened it. The Marauder's Map was still there, along with the rest of his possessions. A corked but empty vial proved that he'd at least taken a Strengthening Draught though. "Something wrong?" Ron asked. Harry shook his head, feeling foolish. "I had a really weird dream and just needed to check." "Weird how?" Harry saw Ron's raised brows and grinned a little. He shook his head. "Maybe I'll tell you later!" "That kind of weird, eh?" Tony murmured wickedly, as he firmly took Harry's bag away from him. "You're a right pervert on the quiet, aren't you?" Harry told him. "Everyone needs a hobby." "True." "Don't forget your cloak," Amy said, picking it up and holding it out. "Want me to carry that for you?" Ron asked, seeing Harry peering at it. "No - no, it's okay." Harry took it from Amy, looking puzzled. "I must be losing my marbles. I didn't think I bothered with my cloak this morning, because I've got warming and waterproofing charms on my robes ..." His voice trailed off as he held it up. It was far too long for him and shabbier than his own cloak besides. Feeling very odd indeed, Harry looked at the name tab inside the neck. It had obviously been replaced a couple of times and the latest strip was embroidered neatly with R. Weasley. Perhaps it was just one of Ron's, for they spent enough time together ... but when he turned it over to look at the badge, it had the familiar Slytherin device on the left breast. "Looks like you accidentally picked up one of Goyle's," Blaise commented. "Yeah, looks like it," Harry muttered, quickly folding the name tab inside before one of them could see it. A scrap of paper fluttered out of the hood and he caught it. It was a small sheet of the Slytherin-headed notepaper that was available in pads on the writing desks in their Common Room, and there was a short note on it in Ron's familiar looped handwriting:

You were out for the count when I left, so I didn't wake you. Tell the Gryffindor me to keep a sharp eye on you. I reckon you don't eat enough, sleep enough or giggle enough, so he needs to do better.

And get him to teach you to play Strip Chess. You'll love it. R.

"Are you all right?" Ron asked, concerned at the odd look on Harry's face. "You sure you don't want me to get Dobby to bring your lunch up here? You don't want to miss whatever exciting bit of grub your diet sheet says you can have today." Harry had to smile at this, for what his diet sheet (which was carefully guarded and closely adhered to by the chief house-elf of Hogwarts) said could be summarised as steamed and easily digestible. Steamed fish and boiled rice got a bit tedious after a while, as did chicken soup. "I'm coming," he said, and he folded the bit of paper up and pushed it into his pocket. "Ron ..." he added, when the others were mostly out of the door, "have you ever played Strip Chess?"

~ finis ~

End Notes

It was Esporamor who suggested that it would be good if Slytherin Harry and Slytherin Ron could meet. My initial thought was that it would never work; there's a whole essay bubbling somewhere at the back of my mind about the different natures and personalities of each of my characters, and to me it's a fact that these two are without a doubt the most messed-up and difficult of the bunch. How could they possibly get along? Then I started thinking about it, which is fatal, and an idea sprang to mind. I leave it to you to decide if it works. I know the Come and Go Room is just another name for the Room of Requirement in the books; however, in this story it seemed like a handy title to use for the other little room I made up when I was writing Two Households III: Growing Pains. I've been thinking about it while I've been writing this story and I've decided that it was a spin-off project by the Founders when they were building Hogwarts, employing the same quirky brand of illogic behind the randomly moving staircases. It's clearly not mentioned in Hogwarts: A History anymore than the Room of Requirement is (despite what Hermione says in the movie, for she doesn't know about it in the books), which suggests that there may be quite a few things in the castle that have evaded its biographers. I put both on the Marauder's Map, though, because I would personally

be astonished if Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs hadn't found them at some point. Would Slytherin Harry and Slytherin Ron get along? Well ... not as the people they are in their respective universes. There's a good reason why I chose to set this at a time when Harry is physically vulnerable; I don't believe either of them would be prepared to trust each other or even give each other the benefit of the doubt otherwise. As it is, Harry's too frail to get into a pissing match and Ron is (somewhat reluctantly) moved to be sympathetic. Having said that, someone also suggested to me that it would be interesting to write an AU where both of them are in Slytherin together. I made a flippant remark to the effect that if Draco was also in Hufflepuff, I would have all the makings of a Hogwarts Dangerous Liaisons. Oh, the temptation ...

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