Someone is charging past in the other direction when the door opens. For a second, they block the corpse from view. Once they pass, I see the body. With the invisibility cloaks on, I can't see the twins either. Just me and the body, and the invisibility cloak veiling my face. The corpse's skull is caved in, two ears on either side of his head, and Fred's clothes. Ginger hair, freckles, certainly a Weasley. If I really look, I can't tell if it's Fred or George. Fitting, I suppose, since it's neither of them.

"Fuck," Fred says.

I dart my hand back to his shoulder and rest it on the back. I hadn't realized I'd let go.

Then, we start to move. George leads us out, just as he led me in. We cross into the corridor where the wall has exploded. There, just up the hallway, lies Landry's body.

From this angle, I can't see his face. Just the soles of his shoes, muck stuck to the bottom from his trek to the castle. He must have come in through the Forbidden Forest, just like I did. I wonder how close we were in the dark then. Never again will I be this close to my brother.

Fred keeps walking but I stop. His body slips away from me. Invisible, and maybe not even there.

My brother is here though. Physically, tangibly, and dead. Just like the Fred we left behind, only no one is going to drag his body to a private place. No one will be coming to mourn him. I go to him.

Landry lies face down on the ground. Bending over, I roll him onto his back. I've gotten used to lugging around dead bodies over the past few months, and for a second it shocks me that he's a bit warm. Of course, it hasn't been that long for him since his death.

We're the same age now, actually. That isn't supposed to happen. I was never supposed to catch up. Behind me, surely, George must be feeling the same way, only his brother now lives.

Landry eyes are open. I bend over, allowing the cloak of invisibility to coat us both. Then, I closed my brother's eyes.

Even if Landry wanted to, he never killed Fred, and even if I wanted to, I never killed Landry. He tortured me. He tried to force me into having Marcus' children, under the threat of death if I disobeyed. He snatched Robbie and delivered her to Azkaban.

And when we were little, he played dress up with me. He'd pretend to be a sailor and I a merperson trying to sink his ship.

He was my brother.

Arms wrap around me on both sides, dragging me off Landry. Realistically, I know it's the war. It could be anyone, but I know Fred's embrace. The firmness of it, the way his arms are strong. At least I can't see them anyway, since they too are invisible. I thank the invisibility cloak for obscuring my tears.

Finally, Fred drops me. I feel him stop, searching the air.

George whistles, a shitty imitation of a magpie. I whistle back, and Fred finds his brother. Linked together, the three of us exit the castle through the hole I blew into the castle wall. Even touching, we whistle. I can't tell apart the Weasley boys whistles, but I always whistle last. One, two, three. George always was in front of us, and this time he still might be, but I walk beside Fred.

Now, I can't let go. Even through these two layers. I can't even see him, and I worry if he slips, he'll be gone. As if I could leave him behind too, and not just the body I costumed to look like him.

We make it to the Quidditch Pitch which has been completely burnt down when You-Know-Who calls for his forces to retreat. First the Dementors zoom through the air, and the heavy steps of the giants teeter after them. Death Eaters, Snatchers, and all sorts of dark beasts start to pour out of the castle. We tuck under the still smoldering wreckage.

"I never did kiss you under the bleachers," Fred whispers.

"Please don't do a bowling alley situation with me here," George mutters.

"You were at the bowling alley," Fred snorts. "You and Robbie were caught up with that claw machine. We never did take Dad like we said we would, huh?"

I shush them both, biting back a smile. None of the forces are coming anywhere near us, and the Death Eaters are shouting to each other anyway. I doubt they'd hear our sounds. Not even the Dementors have found us.

"And you had your own claws on Larkin, I get it," George says.

We wait for several minutes, before we finally begin the trek to Hogsmeade. This time, we move around the side of the Black Lake closer to the castle. From here, I see the destruction brought by Seamus Finnegan to the bridge. There are bodies in the cavern below, dozens of dead wizards who were trying to kill us. The ceiling of the boathouse is cracked, and I can see someone inside, shuffling through the wreckage.

We continue on toward Hogsmeade. Of course, no one is waiting at the train station tonight. George unlocks the door with a charm and the three of us slip inside. Finally, we remove the invisibility cloaks.

"Portkey," I say. I open the bag and grab the thing closest thing to the top. Boot's book about resistance at Hogwarts. I lay it out on the floor in front of us. Fred takes the bag from the ground and throws it over his shoulders.

He squats down, flicking the book open with his wand, and then shutting it.

"You've got to flick your wrist harder than you think when you do it."

"I can create a portkey," I say. It's a difficult charm anyway, even dangerous when done correctly, but I can manage it. "The Spanish ministry has regulations to avoid illegal travel into its borders. It won't ever let me cross over, so I always end up in Portmouth."

"Have you tried saying the charm in Spanish?" Fred asks, smirking at me.

I roll my eyes. George is trying not to laugh too.

"When we got Harry out of the Dursleys, we prepped by making several portkeys," Fred explains. "The ministry can't know when you make one, but they've got a pretty powerful ward over the UK that detects when people use and appear with one. Tonks taught me how to create protective charms to bypass the wards. There is a way to do it when you can't prep your location beforehand, but it's time consuming."

"How did you usually get to the summer home?" George asks.

I sigh, "ministry portkey."

"I can bypass the Spanish wards if they use the same ones the ministry does," Fred explains. "Well, I can teach you how to do it anyway. We'll be here for the next two years if I've got to send us somewhere I've never been."

So he teaches me. In the darkness of the Hogsmeade train station, both of us crossed-legged on the floor with the portkey between us and George watching, Fred coaches me on how to bypass the ward. We turn the Boot book into a timed portkey and then attach the protective ward onto the book. Less than a minute before I've scheduled the book to disappear, I cast a slow-release expansion charm on the book. It's already the size of my torso when it zips through the air and disappears.

"We have to land on top of the book," Fred says. "Landing on the portkey will transfer the protective ward onto our persons, and we'll be completely masked from the Spanish government. Hopefully."

I set the timer for the second portkey longer than I need to, just so the first book has more time to expand. None of us bothered to set up protective wards here, so the ministry will know two portkeys were used to get out of Hogsmeade station. Oh well. I doubt the ministry will even look into it, what with all the murder just a mile away.

"Only a minute now," I say.

George gathers out invisibility cloaks and shoves them into my backpack. The three of us lie down on the train station floor and each place one hand on the second portkey, which fittingly I made out of the book on portkeys.

Fred's finger reaches to mine and runs over my thumb.

His skin hasn't touched mine in years.

I suck in a breath just as we are pulled out of Hogsmeade station.

All this time later, I still hate portkeys. Nausea begins to overtake me, and I unclench my hand from the portkey as soon as the flash of white light above of fades out. It's tempting to hold onto it longer, and all but guarantees you'll smash into the ground.

George and Fred haven't appeared beside me yet. It is so dark that I cannot make out the book below me from the grass, which should hopefully have quadrupled in size by now. I kick out my legs out beneath me just as Fred and George appear, rocketing down to the earth. Reaching out, I grab Fred as George continues down, arse first. Fred's weight drags me and I flip upside down, my arm tearing in its socket as we plummet toward the earth. Far below us, George slams down. Fred still hasn't managed to kick out his feet properly, and my head is hurtling faster and faster toward the earth. Finally, I spot the book.

"Levicorpus!"

The spell hits me and yanks me up by the ankle. The brown hard-back cover is below me. Fred cracks into it too, knees smashing down into the book. As I dangle upside-down, fingertips grazing the book, I look at Fred, making out his silhouette in the darkness and barely his features.

"You alright?"

"I fucking hate portkeys," Fred hisses.

He stands up, putting his hands around my waist and flipping me in the air back into a standing position. From beside me, George drops the charm as my feet are slowly lowered onto the book platform. Fred keeps his hands around my waist, looking into my eyes.

My heart flutters. He lives. He lives and breathes.

"Portkey wards worked," George points out.

He's standing further away on the grass now. No excuse to stand this close to Fred anymore.

"When am I ever wrong?" Fred says.

Pointedly, George looks at me. We're both in agreement, without sharing a single word. Fred always was wrong. Is, wrong, I guess.

~~~~~

Ooh lookie here! A little action, a little tension. I'm really happy with how this turned out. Anyway, since I'm still drafting this story, is there anything in particular that you want to see? Anything you're looking forward to or you're hoping comes up? Let me know in the comments!