Harry Potter Oneshots

Prototype

"Where are you going?" Ron demanded angrily.

"Hell most likely," came George's nonchalant response as he continued towards the door, completely unfazed.

"But don't worry, we'll see you there," added Fred with a generous smile over his shoulder.

Harry smirked and bowed his head to hide it, trying to maintain some sense of loyalty to Ron.

"Hey!" Ron sputtered, rising to his feet and holding his hand out, swollen like a balloon with fiery red bumps emerging on the skin. "You need to fix this!"

The twins stopped by the door of their room, shared a glance, then turned in unison.

"We don't need to do anything," Fred said with the same tantalizing smile.

"I mean, I would feel inclined to help you, but then again, you decided not to help us clean the sitting room this morning," George added.

Ron scoffed. "Because that was your mess! And so is this!" He shook his hand dramatically, the taut and puffy skin barely moving.

Fred shrugged. "Technicalities, little bro." Then he turned back around and pulled open the door, but balked in surprise when he practically ran into Ginny who barely flinched.

"Excuse us," Fred said, turning his shoulder to slide past her.

She frowned and stepped into his path. "What's going on here?"

"Nothing to worry about, little sis," George said easily, shoving his brother in the back to push him forward.

"Harry?" she asked with a raised brow.

"They might have offered us a galleon to test one of their products so Ron agreed and now his hand is fat," Harry explained simply from George's bed.

"And they didn't even pay me!" Ron added, clearly convinced that that was the greatest indignity of it all.

"Well of course we didn't pay you! You never even ate the pastille!" Fred said, rounding on Ron and forgetting about their previous urgency to leave.

"I didn't eat the pastile because my hand blew up before I could!"

"The terms of our agreements were really quite clear. You eat the pastille, we give you a galleon. No eating, no paying," Fred said sternly.

Ginny stood in the doorway staring at them all, unimpressed, with her arms crossed tightly across her chest. With the voice like she was explaining something simple to an infuriating toddler, she said, "Well, why don't you just fix his hand and call it even?"

George sighed and murmured, "Fine. Let's just be done with this."

"No, no, no," Fred interrupted, holding out an arm and stopping him in his tracks. "It's about principles."

"And what principles are those?" Harry asked guilelessly.

George smirked. "Unimportant."

"The principles are the value of looking before touching. Isn't that what Mum always says?" Fred asked, his eyebrows raised condescendingly.

"Wait--what were you supposed to eat?" Ginny asked.

"A damn pastille!" Ron cursed.

"Why do you want him to eat some pastille?" Ginny demanded.

"Not just 'some pastille.' It's a proto-type!" George declared happily.

"Of what?"

George inclined his head at his sister. "If you eat it, it's supposed to make you throw up. Then we were going to give him a different one to see if it'll make him stop."

Ron's eyes widened in mild panic. "What?"

"One, why would you want to make him throw up? And two, why would you agree to eat that?"

"Unimportant," George said.

"I didn't know that's what it was going to do!" Ron spewed angrily.

"Then why'd you agree to eat it?" Ginny asked, trying to coaze her lips to remain in an unemotional line.

"I was wondering the same thing," Harry muttered.

Ron shrugged. "A galleon is a galleon."

Harry shook his head, but smiled nonetheless.

Ron nudged the box at his feet, peering into its depths at the few other inconsistent and nondescript orange blobs at its base. "But they're safe?"

Fred and George shared a glance. At once, they adopted expressions of easy confidence and warm smiles: in short, the face of the perfect salesman.

"Of course!" said Fred.

"We've tried them loads of times on ourselves," George assured.

Ron stared at them both, squinting and searching for signs of guile, finding nothing but calm composure. "If you fix my hand, find me a pastille that won't leak all over me and give me gross bumps, immediately give me the non puking one, and pay me a galleon, then I'll actually try one." He crossed his arms, letting his swollen hand hang limply by his chest, and turned his chin up, staring defiantly at the twins.

With a quick sideways glance at his brother, George nodded. "Deal."

"Boys," Ginny muttered with a shake of her head. "By the way, I'm going to practice Quidditch if anyone cares to join me." She turned on her heel, her hair twisted in a long braid down her back, swishing behind her as she marched out the door.

"You in?" Ron asked, nodding to Harry.

"For Quidditch, yes. For being experimented on, I'll pass," Harry answered.

"Then move aside, Harry," George said, flicking his wrist at him. "We need prime seats to watch his reaction."

"Reaction?" Ron asked nervously.

Harry complied and scooched down the bed towards the pillow while the twins ignored Ron's mounting concern.

Fred dragged the box towards him and carefully picked out a fully formed pastille, no oozing paste hidden underneath to irritate the skin, while George pointed his wand at Ron's hand and muttered a spell to diminish the swelling and the bumps.

"I have an itch cream that you can use too to help with your hand if it still bothers you," George offered while Ron twisted his wrist, examining his hand, still pink but normal sized once more.

Ron nodded and reached for the pastille.

"And it's perfectly safe?" he asked, twirling it between his thumb and index finger.

"Perfectly safe," George confirmed.

"I'll just throw up once or twice?"

"Then you eat this one--" Fred held up a second treat "--and you'll stop."

Ron took a calming breath. "Okay then." He popped it into his mouth without a second thought, closed his eyes, and swallowed.

Harry, George, and Fred all unconsciously leaned forward, their elbows balancing on their knees and sucked in a collective breath in anticipation.

Ron's eyes widened, followed by his mouth, spewing his breakfast onto the faded carpet between his feet. George pumped his fist victoriously and Fred cheered, stomping his feet excitedly before hurriedly passing Ron the second pastille.

Harry waited for the nausea to subside before scoffing in mixed amusement and disgust and leaving as Goerge handed Ron a galleon, as promised. He climbed up the stairs towards Ron's room in search of his broomstick, thinking that Quidditch would be a much more productive use of his time than watching his friend voluntarily throw up or be roped into some other strange experiment.