'Ello, 'ello. I found half of this fic in a bunch of incomplete oneshots, so I decided to finish it. I liked the idea. Completely different to how it first was, but oh well.

I just saw the fifth movie a week ago. Who else thinks Gary Oldman owned? He's completely brilliant. I think he actually mad Dan act better.

Oh well, on with the story...

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Sirius looked around enviously at the various families saying goodbye to their children. Mother’s crying, father’s telling their kids how proud they were of them…parents who loved their kids. Then there was his family. The Blacks. Pureblood, powerful and completely loaded. Oh, and totally unable to show any sign of genuine affection. In his family, there was almost no such thing as love. It just didn’t exist. Not to him anyway.

“Goodbye Sirius.” His mother gave him no more than a brisk kiss on the cheek and shoved his trunk toward him. “Send us a letter telling us how you’ve settled in.” He nodded, almost disgusted at her fake display of motherly affection. “You’ll love Slytherin. You’ll make plenty of friends.” She smiled patronisingly.

Slytherin, Slytherin, Slytherin.

That was all he ever heard. How his brilliant cousin Narcissa was doing the family so proud, how dear Bellatrix was well on her way to becoming a proud member of the Death Eaters, how being an upstanding student of Slytherin was family tradition…how he, Sirius Black, was going to become a valued part of that pureblood mania.

Not a chance.

He may have only been eleven, but he wasn’t an idiot. Sirius knew from the moment he figured out what the word ‘mudblood’ meant (not very far along in life), that he didn’t belong in the Black family. He could sense that his parents knew it too. They’d given him more lectures about pureblood loyalty than Lord Voldemort could ever give.

“Son…” His father started. Sirius cut him off, annoyed.

“I know, I know! Sit with Narcissa and Bella, don’t mingle with anyone else. I got it! Can I get on the train now?” His father frowned and drew in a breath.

“If I ever hear you speaking like that again-” He was interrupted by the sound of a whistle blowing and Sirius rushing off. There was no way he was hanging around for that lecture.

As soon as he was safely inside the train, the tense atmosphere of the platform seemed to vanish and Sirius found himself strangely comfortable. He could hear people’s laughter – a sound so unfamiliar, he actually did a double take. He shook his head and reminded himself that he wouldn’t be joining in on that laughter…Narcissa and Bella were never ones for humour. Letting out a sound of bitter amusement, Sirius began to trudge up the train corridor, in search of his blonde-haired cousin. He doubted Narcissa would even acknowledge his presence.

He glanced into a cabin with the loudest laughter yet. There were only three boys, all probably in first year. They looked like they were having more fun than he could have ever dreamt of. Sirius glanced up the end of the corridor to where his cousins would be sitting. They wouldn’t care if…no. He wasn’t going to risk it.

Then again, who would know?

He looked back and forth between the two cabins. No-one would even care. It’s not as if his cousins loved him enough to go looking for him. They’d most likely already forgotten about their arrangement. Groaning, Sirius shook his head and picked up his trunk once again. He almost dropped it in surprise when a voice spoke from the cabin beside him.

“Need help with that, mate?” He turned his head and saw one of the three boys standing in the doorway of the cabin.

“Uh…” Before he could finish his sentence, however, the boy had grabbed the other end of the trunk and all but dragged it into the compartment.

“James Potter.” He wiped his hair out of his eyes, pushed up his glasses and held out a hand.

“Ah, Sirius Black.” He hesitantly took James’s hand. This earned a surprised look from each boy in the cabin.

“Black? As in-”

“Yeah.” Sirius stared at his feet, suddenly feeling out of place. He should have known. His family was notorious for practicing the Dark Arts. To his surprise, however, he was not thrown out of the cabin.

“I’m Remus Lupin.” A pale boy with sandy blonde hair put down his book and waved from over in the corner, a nervous smile on his face.

“Pe-Peter Pettigrew.” Sirius got the distinct feeling that Peter was expecting him to start throwing random killing curses around the room. He fought the urge to roll his eyes.

“Hi.” He waved and attempted a smile. They seemed to relax, if only slightly, at the smile. James resumed his previous seat, however Sirius remained standing, unsure of what to do or say.

“Well? Are you going to sit down or just gonna stand there looking like an idiot?” James smiled and leaned back in his seat. He didn’t seem to care about Sirius’s family…or if he did, he was hiding it very well. It was James’s relaxed, almost teasing smile that set off Remus’s light chuckle and Peter’s small, timid grin.

And for the first time in his life, Sirius Black felt as if he belonged somewhere.

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He’d never been more nervous in his life. He really had nothing to be nervous about. Sirius knew that all he had to do was sit on some rickety old stool and try on a thousand year old hat. It wasn’t hard. It didn’t even require any thought…not on his part anyway. He nervously glanced over at the Slytherin table. He saw Narcissa and Bella chatting to a bunch of people he’d never want to meet. He gulped as the boy in front of him walked forward to the stool and was sorted into Ravenclaw.

“Black, Sirius!” He took a deep breath and made his way towards the chair. No-one seemed to be paying attention. They all knew what house he was going to be in anyway.

“Ah…yet another Black.” The hat seemed to invade Sirius’s thoughts, and he steeled himself and clenched his eyes shut, ready to be sorted into Slytherin. “Hmm…oh yes. I can see a rebellious streak in you, a need to prove people wrong. Such unlike your other relatives. You’re a tough one.” Sirius could hear the crowd’s whispers growing louder. He doubted it’d ever taken this long for a Black to be sorted.

“I’d put you in Slytherin, but I doubt that’d suit you any better than putting Dumbledore there. You’re a good one. Lots of courage. cunning, yes but not in the sense that Salazar was. I think it better be…GRYFFINDOR!” The word seemed to echo around the great hall. No clapping or cheering was heard and suddenly, Sirius didn’t want to take the hat off and face the crowd.

“I could re-sort you if you want, but that would completely defeat my purpose.” He was sure the hat would have smirked if it had an actual mouth. Slowly he took the hat off his head and walked as confidently as he could towards the Gryffindor table. He couldn’t bear to look over at the Slytherin table. He knew what kinds of looks he’d get if he did.

A clap sounded. The first one he’d heard in quite a few minutes. It was obviously coming from the Head Table. Sirius looked around and saw Dumbledore’s eyes twinkling as he began the chain of applause. Eventually the whole hall (not counting the Slytherins) was clapping. He could hear James cheering wildly. A smile was brought to Sirius’s face as he sat down at the Gryffindor table to watch the rest of the sorting.

Around fifteen minutes later, Sirius had been joined by Remus, James and Peter. Sirius had deliberately chosen a seat that was facing away from the other tables. People were still whispering, not bothering to keep their voices down. Trying to focus on the food in front of him, he ignored the comments from a few of the other Gryffindors. A poke in the shoulder broke him out of his trance.

“Don’t worry about those gits. They’re probably just jealous because their sorting wasn’t as brilliant as yours was.” He smiled. “I don’t think Hogwarts has seen anything like that since it was first formed.”

“Gee thanks for that.” Sirius glared and stabbed a potato rather violently. He could feel James tense.

“Oh Merlin. I didn’t…that wasn’t what I meant.”

“It’s okay. It’s probably true anyway.”

“No! It’s not.” Sirius smirked at James’s vehement disagreement. There were now several heads turned to the two of them. James lowered his voice a little. “You can’t be the first one, mate. You probably won’t be the last either.” Sirius shrugged. “And stop stabbing that potato. You’re going to turn it into goo at the rate you’re going.”

“James is right. Stop worrying. They’ll forget about it soon enough.” Remus said as he ate a carrot and gestured nonchalantly to the Slytherins glaring in their direction. Sirius grinned.

“Yeah, and if they don’t, I can always learn how to hex them into oblivion.”

Six weeks later he did.

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Harry and Sirius sat in front of the fire in Grimmauld Place in silence. Ron, Hermione and the rest of the Weasleys had gone to bed hours ago and Remus was asleep in the chair to Harry’s right. Harry had quickly learnt upon coming to the house that Sirius, like himself, barely slept unless he really needed to, so they ran into each other nearly every night in the kitchen or living room.

Through their weeks of midnight talks, they’d learnt a lot about each other. Harry had told his godfather of his first years at Hogwarts (which led to a lot of lectures about getting into danger mixed with remarks about how Harry reminded Sirius of the Marauders) and Sirius had enlightened Harry on some of the finer points when it came to pranking Snape. Their inability to sleep had formed a sort of bond between them and Harry found himself confiding in Sirius almost more than he did his friends.

“Hey Sirius?” Harry tapped his mug of hot chocolate and turned to face the older man.

“Yeah?”

“Can I ask you something?” Sirius smirked.

“Of course. Although I can only guarantee an answer if the question’s about girls.” Harry snorted. Despite his godfather’s boasting about how he’d snogged half the girls at Hogwarts in his time, Harry was yet to see Sirius even flirt with a woman. Then again, he wasn’t exactly free to flirt a lot.

“Yeah, right.” Sirius glared and Harry continued before he found himself on the receiving end of a particularly nasty prank. “Do you reckon the Sorting Hat has ever been wrong?” Sirius’s eyebrows rose.

“I know you have a thing for defying authority, but really…the Sorting Hat? What did it ever do to you?” He faked a horrified gasp.

“Oh shut it.” Harry had to hold back a grin. “I should know never to ask you anything serious.” Sirius opened his mouth and smirked, but Harry cut him off. “And if you make one more joke about that awful pun, I’ll set Fred and George loose on you.”

“Ah, you’re forgetting that I’m a Marauder, Harry. And while I may have spent twelve years in Azkaban, I still haven’t lost my touch.” He winked. “Then again, I could just tell them I was Padfoot and join teams with them to gang up on you.”

“Not a chance. I’m safe from those two.” Harry grinned.

“Oh really? And why is that?”

“There’s no way I’m telling you. I prefer not to have my hair turned a ridiculous shade of pink.”

“Okay fine. I’ll turn it green then.” Harry rolled his eyes.

“It wasn’t you I was talking about. The twins have knowledge that Hermione can only dream about.”

“Well, seeing as she’s prefect, she’ll be living in her own nightmare.”

“That’s why she was made prefect and I wasn’t.” Harry tried to sound as casual as he could, but Sirius sensed that it wasn’t a cheerful topic for his godson.

“Don’t beat yourself up about not being prefect, kiddo. It only means you get to break more rules and have more fun. James and I always used to tease Moony about being the good boy. It only got worse if he took points off us.” He smiled and Harry shrugged, seemingly a bit happier about the fact his father and godfather were never prefects. A few minutes went by in silence before Sirius spoke again.

“What were you asking me before? About the Sorting Hat?”

“Oh, that. It was nothing.”

“Aw, come on Harry! I have to impart at least some godfatherly wisdom before you go trotting off to good old Hogwarts.”

“I highly doubt you’re capable of imparting wisdom of any kind Padfoot.”

“Hey! I resent that!” He pouted and Harry rolled his eyes. “If I couldn’t, you wouldn’t have asked me about the Sorting Hat.”

“That wasn’t a question of wisdom…” Sirius smirked and Harry glared at his own inability to form a witty comeback. “Forget it.”

“Alright. If I remember correctly-” Harry scoffed.

“Highly unlikely.”

“You asked me whether I think the Sorting Hat has ever been wrong.” Sirius said, speaking as if Harry had never interrupted.

“Merlin! He got it right!” This time Harry had to dodge a light punch from his godfather.

“Oh shut up. Now, before I can pass on any of my famous insight, may I ask why you want to know the answer to such a deep and philosophical question?” Harry snorted.

“He has a vocabulary! Who knew?” After sniggering at yet another of Sirius’s glares, Harry continued. “I just do. Now answer the question. You reckon the Hat’s ever sorted someone into the wrong house?”

“No.”

“Oh wow. What a deep and philosophical answer that was.”

“Well it’s true! You would have gotten the same answer from Dumbledore.”

“Yeah, except that he’d add some sort of speech about Gryffindor courage and how the Hat can read people’s minds, even when they’re trying to hide things or something like that…not just ‘no’.” Sirius chuckled.

“Well Harry, that’s the reason that he’s Dumbledore and I’m not.”

“Really? I could have sworn it was the hundred-year age gap.” They both smirked.

“Well, that too.” Sirius gave a thoughtful look and turned to face Harry. “Are you sure there was no reason for asking me?”

He normally would have lied and let it go, but Harry felt that Sirius deserved to know a little more about him than what his defeats of Voldemort had entailed. The man was his godfather after all, and despite his complete lack of general intelligence when it came to advice, he did understand what it felt like to have an abnormal Sorting.

“The Sorting Hat said some weird things to me in my first and second year. I didn’t think much of it after I asked Dumbledore, but after today…Mr Weasley…” He trailed off, the memory still fresh.

“Yeah? What’d it say?” Sirius’s voice barely sounded worried. Harry had a feeling that the older man knew what the answer would be.

“It said-” He hesitated “It said I’d be great in Slytherin.” To his surprise, Sirius didn’t look angry or even the slightest bit repulsed. On the contrary, he turned to Harry and laughed. It wasn’t a mocking laugh, and it sounded nothing like the bark-like one he usually gave. It was more of a knowing chuckle.

“Did it really? Well it also said I’d look brilliant in Gryffindor and look at me now…” He looked up with a proud and somewhat wistful look on his face.

“That’s hardly comforting Sirius.” The older man glared.

“Discarding the fact I spent twelve years in Azkaban of course.”

“Nup. Still not comforting.” This time Harry could not dodge the light punch from Sirius.

“I’m choosing to ignore that.” He cleared his throat. “Harry…believe me, the Hat did not make a mistake with you. You belong in Gryffindor. Why else would it have put you there?”

“Because I asked it?” Sirius looked only mildly shocked, but soon recovered.

“Exactly. You asked. A real Slytherin would not have asked to be in Gryffindor. The Hat didn’t screw up, so quit worrying.” Sirius shrugged and took a sip of tea, grimacing when he realised it had gone cold. “If you want proof, just look at what you’ve done. Those gits in Slytherin don’t have a slither of courage or bravery within them and you have more courage and bravery than most people my age.”

“Thanks Sirius.” Harry smiled and looked up at Sirius to see a proud look on his face.

“Come here Kiddo.” The boy had barely had time to move before he felt himself being hugged fiercely. It was the polar opposite to Mrs Weasley and Hermione’s bear hugs, but Harry found himself smiling over Sirius’s broad shoulder. It seemed as if he finally had a real family after all.

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A/N: I love reviews...and Sirius. But that's a given. So review! And maybe I'll get you your own cuddly version of Padfoot. ;)