DISCLAIMER: Pardon the time lag, but I just started a new job and it's been leaving me brain-dead most of the time. Well, more brain-dead than usual. - Tess
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Snips and Spirals Fanfic:
"Slytherin vs. Gryffindor"
Text by Lady Tesser
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Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for nearly five years, awoke slowly in the darkness of his bedchamber.
Today was the first day of Quidditch Season. The first match to be played out, as always, was between Gryffindor and Slytherin. From reports he had heard from Penderdandis, it looked as though there was going to be actual competition from Slytherin this year.
The ceiling over his bed began to glow, alarming him awake and making him scramble for his glasses. He slipped his glasses on and saw written on the ceiling in flaming blue letters:
'WE DID IT! SIGNED, THE MARAUDERS'
Dumbledore lay back and sighed, then chuckled.
Quidditch Season had truly begun.
----------
Breakfast on Saturday morning, just hours before the game between Slytherin and Gryffindor, was an exciting time for the students of Hogwarts. The Heads of House of the competing teams walked amid the tables in the Great Hall and spoke to their Quidditch players, while students were treated to fresh waffles and strawberries and cream or elaborate omelettes.
Britomartis Vox, Slytherin Beater, was pouring chocolate sauce all over her waffles and strawberries.
"Ugh, why'd it have to show up NOW?" she whined. "On the day of the big game - and I'm an ugly, bloated, cramped mess! I just want coffee, chocolate, and cuddling!"
Everyone stared at her as she took a huge bite of her chocolate-drenched breakfast. She chewed, swallowed, and returned their gazes. "What are you lookin' at?"
Severus Snape shook his head. "You need to keep that sort of thing down, Spirals. We're not too open about such stuff."
"Why not? It's perfectly natural." She wrapped her arms around his chest and moaned, "Snips - cuddle me!"
"Do you have to do that in public?" Oriana Crescent groused.
"Or this early in the morning?" Akiko Mori asked.
Martis released Sev - who was blushing bright red - and raspberried them. "Well, at least I'm in a hell of a way for the game. I'll take it out on Jimmy and Cirrhosis."
"Yeah," Sev agreed. "Focus it on them."
"Have we got all the ingredients for the Baby?" she whispered.
"Almost," he answered in a low voice. "We're waiting for the last ingredient to arrive."
"I'm surprised Sartoris doesn't have it in stores."
Lucius Malfoy spoke up from down the table, "What are you two plotting??"
Martis and Sev looked up, innocent grins on their faces, and replied, "Noth- ing!"
The mail owls fluttered into the Great Hall, dropping packages and letters. One package dropped between Martis and Sev.
"Yay!" Martis cried. "The yak hair's arrived!"
"And the next step shall be completed tonight," Sev added, chuckling darkly as he clutched the package.
Martis wrapped her arms around him. "And then we shall - "
And they proclaimed together: "- CONQUER THE WORLD!!"
Both cackled madly, making the rest of the Slytherins around them scoot away. A throat cleared and Martis withdrew herself from Sev. Standing over them was Professor Gallo Penderdandis, their House Master.
"Most indecorous," he commented. "Especially for the one female on the team."
Martis looked up at him, adjusting her sunglasses. "Making up rules on the spot, sir?"
His thin purple lip twitched as he controlled the urge to headsmack her. "Good luck today, Vox. You will need it. I trust you will retain the dignity of Slytherin House on the field?"
"As much as the Woot brothers will."
"Oh, dear."
----------
The Slytherin Quidditch team gathered into their entrance area.
"Think we'll keep the team together this year?" Captain Onslow Daizer asked.
"The only question would be if we win," Keeper Fearghus Flynn remarked in his thick Irish brogue.
"Hear that, you three?" Ryan Woot, Chaser, stated.
Thomas St. Claire, Seeker, stuck his Lucky Hair-Pick in his Afro. "Just keep the Bludgers away from me, Spirals."
"No problem," she answered, flipping her bat in the air.
"Nervous?" Jamie Woot, Chaser, asked.
Jonas Kennebunk, the new Chaser, nodded. "I'm going to throw up."
"Don't worry," Martis said. "The feeling will be replaced by terror. Especially with James Potter and Sirius Black try to gang-bang their opposing team's Chasers."
"Spirals," Onslow said. "You have a very weird fantasy-life about those two."
She elbowed his barrel chest. "Ready, you lot?"
"Ready," the rest said, getting on their brooms.
The panels to the field opened, and the Slytherin Quidditch team flew out onto the pitch.
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It was the first dry day in ages, and the Quidditch fans had filled up the stands quickly.
Sev was sandwiched between Martis' sisters once again, Adonia and Artemisia volleying frank opinions back and forth if their little sister had 'grown' since school started, eventually them bringing Sev into the conversation and asking, "Snape, you'd know - has baby sister's boobs grown?"
He turned bright red and lowered his head to make his hair cover his face. Phaedra swatted the twins in the backs of the heads. "Oh, please, you two. Severus is too much of a gentleman to notice something like that."
"He's a fourteen-year-old boy," Adonia retorted.
"Right," Artemisia added. "And everyone thinks they're dating anyway."
Sev sharply looked up. "I am not dating Spirals - she's my best friend! Only!"
"Prince of de-nial," Adonia muttered.
"Ignore them, Severus," Phaedra remarked. "The twins think they're being cute."
"I am cute," Artemisia corrected her. "I don't have frizzy hair like you that stands up most of the time."
"Shut up."
"Go sit with Patil," Adonia told their older sister. "I think you need some smoochie time with him."
"Good idea!" Phaedra agreed, getting up. "Severus, any time they start bugging you, just punch their boobs. It shuts them up quickly."
"Jealous cause you don't have any," Adonia teased.
"At least I don't knock myself out," Phaedra answered, leaving the group.
Sev wanted to ask what she meant, but decided not to. It may be something that would embarrass him. The twins made faces at her back, and then they began cheering as the Slytherin team came out.
The team was still full of large guys, except for the presence of Vox and St. Claire who both flew spirals around their and Gryffindor's teams as they warmed up over the pitch.
"Hey, it's Snake-Bitch!" Sirius Black called.
James Potter swung his broom around and flew toward her. "What bets should we make this time, Vox?"
"That I won't castrate you during the game for being a jackass MALE!" Martis snarled. "Stay out of my way, Potter!" She zoomed off.
Black swooped in next to Potter. "My, my. It seems her man-hating tendencies are at the fore again. Probably be best not to flirt with her like you do, Prongs."
Potter grinned. "Jealous?"
Black rolled his eyes. "She's as sexy as a rabid wolverine with incontinence. Leave her to Snivellus, chap."
Potter shrugged and both continued warm-ups, their crimson robes fluttering in the wind.
Martis spun her broom around and swooped before Slytherin's stands, waving at the rest of her House. "Pray Penderdandis doesn't find an excuse to kick me off this year!"
"Just kick Gryffie ass, sis!" Adonia yelled back.
Martis smiled grimly. "I'm in the mood for it." She saluted them, and then blew a kiss toward her sisters and Sev before taking off again.
Madame Hooch stepped out onto the field, her face serious. The teams circled above her, waiting for her cue. "All right, Gryffindors and Slytherins - opening game - make it clean, all of you!"
The Snitch zipped away. The Bludgers escaped. And the Quaffle was thrown.
The teams fell into a riot.
----------
Thomas St. Claire proved his worth as he gave the Gryffindor Seeker a run for his money. It did not help that St. Claire smiled brightly as he chased the Golden Snitch all over the field, his Nimbus 1001 (newest racing broom on the market) darting here and there at breakneck pace.
At one point early in the game, he intercepted the Quaffle - pulling his broom out from under himself, he swung the tail of the broom into the Quaffle like a baseball bat, then hitched back on before he fell helplessly to the ground.
Slytherins cheered in a frenzy.
A Bludger was hit at St. Claire, only to be backhanded in return by Martis, knocking into the gut of a Gryffindor Chaser.
In fact, the brutality of Slytherin's only female player was nothing Hogwarts had seen within the past generation - Dopplebeater Defense (both Beaters hitting a Bludger at once) with Markham Dearling and nearly knocking Sirius Black off his broom from the impact, a Transylvanian Tackle variation involving her bat just missing a Gryffindor Chaser's nose, slamming Bludgers into every single member of the Gryffindor team, feinting a Blatching foul to disorient the Seeker ('Playing Chicken' a Muggle student called it), Cobbing with not only her elbows but her knees as well (got a penalty for one instance) - and the game was still being played well into the afternoon.
James Potter constantly buzzed Martis, especially when he had the Quaffle. "Can't get me without a Bludger, Vox!"
"If I were a Chaser, I'd have you on your - "
"You and every other girl!"
"YOU -!"
Remus Lupin gazed in rapt attention, devouring the sight of the Quidditch Goddess (aka Miss Britomartis) practically beating up his House's team. "She's bloody brilliant, Wormtail!"
Peter Pettigrew made a face. "She's smearing our team!"
The Gryffindors were being battered (the large Slytherin Chasers had their own versions of 'non-foul' tricks and attacks) but they continued on; their Seeker was starting to get annoyed by Thomas St. Claire's constant grin as they raced each other for the Snitch.
The Bludgers themselves were starting to show battering as well - one went as far as to target Martis, upper-cutting her broomtail and spinning her into a somersault into the two Beaters and Keeper of Gryffindor in what would be called forever after as the 'Arse-Over-Teakettle Maneuver'.
All four fell to the sandy pitch below the goal hoops.
Martis shrieked in rage, punched the larger Gryffindor Beater off of her, grabbed her bat and broom, and shot upward, her robe ripping off in the process.
She circled around, clad in her green sweater, cream-colored trousers, and armor, and cracked the bat into the Bludger that had tipped her over. The entire audience heard her shrill, hideous war-cry...
"KEEP YOUR [CENSORED] HANDS OFF, FREAK!"
The Bludger screamed up toward the blue sky, becoming a dark pinprick against the blue. It seemed an eternity as it fell back to the pitch again ... And down toward the body of the Beater that had landed on top of her.
The Bludger made a small crater on the ground between his legs.
The Gryffindor Beater - narrowly missing having his manhood flattened - soiled his uniform and began to babble incoherently.
Every single male player on the pitch (and a number in the audience) yelped in sympathy, then the game continued on as the Seekers began smashing into each other's sides.
Madame Hooch yelled 'foul' in relation to an attempt to crush a fellow player's anatomy. Martis responded that the fellow player in question had fondled hers during the crash. Both sides were fined penalties.
Gryffindor and Slytherin both had 230 points each by mid-afternoon.
"Gods, I hope the suspense lasts!" Lupin moaned as he memorized every single line of Martis' body in her robeless uniform, straining in movement and showing off a finely toned physique.
Pettigrew had fallen asleep, so he had nothing to add.
Across the pitch, Adonia and Artemisia had dragged Sev with them down to the bottom seats, leaning over the stand wall and screaming their support to their sister. Most of it was in Minoan, but Sev was able to gather it involved violence. The twins' Quidditch Fever was reaching an intense pitch of excitement that annoyed him, mainly because he was horrified at what his Martis was doing in the game.
This was not his Martis - his Martis giggled and smirked and played pranks and hugged him constantly. This Martis was an insane bloodthirsty maniac that did not hesitate to foul or stoop to plain viciousness.
Was it all due to That Time? What about the last time it happened?
Indeed, would any sane person have come up with that sort of Ultimate Prank??
Sev wondered if he could excuse himself from her presence for a couple of days a month. For his own safety. Oh, it was fine now, but what if she turned on him in a fit of hormones and attacked him for simply being male?
The thought left him cold. And uneasy. It would mean his Martis was not Safe, and that was (admittedly) the world he built around her. She would always be Safe. Now it appears she would not be.
He left the twins and wandered back to his own seat at the top of the stands, sitting quietly and worrying.
St. Claire dove after the Snitch, the opposing Seeker close behind. Sensing the intent of the pair, a Bludger screamed after them. Up ahead, Martis backhanded the other Bludger toward Gryffindor's Seeker.
The Gryffindor Seeker ducked (slamming into a stand wall was actually what happened) and the two Bludgers collided -
The Bludgers shattered on impact with each other.
"HOLY -!" seemed to be the general consensus of the students, teachers, and both teams on the field.
The majority of the players promptly forgot the game as they dove out of the pitch, heading under the stands in an effort to avoid the jagged metal shrapnel that was now flying around at hummingbird-speed, still trying to hit anybody unlucky enough to be in the air.
Madame Hooch scrambled on her broom toward the disoriented debris and started casting spells, slowing the metal knife-like fragments down so that she could begin gathering the shrapnel up in the Quidditch chest, locking the lid down tightly and adding a few lock spells for good measure.
Free from Gryffindor, Slytherin's Seeker reached his arm out -
And caught the Snitch.
The cheers and hoots and whistles from the mob of students thundered through the stands. St. Claire grinned, twirling his broom around as he flew in a victory flight all over the pitch, holding the Golden Snitch aloft over his head. The Slytherin team howled and grunted in approval, their first game win since last year's opening game.
... Slytherin: 380 / Gryffindor: 230...
And - without a single doubt - the most dramatic end-of-game play in living memory.
The teams flew back to their ready-rooms, doing a bit of clean-up and first aid before leaving the Quidditch stands to be greeted by the rest of the students waiting outside.
Thomas St. Claire signed autographs while the rest of the guys on the team posed for pictures with their girlfriends and/or admirers. Martis hung back from the group, popping chocolates in her mouth.
The Marauders made their way through the crowd. If anyone had been slightly more observant, they would have noticed Remus Lupin had a goofy grin as he gazed at Slytherin's female Beater, mainly because he could now see her without any stupid robes covering her body. It had been far too long since Quidditch tryouts...
Sirius Black stuck out his hand, glaring. "Good game, Vox."
She snorted, shaking his gloved hand with her own. "It was hell - you played well, even with your wounds."
He smirked. "Your name's going to be changed from 'Backbeat Spirals' to 'Ball-Breaker', you know." He stared down his nose at her. "Keep the Truce, Snake-Bitch."
Martis made an offensive gesture with her tongue at his back as he turned to leave with Lupin and Pettigrew.
Potter offered his own hand and they shook. "Hey, Vox, if you weren't such a pain in the ass, obnoxious, violent, nasty little snake ... I'd ask you to meet me in the rosebushes."
He smirked, winking.
Martis lowered her sunglasses, perching them on the end of her nose. She stepped closer to him, making sure his eyes were to hers. "And, Potter, if you weren't such an arrogant, indecisive, attention-grubbing, wormy jock ... I'd probably make you a junior-member of my harem." She pressed her chest against his, holding his chin in her hand. The proximity allowed her to breathe just against his lips, "Of course, as a junior-member of my harem, you'll have all the menial jobs ... bathing me, rubbing me down with olive oil, keeping yourself in shape by practicing pelvic thrusts, then sometimes you'll be licking the olive oil off my body ... licking ... all ... over ... my soft ... nubile ... body ... "
His hazel eyes filled up the entire area behind the lenses of his glasses. He turned as white as a sheet and fumbled to close the front of his robes as he staggered off, not saying anything.
Martis grinned wickedly. "That'll teach you to try to shock ME, punk."
----------
The Backbeat Spirals Cult was born.
Half of the males (and some of the females) of Slytherin House had descended upon Britomartis Vox and granted her High Honor in their post- Quidditch Victory Party right alongside their new Seeker Thomas St. Claire. She was forgiven (for what she did not know) and praised for her wild plays on the pitch.
Every time Martis got up to attempt to locate Sev, she was sat back down and asked questions. Every time she inquired of Sev, she was given an answer of unknown whereabouts.
Finally, she managed to slip away, climbing up the staircases of the school building and crawling through the cubbyhole into the Conversation Room.
"Sitting in the dark, Snips?" she asked softly.
The twilight overhead offered little more than outlines in the small room, but she recognized her best friend's hunched-over form.
"Are you Safe?" he asked in return.
"Of course I am. I protect you from everyone, remember?"
"Then who's going to protect me from you?"
She gasped, still half in the room. "What's that supposed to mean?"
He raised his head. "You were a monster out there. There was no hiding the fact that your playing was actually violence - and that you enjoyed it. It was like watching my father!"
Martis dropped her head, looking at the stone floor; he was comparing her to his father. "I'd never hurt you."
"For how long during this Time of the Month?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper. "What if you decide to turn around and start beating on me for being born male? It's not like I had a choice of being born at all!"
"Severus - "
"Martis, I'm serious," he stated in a dead voice. "You scared the hell out of me. If you're going to be like this, what's to stop you? You'd realize what a miserable, ugly, nasty git I am and slam me around for wasting your time."
She pulled herself into the room. "That's bull - "
He pulled away from her, covering his face with his hands and scrunching up against the wall.
Martis scrambled back out into the stairway, blinking in incomprehension. "Wha - I - Severus - Please don't do this!"
"Go away," he moaned. "Go away ... "
"Oh, Great Mother ... "She flashed back on the game, her mind running through her movements and plays, and noticed the pattern. She was practically a Berserker on the pitch; hitting, kicking, slamming, cracking nearly every single player, especially all the male ones that even remotely looked at her strangely. Even her own teammates yelped in horror for what she did to that Gryffindor Beater. "Severus - Severus, I didn't know - "
"Now you're sounding like my mother," he spat with disdain.
"Will you stop that? I am not your parents! I'm Spirals - your best friend - "
"Who turns into a monster once a month!" he cried back. "I can't live with that! I don't want to live in fear around you just because of that! And when you're mad, you'll find out what a pathetic mess I am and leave me!"
She crawled into the room. "Severus Snape, there is no way in Avernus I'm leaving you! I will never hurt you! I will slit my own throat before I ever hurt you! I will rip out my womb and everything else with it if it causes me to hurt you!" Her voice broke from tears, making her gasp for breath. "Do you understand me at all, Sev?? I'm not going to be a child forever but I'm still going to be me - it's still Snips and Spirals. Nothing is ever - EVER - going to change that! NOTHING!"
Both found the other in the darkness, squeezing the other hard as they cried together.
"I don't want you to go - I don't want you to hate me," Sev choked.
"Then don't tell me to leave," Martis wept. "I'll never hurt you. I'll protect you as long as I remain alive. You're my delicate spiderweb and beautiful raven and no one will destroy how I feel about you."
Sev buried his face against her neck. "Promise me you'll do something about this. I don't want to be scared of you. I want us to keep being friends."
"I promise - I promise - I promise."
She stroked his hair, holding him close until both felt composed enough to release each other. She picked up the end of her school robe, patting his wet cheeks and drying his eyes, and then she wiped her own face.
"What's going on downstairs?" he asked.
"Victory Party," she answered. "I left by the time the punch bowl started to smoke. I expect house points will be taken off for this one ... Narcissa was dancing in the corner by herself without her sweater pretty early."
Sev shuddered. "Keep her away from me, Spirals."
"I'll make sure of it." She hugged him tightly. "Nobody defiles my Snips."
By the time they arrived back in the Slytherin common room, the party had turned into a general free-for-all involving a few wrestling matches (between the members of the Quidditch team) and several girls playing with Thomas St. Claire's Afro. What Narcissa Black was doing at this time was going to get the Protection Spells activated soon, even though most of the Slytherins really did not care at this point of inebriation.
"There you are!" Evan Ryper barked as he walked up to them. "Explain yourselves!"
"For what?" Martis asked.
"The inflatable sheep! It walked in here, proclaimed it was not Peter Pettigrew, then hopped onto Onslow's head and wouldn't let go! We had to pry the damn thing off with a crow bar!"
"We had nothing to do with it," Sev replied.
Martis shook her head. "That thing is beginning to annoy me."
"Where is it now?"
Evan rolled his eyes. "A few of the guys decided to send it to Gryffindor with a note saying ... " He cleared his throat, briefly blushing. "I won't repeat it - I don't think you did it now."
Sev sniffed indignantly. "How dare you accuse us of such a low-brow, puerile prank?"
"Right!" Martis added. "If we did prank Slytherin, it'd be something more refined than an inflatable sheep!"
Sev folded his arms and drew a fingertip over his lip. "Perhaps ... perhaps we could arrange a visit from a Kappa? We'll have to ship it from Mongolia."
"Japan," Martis corrected him.
"Mongolia."
"Japan."
"Mongolia."
"Bother-Japan."
"Bother-Mongolia."
"Bother-Japan."
"Bother-Mongolia."
Evan wandered off to let someone else tell the Dynamic Duo to shut up.
It wasn't long afterwards that the protective spells were triggered, and Snips and Spirals enjoyed the beauty of the hoarfrost crystals on their frozen and immobilized housemates as they made their way to their own beds.
----------
The next morning everyone went to breakfast either groggy or in high spirits. Several of the younger Slytherins danced around the Gryffindor tables before sitting down, singing about how they were going to win the Quidditch Cup for the year this time.
The Marauders groused, although Lupin was busy brushing his shaggy hair into place and looking at his reflection in the side of a silver bowl. Potter looked around warily while Pettigrew slurped up his highly sugared oatmeal.
"The Ball-Breaker arrives," Black observed casually.
Potter gave a yelp and ducked. "Don't let her see me!"
"Why?" Lupin asked.
"Cause she wants my body - badly!"
Pettigrew laughed, spraying Lupin and Black with oatmeal. "Probably for a sacrifice!"
Lupin scowled, wiping oatmeal off his face. "So why did it look like she kicked you in the cods yesterday?"
"Tried to break your balls, too?" Black commented.
"Shut up!" Potter snarled.
As Martis sat down, Sev asked, "How did it go with Nurse Pomfrey?"
Martis spooned oatmeal into her bowl. "She said my body's still adjusting to the changes and the chemicals are mixing up in weird combinations. She said it'll take a year or so for it to settle down. Meanwhile, she prescribed some stuff during the Time to help dampen down the violent impulses."
"That's a relief." He began peeling an orange. "We can work on ... You- Know-What tonight, then."
"Oh, yeah!" she giggled. "We got the yak hair yesterday! I forgot about that! Yay!" She danced in her seat and sang, "We're workin' on the Baby tonight, we're workin' on the Baby tonight ... "
Penderdandis' throat cleared and they looked up.
"Good morning, Professor Penderdandis," Martis greeted him in a chipper manner. "Is there anything the matter?"
"No talk of working on babies," he stated quietly. "At least where anybody can hear you. Discretion is a House watchword."
"Dirty-minded creep," she muttered under her breath. "All right, then. We'll have to work on The THING, then, Snips."
"Yes, Spirals," Sev answered as he chewed on an orange slice.
"And Madame Hooch is requesting that you help pay for new Bludgers since you destroyed the last pair."
"Anything else, sir?" Martis asked.
"Yes." Penderdandis adjusted his pince-nez. "Your plays were brilliant yesterday ... just try not to emasculate too many players next game, eh?"
She nodded, lowering her head and blushing. Sev looked at her in horror as their House Master continued on to his seat at the head table.
"Spirals!" Sev cried.
"What?" she asked.
"You're BLUSHING!"
"I am not." She shoved a huge spoonful of oatmeal in her mouth.
"Yes, you are! This is the first time I've seen you blush!" He cracked a smile. "It's cute." She looked up at him, and then he blushed and hid behind his hair. "Oh, no, I shouldn't have said that...!"
Martis' mouth fell into a neutral line, her hand raised. With a snort, she twisted her wrist and poked his shoulder. "Bother."
-End-