"Dreams are the royal road to the unconscious. They are simply and undisguisedly realizations of wishes." ~Sigmund Freud

Felt covered his body in a soft warmth. Beyond that initial contact, he had no idea where he was or what he was doing. Was he even awake? He tried to think but a layer of white static blocked the wheels in his brain from turning. He sat on the edge of consciousness, knowing something was amiss but not quite able to recognize what exactly was out of place.

He peaked through an eye.

His immediate reaction had been to blink when the red light invaded his hooded iris, but he resisted the urge thereafter and forced both eyes open. Shades of red danced with blues and greens and even faint traces of orange in the distance. He had been here before, this pastel wonderland.

A great white polar bear walked into his periphery and stared at him with dewy eyes. The bear pulled out a short board that had been sculpted and painted in green. Without warning a tide appeared and the bear jumped, mounted the board, and rose to the top of the wave, arms wide to balance himself. Harry tilted his head to the side in amazement. Such a huge wave, you go bear, good for you, he thought to himself.

"'Aye, mate, did you bring the goods?" Someone spoke from behind him and Harry startled at the brisk voice so close in proximity with no other warnings produced. It was a tan monkey on a unicycle and Harry smiled, he instantly knew this creature was named Maurice and was his friend. He felt brief comfort followed by inexplicable anger that he couldn't place.

"Where is your hat, Maurice?"

Maurice peddled forward, then back and frowned slightly. "I don't know-"

"Dammit, Maurice, I've told you! It's no good without the hat!" Harry shouted, his voice echoing as the space between them shortened.

"Yeah, I know, but-"

"No buts! Wear the hat or I'll take you back to the school!"

"Okay, okay! I'll wear the bloody hat! Jeesh!"

Maurice pulled out a tiny white hat adorned with green jewels arranged in a snake-like fashion. He made a face by scrunching his nose and placed the tiny hat atop his head. Harry beamed.

"Perfect!" Harry clasped his hands together and watched Maurice roll forward while he juggled balloons filled with whipped cream. And it was perfect, Harry felt. Nothing could possibly be better.

A storm cloud wandered over and brought with it an overabundance of green flash lightning and thunder and rain drops in the form of ducks who quacked as they assaulted Harry in the downpour. Harry waved his arms to fend himself from the rain and the light, but he slipped on a duck drop and fell into the darkness below him.

Down, down, down he fell, until he spread his arms and found wings instead. He flapped and flapped but he couldn't catch the wind before he landed on a black plush... Kitten? A huge kitten. A male kitten who glared and hissed at him for disturbing his sleep. Harry didn't have time to utter an apology, however. A rough hand pulled at his collar and forced him to stand.

"Dance for us, Harry. Won't you show me your pretty tap shoes?" Dumbledore's voice resonated throughout the space and Harry turned frantically but couldn't see, his vision was now entirely black crows with beady red eyes. Someone had blindfolded him, a snake, he saw it as it slithered away.

"Yes, I too would enjoy watching you dance, Harry, you filthy excuse for a Wizard," a strained hiss he recognized as Voldemort spoke from inside his head, inside his mind, along with a searing pain unlike anything he had ever felt in his entire life. At that moment he was thinking and comparing every single pain he had ever endured- the Dursley's mistreatment, the hollow feeling that traveled from his stomach to his throat from not being allowed to eat for weeks at a time, emotional detachment from his supposed family, the rips and tears in his heart from being labeled as a freak by his classmates in elementary school, the angst, loosing Sirius, loosing Fred, loosing Dobby, Tonks, Remus, Hedwig, and countless others, the pain of having to watch helplessly as Snape clutched his chest and died in his arms, the hurt and humiliation at Dumbledore for not telling him what he needed to know sooner, the raw anger at Voldemort for doing this to him in the first place, the Prophecy, the fucking Prophecy. The wheels in his brain instantly kicked and the panic spread like a wildfire.

He knew who he was and what his destiny said he had to be, what he had to do, what he had done, and what he had to represent to every single casualty of this war.

Harry ran, he ran and he ran but he was going nowhere; a hamster stuck on a pinwheel, around and around he went until his legs refused to take another step.

There was a door. Was it a way out? Was it a trick? Gryffindors are not known to weigh options before taking the plunge.

He knocked, or rather pounded, shouted, screamed, and pleaded with fate to give him a way out. He was crying, his face pained and his voice raw. The door finally unlocked with a click and slowly opened.

Harry was not prepared to see Severus Snape glaring in that all too intimidating aura that said 'you better have a damn good reason for disturbing my peace or so help me I'll hex you into the next millennium.' Harry had a damn good reason this time.

"Potter." It wasn't a snarl as Harry was expecting. His tone hadn't been harsh, scathing, or ridiculing. It wasn't much of anything but a simple statement, an acknowledgement.

"Help me.. Please," Harry whispered, out of options and clearly defeated by his own demons to struggle on. In the distance Harry could hear mock taps of dancing shoes on wood and soft cheers of 'Harry! Harry! Harry!'

"What is it you require from me, Mister Potter? How can I 'help' you?" Severus pondered as he stroked his beard. Harry squinted his eyes. When did Snape grow a beard?

"I- I don't know, but I need help. I can't do this!"

"Do what? No one is forcing you to do anything."

"But they- they want me to dance!" The cheers now progressed to loud echos of Draco Malfoy shouting, "Training for the ballet, Potter?!"

"And are you dancing, Mister Potter?" Snape's hair was now midback in all it's glorious greasy lankiness. Harry stared transfixed as it seemed to grow by the second.

"Well, no, but-"

"Then you have your answer."

"But what do I do about them? What do I tell them?"

"Tell them to fuck off. If you do not want to dance, then don't. You can resist a Crucio, for Merlin's sake. Resisting pressure should come naturally to a Potter."

Harry smiled as he considered the man's words. "Thank you."

Severus waved a hand. "Just do me a favor. Don't feed my rhinoceros. He bites."

With that, Severus turned and straddled a black Stallion with a fiery mane and rode off into the distance. Clouds of gray and white smoke invaded the area in a dense fog and the static returned, numbing his mind and easing him back into that felt comfort.

Harry woke less than amused at his current state. His bed was in complete disarray and his glasses were broken from his aggressive tossing and turning during the night. It was nothing a quick Reparo couldn't fix, but it was the mere fact that it had to be done that irked Harry greatly.

Ten years. It had been ten years since the final battle and he still found himself the victim of an onslaught of nightmares, however weird in nature. They were tame, if he had to tag a word to it, compared to the earlier years of his youthful battle with Voldemort. Those had been the most damaging years, the sleep deprivation only made his dreams worse. Now he stood in mere shadows of his past, haunting only the darkest corners of his mind. His fears and regrets only came out at night, it seemed.

He was somewhat thankful for this torture. It kept him sane when he woke in the mornings, to know the real nightmare had come and gone long ago. The Wizarding civilization rebuilt itself stronger, wiser, and happier in the years that followed. Harry was filled with a moment of peace as he bowed his head in remembrance of those dark times and how far his own life progressed since.

Not one to indulge in lazy mornings, Harry stood and stretched his limbs as his mind pushed the weird dream out of his conscious thoughts. He knew they would be there when he called them, he depended on it.

Trudging lightly from his bedroom, Harry walked silently down the hallway and found the framed portrait he knew awaited him. With solemn eyes he scanned the passive face he knew all to well, memorized even, of the man he most admired in his later years of life. A sad smile graced his lips as he pressed a hesitant palm against the glass frame.

"You protected me then, Sir, and you continue to do so, even in my dreams. And I thank you with every breath I take. I just wish I hadn't been so blind, and now you'll never know how much I appreciate your sacrifices. I'll never get to tell you, even though you'd probably not give me the chance to say it."

The face remained the same, unchanged, unmoving. Of course, it wouldn't have moved even if Harry spelled it animate. Paintings don't move. Harry knew this, but still wished he could invoke some form of emotion on the stoic face staring back at him. Those eyes, those damn eyes that he painted himself; even if it was just oil pastels on a plain canvas, those eyes still held a very high power over Harry. He hung his head and bit back the bitter feeling rising within him. It was enough, he told himself.

He gathered his strength and held his head up, stealing one last glance at the portrait of Severus Snape that Harry felt compelled to pour his heart out in producing. All of his early depression, sense of lost hope, desperation, everything Harry ever had left in him immediately after the war went into this work of art. It was the first of many to come and the only one that retained so much worth to Harry. He traced the bottom of the frame absentmindedly.

Suddenly inspired, Harry smiled and turned away from the portrait to prepare for work. He felt light and hopeful, as if today would be a productive day. He savored the feeling.

The half crooked smile never strayed too far from his lips.