Author's Note: You wanted fluffy? I'll give you fluffy…

Fluff and Stuff

Hermione looked at herself in the mirror and growled with frustration. How had everything gone so wrong? And the worst of it was that this time it was all her fault.

Well, that wasn't entirely true. Maybe it had been a bit Neville's fault. Just a smidge at the very most.

'Professor Longbottom,' she reminded herself.

The whole thing had been originally Hermione's idea. She'd asked Neville to supply her with the ingredients to brew a modified healing potion that could successfully heal cursed injuries, much like the scar on her arm that Bellatrix Lestrange had given her in the war. Every winter, it would burn and ache like crazy as the weather shifted, and Hermione knew that she was far from the only one who suffered from this particular pain. She'd tested it on Neville's scarred pygmy puff he'd rescued named Kelvin that some awful children had mutilated and it had worked beautifully. Neville's eyes had brimmed with tears when the little guy finally grew back his bright fuschia hair and hummed happily in Neville's hands.

But then, somehow, a bit of pygmy puff dander had landed in her caldron while she was brewing her final batch, there'd been a giant pink flash as the caldron exploded in her face...and…

"This can't be happening," she groaned despondently, hoping for the five thousandth time that when she opened her eyes wouldn't see the massive tufts of pink hair growing all over her body. The hair had grown in so thick so quickly that her robes had burst in several locations, leaving her in an embarrassingly disheveled state. This wasn't Hermione's first experience accidentally splicing herself with another species, unfortunately, but it was one thing to accidentally ingest Polyjuice potion laced with cat hair in one's second year of schooling and quite another thing to purposefully ingest an experimental healing potion without doing exhaustive quality checks beforehand.

If Hermione was being honest with herself (and she rarely refrained from doing so, despite the sting to her ego that admitting such a thing would cause), she'd simply been so excited to be rid of the cursed pain forever that she'd thrown caution to the wind.

'And now look at me,' she thought.

There was only one person she knew of who might possibly be able to help her with her current predicament, but if anything, she was dreading that even more than the thought of being a hybrid human/pygmy puff for the rest of her life.

After the Battle of Hogwarts, Hagrid had moved into the stables to comfort the remaining magical creatures that had survived the onslaught. Over the next few years, he'd built a hospital for his non-human charges and a small living space for himself. Well, honestly, it was fairly large for a regular human, but when Hagrid was inside with his new Boarhound pup who he'd named Killer and old Fang, who was getting up there in years, it became incredibly cozy.

That had left the old Groundskeeper's Hut vacant for a time. That is, until it wasn't and one night Minerva McGonagall had seen movement in one of the windows on her nightly patrol and went to investigate. She found a bedraggled, delirious Severus Snape squatting on the floor eating long-stale rock cakes like some sort of demented garden gnome. He didn't even seem to know who she was. His facial hair had grown out into a scraggly beard and hair was a veritable rat's nest filled with dirt and grease.

Minerva had called in Hermione after swearing her to secrecy because other than Severus, Hermione was the only one who both had the ability to brew the complex potions needed to heal him and, more importantly, would be willing to do so.

Thanks to Harry, Hermione had seen the pensieve memories along with Ron. Both of them had taken things differently, though. Hermione had taken Harry's side in acknowledging Snape as being on the side of Light all along, but she still reserved the right to think that he was a right bastard (Harry, as usual, agreed with her assessment wholeheartedly). Ron, however, had stormed off after saying a few things that ought not to be repeated in polite company. Hermione supposed it had more to do with Fred's death than anything. Ron just needed someone to blame. He'd left the country not long after the war had ended getting an apprenticeship in butterbeer brewing abroad in Romania. According to Charlie, who visited with Ron regularly, the youngest Weasley son was slowly healing, but it was unknown whether or not he'd ever move back to Britain.

It had been some months between the time that the battle had ended and the night that Minerva discovered Severus in the sorry state he'd been in, but Hermione would never forget the weeks that followed. She'd helped Minerva nurse him back to some semblance of health, then once he was strong enough, she'd purchased a new wand and a glamour and installed him as the new Groundskeeper and Keeper of the Keys. Hagrid had his trash can-lid sized hands full, and it was an opportunity to give Severus a place to recuperate fully. Besides, while his voice had mostly recovered, Severus was unable to raise his voice over a conversational tone without it growing raspy and strained. There was no way he'd ever teach again, even if he'd wanted to (which he most certainly did not). When he was under his glamour, Severus looked like a crotchety old man with a long, jagged white beard and an eyepatch. Hermione quite thought that he looked like a grumpy cross between Dumbledore and Filch with a little Mad Eye Moody thrown in.

Perhaps it was because of his loneliness or a strange way of showing his gratitude, but Hermione had developed a bit of a rapport with him that was quite different than their previously established student/teacher dynamic. After all, it would be rather hard for him to treat her like some lowly second year now that she'd finished up her Healer apprenticeship with Madam Pomfrey and was now running the Hospital Ward at Hogwarts. Of course, most of the hospital wing's potions were brewed by Severus in secret (he'd set up quite the potions lab in the cellar of the groundskeeper's hut), and Hermione had to admit that he did offer a much better product than the local potioneers, not to mention the fact that it cost the school quite a lot less. He still needed her help to some extent, though. Hermione's healing and mending charm work was so intricate that even Severus had to admit that she was a leader in her field. She had to see him for his tremors at least twice a month to refresh the nerve stabilizing rune she'd created at the base of his spine. She'd told him many a time that he'd need to come at least once a week to minimize the pain that the after effects of the venom had wreaked upon his body, but he was as stubborn as always, and twice a month was the most he'd acquiesce to being "manhandled by a damnable chit."

And so, it was with this knowledge, that he'd most likely complain or alternatively, never let her hear the end of it, that Hermione approached the door of the groundskeeper's hut and nervously rapped her knuckles on the door.

She heard movement inside along with the telltale sound of a glamour and bulky robes being hastily thrown on, and then the door opened a crack, revealing an eyepatch and a shock of white hair that stuck out as though his housemate was a bolt of lightning. His good eye widened with shock as he beheld Hermione's pink, fluffy appearance.

"Hi, Severus," Hermione said sheepishly, "I was hoping that you could—"

Severus turned around without saying a word and slammed the door shut.

Hermione froze for a long moment, her mind still trying to process the rudeness he'd displayed. After all, he was known for snarking and taking points for all manner of low-level offenses, but that was mostly posturing to keep students away from the Forbidden Forest.

"Severus?" she asked, moving over towards the front window and standing on tiptoe to look in at the darkness beyond. "Please, I know you're in there."

"Go-eh away!" came the sound of Severus' voice from within, but it sounded oddly muffled and thick.

"Are you hurt or something? You sound strange," Hermione replied, trying to stand up even higher to no avail.

"Just...wait a minute…" Hermione could hear his voice wavering, and she thought back to when he'd last come in for a treatment. Had it been more than two weeks ago? In her current state, Hermione could feel her mental calendar growing fuzzy. For all she knew, he could be suffering a horrible episode, his body seizing painfully until...until—

Momentarily forgetting her own troubles, Hermione began to bang her pink fluffy fists on the door and began to shout. "Severus!? SEVERUS?! OPEN THE DOOR! I WON'T LET YOU DIE!"

With shaking hands, she grabbed the doorknob and pushed hard on the door, letting out a tiny gasp of surprise when it flew open. She caught herself and looked up only to see Severus slouched against the wall opposite the door, his arms wrapped around his middle as he—

Hermione blinked, trying to process what she was seeing.

—laughed his goddamn arse off?

"Go...hehe..away...mff mff," Severus said helplessly, trying to cover his laughter with his hand. "You're...ehehe...too..a-ha-ha..p-heh-pink."

Hermione went scarlet with embarrassment. She'd expected a bit of ribbing, yes, but deep down she was utterly flummoxed at the sight of her former Potions professor sitting on the floor laughing so hard that tears were rolling down his cheeks and trailing down the tip of his hooked nose.

"It's not funny," she said, a bit more shrily than she'd meant to.

Severus said nothing and merely giggled behind his hand as he summoned a hand mirror with his wand and pointed at her. Hermione blushed even more deeply as she noticed the pink tufts at the top of her head now resembled a bright fuchsia mohawk.

"Well," Hermione admitted sheepishly, "It is a bit funny."

"Oh, it's not funny," Severus giggled, and it was oddly fitting to hear him make such a carefree sound. Surprising, but fitting nonetheless. "It's absolutely hilarious is what it is."

Hermione stood over him, her arms crossed and her expression (from under the pink fur that covered her cheeks and forehead) in an unamused grimace until he finally calmed himself down.

"Well," he said finally, catching his breath and motioning to the door, which closed softly behind her, "you'd better come in."

Hermione would never admit it, but it made her feel special to be allowed in Severus' innermost sanctum. Other than Minerva, who would visit whenever things weren't too busy, Severus had few visitors for a number of reasons. Hagrid was the only other one who visited with any regularity, but he was only allowed in the front parlor due to an accidental interaction between one of his pocket pygmy acromantulas and a particularly potent batch of Felix Felicis. To make a long story short, it did not end well for the poor beastie, who'd been found belly up and lifeless in the gold mixture, spoiling Hagrid's jovial mood and the entire, expensive potion-making process in one fell swoop. Minerva, too, mostly took the overstuffed guest chair by the fire and curled up with a hot toddy and a game of poker.

Hermione, however, was familiar with the long, darkened hallway that he'd added to the hut using some sort of odd, reality-warping magic so that anyone who wasn't allowed down it would find themselves trapped endlessly at the far end. She always enjoyed walking past his meticulously clean bedroom, whose door was always open, as though getting past the initial defenses was enough to make Severus decide that it wasn't worth hiding anything regarding his somewhat spartan living habits. So, too, was the clean stonework bathroom both functional and attractive to the passing glance. But at the far end of the hall was where he kept the stairs down into the cool, dark cellar, and the large brewing room that he'd set up therein.

Hermione was glad for the cool temperature. Severus had seemingly acclimated to the average temperature of the dungeons he'd lived in for so many years, and had replicated a similar climate in his new home. Of course, this was not all that hard to do in Scotland, but Hermione was impressed at how he kept the moisture at bay. Regardless of how much rain or snow beat on the outside of the diminutive structure, it was always dry on the inside.

They stopped in the small workroom, which was located just outside the brewing room itself, and Severus motioned for Hermione to sit down on a small wooden stool.

"So," he said, looking down his nose at her, "Explain."

Hermione couldn't help herself. She went into a level of detail about the potion and the process that would probably put anyone to sleep.

Well, anyone but the man standing over her and giving her a thoughtful look. When she was done, he shook his head and said, "If I was still a professor and you were a student, I'd deduct points for foolishly testing a potion on yourself."

"But?" Hermione asked hopefully.

"But," he continued, "I am not a professor and you no longer give a flying fig about house points anyway. And I suspect that this little humiliating episode is enough of a deterrent in creating something new...without another set of hands and keen eyes to inspect it first."

Hermione's pulse quickened. Was he actually suggesting...collaborating? He rarely let her help him with any of his own brewing projects, much less bottle them. They were delivered in carefully sealed and meticulously marked containers to the Infirmary each week. The idea that he'd ever want an assistant meddling with his work, much less her…

"It was an interesting bit of thinking to powder the unicorn horn and then blend it into emulsified unicorn milk," Severus was saying, and Hermione had to shake her head slightly to force herself to stop thinking about the other implications his earlier offer might have held.

"I got the idea from Shoemeyer's experiments on healing prisoners of the third Centaur War in Greece," Hermione explained.

"Ah," he replied, as though he hadn't thought of that, and Hermione soon realized that was because he hadn't. "Intriguing."

"Do you think that you might be able to help me, Severus?" she asked. "I must admit that I'm getting a bit tired of looking like a Fuschia Sasquatch."

Severus laughed shortly at that. "Indeed. Well, I think that we must first take a few samples and run some diagnostic tests. Then I should like to have a sample of your potion to test. After that, I would like to brew a batch of it to my own...exacting standards, if that's alright with you."

Hermione nodded, feeling embarrassed yet again for causing such trouble.

"It's a lucky thing for you that summer started a few weeks ago, but from what you've told me and my own calculations, this may take a few months for you to properly sort out." Severus fixed her with a look. "You may be...pink...for quite some time."

"Well, it doesn't really bother me much," Hermione replied, "Other than being utterly embarrassing to be seen. And inspiring dour Potions masters into giggling fits."

"Don't remind me," Severus replied, deadpan, but she could see a small spark of mirth in his eyes. "In the meanwhile, you will need to stay here for awhile in order for me to get samples as needed and for me to monitor your progress. I'll show you to the guest room, but first I'll need to do a thorough examination and take a sample."

Hermione stiffened. She'd assumed he would do so, but the thought of him touching her made her heart thunder uncomfortably in her chest.

"First, I'll get a hair sample." Severus strode over to a cabinet and pulled out a small bottle and pair of tweezers. He then went behind her and pulled a few strands off of her shoulder.

"Ow!" Hermione yelped. "You could have warned me!"

"It would have hurt worse if you anticipated there would be pain," Severus replied. "But fine, I have some salve around here somewhere."

"It's fine," Hermione said tersely.

"I already have it in my hand, so stop being a big ninny and let me put it on."

Hermione could hear him unscrewing the lid on a jar and soon a small bit of cooling lotion was spread over the sore area.

"There. Right as rain." Severus closed the jar and levitated it back into the cabinet as Hermione fought not to roll her eyes. "Now, give me the password to your quarters and I'll pick up a few of your things as well as your failed attempt at potioneering."

"I don't know…" Hermione briefly thought about the Potions master walking through her quarters and seeing her messily unmade bed and various piles of books and other hobbies lying about the room, and went pinker than she already was with the embarrassment of it.

"I'm not going to go through your boudoir, if that's what you're thinking," he snapped.

"Well, no," Hermione admitted, feeling even more embarrassed, "but now I am. I mean, you'd have to pack my...er...underthings—"

"I know what they are," Severus hastily interrupted with a grimace. "I doubt any of them fit you well in your current state, though."

Hermione opened her mouth to argue and then shut it just as quickly. Why should it bother her if he was disgusted by the thought of her underthings? Honestly, she should feel relieved. After all, he was practically two decades older than she was, and a former teacher to boot. Oddly enough, though, all she felt was a vague sense of disappointment. Hermione was not the type to sit around batting her eyes and waiting for her suitors to come to her, but she was also horribly indecisive and often faltered at the first sign of resistance. It had been that way with Ron and with Viktor and with the other handful of gentleman callers she'd had in her young adult life. She was either more interested than they were or they were far too clingy and any attraction she'd held for them withered under their overbearing behavior.

And so, she tended to hold herself back from getting starry-eyed or smitten with anyone, even if it was mainly to protect her own heart.

"Stay here," Severus said, after she'd finally given him the password and location of her quarters. "I won't be long."

Hermione nodded. She didn't want to think about him rummaging through her belongings, but she had to admit that she'd only be a bright, fluffy distraction if she went with him. Besides, she could always change the password when she was back to normal.

Hermione daydreamed for a time as she lay back on the surprisingly soft cotton blanket that had been tucked military-style under the cot mattress. With her eyes closed, she could almost pretend that she was her normal not-pink-furred self, simply relaxing while Severus went to pick up some ingredients. She yawned deeply, and with the sound of the caldrons bubbling softly in the adjoining room, finally dozed off.

"You absolute idiot."

Hermione blinked once, her eyes attempting to focus on the source of the voice above her.

"Unhhhhuhhhhh?" she groaned, rubbing her eyes, blinking rapidly, then looking at Severus' face.

She blinked again.

"What ha—"

"I'm going to stop you right there, because you know exactly what happened." Severus was frowning down at her, but it was having quite the opposite effect. In fact, Hermione let out the tiniest of giggles despite covering her mouth to hold in her mirth.

"But you're pink!" she finally blurted out, when she couldn't hold it back any longer.

Severus stared back, his pink, furry face sporting a pair of eyebrows so long and thick that they looked like giant fuschia feathers impossibly furrowing together.

"Indeed." He stared at her, as though waiting.

"Is it because I added the Hippogriff tears?" Hermione asked, thinking back. "I added them because they make potions more attractive and palatable without reducing effectivity."

"And of course you would think so," Severus replied, deadpan, "because your job involves forcing potions down unwilling students' throats. The problem is that when combined with Gryffin bile, Hippogriff tears produce an effect not unlike an aphrodisiac in the air around them."

"But I bottled it and sealed it after trying it!" Hermione protested, sitting up abruptly, and nearly knocking foreheads with him.

"Yes, which is why I did not use stronger language when referring to your potions inadequacies," Severus replied, crossing his pink-furred arms. It was only then that Hermione realized that the sleeves of his frock coat had ripped to the elbow and his buttons against his chest were bulging dangerously from the force of his transformation. "Those words will be reserved for yours truly for being stupid enough to think that even taking a whiff of your potion was advisable in any way."

Hermione stood slowly, still feeling a bit sluggish from being woken up so suddenly. Severus took a step back and a strange popping noise filled the air as his buttons finally burst free and flew every which way. Hermione stumbled back as a few of them struck her on the chest and cheek, her leg catching on one of the legs of the cot and she fell backwards towards a nearby shelf filled with glassware. She let out a startled squeak and flailed, grasping blindly but finding no purchase. Her eyes were screwed shut as she braced for impact, but the impact never came. Instead, she felt a warm, firm pressure on her wrist and opened her eyes to find that Severus had caught her before she could hit the shelf. His eyes were wide as he stared at where his fingers ended and her wrist began.

Hermione only had a moment to notice they were both the exact same shade of pink, and then he was pulling her towards him, and she found herself flying forward until she was pressed against the pink fur of his bare chest.

It took her another long, breathless moment to realize that his arms were wrapped tightly around her in an embrace that did not appear to be loosening anytime soon. His fur tickled her ear, and she could hear a deep thrumming purr in his chest. She found that soon, she was mirroring this purring noise in a slightly higher register. A hot line of desire traveled through her body and she found herself blushing even more furiously than before as her body heated up under the pink fur that covered her. Even though she was certain that she looked a right mess, there was something simply right about how she fit in his arms.

Something warm and wet touched her cheek, then, and she opened her eyes to see a long, thin tongue slithering down from his mouth. Rather than shocking or horrifying her, it was instead somehow comforting. She opened her mouth, too, and found that her tongue had grown equally thin and long. It snaked out of her mouth as though it had a mind of its own and wrapped gently around Severus' tongue until it slowly found its way back to his mouth. They stayed together with their arms and tongues entwined for a long time, their fur growing at an unnatural rate until their clothing burst to the floor in tatters and both of their bodies were not much more than fluffy puffs of pink.

It was so warm and right. Hermione's mind was suddenly blessedly free from anxiety. A wave of comfort and pleasure blanketed her mind, and as they sank to the floor in twin balls of fluff, she could feel Severus shifting his weight onto her in a most welcome manner. They moved together, their bodies humming with pleasure, and then fell deep into a dreamless sleep, their bodies still emitting a contented, thrumming purr.

Over the next few weeks, Severus and Hermione cloistered themselves away from the world. There was time spent researching Hermione's brewing techniques and ingredients, as well as many attempts to brew a potion that would reverse the pygmy puff transformation without reversing any of the other healing properties, but most of their time was spent purring together in a fluffy heap with their long tongues twined together. Gone was Hermione's hesitation and Severus' standoffishness. Their hearts and minds were one, and that was more than enough.

After more than a month of owled excuses citing a vague "potions experiment," Minerva had had enough and stomped down to Severus' hut at first light, demanding to speak with Hermione.

"Severus Tobias Snape! You had better not have harmed a hair on her head with your ridiculous experimen—" Minerva went silent the moment the door opened to reveal a seemingly-unharmed Hermione rubbing the sleep out of one of her eyes dressed only in a long, white men's shirt.

"Sorry," Hermione said by way of explanation, "We had a late night, but I think we sorted out all the kinks."

"Kinks?" Minerva replied dazedly. "Hermione, your hair…"

"Yeah, I know," Hermione said, touching one of the curly ends and wrapping it around her finger. A few strands went a darkish pink colour as it caught the light. "I still can't seem to get the colour all the way back to the way it used to be, but it's a sight better than before."

"Oi! Hermione! Who's that knocking at the bloody door at an ungodly hour of the morning?" A grumpy voice, still thick with sleep echoed down the hallway behind Hermione.

"It's Minerva," Hermione called back. "She's here about something to do with your wicked experiments."

"Ugh, fine! Give a bloke a second to find his trousers will ya?"

"Um." Minerva was still blinking in an utterly shocked sort of way, her expression somewhere between indignant propriety and smug glee.

"So," Hermione said sheepishly, as she seemingly realized the sorry state of her clothing for the first time, "Sorry about this. I just...the transformation ruined all my clothing, and we only finished the most promising version yesterday evening, so we're understandably exhausted."

Hermione then bit her lip in a way that Minerva knew was a clear sign she was holding back at least part of the truth, but Minerva was smart enough to ask. After all, she had found that if one truly does not want to know the answer to a question, asking it is simply asking for trouble.

Hermione returned to her duties at Hogwarts in the fall, and was much the same as she ever was. However, there were a few notable differences. First off, she'd moved into the little groundskeeper's hut and it was rumoured that she was being forced into an arranged marriage with the horrid old groundskeeper who was surely old enough to be her grandfather.

These rumours, of course, were stamped down by the staff, but like all things that are forbidden and largely learned through second hand knowledge, the ridiculous things that the students began to pass around in the halls were no less than utterly ludicrous.

Some mornings, Hermione would greet her students with an adorable pink pygmy puff on her shoulder. He wasn't very friendly to anyone but her, and would hide under her hair purring for the duration of her class, but most students were smitten with the cute little creature and would bring treats to class in the hopes of being allowed to pet him. And sometimes, when the cantankerous caretaker was shaking his fist at students for stepping on the freshly laid out sod, a little pink pygmy puff would float into the sky above his head and squeak out obscenities at them as well, which the students found utterly endearing and was oddly often more effective in stopping wayward students than Severus' scowls and snarky comments.

When Minerva heard about Severus the Pygmy Puff, she laughed out loud at first, and even Albus' painting snickered at the news, but there was no point in ruining their fun. They were, after all, consenting adults, and if consenting adults wished to traipse around the campus as pink pygmy puffs, who was Minerva to stop them? Also, due to a quirk in the trigger for the transformation, neither Severus nor Hermione were considered true animagi, but they still published their findings in Animagicals Quarterly, receiving much praise for their findings on potions-induced transfiguration.

They had a simple, quiet wedding the following summer. Firenze officiated the ceremony as the staff stood looking on with smiles on their faces. All of Hermione's friends were there, too, and even Ron behaved himself, though he left soon after the ceremony. The Giant Squid did tricks in the nearby Black Lake as they cut the wedding cake, and Hermione could feel her cheeks grow warm as her husband spooned a piece into her mouth and then kissed her gently on the lips.

"After all," Hermione said, squeaking happily as Severus licked a bit of frosting off the tip of her nose, "I know that we're a formidable team against any disaster, no matter how pink or fluffy it might be."

"I am inclined to agree, my love," he replied, kissing her deeply, his eyes dancing with delight as he watched the tips of Hermione's hair go from auburn to bright fuchsia. "Pink suits you, you know."

"You too," Hermione said, giggling as he grabbed the tips of his black hair to see that they, too, had gone a deep pinkish colour.

"You know that I would endure any indignity, including a rogue fluorescent colour, as long as it means that I get to have you."

The music began to play, then, and Severus swept his wife up in their first dance as the others looked on.

They both knew that as long as there were students, there would always be trouble at Hogwarts, just as sure as there would always be magic for those willing to seek it, but just like the vows they'd exchanged, they would meet it head-on— together.