SOME KIND OF HELL
Hey muggles, this was going to be a one-shot but it seems i can't stop talking so it may take a few installments...
Disclaimer: did it occur to anyone that if JK herself decided to indulge in some fan fiction she would be writing under a pseudonym and would partake in the usual etiquette of issuing a disclaimer... consider this article disclaimed.
Usually when one regains consciousness it happens slowly, gradually; like a lump of submerged wood gliding to the surface of a still, deep lake. Well, Professor Snape reflected, he did feel somewhat like a lump of... something... rising from some kind of anonymous liquidy depths. Not unlike numerous unnamed potions he felt occasionally compelled to brew during one of his gloomy spells (i.e. all the time).
Sludge, depths, lump... What he would very much like to know is why he was regaining consciousness or rather, why he was unable to remember the reason for the loss of it.
It could be any number of things. He could be dead; although he very much doubted whether regaining consciousness was a typical side-effect of dying.
The Dark Lord may have become wise as to where Severus' real alligence lay - or he may just have been in a jolly mood and felt like a relaxing torture session to wind down at the end of a long and tiring day of dastardly deeds and general nefariousness. Same difference really.
Snape sighed. Although he was awake, for some reason he could not see. Whoever had knocked him out and captured him had also wrapped a piece of cloth around his head so that only his rather prominent nose poked through. He sighed again. He was too busy for this shit. He had five classes of unmarked exams piled on his desk, his 7th years had just handed in their mid-semester research essays and he was halfway through writing an article for the PTA Review. If the Dark Lord wanted to get his rocks off Professor Snape truly wished he would do it in his own time.
Footsteps. He could suddenly hear footsteps clipping along a corridor outside of the room in which he was being held. A pause as they reached the door, the sound of a key turning a lock. The door opened with an ominous creak and shut heavily behind the person (or was it more than one person?) who had just come into the room.
What fresh Hell awaited Severus Snape, he shuddered to think. Was it the Dark Lord in a mood; perhaps Malfoy had cracked and wanted to play dress up; or maybe it was Bellatrix Lestrange with her perverted sense of humour? After fifteen-odd years of maintaining a composed, blank exterior as a double-agent he was prepared and unafraid for what was to come. Something like this was bound to happen in the end.
The giggle that resounded in the silent chamber was perhaps a little unexpected but knowing someone like Bellatrix, was not completely out of character.
Snape steeled himself.
Someone giggled again along with several snorts of supressed laughter and a bout of furtive whispering, and more giggles, and more snorts until a confused Professor Snape could have bet on Dumbledore's life that he was being held up by some of his teenage students. This fleeting and absurd thought was prompted by the snide little voice in the back of his mind - the one he usually tried to suppress due to its disconcerting habit of pointing out inconvenient truths - suggested the recent influx of female students into his remedial potions class may have a slightly more sinister motif than merely general incompetancy.
The thought was quickly dismissed.
A person, who Snape assumed to be Madame Lestrange, walked around the chair, her shoes clicking on the tiled floor, and stood behind the professor resting her hands on either of his shoulders.
"Esteemed collegues," she began in a voice that echoed around the room. "Our efforts in breaching the Time and Space Continuum have not been wasted. We looked Quantum in the face and conquered it. We mastered the Limits of Reality; crushing them with a force to equal the very building blocks of civilisation-"
A voice from the audience cried out, interrupting the speaker "Stop talking crap and get on with it..."
Smoothly, as though without interruption, she continued. "And so, Comrades, I present to you the fruits of our labours: a man most of us have long desired to have at their mercy... Professor Severus Gregory Snape!" At which she whipped the cloth from around Snape's eyes and stepped back from the chair.