Warning - This story takes place in and after 'Deathly Hallows'. It contains many references to events that occurred in 'Deathly Hallows'. So, if you haven't read 'Deathly Hallows' yet and you don't want to be spoiled then why are you here!
Disclaimer - I own no rights whatsoever to anything in or relating to the Harry Potter books and franchises. Harry Potter and all its related copyrights belong to far prettier, nicer, kinder and smarter people than me. This is merely a fan's story meant as a little fannish fun and no copyright breaches are intended.
All typos, spelling mistakes and bad grammar are copyright to Kazza. :)
Author's note - This is the first in a series of A Princely Plan stories that give a possible alternative future for Severus Snape. I will follow the canon as best I can, although I will ignore any statements about Snape's death made outside of the books by J.K. Rowling. These stories will all be humorous, albeit a dark and corny humour.
Happy reading,
Kazza.
P.S. I have provided Severus Snape with a family. Anyone who has read my now-very-AU story 'Wizard's Honour' may recognise a character or two here.
A Princely Plan - Survival
by Kazza
Chapter 1 - Rescue
or Excuse me, dunderhead, but I'm not dead yet!
Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger missed the rescue.
In their defense, missing it was completely understandable. Witnessing the apparent death of headmaster Snape at the fangs and coils of a magically enlarged serpent was a very sensible reason for Ron and Hermione to leave the shack as soon as possible. Not to mention having a previous appointment to save Hogwarts and the wizarding world from the violent rampages and bad speeches of the self-styled Lord Voldemort.
But, in hindsight, it would have been just as sensible if Ron and Hermione hadn't assumed that Headmaster Snape was dead. For seven years experience should have taught them not to assume anything about Severus Snape.
Like the muggle boy scout he could have been in his youth, Severus Snape was always prepared. But sometimes what he prepared for wasn't exactly what happened.
Since the attack on Arthur Weasley some years before, the former potions master had been concerned about the snake Nagini. He was so concerned that, if one of Voldemort's Death Eaters had asked the Bloody Baron, the Baron would have said that Snape was "completely and obsessively paranoid about being bitten by the snake". However, none of the Death Eaters bothered to ask the Baron, so his bloodiness kept his opinion to himself.
Thanks to his paranoia, Snape had been dosing himself with an antivenin, conveniently discovered by St Mungos, each time he was likely to find himself in the presence of Nagini. That part of his plan had been successful and the snake's poison was doing little damage to Snape's body. Unfortunately, the massive blood loss and crushing from Nagini's attack were most definitely killing him.
The sound of Ron and Hermione's departing footsteps echoed hollowly through the open doorway and around the room. Soon enough the sound died away and the room fell silent save for the occasional creaking of the shack's walls and the near-impossibly slow, quiet breathing of the room's sole occupant.
If the Headmaster was conscious he would have cursed the Fates and his poor luck. But as he was unconscious and near death he could only lie upon the cold floor and project an aura of unconscious unhappiness.
ooooooo
Six and a half minutes earlier.
Medusa was Not Happy.
Medusa was rarely happy but today was an especially bad day for her plans were falling around her.
The elderly witch had planned her twilight years for decades. Her four children and many grandchildren would provide Medusa with a queenly old age; surrounding her in musty and moth-eaten splendour and a multitude of great-grandchildren who she planned would amuse her and carry on the family name.
Instead Medusa found her family disappearing from around her; thanks to politics, poor eating habits, poorer marriage choices, and a fondness for experimenting with volatile potions. So dramatic was the loss of family members that Medusa had eventually found it necessary to 'un-disown' her half-blood great-grandson. This had turned out to be a wise move for a few years ago the said great-grandson had becomes Medusa's sole living relative and thereby her sole heir.
It was around that time that Medusa had retired the family clock, an ancient grandmother clock that solemnly recorded the lives of the Prince family but did little else. She had replaced the clock with a family pocket watch with the latest family monitoring charms.
If the screaming alarm sounding now from Medusa's pocket watch was accurate, then she was about to lose her sole remaining relative.
"I shall not allow that, Severus!" Medusa snarled at the tiny watch hand that was pointing at an even tinier sign that flashed 'mortally wounded.
For a few moments the old witch considered what to do. Almost a minute had passed before she smiled wickedly as a new plan formed in her devious and slightly-senile mind.
The room fell silent as Medusa activated the vibrate only charm on her watch. Then, with a melodramatic flourish of her hand, she activated the medical emergency charm by the cottage's front door.
"You have not provided me with a great-great-grandchild and until then I forbid you to die," muttered Medusa fiercely while she summoned her hat, cloak, and cane.
Two minutes later Ilario Laurencetti, Mediwizard to Baldoro's Magical Retirement Village, apparated into the sitting room of Medusa's tiny cottage.
"Signora Prince, you called for help? What is wrong?" Ilario was surprised to see the elderly lady dressed to leave her house and standing just inside the door.
"About time you arrived," Medusa adjusted her hat to just the right angle for a witch of her generation and waked commandingly towards the mediwizard.
"Are you injured, Signora?" Ilario had raised his wand and was preparing to cast a diagnosis charm.
"Yes," Madam Prince snapped. "My family tree is in danger of expiring and requires immediate medical attention." With that she grasped hold of the mediwizard's arm with her bony hand.
Medusa pressed the little watch against the back of Ilario's hand. Ilario was about to pull his arm free when the old witch murmured the password to activate the watch's locator portkey and the elderly witch and young mediwizard were whisked away from the tiny cottage.
oooooo
Hogsmead was an horrific mess.
A few dead and injured witches and wizards lay amid the rubble and rubbish-strewn streets. It appeared from the mess almost as though the combatants had been using the town's rubbish bins as weapons.
The portkey deposited the Prince Matriarch and the confused mediwizard into Hogsmeade, just outside the door of the Shrieking Shack. The shack's ragged door hung ajar in a disconcerting manner.
"Where have you taken me?" Ilario's panicked gaze swept across the partially ruined town and the people who needed medical attention.
"Typical," Medusa muttered as she looked at town's streets, "put a man in charge and the first thing that slips is the cleaning." The slightly-mad old witch turned away from Hogsmeade and pushed the shack's front door open.
"This way, Signor Laurencetti." Medusa thwacked the mediwizard's heel with her cane. Ilario stepped away Medusa and stumbled through the open door of the gloomy shack.
A gory sight awaited him.
Headmaster Snape still lay as his former students and Voldemort's pet had left him; lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood.
"I want you to heal my great-grandson," commanded Medusa, the instant she had stepped into the room.
Ilario, who was standing stunned by the shock of seeing the near-dead wizard said nothing. Medusa raised her cane and tapped Ilario's backside with it, "Now, sir!"
Ilario blinked, then his years of training at Sicily's magical hospital kicked in and he began scanning his patient with standard triage spells.
"He is almost dead," Ilario said as he worked. "He should be dead but somehow he is not."
The mediwizard fired a level three wound healing charm at Severus's neck wound. While the wound was sealing, Ilairo pulled open the satchel he always carried when on duty. The young mediwizard grabbed two vials of blood replenisher out of the satchel and poured the potions down Snape's healing throat.
"He had crush injuries, Signora," Ilario said while he searched though his stachel. "I have a mild bone repairing potion here but his internal organs will need extra potions."
The Headmaster's body gave a twitch and Ilario fired another charm at Snape's torso. The critically injured man's lungs filled with air when the respiration charm began to work.
Severus twitched again and the mediwizard swore in fluid Italian when Severus's heart shuddered to a halt.
"Don't you dare die!" Medusa commanded. "I forbid it." She hit Severus across the chest with her cane.
Ignoring the old witch's ranting, Ilario fired a heart massaging spell at the now-technically-dead man's heart. Three minutes later the massaging spell dissipated as Severus's heart began to pump on its own - the blood replenishing potions having given it something more to pump.
Ilario sighed and sat back on his heels, "He is alive, Signora Prince but he needs proper medical facilities to survive."
Medusa, who had remained unusually quiet though Ilario's battle to save her great-grandson's life, consulted her pocket watch. The tiny hand now pointed to a new sign which read 'living but in great danger.
oooooo
Medusa's tiny cottage at Baldoro's Retirement Village for Elderly Witches and Wizards was usually quiet when its occupant was away from home. But on this particular day it was anything but quiet. Ilario had not had time to turn off the emergency alarm before Medusa's watch had whisked him away to Britain and the alarm had performed its job well.
"Are you certain Signora Prince is not here?" the manager of the retirement village asked his companions, again.
The mediwitches both gave him their best why-are-you-asking-me-a-silly-question stares and the slimmer of the two commented, "No, Signor, there is no one."
The manager's acidic comment was interrupted by the sound of someone or something portkeying into the cottage.
The portkey deposited Ilario, Medusa and the body-bound Severus into the middle of Medusa's sitting room, Severus's frozen leg narrowly missing the manager's right foot.
Medusa stumbled slightly, regained her footing and glared at the manager, "What a surprise! You are prepared for once."
"I am always prepared, Signora Prince," the manager said pompously to the woman he considered his most aggravating tenant, and who reminded him a little too much of his fierce mother. "Did you activate your alarm?"
"Set off the alarm? Why would I do that?" The cunning old woman looked over to where her unconscious great-grandson was surounded by Mediwizard Laurencetti and the mediwitches. "Someone set off the alarm, Severus. Was it you?"
"No, Signora. A mostly-dead man cannot set off an alarm," Ilario said quellingly. "And please stop avoiding the issue."
"As if I would!" Medusa sneered dramatically and, avoiding the gaze of everyone in the room, she glided majestically and creakily from the room.
"If he survives his injuries," muttered Ilario, "I wonder, will he be able to survive her?"
End of chapter 1 of Survival.
(Updated 6 November 2009)
