Title: Snuff Out
By: Naatz
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Harry, Snape
Pairing: HP/SS
Warnings: Character death
Length: About 2,800 words
Summary: 'There had to be some other way to solve everything; some way other than death and desolation and the ruins of a room with a green bed.'
Betas: Thanks to Sesshiyuki, Mintsui, Mimiheart, Unrequitedangst, Knightmare, and those nice folk from Team Angst for beta-work. Special thanks to Rat and Karit for being helpful on certain issues. :)
Disclaimer: The victims of this 'fic are JKR's.
The clock in Harry's room ticked.
Harry lay in bed and stared at the ceiling. The silence surrounded him, emphasised by the thick, heavy, enchanting ticking.
Harry's eyes were wide open, sight fuzzy. His stomach knotted apprehensively.
If he slept, he'd dream.
The dreams were almost always the same, replaying the last moments in Dumbledore's life:
A tower.
A small amount of wind.
Green light.
And then, a great wizard falling down.
The scuttle of many feet – of Death Eaters, of a boy, of a man that Harry wished he had never met. . . .
Sometimes, the dreams changed. Those were the worst, making Harry feel like he was slipping further and further into restlessness, amplifying the constant buzz that had taken up residence at the forefront of his mind. Never stopping, never decreasing, never letting him just be.
Those dreams played scenes that never happened. Scenes that the constant buzzing in his mind had brought out:
A tower (sometimes, a room).
A small amount of wind (sometimes, maddening silence).
Green light (sometimes, the smothering of a pillow).
And then, a great wizard falling down (sometimes, a black-haired should-be-traitor hanging).
Whenever he woke up after dreaming them, his skin would be clammy. His breaths would rush out of his mouth, and his eyes would open wider than he'd ever thought possible. His stomach would churn horribly and, rushing to the toilet, he would kneel on a red rug and vomit out the buzzing, the nightmares, the discomfort.
Only then he would feel purged. Clean. Sane.
Finally, Harry's eyes fluttered shut over the hypnotising sound of the clock.
He'd been a fool to think he stood a chance.
Harry lay on a green bed with velvet sheets, listening to water dripping from the broken ceiling onto the murky, rotting floor.
Harry didn't like green.
The room would have been empty, if it weren't for a pair of black eyes that watched him from the one dry corner, wooden paleness standing out in the middle of water-stained parquet boards.
Harry wanted to ignore him.
Wanted to run.
Wanted to bury his face in the pillow under his head and not see, hoping that he wouldn't be seen either.
Instead he stood, acting braver than he felt, feet bare against the slippery wooden floor, rotting floor, dirty floor, slip-on-it-and-crack-your-skull floor, and went to the desk by the bed. With trembling fingers he fumbled the top right drawer open, finding matches.
"I know this isn't a good idea," he snapped at the silent person that was watching him.
Still, silent. Reproving. Don't do that, the eyes begged.
Harry ignored him. Opened the matchbox, tried lighting one match, but it broke. The next one slipped into a puddle on the floor. The third lit, but died in the wind that came from the holes in the ceiling and walls, a wind that caused goose-bumps to rise on his arms.
The fourth, Harry covered with his hand, cradling lightly against his bare chest. The wisp of warmth did nothing to warm him, he was that cold, but it felt good to cradle something of his own and protect it from an early death.
Careful of the tiny flame, he walked to the bed, grabbed one of the sheets, and set it on fire.
It was red, just like the plastic bowl that received the worst of the dripping. Red and orange and with a tiny stain of blue dancing in the middle.
The burning bed was warm, and Harry warmed himself.
Then he was hugged from behind, warm cloak against cold back, and his head was tucked under a chin, and something wet dripped against his hair.
It wasn't rain.
"I'm sorry," Harry heard.
His stomach clenched violently in reaction to the words, and Harry broke free of the hold, rushing to the red, plastic bowl, standing in the corner.
While he tried to regulate his breathing and not look back, he wondered what it was that hurt him.
Black silk blocked his view.
Black, because he couldn't have closed his eyes.
Black, because he was told by Snape what colour it was.
Black, matching the eyes. Matching the hair. Matching the rising cloud of despair.
Harry squirmed, and a chuckle invaded his ears, and a finger ghosted over his bare skin, then two, then three, then four, then the entire hand.
Sometimes touching, sometimes not, sometimes in between, and Harry wanted more, more, more, until he was so full of sensation he burst.
The bed under them was green, he knew, and somehow that made everything all right. When it was a bed in the colour he hated, he could do things he should have hated himself for doing.
So he did it all, and had it all done to him. At some point, the line blurred between giving and receiving, and whether they were one man or two, and between hated lust and heated pleasure
Although the blindness was nice for a time, now Harry wanted to see, so he sat up in bed and removed the blindfold.
He found that it was green.
Harry glanced uncertainly at Snape, who was lying right next to him and looking back at him, instead of looking away, ashamed of being caught lying.
The man probably enjoyed seeing Harry's expression, so widely-drawn and betrayed.
Harry threw the blindfold at Snape's chest, disgusted and sick. The red bowl in the corner was exactly what Harry needed, and so he raced to it.
After, a hand rubbed circles on his back. Harry bit back his chuckle, thinking, At least Snape deals with the consequences of his lies.
The silence stretched between them.
"You shouldn't have done it!" Harry yelled at the drawn, sallow face. His fists clenched, but before they hit any skin, they opened and slowed and simply landed softly where Harry had planned them to strike.
"No," said Snape.
Said the man who'd never stop haunting Harry.
Said the man who made Harry feel like he'd never feel comfortable if he weren't haunted by him.
"You shouldn't have," said Harry, brokenly. Instead of the accusation Harry had intended it to be, it had turned into a plea.
He didn't know whether Snape agreed with his words, because all he had said was No, and it could mean anything – that he agreed, or disagreed, or that he didn't want to have this conversation at all. If only Harry could convince himself that Snape had truly agreed. If only.
"I don't think I hate you," Harry said. "I should, but – I don't think I do."
Some emotion on Snape's face revealed itself to Harry: stoic passivity was tainted by apprehension, and all because of Harry's words.
Harry felt triumphant. He'd made a difference.
Snape said, "It would be better for all involved, if you did."
Harry was surprised that he believed in the words he said next, "I don't want to hate you."
A hesitant hand reached to Harry's cheek, so he leaned into the contact, closing his eyes.
"Then don't."
Somewhere outside their room, they found a bed that wasn't green, and everything that happened between them felt hushed and muted, like a dream.
And outside there was a storm, and inside, calm, because the bed wasn't the colour Harry despised.
Though that allowed reality to intrude. A pillow was the last thing Harry saw, because it was put over his face and he couldn't breathe, and he thought he heard a deep voice whispering, "This will make everything better."
Harry's stomach clenched and unclenched with the beating of his heart, which contracted again, and again, and again, until it stopped.
Harry was surprised when he woke to see Snape, sitting at the desk, a wand held in his hand, his eyes staring blankly at a candle on the desk's surface.
He was surprised to see, period.
Snape didn't know Harry was watching him, so he played. Lit the candle with his wand, put his hand above the flame, and then extinguished it, fingers closing swiftly on the burnt end of the wick.
Harry watched. He was lying on the bed, but didn't move, didn't speak. Didn't do anything at all.
He watched how Snape stood and faced that green bed, face paler than usual.
Harry's heart sank when Snape didn't notice him.
Harry watched how, when Snape changed his robes, the muscles danced under his sickly skin.
Harry watched, but he listened, too.
Deep breaths, too even and controlled to be natural. The normal shuffle of moving feet was absent while Snape walked.
This wasn't right, this wasn't right. This Snape wasn't right.
Snape went back to the desk, and opened the second drawer from the right. He took out something long and twisty, and Harry kept thinking, thisisn'tright, because there had to be some other way to solve everything; some way other than death and desolation and the ruins of a room with a green bed.
Snape studied what he'd taken out. Pondered. Put it back.
Then he went back to bed, steps mechanically going tap, tap, tap against the floor, only to find Harry's gaze locked on him.
Even though Snape didn't notice him earlier, he wasn't surprised. His eyes did not widen and his mouth did not curl down, nor up. He just sat down, took Harry's hand in his, and rubbed the palm for a long time in silence.
Harry said, "Please don't do it."
Snape asked, "Do you expect me to make promises?"
Harry wanted to say something, anything that would make Snape see things from his point of view.
They remained silent for a bit, Snape drawing with his fingers against Harry's palm. At some point, the contact became maddeningly painful, but Harry didn't make him stop, just let Snape's fingers brush his.
Then Snape stopped. "You should hate me," he whispered.
Harry closed his hand over Snape's. "I don't want to," he said in an equally soft voice.
A low, bitter chuckle escaped Snape. "It hardly means that you don't."
And the bed was green, and so was the worst spell Harry knew, and so were Harry's eyes, and he hated.
Himself? Snape? It hardly mattered. Not here, not now.
This wasn't real, anyhow.
Snape pulled his hand free. "You should go," he offered with sincere kindness.
"No."
"Please."
Harry shook his head. He was surprised that even after he'd stopped the motion, his vision kept swimming, just like when he'd been under the lake at Hogwarts and had swum with his eyes open.
Harry's hand shot to grab Snape's sleeve before he moved away. "No. Please don't do this."
Snape pulled his hand out of Harry's grasp again, this time forcibly. "This is not a matter in which you have a say," he said in his coldest tone, and turned his back to Harry. He strode over to the desk and took out the same twisty item from the drawer.
"You should go," he repeated himself. He unfolded the twists and knots in what he held, revealing a sheet.
Harry rose from the bed, wanting so badly to stop him that his stomach tightened. He felt sick. He looked around the room, looking for the red bowl where he knew he could vomit, and once he found it he went to it, fleeing.
Over the sound of retching, he could hear neither Snape, tying up the sheet to the ceiling like a rope, nor Snape tying it around his neck as a noose.
Once he'd finished vomiting, he thought he managed to hear the soft words "I never meant to truly hurt you," before something fell.
Harry turned around to look, wiping his mouth with his sleeve, and saw Snape, hanging from the ceiling with a broken neck, thrashing dying out.
Harry went close to the body. Punched it. Punched Snape.
"I hate you," he hissed, resting his forehead against Snape's dead stomach, in a futile attempt to keep what little that remained of the man.
"I hate you."
He couldn't possibly be crying, because there was no sound.
The clock in Harry's room still ticked by, only now accompanied by the sound of scarce traffic outdoors, along with the occasional chirp from birds.
Harry's eyes snapped wide open. His face was pale, his hands were sweaty, his breathing rushed. His stomach clenched forcefully and that made him stand, stumble on his feet to the bathroom, barely manage to close the door, and vomit.
Tears leaked out of his eyes. Harry had to blink in order to stand without tripping over his own feet.
"Potter?" he heard his uncle ask from behind the door, along with a slight rapping of the fingers.
Harry flushed the toilet. "I'll be right out," he called back, and was mortified to discover that his voice was shaking.
Angrily, Harry wiped his eyes. Puking made his eyes water, he'd recently discovered.
He brushed his teeth, spitting out the tastes of vomit and paste into the white porcelain sink, washed his face, and inhaled deeply in order to compose himself further. Only then did he walk out of the door, back to his room, so he could finish packing his bags.
The rattle on his window made Harry stop. He turned around quickly, eyes looking for any sign of danger. He breathed in relief when he discovered it was only Pig, knocking his beak impatiently on the window. He let him in.
The letter Pig carried was written in a familiar scrawl, Ron's, and its beginning read: 'Hi Harry! Happy birthday!'
Harry glanced back at the two bags, thrown on the floor, back at the letter, and then again. He shoved the letter into his pocket, and set back to filling his bags.
He wanted to be out of the Dursleys' home, never again his, as soon as possible.
Breakfast washed the stubborn hints of burning acid climbing out of his throat, and an awkward farewell to his family helped lift some of the bitterness of his childhood.
As he stepped out of the house, one bag in his hand, one on his back, wand in his pocket, he could hardly keep a smile from appearing. While the notion of not having to come here ever again made him giddy, the notion of now having to fight this war as an adult made him grim and want to hide.
Just like he'd hidden in the green bed, so hated yet still considered safe. Hid in bed and waited until Snape would make everything better, by taking either Harry or himself out of the equation. Either of those options would solve the conflict so much faster, spare tired people from fighting.
Though, if Harry died, it would mean that his side would lose. Harry didn't want that.
If Snape died, that would damage the other side; damage, but not destroy. Killing Snape would make Snape's death utterly pointless. Killing Snape would not change anything, so why even try? Maybe, because killing Snape might solve many of Harry's problems.
Harry shook his head and hastened his steps. He wanted to walk for some time before summoning the Knight Bus, to be as distant from the Dursleys' as he could.
When he decided he was in a good place to summon it, he did, and a flash came about, a flash of a storm and of whistling wind, and suddenly he was struck by a terrible thought, that maybe the dreams began because Snape had died, and that was his way of apologising.
Harry closed his eyes for a short second, during which he attempted to collect his mind.
He thought with a vengeance: Snape can't be dead. Not yet.
Snape could only die after Harry told him that he was sorry, and that he didn't hate him, and pleasedon'tdieagain, because Harry had already seen him die once, and he didn't want to repeat that experience.
When they met, Snape might ask Harry to kill him. And maybe Harry would kill him, because that would be the right thing to do.
As Harry opened his eyes, he saw the purple bus in front of him, its door opening to reveal a person whose face was friendly and welcoming, but not Stan's.
Harry climbed the steps, paid the fee, sat in his assigned seat.
He would believe that Snape was alive, and still in the Order. He would believe that Snape had done everything because he was told to. Because he was a person, and people made mistakes.
Harry wished he could make himself believe in Snape.
.end.