Disclaimer: I sort of own Rick. That's about it. It's fanfiction. I'm not even sure a disclaimer is necessary.

The wind blew chilly and unforgiving, gushing through the missing shingles into the rickety hut. The sea roared furiously around it, spraying the faded wooden walls and adding to the hollow whistling of the wind. Inside, two men were huddled around an elegant round table, covered with a tasteful green and silver cloth that rippled gently around the table's spindly ebony legs.

Leave it to Snape to conjure the most inappropriate kind of furniture in any given situation, thought Sirius, shifting slightly in his uncomfortable chair, whose tall back rest and equally spindly legs matched the style of the table. Though if he starts making green and silver drapes I'm going to have to stage an intervention.

Fortunately, no thought of further adding to the decorations seemed to enter Snape's mind, as he contemplated the exquisite metalwork of the diadem in front of him, still beautiful in spite of the gaping, blackened crack Sirius had cleaved through the magnificent oval sapphire.

'Such a shame, though, that the Dark Lord should choose something so utterly perfect for a purpose so terrible...'

Sirius looked alarmed. He decided to direct the conversation towards more practical matters before any though of drape, curtain or veil could be formulated.

'Right, so that leaves us with just one, yes?'

'Don't be so relentlessly optimistic, Black.' Snape seemed to snap out of a daze. 'That snake is better protected than any of the others. Not to mention the fact that we can't use the same method as before. I, for one, am rather fond of my limbs. A sentiment I'm sure you can empathise with.'

They both cast a wary glance at the small goblin-made dagger they had been stabbing various objects with for the past year or so. Sure, it was very practical for reassuringly unmoving items – Sirius shuddered to imagine how much more difficult their task would have become if Hufflepuff's cup had suddenly sprouted legs and he'd had to keep stabbing at it across one of Snape's delicate wooden tables – but when it came to 12 feet long venomous snakes, it didn't quite seem up to the task.

'All right, then, we'll get a bigger sword' Sirius suggested, hoping that the issue would be settled quickly and he could finally go to bed.

'Really, Black, we've been through this before, we've had more than enough trouble finding that dagger as it is. Besides, kindly remember that this was a year ago. Nowadays, I doubt we'd be able to find as much as a genuine goblin-made hairpin.'

Sirius could see his dreams of slumber shatter before him. And he was making unintentional sleep-related puns. Snape had probably picked up on his weakness, as he was quick to deliver the final blow in his customary sadistic fashion.

'Of course, even if we do happen to stumble across the sword of Gryffindor itself tomorrow, lying about in a pond, for instance, there would still be the slight matter of acquiring more Basilisk venom.'

Ah. That. Yes. Sirius had somehow completely forgotten how much time and energy they had spent finding even a very small vial of Basilisk venom and someone who was willing to part with it – for a small fortune. How dangerous it had been leaving the country right under Voldemort's massive serpentine nostrils once they'd finally come to terms with the idea that the only such provider lived in Kashmir. They only had a few drops left, they'd used most of it on the dagger, so anything as large as a sword was out of the question.

'Are you sure we can't just Avada Kedavra it?' Sirius asked hopefully.

'Are you willing to risk it?'

Damn.

'Feed it the remaining venom, perhaps?'

'Yes, Snape, brilliant, go right ahead and sneak past Vold – enbrau, carrying poisoned snacks for his pet.'

He'd stopped himself from triggering the Taboo just in time. And didn't he just have to finish the name off with the one thing that sounded unmistakably like a beer. Snape already thought he was a fledgling alcoholic.

'How about if we fling Daggy at it real hard?' he suggested quickly. Daggy was the nickname he'd given their Horcrux destroyer. Although, he suddenly realised, The Destroyer would've been even better. 'Come to think of it, we still have enough venom for an arrowhead. Or, for that matter, we could just shoot it in the face.'

'Cocksure as always, Black' came the scathing response, 'and assuming we miss? We'll have wasted the last of our Basilisk venom, and we'd be left standing defenceless in the midst of a few dozens angry Death Eaters and their none too pleased master. And, of course, a gigantic, peeved off snake.'

'Oh, come off it, Snape, we're going to have to get close to it if we're going to kill it. And, you know, Vol – the Great Big Snake Man, too, eventually, which, if you'll recall, is rather the whole point of this little operation.'

At least that hadn't sounded like any type of alcohol he was familiar with. A bizarre '80s dance, perhaps, but he could live with that.

'I am perfectly aware of that,' Snape retorted, frowning slightly – perhaps he wasn't fond of dancing? – 'but I'm also quite partial to surviving this experiment of ours for as long as possible. Therefore, I'd rather go in this with odds slightly better than one in a million.'

Sirius didn't really hear a word of that, as his tired brain was busy playing 'Do the great big snake man, yes, he's the great big snake man, follow the great big snake man, yes, he'll kill you and he'll hurt you, but that's all part of the fun when you follow the great big snake man, yes, he's the great big snake man'.

A few hours later, they had still gotten nowhere, as their plans varied from reckless ('What if we used that last bit of Polyjuice we've got to sneak in Vol-Pink-Eye's heavily guarded camp so we can just stab the thing to death'), to mind-bogglingly elaborate ('Perhaps we could Imperius a few Death-Eaters, one to distract the Dark Lord – no, not with juggling, Black – while another one could undo the protective spells, and then perhaps Fawkes might be able to bring the snake to us, whereupon we could petrify it and then stab it'), to down-right idiotic ('Ah, let's just somehow get someone who has so far consistently acted like an unreliable-though-well-meaning-and-sort-of-endearing sidekick to just lop the thing's head off, and we'll figure something out afterwards').

'If we were to somehow draw it away from the Dark Lord, lure it to an unguarded place, then perhaps we might stand a chance' Severus suggested, his eyes half-closed.

'Oh, bugger it, let's just send a mongoose.'

At the very least, this seemed to jerk Snape wide awake.

This, in turn, alarmed Sirius enough to make him realise what he had just said.

'A really big mongoose' he suggested, feebly.

Snape stared.

'No, a really massive mongoose! And it'd be... it'd be all magical and stuff! And we could paint its teeth with Basilisk venom ...' He trailed off.

Snape continued to stare in disbelief.

'Black' he started, patiently, 'we've been doing this for over a year. We've been fighting this war for twenty. Tell me, how come you're still alive?'

However, Sirius was beginning to take this, well, seriously. He'd been half-asleep when he'd made the suggestion, but now that he thought about it, he could see it had certain advantages. He stood up and began pacing.

'No, look, hear me out. It's perfect! It's the most idiotic plan in the history of wizardkind! And that includes that idea I had in fifth year about James Potter and the bassoon! Which is precisely why Lord Volkswagen won't expect it! Those spells he's put around the snake, surely they're designed to keep off a wizard, not an animal!'

Snape gave him a blank look.

'What's a Volkswagen?'

'No idea, I think it's a Muggle broomstick or something. Look, surely we can find a magic mongoose, if there are huge magic snakes out there, there must also be huge magic mongooses – mongeese? – to hunt them! And – er ... do teeth absorb venom?'

'Not unless they're goblin-made teeth, no. And how many mongooses have you met who can afford goblin-made fillings?'

Sirius's eyebrows shot up. Had Snape just made a joke? Under normal circumstances, this would be cause for celebration, he'd throw him a party and demand the Ministry declare that day a national holiday. Then again, the Ministry was currently being run by murderous lunatics, so he figured he'd leave that for until after they'd saved the world.

'All right. I have a Plan' he announced, gravely.

Snape groaned. He knew from experience that whatever Sirius Black deemed 'a plan' was liable to land anyone remotely involved in St. Mungo's for weeks.

'Though I've a feeling you won't like it.'

He tensed. This...this was going to be really bad. Never before had Black formulated anything so over-the-top batshit crazy that even he himself could understand the insanity of it.

Black took a deep breath.

'All right. We find a magic mongoose – if it isn't big enough, we just enlarge it, the charm should last a few hours, certainly long enough. And then...' He sighed. 'I'm afraid we'll have to melt Daggy. I've grown quite attached to it, but there's no way around it. Right, here comes the tricky bit. We pull the mongoose's teeth out and we replace them with the ones we'll fashion out of bits of venom-soaked Daggy.'

Snape rested his head on his fist, staring, unaware that, for the first time in his life, his mouth hung open. He blinked.

'We could call it Rikki Tikki Daggy...' Black added, tentatively.

'You want' (he cleared his throat, his voice had gone slightly raspy) 'to get out of the country once again, to go in search of a creature that probably doesn't exist, in order to pull out all its teeth and replace them with dentures you can't make, fashioned out of a goblin-forged artefact which you couldn't work with even if your experience with metalwork was more extensive than just melting a considerable number of my cauldrons?'

'Yes.'

'And then top it all off with a truly god-awful pun?'

'Yes...?'

'Good. You're insane. Goodbye.'

He stood up and made for the door. The man had clearly finally snapped, he was a danger to himself and, more importantly, to Severus. He was getting out of there as soon as possible.

'No, no, wait. Look, we're both tired, let's sleep on it, and see what brilliant ideas you come up with tomorrow.'

Severus wavered. Sleep, yes, he was indeed familiar with the term. He even seemed to remember a time when he indulged in it every day. Grudgingly, he had to admit to himself he'd probably get splinched if he tried to Apparate. And that would be excruciatingly embarrassing. He stayed.

In the morning, however, he was dismayed to find he really couldn't come up with anything at all. His mind had drawn a complete blank. The only thing a few hours of sleep had done for him was to make him realise he couldn't leave Black alone. He'd get caught and tell the Dark Lord everything, presumably in a mad attempt to get him to explode out of sheer bewilderment. They'd done some fairly mad things in their time – it was unavoidable, really, sanity was not an option when working with Black – but nothing so far had been even half as ludicrous as this mongoose scheme. Black would probably capitalise that.

Although... Between all the mad bits, Black had made a very good point. The Dark Lord most certainly wouldn't expect it. There really wouldn't be any wards against an animal. He briefly considered skipping the mongoose part and suggesting Black do it as a dog, but then he realised he probably wouldn't be too keen on getting all his teeth pulled out. Then again, neither would the mongoose, but at least it wouldn't whine about it. And they would, obviously, do it to a thoroughly unconscious, heavily anesthetised mongoose...

It would probably even be grateful, how many creatures could honestly claim to have metal teeth? Though the well-being of the mongoose (which would never, by any means, be known as Rikki Tikki Daggy as long as Severus drew breath) was of very little consequence. But the possibility of destroying the last of the Dark Lord's Horcruxes was indeed tantalising...

Was he really considering it? Could his Slytherin cunning have failed him so definitively that he would even for a second contemplate agreeing to what was certainly going to earn Black one of those rather fetching nicknames – Uric the Oddball, Barnabas the Barmy, Sirius the Severely Disturbed? Still, he supposed, it couldn't hurt to check if perhaps, by some bizarre twist of fate, there might actually be such a thing as magic mongooses. He winced. Severus Snape the Psychopathic Slytherin it was. At least he'd probably get a painting. Scowling, he kicked Black awake.

'If we are indeed to pay any heed to this mongoose fantasy of yours, we need to approach it rationally.'

And Black grinned a sleepy, yet nauseatingly self-satisfied grin.

I wanted to title this Harry Potter and the Massive Mongoose, but it gave away my amazing, original, unforeseeable plot. Also, there's no Harry Potter in it. So I could have technically called it 'and the', but ... Ack, you see where the trouble lays? I still believe it would make an awesome title for a novel, though.