No one knows why Severus Tobias Snape acts the way he does. Even those who claim to know him (READ: Albus Dumbledore) fail miserably at the task, only succeeding as far as he will let them (Well he couldn't be the world's best Occlamist for nothing was he?). He keeps his robes layered and buttoned, his attitude cruel and undesirable, and his words harsh and lethal: shields to hide from the world that which no potion could ever fix. At one time he would have denied that, even managing to back it up with five potions, all thoroughly researched, that would do the task for him temporarily. However none of the five could be used for very long without severe consequences and three of them were illegal, the fourth could only be used before the intended recipient of the potion was born and was highly frowned upon in society (not that Severus actually CARED about that…), and the fifth had a 95% chance of killing the drinker and had been created accidentally in the 1500s by an apprentice brewer who was learning how to make poisons. What pray tell was everyone's favorite greasy dungeon bat of Hogwarts hiding?

His gender of course…or lack of one.

You see Severus Tobias Snape wasn't your average male with a flat chest, appendix between his legs, and stronger build. However he also wasn't your average female either. He was what he had come to know as the definition of a freak…

….He was a hermaphrodite.

As a kid it was one of the main reasons Tobias beat him and though she never allowed herself to actually do so Severus could tell Eileen wanted to cry at the sight of him, seeing her child as a mistake and a failure. The situation only got worse when he started showing signs of accidental magic, Tobias deciding that meant Severus was old enough to be whipped properly with his belt. When he went to Hogwarts he was terrified of being found out. He might have been able to pass himself off as a girl, if not for his prick, but being raised at Spinner's End made that nearly impossible to pass off. Tobias Snape had a son. It didn't matter that the child was half female, if he had to put up with freakishness then that freakishness would be from a boy. Severus looked up every way he could possibly fix himself but never found a permanent solution. Ending up taking the risk of glamoring himself every morning and hoping it didn't blow up in his face.

Surprisingly it didn't.

Though he still had to deal with the fact he would never truly belong to a gender. It was worse once he hit puberty in his third year and the fact he would forever be a freak slapped him in the face. What normal male, mundane OR wizard, has a period? He watched the others with envy boys and girls alike. How they could change their clothes in front of each other and do so many things that HE couldn't because He wasn't LIKE THEM. How the girls flirted, wore dresses, put on make-up (Not that he didn't wear any but his was for the functional use of hiding the evidence his clothes refused to conceal. They wore it simply to make themselves feel pretty, something he couldn't risk doing due to the consequences it might bring.), and didn't have to bind their chests so tightly it hurt to breathe occasionally dislocating a rib in the process. How the boys didn't have to second guess their every thought or action, talked about girls, quittage, and getting laid not feeling at all out of place while doing so, took their shirts off around others, and became more masculine in looks with every passing year.

Why couldn't HE? Why couldn't HE join in the gossip circle with Lilly and her friends or the conversations the other Slytherin girls were having. Why couldn't HE complain about cramps and boys and actually put work into his appearance that made him look even slightly standard instead of purposefully making his well-below- standard looks even worse to hide the fact that the only things he got from Tobias was his nose and his scars. Thus making being even slightly feminine out of the question since before she married Tobias at eighteen and diminished due to the abuse Eileen had been one of the most proud, wild, beautiful witches of her year.

But he had managed. Managed to wake up every morning to a reflection he despised. Managed to keep every little thing about him locked up and hidden so well no one could find out. Managed to move on with his life no matter how much fate seemed to hate him and enjoy putting him through hell. He managed through Spinner's End, through being shorted into Slytherin, through the bullying of the Marauders, through losing his first friend and the one person he considered his family due to a stupid mistake made out of fear, through Eileen dying from the abuse at Spinner's End during his fifth year at Hogwarts, through Tobias raping him once he returned that summer, through the first wizarding war, through Lilly's death, through knowing it was his fault she was, through seeing her eyes look up at him every day at school since Potter started his first year, through becoming a spy for Dumbledore yet again, through being in love with Sirius Orion Black.

But as this was him, fate had to once again ruin his life.

It happened one night in the summer before Harry Potter's fifth year at Hogwarts. It can be blamed on a lot of people for any number of reasons. Dumbledore insisting that all of the Order members, excluding Dumbledore himself, live at Grimwald Place. Voldemort finding out he was a spy and whoever tipped him off. Himself for being a freak. Poppy for needing help healing him. Molly for over-reacting and thus drawing even more attention… so many things added up all at once to destroy what semblance of a stable life Severus had somehow managed to claim for himself. Could whatever power above that existed take pity on him just this once and allow him to stop breathing before they realize he is awake?

Nope, of course not, where would the fun be in that?

So now he lay in a bed at Grimwald Place alone and listening for the usual chaos that had come to be expected at the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix…

The tight binds on his chest replaced by snug gauze that did nothing in regards to hiding the existence of his shame, his pitch black downy soft hair clean of the oil he usually puts in it for several reasons, and his body lying exposed to the world without any of his glamor charms in place.

…but for once Grimwald Place is full of not chaos but a deadly calm silence.