Fun Fact: I wrote this shot before I wrote anything else for TNT. Wait... it might have been second or third... Basically, there was a weekend in June were I got obsessed and sleep deprived and enabled by a friend of mine and produced like thirty or so pages of just... stuff.
Here. Have some stuff.
September 1991
Hermione was quite thoroughly tired of Hogwarts and said so to her Papa at least once in all her letters home. Hogwarts was just so tame. They were learning spells she and Theo had discovered ages ago in the family library and spending weeks on them! All the homework was a mere foot of parchment though she could have easily produced her own height in details and history of basic transfiguration and its effects on wizarding society. Papa had actually added on to the library for Theo's Transfiguration binge when they were eight.
Hermione and Theo had been surrounded by people underestimating them their whole lives of tutors, so under better circumstances she wouldn't have minded much. But the circumstances weren't better. She couldn't be with Theo at night because they had to sleep in different dorms. She had to share her room with petty, ignorant girls who were all far too interested in her brother too few enjoyed reading (Millie had good days and Daphne only read fashion drivel). The teachers were all impossible and openly played favorites. By far the worst, though, were the Gryffindors.
She and Theo had known they'd be in Slytherin. They'd looked forward to it. Some nights they'd even been able to coax stories from their father about the dungeons and the windows that looked out into the Black Lake. More often than not, however, the twins would be sent straight off to the library to hunt their answers down through the thickets of information among the cracked leather and old parchment which gave off such lovely smells. They'd done cursory research on the other houses, of course, just for context, but they'd always come back to Slytherin.
What the books only hinted at was how truly awful the other houses could be. Especially the crimson cretins in Gryffindor. The youngest Weasley boy who tagged after Potter was the worst. He'd somehow achieved the quintessential balance between ignorance, intolerance, stubbornness, and obnoxiousness. Hermione and Theo decided after the first night to support Draco's obsession (within reason) if it meant the auburn atrocity would also suffer and the dynamic Lion duo gave endless opportunities to make their lives difficult.
They seemed equally capable of skiving out of trouble, which was the problem.
Thus, Hermione found herself, her twin, and her oldest friend at a dead end with Filch and his mangy cat after them. Potter and Weasley had gotten away. Again.
"Do you suppose they'll expel us?" Theo asked idly, though Hermione was familiar enough with the set of his shoulders and the darting quality in his dark blue eyes to know he was nervous.
"They can't. My father won't let them," Draco snapped back. He was much less adept at controlling himself under pressure and seemed inches from bolting pell mell down the corridor.
Hermione grit her teeth against an eye roll. Hogwarts was tedious, but the library here was better than the one at home and she wasn't going to put Theo through Papa's disappointment. "Shut up and let me think the both of you! We are only out of bed, they can't prove we were doing anything else, or went anywhere restricted. We can't prove beyond our own testimonies Potter and Weasley were out of bed too... If Filch catches us he has to take us to Snape, which, won't necessarily be pleasant…"
"He's my godfather! He can't hurt us!"
"Shut up Draco," Theo murmured, his eyes on his sister's and practically glowing.
"But Filch only has the word of his stupid cat… And everyone knows he's paranoid… If he can't find us he can't punish us. He didn't see either of you did he?" Her eyes bored into Draco. Theo was better than even she at not being seen.
"I don't think so," Draco whined.
"Then we can still get out. Theo… do you think we can do a Disillusionment?"
Her twin's eyes were reluctant, but after a moment he shrugged. "Experimenting with magic gives us a reason, if anything."
Hermione nodded once. "Then do me first."
Filch was so close they could hear his uneven breathing and limping scuffle. Theo's eyes darkened in displeasure, but he didn't object. He would have preferred his first attempt at an advanced spell to have a more blond subject, but knew better than to say so. He took a deep breath and rapped Hermione on the head once with his wand. She felt the cold ooze down and over her, but it didn't seem to want to spread to the right half of her body. Theo's eyes widened, horrified. "We're so dead…"
Hermione raised her hands before her eyes, she could see three of the fingers holding her wand in her right hand and only her thumb on her left. Theo was right. They were dead.
Draco panicked openly now. "What did you do!?" he hissed, "Snape'll kill us for sure! Not to mention what your father'll do! This is all Potter's fault! If he hadn't challenged me to that duel…"
"You challenged him," Theo reminded the boy absently, as he carefully prodded her and pet her hair reassuringly like they had when they were little.
"He made me challenge him! With his scar and his stupid, arrogant face…"
"This is not the time, Malfoy!" Hermione hissed as Filch rounded the corner, wheezing.
"A HA!" he crowed, his untempered glee making his already ugly face uglier. "Caught you, you little delinquents! And attempting dangerous spells too!" He limped toward them, his rheumy eyes thrilled with their assessment of the half visible Hermione. "Thought I wouldn't catch you! Thought you could just tear around and destroy school property! HA! We'll see what the deputy headmistress has to say!"
Hermione's eyes, well the visible eye, flashed to Theo's. He was way ahead of her, a smile barely brushing the corners of his mouth. She released a relieved breath. Now they just had to keep Draco in line.
Which was not going to be easy. A cornered Draco never was.
"What?!" the blond yelped, before Hermione elbowed him hard in the ribs. He yelped again, but quieted at her glare.
Filch wasn't paying very close attention. He was fully occupied with his gloating. "Three nasty little snakes slithering the hallways! Attacked a student! Caused extensive damage to school property! It's Christmas come early! Hurry up, you!" He snarled back, a grin stretching his thin lips over crooked yellow teeth. "Gotta get along to the sentencing. They'll probably expel you all! Three less to deal with! Or better they'll finally let me handle punishments! Dumbledore is too soft..."
Hermione nodded to Theo. It would be more natural if he began. They couldn't count on Draco, so it wouldn't be perfect, but it would be better than the McGonagargoyle.
"He's taking us to McGonagall, did he say?" Theo hissed, just loud enough for Filch to think he heard them talking, but not too loud that he could make out the words. They needed him suspicious first.
It worked.
Filch shot them a glare over his shoulder, but kept walking. He wasn't muttering about chains anymore.
"Yeah," Hermione whispered back. She wasn't looking at her twin. She was yelling 'keep quiet' to Draco as loud as she possibly could with her one visible eye. "We're lucky, but shut up or he'll hear you!"
"At least he isn't taking us to Snape!"
"Shh!" Hermione hissed. Draco wore a mean smile he was smart enough to hide before Filch spun around to glare at them. Theo quailed passably before his imagined terribleness, but Draco had smelt victory. They'd have to compensate for him.
The cogs in Filch's brain obviously chugged through his options. "Little snakes, aren't they, my sweet?" He murmured to his stupid cat. Hermione hadn't noticed the dusty thing trailing along behind the little group like a rear guard. "Little snakes musn't be taken to the lion tamer should they? Lion tamers can't deal with snakes…" Hermione tried to blanch her face.
Theo burst out, "But that's where you said you'd take us!"
"Silence! No, no, my sweet. It's off to Severus for this lot… Yes, Snape will do nicely… He always had the right idea about discipline.. Yes…"
Hermione wasn't satisfied with the caretaker's convictions. "No! Please! Not Professor Snape!" Theo sent her a look for her gauche theatrics, but picked up the thread anyway. He really was a good brother.
"You said we were going to Professor McGonagall! You said she was in charge of this kind of thing!" Filch had said no such thing, of course, but given the way he'd gone on about how he wanted to be in charge of punishment, it seemed the right place to prod. Theo had always been better at rooting out the best angles to exploit. "If Professor McGonagall is in charge you can't take us to another teacher!" He'd leveled enough outrage and indignation into his voice to get Filch's dander up and make him contradictory. He'd take them to Snape just because Theo had all but ordered him not to.
"I'm sure Professor Snape will be very interested in why members of his own house don't think he has the right to discipline them. Now move!" Filch herded the three smug first years along in the opposite direction behind Mrs. Norris with her dust colored tail held high.
"My father is going to kill me," Draco mock wailed to himself. The three exchanged smirks at Filch's mean snigger, before returning the woebegone looks to their faces. It wasn't the McGonagargoyle, but it was still Snape.
The Potion Master's office was as horribly fascinating as his classroom. The stone walls were dark and dank, the fire in the grate casting more shadows than light. The three candles on the desk had melted and mutated into a misshapen lump of towering drips and liquid valleys. The tiny flames cast light over the papers Snape marked when they trooped in behind Filch. Snape never looked happy, but at least he only looked bored and annoyed now.
"Pardons Professor," Filch said, his respectful tone too gleeful to be effective. "But I caught these three in a second floor corridor experimenting with dark magic, so of course I brought them straight to you. I also have reason to believe they damaged the Trophy Room."
Snape's boredom and annoyance intensified. "Yes. Thank you, Mr. Filch. I will deal with them accordingly," Filch didn't move. Snape's black eyes flicked from the three Slytherins to the caretaker's beaming face. "Perhaps you could go and see if there are any other students… wandering." His voice was deadly soft, but Hermione felt better with him than with the prejudiced old lioness. He probably wouldn't expel them… Filch stamped out, sulking.
"Would any of you care to explain why Miss Nott is only half visible?"
"That was my fault Professor, sir," Theodore stepped forward.
"No it wasn't! I told you to do it!" She was not about to let him take the fall for this.
"Silence, Miss Nott," Snape said. His voice still soft. Hermione fell silent.
"Hermione and I thought we'd cast disillusionment charms to get past Mr. Filch, sir. We've read about them, you see, and they seemed simple enough… But in the heat of the moment, with Mr. Filch around the corner, I failed to execute the charm correctly, sir."
Snape leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers. His black eyes swept over Hermione before one of his hands produced a wand from his robes and flicked it at her.
She reappeared instantly.
"Thank you, sir," her tone only held the slightest trace of the begrudging feelings in her head.
Snape seemed to be able to sense them, but turned to Draco. "Mr. Malfoy, you are neither partially disillusioned, nor implicated in the illicit casting. Perhaps you'd care to tell me your part in this ill timed excursion?"
"I just came to watch, sir. They said they'd teach me," Draco told his shoes.
"Mr. Filch mentioned damage to the Trophy Room. Tell me, Mr. Malfoy, did your travels this evening happen to meander in that direction?" Snape's eyes glittered. He knew something.
"No, sir," Draco replied stoutly, this time meeting the Professor's gaze and holding it.
Snape withdrew his scrutiny and leaned back once more. Through the dark curtains of his hair, his black eyes moved restlessly between the three of them, probing constantly. "I find I am disinclined to believe the three of you," he declared quietly. "If you three were the only ones wandering the second floor corridors this evening, yet never came near the Trophy Room on the fourth floor, which Mr. Filch said was 'torn up', or near the third floor corridor on the right hand side, which I know was tampered with… I'm sure clever students like you seem to be so misguided in thinking you are, can understand my dilemma."
"Potter and Weasley were out too!" Draco burst out. Hermione sighed and reminded herself Draco was her oldest friend outside of her brother and one does not beat sense into one's oldest friends. Especially in plain view of authority figures.
Snape pounced. "You have proof of this?"
Hermione silently begged Merlin and Salazar for Draco to not be stupid enough to tell Snape about the intended duel.
Merlin and Salazar seemed to be listening because Draco muttered, "No, sir, not exactly."
Snape regarded him coolly for a few moments, before moving to Theodore. "And you, Mr. Nott? Do you have any light to shed on my dilemma?"
"No, sir, Professor. It's like I said. Hermione and I snuck out with Draco to practice disillusioning in the second floor corridor. We were just starting when Filch waylaid us and delivered us to you." Hermione wanted to smirk. Her brother truly was a genius. Draco shot him a betrayed look Theo didn't acknowledge.
Snape considered him for a moment more before switching to Hermione. "And you, Miss Nott? You have nothing further to add?"
Hermione made her eyes wide. "Sir! The third floor corridor on the right hand side is forbidden to all who do not wish to die a very painful death!" she heard her brother choke back a snort next to her, "Sir, I most certainly do not want to die a very painful death. I'm a Slytherin, sir!" Snape's cheek twitched. Theo had coughing fit into a handkerchief he produced from his pocket. "Sir," she continued more carefully, because somehow Potter and Weasley'd squirmed their way out of this and it could not be allowed. "You say the forbidden corridor was tampered with, which means it was tampered with," she stated plainly. Snape watched her, his face a perfect mask. "Sir… if they've tampered there once… perhaps it is conceivable they may tamper there again? I know dull minds once provoked to danger, often return… I understand it's a component of bravery?" They stared levelly at each other for several seconds longer than what might be considered normal before Hermione demurred, "Of course, I might be wrong," She turned meek eyes to the floor. The room breathed. Her eyes flashed up to his under her lashes, "But I doubt you are, sir."
All breathing stopped.
Originally the twins and Draco were going to be much better friends, and the story was going to focus more on them as a Slytherin trio rather than Harry's... Harry-ness. However, my beta is a Hufflepuff and doesn't like it when Voldy wins outright (or Draco in general) and I do try to keep her happy as she is the one suffering through my every sentence... So that plot got shot. It's a shame, really. I sort of liked how Snape turned out here. He's kinda an asshole in TNT... Thoughts?