Disclaimer; I don't own harry Potter nor am i making money off this... I do own a cat named McAllitster though

The Third Parent; Chapter 2

It had been at least a day since Dudley had sent for help. He had managed somehow to disinfect and dress Harry's self inflicted injury but he couldn't make himself stitch it up. It would have to wait for a doctor or whatever the freak wizard equivalent was for that to be done. He made sure that Harry was close by at all times as he still had yet to regain any semblance of sanity. He hadn't injured himself any further but that was not for lack of trying. In the last day he had tried to jump off the roof (Dudley still wasn't certain how he had gotten up there), drown himself in a tub, and fry himself in the oven and any other manner of suicide that was possible. He had even tried to hang himself with on of his father's ties. It was all Dudley could do to keep him from offing himself every chance he got. He even took his wand away. If Dudley had learned one thing about Harry over the years it was that he could run fast. It only took the last day for him to add determined to that list as well. It took everything he had to force his skinny and seemingly weak cousin into a nice bottle green outfit. He thought that maybe they were called robes.

It was around noon when a loud knock interrupted his thoughts about the forthcoming school year and what he would do without his mum and dad to pay for his things. He tried to get Harry to stand and walk willingly but he wound up dragging him over to the door anyway. He somehow managed to hold onto Harry as he made a run for the door that Dudley had opened. The first thing that Dudley thought was that Halloween had come early and an adult dressed up as a vampire was standing on the doorstep.

"Who are you?"

"I would be Professor Severus Snape, Mr. Potter's potions teacher. That would make you Dudley Dursley, the only person in this household who finally chose to give a rat's ass about him. So tell me where your mom and dad are?"

"They've left; I don't think that they'll be coming back."

"They abandoned you? Why?"

"Because I protected Harry from them, it might not have helped that I also sent a letter to Dumbledore."

"Indeed. And that skinny lump in the green robes who is currently talking to himself must be Mr. Potter. Correct?"

"Yes, he is." Dudley was beginning to really not like this man. What was he thinking? He should have gotten help from that red haired family. They seemed to like Harry.

"Very well, I'll need to pack his stuff. His room is at the top of the stairs?"

"Yes, it has a deadbolt and a large hole in the door."

Dudley watched as the man left. He really didn't trust him but what else could he do? He sat down and held his cousin closer to him to keep him from running off. He ignored his mumbling, it never meant anything these days.

Professor Snape had just managed to walk around a large mess of human waste when he sawHarry's Cousin Dudleyholding him. Normally he would have laughed his ass off at the remarkably banal sentiments that he was displaying. But he thought better of it. No, if he was going to be looking after that useless lump despite his better judgment he was going to need someone to help him. It might just as well be that cousin of his as anyone else. He quickly packed Harry's things, retrieved the letter that Harry had gotten from his 'father', and then went to Dudley's room and shrank everything that he owned, and there was a lot of it, and put it in his largest suitcase. It was rather large, thankfully, and held everything quite well. He didn't bother with the broken things in the other room, but he did notice the knives on the hallway's floor so he included them. He briskly walked back downstairs, with everything properly shrunk and in his pockets, and stopped in front of Dudley.

"Well, come on then, time to leave." Dudley stared at him with his little piggy eyes before he blurted out, "You mean I'm coming too?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact you are. I already have your stuff packed as well as Harry's."

"Really? Where is it?"

"I shrunk all of it and put it in my pocket. I didn't bother with the broken things; we'll just let your parents deal with them when they get back. Come on, no reason to stay and gawk is there." With that he turned his back and led the way out the door. He didn't bother to check that the boy was following with Harry in his arms. He knew he would be.

Dudley followed the man; he had given up trying to drag Harry and instead chose to carry him. It was rather difficult, but not because of the weight, because Harry just would not stop struggling. Dudley had never noticed how wiry Harry was before. Even weakened with starvation he was still nearly impossible to hold onto. The tall man led them to a coach that looked like it had come straight out of the Victorian era. It was large, stately and made out of rosewood. Dudley followed him into it. As soon as Dudley sat down he felt the coach start to move, only it felt as if it was flying, not rolling along on pavement. Dudley looked out the window and saw the clouds pass by.

"We're flying!" He immediately regretted stating the obvious as the Professor sneered at him.

"Very observant, obviously Harry's skill at observation has been honed over the years to a very dull edge from being forced to co-habitat with a group of ignoramus since he was a child." Dudley flushed with embarrassment. They sat in awkward silence a moment before the man spoke up again.

"Sorry about that, I am generally not very good at relating to people. I occasionally forget that what I find everyday and obvious is usually out of the ordinary for people who happen to be muggles." Dudley did not know what to say at first. This man didn't strike him as the kind who usually apologized for anything.

"Erm- well that's all right I suppose. No point in getting hung up on the past."

They sat in silence for the next couple of hours.

Severus Snape was astonished at how easily the muggle recovered from his spiteful yet wholly honest comment. The boy had forgiven him almost immediately and all it took was some hackneyed clichéd apology with a sincere voice. He was thankful that Harry, at least, managed to retain a healthy suspicion of most people. He really was going to have to work on him, though, now that he was his 'son'. It would not do to allow him to be too trusting or ignorant. Speaking of him, he was currently curled up on the floor in a ball muttering. He really did not know how this boy could have gone insane so precisely when he had just lost the protection charms. The legendary insanity that his family seemed to be plagued with had ended well over a thousand years ago. It turned out to be a rather nasty practical joke that the perpetrator had not managed to remove before he ungraciously died. Of course it was only poetic justice that he had died at the hands of the first Snape to be cursed with the insanity. It wore off over time and now his family was perfectly sane. Not counting his father, but it really wasn't so much a case of insanity as it was of him being a git. No insanity could account for him so enjoying the prospect of causing pain of the physical nature to his family.

"So, Harry tried to kill himself?"

"Huh? Yes, he actually did cut himself very badly. I can't stitch him there though."

"Where?"

"You know, there." The boy indicated with his hesitancy that it was his privates he was referring to. Snape turned the boy over and tried to examine him but he kept himself curled up. Finally he enlisted the muggle boys help to keep him still. The boy held Harry down by the shoulders as Severus examined the wound. It was disinfected, clearly the muggle had some experience with first aid, and it required healing. It would be a simple matter for him. He knew every kind of healing charm by heart and its effects as well as the best ones for wounds from knives or wounds in a sensitive area. He felt it prudent to know these as his line of work frequently lead to the need of one or several more of them. He of course meant teaching potions as if he were injured in his other line of work odds were that he would be dead before he could get a chance to use them. He used the most appropriate one for Harry's self-inflicted wound and allowed the boy to curl up into a ball again. He sat and stared out the window as they rode in silence. He had a son. His son was nearly 16 years old. His son hated him. He hated his son.

Oh yes, he knew that Harry was his son. He vividly recalled the morning after his one night stand with James. He had woken up feeling blurry from the effects of the alcohol, but he felt immensely satisfied nonetheless. It was the kind of satisfaction that you could only get after a wild night of sex. He woke up and the first thing he had noticed was his utter lack of clothing. He felt pleased as that meant that he had engaged in some kind of debauchery, and that really was his favorite kind of activity. He had rolled over to drape an arm around his 'lover' and had noticed that it was a man. He didn't mind. He actually enjoyed his own gender as much as the other gender when it came to matters of a sexual nature. He was an equal opportunity slut after all. He had gotten as close to this random stranger as physics would allow, and had buried his face in the back of the mans head. He enjoyed his smell, like dirt and earth and spice. It really was an arousing scent. He had started to grab at the man's body when he had woken up. Severus didn't mind at first because that most likely meant that he would have someone to play with. Then the man had started to swear a blue streak. Severus didn't mind he quite often used profanity himself in the bedroom. Of course when the man got up and turned around anything remotely like arousal fled Severus' mind. He had had sex with James Potter, the bullying git that had made his life hell. He stared at Severus; Severus stared at him. Then the yelling had started.

"What the hell do you think you're doing here?"

"Me? What about you? I live here!"

"Jesus crapping god! Please don't tell me that we had sex!"

"Yes, unfortunately we did, now if you'll please leave I have to burn everything in this room, expholiate every square inch of my body that came into contact with yours, and seriously consider how best to shave off my body hair without nicking anything sensitive."

"Oh god no! What the hell are we going to do? This was not supposed to happen. It was supposed to be Sirius, not you."

"What the hell are you prattling on about? Don't tell me that Lily condones you being on the sly with your pal."

"Well she kind of has to as we are attempting to have a child via the third parent charm."

"… Shit…"

"My thoughts exactly. God I hope that this hasn't resulted into anything developing. I don't know if I could kill it if it has."

Snape had fled to the bathroom after that and had stayed there until he heard James leave. He didn't hear from the man again until two weeks later a letter arrived telling him that he did not have to worry about having a son.

So it turned out that they had leaded him on with false information and that he did indeed have a child. The possibility had occurred to him several times throughout the years. Especially when it turned out that Harry was good at defense against the dark arts. He definitely didn't get it from James; Lily while good was not a genius at it. So in his mind Severus convinced himself that it was from Black's side, after all hadn't James told him that Black was supposed to have been the whelp's father? Black's family was legendary in the dark arts. It was also easier to tell himself that it was Black's child, not his, since he couldn't see any trace of his family in the child, and Snape had been jealous; he had wanted to have a child. One that was good at the dark arts as well as being popular and good at quidditch. He did however want one that had the run of Slytherin house, not god bloody Gryffindor. But Harry wasn't a Black; he was a Snape. Apparently James couldn't kill the embryo, as he should have since its other father was an unwanted quantity. He had constantly squashed the tiny little voice in his head that had been telling him that Harry was his. It had been easy in the first year. Everything that he couldn't explain away as either James or Lily had to be Black. Over the years it had become more difficult to convince himself that Harry was Black's child. He could say that Harry's tendency to have words with anyone who raised his ire was from James but he knew that James wasn't likely to do anything like that, nor was Black. They were more the hex now and hex later then hex again for good measure types. Although he had reasoned that it could be from some other relative. He didn't know the Blacks or the Potters that well as his own personal family had been at the lowest possible rung on the wealthy and powerful family of Snape. That is until everyone else had all been wiped out after one of his upper class cousins caught a very contagious muggle disease called Ebola and had brought it to the family gathering that Severus' family had not been invited to. Apparently it was easy enough to cure with potions but since they thought it beneath them to do anything but sit around and live off of old money they didn't stand a chance. So all he knew about the other families he got by watching. But now he was faced with proof of fatherhood that couldn't be ignored. He had the letter from Lily and James as well as his memories of the day after his last drunken one night stand. Then there was the fact that he had been informed of the successful completion of the charm one day after he had been told that the pregnancy had been aborted. So instead of being two weeks premature like everyone had assumed he was, Harry had actually arrived right on schedule, a trait that his family normally had. Apparently it skipped a generation. Severus would of course have a paternity test once they got to his home; he always had to be sure.

Dudley stared at the wizarding freak that sat across from him in the carriage. He appeared to be deep in thought. Dudley was just concerned because he was hungry; he needed to have something to eat. He briefly wondered what fast food was in the freak world of his cousins. Did they serve deep fried frogs, or just ordinary fries? At this point he didn't care. The Weirdo that Harry's headmaster had sent had healed Harry and that was all that concerned him. Maybe he could persuade him to drop him off at Piers? Then he could wipe his hands of this mess and hopefully make it up to mom and dad in time for school. That seemed like a good idea.

"Ahem." Dudley cleared his throat loud enough to startle the man opposite him, "If it wouldn't be too much trouble could you please drop me off at a friend's house? I really need to get back in touch with my mum and dad."

The man stared at him for a moment and then said in a rather caustic voice "I will do no such thing. Your cousin needs help and I need someone to keep an eye on him. I would have gotten your parents to do this instead as the loathsome curs did the most damage, but since they are not around and I have no intention of wasting my time looking for them you'll have to do. As I understand it you did quite a bit of damage yourself. Now you would do well to sit down and shut up for the rest of the journey."

This took Dudley for surprise. This was possibly the first time that anyone had refused to let him do what he wanted. He stood up in indignation and swelled up like he had seen his father do on many occasions.

"How dare you order me around you freak! I went out of my way to help that abnormality and instead of being praised for that selfless act I get bullied around by an overgrown greasy bat like you! I don't deserve this! I demand that you stop this carriage at once and let me out or I will beat you within an inch of your life! I have won the heavyweight championship at my school for the last two years in a row!"

The man gave a very sarcastic laugh then brought his face within an inch of Dudley's.

"Oh do go right ahead you simpering simpleminded fool." The mans voice became deadly quiet "I dare you to try and lay a hand on me. I'll have you dangling outside the window in no time. This was not an altruistic act as you have indicated. No, you did this out of obligation because Harry saved your life. I know; I heard about it all last year from Dumbledore. And if you think that this one pitiful act is going to wipe your slate clean from all of the abuse you chose to visit on your cousin then you are strongly deluded." The man's grin faded into an evil smirk "Go ahead and try to follow through on your threat, unless you're too chicken."

Dudley backed away from the professor and sat down quietly. The wizard sat down with a self-satisfied smirk. "There you go; you are capable of making an intelligent choice when necessary. Now I would advise you to stay put and not open that pie trap of yours again lest you rouse my anger, understood?"

For once in his life Dudley felt it wise to do as a wizard told him to and kept quiet until they touched down.