DISCLAIMER: I'm not Just Kidding when I say I'm not J.K.(R.)
Hey, y'all...the last chapter was way too short. I wrote more and added it on...but then it didn't save or something, and I didn't realize it until now. *hangs head* Ah well. Here's another half, and please forgive me for my ineptitude!
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Chapter Six
The world was dreary when he awoke in the morning, his head throbbing. Gray walls stared at him with all the blank luster of enormous blind eyes. Their glares weren't directed at him personally, he knew, for they were a result of the undiscerning sunlight filtered through the drab windowpanes. Still, they were depressing, and their very shadows in the corners seemed to taunt him with their stony appearance.
I don't want to get up today, he mused soberly, feeling the weight of a seemingly meaningless existence settle upon him. No one would care if I didn't.
The old clock on his bed-stand, a cheap aluminum and plastic affair bought from a thrift store, taunted him with the splinter of a hand that couldn't make it past the forty-second mark.
Tick. Tick. Tick. It bounced and fell, bounced and fell, never moving past the cursed eight on the dial. Sometimes, watching it carefully, he could swear that it went backwards. But, logically, it couldn't have done so, because it was always at the same place. Never moving further up or down, maintaining a steady rhythm in its select section of the clock face.
The other hands worked, at least, and told Severus that it was nigh on eleven o'clock. Do I have any reason to get up?
He thought about it a while, then closed his eyes.
Maybe.
As he focused on breathing deeply, trying to convince himself that a lie-in wouldn't affect his abilities to brew the potions requested by the Dark Lord for that evening's revel, he heard a shout downstairs.
"Snape! Severus bloody Snape! Where are you?"
Adrenaline coursed through him, and he sat up straight. Someone broke through my wards! Who on earth...
"Don' make me come in and get you! Snape!"
Someone outside?
He poked a cautious eye through the blind, but this was to no avail; the mangy yard was empty.
"SNAPE!"
It sounds like...ugh, it's not Black, is it? In that case, it's probably just the Floo. I guess I didn't remember to close the connection last night.
He shoved on a robe over his nightgown, raked his fingers through his hair, and descended the stairs in a hurry.
"What is it, Black?" he snarled to the living-room fireplace, where Sirius Black's head floated.
"Snape! Merlin, you took your sweet time!"
"What is it?" Severus asked again, gazing steadily at the fire. He stood, for he didn't deign to sit and address the man as an equal.
"What'd you do to James?" the other man asked angrily, his eyes full of revulsion and hatred.
"Sirius," a calmer voice interceded, "you promised not to be confrontational..."
"Lupin," Snape replied, glad that he was dealing with at least one of the more rational Marauders, ineffective as the werewolf was at preventing his friends' bullying. "What's the mutt raving about?"
"Don't call him that," chastised Lupin, leaning into the fireplace. "It isn't very polite."
"Your intrusion isn't much better," retorted Severus. "What do you two want?"
"Well, Severus, Sirius was rather of the opinion that you-"
"-YOU agreed with me, Moony!"
"-well, nonetheless, Sirius proposed the idea that maybe, Severus, when you were looking into James' mind, you saw something...anything...about the attack? Specifically, if they left any images in his mind at all?"
"That's not what we agreed on!" cut in Sirius with a roar, "I want to know exactly what he did in James' mind!"
"Hold off," commanded Severus, and the others were silent. "I saw exactly what I told you yesterday, Lupin. Nothing. His mind was entirely blank."
Lupin, at this, sighed enormously, which Severus took as a sign of relief, until the werewolf replied, "Are you absolutely certain?"
"Positive."
They obviously think I did something to it...but what? Do they blame me for erasing it? I was in there for only a brief time, and for the duration, I wasn't using a wand. I don't know anything about how to blank the memory through legilimency, for all I know it's impossible...
He was surprised by Lupin's next comment: "I told you, Sirius!"
He was even more surprised at Black's answer: "All right, so you did."
With that, they both looked at Snape expectantly.
"Is there anything else I can do for you?" he inquired, a sarcastic edge to his voice.
"Actually, yes," Lupin replied, strangely confident. "I...I said yesterday that we needed to talk, Severus, but I didn't realize how urgently we would need to until now."
Severus noticed that Black was hanging his head, and he appeared enraged, but he didn't protest at the prospect of conversation. How decidedly odd. This must be important, if Black's backing down.
"My place or yours?" Lupin continued, and Severus saw that he had no free will in the matter.
"Mine," he returned simply, "the wards are undoubtedly stronger."
He stepped back from the Floo, and the two other men walked through. Without another word, Black flopped onto the couch, looking exhausted, though Lupin had the courtesy to shake hands with Severus.
"Now what, exactly," Severus asked quietly, "is so important to talk about, that you must disturb my work?" When they get tiresome, I'll tell them that I've got a potion on the stove, and therefore be rid of them.
Lupin shrugged, looking uncomfortable. "It...well..."
Black was more blunt. "A life or death situation," he answered instead, inspecting the tapestry of Snape's couch with disgust etched on his features.
"Whose?" Snape asked. If they're asking me to help them, they must be desperate, he reasoned. But it could very well be a trap. Or something.
Sirius' scowl discounted the last idea, though, as he stated baldly: "Mine...and yours."
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