Harry Potter had earned himself quite a few detentions within a very short amount of time, by the end of October he had scrubbed Severus cauldrons' at least eight times, and it reaffirmed Severus' impression that even with his mother's eyes he was more Potter's brat than he was Lily's son.

However, the situation was beginning to become unnerving.

When he looked at the boy he'd see either Lily's eyes or James Potter's hated arrogant face, it was very difficult to see anything else in him, perhaps it was simply that Severus wasn't interested in seeing anything else. Potter was only significant in his miraculous defeat of the dark lord, his mother's death, and an unfulfilled prophecy. By himself Potter was hardly a person, he was only a person in relation to those who had died for his survival.

Sometimes though, more recently, he saw someone else lurking behind Potter. He hadn't seen it until the first class, before then Potter had hidden it behind more pleasant emotions, only when pressed by Severus' questions did a mask in that cheerful golden boy's mask begin to crack. He didn't have the eyes of a little boy, he didn't even have the eyes of the killer but rather something more ruthless and distant, they were cold and unwavering and they stared back at Severus as if he were only dirt under his boot.

Lord Voldemort's eyes had not been like that, the man had been crazed by the time Severus had been inducted, there was always the hazy almost frantic expression in those unnatural crimson irises. He seemed unwound, always moving, always pacing and shouting and fingers twitching as if in withdrawal of some unknown substance. When he looked at his followers it was as if he couldn't quite make them out, had somehow become near sighted and forgotten all their names, but it never seemed as if he particularly cared because to him they were all more or less worthless anyway.

No, when he thought about the way Potter stared at him now, silently and sometimes with a small smile he thought of the boy's muggle uncle Thomas Evans.

The trouble was that the boy had a smart mouth; he'd somehow managed to be blessed with the art of cutting wit but little common sense, at least that's how it seemed at first. On a weekly basis the boy deliberately undermined his authority, it was usually subtle comments, small little things but each one was a slight Severus found intolerable and soon enough he would reach his limit of deducting points and just assign the boy to the cauldrons again.

Then he'd noticed that the other students didn't bother Potter for the point loss, according to the other professors Harry Potter was quite magically gifted and usually earned in their classes more than enough to cover whatever it was Severus had taken. More so the boy had a knack for using his reputation to his benefit, he didn't appear to like it most of the time, but inside the classroom it very clearly became a case of the boy who lived versus all those who hated muggle borns and wished to see them dead. Any action Severus took against Potter then wasn't blamed on Potter but rather on Severus who wished to see the good students of Hogwarts suffer.

One particular incident caught in his mind when he thought about this current trend. His godson, Draco Malfoy, had not yet realized that money could not buy you everything. Having been born the heir to the Malfoy family and possibly the Black family if the Blacks continued to be thrown in Azkaban or else disowned, he was brought up with the firm belief that the world catered to his father's whims and that this connection would bring him anything he wanted. It was true, more or less, but Draco had not yet learned the art of being subtle.

Draco had approached Potter sometime early in the year and told him that he would go much further in life if he knew the right people. Potter hadn't taken that comment particularly well as far as Snape had heard it.

Since then the two had something of a rivalry going on, it didn't help that Potter was praised by all but Severus as being the most gifted student to attend Hogwarts in decades while Draco was simply told that he was 'doing well'. Draco had started slow with mild insults in the hallway, things like Potty and Weasel, but then the insults had begun to become a little less mild, did you know your mother was a dirty mudblood. Severus had personally given the boy detention and deducted points after he heard that one, when Draco had been crying in front of his desk asking why he deserved detention from his godfather of all things Severus had told him that there were certain words you simply did not say.

It appeared to have reached something of a climax in one of his potions classes.

Draco was not stupid, he was young, he was spoiled, but he was hardly stupid. He'd realized that somehow words didn't cut it with Potter, you had to dig deeper than that if you wanted him to flinch, so in a moment of sheer stupidity combined with desperation he turned towards Potter's flawless academic record.

Potter was good at potions, but not brilliant, he followed the instructions with an efficiency that was quite remarkable but he did not invent or innovate as Severus once had when he was a student. He looked quite bored most of the time, yet still with that overriding intensity that caused even Weasley to hesitate talking to him in class. To Severus' disappointment the boy had yet to turn in a single subpar potion that would allow him the satisfaction of telling Potter to his face that he was not as brilliant as he thought he was.

The Slytherins shared Defense Against the Dark Arts and Potions with the Gryffindors but with the Defense class' curriculum Draco must have realized that he'd only really get a chance to embarrass Potter in Potions.

He'd forgotten what they were brewing that day, something trivial enough for first year potions in the fall, and Severus remembered vaguely being distracted by Longbottom's exploding cauldron. He didn't see the moment in itself but when he turned in Potter's hand there was a rather a rather volatile ingredient that hadn't been involved in the day's potions.

After a glance it was clear to everyone in the room that Draco had attempted to drop some unknown ingredient into Potter's cauldron.

Potter stared at it as if he found the idea of it a trifle bit amusing and then those cold green eyes turned to Draco, "Really Malfoy, there are cleaner and more certain ways to destroy the future of magical Britain than this. Although I commend you, had your aim been a bit more accurate and your throw a bit faster then we would all be maimed if not dead."

"Potter! Five points for speaking out of turn." Severus had said, almost on instinct at this point, Potter just tilted his head continuing to observe Draco as if he was a specimen caught under a microscope.

"You know there's something very odd about the way students are sorted in this school, take Slytherin for instance, did you notice that many of the most influential families only heirs are sorted into Slytherin? Did you notice that many of those heirs, you, me, Crabbe, Goyle, happen to be in our year? Sit them all down in a small room filled with volatile potions and well, it's just so easy."

He spoke softly but even so there was this energy when he spoke that made everyone turn and stop and listen. All eyes in the room were on him, and the wide eyes that were on all the children's faces spoke to the fact that they were beginning to see Potter's point.

"Harry, what are you..." The Weasley boy began but Harry held up a commanding hand in front of his freckled face, glancing down only for a moment with an expression that must have stunned Weasley into silence.

"Now," Harry continued in a musing sort of way, "I don't imagine that this would destroy the country overnight, but magical Britain is very small, after two wars as well as the random acts of mass terror here and there Hogwarts' incoming class is… Well let's just say there's not that many truly pureblooded wizards left. Take out thirty of them, many of whom would inherit a Wizengamot seat or two at majority, and in twenty or thirty years those muggle borns you hate so much might have a real chance at gaining control of this country's pathetic bureaucracy."

Potter then turned to look at Severus and for a moment Severus saw, he wasn't quite sure what he saw, only that it brought to mind the dark lord's face on hearing the prophecy that he would be defeated by some child who had yet to be born.

"So tell me, professor, how many points does Malfoy lose for poorly planned homicide and general anarchy?"

Naturally he had given Potter detention for a week. It was after that class that he began to tally the amount of detentions that Potter had served. Some he had been foisted onto other professors to handle but the majority had been with Severus himself, scrubbing cauldrons, or else writing lines. In detention the boy hardly talked, it was almost as if he was an entirely different boy, he lost some of that knife's edge that he had in class. He rarely spoke to Severus, a yes sir here or a no sir there, but he never volunteered anything. No, instead he watched, and Severus began to wonder if Potter wasn't somehow landing himself in detention on purpose.

Severus had been monitoring the boy's uncle. At Albus' behest he'd noted the man's hobbies, his interests, his work patterns, his acquaintances; everything that might prove later important was being recorded and noted by Severus. He wondered if the boy wasn't doing the same for him. Not with magic as Severus was, but with his presence instead, as if being in the same room as Severus somehow allowed him to see all the weaknesses in the man.

He found himself unconsciously watching his actions in these detentions, thinking before each action if it was something he wanted Potter to see, and Potter would be scrubbing away with that silent efficiency at black cauldrons.

Albus had asked him what he thought of Potter at the beginning of the school year, and he had dismissively replied that the boy was an ignorant Gryffindor just like his father had been.

Looking back on that sorting ceremony though he remembered how long Potter had sat beneath the hat and he remembered thinking that generally only two types of students ended up in Slytherin these days, the heirs to noble and ancient pureblood houses, and abused children who saw no way out but ruthlessness and thinly strained patience. The boy had looked very pale and small on that stool with the hat over his eyes, and Severus' knuckles turned white clenching his goblet, but then the boy was sorted into Gryffindor so clearly all was right in the world. It was only in retrospect that he allowed himself to wonder about what house Harry Potter was almost placed into.

However, while he disliked children as a general rule he was not unnerved by them, so until Potter did something a little more drastic than throwing cheap words in the air he'd still be little more than the miniature James Potter he presented himself as.


On the day that Hermione Granger almost died she confronted Harry Potter about his problem. She'd been content to keep it her little secret, something only she knew about the boy who lived, but then it seemed like he'd been pushing harder in Potions. It wasn't talking back, Hermione had seen talking back, he was testing limits. It was almost methodical, he went a little further each day, seeing how far he could push Professor Snape before… Well Hermione didn't know what would happen when he went past the limit.

Normally she'd be offended on the behalf of Professor Snape, no one should treat a professor with such disrespect, but there was something wrong with Harry. The way he went about it, the deliberation, the coldness, well it frightened her just a bit.

She had been sorted into Gryffindor not because she wanted to be brave and noble but because she was brave, that's what the hat had said, so she realized that it would only be her who confronted Harry and no one else.

She found him in the library, he was there quite often, not as much as her of course because he had Ron Weasley to hang out with who hated the library but quite often he'd be in there with his own stack of books that clearly wasn't for homework.

It was Halloween, and she tried to think that it didn't mean anything to approach something scary on Halloween, and he was sitting in his own usual spot in the library looking a bit alarmed at the pile of books in front of him as if he wasn't quite sure what they were doing there. Sometimes, she'd noted, he looked a bit dazed talking to Ron or just walking through the hallways as if he was listening to something else or wasn't really there at all.

He didn't seem to notice her at any rate because he picked up the top most book, flipped through it briefly, shook his head with an odd almost affectionate smile and began to read from the beginning.

"Ah, um, Harry." She said taking the seat across from him trying not to blush at the awkwardness of the situation. She hadn't talked to him since September on the train, at first she'd been too hurt, and then she just felt that she somehow couldn't as if her opportunity had already passed.

"Oh, hi, Hermione or Granger I guess. How is it… How are things?" He set down the book gingerly not bothering to hold his place and looked at her with polite attentiveness.

"Oh I'm…" Well she wasn't really fine because it was all sort of disappointing but that wasn't why she was here, "Harry, have you noticed that you act very… weird in potions?"

Some part of her had expected him to stare at her blankly, as if she was crazy, and she would stammer and try to leave without feeling too humiliated as if it was all just in her head. He didn't look like that though, instead he looked a bit alarmed, and then he looked like he did in Potions.

It was a subtle shift, a narrowing the eyes, leaning back in his chair, and a very impressive poker face. It was as if she had been given a wordless confirmation of what she had always suspected but that was somehow almost worse than looking crazy.

"You're a very smart girl, Hermione." He distantly mused and somehow even though he said it without any real inflection behind it she felt her stomach flutter at the compliment, "I'm afraid our dear Professor Snape brings out the worst in me."

"Quirrel too." She added almost without thinking, this caused him to pause slightly and he began to stare at her more closely as if she was being reevaluated.

"Yes, but tell me, who doesn't Quirrel bring the worst out of? He smells like a cheap Italian restaurant and the stuttering would drive anyone mad." He gave her a smile that was at once as sly as it was charming and for a moment looking at his cool confidence she saw what her roommates meant when they said Harry was pretty.

"But tell me, Hermione, I didn't think we were particularly close. Were you worried about me?" He asked looking at her the whole time but his voice a little bit harsher than it had been before. He was making fun of her, she knew it, and he was right they weren't close. She had just thought they were for one wonderful horrible train ride.

Still, she was in Gryffindor, she was brave and noble and she could talk to Harry Potter without running from the room in tears. "Yes, you act scary in class, what you said to Malfoy the other day… It was just cruel Harry, that's not like you."

He seemed about to say something but then paused, some of the determination went out of his gaze and he seemed a bit tired, "No, it really isn't, is it?" He sighed and picked up the book once again flipping back to the page where he had left off signaling to her that he was done with the conversation, "I am stunned by your powers of observation, Miss Granger, but I'm afraid I've missed the point of this little chat. Should you find some actual reason to speak to me I'll be here all day and then I'll be in Charms with you attempting to make a feather float. Until then, goodbye."

That had not been the worst moment of the day, as she had expected it to be when she slumped out of the library. No, that had come in Charms. Like Harry had said earlier they were floating feathers, Harry seemed back to his old self like he was for everything but Potions and Defense. There was a moment where he was walking in, talking to Ron about Quidditch or something, that he looked at her and it seemed like he saw something but then he looked away and it was like Hermione didn't exist anymore.

Why did she bother with it? She should just leave Harry alone since he didn't seem to care if she existed either way.

Harry, like always, was the first to get it right and like always he got house points for it. Hermione was the only one who earned real points though, Harry just made up for what he lost in Potions.

Ron Weasley wasn't having much luck though, but of course he was doing everything wrong, the wand motions, the pronunciation, everything about it was off so that the feather didn't even twitch.

"I just need to get it…" Ron was saying to Harry. Harry for his own part shrugged, "I don't know, I mean really the words and wand movements shouldn't matter, you have to really want the feather to float."

It had been a long day and seeing Harry there, disregarding everything their professors said, and acting like she didn't exist made her snap, "Oh that's simply the most wrong thing I've ever heard."

"I'm sorry?" Harry asked looking somewhat bewildered but she continued regardless of both of their confused expressions.

"The wand movements, the words, that's why it's not working at all. Ron, it's a swish then a flick, you have to do it from the wrists not just moving your hand and it's Wingardium Leviosa not Wingardium Leviosaa."

"Well, who asked you? She's a nightmare honestly…"

He then turned back to his work and Harry as if she hadn't said anything at all. Academics had been the one thing she had ever been respected for, people may not have liked Hermione but they knew she was smart, they knew that if they needed things done and understood you asked Hermione. Now though, with Harry, she'd replaced and instead she was a nightmare.

She'd asked professor Flitwick if she could go to the bathroom and then she'd walked briskly out of the classroom and tried not to think of anything long enough that she could find some place to go hide and just sit down and cry.

She didn't know how long she stayed in there, feet curled up on the seat of the toilet, but it was long enough to think that everything was a mistake to think that maybe she should have just stayed a muggle like her parents secretly wanted. It was certainly long enough to wonder why, why it was so hard for her to make friends and so easy for others.

She had expected some other girl to come in and kick her out at some point, to tell her to stop crying but it hadn't been a girl. It had been the person she least expected.

Harry Potter's voice rang clearly throughout the empty bathroom reaching her in the stall, "Of all the places to wallow in pity what I can't understand is why anyone would pick a bathroom. You'll get a reputation if you keep going like this."

She opened the door faster than she thought possible and wiped the tears from her eyes, "Harry, you can't be here this is the girl's room!"

She knew without even having to really look that this was Potions Harry again, and not the Harry from class, Potions Harry was much surer of himself than the normal Harry. At her words he just raised his eyebrows and motioned to the room, "Well here I am, so clearly I am capable of walking into the girl's restroom."

She must have looked terribly pathetic then, her eyes puffy and swollen, her face red still trying to hold in the remaining tears, "What are you doing here?"

"I was feeling a bit generous. Don't look so concerned, it doesn't happen often."

He seemed nicer than he usually was in potions, and even in the library. Not like he cared, he acted like it was a whim to barge in the bathroom and listen to her sob, but he wasn't as biting as before. He hadn't commented on her appearance or anything else about her yet.

"You shouldn't be in here, you'll get in trouble." She said wiping at her face again to catch any of those still leaking tears.

He walked over and leaned against the stall so that he was standing across from her, he wasn't much taller than her and was a bit thinner, but the casual way he held himself made him seem so much older than her.

"One of the truly great things about my system, Hermione, is that I'm so booked with detentions by professor Snape that I rarely have time for another and if I lose a house point or two there's always a way to make those up." He gave her a reassuring smile at the end and she couldn't help her own slight smile and small giggle at the comment. She hadn't realized that Harry was funny.

"So tell me, Hermione, what brings a girl like you to a wretched place like this?"

The giggle became a laugh, one she desperately wanted to stop because he shouldn't be here and he was part of the reason she was here. She tried to control herself, to get back some of the anger and sorrow and frustration but it was slipping away.

"I don't have any friends." She finally blurted the words gushing out of the floodgates, "Everyone hates me, or doesn't even know I exist, and I study so hard but I'm still only second best."

"Ah, I see." He said nodding slightly before pausing and then continuing in that musing voice, "I never had friends."

She was startled by this, "You're friends with Ron though…" Not that he should be, Ron was such a prat.

"I am hardly friends with Ron Weasley." He sneered before muttering, "I just think I am because it's so bloody convenient."

She wasn't sure she understood that and even though Ron was a prat she didn't think he should be pushed aside like that but Harry continued, "Humans are not defined by their friends or their fathers for that matter. Clinging to the idea that other people will make you happy is not only shortsighted but also rather foolish. You are the most constant thing you will ever have in your life, live for yourself and people will be drawn like moths to the flame."

"Is that what you do?" She asked, because she didn't believe that, not the normal Harry maybe this Potions Harry but not the normal one.

"Of course, people have accused me of many things but hypocrisy, I'm afraid, is not one of my sins."

"So what now then?" She asked, because even though she felt better she was still friendless and alone, like she had been when she came into the bathroom in the first place.

"Now, now Hermione Granger, you walk out of the bathroom trying not to look like a complete mess and try not to wallow in your rather shallow eleven year old misery."

Perhaps it was meant to be inspiring but all it did was make her smile slightly, seeing his hand gesturing to the door as if the world was waiting for her out there, "You're not very good at comforting people, are you?"

He blinked at that, as if surprised he would be told he wasn't good at anything, "Well, this is my second attempt at this sort of thing so it isn't as if I've had much practice."

For a moment there he had almost seemed normal, better than normal really, smart and funny and concerned in the way that no one else in the school seemed to be. Standing there, looking at him, she wondered why she had ever been frightened of this aspect of Harry's personality.

Neither of them had expected the troll. One moment they had been standing in the girl's bathroom, the girl's bathroom of all places, her looking like a crazy mess and him looking perfect and then the wall caved in and she was screaming.

It seemed both fast and slow in the same instant, seeing its leering face and hearing the dragging of its club, and her brain somehow uselessly rattling off that this was a troll and if only they had some sunlight they'd be alright. Without thinking she found herself clinging to Harry, trying to move him back into the corner with her, but he wouldn't move. In that slow-fast bubble they were caught in, where the sink was broken and water was spraying everywhere, he was so terribly still and focused. There were no words, no wand movements even, just a flash of brilliant light and then troll just wasn't there anymore as if it hadn't existed in the first place.

They stood there, Hermione shaking and clinging, and him standing sweat beginning to drip from his brow as their shoes got thoroughly soaked. Finally, he said in a dry voice, "I hate trolls."

Author's Note: Originally I was going to add something from Harry's point of view to this chapter but I figured that might fit in better with the next chapter so no insight into Tom and Harry's adventures today. We'll have to wait until next time for people to do non-canon exciting things besides giving rather terrifying speeches in Potions class. Thank you to readers and reviewers, you guys are great, reviews are much appreciated.

Also the 100th review fic for Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Has been written, it's called The Joys of Pad Thai so check it out if you want or not if you don't.

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter