Severus led Harry gently out the abandoned classroom, through the corridor and towards the Quidditch pitch. Severus had asked Harry where his things were and they were going to get his belongings from the changing room and his prized broom from off the ground. Harry was horrified to realize that in his distress, he had left his broom languishing in the dirt. Despite this, he kept a sedate pace beside his father, a clear indication that something else was taking place. As such, Severus decided to open the 'talk' there and then. It took place.

In eight words.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Severus asked as they rounded the corner. The waning sunlight cast a brilliant golden glow on the grounds and almost blinded them both as they emerged from the darkness of the underground passages. Harry was silent as he considered the offer. They turned another corner.

Suddenly, Harry stopped short, eyes wide, jaw slack and breathless as he stared into the distance. Severus, who had been watching Harry's reaction glanced up and felt his heart squeeze. The Quidditch pitch huge and thus was a formidable sight, even from a far distance. What caught their attention, however, was a small, oddly long fire that was burning rapidly. Harry raced forward and pulling out his wand, put out the fire. All that was left of one of the fastest brooms on the market was now a pile of wet and smouldering ash. This was also all that was left of Harry's hard-earned and tenuous control over his emotions.

"No!" Harry cried in anguish and before Severus knew it, Harry was dashing away from him again.

"Harry!" Severus called as he started to run after him.

The ashes floated away in the wind, carrying Harry's heart along with it.

-----

Harry ran straight to his room and locked himself in.

Severus tried everything to coax him out so they could talk. After all, it wasn't good for him to keep it all bottled up inside. He asked nicely and when that didn't work, he threatened to blast the door right open. Remus then dropped by after watching the scene unfold from his office window.

"It was a group of Hufflepuffs. I yelled at them from my office window and they ran for it. Didn't see who it was though," he said as he stepped through the door. "What in the name of all things magical are you doing, Severus?"

"I'm trying to get my son out of his room. It's locked," Severus replied through gritted teeth. He looked annoyed but beneath that, Remus could see Severus struggling not to have a panic attack.

"Try an alohamora," Remus suggested quietly as he sat down on the couch.

Severus stared at him. Of course! How did he survive spying for the Order for so many years if he couldn't even think up of such a simple spell at a time like this? He braced himself for a violent reaction to his uninvited entry into Harry's privacy but that never came.

Instead, the room was eerily silent save for the almost constant scratching of a quill and the frantic swish of pages. Harry was hunched over his desk, scribbling so furiously that Severus thought the parchment might tear. His left hand flipped a page of a textbook, a Potions textbook, so violently that the book was actually torn.

"Harry?" Severus called softly and placed a hand on Harry's shoulder. Harry had no reaction save for a slight nod to acknowledge his father's presence. "What are you doing?"

"Studying," Harry said in a strained whisper.

"Studying," Severus repeated, completely bewildered. "Now?"

Harry nodded as if it was the most natural thing in the world. At the rate they were going, Severus was going to have premature heart failure.

"Harry, stop," Severus commanded gently as he prised the quill away from Harry's too tight grip. "Stop."

Harry's hand relaxed and fell onto the table with a dull thud. He looked up at Severus with glassy eyes that were politely curious.

"Why?" Severus asked, referring to the fact that Harry was frantically studying in a moment of great emotional distress. Harry stood up, looking suddenly annoyed.

"I'm a student. Student's study."

"Harry," Severus sighed as he closed the torn Potions text and stacked the book and parchment neatly on the table.

"I know it's hard," Severus began.

"It is," Harry interrupted tonelessly.

"I'm here to help you," Severus offered.

"I don't need help," Harry denied flatly. "I'm fine, dad, really. It's only a broom. I'm not that interested in Quidditch anymore."

"No," Severus said, cupping Harry's cheek with a hand. "You are interested."

Harry's lip trembled and he looked away. "It doesn't matter anymore."

"Why not?"

"I'm resigning. I can't play with a team that hates me," Harry spat bitterly.

Severus sighed but said nothing to dissuade Harry of that notion. In fact, Severus privately agreed. It would keep Harry safer. At least, until the traitorous Black was caught and Kissed for good.

"Besides, I'm used to the scrutiny. I'm the Boy-Who-Lived, aren't I? Good scrutiny, bad scrutiny, who cares? It's all the same anyway," Harry continued miserably.

"No, it's not the same," Severus consoled. "Not when you're this affected. I'm here, Harry. Let me help you."

Harry sighed and shrugged diffidently. "Thanks, dad," he whispered. With that, he slid fully clothed into bed and promptly fell asleep. Severus spelled the lights off and with a last glance at his son, shut the door.

-----

Severus cursed the idiot Hufflepuffs who set his son's broom alight and lost count of how many times he did that that month as he billowed ferociously down the path to Hogsmeade. He actually thought that the perpetrators would have been from his own house and he was prepared to go to the Slytherin Common Room and ask when Remus told him who the actual culprits were. He didn't know Hufflepuffs had it in them to be so vindictive. But then again, he had been judging them all on the one of the more important Hufflepuffs of the century – Cornelius Fudge.

Said idiot Hufflepuffs were now serving detention with the Potions Master every night, every single night, scrubbing cauldrons and preparing disgusting potions ingredients. The news of their punishment and what they did to incur the Potions Master's wrath spread like wildfire across the school the next day and by breakfast, every student decided to leave one Harry Snape and his father alone. Harry was fine with that. It seemed that he was fine with anything.

It had been a month, a long hard month where Severus only saw his son during class, meals and brewing sessions they had together in Severus' private lab. Harry had gone to a rather surprised Severus asking for Potions tutoring. Severus was pleased, of course. His son's Potions grades weren't exactly stellar and it wouldn't do for the son of a renowned Potions Master to do badly for Potions. Severus hated the fact that he couldn't bring Harry back from the faraway place he ensconced himself. He rarely talk and he looked like he rarely had restful sleep either, working on autopilot and going about his day-to-day activities like a muggle robot.

Gone was the passionate Gryffindor seeker who dove valiantly and courageously into danger. Gone was the lively and bright teen that laughed and acted just like a teen ought to act. Instead, Severus saw a boy forced to grow up too fast by the cruelty the world bestowed upon him. The spark of life in his eyes were missing, making the once brilliant green eyes look a dull green. Severus had only seen it once in Lily's eyes and that was the day she caught a glimpse of her behind the door as she brought baby Harry for their weekly visits. Severus heart had ached then but seeing it in his son's eyes, their son's eyes, day in day out, was pure torture. He wished he could give them life again but he couldn't.

He had tried everything in his power to make Harry happy. He had offered to bring Harry to Diagon Alley to buy a new broom but he had declined, citing too much homework. For one, Severus knew that Harry had finished all his homework and was doing some unnecessary studying. He had memorised almost the entire textbook and learnt the applications for everything as well. In fact, he had steadily risen up the class positions to top the entire level at the next term test, beating even Hermione who, rather unreasonably, berated him loudly with fiery passion in the middle of the corridor once. Severus had thought that Harry would fight back but he didn't. Much to his surprise and chagrin, he walked right pass, too engrossed in the potions manual he borrowed from Severus' bookshelf to bother.

Severus made his way towards the Post Office to collect a rather important piece of post. He had it all planned out. He was planning to make Harry Harry again. Even if it killed him.

---

Christmas was fast approaching.

Harry sighed as he stretched out his cramped muscles. It was snowing outside, snowflakes swirling nicely and falling gently. Harry rubbed his tired eyes and redirected his attention to the potion he had before him. He had thought and researched long and hard about how to cure his friends from Voldemort's mind-poisoning.

He searched the entire library over and armed with his Invisibility Cloak and his wand light, he found the book nestled deep within the shelves of the Restricted Section. He had become proficient in writing fast due to the practice he had put in beforehand. He had copied the entire textbook out just to practice it and the not so unpleasant side effect of it was that it was actually easier for him to remember things for his lessons. He had copied it quickly on the spot, just in case his father found the book and shoved the parchment into his pocket.

It was a simple antidote and Harry almost laughed at Voldemort's stupidity. That was, until he saw the actual recipe. There was only one step: drop a bezeor into the poison. The poison was really known as the Mind Poison and Harry felt that it was possibly one of the most unoriginal sounding names he had ever heard out of all the potent mind control potions he had researched. Unfortunately, it was the hardest potion to make, requiring many ingredients, perfect timing and even the correct weather. Harry knew that despite the extra lessons he had been taking with his father, he just didn't have the skill required to brew such a complicated potion.

As such, he had no choice but to seek his father out. With a groan, Harry cleared his desk and took whatever he needed.

-----

"Dad?" Harry called as he stepped into the sitting room in his father's quarters.

"Over here, Harry," Severus called from his lab. Harry made his way anxiously towards the lab.

"Can I show you something?" Harry asked as he peered into the lab. Severus was ladling a ladleful of steaming potion into a goblet.

"Hold on, I'm almost finished," Severus said and covered the goblet with a lid. "Okay," he pulled up two chairs, sat on one and motioned for Harry to sit on the other. "What do you want to show me?"

Harry fiddled nervously with the pile of papers in his hand.

"It's about Ron and Hermione," Harry started. Severus frowned but let him continue.

"See, Voldemort said something about mind-poisoning the last time, the poisoning of the mind is rather hard to cure. I went to the library and… promise me you won't get mad?" Harry said diffidently.

"It depends, but I promise," Severus said.

"I went to the Restricted Section," Harry peered up through his bangs to gauge his father's reaction. When nothing but a raised eyebrow was forthcoming, he continued, "and I found this." He placed the stack of papers on the table. "It's a potion, Mind Poison. Voldemort's description of it was a bit sketchy but I've been watching Ron and Hermione the past few weeks and I think this is it. Everything matches, extreme behaviour that differs greatly from usual, violent tendencies, ease of anger. Didn't Ron just beat up a Ravenclaw the other day just for looking at him funny?"

"This is well researched," Severus commented as he read through the papers Harry compiled. "Well done. Is this what you've been doing for the past month?"

Harry smiled self-consciously at the praise and Severus felt his heart lighten. It had been too long since he last saw that smile. "Yeah," Harry said.

"I thought you were avoiding everyone on purpose," Severus mentioned. Harry looked bewildered.

"What?" he questioned. It was Severus turn to look flummoxed.

"You were avoiding everyone, even me while you were completely lost in your research. If you're been focussing solely on your research, how on earth did you manage to score straight Outstandings for all your tests?" Severus asked.

"I did?" Harry said, sounding very surprised. Severus blinked.

"Are you alright, Harry?" he queried, feeling like he had asked that question too many times recently.

"Yeah," Harry replied slowly. "I'm great. Y-you mean, I was being a complete anti-social berk this whole time?"

"I wouldn't use those exact words but that sums it up, yes," Severus said.

"Oh."

There was awkward silence.

"Well," Severus said. "We've got a potion to brew."

Unbeta'd.