Chapter 14

No Good Deed


When they arrived, Sev looked around to assess the situation. The headmistress had no lips she was pursing them so very tightly as she awaited them. Nobody else was there.

"Mr. Snape, go and wait for me where we have our meetings. Mr. Malfoy and Mr. Potter you two come this way."

And there came out the surnames in that clipped sort of brogue that spelled trouble. She did not oft call him that, but she also most often saw him privately.

"Yes, Headmistress," he replied, ignoring the wide-eyed looks the other two shared. He'd been broken of those kinds of habits a long time prior.

Separating them did make him on his guard. This general pattern was what you did when you compared stories. So far as Sev was concerned, he did not have much of a story to tell. Not much had truly happened, but perhaps this world was so very tame that an exchange of one spell was some unorthodox occurrence?

They used a spell to make sure he could not overhear too.

Well, whatever happened, it could not be anything as bad as what could happen from a trip to the headmistress' office in his world; so, there was that. He stood with his hands folded behind his back, waiting. And then waiting a little while longer.

Finally, they came up by her desk and it was his turn. Alone. Scorpius and Albus had apparently been dismissed.

"Severus…"

So it was back to his first name but in that same stern, clipped brogue. She sat down behind her desk.

"Sit," she said, pointing to the chair with her fierce eyes alone.

He had ignored the chair before, already having decided that it was for his ancient Head of House. Nor did sitting fit his typical 'you're in trouble' script. He blinked in the moment of confusion. Such confusion that he actually said, "Shouldn't Professor Slughorn sit, Headmistress?"

There was another exchange of looks he couldn't read.

Of course he knew any of the three of them could have made somewhere for Professor Slughorn to also sit; so, while his question was what had come out of his mouth, it was not really the exact question he was asking. What his brain truly wanted to know was why are you asking me to sit down if I'm in trouble.

Absolutely none of this matched up to anything he knew about anything! You didn't sit when you were in trouble in his previous life. You stood and braced for the worst.

Neither seemed to want to answer him. Thankfully, his Head of House sat down and thus alleviated some of his psychic stress from not understanding this weird mismatch of tone, words, and actions. He felt much better standing.

Am I in trouble or am I not in trouble? Do they offer you a sweet and a seat when you're in trouble here? Little did he know that had previously happened from this location many a time in the past.

He was again rescued from being adrift with his thoughts and analysis when Professor McGonagall spoke again.

"Professor Slughorn seems to think you do not really know why I asked him to bring you, Mr. Malfoy, and Mr. Potter here this afternoon."

"No, ma'am, I don't know why, really," he agreed readily. He deduced a good part because he wasn't an idiot. Then he added, "If what you mean is that I don't understand what I've done that was wrong enough to merit a trip to the headmistress. Professor Slughorn already told me it was about the corridors earlier."

She exchanged a look with Professor Slughorn. He watched it closely with his charcoal grey eyes but gleaned very little.

These sorts of glances were not World 1.0 sort of glances, so he had absolutely no comparison to employ for World 2.0. All he could tell was he was being given the 'you are in trouble, young man' look all around, and he was fairly certain that look was identical across worlds.

Theirs did not have near the impact of his father's.

"Why don't you start by telling me what happened with Mr. Colby this afternoon," the headmistress asked him.

"If he's the Gryffindor boy who was poking fun at Albus and shoved him, Headmistress? Then he did not like what I had to say in defense of…" there was this slight pause "…my friend, so when we went to leave, he tried to send some spell at me. I blocked it and used a charm to stick him to the wall so he couldn't do it again."

Then he added, "My Expelliarmus isn't…very nice, or I would have used that. A Finite would have gotten him down, ma'am. I figured they would try…" They were wizards after all, for Merlin's sake! It's not like he'd even been mean.

There was another shared glance between the two elders. Sev wished he could anticipate what was going to happen. Then he could gauge himself. But he couldn't. He would just continue on answering their questions, firm in the knowledge that their wildness nightmares could not come up with any punishment that would hurt him.

The headmistress nodded, "That is what Mister Potter and Malfoy said happened as well, but Mr. Colby and his friends say you attacked him after sending a spell at their group." She looked at him over her glasses here.

Sev stared for long moment. Lots of kids lied in his world too; and plenty of them had tried to lie about things he had done as well; and sometimes they had even succeeded in their lies. He, on the other hand, had a human lie detector for a father, lived in a situation where lies could get them killed, and knew from some of his very earliest memories that lying was an offense that was absolutely not tolerated, not even a little. So he was not a liar.

"Well, ma'am. If that's what Colby said, then he's lying or hit his head too hard on the wall. I don't know about his friends, but I know Scorpius and Albus did not really see what happened. They asked me afterward, I told them what I just told you and Professor Slughorn, and I won't let them lie for me and say they saw when they didn't. Maybe he'd let his friends lie for him. I don't think I've done anything worth anyone lying over Headmistress, sir." He gave a shrug more with a tic of his lips and head than anything else. He didn't even move otherwise. Not a fidget to be seen.

The headmistress' lips seemed to disappear even more if that was possible. There was yet another exchange of looks. He was growing more and more frustrated with not being able to read the situation.

"So you maintain that all you did was block a spell and that's what went into all those students?"

He frowned, "No ma'am, I blocked a spell up into the wall above all those students. Nothing went into them. There's probably still a mark on the wall."

This seemed to surprise her. With disbelief, she said, "You directed a block to deflect the spell up away from them?"

Professor Slughorn said, "Merlin's beard, while turning around, did you really?" That was highly impressive for a student of any age.

And up went one dark arched eyebrow. Just in case they had forgotten whose child they were speaking to, there was a good reminder of whose genetics he carried. "Yes, sir. I'm very good with my blocks. I can hit most things just deflecting blocks. My father taught me. I can do it again if you wish?"

As he said that, the headmistress had a different look. Yet another one he really could not read. But she got quite quiet. She seemed to be thinking, but not just thinking, something more. Whatever that was, Sev had no idea. Professor Slughorn was looking at her intently too.

"No, no, I don't think that's necessary," his Head of House filled in, giving a look of concern to the headmistress, who was still silent. "So, you didn't throw that boy into the wall hard on purpose either, Severus?"

Sev frowned again, piecing together precisely what they thought he had done and what these Gryffindors had tried to sell about what he'd done with their lies. He'd been the attacker. He'd sent a spell into a group of people, whacked their defender against the dungeon wall, and then stuck him up there. He probably did some other stuff too, because why not try to add that on too.

And they came up with this not knowing he was from some Dark World! His Head of House and headmistress definitely did. That likely didn't weigh in his favor.

"No, sir. Not particularly hard. I mean you don't need much power into a sticky spell, sir. But my sense of, erm, hard is probably not analogous with anyone's here either," he allowed. He could fathom that gentle in his world might yet be considered hard here, but it certainly would not have been intentional. "But, no, sir, I didn't purposefully blast him if that's what he said. Just stuck him up there normally."

He was not entirely sure what Professor Slughorn had thought, but it was clear to him that the headmistress had believed whatever the Gryffindor boy had already said and had been reluctant over his revision of it. His existence in World 1.0 had likely helped sell the fake story, but he felt that pang down deep that he couldn't quite explain. In his world he would have been believed, pretty instantly, unless it was Carrow.

"It seems we are at something of an impasse," the headmistress finally said.

Sev blinked for a moment at the idea of this being an impasse. "You can Prior Incantato my wand unless you have a Pensieve?" he said, holding it out to Professor Slughorn who was closer. "You could Legilimence me but, technically speaking, even if I would show you the truth, you can't know that it is."

If he could pass by the Dark Lord, never showing his mother's face as Hermione Granger, he could pass anything by just about anyone here so far as he was concerned. He wasn't going to lie about that ability either. Lies, even small ones, had long-term consequences that made everything more difficult and he had many years of life to get through here.

His Head of House looked at his wand for a moment and then at him.


Horace stared at those huge grey eyes, and there was absolutely no way he was Reverse Spelling that boy's wand. Not after he had so politely told them whatever they wanted to know.

"Severus, why don't you go for a little walk down there." He gave the boy a little shoo with his hand.

There had not been a moment that boy had not looked horribly confused to him, just in the eyes, and he still did, even though he was polite enough to take the odd dismissal with surprising propriety. Professors probably did not shoo them where he was from. They probably just blasted them twenty feet away like in that year of Hell they had been put through before Voldemort had been defeated. His eyes widened at the thought that such a thing was far more normal for their time-traveler than this.

Hastily, he blocked the boy from hearing and said, "If you want to create the hermit you so feared when you spoke to me about him needing socialization, then you take his wand and Reverse Spell it, because I won't, Minerva."

"We could simply punish them both. They did both do spells in the corridors."

"Or, you could believe him."

"You do entirely then? You are not worried it's irresponsible to the students to just believe him when we know the world he's come from, Horace?" He lived a life where he had to lie continually survive, and what would keep him from doing the same here? She, at least, had to entertain that thought.

"Let us just say I am quite sure Severus probably said something to grate Colby after the boy shoved Potter. I also think he would tell you precisely what it was if you asked him. He told us Scorpius and Albus lied for him. Why would he do that if he was trying to engineer a great lie to pass by us? He just dismissed his own witnesses, and he's not foolish – even by adult standards."

"You do have a point, Horace, and don't think that I don't see it at all," she replied. "I just wish to take care."

There was a long pause.

Then Minerva said, "Do you know when he said his father taught him how to be so good with deflecting his blocks…A boy that can do it that well…" There was another long pause where she fingered her lips for a moment before finishing, "When I attacked him, Severus, in the Last Battle after Potter…Potter said all those things…my spells ricocheted right into both Carrows." She sat back. "He took them out for us seemingly on accident before escaping out that window, Horace. That was on purpose…I never stopped to think that it could be…not even after."

Minerva had never entirely contemplated what in the heat of that moment, the elder Severus had been able to take out two Death Eaters, one on each side of him, for them – for Potter, for all those students, for her, for Horace – before he had flown out that window. And that was after what Harry had said.

If thirteen-year-old Severus could deflect a block a certain way at his age, then the elder Severus could probably take out the wick of candle with one in his late thirties!

Knowing his moment like any good Slytherin, Horace said, "If we don't believe the boy now, there's not going to be another opportunity. It is not as if he has been able or had opportunity to trust in the life he's had, but he hasn't abused the trust I've given him, and so far as him trusting us...he might attempt once, but if you think there would be a twice, you haven't considered what would happen if he did that in his old world."

Trusting anyone once with anything could have been a death sentence, but being once burned and doing so again, would have been so wildly stupid that he never would have survived three years of Hogwarts entertaining repeating such mistakes.

It was something a Slytherin could see where a Gryffindor could not. Horace very much doubted that Minerva had spent much time imagining thirteen years or twenty years of a world filled with that which they had only experienced a first year glimmer.

Horace could tell she was thinking quite deeply, and he knew from their staff room conversations that she was actually quite fond of the little time-traveler.

"He's snarky with the other boys, sure, but that's all teenaged boys, Minerva. Other than that, he's quiet, spends most his time reading or working, and seems to be fairly kind for being from a world with none of that. Does he truly strike you as a fight in the hallways sort?" In truth, you did not get many thirteen-year-old boys that were in any way tolerable!

"You do remember how often his father fought in the hallways?" She let out a little huff of amusement and raised a brow.

"You do remember how many times you and Albus neglected to take into account how many times the four of them probably got him, where he told nobody, for every time James Potter or Sirius Black ran crying to you about what Severus had done?" Horace asked. The them that made the four was self-explanatory.

Slytherins were not as much with the running to their Head of House for everything (thank Merlin!) as the other houses. That and Narcissa Black had been exceedingly good at fixing most magical anythings that happened to her housemates until she graduated.

Then Horace added, "And he's very like his father, but he's not his father as a child. Severus did a far better job with his boy than anyone did for him." He leaned in as if he was delivering very keen evidence of Severus' superior parenting skill in comparison to what the elder Severus had received himself, "He talks to adults. Very nicely, I might add. Since I made the arrangement for him to go off and have his alone time, he asks me every morning if I need him to do anything for me that day, every morning. And my storeroom is pristine. He would probably make everything for me if I let him. Which is far more dedication that I expected."

There were some moments of quiet between them. There was an element, like when he first arrived, of politics and of protecting everyone, including the boy.

And nor would coddling him do him any good when he was used to the furthest from.

Minerva nodded, "I suppose I will have to Reverse Spell Colby's wand then, though I think I know what I'll find." She couldn't desert her house that entirely to not at least do the spell to confirm it. Then it would not be one's word over the other, and it would not look as if it was Sev she did not believe. In fact, he need never know she checked Colby's wand. "He is so very well-mannered," she agreed.

"And Colby wouldn't give a wit if you checked his wand even if he's telling the truth. This boy will more than care even if he'd not let on."


Sev had spent much of the time stewing over whether they would believe him. He knew that it was as difficult for them to understand him sometimes, as it was for him to understand them and this still-strange place. Being thought a liar was not something he was used to, and he really did not like it. He was fairly sure his discomfort had a lot to do with that, because he was surely not afraid of them. Not at all.

Colby probably was. Poor sod. He almost felt bad for him. But not really.

When they called him back over, he was not sure what to expect.

"Professor Slughorn and I are going to choose to believe you, you've given us no reason not to, but it is not your responsibility to step in and break up such things. You should get a professor or a prefect."

"And just leave him there to maybe do something to my friend who can't defend himself in the meantime, Professor?" Sev asked.

"Yes, otherwise you rather risk escalating the situation which may be exactly what you did, Mr. Snape."

There was perhaps a grain of truth to that bit, Sev would allow. He had called the kid an idiot seven different ways, but this Colby had certainly started it, picking on someone not likely to fight back, like Albus; Sev had more than ten lifetimes worth of standing by watching bullies slowly turn into sadists and then into killers. He took a breath to prevent himself from clenching a fist just thinking about it.

He looked down and tried to think of something to say, but nothing truly sounded right. They probably would not understand what he was thinking anyway.

The headmistress continued, "Because of that, you can serve detention the next two Saturdays with Professor Slughorn. Admirable though your intentions were in defending your friend, I don't want spells flying in corridors, Mr. Snape."

What could he really be expected to say at that point other than, "Yes, Professor."

It was not that the punishment was even so bad, because it was not. In fact, he would not mind at all to have detention (which couldn't even involve any blood-letting!) in exchange for telling off that Colby dolt. The issue was more that he did not quite understand what this was supposed to teach him (considering he had already decided it a fair trade that he'd repeat) and moreover on a grander scale what it would teach anyone.

Mind your own business. Walk away. Someone else will do it. Well, frankly, he was tired of having to walk away from helping someone, and he had not thought he would need to do that here in this world. He was not sure he was prepared to do that.

"Do you understand?" she asked him, raising her brows.

He wanted to say that he did, because he knew that was the proper answer, but it also wasn't true.

"I apologize, but I don't understand, Headmistress…" he began softly, having a bit of a difficult time even letting that out of his mouth, because it seemed quite disrespectful, but he actually really didn't understand, not even a little, not at all. "So…I'm in trouble for not letting someone hurt Albus, just like the person who actually tried to hurt Albus, or me, when I didn't actually hurt anyone?"

He blinked, his eyes first going one direction and then the other as he tried to piece this together in any way that made any sense to him. "All because…I'm supposed to go get an adult, a professor?" If this had come from anyone else, it might have been quite cheeky, but anyone looking at the near-confunded look on the boy's face would know he was being quite serious in not understanding one iota of why he shouldn't stop someone from bullying someone else.

"Doesn't that just teach us to stand by when someone's getting hurt, that it's someone else's responsibility, that someone – what – bigger and stronger and older will just take care of it?" To Sev, that seemed an exceedingly unwise and juvenile application of any sort of moral code. And his emphasis of snark at the end probably went a bit too far, because it was the exact opposite of what made any sense to him.

"Mind your tone, Severus," Professor Slughorn said.

He managed not to grumble the "Yes, sir." Just barely.

"It teaches you to have restraint and to obey the rules while you're still a young wizard, Mr. Snape," the headmistress replied to him.

Pfft! "Yes, ma'am."

There were some unsavory similarities even between this world and his old world, he was finding. No blood and guts, but other things.

Don't think. Obey the rules.

How have this bunch vanquished the Dark Lord? Sheer dumb luck? That would require A LOT of wizards to stand up to A LOT of other wizards for hurting A LOT more wizards! And here they are teaching people not to stand up at all and then wonder how the Dark things happen…

For a very brief moment, he wanted to say something about it now making sense how his entire hellish previous existence had been blinked into existence by their foolish students not respecting magic properly (and their adults too), because they did not teach respecting magic – or life - properly. Or that his father had been alone in that early spying role, because they taught a bunch of young witches and wizards that someone else would take care of it. Someone stronger than you. Someone smarter. Someone selfless. Someone powerful. Someone unafraid.

Or, worse, some Chosen One.

However, he wisely kept his inheritance of snark to himself; although, if he was going to be punished, a small bit of him did think it only fitting he do something properly deserving!

Life in Benevolent World isn't fair either…

Why would I expect anything different…

Go Figure…

He would serve his detentions without a complaint.

And he would probably end up serving a number more of them. Because, to him, it was worth it to not have to keep walking away.

Walking away was a must in his old life. It was walk away or die.

Walk away, or detention? Well, that had nowhere near the same deterrent value.


AN - Thank you to all my new favoriters and followers! Thanks especially to Duj, J, & Anonymous Guest for their reviews. I appreciate it more than you know :D

Like it? Read it? Review it, please! I always reply to my reviewers and sometimes give out some secret tidbits too! :D

J - Yes, it's definitely playing with the no good deed goes unpunished idea! I hope you enjoyed the way it turned out. It definitely is difficult for him to understand many of the things going on around him to the same degree that he could in his own world, and it's probably the thing he struggles with the most.

AnonGuest - Thank you for saying the story is well-developed. Generally speaking, I think it's crap myself, but I'm a pretty hard critic of my own things. It's thanks to reviewers like you that I keep plugging away despite being self-conscious of my writing.

Duj - I hope I got he mix of Minerva's feelings and behavior right! It was a challenging scenario to write with justice. ;)