8:00 p.m., Friday,
Harry and Severus' Cell.
Harry began to bang his little fists against the heavy door and yell. Sitting in a corner, Severus simply watched on in mild amusement. He didn't know what Harry expected as the little boy began to scream at the top of his lungs. Eventually he was rewarded with slowly approaching footsteps outside the door and someone muttering in frustration under their breath as they fumbled with the keys.
"Shut up, you brat!" A very agitated Lucius Malfoy kicked Harry back into Severus.
"I'm HUNGRY!" Harry sat up defiantly and crossed his arms, pouting. "I WON'T stop until YOU feed me!" The boy set his jaw.
/What are you doing?/ Severus thought to Harry.
/I'm getting food! I'm seriously hungry.../ was the reply.
Severus gaped at the other boy, then turned his gaze to a fuming Lucius. "Fine! WORMTAIL!"
The tiny and balding Peter Pettigrew appeared at Lucius' roar. "Y...yes, Master Malfoy?" He trembled.
"Get these brats some food, Wormtail. I'm trying to sleep and they won't shut the hell up." He hissed and stalked out past Wormtail as he gave a muffled reply.
"Don't forget our spoons!" Harry added cheerfully.
Wormtail turned around and shut the heavy door behind him, sliding the iron lock into place loudly. "Spoons?" Severus finally asked after Wormtail's footsteps faded.
"Mhmm.." Was Harry's only reply. Within a matter of minutes, Wormtail returned with a tray and set it down in front of the tiny duo. The tray had two steaming bowls of beef stew, two goblets of pumpkin juice and two spoons.
"What you see is what you get, I brought this from the house elves, so don't kick up a fuss." He stated meekly before scurrying out the door and once again locking the bolt.
Harry looked very pleased and held his spoon up, admiring it. Severus gingerly picked up his own spoon and dipped it in his bowl. "What are you doing?" Harry asked.
"Eating my soup, what does it look like?" Severus growled.
"No! We can dig our way out..." Harry eyed the spoon speculatively.
"Have you lost your mind?!" Severus felt like strangling the other boy.
"What? They do it on tv all the time.." Harry frowned.
"TV?" Severus looked puzzled. "What's that? Another muggle item?"
Harry simply shrugged and attempted to stab the cold stone floor with the spoon....and it bounced back at him. "Ack! Why didn't it work?"
Severus merely laughed. It was just too funny, seeing Harry stunned that he couldn't dig his way out of a cell. Harry shot a glare at Severus before looking forlornly at his now discarded and bent spoon. "Don't laugh at me. At least it's better than sitting here and waiting for Voldemort to kill us."
To Harry's surprise, Severus didn't flinch at the mention of Voldemort's name, but he did stop laughing. "It would have taken you over a decade to dig your way out of a muggle cell with that thing, but in these cells there's always at least a dozen spells to prevent escape. It's always been that way with wizards, but of course, you wouldn't know that."
Harry sighed and settled on picking up his bowl and sipping out of it without the help of a spoon. After he finished, he wiped his mouth with his cloak sleeve and started on his pumpkin juice. Severus watched the Boy Who Lived with mild amusement before finally going back to his own food. As he was eating, a thought came to him.
"Why WERE you crying yesterday?" Severus tilted his head curiously to the other boy.
Harry sighed and pulled his legs up against his chest, wrapping his arms around them. "Well..I just haven't talked to Ron and Hermione in so long, and then finding out that he's the new keeper and on top of it all that they...they're going out..I just feel left out. It won't be the same anymore, I'm sure of it! They'll be so wrapped up in each other and I'll be alone again."
"THAT was all?! How stupid. And here I was thinking that you were the one who'd think your friends would worship you forever." Severus gave a snort.
"What's THAT supposed to mean?" Harry frowned.
"It means that you're being ridiculous. They worship your very presence, they more than likely won't stop now." Harry noted a hint of bitterness in the sallow boy's tone of voice.
"Did you have any friends when you were a student?" Harry asked. "Like Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle?"
"Of course I had friends! I wasn't some scum hated by everyone around me like you may believe." Severus snarled.
"I'm sorry." Harry meant it. He hadn't meant to insult the other boy. "You just...sounded really upset when you talked about my friends, that's all."
"And so you automatically jump to the conclusion that I've always been friendless." Severus stated. "I'll have you know that I was far from friendless as a child."
Harry recalled something that Sirius had once said. "But all of your friends became Death Eaters, didn't they? Is that why you became one too?"
"All of my Slytherin friends did, yes." He nodded.
Harry bit his lip. "You had friends outside of Slytherin?"
"Yes, but not many. Why are you still pestering me?"
"I'm just curious." Harry leaned back against the cold wall. He certainly didn't want to die here as a child. He had at least figured that he'd live to graduate Hogwarts, but at this rate, he wouldn't pass his fifth year. It was such a depressing thought.
/Stop that./ The words had startled Harry.
"What?"
/Stop this insistent pity party that you keep having, it's becoming a nuisance./
"Sorry."
"For what?" The two boys looked up to see Lucius Malfoy standing in front of them, his eyebrow arched. "Lord Voldemort has asked to see you two and I'm to bring you." He snatched both boys up. Harry started kicking and Severus wouldn't stop trying to squirm out of his grip.
"Stop that, you brats!" Then as an afterthought added, "Or else I'll have to jinx you both." That did the trick - both boys stilled.
11:30 p.m., Friday,
The Riddle Mansion, Second Floor.
Harry immediately recognized the room from his dreams as well as the various people who were standing inside. An amused looking Voldemort occupied the chair in front of the fireplace. He was watching a pale and shaking Igor Karkaroff leaning against one of the walls. Karkaroff had various bruises covering his face and blood smeared over his obviously broken nose, mouth, and all over the front of his now tattered cloak. The man had obviously been physically beaten. Standing between Voldemort and Karkaroff was the man Harry knew only as Lestrange. His fist was bloody and an insane grin crossed his dark features at the sight of Harry and Severus. Harry gulped. Wormtail was trembling behind Voldemort's chair and a woman with dark hair and equally dark features whom Harry knew was Mrs. Lestrange was sitting in a nearby chair, holding Nagini in her lap and carefully petting the hissing snake.
Lucius Malfoy stopped in front of Voldemort and dropped the two boys before bowing low. "Here we are, my Lord."
Karkaroff's eyes widened in horror. "That...c...can't be?! S...Snape and Potter?!" Karkaroff's words had a slight lisp due to the fact that he was missing quite a few teeth.
In response to Karkaroff's exclamation, Lestrange kicked him in the stomach, smashing the trembling old man against the wall and allowing him to slump there, sobbing quietly. "Shut up." Lestrange twisted his features as he spat out to Karkaroff.
"That will be enough, Lestrange." Voldemort's cold voice made Harry shiver.
"Yes, m'Lord." Lestrange bowed and he and his wife left the room, shutting the door behind them.
Nagini slithered over Harry and Severus' feet to Karkaroff and began to curl over the not-quite-conscious man's form, using him as a sort of rug - an obvious insult to him. "You've done very well, Malfoy. Not only have you managed to break my most loyal subjects out of Azkaban as well as work on a treaty with the Dementors, but you have also brought me the two.." He paused and laughed," most wanted children." The amused look in Voldemort's eyes showed that this was absolutely the most perfect moment in the evil man's life.
"Goyle and Crabbe helped as well, m'Lord. My son watched over the two to make sure they didn't bundle the capture." Malfoy replied.
"Very good. Once they become official Death Eaters, they will be rewarded." Voldemort nodded and turned his attention to the snake. "Nagini, would you come to me?" He hissed to the snake and she slithered over to him and into his lap.
"Tell me, Severus, how did you ever manage to look so young after all these years?" Voldemort and Malfoy laughed and were joined by Wormtail's own nervous laugh.
Harry glared at Wormtail. He hated the man and he was responsible for the fact that this man had used him to bring Voldemort back to power. He glanced over to Severus and noticed the other boy's hands were curled into tiny fists. He looked furious. Harry was even more surprised to see that Severus wasn't afraid of Voldemort.
/Harry./
/Yeah?/
/There's a window behind Wormtail. I'll distract them while you jump out of it./
/WHAT?! I'm not going to kill myself and let you get caught and tortured.. I KNOW you want me dead, but this is ridiculous!/
/Harry, your magic will keep you from getting killed..haven't you realized that by now? Hasn't something strange always happened whenever you've been threatened? They're called magic reserves, and they're mostly to keep you from being killed through those kind of accidents./
Harry remembered the many times something had happened like that to him, it also brought back the memory of Neville explaining how he had fallen out of a window and bounced safely off the ground. It all made sense now. /Okay, but...what about you?/ He certainly didn't want Severus to be caught after risking his life to save him.
/I'll be right after you./ At that Severus ran forward and kicked Voldemort in the shin and then shoved the chair with all the strength he could muster.
Voldemort shrieked out and fell backwards in his chair, pinning Wormtail to the ground as Nagini spilled over them both. Malfoy was just stunned. "RUN!" Severus snatched Harry's hand and all but dragged him to the window. Luckily for both of them, the window had no glass and the boards that were bolted over it had just enough space for the two small boys to squeeze through.
They fell to the ground and both bounced back unhurt. Immediately they were both up and running towards the town as Voldemort's angry screeches filled the air. /Harry, we've got to find a broom...it doesn't matter if it's magic or not, we can make it fly./
Harry nodded and the two dashed to the nearest house. The house was abandoned and there were no brooms in sight, desperately they ran from house to house, searching for brooms until they got to the last house. The only item to be found at the last house was a vacuum cleaner.
"This'll have to do." Severus winced.
"Will it work?' Harry asked.
"We've got to try, no time left." Severus muttered as he mounted the vacuum and dragged Harry on. Slowly and shakily, the old vacuum rose up into the air.
"It's working!" Harry gasped.
Lucius Malfoy and Wormtail came running from behind one of the near houses and made a grab for the dangling cord, but both missed and fell into a pile on the ground as the vacuum rose higher off of the ground.
"Get off of me, you idiot!" Malfoy kicked Wormtail away and ran back to the mansion to get his broom, no doubt.
Severus turned the vacuum north and urged it forward. It wasn't exactly fast, but it still worked well. Severus knew that Malfoy's broom wasn't exactly up-to-date (he rarely used it and often declared broom riding outside of playing quidditch to be a waste.) and at the rate they were going he'd never be able to catch up with them on his old outdated broom. Severus was surprised out of his reverie when Harry placed his arms around his stomach and rested his head against the sallow boy's shoulder.
"What are you doing?" He growled.
"'m sleepy.." There was a pause that was taken over by a yawn. "Gonna nap.." The other boy murmured and was soon fast asleep. Severus grumbled about being used as a pillow and sighed. It would be a long night.
(TBC - The reason they haven't been acting childish so much lately is because the potion is slowly beginning to wear off - as well as the situation being a bit too serious and so the "magic reserves" kicked in to temporarily allow them to....well, most of the time - to think straight. (Harry must have had a bit of trouble there with the spoon incident.) In a couple of days, they'll be back to normal size. As for the mind link...the potion also affects the other potions that they drink. Since the mind-link was obtained from both drinking a potion, it has managed to stay in place. Now because of the mind-link, another problem has occurred. Any spells cast on one will affect the other until the link is broken, and so the events are becoming a chain reaction. As for Malfoy's broom, it took a while for me to decide to make it an old model (it's a Cleansweep 7, to be exact.). The reason is because I believe that Malfoy would probably prefer apparation to flying. I'm sure he and Severus were probably both on the quidditch team at Hogwarts, but afterwards Malfoy more than likely wasn't in any professional teams (no need for the newer brooms because they are meant specifically for quidditch for the most part.). Malfoy's role in this story was purely humor-based (unlike the Lestranges...and for once I like having Lucius in a non-serious role, it's really all that more amusing to me!). As for the all-out less humor...I apologize for that. I did add as much as I could, but I also have a storyline that I follow and this part was the basic idea I'd originally had. I wasn't sure whether or not to use it, but I eventually went for it anyways. I hope ya'll don't mind it and it's not too dark.)
Harry and Severus' Cell.
Harry began to bang his little fists against the heavy door and yell. Sitting in a corner, Severus simply watched on in mild amusement. He didn't know what Harry expected as the little boy began to scream at the top of his lungs. Eventually he was rewarded with slowly approaching footsteps outside the door and someone muttering in frustration under their breath as they fumbled with the keys.
"Shut up, you brat!" A very agitated Lucius Malfoy kicked Harry back into Severus.
"I'm HUNGRY!" Harry sat up defiantly and crossed his arms, pouting. "I WON'T stop until YOU feed me!" The boy set his jaw.
/What are you doing?/ Severus thought to Harry.
/I'm getting food! I'm seriously hungry.../ was the reply.
Severus gaped at the other boy, then turned his gaze to a fuming Lucius. "Fine! WORMTAIL!"
The tiny and balding Peter Pettigrew appeared at Lucius' roar. "Y...yes, Master Malfoy?" He trembled.
"Get these brats some food, Wormtail. I'm trying to sleep and they won't shut the hell up." He hissed and stalked out past Wormtail as he gave a muffled reply.
"Don't forget our spoons!" Harry added cheerfully.
Wormtail turned around and shut the heavy door behind him, sliding the iron lock into place loudly. "Spoons?" Severus finally asked after Wormtail's footsteps faded.
"Mhmm.." Was Harry's only reply. Within a matter of minutes, Wormtail returned with a tray and set it down in front of the tiny duo. The tray had two steaming bowls of beef stew, two goblets of pumpkin juice and two spoons.
"What you see is what you get, I brought this from the house elves, so don't kick up a fuss." He stated meekly before scurrying out the door and once again locking the bolt.
Harry looked very pleased and held his spoon up, admiring it. Severus gingerly picked up his own spoon and dipped it in his bowl. "What are you doing?" Harry asked.
"Eating my soup, what does it look like?" Severus growled.
"No! We can dig our way out..." Harry eyed the spoon speculatively.
"Have you lost your mind?!" Severus felt like strangling the other boy.
"What? They do it on tv all the time.." Harry frowned.
"TV?" Severus looked puzzled. "What's that? Another muggle item?"
Harry simply shrugged and attempted to stab the cold stone floor with the spoon....and it bounced back at him. "Ack! Why didn't it work?"
Severus merely laughed. It was just too funny, seeing Harry stunned that he couldn't dig his way out of a cell. Harry shot a glare at Severus before looking forlornly at his now discarded and bent spoon. "Don't laugh at me. At least it's better than sitting here and waiting for Voldemort to kill us."
To Harry's surprise, Severus didn't flinch at the mention of Voldemort's name, but he did stop laughing. "It would have taken you over a decade to dig your way out of a muggle cell with that thing, but in these cells there's always at least a dozen spells to prevent escape. It's always been that way with wizards, but of course, you wouldn't know that."
Harry sighed and settled on picking up his bowl and sipping out of it without the help of a spoon. After he finished, he wiped his mouth with his cloak sleeve and started on his pumpkin juice. Severus watched the Boy Who Lived with mild amusement before finally going back to his own food. As he was eating, a thought came to him.
"Why WERE you crying yesterday?" Severus tilted his head curiously to the other boy.
Harry sighed and pulled his legs up against his chest, wrapping his arms around them. "Well..I just haven't talked to Ron and Hermione in so long, and then finding out that he's the new keeper and on top of it all that they...they're going out..I just feel left out. It won't be the same anymore, I'm sure of it! They'll be so wrapped up in each other and I'll be alone again."
"THAT was all?! How stupid. And here I was thinking that you were the one who'd think your friends would worship you forever." Severus gave a snort.
"What's THAT supposed to mean?" Harry frowned.
"It means that you're being ridiculous. They worship your very presence, they more than likely won't stop now." Harry noted a hint of bitterness in the sallow boy's tone of voice.
"Did you have any friends when you were a student?" Harry asked. "Like Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle?"
"Of course I had friends! I wasn't some scum hated by everyone around me like you may believe." Severus snarled.
"I'm sorry." Harry meant it. He hadn't meant to insult the other boy. "You just...sounded really upset when you talked about my friends, that's all."
"And so you automatically jump to the conclusion that I've always been friendless." Severus stated. "I'll have you know that I was far from friendless as a child."
Harry recalled something that Sirius had once said. "But all of your friends became Death Eaters, didn't they? Is that why you became one too?"
"All of my Slytherin friends did, yes." He nodded.
Harry bit his lip. "You had friends outside of Slytherin?"
"Yes, but not many. Why are you still pestering me?"
"I'm just curious." Harry leaned back against the cold wall. He certainly didn't want to die here as a child. He had at least figured that he'd live to graduate Hogwarts, but at this rate, he wouldn't pass his fifth year. It was such a depressing thought.
/Stop that./ The words had startled Harry.
"What?"
/Stop this insistent pity party that you keep having, it's becoming a nuisance./
"Sorry."
"For what?" The two boys looked up to see Lucius Malfoy standing in front of them, his eyebrow arched. "Lord Voldemort has asked to see you two and I'm to bring you." He snatched both boys up. Harry started kicking and Severus wouldn't stop trying to squirm out of his grip.
"Stop that, you brats!" Then as an afterthought added, "Or else I'll have to jinx you both." That did the trick - both boys stilled.
11:30 p.m., Friday,
The Riddle Mansion, Second Floor.
Harry immediately recognized the room from his dreams as well as the various people who were standing inside. An amused looking Voldemort occupied the chair in front of the fireplace. He was watching a pale and shaking Igor Karkaroff leaning against one of the walls. Karkaroff had various bruises covering his face and blood smeared over his obviously broken nose, mouth, and all over the front of his now tattered cloak. The man had obviously been physically beaten. Standing between Voldemort and Karkaroff was the man Harry knew only as Lestrange. His fist was bloody and an insane grin crossed his dark features at the sight of Harry and Severus. Harry gulped. Wormtail was trembling behind Voldemort's chair and a woman with dark hair and equally dark features whom Harry knew was Mrs. Lestrange was sitting in a nearby chair, holding Nagini in her lap and carefully petting the hissing snake.
Lucius Malfoy stopped in front of Voldemort and dropped the two boys before bowing low. "Here we are, my Lord."
Karkaroff's eyes widened in horror. "That...c...can't be?! S...Snape and Potter?!" Karkaroff's words had a slight lisp due to the fact that he was missing quite a few teeth.
In response to Karkaroff's exclamation, Lestrange kicked him in the stomach, smashing the trembling old man against the wall and allowing him to slump there, sobbing quietly. "Shut up." Lestrange twisted his features as he spat out to Karkaroff.
"That will be enough, Lestrange." Voldemort's cold voice made Harry shiver.
"Yes, m'Lord." Lestrange bowed and he and his wife left the room, shutting the door behind them.
Nagini slithered over Harry and Severus' feet to Karkaroff and began to curl over the not-quite-conscious man's form, using him as a sort of rug - an obvious insult to him. "You've done very well, Malfoy. Not only have you managed to break my most loyal subjects out of Azkaban as well as work on a treaty with the Dementors, but you have also brought me the two.." He paused and laughed," most wanted children." The amused look in Voldemort's eyes showed that this was absolutely the most perfect moment in the evil man's life.
"Goyle and Crabbe helped as well, m'Lord. My son watched over the two to make sure they didn't bundle the capture." Malfoy replied.
"Very good. Once they become official Death Eaters, they will be rewarded." Voldemort nodded and turned his attention to the snake. "Nagini, would you come to me?" He hissed to the snake and she slithered over to him and into his lap.
"Tell me, Severus, how did you ever manage to look so young after all these years?" Voldemort and Malfoy laughed and were joined by Wormtail's own nervous laugh.
Harry glared at Wormtail. He hated the man and he was responsible for the fact that this man had used him to bring Voldemort back to power. He glanced over to Severus and noticed the other boy's hands were curled into tiny fists. He looked furious. Harry was even more surprised to see that Severus wasn't afraid of Voldemort.
/Harry./
/Yeah?/
/There's a window behind Wormtail. I'll distract them while you jump out of it./
/WHAT?! I'm not going to kill myself and let you get caught and tortured.. I KNOW you want me dead, but this is ridiculous!/
/Harry, your magic will keep you from getting killed..haven't you realized that by now? Hasn't something strange always happened whenever you've been threatened? They're called magic reserves, and they're mostly to keep you from being killed through those kind of accidents./
Harry remembered the many times something had happened like that to him, it also brought back the memory of Neville explaining how he had fallen out of a window and bounced safely off the ground. It all made sense now. /Okay, but...what about you?/ He certainly didn't want Severus to be caught after risking his life to save him.
/I'll be right after you./ At that Severus ran forward and kicked Voldemort in the shin and then shoved the chair with all the strength he could muster.
Voldemort shrieked out and fell backwards in his chair, pinning Wormtail to the ground as Nagini spilled over them both. Malfoy was just stunned. "RUN!" Severus snatched Harry's hand and all but dragged him to the window. Luckily for both of them, the window had no glass and the boards that were bolted over it had just enough space for the two small boys to squeeze through.
They fell to the ground and both bounced back unhurt. Immediately they were both up and running towards the town as Voldemort's angry screeches filled the air. /Harry, we've got to find a broom...it doesn't matter if it's magic or not, we can make it fly./
Harry nodded and the two dashed to the nearest house. The house was abandoned and there were no brooms in sight, desperately they ran from house to house, searching for brooms until they got to the last house. The only item to be found at the last house was a vacuum cleaner.
"This'll have to do." Severus winced.
"Will it work?' Harry asked.
"We've got to try, no time left." Severus muttered as he mounted the vacuum and dragged Harry on. Slowly and shakily, the old vacuum rose up into the air.
"It's working!" Harry gasped.
Lucius Malfoy and Wormtail came running from behind one of the near houses and made a grab for the dangling cord, but both missed and fell into a pile on the ground as the vacuum rose higher off of the ground.
"Get off of me, you idiot!" Malfoy kicked Wormtail away and ran back to the mansion to get his broom, no doubt.
Severus turned the vacuum north and urged it forward. It wasn't exactly fast, but it still worked well. Severus knew that Malfoy's broom wasn't exactly up-to-date (he rarely used it and often declared broom riding outside of playing quidditch to be a waste.) and at the rate they were going he'd never be able to catch up with them on his old outdated broom. Severus was surprised out of his reverie when Harry placed his arms around his stomach and rested his head against the sallow boy's shoulder.
"What are you doing?" He growled.
"'m sleepy.." There was a pause that was taken over by a yawn. "Gonna nap.." The other boy murmured and was soon fast asleep. Severus grumbled about being used as a pillow and sighed. It would be a long night.
(TBC - The reason they haven't been acting childish so much lately is because the potion is slowly beginning to wear off - as well as the situation being a bit too serious and so the "magic reserves" kicked in to temporarily allow them to....well, most of the time - to think straight. (Harry must have had a bit of trouble there with the spoon incident.) In a couple of days, they'll be back to normal size. As for the mind link...the potion also affects the other potions that they drink. Since the mind-link was obtained from both drinking a potion, it has managed to stay in place. Now because of the mind-link, another problem has occurred. Any spells cast on one will affect the other until the link is broken, and so the events are becoming a chain reaction. As for Malfoy's broom, it took a while for me to decide to make it an old model (it's a Cleansweep 7, to be exact.). The reason is because I believe that Malfoy would probably prefer apparation to flying. I'm sure he and Severus were probably both on the quidditch team at Hogwarts, but afterwards Malfoy more than likely wasn't in any professional teams (no need for the newer brooms because they are meant specifically for quidditch for the most part.). Malfoy's role in this story was purely humor-based (unlike the Lestranges...and for once I like having Lucius in a non-serious role, it's really all that more amusing to me!). As for the all-out less humor...I apologize for that. I did add as much as I could, but I also have a storyline that I follow and this part was the basic idea I'd originally had. I wasn't sure whether or not to use it, but I eventually went for it anyways. I hope ya'll don't mind it and it's not too dark.)