Layers of Nonsense
Chapter 1:
Thus Bad Begins
***
Author's Ramblings: After I read OotP, I only loved Snape more. Either that, or it was Alan Rickman in Sense and Sensibility, but either way, I have found obsession in the man.
This story is the product of a wonderful ship that I discovered in authors such as She's a Star and drama-princess, thank you, ladies.
I ask all of you to leave me comments on how you felt about this, as it's a story I'm somewhat unsure of. It's fun to write, however, so I do believe it will all turn out fine and dandy in the end. For you and me, at least. I'm not sure about poor old Sev.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. I don't have millions of dollars. I don't know if Auriga is really Sinistra's first name, but it it's good enough for those who came before me in this ship, it's good enough for me.
***
Summer. To Severus Snape the word brought relief and happiness. Well, the closest thing to happiness he'd ever been privy to feeling. A more apt description would place him as slightly less annoyed than he was only weeks before. Of course, weeks before there had been students in the halls of Hogwarts, weeks before there had been Harry bloody Potter.
Not that Snape carried resentment or anything.
Now, however, the halls were quiet, devoid of giggles and whispers that usually accompanied teenagers. Snape sneered at the mere thought of the hormonal creatures he was forced to associate with so often.
Maybe now, finally, he could enjoy a bit of peace, something his life was sorely lacking. Snape winced as he thought of the black mark burned into his forearm, when would he ever truly be at peace?
But at least it was quiet. And while quiet didn't always equal peace, it certainly was an improvement. In his next life, Snape decided, he would teach in a school with no students.
Snape entered the Great Hall later than he normally would this summer day. He had spent all morning organizing his office, and hadn't seen fit to eat a proper breakfast. Though it was now eleven o'clock, he expected the house elves would manage to scrounge something up for him.
What he did not expect, however, was entering the large chamber and catching sight of Auriga Sinistra slumped over in her chair at the head table. She was the only one in the room, and Snape didn't even think he would have noticed her if it hadn't been for her large, brown, frizzy hair.
After all, it's easy not to notice somebody when they're dead asleep.
Very quietly Snape walked over to the prone figure, a devilish smile forming across his features as he did so. He fought back the urge to chuckle as he leaned down and put his mouth beside her ear.
"If you insist on sleeping at the breakfast table, you could at least take your arm out of the muffins."
"AHHH!!!" With a shout of pure horror Professor Sinistra was up and out of her chair. She looked around wildly for a moment, pinched herself, then took on a look of even more repulsion.
"Good morning, Auriga, I do hope you've slept well." Snape sat down at his chair calmly.
"Dear Merlin, Severus, I thought I was having a nightmare."
Snape took a muffin and spread some butter on it. "You were sleeping rather soundly for somebody having a nightmare."
Sinistra waved away his comment. "No, no, after I woke up."
"It is good to see the high regard you hold me in."
The astronomy professor blushed a bit, but remained otherwise unrepentant. "That was very cruel of you, Severus, I'll have you know my sleeping schedule has been thrown off drastically ever since I stopped having to teach classes."
Under his breath Snape muttered something that sounded like a very high-pitched, "That was very cruel of you, Severus."
"Fine, then, be that way!" With a flourish Sinistra whipped around and exited the Great Hall, leaving Snape to his muffin.
As he ate, Snape thought back on his history with Auriga. There actually wasn't much of one, to say the truth. They'd both gone to Hogwarts at the same time, but she'd been younger than him, and a Ravenclaw to boot. They had both been teaching at Hogwarts for at least a decade, but only ever said to each other things like, "Pass the marmalade," or, "Good evening."
However, there had been that time three years ago when he'd commented—and by commented, he meant insulted terribly—on her hair and she'd thrown her coffee mug at him. She had professed slippery fingers but to this day Snape believed the mug had had a bit of a wind-up as it sailed through the air.
He shuddered at the memory.
***
Back in her tower, Auriga Sinistra was positively fuming. There were only two things in this world that could cause such anger in her: her hair, and one Severus Snape.
Auriga was a person who always tried to be just and fair. She lived for the night and the stars, basking in their beauty. Snape was her antithesis. Indeed, she didn't think he'd ever heard of the word fair, and she'd once overhead him telling Professor Flitwick he thought it was useless to teach astronomy at Hogwarts. His motive for saying such a thing was heretofore undetected, but Auriga had never quite gotten over it. It didn't help matters that he seemed to be somewhat evil.
***
Snape stared at the wall of his office. It was very clean. And boring…
He turned his eyes to his bookshelves. They too were very clean, but not in the least bit boring; Rows of Shakespeare littered them, taking up even more space then his most prized books on potion making. Even more unusual about his collection was the fact that he had two copies of every play and sonnet. As it was, William Shakespeare had been a famous wizard who delighted in mischief and mayhem. He'd made himself famous in the Muggle world for the solitary reason of leaving behind him centuries of conspiracy theories.
But enough about that.
For years Snape had found solace in the bard's words, and he often found it calming to read and reread his works. The professor walked over to the bookshelf and picked up a copy of Hamlet.
***
"And then he mimicked me! Can you imagine, Severus Snape making fun of the things I say? That greasy-haired git has never said an intelligent thing in his life. Ever."
Victoria Vector, the Arithmancy teacher at Hogwarts, nodded sagely. "Too true, Auriga, too true."
Okay, perhaps Victoria was biased. She was guaranteed to agree with Auriga, mostly because they'd been best friends for years.
Luckily, Auriga was not looking for an open and honest opinion, she was looking for one that would make Snape appear like the bastard he was. Humph.
"You know, we're both going to be seeing a lot more of Snape now that the ministry has admitted You-Know-Who's back."
The brown-haired woman raised an eyebrow. "How do you figure?"
Victoria curled a piece of her blond hair around her figure, making her look like a contemplative Barbie. It was a habit she'd never been able to drop, even though her IQ was said to be well-over average. "Dumbledore is finally going to be able to confide in us, and you know perfectly well he's been working with most of the other teachers here. Thus, we will be working with all of the other teachers here."
"I still don't know why he wouldn't let us join the Order before," Auriga said.
Victoria frowned. "What, do you think he didn't find us trustworthy?"
"No, no. I believe him when he says he did it for our own good, but don't you ever feel kind of left out of the loop? Like we're extras in a movie or barely-mentioned characters in a book?"
"Don't be silly, Auriga!" Victoria laughed. "Honestly, I don't know where you come up with these things."
The other woman looked put out. "It was just a thought."
"Dumbledore just didn't want to see us hurt. After all, we were too young to be involved in the first war, and he would have been risking a lot to tell us about his renegade group when he wasn't sure of our loyalties."
"He should have known they'd be with him, of course!" Logic was something that Auriga could fail to see at times. Mostly when she chose not to.
"Yes, well, we're in it now, so stop your whining."
Auriga gasped. "I do not whine!"
Victoria patted her friend on the shoulder. "That's right dear, and Professor Snape doesn't purposely keep his hair oily."
"What?!" Auriga's scream echoed through the room.
"Didn't you know," Victoria started conspiringly. "His hair is actually…curly."
"No!" Professor Sinistra could not suppress an image of Severus Snape with curls hanging down the sides of his face. "You're making this up, Victoria! I've told you time and time again that you can't believe the gossip you hear—"
"It's true!" the blond interrupted. "I was caught in the rain with him one year when one of the boats capsized in the lake—those poor first-years—anyway, we both got soaked. Soaked enough to make any potions he keeps in that hair of his get the use washed out of it. And as we walked inside, I could have sworn it had a bit of curl to it."
"And you expect me to go on living without knowing if his hair is really curly or not? How could you tell me something like this without being absolutely sure?"
Victoria rolled her eyes. "Why do you care, it's just Snape. I thought it was interesting, yes, but not to the point where I'd actually try to find out."
"Right," Auriga agreed. "I wouldn't either."
***
Days went by with no incident whatsoever. Snape followed his routine, Auriga hers. One day, however, Snape was nowhere to be found. Auriga, who was certainly not looking for him, noticed this as she casually checked most of the rooms in the castle for his whereabouts.
It was time.
Ever so slowly she crept into the dungeons, feeling claustrophobic as she did so. Being an astronomer and all, Auriga felt very much at a loss with out the sky one quick glance away. It figures the git would live in the one place I hate most, she reflected as she stood outside his bedchamber door.
"This is wrong. This is very, very, wrong." Auriga repeated the line to herself as she studied the doorknob. It crossed her mind that it was probably smothered with poison. She reached out to grab it, but then decided that woman's intuition was worth a listening to.
The minutes passed as the sleuth—for lack of a better word—decided upon her best course of action. Finally, she lowered herself to the ground to peak in under the door.
Snape's bedroom was dark, which did not surprise Auriga in the slightest. The floors, just like the walls (or at least what she could see of them) were covered in the same stone that was in most other parts of the castle. He should have a carpet! Auriga thought. His feet must be freezing in the morning. A bed sat on the far side of the chamber, as well as other wooden pieces of furniture that were indistinguishable from the woman's viewing point.
Eventually Auriga spotted another door, one that she was sure led to a bathroom. She couldn't stifle a slight, "A hah!"
"Did you find something of interest, Professor?" a cold voice sneered at her.
Oh, Bugger.
"Er…Severus, fancy meeting you down here." Auriga struggled to sit up as she brushed her hair out of her eyes and tried to fight the profuse blush that was starting to overtake her visage.
Snape crossed his arms. "Au contraire, my dear colleague. You see, this is my room. I believe you too have one, in a tower. Now that I think about it, perhaps it is the altitude that makes you so odd." He paused to insert a sneer. "The question is what you are doing here."
"Right. Well, you see…" Auriga trailed off, unable to think up a good excuse for being on the floor of the dungeon. She racked her brain for a possible explanation.
"I…I…" She trailed off.
"Yes, Auriga, I realize that it is you who was lying on the ground."
"I slipped," the astronomy professor spat out, right before another part of her brain could start voicing the profanities that to this point had only been thought.
"Ah…" Snape said. "I suppose that you are the type to slip often. Coordination doesn't suit you, does it?"
"You oaf!" Auriga screeched. "If you say one more word about my lack of balance, my hair, or anything else, I'm going to hex you into next week!" She heaved a large breath of air as Snape eyed her calculatingly.
Finally, the man took a step closer to her. He was so close, in fact, that she could feel his breath on her face. "I don't think you would," he said simply. "I don't think you can."
But Snape wasn't done.
"After all, what would a twit like you know about hexes?"
If Snape could have seen the future, perhaps he wouldn't have said that. For exactly half a moment later he was sprawled out on the floor, all of his limbs tangled up in each other. A second passed where he could only gape, but Auriga was too angry to soak in her victory. By this point she had completely forgotten that it was she who had been trying to break into his room, and couldn't think past the man she had at her feet.
The situation was really quite pervy, actually. Luckily, both were too occupied to notice.
When she was again capable of speech, the chestnut-haired woman gave Snape a look that expressed a hatred that would have made any other grown man cry. Snape only raised an eyebrow. This, of course, only fueled Auriga's fire. With one last glower she said, "I hate you, you self-centered, egotistical, evil bastard!"
And then she was gone.
Maybe if Snape weren't in the shape of pretzel, and had had the luxury to reflection Hamlet rather than his current predicament, the line, "The lady doth protest too much, methinks," would have crossed his mind.
But it didn't.
_______________________________________________________________________________________
You like? You hate? Tell me in a review. You owe it to Shakespeare.
Right.
