AN: Harry Potter and all related characters, places and terms belong to JK Rowling and/or (not sure which) Warner Brothers.

Hello everyone, back from quite a long break. Sorry. Well, here goes…

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Chapter 11: Aftermath

Sirius descended the staircase from the headmaster's office, walking even though the stairs were slowly spiralling down. Unable to take the tension in the office he had volunteered to get some Butterbeers from the Three Broomsticks, and after promising he wasn't off to find Peter, the other three consented.

He didn't know what to do about Peter - in fact, he hardly even knew how he felt about it. Sure, he had presented quite an angry face to everyone in Albus' office, but underneath he was a bit confused. This was a man he had known - or at least, thought he knew - for more than ten years. He had absolutely no idea what would lead someone to turn on their friends like that. The only thing he knew definitely was that he wanted to find him and cause him as much pain as possible… but he had promised he wouldn't. For now.

Not really paying attention to where he was going, Sirius found that his feet had automatically taken him to the front doors of the school. Pulling his coat tighter around himself in anticipation of the cold, he opened them and stepped outside. It was a beautiful morning with the sun making its way slowly across the sky. Sirius could see the greenhouses from where he was standing, and inside it looked like Professor Sprout was preparing a Herbology class. He made his way down the driveway, reminiscing about past lessons with his old teacher, when he stopped dead in his tracks.

There was a body lying in the snow, with footprints outlined in red leading away from it down the drive. Its black robes were torn and quite frankly, it looked dead. Rushing forward, Sirius turned the man over and let go almost immediately in shock and disgust.

The last person he had expected it to be was Severus Snape.

* * *

Up in the Headmaster's office Albus, James and Remus sat in a thoughtful silence. Their quiet was disturbed, though, by the sound of tapping on Dumbledore's office window. James stood up to let the owl in and it landed on Dumbledore's desk, holding out its leg with the regular little money pouch attached. After getting some coins out of a drawer and counting out five knuts into the pouch, Albus picked up the paper.

"Merlin's Beard…"

James and Remus looked up.

"What is it?"

In reply, Dumbledore dropped the paper back down onto the desk, spinning it around for James and Remus to read. Splashed across the front page was a picture of the charred ruins of a building with the familiar form of the Dark Mark glittering above it.

"Oh no… not again."

James looked up at Dumbledore. "It was St Mungo's, wasn't it?"

Albus sighed. "I'm afraid it was."

"Why?"

Dumbledore shrugged his shoulders, but both he and James knew why the hospital had been attacked. Shaking his head slightly, James looked down at the paper again, and joined Remus in reading the article that the picture belonged to.

Murder at St Mungo's

Reported by Alfred Prufrock

In the early hours of this morning, the highly respected institution of St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries was attacked by He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and his followers. It seems that a remote incindiendous charm was used to destroy the building. Thanks to an early warning from an unidentified witch or wizard, much of the hospital was evacuated and the wards were protected. Even though, over three hundred of the terminally ill and immobile were killed along with hospital staff - including the hospital's head, Mallissa Mungo.

The magical community is up in arms. Such a brazen attack on a clearly peaceful place has not been seen since the days of the Dark Lord Grindelwald in the early 1940s. The motives of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named are unknown, and it is doubtful as to whether there were any beyond causing suffering.

The efficiency of the Auror Headquarters is now also being called into question. It has been revealed that they were notified of the attack via an alarm, but still did not manage to arrive on the scene until the building was destroyed. A representative from the Headquarters claims that they "could have done nothing anyway", but as far as the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement is concerned, this excuse is not sufficient. An investigation is currently under way.

This attack came as a great surprise to all, especially the Mungo family. In a press release made earlier, they stated that they are in mourning for Mallissa and the families of all the victims of the attacks, but will do their best to make it through this tragedy. In an admirable show of defiance against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, there also seem to be plans to rebuild the hospital in a different, more secure location.

For more information, see page 5

Remus and James looked up at Albus, who sighed.

"I knew Mallissa Mungo well. She was a good woman."

"Is there anything we can do, Albus?"

James snorted. "I think I, for one, have done enough as it is."

"Meaning…"

"Think about it, Moony. Why were they there in the first place?"

"You don't think… don't be an idiot, James. You can't claim responsibility for this!"

"Yeah, whatever you say." Dumbledore and Lupin exchanged worried glances over his head, but let it slide. "Listen, this is getting too much - first I get a son, then one of my best friends turns on me, and now this - do you mind if I go up to the hospital wing? I just want to see my wife."

Dumbledore looked kindly at James. "Of course, I understand completely. Do you want to go up with him, Remus?"

"Sure thing. What about Sirius? Shouldn't we tell him somehow?"

Any response Albus could have given was cut off by the door handle turning. They all turned to see who it was, and were mildly surprised when it turned out to be Sirius, looking flustered and slightly red in the face, as if he had run a fair way. He stood in the doorway, appearing to have something urgent to say and making no move to sit down.

James looked up. "That was quick - what, have you learned to fly or something?"

"Haha, you always were the funny one, weren't you Prongs. No, I ran into something on the way. Albus, I've got some news for you…" he trailed off, seeing their expressions. "Has something else happened? Your faces are longer than they were when I left, and that's saying something."

"St Mungo's. They burnt it down last night."

"Oh damn… To think that we were there just last night."

"Yeah, there were three hundred people who weren't so lucky."

Sirius looked dumbfounded. "Three hundred? You've got to be kidding me!" He saw the look on James' face, and realised what his best friend must have been feeling. "Listen, James, it wasn't your fault…"

"Yeah, whatever."

"No, really James…" Seeing the expression on James' face, he trailed off. Always the reliable one, Remus spoke up before the silence could become awkward.

"Listen Padfoot, we were going up to the hospital wing. Do you want to come up and see Harry and Lily?"

"Sure, but hang on - I've got something to tell you first. Voldemort was one busy little boy last night, wasn't he?"

"What do you mean?"

"Here - see for yourself." Sirius went back around the door, and pulled something out from behind it. "Look what I found on the front drive."

There was a sharp intake of breath as Dumbledore realised what Sirius was dragging across the floor, but James and Remus stepped forward to take a closer look.

As Albus sat down heavily, James smiled grimly and gave a mirthless little laugh.

"Well, now I guess we know where Snape got to…"

* * *

"Really Sirius, did you have to drag him all the way up to the office?"

"Why, are you objecting to it?"

"Well, he's in bad enough shape as it is…"

"If it makes you any happier, Moony, I picked him up when we had to go up any stairs. He's heavy, too."

"Couldn't you just have levitated him at least?"

"What's the fun in that?"

"Will you boys be quiet, or I'll have to ask you to leave. And shame on you, Sirius Black."

Sirius blushed, but fell silent. He'd had enough experience in the hospital wing to know that talking back to Madam Pomfrey was about as close to suicide as you could get at Hogwarts - on a good day. Now, with an exhausted Lily, a screaming newborn Harry and one extremely injured Potions Master in Snape, she was not likely to be very kind.

Dumbledore came out from behind the curtain that hid Snape, and joined Remus and Sirius on the chairs at the end of the wing.

"So, what's happening with Snape?"

"I'm afraid what - or more likely, who - got to Severus did a very thorough job of, how should I say this…"

"Bashing him up."

"Yes, well I was looking for a less tasteless way of putting it, Sirius."

"I don't think taste really applies to Snape, Albus."

Dumbledore sighed. "I'm afraid to tell you, Sirius, that we don't all share your hate for Severus. I've always found your loathing of each other quite irrational. Isn't it possible that you can let it go?"

"Not likely."

"All right then, Sirius. I just wish that you and James - yes, and Severus - would be less childish."

When Sirius didn't say anything, Dumbledore moved on. "You'll have to excuse me, I have to go down and tell the students that Potions is cancelled."

"I'm sure they'll be heartbroken."

Dumbledore gave Remus a small smile. "I'm sure they will. Now I have to ask the two of you to either stay here with Lily and James, or go back to my office. I'm afraid I can't allow you to be roaming around the castle."

"Why not? I wanted to go take a look around - I haven't been here in a while."

"I'm afraid you can't. I'll explain later. Can you just promise me you'll stay in one spot?"

"Sure, Albus. We'll just stay here for now."

"Thankyou. I'll come and get you soon."

And with that, Dumbledore turned and walked out of the hospital wing, leaving the most unlikely group of ex-students in the room together.

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OK, so nothing really happened. But I needed a bit of an in between chapter - I couldn't really leave Severus lying in the snow.

I'm really sorry about how long this took to get up, considering the quality of it too, but so much stuff's happened (I'm sure you don't want to hear about it) and I went through the whole thing trying to Order of the Phoenix-ize it before I realised there really wasn't much I could change.

The next chapter will be better, trust me. That particular group of people in the hospital wing… I think it will suffice to say that my favourite sequence in the whole series is the Sirius/Severus conversation in OotP.

And yes, for anyone who picked it up, we've been studying TS Elliott in English.

Thanks go to Claire, ShortySC22, Andrea, Futon and maggie. More specifically:

Olivia Wood: Well, as you can see, Snape's in (more or less) one piece. Sorry, I swear I didn't mean to leave him "lying in the snow and bleeding" for that long! Trust me, I really didn't. I would have hoped that I made it clear when it slipped away from canon - but if you missed it they found out last chap. that Peter was working for Voldie…

Anyway, thanks for the comments, always appreciated.

Blue Yeti: Thanks so much, you've been a great help. You don't have to feel obliged… ;) And I couldn't be bothered changing the article. Go take a look at the last article in OotP. Don't tell me it has an angle. If you do you'll have a hard time convincing me.

Brie Cheese Eater: It's a bit of both, I think. I did start writing it before OotP, but it still counts as AU now. Especially since JK's version of the prophesy has come out and everything. Don't worry, Lily and James aren't that stupid; Peter's not going to be Secret Keeper by a long shot.

Feroina: Yay! Fellow Snape lover! Sorry if I bug you in every little thing for your story, I'm a bit of a nitpicker. One last thing about Knurd - it was never a drink , I don't think, just a state of mind. Just to confuse you a bit more.

Thanks again, everyone.

Later-

~*Lady*~