Suicide Solution.

Notes: this is a Severitus Challenge, go to www.geocities.com\challengefics\thechallenge.htm To find out the 'rules' for a Severitus Challenge piece.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything that is recognisably harry potter-ish, and the Severitus challenge-ness belongs to the writer Severitus, userid=123967

Summary: A Severitus challenge, [Snape is Harry's father] Story begins at 11.59pm on July 30th. It's the summer before Harry's 6th year, and Harry's changing . . .

Chapter 8

Harry settled back into life at Hogwarts easily. He went to class, went to meal, did his homework and went to quidditch practice. He was still hated by the Slytherins, idolised by the younger gryffindors and bullied by Snape. All in all life at Hogwarts was back to normal.

Or so he thought.

"Harry come on!" Ginny's voice broke harry out of his thought stream.

Quidditch trials were over and Gryffindor had five new players: Ginny, Neville and Dennis Creevey as chasers, with Dean and Seamus, as beaters. This was their second practice and their first match was in five weeks, against Ravenclaw.

Harry, as the longest playing member of the team, was captain. He walked out onto the pitch and faced the rest of the team.

"Well, here we are. Now last practice was okay but we still need work to get up to the standards on the Gryffindor team of '93. I think that we all should learn the sloth roll, just in case. Ginny, Dennis and Neville, you three practice passes to each other then I want you to try and get the Quaffle past Ron. I want you to keep track of how many you score and how many you don't. Use this spell to keep a tally, Tatame. Dean, Seamus I want you two to practice your aim. Keep hitting the Bludgers through the hoops at the other end, try to make your shoots harder each time you hit one through a goal. After half an hour we'll have a short match. Okay?"

"Okay!" replied the team, and harry kicked the ball box open and the players set to practice. Harry himself was chasing the snitch, rolling in all different directions, following the tiny golden balls every move.

Thirty minutes later, harry blew the whistle and the team took their positions, he blew the whistle again and dean and Seamus took off to go about protecting the other team players from the assault from the Bludgers. Once again the three chasers set off trying to score goals, each time they got one past Ron, they tried a harder sequence the next time. Ron himself was doing very well at keeping the Quaffle away from the hoops, and he actually saved a few very tricky shots. It was another 15 minutes before harry blew the whistle again. The team stopped playing and they gathered up the Bludgers and Quaffle and landed back on the ground.

"Well done everyone, that was a really good practice session, Ron you saved 80% of the shots, and both of our beaters managed to block every Bludger from hitting us. Good formations chasers, homework for you, look up some different ones for the next practice. Which is next Wednesday by the way. Okay lets head back to the castle."

Dean and Ron carried the chest back into the changing rooms and the rest of the team followed. Once inside harry took his time in getting changed, wanting to speak to Campaspe once everyone had left.

"You coming harry?" Ron asked as he noticed that his friend was being extra slow in getting changed.

"Yeah, I'll be up in a bit, I just want to take a quick walk by the lake. See you back at the tower."

"Okay, later."

Ron left Harry alone. He pulled on his cloak and sat on his firebolt, and flew swiftly over towards the lake, rising only 10 or so feet from the ground. He hovered by the lakeside and pulled out the picture he now always carried with him.

"Good evening, Tanathos"

She greeted him with a smile,

"Good evening Campaspe. Are you enjoying working with the potions ingredients?" a few days before harry had asked Colin to take a photo of him with all his potion ingredients in the background. Colin of course had agreed, so now in the open frame, Lady Campaspe had company, the photo version of Tanathos, dressed in his dark green dress robes from the year before, and she could also visit him in his frame and together they made potions. Lady Campaspe was a lot happier now then she was ever on the wall in Grimmauld place.

"Yes, thank you Tanathos, it was such a wonderful surprise to wake up and find you in an adjacent frame, and with all those ingredients! Such a delight. But how are you, it has been awhile since you spoke of your time at Hogwarts. What year is it, you never said?"

"It's September 1996."

"'96? Really so that would make Severus and Sirius and their year, 33/34 correct?"

"Yes, I suppose they would be about that age. I never really thought about it." He replied yawning.

"Dear, you should head off to bed if you're yawning. Good night my dear Tanathos."

"Good night, Campaspe."

He put the picture back into his pocket and flew back up to the castle. Stopping on the top step he climbed off his firebolt and opened the main doors. The journey was quiet until he reached the 3rd floor and was about to take a shortcut through a tapestry when he heard angry voices shouting at each other. Intrigued he moved closer, and hid in the shadows, it took a moment but then he recognised the voices to be that of Remus and Snape's.

~S~

"Harry's changing Severus! You cannot deny that you havent noticed." Snape scowled at Lupin, who ignored it.

"You're the most observant person in this castle, even more so than Dumbledore, you know what is happening to him, you know what it means."

Snape was pacing, listening to Lupin but making it look like he wasn't hearing what was being said.

"Severus, lily told me what happened, back in 7th." Snape stopped pacing and was glaring at the wall, Lupin continued speaking, "Harry is your son Severus, you slept with her, before she slept with James, neither lily nor I knew this 'till she gave birth. Harry is yours, not James'. She cast a Pereturnous Charm, so that know one would know. But Severus, it's wearing off. You have to tell him."

Snape rounded on Lupin "Tell him? Tell him what? That he's my son? That I fucked him mum, while she was in a state of depression because his so called father was a totally ass to her and told her about the betrothal? No!"

"Why not?" Lupin tried a different angle

"Because, I hate him, and he hates me. We could never be a family. Also what happens if the dark lord finds out that I have a son and it's the wonderful boy-who-lived?"

Lupin stayed silent, then tried again

"James never knew Severus, neither lily nor I told him. You are the first to find out, but it won't stay secret for much longer! His hair has already begun to grow out and not be that messy nest it always was, he doesn't even have to wear his glasses anymore either! That's properly the most noticeable change. Luckily the muggle-borns will just think he has contacts, and the purebloods will think he's just corrected them with magic."

"I wont tell him! And if you do Remus, I will kill you! You know very well that I am capable, Dumbledore may think you're safe here, but you're not, I could very easily make a mistake with the wolfsbane, so very easily, and you'll be dead by morning."

Lupin was looking at Snape with sadness in his eyes, "Harry deserves to know, you owe it to Lily at least."

"You want to know why I fucked her that day? Do you? I loved lily, you remember back in 6th, when we were friends, and she made me make her a promise. That I would never join the death eaters. It was the first promise I ever truly meant, but I didn't keep it, I couldn't. A short while before the end of 6th I told her that I loved her, but she only wanted to be friends. I was devastated, heart broken, and we didn't speak again 'till 7th, but during that summer I joined the death eaters, I don't know if it was out of spite or loneliness, but I did, she found out at Christmastime, and we argued for hours, at the end she told me, "Why did you join? Now I can never marry you" her words took me by such surprise that I didn't now what to say. After that we became friends again. But then she started going out with James. When she found out about the betrothal she came to me, and asked why I joined the Dark Lord I told her my reasons, and she agreed with them. At the Easter party she joined too."

Snape wasn't pacing anymore; he was looking at the ground, talking to it as if it could take away all his pain from those years. Lupin was watching him in amazement, never before had he heard Severus reveal his feelings,

"What happened next? I remember the day she ran off, her and James had a fight, apparently he didn't want her to be friends with you, I saw her run from the Gryffindor common room, and then I guess she ran into you"

"She came down into the Slytherin common room, she knew the password, because of her being head girl and it being her house, when she came in there was utter silence, can you imagine it, the so called mudblood lover of James potter, standing in the Slytherin common rooms, crying. Some laughed, she spotted me and came over and collapsed into my arms, saying how she hated James and how she should have never left me, I took her off to my room to try to calm her down. I left her sitting on my bed, while I went to shout at the common room about not to bother me until I said, being feared always did have its advantages. When I returned to the room, lily had striped, and was looking at me with love and aggression in her eyes. "Severus" she called "Severus fuck me in the way we Slytherin girls like it!" I was speechless, a year before she had said that she didn't love me, and here she was offering herself to me like a piece of meat. I remember the way she arched her back when I didn't move, trying to provoke me into doing as she wanted, I held off but not for very long, I mean could you blame me? The love of my life lying naked on my bed asking me to fuck her."

He looked up at Lupin, and found him watching him. He smirked, "I guess I don't need to you what happened next? You can properly guess."

Lupin smiled, "I remember when she came back, she smelt different I could tell she had been with you, but I wasn't sure what had happened, not until she gave birth did I realise, and then she told me, only she stopped the detail when you re entered your room."

Snape wasn't smirking now, but he wasn't smiling either. He was lost in the memory.

"You should tell him."

Snape snapped back into being angry, "I told you no!"

And with that he left Lupin standing alone in the corridor as he marched quickly off towards the dungeons.

Lupin stayed standing there watching him retreat for some time, but then he too, walked away.

Just off from where the two professor's were previously standing, harry potter still stood, clutching his firebolt tightly in his hands and shaking with anger.

~S~