Chapter 20 :
Ignoring their poorly relevant reactions and his sneer growing acrid on his face, Snape insisted :
"I'm just saying that, for all that Potter is an insufferable attention seeking disobedient rascal,"
He took the time to appreciate his own elocution, genuinely wondering if insulting the brat a bit more would even out his karma after taking his side, before continuing :
"He has neither the capacity nor the predisposition to cheat an ancient artefact such as the Goblet of Fire, especially since it was reinforced by your Age Line, Headmaster."
Dumbledore, the old coot, sent him a speculative gaze. Which Snape deemed well deserved given his out of character response to Potter's obvious -and delectable- distress. Everyone else stared at him as if seeing him for the first time, and he somewhat forgave them their inner turmoil. They didn't know about the tacit agreement he had with The Devil after all. However, when Potter sent him a grateful look, the Potion Professor shuddered in absolute revulsion. This was really taking it too far !
A thankful Potter... what an atrocity...
He closed his eyes in distaste. Firewhisky would not be enough to deal with this new phobia. He would need to take out the wilder stuff, be it his favorite blend of Nuclear Vodka or one of McGonagall's secret stash of her family's Scotch. Surely he could bend his retelling of this episode in a way that implied heavy mental trauma without making her laugh too hard, right... ?
Harry looked at his potion professor in blatant surprise. Of all the people in the room, the man was certainly the last person he expected to take his defense. Even Dumbledore, who liked to pretend to be a genial grand father, wasn't that confident in his innocence.
And, to be honest, Harry was starting to doubt himself too. Did he go on a walk anywhere near the goblet recently? He didn't believe so, but he knew that he sometimes took very enthusiastic walks that he was too tired to remember the following day... -didn't he smuggle a dragon that one time, in first year?-
But no, that was impossible, Harry acutely recalled staying awake all night long to sort out his feelings about Malfoy. The talk with Ron the previous dawn had helped but he was still confused, even now. The young Gryffindor observed Snape for a bit before nodding to himself. Yeah, there was no way he was admitting that to anyone. Much less Snape. The man looked sourer by the second as everyone focused their disbelief on him. He was not gonna open this can of worms. Nope.
Luckily Mad Eye grabbed everyone's attention by being his usual optimistic self :
"Me thinks the boy is victim of a nefarious plot."
"And what do you imply" sneered Headmaster Karkaroff "that this some kind of prank played on the boy? The culprit is obviously an experienced adult ! Master Snape is right to say that not a single student managed to cheat the Age Line. Not even the older years."
Mad Eye glared at the man, somehow making him know with his only good eye exactly what he thought of him and his words.
"This is a trap to kill the boy" he still harrumphed before expounding for those who hadn't understood his glare. "Good thing we have a suspect already, eh, Death Eater."
In barely a second it took to finish his sentence, the wizened former auror brandished his butterfly knife and aimed for the Durmstrang Headmaster's throat.
At the same time, Karkaroff erupted in a vindictive and atrociously vulgar rant in his mother tongue, getting his wand out of his back pocket and throwing up a shield in the same breath.
Headmistress Maxime, not one to be outdone, rolled up her sleeves and unveiled biceps the size of a bull's thigh, ready to add her own very valid argument to the discussion. The suddenly fiery looking French Champion put Harry behind her to protect him, screeching about the adults scaring her baby boy -erh, what?-, the other two Champions taking bets with Ludo Bagman in her back.
Dumbledore tried to calm everyone down of course, but his offering of what everyone knew to be drugged lemon drops only added oil to the fire. Barty Crouch also tried, and failed, to reclaim order.
And through it all, Snape merely sighed in contempt at this perfect archetype of human stupidity. Harry had to admire the man's composure, if nothing else. He wondered what it would be like to not be overwhelmed by every mess he got into.
The Potion Professor felt a strangely disturbing gaze on him. He turned toward the culprit to glare them into oblivion, only to be faced with a ghastly vision straight out of his worst nightmares. Lily's eyes... Lily's eyes were looking at him with a wistful shine and Snape found himself stuck there... unable to move, to breath, to think... Lily... Fuck. He had forgotten -denied with extreme prejudice- that the insufferable brat was also Lily's and now...! Now his greatest weakness was staring at him from the face of a Potter, and he wasn't sure he could forget it again.
AN: Poor Snape... Denial can only take you so far...