Chapter 8 - Snape the Metaphysical.
Let's just say that although this chapter isn't that interesting, the next one will be better!
***********
During the course of that day's lesson, Snape estimated that he took the grand total of one hundred and fifteen house points from Gryffindor for offences such as looking at him insolently, not reacting quickly enough to his commands, talking, whispering, sniggering, eyeballing him, questioning him, asking him questions, not asking him questions, being too quiet, not being quiet enough, breathing in an irritating manner and so on.
Harry thought that he was torturing him more than usual, especially as he gave him detention that night for not getting an "O" in his homework, which he felt was more than a little unfair, as neither had Hermione, Ron, or in fact anyone else in the class. So as he left the class muttering and cursing Snape under his breath, he was surprised to see that Hermione had stayed after class, just to question him about the apparent double.
"I'll wait for you outside, Hermione, " he said, "he's in such a bad mood today."
"Okay Harry, I will." Said Hermione, smiling sarcastically, "I'll scream in horror if he attack me, and you can be a hero."
"Again?" laughed Harry, "I've got plenty of that, without you adding to it." And with that, he walked out.
Hermione walked to the front of the classroom, where Snape was pretending to busy himself in his paperwork, sighing angrily. His mind was still ranting about his other self. He was so.....so....arrogant! He thought he could come in here, come in here, tell some tall tale about some weird race and then bring his own trouble here. Another evil Lord at a time like this! How dare he! How dare he be happy and calm at a time like this when he knew the only reason he still had a job was because Dumbledore, in the absence of a better word, trusted him? But Dumbledore also trusted the other Snape, who turned out to be a liar. It was that thought that terrified him. What if he was a liar as well-.....
"Professor Snape?"
Snape looked up and saw that it was just Hermione. "What!" he growled angrily.
"Um, Sir, this morning at Breakfast, well, I saw two of you and...."
"Miss Granger, although you may think your prefect badge gives you the right to peak into every nook and cranny in this school, you will find that you're mistaken. Twenty points from Gryffindor. "
"But...."
"Ten more points Miss Granger, and if you don't leave...."
"Excuse me, am I disturbing something?" asked a very, very familiar voice from the door. Both of them turned around. It was Sev. He had a self satisfied sneer on his face, even thought his long, greasy hair was a little messy, his long green and red scarf askew and something about his walk said that he was feeling uncomfortable.
"Sir?" asked Hermione, accusingly.
"Hermione Granger, isn't it?' he said, his voice unusually charming. Either that or completely devoid of the usual loathing for her name that it usually contained.
"Yes sir?"
"Hermione Granger, Hermione," his voice mused before he suddenly asked gently, "Why're you here?"
"Err, umm, err, I was wondering, well, why *you're* here." She asked shyly.
"Ah, that's a difficult thing to explain, but I'm sure that my double here will be more than glad to help me explain."
Snape flashed him a look of hatred before letting his face relax into a neutral sneer.
The other Snape ignored this, and said, "Well, I'm not sure how much I'm allowed to tell you, but I will anyway. You're an intelligent girl, if I know you correctly, so it won't take too much explaining. Have you heard of the many universe theory?"
"Yes sir, it states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction that occurs in a different universe. For every different action that happens in a universe, in another one the other possibilities are played out, therefore meaning that all universes are expanding to make room for the other universes."
"You've been reading up on your quantum theory, haven't you?" grinned Sev gently, "Nice to know that at least some wizards have the sense to see that not all muggle's have their head in the sand. Yes, you are correct. From that I assume that you have ascertained where I'm from. I'm from a neighbouring universe, a lot closer than you think. "
"Sir?" asked Hermionie
"Muggle science." Mutter Snape under his breath, "all stupid and illogical."
"I wouldn't mock it until you've listened to It." snapped Sev, "as I was saying, I'm not from around here. That's why I'm here."
"But, but...." Hermione argued.
"Now, I think I have something to discuss with my double, and" looking down at his wrist he said, "I think you better go off to your next class, or you'll be late." Hermione, at the though of being late went wide eyed and ran out of the classroom. The moment she left Sev let out a humourless chuckle. "I knew that would work."
"What?" said Snape weakly.
"I'm just going to retire to your rooms, keep myself busy while you take lessons...."
Snape looked down at his own watch. "No you won't." he said quietly. Then, louder he said, "No you won't. You'll sit down here, and explain yourself!" he shouted.
"Explain what?" said Sev, more calmly than she should have.
"You said you'd tell me everything." Said Snape, "You said that you'd tell me."
"I never said anything of the sort. I said I'd tell you what you asked me." Said Sev.
"Then tell me that." Replied Snape, unsure what he should be doing.
"Alright, the name of the other threat to our world is Avekai. " He said, walking off to the private rooms.
"Wait!" Shouted Snape, "Why's that a threat?"
Sev kept walking, not stopping or turning back. Snape, frustrated with his doubles insolence, ran over to him, and twisted him around.
"What do you want?" snapped his double.
"I want to know everything." Said Snape, his voice edged with venom and menace.
"Your bully tactics might work on children, but they won't work on me!" hissed Sev. Snape growled in response, but Sev smiled unnervingly, and said, "I'll tell you, I'll tell you why he's such a threat, but I doubt if you will either believe me, or comprehend why."
"So try me." Countered Snape.
"Well, if you want to know, he is what they call an Old Blood Psyxen. He is the last of the Kathedui line, the last son. The Kathedui were one of the oldest clans of Psyxen, brought down by their own strength. He is the last of the line, but he had a lot of supporters. Of course, he fell out with the other leaders of the race, who were the ones to decide to go public, and tell everyone that they were there, but of course, that's went wrong. Then to top it all off, Avekai goes to He-Who-Must-Never-Be-Named and makes a pack with him. Equal rights for Psyxens when He-Who-Must-Never-Be-Named takes over, and he has their support. That is why I said two lords, not one."
"That's very hard to swallow." Replied Snape.
"I know it is. I told you that you wouldn't comprehend it if you heard it. And nor do you believe me." Sev sighed and said, "I think I'll let you get on with lessons while I find something to do."
Sev closed the door to the private rooms behind him, and sighed. He hated his Double. It felt odd, admitting that you hated yourself, but he wished that he knew everything about him. They were essentially the same person, but what had happened to make them so different? What had his Double done that made him so different? Had Mother lived? Was that it? Or had Father been what could loosely be called a better man, a better man who could have made even the worst seem good? And why had no one ever heard of the people he knew was threatening his world, it was like the whole place had buried it's head in the sand! Was there an Avekai in this world, and he didn't know about him? Why did he still distrust him, wishing that he were gone?
Sev came to the realisation that he was possibly one of the most infuriating people he knew. He refused to tell anyone anything unless it was forced out of him, he was cold, he was condescending, he was sarcastic, he was a traitor even to himself, and .....he had caused him to say all this.
He growled softly to himself as he heard the class file in.
*********
Snape's mood, if possible, had darkened throughout the day. He was on Tenterhooks. He must have given ten people in total detentions. As the last class of the day left, extremely quickly, he decided that he would have to find something for the people in detention to actually do, or it would be pointless just sending them here.
He went to his personal stock, and tried to find the most poisonous thing he owned to put his Double's tea, as well as he had the feeling he had run out of Deathly Night Flower for tomorrows seventh year NEWTs class. He was right. He sighed quickly. He would have to leave quickly and disparate to the Lake District to find some before tomorrow, and he wasn't sure where they would be. An already pitch-black mood had gone into some sort of ?ber darkness. He growled in frustration. He would have to leave very quickly if he was to have enough time to look for them, but he had detentions tonight.
Snape would have never asked another teacher to take his detentions, as he felt that showed weakness and bad planning on his side, and gave them the impression that he needed help. He sighed, and thought about his Dilemma. He could either let pupils off detention, never a good idea, and get the Deathly Night Flower for class tomorrow, or he could take detention, and not get it. Snape sighed. Difficult.
But then his mind flitted to the Double. Perfect! He could take the detention and Snape could go out and get the Deathly Night Flower! But that just left the matter of asking...a difficult task in itself. Snape felt humiliated for having to ask, but his situation was fairly desperate. He had half an hour to ask before the detentions began. He went into the private rooms, and closed the door delicately behind him.
His other self had engrossed himself in a book about the use of the less traditional items in potions (for example, Veela hair and dragon spleen). Snape stepped forward, wringing his hands looking in the opposite direction. The other self, not looking up from the book Snapped "What?"
"Err." Snape really didn't want to do this, bit it was the only thing he could think of, and the situation was growing more desperate in his mind. "Could you take detention for me?"
The other him put the book down very carefully. "Detention? What do I have to do?"
"You're staying here, you should at least make yourself useful!" Retorted Snape quickly, "All I need you to do is to make sure that some pupils sit quietly at their desks while I go out an get supplies for tomorrows lessons."
Sev gave him the look he knew too well. The raised eyebrow of disapproval, and the knowing, superior smugness. "I didn't know I was out of Deadly Night Flower!" he snapped, "Some one took it!"
"Are you sure?" asked Sev. There was nothing on his face to say that he triumphed in this simple mistake, but Snape felt it. He felt completely humiliated. He knew that his other self saw this as failure, and for that simple fact, he was very reluctant to follow up his sentence.
He did anyway. "Yes, now in my office I have a barrel of spark eels, all you have to do is make sure that they gut them, put the livers, hearts and eyes in the according boxes and don't talk with each other, don't step out of line...."
"Yes, I know the drill. I was at school once."
"I will return before midnight at possible, but you must not, and I repeat, must not, let on that you're not me!" said Snape threateningly, "You can't let them know that it's you taking detention!"
"Why not?" asked Sev, the same, infuriating expression on his face.
"Because that......." Snape had suffered enough from him, "because! Just because! I've got to go, the registration list is on my desk, take off that stupid scarf!" Snape growled, literally ripping the thing off his other self's neck as if trying to make a point, " it isn't even that cold down here. "
"All right, I get the picture, please, just go!" Replied Sev, taking his scarf back from Snape; "I can do something without ruining it!"
Snape growled at him under his breath, and running almost theatrically out of the dungeon, left before he put a hex on his other self.
*********
1/ I apologise for the title of this chapter. It isn't strictly accurate, but I couldn't stop myself.
2/I've really crowbarred in some exposition there, haven't I? GO ME!
3/ You get a bit of Sev POV in this, but this is because of what happens in the next chapter. Trust me on this.
4/I think Snape would find it difficult to ask anyone, let alone his double, for a favour, so that's why he really has a go at him and tries to justify himself.
Thank you for reading - Xandra the Blue.
TBC!
Let's just say that although this chapter isn't that interesting, the next one will be better!
***********
During the course of that day's lesson, Snape estimated that he took the grand total of one hundred and fifteen house points from Gryffindor for offences such as looking at him insolently, not reacting quickly enough to his commands, talking, whispering, sniggering, eyeballing him, questioning him, asking him questions, not asking him questions, being too quiet, not being quiet enough, breathing in an irritating manner and so on.
Harry thought that he was torturing him more than usual, especially as he gave him detention that night for not getting an "O" in his homework, which he felt was more than a little unfair, as neither had Hermione, Ron, or in fact anyone else in the class. So as he left the class muttering and cursing Snape under his breath, he was surprised to see that Hermione had stayed after class, just to question him about the apparent double.
"I'll wait for you outside, Hermione, " he said, "he's in such a bad mood today."
"Okay Harry, I will." Said Hermione, smiling sarcastically, "I'll scream in horror if he attack me, and you can be a hero."
"Again?" laughed Harry, "I've got plenty of that, without you adding to it." And with that, he walked out.
Hermione walked to the front of the classroom, where Snape was pretending to busy himself in his paperwork, sighing angrily. His mind was still ranting about his other self. He was so.....so....arrogant! He thought he could come in here, come in here, tell some tall tale about some weird race and then bring his own trouble here. Another evil Lord at a time like this! How dare he! How dare he be happy and calm at a time like this when he knew the only reason he still had a job was because Dumbledore, in the absence of a better word, trusted him? But Dumbledore also trusted the other Snape, who turned out to be a liar. It was that thought that terrified him. What if he was a liar as well-.....
"Professor Snape?"
Snape looked up and saw that it was just Hermione. "What!" he growled angrily.
"Um, Sir, this morning at Breakfast, well, I saw two of you and...."
"Miss Granger, although you may think your prefect badge gives you the right to peak into every nook and cranny in this school, you will find that you're mistaken. Twenty points from Gryffindor. "
"But...."
"Ten more points Miss Granger, and if you don't leave...."
"Excuse me, am I disturbing something?" asked a very, very familiar voice from the door. Both of them turned around. It was Sev. He had a self satisfied sneer on his face, even thought his long, greasy hair was a little messy, his long green and red scarf askew and something about his walk said that he was feeling uncomfortable.
"Sir?" asked Hermione, accusingly.
"Hermione Granger, isn't it?' he said, his voice unusually charming. Either that or completely devoid of the usual loathing for her name that it usually contained.
"Yes sir?"
"Hermione Granger, Hermione," his voice mused before he suddenly asked gently, "Why're you here?"
"Err, umm, err, I was wondering, well, why *you're* here." She asked shyly.
"Ah, that's a difficult thing to explain, but I'm sure that my double here will be more than glad to help me explain."
Snape flashed him a look of hatred before letting his face relax into a neutral sneer.
The other Snape ignored this, and said, "Well, I'm not sure how much I'm allowed to tell you, but I will anyway. You're an intelligent girl, if I know you correctly, so it won't take too much explaining. Have you heard of the many universe theory?"
"Yes sir, it states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction that occurs in a different universe. For every different action that happens in a universe, in another one the other possibilities are played out, therefore meaning that all universes are expanding to make room for the other universes."
"You've been reading up on your quantum theory, haven't you?" grinned Sev gently, "Nice to know that at least some wizards have the sense to see that not all muggle's have their head in the sand. Yes, you are correct. From that I assume that you have ascertained where I'm from. I'm from a neighbouring universe, a lot closer than you think. "
"Sir?" asked Hermionie
"Muggle science." Mutter Snape under his breath, "all stupid and illogical."
"I wouldn't mock it until you've listened to It." snapped Sev, "as I was saying, I'm not from around here. That's why I'm here."
"But, but...." Hermione argued.
"Now, I think I have something to discuss with my double, and" looking down at his wrist he said, "I think you better go off to your next class, or you'll be late." Hermione, at the though of being late went wide eyed and ran out of the classroom. The moment she left Sev let out a humourless chuckle. "I knew that would work."
"What?" said Snape weakly.
"I'm just going to retire to your rooms, keep myself busy while you take lessons...."
Snape looked down at his own watch. "No you won't." he said quietly. Then, louder he said, "No you won't. You'll sit down here, and explain yourself!" he shouted.
"Explain what?" said Sev, more calmly than she should have.
"You said you'd tell me everything." Said Snape, "You said that you'd tell me."
"I never said anything of the sort. I said I'd tell you what you asked me." Said Sev.
"Then tell me that." Replied Snape, unsure what he should be doing.
"Alright, the name of the other threat to our world is Avekai. " He said, walking off to the private rooms.
"Wait!" Shouted Snape, "Why's that a threat?"
Sev kept walking, not stopping or turning back. Snape, frustrated with his doubles insolence, ran over to him, and twisted him around.
"What do you want?" snapped his double.
"I want to know everything." Said Snape, his voice edged with venom and menace.
"Your bully tactics might work on children, but they won't work on me!" hissed Sev. Snape growled in response, but Sev smiled unnervingly, and said, "I'll tell you, I'll tell you why he's such a threat, but I doubt if you will either believe me, or comprehend why."
"So try me." Countered Snape.
"Well, if you want to know, he is what they call an Old Blood Psyxen. He is the last of the Kathedui line, the last son. The Kathedui were one of the oldest clans of Psyxen, brought down by their own strength. He is the last of the line, but he had a lot of supporters. Of course, he fell out with the other leaders of the race, who were the ones to decide to go public, and tell everyone that they were there, but of course, that's went wrong. Then to top it all off, Avekai goes to He-Who-Must-Never-Be-Named and makes a pack with him. Equal rights for Psyxens when He-Who-Must-Never-Be-Named takes over, and he has their support. That is why I said two lords, not one."
"That's very hard to swallow." Replied Snape.
"I know it is. I told you that you wouldn't comprehend it if you heard it. And nor do you believe me." Sev sighed and said, "I think I'll let you get on with lessons while I find something to do."
Sev closed the door to the private rooms behind him, and sighed. He hated his Double. It felt odd, admitting that you hated yourself, but he wished that he knew everything about him. They were essentially the same person, but what had happened to make them so different? What had his Double done that made him so different? Had Mother lived? Was that it? Or had Father been what could loosely be called a better man, a better man who could have made even the worst seem good? And why had no one ever heard of the people he knew was threatening his world, it was like the whole place had buried it's head in the sand! Was there an Avekai in this world, and he didn't know about him? Why did he still distrust him, wishing that he were gone?
Sev came to the realisation that he was possibly one of the most infuriating people he knew. He refused to tell anyone anything unless it was forced out of him, he was cold, he was condescending, he was sarcastic, he was a traitor even to himself, and .....he had caused him to say all this.
He growled softly to himself as he heard the class file in.
*********
Snape's mood, if possible, had darkened throughout the day. He was on Tenterhooks. He must have given ten people in total detentions. As the last class of the day left, extremely quickly, he decided that he would have to find something for the people in detention to actually do, or it would be pointless just sending them here.
He went to his personal stock, and tried to find the most poisonous thing he owned to put his Double's tea, as well as he had the feeling he had run out of Deathly Night Flower for tomorrows seventh year NEWTs class. He was right. He sighed quickly. He would have to leave quickly and disparate to the Lake District to find some before tomorrow, and he wasn't sure where they would be. An already pitch-black mood had gone into some sort of ?ber darkness. He growled in frustration. He would have to leave very quickly if he was to have enough time to look for them, but he had detentions tonight.
Snape would have never asked another teacher to take his detentions, as he felt that showed weakness and bad planning on his side, and gave them the impression that he needed help. He sighed, and thought about his Dilemma. He could either let pupils off detention, never a good idea, and get the Deathly Night Flower for class tomorrow, or he could take detention, and not get it. Snape sighed. Difficult.
But then his mind flitted to the Double. Perfect! He could take the detention and Snape could go out and get the Deathly Night Flower! But that just left the matter of asking...a difficult task in itself. Snape felt humiliated for having to ask, but his situation was fairly desperate. He had half an hour to ask before the detentions began. He went into the private rooms, and closed the door delicately behind him.
His other self had engrossed himself in a book about the use of the less traditional items in potions (for example, Veela hair and dragon spleen). Snape stepped forward, wringing his hands looking in the opposite direction. The other self, not looking up from the book Snapped "What?"
"Err." Snape really didn't want to do this, bit it was the only thing he could think of, and the situation was growing more desperate in his mind. "Could you take detention for me?"
The other him put the book down very carefully. "Detention? What do I have to do?"
"You're staying here, you should at least make yourself useful!" Retorted Snape quickly, "All I need you to do is to make sure that some pupils sit quietly at their desks while I go out an get supplies for tomorrows lessons."
Sev gave him the look he knew too well. The raised eyebrow of disapproval, and the knowing, superior smugness. "I didn't know I was out of Deadly Night Flower!" he snapped, "Some one took it!"
"Are you sure?" asked Sev. There was nothing on his face to say that he triumphed in this simple mistake, but Snape felt it. He felt completely humiliated. He knew that his other self saw this as failure, and for that simple fact, he was very reluctant to follow up his sentence.
He did anyway. "Yes, now in my office I have a barrel of spark eels, all you have to do is make sure that they gut them, put the livers, hearts and eyes in the according boxes and don't talk with each other, don't step out of line...."
"Yes, I know the drill. I was at school once."
"I will return before midnight at possible, but you must not, and I repeat, must not, let on that you're not me!" said Snape threateningly, "You can't let them know that it's you taking detention!"
"Why not?" asked Sev, the same, infuriating expression on his face.
"Because that......." Snape had suffered enough from him, "because! Just because! I've got to go, the registration list is on my desk, take off that stupid scarf!" Snape growled, literally ripping the thing off his other self's neck as if trying to make a point, " it isn't even that cold down here. "
"All right, I get the picture, please, just go!" Replied Sev, taking his scarf back from Snape; "I can do something without ruining it!"
Snape growled at him under his breath, and running almost theatrically out of the dungeon, left before he put a hex on his other self.
*********
1/ I apologise for the title of this chapter. It isn't strictly accurate, but I couldn't stop myself.
2/I've really crowbarred in some exposition there, haven't I? GO ME!
3/ You get a bit of Sev POV in this, but this is because of what happens in the next chapter. Trust me on this.
4/I think Snape would find it difficult to ask anyone, let alone his double, for a favour, so that's why he really has a go at him and tries to justify himself.
Thank you for reading - Xandra the Blue.
TBC!