A/N: Aren't you glad that I updated two chapters? That way, the suspense won't kill you. Of course, the suspense at the end of this chapter might, so I suppose this isn't saying much...

Disclaimer: Still don't own it, still probably never will... I'll let you know if I ever do though.

Chapter 5

Screaming. Running. Door. Yells. Head. Arm. Throat. Pain. Hurt. Dizzy. Suddenly, Harry opened his eyes. Everything in front of him was blurry, and he felt dizzy looking around the room. He was wet, and he hurt all over. His head, throat, arm and wrist all hurt the most, though, and he didn't know what was going on. He had heard someone scream, and then heard them running away, opening the door, and running out, yelling to other people.

He was trying to understand what was going on; however, his head hurt, and he didn't think he could keep his eyes open any longer without vomiting. So he quickly shut his eyes. However, the dizzying sensation was still present in his mind, and he slowly turned onto his side, and wretched violently over the edge of the bed. It tasted horrible; a mixture of blood and stomach acid. He desperately wished that he had eaten something that morning.

Then, after that thought, he slowly started to remember everything that had happened that day. He remembered the Unforgivable Curse, he remembered the cutting, he remembered Snape...then he remembered more cutting...

Suddenly realizing what was wrong, Harry began to panic, and in doing so, became dizzier and once again wretched over the side of the bed.

He then heard voices and footsteps that kept getting louder, and he heard them enter his room. Then someone screamed, and for a second time, all became black.

Snape had been sitting in the kitchen at Number 12, pondering over everything that had happened. He had been having a conversation with Potter, and everything had seemed to be going well. He had hit it off with the boy quite nicely, but then, he had to go and open his big mouth, and ruin the whole situation again.

Snape sighed loudly, and drank a sip of the strong, herbal tea that was in front of him. Merlin, why did he always have to be so stupid? Why couldn't he, just for once, have been nice to Harry instead of getting mad at him? He had actually found out that the boy could be very pleasant when he wasn't smarting off to you, and Snape was upset that he had made Harry angry with him again.

He was about to take another sip of his tea, when he heard a female scream coming from upstairs. He quickly dropped his cup back on the table where it tipped over, and doing nothing about it, ran to the kitchen door to run up the stairs. He had a sudden feeling of déjà vu overcome him; it seemed like this had just happened not to long ago.

Halfway through the main floor, he saw Lupin stick his head out of his room. He looked much better than he had been earlier, but Snape saw the lines of worry masked into his face again. The two shared a glance, and then proceeded to the stairway, and noticed that everyone else was apparently looking out of their rooms as well.

However, they had only climbed a fourth of it, when they saw Madame Pomfrey running down the next flight of stairs towards them.

"Oh my – oh my – oh my – quick! Someone, quickly, help!" she was shouting, and he and Lupin made their way up to her quickly, and asked her what was wrong.

"It's – it's-"

"It's what?" Lupin asked, sounding ecstatic. But apparently, Poppy couldn't say what. She actually started sobbing as she was standing there, and then, from Snape's right, a door opened, and Dumbledore stepped out of it.

"What's the problem Poppy?" Dumbledore asked softly, though he obviously wanted an answer right away. Madame Pomfrey seemed almost to ecstatic to speak, put finally got out the word, "Harry."

Everyone just stood there for a second, and the whole house seemed deathly quiet. The only noise that was being made was from Poppy's sobs. Snape was just standing there, going over this in his mind. Harry? Had she said Harry? No, she couldn't have. He just left him a mere half-hour ago, and he had been fine...

No, came a voice from inside of his head. He hadn't been fine. You upset him, and he was really angry. Snape couldn't imagine what he could have done this time, especially to get Poppy this upset over it. Yes, she always did fuss over the boy, but this was taking it to the extreme.

There was a sudden movement from one of the doors, and Snape jerked his head up to see one figure running up the stairs, shortly followed by two others.

"Ron, Ginny, Hermione!" Mrs. Weasley shouted after the children. "No! Don't go up there!"

But they kept running anyway, determined to get to their friend. It appeared that they cared for Harry as much as he cared for them, and wanted to make sure that he didn't need help and was all right.

Mrs. Weasley was still shouting after them to come down, but it was useless. They wouldn't do it. So, again taking on a lead roll, since no one else was, Snape pushed pass Lupin and ran up after them. He heard other footsteps behind him, and turned to see everyone else follow.

He quickly made his way up the stairs, and was almost to Harry's room, when he heard a scream. This made him and the others stop momentarily, but when he started up again, he practically sprinted into the room. He saw Ron, Hermione and Ginny all standing there, sobs racking the latter two's throats. Ron seemed like he was on the verge of tears, but was trying with all his might to hold them back.

Then, Snape looked over at the bed, and had to bite his inner lip to keep from screaming himself. It didn't matter though, as people were filing into the room behind him, and each time someone else entered, they screamed.

Snape was wondering why no one had passed out yet from the sight in front of them; he was certain that he was about to. He stared at the bed, and felt a nauseating feeling overpower him. The crisp white sheets of the bed had turned a dark red color, and they appeared to be soaking wet with the liquid. But they didn't look as bad as Harry did.

He was laying on his right side, his head hanging partially over the bed, underneath him a pile of vile looking vomit on the floor. It was partially red, meaning that he had probably coughed up a lot of blood while doing this. But that wasn't even the half of it. No, Harry still looked much worse. Snape saw with repulsion that, although he was wearing the black pajamas that he had placed on him earlier, they had now turned a heavy crimson color, and were also soaking wet. The left arm sleeve of the shirt was pulled up all the way to Harry's shoulder, and he saw that he had ripped off the bandages on his wrist, and had once again cut into it, making it bleed freely.

But Snape saw something else. Something else seemed to be running down his left arm. He walked slowly over to Harry, and moved his arm to the side a bit to look at it, and upon seeing what it was, he let out his long awaited scream.

Everyone else in the room tried to move in closer, but Dumbledore managed to get to the front of the crowd and held them all back.

"Everyone! Back to your rooms!" he shouted, and when no one moved, he yelled, "Now!"

That got everyone moving, and they were quickly leaving, their voices carrying hints of worry and sympathy. However, it appeared that not everyone had left.

"Ron, Hermione, Ginny," Dumbledore said softly. "I need you three to leave." They must have just been staring ahead, not saying anything, for Dumbledore repeated himself. "I need you three to leave."

Snape heard someone turn around on the floor behind him, and then heard the shouts of Ron. "We're not about to go and leave Harry here like this! Look at him! Look what happened the last two times we left him!"

"Ron," Dumbledore said gently, trying to persuade him. "He won't be alone. We'll be here with him. He needs medical attention, and I know for a fact that if he were awake, he wouldn't want you here to see this."

"Yes he would!" Ron said, and his voice now sounded like he was close to tears. "He'd want us here by him. He would. He would. He would." His voice slowly faded, and there was a soft thud on the ground, followed by small sobs. Dumbledore must have bent down and dragged him out of the room, for his sobs became quieter and quieter until they stopped.

"Hermione, Ginny, please go help Ron," Dumbledore told the two remaining teenagers. "He needs to be helped as much as you do. Please, go on. We'll let you know as soon as we're done, all right?"

Then he heard soft, slow footsteps moving along with the sobs, and as soon as the door shut, the was silence again, except for Harry's ragged, uneven breathing.

Snape was still staring straight-ahead at Harry, but quickly turned around when Dumbledore next spoke.

"Lupin," he said. "Are you all right?" Snape had no idea that Lupin would have been in here, but he supposed that he should have expected that. After all, he was Potter's – no, Harry's – new replacement godfather.

Snape looked into Lupin's face, and saw that he was just staring at Harry, tears forming in his eyes again. The man tore his eyes away from the sight in front of him, and nodded at Dumbledore, putting a determined look on his face, though the tears were still there.

Snape looked back over at Harry's arm, and even though he had already seen it once, became instantly shocked again at the sight in front of him. It was too hard not to be. He heard the footsteps behind him, and saw Lupin and Dumbledore kneel down on either side of him. They both gasped at Harry's arm as well, and after he swished his wand to clean up the vomit on the floor, Dumbledore gently reached out and softly took the arm in his hand to examine it.

Not only had the cut on Harry's wrist become deeper, but it seemed as though he had cut his upper arm as well, and there was a small, intricate line running down his arm from that spot, leaking out blood. It looked as though Harry had traced the blood that was flowing from his other cut all the way down his arm until he reached the creasing point where he would bend it. Snape figured that he had bent his arm, and it had hurt extremely bad from doing so, so he had stopped there.

The blood was still pouring from his arm and wrist, and it was softly dripping to the floor, where a small puddle of it was already forming. That's when Snape looked up into Harry's face, and again gasped. "Merlin," was all he could say, and he heard the two other wizards behind him do the same.

Harry's face was bright red and warm, and he looked like he had a fever. He also had small flecks of blood around the perimeter of his bottom lip, which confirmed Snape's assumptions that he had, indeed, coughed up bits of blood. But neither of these were anything compared to his scar.

His scar was bright red, and small, tiny drops of blood were oozing out of it. Never, in his life, had Snape ever seen Harry's scar bleed. He had seen it after the Triwizard Tournament when it was bright red, and had even heard Dumbledore talk about it after the incident at the Department of Mysteries when he had been possessed by Voldemort and it had turned a dark scarlet color. But never, ever had he seen or heard of it bleeding.

Lupin let out a soft sob next to him, and Snape looked over into the man's face. He seemed on the verge of another breakdown, but Snape saw the determined look in his eyes that made it seem like he was trying hard not to do so and stay here with Harry. Snape then looked at Dumbledore, who looked back up at him. Once again, there was no twinkling in his bright blue eyes, and they seemed to have turned a dull navy color. There was once again a frown underneath his long white beard, and he had never looked so old.

Turning back to Harry, Dumbledore said, "He will need medical attention immediately." Snape was still looking into Dumbledore's face, though now it was with shock instead of uncertainty.

"But, Dumbledore, how can we get that to him?" he asked, and in his mind he thought that Dumbledore would have realized all of this. "It doesn't appear that Poppy can really give it to him, and it's not like we can just go to St. Mungo's with him like this. Even if we could Floo or Portkey him, it still wouldn't be a smart idea."

Dumbledore looked Snape full in the face. "I realize all of this, Severus," he said sternly. "Which is why we're going to have to do this all ourselves."

Snape gasped in shock at this last statement, and Lupin quickly jerked his head around to face Dumbledore. "What do you mean?" Lupin asked him. "We can't do this! None of us have Healer qualifications by any means, and I don't want Harry to be in any more harm than he is in now."

"Nor," said Snape, voicing his opinion. "Do I." Dumbledore faced him, and Snape felt slightly nervous. He had never seen the Headmaster look as serious and menacing as he did now.

"Either we all try to help him now, or we leave him like this, until he becomes too weak to do anything. According to the Prophecy, he will not be able to die, but he can come and inch from it, and if Voldemort somehow suddenly showed up, it would be the end of Harry."

The two younger adults looked at each other, and each made a silent agreement: they were going to help Harry, no matter if they had to do it themselves or not.

"Good," Dumbledore said, reading their minds. "Well, we ought to get to work. Remus, would you please go fetch Molly? I know this will be hard for her as well, but until Madame Pomfrey calms down, she may be the best we have to help us." Lupin nodded, and walked quickly from the room.

Next, Dumbledore turned to Snape, and he felt suddenly a little nervous again. He didn't know what they would have to do for Harry, but he was sure that it wouldn't be that good.

"Severus," Dumbledore started. "I need you to run into the linen closet out in the hallway and grab some new sheets, and a stack of towels and washclothes, all right?" Severus nodded, and stood up quickly. As he was about to walk through the door, he heard Dumbledore call to him.

"And Severus? We may need for you to make some potions for us throughout this, so if you have any of your potion ingredients or anything with you, bring them up as well." Snape nodded, and made his way out the door. He quickly walked over to the hallway closet, and found a new set of sheets, and an arm-full of towels and washclothes, and then went back into the room.

Dumbledore wasn't in the room, and Snape was wondering where he had gone off to, but didn't have time to stop and think about it. So, setting the towels down on the floor at the foot of the bed, he turned around and thundered down the stairs, black robes billowing after him. He ran into the kitchen, and picked up his black leather bag that was lying on the floor by the table. Then he turned back around and ran up the stairs to Harry's room.

When he entered, he saw that Dumbledore was back, and as soon as he was back by the bed, Mrs. Weasley and Lupin were hurrying back into the room. Mrs. Weasley took one look at Harry, and a loud noise came from her mouth, sounding somewhat like a small shriek. She looked like Lupin had earlier; about to sob, but determined not to.

Dumbledore looked up and walked over to her. "Thank-you for helping us, Molly," he said, his eyes still slightly somber. "It may help to have a woman in here; especially one who has had some experience in Healthcare areas, what with having seven children."

She smiled weakly up at Dumbledore. "Of course, Albus. I'd do anything to help Harry. He's like an eighth son to me." Dumbledore smiled slightly at her, before making his way over to the bed.

"Well, first I believe that we should do something about his wrist and arms. The quicker we can get those bandaged up, the quicker they'll stop bleeding," he said. "Severus, do you have any blood thickening potion with you?"

Snape quickly checked his bag. "No, Headmaster, I'm afraid I don't," he told him. "But I can quickly make some up. It should only take a matter of about five minutes if I make it the quick way."

Dumbledore nodded, and Snape set to work. He conjured up a cauldron, and quickly started to pick out the ingredients from his bag to make the potion. He threw them all into the cauldron, and started mixing them all together. Meanwhile, Dumbledore, Lupin, and Molly were all examining the wounds that Harry had, before taking washclothes and dampening them with their wands to try to clean them up a bit.

However, they still kept bleeding, and they eventually had to take a large bath towel, and wrap it around his whole arm a few times to keep it all in. The blood on the floor that had started out as a puddle had now turned into a small pool of blood, and as each drip leaked through the towel, it became bigger. By the time the five minutes were up, and Snape was putting the potion into a small vial, the towel was completely soaked through.

Snape rushed over to side of the bed, and produced the potion for Dumbledore, who took it in his hands. He then picked up a small eyedropper that he had made with a swish of his wand earlier, and squeezed some of the liquid into it. He then unwrapped the soaking towel, and put a few drops of the potion into Harry's wrist where the wound was.

Harry's body jerked suddenly, but he didn't wake. Mrs. Weasley looked positively fearful. "What did that do to him, Albus?" she asked Dumbledore, who was now trying to put some into the slash on his upper arm.

"It should thicken his blood," he said, as Harry's body lurched again. "That should make the blood flow a little slower through the cut, preventing him from loosing a lot more blood." Then, he slowly dripped a few drops of potion down the cut that was winding down Harry's arm, making him jerk one more time, before Dumbledore set the potion aside.

He then asked Snape if he had a healing potion, which he did. Snape reached down into his bag and produced a small bottle, with a light green potion inside of it. Dumbledore uncorked it, and again took the eyedropper and sucked up some of the green liquid. He then put some onto the cuts on Harry's arm and wrist, and once again corked the bottle and set aside the eyedropper. He made to take his wand and bandage the wounds, when Mrs. Weasley spoke up.

"Err, Dumbledore?" she asked timidly, and Dumbledore turned to face her. "Yes, Molly?" he asked politely.

"Err, would it be possible for me to hand wind his bandages for him?" she asked, still sounding a little timid. Dumbledore smiled, and moved away, gesturing for her to do so. She found some medical Spell-o-tape, and began to gently wind it, first around his wrist, and then around his upper arm, all the way down to his elbow.

When she was done, she stepped back, and Dumbledore then examined Harry's forehead, looking intently at his scar. Snape was waiting for Dumbledore to say something; he was really quite wondering how on earth they were going to fix it. However, his question was suddenly answered.

"Severus?" he asked, and Snape looked over at him. "I would like you to see if you can use Legilimency on him and try to find out what exactly would have happened for his scar to do this."

Snape froze, looking at Dumbledore. "Surely you can do it, Albus?" he asked him finally, staring at the man in front of him. Dumbledore nodded his head.

"Naturally," he said, smiling slightly as he went on. "But we all know that you are the better one of the two of us, and I daresay that if you're breaking into his mind, we may wake up Harry quicker."

Hope you liked the chapter. As always, please be kind and review. That always makes me happy and more willing to put up new chapters. Thanks to yellowpages, FroBoy, ciberloco, hufflepuff poof, Ahmad53832, Klover P, Malfoy vs Potter, follishangel87, sugarplum-princess1, and Crazy-lil-nae-nae for doing tha latter already with the last chapter. You guys rock my socks!

To yellowpages: I think I know what you mean - you aren't the first person to say that.

To Ahmad53832: Well, are you ahppy now? Nevermind, don't answer that. I'm sure it's a no, becasue now you have to wait for another update...Glad to know you still like it anyway.

To FroBoy: Glad to know you liked it!

hufflepuff poof: lol. Yeah, gotta love that angst! Check ya later, Ping Pong Lee. ; )

ciberloco: You'll just have to wait and find out...

Klover P: Happy to know you like it!

Malfoy vs Potter: Glad to know you liked it, even though you've already read it...

foolishangel87: Yay, I'm glad you liked it!!

sugarplum-princess1: Yeah, you aren't the first one to comment on that fact. But I'm just going to go with the fact that...err...rabid monkies from Mars made it okay to happen that way...yeah, that sounds about right. lol. That's my theory, and I'm sticking to it! Glad to know you liked the 'hug' part as well - I also love that scene.

Crazy-lil-nae-nae - Thanks, I'll try.

Wow...these are getting quite long...

May the Force be with You,

SiriusBlack4Ever