Coma
Hermione took one look at the immobile figure on the bed; and screamed.
The room itself was stiflingly warm and faint sounds from the road outside drifted through the partially open window of the wall opposite. The walls, ceiling and floor were all spotlessly clean and several strip lights, set into the ceiling, somehow intensified the glaring white of the room. The acrid stench of disinfectant was poignant and sharp, stinging Hermione's nose as she froze on the threshold of the room.
Even the worst possible situations Hermione had imagined fell a million miles short of what the truth really was. For a long moment, silence reigned as both Hermione and Professor McGonagall gaped at the Potions master in terrified disbelief.
When Snape had left Hogwarts three weeks earlier, he had been shrewd, calculating, sarcastic and angry. He had made it perfectly clear that he wanted nothing more to do with either of them and both Professors had come to the same conclusion: Snape hated company and needing to rely on someone else was something he had vowed he neither needed nor wanted. He would never, ever, surrender himself to someone else's care or affections, openly preferring to handle his troubles alone. His complexion had always been pale with a slightly greyish tinge but there had always been some colour in his sallow cheeks while his dark hair had always been tidy, albeit greasy.
The figure on the bed Hermione rested eyes upon now, however, bore no resemblance whatsoever to the man who had left Hogwarts so recently and it made the state the bitter Potions master was in now all the more incredible, and terrible.
Snape was slumped motionlessly on the bed with a sheet pulled up to his thin waist and covering his leg which was clearly propped up underneath it. Wires seemed to surround him everywhere and several monitors were flashing around him as they detected his vital signs. Thick, gauze pads were strapped across Snape's wasted chest, not quite concealing his prominent, bruise blackened ribs and the edge of what looked like a deep incision across his breastbone. His pale, sticklike arms hung limply beside him where several intravenous lines fed various substances into his broken body while halfway down his left arm, the vivid scar of the Dark Mark stood out like a blood red stain. Several inches of inflamed skin surrounded it and it brought with it a sharp reminder to both teachers of Snape's somewhat shadowed past.
Hermione, feeling incredibly sick, traced her eyes up the Half-Blood Prince's frail body and settled her gaze on his face. Hermione's breath caught in her throat.
Oh my god…
Snape's face was white, as white as the pillow he was lying on, with not even the faintest yellowish tinge colouring his cheeks to alter its deathly pallor. A thin, jagged line of dried blood snaked its way along his chin while a deeper, stitched wound carved its way down his left cheek and onto his neck. A long bandage was wrapped around Snape's head and a livid bruise covered the right hand side of his face completely. A thick, brutal looking translucent tube fed into Snape's mouth from another machine, which emitted a soft hissing sound every few seconds as it inflated his lungs automatically.
Hermione just stared, stunned into silence, as she surveyed what had befallen the Order's only spy and the man who had won the most significant fight of the war so far for them.
This wasn't meant to happen…
Hesitantly, she stepped towards her old teacher and gingerly reached out her hand when she was directly beside him. As carefully as she could, she stretched out her fingers and lightly brushed a strand of black hair out of Snape's face. It was only then that she realised how guarded he looked, even in unconsciousness. It was almost as if some small, instinctive part of the Potions master was still clinging onto his life as a double agent and was trying to protect him, even now.
A tear dropped down Hermione's face.
She dragged her eyes away from Snape and looked at Professor McGonagall, who was holding the door handle for support.
"Are you both ok?" the doctor, Mark Jones, said consolingly as he too stepped over to Severus.
"Dear Merlin," Professor McGonagall breathed in horror, not letting go of her grip on the door handle. "I… didn't… quite…"
Hermione's gasp interrupted Professor McGonagall, the younger witch barely even hearing what the Headmistress of Hogwarts had just said. Mark Jones gently pulled Hermione's hand away from the lifeless spy.
"As I said earlier, I was encouraged by how well the operation went as a whole and I am hopeful that Severus here will be one of the lucky ones to make a good recovery. He certainly is a fighter," Dr. Jones added with a smile.
"Has he got a chance then?" Professor McGonagall asked slowly looking distinctly nauseous.
"Most definitely," Mark answered without hesitation. "As I said, he is a fighter in the extreme. The amount of blood he lost was staggering; I was honestly surprised that he was alive when he arrived here. When he was brought down to theatre, I put him onto a heart/lung bypass machine straight away and managed to stop the bleeding, although it was a bit touch and go for a long time. As soon as he was stable enough to be moved, we gave Severus a CT scan and the results, I'm pleased to say, showed that there has been remarkably little damage to his brain, if any, which will cause any long term side effects."
"But… but he's…" Hermione stuttered.
"I think you are referring to his current condition?" the doctor said slowly. "Severus is in a coma, induced by serious head injuries but mostly just as an after effect of losing so much blood, so quickly." The surgeon sounded emotionless as he stonily told Hermione what he knew. "He had sustained critical injuries to his chest and his airway was blocked soon after he arrived at the Hospital making normal use of a bag and mask impossible. One of our most senior doctors performed RSI and managed to prevent Severus' Coma Score from dropping any lower. It was eleven while he was at the scene but the moment he was moved, it fell to six. At one point during the operation it dropped to three, although only for a minute or so."
"That means he had died, doesn't it?" Professor McGonagall said quietly, sounding suddenly childlike.
"Simplistically, yes. He went into cardiac arrest so there was no heart beat, respiration rate or blood pressure. He pulled through it, however, and by the end of the operation he was back to a six. I was expecting that score to drop when we brought him out of surgery but it stayed constant. He has been an incredibly lucky young man; someone is obviously looking after him up there," he finished, indicating the sky out the window.
"It's a shame they did not look after him sooner and stop it from happening at all," Professor McGonagall said dryly, looking unnerved but more controlled than she had been.
"These things happen for a reason," Mark answered as he adjusted one of the bags of fluid feeding into Snape's wasted arm. "Well, that's my opinion, anyway."
"What can we do to help?" Hermione asked worriedly as she looked back at Snape's chalk like face.
"Be there for him," Mark responded simply. "Let him know you are there, and that you care. Some patients can hear when they're in a coma while others can't. The only thing you can do is try, and it certainly won't do any harm whatsoever. Try to talk about things which are positive and have some relevance to him, like his job or favourite hobbies; reading books aloud that he liked may also help; especially ones that he was fond of. Give him a reason to live," he finished softly, sounding incredibly composed.
"There's also something I should tell you about," Mark started a few minutes later as he broke the relative silence which had descended on the room. "And I am afraid that it is not good news."
"What?" Hermione asked softly, not sure how much more bad news she could take.
"I am so sorry," the surgeon said quietly, "but alongside his other injuries, Severus has also broken his back. A disk of cartilage seems to have slipped and looks on the scans we took that it has severed the spinal cord completely."
Professor McGonagall shot a frightened look at Hermione, who returned with a similar glance of terror.
So that means…
"As I am sure you aware of the complications of this, I will try to keep this a brief as possible," Mark continued, breaking into Hermione's thoughts like a drill. "When the spinal cord becomes severed, the nerve impulses can no longer travel along it so the connection between the lower limbs and the brain is lost. There are no chances of recovery and all sensation below the break will be no longer existent. Simplistically, Severus is never going to walk again."
Hermione bowed her head. How is he going to survive if he can't even walk? she thought grimly. He's not exactly one who is likely to be content with just sitting by a fire all day…
"Here," Mark said quietly, opening a cupboard and pulling out a small bag. "These were found on Severus when the paramedics arrived at the scene. You may take them if you wish, or you can keep them here if you prefer."
"We'll take them," Professor McGonagall said in a muffled voice.
"Either myself or another doctor will inform you whenever there is any change, for better or worse," Mark said steadily. "I don't think you will be aware, but visiting hours are different for people with relatives in Intensive Care; it starts at seven in the morning and finishes at nine in the evening. There will be irregular times between those hours when you will be asked to leave, however. For example, if a patient's condition goes downhill, you will be required to leave immediately and you must do so without delay or question. It is sometimes a matter of life and death," he finished firmly.
Recognising that it was time for them to depart, Hermione and Professor McGonagall left the hospital leaving Severus alone, his wand in Hermione's pocket to keep safe until he recovered.
If he recovers, a nasty voice hissed in the back of Hermione's mind, which she resolutely ignored. Which, incidentally, he cannot do…
The seed of doubt had been planted; she was devastated for the spy.
An hour later, Mark Jones looked in on the Half-Blood Prince for a final check before his shift ended. The doctor shook his head sadly as he glanced over the monitor screens, a frown creasing his brow.
He didn't know why, but for a long time afterwards he couldn't quite forget the feeling that had stolen up on him as he had been on ward six on the evening of the seventh of January; the evening when the strange, skeletally thin man had been rushed into Guy's hospital heavily unconscious from massive head and chest injuries.
He couldn't help but feel that there was something different about Severus Snape that he couldn't quite put his finger on. He shook himself mentally: he was being stupid.
Get a hold of yourself; he was just unconscious and you were tired, that's all…
Even so, he couldn't explain quite how Severus had survived at all, or why he was in a coma in a critical condition with what looked liked minimal brain damage. It also confused him slightly that Snape had gone into cardiac arrest only to pull out of it as if nothing had happened. Something just wasn't quite hanging right. It was like magic…
Mark Jones sighed as he left the room Snape was in. What worried him most was the way he knew that the aura engulfing room one was one of suffering.
And fear.
9th January 2001
"Any change?" Hermione said hopefully two days later as she met the surgeon, Mark Jones, just outside the lifts on floor nine.
"No," he answered heavily, sounding exhausted.
"But… when is he going to wake up? How long is this going to last?" Hermione asked desperately as she followed the neurosurgeon into his office. "Nothing's changed!"
Dr. Jones put his head in his hands for a second and rubbed his eyes. "It's impossible to say," he said slowly. "If he can make it through this week; well, that's the critical time for coma patients and if he can pull through it, there's a good chance that he will survive. Just be aware that Severus could be in a coma for a lot longer than that, years even, and there may well be permanent damage to his brain, we just cannot be sure."
"You mean…" Hermione faltered.
Mark sighed heavily. "We just don't know yet. There is the possibility that he will wake up in a few hours with his full faculties; that means no loss of balance, co ordination or memory. Equally though, there is the possibility that there will be complications; the effects of a coma are sometimes vast and I do not wish to scare you but it is important that you understand – he may not come out of it at all."
A long silence hung between the doctor and Hermione.
"Isn't there anything you can do?" Hermione said quietly.
"Not that we aren't already doing, no," he answered gently. "The best thing you can do is to try and stay strong, and be there if and when he needs you. Just let him know that you care."
"I…" Hermione started before dropping her head onto her chest in defeat.
"Hey," Mark said quietly as he took in her tear stricken face. "Don't give up on him yet. I know this is hard for you… you can go and visit him now, if you wish. I will come with you as well if you want me to."
Hermione nodded awkwardly. "I'm scared," she whispered as the surgeon laid a comforting hand on Hermione's shoulder as they both stood up.
"You wouldn't be human if you weren't," he responded calmly. "Trust me; we are doing everything we can do to help him to recover as fast as possible. The drugs Severus is on are very strong but they are designed to restore normal blood flow to his organs again. Please believe me when I say that we are doing everything that we can. It's up to Severus now; we will just have to wait."
As Hermione walked into Room One, she stopped again in the doorway in horror. The complexity of the wires and drips around Snape's lifeless frame overwhelmed her as they had done on the first time she had seen him. The steady bleep from an electrocardiogram broke the silence as it traced a line across the monitor screen.
"Steady," Mark said quietly as Hermione wavered slightly.
Hermione hesitantly stepped over to the side of Snape's bed and sat down as Mark placed a chair behind her. For about five minutes, nobody spoke.
"Are you all right now?" Mark asked simply.
"Yes," Hermione answered shakily without looking up. "I think I am. Sorry…"
"Good," Mark said easily, choosing to ignore her apology. "In that case, would you mind if I leave you for a while? My shift ended about an hour ago."
Hermione blushed and looked up at Mark's tanned, but obviously tired, face. "I'm sorry… I didn't… You should have said… sorry…"
The neurosurgeon smiled warmly. "Don't beat yourself up about it," he murmured. "I don't mind; giving a shoulder to cry on is what I'm here for, it's just part of my job. Well, that and trying to pick up the pieces after someone has gone and made a hell of a mess on a road somewhere," he added lightly.
Hermione smiled faintly. "You didn't have to…"
"I know I didn't," he said cheerfully. "But it was worth it just to see you smile. You've been walking around with the longest face on the planet for the last few days. Seriously though," he finished, looking back over his shoulder. "Have faith; hope is the most powerful healing process known to medicine. If you keep believing, and stay strong, you won't be disappointed. Talk to him, he will hear you."
For a long time, Hermione sat in silence as she stared unseeingly at the door Mark had just left through.
"Oh Professor," Hermione whispered at last. "Come back to us. It hurts everyone to see you like this. Please, just try to wake up. We need your help…"
Very gently, she reached over to the Potions master's bandaged head and gently brushed a strand of hair from his uninjured cheek. Snape didn't move or make even the slightest notion that he knew anyone was there. After a long, long time, Hermione stood up. When she looked at the Potions master now, she saw only a very frightened, rejected and hurt man who had made some terrible decisions in his life and had paid for them ten times over. As she stared at his white face, Hermione felt the first pang of sympathy for the Half-Blood Prince.
He had been only seventeen when he had told the Prophecy to Lord Voldemort. Three weeks before Voldemort discovered the location of the Potters, he had told Dumbledore what he had done and had changed sides from being a Death Eater to the Order's one and only spy.
And now he's fighting for his life…
"I'll be back soon," Hermione breathed, running her finger down his icy hand carefully before stepping over to the door. She consciously decided to ignore the niggling guilt of the debt she owed him in the back of her mind – the guilt which reminded her of what had happened in August when Lucius Malfoy had…
No, she told herself firmly. Just get a grip on yourself… Move on… Stop thinking about Malfoy…
For a moment, she looked back and half heartedly waited for a response from the acerbic Potions master, and spy, which to her knowledge never came. With a resigned sigh, she closed to door behind her just as a fresh tear rolled down her cheek.
If she had waited only a few more seconds, she would have seen the response she, Minerva McGonagall and Poppy Pomfrey had been so longing to see. Snape knew more than anyone what had happened and everyone, most importantly the Order of the Phoenix, needed to know the truth behind his attack if the culprits were ever going to be caught.
In truth, the Order couldn't defeat Voldemort until Snape told them what to do.
Snape had heard, and understood, every word which had been spoken by both Hermione and Dr. Jones and he moved his head a fraction of an inch towards the now closed door just as he heard Hermione give a small sob. He instantly realised that the annoying, know-it-all Gryffindor had just left and frowned mentally in disgust at Hermione's show of emotion. When he had found her in August at Malfoy Manor, it had somehow triggered of the idea that Hermione felt that she owed him some form of repayment.
The stupid twit was only there to offer her sympathy, nothing more.
He would wait though; he knew someone from Hogwarts would return soon enough and he would explain everything as soon as he could. He wished he could answer their questions now, but every time he tried, he was just too exhausted to force the words out. As the unnatural darkness dragged him back into nothingness again, he waited patiently for someone to return.
It was several hours before he next heard her voice. Well, he thought it was several hours, anyway.
Minerva McGonagall, Hermione Granger, Mark Jones and Madam Pomfrey knew differently. Soon after Hermione had left, he had slipped peacefully back into a coma so deep that even the specialist neurosurgeon flown into Guy's to see him was stumped for any suggestions on how to treat him. Never, in the combined careers of both surgeons, had they ever seen anything like it.
Snape was hanging onto life by a hair. Nothing changed for the next nineteen days until five past two in the afternoon, precisely ten weeks to the day since he fought beside Harry against the Death Eaters and three weeks to the hour since the assault on him on Black Prince Road.
The Death Eaters who had been reinforcing the spell they had cast over the Half-Blood Prince forgot to recast it at the time of the accident. Their lapse in judgement gave Snape the chance he needed to fight his way free of its deadly hold. For some unknown reason, Snape had the strangest idea that he was running out of time and, with a desperate effort, he tried to call out.
"No!"
Mark Jones froze beside him, his face dumbstruck.
Don't leave, Snape thought desperately as he grasped the distant idea that Professor McGonagall was there. For Merlin's sake, you're an Order member. There are Death Eaters all over the capital, and they're going to target Muggles next time…
"Severus?" Mark said cautiously, his hand hovering over the switch to turn of the life support machine.
"No…" Snape moaned. "Don't… No… Stop… Please…"
"Poppy!" Mark shouted as he flicked his eyes over the monitors which had just sparked into life. "Minerva! Hermione! Get back here now!"
Professor McGonagall, Hermione and Madam Pomfrey spun round as soon as she heard the surgeon's disbelieving yell and bolted back to the room, Professor McGonagall brushing her tears away with her hand. She'd just agreed that the life support machine was to be switched off; they had all concluded that the Half-Blood Prince was never going to recover…
"Please," Snape whispered. "Don't."
The three witches froze as Hermione forced open the door of Room One.
"Don't," Snape repeated painfully quietly, causing Madam Pomfrey to shake her head in stunned disbelief. "Death… Eater… curse… wait…"
Everything clicked into place in Hermione's head in an instant. The way Snape had been in a weird unconsciousness. How he'd not reacted to the drugs he'd been given like a normal coma patient. How he had worsened each day at the same time for an hour or so at the exact moment of the attack before returning to the same as before. How his attackers had not been found but witnesses said they heard cracking noises and the men just vanished, literally. Just now; he should have got worse at this time but instead he recovered. And how the two surgeons said that the fact Snape was alive at all was a miracle; that it was like magic…
"What did they hit you with?" Hermione said shakily, completely forgetting that there was a Muggle doctor present and seemingly oblivious to Professor McGonagall's and Madam Pomfrey's dire hisses of warning. "Which spell did they use?"
"Don't… know," Snape groaned, his eyes closed. "Hurts. Everything… hurts."
"Hold on, Severus," Mark said quietly. "Don't give in. Just a couple of minutes…" The surgeon pulled an oxygen mask off the hook on the wall above Snape's head and pulled it over the Potions master's mouth and nose. Snape instantly tried to resist but he was much too weak to put up any form of a fight.
"No…"
"Yes," Mark said firmly. "It's only oxygen, nothing more. You'll still be able to talk but it will help you to breathe a bit easier. You've had one very similar to this on for the last three weeks; we only took it off a few minutes ago because we had decided to switch off the…" Mark tailed off, not willing to finish his sentence. Snape didn't need to know that they were about to let him slip away if he hadn't just spoken.
"There's going to be a small prick on your arm in a second too because I'm going to give you some painkillers, ok?" Mark added decisively, his voice stronger again.
The three witches watched as the doctor picked up a long, vicious looking needle and filled it with a clear, watery liquid.
"Demerol," he said quietly. "A morphine substitute." Snape clenched his teeth as Mark skilfully injected the drug into his arm but within a few moments, the Half-Blood Prince felt the pain receding slightly.
"Better?" Mark asked clearly.
"Day…?"
"Day? Do you mean what day is it today? It's the 28th January and about quarter past two in the afternoon now," Mark answered as Snape grimaced.
"Don't… go…" Snape choked out quietly.
"It's ok, Professor," Professor McGonagall whispered. "We're here. You're not on your own. Don't give up. Hold on; you can fight this."
"I'm… trying…" Snape breathed in a muffled whisper before letting his head drop back slightly on the pillow, his eyes still closed. Hermione yelped in fear.
"Is… has he…?"
"No," Mark answered reassuringly. "He's just asleep; not even unconscious this time. I don't mind saying so, but… well… My god," he finished, shaking his head. "I wasn't expecting… Does Severus enjoy living life dangerously or something! He couldn't have cut that much finer if he'd tried."
Professor McGonagall smiled wanly; it was the first time she had been able to do so for days. "You could say that. Severus does have a knack of, er, taking things to extremes."
"I won't ask," Mark answered softly. "I don't want to jump the gun too much but from those readings," he indicated the machines with his head, "I would hazard a guess that the worst is over now. I think you could say that he's just made up for the last three weeks in about five minutes. It's like magic."
"Yes," Madam Pomfrey murmured with a shake of her head in response to the irony of the Doctor's last comment. "Just like magic…"
The Half-Blood Prince slept on, his breathing steady and even. He had come such a long way already, but a small part of him acknowledged that there was still an immensely long way to go.
And it was going to be a rougher ride than he was anticipating.
29th January 2001:
PAYING THE ULTIMATE PRICE:
TRAITOR DIES AFTER ASSAULT IN LONDON
By Rita Skeeter
Rumours emerged yesterday that Severus Snape, former Potions master of Hogwarts and supposed spy for Albus Dumbledore, died last night in a Muggle hospital after sustaining unsurvivable injuries in an unprovoked attack in London three weeks ago.
Snape, who has not been seen since his controversial attack alongside Harry Potter against the Death Eaters in the battle in Hogsmeade, is believed to have been brutally beaten while walking down Black Prince Road on the morning of January 7th. The forty-one year old Potions master supposedly sustained massive chest injuries which resulted in a collapsed lung and catastrophic blood loss alongside severe head injuries which knocked him into a coma at the scene.
His condition, the Daily Prophet can exclusively reveal, was so critical that he could not be moved to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries and instead was forced to stay at an undisclosed Muggle hospital in London. An emergency seven hour operation was carried out on his arrival at the hospital to try to save his life and the Potions master had been in Intensive Care ever since. A specialist Muggle Healer is believed to have been flown into the hospital to try to save the Professor when his condition deteriorated two weeks ago.
The exact time and circumstances of his death are as yet unconfirmed although news off his unexpected death, and the horrific events which caused it, are likely to install fear into the Magical community. Fears that the attack was carried out by Death Eaters also remain unconfirmed. Story continues on pages 3,4,5,7…
"Somebody die?" Ron said jokingly as he walked into the kitchen at the Burrow to see Harry and Ginny sitting at the table looking shell shocked.
Ginny turned several shades paler while Harry just continued to stare unseeingly at the curled Daily Prophet. Ron, who had come to the Burrow the day before to stay for a week or so with Harry and Ginny, was at a loss as to what had happened.
"What?" Ron said, the grin sliding off his as Ginny looked at her brother in disgust.
"Here," Harry said quietly, chucking the paper across the table towards Ron.
"Is this a joke or something?" Ron asked uneasily without looking at the front page. "What have I missed?"
"He's dead, Ron," Harry said flatly, his voice shaking slightly.
"Who's dead? What…? When…? Why…?"
"Snape. An attack in London three weeks ago. Died last night."
"No," Ron said instantly. "No. That git's not… He can't have… He wouldn't have… Someone from the Order would have told us…"
"He's dead, Ron," Harry stated bitterly. "Read the Prophet. Front cover. It'll tell you everything. The Order didn't tell us anything because I don't think they know. He snuffed it because of his injuries."
As Ron scan read the front page, Harry stood up and wrenched his cloak around his shoulders. "Where are you going" Ginny said worriedly. "You can't…."
"I'm going out," Harry snapped. "See you later."
Harry pushed open the door and Disapparated just outside. Just as he appeared outside the main gates of Hogwarts, he felt ashamed of himself.
I never even said thank you to him…
Harry ignored the shudder of fear which ripped through him as he walked up to the castle.
A/N: Let the speculation begin…
Please review – your comments are hugely appreciated and the only form of payment a writer gets. Rest assured that if you review, I will respond.
Thanks for reading,
Stormy x
Ji : Thanks for reviewing and no, you haven't missed anything about Snape and Hermione. I've told you roughly what happens in this chapter as to why Hermione was making an effort to be charitable towards Snape and I'll explain the situation more as the story continues.
As for whether it's research or first hand, the answer is yes. I had to research quite a bit of the medical terms, and the drugs etc. but I have seen a few of those sorts of injuries in real life although thank God that they were no where near as bad. Occupational hazard when your life's ambition is to become a doctor and you've spent two years escorting people on horseback rides when they have fallen off at a gallop…
Selina : I'm glad you liked it and more is coming soon!
Carpathia : I'm really pleased that this is the kind of story you enjoy – plenty more to come!
Excessivelyperky : Ahh… You've hit the snag there when you say the Wizarding world won't care about the greasy git… I'll say no more here, you'll just have to wait. Evil grin PS: I hope you've cheered up!
Alkene : I'm glad you like what's happened so far and as for Snape washing hair…! I'll see – if it works somewhere later, I'll consider it!
Badluck-ngprod : More coming soon – thanks for reviewing!
Simply Dora: I hope the 3rd paragraph of the Prophet's article gives you some of the answer as to why Snape wasn't in St Mungo's but there is slightly more to it than what I've said. Thanks for reviewing!
Duj : I can assure you that when you see someone whom you last saw alive and well unconscious in an ICU, it is not pleasant. Hence Hermione's reaction. And as for McGonagall and Hermione effectively turfing Snape out, they did not intend for him to end up in hospital somewhere in a coma for weeks. Don't forget that Snape spent half his life deceiving Voldemort – he knows how to take care of himself! Thank you for leaving your comments and I hope that this clears things up a bit.
Barb8 : Thank you for leaving a review! And the answer to your question is yes and no. Hermione will be around but she isn't really a central character. At least, not one of the central two. She is going to help though.
CareBearErin : Yep – spot on that I'll go into more detail later as to why Snape helped Harry. I won't say why yet, though… As for being SS/HG – no it isn't, not at all. Sorry if it came across that way but I really didn't mean it too – I hope I haven't offended anyone… Thanks for reviewing!
Charbar : Hiya! They aren't really as close as you think – Hermione is just feeling guilty about the debt she owes Snape, and the one Harry owes him, and is try to make amends. As for including Guy's – freaky or what! My brother is at Uni in London and I got hold of one of his maps and found Black Prince Road – which seemed appropriate. I then tossed up between Guy's and St. Thomas' and settled on Guy's as it is the more well known of the two.
As for including Borough Market – any particular reason why? And sure I'll include it – it gives me a starting place for later in the story. Do you want the Leaky Cauldron aka the Market Porter to be included too…!
Thanks for your comments!