Raya and Raven sat at the Slytherin table in the Great Hall, talking back and forth. It was an adjustment being twenty years in the past, but at least they had each other. Raven had been in the middle of saying something, when she stopped short. "Raven?" Raya asked. "Raven are you still with me?" She waved her hand in front of the other girl's eyes.
"Raya." Raven whispered, eyes transfixed over the other girls shoulder. "It's professor Snape...I mean...It's Severus."
Raya followed Raven's gaze, a tall skinny boy with long black hair falling in his face had just entered the Great Hall. "Bloody hell Raven, I can't take you anywhere." Raya quipped.
Young Severus Snape took a seat at the very end of the Slytherin table, alone. He opened the thick tome her carried, and busied himself with reading. "Do you see that Raya?" Raven asked. "He's all alone. No friends to talk to." Raven looked back at Raya. "I know how he feels. That's how I was at the orphanage. It hurts." Raven continued, "You put up a cold uncaring facade to block it all out." She smiled sadly. "We really aren't so diffrent." she let a sigh escape.
"So, why don't you go talk to him?" Raya suggested.
Raven's eyes went wide. "I...I can't." She said, biting her lip and looking down at the end of the table.
"You're scared." Raya replied with a bit of amazement in her tone. "You who takes on the full grown Potions Master any chance she gets, is afraid of him as a boy." She was nearly in hysterics now.
"Bloody hell Raya." Raven hissed. "You're making a bloody scene."
"And I'll keep it up until you go and talk to him." Raya spat back.
Raven frowned. "Bloody hell." She pushed herself up from the table, glancing nervously between Snape and Raya. Raya shooed her along with a giggle. 'Bloody hell, remind me to repay you for this later.' Biting her lip once more, and fidgetting nervously, Raven took the tenative steps that would take her to the end of the Slytherin table, and the loan figure that sat there. Her insides twisted in knots, and it felt like she'd swallowed a hundred butterflies. Standing across from where Severus sat, her heart beat wildlu. Raya was right, thiw was foolish. Raven would happily take on Professor Snape without a second thought. Here, facing his younger self...She was terrified!
"Do you want something?" Instinctivly she closed her eyes, breathing in, letting his voice wrap around her.
"I..." She began, but faltered. "I..." She swallowed hard and bit into her lip once more.
"You what?" Young Severus asked impatinetly, then looked up at her. As his dark eyes reached blue onces, Raven could swear her heart wanted to explode.
"Can I...May I, sit down?" She managed to finaly ask.
"Go ahead." Snape replied. "It's not like I can stop you." Raven smiled, taking a seat across from Severus. She glanced down twords Raya who mouthed 'Get on with it' then smirked at her.
Raven looked over at the book Severus had before him. "Advanced Potions, huh?" Her bad attempt at small talk.
"Yes." his one word answer. 'Gee, he hasn't changed much.' Raven couldn't help but think.
"I find potions intriging." Raven said after a moments silence. Again Snape's eyes looked up from the book to catch hers. "It requires so much more skill than foolish wand waving, and repeating some silly incantations." She added with a smile.
"So true." Severus replied, with the meerest hint of a smile trying to creep through.
Just then, the relative quiet of the Great Hall was interupted by the arrival of four boys. Two acting quite rowdy, one more subdued, and the fourth, seemingly barely more than a shadow of the first two. It wasn't hard to guess who they were, exspecailly with the Gryffindor lion on their robes. Raven shot a quick glance twords Raya, who from the look on her face, had seem them as well.
Severus frowned deeply as the four boys headed in their direction. He closed his book, and started to stand. "Why Snivellus, leaving so soon?" Snape almost cringed at the horrid nickname. "And who's this enchanting creature?" Raven felt herself cringe as the words 'enchanting' and 'creature' were put together.
She hadn't introduced herself, so Snape was at a loss for an answer. "My name is Raven." saying it more for Snape's benifit than the boy who has asked.
"Raven is it?" The boy leaned down, arms resting on the table. "Why don't you come play with the big boys, and let Snively get back to his chemisty set?"
Severus paled, Raven's heart ached for him. He started to move away from the table. "Not leaving already are you Snivellus?" The second boy spoke up...It was almost like looking at Harry, the resemblence was eerie.
"Severus, please don't go." Raven whispered. He looked at her with a bit of a shock, since he hadn't introduced himself to her either.
"Yes Severus, stay a little longer." The first boy again, standing back up. Snape looked as if he wanted to say something, but then got a defeated look and turned to leave.
The first boy made to follow, intent on more torture. Raven reached out, digging her nails into his forarm. "Sirius Black, you are a cruel arrogant arse." she hissed at him.
Raven felt a hand on her shoulder. "Raven." Raya whispered in her ear. "I don't think this is the best idea."
Raven frowned, letting go of Sirius's arm, who took to rubbing the place where her nails had dug into it, an amused smirk playing on his lips. Raven turned to face Raya. "You are right of course." Once more she glanced over to the four boys, then back at Raya. "You almost sound like your dad." and then with a smirk, "too bad he doesn't." With that the two girl's made their way from the Great Hall, leaving the Marauders behind.