Disclaimer: Characters belong to J.K. Rowling. The music (not the words!) comes from Joss Whedon's "Once more with feeling", my favourite ever episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
The song Snape sings in a potions lesson in this chapter is to the tune of "Walk through the fire".
More Snape, With Feeling!
Chapter 2: Snape's a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here
In a distant office, some people were discussing an exciting new invention.
"It's like a Wizard Wireless," the small man excitedly exclaimed. "Only it transmits pictures!"
"Amazing!"
"Brilliant!"
"What's it called?"
His face fell. "I thought maybe we could come up with something. Possibly a mixture of Greek and Latin, like with spells."
The one Muggleborn in the room spoke up. "What about television?"
The small man continued. "Something meaning distant, like... I don't know..."
"Tele," someone else suggested.
"And then, something implying that you look at it. Telepicture? Telesight?"
"Television," the Muggleborn repeated.
"Telescreen?"
"What about television?" said the beautiful buxom blonde.
"Excellent!"
"And we need ideas for programmes. Quidditch, obviously, but what else?"
"I have an idea... What about depicting 'real life'? We could see how people act and behave in every day situations!"
"Maybe we could shut them up in a house and make them do pointless challenges?" the Muggleborn said sarcastically.
"Hmm," murmured the small man. "For once, that's actually a good idea. Or maybe we could follow people round, like teachers at Hogwarts maybe?"
"What a wonderful idea," said the blonde. As usual, everyone was overwhelmed by her amazing personality and intellect.
---
The invention of television took the wizarding world by storm. Dumbledore was soon approached about the possibility of following around people in Hogwarts armed with television cameras, or a "reality television show" as they called it in the trade.
Dumbledore was anxious for Severus - his Potions Master hadn't been the same since that little musical outburst the day before. On the other hand, perhaps this little distraction might help him recover from his most recent bout of depression. Hmm. This being Severus, meta-depression might be a better term.
---
Parvati and Lavender were excited. Despite having so many detentions that by rights they shouldn't even have been allowed to go to the bathroom, they were going to Hogsmeade that weekend! No less than with Hank and Seamus!
They took their respective dates to all the normal places. Lavender listened to Seamus's dreamy Irish accent and fluttered when he bought her a Butterbeer. Parvati listened to Hank's utterly thrilling Quidditch stories... well, actually she didn't. She was thinking up more pranks - or perhaps 'wheezes' was a better term? Because Hank's presence didn't seem all that exciting anymore. When they got to the Three Broomsticks, Lavender and Seamus were practically snogging. It just wasn't fair. Seamus wasn't good looking, he wasn't very smart and Parvati could hardly make out what he was saying. It so wasn't fair that Lavender was having a better time. Oh well, she thought, I haven't put a potion in anyone's drink since the Musical Moments Potion in Snape's coffee. And that was a whole two days ago.
It turned out Hank really was much more interesting when he could only converse in a variety of animal sounds. Somehow, though, he didn't seem too enthusiastic about meeting up again. Unless that was a happy pig grunt. You couldn't tell with pig noises.
I wish Angelina was here, Parvati thought. Then she winced.
No, you're not Fred Weasley. Stop it!
On the way back from Hogsmeade, they were briefly distracted by Snape, yelling loudly in Honeydukes at an incompetant shop assistant.
"It may look yellow, and it may be sweet, but..." The music swelled. Oh dear. The mustard.
"That's not a custard tart!"
They found themselves singing in response, "That's not a custard tart!". Although Hank ended up braying like a donkey.
---
On Monday, there was an announcement that stunned the entire school. They were going to be part of the first wizard television programme! A reality show.
"I bet it won't be as good as 'I'm a survivor, get my big brother out of here'," Lavender remarked.
"To be fair, that got dull after the seventeenth series," Parvati said.
Professor Snape was distraught. As if it wasn't enough that he was getting fed up of teaching and that he was randomly bursting into song without explanation, he was going to be followed around by morons with television cameras. Why did he agree to these things?
In the first lesson they were filming (with his sixth year NEWTs class - didn't he teach anyone else nowadays?) he had just managed to give their next essay title and give them a suitably fiddly potion to make, when it happened again.
He had a burst of sudden doubt. Not even Slytherins appreciated him nowadays. Even the cameramen looked bored. Could it possibly be that not only was he a reluctant teacher, but also a bad one? And then, just when he thought it couldn't get worse, he started to sing.
"I can't inspire, it uneases me
I look at Goyle's and it's black
Longbottom squeals - those beetles should be peeled
This class is direly slack
Now cauldrons smoke, they call to me
Always simpering my name
Not worth the pay
The cauldrons melt away
It's Potter who's to blame
And so of Potions I tire
But where else can I turn?
This work can't inspire
They'll never-"
He broke off abruptly in horror. The cameramen looked particularly interested now. A stupid, weedy voice took over. Draco Malfoy again.
"This potions work is boring me
Snape is barking mad, no doubt
Why even try? These potions I can buy
But he can't see me pout
Because it's fun I desire
This Potions work I spurn
It just won't inspire
I'll never-"
Malfoy broke off too. He was also rather horrified at the people staring at him.
But Snape couldn't stop himself.
"What is with that smug girl, Granger?
Countless essays just won't faze her
The Gryffindor's tenacity is rare"
And then Potter started to complain!
"Snape says this must be repeated
Didn't add some thing I needed
I'm just too fed up with this to care"
Then the entire class!
"We'll make this brew just like we always have to do
So we will stoke up the fire..."
One of the television people darted up to him eagerly. "What is it like, teaching NEWTs at Hogwarts?"
He replied, of course, in song.
"Those dunderheads ignoring me
Forget that spleen should be kept cold
This course they chose
But not one of them knows
They never can be told."
Then everyone started piping up...
"Snape's a cruel Death Eating wizard."
"Have you any dragon's gizzard?"
"Why's my potion turning out so dark?"
"He's greasy, mean and quite depressing," Dean Thomas confided in the television presenter.
"Unemployment's such a blessing," Snape retorted.
"His bite is surely much worse than his bark," squeaked Neville Longbottom.
Snape protested, as their potions once again started to spontaneously combust.
"My teaching days they are destroying with a blaze!"
But the class had the response ready.
"And we are starting a fire
This potions work to burn
And we will stoke up the fire
We'll never learn
Never learn
Never learn
Never learn!"
"Awesome," Lavender whispered, as the last notes of "Walk through the fire" faded out.
---
Later on, Lavender and Parvati served their detentions in a state of shock. Not only had the new invention of 'television' proved successful in the wizarding community, but all anyone could talk about on it was Snape!
And Snape himself was sitting watching it, whilst they cleaned the dungeon.
"Of course, the Slytherins are always great entertainment - just look at the prank the third years pulled on Professor Flitwick - but the most fascinating of all has to be their head, Professor Cerberus Snape." A man in his mid-forties was talking. The words "Thelonius Gripe, Author of 'Slytherin: A history of cunning' " flashed up at the bottom of the screen.
"That's Severus," someone corrected from off-screen.
"Severus. Of course," said Gripe. "In today's episode, Severus stunned everyone by bursting into song in his sixth year NEWTs lesson."
The screen flashed to a clip of Snape singing "My teaching days they are destroying with a blaze!" Then Celestina Warbeck - looking frightfully made-up for her first appearance on television (she was a harpy who was not exactly renowned for her good looks) appeared on screen and joined in the praise of Snape.
"Well, he's a perfect baritone, I must say. If he ever got bored of teaching, I'm sure a career in singing would be on the cards."
Back to Thelonius Gripe. "And that sarcasm! He was heard to tell a nervous Hufflepuff that a chipmunk with seven fingers missing and St Vitus' Dance could do better."
"We haven't heard such remarks since Simon Cowell jumped ship," commented Rita Skeeter. "Perhaps journalism would suit him better..."
"Thanks for your comments," said another man, who appeared to be presenting. "Let's ask the audience what they thought..."
He turned to a number of people sitting in auditorium style seats, and thrust his microphone into the face of the first girl he saw. "And what did you think?"
"Snape's sooo dreamy," she murmured. In the dungeon, Lavender and Parvati collapsed into hysterics. Snape turned around and thundered, "SILENCE!"... then turned back even more avidly to see his first fan being interviewed.
"He's obviously totally misunderstood. He's so over-qualified for his job, Dumbledore should have given him deputy-headship at least... or he should even stand down and make him headmaster!"
"And what about Snape's tendency to employ withering sarcasm on everyone he meets?"
"They ask for it," the girl said. "They should be grateful for his teaching..."
Parvati glanced around to see Snape nodding vigorously.
"What have we done?" she mouthed to Lavender.
---
The next day, the school was in uproar. Everyone had seen the television broadcast - Dumbledore had installed a television in every common room. And nearly everyone had watched a nauseating half-hour documentary entitled "Snape's Slytherin Childhood" in which hordes of famous Slytherins went on about how hard it was to survive in their house and how Snape must have turned to sarcasm in self-defence. A number of people also said Snape would have been better suited to Defence against the Dark Arts, and a shockingly large number of women in their early twenties claimed they found Snape sexy. While Gryffindor mocked this new-found adulation (Lavender and Parvati skipped breakfast so they could stick up a large picture of Snape doing a John Travolta style dance, with the caption Greasy) the Hufflepuffs intermingled fear with respect, the Ravenclaws looked at Snape with a new interest, and the Slytherins...
The Slytherins were merchandising.
It was disgusting. Snape sweaters, snape baseball caps, Snape t-shirts and apparently Snape's own love potion. Certain students wasted no time in remarking that Snape was the last person you could trust if you wanted to learn how to attract people. The stall had been set up in a wide corridor by the Great Hall, and was being run by Pansy, Millicent, and Blaise, who was quietly taking the accounts. Pansy and Millicent were singing a song that sounded rather like the parking ticket song from Once more with feeling. Blaise wasn't singing, which was a shame because neither Lavender or Parvati had yet worked out what gender Blaise was.
"Everything must go!
A whole collection of Snape-ware,
A Potions Master teddy bear,
Some photographs that are quite rare,
A book of Snapey's tales of woe,
Some chocolate Snapes - too good to share,
And some exclusive underwear,
Just seven Sickles for a pair."
The enterprising team were discovered a few seconds later by Professor Snape, who peered down his beaky nose at their various wares.
The three girls/two girls and one boy (delete as appropriate) trembled for a moment as he glared at them.
"So," he began, softly, "What percentage of the profits were you planning on giving to me?"
They looked at each other for a moment.
"Twenty," Blaise said, candidly. The (other?) two girls cringed.
"Just twenty?" Snape said, dangerously.
"Oh no, Professor," Pansy said hurriedly.
"Thirty, then," Blaise said shortly.
"For this..." Snape cast a both distasteful and approving glance over the Snape-wares... "I would expect at least fifty. Is that clear?"
"Yes, Professor," chorused his three students. Snape stalked off. Millicent immediately turned on Blaise.
"You moron, why did you say twenty?"
Blaise simply shrugged his/her/its shoulders. "Can you imagine what we'd have ended up giving him if I'd said fifty?"
---
Hogwarts had a visitor a few days later. I presume he came on the Hogwarts Express, if indeed the Hogwarts Express runs at any other times than at the beginning and end of terms. Speaking of which, has anyone written a fic called, "Murder on the Hogwarts Express"? It'd be great.
The visitor came in a smart suit, carrying a briefcase. His name was John Smith. It really was - his parents, Peter and Mary Smith, had christened him after the great wizard John Csikszentmihalyi-Anastopolous. John Smith occasionally signed his name John C.A. Smith, when he was feeling exotic. When the visitor arrived, Dumbledore didn't even bother asking what he came for, but sent him straight to Professor Snape's office. Indeed, the other teachers only exist as briefly sketched peripheral characters in this fic, so there was no point pretending that anyone who visited during term time was there for anything other than talking to Snape.
Smith knocked on Snape's door, and Snape opened it warily.
"Ah, Professor Snape, I presume?"
"Was it the inscription on my door, or the fact that I have been featured in every single 'television programme' as yet made, that gave away my identity?" Snape asked his visitor.
John Smith missed the sarcasm. He had been given a sarcasm inoculation by his employers before going to work with Snape, and as such, would be immune to any cruel remarks which would inevitably come his way.
"Both - and the directions given by Professor Dumbledore," Smith said. "My name is John Smith... And I've come to offer my services as your agent."
Snape frowned. "Agent of what? Oxidising agent? Reducing agent? Agent of despair?"
Smith didn't bat an eyelid. "None of these. Your agent."
"You can't be an agent in the abstract," Snape said coolly. This was the sort of thing he often said when not in the classroom. The abuse he'd suffered within his family at a young age had been almost entirely due to his annoying habit of pointing out the prepositions his parents had ended sentences with. Actually it wasn't so much abuse as deprivation of his Young Potions Maker Kit.
"No, Professor - your agent. The agent of you. World without Snape - enter agent of Snape. Reaction. Gives world with Snape. Comprenas?"
"Don't you mean comprena? In any case, Mr. Smith, or Agent Smith, or whatever you want to call yourself-" Smith started sniggering "-In case you haven't noticed, I've been dubbed the first television celebrity, and countless women are already sending me items of underwear by owl post. What they expect me to do with them I have no idea - most of them aren't in my size."
"Right," Smith said. "That's great... except you can have so much more. Fame, fortune, women, fast broomsticks..."
"Not interested," Snape snapped.
"You could even quit your job as a Potions Master."
Snape stopped. He wondered if Smith had slipped something in his coffee, because he suddenly had the urge to kiss him. In a manly kind of way, naturally.
"Please go on," he said, cracking his mouth into a leer - which was the closest he usually got to smiling.
"Well... you're so very popular now, but your immense talent is rather... raw. We can refine it. Focus it. Earn you money."
It was tempting. Snape had made quite a lot of money already from selling the ladies' undergarments on Magi-Bay, and then there were the merchandising sales, but...
"I'll do it," he said.
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