Another few months to update! Once again, I apologise for the pathetic attention span.

Warning: Toilet humour. Literally.

…….

Dumbledore was sitting in his favourite armchair, warming his toes in front of the fire as he tried to decide how best to commemorate the memory of his departed colleague.

A portrait would be the traditional method, though Snape's natural aversion to being photographed meant that an artist would have difficulty finding a likeness to copy. When Albus had first noticed that any pictures of the staff at school functions or Quidditch matches turned out not to show the young man, even if he had been right there at the time, he had wondered if the children's theories on vampirism may have been correct. He kept a close watch on Severus from then on, but the only other symptoms of that dreadful curse had been a touch of the Undead about his sallow complexion and the tendency to swoop about at the dead of night, frightening people. He was fairly certain that no vampire would have such an appetite for garlic, however. Or apple and blackberry crumble, for that matter. No, he had been forced to conclude that a natural disinclination for having his image recorded had prompted Snape to avoid the lens through a little judicious hiding. Behind pillars or other people, under tables, inside his own hair – or by any other means available. Not for nothing was the ex-spy recognised as the sneakiest Slytherin to ever slide through Hogwarts.

Another option would be a commemorative prize for Potions students. The trouble with that idea was that Snape's opinion of his pupils had never been very high. As far as Albus could remember, the young brewers had been divided into two categories: hopeless dunderheads or irritating know-it-alls, with slight concession to the perceived superiority of everyone in his own house. Not one of the end of year reports which the headmaster signed off had ever contained a genuine compliment from Snape – upon closer inspection even Draco Malfoy's turned out to be a critique of his brown-nosing skills.

That left Quidditch. The house Quidditch cup could be renamed in his honour, but Albus did not want to be the one to inform Minerva. Over the years their rivalry and heavy gambling on the outcome of matches had caused quite a stir in the staffroom and while Slytherin openly cheated on the pitch, the Head of Gryffindor had once been spotted trying to knobble the a rival chaser at breakfast before the match. Perhaps not the best idea. He would have to try much harder to come up with the perfect idea.

Before he got any further, he was interrupted by and odd noise coming from his fireplace. First there was a sneeze. Then someone said:

"Is this thing on?"

There was a whoosh.

"Hello?"

Dumbledore pulled out his wand, just in case and rose from his seat.

"Good morning," he called.

"Hello!" shouted a voice with a heavy Northern accent. "Is that Warthogs?"

"Er, this is Hogwarts," suggested the headmaster helpfully.

"Oh, aye, that's right." The man using the floo connection seemed to be under the impression that you needed to shout very loudly to make yourself understood.

"This is Professor Albus Dumbledore. To whom do I have the honour of speaking?" He didn't recognise the voice. It was obviously someone who was not too familiar with the magical world.

"Dumbledore? By 'eck, you must be getting' on a bit now! You were proper old when my first wife were a lass!" there was a wheezing chuckle. "This is Snape, Toby Snape, Sev's dad."

Albus' jaw fell open.

"Now, can I actually come through the chimney with this powder stuff, or do I need to do owt else? José gave it to me, I don't know as the Brazilian stuff works in British fireplaces," he was still yelling fit to burst his lungs. Dumbledore recovered himself.

"Just take a handful and step through, Mr Snape," he instructed calmly, wondering how on earth they had managed to bury Severus without thinking to contact his muggle relatives. Racking his brains, he couldn't remember ever hearing him speak about his father. He supposed everyone had assumed the man to be dead.

There was an almighty 'whoof' and a cloud of soot, ash and sparks exploded into the study. After a few seconds, it cleared to reveal a coughing figure. Out of courtesy, Dumbledore cast a cleansing charm and his visitor turned out to be a spry-looking man in his sixties, with improbably red-brown hair, an all over orange-brown tan, dressed in a yellow T-shirt and Bermuda shorts with big red flowers on them. Despite having spent a century and a half cultivating his own garish eccentricities, Dumbledore was taken aback by the sight. The only resemblance to his austere son was that remarkable hooked nose.

"Mr Snape," he stretched out a hand in greeting. "I'm pleased to meet you."

"Likewise, likewise," he shook it cheerfully. "So this is the magic school!"

"I…" began Albus. Tobias interrupted him.

"Well, it were very odd, because the only one of you folks I know nowadays is José who drinks in the same bar as me ever since he got kicked out of O Ministry da Mágica for fraud or something, and his cousin lives in Skegness and sent him an article from you people's newspaper about summat or other, and on the back of the article were Our Sev's death notice," Albus cringed as Mr Snape paused in his narrative to scratch his chin. "Now I'm a man of the world, Dumbledore, and I never believe what I read in the papers, so I thought I'd come here and find out what really happened for meself. Can't spend too long in this country though, you know how it is."

Swallowing down his horror that anyone should learn of their child's death in such an offhand way, Albus offered him a seat.

"My deepest condolences, Mr Snape," he began. "I'm afraid Severus was involved in a fatal accident over the Christmas holidays. We had no idea that he had any living relatives, or we would have contacted you immediately. I'm very sorry."

"And he was teaching here?" The muggle sounded rather bemused. "Only he were such a sharp little lad, always tinkering with something or other and I thought he was destined for real greatness. Fame, fortune, all of that. Teaching seems like a waste of a good brain, to me."

Dumbledore's natural ferocity on hearing the recurring small-minded belief that teaching was somehow an inferior profession warred with unease at hearing that father and son had obviously not been in touch since before Severus started working at Hogwarts. He made sure he wasn't subliminally condemning Tobias for this, as Severus' legendary temper may well have played a part in the estrangement. The first rule for dealing with any family troubles, magic-related or not, was 'tread carefully'. He did so now.

"Severus was an excellent teacher," Albus stretched the truth. Though perhaps the least approachable member of staff since that Wallachian exchange Professor, Tepeş, in the fifteenth century, Severus had successfully used a mixture of intimidation, bribery and yelling to frighten the highest grades out of his students. They may have been scarred for life by their schooldays, but most witches and wizards between the ages of sixteen and thirty-two had at least an 'E' at OWL level potions.

"Fond of children, was he?" asked Mr Snape. Albus squirmed.

"He taught here for almost twenty years," he replied, evasively.

"Any kids of his own?" The question was asked mildly enough, but immediately put Dumbledore on his guard. He wondered what on earth this man was doing here.

"No," he said.

"Did he ever marry?" Again, an almost conversational tone.

"No," the headmaster had never known much about his potions master's private life. Obviously, he was not the only one.

"Very sensible. Sprogs and women cause nowt but trouble, always after your money and your time – but you don't think of that when you're off sowing your Wild Oats, eh?" he concluded with a leer. Dumbledore, who hadn't sown anything for nearly a century, smiled politely.

"I wasn't aware that Severus had any brothers or sisters," more people who ought to have been informed of his death, Albus realised with dread. Snape senior counted on his fingers for a second.

"There's five of 'em, I think," he frowned. "Or six. Not including that brat of Pat's which she swore is mine, but I know for a fact I was in Swindon nine months before he was born, so they never got a penny out of me. Sev's the eldest; Sharon's the youngest, she's about…twelve? No, must be sixteen by now, by 'eck, don't time fly? Sev never met the others, I don't think. Got very uppity with me after the divorce, like he couldn't understand that Man is supposed to be a Free Spirit."

A picture of this person was forming in Albus' mind, and it was not hanging in a flattering light. He realised that the bereaved father had yet to show any regret at his son's death. As the headmaster himself had been very upset at losing his dear colleague, comrade-in-arms and former pupil, he was finding the light tone of the conversation rather offensive.

"So, anyroad, I reckon I must be his nearest living relative, then?" Snape ploughed on, oblivious. "If it were an accident, and he were only young, he probably never got round to making a will."

You complete and utter scumbag, thought Albus, accidentally cracking the china inkpot sitting on his desk with a stab of uncontrolled angry magic. Aloud, he said:

"We haven't got round to going through his papers yet," only a handful of his closest friends would have spotted the thorns hidden beneath his rosy expression.

"Well, perhaps I could help you start?" Tobias was smiling broadly, his avaricious little eyes glinting.

One of the windowpanes exploded.

"What was that?" The muggle leapt to his feet.

"Probably just the wind," said Albus smoothly, without turning to look.

…….

Harry, Ron and Hermione were discussing Quidditch strategies in the Room of Requirement.

Or rather, Harry and Ron were, and Hermione was leafing through a book called "Everything you Ever Needed to Know About Poltergeists, But Were Too Irritated to Ask," and periodically shaking her head.

"Personally, I don't think we've got a lot to worry about. The Slytherins are all so busy grieving they'll be a pushover," said Ron, cheerfully.

"Ron!" Hermione admonished.

"Yeah," said Harry, nodding as though he agreed with her. "They might decide to play their hearts out in his memory, or something."

"Harry!" She yelled.

"What?" they chorused.

"Don't be so callous, how many times do I have to remind you it's only a game…" she tailed off, looking confused. "What's that noise?"

"Quidditch isn't just a game!" Ron grew pink in exasperation.

"What noise?" asked Harry.

"It sounds like running water," she looked all over the room, first at the ceiling, then at the window, then finally at the door. "Look!"

Water was pouring underneath the door, forming a shallow pool on the floorboards which was growing and spreading before their eyes. Pulling out their wands, they approached the door.

"What can it be?" asked Ron, looking worried.

"Only one way to find out!" sighed Harry. "Alohamora!"

The door swung inwards, letting a small wave about a foot high slosh towards them. Wading through it with a few complaints about freezing ankles and wet socks, they emerged into the corridor which was also flooded. Hermione's gaze swept up and down, then her face cleared and she splashed off. Shrugging, the boys followed her.

"Where are we going?" asked Harry, panting to keep up.

"Does this flood ring any bells with you?" she turned a corner and entered another inundated passageway.

"The Chamber of Secrets?" gasped Ron.

"Oh no, not another Basilisk," groaned Harry.

As before, the water was coming from the girls' bathroom. Every sink – including that one – was gushing, as was every toilet bowl. The soft soap dispensers were drizzling gloopy pink waterfalls into the rapids, creating a pleasant-smelling foam in all the corners of the room.

"Myrtle!" called Harry, wading up and down as he tried to find her. Ron kept looking warily over his shoulder, as though the monster, Tom Riddle's horcrux or even Gilderoy Lockhart might materialise at any minute.

"Could it be Peeves, if he's in a funny mood?" wondered Hermione.

"I've never known him mess around with the toilets before," frowned Harry. "It has to be her, you know what she's like, always upset about something trivial. Myrtle!"

"Yeah, typical," tutted Ron.

"What?" snarled Hermione. "Typical what?"

"Er," said Ron, then screeched as a narrow grey plastic box banged into the back of his knee as it floated past. "What in Merlin's name is that?"

Harry shook his head, bewildered.

"Oh, for goodness' sake!" exclaimed Hermione. "After all the time you two have spent in girls' bathrooms! It's only a sanitary bin."

Two cries of horror rent the air.

…….

The house elves managed to get the flood under control after half an hour or so, but of Myrtle, there was no sign. Hermione insisted that something odd was afoot in the castle and retired to the library to do some more research.

Ron tucked the latest Chudley Canons newsletter under his arm and retired to the prefects' bathroom, which, thankfully, was perfectly dry and apparently devoid of any supernatural activity. He locked the cubicle door and unzipped his trousers, ready to settle down for a quiet ten minutes of privacy, when out of nowhere, a whiny little voice whispered:

"Is it safe?"

Swearing as he yanked up his jeans, Ron turned around to see Myrtle's face peeping out of the toilet he had almost sat on.

"What are you doing here!" he yelled. "Go away! I was about to…! Oh, honestly, is there never a moment's peace around here?"

"Ooh, you're horrid! Everyone is so horrid to me!" she sobbed miserably. "They don't want me around, always shouting or bullying, even in my own toilet! 'S'not fair, I'd been in that toilet since before he was born and…"

"Myrtle," Ron might have managed to hold his temper, had he not just noticed that the Canons Magazine had fallen down the pan and been ruined during the excitement. "Get out! Take your whingeing and your moaning and clear off! Go on! Scram!"

"Oh!" she squealed. "You're a horrid, horrid boy!" And wailing, shrieking and muttering imprecations against Ron, boys and the Living in general, she vanished.

…….

AN: Another short one! How do you like Toby? I couldn't resist trying out another way in which a father can be bad without being (fanfic cliché) violent…

So the most unapproachable teacher at Hogwarts ever? Anyone? Heh heh.

Thanks for reading, love SN x