Here's the next chapter! Thanks again for all the great reviews! I hope you enjoy this!

Harry gulped and slowly stood to his feet, coughing a bit from all the gray dust. He was covered in the smoky colored powder and he tried uselessly to wipe off his hands. He looked at his father, whose eyes landed on him.

"What," Severus growled between clenched teeth, his words slow and clear, "the bloody hell did you do?"

"I didn't do this!" Harry insisted.

Severus's mouth fell open as he glared at his son. Harry knew that that statement probably seemed ridiculous and a bit unbelievable.

"What!?" Severus snapped. "Then who the hell did? The fox? Last I knew, he was out hunting and it was just you and I here. Don't you stand there and lie to me, young man. What happened in here?"

"I'm not lying, Dad," Harry felt hot tears burn his cheeks. "I really didn't do this – it was a house elf! His name was –"

"Harry Severus Evans Snape!" Severus shouted. Harry took a cautious step back, more tears trailing from his cheeks, leaving tracks on his gray face. "Do not make up stories! We don't even have a house elf! Never have! And why would one even . . . I mean . . . this is . . ."

Severus seemed to be at a loss for words as he surveyed the destroyed lab. He ran a frustrated hand through his hair and took several deep breaths.

"His name was Dobby!" Harry tried again. "He said he works at Hogwarts and that I couldn't go back there because it was dangerous and he told me to get rid of Sam because – well, I don't really know why – he thinks Sam is dangerous and he said he was just trying to protect me, but I told him I didn't need that and I really did try to stop him –"

"Harry," Severus interrupted in a low voice. "Enough."

Harry froze as Severus briskly walked towards him and grabbed his arm roughly. He hoped he hadn't spoken too quickly and his father didn't hear any of what he had said – perhaps believing he was making up some chaotic story. Harry was expecting a smack or even a trip over the man's knees, but instead, Severus gripped his chin and angled his head one way then the other. Severus looked him over for any injuries, keeping him near and still with a maintained grip on the boy's arm. When he was satisfied, he let Harry go and stepped back. Harry stared up at his father nervously.

"Go to your room," Severus commanded, pointing in the direction of the stairway. "I am too furious to deal with you right now. Go."

"But do you believe me?" Harry asked, slowly moving to the stairs.

"I don't know yet," Severus responded. "To your room."

Harry sighed and ran up the stairs and the then next flight to his room. He passed a few knocked down picture frames and fallen books from the shelves in the living room. The explosion really impacted the entire house. Harry entered his room and closed the door behind him. For a moment, he wished he could lock the door, but he knew that wouldn't keep his father out. A simple unlocking charm would suffice – besides, it might make his father angrier.

Harry jumped up on his bed and plopped his face down in his pillow. He hoped his father took all the time he needed to calm down and realize that his son was telling the truth.

Severus just focused on breathing as he scanned the mess, running another frustrated hand through his hair. Everything was ruined – all of his cauldrons, the potions he had been working on, years of hard work brewing and stocking, five hundred galleons worth of ingredients and valuable potions lost. He had another supply closet upstairs, but it was ten times smaller and didn't hold nearly as much inventory as this one had. Magic could restore the tables and the cauldrons could be taken to a cauldron repair shop, but he would have to restock on everything else.

A house elf. Severus shook his head at the very idea. He had not really caught anything Harry had said earlier, the boy spoke too fast, but he did hear the part of the house elf. And the very idea of a house elf causing such destruction was unbelievable. They just weren't the creatures to do so. Besides, why hadn't the wards alerted him to a new presence in the house?

Deciding to give his son the benefit of the doubt, Severus pulled out his wand and looked for any detection of elvish magic, any trace of something that would indicate a non-human being had been here besides a fox. There was nothing, just a whole lot of fox magic.

Severus checked on the wards surrounding his property. Nothing had been in or out of them in the past twenty-four hours. Severus double checked, this time using a spell that would lift anti-detection magic off his house and the wards. Still, nothing. Such complicated anti-detection spells would have been too difficult for a house elf to perform, unless it was a powerful one, but Severus doubted that. Those were rare – and besides, most house elves were busy tending to families they served. When would one have found the time to come here?

"Harry," Severus muttered under his breath, rubbing his face wearily.

Had his son truly lied to his face? The facts seemed to say so. There was just nothing here that indicated another living source. Unless he was doing something wrong or missing some kind of clue, no house elves have been here. Harry must have lied. But why? After the night the boy had already had, he was truly willing to lie to him again?

Why had the boy even been in his lab?

Severus figured that Harry had decided to throw a tantrum for being grounded and messed around in his potions lab. Harry had done so before years ago when he was five and Severus had stepped out of the lab for a minute. But that time had been different. One, Harry was young and really didn't know better, and two, Harry was still going through tantrum phases.

The boy was twelve years old now. Throwing tantrums weren't as childish as this anymore. They usually just involved a lot of yelling about unfairness and what a overprotective and uncool father Severus was. But this kind of tantrum was uncalled for. Though it could have simply been defiance. There was a lot of that at this age, too, now.

Well, whatever it was, Harry may have never intended to blow up his lab. Accidents were understandable, but that was no reason to lie about what happened. Besides, Harry knew he shouldn't have been in the potions lab without him anyway. And this type of accident could have been completely avoidable.

After several moments of just staring at the mess, Severus decided to leave the lab as it was. He was too upset to deal with any of it for the time being.

Back in the living room, Severus paced around the couch. He had no idea what to do. Harry had lied to him once more, but he really didn't want to punish the boy if he stuck to his silly story. He would have to pry the truth out of him. Maybe negotiate punishments? Perhaps it could work.

Sighing, he climbed up the stairs and to his son's room.

Knocking softly, Severus asked "May I come in, son?"

"Yes Dad," came a muffled voice

Severus entered and approached his son's bed where the boy was lying with his face buried in his pillow. Severus pulled his son's desk chair over and sat in front of the bed. He stared at Harry for a moment, trying to gather his thoughts and pick out what to say first. Harry should at least look at him.

"Harry, sit up and look at me."

There was a split second's hesitation before Harry rolled over and sat up crisscrossed on his bed. He gave his father a curious but uncertain look. Severus sighed again before speaking.

"I want you to tell me the truth about what happened downstairs."

"I did!" Harry insisted with a nod. "Dobby came here and he –"

Not this again. Severus growled in frustration and rubbed at his head.

"Harry, please, work with me son. I know you were mad at me early –"

"I went straight to my room like you told me, I got dressed, you brought food, and I stayed here until that elf showed up. I was just trying to stop him! I would never destroy your lab, Dad. I told you what happened. He did it. It's the truth!"

Severus growled under his breath, growing frustrated once more. He decided he should tell Harry what he had discovered in the lab before the boy kept to this bizarre story.

"I checked the lab and the wards for any possible intrusion. There was nothing. No one but you, me and Sam have been in this house in the last twenty four hours. There was no elf magic, no nothing. Now, I'm trying to be patient with you, son. I will understand if you were mad at me and decided to break my rule of going into my lab alone . . ."

"It's not like that, Dad! Dobby came to me in my room and told me that I was in danger and he kept saying that I can't go to Hogwarts because . . ."

"Harry Severus!" Severus snapped exasperated. "Enough of that! Please! Why in Merlin's name would a house elf do any of that, especially blow up a lab that had over 500 galleons worth of inventory! Do you have any idea how long that took me to stock - the work I put into it – the money!? And why would some random house elf none of us has ever met tell you that you would be in any danger at a well secured school! Why would a house elf come here to Snape Manor at all! Explain that to me, son!"

"I don't know, Dad," Harry was in tears once more. At least the dust was falling off him. "He said you would ground me so I couldn't go to Hogwarts and –"

"Oh, you're about to get a lot more than a grounding, young man."

Harry's eyes filled with tears and he began to sniffle, his shoulders shaking as his breath hitched slightly.

Severus sighed before reaching out and gently holding his son's hands in his own, gently rubbing the smaller hands.

"Look at me, son," Severus encouraged. When the emerald eyes met his, he continued "I will make a deal with you. If you tell me the truth now, I will not spank you and you will write me an essay on the dangers of playing around in a potions lab. Then you will help me restock my store and do extra chores around the house. You will be grounded to your room for two weeks now in that time. I will understand if you were just mad and wanted to get back at me, son. We all get angry sometimes and make mistakes. However, if you continue to lie to me, you will still write that essay, but I will also spank you and you will be grounded to your room for three weeks after which you will do extra chores and help me restock. The choice is yours."

Harry's eyes burned as more tears welled in his eyes and his cheeks itches from the tears that had already fallen. Harry looked down at the bed, avoiding Severus's eyes once more. Why was the child making this so difficult? What was so hard about telling the truth? Severus just watched his son patiently. The boy had to learn to always tell the truth. This was important.

"Tell me the truth, son," Severus encouraged, still rubbing Harry's cold hands in between his.

Harry looked up at his father, his eyes red and his face miserable.

"I did tell you the truth, Dad. I swear. You just don't believe me."

Damn it, Harry, Severus thought, just damn it. Severus released his son's hand and rubbed aggressively at his temples. Today was just not a good day for either of them. He was going to have to harden his heart for this.

"So be it," Severus said firmly, sitting up straight in the chair. "Over my lap, young man."

Harry stared at his father, thinking about the unfairness of it all. He frowned, his sad tears turning into tears of anger.

"No."

Severus was surprised to hear such anger in his son's voice. This was new. Usually Harry was more accepting of his punishments when he understood that what he had done was wrong. But that was just it, wasn't it? Harry didn't believe himself in the wrong. He refused to change his story and continued to lie.

"Excuse me? I believe you know the drill and I expect you to listen to me. Over my lap, now."

"No! I didn't do anything wrong!" Harry shouted at his father. "You can't punish me when I didn't do anything wrong. I won't let you."

He was going to make this difficult, wasn't he? Severus really just wanted to get this over with. He snatched one of Harry's arms and pulled him forward, trying to get the boy off the bed but Harry threw himself down on the bed and tried to wrench his arm free of his father. Standing, Severus kept trying to pull his son off the bed, but Harry twisted and tried to yank his arm free.

"Stop it, Harry!" Severus snapped. "Get up! Now!"

"Let me go! Stop! I didn't do anything wrong!"

Severus was ready to just spell the child over his lap, but he noticed it might just be easier to carry out the punishment right where the two were situated. Harry was kind of in a good place.

"Fine," Severus growled, "you want to play that way, I can work with that."

Severus pulled on Harry's arm and forced his son to flip over on the bed. Harry quickly understood what his father was doing when the man pinned his back to the bed with a single hand.

"Nooo!" Harry screamed angrily into the blanket. "Let me goooo! Noooo! Stoop!"

The screaming rang in Severus's ear, paining them slightly. But Severus ignored it and managed to pull down Harry's night pants easily, the boys kicking legs aiding tremendously with that task. Harry's angry screams were quickly turning into angry, loud sobs. Severus pulled the boy's shorts down as far as they needed to go and pinned Harry's kicking legs down to the bed with a quick wordless spell.

Harry was already sobbing when he landed the first smack. Hardening his heart once more, Severus landed sixteen hard smacks, turning the pale bottom a shade of pink. He returned the clothes to their proper place and turned the sobbing child over.

"Alright, it's over, come here," Severus tried to pull Harry into his arms as he sat on the bed.

"No!" Harry threw himself away from Severus, plopping face first down on his bed, crying into the blanket. "Leave me alone! I hate you!"

"Young man, knock this off," Severus scolded, a bit hurt at his son's refusal of an embrace. In his opinion, they both needed it.

"Go away!" Harry shouted, burying his head in his pillow that he had pulled over to him.

Honestly, what was Harry's problem now?

"Harry Severus, you watch your tone with me before –"

"I said go away! Leave me alone!"

"Harry Severus, if you think that lying would be tolerated any diff–"

"Leave me alone!" Harry screamed lifting his head out of the pillow enough to do so. He dropped his head back down and sobbed.

Severus breathed and bit down on his inner cheek, resisting the urge to give Harry another dose of the discipline he obviously needed. Clearly, Harry didn't like not having plans go his way. But lying was inexcusable. Harry knew that. Severus wanted to lecture his son more, wanted to smack him over his clothed rear as a reminder of who exactly the boy was speaking to. Instead, Severus stood and left the boy to sulk.

Sam, wolf sized, sniffed around the potions lab, stepping over bubbling spots of ingredients that had combined and formed some kind of foul smelling aroma and avoiding liquid potions spilt on the floor. He sniffed at a vial that lay surprisingly unharmed among shattered glass. He picked it up in his jaws and trotted back to Severus, who was kneeling on the floor picking up unscathed billywig stingers. He nosed the man's arm for his attention.

"Thank you, Sam," Severus accepted the vial from the fox and held it up to read the slightly ruined label.

"A wolfsbane potion, Remus will be happy for that. Probably the only one I have at the moment. I'll have to get going on brewing more. But with what ingredients?"

Sam whined in answer, looking off to the side at a large hole in the wall.

Severus sighed and stood up. He dropped the stingers in an empty container on a fixed table. He set the vial down with the other four vials of prepared liquid potions he and Sam had managed to salvage. Two cream based potions had also survived the fall from a shelf. A bottle of castor oil, a bottle of thyme, and two bottles of doxy venom along with five containers of powdered, sliced, or chopped ingredients had been salvaged as well, including the billywig stingers. One jar of armadillo bile, two jars of honey, and a lone jar of expensive dragon liver. And that was it. That was all that remained and tallied up, the price came to about 110 galleons. Still nearly 400 galleons worth of supplies gone, years of stocking ruined.

Severus sighed and looked around. It had been nearly two hours and he was sure he would find nothing else.

Sam sniffed around once more. Sam had found the majority of the surviving ingredients. Severus watched the fox and waited to see if there was any chance more vials or ingredients had endured the explosion.

Sam paused by a cauldron on the floor that had a large dent in the side and was partially melted from the blast. Sam sniffed at it for several long seconds, his eyes closing and his ears falling back. Then his eyes snapped open and he snarled viciously at the cauldron.

Suddenly, the fox misted and flew out of the basement.

"Sam!" Severus called after him. He walked over to the cauldron and studied it, turning it over and over in his hand. He looked around the spot where the cauldron was. There was nothing there.

Severus sighed, wondering what had caught the fox's attention. Probably the smell of the cauldron. Melting pewter wasn't exactly pleasant. Besides, Sam nose had to be worn by now. Best to let Sam have a break.

He looked around the lab. He was sure there was nothing else to be found, anyway. The room was starting to fill with a toxic smell and he left the lab after transfiguring a broken shelf into a fan to keep some ventilation in the room. He'll return tomorrow morning and just banish what he could away. He might even have to burn the entire room just to eliminate the toxins forming.

Severus returned back upstairs, making sure to close the door to keep the fumes in the basement. He looked around for Sam. The fox was gone. Sighing, Severus decided to check on Harry. It had been two hours now since he had punished the boy. Opening the boy's room, he saw Harry asleep on his bed, still splayed across it.

Severus quietly walked across the room and gently picked Harry up in his arms, opening the covers with a snap of his fingers. He laid Harry down and tucked him warmly under the blanket. Sitting on the edge of the bed he stared down at his son.

What a ruddy day.

Severus watched his son sleep peacefully, his even breathing and soft flutter of lashes on his cheeks telling Severus that he was dreaming. He hoped they were sweet dreams. Leaning down, Severus placed a kiss on the boy's temple before turning out the lights and leaving the room, closing the door behind him. He would go over the details of his son's grounding tomorrow. Hopefully, Harry would be in a better mood to listen to him without throwing a fit.

As Severus returned downstairs and into the kitchen to make a relaxing cup of tea, an owl flew up to the window and pecked at the glass. Severus opened the window and accepted the parchment it carried. The owl hooted and flew off. Severus read the parchment.

Good evening Severus Snape,

My boys are wondering if Harry dear could spend the last week of summer at the Burrow. I would be happy to accommodate your son for the week, he is such a gentleman! I'm sure he'd be a great influence on my boys and they would all love to play quidditch and perhaps work on any last bits of homework together. Just let me know by the end of the week.

Have a good night!

Molly Weasley

Great, Severus thought sarcastically. A wonderful opportunity to spend time with friends but the last week of summer also included Harry's grounding which was now three weeks. He couldn't go back on his word. Just one more thing to upset the boy. Yep, definitely prepare for a tantrum tomorrow.

Severus left the letter on is desk in his study. He'd get back to Mrs. Weasley later, once he figured out if he could somehow make that week trip work. Perhaps he could negotiate?

He was too optimistic. Look how negotiating worked out earlier. What was he thinking?

Once tea was ready, Severus poured a cup and went out to the living room.

Still no Sam. What on earth happened to that fox? Severus stared into the fire in thought as he took a sip of the spiced tea. What had caught Sam's attention downstairs? Oh well, he had more important matters on his mind. Severus set the teacup down on the coffee table.

Severus collapsed in an armchair. Harry wasn't one to not accept his punishment - he was usually always so regretful for whatever he did. It always made Severus feel terrible when he punished him. But there didn't seem to be regret now. Harry seemed angrier than anything else. It was so confusing. Severus rubbed at his face once more.

Had he missing something? Overlooked something? What had he done wrong?

Severus stared into the fire again. If this was a glimpse of Harry's teen years, Severus was not prepared.

Damn Severus - yet, he's only human after all, don't put the blame on him (RagNBone Man). Well . . . what do you guys think? Thanks for reading and remember to review!