Thanx for bein' so patient you guys. My compy has been crap. Points to ParanoiaIn2005 for figuring out who enters the room. And now....
Chapter 13- Fading Away
*********************************
Snape walked in through the hospital room doors, and caught sight of the terrific trio sitting on Harry's bed. His surprise at seeing Harry awake, and at finding the two others out of class, was evident on his face, but he quickly replaced it for a look of iciness, and entered fully into the room.
"What are you doing out of class?" The silky ice in his voice seemed to wash over the whole of the room. He was probably wondering where Madam Pomfrey was, and why this was being allowed. The three just looked at one another in silence.
"Uh-..." Hermione started. She tried to think of something, but knowing Snape, an answer of 'we were worried' was sure to gain them a loss of housepoints.
"Yes, Miss Granger?"
"We lost track of time, Professor."
Snape looked at Hermione with a glare, and shot Harry an equally icy look. He knew that they'd been there for Potter, but he wanted a straight answer. "You didn't answer my question."
"We came to see Harry. That okay with you?!" Ron was slightly trembling, but whether it was from fear or anger, they knew it took a lot of gall to talk that way to Snape.
"Ten points, Mr. Weasley." He sneered at Ron. "Now get back to class. Both of you."
Hermione and Ron grabbed their things in silence. Ron shoved the invisibility cloak under the bed with his foot and raised his eyebrows in knowing to Harry. They said goodbye and exited the wing, but not before Ron shot Snape a very dirty look. It was evident that he wouldn't be returning to class of his own free will.
Harry would've grinned at Ron's display of bravado had the potions master and he not been in the same room. Alone. It was then that he wondered exactly -why- Snape was in the hospital wing.
//I wish Dumbledore'd let me speak with the Dractnox...This makes things so much more difficult//
"I expect You're back to health, Potter?" Snape looked down upon Harry with something of abject sympathy.
"Yes, sir." //He probably wants me to return to training already...Geez, and I just woke up//
Snape studied Harry for a moment, and then walked towards the back of the wing.
"Uh-," he was going to tell Snape that Madam Pomfrey was out, but thought better of it. He didn't want to be the one to bear Snape bad news.
"Severus! I didn't expect to see you here so early in the day." Madam Pomfrey's voice was like a godsend. Harry wasn't sure when he'd ever been so happy to see her.
She smiled at Harry, noticing the loss of his friends, and walked over to Snape with a knowing glance. She took him into the back of the wing for some reason that Harry couldn't see.
He was very curious about what business his potions teacher/trainer had to take care of in the wing. //Probably giving Madam Pomfrey potions...or trying to get her to have me training once more...Hmph. He'd probably make a coma patient endure no less!//
"My my! You've healed quite nicely. I suppose this is your way of telling me that you won't be coming back to me for any more treatment, Severus?"
Harry pricked up his ears at this and listened in for more. So Snape wasn't there for him. He got hurt. But where? Doing what? More spy work? Did they already invade Voldemort's stronghold while he was asleep? Surely Ron or Hermione would have told him?
//GAAH! It'll be okay if I just ask the Dractnox one question, won't it? Nothing'll happen. It's just one question...//
He listened in to the conversation that they were having, waiting for something of explanation. He didn't want to disobey Dumbledore, but he felt that this was something he should know. Besides, of whatever they were talking about back there, it didn't seem too important. It seemed to consist of how stubborn Madam Pomfrey thought Snape was, and at any rate, it wasn't about him.
Harry looked to a Dractnox and thought for a moment, trying to decide whether or not to ask it what was up. He didn't think it dangerous. He'd spoke with them many a time before, and was pretty good with Legilimency to speak with them mentally, and he was feeling better than ever, so why not try? It was only one question, after all.
He listened to Snape and Madam Pomfrey, and decided it was now or never.
//Dractnox?// One immediately came to attention and brought itself to him with what seemed the utmost interest. //What happened to Snape? // Asking was putting a great strain on him. It was hurting him, straining his heart, and he wasn't sure how much longer he could stand it. He breathed heavily, panting. //While I was asleep, I mean//
Immediately, Harry knew something was wrong. His question was being answered alright, but not in the normal speech way. He was being shown pictures, as he had when he was unconscious, and it was a completely different experience. His head spun and his eyes fluttered, trying to keep up with the images being shown. He felt all his strength and control leaving him, and he felt himself slipping away. He tried to fight it, tried to stop it, but couldn't. All he could feel was slipping away. Slipping, slipping, and all the while Madam Pomfrey was having a conversation with Snape not even fifteen feet away. He tried to grasp onto something, tried to somehow communicate that he needed help, but he couldn't. All he felt was slipping, and all he could see was his question being answered, over and over again, from one angle, and then another. He knew he wouldn't last long like this, and wondered when he would slip away. If the two in the other room even knew what was happening, Harry could not tell. He couldn't feel anything or sense anything other than an immense slipping...
"Hold him still! Damn it Poppy!" Snape and Madam Pomfrey were trying to contain Harry, who was more or less struggling on his bed, and seemed to be sort of fading away. Literally fading. He was becoming translucent some, so that with each passing moment, they could see a little more of the sheets underneath him. "Hold him!"
"I'm trying! I'm trying!" Poppy Pomfrey held on to the struggling boy, tears streaming down her face, and utter terror filling her countenance. What was happening to Harry never happened in the history of anything she knew. For once in her life, she felt helpless.
"Potter! Listen to me!" Snape yelled at Harry in the most icy voice he could muster, but not even that could get through to him.
"Please Severus!"
"It's in his mind! Dammit! Hold him still!" Snape kept trying to breach Harry's mind with his own Legilimens, but he kept getting pushed back mentally and physically by Harry's struggling. Albus had told him what Harry had said had happened as he slept, and he knew this was some by-product of speaking mentally with those creatures of his. He rued the day he ever taught Harry anything of Legilimency. Of all the times he'd hated Harry, he never wished this upon him.
"Severus! Do something! Please!"
He tried to pry into Harry's head once more, all the while Harry was getting more transparent. Then suddenly, it was as if he had popped a through an ice-hole into his mind, and saw the chaos ensuing. But it wasn't quite long before the images themselves attacked Snape and threw him out. He slid across the floor of the hospital, hitting one of the beds and stopping. Madam Pomfrey tried to hold Harry herself, but he was too much for her.
"Careful! His magic is out of control!" No sooner than Snape said the words was Madam Pomfrey levitated up and dumped somewhere behind her medical curtain. Harry was flailing, and almost blinking out of existence completely. He was becoming same as he was only a little bit ago inside of his mind. This time permanently.
Snape lunged at Harry and held onto him tight, refusing to be attacked by rogue magic once more. He heard the crashing of medical instruments followed by Poppy's appearance out of the curtain once more.
"Go and fetch the Headmaster!" Snape grunted, trying to keep Harry still. "Dammit woman! Now!"
Taking a look at the nearly gone boy, Poppy ran out of the hospital with the speed of flight.
Snape struggled to keep Harry still as he tried to penetrate his mind once more. "Listen to me, Potter. Your house will be in negative points until your grandchildren graduate should you decide to fade out on me! Don't you dare such a thing!" He concentrated hard with much struggle, but like a breath of fresh air, he got into Harry's deteriorating mind. //Potter!// He tried to make sense of everything in the boy's head, but the pictures were too fast, and the chaos too great. He tried to stop it, force it out with Legilimens, but found it a harder task than he had thought. //Potter! Dammit! Where are you?!//
He felt a punch to his jaw, and realized that one of Harry's hands had gotten free. He grasped it with his own, and tried to find the boy within his own mind. Harry was becoming nothing more than a mere shadow of himself, and was practically gone.
//Potter! You will answer me now!// Snape forced his mind into Harry's, yelling his order into the chaos of the mind.
//Pro...fessor...//
Snape heard the tiniest voice coming from somewhere within Harry's mind, and tried to find it underneath the chaos.
//Answer me, Potter! Stop this!//
//I...here...stop...//
Snape tried to zero in on the sound, and found himself feeling Harry slipping away. He gripped onto Harry's hand, and tried to find him within his mind.
//Where are you in here, Potter?! Stop all this!// He tried to force what he could out of Harry's mind, but what he could do wasn't much, and he was very pissed by that fact. //Wake up now! You're fading away! Twenty points from Gryffindor, Potter!//
//...no...//
Snape thought for a moment, and tried something.
//If you don't stop this now, that will be another twenty points from Gryffindor, Potter!//
He felt Harry's hand gripping his own, and looked to see that he wasn't as see-through as before.
//...stop...//
//Another twenty to that makes for an even sixty. Care to try for eighty?!// The chaos in Harry's head began to slow, and he felt the boy's presence stronger than it was before.
//...you...git...// Snape actually smirked at this. It was working.
//Should you decide to make your holiday in there any longer, Potter, that will be forty points!//
//Get out...of my...head...// Harry's voice was strong in his mind, and Snape found that he couldn't see the bed-sheets through Harry anymore.
//A grand total of one-hundred points deducted, Potter. If you don't stop now and awake, I'll double it!//
Snape felt himself mentally kicked out of Harry's mind, and immediately thought that he had trained the boy too well in only a few days. He was panting, and took note of the mental strain he had put on himself. He tried to straighten out his own head and regain his composure as the boy became as solid and opaque as anything else in the room. He noticed the Headmaster and Madam Pomfrey in the room, having arrived only moments before. He looked at them with a little confusion, and then he felt Harry grip his hand, and he looked down and saw the boy looking back up at him. He wasn't sure what to do.
"That...was a dirty trick...Professor..." Harry actually smiled at Snape, who looked severely bewildered. He knew he would be gone if it hadn't been for Snape. He wasn't sure how he felt, except incredibly drained. "You...look awful..."
"Another ten points from your house, Mr. Potter, for disrespecting a teacher."
Harry grinned exhaustedly at Snape, who thought the boy had some irreversible damage done to his head. Madam Pomfrey slowly approached them and took Harry from Snape, depositing him properly back in bed. Within moments, he was asleep. She then helped Snape to his feet, who was just as mentally drained as Harry, and helped him to an unoccupied bed, where she laid him down and forced him to drink a potion to restore his strength.
Albus came up between the two beds, and studied Harry for a moment. "What did you do, Severus?" His voice was filled with a sort of admiration for the potions master, and he seemed, if anything, curious.
"I told him I was taking house-points from him if he did not wake up." His head was throbbing with pain, and he wished more than ever for a Migrean potion to stop it, or at least stop the throbbing. Dumbledore chuckled.
"And how many did you deduct?"
"One-hundred points."
"But it doesn't count inside your mind, does it, Severus?" Snape didn't answer him, but scowled, and Albus smiled. He knew no points had really been taken. Not really. Except for the last ten... "I suggest you get some rest, Severus. I don't think you, or Harry, will be doing any training today." Snape glowered at the Headmaster from drooping lids. He reluctantly fell alseep in the hospital wing.
They both knew that this whole ordeal was only the beginning.
******************************
So, since i know you all want more (i probably just jinxed myself, huh?) I had to write this up as a sort of middle point, as we get down to all the nitty-gritty details in the next chapter. The original title of this chapter was going to be "The Eye of the Storm", but i don't want three titles with the words 'storm' in them. Kinda redundant. And don't worry, everything will soon be cast into the light...And as for Moldy-Voldy...well, we'll see.
Katani Petitedra: Evil Cliffhanger Demon? I'll just add that one to my many titles. *Stay away from toasters!*
ParanoiaIn2005: Perhaps I am crazy... But it's all good. You get a reward of delicious peanut buttery-candies and rootbeer for guesiing Snape! Kudos!
PhoenixPadfoot89: Well, Dumbledore -eventually- came...But you're onto something with draco...heh heh heh...
callas-and-ivy: Yep. that's me, Cliffhanger-Demon-Queen. Thnx very much!
Keitorin: Now see, it's that kind of dedication and attitude that make writing this all worth while. You drank coffee for mah story, man, and dedicated those ever precious hours to it. *single tear* Thank you! And don't worry, we'll get to draco...muhuhahaha!!
Chapter 13- Fading Away
*********************************
Snape walked in through the hospital room doors, and caught sight of the terrific trio sitting on Harry's bed. His surprise at seeing Harry awake, and at finding the two others out of class, was evident on his face, but he quickly replaced it for a look of iciness, and entered fully into the room.
"What are you doing out of class?" The silky ice in his voice seemed to wash over the whole of the room. He was probably wondering where Madam Pomfrey was, and why this was being allowed. The three just looked at one another in silence.
"Uh-..." Hermione started. She tried to think of something, but knowing Snape, an answer of 'we were worried' was sure to gain them a loss of housepoints.
"Yes, Miss Granger?"
"We lost track of time, Professor."
Snape looked at Hermione with a glare, and shot Harry an equally icy look. He knew that they'd been there for Potter, but he wanted a straight answer. "You didn't answer my question."
"We came to see Harry. That okay with you?!" Ron was slightly trembling, but whether it was from fear or anger, they knew it took a lot of gall to talk that way to Snape.
"Ten points, Mr. Weasley." He sneered at Ron. "Now get back to class. Both of you."
Hermione and Ron grabbed their things in silence. Ron shoved the invisibility cloak under the bed with his foot and raised his eyebrows in knowing to Harry. They said goodbye and exited the wing, but not before Ron shot Snape a very dirty look. It was evident that he wouldn't be returning to class of his own free will.
Harry would've grinned at Ron's display of bravado had the potions master and he not been in the same room. Alone. It was then that he wondered exactly -why- Snape was in the hospital wing.
//I wish Dumbledore'd let me speak with the Dractnox...This makes things so much more difficult//
"I expect You're back to health, Potter?" Snape looked down upon Harry with something of abject sympathy.
"Yes, sir." //He probably wants me to return to training already...Geez, and I just woke up//
Snape studied Harry for a moment, and then walked towards the back of the wing.
"Uh-," he was going to tell Snape that Madam Pomfrey was out, but thought better of it. He didn't want to be the one to bear Snape bad news.
"Severus! I didn't expect to see you here so early in the day." Madam Pomfrey's voice was like a godsend. Harry wasn't sure when he'd ever been so happy to see her.
She smiled at Harry, noticing the loss of his friends, and walked over to Snape with a knowing glance. She took him into the back of the wing for some reason that Harry couldn't see.
He was very curious about what business his potions teacher/trainer had to take care of in the wing. //Probably giving Madam Pomfrey potions...or trying to get her to have me training once more...Hmph. He'd probably make a coma patient endure no less!//
"My my! You've healed quite nicely. I suppose this is your way of telling me that you won't be coming back to me for any more treatment, Severus?"
Harry pricked up his ears at this and listened in for more. So Snape wasn't there for him. He got hurt. But where? Doing what? More spy work? Did they already invade Voldemort's stronghold while he was asleep? Surely Ron or Hermione would have told him?
//GAAH! It'll be okay if I just ask the Dractnox one question, won't it? Nothing'll happen. It's just one question...//
He listened in to the conversation that they were having, waiting for something of explanation. He didn't want to disobey Dumbledore, but he felt that this was something he should know. Besides, of whatever they were talking about back there, it didn't seem too important. It seemed to consist of how stubborn Madam Pomfrey thought Snape was, and at any rate, it wasn't about him.
Harry looked to a Dractnox and thought for a moment, trying to decide whether or not to ask it what was up. He didn't think it dangerous. He'd spoke with them many a time before, and was pretty good with Legilimency to speak with them mentally, and he was feeling better than ever, so why not try? It was only one question, after all.
He listened to Snape and Madam Pomfrey, and decided it was now or never.
//Dractnox?// One immediately came to attention and brought itself to him with what seemed the utmost interest. //What happened to Snape? // Asking was putting a great strain on him. It was hurting him, straining his heart, and he wasn't sure how much longer he could stand it. He breathed heavily, panting. //While I was asleep, I mean//
Immediately, Harry knew something was wrong. His question was being answered alright, but not in the normal speech way. He was being shown pictures, as he had when he was unconscious, and it was a completely different experience. His head spun and his eyes fluttered, trying to keep up with the images being shown. He felt all his strength and control leaving him, and he felt himself slipping away. He tried to fight it, tried to stop it, but couldn't. All he could feel was slipping away. Slipping, slipping, and all the while Madam Pomfrey was having a conversation with Snape not even fifteen feet away. He tried to grasp onto something, tried to somehow communicate that he needed help, but he couldn't. All he felt was slipping, and all he could see was his question being answered, over and over again, from one angle, and then another. He knew he wouldn't last long like this, and wondered when he would slip away. If the two in the other room even knew what was happening, Harry could not tell. He couldn't feel anything or sense anything other than an immense slipping...
"Hold him still! Damn it Poppy!" Snape and Madam Pomfrey were trying to contain Harry, who was more or less struggling on his bed, and seemed to be sort of fading away. Literally fading. He was becoming translucent some, so that with each passing moment, they could see a little more of the sheets underneath him. "Hold him!"
"I'm trying! I'm trying!" Poppy Pomfrey held on to the struggling boy, tears streaming down her face, and utter terror filling her countenance. What was happening to Harry never happened in the history of anything she knew. For once in her life, she felt helpless.
"Potter! Listen to me!" Snape yelled at Harry in the most icy voice he could muster, but not even that could get through to him.
"Please Severus!"
"It's in his mind! Dammit! Hold him still!" Snape kept trying to breach Harry's mind with his own Legilimens, but he kept getting pushed back mentally and physically by Harry's struggling. Albus had told him what Harry had said had happened as he slept, and he knew this was some by-product of speaking mentally with those creatures of his. He rued the day he ever taught Harry anything of Legilimency. Of all the times he'd hated Harry, he never wished this upon him.
"Severus! Do something! Please!"
He tried to pry into Harry's head once more, all the while Harry was getting more transparent. Then suddenly, it was as if he had popped a through an ice-hole into his mind, and saw the chaos ensuing. But it wasn't quite long before the images themselves attacked Snape and threw him out. He slid across the floor of the hospital, hitting one of the beds and stopping. Madam Pomfrey tried to hold Harry herself, but he was too much for her.
"Careful! His magic is out of control!" No sooner than Snape said the words was Madam Pomfrey levitated up and dumped somewhere behind her medical curtain. Harry was flailing, and almost blinking out of existence completely. He was becoming same as he was only a little bit ago inside of his mind. This time permanently.
Snape lunged at Harry and held onto him tight, refusing to be attacked by rogue magic once more. He heard the crashing of medical instruments followed by Poppy's appearance out of the curtain once more.
"Go and fetch the Headmaster!" Snape grunted, trying to keep Harry still. "Dammit woman! Now!"
Taking a look at the nearly gone boy, Poppy ran out of the hospital with the speed of flight.
Snape struggled to keep Harry still as he tried to penetrate his mind once more. "Listen to me, Potter. Your house will be in negative points until your grandchildren graduate should you decide to fade out on me! Don't you dare such a thing!" He concentrated hard with much struggle, but like a breath of fresh air, he got into Harry's deteriorating mind. //Potter!// He tried to make sense of everything in the boy's head, but the pictures were too fast, and the chaos too great. He tried to stop it, force it out with Legilimens, but found it a harder task than he had thought. //Potter! Dammit! Where are you?!//
He felt a punch to his jaw, and realized that one of Harry's hands had gotten free. He grasped it with his own, and tried to find the boy within his own mind. Harry was becoming nothing more than a mere shadow of himself, and was practically gone.
//Potter! You will answer me now!// Snape forced his mind into Harry's, yelling his order into the chaos of the mind.
//Pro...fessor...//
Snape heard the tiniest voice coming from somewhere within Harry's mind, and tried to find it underneath the chaos.
//Answer me, Potter! Stop this!//
//I...here...stop...//
Snape tried to zero in on the sound, and found himself feeling Harry slipping away. He gripped onto Harry's hand, and tried to find him within his mind.
//Where are you in here, Potter?! Stop all this!// He tried to force what he could out of Harry's mind, but what he could do wasn't much, and he was very pissed by that fact. //Wake up now! You're fading away! Twenty points from Gryffindor, Potter!//
//...no...//
Snape thought for a moment, and tried something.
//If you don't stop this now, that will be another twenty points from Gryffindor, Potter!//
He felt Harry's hand gripping his own, and looked to see that he wasn't as see-through as before.
//...stop...//
//Another twenty to that makes for an even sixty. Care to try for eighty?!// The chaos in Harry's head began to slow, and he felt the boy's presence stronger than it was before.
//...you...git...// Snape actually smirked at this. It was working.
//Should you decide to make your holiday in there any longer, Potter, that will be forty points!//
//Get out...of my...head...// Harry's voice was strong in his mind, and Snape found that he couldn't see the bed-sheets through Harry anymore.
//A grand total of one-hundred points deducted, Potter. If you don't stop now and awake, I'll double it!//
Snape felt himself mentally kicked out of Harry's mind, and immediately thought that he had trained the boy too well in only a few days. He was panting, and took note of the mental strain he had put on himself. He tried to straighten out his own head and regain his composure as the boy became as solid and opaque as anything else in the room. He noticed the Headmaster and Madam Pomfrey in the room, having arrived only moments before. He looked at them with a little confusion, and then he felt Harry grip his hand, and he looked down and saw the boy looking back up at him. He wasn't sure what to do.
"That...was a dirty trick...Professor..." Harry actually smiled at Snape, who looked severely bewildered. He knew he would be gone if it hadn't been for Snape. He wasn't sure how he felt, except incredibly drained. "You...look awful..."
"Another ten points from your house, Mr. Potter, for disrespecting a teacher."
Harry grinned exhaustedly at Snape, who thought the boy had some irreversible damage done to his head. Madam Pomfrey slowly approached them and took Harry from Snape, depositing him properly back in bed. Within moments, he was asleep. She then helped Snape to his feet, who was just as mentally drained as Harry, and helped him to an unoccupied bed, where she laid him down and forced him to drink a potion to restore his strength.
Albus came up between the two beds, and studied Harry for a moment. "What did you do, Severus?" His voice was filled with a sort of admiration for the potions master, and he seemed, if anything, curious.
"I told him I was taking house-points from him if he did not wake up." His head was throbbing with pain, and he wished more than ever for a Migrean potion to stop it, or at least stop the throbbing. Dumbledore chuckled.
"And how many did you deduct?"
"One-hundred points."
"But it doesn't count inside your mind, does it, Severus?" Snape didn't answer him, but scowled, and Albus smiled. He knew no points had really been taken. Not really. Except for the last ten... "I suggest you get some rest, Severus. I don't think you, or Harry, will be doing any training today." Snape glowered at the Headmaster from drooping lids. He reluctantly fell alseep in the hospital wing.
They both knew that this whole ordeal was only the beginning.
******************************
So, since i know you all want more (i probably just jinxed myself, huh?) I had to write this up as a sort of middle point, as we get down to all the nitty-gritty details in the next chapter. The original title of this chapter was going to be "The Eye of the Storm", but i don't want three titles with the words 'storm' in them. Kinda redundant. And don't worry, everything will soon be cast into the light...And as for Moldy-Voldy...well, we'll see.
Katani Petitedra: Evil Cliffhanger Demon? I'll just add that one to my many titles. *Stay away from toasters!*
ParanoiaIn2005: Perhaps I am crazy... But it's all good. You get a reward of delicious peanut buttery-candies and rootbeer for guesiing Snape! Kudos!
PhoenixPadfoot89: Well, Dumbledore -eventually- came...But you're onto something with draco...heh heh heh...
callas-and-ivy: Yep. that's me, Cliffhanger-Demon-Queen. Thnx very much!
Keitorin: Now see, it's that kind of dedication and attitude that make writing this all worth while. You drank coffee for mah story, man, and dedicated those ever precious hours to it. *single tear* Thank you! And don't worry, we'll get to draco...muhuhahaha!!