Severus was sent right away to Saint Mungo's hospital for magical injuries after Dumbledore came to examine him up in the owlery. After checking Severus's pulse, blood pressure and breathing, he understood that his state was critical and that Madam Pomfrey wouldn't be able to handle him alone. Hermione accompanied him aboard the Hogswart Express, which had been magicked to high speed for the occasion. During the short journey, she couldn't manage to tare her gaze from the man she now knew she had feelings for. She managed to utter explanations to Dumbledore and very soon, she couldn't contain her pain anymore and was crying her heart before him.
He patted her hand in a fatherly way.
"Miss Granger, it wasn't your fault. Severus had no right to-"
"Of course he had! I had… I didn't understand… I exposed his weakness to…" She gave a sob.
"Miss Granger, he didn't… Well I suppose he didn't want to stop you from sending this letter to Mr Potter for these reasons… You see, he was afraid Harry would've come to speak to him if he had got wind of his attempted suicide."
Hermione looked at him quizzically. Dumbledore sighed.
"Severus loved Lily, and always considered he was responsible for her death. He thought that he was the only one to blame."
"But that's not true!" said Hermione, scandalized. "There was also Peter Pettigrew, and-"
"All the same, he set his mind on the fact that he was the only one to blame, as he was the one who ran to Voldemort after having witnessed Professor Trelawney's prediction."
Dumbledore smiled at the look of outrage sketched on Hermione's face.
"Has he ever given himself a little credit for all the help he's provided to the Order?"
"I don't think so… He's always been very modest and perhaps a tad selfless too. This brings me to answer your thirst for knowledge about Severus." Hermione felt herself going pink; Dumbledore's smile broadened.
"Feeling Harry's eyes upon him comes back to feeling Lily's eyes… He thinks that if Harry came back to show him support after he tried to commit suicide, he'd be looking at him in a way which would suppose understanding, or maybe friendliness… He'd refuse to have Harry looking at him like this, because his eyes remind him too much of Lily's eyes… And he considers he deserves nothing less than Lily's loathing."
Hermione looked flabbergasted.
"But I always thought he was horrible to Harry because of his father! Do you mean to say that for all these years, he acted unfairly just to have Harry hating him? Wouldn't he feel better if he saw-"
"I know what you're thinking of, Miss Granger, but there's no telling Severus he needs to be nicer to Harry. You must understand that he couldn't stand seeing Lily's eyes, happy and kind, just as they were when both were still best friends, he wou-"
Severus groaned. He tried to roll on his side, without success. After fidgeting a little, he laid still upon his stretchers, dozing under thick blankets. Hermione checked his temperature by feeling his forehead, and found him quite cold.
"Excuse me, Headmaster, will it be long 'till we arrive? I'm starting to doubt we'll make it in time…"
"Well, miss Granger, if you'll kindly step out, it's only a matter of minutes now."
And so it was.
Hermione was amazed at how quickly they'd arrived; she'd spent half an hour on the train with Severus and Dumbledore, whereas the usual journey takes nearly all day. A group of qualified healers were already levitating their patient out of the train and bending gravely over him. One of them took out a breathing device out of his bag and placed it upon Severus's face.


"Muggles use these too, you know", piped up Hermione. To her surprise, the healers laughed heartily.
"Sure, they use stuff which look like these, but ours work by magic, little lady." The man grinned. Hermione looked stonily back at him, making his smile fade a little.
"Hum… May you explain exactly what happened?"
Hermione told them about Severus's invention, its effects, about how she had tried to cure him, …
They stopped by a bright yellow ambulance, and the stretchers were levitated upon a bed nailed to the floor. Hermione made to join Severus, but was held back by a healer.
"Staff only, madam."
"Oh. But I-"
"I know you where his private nurse, madam, but it's all for the best. Professor Snape has got to be checked out by the gang"-he nodded towards the healers-"just to make sure nothing's been overlooked."
"But this isn't an usual curse, and I've been looking after-" Hermione had been pushed aside by a small, over enthusiastic , young wizard. She glared reproachfully at him, coughed on purpose, but there was no attracting his attention. She noticed his hungry eyes, seemingly hypnotized by no other than Albus Dumbledore. The healer standing in front of Hermione sighed in an exasperated fashion.
"John, you've done it again! Apologize to the lady, you nearly made her fall!"
"Sir, it's him! The real Dumbledore!" The second healer sighed deeply. It looked like it wasn't the first time John acted like a complete yahoo… Hermione decided to use this at her advantage.
"Why don't you ride along with the Headmaster, Mr. John, sir, and leave me your place in the ambulance?" John looked delighted, and turned his head pleadingly to the healer next to Hermione. His boss looked thoughtfully at him before saying: "well, I guess it would be okay just for this time". John grabbed his boss in what was supposed to be a loving hug, and ran off to find his hero.
Hermione climbed into the ambulance and gave the healer a "what's-his-problem" look. He pinched the bridge of his nose before answering her unasked question.
"John is a big fan of Dumbledore, always has been. He always gets over-excited even when it only comes to having a quick glimpse of him. I'm sorry he may have been a little rude with you, but, you know, it's his heart's desire-"
"I think I get the picture." Hermione smiled weakly at him, and turned back to face Severus. The ride inside the ambulance seemed to take forever, and his pulse was getting weaker all along. When they finally arrived to the hospital, they levitated the stretchers through the back door of the rickety old store; instead of the ugly dummy was an old castor oil commercial with a pretty nurse holding a silver spoon full of medicine. She turned her head to the healer, and asked in a smug tone "password?" The oldest healer muttered "wolfs bane", and the nurse giggled annoyingly, reminding Hermione of the silly girls in the painting of her old room. The commercial faded away, leaving a hole large enough for them to pass. Severus was brought to a gloomy room smelling strongly of curing potions. In the middle stood a big steel bed with white sheets, under which he was slid. Hermione threw the heavy covers he had been wrapped in over him, and grudgingly walked out of the room to leave him to the healers. She waited, waited with Dumbledore, the minutes creeping by… After what felt like an eternity to them both, the head-healer came out of the room; his face clearly showed he had no good news for them.
"Miss Granger, Professor Dumbledore, I'm afraid we're going to have to use… drastic means to cure Professor Snape"
"Dra-drastic means? What do you mean?" stammered Hermione. The healer looked away 

from her. He seemed to be building up the courage to tell her what he was about to do.
"We're going to have to bleed him, Miss Granger… The poison is weakening him and there's no antidote we know of that would be able to save him. We don't have much time left. We need to get the potion out of his blood, and-"
"But you'll kill him trying!" screamed Hermione, horrified.
"Not if we use a stasis charm on him first, and feed him blood-replenishing potions during the operation. I won't lie to you by saying this is a risk-free procedure, but I'm afraid our choices are limited, very limited." Hermione looked on the verge of tears. The healer decided to carry on with the explanations.
"We'll first use a stasis charm on his heart for it to stop pumping the potion in his body, but don't worry, that won't kill him!" he added hastily. "Then, we'll proceed by using a stasis charm on his limbs to stop his blood circulation, and bleed them one by one, using each time blood-replenishing potions each time we've finished with a limb. When we'll be finished, we'll use "enervate" on him to wake him up, and voila, you'll have him as good as new!"
Hermione looked very green in the face. She turned on her heels, grabbed the back of a chair, threw her head forwards and vomited on the floor; Dumbledore quickly vanished the pool of sick and pulled her back on her chair. She still looked ill, and he slid out of the way just in time to escape a second serving. Hermione's eyes flew upwards and she fell on her side, bushy hair covering her face.
It took a few seconds for Dumbledore to realize she had fainted.