Remembrance and Renewal by Nigel Tatsuya and Avatar Arkmage

Chapter Seventeen: Mental Instability

"Uh..." Harry began, watching Severus attempt his customary glare with the remains of tears still glistening faintly in his obsidian eyes. "It was polyjuice potion...thepolyjuiceIV..."

When Harry trailed off, and did not continue for almost a full minute, Severus pressed further, taking care to keep any hint of anger or surprise out of his tone. The last thing he wanted to do was scare the boy into silence. "Polyjuice IV? May I inquire as to where you procured the Polyjuice IV potion?"

"From your labs, sir."

Severus moved closer until his face was nothing more than a blur to Harry. "You stole from my labs!"

Harry wiped minute quantities of saliva from his face; depending on how angry Severus was, he had the annoying habit of spitting whilst he talked. "Yes, I did sir."

"Tell me," his voice dropped several decibels below what human ears could normally perceive. To Harry however, Severus may as well have been shouting. "Why would you do such a thing? Surely you're not such a..."

"Severus," called Albus Dumbledore from just behind Harry. Severus was almost certain that the anti-apparition wards at Hogwarts made exceptions for the barmy Headmaster, for neither Harry nor Severus had seen him approach. "Perhaps we should discuss these matters in a more private location. Severus, are you well enough to..."

The dark haired man had already thrown his covers aside and was starting to climb out of the narrow hospital bed. Not wanting to invoke Poppy's wrath, but knowing that Severus was going to walk out of the infirmary with or without assistance; Harry and Albus wrapped a blanket around him, took their places on either side of the dour potions master, and hastily walked escorted him out.


Draco had feared that his experience in the muggle hospital would make the prospect of being imprisoned in a tiny box filled with blast ended skrewts seem a more desirable fate by comparison. Oddly enough, he found it a time of wonder. There were amazing, albeit odd new things and experiences awaiting him each moment he was awake. The muggles were admittedly resourceful, and coped rather well for beings bereft of magical prowess.

The Malfoy heir even found himself immensely enjoying the programmes in the strange telly box in his room. He had initially been startled by it. How did non-magical folk shrink themselves to perform in such a tiny box? When one of the matrons first powered it on for him, he screamed in terror at the sight of alien troops firing weapons on a group of humans armed with curious blast sticks which fired lightning bolts.

"Oh!" the matron gasped, "you don't like science fiction, do you? Very well, let us see if there is something else you might enjoy..."

"AIiii!" Draco screeched when a man wearing brightly coloured feathers and body paints fired a flaming arrow at him.

Thankfully the matron switched the telly to another station before the flaming arrow could come through the glass screen, which probably would not offer adequate protection against the flaming arrow. The matron handed Draco the tiny box which controlled the telly. "Here you are, Draco, you watch what you like."

The matron quickly showed Draco how to operate the call buttons, as well as the channel changer. After inadvertently calling the nurses enough times to get them sufficiently annoyed, Draco learned that the telly box was an inocuous, and ingenious form of entertainment. He particularly liked a show featuring brightly coloured princesses who were capable of powerful forms of magic called Sailor Moon SuperS.

Draco also found that he enjoyed another show featuring a funny muggle named Benny Hill, who could move extremely fast, especially when other muggles were chasing him.

"So muggles really CAN do magic!" Draco mused, watching the bespectacled man and his elderly companion elude an irate mob at speeds he had never seen wizards or witches accomplish without the aid of brooms or spells.

Even the food wasn't too bad. Draco's breakfast of pancakes, bangers and eggs tasted very similar to anything the house elves at home would serve, perhaps even better. It was the drink with fruits, yogurt and crushed ice a pretty muggle nurse served him later on that intrigued him greatly. The pretty nurse, who Draco could have kicked himself for not learning her name because he was too busy watching her form fitting nurse outfit, said the drink was called a smoothie. Apparently muggles employed magical people who could spell food cold, or else they used muggles like Benny Hill or Jackie Wright who could run really fast to and from the tops of mountains to retrieve snow for the smoothies.

When Dr. Payne looked in on Draco sometime later, he brought along another pretty nurse in a white uniform. Draco entertained the thought of Madam Pomfrey abandoning her loose magical nurse robes in favor of the more fitting muggle nurse variety. Draco then castigated himself for even thinking sich thoughts about Madam Pomfrey.

"Well, Mr...uh...Mal-foy." Dr. Payne said, helping the pale wizard to sit up. "If you're feeling up to it, you may visit your father now."

Draco eagerly tried to stand, but only succeeded in taking a few awkward steps before falling into the pretty nurse's arms.

"Oh no, no, no." Dr Payne said, gently guiding Draco to a wheelchair. "You're not in any condition to walk all the way to the maxillofacial surgery ward yet! Nurse Asphalt will take you there."

"Nurse Assault!" Draco gasped under his breath, hoping that the nurse wasn't as violent as her name indicated. If there was anything worse than a doctor whose name was 'Pain,'it was a matron called 'Assault.' What were the names of the other staff? Battery? Mutilation? Pogrom?

Nurse Asphalt steered the wheelchair out of the hospital room and down a long corridor. Draco sincerely wished that nurses pulled the wheeled chairs rather than pushed them, not because he wanted to enjoy staring at the nurse's well fitting dress, but because he was very nervous to have some one named 'Assault' where he couldn't readily see her.


"Professor Dumbledore?" Harry wasted no time once they arrived in the Headmaster's office.

"Yes, Harry?"

"I know you both want me to explain what I did last night, and why I did it." Harry stole a brief glance at Severus, who glowered at him in return, as much as to say 'no, whatever would lead you to THAT conclusion?' "But I think it would be easier if I...if I showed you." Although Harry lowered his eyes, he knew that both Albus and Severus were listening intently. Professor Dumbledore, I wonder if I might borrow your Pensieve?"

"Are you certain that is what you wish, Harry?"

Harry nodded, his still long black hair framing his face as he leaned forward.

Without hesitation, Albus waved his hand, and the stone basin levitated from its hiding place in a nearby cabinet. It landed directly in front of Harry. After some brief instructions from the Headmaster, Harry retrieved his wand from his sleeve, and slowly pulled a silvery strand from his temple.

The teen could not help but marvel at the tremendous relief he felt once the thought was removed from his head. He could still remember the particular sequence of events, but somehow the images no longer had its frightening clarity, or its accompanying myriad of painful emotions. It was almost as though the scenes were from some one else's life and experiences, almost like watching a picture of sorts.

Harry tentatively placed the strand into the basin and tapped it with his wand. Because Severus still could not have direct contact with anything magical, Harry tapped the semi-liquid surface of the bowl once more, as he had watched Albus do during his fourth year at Hogwarts. The image of the Headmaster and Harry obediently rose into the air just above the stone basin and began revolving very slowly.

"Harry," the Headmaster's image echoed in the silent office. "Voldemort has forced your father to ingest the Interventio Interferus potion, are you familiar with its properties?"

"No sir," the image of Harry echoed back. "We haven't studied that in class yet."

"It is not likely that you would have, for this variant was first developed by dark wizards, and refined by Severus himself during his service to Voldemort. The potion was favored greatly by inquisitors as they could torture a witch or wizard, and then force the victim to ingest the potion." The image of Harry looked both perplexed and saddened simultaneously, and the Headmaster continued in a softer voice. "That potion would prevent healing by any magical means, greatly prolonging the victim's suffering. In fact, even very low levels of magic used by or around the victim could prove fatal."

"So that's why father couldn't be healed?" Harry's image shouted as he stood abruptly, knocking several shiny trinkets off of the Headmaster's desk.

"And why he could not safely use his magics to brew a potion that would have facilitated his healing, or at the very least, eased his suffering." Albus sighed, as he continued explaining the potion's effects as well as recapping highlights in the potion's infamous history that Poppy Pomfrey had told him about in the previous week.

It was apparent to Severus that Harry hadn't been listening fully that day as his bright green eyes filled with tears. Eyes that reminded Severus so much of his beloved Lily. So much like Lily was their son. "Oh NO! I asked him to heal me!" The pain emanating from Harry's image could be felt by all present in the room. The image bit on his lower lip and collapsed to the floor sobbing. "Why didn't father tell me! WHY? WHY? He's suffered enough!" Harry's image looked up, crying fiercely now. "He's suffered too much in his life! I can't stand the thought of him suffering anymore! And YET! AND YET I DID THIS TO HIM! I caused this!"

"Harry, you didn't know." Albus said, rubbing Harry's back.

"NO ONE TOLD ME!" snarled Harry, hiding his face in his hands. "WHY! How could he not tell me? How could YOU not tell me, Professor Dumbledore?"

"It was not my story to devul–"

"TO Bloody HELL with THAT!" Harry screamed, standing and stomping in front of the Headmaster. For a moment, it looked as though Harry were going to strike the old man, but struck the empty chair instead, knocking it across the room."

After a while of pacing the office like an animal locked in an enclosure several sizes too small to adequately house it, Harry slowed and started sobbing like a sick child. "Oh Professor Dumbledore, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry I did that."

The Headmaster patted the youth's shoulders soothingly.

"It's just that..." the Harry in the pensieve dashed his tears away, only to have them replaced by new and more dense tears. "I may have hated Professor Snape before, but that was before I really saw him for who he was. I didn't stop to think why he acted the way he did before. It was easy just to think of him as a grouchy old git, but I can't see him that way anymore. I can almost understand why he acts as he does. He's suffered so much, lost so many people who he loved and who loved him, and I ... I just don't want him to suffer anymore." Harry paused for a while as his lower lip started trembling in a fashion so similar to Severus's that were it not for the fact that Harry looked like James, it would have been like seeing his own reflection. " I love him!" He mouthed silently, but it was clear to Severus what the Harry in the pensieve had said. "He's all I have and I'll be DAMNED if he suffers any more, and I don't want him to ever suffer because of me ever again!"

"When I had nearly drowned, my spirit was freed from my body for some time afterwards." the image of Harry continued, "I hated it in the beginning when I found out that Professor Snape was my biological father, but when I saw how different he was before Voldemort forced the mark on him... and after he took the mark... when I saw him missing me after he thought he had denied me life..."

Severus turned to gaze upon the real Harry, and saw that the boy was covering his ears, and had lowered his head so that his long hair was obscuring his eyes. The grimaces on the image of Harry spoke volumes. It was too painful for him to continue. The Headmaster tried to offer comfort, but Harry just fended off his hands and ran out of Dumbledore's office.

The next image the Pensieve generated took place inside of Snape's chambers. Harry had changed into his pajamas and looked abnormally calm as he told the aged headmaster that he was going to sleep. Both Snape and Dumbledore seemed disturbed by the expression on Harry's face. It was almost blank, yet the boy's green eyes seemed to burn as though they generated destructive quantities of radiation. Almost immediately after the Headmaster left, Harry got dressed and practically sprinted out of the room.

Harry was also watching the Pensieve's images along with Severus and Albus now, for he could not fully recall all the events that had transpired then.

He watched as he dragged Cho to the dungeons and coerced her into assisting him. Harry covered his eyes when he saw his image covertly taking Snape's arm from the cooling unit. Harry was further shocked when he saw himself taking a fine needle from Dr. Chang's black bag and using it to withdraw blood from his father's unconscious form before fleeing back to the dungeons. Once there, he added a few drops of his father's blood to the polyjuice IV vial and drank it.

At first, nothing happened, and Harry was so incensed that he started throwing things all over the dungeons. He stopped only when he noticed that he was throwing items farther, and that his clothes were suddenly too small for him. Harry, Snape and Dumbledore watched in wonder as the image of Harry morphed into a perfect replica of his father. After putting on a set of Professor Snape's clothes and Death Eater robes, Harry picked up a hairbrush and brushed his now long hair.

"Always wanted to see what you looked like with brushed hair, father." Harry muttered to his reflection before he fled the castle and used the arm to apparate to Voldemort's side.

The real Severus jumped out of his chair and stomped over to where the real Harry was sitting. Before Dumbledore could react, Severus grabbed Harry's shoulder fiercely.

"YOU WENT TO VOLDEMORT!" Severus whispered harshly. "You deliberately put yourself in harm's reach? Are you so vain that you think you can fight him?" 0

Although Severus had not grabbed Harry's shoulder particularly hard, Harry froze at the intensity of his father's actions. He closed his eyes, half expecting to be punched, slapped or at the very least shaken roughly.

Severus stopped when the Pensieve showed Harry, now in the guise of Snape, at the entrance to an abandoned warehouse. At the far end of what the Pensieve showed, was Voldemort, roughly forcing Mervidith Snape onto a pile of old rags as Wormtail looked on.

Severus released Harry and watched as his image attacked the Dark Lord with an intensity he would have never guessed Harry capable of. Dumbledore, Snape, and Harry made no sound as they watched the carnage unfold. All, including Harry, were astounded at Harry's endurance and power as well as the raw anger and determination blazing in his dark eyes.


Nurse Asphalt wheeled Draco into a brightly lit room in the maxillofacial surgery ward. There were four beds in the spacious room, yet only one of them was occupied.

"Father?" Draco said tentatively as the Nurse wheeled him closer to the pale man in the bed. The man's long ashen hair had been fixed into a loose plait and hung over the man's left shoulder. His face was covered in cuts and bruises that muggle interventions could not heal instantaneously. His right arm was bound in a sling and his hand was heavily bandaged.

Although the man could not answer for reasons Draco could not fully understand, Lucius Malfoy turned slightly to attempt to face his teenaged son. Draco wanted to admonish his father right away for allowing the Death Eaters to use the Malfoy family as a source of amusement, but at seeing his father's poor condition, he decided to keep the conversation mild for the time being.

Knowing that muggles would not care, Draco placed a hand gently over his father's left hand, which save for some bruising, was comparatively in good condition. "I'm relieved you're still alive, father." Draco said in his usual haughty voice, "With these muggles still practicing Neanderthal potions, and barbarian surgeries I was starting to get worried. "

Lucius uttered a soft moan.

"Have you seen the telly box father?" Draco asked, turning on the television to a televised football game.

Lucius reached over to Draco with his semi-good hand and patted his arm.

"I guess you couldn't tell the monkeys the lie about why we're here huh, father?" Draco asked watching one of the muggle players on one team moon a player on the opposing team. "Well this is the game we supposedly got our beatings at."

The older man's grey eyes widened in confusion.

"Oh, I suppose you were in too bad a state to even remember when you were brought here," Draco said, absently stroking his dad's pale fingers with his own. "Well the folks at St. Mungos said I had to tell the monkey medifolk that we went to watch one of those muggle football games. And that our team had violent people called hooligans, who fought with the other team's hooligans and we were supposedly caught in the melee."

Lucius seemed almost amused, but he only hacked and wretched rather than laughed.

"It's more inane than funny, father." Draco said, sneering towards the closed door. "I wonder what a Molotov cocktail is? Because that's what our team's hooligans supposedly threw at the other team."

Lucius uttered what sounded like an 'I wouldn't know.' and/or 'I don't want to know.'

Draco and Lucius watched the televised football game for a while in silence, each enjoying the other's company. Both father and son found themselves marveling at the muggle players' abilities to play a game entirely without the use of magic. They seemed to be able to control the ball as well with their feet as any beater in quidditch could do with their clubs.

"Oh yes, I almost forgot, father." Draco said, laughing in a disdainful way. "Do you know that muggle hooligans at these games fight with beer bottles?"

"Mey mrooph?"

"Oh yes!" Draco said, smiling scornfully towards the door to the main part of the hospital again. "What a bunch of oafs!"

Their largely one sided conversation was halted by a knock at the door.

"Mr. Draco Malfoy?" the pretty nurse called from the door. "Dr. Payne says I'll have to take you back to your room in five minutes."

"Tell Dr. Pain 'I said okay.'" Draco called back, watching as the nurse once again disappeared behind the door.

Draco looked around the room to make sure he wasn't being observed, then he leaned over and hugged the elder Malfoy. Although Lucius could not say anything, and his face was too bruised to show much of his emotions, he made a contented sound and patted his son on the shoulder.

It was then that Draco noticed something frightening when his father's lips parted into a small smile. His father's jaws had been totally immobilized and appeared to have been stitched together by what appeared to be steel wires.

Draco jumped back in horror. "OHH!" he gasped. "What have they done to you father?"

Draco's sudden reaction startled Lucius, causing him to reflexively attempt to open his mouth in surprise. The action caused several of the wired areas of his jaw to start bleeding.

Panicking, the pale youth charged out of the room, hoping to call for help, but at the same time, Draco did not want to consult with these monkey-brained muggle healers. He ran, not feeling the pain from his battered body, and knocking over several medical personnel in the process.

They had sewn his father's jaw shut with metal wires...metal wires! That surely was a form of torture wasn't it? Draco continued running, hoping to find anyone who looked remotely like a Mediwitch or mediwizard.


Severus, Harry and Albus had not once removed their eyes from the Pensieve's images. They had watched the fight in its entirety. As the ultimate anticlimax to it all, Voldemort and Wormtail fled.

Although he knew better, Severus had been anticipating Harry's win. He longed to see some one bring the Dark Lord down.

Who better than a son to do it?

Then again...the fool boy had risked his life.

Severus rose out of his chair once more and ambled over to Harry. "How could you be so foolish!" Severus shouted in a whisper, shaking Harry with his remaining arm. "Taking on the Dark Lord alone like that!"

"SEVERUS stop that!" Albus shouted, moving in between the father and son.

Harry had his eyes closed tightly. He had seen how harshly his grandfather had dealt with Severus when he committed any infraction of the rules. Surely Severus had learnt those lessons well and was about to pass them on to Harry.

Fear overcame him though. "Don't beat me, father. Please don't beat me!" Harry cried, shielding his face and turning away in shame. "I know grandad would have hammered you if you did something like this, but please don't hammer me. At least not in front of Headmaster Dumbledore... If you want to punish me back in the dungeons however..."

Severus looked at Harry in terror. Was he really about to deal with Harry the way Lucien would have dealt with him? All at once, the memories of Lucien flooded to the forefront once more. Severus released Harry's upper arm as though it had suddenly caught on fire, and backed away. Where his hand had been, there were darkening red marks, which would very likely develop into bruising. "Oh, Merlin!" Severus said, his voice faltering. "Harry... I..." Severus continued to back away until ne nearly lost his footing. He would have landed on the floor were it not for Albus, who quickly summoned a chair for him to fall bonelessly into.


"Confound it!" shouted Lucien, pouring preserving potions onto an amorphous chunk of flesh in a sterile container. "Severus! You will stop your infernal snivelling this instant, and carry out your task!"

Although Severus had been working on Mr. Oduruss' carcass for nearly a half hour, he had managed only a single, long incision along the stout man's chest and abdomen. Try as he might, he could not proceed any further. For one, he had never had to disembowel a human before, and for another, looking at this man made him feel utterly sick. This man had tried to violate him in one of the worst possible ways, after all, and his hands trembled even more with each time he thought on it. Finally, Severus' eyes were so full of tears that he could not see clearly enough to complete his task with any satisfactory degree of proficiency.

"Listen, boy!" Lucien grabbed Severus by the collar of his nightshirt and lifted him off the floor. "Are you going to allow whoresons like these, who would tear your arse open for their own amusement, go unpunished? Or does the thought of such a violation of your body excite you?"

Severus shook his head fervently, but did not say anything, for he knew he was not capable of comprehensible speech at the moment. He disliked crying in front of his father. The fact that he had so little control over it was a source of almost daily reproach from the elder Snape.

"You had better stop your crying," Lucien scolded as he lifted Severus into the air and slammed him into a wall. "Or I shall give you something to cry about and you'll have a long time to go about it." With each word, the elder Snape trust his nearly grown son into the wall. On the last syllable, he dropped Severus to the floor and raised his fist.

"Please," Severus implored. He had only then became aware of his mother's presence in the room. As always, she had returned to try and save Severus from his father's malicious disciplinary methods. "Don't beat me, father. At least not in front of..." Severus began sobbing, "...not in front of mother."

"LUCIEN!" Mervidith shouted, "we've Sevvie's parents! We should support him now more than ever, we can't..."

"...have him at your breast forever!" Lucien finished. "He will have to learn to fight on his own, for we're not omnipresent beings, and won't always be there to heal him every time he's hurt." He thrust Mervidith outside and locked the door.

Severus shielded his face and prepared for the blows to fall.

None did.

When Severus found the courage to raise his head sometime later, he saw Lucien returning his frightened gaze with his icy blue eyes. At first, Severus thought his mother had done something to his father, for he seemed to have been frozen in the middle of his motion. Upon closer observation, Severus noticed that the older man was trembling. Where he expected to see anger, he only saw the darkest horror.

"Father?" Severus whispered.

"Go back to bed, boy." Lucien replied, his voice abnormally monotonous, considering that it was coming from a person who looked as though he were being shown his worst fears repeatedly.

"Dad?" Severus slowly rose to his feet and gazed in confusion at his father's blanched face.

"Come on, Sevvie." Mervidith had kicked the door right off of its hinges and returned. She wrapped an arm around her son, coaxing him back to his bed.

"What's happened to father? Something's not right about father?" Severus asked.

"I don't know, dear boy." Mervidith looked back, and could not help but wonder why Lucien was trembling. "Best not to do anything to anger him again though. Just do as he says."

Severus compliantly lay on his bed while Mervidith went to the cupboard and took out a clean set of blankets. "Ever since your father took that mark," Mervidith began, unfolding the blankets and covering Severus with them, "he has been very mentally unstable."

"He wasn't always this way?" Severus asked, willingly accepting the stuffed dragon doll Mervidith placed into his arms even though he hadn't slept with a stuffed toy for the last decade or so.

"No, not until the time he returned from that Death Eater meeting..."

"Do not speak about that time! I do not need to be reminded!" Lucien shouted, threatening to strike the meek woman. He grabbed the back of Mervidith's robes and threw her out of the room before returning to the bodies on the floor. "If I wanted Sevvie to know about THAT I would have told him myself! Now go back to sleep! Both of you! I'll finish up with these THINGS myself."

Severus lay in bed shivering. He was not physically cold, for the blankets his mother had knitted were very warm and comforting. It was the memories of the nights events as well as the sight before Severus that caused him to tremble. Lucien was seated on the floor with his back toward Severus as he continued cutting up Mr. Oduruss' corpse. The elder Snape was cutting so rapidly that flecks of bright red were jetting seemingly unnoticed on to the man's white-blonde hair.

Just as Severus was about to fall asleep, he became aware of an unexpected sound from his father's direction. As full consciousness returned to him, Severus noticed that his father's shoulders were quivering violently. Once more he heard the sound which he identified at first as a dry heaving, but upon further observation, Severus realized that it was the sound of his father sobbing.

"Father?" Severus whispered, lightly placing a hand on his father's quivering shoulder.

"Go back to sleep!" Lucien shouted, shoving Severus away so hard that he fell on the blood soaked carpet.


Severus was drawn from his reverie by the feel of someone's hands on his shoulders. Upon hearing the familiar swish of his billowing black robes, he lowered his head even more. He could not face his son. He could not face Harry, for looking the boy in the eyes would cause him to long to be the father he was not sure he could ever be.

"Father?" Harry said, squeezing the older man's shoulders gently.

"It was never my intention to beat you." Severus stated truthfully, his eyes still firmly fixed on his own hospital pajamas clad lap. "You're still a juvenile, Harry. And as contrary, unmindful and utterly asinine as your actions last night may have been, I'll not raise my hand to you for it."

Harry knelt onto the floor, forcing Severus to look at him. "I meant what I said last night to Professor Dumbledore. You may not believe it, because we haven't got on very well in the past, but now I really do love you, father." Severus plastered his most stoic look on his face and tried to pull away, but Harry held on gingerly but firmly. "And even when I met you in our dreams, remember when I told you that I needed my father?"

Severus quickly ventured through the hazy shelves of his dream memories and nodded.

"Well even though Voldemort may need his potions master," Harry smiled at the fact that saying the Dark Lord's caused no one in the room to tremble. "I still need my father."

After years of necessity, Severus could keep his expressions impassive with nearly the same effort required of him to take a breath. This day, it was as though his proverbial breath was caught somewhere in his throat, and his stolid guise took its leave. "When we met in our dreams, you gave me your word that you'd stay did you not?"

Harry nodded, not quite understanding. "I am going to stay..."

"No!" Severus countered. "If you persist in foolish acts as you did last night, you will meet with your demise prematurely! Did you really think you would win against Voldemort on your own?"

"No father, I didn't." Harry replied, realizing only then, that he would have preferred his own death over having too watch his father suffer any more as a result of Voldemort's tortures. "I just didn't want you in pain anymore. I wanted to kill him! I literally wanted to kill him with my bare hands. When Dumbledore explained to me about the Interventio Interferus potion, and how magic could hurt you, I figured that Voldemort was hurting you even more through your Dark Mark. It must have really hurt when he summoned you."

Severus opened his mouth to respond, but Harry went on.

"And then..." Harry closed his eyes tightly. "When you.. when you... hit... me... ACCIDENTALLY of course because I was stupid enough to try and wake you up whilst you were having a bad dream."

"Har..."

Harry surged onward. "And when I asked you to heal me..." The boy, who now looked like a distorted mirror image of his father, clenched his teeth before continuing. "...you did. You healed me even though you knew what it would do to you. And you... you didn't stop until I was completely healed.. Even though it really hurt you to do so."

Severus exhaled deeply. "It was the least I could do! I punched you for Merlin's sake!"

"But you were having a nightmare! You didn't mean to punch me!" Harry protested. "I probably deserved to lose a few teeth for trying to shake you up like that!"

"NO ONE!" Although Severus' voice grew many decibels softer, one would swear he had been shouting. "Deserves to be hit by their parent for something like that!" Severus said as much to himself as to Harry.

"Especially not you." Harry said, tenderly kissing Severus on the cheek in the precise spot he had seen Lucien Snape strike him many years in the past.

Severus pulled back at the contact, yet strangely, comfort and warmth he had never felt before spread over his cheeks like a soothing elixir.

Albus had once again walked close to the father and son, ready to intervene in case either one of them did anything physically harmful to the other.

After a few uncomfortable minutes of silence, the words Harry had spoken so freely in his dream resonated verbatim through his mind and meandered to his lips once more: "I will never leave you again. As long as I'm living. I promise you..." Although Severus had been averting his eyes as much as possible from Harry before, Harry held his gaze so that he found himself unable to look away. "You've given up so much to do what you believed was right. You gave up your happiness with mother because you were worried that bearing the dark mark would cause you to become violent towards her, you didn't want to risk becoming to mother and me, what Lucien Snape became to Grandmother and you."

As he did in the dream world, Severus nodded wordlessly, tears threatening

"And you risk your very life to keep as many innocents in the wizarding world safe. Surely you understand that each mission could be your last, but you do it because you feel it is right. You want to avoid families having to suffer...as your family did." Harry, seeing his father once again battling against his own instinct not to cry and losing, pulled his father into his arms. "There is no one I am more proud of at this moment than you, father, and since you've given up so much of your own happiness for the wizarding world, I, as your son vow to give it back to you, no matter what it takes."

Although Severus normally could not stand to be touched for any length of time, let alone hugged, he found that he could not shrink from Harry's touch. Having no option to flee or to push Harry away, he returned the embrace.

Could he both keep Harry safe AND raise him at the same time?

Harry did not allow Severus the option of escaping and relentlessly held onto him, even as the Pensieve resumed flashing images several feet above it.


The sight of the metal wiring in Lucius Malfoy's mouth so unnerved Draco, that the fair-haired youth sprinted from the room. "Bloody, half-witted bottom feeders!" Draco murmured as he ran. What did his father ever do to deserve such treatment from the muggles? Okay, so perhaps Lucius did some things along with the Death Eaters that could incur their ire, but what did he ever do to these particular muggles to deserve such ill treatment?

Draco shuddered when he imagined how painful having those wires piercing his gums might be. It was an outrage! What kind of individual could be so cruel as to envision that kind of sadistic punishment? Even Lord Voldemort himself would be hard pressed to dream up anything comparable to such unsophisticated, yet so barbaric a torture method.

"There you are!" chimed Dr. Payne from directly behind the teenaged wizard.

"Get away from me, Dr. Pain!" Draco hissed at the young physician.

"But where are you going?" Dr. Payne asked, his voice somewhat breathless as he fought to keep up with the frightened youth.

"What have you done with my father?"

"Nothing..." rasped Dr. Payne. "Your father is not my patient... but you are, and as such, I am ordering you back to your room. You're in no condition to be..."

Draco responded by bolting down the long corridor, dodging other patients and medical staff when he could, and colliding dangerously when he couldn't avoid them.

"Mr. MALFOY!" Nurse Asphalt joined the pursuit several paces behind Dr. Payne.

Draco saw a strange metallic wall closing at the end of the corridor. With any luck he could get on the other side of it before it closed and escape from the two monkey medical staff members. Only magical people could make walls move like that right? Perhaps there was a mediwitch or mediwizard somewhere in the vicinity. He closed his eyes and jumped in, his only partially healed body screaming for respite.

"No! That's the service elevator!" Dr. Payne said, stopping so abruptly that his shoes skidded a few feet on the highly polished floor.

"I'll notify security." Nurse Asphalt walked over to the nurse's station and keyed the intercom. "With any luck, Mr. Malfoy will not make it outside."


Panicking when the room seemed to rise, Draco hit the buttons on the wall with the hope that the room would let him out again. After the "room" had risen for a bit, the doors opened and Draco charged through them as though he were running from a goblin he owed several hundred galleons to.

This corridor was far dimmer than the one he had left earlier and exhibited far less activity. There were no nurses and doctors frantically doing their rounds, no cafeteria workers delivering meals to the sick, and no fussing families to visit the patients. There were no patient rooms along the corridor for that matter. Where had that moving room taken him?

All of a sudden, an omnipresent voice echoed through the whole building. At first Draco assumed that it was merely a foolish muggle who had fallen into a chute or something and was calling for help, until he heard the voice giving his description as well as instructions on what to do with him once he was found.

"If you're really everywhere, why do you need to ask other monkeys to help you?" Draco shouted to the empty corridor as the voice surrounded him like a ghost with the power of existing in more than one plane at once.

The announcement repeated, and this time, he was passing directly beneath one of the speakers. The voice was so loud that Draco ran to escape it.


Hermione had spent the better part of the morning trying to convince the medical librarian to permit her to borrow a large stack of books. After hours of negotiation, it was agreed that Hermione would be allowed to take a few books back to her parents' office to read there, if she would return them at the end of the day.

The bushy haired girl nodded and happily left the medical library with some books in tow. The stack was far smaller than the one she had originally intended to borrow, but it was still high enough to not allow her to see over the pile, forcing her to look around the side of the stack to navigate safely back to her parents' practice.

She did not notice Draco running around the corner until he collided with her.

"Watch where you're going, you filthy mudblood!" Draco yelled, pain erupting through his body as he hit the linoleum with a heavy Pharmacology text smashing into his face.

End Part Seventeen