CH 5- Petrified

Hermiones POV...

Something in his eyes softened as he slowly walked back towards me, but he still said in a rough tone, "What do you want to talk about?". Despite the not so warm greetings by him I decided to be forward and take the initiative, "I am Hermione Granger.. and you must be Severus Snape?"

His eyes went wide with shock and suspicion and his body language immediately went into self defense mode, "Who are you? Have you been spying on me? You are a relative from moms side arent you.. she put you up to this.. you are here to take me away. Well I am not coming, and I will put up a fight if you try to force me"

Now it was my turn to give the surprised pikachu face. I tried to make sense of his words, why would his mom want him taken away? Probably because of his dad.. but then why would he want to stay, he was clearly scared of the man. I realised I hadnt said anything for several seconds so I decided I would do this investigation later, right now I should try to pacify young Severus, as odd as that sounded in my head.

"Look I told you I am from the future. You are a professor at hogwarts and I am a student. I broke a time turner accidentally and turned up here a few days ago. Believe me", I said pleading a little. Snape still looked warily at me..

A malicious voice cut the cold air like a knife, "Found you", he said in a sing-song voice with a wide malicious grin on his face. He was advancing on Sev like a hungry bear, while Severus slowly went back step by step, not daring to run. I was so terrified and shocked I couldnt move or act. He didnt seem to have noticed me or simply ignored my presence sensing me as a little girl. I was starting to panic. As Sev was scarpering backwards, he stepped on a spare twig and fell with a thud.

"Nowhere to go shitface.. no mommy here is she? What will little bastard do now? Oh dont hurt me, pwease dont hurt me.. you damn well deserve a good beating to get that abnormality out of you, freak!". I felt like throwing up, is this what Prof Snape had to deal with all his childhood? No wonder he was bitter. I really wish things would have been different. Oh wait, I can make things different.

As he pounced with his fist raised, Severus had his eyes closed tight in anticipation. I didnt know what I was going to do until I had done it. My wand was raised and the words came out of my mouth like a storm, "Petrificus Totalus". With a resounding thud, Sevs father fell onto the grass, frozen solid with eyes wide. I stood there for a moment marvelling at what I had done as relief flooded through me and made me feel a little light headed. I leaned on a tree trunk and slipped to the ground, sitting with my knees close to my chest. Severus was awe struck at this bit of magic. Was Sev a muggle born? His father was clearly muggle.. calling him a freak and all. His mother must have been too otherwise she could have stopped this monster with magic. But then how did snape Sr. know about sevs "abnormality" since he hadnt got his hogwarts letter yet. Most muggles label accidental magic as some trick of the eye or a glitch, thats what her parents had done with her. And for someone like Snape Sr. to recognise it as something more than that didnt make sense. I realised this wasnt the right time to ponder over this as Sev got up and prodded a finger at his dad. He must be wondering whether he is dead.

"He is just petrified. He can be revived. But I have a feeling we wont be doing that anytime soon. Also he is fully aware of his surroundings"

At that Sev quickly drew back his finger. He stepped over the body and came to sit beside me. "Thank you". Yup he knew about magic, or else he would have been bursting with questions.

"Are you okay?"

Sev looked uncomfortable at that question, it seemed he was foreign to it. "What are we going to do about him?", he asked instead.

"How did you do that Hermione!?", came a tiny voice as a girl in a flowery frock stepped out from behind a nearby tree trunk. Oh shit, it was Lily. Another figure whom I recognised as her sister Tuney came into view, with a sour expression on her face. "I told you Lily, she is a freak just like you! Dont you have any normal friends!?". Ohhhh so Lily was magical too, thats why she had called her a freak the last time. I relaxed a little, as it meant Lily would in any case know about magic in the future and as Tuney was her immediate relative she was allowed to know too. But man was I changing the timeline, I had meddled too much, but I couldnt leave at this point.. I had to do something about Snape Sr. I wondered how Prof Snape would react to this..

General POV...

That night neither Harry nor Ron has any intentions of going to bed. They are sprawled on the sofas by the fireplace looking miserable. They decided against the idea of going to the restricted section that night as Harry said they should probably look into the rest of the library first. So tomorrow they were planning to scour the entire library. Right now however they were sitting idly thinking of what Hermione must be doing. They knew by Mcgonagall that she had landed in spinners end, near the childhood home of Snape. It was weird to think of Snape as a child. Had he always been this mean and bitter? Did he always want to be a teacher? Didnt seem so to Harry since he hated students so much. Ron was missing Hermione a lot and Harry tried to cheer him up by assuring him Dumbledore would surely find her.

"If we had gone back with her, atleast we would know she was safe", Ron complained.

"I know. But this is Hermione we are talking about, she is a master at spells"

"And Snape? What will that bastard do to her if they met?"

"Oh Ron, he is just a child, younger than Hermione herself probably"

"I guess", Ron reluctantly accepted.

"What about the timeline Ron? Mcgonagall said its bound to change a little and its very dangerous". Despite all the fears of many evils lurking around the corner of a broken time turner, Harry couldnt help but feel there could be a teeny tiny, very small, infinitesimal chance that somehow his parents wouldnt die. But then again that would be in a different universe, he assumed going back in time created a new parallelverse and in this universe he would still be an orphan.. so much for hope. Besides he didnt want Voldemort to still be alive, that would be worse. Voldemort.. what if he got a whiff of a time turner existing?

Ron seemed to be thinking along the same lines

"You-know-who could use it to save himself", Ron said a little terrified. Harry groaned and put his head in his hands, "This is a mess".

Next morning they were hardly paying attention in class, being distracted by thoughts of their best friend and also due to being sleepy from staying awake most of the night. The teachers were a lot sympathetic to them knowing their situation.. except Snape. He scalded them for not knowing the answers and messing up their potions. He seemed angrier than usual.

"Bet he is mortified that someone is gonna see his 9 year old self", Ron whispered to Harry with a snigger. Harry couldnt help but smile and wish he could have got the same opportunity.

Neville sensed something was up and inquired them. They looked uncomfortably at each other as they hadnt worked that part out yet of what to tell to their fellow gryffindors regarding Hermiones absence.

"Uh.. she is sick.. in the hospital wing", Harry said nervously. Ron trudged on his foot and Harry realised what he had said.

"Oh I will visit her after class then", Neville said with eyes wide with sympathy.

"No um she actually got dismissed from the hospital wing today morning and now she is.. in her dorm"

"O-kay", Neville looked rather suspicious, not knowing Parvati had been listening in on their conversation. "But she wasnt in the dorm this morning. She hasnt been all night", she said with an eyebrow raised at the boys.

"Is that so?", Ron quipped in false surprise, "I wonder where did she go.."

I liked writing this chapter. Its been a while I know. Please revieww and tell me where do you think this story is going? Hope to see you soon. Take care 3