Saving Severus Snape

Chapter Four: Consequences

"Harry." Someone was shaking him, it hurt, the pain was too much, just too much, they had to stop- "Harry!"

Harry convulsed as he shook Snape out of his head. He turned to Hermione and Ron. "That was really close," he said. "I was so nearly there. Only.. it was a bad time for the link to strengthen....I mean...the Lestranges and Malfoy were with him...and..."

Hermione and Ron gazed at him in horror. Hermione shuddered visibly. Both had seen what Death Eaters were capable of.

"I think," Hermione said slowly, "if any of this is going to do Snape any good, we had better hurry..."

"You need to let me in..."

"I do, do I? Even if I were no longer chained to this singularly damp and slimy wall, I doubt I am able so much as to walk any longer. What would you propose to do after that? Share my sufferings? Halve my troubles? What a wonderfully heroic and completely pointless gesture. How entirely typical of you, Potter."

The hallucination that Harry Potter was talking to him seemed to have resumed. He gave in to it. It was, at least, more entertaining than continuing to contemplate his own pain. What a shame, really, that he could not tell this to Potter. He would probably have found it almost as amusing he did himself.

"Well yeah, but I mean it's not all that flattering, is it? I mean, it's not like you have great alternatives here."

"True, Potter. Sadly, very true. So come along then. Let's have it. Let me share in what passes for a mind in your tragically limited worldview." Snape's sneer was directed as much at himself as at the shade of Harry Potter invading his consciousness.

As the phantom presence of Harry Potter sank into his mind, the world turned itself inside-out. He found himself falling in a chasm of churning memories.

--- A kaleidoscope of images. --- A scar. Pain, again, of a different sort --- James Potter. Dad? Hate/love/hate --- Lily...an aching longing. His father hitting his mother. Whose mother? Weasleys, all over the place --- Rage, pain. --- Sirius, Sirius . . . Sirius. Maelstroms of anger, confusion. --- His father hitting him --- shutting down, shutting everyone out --- retreating behind a sneer and curtains of greasy hair --- Lily loves me, mum loves me... Whose mother?

Adolescents, he thought in disdain as the whirling mass of confused thoughts receded. How did Potter live in that chaos he chose to call a mind? He shook his head, to clear it. Oddly enough, that delusional little diversion had left him feeling better. Warmer, even. He hadn't realized how cold he had been feeling. He did not want to open his eyes again and return to that grim place of terror and waiting.

"Is it working?" a voice asked excitedly. It sounded rather like Ron Weasley, and it sounded rather like he was yelling into his left ear.

"Shush, Ron, yes...but don't disturb Harry....the locator spell hasn't quite got a fix yet."

He had not felt this comfortable in so long. He lay back and coasted in the illusion of a body free of pain.

"Right, got it. Quickly, now, Harry, pull out, it's been too long, pull out..."

In the dream, someone was shaking him and almost by reflex his eyes snapped open.

Hermione Granger was staring at him with an expression of enormous relief on her face.

"Harry! Thank goodness, oh thank goodness, I was so afraid we'd lost you..."

His mouth opened. He looked around. He stood up - rather clumsily; he seemed to be the wrong size and shape.

"Harry?"

"No." The voice that emerged from his lips was that of a boy just deepening into manhood. "Ah. No. I'm afraid not."

"What...?"

"You are talking to Professor Snape, Miss Granger."

"WHAT?!"

"Then where is Harry?!" Ron chimed in, panicking.

He cleared his throat. Or rather, he cleared Potter's throat.

"If I am here, then it seems to follow that he is . . . there....."

"Ron, get off him! RON, STOP HITTING HIM!"

Hermione yanked Ron off Harry's throat. Snape's throat. The boy on the bed with black hair's throat.

"Is this really happening?" the boy said in a detached way.

"YES!!!"

Awareness in the green eyes sharpened into abrupt focus. He jumped up.

"This is real? I am here? He is...there? Then, Miss Granger, what on earth are you still standing there for? You too, Weasley! Get Dumbledore and Lupin. NOW!"

He was alone. The pain was worse than anything he had ever dreamed of. He tried to move, and found his body was past such things. What happened? Harry thought groggily. Where had Snape gone...he had swum through Snape's mind like a fish, and flopped out at the other side. And found himself alone......except, somewhere, for the footsteps...a deep tremour shook him. This body remembered.