The Many Gruesome Deaths of Severus Snape

Prologue: Finding It

I can't believe that Sirius kept all this junk," Harry said as he and Remus Lupin scouted through the mounds of garbage in Sirius's room that the man had collected over the years. In Sirius's will, Harry had become entitled to all of his godfather's material possessions, including 12 Grimmauld Place, so he and Remus (who was now Harry's guardian), felt it their responsibility to make the house more fit to live in.

"It isn't junk, Harry," Remus corrected. "It's . . . well, yeah, it is junk." Harry chuckled and continued digging through years worth of stuff, now and again finding something interesting like a photograph of the Marauders or of baby Harry himself, but throwing the rest in a garbage bag that Remus kept expanding to fit their needs.

As Harry dug through a chest, he pulled out a gold-framed picture of Sirius holding baby Harry in his arms, grinning spectacularly and looking ecstatic. Harry placed the picture in the pile of things to keep, and, upon doing so, caught sight of the caption on the back: Padfoot and Harry - October 1, 1980. Harry stifled a sob with difficulty. Sirius and the rest of the Marauders family (minus Peter, of course), would be torn asunder in less than a month. A month in which James and Lily would be killed, Sirius wrongly accused of murder and put into Azkaban, and Remus sink into depression as Harry's new guardian had informed him with that 'don't let it happen to you' air about it. Nevertheless, Harry was depressed, his friends thought that it was because of Sirius's death which it partly was. For Harry knew that it was his fault that Sirius was dead, he should have practiced his Occlumency more, shouldn't have believed the vision that Voldemort had sent him. He should have used the two-way mirror that Sirius had sent him to try and contact his godfather (which he had been a stubborn jackass by not using, he berated himself), and, most importantly, shouldn't have charged off into the bowels of the Ministry of Magic itself, the Department of Mysteries, with his 'saving-people thing' as Hermione had so aptly put it, having Sirius come to try and save him and ending up getting killed in the attempt. However, this was most certainly not all, and, if his friends thought this was all, then they only knew the half of it.

For Harry had a destiny, a destiny that he had just been informed of by the headmaster, Albus Dumbledore a few weeks previously that said he had to defeat Voldemort or the Dark Lord had to defeat him in the end - in other words, he had to kill or be killed. And if he wasn't the Boy-Who-Lived, the one destined to defeat the most evil wizard of all time, Voldemort would not have gone after his mother and father when he was one year old, Sirius would not have been put in Azkaban for twelve years (before he escaped), and Remus would not have been put into a nearly interminable depression (for it would have continued if Dumbledore hadn't come and offered him the DADA position). Even now, Sirius would have been alive because Voldemort would not have tried to lure Harry into the Department of Mysteries to try and find the full contents of the prophecy and Sirius would not have had to go and rescue him and get himself killed in the attempt.

"Harry?" a voice asked, bringing Harry out of his reverie. Harry looked up to see Remus's amber eyes boring into his, studying him closely. "Are you alright?"

Harry sighed inwardly. Remus had taken to asking him this whenever he got too quiet. "Yeah, I'm fine," he answered, cursing himself that his voice was somewhat croaky.

Remus smiled kindly, hearing what Harry wasn't saying more clearly than what he did say (which wasn't much these days). Remus had always had an uncanny talent for reading Harry's mind which Harry now realized came from quick bursts of Legilimency (though Remus wasn't as skilled as Snape). "Let's go get something to eat," he said, leading the teenage boy out of the room. "You've earned a break, I think."

"Can you bring some lunch up to me?" Harry asked, clearing his throat as he spoke. "I'll just continue working."

"You're working like a house-elf, Harry," Remus said gently. "Everyone needs a break now and then."

"Well, now that Kreacher's not around," Harry said with a dry smile. This was true, for when Harry and Remus had come to Grimmauld Place, they had found a beheaded Kreacher in the drawing room. He had killed himself. "We need to get this done sometime, Remus," Harry said with a sigh.

"Fine. If you're sure," Remus said. Harry nodded and Remus sighed, disappearing down the stairs. Harry sighed in return, kneeling down and continuing to clean out the chest, at least it kept him busy and kept his thoughts partly away from thoughts of Sirius. Remus was always trying to have talks with him about Sirius's death and everything, but Harry knew that his guardian could never understand how he felt. No one could, no one knew everything of what was wrong with him and even if they did, that would make it harder because his friends would want to come along even though he had to go it alone.

Harry's eyes fell upon a solitary word that seemed to be misplaced in Sirius's chest of belongings: Snape. The rest of the parchment was obscured by some History of Magic essays that had all received T's. Harry tossed them in the rubbish and picked up the parchment. Now he saw that it was titled The Many Gruesome Deaths of Severus Snape. Ah, that was better. Scanning further down, he saw four different sets of writing which he could only guess belonged to the four Marauders (Remus's neat cursive, James's scribble, Sirius's untidy scrawl, and Peter's large, curly letters, which he recognized from the Marauders Map).

It was then that Remus came up with a plate of sandwiches and a flagon of butterbeer for the two of them. "I thought I'd eat up here with you. Alright?" he said.

Harry could tell that Remus expected an answer and he nodded, then asked, "Remus, what's this?" handing the yellowed piece of parchment over to the man.

"What's what, Harry?" Remus asked. Then, upon looking at the title, he laughed. "I didn't know Sirius still kept this," he said incredulously. "We made this ages ago, that man is such a packrat!" he said affectionately and Harry could tell that his guardian wasn't really annoyed.

"So, what is it?" Harry asked.

"Stories, these stories that James, Sirius, Peter, and I made up in our fifth year about Snape's 'gruesome deaths,' as you can understand by the title. I believe it was a little bit after that incident between your father and Snape, that you saw in the Pensieve and we were all in a crazy mood, so we made this up. Why, I didn't know he kept this. . . ."

He trailed off incredulously and Harry allowed him a few moments of reminiscing before asking, "Can I read it?"

"Of course," Remus said, glad that something had finally sparked Harry's interest (as so little did these days, despite Remus's hard tries). He handed the parchment to Harry.

"I suppose this is as good a break as any," Harry commented, leaning against the wall and beginning to read.