He Said, He Said

III.

This was definitely not a place a potions master like Severus Snape could feel comfortable. For one, the floors were far too antiseptic, and wholly unsuitable for the organic needs of proper experimentation. Any wizard with sense knew that a laboratory had to be shrouded in ancient dirt, cobwebs, the more spilled substances on the floors the better. Within such an environment, life in all its forms could thrive, and all the better be exploited with a few well placed ingredients and phrases.

Not that Muggle experimentation didn't have these last attributes. There were stacks of small papers with odd hieroglyphics written on them, lots of little {} signs and +, x, ab, AACCBB, =, %, along with others of much more complicated construction. Daniel seemed to be able to interpret this odd language of numbers and symbols, though it was quite disheartening to Snape to see it consisted of no astrological references whatsoever. It couldn't be a very perfect method.

They had arrived at the lab early in the morning, and this time Snape *did* receive a few odd looks as he followed Daniel through the building. Every section of the place had a horrible stale, antiseptic feel about it. Even the plants that dotted the hallways were in fact made of plastic. Snape couldn't help but feel a terrible mixture of foreboding and disgust within these walls. Though he wouldn't admit it to Daniel, (no, never), he longed to be at home in his cosy, comfortable dungeon office with things in jars that were alive instead of dead.

Daniel glanced up from a beaker full of pale blue liquid and smiled at Snape. The vial had left his pocket and had been given to a young woman who was bent over what looked to be a huge barrel made of glass. It spun at an alarmingly fast rate, the inside of the barrel's drum perfectly sealed. The vial had been carefully placed in the centre, and the woman beside Daniel was now reaching into the sealed drum using rubber gloves attached to it. Snape watched with a kind of horrified fascination as she brought the tip of a needle through the stopper on the vial, to take a tiny sample of the substance into it. It had altered yet again since it's spinning within the sealed, glass barrel, and was now a writhing smoky substance that still held onto some of its liquid properties.

"This stuff isn't organic," she said, looking at a glass screen that scrolled green and white numbers in various shifting levels. "It doesn't seem to be metal or chemical, either. Where did you say you found this?"

"Some drug pusher," Daniel said.

She took out a shallow, round dish from a sealed shelf within the barrel, a clear gel covering the bottom of it. She carefully deposited the substance within the needle onto its surface, watching it carefully. All three of them were silent as the grey smoke curled over the gel on the bottom of the dish. In seconds, the shallow dish yellowed, the gel on it hardening to a thick, plastic, clump.

"What do you think of that, Amanda?" Daniel asked.

Snape watched as the young woman withdrew her hands from the gloves attached to the barrel, and gave Daniel a rather warning glare. She adjusted her brown glasses on her nose, to better look down on him like a disapproving headmistress. "You got a lot of nerve bringing this here," she said. She shook her head and glared back at the petri dish, it's dried up contents had now completely absorbed the smoky example from the vial. She checked the readings on the computer above the bin, and then placed her hands in the gloves again. She lifted a lid within it, and deposited the shallow dish within it. "It's highly toxic," she said. "You're looking at a chemical weapon of some sort, I'm sure of it."

Daniel smiled. "I thought you said it wasn't chemical," he said.

"Nothing that I can determine," she said. She gave Snape a dubious once over. "You with the FBI or something?"

"Yeah, he is," Daniel said. "Just seal that up with some duct tape, and we'll take care of it from here."

'Amanda' gave them both fierce, and if Snape was right, slightly frightened looks. "You don't understand, Daniel," she said. "This...it destroys every tiny thing that lives." She took her hands out of the rubber gloves attached to the drum, and inspected them as if, regardless of the protection so clearly provided, the substance had managed to leak out.

"It's so cold," she said.

Snape walked away from them both, to wander a little more around the lab, the eerie cleanliness getting to him even more now that the substance had been investigated. What did she mean specifically by chemical weapon? Are these the curses muggles use? If so, they were horribly twisted in their simplicity, for a curse was meant for one other, and a chemical, well, wouldn't a chemical be used as a method for massive killing? Such things were so intrinsically wrong for his wizard training--a wizard was used to fighting one on one with a foe, using whatever means he could to destroy the other, and yet...These were solitary wars, and rarely did they mean the destruction of others.

He could feel his heart beating too quickly at the thought, his mouth dry. This was, he knew instinctively, some new method of He Who Must Not be Named. It explained the near destruction of Poempi, the loss of innocent life possible had been enormous. Difficult as it was to fathom, He Who Must Not be Named had become even more bloodthirsty and cruel as time had wore on him. Perhaps his humanity had eroded away with his body, when he was left as nothing more than a wraith from the backfire of his own spell when he had tried to kill Harry Potter.

Still, Daniel and his former forensics peer Amanda knew what chemical weapons *were*. He frowned. Was this some strange metaphor from He Who Must Not be Named? A final blow to the Muggle world once and for all?

Something clanked next to his ear. He looked over his shoulder to see the horrible vial with its deadly substance now placed in another, slightly larger glass tube, the original vial's stopper duct taped severely over it, the glass tube holding the vial likewise taped up. Snape shrank from it's danger as though it were a living monster.

"Is it okay if I hold onto this?" Daniel asked, cheerful.

Snape was about to say "CERTAINLY NOT!" only to hear Daniel shout back to Amanda, "Yeah, it's all right, we got it. Don't worry!" He gave her a hearty wave, which was weakly returned. "Be sure to send my love on to Ricki!"

"He was laid off last week," she said, dully.

"Cor, that's a pisser," Daniel said. He pocketed the vial, and patted the outside of his Muggle jacket. "They always want to cut corners at labs these days. I'm starting to think our government never wants to see a cure for cancer."

She remained in the stark, white, sterilized setting, looking on with a worried expression as they left. Snape found he couldn't take his eyes off of her, the fear she emanated touchable. Even after the glass doors closed behind them, and they were out of sight of her as they walked down the white hallway with its plastic plants, Snape still couldn't shake the feeling of horrible dread welling within him.

"You told her I was with the FBI," he said. "What's that?"

Daniel slapped Snape on the back good naturedly. "Freaky Black robed Investigators," he said.

They walked into an elevator, its steel construction so shiny it was like a box made of mirrors.

"I don't believe you," Snape said. "You're obviously lying."

"No, really, they exist," Daniel said, without missing a beat.

"I think you're making fun of me."

"Never!"

The elevator stopped on the ground floor, and Snape was too angry to wait. He marched out of it as the doors opened, the skirts of his black robe swaying. He turned back once to shout out some evil retort at Daniel, but was silenced.

Daniel was nearly out of the elevator, when a hand reached out and grabbed his shoulder, pulling him back in.

Snape didn't have a second to think. He lunged at the elevator door and managed to prevent it from fully closing. The metal door swung open again, and Snape tumbled in. Daniel was being pulled through a reflection in the mirror interior of the elevator, and though he was putting up a good fight, it was nothing against the power of a displacement spell. The elevator doors closed as Snape took out his wand and pointed it at the shadowed wizard in the reflection. The wizard, with Daniel partially brought into the steel two dimensional world of the mirrored surface, was suddenly out of shadow as he shot a look at Snape.

He did have a large brow, and a rather mean profile, but though he wanted this man to be Sirius Black, he wasn't. There was a momentary recognition, and then, regardless of the shocked look of surprise on his enemy's face, Snape's wand sparked into action:

"Combustio!"

Flames leapt into the mirror, burning the wizard who had a hold on Daniel. He let him drop, and Snape grabbed him just before he slid fully into the mirror. The wizard inside of the reflection was running, patting the flames on his robes. The elevator was engulfed in a warm, golden glow as the flames crept along the mirror's reflective surface.

Music trickled from the speakers in the roof of the elevator. Daniel, out of breath and covered in soot, was on the floor, dark, navy eyes rolling up to the song that was playing.

"Oh..Oh...Oh...I'm on fire..."

"Haven't heard a Bruce Springsteen tune in a long time," Daniel said.

The wizard who had attacked him was still running around the circumference of the elevator's reflective surface, his hands wildly patting out the flames on his robes. The 'real' elevator interior was in fact quite cool. Daniel nodded at his attacker, a gesture for Snape.

"Do you know that guy?" he asked.

"Icarus Moonbellow, I met him when he was a student not too long ago," Snape answered. "He seems to now be one of He Who Must Not Be Named's lesser henchmen. He's always been a weasly sort of fellow, I remember when he was a student at Hogwarts not seven years ago. He used to whine over the state of the Potions room, claiming it was the disorganization that had caused him to fail."

Daniel stood up, wiping soot from his jacket sleeve. He had a bemused smirk on his face as he watched Icarus Moonbellow howl as a clump of flame ignited his butt. "So, he failed your class because he couldn't use an organizer?"

"No," Snape said. "He failed because I couldn't stand him." He took what looked like a matchbox out of his robe pocket and opened it. Waving his wand around it a few times he shouted "Transmigro Littlus!" The flames in the reflection immediately disappeared, as did the wizard who had attacked Daniel. Where the wizard had gone soon became apparent, however, if the tiny squeaks emitting from the matchbox were any indication. "His use of a reflection spell is a good indication of how poor his skills are. Any first year wizard can utilize that particular spell, so it's clear He Who Must Not Be Named was relying more on this useless idiot's brawn. My worry is why he was after you."

"He wasn't after me at all," Daniel said. He peered over Snape's shoulder to see the wizard who had attacked him now shrunken to about the size of a small beetle. Icarus Moonbellow shouted up at him from his place in the tiny box, shaking his fist. Snape shut it with one hand, and pocketed the matchbox roughly.

"If you had been fully pulled into the reflection, I never would have been able to get you back," Snape warned. "So I don't see how you figure he wasn't out to harm you."

"Oh, I didn't say he had my best interests in mind," Daniel said, smiling. He shrugged, and scratched the back of his head, a nervous tic that Snape had learned could bode no good. "You see...He was rummaging in my pockets. Looking for the vial."

He took it out, as if to assure Snape that it was still in his possession. But the vial was now a murky black substance that emitted such coldness this time even Daniel seemed a little perturbed by it. He placed it back into his side jacket pocket with the utmost care. The elevator doors finally opened, and they both stepped out into the white, sterile environment of the Forensics and Pathology building wing of Scotland Yard.

***

The day, of course, wasn't over yet. They made a quick trip to their first visit, and Daniel had been given a couple of gifts from his pals back at the busy lobby of his former precinct. They travelled up to the second floor where Daniel used to have an office. Lucy with her plastered make up was there yet again, the two usual detectives again huddled near the file cabinet, avoiding her. Daniel disappeared behind the glass door of the office, to have another animated discussion with Blurty. It was so similar to the previous day, that Snape half wondered if some spell hadn't been performed to mask time, but he couldn't detect anything so obvious. This time he hung closer to the two detectives at the file cabinet, avoiding Lucy and her disturbing talk.

"Here," the fat detective to his right said. "You Danny Boy's new thing?"

"You gotta be better than that Monaco freak he 'ad," the thin one on his other side said.

"I thought that one was Asian?"

"It dun matter, I dun think. Danny Boy's a right fuck up for anyone, wha'?"

He punched Snape's arm, a little too harshly, and Snape rubbed the slight bruise. He was beginning to wonder if the two detectives were spending too much time on Lucy's case.

The door to the glass office opened, and Daniel beckoned Snape in. He gladly left the trio in the empty precinct to themselves, and their oddly single mind. Blurty, a ruddy faced Scot with a furiously bulbous nose offered him a cup of coffee, which Snape politely refused. The door behind him was shut, and though the two detectives were now leaning nonchalantly with their backs against the glass, privacy, it seemed, was assumed.

"Go on," Daniel said to Snape. "Hand over the suspect to Blurty for a bit."

Snape gave Daniel and his former chief a questioning, uncomfortable look, but Blurty seemed perfectly happy with whatever Daniel had suggested. Not entirely sure this was the proper thing to do, Snape took the matchbox out of his robe pocket and placed it on the surface of Blurty's desk. He opened it, and the tiny, shrunken wizard Icarus Moonbellow leapt out as though to escape, only to cower in horror when he saw the form of a massive Chief Constable Blurty staring down at him.

"Ah, we've met before," Blurty said to the tiny form. A large, pudgy finger pinned Moonbellow down amongst some papers. "You remember that case, Daniel, the pickpocket on charles St., the one who preyed on the elderly and infirm. I don't think he garnered how tough little old East End ladies can be. I rather remember that nose being even more crooked the last time I saw him." Blurty looked down on his prisoner with good natured menace. "Ah, but maybe that's because he was just a tiny bit taller back then."

"Go to hell!" the tiny figure shouted up at him, and it was such a tinny, squeaky voice that even the suggestion of threat was hysterical.

"You sound like the guy in that old fifties movie," Daniel said, the tiny shrunken wizard turning his attention to him instead. "I think it was called The Fly." He bent low so that even though their massive size differences prevented direct proximity, Daniel was still able to maintain a deadly eye contact. "What was it he said when they found him trapped in that spider's web?" He imitated the tiny voice, "Help meeeeee!"

Snape peered down in disgust. "I don't imagine He Who Must Not Be Named will be all too pleased to know of your failure," he said. "A pickpocket like you should have known how to easily take it from Daniel without a fight."

The tiny figure actually looked a little defeated at this fact. He sat on the edge of the matchbox cover, his arms crossed, his glare for his own, minuscule feet. "It was so damn cold," he said, and visibly shuddered. "I...I couldn't get a proper grip on it." He cast a wary glance up at Daniel. "I don't know how *he* manages it, that's for sure."

Blurty coughed. "Danny Boy has a lot of uncomfortable attributes," he said. "But he knows his work, as do I, and what we both want of you are some facts. Like just what the hell that vial was going to be used for."

"It's a weapon," the Moonbellow said, sneering. "I don't care if you know that."

"Against who?" Daniel asked, and Moonbellow became a lot more uncomfortable. He paced around the circumference of his matchbox prison, arms crossed.

Snape's mood was decidedly black. He picked up the wizard Icarus Moonbellow with a quick pinch of his forefinger and thumb and dumped the protesting figure back into the matchbox, and shut it with another pinch. He pocketed the prisoner, and didn't look at either Daniel or Blurty as he spoke. Blurty's nose was just a little redder, and Daniel was inspecting his nails.

"It's obvious," Snape said, dully. "He Who Must Not Be Named may be a vicious killer, but he still knows the value of one on one battle between wizards. Even the destruction of Poempi was to take place with thousands of his followers, and not through the mass destructive use of magic. To fight one on one is a strict part of wizard code, and I doubt He Who Must Not Be Named has quite lost that habit of tradition." Snape frowned, "However, he would not hesitate to wipe every Muggle off the face of the Earth with one fell swoop. This is his weapon of choice for what he sees as the lesser of all creatures."

Blurty's red nose looked a little pink now as he paled. "What kind of scope are you talking about?" he asked.

Snape took the matchbox out of his pocket, and opened it just enough to catch a few curse words thrown out. "Answer the man," Snape ordered him.

But Moonbellow merely laughed. He pointed a tiny arm at Daniel.

"Ask *him*," he said. "He's got all the answers."

***

The train ride back to Hogwarts was mostly uneventful. Snape tried to suggest to a pink mohawk haired girl with a baby that a safety pin through her bottom lip would be much more attractive than through the top, but Daniel stopped him with a glare. The tube was fairly quiet as they made their way, the bulk of people on the tram looking tired, and haggard, as though worn away from life. He half wondered if this might have been some working of He Who Must Not Be Named after all, but then, the baby in the brightly pink mohawked girl's arms began giggling, and in turn elicited a few approving glances from a nearby old lady. If this was some magic of sadness performed upon the Muggle world, it was an imperfect one, and Snape knew He Who Must Not Be Named never did anything that wasn't predetermined to be exact.

Daniel's quiet was unreasonable, Snape thought. He kept glancing over at him, at the seriousness of his profile as he sat in his chair, thinking, his hand at his breast pocket, touching that horrible coldness seeping through it. Snape had left Moonbellow, still shrunken, in the care of Blurty where he was being processed for the attempted murder and assault of a former police officer. Considering what the aim of the weapon was set to do had he retrieved it, suffering his days in a Muggle prison was perhaps a good end.

They left the tube at quarter past, to arrive at station 13 1/4, their tickets complete with moving trains and it was such a relief to not be given a hassle over it. If anything, the conductor admired the craftsmanship. Daniel was lugging a small suitcase with him, now laden with a few more Muggle things within it that would no doubt cause all manner of trouble once they got back to Hogwarts. They boarded the train and made themselves comfortable in a private booth.

"No dissaparation today?" Daniel asked as he settled into his seat. A tray of tea instantly ran to their side, but Daniel waved it off, while Snape impatiently grabbed a cup before it scrambled further down the train's corridor.

"No," Snape said, balancing the cup and saucer in his grip. "I wanted a more leisurely ride...To think things over."

"Like what?" Daniel asked.

"Such as," Snape said, setting the tea on the empty seat beside him, "the fact that the more time we spend together, I know you less and less."

"That's probably a good thing," Daniel said. He had his chin in his palm, his elbow propped against the window he was now looking out of. "I told you what the end would be, didn't I? Right from the beginning."

Snape frowned, wondering just what the hell Daniel was talking about. What did he tell him? He'd spent the majority of their trip to London in stuffy laboratories and empty precincts, what could he possibly have to say other than, 'This is a whole lot of nothing, darling?'

"Your tea will spill," Daniel said.

"I don't want it," Snape replied.

"Oh now, don't be like that."

"Like what?"

"All pouty and disappointed."

"I am not."

"You most definitely are. I should take a photo of it, only I think your portrait would be quite nasty to me at times."

Snape's black eyes narrowed. "Would it have a reason?" he asked, sharply. "A Moroccan, or an Asian one perhaps?"

"Cor," Daniel said, and even blushed a little. "Those bastards didn't tell you about *him* did they?"

"A little," Snape said. His mouth was a set line, waiting for Daniel's answer. He watched Daniel shrug and scratch the back of his head, the nervous tic setting off warning bells all over Snape's emotions. He did his best to keep his demeanour cool and unassuming, but it was pointless. His anger won out.

"I suppose you cared about him as much as you cared about all the other 'things' you've had. Once a week, wasn't it?"

"What?" Daniel said, his attention diverted from the window to rest on Snape in shock. "I never cared a whit about *him*! He stalked me, Snape! I never even *knew* him, he delivered my pizza! For God's sake, he broke into my flat and killed my fucking goldfish!"

"But..." Snape began.

"And what's all this new thing once a week business? You didn't believe that old whore Lucy, did you? Dear God, she's convinced Blurty is hopelessly in love with her when it's obvious all Blurty cares about is his wife Caroline, their cocker spaniel, and whether or not the cat is allergic to gardenias. You speak once to Lucy and she's thinking she's slept with you more than five times! She's probably got a whole love affair decked out over that conversation she managed to drag out of you yesterday!"

"Oh!" Snape said, thoroughly disgusted, his arms crossed over his shudder. "Why didn't you warn me!!"

"I never thought you'd believe such garbage," Daniel said.

Snape felt utterly terrible. "I didn't quite believe it," he said, trying to save face, but Daniel wasn't buying it, at least not right away. Snape sighed, and moved from his seat across from Daniel to the one just beside him. Their booth was private, and no one was walking past in the train corridor. He kept his hands palms down on his thighs, and gave Daniel furtive looks from the corners of his small, black eyes.

"I couldn't help it," Snape said, resignedly. "You never tell me anything."

Daniel was looking out the window, and this time he sadly smiled. He turned to face Snape, and, in a gesture that just about made Snape's heart crush to dust, he smoothed away a lock of tangled black hair that had fallen before Snape's face.

"You're too brilliant to not figure things out," Daniel said. "Blurty told me if you ever decide to give up the whole magic wizard scene he'd be more than happy to have you on the force."

Thoughts of Lucy made him shudder again. "I don't think so," Snape said.

Daniel laughed, a sure sign of forgiveness. Snape gave him a nervous, strained smile in response.

"You have trouble just enjoying life, don't you?" Daniel asked. He pinched Snape's chin. "Nah, don't answer that. Just keep that annoyed, pouty look on you, I've grown quite fond of it."

***

Albus Dumbledore stood in front of Daniel Deschamps with an expression of grave concern lining every feature of his posture and face. The vial was now suspended in mid air, the two bottles as well as several magical shields placed over it for the best protection possible. Snape had told him the finer points of how it was going to be used as a weapon by He Who Must Not Be Named, and Dumbledore nodded in approval at Daniel.

"It was wise for you to bring it back here, rather than leave it in Muggle territory," he said. "The spells placed upon it right now are of a complicated variety of my own creation, and will not be nullified easily, if at all. Let them try to take it, they'll soon learn not to trifle with Life and Death."

They had left, then, Snape running into Sirius Black only briefly before rudely brushing past him to continue after Daniel. Sirius called after them both, his voice brash:

"Hey, both of you!"

Snape and Daniel turned in unison. Sirius Black began to speak, only to halt a few times before finally getting out the words.

"Good work, you two," he said, and then made his way into Dumbledore's office, the large, ornate door nearly slammed behind him. The hallway was now shrouded in doubtful silence, both Daniel and Snape wondering what to make of that sudden outburst of positivity.

Snape was the one who began walking again first, Daniel slightly behind him. He noticed Daniel was still absently patting the area on his jacket where his inside pocket had held the vial. It disturbed him. He kept thinking on what Moonbellow had said, and how Daniel had just smiled back at him, and never said a word to clarify just what the wizard had meant.

"Daniel," Snape said. "What is in that vial?"

Daniel raised a brow, as if surprised that Snape didn't already know.

"It's obvious, isn't it?" Daniel said to him. "It's a little piece of Death."

Snape frowned. "I don't understand. It had no magical properties..."

"...And no chemical or biological ones, either," Daniel finished for him. His hand finally fell away from his now empty pocket. "That's the nature of Death, isn't it? It's not a magical thing, and yet not a part of this world of the living. What's there, but isn't...Do you understand what I mean?"

Snape didn't. If anything he was even more perturbed now than ever, for hadn't Daniel so easily touched and pocketed that vial of Death, keeping it so dangerously close to his own heart? For all his dishevelled Muggle ineptitude, he'd managed to side-step the one thing that would destroy Muggle and Wizard alike.

As they continued to the express stairs that led into the dungeons, Snape couldn't help but think once again on how there was so much about Daniel he didn't know.

Considering how close Daniel had kept that coldness next to him, and even seemed to mourn it--Perhaps not knowing was the best recourse after all.

They descended into the dungeons, one bleak, tall, gaunt, black robed man with straggly black shoulder length hair and beady eyes glaring down into its gloom, and behind him one rather innocent looking Muggle with dark brown hair and lazy, dark navy eyes and an equally lazy smile following him down. They seemed opposites, in every respect.

First impressions. They are often incorrect.

END