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[subtle_simmer]

Date: Friday, 26 January
Time:
Place: Hogwarts, Snape's lab
Characters Involved: Severus Snape, Neville Longbottom
Rating: Better say PG to be safe, poor Neville!

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[living_boy]

He had done this before

[subtle_simmer]

It was remarkably easy to intimidate children. The mere environment of his classes seemed right out of the pages of a gothic horror novel - chosen not because he innately loved the dark, dank location as some of the children believed, but because of the safety provided by having heavy layers of cold, damp, inert stone between the dozens of hot, often explosive student cauldrons and the rest of the school.

Still, Severus Snape did not rely on location alone to intimidate! No, indeed. If location was all that was required, Slughorn might have managed it, and the only thing that frivolous toad could intimidate was crystalised pineapple.

Air, voice, manner, were all employed to insure proper fear and deference - or to attempt such. Some idiots, like Potter hadn't enough sense to be appropriately cowed.

Alas, in this situation, his usual methods of commanding the sort of fearful respect he enjoyed would be quite counter-productive to his purpose. Slytherin to the core, he could not forget that Longbottom had something - or at least

[living_boy]

It was like going back in time. Being in the castle, in the dungeon, with that dark presence standing over him, that cold voice shaping his name...

Neville drew in a breath, squaring his shoulders. He was no child. Not anymore.

He moved into the office, to the station Snape indicated. He set his plant down, and for a few seconds he used it to draw strength into himself.

Green. Healthy. Ready to burst at the slightest indication. He was proud of it. Proud he had solved the problem on his own.

He turned to Snape with his chin up. "I have five of these in the greenhouse. All five show this same level of health." He pulled the vials from his robe without giving Snape time to say anything snide about how healthy his plant looked.

"The hybrids I was attempting are, I think, successful. I've gotten sap from each of them." There were six, labeled with the names of the plants Neville had crossbred.

Aloe. Lemongrass. Sagebrush. Banisteriopsis caapi, whish he was particularly proud of. Chamomile, and the one from the plant he had

[subtle_simmer]

This was the first time Longbottom had brought the actual plant, and Severus was surprised that he would risk it in the icy Scotland weather. Still, there must be some means of protecting it adequately, because there wasn't the slightest hint of cold-wilt in the stiff leaves

[subtle_simmer]

This, as might be expected, overcame Severus' almost polite professionalism. As Longbottom would not stand for being insulted in his profession, neither would Severus tolerate such a thing toward himself.

The simmering cauldrons were forgotten for the moment, in order that the Potions Master could draw himself up to his full height, turning directly to face the younger man and call upon any intimidation effect to be gained by advantages of height, scowling brows and eyes all but flashing in anger.

"Excuses? You are trying to offer me EXCUSES? You expected me to make concessions to someone in my classroom full of dangerously volatile ingredients because of a 'poor memory for details'? Does this poor memory excuse blatant cheating, as when you got Granger to attempt to repair your ineptitude?

"You lacked concentration and effort. I will certainly not tolerate you attempting to lay blame for your deficiencies at my door

[living_boy]

Neville stared at Snape, his fear - so recently overpowering him - was washed back like a high tide by a new emotion. Anger.

He wasn't ready for this particular confrontation, but it seemed to be upon him.

If course, as he did everything else, he handled confrontation quietly. "Professor Snape, with all due respect..." The second time he'd said that today, but of course respect was due to Snape and he did know that, irregardless of their history. "I wasn't equipped to be in your class. Fine. My memory was spotty, and my nerves were...are shaky. But neither of us had a choice. Until sixth year I couldn't not take your class. We were both stuck, weren't we? And everything you did because I wasn't fit for potions made it worse

[subtle_simmer]

Severus fumed, but held his tongue. His fear of Bellatrix was no less than what Longbottom's must surely have been - and very likely was more, since Longbottom was a Gryffindor and therefore could not see the sense and rationality which intelligent fear provided. It might have been mere paranoia on his part, but Severus had spent too many years living amongst Death Eaters not to know how they thought!

He was not quite so arrogant as to believe Bella would pursue Longbottom with the intent of coming after Severus, himself - but he was not so naive as to believe that if she found out any snippet of information about him, accidentally, while toying with the boy, that she would not use it to her advantage.

"My point was that had you given a fraction of this focus to your potions work," he reiterated through gritted teeth, "the rest might not have occurred."

Severus hadn't started out on Longbottom! Indeed - it would have delighted him had Potter possessed the all-thumbs fumbling and cauldron-melting idiocy, instead. It would have

[living_boy]

"You think it was a lack of focus that held me back? that I might have been a different student had I just concentrated?" Neville gaped at his old teacher, shocked somehow that Snape could be so off the mark