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[endingupdead]

[Who:] Severus Snape, Open
[What:] Long-awaited Lilyfaces fallout that I've been avoiding
[When:] Tuesday of week 8
[Where:] Snape's self-allocated potions lab in the Stadium
[Warnings:] TBA

Comments

[leviohhhhsa]

After the fiasco that had been her attempt to apologise for Snape’s loss over the network, she hadn’t meant to go looking for him. She’d meant to leave him alone- at least for a little while- knowing that her presence would likely just be an irritant. He was an adult and intelligent, and he didn’t need or want her hanging around- and frankly, she wasn’t entirely prepared to try and be sympathetic as he called her (and Ron) everything he could think of.

But the fact was that Hermione was a Gryffindor. And a Gryffindor’s reaction to the sound of things shattering in the distance was always to run towards it. Her first reaction was that there had been some kind of attack or accident or ambush- she pulled out her wand automatically and started racing towards it, her heart thudding and her mind totally focused on the new issue.

It was this focus (and this assumption) that meant she only half-noticed that around here in the Stadium was where Snape lurked with his makeshift potioneering equipment. She realised it properly right as she

[endingupdead]

It said something not only about the depth of his desire to reduce the entire room to rubble, but his state of mind in general, that he didn't notice Granger until she disarmed him. The wand shot out of his hand and he moved sharply to the nearest table, an arm thrown up protectively and one hand grasping a bootknife which had served its purpose mincing ingredients until now.

It wasn't often he was disarmed; the last person to do it had been Potter. So it was that he was ready to fight now, expecting an attack, his face lined with rage.

Holding the knife in a tight fist, he spun on her. Some of the fight went out of him when he saw it was Granger, but not enough to stop him entirely. He assessed the situation, a tic jumping in his cheek, his eyes darting from her face to the wand in her hand and back again. Finally, with a disgusted sound, he flung the knife away.

He wouldn't fight her.

[leviohhhhsa]

She cried out and backed away as he snatched up the knife, her eyes wide and the first syllables of an incantation on her lips- but when he hesitated so did she, her instinct to hex him fighting against the thought that if he genuinely meant to hurt her he wouldn't have been so stupid as to pause.

She flinched as he threw the knife away, her eyes following it before they snapped back to his face and her lips parting, her face a mixture of fear and concern, with incredulity and anger there as well. She lowered her wand, still gripping it tight.

What to say?

Are you alright? would have been a little redundant, after all. What do you think you're doing? was fairly clear: destroying his makeshift potions lab, obviously. Why he was doing that was also perfectly clear, even if as a response it was hardly productive.

Incredulity and anger won. "I thought someone was being attacked," she snapped, breathless and accusatory- what were you thinking?- before she looked around at the debris littering the room and relented slightly, shaking her

[endingupdead]

He didn't have anything to say at first; he simply eyed her with cold dislike, as though he could see straight through her. Slowly, he looked away, assessing the damage and looking for his wand. What response he finally gave her was disdainful - though it was clear from the way his voice wavered that it was little more than a front.

"Neither is a blood replenishing potion."

Moving around the table without regard to the glass under his boots, he cast a look around for a telltale glimpse of ebony wood. He was still seething; he was angry and hurt and the destruction had done nothing to alleviate the sting, and when he didn't immediately find the wand, he grasped a bottle that had survived the onslaught and flung it against the far wall.

"She left me, Hermione!" he snarled, more a wounded animal than a predator.

[leviohhhhsa]

She opened her mouth to protest that the potion had little to do with it, that she was grateful for the work he'd done, but the words died on her lips as she processed how his voice wavered. She bit her lower lip, watching him look for his wand- and when he flung one of the bottles he'd left still standing, she gasped and flicked her wand and made it stop short before it hit the wall, suspended in thin air before it floated slowly to the floor.

Pointless, considering the extent of the other damage, but it was an automatic reaction.

It was strange to hear him use her first name, but what he said tugged on her much-maligned bleeding heart. "She didn't have a choice," she said, trying to keep her tone as placatory as possible. "This place plays games with all of us..."

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He gave a frustrated grunt and turned away from her, from the stupid, logical, irritating rationality. He didn't want to hear it. His fists clenched again, opened, then slammed down on the table. He didn't have anything left to throw, and she wouldn't have allowed him to hear the satisfying sound of glass shattering if he had, anyway.

"She played games," he snapped tersely. "She told me I had chosen my way, that I had to follow it to its end. She wouldn't let me be anything but - this." He assumed she understood what 'this' was, because he had absolutely no idea. "She refused to see me until I told her about the Dark Lord's arrival, refused to even speak to me - and when she finally did allow it, for all those time she took the moral high road, telling me how it was evil and wrong to align myself with them -"

With a scowl, he glanced over at her. "She told me to kill him. Again and again, until he remembered nothing. And I would have. I would have torn my soul to shreds to protect that brat of hers

[leviohhhhsa]

The accusations shocked her- Lily Potter, manipulative, and accused of being so by him of all people? Her heart sank- if he went home remembering this, would he ever do the things he had, the things which had helped them win the war

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"Oh, shut it. I'm not interested in pity," he cut her off sharply, squeezing his eyes shut as though it could block out the sound of her voice.

After a pause, he dropped his hands to his sides. What could he do? Lily was gone and he was here with...Granger. Bleeding-heart know-it-all who was not saying anything helpful at the moment. She hadn't been there for the conversation. She hadn't seen how Lily had rebuffed him until that moment, as a friend or otherwise.

And now...now he had to decide how to move forward. He had no purpose. The Dark Lord was gone, Lily was gone, and all that was left was a silly war he didn't care about. He felt weak, unwanted, useless - and very small. He let out a soft, frustrated sigh and glanced around the room, surveying the damage. Finally, he fixed his gaze on her and said softly, "I don't - know what to do."

[leviohhhhsa]

She bit her tongue as he told her to shut it, but she hadn't felt like she was offering pity. She remembered how she had felt when Ron had left Harry and her alone in the tent to search for Horcruxes on their own- abandoned and lost and guilty and betrayed all in one, and more besides. Their cases were different, but she thought she could guess at how he felt.

And then he dropped his hands to his sides and looked defeated, and that responsibility she had felt early surged back in full strength. If there was one thing she felt she could do, it was chivvy people into action when they needed it- and if he didn't want pity

[endingupdead]

Carry on. He brought a hand up and passed it over his eyes, then pinched the bridge of his nose. Carry on. But what did it matter if he went back now? Lily was dead. Lily had maneuvered him, manipulated him, and now she was gone and dead. And the Dark Lord -

"What is there for me to go back to? I don't -" he faltered, then looked at her beseechingly. Give me some purpose. "Do I have anything to look forward to there? Anything at all? I'll return home and Lily will be dead. And then...what? A teacher whose pupils obviously despise him -"

He gestured at her for emphasis.

"A second war." Another gesture, vaguely indicating Lucius, not present in the room. "You say we need to carry on. Why? What could possibly be better for me in that world - in that war - than in this one? What's waiting for me, Hermione?"

[leviohhhhsa]

What was waiting for him? A relatively short life full of difficult work and no recognition save what came after his death- when Harry had told her the story her heart had hurt at how unfair it all was, and now it did the same. It was worse, however, to see him like this- young, and knowing.

"Despise you?" she said, latching on to something she could give him a real answer to. Had she despised him? After he had killed Dumbledore, perhaps, after Hogwarts had gone to ruin under his rule- maybe then, but not before, and not afterwards either. She shook her head to indicate her feelings on the matter, running a hand through her curls and trying to find words to answer his questions when none came easily.

"You're on the winning side this time," she said abruptly, and then thought I can't tell him that, but it was much too late, so she carried on after biting her lip for a moment. "I can't tell you everything because I don't know everything and even if I did- no one knows, really how the past affects the future, there hasn't been enough

[endingupdead]

Severus stared at her for a long while. For everything she was saying, it was a non-answer. He was getting sick of people dancing around him.

"You -" He stopped, then started again. "Have no idea what it is like, to know that everyone - everyone knows your future except you. Even Lily. And every last one of you refuses to tell me save these roundabout, insufferable platitudes about preserving the future and helping people and -"

He threw up his hands in frustration, then paced away from her, running his fingers through his hair. Finally, he turned back and pointed at her emphatically.

"I want control of my life. I want -" His hand shook. He didn't know what he wanted. Severus licked his lips and looked away, then set his jaw. Turning his attention back to her, he went on firmly, "Tell me all of it. Right now. Tell me what everyone knows and no one will say, because if you don't, I won't do one blasted thing to help the Militants win this war. You need me here, but you need me more there and I know it. I'm content to sit here until

[leviohhhhsa]

It was an impossible situation to be in, and her lips thinned into a harsh, set line, anger and indecision in her eyes- "Don't be absurd," she said, with a little more ferocity than she had meant to express- "Don't act like I think it's fun to keep you in the dark, or like I wrote your biography or like I'm only here because you're a 'useful asset'- I'm not Ana." Was that fair- on the Baroness or on him? She couldn't tell. She shook her head, pinching the bridge of her nose- and then looked up at him, held his gaze, something determined in her face.

Control over his life. Well, he deserved that, didn't he? And she hated hanging back on the truth. Other people here could do it- he could do it, he'd proved that- he could keep on top of a life of lies and trickery and not trusting anybody, but she felt things slip outside her control as soon as she began to cover up the truth. Flatly and rather bluntly, she said, "You switched sides- that is, became a spy for Dumbledore- so that he would protect Lily. Obviously, it didn't work." And it

[endingupdead]

"Hold myself ransom?" he shot back with incredulity. "You think this is about my willingness to go back and do whatever Dumbledore asks? Don't you get it?"

His voice was raising, coming close to shouting. A part of him appreciated how this was affecting her - sympathized, even - but he wasn't a good enough person to stop himself from yelling his head off. He was angry; she'd walked into it, she'd come running, and if she wasn't going to run out again, she was going to bear the full brunt of it.

"I don't want to remember!" He advanced on her, red-faced, wandless and not particularly concerned what she might do to him if he terrified her. She wanted him alive. "My happiness has been Lily! Give me a reason to want to go home. Tell me I'm a hero! Tell me I have a happy life! Tell me there is something to replace her! You have a future, Hermione. You have a war behind you and a romance ahead of you. What do I get out of it? What's waiting for me?"

[leviohhhhsa]

She flinched and leaned back a little but didn't actually take a step backwards- the proximity was threatening and she hated to be physically threatened and made to feel powerless, but she had a wand and he didn't, and she could see that his anger was focused more on the situation than on her.

It didn't stop her from feeling a little like a deer in the headlights, or keep her knuckles from whitening on her wand.

"Yes," she cried, her tone full of frustration and a hint of fear- "yes, you are a hero! I've told you- oh, please calm down, can't you see this isn't helping--"

[endingupdead]

He stopped his advance a few feet from her, his eyes briefly flickering to her hand on her wand before returning to her face. Calculating, assessing. She didn't want to tell him something. Ana didn't want to tell him. It was all-important to them to keep him willing to go through with whatever future he had in store.

So why not simply tell him what lay ahead? What one thing would cause him to refuse to follow through with it if he discovered it? Because surely, being a hero was something to value.

He raised an eyebrow at her, his jaw clenching for a moment before he asked coldly, "A hero, Hermione, or a martyr?"