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Breaking Forwards	By : lastcrazyhorn Category: Harry Potter AU/AR > General Views: 13749 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: Not mine. J.K. Rowling's fandom. She's makes money off these stories and I do not. Nor will I ever. Harry Potter is all hers. sniffles But the weird twisted shit? Muahahhaa.

Chapter List
- 15
- 16
- 17
Chapter 16 – Discoveries
"Ms. Weasley," Severus said to the girl who had just entered his office.
"Sir," the red haired fourth year answered timidly, not at all sure of why she was there in the first place.
Severus briefly looked her with a critical eye and wondered why she had not been questioned before then. The signs were very obvious to anyone who was looking. The child's hair was unkempt and there were pronounced bags under her eyes that were almost certainly due to nightmares. Furthermore, the girl's personality had changed; her demeanor far more shy and timid that it had ever been, even earlier in the school year.
"Take a seat Ms. Weasley," Severus indicated with an idle wave of his hand, looking back at the work he was grading. No reason to let the girl know he was onto her, at least not yet.
He waited until he heard her shifting nervously before looking back up at her from the pile of scrolls that seemed to permanently adorn the top of his desk.
"I've called you in here to discuss a matter of great importance with you, Ms. Weasley," he said, taking note of her slightly widened eyes.
"Sir?" She asked in little more than a squeak.
"Your brother, Ms. Weasley," he informed her in a solemn voice, his eyes staring intently into her own frightened ones.
He can't possibly know about that! The thought blared in her head almost loud enough for him to hear without the use of legilimency.
"Which brother, sir?" She asked demurely, her calm façade betrayed by the twitchiness of her hands in her lap.
He fought against showing her any emotions in his face. He had asked the question in an ambiguous way in hopes that her mind would let him know whether he was on the right path.
"Percy," he specified, seeing her cheeks pink with the one word. It was little wonder that Ronald had chosen that topic as the one with which to torture her to silence.
"What about him, sir?" She asked after taking a fortifying breath.
"It has come to my attention that some of his behaviors, his actions regarding the female students here at Hogwarts were not among the most honorable during his schooldays here."
That was hogwash. Whatever nefarious acts Percy Weasley had been involved with during his schooldays had been limited to his home turf, so far as Severus could tell.
"Female students?" The girl's voice had dropped into a whisper, her eyes almost impossibly wide. Another less aware professor might have taken the girl's reaction simply as one of shock, but he knew better.
"Yes, Ms. Weasley," he stated calmly, turning the intensity of his glare down a notch in what he hoped came across as a commiserating look. "Female students. Have you heard anything about this before now?"
She was licking her lips nervously, her eyes darting back forth from his face to his desk and back again.
"What sorts of n-nefarious acts?"
"From what I have surmised, he seems to have had an unusual amount of interest in the younger girls," he said pointedly, looking on calmly as the spots of pink in the girl's cheeks briefly flared a brighter red.
He didn't enjoy frightening the child, but given the delicate nature of the topic, he couldn't just very well ask her whether or not her brother had been molesting her. He hoped that with the addition of potential other innocents into the equation, she might be prompted to say something more about her own experience.
"Was it other girls in Gryffindor?"
"Quite possibly yes, Ms. Weasley," was his grave response. He wasn't lying really since she herself was a girl in Gryffindor.
Their conversation went back to silence, and it was then that Severus decided to make his play.
"If there's anything you know about this situation, your input would be greatly appreciated Ms. Weasley," he looked at her intently, but she made no further sounds. He had a feeling that she would need to go and think on his proposal first.
So it was with a properly placed sigh that he finally dismissed her to go on her way. She wasted little time in vacating his office, leaving him alone at his desk with only his dark thoughts.
. . .
After determining that Hermione had likely been attacked by one of her fellow Gryffindors, it had been decided that she would be safer staying in the infirmary until the guilty party was found. Madam Pomfrey had given her a set of quarters located at the back of the infirmary. This allowed her some privacy, aside from the ever watchful eyes of the aptly named "Dragon Lady" matron.
Hermione appreciated the solitude of having her own room, especially after being told about Pomfrey's findings in her medical scans. At first she had been flabbergasted, and she had tried to argue with the healer, denying completely that such a thing as rape could be true—especially in regards to her own self. It had taken her quite a while to come to grips with the idea, but finally she had accepted the truth of the evidence.
It was then that she had truly understood the necessity of the solitude her private room afforded her. How was it that she had been betrayed so horribly? Why hadn't anyone said anything? How many times had she been obliviated really? How many times had it happened?
The subject of rape had always made her uncomfortable, but now that it was so very personal, she found it impossible to give voice to the word at all. If anything, she referred to it as being attacked, but if given the choice, she usually opted to say nothing at all about it. After all, her contact with the outside world had largely been cut off. Who could she talk to, really?
Madam Pomfrey had set up appointments for her with a mind healer, but they hadn't made it very far in their sessions yet. Everything was still too raw, too emotional for her to talk about. And of course, what made it worse was that she didn't know what had happened. And as much as she deplored being left in the dark about something, she had to admit—at least to herself—that perhaps not knowing was the best course of action. Perhaps. Maybe. She didn't know. She wondered if she would ever know anything ever again.
The mind healer—her counselor—was an older woman by the name of Madam Moss, who had been trained enough in legilimency to allow her to see some of those memories that Hermione had lost. Strangely enough, none of those memories had yet revealed her attacker's face.
"He's there Hermione, but your mind isn't yet ready to see him," Moss informed her at her latest session. Thankfully Madam Moss came to her, and hadn't yet made Hermione leave the safety of her warded infirmary room.
"What do you mean?" Hermione asked in a quiet voice, her hands clasped tightly together in her lap.
"At first glance, it seems as though he's always in your peripheral, never in your direct line of sight, but upon further investigation, I've come to realize that it's your mind that is shielding his identity from me. If I were to make an educated guess, I would say that he is someone that you know, perhaps even someone that you trusted a great deal."
Hermione didn't know what to say to that. She had trusted many people a great deal prior to being told the truth by Madam Pomfrey.
"Are you sure that your boyfriend didn't see anything?" Madam Moss prompted in her silence. "Anything out of the ordinary?"
"He would have told me," Hermione said in a younger sounding voice.
"I know that we've discussed this possibility before, but—."
"—He didn't do this," Hermione cut the other woman off with an angry glare. "Ron wouldn't do something like this. He's good!"
"And what of your other friend? Mr. Potter?"
"Harry wouldn't hurt a fly," she insisted stubbornly, hurriedly scrubbing at her eyes with a balled up tissue.
"But you have to admit that he's changed. Isn't that right?" The woman prompted with a patient look.
"Everyone changes," she spat out. She was tired of this conversation, tired of this woman. She might not have understood the changes that the summer had wrought in Harry, but she would never have ever thought him capable of something this heinous. He respected her more than that. He respected all of them more than that.
"I'm tired," she said a touch grumpily. "I'm going to take a nap."
"Very well, Hermione," Madam Moss said with a sigh before standing up slowly. "I'll see you again on Friday."
Hermione nodded, still looking away. It wasn't until she heard the door close that she allowed her tears to come for real.
Sometimes she wondered if they would ever stop.
. . .
In the afternoons after classes and before he went back to Severus's—also known as their quarters!—Harry's time was usually spent in either the Slytherin common room or the back corner of the library. Madam Pince had shown him a surprising amount of support whenever anyone had tried to harass him there, and as a result, the library had become something of a safe place for him and the other Slytherins to spend their time.
This particular afternoon found him in the Slytherin common room, surrounded by the other Slytherin fifth years. They were camped out in the far corner of the room, against the wall that showed them murky images of the lake and whatever creatures that happened to choose that time to swim past them.
Out of nowhere, Millicent looked up at Harry and announced rather gruffly that, "It's a good thing you're a boy." This was followed up with a glare and a couple of snickers from the boys on either side of him.
"Um yes," he stammered with a bewildered look. Where on earth had that come from?
"Don't mind Milly, Harry," Pansy said with a glare of her own back at her girlfriend. "She's a bit jealous," Pansy said in a loud stage whisper.
"What happened this time?" Draco asked with a long suffering sigh that told Harry he dealt with this sort of thing more often than he'd like to admit.
"Clarice Fatua was looking and making eyes at Pansy during lunch today," Millicent answered in an affronted voice.
"Clarice?" Harry questioned with some confusion. "Isn't she that tiny third year that always tries to sit next to Blaise in the Great Hall?"
Blaise let out a resounding groan and put his head in his hands.
"That'd be the one," Draco nodded with a smirk at his friend. "She thinks she's going to get lucky, and she doesn't care how."
"She's only thirteen!" Harry hissed back with wide eyes.
"She's just desperate for some attention," Draco answered with a shrug.
"Then she's choosing a bad route to get that attention," Harry said after a moment's thought. "Has anyone tried talking to Severus about her?"
"Oh, he knows," Pansy answered with a casual flip of her hair.
"And he's not doing anything?"
"He gave her a warning," Teddy answered absently, his attention primarily on his notes as he flipped through the back of a textbook.
"And she ignored him?" Harry asked, his eyebrows disappearing behind his bangs.
"Naw man," Blaise corrected him with a shake of his head. "She used to be worse. This is what she's like after he talked with her."
"Seriously?' Harry squeaked.
"Yeah," Blaise answered and Harry could see the others nodding their agreements as well.
Silence fell between them and it was several more minutes before anyone spoke again.
"Does this sort of thing happen often? Someone doing something risky like that?"
"Sometimes," Draco gave another shrug, looking up and piercing him with his slate colored eyes. "As a whole, Slytherins don't get treated the best at home and they tend to act out in darker ways than the other houses."
Harry found himself nodding at that. Now he really wished that he had let the Sorting Hat do its job.
"Stop with the regrets already," Blaise said softly with a light punch to the arm. "This is here. This is now. You've found the right place to be. Who cares if it took you a little while longer than most?"
"Yeah," Harry answered back with a small nod. Blaise was right.
"Come on," Blaise smiled a blinding grin at him and he felt the corners of his mouth turning up in response. "Help me study these ingredients for Potions. We wouldn't want our star student to screw up, now would we?"
Harry's grin got bigger. Who would have ever thought that he'd be Snape's star pupil?
Certainly not him.
. . .
The sludge, the crud that was the failed experiment stinking up the room in the dungeons, didn't like being secluded far away from the student population. It had been created by magical beings, and therefore wanted to be near magical beings.
Thus it pushed itself out through the cracks and the holes of the stones of the room it was housed in; searching out sources of power, light and energy that it could feed on and become rejuvenated by. At first it headed in the direction of the Slytherins, but turned away after detecting the magical signatures of the few students who had served detention hurting it.
Turning away from the Slytherins in their even colder dungeons, it unknowingly began traveling in the direction of the Gryffindor tower.
. . .
Dennis fell for what felt like forever. Little did he know that his path was being forged and guided by the magic of both the Room of Requirement and Hogwarts herself. In a rare show of solidarity, the Room of Requirement had joined its magic with that of the castle and the result was the dark tunnel that Dennis was now hurtling down in. The Room of Requirement had decided—quite forcibly—that if it could not figure out a way to bring Harry Potter to it, then it would take Dennis Creevey to Harry.
. . .
Harry had just said good night to Severus moments before and was now lying in bed trying to drift off to sleep. The twins had approached him earlier that day about a new prank they wanted him to try out on Ron. They had told him it had something to do with exploding spiders and Harry's interest had been hooked. Now it was just a question of making it happen, and hopefully getting the other Slytherins in on it.
He could feel a smile on his face at the thought.
His thoughts were becoming less concrete and he was beginning to nod off when suddenly a loud THUMP from the other side of the room startled him awake.
"Lumos," he whispered, waving his wand at the lamp beside his bed.
Sitting on the other side of his room was a small figure with mousy brown hair and he sucked in a breath at the sight.
"Harry?" The voice was small and hesitant, but he recognized it immediately.
"Dennis?" He asked in amazement. Where on earth had the boy come from?
He watched as the little figure stood up and timidly made his way towards him.
"Is it really you, Harry?" Dennis stepped closer and he could see that the boy's eyes were full of unshed tears. What had happened to the little second year to make him like this?
"Where have you been, Dennis? Everyone's been really worried about you," he answered, patting a spot on the mattress beside him for the little boy to take a seat.
Dennis's lower lip trembled and suddenly the tears began to fall for real. Following his instincts, he reached out and pulled the boy into his lap and wrapped his arms around him tightly.
"Harry," the second year clutched at his pajama shirt and cried great big walloping sobs out onto his shoulder. "It's been so bad. I've been so scared," he managed to get out between his violent outpouring of emotion.
"Well, you're safe now. I've got you," Harry soothed, rubbing the tiny boy's back. He wondered if Severus could hear them. Dennis's tears weren't slacking off. The boy actually seemed to be getting more upset the longer he sobbed. He didn't know what the kid had been through, but he could tell that some of what was making the boy so upset now was relief.
Feeling very out of his depth and worried that Dennis was going to make himself sick with heartbreaking cries he was still letting out, Harry gathered the boy up in his arms and stood up.
"I'm going to get you some help, Dennis," he whispered, sounding more in control than he felt as he carefully made his way out to the main room of their quarters. Severus's room was directly next to his, so it was only a few more steps to the right and he was lightly knocking on his professor's door. In the back of his mind, he wondered what time it was, and he hoped that he wasn't waking the man up.
"Harry?" Severus asked, opening the door and looking somewhat shocked to see a crying boy in his arms.
His professor was dressed in midnight blue pajamas, his feet covered in thick woolen socks, but since his hair wasn't mussed and his eyes were still focused, Harry figured that the man hadn't yet gone to sleep. It was a good thing, especially since it seemed that theirs was an evening still in the making.
"I think I need some help with this," Harry said, shooting Severus a worried glance.
"Put him on the couch. I'll be there in a minute," Severus replied in a deep voice, taking control of the situation as Harry had hoped he would. The man closed his door and Harry carried the nearly hyperventilating boy over to the couch.
Moments later, Severus joined them wearing a black dressing gown and carrying a vial of calming draught.
"Dennis, open your mouth," Harry prompted and the boy did so obediently, his breath uneven and his cheeks wet and splotchy.
Harry watched Severus administer the draught quickly and efficiently and then sat back and waited on the potion to kick in. To his great relief—and comfort—Severus sat down on his other side and put an arm around his shoulders, the same way his arm was currently around the Gryffindor second year.
"Thank you sir," Harry murmured quietly against the man's chest. Even with the excitement of finding Dennis in his quarters, he was still tired. It had, after all, been a long and trying day, and he was sleepy.
The sounds in the room dropped down to faint sniffles and the crackling of the fire as the calming draught finally kicked in. Harry was almost asleep when he felt the faint telltale signs of laughter coming from the man he was currently propped up against.
"You two are certainly a sight," Severus said softly in his ear. "Do you mind if he sleeps with you tonight? I have a feeling that he will be most comfortable there."
"Sure," Harry breathed and leaned farther into the soft heat that Severus's chest provided him. He felt the weight of Dennis shift as the boy reacted to the change in angle, but he wasn't coherent enough to realize why.
Distantly he felt Severus's arms come around him and the weight in his lap more firmly, and then he felt those same arms flex as they lifted him and Dennis up into the air. He blinked and suddenly he was in his bed with a smaller warm body pressed tightly up next to him. He felt Severus's hand ruffle his hair. If he been more awake, he likely would have flushed in embarrassment at the act—regardless of how much he liked it.
He could feel his professor's hands pulling up the blankets around he and his small friend and he smiled a bit in the darkness. He wasn't afraid of Severus's hands the way he was around his Uncle's or Sirius's. He didn't have to be on his guard around him, because Severus just wanted him to be a student—just a teen. He didn't want him for more nefarious acts. He didn't want him for a scapegoat. He just wanted him to be safe.
It made perfect sense to him as he fell asleep, but it likely wouldn't be as easy for him to accept come morning. However, he would appreciate the peace that the realization brought as long as he could.
"Safe, Dennis. We're safe," he muttered to the boy huddled next to him. "Severus—," here he yawned, "Severus won't let anyone hurt us here. Safe," he whispered, finally finding his way into sleep.
. . .
Severus watched somberly as his snake and the tiny lion fell asleep. Questioning Dennis on his whereabouts over the past few weeks would have to wait. The child had been far too emotionally distraught to even consider speaking with him, let alone speaking on such sensitive subjects as why he and his brother had disappeared. Of course, that was assuming that the two had even been together, something that still had not been proven. After all, why would the younger of the two find his way back to them now, but without the other boy as well?
The questions were numerous and the answers were few. He sighed and shook his head at the all too familiar situation. Before going back to his own bed, Severus activated several of the wards that had long been in place around the bed the two boys were nestled in; the most important of which being the one that would alert him to when the boys awoke.
He touched Harry's head once more before leaving the room, and smiled a bit when the child relaxed a bit more under his fingertips.
"Sleep well," he whispered and then waved his wand at the lit lamp to turn it down to almost nothing.
. . .
About the point that Dennis was finding himself in Snape's quarters, Colin found himself being thrown out of a tube, back into the living area that he had created for himself. Upon seeing that he was still alone, the emotionally distressed boy began screaming and beating his fists against the ground hard enough to bloody them.
"Get rid of it all!" He howled at the magical room. "I want it gone now!" He screamed, jumping to his feet and beating his bloody hands against his thin chest.
The creation that he had painstakingly built over the past week shimmered and then disappeared for good, leaving him alone in a large empty room. His wand still in his back pocket, the shirtless wild eyed boy screamed out one final request.
"Give me the door!"
A door appeared on the wall next to him and he leapt towards it, barely aware of the pain from his hands as he made his way through to the outside world.
Where's Dennis? His muddled brain kept going over his brother's disappearance. He couldn't understand how he had lost the younger boy.
"I have to keep him safe!" He shouted out to the hallway, his breath catching with a sob. He stumbled down the hallway and made it to the stairs, taking them two at a time as he rushed to make it down quickly.
He couldn't see, his tears were blinding his sight, his fear for Ron forgotten in lieu of the terrifying idea that he had lost his brother. He barely noticed it when he began to fall.
. . .
"Wake ups, young Master student sir!" Blim, one of the Hogwarts elves said desperately after finding the boy sprawled at the bottom of the massive staircase. The boy was only partially dressed and there was blood on his hands and head, along with a massive goose egg that was rising at the top of the child's hairline.
A younger elf and certainly not one of the smarter ones, Blim did what he always did when faced with a problem. He took it home to his father.
Blim was waiting by his bedside when the boy finally opened his eyes, several hours later.
"How is you feeling?" The young energetic elf asked, peering into Colin's confused face.
"Bad," the boy croaked out, closing his eyes against the nauseating rush of colors and light.
"Where is you supposed to be at?" Blim's father asked from the doorway. He was an elderly elf by the name of Cratch. Blim was the last of his children, and he was thankful that he had ended with Blim and not the other way around. If he had, he likely would have never had another little elf, as much as he loved the little blighters.
A confused look came over the boy's face and he cracked his eyes open again, although it was clear to the two elves that the act was causing the child a great deal of pain.
"I don't know," the boy said in a bewildered voice.
"Whats you name?" Blim asked curiously. "I be Blim. This be my father, Cratch," he stated proudly, nodding his head swiftly while staring openly at the boy with his large bulbous eyes.
"I—I don't know that either," Colin answered with a frightened look at the two house elves in front of him.
"Well, best you sleep now," Cratch said, grabbing his overzealous son by the elbow and dragging him away from the injured boy.
He looked back at the boy and noted with displeasure that the child was still awake. So it was without much more thought that he snapped his fingers and caused Colin to fall into a magically induced sleep. Then he left, taking Blim with him.
Just because they had a visitor in their home didn't mean that they could afford to shirk their other duties. For one thing, they still needed to clean the blood off of the steps that the boy had fallen on.
After all, it was up to them to keep Hogwarts looking her best.
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