Harry landed hard and instantly felt like he was about to lose his small breakfast. Snape held him by the shoulders with a concerned glare waiting for the disorientation of the first time apparating to pass.

Satisfied that he wasn't going to sick up all over his professor's shoes, Harry stood up with confused eyes. He wasn't standing in front of the hidden entrance to St. Mungo's, but instead was standing at a very muggle-looking private hospital.

"Erm... Why are we here?" Harry asked, trying not to sound nervous.

"I told you alternate plans were made, " the professor explained. "Occasionally, magical healers do work in muggle facilities, especially if that healer currently lives in the muggle world. The healer we're seeing is such a person."

Muggle or magic, Harry didn't want to be there. While he was intimately familiar with exams from his time at Hogwarts, he had never really voluntarily gone for a check-up. The Dursley's wouldn't dare take him unless it was absolutely necessary.

Walking into the brick building, Harry's heart rate immediately increased when the sterile smell hit his nose. The reception area was bright and inviting, but that didn't stop the small trembling in his hands. As Harry was walking up to the reception desk, Snape walked beyond it quickly towards the lifts tucked behind the desk. He ran to catch up to Snape, who was holding the lift open for him. Standing next to the man, Harry watched him wave his hand over the lift buttons and a small black circle appeared at the bottom of the list of floors. He pressed the black button followed by the #4 (pediatrics).

Opening his eyes in surprise, he asked Snape, "Is there one of those in every hospital?"

"Only if there's a magical healer present," he explained. "Which I made sure there would be today. The hidden button is activated by a magical signature and it alerts the floor that the witch or wizard is arriving."

Harry appreciated the extra explanation, knowing Snape didn't have to go into the details. He wondered how Snape was so familiar with the muggle world when the elevator lurched to a stop. The door opened to show a room with bright yellow walls lined with butterflies and flowers across them. A variety of rainbow colored chairs, both large for parents and small for young children, sat in a horseshoe pattern around the reception window. Sitting in a set of chairs along the left wall was a mother with her daughter who looked about five. Harry felt extremely out of place.

Snape walked up to the reception desk and said to the middle aged lady, "Alton Smithe is expecting us for Harry Evans."

Harry peered sideways at Snape when he heard his alias, but the man was staring forward so he decided not to say anything.

"Come this way," the receptionist told them, opening the door leading them back to a set of rooms. They were led through a hallway, all the way to the last room on the left where a small black circle could be seen on the outside of the door. Snape lifted his hand and waved it in front of the black circle and the door immediately opened.

Walking into the room, the receptionist told them Healer Smithe would be with them momentarily. Harry sat in one of the plastic chairs nervously tapping his foot waiting. Once the door closed, Snape waved his wand removing both their glamours.

"So... Is there just like a whole underground magical healthcare world hidden away here," Harry awkwardly asked.

"Very eloquent Mr. Potter," Snape replied. "Sometimes it's not conducive for a magical parent to bring a child to St. Mungo's or when muggle parents have a magical child, like Miss. Granger, it's an easier transition to go to the local hospital if there are dual healers available there."

"Ah, guess I've never thought about that much," Harry looked around the room just for something to do while waiting.

Snape lowered his eyebrows, "Why do I feel you haven't put much thought into most aspects of your medical needs?"

Harry decided to ignore that remark, as the door opened and a man, who Harry guessed was in his mid-40's, entered the room. He had sandy blonde hair, hazel kind eyes behind a set of modest glasses, and a small goatee growing. He reminded Harry of a more clean-cut version of Remus, and he immediately felt comfortable around this man.

"Severus," Healer Smithe called out as he closed the door. The friendly tone showing he obviously knew Snape from somewhere. "It's been too long. How have you been?"

"Quite the same, Alton, as always. How's Mary these days?" Snape actually sounded concerned which caught Harry's interest.

"She's doing well," he had a sad look in his eyes as he said that, "all thanks to you. Which brings us to this young man."

He turned to Harry. "Hello Mr. Potter, my name is Healer Smithe," he held out his hand to Harry.

"Hi sir... And please just call me Harry." He shook Healer Smithe's hand, his arm still trembling from nerves.

Looking through the file he had in his hands, which Harry assumed was from the Hogwarts infirmary, he said, "Harry it is. It looks like your professor and the medi-witch from your school sent over an extensive list of things to check for, most of which are muggle tests."

His eyebrows shot up as he read over the sheet of parchment in his left hand. Harry watched as he looked skeptically at Snape who gave a nod so small Harry thought he might have imagined it. This was not a good sign at all.

"Ok," Healer Smithe finally said, "let's get some basics out of the way. I'm going to run a diagnostic spell which will record things like your height, weight, temperature, and if you currently have any illnesses or injuries." Harry felt the tickle of the diagnostic scan start.

"It says here, you visited the school infirmary due to a bloody nose. How else you've been feeling overall, have you had any other nose bleeds? Or any unexplained bruising?"

Healer Smithe took a seat on a small, yellow stool at the desk on the other end of the wall. Harry looked up at Snape, not sure he wanted to discuss things this personal with his hated potions professor standing there.

"Severus," Healer Smithe said quietly, picking up on Harry's hesitations. "Can you wait in my office? I'll be right there to clarify a couple things before we get started."

Harry was surprised by the understanding that crossed Snape's eyes. "Of course," he replied slowly walking out of the exam room.

"So tell me what's been going on," Healer Smithe questioned, turning back towards Harry.

~~~~SS~~~~

Severus sat in the comfortable office of the only other person besides Lily he would call a friend. He had met Alton while he was working on the healing portion of his Potions Mastery. Having just completed his own Healer Mastery, Alton was nervous to have a junior apprentice, but enjoyed Severus's level of knowledge and the theoretical discussions they so often had.

Alton had married Sarah, a muggle he'd met while Severus was studying under him. Severus had been invited to the wedding and still regretted not attending; it had been a dark time in his life and he didn't want to dampen their day. From then on, Alton enjoyed living in the muggle world even after their daughter, Mary, was born 5 years ago and would most likely be a witch.

Severus had heard from Alton over two years ago when Mary was diagnosed with a heart murmur due to a small hole and they wanted to do open heart surgery. Severus created a series of potions to help close the hole without any surgical intervention over several weeks. Thinking about it now, Severus was surprised that both realities were the same in regards to Alton Smithe.

He'd been waiting about 20 minutes when Alton walked back into his office. His friend leaned against the edge of the desk with his arm folded across his chest.

"Want to fill me in on anything Severus? It's not like you to get so involved to the point of sending the tests you want to run."

"Let's just say I have a feeling and leave it at that," the Potions Master said. "I take it there won't be any issues running them today? I imagine you agree this needs to get started as quickly as possible."

"I mean, I have everything here per your request, but what do you expect to do about the guardian permission? I can do the blood tests, no problem but, assuming it's necessary, I can't do the bone marrow biopsy without guardian consent," Alton had a sad look on his face as he explained that fact.

"Albus Dumbledore is working on a medical proxy," Severus said matter-of-factly. "I'll send everything necessary when I receive it and it will be valid for today. Given the symptoms, it's very likely Leukemia, and let's just say his guardians don't have his best interest in mind. "

"I think that these types of symptoms can be any number of ailments or even nothing at all. Cancer is extremely rare in the wizarding population as a whole and even when we do see it, it's generally in either weak wizards and specifically muggleborns, neither of which describes Mr. Potter," Alton paused taking a cleansing breath. "Let's just say you're lucky I owe you. All of this is coming very close to lines that can't be crossed in both the muggle and magical worlds."

"That's why we're here," Severus said standing up to exit the office. "Let's get this started."

~~~~HP~~~~

Harry was waiting for Healer Smithe to return and had no idea what to expect. He wasn't exactly sure what he needed to consult Snape about seeing as the man should have nothing to do with his medical files. Maybe it was because Snape originally ran the diagnostic spell back at Hogwarts? I should have gone for a nap instead.

"Ok, Harry I think we're ready this morning," Healer Smithe cheerfully called as he entered the room again. "Is it ok if Professor Snape joins us? I may need his assistance on a couple things. I promise we won't discuss anything you're uncomfortable with him hearing." Healer Smithe knew that keeping Harry's trust was about the only way they would get through this easily.

"Yes sir, that's fine," Harry eyed Snape as he was let back into the room. While he felt very comfortable with Healer Smithe, he still was wary of Snape and why he had to be so involved.

Putting on a pair of gloves and grabbing the phlebotomy supplies he sat down in front of Harry to walk him through the process, "The tests we're going to run today are all going to be muggle tests. Occasionally, there are times where a magical scan just can't show us the whole picture of what's going on and muggle tests can make up that difference. We're still able to use magical methods to read the tests however, so as long as everything cooperates you should leave here today with some answers.

"This part is pretty straightforward. I'll just draw some blood and look to see if anything is out of place," he paused looking at Harry. "Are you afraid of needles?"

Having not had any experience with needles before, Harry shook his head "no" figuring it can't be any worse than what he's gone through with Voldemort. Even so, he decided at the last second to look away and he met Snape's eyes just as he felt the cold, wet touch of the alcohol pad followed by a sharp pinch. He couldn't hold in the grimace that formed on his face, and he scolded himself because the last thing he wanted was to appear weak in front of Snape.

After what felt like at least a minute, he felt another dull pinch as the needle was removed from the inside of his elbow. A small piece of cotton was taped over where the blood was taken.

"That's it," Healer Smithe exclaimed, disposing of the blood collection kit and gloves in the red rubbish bin next to the desk. "I'll go run these now. Do you want to go get a snack or wait here?"

"I think I'd rather wait here... if that's ok," Harry asked. "I'm not so hungry anyways."

"Sure thing," he replied standing up with the vials of blood. Harry thought it was strange to see his blood captured outside his body in that way. "It shouldn't be more than 10 minutes then."

"Thank you Alton," Snape spoke, for the first time since coming back into the room, as the Healer was leaving.

Harry was suddenly very interested in his worn out trainers for the simple reason that he didn't know what else to do. He was amazed at how easily he'd adjusted to walking in shoes too big for him and where they were worn through. Making a mental note of needing to find a way to get new ones, he felt Snape's eyes on him. Lifting his head up, his bright emerald eyes met Snape's dark onyx ones.

"It's bad isn't it," Harry finally admitted worrying his lower lip. He really didn't want to have this conversation with Snape but he felt utterly alone not for the first time in his life, but very strongly at that moment. He was reaching out to the only person present and just hoping Snape wouldn't throw it back in his face.

Snape's face showed something close to concern. "Of the possibilities... most are not good," he said honestly. "But whatever it is, we'll figure it out," that was the best Snape could say without flat out lying.

"I thought you said last night I'd be seeing someone Madam Pomfrey knew," Harry challenged, catching Snape in the lie he had told.

"I may have misspoken last night," that was as close to 'I was wrong' as Harry was going to get. He smirked at the thought and felt comforted that Snape would call in a... No, Snape doesn't have friends.

"You won't tell anyone what goes on here right?" Harry asked the question weighing heavily on his mind. The last thing he needed was all of Slytherin knowing his business.

"I have more decorum than you think," Snape felt insulted, but looking at the past 5 years, he couldn't blame the boy. "Anything said or done here is protected from everyone except, unfortunately, your relatives and then of course anyone you choose to disclose the information to."

"Oh... good. So my aunt and uncle still need to know?" Harry figured if he could, he really wanted to leave them out. "The stuff I said last night wasn't just talk, you know, I doubt they'd sign off on anything having to do with me. Unless of course it meant they could get rid of me." Harry felt his face flush. Why was he telling the person he hated almost more than Voldemort about stuff like this? He was prepared to blame the clinical setting for throwing him off.

"The Headmaster is working on alternative arrangements for that as well," was all Snape said. They were getting really close to the topic he wanted to avoid, Sirius. That's who should have been here with Harry and he knew Harry blamed Snape as much as he blamed himself for his godfather's death.

Almost as if sensing what Snape was thinking about, a wave of anger spread through Harry and just as he was about to yell at Snape to leave, the door opened and Healer Smithe walked in. His apprehensive face did nothing to calm the storm in Harry. He sat on the same yellow stool in front of Harry.

"The test showed some abnormalities," the healer tried to explain in a nice way to say something was definitely wrong, but without putting a name to it before the other tests could be run. "It's not a very conclusive result, meaning I'd like to do another test which should give us a better idea what we're dealing with."

To Harry, that sounded like he already knew, but just didn't want to tell him. He was sick of adults making decisions for him, "Just tell me what's going on." Harry needed to know.

"It could be a wide range of things at this point, which is why I don't want to speculate on anything yet," his kind eyes told Harry to just go with it; that if this turned out to be nothing he didn't want to cause Harry to worry over nothing.

"Ok," Harry thought about his Gryffindor bravery. "So what now?"

"The procedure is called a bone marrow aspiration and biopsy. Both are done at the same time and we can do it in the procedure room here," Healer Smithe paused for Harry to nod that he understood so far. "The basic idea is that we'll use a needle to pull out some marrow directly from your hip bone. That will give us a definitive answer to what's going on with you."

Harry didn't want to say anything about how awful that process sounded, or how scared he actually was about it. It's not like he's ever had anyone to lean on in the past, why should he expect any different now.

Lifting his chin a little higher to give himself confidence he said, "Ok."

Walking out of the exam room and towards the procedure room, Harry could barely feel his legs carrying him. Surely whatever was going on, could be fixed pretty easily. He lived in a world with magic and potions, something like that has to be able fix this.

Healer Smithe walked in right behind Harry, but Snape stayed in the hallway. Handing Harry a gown, he said, "I need you to change into this with it open in the back. The procedure will take place here," he pressed on a spot on Harry's back just above his right hip bone. "I'll be back in a couple minutes to get you ready and the whole procedure should take about 30 minutes."

As he left, Harry looked around the room. In the center was a table, softer than the exam table in the previous room but definitely not comfortable looking, and next to that was a tall covered tray which he assumed housed the instruments used for this procedure. Taking off his clothes and folding them neatly on the chair against the wall, he sat on the procedure table and waited.

There was a knock on the door and Healer Smithe ducked his head around the door. "All set?" He asked.

"As much as I'll ever be," Harry mumbled; the feeling of loneliness settling into his chest.

"Is it alright if Professor Snape joins us again? Honestly, this is a hard procedure to do alone," the healer looked sympathetically at Harry.

"Yeah, sure," Harry barely heard what he said as the door opened and his professor walked in. "Hi sir," Harry almost hit himself in the forehead for how stupid he sounded to Snape.

"This will be over before you know it Harry," Snape let the use of the young wizard's given name settle as a truce for what was about to happen.

"I'd like you to lay down on your left side please," Healer Smithe explained patting the other side of the table. "I'll cover up your bottom half with this blanket, since we need to have access to your hip area. Severus, please sit in that chair and try to help keep him calm."

Totally the wrong person for that.

He pointed to a chair that was next to Harry's head when he was laying down. Snape took a seat and they were now face-to-face. "The first thing they'll do is numb the area which should help significantly with the pain," Snape told him, trying to calm the visible nerves of the Boy-Who-Lived. "Just breathe."

Harry felt something cold on his back, right in the area Healer Smithe pointed to earlier. He then felt a quick pinch, like when the blood sample was taken. Remembering to breathe, Harry closed his eyes trying to think about being anywhere but there. He settled on the image and feeling of flying. He didn't know how long he laid there on his side, almost feeling the wind blowing on his face, when he heard someone say, "Here we go."

At first he thought it wasn't so bad. He felt some pressure in the area that he knew they were working in, but with everything he'd faced before it was nothing. Unfortunately, that lasted less than a minute before he felt an intense, sharp pain radiating from his hip bone.

Opening his eyes wide, he immediately grimaced trying not to yell out in pain. Instead, he felt tears coming to eyes and he couldn't stop them from falling. He didn't think about his most hated professor seeing him cry, and he didn't notice when the man took Harry's hands in his own and started saying to him "You're almost there," or "Only a couple more minutes". All he could try to do was focus on the feeling of the hands holding his own, rough from years of grinding and chopping potions ingredients

Later, Harry couldn't have said if it was 5 minutes or 5 hours, but once it finally ended he felt exhausted and sore. He looked up and saw Snape talking to the healer over his head, hands still clamped around his own, now shaking. He carefully removed his hands from Snape's and tried to sit up.

"Hold it there," Snape said gently pushing Harry down. "You need to rest for about 15 minutes to make sure the aspiration site isn't bleeding." He felt something soft push against the sore area of his back.

"Gotcha," he managed to say not looking anyone in the eyes. "That sounds like a perfect idea."

"You did great Harry, like Severus said, just try to relax and we'll be right back in to check the area before you can get up," the healer explained before leaving the room with Snape.

~~~~SS~~~~

Severus walked with Alton towards the processing area, "How long until you know for sure?" He asked even though he knew what the results would be.

"I can know in about 40 minutes, but I want to get an extra set of eyes on the sample before giving the final report," his friend explained. "Given that we're dealing with a very rare occurrence in a very well known young wizard, I want to be sure before finalizing the results."

"That's fair," Severus conceded. "I'll see if he can try to eat some lunch while we wait." Alton nodded and walked into the other room to work on the sample.

For the first time since waking up in this reality, he felt like he had some control over the situation. Thinking back to what Harry had just gone through, he couldn't help but feel sad and disappointed by not only how much Harry thought he had to do this alone but also how he just accepts it. He'd have to discuss how they would handle treatments because Harry couldn't stay at his relatives' house with no one as his advocate.

Walking back inside the procedure room, Harry was staring off at the wall.

"Something interesting Mr. Potter?" He said sitting back down in the chair facing Harry.

"Nothing sir, just thinking... Or trying not to think, I guess is more accurate," Harry said monotone.

"Once you're able to get up, let's go grab some lunch in the cafeteria. Healer Smithe wants to consult with another doctor. That will give him time to process the results," Severus could see the young man mulling over what he just said.

A strange, comfortable silence fell between them. Thinking about his next obstacle, convincing Harry to do the muggle treatment, was coming upon him and he had no idea how to handle it.

There was a knock on the door interrupting both wizards' internal thoughts.

"Let's have a look," Alton said, putting on a pair of gloves. "No bleeding, and the site appears ready to go. You'll be sore for the next day or so and you should keep the area dry for 24 hours. Any questions so far?"

"No sir," Harry replied, sitting up very slowly. Severus held out his hand to help support Harry and was surprised when the raven-haired boy took it.

"Go ahead, get dressed, and then we'll grab some lunch downstairs," Severus said handing the pile of clothes to Harry. "I'll be right outside the door if you need any help." Before exiting the room, Severus reapplied the glamours to both of them.

Leaving the room, Severus felt his heart clenched. He wanted nothing more than to help Harry, but instead he was stuck in this impossible situation of being the angry, hated professor. He couldn't even start to think about how all of this would work with his spying duties. It's not like someone just walks away from a dark megalomaniac wizard like Voldemort.