Gary then did the odd clucking noise that Harry had heard last night. And before Harry knew what was going on, Snape’s body went rigid as Gary used his power over dementors to control the dementor side of Snape.

Then, both Snape and the dementor holding him, dived right for him.

Gary held Harry tight until both Snape’s gnarled hands and the dementor’s gnarled hands were clawing at him. Then, with a thrust, Gary shoved Harry forward, hard into the folds of the robes and a sickening wave of cold over swept Harry.

“Kill him,” Gary ordered.

In the distance the oh-so-familiar scream from his past erupted in Harry’s head. Harry had never been so cold in his life as the folds of the real dementor’s robes engulfed him. His whole world wanted to give away, to drop out beneath him and for him to collapse and faint to the world.

Then, just as he was about to receive a horrid lesson in how to kiss from a dementor, hands grabbed him and pulled him away. If dementors screamed, Harry just heard it. As Snape’s gnarled hands dragged him away from the clasp of the dementor a horrid sound erupted from the dark being.

“Listen,” Snape’s voice was crocked and hollow. Harry found himself trying to fight free of Snape’s grip. Somewhere over the long years of dealing with dementors Harry had built up a strong immune sense against fainting in front of dementors. However, right now, that immune sense was about to collapse.

“Run!” Snape crocked and he shoved him. Gary had already run away to deal with the dementors in the Entrance Hall. But the other dementor was obviously not as rebellious as Snape because it dived forward in a desperate attempt to grab Harry.

A sickening wave of cold over swept Harry again and the final screams of his mother sent him reeling forward. Yet, the dementor never grabbed him as yet another scream erupted in the dungeon corridor and Harry turned around to see Snape wrestling with the dementor.

Harry didn’t know how to react. He had never seen anyone ever come into a wrestling contest with a dementor, especially someone with dementor traits inside of them.

As they wrestled, Harry tried to climb to his feet and run. Snape had fought Gary’s control over him trying to save Harry and all the boy could do was sit on the dungeon floor to watch him.

There were footfalls and Harry spun around to see a panicked Gary running down the corridor, shouting. He didn’t even spare a glance at the sprawled boy on the ground, just ran toward the wrestling duo and tried to yank them apart.

Shouting, he grabbed Snape by the scruff of his ragged robes, and threw him backwards. The other dementor rose up and flinched as Gary began to cluck his tongue and muttered under his breath. Harry could see his wand peeking out of Gary’s robe sleeve and without hesitation he dived forward.

Gary’s spell went spiraling off sideways but Harry didn’t see where as he crashed down onto the ground. Having broken the man’s clucking of the tongue and spell, the dementor was jolted free its containment. With another scream, it dived forward and grabbed the screaming Gary.

Harry jerked off of him, and spun around in time to see Snape gasping and panting as an odd black film filed into his stomach. With a sickening jolt, Harry realized that Gary’s spell had hit Snape.

“No,” Harry panted, wiping away a stream of blood that was leaking from his nose. He turned around in an attempt to run and saw to his horror the dementor leaned down and give a hell of kiss to Gary. The man stopped screaming and his body went limp from the pulling of his soul. It was one of the most horrifying things Harry had ever seen.

Then Gary was dropped to the ground in a soulless lump and the dementor, carving more souls, turned toward Harry. Realizing the sudden danger Harry was in, he tried to scramble to his feet, but Snape got to him first.

Harry knew that somewhere inside of him that Snape couldn’t suck out his soul but Snape could kill him. Gary hadn’t ordered them to suck out his soul, take all his happiness away, but to kill him. And Snape was under Gary’s control.

Snape gnarled hands were dancing around Harry’s throat while the dementor glided forward and began to struggle with Snape for the soul of Harry. The dementor only sensed Snape’s dementor side; it didn’t realize that Snape was human.

Snape hissed darkly at the dementor and tried to push the dark being away while choking Harry.

“Snape, listen to me!” Harry crocked. He had to get through to Snape. “I’m Harry Potter! You know me.” That didn’t help much, if anything it made everything worse. “Listen to me, please. You don’t want to kill me, please Snape, please.” Tears were streaming down Harry’s cheeks.

In the background he could hear the screams of his mother, the screams of his friends, and the screams of every person alive. They were horrible screams and Harry was receiving them through the dementor’s claw that was wrapped around his shoulder. He was pressed hard against a wall, and soon he would lose himself to the sorrow and depression that tried to beat its way into his head.

No! He had to hold on! He had a reason to live now. He was going become a curse breaker. He had friends who loved him. The Weasleys, Hermione, Dumbledore, Neville, Luna, Lupin, and all his friends. He had people who cared. He didn’t have to return to the Dursleys and Voldemort was dead. He was free to live his life. He had people who cared...he had Snape...

“Snape! Please, listen!” Harry pleaded. “I’ve come to trust you, in the same way I trusted Sirius. I don’t even trust Lupin that much. Oh, please, Snape. I don’t know why, you understood me. You helped me in the way I needed help.” Snape’s hands were tightening around Harry’s neck. “You taught me chess, you helped me. I trust you like I trusted Sirius! This isn’t you! You know this!” Harry pleaded but he wasn’t getting through.

“Please...” Harry’s breath was coming in short gasps. “I trust you,” Harry gasped and for a minute Snape’s black eyes seemed to jolt a bit. He seemed to loosen his grip but Harry couldn’t tell. The dementor’s gnarled hand had already crept up onto his neck right next to Snape’s. Harry was so cold and he knew...he just knew that he would never ever be happy again.

“Snape...” Harry pleaded as Snape’s hands fiddle a bit with his neck. Then suddenly Harry remembered. The necklace! “Snape...listen...you’ve got to say leapigh. Please, Snape...say it!” Harry cried out as the dementor dug his hand hard into Harry’s neck, lifting his chin upward so that Harry could get an improper lesson in kissing.

“H-Ha-Harry?” Snape crocked and for the first time Harry realized just how far Snape was under Gary’s control.

“Leapigh, please just say it...trust me.” Harry murmured groggily. It was getting harder and harder to stay awake.

“Leapigh!” Snape suddenly shouted in a deep hollow voice. What would follow would be something Harry would never forget.

Harry’s necklace jolted harshly, much more harshly then ever before, but Harry had been messing with an enhancer spell one day and it had hit the necklace. So the jolt that followed was much more enhanced and much more powerful then ever.

Snape’s hand, which had been curled around the necklace, suddenly seared up and Snape screamed. But not a hollow scream like the dementors, but a real scream. A human scream. Yet, the dementor, which had also been holding the necklace, screeched in an inhuman way and flew backwards.

The jolt from the necklace seared Harry’s neck too. He cried out in pain, dropping to his knees as the hands holding him up abandoned their hold, holding his neck and sobbing. The intense cold had left him.

He glanced up in time to see the dementor screeching and flying backwards. A solid black painting jerked open when the dementor came in range and the dark being soared back into. Holding it’s hand and screeching.

For a brief second, Harry was relieved, and then he remembered Dumbledore talking about a hidden room with a black painting as its entrance and how it seemed seconds from collapsing.

Horrified, Harry turned around, not wanting to see a dementor crushed, he wasn’t sure if it was possible but if it was he sure as hell didn’t want to see it. Yet, that was the least of his worries.

For as the hidden room was jolted free and able to collapse down...the whole dungeons shook and above Harry, stone began to slip.

“That room was one of the main supports of the ceiling in the dungeons!” Snape hollered and Harry glanced at him to see to his immense relief that the man was normal looking. “MOVE!” he shouted and with a lunge he grabbed Harry’s robe collar and dragged him.

Suddenly, the dungeon ceiling collapsed and there was a scrambling of movements. Harry found himself slammed hard against a corridor wall as stone skidded down his back. For several minutes, Harry sat crunched up against the corridor way, his eyes slammed shut, until all movement stopped.

“Potter?” Snape’s voice was close but strained. “Potter?” he called again but Harry didn’t move. “Harry!” Harry jolted and looked around through the dust. There was a gap between the end of the corridor and the crumbled ceiling. They were blocked in.

Snape was sitting crunched up against a corridor, holding his arm, which from Harry’s angle could be seen as completely smashed.

“Are you OK?” Snape asked weakly as he shifted his weight. Snape was horrid looking. He was completely torn and beaten up, probably from his wrestling match with the dementor, his arm was crushed and he was shivering like mad. Harry was shivering too, probably from all the coldness he just went through.

“Yeah, I’m not even going to ask you.” Harry said weakly, staring straight at Snape’s arm. Snape didn’t respond, he was eyeing Harry wearily. “I’m fine,” Harry muttered. “We need to dig our way out of here,” Harry mumbled, climbing to his feet and stumbling toward the cave-in.

“Potter, stop moving now! You’ve just been nearly choked to death, you’ve been in the grip of a dementor, and me...you are not fit to move!” Snape ordered and Harry leaned heavily against a stone.

“Do you remember?” Harry asked weakly, rubbing his neck slightly. Snape looked away with an ashamed face. “It wasn’t your fault, he got control of you.”

“Yes it was Potter!” Snape hollered. “You could’ve died! I would’ve killed you! It’s my entire bloody fault!”

“Well you didn’t!” Harry shouted back, his voice raspy and strained. “You didn’t kill me and you tried to save me at first. I just didn’t run like you ordered me too! And for your information, if you hadn’t been in that dementor’s way then I would’ve been kissed! Also, if it hadn’t been for that bloody necklace of yours then we wouldn’t be having this conversation. You couldn’t help it and you know it!” Snape glared at Harry as he yelled and then he slumped backwards.

“So it was the necklace?” he asked weakly and Harry nodded painfully. “How was it so strong?”

“Flitwick was teaching us enhancing charms on Tuesday and one hit the necklace. Guess that’s lucky now. Feel sorry for Ginny, bet she got a jolt.” Harry mumbled. “We’ve got to get out of here! The Entrance Hall, the dementors, the Death Eaters, what if they need help.”

“Potter, we’re not getting out of here!” Snape hissed. “Not at least until Dumbledore or someone else comes down here to get us out. So sit down and stop straining yourself!”

Harry slide down onto the ground and sighed.

“Potter...I’m sorry.” he trailed off and Harry shook his head.

“It wasn’t you fault. How’d you wrestle with the dementor?” Harry asked weakly.

“The dementor traits give me the advantage that humans don’t have. I can touch a dementor without feeling the side effects. Jones had dementor traits, and a way of controlling them with spells. He spent years, I do believe learning to do so, and then subjected himself to several cruticas curses to get so he didn’t feel too many side effects. Only someone deranged can do what Jones did.” Snape informed.

“And he got kissed for it,” Harry mumbled. Snape nodded. “It’s horrible, seeing someone kissed...” He shuddered slightly.

“You shouldn’t have been subjected to that. Anything you been subjected too.” Snape sighed and he shivered violently. His arm was too painful as were all the other injuries.

“Guess my year doesn’t get out of end-of-the-year exams, eh? I didn’t last the year without meeting a murderous fiend.” Harry sighed. “And I was so close.”

“That’s wretched,” Snape muttered sarcastically. “Potter what are you doing? I told you to sit down!”

“Sir, if we just sit here, you’ll not make it before they find us. You need help. I’d give you a mirror if I had one, but you’d just break it anyway.” Harry retorted as he began to climb to the cave-in and dig his way from the top.

“Potter, you’ll pay for that remark.” Snape snarled. “You’re insane for thinking you can dig your way out of this. It’s stone, Potter. Heavy, charmed, dungeon stone!” The dusty outline of Harry shrugged.

“I’m stubborn, sir,” Harry replied and Snape growled to himself. But seeing that he was going to get nowhere with the boy he decided not to argue. He didn’t have the strength to anyway.

“Potter, if you manage to dig us out of here, I will excuse your class from the end-of-term exams. But since I know that won’t happen, I don’t have to worry.” Snape chortled and Harry rolled his eyes.

“Well, I’ve got a goal to shoot for don’t I?” Harry retorted and set to work. Snape wasn’t lying, it was hard work. After around half an hour of laboring on it, he hadn’t made much of a dent and his fingers were scraped.

“Told you,” Snape growled as Harry set back on the rubble panting. Harry didn’t respond. “Potter...” Snape trailed off a bit. “What you said to me...did you mean it?”

“That you’d break a mirror if you looked into it?” Harry asked. “Yeah, you haven’t seen yourself, trust me on this.”

“Not that Potter!” Snape snapped. “What you said about trusting me...”

“Yeah, why? No one trust you or something?” Harry asked weakly.

“Not many,” Snape replied and Harry looked at him. Snape was paler then usual and his arm seemed have taken a shape of its own. “Why do you trust me?”

“I-I’m not sure,” Harry muttered. “I’ve always, in a sense, but only till this year did I realize I truly did. I can’t explain it...but I meant everything I said.” Harry whispered and Snape fell quiet. Harry groaned, pulled back up, and started to dig again.

The silence was thick between them and Harry kept working. After a while Harry realized he was doing it more for his own sake of mind, something to keep himself occupied, and a sense of trying to help Snape.

Snape must’ve drifted off after awhile because when Harry glanced back, Snape’s head was rolled against the wall and his breathing was shallow. The sight made him remember Lupin and his heart jolted. He sure hoped Lupin wasn’t dead.

Harry kept working without even realizing that he was. After a while everything became blurred and he was barely seeing his hands move. They were scraped up and bloody, and after one roll backwards for a rest his glasses fell off. After that he couldn’t see very well, but he kept working.

Finally, almost two hours later, Harry knew he couldn’t go any farther. Panting, he stumbled backwards and slipped down the rubble. He shivered when he hit the ground and slowly he pulled himself up. Snape was shivering too, Harry could see his blurred outline shivering.

On a split second decision, Harry stumbled over to Snape and leaned against him. He leaned perfectly so that Snape’s arm wouldn’t be crushed, but so that Harry was using Snape’s chest as a pillow. His rhythmic breathing caused Harry to slip into slumber.

888

Harry woke up with a jolt when Snape shifted. He didn’t even need a second to remember, for everything flooded through him instantly. He sat up quickly but Snape’s good arm pulled him back down.

“Lay still, Potter. You’re weak and that foolish digging didn’t help.” Snape snarled and Harry found himself tensing up against Snape chest. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, you?”

“Potter!” Snape snarled and Harry snorted.

“Sorry, forgot,” Harry mumbled. There was a long pause and Harry thought after a while Snape might’ve fallen back asleep.

“You’re a lot like your mother,” Snape suddenly said and Harry jolted. “You’ve been told several times, I know, that you look exactly like your father but you have Lily’s eyes, but you’re more like your mother then you know. Stubborn like your father, but stubborn in the same sense as your mother.” He paused and checked to see if Harry was even awake. He was.

“She and I didn’t get along, but she would help me when I needed it. After some of your father’s pranks, she would help me, no matter how mean I was. She had a good soul, and she put everyone before her, before herself. Much like you. Though she seemed to think things through more.” Snape chuckled and tensed as Harry relaxed against him. Harry had been tense earlier, he didn’t mind that.

“Sir?” Harry muttered weakly.

“Potter?” Snape said softly.

“Thanks for telling me about my mother, no one ever does.” With that Harry completely relaxed against Snape and fell asleep, no longer able to keep his eyes open. Snape smiled slightly, tightened his hold on Harry, and fell asleep too.

888

Vaguely, Harry woke up later to see Peeves bobbing up and down before him.

“Oh no, Potter, just go back to sleep. You’ve been found, I’ll just go tell headmaster.” With that Peeves bobbed off and Harry, no longer worried about, fell once again into sleep.

888

Peeves did indeed get the Headmaster and after a few minutes, they had shifted all the rubble. Headmaster Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall stood in the rubble of the cave-in, stunned by the sight before them.

Professor Severus Snape, the Head of Slytherin House, the bane of existence of all Gryffindors, the dreaded Potions Master, was holding Harry Potter, the bane of the Potions Master’s existence, resting his cheek in the boy’s hair while the boy rested his head on Snape’s chest. They were sleeping peacefully, curled into each other.

Neither of them looked tense, and neither of them looked at all disgusted.

“That’s something I never thought I’d see,” McGonagall whispered and Dumbledore chuckled.

“They’ve done something I thought would take ‘em years to do.” He said merrily.

“What?” McGonagall asked. “Rest against each other, get trapped in a cave- in, fight dementors?” McGonagall demanded.

“No, go through a test of trust and pass.” Dumbledore chuckled as Harry shifted closer to Snape for comfort and warmth.