COUNTESS ZERO (countesszero) wrote in lupin_snape, @ 2009-08-26 22:54:00 |
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Current music: | The Velvet Underground - Venus In Furs |
Entry tags: | retro fest |
RETROFEST ENTRY
Title: THE ADDICTION 09/14
Rating: NC-17
Author:countesszero
Beta:schemingreader
Pairings: SS/ES, SS/RL, SS/SB, RL/NT
Genre: AU, Drama, Tragedy, Romance, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort
Challenge: Retrofest 2009 Prompt No. 05
Canon: Compliant with PS, CoS and 90% PoA compliant.
Wordcount: Approximately 2,600 words
Summary: When Harry, Hermione, Ron stun Severus in the Shrieking Shack, they don't know there is a Sleeping Beauty Spell on the bed already. It interacts and Snape wakes up a woman. Remus who already is attracted to Snape finds this even more intriguing and begins to woo Snape.
Warnings: Incest, Heterosexual sex, (Child) Abuse, Drug abuse, Alcoholism, Mental illness, Non consensual sex, Sex with dubious consent, Gender switch, Attempted suicide, Character death (no main character)
A/N: At this point I would like to express my gratitude to schemingreader who has despite her very busy life supported me greatly in my first attempt of writing fanfiction.
Disclaimer: Severus Snape, Remus Lupin and all associated characters from the Harry Potter universe are the property of J.K. Rowling. The author is making no profit by this story.
The pain did not subside.
How had it come to all this? Quite a mess, wasn't it? For once he had decided to actually participate in this foolish game called love, and that was what he got out of it.
He spent the rest of this night on the floor of his bathroom staring blindly at the ceiling. The white tiles were soothing and cool. People were coming and going, he could feel the hems of their robes swishing over him, the usual ghosts. To pay attention to them would mean to give them power and he would not do that. There were shadows caressing him, voices murmuring to him.
He couldn't forget Tonks' face. The sweat on her forehead, her shoulders, her young breasts. How effortlessly she had made love. How she had enjoyed it. Her body was an instrument of pleasure to her. She loved what she was doing.
Tonks' face in carnal passion filled him with pure hatred. The hatred in him made him sick.
He had to take a vial in the morning to make it until lunch, then one for the afternoon and then another one for the night. He knew he wouldn't get through the day otherwise. Otherwise he would end up hexing and cursing everyone who dared to be in his way, or he would just mindlessly scream out his rage and bitterness.
None of this was fair.
He was walking through the corridors and realized only when somebody stared at him in a shocked expression - Potter? - that he was biting his hand, and he had drawn blood.
These last days before the OWLs didn't seem to want to end. Severus entered the class rooms, wrote the assignments - mostly readings and essays - on the board, then sat at his desk and spent the rest of the lesson looking off into space. The homework and tasks he assigned were from last year and he barely remembered what he was doing. It was purely mechanical.
Lately his stomach refused food. Whatever he ate, he threw up again , so he avoided eating as much as possible. Strangely enough he attended the meals nevertheless, pretending he was eating. Once he had been good at pretense. It was never an easy decision because every time he sat at the table in the Great Hall he subjected himself to curious glances and nervous inquiries. Every time he risked being asked nosy questions about his well being and he had to especially be careful around Dumbledore. But in the end, he went because he hoped that he would see Lupin there. Lupin of course didn't make an appearance for the next three days.
Dumbledore made a remark about Severus' weight loss. Severus told him he was overworked and had no time to eat, and that he'd had too much coffee recently. He told the lie with his hand over his eyes - not that Dumbledore would be fooled. But it would buy him some time.
Time for what?
More often than not he sat in the dark, in his arm chair. Outside of his rooms, he was dimly aware, the world continued to move, children played their games, ran laughing through the corridors, dreamed about their future, fell in love. His colleagues chatted and immersed themselves in their work. Dumbledore brooded in his office, Pettigrew was still on the run, Malfoy was doubtlessly scheming and planning, Potter was turning into a sulking teenager and Voldemort was probably getting stronger every minute.
He didn't care about any of it. He needed to rest.
He remembered a song he once had heard many years ago.
I am tired. I am weary.
I could sleep a thousand years.
He didn't remember the rest of the song, only these few lines went round and round in his head like a mantra.
He never really slept of course. He could not allow himself to sink into his dreams. Too dangerous. In the nights he was lying in his bed, listening to the dull sound of voices in the back of his head, his own rapid heartbeat.
One more vial of his draught a day did the trick but he had to brew more, order more ingredients from Sprout and from various apothecaries and make weekly trips to London to buy the other less legal ingredients. Eventually he stopped brewing the draught by himself as it was too time consuming (not to say suspicious) to continue. Somebody would notice, he knew. Instead he purchased a cheap base that he diluted with the cocaine. Out of time restraint he had to limit the delivery of other potions to Poppy (he delivered a derivative, a weaker, legal variety she used to treat Quidditch injuries with), telling her that he was busy now with his classes, and had to work on potions for Dumbledore. He advised her to buy what she needed from the apothecaries in Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley.
He almost summoned a quill to write her a list, when he remembered that these days his fingers wouldn't stop shaking. It wouldn't do any good to let Poppy see that.
Poppy looked at him questioningly and said: "How very unusual of you, Severus," but before he could reply she had turned around and walked away. Only later it occurred to him that two years ago he had protested vehemently when she had suggested a contract with an apothecary in France because he hadn't trusted the apothecary's ingredients and their expertise. If he remembered correctly he had called her "irresponsible" to rely on ready-made potion bases.
Two days later during his last examination Poppy told him about a healer. He had been a woman before he decided to undergo a gender transformation spell, she explained. Severus listened, his face a bitter mask.
"I am aware your situation is different but it might be useful to talk to him. He could help you." she said.
"I am not like him," said Severus. "I did not choose this."
"But you do need help with your new situation," Poppy insisted. "You know that your situation is final. You won't change back. Ever."
Ah Poppy, sensitive as ever. He swallowed and wished she would be a bit kinder, leave him some hope he could cling to. But then she was right. No use in sugarcoating the truth.
She changed the topic - or tactics - and attacked him with questions: How often did he eat? When did he last eat? How much did he sleep?
He told her that he ate three times a day, a blatant lie.
"How was your period this time?"
When he thought it couldn't get any worse ... it did. He opened his mouth, then snapped it shut.
"This is what I mean." Poppy said.
"What do you mean?"
"You cannot bring yourself to acknowledge your transformation. But you have to accept the changes in order to ..."
"I am well aware of everything that is happening to me. But I have no intentions to discuss my monthly bleeding with you," he hissed.
Poppy started twirling her wand behind her back and said nothing.
"Fine, if you insist." Severus rose to his feet. "I started bleeding a week ago, the first day suffering from cramps and nausea so badly I had to stay in bed, and I soiled three sets of linens. The bleeding didn't stop until yesterday. It was quite the massacre, I assure you, my bed looked as if a pig had been slaughtered on it. Do you want a report on the consistency, the daily amount of blood? The smell?"
"Sit down, and stop your hysterics. I need to know about your first periods to know they are regular, and that everything is functioning," Poppy snapped.
He sat down again. It was true though. Two days after he had seen Lupin and Tonks together he had woken up in his armchair, and noticed how his underwear was sticking to his body. When he stood up, something warm trickled down the legs and to the floor. He had stepped away from the chair, lifting the hem of his robes and seen the dark red - almost black drops of blood on the stone floor. The symbolism of him bleeding from the inside ... that was adequate. And it amused him, that even his blood was black.
"If you lost that much blood I need to examine you, but this time manually. No wand, no spell."
"Not now. I don't have time for this," said Severus, suppressing a shiver.
Poppy went to her office where he could hear her rummaging in her desk. After a while she came back with a brown cotton bag.
He peered inside.
"Herbal tea?" he asked.
"You have enough painkilling potion in your own stock room to douse a whole army," Poppy said with an expressionless face. "But the tea helps to maintain magnesium, calcium, zinc and iron levels and will also help with your blood pressure. Your blood pressure is much too low, so you should pay attention to it. You wouldn't want to faint during class, would you?"
Her cold bright stare was even more uncomfortable than his own he thought with amusement. Strange, how he had never realized that she could look at people like this. As if her eyes were some sort of diagnostic instrument as well, scanning him.
Severus took the tea. "Thank you," he said and turned to leave. When he was almost out of the door believing himself safe she raised her voice again.
"I believe you are addicted to an illegal derivative of the draught of peace or calming draught, possibly enhanced with a solution of aether or liquefied cocaine, maybe even heroin," Poppy said.
Severus froze but did not turn around. Suddenly he had a cold, metallic taste in his mouth. Before he could reply Poppy continued: "I noticed your high tolerance to the pain killers we gave you. I have observed your behavior over the last weeks. Your hands are shaking. More than once I also noticed cold sweat on you. You scratch yourself a lot. Your pupils are dilated and your heart rate is alarmingly fast. I have overheard conversations about your behavior in class lately. Erratic and confused were the nicest descriptions I heard."
Severus gathered all his strength and turned around, straightening his back and looking her in the eyes. "This is a serious accusation," he said in the most dangerous voice he could muster.
Poppy's voice sounded suddenly pained. "Just look at yourself, Severus."
"I was taking more than the usual amount of the peace draught since the transformation. I developed a higher tolerance because I had to take the draught regularly during the first weeks of my transformation. That is all. No illegal substances. No addiction. And I refuse to even discuss the rumors some Gryffindors might spread about me." He turned to leave again.
And there it was.
This sudden, absolute insane longing to confess to her. He was filled to the brim with this powerful urge to tell her what it was like to drink his poison - to feel this peace, this hushed stillness that came over him. It was like a cool breeze in the stifling summer heat, or the first hint of dawn at the horizon, the dew drops catching the morning light, the light of a new day. Sometimes it was like the warm gaze of a lover caressing him.
It was like coming home.
Did she know how it was like to have to run through the night, haunted by ghosts, chased by one's fears and to be so tired? What it was like to suddenly pull a veil aside and stand in a garden of beauty awash with golden sunlight? How it was to be lost and alone and then close your eyes, let the draught slide down your throat? And to feel with every precious drop all his fears, all the sadness, all the loneliness disappear? How it was like to find a place to belong to?
Yes, a garden of beauty.
He quickened his steps.
"How stupid do you think I am?" She said, hurrying after him. "I can detect the signs of addiction and drug abuse, Severus. You need ..."
"Why don't you try and switch your gender? See how you deal with the pain," Severus said, walking faster.
"Severus ..."
"Go and try to prove it."
She stopped and watched him as he reached the hallway.
When he canceled his classes for the rest of the week, Dumbledore did not object or ask any questions. Irritated by the headmaster's sympathetic face Severus cut the connection and closed the floo.
After the conversation with Poppy he was so upset that he decided to pour himself a bath.
He opened the tap.
The sound of the water swell to a dissonant, shrieking chorus of demons. The panic attack hit him so hard he immediately crouched on the floor, scrambling away from the bathroom into the living room, close to the floo. Mindless with panic he cowered in front of his armchair.
When he looked up he saw Eileen hovering over him.
"Others hallucinate about angels and demons. I conjure visions of my mother. Even in my madness I am ridiculous," he said aloud, hoping to chase her away, but his voice was drowned in the mad shrieking around him.
The cacophony of voices grew louder and louder. There were other sounds. A child crying, his own voice, when he was nine or ten. His father screaming at his mother. Black's voice mocking him.
Eileen was saying something but he couldn't hear her.
He tried to clamp his hands over his ears.
The water, he thought, I have to turn off the water. It's the water. They are in the pipes. In the walls. Everywhere.
He sat there for a while, waiting. Then when the attack slowly abated he dared to remove his hands from his ears. The hissing of the water still sounded menacing to him. There was still a manifold growling and snapping around him, like wolves circling him, hiding in the shadows.
Excruciatingly slowly he crawled back to the bathroom, beside himself with panic. He was gripping his wand with his right and stopped every few meters throwing hexes around. One could never know. His robes were dragging behind him. He could feel somebody in his quarters, waiting for him to stand up and show himself. He felt somebody close behind him. He turned around. Nobody, of course.
Ah, they were quite clever.
Maybe the ministry is trying to drive me mad, he thought.
After many hours he finally reached the bathroom and closed the tap with shaking fingers. The sudden silence was overwhelming. His own breathing was ragged and too loud.
Too loud.
He gripped the sink and pulled himself up, then opened his cabinet and took three vials out, opening two and drinking both of them, pocketing one.
Sighing with relief he threw his head back. When he looked at his reflection in the mirror he shrank back in horror. The black eyes in his ghostly white face were nothing less than terrifying. His lips were almost blue. The jar of cockroaches he kept close to the worktable must have fallen down and opened. He could feel the little beasts crawling all over his body underneath his robes.
He climbed into the tub. With pleasure he noted his robes billowing in the warm water, like a cloud of ink. He rested his head on the rim of the tub and hummed to himself.
I am tired ... weary...
"How does it feel to go insane?" asked Eileen. "To lose everything?"
I could sleep a thousand years ...
"Shut up," he said, without opening his eyes.
A thousand dreams that would awake me
Different colors made of tears.*
* The Velvet Underground: Venus In Furs
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