A Means of Survival – Chapter 06 – Ron Makes A Mistake

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Chapter 6 – Ron Makes a Mistake

Ron sat by miserably by himself at the end of the Gryffindor table, amidst a wildly talkative room of students. Hermione had done something that few other students had ever succeeded at; not only had she bested Professor Snape, but she had gained control of the classroom as well, all with the aid of just one well-placed curse.

Ron knew that it was a curse and that it had involved doing something very painful to Malfoy’s genitals. Given what he had done to them that previous weekend, Ron hadn’t been surprised at the level of the viciousness she had used in her retaliation upon the arsehole. Draco was damned lucky he hadn’t lost his life in that exchange.

I would have killed him, if I could have figured out how. He thought bitterly to himself, his stomach clenching against his will.

He had also been shocked at the level of compliance that the boys had exhibited following Draco’s downfall.

If Snape had questioned any of the girls other than Hermione, he would have gotten his answers much quicker, Ron thought glumly to himself as he barely picked at his food. It was very rare for him to lose his appetite, but after a class with the creature who had—Merlin, he couldn’t even think the word in his head.

He closed his eyes and seriously considered skiving off the rest of the week in favor of just going to sleep until Monday. He was dangerously close to drifting off into his mashed potatoes when someone grabbed his shoulders.

Without thinking—he probably wasn’t capable of rational thought by this point—he drove his elbow hard into the figure behind him, before freeing himself and jumping away from his apparent attacker. He had Hermione’s wand in his hand without thinking, and was still nervously backing away in the sudden silence that had developed since accidently attacking his head of house.

Merlin!!! He had just attacked his head of house. McGonagall was being helped up by several frazzled looking students when he decided that he had seen enough and started running desperately for the doors to the Great Hall. He barely slipped through them before they clanged shut, apparently on orders from Dumbledore. After all, whom else would the castle listen to as readily?

He had to get out of the castle. He had to. He had to.

…

“Professor McGonagall?” several students asked at once following her forcible fall to the floor. “Are you okay???”

She had waved them off, before turning to witness the youngest Weasley boy’s escape from the Great Hall. Upon seeing—and hearing—the clang of the doors, she abruptly realized that Dumbledore was now involved and had taken matters into his own hands, as it were.

Blast the old man.

It was obvious to her that something had badly frightened the trio of second year Gryffindors over the course of the previous weekend. Now she had acted stupidly by coming up behind the solitary boy and scaring him into pure fight or flight mode.

Dumbledore had further complicated the developing situation by making an apparent forceful grab for the boy’s person, by use of his connection with the castle itself.

Merlin only knew when they would find the boy now. She sighed inwardly, and then turned to go speak with Dumbledore, promising herself a stiff drink at the end of it all.

…

He got outside of the castle somehow, still in full panic mode, and continued running full out for the darkness that lay before him. It didn’t matter where he was or where he was going; all he knew was that he could no longer stay there, in a place where the creature who had hurt him could be anywhere, at anytime. He knew that if the younger Malfoy found him, he might not manage to escape with his poor pitiful excuse for a life this time.

He fell, once and then twice, and then once more; the last time he fell resulted in him tumbling down a short hill, rolling head over feet in a rough mindless panic before finally landing at the bottom. He wheezed painfully by himself in the plush itchy grass, as he tried to get a hold over his wild untamed fear that was currently rushing madly through his body.

He took a breath and held it and then let it out, clapping his bruised and scraped hands over his mouth as he heard a wildly hysterical giggle pass through his lips. He was crying by the time he forced himself to stand, and bit down on a groan as he realized that he had twisted his right ankle in one of the three falls he had had since his wild exit from the castle.

He gripped his head and squeezed it, trying to mold his brain back together with just the strength of his frazzled will. Suddenly paranoid, he held his breath and listened to the darkness that was behind him. He heard nothing, but was still unwilling to use Hermione’s wand to light a lumos. Wait, did he even still have her wand?

He reached into his pockets and pulled out the miraculously intact wand, before shoving it back down where it had been and taking off in the direction of where he thought Hagrid’s house sat. Hell, maybe he could wander into the Forbidden Forest and be accidently killed by a centaur. That would really fit well into his life of late.

He giggled breathlessly to himself, still walking briskly in the near blinding darkness—it was cloudy that night—but moving onwards with infinitely more care this time.

…

As he walked, a terrifyingly horrible thought came to him and he fought against it for another few steps before the strength of his fear brought him crashing down to his knees. He held his stomach as he moaned piteously against the grass carpet under him.

What if Malfoy is out here wandering in the dark, same as me? What if I were to take another step forwards only to feel Draco’s clammy dead feeling fingers latch onto my neck?

They wouldn’t stay there, he knew. They would trail downwards, back under his robes to thrust themselves into his pants and –he choked against the fist that he had unknowingly wedged in his mouth.

What the hell was wrong with him? Harry had been brutalized by that man and he was fine compared to him. And Hermione, gods she was strong. She had managed to intimidate an already terrorized class and had practically forced them to switch loyalties over to her entirely.

And what kind of friend was he then; lying in the cold grass, his fist wedged so tightly in his mouth that he had begun tasting blood, afraid to take another step for fear of phantom hands. Merlin, he was pathetic. It didn’t seem to matter though; he could not convince himself to get up and go out back out into the dark on his own.

A flashback overtook him then, and he was forced to relive the feel of Draco’s cock as it forced its way inside of his unwilling body. And Draco’s hands, his hands had pulled Ron’s body back into the soft folds of his body, against his vile and warm flesh. How could he have taken note of such a hideous thing?

But the worst part was after Draco had come and pulled out, leaving a warm trickle of cum down the backside of his thigh. Draco had reached forwards and given his partially hard cock a brief and gentle caress, before putting himself to rights. Had Draco been proud of him? Or just admiring his cock? Or was he just being creepy?

He remembered that the boy had whispered to him softly and sibilantly the entire time. The sound of his voice over the backside of his shoulder had made his skin itch at the things the other boy had said.

“I can tell that you are enjoying having my dick up your pussy.” He had told him, more than once, but in different ways.

“I don’t think you really are a virgin. You’re far too good at milking me with your tight cunt, you fucking piece of arse.”

It had only gone downhill from there. The other boy had only stopped talking when he was biting or licking his backside with increasingly possessive sounds coming out of his throat, the more turned on he became. And Ron had just lay there and had been forced to take the ragged pain of being invaded and owned by the harshly panting sadistic perversion of a boy who had been standing proudly over him.

He could almost feel the cooling warmth of Draco’s cum against his legs once more and he unconsciously let loose a long pained moan. Although he wasn’t personally aware of it, in his fear he had lost control of his bowels, which was why he currently felt dampness pressing against his skin.

He was a crossroads of his existence. On one hand, he desperately wanted the protection of his family against the terrors that had railed against him; however, on the opposite side of that, he was terrified of hearing their reactions to what had happened to him in that hallway under the ministrations of Draco’s long heated tongue.

He’d gotten hard at Draco’s fucking touch!

He muffled another sob against his fist. Like Harry, Ron was too young to understand about autonomic physical responses. Had he talked to Hermione about what kinds of thoughts he was having, she could have explained it in a heartbeat; unfortunately though, she was in detention with Snape, Harry was in the infirmary, and he was out there by himself, alone.

He sobbed miserably to himself out in the darkness by himself, as he desperately tried to banish the cruel memories from his cortex. Alas, they were not to be gotten rid of quite as easily as all of that.

So he bit down on his hand once more and jerked as he felt his teeth touch some hidden pressure point that sent pain wailing through his entire arm. He cried out again, but did not feel shame for his weakness; rather, he felt justified for the punishment he was receiving.

…

After the class had left his Potions classroom, Snape remained standing in the same place as he continued to glare at the student who wreaked such havoc in such a short time upon his life therein.

“I am most displeased by the turn of events this afternoon,” he snarled out at the girl whom he had comforted less than a week ago.

“Really.” She stated calmly, looking at him as though he were just a fly on the wall.

“YES!” He growled towards her, taking several steps towards her smaller figure. He was therefore quite unprepared for what happened next.

She got up—without his permission—and took several defiant steps towards his towering form.

“You will sit back down now,” he growled harshly at her, his eyes lighting up dangerously. Any other student would have run backwards at the look on his face alone, but as she was quickly proving to him and the others who had been around her in classes that day, she was not just any student.

“How do you think it felt to walk in here and find Draco Malfoy just sitting there, licking his chops at me and pulling on his crotch?” She demanded from him shrilly and angrily.

“The matter was fully in my control!” He bit out just as angrily towards her, shoving a finger into the middle of his chest.

“Your fucking control is a joke to Slytherins!!!” She hysterically spat at him.

“20 points from Gryffindor for cursing at a professor,” he said icily, trying to regain some kind of control over the situation.

“Fuck your points!” She said, throwing herself at him to beat her small fists against his lean torso.

And suddenly just like that, the anger in the room dissipated, and he swiftly discovered that he had a young girl sobbing her heart out against the front of his robes.

He looked down, somewhat discomforted by the turn of events in the past ten minutes. Her hands were now fisted in his robes, as though she were hanging onto him for life, as though he was some kind of ugly excuse for a life vest.

“Ms. Granger?” He asked in what he was hoping came across as a gentle voice.

But she did not answer him, and continued sobbing desperately against him. Her cries were not just tears of frustration and anger, but rather they were tears of loss, tears of misery over what had transpired to make her break off from the person she had been.

Snape carefully backed up towards his desk, half-carrying, half-pulling the young and wildly distraught girl with him, until he had reached his desk. Once there, he sat down upon its surface, and with only a moment’s hesitation, bent over and pulled the girl up, so that she was resting sideways on his lap, her head on his shoulder. From there, he reached his arms around her and brought her in close next to his chest, feeling the tremors of her body continuing to move through her lithe young form.

And so they sat, completely silent save the sounds of her tapering off sobs.

…

Harry moaned as he began swimming back towards consciousness. He ached everywhere, inside and out, and personally wondered why the powers that be had thought it necessary for him to ever regain consciousness. The inky blackness surrounding his body and mind had been so very nice.

“There now,” he heard Pomfrey’s indistinct voice clucking beside him. “That’s the way.”

Regretfully, he opened his eyes to see her face bobbing next to him blurrily. Half-blindly, he reached for his glasses, only to have them pressed carefully into his hands.

After shoving them on his face, and realizing that Pomfrey was the only one in the near vicinity, he took an unobtrusive breath of relief.

“I haven’t told the headmaster, or Professor McGonagall,” Pomfrey said, seemingly reading his unvoiced thoughts.

“But Snape?” He croaked out at her, his throat very dry.

She poured and handed him a glass of water before answering.

He slowly drank it gratefully. In addition to clearing out the taste in his mouth and throat, its simple coolness seemed to help clear the leftover cobwebs left in his brain. He started as though someone had just slapped him, suddenly remembering the initial reason for passing out in the first place.

He reached delicately to the back of his head and felt a tender spot that no doubt had been a wide open gash mere—hours?—before.

“What day is it?” He asked uncertainly, putting his previous question on hold for a moment.

“It’s still Thursday,” she answered calmly and matter-of-factly.

“So, Snape?” He responded, feeling the need to prompt her into explaining that decidedly odd turn of events.

“Professor Snape,” she said, emphasizing the word with a sharp look at him, “carried you down here himself.”

He goggled openly with surprise at her. Madam Pomfrey was no fool; she knew, perhaps better than most—Dumbledore, he thought ruefully—how little he and the Hogwart’s Potion master got along.

“I suppose he waited until after class?” He asked fearfully, but resignedly willing to accept the truth.

“No, Mr. Potter, he did not.” She said, putting her hands on her hips and straightening her already impeccable posture to an obviously annoyed level of ramrod stiffness.

“He brought you in immediately after the incident in question, and then did not leave until he was certain of your prognosis,” she continued, sniffing daintily at him and his audacity.

He blinked owlishly at her before daring to peer under the standard hospital issued pajamas he was wearing.

“You are mostly healed,” she clucked exasperatedly at him. “But you would be completely healed if you had come in directly after acquiring them,” she said angrily, though her anger was not directed at him.

“As it is,” she crossed her arms in front of her, “you will have to spend the night.”

He looked up in terror at her calmly stated matter-of-fact words.

“I feel all right ma’am,” he said meekly, afraid of what might happen if he were to sleep in front of the dragon lady after the events of the past week. “Honest,” he added with less than a truthful look on his still pale face.

“Nonsense!” She huffed at him. “You are the patient, and as such, you have no right to be making decisions about your health while in my care.” She said, glaring reproachfully at him. “Especially,” she added, raising her eyebrows, “when your previous decisions about your own health have been so very poor!”

He winced at her words and shrunk back from her fury as though she were about to hit him.

Instantly, she felt her anger dissipate as she saw her charge reduce down to the cowering figure before her.

“Sorry ma’am,” he was mumbling, looking resolutely down at his trembling fingers, before balling them up and thrusting them under the sheets. “Sorry sorry sorry,” he rambled on, still somehow managing to shrink further into himself and the pillows behind him.

“Don’t worry about it dear,” she said gently, slowly laying an arm on the bedcovers beside him. She felt her gut twist as he continued to move his lips soundlessly, still staring downwards tensely, as though he expected to be struck at any moment.

“You are not in trouble,” she said, still speaking gently and calmly, in an effort to bring him back from whatever place he had automatically switched into at hearing her angry tone of voice directed at him.

She saw him quickly glance up at her from behind his bangs, before resuming the same pose.

“Harry,” she said, feeling the overwhelming need to put the poor child at ease, “I want you to feel safe here. You should know,” she said, smiling a bit up at him, “I can keep secrets even better than the headmaster.”

He glanced up at her and this time continued to hold her gaze.

Emboldened by his response, she continued on with her request.

“If there’s ever anything you need to tell me about,” she said, moving her hand to his too thin shoulder and feeling it tense for a moment before relaxing, “you can without worry of reprisal or punishment.” She patted him on the shoulder for her own comfort, as much as his. “This I can promise you with the whole of my being,” she said resolutely, finally taking her hand away.

Harry was dumbfounded, to say the least, at her turnaround in mood. For a few moments there, he had felt as though he were back at his uncle’s house, about to be roughly thrown into his cupboard.

He blinked and automatically tensed when she laid her hand on his shoulder, but soon relaxed as he realized that her touch did not hurt.

Maybe it’s a girl thing, he thought to himself. But then, that theory didn’t explain Aunt Petunia very well, now did it.

He could see that she meant the words that she was saying, but as Uncle Vernon had demonstrated, and then Lucius Malfoy had reemphasized, words meant absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. It was obvious enough to him that she thought she would be able to stand by her words of promise, but that didn’t mean that when the shit hit the fan, she would actually continue to hold up her side of the bargain.

And yet, the idea of trusting someone, while complete aberrant to his way of thought, was also strangely enticing. To think, he could put all of his troubles in someone else’s hands and trust them to do right by him; that was truly a heady thought, as well as a pleasant image to have pass through his mind. Unfortunately, an image was all it was; no one had ever done right by him, and he had the scars—mental and physical—to show for it. After all, look what he had gotten for trusting Lucius Malfoy’s fucking word! Hermione and Ron had been given over to his lying, cheating, sack of shit son!

No, he thought angrily, his eyes tearing up slightly as the emotions bubbled uncontrollably through his chest; trust was something best left to those who just don’t know any better. He bit his lip as he fought to regain control over himself.

Beside his bed, Madam Pomfrey sighed quietly to herself as she watched the boy’s face flit between emotional extremes before he resolutely clamped down on his bottom lip and stilled himself. Somewhere in his past, the boy had learned to fend for himself against a world whose purpose seemed only out to hurt him.

She feared that Minerva had been right about the Muggles he had been sent to live with as a wee little one.

Sensing that their conversation was done with, she went ahead and told him that she wanted his cooperation for the remaining time he was to spend there. Moreover, she wanted him to eat a good dinner and then shortly thereafter take some dreamless sleep to ensure his rest.

Surprisingly, he did not argue with her on any of her demands. She sighed quietly once more before getting his supper; the least that she could do for Lily’s son was to make sure he went to sleep with his belly full and his immediate needs met. After that, it was anyone’s guess.

…

“How can you stand to touch me?” Hermione asked him quietly after her sobs had quieted somewhat.

“Pardon?” Snape asked, somewhat befuddled by the question she had sprung on him in the midst of one of the stranger evenings of his life. There he sat on the edge of his desk, Ms. Granger’s head seemingly welded to the front of his—damp—robes, while his own arms were draped protectively around her back. It was a potentially odd situation for anyone, really, given Granger’s generally resolute nature.

“How can you stand to touch me?” She asked, repeating her previous inquiry. “I’m so disgusting and dirty.” She continued before pressing her face more firmly into the crook of his shoulder.

He could feel her body trembling as she waited for his reply.

Now would be a really good time not to eff things up, Severus, he thought determinedly to himself, as he looked down at the petite feminine form in his lap.

“Draco is the one who is filthy, dear child,” he said in a surprisingly gentle voice. “His actions against you didn’t transfer that inherent slime to you.” He said, lifting her damp cheek off of his chest, so that she would be forced to look into his eyes and see the truth there.

“He hurt me,” she whispered simply, sounding to him like a much younger child. She spoke her truth plaintively, steadily looking up at him even though he had removed his fingers from her milk-white cheek.

“You are infinitely correct, and I am very regretful over the sadistic actions he performed against you.” As he spoke, his eyes narrowed dangerously, as he venomously railed against the pain that the boy had caused the innocent creature in his arms.

“And yet, I am no child,” she said, speaking with a bitterness he had not been expecting. “He took that, and he didn’t even give a damn about it. He just laughed and—and–,” she gasped, breaking off as sobs ricocheted through her thin body once more.

“Child,” he said sadly. He kissed her gently on her forehead, just the way that he had done after speaking with her the following weekend.

She surprised him once again when she reached out a shaking finger and traced the tip over his lips.

“You stopped there last time, but then, like this time, you could have continued.” She said, looking inquisitively up at him. “Why did you stop?” She asked, seemingly unaware of the reaction his body was having in response to her simple question.

“You are much too young and far too vulnerable for such a thing.” He said sternly. “No one should have to endure just an experience, yet people, males and females are forced to do so every day.” He said, looking at her carefully.

“I would be no better than a monster like them if I had done, or ever did, such a thing as you have requested.” He knew that he did not have to explain what he had meant by them.

“I just want to feel safe again,” she said, her voice breaking a bit at voicing her fear to a man not known for his kindness or his tenderness towards the feelings of others.

He nodded. He knew all too well what it was like to feel in such a way. But no, he would not allow himself to dwell on his dismal past.

“You should straighten your robes and leave.” He said formally to her, but not harshly.

She nodded obediently, understanding that his dismissal was not against her.

“Get,” he said, though not unkindly, and pointed at the door with his wand as he removed the privacy wards that he had quietly cast earlier.

“Sir, what about the classroom?” She said, demonstrating at the mess that was still left from the end of that day’s disastrous class.

Looking around, he muttered something unintelligible, and simultaneously waved his wand. She watched in amazement as he instantly vanished away the entire mess before her eyes.

“I wish I could do that,” she said, her eyes bright with usefulness of the magic he had just used.

“I will teach you,” he stated calmly to her, pleased to note her newly grinning countenance at his words.

“Oh would you sir!?!” She said, feeling her joy bubbling over at his offer.

“Yes,” he said smirking, “but only if you leave now.” This he said to her with an upturned eyebrow. “And only,” he said, adding another condition, “if you leave in a proper manner.”

“Tired and weary?” She brightly quipped.

“Very,” he said, schooling his features into the stern and dark professor once more.

“Yes sir,” she answered, trying to sound meek.

She got another upturned eyebrow for her tone of voice.

“That will do for tonight Granger,” he said, sounding weary as well, as though the chore of dealing with wayward Gryffindors had slowly sapped every ounce of his energy for the day.

A Means of Survival – Chapter 07 – Snape is Amused