𝙳𝙴𝙻𝙾𝙲𝙰𝙿𝙾𝙽𝚄𝙼 » 𝚂𝚂/𝚁𝙻

𝚇𝚇𝚇𝙸𝚅 >> 𝙰𝙽𝙳 𝙾𝙽𝚆𝙰𝚁𝙳

< 3 MONTHS, 5 DAYS >

A tall door is ground open, eyes bulging out through the gaps like sidling animals. Severus stands outside, peering in. It is Minerva's gaze he recognizes introductorily, and she speaks to him from the other side.

"I require your full name, your date of birth, and a description of our most recent conversation," she says sternly, as if pretending that he is a false version of himself, or that she knows him not at all.

He regards her with a nod. "Severus Tobias Snape. Ninth January, 1960. This morning we met in the Great Hall, both of us getting coffee, and you asked me how I had noticed our students acting recently regarding their insecurity and neoteric events. We then exchanged observations and returned to our respective offices."

McGonagall sighs and nods, stepping back and letting the door fall open just enough for Snape to enter into the meeting room. The door is closed and locked once again, and Minerva beckons Severus to sit in a procurable seat at a long table. Light and shadow touch one another across it, stenciling the window nearest them on the cold stone wall. It reflects on McGonagall's aging features like moonlight, foregrounding her skin's deepening corrugations, but she is still beautiful this way. This soft, weathering elegance reminds Snape of his mother, and he looks away.

"We are only waiting for Filius," Minerva says as everyone else gives Severus a welcoming nod. He takes a seat, noticing Albus regarding him with a solid stare. He comes to terms now with the fact that he has not seen Dumbledore in quite a long period of time, and also that he still has not given any thought to his request for spy-work, or whatever of the like he has decided to denominate it. He decides to omit both of these things (mainly the latter. He does not want to consider the idea any more than he has already) from his thoughts. He's too tired today. And every day.

"Severus," Dumbledore says, "I am interested in your answer to Minerva regarding your students. While we have time, what is it you both have been noticing in your students' behavior?"

Snape looks coldly back. "Must we discuss this now when I have already done so only hours ago?" he asks rhetorically.

Dumbledore pauses. "Well, that would be ideal."

"Are you asking because you want to compare notes, Albus, or because you have become less and less present to the point of which you have not noticed anything yourself?" Snape accuses sternly, realizing abruptly his resentment for the man that he was unaware that he has been harboring. Even as it hits him, he does not know why he is irascible like this. Perhaps everything at once, the whole world coming down around him, Dumbledore's expression as he serenely sits in his high-paying, undefiled seat of welfare. Perhaps that is it, and if it is, Snape rules that he has the full right to dispute and challenge it.

"Both, Severus, I admit, are fully possible," Albus decides carefully, analyzing Snape's expression and trying to make just as much sense of it as he is himself. "It is true that I have not been very contactable for any of you as of late. I have seldom left my office or taken care of much business aside from planning to protect our schoolchildren. It is fair to note that I have not been interacting with them as much as I would like to."

Minerva jumps into the conversation, making an attempt to lessen the strain between the two of them. "I will say, Albus, that I have noticed heightened hyperactivity in my students. I have been less harsh on them, but I still do not accept this disruptive behavior. I have given many detentions, as have other professors. Each time I hold a detention after class, I receive almost twice as many students from other professors than I used to receive before the worsening of our situation."