Summary: AU. Instead of dying, Severus' soul is sent to a place he thought impossible - into the body of himself in another world. It's a world free of Dark Lords and debts to Dumbledore, but it bears a catch: no magic. SSHP slash.
Rating: PG-15
Pairing: SS/HP (main); mentions of past SS/LE, HP/GW, and JP/LE
Warnings: swearing, slash, non-magic, brief mention of past abuse
Disclaimer: I only wish this universe belonged to me.

Author's note: I mean this to be a one-shot in four or five parts - short, probably under 20,000 words (if it even reaches that). I deal with a concept that is unoriginal - the non-magic AU. The difference in this one is that Severus can still use magic even though the others cannot; that is very important to the plot. You'll notice that Severus seems frazzled in the beginning of this and not at all his usual subtle, prudent self; he ends up revealing more information than he normally would. That I chalk up to the fact that only five minutes before his arrival here, he nearly died. And to the fact that he's in another universe. That might unsettle anyone. He'll go back to normal, I promise!! If you can wait it out then you'll hopefully be all the more satisfied when he regains his subtlety.

I also hope things don't move too quickly in this. Because it's a one-shot (or a four/five-shot, rather) it will of course have a faster pace than many multi-chaptered fics out there. But if you find that their relationship is actually moving unbelievably fast, just drop me a line in a review and I'll try to slow things down a bit and heighten the snark. I want them to remain in character as much as possible.

Harry's character will be very different than it is in the books, due to the fact that he was raised primarily by Lily and then the Dursleys. He will be calmer and less impulsive. I hope that isn't too infuriating either. It too is imperative to the plot that he be calmer. He loses some of his cool along the way too, though, rest assured.

After that long-winded extravaganza I've probably lost about half of my readers. Oh well! On with the fic!

-o-O-o-O-o-O-o-

A Lesson in Patience
Part I

-o-O-o-O-o-O-o-

He wasn't sure what had happened - one minute he remembered dying in the Shrieking Shack, asking to see Lily's eyes one last time, and the next he was here, staring into those same startling green orbs as he lay on the ground of what should have been the Quidditch pitch but very clearly wasn't: there were no goal posts, but rather large, deep nets that stretched across poles a metre and a half apart. The green, too, was pock-marked and ill-kept, with bits of grass torn up as though many bodies wearing spiked shoes had run its length and width many times before.

Severus swallowed and looked up into the face that held those unforgettable eyes: messy hair, glasses - unmistakeably Harry Potter. Only he wasn't sneering; he looked merely concerned. And he wasn't bloodied and sweat-streaked from battle.

The boy frowned, looking Severus up and down. "Sir, are you all right?" he asked.

"Of course I'm all right, Potter. Help me up," he snapped. As Potter did so, he added, "Is the Dark Lord neutralised?"

Potter stilled. "Come again?" he said slowly.

"The Dark Lord!" Severus barked. Merlin, there wasn't time for such foolishness! "Has he been eradicated? Snuffed out? Brought down? Killed, Potter. Have you killed him yet?"

Potter drew back hesitantly, face closing off. "I haven't...killed...anyone," he said in that same soft, slow voice. "What are you talking about?"

He was studying Severus very meticulously, but with an air of detachment as well. Severus recognised that look: it was the same one Lily wore when they had partnered together in Potions all those years ago. Whenever something did not go quite right with their work, her eyes narrowed just so and her postured straightened just like that and her head tilted ever so slightly to the side as she studied the flawed attempt before her and endeavoured to reason out what had gone south and when.

Severus did not know this Harry Potter. This Harry Potter was too much like his mother. And there was no scar upon his forehead. And, Merlin forbid, he was wearing a collared shirt, grey sweater-vest, black slacks and Birkenstock sandals. How had he missed this before?

"What in Merlin's blue blazes are you wearing, Potter?" Severus spat. "You look like the poster child for Muggle nancy boy boarding schools."

"Sir," the boy said calmly, "I think we should get you inside. Whatever it is that made you faint has clearly affected your mental faculties as well."

"I didn't faint," Severus snarled. "I do not faint!"

Potter's eyes widened a fraction. "Sir, I really do think - "

"No, you don't," Severus muttered darkly. "That's precisely your problem, Potter - you haven't the brain capacity to think, and so instead you run your mouth off incessantly which hardly gives us beings of higher intelligence any time in which to think."

Which was exactly what Severus needed to do. Think, think! Where was he? What was this place? The structures - the Gothic architecture - the greenery - it all seemed familiar, but other things, other very key important details, were not. Potter was not. His lack of scar was not. His clothing was not, his facial expressions were not - bloody hell, even his sodding glasses were not! Where were the horrid round frames that had always made the boy look like a bug? When had he replaced them?

Potter's lips twisted into a frown. Severus recognised that look too: it was the same one Lily wore when she told him to stop hanging out with people like Nott and Avery. Disappointment, confusion, frustration, and annoyance. "Really, sir," Potter said, shaking his head, "there's absolutely no need to be rude."

"Stop doing that!" Severus snapped.

Potter looked very perplexed. "What?" he asked. "Sir, I haven't done anything but ask if you were all right - which you most obviously are not - and then I - "

"No, you idiot!" Severus yelled. "Being all calm and respectful! Behaving like your mother! Stop it, it isn't right!"

Potter was clearly at a loss. "Well...how shall I act, then, sir?" he asked dubiously.

"Loud, obnoxious. Arrogant, like your father." Severus was at wit's end. "We haven't time for this, Potter," he said suddenly. "I need to know where I am immediately."

"You're at Hogwarts' School of Refinery, obviously - "

"Obviously, nothing, you insolent - " and then the words sunk in. Severus stopped dead in his tracks. "Hogwarts' School of Refinery, you say," he repeated shakily.

Potter nodded. "Yes, sir. Most prestigious boarding school in Scotland, and one of the best in all of the UK. People come from all over to attend. You - " he swallowed suddenly and then smiled, as if at the ridiculousness of the situation. "Sir, you teach here."

"What do I teach?" Severus hissed, grabbing Potter by the front of his stupid heather-grey sweater vest.

Potter winced. "Sciences, sir!"

"That does not narrow it down," Severus ground out, shaking Potter a bit. "Honestly, you idiotic child, how in the world are we to get anywhere if you do not give me specifics?"

"Sir!" Potter said, sounding uncomfortable. "Let me go, please?"

"What?" Severus blinked."Oh." He shoved Potter away. "Better?" he sneered.

"Thanks," Potter said with a frown. "I didn't give you any specifics, sir, because...well..." he looked a bit helpless, "because actually, you teach a lot of different ones. Physics, chemistry, and biology as the generals, but then you teach a couple advanced and concentration classes in Biochemistry and Psychopharmacology."

"How do you know all this? Are you a student here?" Severus' head was spinning. "You look too old to be seventeen." His lips curled nastily. "Were you held back a few years? I always knew you were too obtuse to graduate on your own merits. I could have sworn that Miss Granger was dragging you through by the skin of your teeth - "

Potter had a very tight expression on his face, as though he'd stopped himself mid-glower. "Sir," he said in as polite a tone as he could manage, "I am here because I am you T.A.!"

"My what?" Severus snapped, lurching forward.

Potter wisely anticipated this and took a step back. "Your T.A.! Your teaching assistant, sir! I run lab courses for you, I grade papers, I help you come up with lab assignments; I lecture in your stead when you cannot make it! I keep your notes in order, and I have my own lab sections but they are ultimately a part of your class!"

"My...teaching...assistant..." Severus repeated, brain moving too quickly. "How old are you?"

"Twenty-two, sir," Potter said, seeming to relax a fraction. "Just graduated from University of London last year, with a double major in Education and Physics."

Ah, a Muggle, then. This was all beginning to make sense - the mannerisms, the garb...and yet, it certainly complicated things to a degree higher than Severus had initially anticipated. If Severus had been more himself, a little less shaken by the fact that only moments before he'd been in the Dark Lord's presence and about to be devoured by a large, poisonous snake, he might have had the presence of mind to belt up and stop revealing how little he knew. One quick glance at the boy was all he needed to determine that as much as Potter wasn't Severus' Potter, Severus wasn't Potter's Severus at all.

Severus sneered, almost to himself. "Not chemistry, then? Of course not. I am not surprised. You never were all that good with chemicals, were you," he said nastily. "Didn't have the patience or the appreciation for subtlety, as I recall."

Potter exhaled quietly. "No, I remember you telling me I was a terror in the Chem lab. I'm sorry you had to deal with that."

"That makes two of us," Severus said grimly. "And yet you still plague me with your presence. Why may I never be rid of you?"

"Well...because you asked me back, sir," Potter said softly. "I was your best Physics student and we got on really well. When you offered I was smart enough to take you up on it."

"We...'got on'...'really well'..." Severus repeated faintly. "Oh, Merlin. We 'got on really well.'"

Potter was gazing at him strangely again. "Well, yeah. I mean, I know we had our differences in the beginning - "

"Differences?!" Severus barked, "We despise each other!"

" - but we worked through them by the time I was in my third year and you've been lending me a hand ever since," Potter went on as if he hadn't heard. He looked shaken and pale, and for a second - only a second - Severus almost felt sorry for the boy. "Sir," Potter after a pause, "You really don't remember any of this, do you."

Severus realised several things then. Several important things. The first was that he was scaring the boy, and for the first time in perhaps ever, it brought Severus only a sliver of satisfaction. A distressed Potter, in his experience, was a useless Potter; Severus would do well to keep the boy - er, young man - as calm as possible.

The second thing Severus realised was that he had very few choices. He could play the amnesia tactic, but things may grow to be unnecessarily complicated as time wore on and his memories did not return, or when he remembered certain details (like names and places and his way around the school) but not others (such as the fact that he was apparently the teacher of five incredibly complicated Muggle sciences and had actually grown fond of James Potter's infuriating son).

He could also go the Gryffindor route and foolishly confess his being from another plane of existence: one where magic was prevalent and up until what felt, to Severus, like five minutes ago, a Dark Lord and his henchmen had been storming this very castle and the surrounding village of Hogsmeade. But this approach was rather foolish as well: Severus had garnered very little information regarding Potter's character, merely his relationship with Severus. He had no idea how the young man (who was obviously raised Muggle) would react to being told about magic wands and flying broomsticks and creatures that were not quite human.

Even if Severus could prove it to Potter - and he could; he felt the familiar comforting presence of his wand, somehow carefully placed up the sleeve of this ridiculous collared-shirted, tweed-suit-jacketed, khaki-dress-trousered, Remus-Lupin-like monstrosity - there was nothing to say that the young man would not panic and report Severus to the Muggle authorities.

And so Severus came to the final thought: he was out of ideas. Completely reliant on Potter, in a world he knew nothing about save what little he'd managed to glean from a few minutes' conversation with the young man. Which really wasn't very much.

Merlin save him. How had he gotten into this position?

"Sir," Potter said again, "Maybe you should go home, take the rest of the afternoon off."

That was an idea. If left to his own devices in the chambers of this world's Severus Snape, Severus could likely find out what he needed to know. Perhaps the man kept an address book or rolodex, or (Merlin forbid) a journal. And he was sure to have volume upon volume of subjects pertaining to his classes...Potter had said he kept the man's notes for him, but maybe Severus prudently held onto some of the more delicate ones himself; it sounded like something Severus would do. Muggle professors had to get their Doctorate of Sciences before they were permitted to teach at an accredited secondary or university, were they not? Perhaps Severus had a copy of his thesis (or multiple theses; who knew?) lying around.

The snag in that plan came, however, in Potter's next words:

"Um, sir, where are you going? Hogsmeade station is this way."

"Yes, Potter," Severus sneered, "The castle is this way." Then he paused suspiciously. "Why are we not going to the castle? Why are we going to Hogsmeade station?"

Potter looked uncomfortable. "You take the train home everyday. Sir."

He took the train home everyday. He took the train home everyday! Where did he live?

As if sensing his confusion, Potter said very awkwardly, "The on-campus teacher housing is just for...visiting professors. You know, international professors just here for the semester...or the year or...I mean...most everyone else lives off-site, with their...families...or whatever..."

Severus was silent.

"Well, it's like uni, isn't it. Professors only live there if they've nowhere else to go..." Potter finally looked at a loss. "I'm sorry, sir. That you can't - " he cleared his throat - "that you've temporarily taken leave of your memories. It's...um. It's most unfortunate."

"Yes," was all Severus said, because now they were facing a larger problem: he had no idea where to go. "Perhaps you could direct me to the office?" he added nastily.

"So you can get your keys and check your driver's license to see if maybe that solves anything?" Potter hazarded.

Perceptive boy. But Severus would never admit that. He gave a non-committal grunt. "Well, hurry along, you dunderhead," he snapped. "I haven't got all day."

Potter snapped to attention, and together they made their way back to the dungeons in complete silence.

-o-O-o-O-o-O-o-

The train ride was bumpy and rather unpleasant; Potter was with him all the way, too, as infuriating as can be. More infuriating still, the blasted kid had his bicycle with him. When Severus had pointed out that it was quite a far distance for Potter to be riding back and forth everyday ("How far did you say? Twenty kilometres? Twice a day? Merlin, Potter, have you a death wise?") Potter's response had been that he liked the exercise, and besides, twenty kilometres was "only about 12.6 miles; well, 12.56 to be exact."

To which Severus had snarled, "I know metric conversions, you idiot! I know derived and standard and international units! I'm a bloody Po-- chemistry and physics professor!"

There was more silence after that, only to be broken when Potter said, "Our stop is coming up next."

"Our stop?" Severus repeated faintly. "Merlin help me. You cannot tell me you live down the way from me."

Potter, who was clearly tiring of the Potions Master's surliness but trying his very hardest not to let on, gave a tight smile and said, "I have since I came back to assistant teach, sir. It was a funny coincidence, really, but I assure you - a coincidence only."

"Hmm."

They got off the train and Potter starting walking in one direction while saying simultaneous, "Your house is over there." He gestured vaguely. "Number Nine." Then he paused, as though struck by a crisis of conscience and finally losing the war against it rather spectacularly. With an irritated shake of his head, he grabbed a piece of loose leaf and a biro from his shoulder bag and scribbled something on it quickly then thrust it at Severus before he could change his mind.

"What's this?" Severus said nastily, staring down at the numbers in front of him. But he knew very well what it was. Tobias Snape had been a Muggle, after all; Severus was no stranger to the Muggle world.

Potter had an awful sort of look on his face. "My phone number, sir. It's my phone number. Since you've probably forgotten it. In case..." he looked pained to say it, "In case you run into a spot of bother and need some assistance."

And with that he was off, ungainly bicycle and all, and Severus was alone again with no idea what to do.

As much as Severus was loathe to admit it, Potter was his only link to this strange world. If he and Potter truly were as close as Potter suggested - had moved past the animosity and were working together as teacher and assistant - then Severus would be relying on the boy rather heavily until he figured out what in the hell was going on.

Severus sighed as he made his way through this strange house. The first thing he thought to himself was that it was rather small; a more politically correct term, he supposed, would be "quaint," but Severus placed little stake in political correctness unless he was dealing with the Dark Lord or the Headmaster - two wizards with whom prudence and subtlety were higher recommended. The Dark Lord's followers, too, required a certain degree of delicacy in each exchange.

With everyone else - children especially - Severus recommended bluntness. And insults. Plenty of really cutting, debilitating insults. There was little else he figured they would understand.

Severus made his way into what must have been the study and took a look around. Just as he had suspected, there were volumes upon volumes on the shelves - Advanced Mathematics and Statistics; Astrophysics; Quantum Mechanics; Biochemistry and the Atomic Element; Electricity. More texts than Severus had seen in a long time, for there were more here than even in his private study back home. And all on subjects about which Severus knew virtually nothing.

And he was supposed to teach all this? Oh, Merlin.

He sat down at the desk - mahogany, he noted appraisingly - and began opening and closing the drawers, hoping against hope that he would find a lesson plan, some notes on a reading, or better yet, his bloody dissertation. He found very little in the way of all that, however; he found a few stray lab reports and physics problem sets, but they were all. Each had clearly been marked down due to the fact that the student had initially forgotten to write his or her name at the top. How peculiar! Instead of just giving the work a zero as Severus would have done in his Potions class, this Doppelganger Snape had simply docked them 10 and recollected the assignments once they'd been rightfully claimed.

Severus sneered lightly at this. Docking points in lieu of doling out zeros? Befriending Harry Potter? He was beginning to think the Severus Snape of this world was very soft.

Then he discovered something strange. The top drawer was locked. Severus frowned at this; what would he think so important as to keep under lock and key? Severus tried to think of what he himself would keep locked up: pictures of Lily from when they kids, perhaps. Or nefarious plans to carry out his dreams of poisoning the headmaster. He admired Albus Dumbledore immensely, really, but he was kidding himself beyond belief if he claimed not to occasionally wish harm upon the man...

Or perhaps it would be filled with damning photographs he intended to use for blackmail. Or very important notes, perhaps, for a book or journal he meant to publish.

All Severus knew was that whatever this Other Universe Severus kept locked within that drawer held more information about him than Severus could ever gather from the volumes on his shelves or the class notes Potter allegedly kept for him in his shoulder bag.

Severus grabbed his key ring and started trying out the different keys - and Merlin, there were a lot of different keys. He was about to grab his wand and just blast the thing when he finally found the right one and got the bloody drawer open. The contents of the very secret drawer now unearthed, Severus found among them no top secret plans of world domination; nor did he find any incriminating photographs or very private diaries.

What he found was far more interesting (and terrifying) than all of those items combined: the drawer was filled to bursting with old, already opened envelopes, each thick and containing several folded sheets of loose leaf paper that looked nothing like the typed lab reports and neatly-written problem sets. He pulled them out and felt his blood run cold. Each and every one was addressed to him in the same familiar handwriting he'd spent years damning as he annihilated one horrific Potions essay after another.

And each envelope had one of two return addresses: a certain mailbox at the University of London or that of a flat in London's East End.

These were four years' worth of letters from Harry Potter.

These letters would certainly give Severus a better feel for his relationship with the boy. And after all, it wasn't really snooping if it was Severus' own mail, right? Of course right.

Well, Severus thought to himself wryly as he picked up the envelope at the very back of the drawer (postmarked 27th August 1998), I might as well begin at the beginning.

-o-O-o-O-o-O-o-

AN: Hope to see you in Part II! Tell me if you think it's worth continuing, or even if you think it's total crap!