A Single Moment

Harry removed the magical locks on the closet and opened the door. As always, he scowled at the unconscious form of his former professor; no matter what happened, Harry would never forgive the man for murdering Dumbledore right in front of him.

Harry Levitated Snape out of the closet, and left him floating in the middle of the room; then he nodded to Ginny, who pulled open the door to the basement. “It’s okay now,” Ginny said, and stepped aside to admit Pansy, who’d been waiting outside so she wouldn’t hear the unlocking charms.

“Are you sure about this?” Harry asked again. “Snape’s-”

“Snape is a Slytherin,” Pansy interrupted. “Which means he’s cunning, crafty and manipulative. And he’s better at it than me, don’t think I don’t know. But I just don’t know anything about the Death Eaters; if any of the Slytherin students truly knew anything, they weren’t talking about it, and no wonder. If you really want information on the Dark Lord’s followers, Prof- I mean, Snape is your best bet.” She grimaced. “I can’t say I’m looking forward to this, but the worst he can do is speak cruelly. I’ve heard enough of that to be…hmm, desensitized.”

“We could stay if you’d like, under the Invisibility Cloak…” Ginny suggested tentatively.

Pansy shook her head. “He would know you’re here. He’d sense it in what I said, or he’d hear your breathing, but he’d know. Anyway, you said Finch-Fletchley and Bell are using the cloak to guard Neville right now; that’s more important.”

Harry and Ginny clearly both had opinions about that, but neither commented. “All right,” Harry said, walking back over to Ginny. “We’re going to start looking into some of what you told us about the other Slytherin students; we’ll be in the conference room when you’re done. Remember, we specifically need to know what Death Eaters we could bribe or blackmail into feeding us information, or if, Merlin forbid, there’s someone we could appeal to the morality of.” Pansy snorted, and Harry shrugged. “I know it’s a long shot, but…well, having inside information could easily make the difference.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Pansy said wryly, turning back to look at Snape. “What do I do when I’m done?”

“Just Stupefy him and put him back,” Harry said. “The magical locks will reactivate by themselves.” He followed Ginny into the stairwell. “Good luck,” he said sincerely, and shut the door behind him.

Pansy stared at her former Head of House for a long time. She’d heard all the rumors that went through Slytherin during her six years there; most of them were clearly overly imaginative first-years’ reactions to Snape’s behavior, like how he could turn into a bat or that he was a vampire. Pansy, however, was only concerned with one particular rumor; that Snape, rather than being a loyal follower of the Dark Lord as was widely accepted, was actually in Dumbledore's pocket. Or, of course, there was the counter-rumor that Snape had Dumbledore completely fooled and had remained loyal to the Dark Lord always.

His murder of Dumbledore certainly supported the second theory, but Pansy suspected there was more to it than either story touched on; there always was when it came to Severus Snape. The first thing she had noticed when he’d addressed the new students her First Year was that Snape was far too intelligent to do anything without considering every angle and deciding which route would benefit himself the most. His personal biases aside, Severus Snape was a man for whom convictions, politics and morals turned to dust and a fleeting thought when a more fruitful path presented itself. It was possible, of course, that Dumbledore’s dedication to the Light had shamed and then inspired Snape; extremely unlikely, but possible. Pansy wondered briefly what the man had seen in the Dark Lord’s path that appealed to him so greatly, but dismissed the speculation from her mind as pointless. She spent several minutes weighing her options and schooling her thoughts, preparing her plan of attack; then she raised her wand, took a deep breath, and said “Enervate.”

Snape’s eyes fluttered open, and he slowly raised his head. He focused on Pansy, and for the first time in Pansy’s recollection he looked truly nonplussed. “Parkinson?” he said incredulously.

“Hello, Sir,” Pansy replied, carefully giving him the respect of a title while not bestowing the honorific of ‘Professor’.

Snape’s mind was clearly moving quickly, and he responded with a slightly sad shake of his head. “I am tragically disappointed in you.”

Pansy raised her eyebrow elegantly; she’d been expecting him to say that. He clearly had guessed instantly that Pansy had chosen to side with Harry Potter and his friends. “I’m hardly ashamed of my choices; for what it’s worth, I am sorry to have disappointed you. But passing judgment on me is no longer a claim you have any right to, I’m afraid.”

Snape’s eyes widened; Pansy was being quite careful to show respect and independence both. “Perhaps not,” he accepted after a moment. “You of all Slytherins seemed to grasp my lesson about choice and take it to heart, even from your beginning at Hogwarts. My right to ‘pass judgment’ on you faded long ago, I admit.”

Pansy bowed slightly, never taking her eyes off of Snape’s, accepting the compliment. “What I remembered most clearly through my time at Hogwarts was your final admonition to us; Choices are made with the intellect – never the heart. The intellect will choose what is best; the heart will choose its own desire.” She dropped her eyes slightly. “I fear that the one time I forgot that lesson was when it would have been most important.”

“Draco,” Snape stated with a slight sigh. Pansy nodded, mildly surprised; she hadn’t realized her intentions toward Draco were known to Snape. “His own choices were considerably less thought out than he was capable of,” Snape continued, his voice making it clear he was also disappointed in Draco; Pansy had to fight down the urge to lose control and beg Snape to tell her where to find him. Snape considered her again. “I would have thought choosing Draco would have led you down a very different path,” he pointed out.

“I’m not a killer,” Pansy said, slightly more forcefully than she’d intended. “Neither is Draco, as I know you knew.” Snape nodded in acknowledgment. “For a…different path, that would not have been acceptable. I’ve chosen to live for Draco, not to die for him.”

“To live for Draco,” Snape repeated with a curl of his lip, and Pansy inwardly cursed herself for choosing her phrasing so poorly. “Such passion,” he sneered, spitting the word.

“Passion is for the bedroom,” Pansy countered shortly. “Survival is for the Slytherin. Or so I’d thought; many Slytherins of my parents’ generation seemed to find servitude and dispossession more appealing.”

“Draco chose to seek glory,” Snape said, looking as though something foul had passed under his nose. “As though he were nothing more than a Gryffindor.” He looked down on Pansy. “A Gryffindor’s path is rarely ever a Slytherin’s.”

“As much as it did surprise me, a Gryffindor is capable of putting survival before glory,” Pansy said, thankful they’d returned to the subject she wished to touch on. “Here in-” she paused, feeling the effects of the Fidelius Charm preventing her from saying the name of the House of Black. “-this house,” she continued smoothly, “everything has been set aside in favor of survival.”

“And survival in this house is a possibility?” Snape asked skeptically.

“I believe it is,” Pansy replied instantly. “I would not have come here otherwise, not even for Draco. I must survive first, before I can look to his options.”

Snape considered her words for a long moment before nodding. “Then perhaps you made the correct choice after all. You have chosen Draco; you have not allowed him to choose you.”

Have I chosen? Pansy thought, and then wondered where the thought had come from. She was deeply thrilled to have received that compliment, although she took pains not to show it. “Perhaps we should speak of where your path has led you,” she said carefully.

“Tied up, Stunned and locked in a basement closet,” Snape retorted sourly. “Your choices would seem to have been better than mine.”

Pansy smiled slightly in sympathy. “I should probably state now that there is nothing I can do to aid you in that – other than speaking to Potter on your behalf, which I’m sure you are aware won’t count for much.”

“Of course,” Snape agreed bitterly. “Potter no doubt has many preparations waiting should you attempt to free me.”

Pansy chose not to correct Snape on that; Harry really didn’t have much of anything, another Gryffindor oversight she’d have to mention. “I’m sure you’ve also figured out that Potter didn’t just agree to let me have a chat with you.”

“Again, very obvious,” Snape acknowledged with another sneer. “Potter and subtlety shall never meet each other in daylight.” Pansy smirked, and Snape sighed long-sufferingly. “What did he ask for?”

Pansy had expected it to take longer to get here, but she answered readily enough; “Names,” she stated. “Who can be bribed or blackmailed, and with what.”

Snape smirked. “Potter, blackmail? Will wonders never cease?”

Pansy hesitated, not entirely sure she should reveal what she was about to, but finally spoke; “Potter placed a secrecy geas on me – or rather, Granger did at Potter’s direction. If I try to speak to anyone about his actions or whereabouts without his permission, it will kill me.”

It wasn’t the literal truth since the geas had been lifted, but it have been true once. Snape looked truly shocked; “Kill you? Surely Potter-”

“It was his idea,” Pansy confirmed. “They questioned me under Veritaserum to ensure I wasn’t a plant from the Dark Lord-”

“I am surprised he thought of that much,” Snape muttered.

“-and then said I had to accept the geas or they’d remove the memories of meeting with them and Obliviate me.” She shrugged. “I believe they’d have done it, too.”

Snape’s face darkened at her description, but quickly slid back into his impassive mask. “More dark than I would have given Potter credit for. Of course he did attempt to torture me, weak and clueless though it was. It seems I’ve underestimated his capacity for necessity.”

“He would call it ruthlessness,” Pansy said, and they shared a silent exchange that said clearly what they both thought of so-called ‘ruthlessness’. “Well, shall I go back to Potter and tell him I was unable to coax anything from you?” she said lightly.

Snape thought about her question. “You will of course have realized that the Dark Lord has placed restrictions upon me,” He said, and Pansy nodded. “I cannot give up much, but there is one thing…”

“Yes?”

“I’d best give it to you, rather than tell you,” Snape said reluctantly. “Potter would never believe anything less than a memory; not from me, and certainly not about this man.”

Pansy’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You want me to take your memory?”

“No,” Snape answered darkly. “I recognize the necessity. And it is ‘memories’ – three of them.” He leaned his head down, and after a moment Pansy shook off her shock and retrieved three jars with stoppers from the shelf nearby. “And Parkinson?” Snape said as she raised her wand to extract the first memory.

“Yes?”

“Make certain these memories are returned to me,” Snape demanded, his eyes flaring like a phoenix.