Summary: Harry's turned into a baby, now the Potions Master is stuck having to take care of him, but now things are different. The scar is gone, and Harry can't be returned to his family, so he's left in Snape's care.... question is, will they actually SURVIVE the experience?

Disclaimers: Any name, potion, or whatever, you recognize, doesn't belong to me. I borrowed them from Rowling, though she has yet to discover this. Michael is all mine though.

Child of Mine

Chapter 1:

Complications

"Now, as you are fifth years, though I myself am still amazed some of you ever made it this far," Snape's eyes traveled over to Neville, Harry, and Ron, then went to the others as he continued, "You shall be learning more of the advanced potions. Your first day here I told you there were ways to stop death, but there are also ways to youthen yourself, to see that you don't age, although most of these are extremely temporary. The ingredients to this potion are rare, and one of the prime ingredients only blooms at certain times of the year, and if you do not find them yourselves, cost a king's sum to buy.

"Now you will be put off into pairs, and you all better get this right the first time, or you will receive failing marks. There is no second chance in recreating this potion... that would waste the components, and if you're not intelligent enough to figure it out the first time, I highly doubt you will catch on the second. Now, I shall call off a list of names, and as I go down, I shall tell you your partner."

Harry groaned, barely a month and a half into fifth year and Snape was at it again, it seemed as if he was TRYING to earn some, 'Prick of the Year' award on purpose, and every year he didn't receive it, he tried even harder the next year to win it. So intent was he, at his mental complaining, he completely missed Snape ordering him and Neville together.

"Potter! If you cannot even keep your attention long enough to listen for your own name, how do you expect to even try and succeed at this potion? Now get over to Longbottom's cauldron!"

Harry groaned out loud and stood, walking over to Neville's cauldron. This was NOT going to work, every year Neville failed potions, and every day of the school year Neville would nearly collapse in a mental breakdown of nerves because of Snape.

As they gathered their ingredients they went down the list of items they would need from the parchment of directions. "First, boil the water. Neville, fill the cauldron with water while the fire heats the pot up, but be quick about getting the first bucket of water, we don't want to scorch the inside." Neville went off to get the buckets of water as Harry read on, "Carefully remove the Rose of the Night flower petals, and take the main part of the rose and shake it over the boiling water, letting the pollen fall into the cauldron. Each petal should be put in, one petal at a time, every minute, no sooner then that. All right..."

As Neville finally filled the pot, Harry had taken the rose and plucked all thirteen black petals off of it carefully, making sure not to rip or shred any of them. It was an odd rose he mused, every single one the same, thirteen petals, with silver pollen in the middle... when in full bloom, the silver pollen would glow brightly, and was lethal to bees.

He looked to the next ingredient, one phoenix tear... Oh, that's what must be what cost the king's fortune... He looked up and could see Snape beginning to hand out an eyedropper to each pair, telling them to be careful. As Snape reached them he set the dropper down, telling them there was only enough for one tear, and not to waste it.

Harry looked back at the rest of the list, Elven Marrow. He blanched, 'Euuughhh', he thought to himself. They did not mean house elves, but actual forest elves, another thing that must have cost a fortune... to actually find a tribe of elves that were willing to do whatever it was that... he cut his thoughts off, not wanting to actually know where any of it came from or how it was attained. A dram of a basilisk egg yolk, and the other six items were everyday potion ingredients.

"Harry, the waters boiling," Neville warned his partner.

"Oh good... Neville, listen, throw in these thirteen rose petals one at a time, one every minute on the minute, no sooner understand?" he said this slowly and carefully and Neville nodded.

As Harry put the yolk into a long cylinder container, and began stirring it with a glass utensil which was long, thin, and straight, Neville counted the seconds, and put the first petal in, waited a minute, then the next. Harry decided to read through again on the instructions and then added,

"Don't forget to stir it only once, clockwise, thirty seconds after the petals been dropped."

"What?! All right..." Neville said nervously, stirring up the two petals. About twenty minutes later they were ready to add the bone marrow, which was in a stone bowl. Neville, who was slightly shaking because he was terrified of failing Harry and his professor, reached over for the stirring stick and knocked over the egg yolk. He barely could catch the vile to keep it from breaking, but the cylinder slipped from his hands, and it tumbled head first into the stone bowl, the green sticky substance spilling into the deep red brown marrow.

"Oh shit," Harry whispered. He picked up the thin beaker with a sickening feeling in his chest, and saw all of it had spilled into the bowl, and the only thing within the beaker was the green sticky residue that was slowly dripping out in disgusting strings of... goo.

"That's not a good thing, is it?" Neville said with a low moan. "We need to ask Professor Snape if this is still useable."

Harry winced and looked to the instructions, "It doesn't say they can't be mixed, it just says that it should be put in separately and stirred once when both are in.... Meaning they get put together anyway... Profess-" he looked up to find Snape, but the call died on his lips as he saw Snape snapping at one of the Gryffindor's. "Errr, Neville, maybe we should just leave him be.... I'm sure it will be fine..." he poured the contents of the bowl into the cauldron and they stirred it, hoping for the best. As they watched, the potion turned bright green, and then slowly started to change to a deep black color, worried they turned to look at the other cauldrons, but saw their potions were black as well.

"Is it supposed to do that?" Neville asked worriedly, eyeing the potion as if it just might suddenly explode.

"I don't know," Harry answered. "It looks normal now, so I don't think we should worry..."

Letting out sighs of relief they began cleaning up- after two more minutes of boiling they pulled it from the fire. Ten minutes from class ending, Snape walked over to them with a sneer, looking into their cauldron with a raised eyebrow. Harry's stomach clenched, could Snape tell just by looking at it, that it was off? He hoped not. Walking to one of the cabinets, the professor pulled a glass goblet from within, and walked back to them. He then filled the cup half way, and watched it bubble for a moment; he waved his wand and muttered a cooling spell over it.

"Well, we are to see," he spoke to the class, "If for once in Longbottom's sad existence, he and Potter did something correct." Harry nearly glared at Snape.

"Longbottom, drink," the Potions Master held the goblet to Neville, who looked as if he might just pass out if he had to even hold the cup. Neville looked up to Snape's eyes briefly, and shook his head, pleading almost not to make him drink it.

"I'll drink it," Harry spoke up suddenly, his voice holding no room for arguing, it seemed. He took the cup from Snape looking him in the eyes; he had grown in his years there, and was eye level with the Potions Master now. He was no longer intimidated by Snape's size.

Snape's mouth curled into a sneer, "Ever the savior of the incompetent fools you call friends, I see. Very well, Potter. Drink it. Now if the potion's gone right, Potter should only feel a small amount of discomfort as his body changes to de-age a year," he informed the rest of the class.

Hermione and Ron looked at him from behind Snape, worried that the potion HAD gone wrong and he looked down to the goblet, the next moment he brought it to his lips and swiftly drank it without a moments hesitation.

Harry gasped as a sensation like liquid ice went through his veins, leaving him to nearly flinch in pain, and then all of a sudden the icy feeling was gone. Not giving him even a second to catch his breath, he soon felt the coldness quickly being replaced by a burning sensation, as if instead of the ice, there was a liquid fire within him, dissolving him from the inside out...

Harry choked and dropped the cup from nerveless fingers. It hit the ground and shattered, as he fell against the table. Bones started dissolving in his body and his eyes widened in horror, seeking for his Potions Master's eyes, begging for the torture to end. Unable to help it, he let out a scream -- louder then he ever had before; almost, if not as loud as, when Voldermort had put him under the Cruciatus curse not even six months ago.

Harry fell against the table and students backed away from him as Snape's eyes widened in fear as he realized something was obviously wrong with the potion. "Damn it," he muttered as he came to this conclusion. He strode over to Harry and tried to grab him, but Harry's body spasmed and collapsed to the ground, going into convulsions.

Screams of fear and horror echoed within the room as many of the girls broke into tears, Ron had to hold Hermione back from trying to do anything, as Snape looked up for a moment unsure for once, of what to do. Finally, he knelt down next to his student, and suddenly Harry's arms shot out and grabbed him by the front of his robes, so strongly that he was brought down. Harry's face was level with his chest, and as Snape barely caught himself from kissing the dungeon floor, he felt the grip vanish, the tugging had stopped.

Ron watched the Potions Master on the floor; Snape's robes were billowed around him covering any view of Harry. Slowly, their teacher pushed himself up, looking at the ground where Harry lay, and as Snape brushed his robes away, they heard a low cry -- a sharp and quivering sound in the quiet room.

Snape froze as he found himself looking down at what was left - - Harry's school robes, shirt, and from within it, a lump kicked... Numbly, he moved his hands over the robes, hearing the cry beneath the cloth, already having a sinking feeling, he moved the shirt aside, there, within the folds of cloth, was one of the sweetest babies one could lay eyes on. Quieting down, Snape found himself looking into big, bright green eyes that looked up to him for a moment curiously, as if to ask, 'who are you?'. His body was small, and looked very delicate, soft skin, pale and smooth, graced the naked child, and his hair was bushy, wild, and covered his perfectly unmarked forehead...

"Oh dear God..." Snape said in a voice closely akin to horror, "Albus is going to kill me."

~~*~~

Notes: My mom helped me with areas in the story that needed correcting and livening up. Some chapters are still in need of repair though. And if you wish to insult me, I prefer you to leave any overly rude comments to yourself, if you have suggestions about spelling, writing style, and so on, be my guest… Please, leave a contribution, in the little box!