Chương 14: Chapter 18: 1-8: Observation
Disclaimer: Being neither British nor Japanese, it should therefore come as no surprise that I own neither Harry Potter nor Naruto, nor anything from their respective franchises.
As soon as he had heard of the Disillusionment charm and its effects, Iruka had made certain to master it. What self-respecting shinobi wouldn't want access to such near-perfect camouflage? The only ninjutsu he knew of that served a similar purpose was an Earth-style ninjutsu, one of his weaker affinities, so having a magical analogue was definitely appealing.
It was using this camouflage that had Iruka hidden and observing several of today's History of Magic class sessions, and to put it simply, he was not impressed. Even when discussing historical events that were both pivotal and exciting, Professor Binns simply droned on emotionlessly. How were the students supposed to consider the information important if it was being delivered with such utter bland apathy? It was frankly no wonder that those few students who remained awake through the class mostly did so by completely ignoring their professor and self-studying History or doing work for their other classes. Given the fact that the ghostly teacher couldn't correctly name his students (or, indeed, some of his fellow faculty at staff meetings), Iruka suspected that trying to talk through the problem with him would be an exercise in futility. He'd have to go up the chain of command and speak with Minerva to see if anything could be done, but first, he had another class to observe.
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Since he was most interested in the first-year Gryffindor/Slytherin session of Potions, Iruka was forced to wait until Friday to carry out his second bit of classroom espionage, though he did make some use of the intervening days to get a look at the dungeon area where the Potions classroom was located, and at least a few looks inside through the door as classes filed in and out. This allowed him to plan his approach, something he felt worth the effort as Professor Snape seemed a bit more observant and wary than average (and far more than Professor Binns). While he'd been able to just slip into the History classroom and hide before the first class arrived, chances were good that the door to the Potions classroom would be kept locked except during classes, and given Severus Snape's temperament, might be warded as well - not something Iruka was equipped to handle. Given the man's reported skill in the Mind Arts, he also didn't want to chance using a genjutsu until he knew how well or poorly they would work on a trained Occlumens.
This all led to Iruka perching, Disillusioned, on the wall above the door to the Potions classroom as the first year Gryffindors and Slytherins gathered (separately) outside on Friday morning. At precisely 0945, the door slammed open and the students began filing in. Taking advantage of both the short height of the students and the poor illumination (not the best idea when making volatile brews, he thought idly) he used chakra adhesion to clamber through the top of the doorway and onto the ceiling of the classroom, timing his move for shortly after Harry entered as his colleague's glare followed the boy. When an opportunity arose as Professor Snape was distracted, he moved silently from the ceiling to the floor, concealing himself in an out-of-the-way corner of the room and taking full advantage of the deep shadows.
Were it not for his commitment to remain hidden through multiple classes, he would have interrupted within the first ten minutes of the 135-minute lesson. Over drinks several years back, Naruto had related stories of how the other Academy instructors had treated him when Iruka wasn't around, and the chuunin had been appalled at the horrific behavior and outright abuse they'd heaped on the young jinchuuriki. Severus Snape made them all look like consummate professionals (well, except for Mizuki, but attempted murder and treason are hard to top). By the half-hour mark, Iruka had to clamp down on his emotions when he noticed the sheen of fear sweat on the pale Slytherin in front of him, a reaction to the increasing amount of sakki he was starting to emit. Even untrained, the blond boy's proximity meant he was getting a heavy enough dose to fray his nerves despite being unable to discern its source. The chuunin's mood wasn't helped when the child tried to throw something into Harry's cauldron, though he was able to foul the throw's aim with a quick-and-dirty burst of focused sakki. Of course, Snape saw the throw, and proceeded to take points from Harry for "tossing ingredients on the floor like a dunderhead".
That first-year class was certainly the nadir of the day, but the other classes still showed that Severus Snape had no business teaching (or even being near) children. He showed no concern for his students' safety or wellbeing, provided little if any real instruction, and blatantly favored Slytherins while bullying and tormenting children from the other three Houses.
Even if he thought that Severus Snape could be persuaded to improve his behavior, Iruka couldn't be confident enough in his own ability to make it through such a discussion without pulling a kunai on the man. He needed to talk with Minerva.
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"Come in!" Iruka did as he was bid and opened the door to Minerva's office. "Good evening, Iruka," the witch said with a slight smile, "do come in and have a seat." A wave of her wand transfigured the rather Spartan wooden chair in front of her desk into a high-backed armchair, which her guest found to be only slightly more padded than before but still significantly more comfortable. She quickly poured him a cup from her seemingly ever-ready teapot. "So, what brings you to my door at this hour?"
"I have... concerns, I guess, about two of our fellow staff members and their suitability as teachers." Seeing the scowl beginning to develop from his response, Iruka quickly continued. "Professor Binns is the less problematic of the two. His lectures are technically informative, but his apathetic monotone quickly destroys any interest most students might have in the topics being discussed, no matter how important or exciting they might be. I was able to observe a couple of his classes, and most of the students either self-studied, worked on material for their other classes, or simply napped through the entire class, and their professor allowed it all! To be honest, I'd bet that most of what the students learn in that class they learn in spite of its teacher, rather than from or because of him. I'd have spoken to him about this before coming to you, but I get the impression he wouldn't even remember the conversation afterward."
"The situation surrounding Cuthbert is unfortunately rather complex," Minerva frowned, "with a number of factors making it either difficult or inadvisable to remove or replace him. First and simplest is inertia - as the longest-serving member of Hogwarts' faculty, Cuthbert has certain privileges due to seniority, including the requirement that the Board of Governors would need to approve his dismissal. Wizards and witches, at least here in Britain, are deeply disinclined to change anything without strong reasons to do so. Many of those on the Board would take the attitude of 'I had History from Binns and I turned out fine,' particularly those old enough to have had him prior to his death. It would likely take significant convincing to garner enough votes to remove him on that basis alone."
"Secondly, I'm sure that since your arrival in Britain, you've become aware of certain... political divisions?" Iruka nodded. "While such divisions do not make removing Professor Binns more difficult, they make replacing him a rather chancy business. A more active teaching of History could significantly shape the political attitudes of young students for the rest of their lives, and so everyone would want the subject taught in such a way as to indicate the rightness of their own views. Neither the more progressive nor more conservative factions are positioned strongly enough at present to be confident of their ability to push through a replacement they approved of, and so both would rather remain with the unsatisfactory status quo than risk an engaging History course that promotes an opposing ideology."
"And in the meantime," Iruka sighed, "the children's education suffers because the adults can't stop squabbling. I really shouldn't be surprised; people are people and politics is politics, no matter where you are." He gave a defeated and somewhat exhausted shake of his head before refocusing. "Anyway, the other professor that concerns me is Severus Snape..." Minerva's raised hand halted him here.
"I'm certain you have heard many of the same outlandish tales of horror from his dungeon classroom that I have, but they are tales only. The fractious relationship between Slytherin and the other three Houses, combined with Severus's appearance and somewhat caustic nature have caused Hogwarts' already spectacular rumor mill to transform a strict and less-than-personable Professor into something with which to terrify credulous first-years. Surely, as a longtime teacher yourself, you have experienced the tendency of children and teens to exaggerate wildly?"
"Minerva, I know full well how readily most children embellish things, but the ones I spoke to are the type to downplay such incidents. Still, their accounts were pretty unbelievable, so I decided to see for myself. I spent most of today hidden under a Disillusionment charm in the Potions classroom, observing the classes, and found that both students had understated the problem. The first-year Gryffindor/Slytherin class this morning contained some of the most unprofessional and downright odious behavior I've ever seen in a supposed teacher, second only to the time one of my colleagues betrayed our village and tried to murder one of my favorite students, nearly killing me in the process." Iruka proceeded to recount some of the worst abuses he had seen over the course of the day, watching as the normally unflappable woman across from him went from shock to a growing outrage. Finally, he wound down, and the room lapsed into a tense silence for nearly a minute.
"I..." Minerva finally stammered out, "I see. Unfortunately, while I am the final arbiter of student discipline, staff issues fall under the purview of the Headmaster, so it is him you will have to convince, and the Board of Governors might also have a say. Doubly unfortunate is the fact that Lucius Malfoy, the father of the misbehaving Slytherin first-year you described, is both a close associate of Severus Snape and a member of the Board. He would undoubtedly oppose any attempt to dislodge our current Potions 'teacher'." She spat the last word with an angry bite of sarcasm. "Albus, meanwhile, tends to respond to any criticism of the man by stating 'Severus Snape has my complete confidence,' or something similar. In hindsight, it was also Albus who convinced myself and many others on staff that the students' stories were mere tall tales, rather than signs of a very serious problem. Still, perhaps with your observations, we may be able to see some changes made." Here the witch rose, which prompted her guest to follow suit, and both immediately departed for the Headmaster's office.
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"Minerva, Professor Umino, to what do I owe the unexpected pleasure of your company?" As usual, the Headmaster was seated behind his desk, a welcoming smile on his lips and a twinkle in his eye.
Iruka suspected that neither the smile nor the twinkle would last long.
By far the senior member of staff, and with much fresher anger, Minerva took the lead. "I allowed you to convince me that the students' reports of abusive behavior by Severus Snape were exaggerations and fanciful rumors. Tell me, Albus, did you actually investigate those reports when Pomona, Filius, and I brought them to you, or did you simply dismiss them as I'm beginning to realize you have dismissed so many of our concerns over the years?"
Iruka was right.
After gaping in shock for a moment, Dumbledore rallied. "I can assure you, Minerva, that Severus Snape has my complete confidence..."
Iruka winced.
"So you keep saying," Minerva interrupted her boss, "and yet according to what I have just heard either your confidence in Severus is misplaced or my confidence in you is!"
Iruka made a mental note to never get on Minerva McGonagall's bad side.
Headmaster Dumbledore was clearly reeling from his deputy's unaccustomed hostility. "Perhaps if you were to explain what precisely has so incensed you? I can hardly answer your questions nor your accusations while I am lacking in vital information, such as what you're even talking about." This last bit was said with a stern, irritated, and slightly sarcastic tone.
Iruka had to admit, the man had guts.
"Iruka came to me this evening with concerns about two of our professors. The first was Cuthbert, and I explained the complex and difficult situation surrounding our History Professor. When he then brought up Severus, I was quick to give him the same reassurance that I have offered the scores of students that have come to me in the past ten years with similar concerns: The horror stories about the man are mostly rumor and exaggerated hearsay. Imagine my shock, then, when he informed me that he had surreptitiously observed the Potions classes held today, and personally seen confirmation of many of the worst claims!"
Iruka stepped forward at this point, and began to again describe the events he had witnessed.
After the first few anecdotes (covering about the first twenty minutes of the morning class), a very dismayed-looking Dumbledore held up his hand to halt the recitation. "Rather than hearing these tales secondhand, I would much prefer to observe the events in question myself. Tell me, Professor Umino, have you ever heard of a pensieve?"
Iruka shook his head.
"To put it succinctly, it is a device which permits the storage and review of memories. I would like to ask if you might loan me a copy of your memories of your time observing today's Potions classes, so that I may view them for myself? The extraction process is painless and causes no harm; I would only be taking copies, not removing the memories as is also possible for occasions where one wants to review an event with fresh eyes."
Iruka somewhat nervously gave his agreement.
"Very well. Simply focus on the memories you wish to share; if you know any Occlumency, use it to push them forward. I will place my wand tip at your temple, and draw it away with a copy of the foremost memory, after which you will need to put the next one forward. Let me know when you are ready, and when I've got the last memory."
Iruka closed his eyes and focused, pushed the memories forward, then nodded.
Again and again, he felt the touch of a wand to his temple, each time feeling a strange pulling in his mind as the memory was copied away. After the last iteration, he opened his eyes and stepped back. "I shall begin reviewing these immediately," said the Headmaster, "and if Severus has truly been so badly mistreating his students, I shall make it abundantly clear to him that it will no longer be tolerated. To that end, I must bid you both good evening. Thank you both for bringing this to my attention."
Iruka followed Minerva out.
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It was nearing lunchtime on Saturday by the time Albus had finished reviewing the memories, stopping only for sleep and a quick elf-delivered breakfast in his office. Now, while munching on a similarly expedient lunch, he was left pondering what he had seen.
There was no question that Severus Snape's grudge against James Potter remained as bitter as it was during their Hogwarts years. That Severus would exercise that grudge upon an innocent child was shocking, even without considering that the man had sworn to the woman he professed to love that he would protect the son she died to save. To further compound the problem, it was also clear that while young Harry might be the primary focus of the Slytherin Head's vitriol, most of the students outside the house of snakes were subjected to varying degrees of abuse. Worse still was the clear and callous disregard Severus showed towards his students' safety, not correcting unsafe practices and dangerous errors that he had clearly seen but rather waiting until after mishaps occurred to berate and punish the errant students. He even seemed to be permitting, perhaps encouraging the active sabotage of other students' potions in potentially dangerous ways!
When young Severus had first begun teaching at Hogwarts, there had been a few complaints regarding his conduct. Observation of several of his classes showed that his teaching style was largely acceptable: The newly-minted Professor was harsh and strict, even more so than Minerva, and did admittedly go too far at times in berating his students, but Albus had put it down to his inexperience and his still-raw grief over Lily Potter's death. Given his spy's importance in the eventual defeat of Lord Voldemort, he'd decided to give the man a bit of leeway, though he did privately admonish Severus to moderate his behavior somewhat. From there, the Headmaster's hectic schedule had kept him from conducting further inspections beyond some early checks to ensure that the classroom conditions had improved. He had simply (and erroneously, it now appeared) assumed that the ongoing reports of misconduct had been rumor based on his prior actions and dour attitude. Now, however, it seemed likely that the improvements had been temporary, and that the Potions Professor's misbehavior had escalated over the last decade.
The other staff member involved had not escaped Albus's scrutiny, either. He thought it rather telling that the memories were cleanly cropped to only show the time Professor Umino actually spent within the Potions classroom. It seemed likely that this was deliberate, an attempt perhaps to hide precisely how the man had gotten into and out of the classroom undetected; he would have to check the walls and ceiling in the corridor nearby for footprints to determine if this was another case of the Sealing Arts teacher's extraordinary mobility. More directly puzzling were two incidents during yesterday's first class: In the first, Draco Malfoy showed signs of increasing apprehension as Professor Umino's outrage built; a causal link was made more probable by the fact that when the Professor noticed the boy's distress, he calmed himself and the boy soon relaxed. Not too long thereafter, young Draco attempted to sabotage Harry Potter's potion with a thrown reagent, but fumbled the throw at the last moment showing clear signs of acute terror that subsided fairly quickly. In neither case were Professor Umino's hands near his wand nor out of sight, though in the latter case his attention was clearly focused on the Malfoy scion, leaving no visible indication of how he was able to affect the boy so profoundly without using visible spells or even having eye contact through which a wandless Legilimency connection could be made. Another mysterious ability to consider, it would seem.
At least Albus's confidence in the displaced Professor's motives and character was growing. Thrice now the man had risked the exposure of abilities he clearly wished to conceal, and in each case had been acting in the students' best interests. His proposed changes regarding the third-floor corridor would, had they been feasible, have only increased the security around the Stone, further lessening the probability that he was here coveting the artifact.
Placing the enigmatic traveler to the side for the moment, Albus returned to the matter at hand. If these memories were accurate, his Potions professor was bullying and endangering his students, not to mention undermining Hogwarts' discipline by abusing the House Points system. The latter, at least, could be readily confirmed. Drawing his wand, the Headmaster quickly summoned the master copy of the Book of Discipline, in which all detentions and point assignments and losses were recorded. He took a fresh sheet of parchment and a self-inking quill and set to work tallying Severus's recent activity, separated by House. As he worked, he noted several dubious and a few outright frivolous awards and penalties. After reaching this time last week, Albus felt that he had a reasonably representative sample, and gazed at his results in dismay: Slytherin had been given a wealth of points with only a handful of penalties, while the other three Houses had been heavily penalized with almost no awards of points. Could this pattern be the reason for Slytherin's long streak of House Cup wins?
Albus could feel his anger growing as he pondered the potential consequences of his spy's behavior as a Professor. Cheating Slytherin's way to the House Cup repeatedly and bullying other Houses set a very negative example for the young snakes, teaching them that such behavior was acceptable, encouraged, and beneficial. Couple this with the hostility it likely engendered in the other Houses, and it was likely that the students in green and silver were being pushed strongly towards the Dark, with few or no bonds outside their House to pull them back towards the Light. Abetting misbehavior by these students would only reinforce the poisonous lesson. Should Tom return, this could only ease his recruitment efforts. Conversely, it was likely that Severus's behavior would sour many non-Slytherin students on the entire subject of Potions, depriving their community of candidates for such beneficial occupations as Aurors and Healers. How many otherwise potentially-redeemable souls had already been lost to Darkness? How many children's dreams for their future careers had died in that dungeon classroom?
He couldn't act until he had full confirmation. To that end, he would emulate Professor Umino to a degree: Albus would conceal himself in the Potions classroom under the Cloak of Invisibility, and observe Monday morning's Gryffindor/Slytherin first-year class. Should the memories be proven accurate, there was no question that steps would have to be taken to remedy the problem. Planning those steps would be the Headmaster's task until then.
A/N: Thus does Iruka begin to show that magic and ninja skills can complement each other. The penultimate scene's odd style was me having a bit of fun - when writing it initially, the second paragraph was phrased differently, but looking at the fourth and sixth gave me the idea to do the entire scene as it came out. I doubt it'll happen again, but I just can't bring myself to pass up obvious opportunities.
The Book of Discipline is a fanon concept, one of the few that I'm knowingly using for the sake of convenience.
Regarding Dumbledore and Snape: In this fic, I'm basically having it that Dumbles figured everything was fine and the students were exaggerating, especially since Snape told him so, and never bothered to verify it for himself. He was simply too confident in his own assessment of the man's character and honesty (not that I think Severus Snape actually had much of either) and his hubris combined with his lack of available time (due to holding three positions) to let the problem compound. When students complained at the start of each year, the staff blew them off due to their boss's assurances, which led the children to stop complaining because they figured it was pointless, which in turn led the staff to conclude that there was no problem.
Sorry to all you Snape fans, but I'm writing him as I see him - a petty, bitter, vindictive bully that enjoys child abuse and endangerment. Even at eleven, he snooped and read Petunia's letter from Dumbledore, then later dismissed her as being only a Muggle. He didn't fall in with a bad crowd at Hogwarts because it was his only safe option, he did it because of their shared interests in power and Dark magic. When a sadistic fellow Junior Death Eater used Dark magic on an innocent schoolmate, he dismissed it as "a laugh". I could go on for a while, but suffice to say that I don't foresee him being heroic in this story.
To the guest reviewer on Chapter 1-7: Thanks for your support! The fic recommendations are something I copied from some other writers that do the same thing. It's led me to some new stories I enjoyed, and so I wanted to pay that forward.
Fic Recommendation: "The Merry Killers" by The Sage of Toads - A very slow-updating WIP, this is a Love Hina fic with one huge twist to the premise. Hilarity ensues.
Posted 03 December 2017
Updated 10 December 2017: Added a paragraph (the third one) to the last scene better explaining/clarifying part of how Snape was able to behave so badly.
Updated 1 December 2019: Character-specific dividers
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