#in addition to neville basically accidentally making a pipe bomb in every potions class

[severus-snaps]

a fun little headcanon I've been thinking about lately is that Snape was somehow involved in giving evidence for (or witnessed part of) the torture of Alice and Frank Longbottom

I like to imagine that the capture and torture of the Longbottoms was, of course, done by the Lestranges and Barty Crouch Jr. But how do we know? Alice and Frank were probably in no condition to give evidence themselves, of course - described as 'tortured to insanity' to the point where they don't recognise their own son - and the death eaters weren't about to hand themselves in. For Bellatrix this is part of her MO, I'd imagine - but the others??

So Snape possibly heard about it on the grapevine, and gave evidence (either at his own trial if he had one, or privately to the authorities/Dumbledore). Bellatrix was probably having a great time and bragged about it to the other DEs/her sister/Lucius, and she even bragged at her trial, so she'd have been connected to it easily enough (and was it her husband who was also there? Snape probably knew the family personally via Lucius)

but I like to think, for the sake of this headcanon, that Snape was there - that this was another time where he 'slithered out of action' in Bellatrix's eyes, and went to stand watch, or arrived late with the excuse of teaching at Hogwarts, etc. That he knew their voices - because whether Bellatrix wore her mask or removed it, Snape would know it was her, would know her voice, would hear it through the others, and reported the incident

But what about Crouch? There was some doubt, even from Dumbledore, whether he was involved. This isn't so far-fetched; many DEs didn't know who the other DEs even were (per Karkaroff's trial), Snape could only identify for certain the Lestranges.

Perhaps when the torture proved fruitless, Crouch left before Snape arrived whilst Bellatrix continued her fun - or, Snape witnessed/was nearby for the whole thing, but Crouch was unidentifiable beneath the DE mask (not being as intimiately connected to the Blacks/Malfoys/Lestranges), which was why Dumbledore couldn't say for certain that he was involved.

But what I also like to think is that Snape, had he been there, heard a screaming child in the next room; a child who'd grow up to have nightmares about masked figures, who would never forget his parents' screams.

Now, Snape is not a comforting man. He is not a maternal man. He didn't cradle the crying toddler, didn't soothe it. But there was one thing he could do - something pragmatic, something that wouldn't arouse suspicion from the death eaters, nor incriminate him in the eyes of the law, or alert Muggle authorities or the Aurors.

"Obliviate."

The child's eyes gloss over for a moment, and Severus has left the room before it's even stopped crying.

Turns out Snape's not very good at memory charms, and he slightly damaged the child's memory for life. A small price to pay for not having to remember that night, he reasons (through gritted teeth; has no patience for the fact that it now impacts his potions lessons).

So perhaps there's a reason that Neville is dangerous in potions; and perhaps it's the same reason that Neville's boggart is Snape "bearing down upon him, reaching inside his robes"