Tom looked around the court room. It was large, not that he could move. He was sitting in a metal chair, well chained to it, with a cage around him. The cage had sharp spear points protruding from the bars, all aimed at him. Even though it was black, the points were stained red. Many men had thrown themselves against the arrows trying to plead with their sentence, not caring whether the points pierced their desperate bodies. All of the cage's past resident's had one thing in mind, I'm not going to Azkaban. Tom was the exception as he sat down in the chair with his feet up and resting on one of the red arrows. He had every expectation of living the rest of his miserable life in the dark desolate place that wizards called prison. He stretched his arms and put them behind his head. If only he were on a cushioned couch he would be the image of comfort. He was going to spend the rest of his life rotting with dementors and he was going to enjoy these last minutes of peace while they lasted.

The room was full of every witch and wizard with in a one hundred mile radius. The entire population in the ministry had come to see him and more. In the front of the rows of wizards was an older man, maybe fifty years old, dressed in crisp black dress robes with tassels hanging around his collar. The man's grey hair was pencil stick straight, and his moustache was seemed to have been combed recently. Of the many pairs of eyes in the room, his revealed the most emotion. If looks could kill, then the piercing glare that the man, Barty Crouch, was shooting towards Tom, would have killed him. Of course the punch line of it all was that today he was going to Tom's judge and jury. He leaned back in the metal chair, today was a waste. Judging by the murderous look in the judge's cold grey eyes, his fate was already decided.

Tom must have been sitting in the center of the court room for at least an hour, when Crouch tapped a large gavel on the table in front of him twice, declaring the start of the day's proceedings.

"State your name," he commanded.

"Tom Riddle the third."

"Your father is Tom Riddle Jr?" Crouch asked crinkling his nose in disgust. Of course, he already knew the answer. It was probably for the benefit of the crowd.

"I share his DNA, yes, but he never acted as my father," Tom replied. There was no real benefit in describing the distance between him and his birth father. Still, maybe if the people in the room believed that he truly never had nothing to do with the man, they'd stop looking at him like he was an attraction at a popular freak show.

"Explain yourself," Crouch grunted his lip twitching slightly.

"After I was born Voldemort imprisoned my mother and tasked her to take care of us. She raised me and my brother until we were three. Then she died and my father took us in. The Dark Lord was dead at that point. I refer to the man who took me in as father," Tom explained bluntly, fidgeting his hands when he talked about the man. He had practiced the speech a few times over in his head on his way here. Though, it really didn't convey things properly. His voice sounded emotionless and foreign as it left his lips. He told himself that it had to be this way. He couldn't let them know how much it hurt to proclaim everything that had happened in front of the wizarding world. Life was so much simpler when he pretended that his past hadn't happened to him.

"Your father is Augustine York," Crouch said almost accusingly.

"Yes," Tom had to keep himself from cringing at the name. If he had learned one thing over the years he'd spent being raised by York, it was that he was never to call father by his real name.

"The death eater?" Crouch clarified. The man was tapping his bony fingers rhythmically on the table. Each time his fingers touched the wood a faint pat, pat, pat, could be heard. Tom focused himself on the sound of Crouch's fingers, synchronizing his breathing with the sound.

"Yes," Tom repeated

"You mentioned you had a brother. Where is he?" Crouch asked.

Tom knew they would ask about Jonathan, but that didn't mean that he was prepared for it. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Keep it short, he reminded himself, it will hurt less."We were twins. He is dead now."

Crouch narrowed his eyes, "How did he die?"

Tom bit his lip, "I'm- I'm not sure. I buried him though. I dug his grave with my own two hands. No magic. If you don't believe me I can take you to it." He felt his hands shaking now as memories threatened to overwhelm him. With a deep swallow, he pushed them back down into the depths of his mind. Only a little longer and he would be alone again on the cold floor of a private cell. Soon, this would all be over.

Crouch shook his head, repulsed at the thought of visiting the grave of Voldemort's son. "That won't be necessary. How old are you?"

"Thirteen," Tom answered grateful that the questions were moving away from sensitive topics.

"What is your magical ability?"

"I've been learning spells since I was three. Since the ministry didn't know I existed I don't have the trace on me… I am probably more skilled than most twenty year old normal wizards," Tom responded. A murmur went through the crowd. Apparently, that was impressive.

Crouch leaned forward in his seat, "We have examined your wand and have found spells deemed illegal by the ministry on it. Specifically, the Cruciatus curse and the Killing curse. Most wizards go their whole lives without the knowledge of how to perform these spells. Who did you harm?"

Tom showed no reaction to the accusation. Why deny the truth? "My father hunts muggles. He incapacitates them and takes them to our house. He will kill them immediately sometimes. Other times he tortures them for days. It doesn't happen that often, but when he's in an especially rotten mood he'll bring me up and have me use them as practice dummies." Tom paused taking a deep breath.

Somewhere in the back of his mind a distant memory of his mother surfaced. The three of them had been in a field and Jonathan had squished some bug under his little shoe. Jonny what did that poor bug ever do to you? His mother had said to his brother. God, he wondered what she'd say if she saw him now.

"I killed a lot of them," Tom whispered gently, as if he were confessing to his mom in the flesh. Guilt weighed down on him like a two ton mountain.

Crouch stood up and pointed at him enraged with by the words, "So you admit it then," he yelled extending a long finger and jabbing it at him.

Tom was about to respond when someone else beat him to it, "Would you have expected him to do otherwise?" a man asked from behind Crouch. The man was old, with a long white beard that went down past his chest. Half-moon spectacles adorned his wrinkled face. Behind them, two crystal blue eyes shined bravely. Clearly, he was the most respected wizard in the room, for no one questioned his interruption in this high profile trial, not even Crouch.

"We have laws to uphold Dumbledore, laws that have been broken. The boy has confessed," Crouch sneered at the man. His piercing grey eyes weren't glaring at Tom with hatred anymore. Now they looked pained as he tried to implement his authority as judge without undermining this man's esteemed place among the wizards.

Dumbledore ignored Crouch and instead he addressed Tom, "What is that on your arms Tom?"

Tom glanced down at his tattoos becoming uncomfortable. They brought up another weapon that his father had physically drilled into him: never show weakness. Well, right now it seemed as if he were going to have to announce his to the world, "I believe it is a dark mark. I've been told that all of His followers have them. I've always had mine."

Dumbledore shook his head, "A traditional dark mark only is on one's left arm. I see you have it on both. And yours is particularly dark. If I am correct, it is only dark when active. Voldemort has been gone for ten years now and yours looks like it was active just yesterday."

Tom nodded and sighed then he proceeded to remove his shirt. The room gasped. He had two normal marks on both of forearms with the skull eating the snake. That was about as far as normalcy went though. The snakes from the two marks spiraled up from his wrists, around his bicep, and onto his chest. In the center of his chest was a third mark, the tails of the two on his arms connecting before disappearing into the skull of the third larger mark. The closer the mark got to the skull's mouth on his chest the better his audience could see the pink irritated outline around the black of the actual mark.

"When my brother and I were little my father's favorite punishment was the Cruciatus curse. Well apparently you can build an immunity to that because when we were six it stopped working. He made a new curse for us. I think it's linked to my dark marks and believe me it's much worse than the Cruciatus curse. It makes my mark turns a fresh black color and my skin get's red around the edges." He explained. His voice was faint, no louder than a whisper, but the court was silent as everyone listened intently to the thirteen year old boy. The people of the ministry were hanging on his every word staring at his dark mark with what might be sympathy in their eyes. Not that Tom would know, he grew up in a house hold were sympathy wasn't exactly a common emotion.

Dumbledore nodded and turned back to Crouch, "Tell me Barty if you were under that kind of pain for your entire life and you were raised knowing if you obeyed the pain would go away, how quick would you be to kill a muggle here and there."

Crouch's lips twitched, "What are you suggesting Dumbledore? We cannot just let him go. He-who-must-not-be-named was also known to be quite charismatic and look what happened when we let him run wild." Tom scanned his audience. Most of the spectators looked rather shocked that Crouch was still fighting for him to be put away. The judge on the other hand held a strong resemblance to a mad man as it was becoming clearer and clearer that he had no intention of losing this trial.

Dumbledore nodded, "Yes many were taken by Tom Riddle Jr's smile. However, this Tom has yet to even so much as defend himself. He just admitted to breaking the law and is probably expecting to spend the rest of his life in Azkaban. I am the only one here arguing his case, Barty. Unless you are suggesting his plan all along was to play on my compassion by confessing to his crime, assuming that I would stand up for him myself." A smile danced upon the old man's face.

Crouch irritation was becoming more and more evident in the lines on the man's face. Dumbledore was putting a damper on his plans. "Alas, I agree though, it is not in our best interests to simply send the boy off to his own designs," the old wizard went on bringing out his ace in the hole. "I think you should enroll him to Hogwarts. Have him start out with this year's group of first years. Then he'll have seven years in which he will be under my watch. At the end of this probation period he will have another trial. At that one we can gather witnesses of his behavior and nature and then decide whether he is a risk. Thirteen year old children don't belong in Azkaban. They should be out enjoying their childhood. This boy hasn't had a childhood, he has been trained and abused and I think that we should salvage what he has left his innocence."

The transformation that was occurring in the crowd was incredible. They had entered with expressions similar to that of an angry mob and Tom didn't blame them. The Dark Lord may have fallen eleven years ago, but the wounds he left would last for a lifetime. Tom's sudden appearance had reopened this wound leaving the pain raw and fresh. He was the devil's spawn to them. Then Dumbledore had spoken. He had opened the ministry's eyes to something they hadn't noticed before. Tom was indeed human and this realization was showing on each and every face that stared down from the audience. Suddenly, he had become more than the Dark Lord's son, he'd become the Dark Lord's victim.

Crouch's eyes may have been the only one not boring into Tom, instead he was staring at Dumbledore. The man looked like he was about to explode. He must not have been used to setting people free. Tom decided it was best to keep his poker face on. His eyes were staring at Crouch waiting for the man to say something.

"He shall not be allowed to join Slytherin. I don't want him in his father's house." Crouch growled. Tom fought the urge to drop his jaw in shock. He knew exactly what those words were: an admission of defeat.

Dumbledore smiled warmly at Crouch, "Of course we will leave him out of the normal sorting process, and have the hat put choose his house appropriately under these circumstances. I will be sure that it understands that Slytherin is not an option."

Crouch nodded miserably, "Alright, I hereby sentence you to a seven year trial period at Hogwarts," he hesitated, a sudden cruel smile spreading across his lips as he played his final desperation card. "Let me make myself clear though. If you so much as slip up once in your time there. Meaning any visit to Mr. Filch's office for any measure of rule breaking I will have you shipped to Azkaban before you even realize what you did."

Crouch wrapped a claw-like hand around his gavel and clapped it loudly on the table. Court was adjourned.