A/N: I just realized the year was off for when Tom started school, the first was a guess, but I found out I was few years off, so that's the only change on this.

Birds of a Feather

September 1st, 1938

There was a flurry of colors and smells as people rushed between the platforms of King's Cross Station. Everyone seemed to be headed to someplace in an awful hurry. So much so, that no one stopped to realize that a small little boy had been walking between the 9th and 10th platform, seemingly aimless, for the past hour. Frustrated beyond belief and mentally cursing non-cooperative engineers who laughed in your face when you asked a simple question (like how to get onto platform 9 ¾), he sat down on his trunk and exhaled a breath of frustration. If there was one thing Tom Riddle hated, it was being laughed at. He had it in his right mind to teach the pompous man a lesson, however, he restrained himself due to fact that there were too many people and even if he did do something, he would have no idea what was going to happen. Only that something would.

Suddenly, Tom saw a family go by. Not something to uncommon here, except that one of the boys had a snowy white owl in a cage. Tom's attention focused in on them like a hawk in flight to a mouse, as he stood and followed; not close enough for them to notice him, but close enough for him to see what they were doing.

"Hurry up Abraxas! The train will leave soon and then how will you get to school?" the woman said coldly.

"It's not my fault I couldn't find my wand! The stupid house elf kept it in the trunk-"

"Where you should've put it in the first-"

But the woman was cut off as she…that's impossible…she couldn't have…could she?

'Magic…' Tom thought in awe. Tom rolled his trunk and decided to try it out for himself. As he positioned himself in front of the barrier of Platform 9, he took an unnoticeable breath to put himself at ease. Then, with his eyes open, he strode towards the wall. He braced himself for the impact and even allowed himself to close his eyes when he was at a distance close enough where no one would see that he had. It was close now. 5 meters away….now 3…..now 1….he clamped his eyes shut and waited for it; that crash that would sound as he hit the solid brick. He imagined how utterly ridiculous he would look, how the engineer from earlier would have a jolly good laugh at his expense again. He waited for it, but all he felt was a rush of air and the disappearance of all the noise from the platform. The type of silence that rings in your ears due to an absolute absence of sound, not even your breath or the beat of your heart. Then, almost as soon as it came, it was gone and the sounds of chatter and laughter came back.

Tom opened his eyes. Swarms of people mulled around and a mirage of colors assaulted his eyes as robes of every color imaginable donned by, what he now knew must be, witches and wizards swirled by.

Tom must have been gawking in silent awe for too long for someone slammed into him from behind. Hot rage built up rapidly in him as he turned a cool exterior around to see his assailant. An older boy, maybe a fifth or sixth year, smirked down at him as he lifted his hand and ruffled Tom's hair. If his anger could possibly been stoked any further this was the only way Tom thought was possible. His eyes darkened as he looked up at the boy. Tom was beginning to contemplate several ways to show this insolent prat just how powerful he was. His only problem was that he couldn't properly channel his power to do as he wished it to. He could release it, like he had several times in the orphanage, but there was no telling what it could do and no way to make it do something specific. And right now Tom wanted to hang this boy by his toes.

"Watch out there! Someone could cream you if you stand in front of the barrier, little tyke," the boy said with a warm smile. He looked up when he heard someone calling him (apparently his name was Anthony Freeman) and he promptly walked off.

Tom's face was indifferent but inside he was fuming like never before. Little? Tyke? Who this…this…GAH! He couldn't even come up with a proper name for him! But who did he think he was? Tom continued to stew as he boarded the train. He strode down the aisles of the compartment scouring for a place where he could be alone and finish completing the death plans Anthony Freeman had coming to him. Hanging by his toes was simply unacceptable at this point.

"What's a filthy wench like you doing here?"

"I thought you darkies wanted to be rid of us! And now you're following us to OUR country like a pack of disease infested rodents?"

"And they're infiltrating Hogwarts. How did the Board of Education possibly let you by? They're standards must be really lacking as of late."

Tom looked ahead and saw three older students grouped around the entry way to a compartment.

His first instinct was to roll his eyes and continue down the hall. So some students were bold enough to put down a younger year for their skin so openly. He failed to see how this was his problem. Sure, racial discrimination was supposedly frowned upon in Hogwarts but even he knew that was never going to be properly implemented. There would always be students and even teachers who did not agree that all subjects of the Ministry should be allowed to attend the school. A court case had been held a month back when a student of Kenyan descent had petitioned Hogwarts for entry on the grounds that there was no formal schooling to be had in his current place of residence. Children in other parts of the world usually were taught whatever their parents learned and, like stories, it was passed down from generation to generation. The wizarding community in England had been in an uproar unseen in decades and violent crimes were still being committed against any and all non-European witches and wizards living in the London area and even in some of the country side residencies. Why, hadn't a lynching been reported just last week in Ottery St. Catchpole? However, the Court had ruled that the student, although of non-English inheritance, did in fact reside in English territory (as a colony), and so he was granted admission. Unfortunately, the boy had met an "untimely death" shortly upon docking in a port in Liverpool.

Tom intended to continue his seemingly futile search for an empty compartment when he happened to glance at the group again. One more glance and he realized with a jolt that one of the perpetrators was Mr. Freeman himself. Still angry from his previous encounter with said boy, Tom could've jumped with joy for the excuse to beat the naïve child to a pulp. Except that that kind of a display of blatant emotion was something Tom just didn't do.

"Hey! What are you three doing there?" Tom stated authoritatively. The three turned around to see him. Obviously he wasn't exactly the largest threat they had seen. Or at least, they didn't think he looked it.

"Observing the kind of rotting rubbish this school has allowed to come to Hogwarts and contaminate everything it touches. Why don't you come and have a look for yourself, kid?" Freeman crooned smugly. The two other boys chortled as if what he had said was particularly witty.

"If it is so filthy, why don't you leave," Tom hissed. It was less of a question and more of a threat. Apparently the brainless gits weren't completely brainless for they seemed to finally register the underlying anger Tom was exhibiting.

"Oh ho! Looky here boys! A darkie lover!" Freeman had a real nice laugh with that one. Tom's fury was further bolstered by their mirth. Suddenly the air seemed to change around him and about 2 seconds before it happened, he knew what was now inevitable. Like a miniature sonic boom, energy channeled from him and plunged forward towards the boys. They flew about 20 feet backwards and collapsed in a heap of tangled limbs.

Breathing heavily and a little surprised by the shear display of power and the feeling of the euphoria from it, Tom stood stalk still as he observed his work. They seemed to be knocked out cold. Otherwise they were too scared to move and show they were alright in case they received an encore. A head poked out from the compartment.

"Thank you for your help, but I could've handled them," the head said. Tom slowly turned his head to voice, using as little energy as he could. It was girl. Well, that was unexpected. Tom remained quiet from a lack of energy. She must have misinterpreted his actions. It was easy to do since she didn't know the previous encounter he had had with Freeman.

"I honestly don't give a damn if you could've handled them," he said frostily, "I had a score to settle with one of those dunder heads." 'And it has not yet been paid back in full,' he thought to himself.

"Oh. Well do you have a place to sit? You still have your trunk on you."

"I'm looking for a place to sit alone. So I can have peace and quiet," he said condescendingly.

"Well, I won't talk much if that's what you want. Besides, the rest of the compartments are full. No one gets one to themselves when they come onto the train this late," she said with a smile. What did it take to turn this girl off? He basically told her on her face he didn't give a rat's ass about her then to add insult to injury, he spoke down to her. Still she smiles and offers him solitude? Tom, too drained to bring himself to continue down the long aisle of endless compartments (compartments he knew would be full as she said), sighed softly and shoved her as he pushed past her. At least he may be able to get some peace here, if she stayed true to her word.

The two sat down across from each other and next to the window. Tom got lost in his own thoughts, not all of them necessarily about Freeman anymore. He thought of Hogwarts, how life was going to be so much more different now that he wasn't in that wretched prison anymore.

'At least for the year,' he thought sullenly, but banished these thoughts from his mind and concentrated on what lay immediately ahead. He had bought a book from the bookstore from his trip to Diagon Alley, Hogwarts: A History. Naturally, Tom had read it twice by the time he boarded the train. He thought back to one of the passages he had read about the houses. From what he read, he hoped to get in Slytherin. Just reading the word had sent a shiver down his spine. The sense of power that the name extruded was not lost on Tom. It could also be that the word sounded so similar to the hisses of a snake. But honestly, for Tom, anything but Hufflepuff would suit his purposes just fine.

Tom's gaze drifted to the girl in front of him. Her face was buried in the book she was reading, something about the universe and planets, things that didn't interest Tom unless it could help him in some way. He observed her silently, taking in her appearance. He scowled slightly at the untidy bun atop her head. Her hair, much like his, was a deep black color and her skin, a rich olive tone. She was most likely from some part of the Indian colonies as far as he could tell. Her fingers that gripped the tome she was so engrossed in were long and slender but seemed strong. Tom returned his gaze out to the outside scenery and observed the English countryside as it rolled by. Just as he was about to return to his thoughts of his future, the voice of his companion very nearly caused him a severe case of whiplash.

"Did you find what you were looking for?" Tom noticed then, at the oddest time too, that she had a lilt in her voice. He had only heard the type of accent she carried once before, when he had seen a boy and his nanny (or, as he had called her, his Ayah). The ayah had the same kind of lilting voice that this girl spoke with. It was confirmed then. She was Indian.

"What are you going on about?" He asked snidely once he had gotten over his shock. She looked up from her book.

"Did you find what you were looking for?" she repeated but Tom only looked at her like she had grown another head. She sighed and proceeded to clarify.

"You were looking over here. I thought you were looking at me, but I really couldn't be sure. I had been a little preoccupied," she stated with a smile. Tom could only look at her for a few seconds in bewilderment. Was she totally off her rocker? Her large, almond shaped brown eyes were smiling too. Was she drunk? Had she taken too much of her medication? Slightly put off that her awkward, open ended question had left him speechless, he resorted to a grunt and looked out the window again.

"Was that a yes then?" she asked. He turned back and looked at her to see if she was serious. From her genuine look of confusion, she was. Tom gave her the original are-you-kidding-me? look which prompted her to chuckle lightly.

"What are you laughing at?" he asked hotly.

"You-you look funny when you do that!" she exclaimed between giggles.

'She's crazy! She's absolutely batty!' his mind thought. A furious whirl of images of her actually being this happy to lure him into a false sense of security so she could kill him (or worse, eat him) when he least expected it played in his mind's eye like a news reel at the cinema. Tom started to regret even stepping into the compartment in the first place. Why? Why had he not refused like his gut told him to and looked for another compartment? Sure, he may not have found an empty one, but even one with a gaggle of giggling girls was better than this!

"Would you like me to be quiet again?" she asked with her head slightly cocked to the side and a silly grin on her face. It was all Tom could do to nod in the affirmative. She beamed brightly and ducked her head back into the depths of her book. Tom now knew why she was reading it. She was trying to discover her home planet.

The train ride to Hogwarts had been long and ('thank god!' Tom thought) quiet. Tom scrambled off the train as soon as it pulled into the station.

'FREE! FREE AT LAST! And I'm alive!' His mind was doing cartwheels and his heart was soaring. He didn't think he had ever been that happy to be rid of someone in his life.

"FIRST YEARS! FOLLOW ME! ALL FIRST YEARS THIS WAY!" Yelled a man about 20 meters from him; Tom began to roll his trunk on that a ways. All around him children his age were flowing in a massive crowd. He observed the faces that passed him by. Most looked nervous, some even petrified. Tom inwardly smirked and outwardly schooled his features into the cool, calm expression he had trained himself to always project. Tom knew from his research that it had been customary for all new members of Hogwarts to cross the Great Lake in front of the school by boat and enter the Great Hall by the side door. The man had ushered Tom into a boat and then proceeded to put someone else by him.

"You know, I never got your name."

Tom's head whirled around as his insides squirmed with the recognition of the feminine, lilting voice. Sure enough, there she was. Smiling. Again. If Tom and this girl were comic book characters, Tom would have had smoke coming from his head, so much was his frustration.

"Leave me alone you loon!" Tom all but shouted. One of her black, arched eyebrows rose.

"You think I'm crazy?" she broke off laughing, "All this time I thought you were acting this way because you were shy!" She started laughing. Tom didn't like this girl. She made odd comments and exhibited even odder emotions that left him incapable of the snide remarks she deserved. He didn't like the fact that she could spark reactions he had thought he had long ago gotten rid of. She unarmed him at every chance he gave her. Why was he giving her chances?

"Leave me alone," he replied darkly, "Leave me alone and don't talk to me." She met his glare with curiousness. The way she was looking at him, it was hard to describe the feeling, but he suddenly felt like a particularly puzzling book that she was trying to decipher; only, the characters were in a foreign language, but she knew that if she looked long enough, they would spell themselves out to her. Tom shifted uncomfortably under her gaze and, finally, was able to pull his eyes from hers. He felt her jerk once and looked back at her. The smile that had made her way over her face again was one of mirth; she immediately stifled it and attempted to shove it back to wherever it bubbled up from. Tom rolled his eyes in irritation.

"Sorry. You don't seem to like people laughing at you, but I couldn't help it." He wasn't looking at her. He was forcing himself not to. (God! Just how large was this lake?) But he could feel her eyes on him. He shifted again, hating the way she was making him behave; the way she was making him feel.

"I'm making you feel like a goldfish in a bowl aren't I?" She asked after a little while. Tom just sent her a dirty look.

"Sorry," she said softly, turning her head forward toward what he realized was Hogwarts. The castle stood tall and imposing in the darkness of the night and Tom felt a little of the fear his classmates were showing creep up inside of him. A thousand glittering lights illuminated the windows of the tall towers and the spires were enveloped in the evening fog. It was a half moon night.

Soon enough, the boats began to dock by the school. Tom felt relief wash over him as he was allowed to leave the boat and put some distance between himself and her.

"Welcome first years! I am Professor Dumbledore. I teach Transfiguration here at Hogwarts and am looking forward to seeing you all in my class in the upcoming weeks! I do trust your journey here went smoothly…" a soft murmur swept through the students in the affirmative. Dumbledore beamed. "I'm glad to hear that. Now if you will just follow me, I will take you up to Great Hall where the sorting ceremony will be held. Then you all may have your fill of dinner before bed. I do say the house elves have been especially busy today. I think we can expect a very sumptuous meal to send us to bed," he chortled merrily with a twinkle in his eye. The same twinkle had been there when he had come to see Tom in the orphanage.

Dumbledore was right about going to bed with a full stomach. Tom had been sorted into Slytherin to his delight. To add more fire wood to the happy glow that was his mood, Thirumala Arjuna (the annoyance with a lilt) was sorted into Ravenclaw. So she had no excuse to linger and disturb him. Not in the sense that he was busy with something (Tom allowed himself to just sit and admire the Great Hall, just absorbing the general splendor of the room, its many floating candles, and the dark night sky abovethat it had to offer), but more in the sense that she, herself, was disturbing. He had never known what people meant when they said that someone gave them the 'willies', but Tom now thought he had a rather good idea. How she managed to get sorted into a house known for its cleverness was beyond him, but Tom decided not to linger on that thought too much.

Tom looked around the table to see some of his new house mates. Abraxas Malfoy, the boy from the station was three seats down to his left, and next to him a girl, Calypso Lestrange. There was also a slew of Blacks, all siblings or cousins of varying ages. There were a few Averys and few more Notts. There were also three Flints, a set of twins named Greengrass and a pudgy girl and brother duo called Parkinson. Some people called Carrow too. They seemed surprised, to say the least, that Tom had been sorted into their house. And it wasn't the pleasantly surprised kind of surprised either. The first thing people had done to welcome him was to shoot glares in his direction and one even had the audacity to call him a 'mudblood'. Whatever that was, but either way Tom knew it was some sort of insult based on the way the guy had said it. Well, more like snarled it. Tom then let his gaze drift to other tables. The Hufflepuffs seemed to be talking boisterously and the Gryfinndors were listening to one of the older students recount something he had presumably done over the summer, complete with wild hand gestures.

'Must be an Italian' Tom thought wryly. Tom's gaze drifted over the Ravenclaw table just long enough to see Arjuna. She was reading that blasted book again and was sitting with a few other girls, who were chatting much like every other student in the hall that night. It was almost like she felt him watching-er-just casually glancing her way, for she then looked up and found his eyes amongst the crowds and beamed at him. Tom growled softly and whipped his eyes down to his plate. He spent the rest of his meal picking at his roasted potatoes and the seemingly-similar-to-Salisbury-steak he'd served himself with his fork.

Finally, Headmaster Dippet stood to announce that the feast was over and that it was time for bed. Tom determinedly did not look at the Ravenclaw table as he followed the boy who claimed to be the Head Boy of Slytherin and told them to follow him. The Slytherin Common Room was in the dungeons and unlike its less than warm enterance, it was more than warm on the interior. Luxurious was the only word that could come up in Tom's mind when he observed the black leather sofas and the green lighting rebounding off the gray flagstone walls. The tables and bookshelves were nothing like the decrepit and warping wood things in the orphanage. These were a gleaming mahogany and the fireplaces on either side were enormous! A single flight of stairs was in the back of the room and split into two separate flights that went right and left, much like a forked tongue.

"The flight on the right side leads to the girls' dormitory, the left, obviously, leads to the boys'. Any questions?" The Head Boy asked disinterestedly. He apparently wanted to get back to the Head Girl, a petite blonde, who had drifted away from the group once the Head Boy had puffed his chest out and said he could handle it. She then proceeded to walk up with her friends to the Head Boy's great chagrin. She was now sitting by one of the large fireplaces on the left and the Head Boy was glancing her way one too many times for it to be just casual glancing. The other first years were still openly gaping at the large expanse of space and so no one raised their hands let alone realize just where he would rather be and roll their eyes, the way Tom had. Girls were a distraction, one he had no intentions of getting caught up in.

"Fine. Have a good night you lot."And with that, the Head Boy stalked off to pursue his target. Tom proceeded to head up the stairs and then went up the left stairwell as the Head had said to. At the top was a single door. Tom opened it to find a room with about 10 or so beds, each with forest green velvet curtains around them. Tom noticed his trunk with his things at the foot of one of the beds. Like the common room, there were no windows, but that suited Tom just fine. He preferred the dark anyway; it was soothing. Perhaps that was because of the many years he had spent by himself as an outcast in the orphanage, but he didn't want to think of that just now. He would get his revenge on all of them in good time. When the time was right, all those who had spurned him would beg him for mercy. For his benevolence, and he would deny it to them, they way had denied it to him.

Tom had no wishes to socialize with his new housemates. It had been a very long day and Tom was exhausted. It was awhile before Tom was able to fall asleep in the new bed, but before he did, he closed the curtains. And darkness fell upon him.