Inadequate
by Odd One Out
Rated PG
Disclaimer: All characters belong to J.K. Rowling, Scholastic, and Warner Brothers. No copyright infringement intended.
Look into the mirror, child. What do you see?
There's a boy staring back at you, black hair limp with moisture, eyes glittering in the torchlight. Your skin, usually so pale, is tinged pinkish-red and covered in a fine mist of water. You scrubbed yourself so hard in that shower, didn't you, child? Why? Could you feel the blood of your father coursing through you, that horrible murky liquid poisoning your purity? Were you trying to cleanse yourself of something you never could - the Muggle filth within you?
You wipe aside the condensation that builds up on the mirror. Gnawing on your bottom lip, you shake your head, sending a light cascade of droplets through the air. It makes you look a bit like a dog, did you know that? Dogs always shake themselves to clear their fur of water.
Of course, deep down, you are little more than an animal. Poor, poor little orphan boy, shunted off to live with the Muggles, beaten, starved, taunted. Did you ever fight back? No, of course not. You spent the whole time cowering with your tail between your legs, shielding yourself from the blows, closing your ears off to the slurs - never baring your teeth and lunging for the jugular. It was your own law of the jungle: submit or be killed.
Sighing, you grab a green-and-silver towel and run it over your short hair, dispelling the final few drops of liquid. Your eyes are trained on the mirror the whole time.
You're a failure. Sure, you achieve the highest marks in your class, you're envied by the other Slytherins, and you're sure to be Head Boy in two years. But what makes you think you're so special; what makes you think you're the star of Hogwarts? After all, you're just one wizard out of a billion. You're little more than a statistic: just another boy, just another student, just another orphan to pass through the magical world. You're not even the first Parselmouth to grace the planet.
You're nothing special.
But you want to be, don't you?
You want to show the world that you can fight back. No longer do you want to be labeled as "the boy from the Muggle orphanage." You want to make a new identity, become a new person. You want to stand up and fight back for a change. Battle instead of cower. Kill instead of submit.
You reach out and write your own name on the mirror. Your finger slips and skids over the warm water on the glass. Clear letters stand against the translucent mist, and you frown at them in thought. Lightning-quick thoughts dart through your brain, and the same letters shift about into a new pattern.
Now you are smiling. Again, your finger glides over the frosted mirror, and a new line of words form beneath it. To change yourself, why not change the most basic aspect of yourself: your name? No more will you be a failure; no more will you hide from the ones that hate you. You are being reborn, Tom Marvolo Riddle, into one who is much greater than your opponents will ever be.
The second line of words on the mirror cross your lips in a whisper: "I am Lord Voldemort." You laugh and turn, swiping the words away.
And before you lose sight of your reflection, you watch as your eyes flash with a reddish glow.
*end*
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