Rage is usually portrayed in shades of red, impairing the vision of those affected by it, tinting everything in sight; for Tom, however, it was as if his rage had caused the colour to melt from the world.

Hearing the girl with the frizzy hair - hair that seemed to spark with each change of her emotions, he noted from their encounter - essentially tell him he had traveled over fifty years into the future had drained the colour from his vision. He watched as it slowly dredged closer and closer to the hard stone floor before melting away completely into some imaginary hole, taking away any feeling other than true, unfiltered anger.

All that he had worked for was gone - had disappeared with the sound of the Room of Requirement's door as it had shut behind him, sealing him in this Hell that he undoubtedly could not escape from.

And Tom Riddle had certainly tried.

Before the girl had announced her arrival, slamming a book on the floor with her outstanding display of clumsiness, he had been trying to get the door to reappear. He thought that it was simply playing a joke on him, spitting him back out in the exact location he had walked through, like the Founders of Hogwarts were laughing in his face-

But it seemed they were, if only for a different reason.

Leave it to the Room of bloody Requirement to take his request too fucking seriously and take him as far away from his knights as possible.

Fifty fucking years in the future.

He would have laughed at the undeniable disaster if it hadn't left his blood boiling.

He imagined himself ripping them apart, one by one, for ruining his plans that were seven years in the making.

Seven fucking years.

All of it.

Gone.

Gone, and he would have to start over, find more insufferable idiots to manipulate into following him; attempt to mold them into puppets that would fail him, again, just like all the others.

Because no matter how much he could teach someone - and Tom was quite the tutor in his time - he couldn't teach someone common sense, or give them the proclivity to figure things out for themselves.

The sound of a person huffing in front of him pulled him from his thoughts.

Tom sighed, shoving his anger into the deepest recess of his mind, available at a whim's notice whenever something inconvenienced him greatly - or, if he was being honest, even inconvenienced him in the slightest. He certainly wasn't the most even tempered person to walk the halls of Hogwarts.

Allowing his face to fall into the perfect facade of calm, unfeeling nothingness that he had mastered over the years, he acknowledged the person in front of him who had started to shuffle from foot to foot subconsciously, staring at him with poorly hidden anxiety.

"Pardon me," he murmured. "I'm sorry for the confusion surrounding this situation. It appears the Room of Requirement has sent me forward in time, and I'm a bit out of sorts." He did his best to look sheepish, diverting his gaze from her eyes momentarily for authenticity.

"Er-what?" She responded, looking dumbfounded.

It seems that the students weren't much brighter in this time than they were in his. Brilliant.

"I asked the room to provide me with an area away from some issues I was having, and it brought me here. Stepped through the door in 1944, stepped out in 1997."

The girl continued to stare and he began to question whether she had a brain at all.

"How else can I explain this?" He grouched, slowing his sentences down as much as he found possible. "Me, Tom, go through door fifty years ago-"

"I'm not an idiot!" She growled, red colouring her cheeks as her eyes narrowed. "It's just- the Head Boy disappearing. That's just a rumour spread by second years to scare the firsties. It's not real- right? It can't be right."

"It seems there's some truth to it, I'm afraid. First hand experiences and all that."

"Well- I- We should probably-"

"Do you always speak so eloquently?"

"Excuse me! I can't take everything in stride! I'm doing my rounds and you're just dropped into my lap, fifty years from the past, and I'm supposed to just accept it? Oh, all good and well, just any other night, right? Maybe for you, but not everyone can have mood swings for days and just snap back to normal at the drop of a wand!"

She threw her arms up in the air, huffing her breath out after working herself up. He struggled to contain a laugh at the disdain for him painted so blatantly on her face as he leaned against the wall, raising an eyebrow at her.

He chose to ignore her comment on his emotions for another time.

"So, are you going to introduce yourself and take me to the Deputy Headmistress or are we to continue standing here so you can accost me with your flailing limbs?"

He watched as she took a deep breath, appearing to be trying to calm herself down.

"He's just out of sorts," he heard her mumble to herself like a mantra. "He time traveled. He doesn't know what's happening. He's just out of sorts.."

It was so easy for him to get underneath her skin already, and he had to admit, he was having a bit of fun riling her up - surely, it was much better than any other event from his night, which seemed to have spanned fifty years. He almost grimaced at his internal dialogue, not fully forgiving himself for the awful pun.

"Hermione. Hermione Granger."

"Pleasure to meet you, Hermione Granger, even given the unfortunate circumstances. I'm Tom Riddle."

He held his hand out for her to shake and he watched as it hung in solitude for four seconds before she stepped forward and grasped it.

"Pleasure." She gave him a small smile before releasing his hand and turning on her toes - not entirely gracelessly, he noticed - and straightening her shoulders before leading the way. "This way to the Deputy Headmistress. She always knows what to do."

He followed behind, only briefly aware that her hair had different tones of honey that glowed as she walked under the lights of the torches.

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Hi, again! Hope you enjoyed this bit. I'm trying to have Tom and Hermione both be a bit less rigid than they were in the books but trying to keep to their personalities as much as possible. If I'm getting too OOC lemme know, but this is how I've always imagined them interacting in my head.

As aaaalways, please leave me a review if you're reading! Even just a quick hi will make me super happy :)

Until next time xxx