Warning: There are some gruesome descriptions in this chapter. Please remember this is a work of fiction, it doesn't reflect my personal convictions at all.

Sixth year (1943-1944 / 16-17 years old)
Chapter 9: A permanent digestion of dead bodies

It's a very bad idea.

Have you always been such a coward?

Being brave also means knowing when to go back, Harry said, feeling like Hermione.

You think about her so much that I can't believe nothing happened between both of you.

I never thought at her like this, Harry made a face. She was my best friend. And she was going out with Ron.

Lately, you've been very disposed to talk to me about your first life, Tom observed, collapsing on a stump. Why I am so breathless when I'm the very personification of youth?

We don't work out a lot, Harry teased, breathing the air with delight.

He could clearly have enjoyed the moment – hiking on the heights of a lost village – if he had not known what was coming. The road led to the House of Gaunt and the worst part of this story was that it was Harry who had taken them up there.

Since the creation of the first Horcrux, he felt different and indifferent. If Tom asked him question he knew the answer to, Harry would gladly reply to him, even if it could be compromising.

It was as if the mission he thought he had when he had reincarnated – protecting Tom, stopping him from becoming Voldemort, doing everything he could to change the story – had been canceled. Whether he struggled or not, events kept happening and he could not do anything about that. But what once made him feel helpless was now a status quo he calmly accepted. He could not save Myrtle, he could not save Tom and he could not save himself.

Yet the closer they got to the House of Gaunt, the more he realized what he was about to do. How could he have give in to Tom's whim? Why had he dragged him to a new murder?

xXx

Tom had always been a bit obsessed with his origins. During his first year, he had sought his surname everywhere at Hogwarts, in vain. Harassed by Harry, he had finally come down to never know where he came from. He had persuaded himself it did not matter as long as his imaginary friend stayed with him forever. Harry was his family's only member.

His old obsession had been reborn two months earlier, when he had received an Award for Services to the School. Seeing his name in the Trophy Room had reminded him he was perhaps not the last of the Riddles. Old questions then began to echo in his skull: Which one of his parents was Muggle? Why had no one ever come to get him? Why was he, the heir of Slytherin, born?

On the train to London, he had once again asked Harry if the name of Riddle did not evoke something to him. He had not expected Harry to tell him, in a detached way, where Tom Riddle Senior was living.

Tom had not been upset. Since the little Gryffindor girl's death, Harry was imperturbable. To retrieve Tom's soul from the Diary he had torn a large part of his own. This self-mutilation had made him as sensitive as an ice cube.

In short, the Slytherin had simply ordered him to reveal what he knew about his origins. Harry had not argued. He had told him his mother was descended from Slytherin, for she was a Gaunt and his father, whom he resembled very much, was a rich and handsome Muggle.

When Harry had dropped the name of the village where the Gaunts and the Riddles lived, Tom had begun to prepare his expedition to Little Hangleton. Harry, who previously would have attempted by all means to dissuade him from going, had even helped him organize the trip.

This convenient Harry being very convenient, Tom did not try to find out why he was so well informed. The main thing was that Harry shared what he knew with Tom.

xXx

Tom, don't go, Harry suddenly ordered. I should never have told you all that. If I've hid what I knew from you, it was not for-

Shut up, will you? Tom interrupted. I don't believe in your lies anymore. You are distraught. I know you lost the thread because of the Diary. But don't worry, this time there will be neither Basilik nor dead body. I only want to see from what kind of people I come, so I can understand why I'm on Earth.

Harry sighed and fell back into his lethargic state. He felt like he was Imperiused. It was not unpleasant. He would never have thought that owning a Horcrux could make him so careless.

Xxx xxx xxx

Are we there? Tom asked dubiously, as they arrived in front of the shabby hovel where his mother had grown up.

Yeah. Look at this.

Harry indicated the doormat on which three snakes were rotting. One of them was quite fresh, the other two were partly eaten away. Tom approached, hesitating between fascination and disgust. Settled down on one of the bodies, a large blue insect was munching flesh with zeal. Ants were picking up the small bits which were too small to be eaten by the beetle. Then they head back to the west, where the entrance of their underground shelter had to been.

The show was hypnotizing. Following the leader, a parcel on the back, the ants climbed the obstacles and skirted the boldest reliefs without ever stopping, as if they were a single organism cut into several pieces. To their right and going in the opposite direction, their congeners with empty legs formed another line. These one had already dropped off their load in the anthill and were coming back to help them out.

How did they find their bearings in this gigantic world? Did they communicate through their antennae? Were they presently passing messages to one another, oblivious to the presence of the huge voyeur?

And did not the enormous blue bug see these profiteers in a negative light? Would it abandon his meal and have a bite of a crispy ant? Or was this plundering inevitable, natural, in his opinion?

The scene was trivial and repetitive but Tom was struck by a revelation, as if he was in front of a religious painting. To stay alive, one had to feed on death, it was as simple as that. To plunder the corpses, to trample them, to act as if they had never been animated bodies but only dead flesh, it was not cruel, it was life. Some had to die so he could survive, for his heterotrophic cells were renewed only at the cost of other lives.

He was not a plant, a little water and light were not enough for him. His situation did not sadden him though. That was how it was. His flesh existed only because he ingested other flesh, only because he was incessantly recycling matter. He was even glad to be a necrophagus. He wanted to grap one of the snakes and eat it raw. Leaving this body, this food, slowly molding on a doorstep had no sense.

Everything had to be reingested, one inside the other and the other inside one, for the world was a permanent digestion of dead bodies.

xXx

Was it not thanks to a similar principle, an equivalent exchange, that Harry and he had lost part of their souls? The girl was dead but they got through it. Tom's soul had been torn from his body, but instead of fading into the air, it had passed into the most alive thing of the room, the Diary in which Harry had poured out his thoughts for months.

But why had Tom's soul broken out firstly? He assumed it had to do with the protective gesture Harry had had for Myrtle. By throwing himself on her to protect her from the Basilisk's eyes, he had intended to sacrifice himself, while Tom had spent long seconds praying for her to die.

This dilemma had separated them deeply, so much so that one of their souls had been sacked of their common body. Roughly speaking, everything had gone pretty well, considering it was an impromptu experiment.

During the few moments when Tom had been nothing but a wandering soul, he had taken possession of the Basilisk, had made him close the Chamber, and had sent him underground. Exhausted, he had then landed in the Diary, which was glittering and beating like a heart.

It was unfortunate that a person had died for his research, but other ones will soon have to die so he could reach his goal. Unknown lives, mortuary faces, it was not so important, compared to the possibility of seeing Harry at last. All in all, he might become a vegetarian. By sparing a certain number of animals, he could, in return, steal some human lives, for all the beings of the Earth were interchangeable, except one, and this irreplaceable being existed his skull only.

xXx

For his part, Harry had thought a lot about what had happened last June. He had come to a similar conclusion. In order to create a Horcrux, taking a life was not enough – if it had been the case, all humanity would be immortal. One had to feel remorse at the very moment when the act was done.

That was what was so terrible in the creation of a Horcrux. It was not enough to kill. The murderer had to feel teared apart by this death. He had to be ready to die because of it.

Tom's soul had been ejected from their body because Harry had been ready to sacrify himself to save Myrtle. If he had not thrown himself at her, if she had died without anyone protecting her, Tom would have stayed in their body, end of the story.

So the Horcrux had little to do with dark magic. On the contrary, it reminded Harry of his mother's sacrifice. No one wanted to talk about it and wizards were very afraid of it, but only because the Horcrux conferred a cursed immortality, an immortality reluctantly achieved. Who would want an existence full of remorse, a life even Death did not demand?

The Basilik's eyes kill anyone who looks into them. Myrtle died. I was torn apart, I didn't want her to die. My sorrow snatched Tom from me. His wandering soul slipped into a close and worthy object: the Diary he gave me, the Diary I had filled me with my thoughts. He woke up a few hours later. At that time, the Diary became a Horcrux. In order to take back most of his soul, I had to put a piece of mine there. Now the Diary contains a small piece of his soul, a bigger fragment of mine. But how did the sinks return to their place? Why was the Diary in our bag? And why was the Horcrux created, if Myrtle's death was not a murder but an accident? Who is the culprit?

Xxx xxx xxx

~ Who are you? ~

Tom turned around. Lost in their thoughts, Harry and him had not realized someone had come behind them.

~ My name is Tom Riddle, ~ replied the teenager in Parseltongue. He looked at the unknown man.

The guy was dirty, poorly dressed. His eyes were glassy and haunted, his lips split. His long and messy hair dangled in his back like lianas. Behind him, a horned animal, its throat cut, was levitating, pouring blood on the ground.

Tom noticed that some ants had lost interest in the snakes and were packing together under the slaughtered creature. The blood spattered them hard. One or two ants drowned in the scarlet puddle, but none left until having drunk the vital elixir.

A deer, Harry commented, without looking away.

Tom shuddered. The fresh game's sight and smell were stomach-churning but what really upsetted him was Harry's lack of reaction. Harry had always been the most sensitive, the most naive. Since the bathroom story, something had broken in him. Tom's experiment had been a success but it had cost him dearly. Was it really worth trying again?

Try what again?

Tom did not answer.

~ What are you doing here? Go away, ~ Morfin Gaunt grunted after a long silence.

He did not seem surprised that Tom could talk Parselmounth. He might have not realized it. After all, he did not seem disturbed by the fact that he only wear one shoe and that his beard looked like alopecia areata.

If Harry's calculations were right, Morgin had left Azkaban more than a decade ago, in 1928 or 1929. The prison seemed to have destroyed what little mental balance he had received at birth.

Morfin walked past them without looking at them and opened his house's door with a shove of the shoulder, crushing the dead reptiles under his bare, dirty feet. The big blue insect flew away and buzzed for a moment around the throated deer before disappearing into the forest.

Tom went inside and horrified, he looked at his ancestors' home.

xXx

I can't have a link with this place. How can this man be a Pure-blood? How can he be descended of Salazar when ...

The half-full plates emitting strong rotting smells, the dust covering everything – the floor, the furniture, the lamps – the bits and pieces lying around, everything made him nauseous. Could one really live in such a slum?

Ask him, maybe he knows, Harry suggested, half seriously. His name is Morfin.

Tom mantained a reasonable distance between Morfin and him – he did not want to get fungus – and questioned him:

~ You're Morfin, aren't you? ~

Tom's uncle was busy cutting up his game, but he looked up to him.

~ And you, who are you? Go away, or I'll cut you into pieces. ~

He's right, we might be better off going away, Harry said.

We came here so he could talk to me about my mother, Tom retorted in an exasperated tone.

Harry did not argue any more for he was thinking of something else. He was almost certain that Pensieve-Morfin had recognized Tom. Yes, he remembered that Morfin had confused Tom Riddle with his Muggle father. There was no doubt, Morfin had shouted, he had even thrown himself on Tom.

The fact that Tom had found the Gaunts thanks to Harry and not thanks to genealogical books had probably changed the story. Perhaps Tom's first version had come later in the summer, with a haircut that resembled his father's, one day when Morfin was particularly lucid.

Some elements were therefore modifiable. It was not over yet. This thought did not lighten Harry's mood as much as it would have done a few months earlier though.

xXx

~ I told you before, my name is Tom Riddle, ~ Tom replied. ~ Tell me what happened to my mother. ~

~ I dunno your mother, ~ Morfin said, resuming his dismemberment.

~ She was Merope Gaunt, ~ Harry breathed in spite of himself, driven by an unhealthy curiosity. ~ ~ Your sister. ~

Morfin dropped his bloody knife. With horror, Tom watched him pick it up, wipe it vaguely on his jacket and, muttering, got back to his sordid activity.

~ Merope, this slob ... This little tart ... Father died because of her ... The prison, because of her ... ~

After a long silence, in which he played absent-mindedly with the dead animal's nostrils, he stood up and groaned with anger:

~ You're the Muggle's son, aren't you? I remember now. Riddle ... To say he's still alive, that dirty ... that dirty ... ~

He fell back on his chair. His knife slipped from his hands again, but this time he did not bend over to pick it up.

~ Where is the Locket? Where is Merope? If she were there ... I could beat her, she would cook something for me. Merope ... ~

He was whining, occasionally accusing 'that Muggle bastard on his hill'.

Harry wanted to leave. Despite his new heart of stone, he was shaken up by the pitiful scene. Morfin was already unstable before Tom's birth but the prison, his father's death, his sister's betrayal, all that had finished him off. Harry did not even understand how he could have survived until Tom's visit.

You're right, you can't get anything from him, Tom sighed. Let's get out of here. Besides, will you one day explain to me how you know all this about my family?

Oh!

Tom immediately understood what had taken his friend's breath away. Morfin had abandoned his meat on his chair to catch something on the extinguished fireplace's mantle. Morfin was kissing the little object with fervor, and each of his infectious licks made it brighter.

It's a-

A ring, Harry said, without hiding his fright. In the Pensieve, wasn't he wearing it to his finger?

xXx

In Harry's panicked tone, Tom understood the ring was invaluable. Why Harry knew it was a mystery he would solve later. For the moment, he needed the ring. It was like when he had seen the engraved snake on the girls' bathroom's faucet. This ring attracted him terribly and he would heed his call.

Tom, no! the Survivor shouted angrily.

I hasn't been obeying your orders for a long time. I'm not your son, Tom said softly, pointing his wand at Morfin.

Harry struggled with all his might but since the creation of the Horcrux, he was unable to compete with Tom. He looked helplessly at the scene. The Slytherin boy Stupefied his uncle, who fell face down, his nose buried in the hearth's ashes.

I'm not gonna kill him, why are you such an unsufferable git? I would get more use for that ring than him, Tom cleaned the object by waving his wand and slipped it into his pocket. I'll also take this just in case.

The ring and Morfin's wand in his pocket, Tom headed for the neighboring hill, where, according to Morfin, the Riddles lived. During the short journey, he did not pay attention to his other conscience's cries of distress for he already had a lot to think on his side.

For many years, he had been desperate to find his biological wizard family. A black bile was rising in his esophagus, though. Considering the unhappy condition of his uncle, Tom was no longer surprised that his mother had died giving birth to him. Even if they were descended from Slytherin, The Gaunts had nothing to do with the powerful Pure-blood families John had described to him.

He hoped, therefore, to be more impressed by his Muggle family. He had inherited the face of his father and the latter was rich: he might not be as badly welcomed at the Riddles' as he had been at the Gaunts'.

Xxx xxx xxx

He had never been so strangely welcomed in his life. The first time he had rung at the Riddle Manor, an old woman had slammed the door in his face just as she had seen him. The second time, an old man had opened the door. He had given him a large senile smile.

"Tom, we were waiting for you. Mother is not going to be happy, you are late again," the Muggle had whispered, before signalling him to follow him.

He-Mother-What?

Harry had not known how to calm his soul's confusion.

Tom, he's a doddering old man.

But he called me 'Tom'-Mother-He said-

Tom did not remember to have even been expected somewhere for dinner. Even if it was a sweet and ephemeral illusion, he followed his grandfather pretending to be his son who had come home a bite late, pretending to have always lived there.

Unlike the House of Gaunt, the Riddle Manor boggled his mind. Everything was almost like in his dreams: high ceiling, old tapestries, posh furniture and labyrinth of corridors. But the quiet paintings were undoubtedly Muggle ones.

They came in a large and austere dining-room, where the table was set up for three people. The lady who had slammed the door in Tom's face ran to them, looking exasperated.

"Thomas, what were ... " she gasped. "What are you doing here?" she asked Tom, dragging her husband to a chair. "Did your parents never teach you not to walk into strangers'?"

She knows who you are, Harry noticed.

Obviously.

"My parents are gone," Tom smiled in a charming way. "They abandoned me at birth."

"That is unfortunate, but these things do happen," Mrs Riddle commented without an ounce of compassion. "Excuse us but you have to go. We will have dinner. Furthermore, in this day and age, it is not recommended to hang out in the streets at this hour."

"The Germans' bombs don't scare me," Tom sighed with exasperation.

"So you're an unconscious young man. Go away or I call the commissioner."

Tom, we're not welcome here.

And this Muggle cow is the height of rudeness. Maybe him ... Tom came near the old man with a soft, empty look, who did not seem to understand what was happening.

He was just smiling foolishly, waiting patiently for his wife and son to sit down to have dinner.

xXx

"Don't go near Thomas!" Mrs Riddle ordered, protecting her husband with a wave of her arm.

Tom backed away.

"But I am..."

"I know who you are," Mary Riddle admitted with regret. "You're the son of this ... crazy woman, aren't you? The one who lived in the old house they have been trying to destroy for years. Why don't you go there and beg for money? The maniac who lives over there is your uncle after all."

"I've been there."

"Well, go back there!"

"I'd like to see my father," Tom smugly said.

The old lady straightened up and laughed briefly. The sound barely resonated in the large room.

"Your father ! You think Tom ... "

"I'm Tom too."

"You think my son would like to see you? He will not be long, he should already be there. Wait for him if you want to, but don't move a muscle and don't do anything strange. You probably inherited your mother's ... defects," Mary Riddle's voice was quivering.

She was still standing in front of her husband's chair.

Damn, she looks like Petunia, Harry thought.

Tom did not ask who he was referring to. It must have been the Muggle woman he had grown up with, the one who had condemned him to live in a cupboard all his childhood. One day, Tom would go see them.

Don't even think about it.

Tom sighed and moved on. If they ever visited people of Harry's first life, they would surely meet his old friends, Ron and Hermione, not his adoptive family.

Tom, it's you who want to find your origins, not me. My friends are far away now, Harry whispered, hoping Voldemort would never go after his two best friends.

One Boy-who-lived was already enough.

xXx

In a corner of the dining-room, a large clock was sinisterly ticktocking. Six and then seven minutes passed. At the very moment Tom was about to leave, unable to stay longer in the same room as his grandparents, a man finally came.

Tom recognized him at first glance because it was like seeing himself in an aging mirror. High cheekbones, brown eyes, pinched mouth and auburn hair cut clean, Tom Riddle Senior and his son looked unbelievably alike. For this sole sight, Tom congratulated himself for having come to Little Hangleton.

You have the same face, Harry pointed out in a dumbfounded tone.

He had already seen Tom Riddle Senior in the Pensieve but to see him in real life .. it blew his mind.

You too, you look a lot like your father, Harry.

If you age, you'll have the same wrinkles, the same-

Why 'If I age'? Tom asked with amusement. Why on earth wouldn't I age?

He did not listen to Harry's answer because his father had sat down. Tom was looking at him, trembling with anticipation.

xXx

"Mother, who is he?" Tom's father eventually said, his eyes fixed on his empty plate.

"He is this woman's son."

He doesn't seem thrilled to hear that news, Harry was observing Tom Riddle Senior's scandalized face.

Mrs. Riddle shot a triumphant glance at Tom before sitting down in front of her husband. Her son's delicate purple complexion had not gone unnoticed.

"Why are you here ?" Tom asked Tom, his head still down.

These people are so witless, Tom was surprised, but he calmly replied, with the touching tone he used to charm his teachers:

"I just want to understand why I was brought up in an orphanage."

"You've been abandoned?" the Muggle man said lightly, before turning to Mary Riddle. "Mother, I am genuinely sorry for the wait."

"Next time, introduce us to your companion."

"Come on, Mother, we're not even engaged."

"Times are changing and you are not so young anymore. Go and kiss your father."

Tom Senior, thirty-eight years old, rose reluctantly and kissed his father's cheek, who looked at him without recognizing him.

"I'm very pleased to meet you, my name is Thomas Riddle. I don't know if you've already met Tom, our son? Come, my dear Tom."

I-

He confuses you with-

Harry, I know it, just shut up. Must you shatter my illusions?

The rest of Tom's thoughts were confused but Harry immediately recognized what was gnawing at his stomach: the visceral need to be accepted.

xXx

Even if old Thomas was a decrepit old man, Tom could not help but be moved by his tender gaze. No one, not even Harry – for his green and dead eyes were no longer part of the world – had ever looked at him like that.

These are the eyes of a parent, he thought standing still, forgetting Mary Riddle and Tom Senior.

"He is sometimes a bit capricious," Thomas Riddle finally said, with a spark of pride in his eyes, "but he's a good son. Please, sit down. Remind me, you are Mister ...?"

Tom Riddle Senior, although he got used to his father's senility, could not hide his pain. As he did not know what to say, he stood foolishly, looking wounded. His mother came to his rescue and motioned to him with her hand to sit down.

"Thank you, Thomas," she said to her husband with a sight. "My son, the starters are on their way, Cathy is in the ..."

"Shut up!" Harry suddenly exclaimed, his other self's sorrow being an acid in his viscera. "I came here to meet you. I wanted to understand where I came from, why ... why I am alive, why you are alive! My mother is dead, but why didn't you raise me? I've always wondered who my parents were and now that I find my father, he only worries about his stomach. And you, how can you be so hurt by the fact your father doesn't recognize you, when you are not interested in me, your own son?"

Tom Riddle Senior made a face and muttered that he had not eaten all day and 'compared only the comparable, will you'.

Tom was restless. He had just had proof Harry was unwaveringly supporting him despite their many differences. It was something that pleased him more than having met his biological father. Harry, wherever his soul was hidden, loved him to the point of forgiving him all. Harry, whatever that future was, would always be with him, in him.

Moreover, Tom had always been immorally excited when Harry's magic was vibrating under their skin, as it was at that moment.

As soon as he was reincarnated into Tom, Harry had chosen to behave like a parent and, in order to do so, he had to put an end to his teenage crisis and bury his extraordinary angry potential. In everyday life, he repressed his power more or less well. Yet he had something enormous in his heart, something that even death could not destroy. Then, when he allowed his emotions to run their course, it was as if all this patiently accumulated energy was suddenly released by all their skin's pores. And it made him fantastically alive.

The idea that Harry was a different being from himself excited Tom and always made him want to hug him so hard he would break into pieces. But, of course, it was impossible, for Harry did not have a body of his own. Oh, how he did not care about the other Riddles! Was not Harry the only being that mattered?

Your father is alive and ... he doesn't give a damn about you. You have a family and ... And ...

Understanding that no Riddle intended to answer him, Harry unconsciously clenched his fists. He now released spores of magic as a toxic plant. The chandelier slowly oscillated over them, and the Riddles, even the grandfather, looked embarrassed, even frightened. Harry felt no pity for them.

There was no doubt: after Tom Senior's return to the village, the Riddles had resumed their old life, as if the son had never married Merope Gaunt, as if he had never become a father.

xXx

While Tom, a baby, then a child and then a teenager, had spent his time wondering who might be his father, Tom Riddle Senior had taken back his privileged position in Little Hangleton without worrying about his son's fate – without recalling his existence.

Merope had perhaps been a miserable person, but she at least had the capacity to love madly. She had loved her rich and beautiful Muggle to the point of not being able to deceive him any longer with a love potion. She had naively believed he would stay with her to look after the unborn baby, thinking that after some romance he had fallen for her too.

The torment she had felt when he had abandoned her, Harry could only imagine. He knew, however, that she had sold Slytherin's Locket, her only good, to survive until her child's birth. Her task done, she had died, dedicating her last words to her baby and to the man she had so foolishly loved. Even though Tom had never been able to meet her, even though she was no Lily, Harry thought she had taken on her role as a mother as best she could.

Unlike her, Tom Riddle Senior had not given a fuck about his responsibilities. Of course, he would never have slept with the witch if he had not been drugged, but in any case a child was born, a child whose veins were defiled by his cowardly blood. One thing was certain: he was no James.

Harry, you're hu-

Shut up! Harry yelled, but he also felt like a hand was gripping their heart, in order to bust it open.

Was it because of his anger or of Tom's fear?

Mary Riddle, momentarily taken aback, regain his ability to speak.

"The cook will bring the starters, please ..."

"I won't leave before having heard what you have to say!" Harry snapped.

Tom Riddle Senior's eyes widened. He looked like a complete cretin. He was sweating stupidity while his Tom ...

"What I have to say to you?" the Muggle man repeated. "Your mother, this slattern, trapped me! Without her artifices, I would never have ... Without her diabolical magic tricks, you would never have stood there! If you want money, I'll give some to you, but afterwards, go away, I really had a long day."

He rummaged his coat's pocket, took out a wallet but he dropped the object. He fell to the ground, dead.

xXx

Everything had happened in a flash. Blinded by the fury of his other self, Tom had pointed Morfin's wand at his father to impress him, to be taken seriously finally but Harry had shouted the Death Curse.

Neither of them could believe it. They stared at what they could see from the fresh corpse: a pair of legs in gray pants, resting strangely on the chair. The rest of the body was on the floor, hidden by the table.

Why did you do that? Tom asked with horror and admiration.

Why did I do that? Harry wondered, but he felt very calm, almost empty.

He did not regret his act. He had just killed a man, with the same spell that had snatched his parents from him, but he felt no guilt. In reality, with this crime came a revelation: Tom had never intended to kill the Riddles. It was him, Harry, who was going to do it. If he was not destined to commit triple murder, he could never have cast so easily an Unforgivable Curse. It was like when, at the end of his third year, he had invoked his Patronus for the first time on the other side of the lake, without hesitation, without being afraid.

His mission in this world was certainly not to save Tom but, on the contrary, to turn him into Voldemort. He wanted to laugh.

"What have you done to him?" Mrs Riddle chirped, coming to her senses. "Cathy, Cathy! Cathy, call ..."

She was getting up out of her chair when Harry pointed the wand at her and killed her. In the first version of the story, the three Riddles had been found around the dining table. Harry would respect that detail.

The sight of his grandmother's corpse did not do much to Tom. Without her, Earth would surely be better. The Slytherin wanted to approach the dark mass of his father's body, but Harry forced him to look at the last Riddle at the table. After having dazily stared at his wife and son falling to the ground, the old man had turned his head towards Tom, realizing at last the teenager was not his son but a stranger.

No, not him, Tom whispered. He welcomed me as his own son. Harry ...

"Tom," Thomas Riddle murmured, his eyes tearful. "Tom, it's you, isn't it?"

Tom lowered the wand. He would not kill the last member of his family, it was too great a sacrifice. If he hid the corpses, if he modified the memory of the old man and retrieved his belongings at the orphanage, he could move to the Manor with him. He did not mind being mistaken for another one if he was so gently welcomed, if he had a home of his own.

Lost in his reverie, still a bit stunned by the two murders committed by his usually virtuous second conscience, Tom noticed a second too late that Harry, the Gaunt ring clasped in his left hand like a rosary, had raised the wand towards Thomas Riddle.

'No!' He wanted to scream but at the same moment, from his mouth escaped an old incantation, like an echo:

"Avada Kedavra."

Xxx xxx xxx

Tom being in a daze, Harry took it from here. He went to the kitchen and used Legimency to make Cathy, the cook, believe that her day's work was finished. When she would discover the bodies the next day, she would go down to the village to shout to anyone who wanted to hear that the three Riddles were dead.

While leaving, Harry made enough noise to catch the gardener's attention, and while leaping from the garden gate, he heard the door of Frank Bryce's cabin squeak.

Everything went as planned … or rather as the first time. But Harry was not grieving, on the contrary, he was almost enjoying reconstructing the events as faithfully as possible. It was not quite a game, it was rather his duty.

He felt like a slaughterhouse worker who do his work conscientiously but who sometimes feels a cruel and inappropriate pleasure in killing an animal. This feeling of superiority, which had no reason to be, was bitting his stomach on his way to the House of Gaunt. He was no God but he knew Tom Riddle's whole story before it happened. He was no God, but he came close to it.

He successfully modified Morfin's memory, canceled the Stunning Spell which was keeping him still, gave him back his wand and flew away.

At no time was he afraid of failing, even though he had never changed someone's memory in his previous life. Being in such a deep shit should have troubled him, but everything was very easy, almost too much. It was really like his first corporeal Patronus: he had committed his first murders with disconcerting simplicity.

He suddenly decided to Apparate instead of riding the train. He had not used this means of transport since the Horcruxes' hunt but not for a moment did he consider the risk of Splinching. The short feeling of suffocation was not as disturbing as he remembered, and he reappeared in the courtyard of the orphanage without any problem.

No one asked him where he had spent the day and he locked himself in their room without talking to anyone, not even Tom, who still was groggy. He put on his pajamas and the cursed ring, and he felt, inside the piece of jewellery, two discordant hearts gently pounding. Around his skin, the warm ring calmed him down and made him feel less broken.

He had created the second Horcrux.

Xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx xxx

From the Start-of-Term Feast, people noticed there was something different about Tom Riddle. He who had always been very quiet, not to say asocial, cordially greeted all his schoolmates. He even shaked a few hands here and there. He replied kindly when asked about his OWLS results and seemed worried about Walburga's health, who had turned red when he had kissed her hand.

The murders eventually make one ugly but Tom's first Avada Kedavra had only accentuated his astral presence. Some followers were now fluttering around him all the time, as if he were the sun . It did not seem to bother him. He even went to the little events to which Slughorn had striven to invite him for a few years. He had, however, setted a condition for his circle: he should not be called by his name or surname. He was done with the Gaunts and the Riddles. Had he really been obsessed with his origins during such a long time? He could not believe it, it seemed so insane.

"But how should you be called?" Walburga whimpered. She was eating out of the palm of his hand since he had promised to attend their New Year Eve's party.

Harry shuddered in spite of himself.

"What's the use of calling me if I'm already here?" the Slytherin boy smiled.

"To–, I mean, you have matured so much during the summer," Walburga said, before being dismissed by a distracted hand gesture.

Tom's smile disappeared at once.

Why do you seem so relieved? Did you think I was going to allow her to call me 'My Refined Sugar' or 'My Little Marsupial'? he inquired suspiciously.

I must say, I was afraid you'd give yourself a ridiculous nickname, Harry half lied. Do I still have the right to cal–

Of course you can call me Tom, the Slytherin sighed, raising his eyes to heaven. You are special, must I repeat it one more time, after so many years? But I'm 'Tom' only for you.

Why do you wear it then, if you don't want to have anything to do with your ancestors? Harry asked, playing with Marvolo Gaunt's ring. Tom never took it off.

You know why.

That was the truth. Harry knew.

xXx

The ring represented the murders that Harry, the allegoy of innocence, had committed for him, to defend him. It reminded him that he was only at the beginning of his quest. That he was not done with the corpses but that the result would be worth all those sacrifices. It whispered to him that he was the last of the Riddles and that if he did not want to die alone, he had a lot to do. It was proof that he had finally found a meaning to his life.

Whenever they took off the Horcrux to shower or jerk off, Harry was thinking that he should never have let Tom live that long. If he had opened his eyes, figuratively and literally, in the Chamber of Secrets, neither Myrtle nor the Riddles would have died. Yet, in both cases, his heart could not help but object, Tom had not been fully responsible for the crimes.

However, Harry was not so sure Myrtle had died by accident anymore. It did not fit his theory about the Horcruxes' creation. And he could not be mistaken, to create a Horcrux, to tear your soul and store a piece of it in an object, you had to simultaneously want and not want to kill. Two fundamentally contradictory impulses had to express themselves at the same moment with the same intensity: such a murder could not help but separate a soul in two.

That was why it was so easy for them. While they shared a single body, they constantly had drastically different desires. When Harry had killed Thomas Riddle, Tom had prayed, screaming with all his soul against this murder, and as the Death Currse had touched the old man, he had felt all the bones of his body liquefy. An inaudible cry had resounded in his skull, his heart had broken in two. He had thought he was dying.

It was exactly what Harry had felt when the Basilisk's eyes had met Myrtle's. There was only one explanation: Tom had wanted the death of the Gryffindor girl. How was it possible? And why would he want to kill her? Did he know what a Horcrux was before the opening of the Chamber?

Harry did not know and he refused to think about it, for he had no desire to accuse Tom of anything, himself being guilty of triple murder. Had he even the right to blame him, when he had murdered three people almost in cold blood?

The Boy-who-lived had thus abandoned moral questions to take an interest in the theory of the Horcruxes. For example, he was surprised that the piece of soul's size contained in the artifact could vary. The Diary contained a good half of his soul but only a crumb of Tom's. The Ring, on the other hand, housed a big chunk of Tom's … and Harry had no idea if he had lost something on the way.

He was sure of one thing: the bigger a soul's fragment in a Horcrux was, the more insensible you became, or, to be more precise, the less you felt. Indeed, if Harry had felt surprisingly empty after Myrtle's death, it was because the Diary had rid him of the feeling of anxiety. Since his reincarnation in Tom, he had been constantly worried, he had worried for Tom, for their future, for their incestuous relationship but the Horcrux had rescued him from this permanent anguish.

For that was the role of a Horcrux. In the same way that a Pensin stored the most unpleasant memories out of the body, a Horcrux took charge of the destructive feelings, those that prevented one from living. In ridding oneself of those evils which devour the intestines, was it not evident that one could get immortality?

According to Harry, the little piece of Tom's soul that resided in the Diary was nothing but his desire to be the heir of Slytherin. He could easily imagine that Tom's desire to find his family was slumbering in the Ring.

Unfortunately and against all odds, the fact that Tom had relieved himself of these two wishes – having the dignity of a Pure-Blood and having a family – had not kept him away from Voldemort. Taking advantage of the newly liberated space in his now selfish and cold heart, a more sneaky, less childish wish had germinated immediately, a vow which had nothing to do with the first Voldemort but which, ironically, would push him to the same fate.

He wanted Harry to come alive and for that, he was ready for anything.

Xxx xxx xxx

Tom had long believed that being the heir of Slytherin or that finding his father would make his existence precious and indispensable. But the Gaunts, Pure-blood descendants of Slytherin, and the Riddles, rich Muggles, emitted the same decaying smell.

He had imagined, inside him, that he was born out of an act of love. He had to be the result of an impossible love story, much like Harry's and he's. But although his mother had died to give life to him, it did not mean she had desired him. When Tom listened attentively to his other self, he felt like she had gotten pregnant just to have a way to pressure Tom Riddle Senior.

He had been wrong to look for a reason to live in other people, as he had been wrong to be fascinated by the Blood Theory which gave him a secondary social rank. He could, if necessary, use this dogma to achieve his aims, but his goal had nothing to do with the enslavement of the lower races.

For the only thing that gave a meaning to his life was that he was born with Harry. This anomaly made his existence a miracle. Unlike the other orphans, the other Half-Bloods, unlike the Pure-Blood folks, he had been destined from birth to something great.

Harry could have been reborn in Walburga Black, John Lestrange or Albert Avery, yet he was there, in him, Tom Riddle. He knew so much about the Gaunts, the Riddles and souls that could not be anyone else than a guide. He who would lead Tom to the truth, by hook or by crook.

Oh, Harry, evil genie or guardian, I don't know what you really are, but I love it above all when you moan my name while scourging yourself for doing so-

Tom ... Let us come in peace, okay?

The Slytherin smiled and let out a little desperate cry when Harry's hand on their cock made them ejaculate.

xXx

While Harry was recovering from their solitary hanky-panky, Tom cautiously resumed his questioning about souls. He took care to carefully encrypt his thoughts. If Harry learned that Myrtle's death was not as accidental as it had seemed ...

This was not exactly what he had tried to do but at the same time the unexpected experience had a rather satisfactory result. The Diary unquestionably contained a piece of him and of Harry, which meant it was possible to separate the soul from the body by murder.

Indeed, through his fifth year's readings, he had learned that killing could, under certain circumstances, divide the indivisible. Of course, it had immediately caught his attention. He had always longed to embrace Harry one day. Yet he had not sought to know more about the matter, for he was aware that neither Harry nor the librarian would appreciate his interest in a process that wass obviously Dark. In short, revising his OWLS as if his life depended on it, he had put the idea aside.

However, on the day he had opened the Chamber, when the Basilisk had brought him back to the surface, he had vaguely hoped that someone would be in the bathrroom. He had not known exactly what to do. When he had felt his soul leave his body, he had thought he could go to the corpse, but he had only been able to possess the Basilisk and then he had thrown himself into the diary.

When Harry had killed Thomas Riddle, Tom had, in spite of his sorrow, used the occasion to try to animate the dead body of his father, but he had had to fall back on the ring, which was pulsing in Harry's hand.

Obviously, a piece of soul torn from the body could only occupy a living being or an object so precious it was nearly alive. That was not what Tom had wanted to do, but it was getting close. If he learned more about how, in three months, he had twice broken his soul, he would surely find a way to give Harry a body. He would invent a new protocol. It was within his reach: after all, he had made two soul transplants almost accidentally! He was a genius!

This new caprice consumed him like an acid and he felt like he was sweating frustration. All his classes were of no use to him, and no professor gave him answers. Dumbledore would not teach him how to bring a man back from the dead. Even Slughorn, Head of Slytherin, did not seem to be fond of Dark Magic. But Tom's interrogations were purely theoretical, it was not as if he intended to create other soul's receptacles ...

xXx

Against Harry's will, Tom had tried to discuss the matter with his classmates, but they all had looked at him with disgust. Even those who infallibly supported Grindelwald had shuddered at the idea of separating a soul from a body. It was worse than a rape, much worse than a Dementor's kiss. It was crossing the line with divinity. It was not a question of darkness but of madness.

"Are you serious ?" Mulrber Byron had said.

"You should take it up with John. But even him, I don't know if he would be able to help you," Nath Rosier had grumbled.

"Why would you want to do that?" Albert had asked fearfully.

"I just have questions," Tom had argued. "I am certainly not the only wizard wondering if it is possible to remove the soul, to place it elsewhere than in its original body."

"You ... You know you'd have to kill to create what you're talking about?"

"Yes, I do. Again, I remind you these are mere questions."

"And are you ready for that? Ready to kill to become immortal?"

"That's harmless curiosity, I tell you," Tom had repeated, but his classmates had not seemed to believe him, and had moved away from him with fear.

I'm not reaching for immortality, Tom had been mentally surprised. Why do they all think that?

Perhaps because it is the primary purpose of a Horcrux, Harry had dropped. And shit shit shit–

So 'Horcrux' was the name of a soul stored in an object, Tom had thought, stroking his ring, amazed. The word was as mysterious as the process it designated. For if Tom intended to use it to offer a flesh to his soulmate, its first aim seemed to be to confer immortality. So, was he already immortal? The idea was pleasant and frightening at once. An endless life where he could never see Harry's face, he was not sure if he wanted it.

He had to find a way to divert the process, but for that he had to learn more about the Horcruxes. And Harry was not particularly cooperative. If only he found someone to help him, someone who had enough confidence in him to tell him the truth ... He had to check his hypotheses: he would not risk Harry's life because of an error of reasoning.

Xxx xxx xxx

Tom waited several months before daring to approach Slughorn. He methodically prepared his deal, establishing himself as leader of the Slug Club, building with his fellows and his teacher if not a frienship, at least a relationship of trust.

Are you sure you want to do that? Harry asked suddenly.

I'm just ordering candied fruits, Tom protested, frowning. Even you, Saint Harry, can not blame me for such an innocuous act.

Harry weighed the pros and cons and eventually confessed:

Candied pineapples are what Slughorn likes best.

That's all it was? Did you need to be so dramatic? Tom sighed, crossing out his order. How do you know?

He had ... told us about it? When he was my teacher?

Tom raised an eyebrow but did not insist. He watched as the school's owl flew to Honeydukes before returning to the dormitory. The next evening he would talk about the Horcruxes with Slughorn, whether Harry wanted to or not.

Harry did not want to but he had not enough strength to fight against Tom lately. He did not know exactly when it had begun, but his presence was gradually decreasing and this decline, like a headache, prevented him from thinking about painful things. It was much easier to get carried away by events, to acquiesce to everything Tom said and to just feel their hearts beating in unison.

It must also be said that with his new carelessness, the prospect of a conversation on the Horcruxes no longer frightened him so much. He knew Tom's goal was not to create other Horcruxes but to find a way to hijack the process and Harry could not lie to himself: he wished Tom would succeed.

Xxx xxx xxx

As soon as Harry opened the door of Slughorn's office, he was assaulted by a disagreeable impression of déjà vu. Everything was as in the Pensieve: the Potions Master buried in a large armchair, his feet resting on a velvet pouf, a glass of wine in his hand, and the five boys sitting on the carpet, turning as one man towards Tom.

The only thing missing was the box of candied pineapples, but Tom held it in his hand.

"Tom, we were waiting for you!" Slughorn exclaimed.

Tom smiled, handed him the box of sweets and sat down in the middle of his fellows, next to Albert. Nothing happened for five long seconds and he realized they were waiting for him to speak. As Tom made an inventory of all the jokes he had already made, Harry came to his rescue:

"Sir," he said politely, "is it true that Professor Merryjoy is retiring?"

Have you not found anything better? Tom sighed mentally, but he was relieved he had not had to intervene on his own. He was too focused on his future discussion with Slughorn.

The latter pointed at him with a reproachful finger, but his malicious expression showed how much he appreciated his audacity.

"Tom, Tom, if I knew, I couldn't tell you. I must say, I'd like to know where you get your information, boy; more knowledgeable than half the staff, you are."

All the boys laughed, while Tom wondered vaguely how Harry, who was with him all the time, could hold information himself did not have.

"What with your uncanny ability to know things you shouldn't, and your careful flattery of the people who matter – thank you for the pineapple, by the way, you're quite right, it is my favorite –"

The Slytherins giggled, but Tom's face remained neutral.

"– I confidently expect you to rise to Minister for Magic within twenty , if you keep sending me pineapple. I have excellent contacts at the Ministry."

So you were right for the pineapple. In fact, Tom realized, he isn't complimenting me but you, through me. I doubt, however, that you have the capacity to become Minister for Magic.

I doubt it myself, Harry admitted, wondering if in the present – if his present still existed – a statue of him had been erected.

He was a bit ashamed of this reflection.

xXx

The evening progressed slowly. Tom laughed at the right moments and spoke from time to time but he spent most of his time thinking about Harry. If he found a way to install him in a body of his own ... In someone else's body, maybe ... But whose?

None of the boys around him would fit. He wanted Harry in Harry Potter's body and if he had to lose a part of himself in his experiments, it was not that bad. He had already lost a lot the year before, but the diary and the ring were only first steps.

Harry pretended he had not heard anything. It was crazy how he had gotten good at burying his head in the sand.

The small clock finally struck eleven o'clock, and Slughorn dismissed his guests, not realizing that one of them had remained behind. Harry wanted to clog his ears, but obviously it was impossible. So he listened to Tom pronounce the phrase that had haunted him much of his own sixth year:

"Sir, I wanted to ask you something."

"Ask away, then, m'boy, ask away..."

"Sir, I wondered what you know about ... about Horcruxes?" Tom stammered, for Harry, at the last second, had tried to stop him from speaking.

It was too late but, if one thought about it, the day Harry had masturbated Tom for the first time, it had already been too late.

The rest happened as in his memories. Slughorn hesitated, Tom flattered him, Slughorn gave in to him and Harry felt like the time he had seen this scene in the Pensieve: Tom seemed to have prepared this moment for weeks, which was true.

" – But, of course, existence in such a form ... few would want it, Tom, very few. Death would be preferable."

The thirst for knowledge was now apparent on Tom's face, he could no longer hide his greed. True, it would be a cursed form but it still was a form, it still was a ghost, it was better, according to him, than death. He refused to believe that Harry no longer existed in this world and that his presence in their head was comparable to the light of a star that had long since disappeared.

And Slughorn had taught him everything he wanted to know: it was possible to make the experiment several times, without messing up their souls too much. He had at least four other chances.

Xxx xxx xxx

All the rest of their sixth year, Harry spent a lot of time cloistered in his corner. Being curled up in a ball made him less nervous than before. On the contrary, since his soul had lost a bit of its substance, he found it comfortable to be folded upen himself, as if it enabled him to collect his disintegrating soul.

Images and words of their discussion with Slughorn sometimes danced in his mind, reminding him that Tom, despite his sweet promises, had asked if it was possible to divide his soul into seven, that Tom, despite his love for Harry, was undoubtedly becoming Voldemort.

But Tom ... Like the group of students who followed him everywhere, Harry had completely fell under his spell. He had not fell in love of his aura of power, but of his unsuspected sweetness, of his incongruous ingenuity, totally foreign to the first Dark Lord. Tom had remained, deep inside him, the child who asked him to tell him stories because he had not yet learned to read.

However, Harry did not doubt Tom was destined to become evil. And that was his fault. He had spoiled him too much, then he had subsued him too much, he had lied to him, then he had left him too much freedom, and then he had locked him up in their so exclusive relationship that no one else would ever be interesting in Tom's opinion.

The worst part of it was that Harry enjoyed, with a guilty pleasure, being under constant attention. He had never loved, he had no recollection of having ever been loved in such a sickly fashion. When he had told Ginny he was leaving for a dangerous mission, she had replied she would not hold him back for after all, he was like that.

But that was not true. More than anyone, Harry had always wanted to meet someone who would simply be ... someone who would be like a mirror. Then he would just have to hug his reflection to feel at last complete. And that double was Tom. Tom who wanted to create other Horcruxes for an unknown reason, since he had never wanted to be immortal.

By the end of Tom's sixth year, everyone had heard about his dark projects and no one dared to call him by his first name. But, as it was necessary to designate him in one way or another, they started to call him 'You-know-who'.

To Be Continued ...

What's beautiful as love, merry as a fairy and rainbow colored as a rainbow?
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