Tom Riddle's Punishment
A white landscape came into view, and the distant glow of a gleaming white castle illuminated the blank ground. Voldemort lay on the ground, feeble and weak, looking up at three disappointed faces.
"We've been waiting for you, Tom," said the deep voice of Albus Dumbledore.
Voldemort reached for his wand from the pocket of his robes, and noticed that neither his wand nor his robes were with him. He looked down again, and robes were there, but the Elder Wand would not appear, and neither would the yew wand he had bought from Ollivander's so long ago.
The other two faces became clear, but Voldemort only recognized one of them – the sullen, crooked-nosed face of Severus Snape. The other, however, was of a young woman with dull hair dotted with grey lines and sunken features.
"Tom, I bet you're wondering where you are," Dumbledore said calmly. "This is death."
Lord Voldemort, the greatest sorcerer of all time, could not be dead. Harry Potter had not killed him, surely not. This was all some big prank, he was being fooled. Dumbledore was just a hallucination, as were Snape and the woman.
"Dumbledore, that's not entirely true," said the woman.
"An excellent observation, Merope. This is, in fact, a sort of Limbo," Dumbledore said happily.
Merope . . . Voldemort had heard that name before. Merope was his mother, Merope Gaunt, the Squib who married the filthy Muggle Tom Riddle.
"You know, of course, why this is not truly death," Snape said curtly.
"I have gone farther to achieve immortality than anyone!" Voldemort exclaimed triumphantly, as if it meant something now.
"And unfortunately, that is your downfall. You see, you were not the only ones who discovered your Horcruxes," Dumbledore said expressionlessly.
"Yes, Harry Potter found out about them, and I killed him-"
"But then he killed you," Snape finished.
Voldemort stood, staring wildly at these peoples' faces. Dumbledore, dead on his orders! Snape, dead by his hand! Merope Gaunt, too weak to live! These people had no right to talk to Lord Voldemort about death.
"You see, Tom," started Dumbledore, "We say things we don't mean to be overheard quite often, and a great example of this is when you confronted Horace Slughorn on the nature of Horcruxes. Of course, you only asked to see if it were possible to split your soul into seven pieces, and it seems that you did – at first. You indeed succeeded in turning the diary, the diadem, the cup, the locket, the ring, and Nagini into Horcruxes, but you accidentally turned Harry Potter into one as well. The reason is because your soul is so maimed that you could not stand to live, and therefore lost your physical body that night sixteen years ago. But you came back, unwilling to die, and Harry Potter ripped you from life again, but first destroying your Horcruxes this time. You cannot move on – you lost the chance for remorse."
"Death is a weakness!" Voldemort screamed.
"Then was I weak for choosing death over the terrible life I lived?" asked Merope.
Voldemort, as powerful as he was, could not bring himself to call his own mother weak to her face.
"Was I weak accepting death?" Dumbledore asked.
"Yes! Dumbledore, you are weaker than any human being on the planet! Believing that love is the most powerful kind of magic, when the most powerful kind of magic is murder! It was on my order that you are dead!"
"I will object to that," Snape interjected, "Dumbledore was already suffering a terrible curse from your ring Horcrux, and instead of dying painfully and slowly, he wanted me to do it quickly."
"But he is dead!" Voldemort shouted, his scream echoing throughout the blank landscape.
"And you are as well," said Dumbledore quietly.
"You are a foolish boy, and I am ashamed that I gave birth to you," Merope spat disappointedly.
"Snape, what about you? I killed you! Nagini feasted on your flesh!" Voldemort argued.
"But I accepted death, something you, the so-called Dark Lord, could never do," Snape responded.
"Was love the reason you accepted death?" Voldemort asked mockingly.
"Indeed. I knew that if I died, I could be with Lily Evans again," Snape said blankly.
"I knew that if I died, I could be united with Tom Riddle without consequence," Merope said, slightly tearful.
"I knew that if I died, I could see my family again," Dumbledore said happily.
"Family, what a useless thing. If I needed family I would have searched for it. Instead, I killed my family," Voldemort said strongly.
"You act as if that makes you a good person," Snape confronted him.
"I am better than any of you! Dumbledore, who worked so hard to keep the filthy Muggles from my wrath. Snape, who evaded my anger by hiding behind Dumbledore. My own mother, who died instead of raise me!" Voldemort yelled.
A revelation came to Voldemort's eyes. One of the driving reasons behind his actions was that his mother disappeared from his life.
"Tom, all four of us has something in common. All of us had a parent that we felt estranged to," Dumbledore said quietly. "You lost your mother at birth, Severus had a mutual hate of his father, Merope's mother died and her father was abusive, and my father was imprisoned during my childhood."
"Enough of this! Leave here, for Lord Voldemort does not listen to the foolish words of weaklings!" Voldemort commanded.
"Very well. Goodbye, Tom Marvolo Riddle. Goodbye forever," Dumbledore mused.
Dumbledore turned and walked toward the castle in the distance, and Merope and Snape followed. Voldemort was left alone in this bleak, white landscape for eternity.