Sorry it's late! I hope you enjoy it anyway...

Look for the Good Instead

Chapter 9

Connect the Dots

"All I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be I learned in Kindergarten. Remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned – the biggest word of all – look."

Robert Fulghum

.Draco Malfoy.

The book was simple, a diary bound in black leather. I didn't bother trying to reveal his writing though. He'd probably charmed it against such attempts (and he was right there). I closed is to hand it back, and stopped. The gold embossed name on the cover, T. M. Riddle. I had seen this on the desk of my father's study! Why should he have something of my father's?!

"Where'd you get this?!" I suddenly spat, tearing my eyes from the leather. They locked onto Charlus, and he furrowed his brow. He looked confused and concerned at once. How could he have even gotten father's journal? Our house was impenetrable to any not keyed to the wards!

"Sirius Black gave it to me," replied the lion in snake's clothing. His eyes were searching me, and flicking down to the book every so often. His hands fidgeted. He wouldn't have let me see if he knew it had been Father's. Black had given it to him and left him in the dark about what it could be! "Why, what's wrong with it?"

Black! I thought furiously. He can't have stolen this from Father though. Especially not his study. It made no sense, and yet Charlus seemed to be honest! At the very least, he must have believed that Black had given it to him. But, really, who could have? Who had?

"This is my father's!" A scowl came upon my features at this statement. "This is his private journal!"

Charlus' bangs flew under his fringe. "Oh..." was the surprised reply. My scowl stayed in place as I snagged his elbow and dragged him away, explaining "Dumbledore" when asked where we were going. Professor Snape, I knew, had been sent to pick up streamers for the Halloween Feast, and all the other teachers would be decorating or getting ready to bring students to said Feast. The Headmaster was, unfortunately, the only option.

We came upon him swiftly, and he led us to his office, which was opened with the password "Fizzing Whizbees". The office itself was eccentric, filled with portraits (moving obviously) of all the Headmasters since the Founders (the portrait of the four being still, sadly), and odd silver instruments on every flat surface that shrieked or twanged every off second. In the corner, a Phoenix was perched, surveying both Charlus and myself as we entered the all too circular room.

"Mr. Malfoy, Mr. Potter," began the barmy old codger, "what brings you to my humble abode?" Abode? I couldn't think that he actually lived in his office!

"Charlus' journal," I replied immediately. I refused to call something of my father's a name so girly as diary! "He got it this summer, but whoever gave it to him stole it, I believe, from my father. I have seen that very journal on the desk in my father's private study, including over this very summer."

"I see," The Headmaster steepled his fingers before him. "And where, Mr. Potter, did you come across this book?"

"Diagon Alley," Charlus spoke up then. "I'm... not quite sure what happened, really. I went to Diagon Alley in mid August with Harry and Sirius, and when I came back home the diary was in one of my bags. I assumed that Sirius had given it to me, and hadn't wanted me to protest, so I could deal in my own way with what had happened over the summer. But now... well, I'm starting to doubt it."

What happened over the summer? Oh! I mentally smacked my head. His mother left! That was it, I believe... I had heard his old compatriots talking about it in the Library at the start of term. Apparently, he had gone to pieces and returned as a proper Slytherin. I remember being glad that I didn't share things with people who were dumb enough to talk about private matters in such a public place as the Library, and such an easy place for someone to eavesdrop in the relatively quiet environment.

"Indeed," the bumblebee sighed. "Mr. Malfoy, we shall floo your father later. Mr. Potter, may I see your... diary, was it?"

"Yeah," Charlus truly seemed to not want to give it up, but he opened the book. "Ink just seeps in, and can be brought up again. Watch." He made a little scribble, just a small squiggly line across the paper with the green ink the Headmaster gave him, and the ink just seemed to drain out of the paper, as though he'd never written. Charlus then tapped the page ten seconds later, and the line was back, in silver ink this time, before it sunk back once more. "See? It's very convenient."

"I see," confirmed the Headmaster. I gave Charlus a sidelong glance. Why did Charlus show him the secret of the journal? Unless that wasn't the real secret? As he had been so Slytherin as of late, I refused to think he would reveal the actual secret of his –Father's – journal. Slytherin instincts said to keep things secret, even an enemies unless it would help. I couldn't see how revealing that to the Headmaster should help him beyond knowing that Father had probably written in it using the same trick. "Regardless, if this is truly Mr. Malfoy's diary, I must return it to him. I'm sure he would like to have it back after its long absence."

"Alright," sadness crossed Charlus' face. "Can I at least write him a letter in it? To apologize for having it and explain? I'm sure he would appreciate it, and I'm not sure if he'd want to see me face to face after I had his diary for so long..."

Had I not been a Slytherin through and through, my jaw would have dropped, I was sure. He was milking it! Charlus was using the Potter family reputation of being goody goody Gryffindors to seem naive! I smirked internally. Cheeky bugger.

"You may," The Headmaster's eyes were twinkling madly, and Charlus went straight to writing, taking back up the quill and ink that the Headmaster had loaned him for the example, pausing on occasion in thought. Eventually, he stood and handed the leather bound notebook over. "Very well. You may both head off to your dormitories now. The Feast has been moved."

We did, and I couldn't help but wonder, what had the true secret behind the journal been? Later, I would think about the moving of the Feast, but I hardly gave it a thought for a while.

.Tom Riddle.

I stood in another of my memories, bored. Eleven year old me hexed a Hufflepuff out of the way, and continued on. Suddenly, as Professor Dumbledore, the Tranfiguration instructor, was about to come reprimand me, a message written in green fire appeared before me, and I paused the memory. It was parseltext, and much better than I had expected for Charlus only revealing he could so much as read it but ten minutes ago.

'Do not reply for ten seconds, in parseltext.' Charlus had written.

I waited, and squiggled my reply. 'Why? Have we been found out?'

There was no reply until a full minute later, the information being quite surprising. 'Dumbledore is here,' was the reply, in simple English script this time. 'Draco said that this – you – actually belongs to his dad, Lucius Malfoy, and I have to give you back. I'm sorry.'

Give me back? I thought, horrified. I started writing quickly in the air, silver fire marking it before my eyes to show only as ink on the page before his. He couldn't give me back! I had too much to do!

'There is little to be done, young serpent, but you can give me a temporary stay in your mind. Please, I like speaking with you, I don't want to return to Lucius; he doesn't respect me like you do. Will you, please, allow me to stay?' It was horrible to beg, but I had things to do, mudbloods to kill! I couldn't wait for Lucius to plant me with another student. It would take far too long!

The reply came back not even half a second later. 'Yes.'

In a second, I was in Charlus' mind, watching the Headmaster's office through his eyes. He continued to write for a few minutes, an apologetic letter to the supposed owner of the journal. I was out of the book! I was no longer bound to it at all! What was more, my host was a willing host. He was willing to have me in his head, replying before I even had time to weave a compulsion into my request. This was going to be the start of something to make history, I was sure.

.Lucius Malfoy.

The soot was removed from my cloak almost immediately after I stepped from the grate in the Headmaster's office. He had called, requesting I come to his office (which had much too many noise making objects), though he wouldn't say why. Perhaps the Chamber had released its beast once more, the second attack. Perhaps it had killed this time instead of just petrifying the mudblood.

"Mr. Malfoy, I'm glad you have come," Dumbledore waved me to a seat across the desk from his own throne-like chair. "Earlier today, about five minutes before I wrote you, your son and Charlus Potter came to me with the most odd object."

"Oh?" I didn't really care. So long as the Potter boy still had the diary, everything was fine.

"Yes. Young Draco seemed to think this was yours," a small black book bound in leather, the diary, was in his right hand. "Quite an interesting book, a diary that hides all of your secrets from anyone but the one who writes them, and only when called with a silent spell simple enough for a second year to know, but still impossible to figure out. Ingenious really. I thought I should return it to you. Though, it is my duty to inform you that handing out Voldemort's old school things really isn't very nice."

I sat stiffly, taking the diary back. Did that mean he really didn't know that Voldemort had trapped a soul in it? But who could I plant the diary with now? I left with the book, ready to confer with the soul Voldemort had entrusted the diary to.

However, I didn't write in it, not a word. There was a letter on the first page, the rest soaked through with many colors of ink, though mostly the black that I preferred, the silver the soul would reply with, and quite a lot of green ink as well. At the very end of the letter from the boy I had given the diary to, a single, short sentence was written in the neat text of the diary's soul: 'Fear not, I continue the purge.'

A slow smirk crawled along my mouth. The diary that the Dark Lord had entrusted to me had slipped its soul into a student, a Potter.

I wonder how the boy wonder will take the loss of his twin brother so soon after his mother?

.Harry Potter.

The Common Room was full of fidgeting and fearful students. We knew it wasn't a Gryffindor who had been attacked, we were all there. What we did know was that the teachers had rounded everyone up to "keep down the panic." It was a double attack, already, and that was all anyone knew.

My problems were simple. I didn't know who had the diary this time, so I couldn't take the thrice damned horcrux away. My list of suspects was also far too broad, with most second years on the list, and quite a few upper years who were very stressed about testing as it was, not to mention all but twelve seventh years. I couldn't tell anyone either. My friends (and I really did consider them friends, but Terry and Ernie just couldn't make up for Hermione), aside from Terry, were all pretty thick, and Terry would be curious as to how I knew so much, let alone why I should think it was a diary that was controlling the overlarge serpent. The teachers wouldn't believe me (I'd learned the lesson in first year, the first time about), but also wouldn't let me help, despite me being the only person outside of Voldemort himself that could open the Chamber, the latter being rather counterproductive anyway.

So, really, it should have been little surprise that a very important attack should happen months ahead of time. Hermione had been found petrified with the sixth year Ravenclaw Prefect Penelope Clearwater, just as before.

Over the next month, Neville took to hanging about with my group. Charlus had gone from being a sort of symbol of House Unity to associating exclusively with Slytherins. Neville, with one friend talking only with his own House and two turned to stone in the Hospital Wing, had turned to us, because he and I (the me of wherever I truly was) had apparently been more casual friends as children, and he didn't have that sort of base with anyone else... not that he would tell me that for a few years.

I did everything I could to find out who was doing the attacks, when it hit me. Towards the end of the semester (I knew we were due for an attack before the Christmas Holidays) I borrowed the Marauders' Map from Fred and George, knowing exactly how to find out. If the third attack was found quickly enough, I could back track the map by an hour. Whoever was to appear or disappear from Myrtle's bathroom in that time would have to be the one with the diary.

The attack came, another double petrification. Two fifth years, Gryffindor boys, were put in the Hospital Wing the day before we were set to go home. As soon as the bodies were found, I started looking about the map, requesting that it rewind.

Everyone's dot began to move backwards, into the Great Hall, outside, wherever they spent the time before the attack was noticed, the end of the lunch hour. Several people passed Myrtle's bathroom, but none went in (or left, technically) for a good while. I told the map to speed up, and ten minutes later a dot entered the bathroom, disappearing by the sinks.

My breath caught. How didn't I notice? He wrote in a black book all the time. He had distanced himself from anyone who could notice or help at all... and I didn't even think of him. How could I not?

Oh, I knew, of course I knew! I just didn't want it to be him, just the same as I hadn't wanted to find out Dumbledore manipulated me (though I was, and to an extent still am, loyal to him despite it), I hadn't wanted to know that Moody (who wasn't Moody) was setting everything in line for me while I stumbled in the dark in fourth year. I didn't want it to be him, and so I had ignored every sign – every bloody sign! – that it could be him.

Snape always did say that Potters were arrogant softies (though in more angry terms). I guess he was right. I was so intent on my family – a family I didn't even know – being Potters, the good, infallible, loyal to a fault family that I never had, that I never thought my own brother (did I think of him much as that though? I had expected connection to him... but did I even make much of an effort to build a connection in the first place?) could be the one Riddle would possess.

The winter holiday hit fast, and the next day I found myself at Potter Manor. Dad had been waiting for us at the station this time, Sirius being on his honeymoon (Sirius! Married! End of the world, surely), but seemed stable enough. I took this to mean he had been going to his therapy sessions.

It still wasn't public knowledge that Mum – though I was beginning to wonder why I called her that when I had barely known her – was gone. Everyone wondered at the "family emergency" which had made Dad retire from the Wildebeests, and Mum no longer appeared anywhere, even to do so much as shop. The whole wizarding world knew that something was up, they just didn't know what.

But, to think, it would be so near Christmas that I could stop the attacks! No one else would be hurt by the basilisk. If I could get Dumbledore to realize that the little black book was a horcrux of Voldemort, I could get Gryffindor's Sword from the Sorting Hat andstab the bloody thing.

"Hey Dad," I called, trotting up as the edge of my trunk bounced on the cobblestone platform. Charlus was somewhere behind me, walking quickly and from his toes, back straight and head high, his face set stoically. I winced every time I saw him going about so... aristocratically (even if Dad did have a title) if that's even a word. He had been like that since school started, since he got the diary.

"'Lo Harry, Charlie," Dad nodded, a pained smile on his face. I knew why, our eyes. Snape's last wish was to look into my eyes, my mum's eyes, before he died. That same blessing was hurting my dad. Not for the first time, I wished that it wasn't just Potter women who were partial metamorphamagi.

"Dad," greeted Charlus, seemingly caught trying to avoid being at all casual in public, and too cold to his father. I was sure that, for someone being periodically possessed by the Dark Lord as a teenager, it was quite the vexing conundrum. "Are you well?"

Dad blinked owlishly at this. No one in our family spoke like that. "As can be expected," was the noncommittal reply.

"Let's head on home," I piped quickly, as I noticed prying eyes and ears all about. "How was Sirius' wedding? And where did he and Cynthia go for the honeymoon? You 'big bad adults' scheduled it while we impressionable children were away at school after all."

"It was fun," a clipped reply from my father as he led us away from the wizarding world and to the car – Ministry provided this time since Dad couldn't drive for the life of him – "Sirius figured you two would be bored anyway, so November was the prime time to get hitched. You'll have to ask Sirius where they went though. He didn't tell anyone, even Cynthia, so we're all in the dark."

"Probably Hawaii," I put in as we all sat in the car.

"Or Russia."

I gave my father a weird look. "Russia?"

"Sirius likes it there, though why I will never dream to know. Barmy if you ask me."

"Oh... 'kay," Another thing I had never known about my godfather while he was alive (I just couldn't think of this Sirius as mine, their personalities were so different!). I couldn't even imagine why he should like Russia of all places.

The conversation remained on comfortable topics until we arrived home, where the house elves mobbed us. "Master Harry! Master Chazzy! You is home!" This was Springy, hopping in a manner befitting her name.

"Hello Springy," Charlus said with a hint of happiness behind his tone, a soft smile on his face. Apparently, he liked the happy-go-lucky house elf, as this was the first sign of fondness I'd seen him have for some time, especially for something living. Usually was filled with disdain for living anything. At least, in the pas three or four months.

Soon, we had settled back into life at the Manor, having put whatever we had on us away in our rooms. Dinner was a quiet affair, despite Remus dropping in with Tonks (who Charlus referred to as Aunty Rainbow) and the young Emmalie Selena Lupin (who giggled over the pink locks of hair that she had forced to grow from her head, much the way Teddy used to). We hadn't seen them much over the summer vacation, so I was happy to see them all again. The meal was filled with subtle questioning about the school year, which Charlus and I both answered carefully. He was more stable, it seemed, currently vying with me for top of most classes (and outright beating me in Potions, he had inherited Mum's flair for Potions), and very polite, but something was very much off, and everyone knew it. I was just the only one to know what that was.

During dessert, I attempted to pry, but my legilimancy probe caused him to pop his head up, and I found occlumancy walls. At first they were brittle, the shields of a beginner, or else someone who was neglecting them from lack of use, or need to use them. Then Charlus saw the probe, and I was met with very professional walls, without and made of metal, or so he imagined them. He might not have known just who it was that did it, but he did know that someone was trying to look into his head. Even as I continued to gaze at the impressive walls (it had taken me a year to get so good, with professional training!) I saw him look about the table, trying to figure out who would look in on his mind, or could.

How he knew occlumancy at twelve, when I was sure he hadn't last June, I couldn't know, but I resolved to tell him that night about his –the – diary. I didn't want him to try and kill Dad and I in our sleep or something.

The evening came to a close when Emma yawned, causing the new parents to retire to their own home. Dad went to bed as well, bringing with him the new sleep medication he had been prescribed the day before. He told us to go to bed too, but I don't think he really expected us to. So, naturally, we didn't.

"Charlie," he turned as I spoke. "Your diary is possessed."

"Um... yeah," he gave me a sidelong glance. "How did you know about that exactly?"

"Because it's possessing you!" I shouted this. Not quite sure why, but it felt could to yell. How could he be so unsurprised that the book had a soul?! I was slightly pleased when his jaw dropped, but the verbal response wasn't satisfying at all.

"How'd you know about that?" He was completely flabbergasted now. I got some pleasure from that.

"That doesn't matter. Give me the diary."

Now it was my turn to be surprised, as he stopped being at all shocked and relaxed, rolling his eyes. "Too late for that, Bromine. Dumbledore took it away already," he scoffed. "So much for you being all knowing, eh?"

"Oh..." I blinked owlishly, but Charlus just smirked. "I guess the old coot really is on top of things for once."

"Mhm," Charlus turned up the stairs. "See you in the morning."

"Yeah, night," I replied, a bit preoccupied. Little did I know how "on top of things" Dumbledore really was, or rather, wasn't, as the case just so happened to be.

Author's Note: Season's Greetings earthlings! Sorry I'm posting this late, but I only just got internet today at noon (which just so happens to be a day after I wanted to post. Grr). So, sorry again. I'm posting the first four days of Christmas in the next hour, and after this everything should be normal again. Also posting Kingdom Hogwarts today! And The Sirius Misadventures of Snuffles comes out tomorrow, even though I wrote the chapter at school the week before last... um... yeah...

Anyway, be glad! I'm writing the Christmas things and typing what I've written of this story instead of doing my extra credit for English, or learning katakana for Japanese like I was going to (which, while not for credit, extra or otherwise, as we're not actually to be learning that 'til next semester, I still wanted to do). Anyway, hope you all have had a Happy ChristmaChannuQuanzikah. I had a white Christmas! 'Twas amazing, as it's the first white Christmas I've EVER had. Special :P

Explaining parts of the chapter now, I guess. Okay, so two weeks ago I got a review about how Harry acts towards Charlus, so I'll start there, and my reasoning behind it, yeah? Personally, I cannot imagine thinking of someone as family as quickly as most people write it. Alright, so I hate my family and thus am a bit jaded, but think about it this way: Harry never had a loving family, and he's worried they will treat him like the Dursleys did (or how the Dursleys treated Dudley for that matter!). He has reservations. When he finds out about Charlus, he is conflicted. He always wanted a brother, but the closest he had was Dudley, who was a rat bastard, got it? He isn't sure how to approach him, and he doesn't have some sort of instant connection to him. He doesn't know him! He decides a good way to approach Charlus is through his friends, people he already knows how to handle, but they think he's just trying to steal Charlus' friends! Then Charlus offers up a truce, and they eventually develop a tentative relationship. Things are okay, and then Charlus recoils from everything because of Lily leaving. Harry can't mourn the way Charlus and James are because he mourned his mother long ago, and he doesn't know how to help. Instead, he does what he knows, and helps out the elves. Charlus thinks he's just cold, and strives to be less affected than his brother. Riddle helps him tamp down emotions with occlumancy, and voila! The twins are, once again, on bad terms. Get it?

O.O Wow. Big paragraph... um... about Draco: He's on talking terms with Charlus, and while not desperate to know what's up with the book, he's curious, so just asks, because at least then he'll know if it's something really private. Lucius knew that he would give the diary to someone soon, so he had it on his desk, running ideas by the soul (that he doesn't know is Voldie's) of who to give it to. He suggests a Potter, the diary agrees (as I rather imagined that a Potter cousin might have been a nuisance to him at Hogwarts and he likes his petty revenge, being Voldie), and forgot to put the diary back in his drawer sometimes, so Draco saw it, thought that Charlus had stolen it, and wanted to get it to his father ASAP. He couldn't just go to Snape, so he went to Dumbledore (against his better judgment) and demanded it be returned to his father. He sees the supposed secret of the diary, and decides to ask his father about it later, since it is his.

What else, what else? Oh, Charlus is very much possessed. You'll see more on that in the next two chapters (the second of those two being the end of book two!!! And much more climactic than the lame ending to book one that I wrote...), so please stay tuned! Like I said before, I'm written through the end of January (so I'll be writing more in January again... ehheh... I've been busy with the Christmas stuff and We Are Survivors lately, so I've not written anything new since the start of December...). Chapter eleven is going to be long, 7 pages in my (now full) notebook (14 both sides), and a page is usually about 1000 words, so that'll be good and long...

Happy Late Boxing Day!