Summary: Fourteen year old Harry Potter is sick of the wizarding world and everyone it. Well, almost. With the help of a sixteen year old Tom Riddle, Harry shows the world it's time to treat him with a little respect.

Rating: M. For a reason folks.

Characters: Harry Potter. Tom Riddle. Draco Malfoy.

Warnings: Violence. Vengeance. Dark Magic. Backstabbing. Mental and Emotional Abuse. Pureblood Politics. Possessed Diaries. Teenage Dark Lords. Manipulation.

Got Questions? Put them in your review! If I can I'll answer them.

AN: Because sometimes things need to get even more complicated before they start to make sense.

-Pseudonymous

Skin against skin, blood and bone

You're all by yourself but you're not alone

You wanted in

Now you're here

Our shadows ask us to look at all the things we really don't want to see, the truths we do not wish to face, the world just outside our rose coloured peripheral vision we pretend isn't there. People like to bleed over-descriptional praises of light and it's warmth. The way it shows the world around you so you can see what's there, how everything seems so much safer. But that doesn't really make sense. Not if you think about it. Because if the lights are on and you glance around and you see that the room is empty, why does a skittering of phantom fingers and claws and teeth crawl it's way up your spine and the base of your neck the moment the light is switched off? What is so frightening about the dark when you knew for certain, not a moment before, that the room was empty?

The only logical conclusion is that either every single person in the world had an irrational fear of nothing- or that the light did not show the world as it is...but rather it covered bits of it up. Maybe darkness was an obsidian mirror reflecting memories and unspoken truths and all the cool, jagged edges of ourselves we pretend we can't see during the day. Out of sight, out of mind. Right? And that was sort of the way the Wizarding world seemed to function as well. A living embodiment of it really. Cover up and stow away anything labeled dark and never speak of it unless it's to warn yet another away from it's clutches. Pretend it isn't there and if anyone let their darkness show, or even hinted at, they weren't trustworthy.

Every knew it. A dark wizard was a bad person, a liar and a betrayer. Someone who'd torture you for fun and routinely sacrificed kittens to unknown gods of evil for untoward purposes not to be known by those noble souls walking in the light.

Except.

Except Seamus Finnegan didn't feel quite so noble anymore. He didn't feel tolerant and educated and open minded and forgiving and accepting and right. Because some things weren't adding up with his previously, religiously held world view. And it made him nervous. It made him frightened. And angry and confused and uncertain. If things weren't straight black and white...if that fact wasn't a fact anymore. If it could sometimes be a lie...than what else could be a lie? What else did he think he know that he really didn't know at all?

And, if he was being fully honest with himself, which he felt an unyielding need to be as nothing else in his world seemed to be, this was not the first time the thought had crossed his mind. He'd beaten it down of course, told it it was one of those once in a lifetime exceptions and that was that. Only it wasn't that. Not at all. Gryffindors are the bravest. They are always true to their friends. Slytherins are cowardly. They can't be trusted as far as you can throw them. Darkness was to be avoided.

But the Gryffindors were giving one of their number the cold shoulder, some of them even hexing him in the halls or locking him out of the common room. Malfoy, a Slytherin, was giving Potter more support than any of Potter's house had even attempted. The Tabbris twins were dark creatures, but Potter, the boy-who-lived was seen in their company on a daily basis and he didn't seem worse for ware. In fact he seemed...better. His eyes were clearer, sharper. He held his head higher.

So what did it all mean? Because he really hoped it didn't mean what he thought it meant because then Seamus would be utterly lost about his place in the world. Then again he was a halfblood who parent's slept on opposite sides of the house because they couldn't stand one another and his father doubted his parentage anyway. He was already confused before he ever came here...the wizarding world only gave him more things to be confused about. He wasn't even sure if ever believed in all of this good and evil nonsense until second year and that whole Chamber of Secrets fiasco.

As if in answer to the shattered world within his mind the great hall grew strangely silent and then it shook. Goblets overturned and rolled down the table, hitting the benches and clattering to the floor. Silverware and dishes and books and students following soon after. There was shrieking and crying and cursing as everyone attempted to stay in their seat or stand up without toppling over, dodging flying eating utensils. To his left he heard Patil calling out for her sister.

Seamus turned his head and watch Malfoy and that boy from the Viridian with the golden hair talking to one another. The Tabbris woman actually crawled on top of the table and across it to get to the blonde, whom she held on to and spoke to, though over the clashing and yelling he could hear what she said. The Slytherin turned and ran out of the hall, the other Viridan members and even professor Snape following after.

Narrowing his eyes, Seamus decided to follow Tabbris' example. He grasped the table and hauled himself up on it, pulling himself along on his stomach until he reached the other side. He was halfway to the Slytherin table when the windows shattered, sending tiny pieces of glass in every direction. He swore and threw himself under the Slytherin table, several others joining him.

"Finnegan?"

He turned and saw Nott and Zabini in front of him, crouching. Zabini had several scratches on his face and Nott's robes were torn.

"Is it true?" Nott called, trying to get heard over all the noise.

"What do you mean?"

"That-"

Something heavy fell with a solid thunk on top of the table, the legs groaning underneath the weight. All three of them jumped about a mile high.

"What the bloody hell was that?"

Seamus stuck his head out cautiously. And stared.

"Finnegan? Finnegan."

"I..bits of castle are falling off." He looked back at them.

Nott and Zabini's faces paled. "Bits of castle are falling off?" Zabini repeated, in such a way it was obvious he was hoping he misunderstood.

Seamus nodded. "The castle is falling apart."

"Why did he leave us?" A smaller Slytherin girl squealed, sliding under the table, two other first years hot on her heels.

"Who?"

"Dumbledore! he's left us."

Seamus and Nott struggled against each other to look out from underneath the table again. The head table was empty. Seamus flicked his eyes around the hall. He could make out McGonagal in the far corner but he didn't hold out any hope for seeing the little charms professor. There wasn't any sign of Dumbledore.

"I don't understand. He was just here. I saw him not five minutes ago after Malfoy-"

Zabini grabbed Seamus' collar and dragged him back under the table. "What about Malfoy?"

"I saw him talking with those people from the Viridian. He said something and then they ran from the hall. I think he knows what is going on."

Nott scowled. "Bloody bastard. He could have taken us along with him. No, no just leave us here to fend for ourselves. We're doing fine thanks."

He was cut off by Zabini putting a hand firmly over his mouth.

"Forgive him. He's annoyingly sarcastic when he panics."

Seamus looked at the first years huddled to his right and then out into the aisles where the older years were scrambling and falling into one another, fighting to stand up or get out. Slamming into the walls and falling under debris.

"We best stay here for now."

The table gave another groan and then started to bow under the weight of whatever had fallen on it. It creaked ominously.

"Or not." said Zabini.

Seamus grabbed Nott, thrust him out of the table, and motioned for Zabini to follow him. They tried to stand, holding on to one another, house rivalries forgotten. Seamus' eyes narrowed on the entrance to the great hall when a familiar flash of red passed by.

"Follow me."

He darted through the crowd like a long distance runner going through an obstacle course with the hounds of hell after him. He really didn't know how he made it through without a broken ankle at the very least.

Reaching the doors he peered out. There. Ron Weasley and that foreign kid from the Viridan, Tabbris' cousin or something, were standing to the side.

"Hey Ron-"

They both faded and disappeared.

"What the bloody Hell..."

He turned to Nott and Zabini, both of whom were staring off in the direction of the disappearing students with smooth, calculating eyes,

"Time turner." Said Zabini.

"What?"

"The ginger's got himself a time turner."

Seamus turned back and looked where Ron once stood. What in blazes was going on?

He must have said it out loud because Nott took a hold of both him and Zabini and started off down the hall when he saw Hermione and Ron run past heading toward the tower, even though Ron just disappeared with the Viridian boy.

"We're gonna find out."

The three of them chased after, ducking under falling banners and picture frames, the noise covering the sound of their foot steps.

Seamus couldn't shake the bad feeling creeping in the back of his mind.