The Imposter Complex

by Notus Oren

Tom Riddle escapes at the end of Chamber of Secrets, and is quite surprised to find that nothing about the future is as he ever thought it would be. Soon, Tom finds himself on a globe-spanning quest to follow the path his forebear blazed and perhaps, at the end, to put a stop to him once and for all.

26. A Turn For The Worse

The Imposter Complex, Chapter Twenty Six: A Turn For The Worse

A/N: My apologies for the long delay since my last chapter. More on that at the end.

:-:-:-:-:

The ageing auror leaned back in his chair with a heavy sigh. He looks like he hadn't slept in days.

'Fuck me blind, what a mess...' he muttered, only to scowl at himself when the Dictation Quill picked up on the quiet curse. He picked up a regular one to quickly scribble it out.

I sat calmly across the table from him in the dingy, dimly lit room, manacled quite tightly to my iron chair and all-too-aware of the other two green-and-gold robed men aiming their wands at my back.

'Alright mate,' he resumed at last. 'For the record, this is Auror Brian Macmillan interviewing Suspect seven three one eight dash two, Thomas Morgan Grey, in relation to Case seven three one eight on this day, the twenty fifth of September, nineteen ninety five.'

He paused for a moment to clear his throat. 'Mister Grey, you're probably wondering why we've hoisted you out of Denison. I've read through our office's report on this clusterfuck a couple times already, but my bosses want to hear it from, ah, the horse's mouth, so to speak.'

'It took you three days to figure that out?'

Macmillan scowled. 'Don't go cracking the shits with me, Pommie. Just tell your story and we can both be on our ways.'

I sighed. 'Fine. I want to start by saying we didn't know he was out there. We were going into the desert on a research trip, Sirius and I. We hired a Songwalker to take us into the bush safely, which he did. Got us out to the Northern Territory in a couple hours, all was going properly when, well...'

:—:

Gellert Grindelwald grinned toothily at our shocked visages, utterly unconcerned by the two wands pointed at his face.

'Well well well, I was wondering when someone was going to stumble upon my little home away from home.'

That was his voice, no doubt. I'd listened to more than enough of his speeches over an illegally modified Wireless back in the day to recognise it. Austrian-tinged Swiss, wrapped in silk.

'Novaculous Filio!' I lashed the spell out in a heartbeat, before I'd even registered conscious intent. Twin filaments of white-hot copper fired out of my wand at the Dark Lord.

They ignored him entirely, flying past him like mundane streamers to pile sizzling onto the dirt.

'Stupefy!'

Sirius' spell fizzled out entirely after just a few feet.

I lurched forward in panicked reflex, flinging myself at Grindelwald faster than I could control.

I slammed into the centenarian hard, and we both went tumbling across the red soil. I felt his bones break against me at the impact, and Grindelwald howled in pain.

I scrambled to my feet in a flash.

'Incarcerous!'

With a bang, half a dozen leather cables spat out of my wand, flopping limply into the dirt, but that was all I needed. I seized the rope and rounded on the Dark Lord who was still flopping about like a beached fish.

His dogs charged at me from the side, and latched onto my arm and leg. I shook them off roughly, their teeth unable to penetrate my skin, but this did not dissuade them in the slightest.

'Stupefy! Stupefy!'

At point blank range, the spell held together just long enough to function. The dogs slumped in unison.

'Sirius! Get over here and help me.' My cry broke Black from his shock, and he hurried over to help me restrain our new captive...

:—:

The Australian Auror frowned, and flipped through his notes.

'Hang on. What's this about you running into him so hard you broke him?'

'Jumped. I jumped into him. I have Class-Three magically enhanced strength. Re'em serum, though suppressed by these manacles at present of course. I have a permit with the British Ministry.' I provided helpfully. No need to mention how wildly falsified that permit was.

'...Right. I'll have to check up on that. And the dog immunity?'

'A potion of my own invention, patent pending.'

Macmillan sneered at that.

'Carry on then.'

:—:

The interior of the building was as idealised as the exterior. Unlike what one comes to expect from wizarding homes in the West, the space within was not expanded beyond its true confines. Indeed, it appeared in almost every respect to be entirely muggle, save only for that every nook and cranny of it looked brand new, from the gleaming kitchenette to the un-blackened fireplace. It was also, I noted, mercifully much cooler in here than outside.

I manhandled Grindelwald into one of his two dining chairs. He shrieked profanities at me in Swiss German all the way, spitting up blood in my face. I attempted a medical assessment charm, but like everything else it sputtered out halfway through. Still, it told me enough to know he wasn't in a great state. I shoved some brute-force healing into his chest until it sort-of worked, and then bound the man to his seat.

Honestly, this was very cathartic for me. The big bad Grindelwald not nearly so terrifying in his old age, it seemed.

I searched him, finding a luger in his jeans. I snorted, and tossed it onto the table.

Sirius made for the kitchenette, shamelessly raiding Grindelwald's fridge. It was apparently full to the brim with pastries and cakelets.

'Whaw?' He said through a mouthful of Berliner, noticing my incredulous expression. 'We habent eaten since breakfass'

Well, I suppose it was fairly unlikely that Grindelwald poisoned his own food.

'So why aren't you still locked up in Nurmengard, Nazi?' I asked in a faux-casual tone. I examined his mantlepiece, replete with an array of oddities and knicknacks that almost reminded me of Dumbledore's own office.

Grindelwald spat another, smaller gob of blood onto his floor. It vanished without a trace after a few moments.

'Fuck you, English'

Well, I don't know what I was expecting. Normally this was where I'd jump into creative interrogation, but magic being as it was...

Instead, I flipped around his other dining chair and sat directly across from him, leaning in with as much menace as I could muster.

'Would you prefer I bring one of your dogs in here?'

He scowled viciously, and Sirius gave me a sharp look over the old man's shoulder, but I saw the Swissman flinch, as tiny as it was.

'I'm not a Nazi. That alliance was a means to an end, nothing more.'

'You're literally carrying a luger in your back pocket. In nineteen ninety five.'

'It's a reliable pistol!'

'It hasn't been made since the forties!'

I had no idea if that was actually true, but I certainly hadn't seen any around on my travels.

'Well I've been here since the damn forties!'

That gave me pause. 'Back to my original question then. When did you escape Nurmengard?'

Grindelwald sneered. 'I never was imprisoned in Nurmengard. It was a decoy to capture any compatriots of mine who might come looking for me. Albus did always so like his bait-and-switches.'

Sirius gaped from his spot by the kitchen. 'Dumbledore set you free?'

Grindelwald sneered.

'Free? Oh no, sadly even dear Albus isn't that trusting. This place is just as much a prison as Nurmengard was, and even more difficult from which to escape. Even when the door lies open and the guards are much more... agreeable.' The last was said looking out his door to where the dogs still lay in the soil.

'Can you bring them into the shade please? I don't want them getting heat stroke.'

I jerked my head at Sirius, and he reluctantly put down a cremerolle to accede.

'What's with all the pastries, by the way?' I smirked. 'Got into baking?'

Grindelwald scowled. 'Albus's idea of a joke. I despise sweets, yet it is all I am given to eat.'

Huh. Who knew the coot had it in him to be petty.

'So... what, he just leaves you here for whatever random person stumbles across you?'

Grindelwald glanced at his dogs. 'Not quite so. I believe Albus did something - or the natives did something. He never did tell me where exactly this place is, but I've not seen any muggles or the like.'

'And wizards?'

A barely visible twitch passed across his face. 'Never.'

'Really? Hector Drágen doesn't ring a bell?'

:—:

'Hector Drágen?' Macmillan asked with interest.

I hesitated.

'Yeah. An alias for Lord Voldemort, British dark wizard. Defeated now, but we were looking into his past.'

'Doesn't ring a bell.'

'He almost conquered Britain in the Seventies?' I said coldly.

He shrugged dubiously. 'I'll have to take your word for it. Carry on.'

I suppressed an irked twitch. Foreigners.

'Can I get a glass of water? Feels like I haven't drunk in days.'

Macmillan jerked his head to his fellows, then indicated for me to continue.

:—:

Grindelwald's mismatched gaze met my own, and I double-checked my occlumency on reflex. In those eyes I saw his resolve harden to adamantine.

'I see now. Let me save you some time. Kill the dogs. Kill me. You'll get no further assistance from me, Death Eater.'

My brow furrowed, somewhat unconvinced by his shift in attitude. 'We're not Death Eaters. You know who he was then.'

He said nothing, glaring at me mulishly.

'Did you get that information from Dumbledore?'

No response.

'For fuck's sake, we're not Death Eaters. We're trying to stop Lord Voldemort from coming back, not aid him.'

Grindelwald just snorted derisively.

I sighed, and stood, walking slowly over to where the dogs lay.

His voice rang out from behind me. 'Were you ever a sailor, boy?'

I stopped. '...No?'

'I can tell. Your knots are shit.'

I whipped around, but I was too slow. The ropes fell away from Grindelwald, and he shot to his feet, faster than any man his age had a right to be. He snatched up the luger, and brought it to bear.

A sharp crack! like Apparition rang across the room, and something slammed into my forehead and bounced off like a blow from Czernobog's hammer.

My head snapped back, and I reeled, temporarily blinded by the pain. A shout, then two more cracks and Sirius yelping swear words.

My vision cleared, and I beheld Grindelwald, aged pistol in his hand, pointed right at me. In the kitchen, Sirius had huddled behind the counter, where two big chunks of timber had been gouged out.

My head throbbed agonisingly, and I heard furious blood pumping in my ears.

Grindelwald's face twisted with confusion. He emptied the magazine at me, the bullets beating my chest like a drum, but it wasn't enough. I crossed the distance between us in a heartbeat, snatching the gun from a hand that may as well have been paper for all the resistance it gave.

I seized the Dark Lord with my other hand, lifting him off his feet. The gun I threw across the room, far out of reach.

Grindelwald, to his credit, didn't go down without a fight this time. He slapped his hand onto my forehead - right where the bullet had left a nice big lump - and zapped me with... something. I spasmed, dropping him like a sack of potatoes. My own body soon followed. He scuttled backwards, and made to flee.

Sirius intercepted him, a great black mass of fur and muscle between him and the door, snarling viciously. But Grindelwald hadn't nearly taken over Europe by being a pansy. He breathed in deep, and when he exhaled, a great gout of flame billowed forth.

Sirius yelped, and got the hell of his way like any rational man would. Grindelwald booked it out the door without looking back.

I finally regained control of my limbs, and staggered to my feet. My nose wrinkled as I realised with disgust that Grindelwald's little neural shock trick had made me lose control of my bladder.

I kicked the back door off its hinges, storming outside.

Grindelwald was nowhere to be seen. All around was naught but arid desert. Nowhere he could be hiding, even behind the thin framework of the windmill, steadily pumping water up from deep underground. Fuck.

A wave of nausea surged over me. I stumbled, dropping to my knees, then my hands. I retched, then vomited, and the vomit was black and putrid. The veins of my hands began to turn black before my very eyes. What fresh sorcery was this?

I looked behind me, and spotted Grindelwald, perched upon the roof of his house. He was pointing something at me. A long bone of some sort?

Grindelwald smiled viciously. 'Do you like it? One of the local tricks. Quite effective, isn't it?'

I tried to respond, but succeeded only in splattering more black bile over myself. I could feel the black magic coursing through me now. I could fight it off, I knew I could, I just needed a hot moment to focus. Holding focus through sicking up one's guts was proving a challenge.

Bang!

Grindelwald gave a shout, and toppled from his perch, landing hard on the russet soil, blood spewing from his shoulder. Sirius yelped too, and dropped the luger, shaking his hand in pain.

The foul nausea evaporated from my mind in an instant. Glancing down at my chest, the black bile too was gone like it had never been. Not taking any time to question it, I leapt up and hurried over to my compatriot.

'Sirius! Are you alright?

'Bloody hell, they never tell you how much those things kick in movies!'

I snorted. 'It's basic physics, Sirius, what did you expect.'

Sirius abruptly realised what he'd done. 'Oh fuck. Is he dead?'

The old man groaned lowly.

'Apparently not.' I growled. I scooped up the bone Grindelwald had dropped. It had clearly gone through some sort of ritual preparation - its tip was blackened as if by fire, and a coiled string of woven sinew hung limply from its handle. I briefly contemplated snapping it over my knee, but who knows what sort of reaction that might cause?

Instead I pivoted, and flung it as hard as my enhanced might allowed. It was weighted enough that the wind could not catch it, and so it was with no trouble at all that it was swiftly sent vanishing into the distance.

Sirius and I hauled Grindelwald up, and back into the house. This final injury seemed to have pushed the Dark Lord at last beyond his breaking point, as he didn't even try to resist me strapping him back into his chair.

'Episkey.' I incanted stoutly, brutally overpowering the spell. Even still, the blood flow only slowed.

'Oi, dickhead.' I slapped Grindelwald's face. 'Do you have a first aid kit?'

He responded sluggishly, and called me a wanker in Zürich German. Very helpful.

'Accio bandage'

One of the cabinets in the kitchenette sort of bucked limply. Sirius flung it open, seizing the white and red plastic box within. He flipped it open and deposited it on the table next to us.

'Well old chum, I've got good news and bad news.' I said conversationally to Grindelwald as I sifted through the kit. 'The good news is you're well provisioned. The bad news is, I've never done this by hand before.'

:—:

Grindelwald, predictably, passed out in the middle of us wrapping him up, and no amount of cold water, slapping, or flimsy Reenervates would wake him. He looked very, very pale.

'Well fuck, we can't just leave him here.' Sirius said, rubbing the top of his head.

'Why not? We can't get any information out of him like this.' I shrugged, leaning back on the sofa.

'Who knows when Dumbledore visit next? He could get an infection! Or bleed out!'

'So? It's Grindelwald, who's going to cry over that?'

Sirius scowled deeply. 'I'm not going to become a murderer because you feel like being lazy.

I sighed. 'So your solution is to take the second most dangerous dark wizard of our era out of the prison that has held him for fifty-odd years, heal him up, and then hope he doesn't immediately kick us in the teeth and run off?'

'We only need to get him to Sydney, then we can take him back. We don't even need to wake him up.'

'Hard. No. This sort of thing always blows up in our faces.'

I chewed on my cheek for a moment. Sirius wasn't going to back down on this one, idiotic as it was. I couldn't afford another falling out with him so soon after our last big fight.

'Alright, how about this.' I said. 'You go back to Sydney with Peggy Jim. Heres's the money if he asks for it. Take a portkey back to Britain, fetch Dumbledore. I'll stay here with Grindelwald.'

Sirius looked like he was about to protest, but I cut him off.

'I've read literally magnitudes more about muggle medicine than you. I've barely ever actually done it, but if he gets worse at least I'll have some idea of what to do.'

He looked from me to the Dark Lord and back.

'...Ok. But you better do your best to keep him alive.'

I smiled winningly. 'Of course. What do you take me for?'

:—:

The door to the interrogation chamber screeched open, and I stopped for my glass of water. It was thrust roughly in front of me by some faceless clerk with a scowl on his face, but I thirstily gulped it down regardless. It was lukewarm, and didn't taste very clean, but it was something at least.

'From there, things got dull fairly quickly. I spent a few hours pissing about his house, cleaned myself up. Ran out of things to do pretty quickly. Until he woke up.'

:—:

The shine of the blazing sun slowly crept its way across the floorboards of the house, the only indicator of passing time. Far too slowly.

For a moment I moved to take out my pocket alchemy kit to do some experimentation, before abruptly remembering the no-magic problem. Blech.

I sighed. Hmm.

With a splutter, Grindelwald abruptly came to, heaving thick, raspy breaths. He went to get up, but I pushed him back down, gently but firmly. After a few moments, his breathing stabilised.

'Take it easy. I'm not patching you up a third time.'

Grindelwald sneered. 'I was not aware that Lord Voldemort employed cowards who shied from killing.'

'You're still on that? We told you, we're not Death Eaters.'

'...where's the other one?'

'Fetching Dumbledore to heal you properly.' I said, to which Grindelwald scoffed. 'Oh be like that then. You'll see.'

As if on cue, there was a smart rapping on the front door, and both of our gazes snapped to it. The door's handle jostled, and then it swung open to reveal Albus Dumbledore, his obscenely long beard flapping in the twilight wind like a demented flag.

His eyes fell upon Grindelwald, and his expression melted at seeing the latter's condition.

'Gellert!'

He took a few involuntary steps forward before catching himself. He looked to me furiously.

'What happened?'

'Really it's Sirius' fault if you th-'

Grindelwald struggled to rise again, only to fall back before I could reach for him, hacking out gargling coughs. Blood spattered across his chin and chest.

Dumbledore's caution broke, and he swept to the old man's side, shoving me back out of his path, running his knobbly wand over Grindelwald's chest.

'He was fine just a moment ago!' I exclaimed, as Dumbledore began murmuring in latin. Miraculously, his spell actually seemed to be taking. He must have figured out how to-

Grindelwald struck like a viper, brutally headbutting the headmaster right on his crooked nose with a sickeningly wet thud. Blood spurted from the injury, and Dumbledore stumbled.

Sirius gave a shout, and I surged forward, instinct driving-

Reality bent.

Literally, the space between Grindelwald and I pivoted impossibly by ninety degrees, and Sirius and I found ourselves falling, slamming into the far wall of the house.

I hit the fridge, the aluminium casing caving around me. I heard a shattering, and Sirius yelp, and whipped my head around to see a broken window where he had fallen.

'Sirius!' I cried, throwing myself to my feet upon the wall, and running to the hole. He was still falling, flailing, through open space with naught but the horizon beneath him.

I could do nothing to help him. I whipped my gaze upward instead, to the sheer cliff upon which Grindelwald stood, the centrepoint of his newly-hinged domain.

I leapt up, landing neatly upon its edge, where the timber flooring had not even splintered at the casual warping of What Should Be.

Dumbledore had fared no better than us. Grindelwald had bound him, some manner of shimmering energy field encasing him and twisting his body into what had to be an incredibly painful pose.

The man himself stood casually, grinning widely at me. Dumbledore's wand lay comfortably in his hand, as if it had always belonged there.

I swallowed hard.

'Yes, not so pleasant when the pike is turned on you, is it herr...' He looked momentarily embarassed. 'We never exchanged names?'

My legs were trembling in my trousers, and I found I couldn't speak. All bravado, it seemed, had fled me.

I was fucked, I was so fucking fuck-

'Well?!' He demanded. 'Have you forgotten how to operate your tongue?'

I swallowed again, forcing childish emotions under a fresh shell of Occlumency.

'Thomas Grey' I sneered. 'And if you don't want that being the last name you learn before you die, you'll drop the wand and surrender.'

Grindelwald laughed, a full-belly chortle that seemed to rack his entire body.

'Ah, it is good to laugh again. Tell me, you don't know what this is, do you?'

He raised the wand between two fingers tauntingly.

'Dumbledore's wand?' I hazarded.

He sighed, and murmured to Dumbledore. 'Children these days...'

I took a step forward, but froze in place, statuesque, before I could get any further.

'Enough of that foolishness Thomas, men are talking.'

He seized Dumbledore by the chin, and looked deep into those piercing blue eyes for a long few minutes. Neither of them blinked.

Finally, Grindelwald tore his gaze away, both of them blinking rapidly.

'Fair enough.' Grindelwald said cheerfully. He turned to me and tapped me gently on the cheek. 'Thank you very much for your assistance, Herr Grey, this couldn't have come together any better. I hope you enjoy the view from where you're standing, you'll be getting quite used to it.'

With that, he turned on his heel, before chuckling to himself. The front door was on the folded side of the house. With a flick of his wand, reality straightened itself out, and he trotted out into the world with his revived dogs following him.

The door closed with a snap.

:—:

'And that is where you were when we found you then?'

'Only shortly after I finished counting every knot in the wood of his table, sure. I was meaning to ask about that, how could you possibly have found the place that swiftly?'

The Auror stood, stretching stiff legs. 'Dumbledore's no fool. He told us where he was going, like he does every time he visits. When he failed to check in, we knew something was up.'

'I see. Well that would be the end of my tale then. So... what happens now?'

'Now? Now you go back in your alcove in Denison, mister Grey, until they're ready for your trial.'

'Excuse me? On what fucking charges?' I exclaimed furiously.

'Aiding and abetting the escape of a maximum security prisoner, employing the services of an Aborigine Songwalker without a permit, and...' he paused to check his notepad. 'Ah yes, trespassing on Ministry property.'

'You're shitting me.'

He sighed, and plucked the Dictation Quill from its perch on the record parchment.

'I'm going to level with you here, matey. They're going to throw the book at you here. More accurately, Minister Hughson is going to throw the book at you on this. He really wanted to nail Dumbledore on these charges, they hate each others' guts, but unlike you, Dumbledore is Supreme Mugwump. He's got more diplomatic immunity than pretty much anyone on the planet. So you're copping the short end of the stick in revenge.'

I scowled viciously. 'Why does anyone need to be charged at all?'

Macmillan snorted. 'Are you kidding. This is fucking Grindelwald we're talking about. It's been headlining everywhere. The Powers-That-Be need someone to throw under the bus to save their own skins. Turns out that's you.'

I strained against my manacles, but they were cold iron, and under their effects I was but a mortal man.

'That's fucking bollocks!'

Macmillan gathered up his documents, and turned to leave.

'It's the way it is, mate. For what it's worth, I'm sorry about it. Spewin' fuckin' politics, eh?'

'Wait! What about Sirius?'

Macmillan quirked an eyebrow. 'What about him?'

'Is he being charged too?'

'Nope. Turns out he fell so far that by the time Grindelwald ended that spell, he couldn't find his way back. Dumbledore picked the cunt up after we were forced to release him. Swooped the bugger back to Britain before we could get a word in edgewise. Hughson was fuckin' spitting about that, I'll tell you that for nothing.'

And with that, he swept from the room, leaving me to the tender mercies of my guards.

:—:

'The Council finds the defendant Guilty! On all charges!'

Minister Hughson, bear of a man that he was, leered down at me over his wildly out-of-style mutton chops. He looked positively gleeful, vengefully so, at the judgement.

My lawyer, a dribbling idiot if ever there had been one, looked down glumly at his feet. He'd been assigned to me without my appraisal, and attempts to get him swapped out had been denied at every turn. Not that it would have made much difference anyway.

'Thank you so much, mister Speaker,' Hughson drawled, drawing himself up to his full height. 'Thomas Morgan Grey, by the power invested in me by the Queen of England and the Wizard's Council of Australia, I sentence you to ten years in Denison prison, that you may contemplate the severity of your crimes, and the choices that led you towards them. May the gods look kindly upon your rehabilitation.'

I thrust myself forward in my chair, straining against my bonds. There was no point in feigned politeness now, I shrieked every obscenity under Sun at them, anything I could imagine. But they were Australians; all they did was chuckle.

Finally, they got sick of it, and the last thing I saw was a flare of red light in my face, before darkness consumed me.

:-:-:-:-:

A/N: In case it wasn't obvious, the tale Tom gave to the Aurors differs in a few details from how the events in italics actually played out, but there's no fun in making you all read between the lines of what he was actually saying.

So I finally managed to get another chapter out. As I said at the start, I'm very sorry that it's taken so long. A number of factors in my personal life all sort of collided at once, which coupled with a dab of Writer's Block crushed my ability to put anything to paper for a good few months. Most of what actually made it in to this chapter was only written over the last couple of weeks.

That said, all of those personal issues have been successfully resolved, so if all goes well we shall not see another hiatus like that in the future. Fingers crossed.

Be sure to review, let me know if I've still got it, or if I'm not quite back in the saddle yet. Cheers.