A guest in the Chamber

'Harry Potter…' Whispered Tom.

'Do we know each other?' asked Harry casually.

'I don't need to,' replied Tom. 'All I need to know is what you represent.'

'Which is?'

'A mere obstacle,' said Tom like he was talking to an annoying parasite. 'Your existence is in my way and therefore needs to be eradicated.'

'And you got this from a rumour you decided to follow blindly,' continued Harry with mockery pointing in his voice.

'A rumour?' Laughed Tom. 'Think what you want, but a Prophecy is nothing like a rumour.'

'A bunch of rules, nothing else,' yawned Harry. You're boring. I thought that the boy who became Lord Voldemort had more backbone than this. Guess I was wrong.'

Harry was pleased to see that he had struck the right nerve. Tom looked deeply offended.

'A rule?' He spat. 'Prophecies are not rules. They are the prediction of Fates. Fates that are bound whether we want it or not.'

'Yeah well, Divination has never been my favorite class.'

Tom scoffed and rolled his eyes. Why had Fate chosen to bind his destiny to a dumb boy like Harry Potter.

'Have you ever wondered what would have happened if you had chosen to disregard this rule?' Continued Harry. He didn't know where he was trying to get at. He was following his instinct like he always had.

Tom glared at him. This brat was annoying.

'You're too young to understand such things,' he finally said.

'Actually I think we are of the same age,' replied Harry.

'I am not talking about the time you spent on Earth,' smiled Tom. 'I am talking about experiences, knowledge.' His look turned ferocious. 'Tell me Harry Potter, have you ever killed anyone?'

Harry's face filled with disgust.

'As I thought,' continued Tom. 'Your reaction is the one of a young boy unaware of this World's deepest secrets. At your age I had already unraveled most of them. I wouldn't have been able to create my second Horcrux if I hadn't.'

'Whose life did you steal?'

'My father's,' Tom's smile grew larger. 'That weak stupid Muggle.' He spat. 'He should have known better than to abandon my mother.'

An illegitimate child. Harry was starting to understand why he hadn't found any trace of Merope's marriage with Tom Riddle. It's because there hadn't been any. He was a Muggle Lord. She was a poor witch and sole survivor of a declining wizard House. She must have found a way to seduce him and when he had realized what she truly was, he had abandoned her and the child.

'You still had your mother then,' said Harry softly. 'Why did you end up in an orphanage?'

A glimpse of pain passed in Tom's eyes. Unfortunately for him, Harry was too used to green eyes trying to conceal sadness as this is what he was mostly seeing every time he faced a mirror. He processed the information and stored it. Family was a sensible topic for Tom. First weakness.

Tom didn't answer.

'She abandoned you,' said Harry in a blank voice. Tom looked away. Touché.

Harry considered the dark haired boy for a few seconds. He had always thought that Voldemort had been directly born on the evil side. Whether he were raised in a family of dark wizards or were inherently wicked, his nature was unquestionable. Until then. Harry had never thought that Tom could just have been… unlucky. Like him, again.

'Did you do that?' he heard Tom ask. He was pointing at the remains of the basilisk.

Harry nodded.

'Dumbledore must have been so proud,' said Tom sarcastically.

'Is that jealousy I hear?'

'Jealousy?' Tom burst out laughing. 'I never cared about his opinion! And I was right because his only interest towards me was to make sure I wouldn't be too much trouble. I should have been the quiet model student.' The laugh faded out and the grim smile was back. 'A model student,' he repeated scornly.

'But he pulled you out of the orphanage,' insisted Harry. 'Surely you must have some consideration for him.'

'I would have left it eventually. I can only thank him for saving me some time.' His disdain turned into something more intense. A gleam appeared in his eyes. 'I knew I was born to achieve great things, Potter. You can't understand this, but I knew my life was about to change in an unprecedented way. I could sense it!'

'Because unleashing a beast on innocent students is indeed a great thing… Right.' Harry sighed. 'So much for Slytherin's legacy.'

'Who do you think you are to question me about his legacy?' Spat Tom with anger. 'I am the only one who can understand the purpose of this legacy! I am the heir of…'

'What? Killing Muggle-borns?' Hissed Harry, cutting him off. 'Do you really think that Salazar would have been proud of you?'

If looks could kill, Harry would have died immediately.

'Magical education to worthy wizards and witches,' recited Harry. 'This is the noble task of Slytherin. This is why he built this castle. ' He turned his eyes towards Tom. 'And you tried to destroy it.' Harry paused. 'You know I am right. Because when they tried to close the school, you immediately stopped.'

Tom would have given a lot to shut the brat down.

'Worthiness comes from blood,' he said in a low voice.

'Then that explains why the father of the Heir of Slytherin is a Muggle,' said Harry sarcastically.

'Shut up!' Shouted Tom while clenching his fist. 'You shut up now! Don't talk about things you don't know!'

Tom's breath was heavy and his scream surprised him. This boy had gotten to him. He slowly calmed himself down while relaxing his hands. Why was it hurting so much?! He was Lord Voldemort and he had conquered immortality. Why was a little ignorant Gryffindor able to make him lose control like that.

'I loathed my father,' he finally said. 'People of his kind are the rampant scum of this World. They are everything that is wrong with magic.'

'He is everything that is wrong with you,' retorted Harry.

With every burst Tom had let out, he had been able to draw the portrait of the abandoned kid who never grew out of his wounds. He could see now that Tom had never been able to seek any hope anywhere even when he had come to Hogwarts. He had suffered all his life and revenge had consumed him to the core. Harry could see it because he had suffered from the very same wounds. He could see it because he had the same taste for revenge and he could understand how easy it was to lose faith.

But unlike Tom, Harry knew his parents had loved him. Unlike Tom, he had friends and adults who had reached out to him. He had all the reasons to follow Tom's path, but love was embedded in his own core.

His mother had died for him. Tom's mother had abandoned him.

'How can you lie to yourself like this,' continued Harry. 'Muggles are not wrong. Your father was. You were left alone in a World that wasn't yours, among people who saw you as a freak and tortured you for this!'

'How could you understand any of that?' Spat Tom.

'Because the same happened to me,' replied Harry calmly. 'In case you forgot, a Dark Lord on rampage murdered my parents and I was abandoned in my turn.' Sorrow pointed in his voice. 'I was left alone in a Muggle family that hated me and tried to get my "freakness" out of my system in every possible way. But unlike you, when I arrived at Hogwarts for the first time, I didn't try to destroy it. There was a light at the end of the tunnel. There was hope.'

'Are you saying you are better than me?'

'No I'm not. I just acted better than you.'

Harry was caught at his own game but he didn't care anymore.

'Hogwarts is the Home that us, the left out, never thought we had. This is the haven we never hoped we would have one day.' He wasn't trying to hide his pain anymore. 'Tell me, Tom Riddle, was its destruction one of the great things you wanted to accomplish?'

Tom considered Harry and looked away, again. Every word the boy had pronounced had echoed off his mind and had shaken him. He hated it but the boy was right. He had internalized every blow, every insult. He had never forgotten about the adults who had turned their back away from him when he needed them. He had judged them all and his sentence was irrevocable.

But he had never expected that his action could hurt innocents. And somehow, it bothered him. He almost felt a shock when he realised it. He was starting to sense something he had never felt before and he didn't know how to describe it. Knowing that he had hurt people who didn't deserve it bothered him. He turned his gaze towards Harry.

'Hogwarts is Home,' he repeated in a soft voice Harry had never heard before. 'I didn't have a choice but to follow my legacy.'

'For a Slytherin you seem to be very attached to rules.'

'You can't understand!' Spat Tom.

'I can assure you I can! I can perfectly understand how old grudges can force people on the path they eventually regret. I can very much understand why people can blindly follow rules to legitimize their stupidity. Some call it Fate, others call it legacy. I also heard about duty, Prophecies and greater good.' His eyes darted towards Tom. 'Rules, rules, rules! And you Slytherins are the worst about them! Isn't that ironic?'

Tom was speechless. Every words made sense to him.

'What was I supposed to do then?'

'I don't know,' replied Harry. 'Have you tried enjoying life?'

'Don't laugh at me, Potter.'

'But I am very serious. You spent your childhood suffering from people who couldn't understand how different you were. And the first time you met those you could, you rejected them.'

Tom sat on the floor and let his gaze float on the Chamber that was once his realm. It was spinning around him.

'Leave me alone,' he finally said in a low voice.

Harry sighed and nodded. He turned towards the white statue and hissed the order to open it.

'You… speak Parseltongue?' Asked Tom surprised.

Harry didn't answer and greeted his basilisk who looked happy to see him. The snake glanced at Tom.

'He will stay with us for a while,' explained Harry. 'I need to leave. If he tries anything funny, bite the ring.'

The basilisk nodded and clutched his coils around the jewel while looking at the other boy with a suspicious look.