I had this idea a long time ago but never found the right story to add it to. So, for now, I'm posting it here.

Lord Voldemort felt truly powerful once more. His old wand once more gripped in delicate fingers. His 'loyal' followers cowering at his feet, unknowingly prostrating their pure-blooded bodies before his own muggle besmirched form. The dull pain throbbing throughout his veins...

He paused at this last feeling. It was certainly not one he was familiar with. He stretched his limbs, pretending he was removing any final kinks from his resurrection as he turned to view the boy. The boy who was now slowly standing after the Rat released his bonds. His own meagre wand in hand, the blood from his still-open wound dripping from its tip.

But it was not the blood that held his attention. It was the cold smile on the boy's face.

"You're dead, Tom Riddle."

He cringed internally at the infernal name. None but the Rat had been privy to the knowledge of his true parentage before tonight, but now the brat was taunting him with it in front of his followers. The thought was brushed aside as shards of white-hot agony burst all over his body. He'd never felt any pain quite like it before.

"And I'm going to stand here and watch you die, Tom. Take your time. I'm in no hurry."

Voldemort felt weak. Weak in a way he'd not felt since that Halloween, and never once before that night. And it terrified him. Had something gone wrong with the ritual? He'd checked everything, and even the incompetent Pettigrew had performed the steps as instructed. He knew all too well the price of failure here tonight. The graveyard about him seemed to be spinning and he was having trouble remaining standing, much less keeping his agony from showing before his lessers.

"So ends the famous Lord Voldemort." The boy's voice was becoming distant now, harder to focus on through the pain. "Alone, though his sycophants stand beside him. Forsaken by all who might have loved him. Defeated by the child he so unwisely challenged. You'll be back with your dear Muggle father soon, Tom."

Tom was utterly afraid. The boy seemed to be reciting from some unknown encounter. The words did seem to be his own. With a surging effort, he locked eyes on the child and forced his way inside. And nearly fell on his arse in shock.

Inside the boy's mind was his own face. The one he had worn decades ago when he was a fresh-faced Head Boy at Hogwarts. And the words were indeed his own. Words he had spoken at the child as he huddled, dying on the floor of his noble ancestor's masterful secret Chamber. Dying of the basilisk venom flooding his veins causing…

The very same agony that now coursed through his entire body. The venom that had not been cleaned from the boy's system, only healed in its progress every moment of the day by the phoenix tears also sharing his veins. But it was clear to him now that none of those tears had been in the blood the Rat had dripped into the cauldron.

He had taken Harry Potter's protection and with it his deadly secret.

Voldemort fell to his knees, wand dropping from his loosened grip as reality reasserted itself around him. He, the greatest sorcerer in history, was going to die here. At the foot of the grave of his filthy muggle ancestors. Killed by the child of prophecy. By accident. By fluke. By Lucius…

A surge of anger returned some of his strength to his body and he whirled on the Death Eaters mulling worriedly behind him. Pale yew flashed green as he unleashed his wrath.

"Avada Kedavra!" he yelled, ending the Malfoy patriarch with a green flash and driving fear into the eyes of his followers he would normally relish in.

Yet tonight it felt hollow. The arrogant fool. He had given him the diary to protect. To keep safe. And in his long absence, the idiot had used his soul container to better his own station. To settle petty scores with unimportant blood traitors instead of just killing them for their actions. And now he would cost Lord Voldemort everything.

"You bought yourself thirteen years of borrowed time. But Death got you in the end, as you knew he must."

Potter was closer now, standing right behind him as he panted in agony on the muddied ground. His Death Eaters began to fall as well, each clutching at their arms as they fell, sharing his pain as he drew on them through the Mark. Using them to sustain his life as he tried to use his prodigious magical skill to burn off the venom that pervaded his every cell.

He clenched his jaw and eyes tightly against the pain as he sought his once more fallen wand on the ground before he heard soft footsteps to his left and a resounding crack rent the air of the night.

His eyes flew wide as he tracked the sound and they locked on a sight that left him in despair. His loyal wand, which had been with him all these years, had helped to cleanse this disgusting world of such filth, now lay broken in two. Crushed under the heel of his greatest foe.

"Oops."

Tom glared at the boy as best he could. Trying in his weakness to summon something, anything with which he could hurt the child. But even with the collective strength he was pulling from his many followers, he couldn't have lifted a feather at that moment. And his heart went cold as he heard a horrid whisper.

"Master… help me…"

Had it been any of his followers, he would not have cared. But he could tell by the smile on Potter's face where the voice had come from. The memory had shown him the truth. The boy had stolen his family's noble talent that night and had heard his loyal familiar just as clearly as he had.

Sweeping his eyes to the right, he saw her there, twitching in agony. And he could feel the energy leaving her body. His soul was doing everything it could to prolong its time in this world, drawing first on the lives and magic of his willing followers. But when that failed, it had sought a more familiar form of magic. He was draining the containers.

His furious yet impotent gaze returned to the boy and he noted the scar he had gifted him was bleeding, but already seemed diminished from earlier. Realization speared him as he realized he had marked the boy with his soul. Inadvertently making him an additional container. So long as the boy had lived, he could not have died, until he was fool enough to use his blood. Already tainted by his Mudblood mother, and now by the venom as well.

"You…"

"It's your own fault really. You shouldn't leave your diary lying around. You never know who might find it."

Tom wanted to hurt the boy. Destroy him. Rip him apart with his bare hands if need be. But he could not move. His body would not obey his commands. He noted that the night air had once more become silent, but for his own pitied whimpering. The others lay dead, looks of fear etched forever on their faces as he drained them dry.

"I…" Tom mumbled, barely able to muster the energy to open his mouth. "I'm…"

Harry grabbed him by the robe and pulled him upright, bringing him level to the boy's dirty exhausted face.

"Just die, Tom."

And with a shove, he fell until his head collided with the broken concrete footing of his father's grave. Every fibre of his body was screaming in agony, but he lacked the energy to as much as whimper. He had lost it all to vanity and happenstance. To the luck of a child who by rights should be dead many times over.

"I…"

He felt his body surrendering to the inevitable. All his effort. All his planning. The pain of sundering his soul again and again. Was all for naught. And his last sight in this life was the smiling face of one Harry James Potter.

The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord…