Disclaimer: See prologue
A.N. hey guys look who updated on time. Also I recently adopted the story Tripping through time by Coho Comanche, doing some revisions of the published chapters and I'm about done with the first one so expect that soon if you're interested. In the meantime enjoy this and review.
Warnings: This story is unbetaed, couple of oc's later on, and Tom Riddle developing emotions. & Female Harry
Rated T: for Tom Riddle's presence in this story...okay it's because I'm paranoid but whatever.
Updates: Hopefully on Saturdays, otherwise whenever I get the motivation to write for it, we'll have to see.
For your reference unless otherwise stated:
"Speech"
Thought
"Parseltongue"
"In head conversations"
Chapter One: The Hunt Begins
He wasn't sure what he had been expecting when he was told he'd have to reunite all the pieces of his soul. But to suddenly wake up in a cheap motel in muggle London was not on his list. While he didn't exactly have a list, if he had one it would have included waking up anywhere but in a room that smelled of smoke, had yellow walls torn and stained carpeting and filthy bedsheets. Needless to say it was the fastest he had ever cast a scourgify on himself.
Once he was free of as much filth as he could be Tom did the only thing a deceased Dark Lord sent back into the mortal plain could do. He checked his pockets for money and his wand; his wand luckily was still on him and Tom relaxed slightly upon feeling the warmth of his yew and phoenix feather wand; however the frown on his face deepened upon finding no money. Checking his surroundings with a look of disgust Tom Riddle did the only thing that he could, he went over the facts, reviewed what he already knew.
1. He was technically dead
2. Death has made him a deal
3. He needs to unite all 8 pieces of his soul
4. He still has no resources
5. He's in muggle London
6. He has no money
7. No transportation
8. And no idea of where to begin searching
9. If he succeeds he'll get a reward
10. He has no idea what it is, just that it's not hell
"Alright, if I was one of my horcruxes and my container was destroyed where would I go?" He couldn't help but groan as he realized he was talking to himself, he knew he was insane but this was something he would have preferred not to have; but he knew talking to oneself was often considered one of the first signs of insanity; becoming a Dark Lord hell-bent on world domination was the second…so far so good.
As Tom thought over where his horcruxes could be he realized that he had no idea where any of his seven horcruxes could possibly be. Each horcrux would be a main piece of his humanity he had rid himself of, and each one would be a different amount of his soul and therefore some would be stronger and more dangerous than others. While others would be easier for him to take on, not that it mattered, he still had the issue of not having any idea as to where to start.
He would need the majority of his horcruxes before making any attempts at the diary, after all the diary contained half of his soul and therefore would be the most dangerous of his horcruxes leaving the horcrux that was in Harry to be the weakest, but it was one of the two that resided within a living being meaning it could prove harder to track. The same would prove for the horcrux that had resided within Nagini.
Tom sighed as he began narrowing down the list of where to start his search, the Gaunt family ring would be the second largest of his soul pieces and therefor would be one of the harder pieces to conquer it would be able to fight back more than the cup or diadem but if he could remerge with that soul piece then he would have no trouble with gaining back the rest of his soul except perhaps with the diary.
Deciding it would be better to start with something that would give him power over the majority of his other horcruxes but wouldn't be the most difficult to face Tom decided that the Gaunt family ring would be the ideal horcrux to begin with; whether that would later prove true he had no idea, but it was what he decided on and to him that was all that mattered in the end.
"Alright, now that I've decided which horcrux to start with, I need to figure out how to find it, there must be a reason that I'm in muggle London, besides some cruel twist of irony on the part of Thanatos with sending me back to the city I was born in." As Tom began to think of why Thanatos would have sent him back to muggle London he ignored the fact he had been talking to himself again, after all surely nobody could take that much silence.
Glancing into the mirror showed Tom that he looked like Tom Riddle and not Voldemort at least, Thanatos had granted him that mercy and not sent him back looking like Voldemort; if he had Tom wouldn't have stood a chance at navigating muggle London or gathering any of his seven horcruxes which he needed to complete his task. Otherwise it was a one way ticket to hell for him and he really wasn't looking forward to that.
"This is brilliant, just brilliant there's no way I'm going to be able to find my horcruxes, there's no way that they'd be the place I had hidden them or where they were destroyed, so where could they possibly be?!" As Tom ranted and raved at himself like the madman he truly was he didn't notice as a darkly clothed figure silently appeared into his cheap motel room and left something on the bed, nor did he notice as they had left.
It was a good fifteen minutes later when Tom had finally stopped his ranting and noticed the slip of paper resting on his bed. Tearing it open he found nothing more than a blank sheet of paper, releasing a frustrated sigh he crumpled the paper up and tossed it in the waste bin, he smirked just a little when it went in perfectly even if it was a bit childish for him to do so.
He didn't know where he was going to go, or how he was going to pull off obtaining any of his horcruxes when he had no money, but he was determined to do it. And if there was thing that was certain it was that when Tom Riddle put his mind to something he did all that was within his power to achieve his goal. He had split his soul seven times in his quest for immortality; he did everything he could in order for him to win the war against the light; though that had not been enough, just like his attempt at gaining immortality.
It was then that Tom began to realize that Death very well may have given him this task with every intention for him to fail. No matter what Tom seemed to set his mind on achieving he had failed in the end. He failed to get the DADA position at Hogwarts, he failed to gain immortality, he couldn't kill Harry Potter and in the end, he failed to win the war he had started.
Tom sat down on the bed wondering if there would even be any point in him trying to unite the pieces of his soul. For the first time in his life Tom Riddle felt that he couldn't achieve his goals, something that hadn't even happened when he was a small child within the orphanage. When he had been at the orphanage he wanted to prove that he was better than the other children, and he'd done that countless times.
When he had arrived at Hogwarts he wanted to prove himself better than the purebloods that had called him mudblood because his last name was that of a muggle. He had wanted to prove that he wasn't just some muggleborn and that he had a magical parent; he had wanted to prove that he was powerful, and he had done those things. He had gone beyond doing those things; he had become Voldemort and briefly taken over the British ministry.
Tom was a strategist, a military leader perhaps, a warrior in a way; he was not meant to live a life of peace, war had plagued much of his Hogwarts years; and it had plagued his adult life from the 1970's a small break in the 80's and up until his death within the 90's. But even before he had declared war he had been gathering recruits, planning and strategizing.
He had been confident that he could win the war; that he could kill Harry Potter and that he could live forever, but he had learned that none of those things were true. And now for the first time in his life Tom didn't know what to think, he didn't know if he could achieve his task or if he should just quit and face the consequences of his actions.
Not knowing was a completely new concept to Tom, not in the sense of knowledge, nobody knew everything so there had been many cases for him growing up in which he had managed to learn what he needed. However this was the first time that he didn't know what to do, he was at a fork in the road and he had no idea in which direction to go.
He was the heir of Salazar Slytherin himself, his self-preservation instincts told him to do what he needed to in order to avoid the punishment that he knew awaited him. Yet it also told him that what Death was asking of him was impossible, that he should quit before he wasted his time. But he was a Slytherin, and Slytherins are ambitious, they stay alive, and they will go to any means to meet their end.
Being a Slytherin mean he was cunning, sly, intelligent, it meant that so long as his self-preservation instincts weren't kicking in, that he would stop at nothing to get what he needed done. Tom may not have had any resources, and he couldn't use any old connections being dead, but he was the heir of Salazar Slytherin and that meant he was a parselmouth and the thing about being able to speak to snakes; it meant that the serpents would always be willing to help him.
Snakes were Tom's first friends and had always been his ally, and in a world where he had no money and was by all rights dead, he would need all the allies he could get; even if they were all snakes. Snakes were slippery creatures, they had the traits of the house of Slytherin and that was something the former Dark Lord could admire. And the thing about snakes was that they would be able to help him find his missing soul pieces.
Tom supposed that the fact he still had his wand should have been enough; with his wand he could accomplish far more than he could even dream of accomplishing without one. The thing was he was still technically dead, and even with a wand it wouldn't be as simple as using a point me spell to find his soul pieces, he would need all the help he could get, but for him at the moment his only help would have to be found within the snakes.
The only thing was, he was entirely sure if he'd be able to get aid from the snakes when he was technically dead; he had to admit that he at least looked like he had a mortal body, like he was alive; but he knew that he wasn't. It wouldn't have been so bad if he would have gained some kind of special abilities being dead but the thing was he hadn't at least that he had known of.
It was strange really, being dead but still in the mortal realm, despite the fact he looked like anyone else who was alive, even if he was paler than most people; he had always been pale. But Tom could tell that nobody would suspect a thing, so long as they didn't notice the fact he wasn't breathing and had no pulse; essentially it seemed as though he was a vampire, without fangs, the need to suck blood and the allergy to light.
He needed a plan, it was after all the Slytherin thing to do, however he really didn't want to try and figure the situation out. He was supposed to be collecting the pieces of his soul and merging them together. Pieces that according to Death were scattered across the world; and that Death itself claimed to be unable to collect. Reuniting his soul pieces would not be easy and given Death's own claim of being unable to do it, it may be impossible.
The thing is Tom Riddle does the impossible; he didn't get to be the most feared and powerful Dark Lord since Salazar Slytherin by doing nothing. Tom was Lord Voldemort and that meant he was willing to do whatever it would take to achieve his goals, including murder; except this task would require for him not to kill anyone as that could prove counterproductive not that Tom really cared about such things but he was trying to avoid his sentence to hell for as long as he could.
Tom silently left his cheap motel room without bothering to check out, after all he hadn't been the one to check in, and he is a former Dark Lord, making the world a terrible place one bad deed at a time. Once outside Tom immediately recognized where he was; he was only two streets down from the orphanage he had grown up in, the birthplace of Lord Voldemort. Not even he the Dark Lord wanted to visit the place that created him the way he was…unless he could burn it to the ground of course.
Now that Tom actually thought about it, it really should have been the first thing on his agenda when he had become Voldemort. While it would have been of no significance to anyone, it would have held a good deal of significance for himself, and he had always been the only person he had cared about, so he was therefore the only one that mattered. But no, he couldn't lose the support of his followers, and while they were muggles, wizards valued children above all else.
His attempt at killing Harry Potter was a necessary sacrifice and one that which his followers had accepted especially when they knew his only rules. Children were to be spared as often as possible along with their mothers, and he absolutely did not allow for raping of anyone. Surprisingly enough it was the last one that always threw his Death Eaters for a loop; he just didn't see how anyone could be so barbaric as to rape someone.
While he actively encouraged torture and even murder he could not and would not condone rape; and honestly not even he knew for certain why it was. It wasn't as though he really cared about people; but the more that he thought about it, he supposed that perhaps that was another thing that stemmed from his childhood at the orphanage.
He may have often been bullied by the other boys at the orphanage, up until that was they learned to fear him, but the thing about it was that he had still seen what some of those older boys did to the girls in the orphanage. It had made him grateful during his childhood that he had been a boy rather than a girl, he knew had he been born a girl he wouldn't have lasted magic or no.
Those boys that were in the orphanage had no mercy for the girls, and they scared the girls so much they would never tell what happened at night. So perhaps it was the memory of what those boys had done to innocent girls; that had led him to ban his Death Eaters from doing the act; perhaps it would have seemed strange to anyone else; but he didn't care how strange his rules seemed to others; or even himself. His rules, no matter how strange, were still his rules.
Everything traced back to his time in the orphanage; his rage, his anger, his hatred for muggles, his desire to keep the mothers and their children to the best he would allow himself. It all stemmed from the orphanage, perhaps I should have seen this coming, Tom mused, and after all it would be poetic justice for my life to have begun at that wretched place and for Death to have me begin my search there. And that was what Tom was going to do; he would begin his hunt at the place where it all began.
The birthplace of Lord Voldemort was a rundown old building when he had lived there as a child, but now it was closed down and looked to be falling in. Tom felt no remorse to that fact; it would be hazardous for anyone to attempt to walk through it, but Tom knew he had no choice but to check inside for any hint as to where his horcruxes would be.
Tom silently made his way past the broken gates and through the cracked sidewalk, he continued on up the broken stairs and pulled on the door finding it didn't matter that it was locked, it came right off; clearly the place had been undertaken by termites. Tom walked inside and wrinkled his nose in disgust seeing all the dust and the smell of mold…he most certainly didn't miss this place.
Sighing Tom walked up the staircase carefully so as not to fall through the stairs something that which he had no doubt was extremely possible given the condition of the front door, and sure enough by the third step he found his foot falling through, sighing he cast the strengthening charm fortifico on the rest of the stairs in order to prevent any more steps collapsing. He had to admit it was actually a bad idea for him to have not cast the spell immediately, especially when he knew that it would happen…it was an oversight he should have never made.
Now that he was confident that he wouldn't have to worry about any more stairs breaking, Tom continued his way up the stairs, once he reached the top he cast the charm once again. Once he was certain he wouldn't be falling through the floors he walked down the halls until he reached the last door on the right, carefully he opened the door to reveal his old room. It was covered in layers of dust; but it was obvious that someone magical had been there first.
"Magicae Revelare" Casting the spell revealed the magical traces within the room; other than Dumbledore's magic on the wardrobe the only magic in the room belonged to him. However there were some differences, his signature had variances here and there; a difference between a complete soul, a partial soul, and there was one that appeared ripped, that was the Horcrux's magical signature. So at least one of his soul pieces had been here.
Tom once again cast the strengthening charm on the room before he began to scour the room for even the slightest clue, but it didn't take long, he found an atlas opened up to show a map of the United States; Tom had never had interest in America when he had been in school; not enough to go there at least; it had been somewhere he thought he could go if he successfully conquered Britain and the rest of Europe, the United States was a powerhouse in both the magical and muggle worlds.
It was bearing that in mind that Tom made his decision, he would begin his search in the States; if he was going to find whichever horcrux had been there then that was where he'd have to look; he could only hope that the one he'd find would be the ring; or even anything else so long as it wasn't the diary; it was the strongest of his horcruxes and therefor would be the most dangerous for him to try to obtain.
His next issue would be finding out how to get there, and where to look once he was there; he would figure that out later he supposed. His most important task at the moment will be getting to the States once there he supposed he had a lot of places to check before he would find his Horcrux; luckily though there was a lot you could do with a spell to find someone's magical signature; and thing about the States was that while in most aspects they were more tolerant ; they were rather strict in keeping magicals from muggles…very strict
It was that thought that led Tom to believe only one thing could be the case; wherever this horcrux was in the States; it was in the muggle community. After all Tom may have always hated muggles but he wasn't much of a fan of rules either; knowing himself as well as he did he'd choose to remain in the muggle world over the magical; it'd be easier him to break magical laws and regulations; and considering how lax they were about dark magic; he would enjoy practicing the dark arts and discreetly practice the darker things that were less legal.
Knowing that; Tom began to contemplate the various ways that he could use in order to travel from London to the States; but his perhaps biggest challenge will be finding where in the States he would need to go in order to find his soul piece. Tom supposed that perhaps he could handle things one item at a time; first he would need to find how he was going to get the states; then he could look at where he would go searching for his horcrux once he got there; though he wasn't entirely sure how everything would turn out.
Sighing Tom down on his old bed and laid back staring at the ceiling; he had no idea how he was going to pull of uniting his soul pieces but he knew that if he didn't he wouldn't like the consequences. He was Tom Riddle; he had a knack for figuring things out; he just needed to review the facts again; after all that would help him to think of a solution surely.
1. He was still technically dead
2. Death has made him a deal
3. He needs to unite all 8 pieces of his soul
4. He still has no resources
5. He's in muggle London
6. He has no money
7. No transportation
8. And now knew he was going to the States to start his search
9. If he succeeds he'll get a reward
10. He has no idea what it is, just that it's not hell
11. Getting to the states would require expensive transportation
12. Magical transportation might not be his best option
Tom wasn't sure what he was going to do for transportation; especially given he didn't have any money; but he knew that apparition would be too risky; that distance without having previously been there could lead to severe splinching. An international port key would have to come from the ministry, there was no way that he could create his own illegal one; not in his current circumstances. The Knight Bus would be too expensive; and international floo powder was more than expensive.
Which left him out of magical means of transportation; sighing Tom began to think of methods of muggle transportation; driving wasn't possible. He could try a plane, but he couldn't afford to buy a ticket and sneaking on board wouldn't be an easy task. He supposed he could always steal some money from muggles; but that wouldn't be easy; and who knew what his magic could do to a muggle plane even if he wouldn't be using it.
He supposed he could find a ship that was headed towards the States; that would be something simple enough for him to do. The chances were that his magic wouldn't interfere with any type of ship; a cargo ship would probably be easiest for him to sneak on; but if he had to get on a cruise ship he could deal with that. He was the heir of Salazar Slytherin and that meant he was cunning and intelligent; surely he could decipher a way to get from London to the States; it was just a matter of how and when.
His fastest option, while avoiding all magical types of transportation, would be flying; he'd fly via broom but he knew that would take too long. All in all Tom wasn't sure how he would get to the States and for some reason he didn't really care; he was dead after all, it didn't matter in the end what he did; he was already facing the worst punishments in hell. No matter he did he couldn't possibly make the situation any worse; he was at rock bottom.
His only options were to fix his soul, or got to hell but it didn't matter, not really. Either way he was screwed over he knew it. Thanatos said itself that it had been having trouble locating all of the pieces of his soul, so Tom supposed maybe he was on an impossible mission, but he didn't really care. Even if it meant that he would never succeed, he would still have the advantage of not being in hell; he'd end up there in the end, but in the meantime he could roam around the world until he was either taken back by Thanatos or succeeded in managing to fix his soul…the former was more likely.
Sighing Tom sat up on the bed and made his way back down to the main floor, he walked through the door, down the sidewalk and out onto the streets of London. It wouldn't be easy, but he could do it; he could find the money he would need to buy a plane ticket to the states; but it wouldn't be cheap a few hundred pounds probably; he wasn't really sure. Tom hadn't dealt with muggle currency since he graduated Hogwarts.
However he pulled it off Tom knew one thing was for certain it wouldn't be easily accomplished, he didn't have a passport so he'd be slowed up at the airport by having to obliviate people in security. Yet if he chose to stowaway on a ship of some sort that would leave him to lose time; and Tom wasn't really sure if he had any time to kill. He supposed that if he took a ship it would be safer; there'd be less risk of magical interference with the systems.
There was also the fact he hated ships; he didn't get seasick or anything but a ship would take forever to get him to the States and he'd be left with very little to do…he could only wish that he had some manor or another of getting there that wouldn't be quite so difficult; but he knew he wouldn't be quite so lucky; he'd just have to carefully think between taking a ship and a plane and decide what the better decision would be.
All in all he supposed that of the two choices the airplane would be more interesting; there would be the risk of his magic; and all the security; and having to steal the money to buy his ticket. All in all taking a flight to the states would be more interesting, and therefore it would be more risky. If there was one thing that he preferred it would be the more entertaining option, that's what he always preferred. It was led him into exploring the Dark Arts and later on to travel the world; Albania mostly.
Tom had always had a love for adventure; even if he would never admit it aloud, he had always enjoyed exploring as a small child. He wanted to know everything that he could; and in order for him to do that he needed to explore and that led to adventure, it was something he could do on his own and not seem overly strange for; after all normal children tried to go on adventures. There was something about danger that Tom was attracted to, It was why he had always loved Defense Against the Dark Arts and had loved the Dark Arts when he had discovered them as well.
Those were things he had been good at, and he had even pursued his masteries in the subjects; Defense Against the Dark Arts had been easy to pursue, there was nothing wrong with that. It was the Dark Arts that had been tricky for him to get a mastery in; he had been unable to get it done in Britain; it was one of the things he pursued during his travels in Albania, there had been where he had gotten his mastery in the subject.
It had been the easiest mastery he had ever achieved, but by the time he took the test he was far too lost in the subject; by then he had three horcruxes. By then he had delved too deep too fast and was rapidly losing his sanity; it was by the time he returned to Hogwarts for an interview with Dumbledore he had bloodshot eyes; and sallow skin; he should have grown to be far more handsome than he had been as a student instead he was too far gone in the dark arts.
Tom didn't regret it though, his time in the Dark Arts was not something he would regret and he wouldn't stray from their use, no matter what Death threatened him with. The Dark Arts brought him more adventure so to speak, and so he would continue with them no matter how things turned out. It was bearing that in mind that he decided that he would take a plane to the States…flying would be more entertaining; and Tom loved adventure.