Disclaimer: All characters, places, etc. are the property of J.K. Rowling, at least so far. If anyone is mine, I'll let you know later.

Birth of a Monster: The Diary of T. M. Riddle

Prologue:

"I don't know how you did it, Riddle, and I don't really care. I'll make you bleed for it just the same!" The old woman nearly shrieked each word, bringing down the cane with a crack to add emphasis occasionally. Her victim, a small boy of about eleven, took each blow and curse without complaint, but returning the woman's own contempt filled glare as she beat him. When he was younger he would cringe and cry when the beatings came, as they inevitably did. When he got a bit older, he had tried to reason with her. After all, it wasn't as if he meant to do any of the things he was punished for, they just sort of happened.

Now, however, after eleven long years, he had learned that nothing would stop the miserable old crone once she got started, and nothing he could say, before, during, or after the beatings would make things any better, so he just kept his mouth shut, lest he make them worse. This was easy to do. None of the other children ever spoke to him. He was a nice enough boy, but they all knew the mistress had it out for him, and so wouldn't risk the guilt by association that would come from befriending him.

For the most part, the boy didn't mind the silence. What would he speak to other children about, anyway? From the short discussions he'd had with them, it became obvious (to him at least) that they lived in totally different worlds. He was a tremendously bright young man, but despite his knowledge beyond his years he couldn't put into words the strange feeling of separation he felt from his peers. He was just . . . different. So, he simply contented himself with silence. But everyone needs conversation sometimes. And that is what had gotten him into his most recent difficulty.

After being denied anything for too long, a person may seek what they need in the most unlikely and impossible places, places they would never look under other circumstances. So it was for the boy, denied a good conversation for so long. It happened one night, when he was sitting alone on his bunk. The mistress had sent him to bed early, without his supper, when a heavy food plate had leapt, seemingly under its own power, from the table and slammed into the back of her head. With no clear culprit, the young man was immediately found guilty and banished to the empty dormitory. Aching from the hunger, the beating, and the terrible loneliness, the boy simply broke down crying. He cried for the first time in years, cried all the tears he had so long kept back.

"And why does he cry, do you suppossssse?" a voice asked. It was a strange voice, low, barely below a whisper, and sibilant, almost more of a hiss than a voice. They boy kept crying, supposing he had just imagined it.

"Wouldn't you? You saw how that foul mongoose treated him," a second voice replied, this one as strange as the first.

"Who's there?" the boy called out. If he had known he wasn't alone, he would never have appeared so vulnerable.

"Was he just speaking to usssss?" the first voice asked.

"Yesssss, I believe he was. Most curioussss," the second replied.

"You know I can still hear you," the boy said, both annoyed and curious, "So how about you show yourself and tell me who you are?"

The two voices chuckled. "As the master comandsssss," the first said, and from under his own mattress slithered two long snakes. Where most children (and most adults, for that matter) would have been absolutely terrified, the boy was absolutely fascinated. He had always loved snakes, and the cunning and perilousness they were always said to possess. These two he recognized as rare South Asian vipers, never found in England, and highly venomous. Even so, he leaned closer, partly to get a better look at these two magnificent specimens, and partly to see if these were indeed the owners of the voices he had heard. As he looked carefully at one of the deadly serpents, it seemed to smile at him. Not trusting his own senses, he came in closer still. The snake flicked out its tongue playfully, tickling his nose. The boy smiled, unused to any show of affection from anyone, human or otherwise. "Hello," he whispered, not wanting to frighten off his new friend, "My name is Tom Riddle."

"Greetingssss, Tom Riddle," the snake replied. "I am Sssset, and this is my companion, Reshhhh."

"Pleased to meet you," Tom said to the other snake.

"No, dear boy, the pleasure isssss mine," the creature said.

As odd of a boy as Tom Riddle was, even he would not normally be one to address himself to snakes. But after living in silence for as long as he had, Tom was just relieved to have people to talk to, even if they happened to be a pair of very dangerous snakes. So they just sat there, the three of them, as Tom told them all about himself. The snakes mostly listened, recognizing that the boy desperately needed to talk. He had just finished telling his new friends all about the Mistress of the Orphanage, and how awful she was to him, when the clatter of footsteps on the stairs had signaled that the rest of the boys were coming to bed.

"Foul beasssst," Sssset had said. "Don't worry, Tom, we'll see she gets what she deserves."

The offending plate must have been particularly heavy, because the Mistress carried a lump on her head and a foul temper well into the next day. No one was safe from her wrath, and to most the swish of a cane meant relief, for it meant that the awful thing was too busy with someone else to come down on them.

Tom, of course, had no such luck. As the Old Woman's most loathed charge, he was also the victim of an overwhelming number of her moods that day. After a blow so savage that it sent him to the ground, the boy lost his cool. "You miserable old wench," he spat, "I hope you die in agony like the animal you are!" It slipped out so quickly he couldn't stop himself, so it took a moment for it to register that he had hadn't just spoken English. Instead, the words had come out as a low hiss, like the sound of a snake. What on earth, he thought to himself, what was that? Why, how could that have happened?

His thoughts were interrupted by a scream of terror. He looked up to see the mistress cowering in a corner, holding her cane in a defensive position, while two familiar forms circled her. Sssset and Reshhhh were stalking the old woman, their eyes aflame with contempt and anger. "Pathetic human sssscum," Sssset said, bearing his fangs, "how does it feel to be the prey?"

The mistress didn't answer of course, nor did any of the other children, who watched transfixed from a safe distance. To them, of course, it sounded like nothing more than an angry hiss. Tom, however, grinned in glee. Yes, you foul old woman, he thought, how does it feel?

The dangerous serpents tormented their quarry for five long minutes, circling, hissing, and striking, almost playfully. The mistress, however, was deadly serious, and not one to be trifled with. Not even by a pair of pit vipers. Reshhhh nipped at her heal, enough to draw blood, but injecting no venom. He withdrew just a split second too slowly, and the old woman leapt to the advantage, stamping down hard with her foot to pin the hapless snake before dashing his brain out with her cane. Sssset, enraged, struck forth, ready to kill to avenge his friend, but the prey was faster than she looked, darting out of the way before landing the second snake with a blow nearly hard enough to split him in two.

As she lifted her head in triumph, she fixed Tom with a murderous glare. A look of horror and sadness had replaced his earlier glee, but she had seen the smile. She saw everything. She seized him by the ear, and dragged him off to her office.

Now, ten whole minutes later, the only emotion on the boy's face was hatred as the blows kept raining down, hatred for this foul, despicable, evil thing who had made his life a living hell for these eleven long years, who had beaten him, cursed him, and spit upon him. And who had just killed the only two creatures who had ever cared.

"You are a sorry, miserable, skulking little piece of trash, Riddle," she snarled. "And the worst part is you can't even accept it. I see it in your eyes. You seem to think because you have a little charm, a little book smarts, that you are somehow a cut above, somehow better than anyone else. When of course, you are not. That's why your miserable father left you on our doorstep, Riddle. As despicable as he was, even he could see how much more despicable you are. And even if he couldn't, I can, and so can all of those families who come looking for new little boys. And that, Riddle, is why someday, soon with any luck, you will die, unwept and unremembered. If you could just accept that, maybe you could leave this world with a little dignity."

Again, he sat alone in the dormitory, but this time he kept his feelings strictly in check. No one alive will listen anyway, he thought. Maybe the evil old witch was right, he thought to himself, maybe I really am worthless. Maybe I really will die…forgotten. He shuddered at the thought. What could possibly be worse than such a death? He felt tears building in his eyes, but he fought them off, turning his face to stone.

"No," he hissed aloud, to no one in particular. "That fate will never be mine. I shall write my name in the very stars, and miserable insects like her will tremble to see it. I. WILL. FIND. A. WAY."

And at that very moment, as if hearing his promise, an owl glided into his window on silent wings, with a letter tied to its claws.