Disclaimers: None of this is mine. Except the plot… methinks.
Authors Notes: This is a companion to Ashes to Ashes. It consists of various snippets, some short and some long, in Tom's POV (both first and third person) before, during and after events in the original story. No slash in this one, I'm afraid.
Summary: Companion to Ashes to Ashes. Turned back to what he was before he was Voldemort. Before he had lost all trace of his innocence. But just how innocent is Tom Marvolo Riddle? Take a peek inside his head.
Ashes to Ashes:
Inside his head.
1942
"Let go of me!" he screamed threateningly at them. "Let me go or you'll be sorry."
An empty threat. There wasn't anything that he could do unless he wanted to be expelled from Hogwarts and that was the one thing that preserved his sanity. He didn't know what he would do if his wand was snapped in two and he was thrown out. His magic now came as natural to him as breathing and he had no doubt that if magic was forbidden to him he would curl up and die very much like if were forbidden to breath. They knew this as well as he and did not pause in their approach.
They laughed cruelly mocking him knowing that he was powerless against so many of them. He backed off until he felt the wall behind him and there was nowhere else to go.
He saw the fist coming at him before it connected with his jaw. His head exploded with pain as it struck the wall causing him to groan and stagger - his mouth full of blood. His attacker moved in close slamming an arm very near to his face and pulled him up by his collar with the other.
"Thought you were gonna make me sorry, freak. Well come on. What are you waiting for?"
He waited until the other was close enough for him to feel his breath on his face steeling himself not to react to the jeers and taunts of the other boys. He then smacked his forehead across the others with a resounding crack and at the same time kneed the other in the groin - putting as much force into the impact as possible.
The larger boy howled in pain and let him go dropping to the floor clutching at his injured appendages. The others stopped laughing at him and glared at him menacingly.
He didn't have time to think before they pounced. Their fists pummelling everywhere that they could reach. He fought back the best he could at first but soon he concentrated on trying to avoid their blows instead of inflicting any.
His arms shielding his face he tried his best not to cry out. He concentrated on his hatred instead. Concentrated on how he was going to make them pay. Promising them silently a world of pain and suffering. His mind thinking of cruel tortures each one more sadistic than other he promised them that one day they would beg for death and smiled to himself - and a horrible, mirthless smile it was - as he thought how he would delight in their screams.
Power surged through him and the next thing that he knew an invisible force had flung his assailants off him. He knew that he had lost control momentarily and that he could expect a Ministry caution very soon. Now, however, was not the time to dwell on that. The other boys were already picking themselves up and were glaring at him with murder in their eyes.
He jumped to his feet feeling sore in a hundred different places and ran.
He felt like an absolute coward as he wrenched the door open and bolted as fast as he could.
He clattered down the stairs and out into the streets. Darted into an abandoned alleyway and then sank to the ground unmindful of the grime and dirt as he heard them crashing past in hot pursuit.
At times like these he hated his Muggle father more than ever for abandoning him and leaving him at the hands of these foul creatures who revelled in his suffering. He hated his father for his Muggle prejudices. For casting out his mother. For the weakness and filth of his blood; the blood that now flowed through his veins. There were times when he almost felt like cutting himself and to let the impurities ebb away along with his life. But then he could never do that - for he feared death too much.
He would kill his father though. He liked to think about how he would do it. He was sure that he would enjoy it probably more than he would even enjoy disposing of the worthless Muggles that tormented him. He had never hated anyone more than the absent father whom he had never met. The man who had given him his name. He hated that as well. He would change it as soon as he thought of something else. A name worthy of the bloodline of his mother's side. A name befitting the heir of Slytherin. A name that Wizards and Muggles would fear to speak alike when he became the greatest sorcerer in the world.
Well it would all begin this year.
He now was very close to knowing where the Chamber lay deep within the caverns that lay below the school and he knew the deadly secret that it held. The Baron had been most helpful where that had been concerned and he dreamt often of the black snake.
He laughed. Cruel and cold and high pitched. A laugh that no boy should have had. This year - his fifteenth - the Chamber of Secrets would be opened and the school would start to be purged from all those unworthy of learning Magic.
Enemies of the heir, beware!