The rest of his Potions class Harry spent doing exactly what he had been told by his new friends. To avoid his fellow Slytherins....and not piss Snape off. 'No matter how tempting he makes it', Harry thought, gritting his teeth, and brutally chopping his moon leech. He wasn't really focused on what he was doing, though he knew this was the class he needed to focus in more than any other. In this class, he'd have someone hoping for any excuse to fail him...or worse.

Luckily for Harry, class was over only a short ten minutes after being moved to the front of the classroom, and object of ridicule and hatred. When the bell rang, he was the first one out, before many others in the room had even stood up from their seats. "Potter," called an unpleasant voice after him.

Harry stopped, and could tell that everyone else in the classroom had as well, even though he had not turned around. Everyone was eager to catch come more of the drama. "I expect to see you in detention next Friday. I will inform you of the date and time later."

Harry didn't even pause in his frustration. As soon as he realized Snape was finished talking, he walked on, without showing any recognition of him. In a foul mood, with a foul temper, Harry went of to lunch. He wasn't particularly hungry. But he needed to talk with Sean and the rest.

On the way to lunch, Harry forgot his way, lost in his thoughts. 'I don't get it. I've done nothing to deserve this kind of treatment. So he has a problem with me thinking that I'm better than the rest of the Slytherins? Well I AM better than them! Why shouldn't I let them know it? They're not renowned for their bravery, cunning, or hard work. But ME. Well I was considered for all of them.'

Harry shuddered and forced this voice out of his head. That wasn't right. Harry knew he shouldn't think that way, and yet....it had become his mind's most prominent voice of late. How he was the one who would change everything around for Slytherin. How he was the one that everyone depended on. How he had the qualities that would bind all the Hogwarts houses together.

"What's wrong with me?" Harry wondered aloud to himself. "What am I becoming?"

The nasty little voice sneered. 'Only who you were born to be....'

Harry didn't know why, but hearing himself think in that voice terrified him. Tears welled threateningly in his eyes, and he swallowed a growing lump in his throat. "No," said Harry firmly, "I was born to be good, and....human."

'And what else would you be? But there's so much more you could be to humanity. You could be the best. The very best. Paragon of humanity.'

The change of phrasing had not been lost on Harry. Instead of the voice speaking as though it was him, anymore, it was speaking of him as another. "Who are you?" he asked the voice. 'Whoever you are to acknowledge me.'

Harry abruptly jerked back into reality at the sounding of a loud , quick noise. He looked down and realized he had bumped into a lamp stand, and sent the lamp spilling to the ground. He also realized that wherever he was, he should not be. In his interrogative daze, he had stumbled aimlessly into the Third Corridor. Horrified with himself, Harry tried to remember how he had gotten in here in the first place. He turned around, hoping he could find his way out again. He began trying every door on the way. He had definitely walked through a door. The only problem was that all the doors back this way appeared to be locked.

Turning back abruptly from yet another locked door, Harry ran into someone head on. "What do you think you're doing?"