AN: A big thank you to those who have read, favourite and followed this fic. Can I be super cheeky and ask for a review (it would be an awesome birthday present ;), lol).

Also, a big thanks to my beta-readers: WithPatienceComesPeace, JujuGentle and CleverMird for beta-ing this chapter. You guys are all awesome! Along the way, something odd happened with the chapter and I feel like there are mistakes in it, even though I've read through it SO many times, but those are mine.


Chapter 2: Chasin' Shots of Nyquil


1st September 1991

"Potter, Halley."

Halley breathed in quickly, letting out any tension she had. If she made a fool of herself now, it would be remembered throughout her entire school years and she didn't want to have that memory hanging over her. This was her chance to develop, to learn, to try new things - things that she would never have been able to do under the Dursley's roof.

She walked up the stairs, her head high, back straight. She knew they were whispering. She could hear it through the hall. The Girl Who Lived; she had researched herself while looking for books that would help her submerge into the Wizarding world without problems. Almost everything she'd read had been a lie.

If she failed here, she'd get sent back to the Dursley's, and she didn't want that. Anger sparked through her as she remembered the names they'd called her, the punishments she'd received - her room!

The Wizarding world thought she was an entitled princess. She was Halley Potter, heir to the Ancient and Noble house of Potter so she must be living a wealthy life.

Well, she hadn't. And she was going to find out why people thought that she'd been anywhere other than with the Dursley's. She would start, she thought as her eyes trailed up to meet the periwinkle blue of her headmaster, by asking him.

The hat was placed over her head and was so large it covered her eyes.

"You are not what I was expecting," the hat said. Halley controlled the small jump as she felt it speaking into her mind. She'd seen this being done of course - there were countless names before Potter - but it was different to feel the hat inside her mind.

"Should I apologise?" she asked.

It was odd, having a conversation in her mind. She didn't know if she was doing this right but surely the hat would tell her if she wasn't

"I see how angry you are at our world and rightly so -"

Halley clamped her eyes shut as if the physical movement would stop the hat from being able to see anything else, but of course it wouldn't.

She was powerless. Again.

Anger, hatred, rage. It was what she'd been used to feeling for the last eleven years, but the hat moved off her head slightly, as if he was trying to get away from it.

"I am sorry you went through all of that. You shouldn't have had to."

Well, that was all well and good but what could he do now for her? "If you want to make it right, place me somewhere where I'll succeed."

The hat paused at the familiarity of the words the girl had spoken. He should have been more careful placing Tom Riddle in Slytherin. The boy's need for power and control had only been fostered and encouraged there. Young Halley seemed to have similar attributes.

"Perhaps Hufflepuff?" he suggested. He felt her stop for a moment, felt her curiosity as to why he would put her there, so he continued. "They are loyal, loving, kind and compassionate - things you have not felt very much of in your life."

Memories of a young woman called Hannah flashed through the girl's mind and the hat saw the happiness in those memories. He was glad to see that she'd had at least one relationship that gave her some support. But the bitterness was still there as her memories turned to Hannah walking away from her over and over again.

But all through those thoughts, the girl had been pondering his suggestion and, in the end, she answered with a question of her own: "Could they help me protect myself? Can Hufflepuff teach me how to stop it from ever happening again?"

The hat paused for a moment. Would it? She would gain relationships that were loyal but only if she allowed herself to be open to them. Halley Potter was nothing but cautious as he could see. And she was far too closed off for them to have much impact on her.

"No."

"Can you read my mind?" she asked.

"Somewhat. I skim your thoughts and prominent memories in order to make a decision that will benefit the students."

She was silent. But he could hear her very clearly.

She gave him permission, as though he hadn't already looked into her mind and determined exactly where she needed to go. Her thoughts were not quiet, and she was not particularly good at shielding them either. She was not a natural Occlumens, that was evident.

The girl practically screamed her need for protection. To never be taken advantage of.

The hat saw children like this more often than he would care to admit, and he sorted them without too much consideration. It was true that there was always some fight between where a child should be placed; the magic living in Hogwarts' walls kept the hat sentient and the small, minuscule pieces of the founder's souls gave him the ability to judge the young minds that sat under him. And the souls were always very sure that a child belonged to their house.

But the similarities were too stark to choose so haphazardly. Still, he couldn't deny her request as much as Hufflepuff was screaming out to claim the child.

"Slytherin," he stated quietly. There was a moment as the sorting sunk in around the hall and then there was a typhoon of sound from Slytherin. They smirked at Gryffindor as if to say of course we got Potter, but the hat knew that pretence wouldn't last long.

Then Halley Potter moved over to the one house that would give her what she wanted, but perhaps not what she needed.

Later that night when the hat had been returned to Dumbledore's office he frowned. "You must keep an eye on her, Dumbledore. The anger she felt was astounding."

Dumbledore looked at him, there was no twinkle in his eye. It was a worrying sign. "Why place her in Slytherin then?"

The hat huffed. "I couldn't not! It was what she asked for. There is no doubt, the girl will flourish in Slytherin, but you need to monitor what she flourishes in. There will not be another Dark wizard under my watch."

Dumbledore sighed. He had watched her, seen her green eyes flash with anger as she looked at him and if what the hat was stating was true, she could very truly be someone to fear.

Why did it have to be so difficult? He hadn't imagined that placing her with her family - doing what was necessary for her protection - would cause her to turn so cold. Miss Potter did not seem to hold the same attributes her parents had at her age and it was worrying.

Maybe he had made a grave mistake - maybe he should have listened to Minerva. But all was not lost. She wouldn't turn Dark. He would fix this.

15th July 1993

Somehow, Tom Riddle found himself walking along the pavement of Vauxhall Bridge Road at 2.30 in the morning. The street he'd walked along almost every day in his childhood was unrecognisable, though he supposed that had more to do with the fact that the last time he had been there, he had nearly been killed by air raids. He wondered if they'd rebuilt the orphanage.

He followed the long road that had led to the orphanage almost by muscle memory, the street lamps illuminated the path ahead of him better than any had in 1940, but when he finally got to the foot of where it had been, the orphanage wasn't there.

Instead it was a large, fenced warehouse that seemed dilapidated. Well then, it seemed the orphanage hadn't survived. Tom laughed. He hoped the Matron had died in agony.

"Lookey here," a voice came from behind him. "Ain't you out past your bedtime."

Tom turned and there was a man sneering at him. Tom raised his brow. "Walk away," he said.

"What?" The man laughed. "I don't think you know who you're messing with, boy." The man took out a knife from inside his dirty coat pocket and flicked the switchblade out. It glinted under the sepia light.

"What are you going to do with that?" Tom asked, amusement colouring his voice.

"You're obviously not from 'round here. So here's what's goin' to happen. You're goin' to give me your money and I won' stab you. Seems fair, don' it?" The man took a step forward.

Tom looked at the blade. He wasn't sure what would happen to his body if he were to be stabbed; it was better safe than sorry.

Besides, that meant that he would be able to work some of the stress out that had accumulated after making his way back out into the world without alerting Dumbledore or any other high ranking individual who could potentially remember his face.

In an instant, his wand was out and the man had been disarmed. The man spluttered, eyes wide and looked between his hand and the blade now in Tom's.

"What was that?!"

Tom smiled and took one step towards the man, raising his wand so it was at his eye level. This Muggle really did have unfortunate luck, didn't he?

"Oi! What do you think your doin'? Stay there!" The man pointed at Tom.

Tom took another step forward in response. The next step had the man backed away quickly.

"Listen, mate, let's just stop all this. We'll both pretend it never happened."

Tom laughed and the man paled. "I think not. But you gave me a warning so it's only fair I do the same. I'm going to give you a ten second head start. Ready?"

"What the fuck?!"

"One. Two -"

The man turned and ran, stupidly, straight down the long road leaving him visible to Tom. Just as the Muggle was about to join the main road, Tom shot a half-body body bind curse. It hit his legs and the man dropped like a log.

Tom walked towards him, taking his time. He noted with a thrill that it felt good to feel the rush of blood and adrenaline pumping through him again.

His body was fine. The Weasley girl's soul nourished it enough for the illusion of life to hang onto Tom Riddle, but it wasn't enough.

He had not been aware of what he was creating when he made the diary a Horcrux, that much he was certain of. Horcruxes were dark magic and Riddle had thought he had the control needed to execute it. He thought he had all the pieces to make himself a God. And he did have them all. He just hadn't understood the consequences of it.

He didn't realise that his consciousness would imprint so heavily on his soul until it - he - was in the diary and there was nothing but a blinding blackness surrounding him on all sides.

There was no sustenance. No smell. No taste. No sight. No touch. Nothing but his conscious half-soul. And there was no measure of time.

The seconds had blended into years, although he didn't know which was a longer fragment of time in the diary. Soon - how long had it been? - it was too much.

If it had happened to anyone else Riddle would have laughed and called them weak.

The Muggle called out for help and Tom silenced him. He couldn't let anyone interrupt this. Not now. He was finally feeling the thrill of power and it wasn't all-consuming like it had been.

He'd not had a body in the diary. Nothing tangible. So with every emotion, there was nothing but that emotion. And the inability to escape how present it was every moment he was conscious. Never had he felt such raw emotion. And without a body, Occlumency didn't work.

Soon - too late - Riddle forced himself into a state of semi-conscious before the pain of the blinding blackness turned him mad, and that was how he stayed until the girl had awoken him.

Property of Ginny Weasley.

With a casual mark of her quill, the galling words of the Weasley bitch had forced him back into pain.

The notes, the scribbles, the drops of ink. Every little flick of the quill the girl had made was followed by milliseconds of the blinding blackness that left Riddle wanting to slaughter her for the rush of panic it had created in him.

And so he had.

If he had known that this was what creating a Horcrux would do...

But he was out now. The diary was destroyed, its remains left with Dumbledore in a carefully crafted web and he would not need to consider it anymore.

But there was something missing. Half-smells. Rumbles of hunger but no taste when food entered his mouth. The ghost of touch or only the memory of what sunlight would feel like when he was outside.

Those moments struck a fear into his stomach that he did not ever remember feeling. And he hated it!

Tom was upon the Muggle now. The man had been trying to claw his way towards the street and so Tom put a foot on his back.

The Muggle collapsed under the unexpected weight for a moment before he was trying to trash with the top half of his body. To turn around so he might have more of a chance to live.

It wouldn't matter.

Glancing around to see if there was anyone else about but considering how unsociable the hours were, it was unnecessary. He levitated the man and walked back on himself until he passed a small alleyway engulfed by darkness. He dropped the man and crucio'd him. The rush of euphoria was familiar as he held the dirty Muggle writhing underneath the Cruciatus.

Once. Twice. Three times.

Tom hummed in satisfaction at the sight before him; on the third cruciatus the man had bitten his tongue off and seemed to be choking on his own blood. He was struggling to turn from his back to his front in order to spit it out but Tom could see the tremors absolutely wracking his body.

The curse had obviously been less powerful than usual if the man still had his wits about him.

Tom raised his wand once more but the man's body recoiled and suddenly he had vomited. Blood, bile and digested food came up and spilled over his mouth and then the Muggle really was choking.

Tom saw the panic in his eyes as, even now, as he struggled to turn over. He supposed that the sheer will of surviving was a powerful thing; it was how he was standing there after all.

But it wasn't enough. Over the next few minutes, the Muggle drowned in his own bodily fluids and Tom watched on with a small smile.

When the Muggle was finally dead, Tom turned and walked away. With a clearer head, he began planning.

Tom watched, disillusioned, as the ridiculously tiny thing in front of him followed the specific instructions of a lanky horse-faced shrill woman watching her, shaded from the sun inside what he imagined would be a cooler house, and he couldn't help himself.

It had taken some time to get to her.

The first thing he'd done was ensure that he understood the workings of the current London. Not too much had changed in Wizarding society - at least nothing that he couldn't figure out fairly quickly - but Muggle London had changed drastically and there was little Riddle hated more than unnecessarily stepping into a situation blindly.

And as much as the Wizarding world hated to admit it, the coming and goings of the Political and sovereign society influenced their world enough. After all, Mudbloods made up an ever-growing population.

And there was Dumbledore to deal with as well. Albus Dumbledore. How was he still alive and still so much of a thorn in Riddle's side? And how had Lord Voldemort not yet dealt with the man?

Tom wished that the unlucky Muggle was still alive just so he could Crusio the life out of him again, but blinding anger wouldn't do anything for him. Nor would creating a trail of bodies behind him.

Dumbledore was not something he could do anything about here and now. What he needed to do was find the Potter girl and figure out how she had the ability to speak Parseltongue.

In and amongst all the chaos of that night, he'd managed to place a tracking spell on Potter. Interestingly enough, the spell had tracked her to a road in Surrey, only to cut out upon her crossing some sort of boundary.

That boundary was, apparently, the house she was living in.

He'd expected it to be from the Fidelius Charm - after all, Dumbledore would do nothing except provide the utmost security for the Girl Who Lived - but the lock on the girl had led him straight into a Muggle neighbourhood and Riddle had to double-check his spell. Because she could not live here. Not in the open without even the Fidelius on her home.

And she most certainly could not live life like a House Elf to filthy muggles!

He looked at the tiny thing working tirelessly and was disgusted. Why would she allow anyone to treat her that way when she had magic at her fingertips and the name Potter to fall back on? If nothing else, her ability to speak to snakes marked her as powerful.

But Potters did not come from the Slytherin line so how was she a Parslemouth?

Tom looked at Weasley's wand. The wand was not the most compatible he'd ever used but it would do until he could procure another one. It was likely why the Cruciatus hadn't been as effective the previous night.

A spark struck him; Potter's wand had all but trilled in his fingers as he'd held it. The wand seemed familiar to him, like a scent on the breeze that you couldn't quite place. Why was her wand so compatible with him?

It was another question to add to the growing list and Riddle found himself clenching his teeth in frustration. There was too much coincidence surrounding the girl and he didn't like it. It reeked too strongly of fate and he was not one to put stock in Divination.

No. There was a reason for what was happening, and he would find out. The old-fashioned way if need be.

Tom cancelled the disillusionment and smiled down at the girl. "My my, isn't this a surprise Miss Potter."