Teaching History (is Old News)
6 - First Day
"I do hope that it won't be a mistake," Dumbledore says just as Tom and Potter step into the Great Hall, "hiring someone so young as our DADA professor."
Silently, Tom clenches his fists.
Dumbledore's passive aggressive comments never fail to irk him. The fact that Dumbledore could fire Tom at any moment… makes Tom feel weak. Someday, Tom will be the one with power over everyone. Someday, no one will control his actions and Tom will—
Potter elbows Tom in the stomach.
Just as Tom snarls back, Potter grins blindingly at Dumbledore. "Yeah, you'll probably regret hiring me, Albus," he says, making Dumbledore's eyes go wide, "but Riddle's going to be an amazing professor. Just watch."
Is this what the saying 'swallowed a lemon' feels like? Tom hates it.
Dumbledore's eyes dim. "Harry," he says in that ridiculously gentle way every time Potter is involved, "you mustn't—"
"Oh look," Potter says brightly, "I think I see Cho. She owes me a match. See you, Riddle, Albus. Don't worry, there won't be any flamingoes today!"
He prances off towards Chang and McGonagall with that infuriating smile and Tom stares at the space where Potter stood in annoyance.
"Well," Dumbledore gives a false smile to Tom, "if Harry insists there's nothing to worry about then I'm sure your first day will go splendidly, Tom."
The urge to punch Dumbledore, rather than curse him, is all too real. Tom only just manages to force out a nod instead of a sneer before storming off to the breakfast table.
Potter's words felt like a prediction. A mocking one. Tom knows how Potter's predictions turn out. Lies, all of them. Probably a prank thought up with Dumbledore while both of them had tea in Hogsmeade. And yet the look in Potter's eyes, like the way Potter looked at him once, so many Christmases ago…
No. That's in the past. Potter is merely egging Tom with an underhanded insult. Everything Potter says is nonsense or a lie. By complimenting Tom, Potter's insinuating that Tom will fail.
Tom will show Dumbledore and Potter just how superior of a teacher he can be.
:
[I do not want to be stuck in a room full of human babes if I am not allowed to eat one,] Nagini complains.
[I do not wish to be in the same school as Albus Dumbledore either but we both won't get what we want,] Tom scowls, [I need you to make a memorable impression on these students. My reputation will depend on it.]
He needs to stand out among the staff, as a teacher and a wizard. Prove that, despite his age, he belongs here. Most of his followers are his former classmates and their pureblood parents. He had to word his agenda carefully back in fifth year, appealing to their prejudices by speaking of 'cleansing' the Wizarding World of impure blood, but really, Tom had needed to secure their loyalty. If he has to adopt their tedious and petty rhetoric over blood politics, then he will use it. Otherwise, he could care less about blood. Power is what truly shapes society, not blood. Muggles just happen to be the powerless.
But students are different. Young. Impressionable. His words will no longer be limited to Slytherins and elite purebloods. He will have to be careful, appeal to their desires in order to lead them to his side. But subtly. His teachings on the Dark Arts can wait until he's gained some trust. But first, he needs to show these students that he is unique, different, special. He needs to break apart their own prejudices about magic.
[The twinkly one said something, didn't he?] Nagini hisses.
[He said nothing,] Tom snaps.
[Of course, he did! You have wrinkles in your forehead skin. It's disgusting. Why humans did not evolve to wear scales instead of skin eludes me… You only ever wrinkle like that when you talk to the twinkly one. Or my Green-Eyes.]
[Stop calling Potter that.]
[But it's true. He has the most lovely green eyes, like a true snake. Why did you not convince him to stay in the House of Snakes like you? He's wasted as a Lion. Then he could have fed me more sugar mice and—]
Tom ignores her. As grating as Nagini can be, she's very perceptive. Tom can still hear Dumbledore's words from this morning now.
[This is merely an introductory lesson with the first years. After the first twenty minutes, you may wander off and visit Potter if you wish.]
[You mean, spy on him?]
[Yes. Exactly.]
[Hmmm, more snacks! Very well. I don't see why you don't court him the serpent way or the human way but more affection for me, yesss.]
Tom doesn't even bother responding to that comment anymore. Many complexities of human nature are often lost in translation to Nagini.
[I could always court him in your place, if you like? Do you think Green Eyes would prefer an offering of mice or birds?]
[Birds,] Tom says, picturing the horror on Potter's face if he ever saw a dead feathered corpse. Potter has always obsessed over birds like his demon owl and this flamingo nonsense. If Tom didn't know any better, he would accuse Potter of being part bird. Though Tom does recall an incident with a hippogriff in Third Year… however he'd never classify a hippogriff into the bird family, it's a magical creature that shares a lot of structural qualities with the avian family, particularly in the skeletal system and dietary—
Tom scowls. He blames his in-depth knowledge of magical and muggle creatures on Potions class and Potter. Idiot Potter who probably plans on sabotaging Tom's lessons on purpose…
Speaking of that…
For the fifth time, Tom checks his cages for any spells that might teleport flamingoes or throw eggplants at his students. He inspects his bag for anything that Potter might have contaminated with his presence.
Nothing. Of course there's nothing. But the look on Potter's face when he told Dumbledore that Tom would be amazing… the lie… Tom dumps out all of his quills and paperwork on the desk again, checks, and checks, and—
[I smell the human babes approaching!]
He vanishes the contents of his bag to his office. The lesson plan is memorized and he can always summon more quills if he needs them. For now, Tom has to make a good impression. Tom has to teach.
The children come bustling into his classroom, twittering and twitching about nonsense. Some of them look up at Tom in admiration, apprehension or reluctant awe.
As Tom surveys the mix of green and red ties, he plasters on his most charming smile.
"Welcome, first-years, to Defense Against the Dark Arts. I won't go over introductions. You know who I am from the welcome feast and I will know who you are by the end of the week. Now, who can tell me the purpose of this class?"
A few hands go up. Tom nods to the closest one, a girl he recalls as Ginerva Weasley.
"To protect ourselves?"
"From what?"
Ginerva Weasley frowns. "Well. From dark creatures, I suppose… And magical attacks."
"But what can be defined as dark?"
"…Dangerous things. Things that want to hurt you."
Tom's smile widens. "A good answer but not entirely correct, Ms. Weasley. Certainly, we should protect ourselves for anything that would inflict harm… but in the magical world, often, discerning what will be dangerous to us can be difficult. Can you think of why?"
Zabini, the not-Hufflepuff, raises his hand. "Some dark beings use glamours to appear non-threatening. You might be lured away by a friendly conversation only to be stabbed in the back."
"Precisely," Tom answers, noting the way Ginerva Weasley frowns at Zabini. "Nothing in life is entirely good or evil. There is only power and intent. Sometimes the most dangerous attacks come from an unassuming guise…"
Tom snaps his fingers, watching every child's face melt in awe at his wandless magic when several cages appear. The children stare in confusion at the animals present in each cage, a snake in one cage and a rabbit in the other. Next to his lovely snake, the rabbit seems tiny, fragile and insignificant.
[I don't like metal bars. They taste boring. And I can't swallow them,] Nagini complains. [Are we done yet? Can I visit Green Eyes? There are so many human babes here, surely you can spare one for me?]
Ignoring her, Tom continues, "Which of these creatures would you call dark and which one would you trust?"
Some scattered laughter and wide-eyed looks echo around the room. He hears someone mutter anxiously, 'is this a test'? and resists the urge to smirk.
"Oh, I'd trust the rabbit any day! Aw, he looks so precious," another Gryffindor, Lavender Brown, coos. "Do you take him out for walks, Professor?"
Ginerva Weasley looks at Brown with mild disgust but other Gryffindors nod in agreement. Tom even sees some Slytherins looking at the rabbit fondly while other Slytherins and a few Gryffindors pay more attention to Nagini, eyeing her carefully. A good start, but not quite there yet.
Zabini looks conflicted. "I suppose I would trust the rabbit… As far as I know, that snake is a magical breed of python… Highly poisonous, unlike the non-magical breed…"
"Five points to Slytherin for the very educated guess." Tom nods, he's not surprised that Zabini can recognize Nagini's species, not if the rumours about Zabini's mother are true. "Why don't we test your hypothesis?"
The students blink owlishly back at him. Honestly.
"I'm going to connect the two cages together and then I will walk into the joined cage by myself"—many students start twittering in panic—"and we will see which creature attacks first."
"Professor, don't do it! What if your face gets hurt?!"
"Oh for Merlin's sake, Lavender, he's a DADA Professor, he knows what he's doing!" Ginerva Weasley hisses back.
Tom only smiles and walks into the now-joined cages.
At first nothing happens. Good. The hush before the first act is always key in gaining an audience's attention. Tom waits, with his back to the class, listening to their breathing, listening to the rabbit shuffle to his right and Nagini slithering on his left.
The rabbit leaps for his throat, its body shifting into an eerie wisp like the moon, eyes piercing red.
Tom flicks a stupefy at it just in time and the rabbit shrieks in pain, revealing its long shark-like teeth. Several students gasp in surprise. The rabbit thrashes forward, trying to bite at Tom but he only gestures towards Nagini and she slowly slithers towards the rabbit, swallowing it whole.
"Good girl," he whispers in English, patting her head.
[Can I go now? That dream-rodent is giving me indigestion and I want Green-Eyes to pet the pain away.]
Normally he would roll his eyes, but Tom only nods and vanishes her into the corridor near Potter's classroom. Then he looks back at his class, smirking at the various shades of green he sees on their faces.
"That," he gestures at the spot where the rabbit used to be, "was a creature known as the lapin revê, or the 'dream rabbit.' It feeds from the jugular, on human blood if possible, or on your thoughts. It's a highly dangerous creature that you will only find in the subzero temperatures in the Arctic or Antarctica. Most who encounter it don't live to tell the tale, hence the limited information we have on it in textbooks. It might as well be an urban legend, but of course, I decided to study it for my BOILS and was lucky enough to find a few specimens to show you today.
"The lapin revê is just one example of a seemingly harmless looking creature with arguably dark origins. From our perspective, such a creature must be dark because it kills humans but from its perspective, we are prey. Can you imagine what would happen if we could tame these creatures? Study them further? What we could learn?
"Your first instinct might be to recoil and claim that its impossible. But you saw my familiar, Nagini, the lovely snake in the cage earlier. As Mr. Zabini said, she's a highly poisonous breed of python. If she had been bred in the wild, certainly she wouldn't hesitate to attack me but I have raised her from egg until maturity and she obeys me.
"The key to Defense Against the Dark Arts is to remember that anything could be considered dangerous, depending on the circumstances, and know spells to defend against anything. But also know when you can manipulate dangerous elements to your advantage." Tom pauses, taking in the awed silence. "Any questions?"
Every hand shoots into the air.
Tom hides a smile. One step at a time.
:
By lunch, every First and Fourth Year in Gryffindor and Slytherin is gossiping about Tom's classes. As it should be. If this pattern keeps up, Tom will gain every student's trust by December and then he can start slowly introducing dark magic into the curriculum. Nothing blatant or obvious. But small hints. Change takes time and Tom will have all the time in the world once he's made enough horcruxes.
"You're… smiling."
Immediately, Tom scowls. He'd forgotten that somehow he and Potter have been delegated spots next to each other at the teacher's table. "No, I'm not."
"But you were. Earlier, I mean. And it was a real smile. Not one of your fake ones," Potter adds quietly.
Momentarily thrown by this odd moment of insight, Tom refocuses his attention on the annoying paper birds flying around Potter's head. Today, he spots some folded paper flamingoes among them.
"None of my smiles are fake, thank you," Tom lies sweetly, "but if they had become genuine, perhaps it's because I didn't walk into my classroom to find my materials transfigured into flamingoes by a certain meddler."
"What?!" Potter puts a hand over his hideous sweater, "Why, I would never. What makes you think I would even—"
"So the frog on Snape's face a few weeks ago wasn't your doing? Or the mass hysteria you've caused among the first years yesterday?"
Potter stares at him, the green in his eyes oddly bright. "I know you don't think much of me, Riddle, but I am a professional. I would never interfere in a fellow teacher's classroom. That's just not cool. Though if there were hints of you emotionally or physically abusing your students, that would be a different story, and I'm sure you'd never do that."
This idiot dares to…?
"Are you insinuating something about my classroom practices? Do you forget that I am a professional as well?"
"No, of course not," Potter replies brightly. "Just making sure you understand my position, you see."
Tom narrows his eyes, bottles up all the insults he could shout and smiles instead. "Of course."
They both know this smile is fake.
:
Tom stalks down the corridor, resisting the urge to blow apart the nearby statues and suits of armor. Harry Potter is mocking him. Him and Albus Dumbledore. They want him gone.
From that false prophecy that 'Tom will be an amazing teacher' (because everything Potter predicts is false and Potter is clearly playing a mind game and implying that Tom will fail because Potter is here to ruin him) to the insinuation that Tom would torture his students to do his bidding. Insulting. Tom is clever enough to manipulate these young minds to his side without the use of force. He's not an idiot. He sat through Snape's classes once before after all.
"I'm going to kill him," Tom mutters, thinking of Potter's corpse nailed to a wall, ignoring the lurch in his stomach. "One day, I'm going to kill him."
"I should hope not," a voice says behind him, "because then I would lose someone like a son to me and you would not be able to step out of Hogwarts' doors."
Tom stiffens. Damn it, of all the people to hear him plotting murder…!
Albus Dumbledore only hums at him.
"I wasn't going to hire you, Tom," Dumbledore interrupts.
Tom almost snarls but keeps his emotions chained down with his default smile. "Oh? What changed your mind?"
"Harry did."
Tom… doesn't say anything in response.
Dumbledore twinkles brighter than a police siren, "He has an alarming amount of faith in you, despite your… homicidal… sense of humour. I do pray it's not undeserved."
He walks away without waiting for Tom's reply.
:
Tom ends up blasting the nearest suit of armor into a wall anyways. He feels no closer to solving the puzzle of Harry Potter.
EDITED CHAPTER - Nov 15, 2019