What Really Happened- by Tom Riddle's ghost

Part One

What Really Happened

by Tom Riddle's ghost

Every story has two sides (or more).  I shall tell you what really happened in the Harry Potter story.  Please ignore any punctuation errors I make; I stopped attending public school at age 10, and they never taught us grammar at Hogwarts.

About twenty years ago, I led a growing social organization whose goals were slowly coming to fruition.  I had dedicated my life, and sacrificed all potential friends and lovers, to achieving a harmonious world for wizardkind.

My growing organization unfortunately attracted the attention of a powerful wizard who, not satisfied with a room full of trophies, a vault full of money, veins full of pure blood, and a legendary wand, sought to debase my reputation.  Albus Dumbledore was his name.  Jealous of my potential success, he decided to play a cruel trick on me.  He invited me to apply for a teaching job at Hogwarts (he was the headmaster), but then rudely rejected me in the interview.  He even had the audacity to call my father (and namesake) a "Bloody Muggle!"

I politely left the grounds of Hogwarts after learning that he didn't like me, and I was even willing to "forgive and forget," as they say.  However, once Dumbledore found out that my dad was a Muggle, he vowed to make my life miserable.

Dumbledore forced the most gifted Seer of the time, Sibyll Trelawney, to curse me with one of her predictions. (He used the Imperius curse.) The prediction foretold that a young boy, born near the end of July, would kill me.  You can imagine the fear I felt!

As it turned out, one of my few friends, Severus Snape, had overheard the prophecy through the keyhole in the lock of Trelawney's door at the Hog's Head.  Snape was only there to warn Dumbledore of an approaching thunderstorm, but then he had heard the commotion inside.  Snape was too scared to save Trelawney from being Imperiused, but he later told her what Dumbledore had done. (Trelawney later demanded payment from Dumbledore, but he paid her with leprechaun gold!)

Anyway, I spent the next month worrying about who would assassinate me, and I finally narrowed down the clues to Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom (a sweet-faced baby whose father had been on my basketball team during my stint in the Wizards' Basketball League).  In an ironic twist, the prophecy demanded that I choose my own murderer, so I chose Harry.  First, though, I wanted to reason with his parents.  I located their house, thanks to a kindhearted rat Animagus.  (It's hard to find a braver wizard than Peter Pettigrew, who was not afraid of my pet snake, even when he was a rat.)

I entered the house of my murderer and begged to be introduced to Harry.  "Maybe if we become friends," I thought, "he won't kill me."  His father stood before me and blocked my way.  I tried to conjure some treacle fudge as an offering, but my wand misfired, and I accidentally killed him.  :-(

Then I ran upstairs and begged Lily to kill me—I was so ashamed.  She tried to, but her wand backfired, and she died instead.  Then, as I faced Harry, the prophecy came true.  He somehow shot a blinding flash of green light at me.  I heard a cackle, and I was suddenly ruined.

Dumbledore's plan had succeeded; he had turned the wizarding world against me.

The curse should have killed me, but it did not.  Perhaps there is some kind of deep, ancient magic that gives good a 1% chance of triumphing over evil, even in hopeless circumstances.

I was left terribly weak and ruined.  I managed to escape to Albania, so I could live naturally, without magic.  You see, Dumbledore's abuse of magic had instilled in my mind the notion that maybe wizards didn't deserve to use magic.  For years, I lived with that mindset, ashamed of wizardkind.  The only thing that kept me alive was the hope that somewhere out there, some wizards were continuing to work for a peaceful and just society.

After nine years, I finally had an epiphany.  "Not all wizards are bad," I thought.  Dumbledore's flagrant abuse of power will not be the final word!"  Well, I may not have thought those exact words, but it was something like that.

I left Albania and went back to Britain.  I made my way to Stonehenge to pay respect to ancient Squibs, who were buried there by wizards thousands of years ago.  I'd visited the monument about every three years before my downfall, because I was so afflicted by grief for those Squibs, many of whom were killed for sport by cruel wizards in the past.

As it so happened, my brother-in-law, Professor Rubeus Quirrell, was there.  (He and Hagrid were both named after their grandfather Rubeus, a renowned Flobberwormologist.)  Quirrell agreed to let me ride on the back of his head.

I was afraid to return to Hogwarts, but I was determined to face up to Dumbledo'.

One time, in September, my host, Quirrell, had night patrol duty (because Potter snuck around the castle so much), but Quirrell was too sleepy, so I offered to take his place.  Quirrell wrapped his turban around the front of his head, and fell asleep.  I steered his body.  I heard a commotion coming from Professor Flitwick's office.  I crept up the corridor (that means hallway) perpendicular to the one containing Flitwick's office.  I peered around the corner, and guess what I saw!  The Headmaster putting nifflers in Flitwick's office!

I drew my wand and told Dumblesnot that stealing was wrong, and that he should stop.  He cackled, and spilled some butterbeer on his shirt.  Then he pointed his wand at me and shouted, "Obliviate!"  I blocked it with Protego.  It bounced off and blew up a nearby statue of Mickey the Muckraker.  Dumbledore said he would fine me for that.  I ran away.

In the morning, I told tiny little Professor Flitwick that Dumbledore had stolen his money with nifflers.  Dumbledore paid him back, but Flitwick later told me that Dumbledore had paid him with leprechaun gold!

From then on, I kept a low profile, staying under Quirrell's turban, except when we played Exploding Snap against each other in his office.  Sometimes Moaning Myrtle came over, but I didn't like her; she was too whiny. (Not as whiny as Harry, I've heard.)

Well, that year was the Sorcerer's Stone incident.  You may have heard that it grants immortality.  It doesn't.  That's a rumor fabricated by Dumbledore to increase his glory and prestige.  He and Nicholas Flamel did make it, but it doesn't create the Elixir of Life; it cures Dragonpox.  Dumbledore kept the stone guarded while he thought of a business plan to sell it and get rich.  When Flamel expressed a desire to donate the Sorcerer's Stone to St. Mungo's Hospital, Dumbledore had the stone removed from their shared Gringotts vault and taken to Hogwarts.

At the end of Potter's first year at Hogwarts, several teachers, including Quirrell, came down with severe cases of Dragonpox.  (It was a very virulent strain, possibly developed by Dumbledo' to increase his profits.)  Quirrell and I volunteered to go get the stone.  However, we found that Dumblesnot had hidden it in a mirror.  Luckily, Potter showed up and helped us get it out.  Tragically, Quirrell died of Dragonpox, because he didn't get to use the stone in time.  I fled.  Harry contracted the disease and fainted, but managed to recover in the hospital wing.

To be continued...