Nine Lives

One

Lord Voldemort woke up after what he felt was decades of uncomfortable slumber. In the very first moments of consciousness, everything was dazzlingly odd. He saw blurry figures of people falling before him as a flash of green light hit them. He heard their screams echoing in his head as they cried for mercy. A father yelling, a mother begging, an infant crying - he remembered!

Yet everything remained the same: dazzlingly odd and infinitely bizarre.

Maybe he just had to get up...

He let out a small groan as he got to his feet. He looked around him, but his surroundings were obscure and almost colorless. Not that he bothered. He wanted to know where he was, even if he were to be shown that in black and white. Mind, even if it were in black only, he didn't care as long as he was going to know. But no matter how many times he blinked, his vision didn't become any clearer.

Maybe he just had to go with it...

He was in the ruins of some house... yes, he recognised this house. It belonged to the Potter family and was once the place they used for hiding.

But why did what remained of the walls look so high? Why did the bricks look so big? Why was everything so large, larger than he was, larger than he remembered?

Maybe he just had to ignore it.

The boy... he wanted to find the boy for whom he came to this wretched place in the first place. He wanted to find him and murder him... he wanted to end the living threat.

But there was no trace of the kid..was Harry Potter finally dead? Did he really succeed?

Maybe that was it - or maybe not.

When he thought about it, he found it so foolish to think that he had managed to get rid of the boy, and there were pretty good reasons to support this assumption.

First, there were no dead bodies around him. Not even the ones of those whom he was sure were dead.

Second, the Order of the Phoenix must have come around the house. As much as he despised the lot of them, he knew they weren't stupid enough to find their number one enemy lying there and just let him be.

Third... well, there was no third. It was more like his instincts were telling him that he simply hadn't made it yet.

So maybe he just had to trust his instincts.

The first thought that came to him afterwards was his wand. He wanted to find his wand and set off to finish his duty. He looked for it everywhere in the ruins, but he couldn't find it.

He couldn't find his precious wand.

Voldemort now became frantic. He moved swiftly, searching for the wooden stick in every corner in the remainings. Finally, after what seemed like ages, he saw it. Under a small pile of bricks, the tip of his wand was visible. He jumped with joy and rushed into its direction, eager to get hold of his wonderful wand once more.

The Dark Lord tried to push the debris with all his might, but even that didn't seem enough. The bricks were so heavy for him that he found it impossible even to pull out the wand. He groaned again.

He knew that there was something wrong with him and denying this truth wouldn't change anything. He needed help, and whose help was better than his faithful servants'? The Death Eaters would do anything their master commanded them to do. They would kill for him. Literally.

Bellatrix Lestrange. She was the most loyal of them and the only one who wouldn't make use of his weakness and turn against him because of it. He needed to go to her house as soon as possible.

He left the wreckage behind and walked along the streets of Godric's Hollow. So many people gathered there, all dressed in mourning clothes. Silent tears were rolling down most faces. He passed them all, then came to a sudden halt as he realised something very peculiar.

He was the darkest wizard of all time, he was the one whose very name was feared, and they were just letting him walk among them this easily? They didn't even do him the courtesy of looking at him as he passed.

The maudlin fools!

The idea of himself being somehow invisible did occur to his mind. But right now it didn't really matter..he had to go to Bellatrix.

Voldemort left Godric's Hollow into a town that was clearly inhabited by Muggles. Although he hadn't walked much, he felt quite tired and decided to rest.

He leaned his back against a street lamp and sighed. Then out of the corner of his eyes, he noticed that his face was visible in the glass of a shop nearby. He turned his head to see his reflection and that was where he became paralysed with shock.

That couldn't be. That could never ever be.

The door of one of the shops opened and three people came out of it. A woman with her two children, it seemed. The woman looked irritated as her kids didn't stop complaining all the time they spent inside. They went out to have a good time together, however, she now wanted nothing else but to go home as fast as possible.

They ambled into his direction, but he was too horror-struck to notice them. As they reached the pavement, one of the children, a small girl, stopped.

"Oh, look, Jerry!" she said pointing at the fearsome dark lord. "I have found a kitty!"