HPxDN - Hell and Back

7/28/2019 HPxDN - Hell and Back

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Hell and Back

Story: Hell and BackStorylink:http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5454064/1/

Category: Harry Potter + Death Note Crossover

Genre: Fantasy/Horror

Author: esama

Authorlink:http://www.fanfiction.net/u/1137344/

Last updated: 06/15/2010

Words: 49514

Rating: T

Status: In Progress

Content: Chapter 1 to 8 of 8 chapters

Source: FanFiction.net

Summary: Voldemort breaks him, Dursleys abandon him, Watari picks him up, Dumbledore calls him back, and Lmakes it all worth it. Harry Potter Death Note crossover, drabble series, dark-ish, slash-ish and spoiler-ish.


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*Chapter 1*: Horrible Boy

Hell and Back

1. Horrible Boy

He was like broken goods. That was all Petunia could think about the child she had discovered on her doorsteps and

greeted with her scream. This little boy, this Harry James Potter, the only child of her now, suddenly, brutally, dead

sister, was broken goods. Damaged, not quite right. He might've been perfect upon birth - because Lily wouldn't,couldn'tgive birth to any way flawed child but maybe he had been damaged somewhere along the way. In day to day

wear and tear. Upon delivery from Lily's house to hers.

It helped some not to think the child as a child at all, but a product. Harry didn't feel or sound or act like a one year and

three months old child he was supposed to be, after all. He was too quiet. His eyes knew too much - the eyes were

wrong, they werefalse. They were the same emerald green, almond shaped eyes she had always envied in her sister,

and they were just not right. Sometimes, when she looked at them just so - or didn't and caught them from the corner

of her eyes - they didn't look like green at all. Sometimes it looked like the colours had been reversed and instead of

green, they were red.

In comparison to her lively Dudley, Harry was unbearably still. He didn't trash, he didn't squirm, didn't crawl, didn't

play. He was silent too; never cried or wailed, he didn't make any noise of all. Petunia had to make up a schedule to take

care of his needs, to change his diaper, to feed him, to wash him, because the boy never let know that he needed

something. He was more like a doll than a child, and if he hadn't been warm and looking at her, she would've thought he

wasn't alive at all.

For a long while, she thought he was about to die. No normal child was so quiet, so still. There was something terribly

wrong with him and one day she would take him from his crib and find that he was no longer breathing. Vernon thought

so too, in fact Vernon was almost relieved by the idea. He didn't want one like Harry in his house after all. And neither,

really, did Petunia.

But it never happened. Harry persisted, almost stubbornly, and weeks went by. Then, all of sudden, he was no longer

still. He was on his feet, walking. Not much after that, he spoke. "Hungry," was the first word. "Bathroom," was the

next. Suddenly, Petunia didn't need to care of him at all, and it unnerved her to no end.

2. Hundred Bodies

Harry dreams of people dying. Of flashes of green light and blood running down the chin of a feral man who grins up to

him and calls him his lord and master. He dreams of burning houses, crying children and people decapitated, mutilated,

their arms and legs cut. He dreams of screams and curses and accusations, endless conversations over the cooling

corpses, the mockery and the plans. He dreams of his servants, gathering around him, begging him. He dreams of

laughter, cool and maniacal, like cackle of a lunatic. And he dreams of people dying.

3. Hinting Boldly

The atmosphere in the Dursley house is always strained by the time Harry is three years old. He is a very smart three

year old and can see it so very easily, so clearly. The way his Aunt never looks at him in the eyes and the way she never

touches him, never to brush his hair or tug his clothes in place or hug him like she does with Dudley. Dudley leaves his

presence when he gets too close and he isn't allowed to sit in the kitchen table - if he has touched one of Dudley's toys,Dudley will never touch it again. Uncle Vernon lifted his hand to hit him once, he remembers it very clearly, but the hit

never landed. He hasn't talked or acknowledged Harry in any way since.

He makes them feel bad, he can tell. It's not that they don't like him. It's like they can't. They can't stand to be too near,

can't stand to look at him, barely can stand to talk to him. That's why he sleeps in the cupboard, because he makes them

see nightmares - the same "nightmares" he sees. They don't want to be close to him because he feels bad to them. He

doesn't blame them. He is a smart three year old, he knows they would try if they could and they can't, they really can't.

And besides, he feels bad to himself too.


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4. Hide Behind

Aunt Petunia starts working in local grocery store when Harry is four years old. She says it's because they're thinking of

moving, of getting a bigger house, of of something. He knows it's because she can't stand it anymore, being so near

day in and day out. Because of that, she gets a job and arrangers day care for Harry and Dudley.

At first the kids at the day care centre are nice; they even let him play with them. They don't even care about his too big

clothing or messy hair. He enjoys it for as long as it lasts, growing fond of little straw dolls they make in the craft's

hour, and the lullabies they sing before naptime - even if he never sleeps. But eventually he starts unnerving them too.They whisper about him and so do the caretakers. They don't like his hair; it's too messy, too long, too black. They

don't like his skin, too pale. His eyes are the worse. Too wide. The colour's wrong. He stares too much. He stares at

everything.

He tries not to care. He's a mature four year old, he knows the effect he has on people, it's not their fault. He plays with

the straw doll he made in the corner of the play ground where he won't bother anyone and let's his hair fall to his eyes.

Maybe, if he plays like normal kids and doesn't touch the other toys, he won't be so scary to the others. Maybe if he

would stop brushing his hair aside, his eyes would stop bothering people.

He rather doubts it.

5. Hands Bound

Four years now, Vernon thinks to himself with frown while looking outside. Harry, five years old now, is playing in the

back yard, making more of his straw dolls out of the weeds growing in Petunia's flower beds. For four years, the boy

had been living with them, under Vernon's roof, under the stairs, eating from his table, using Dudley's old clothing.

True, it could've been worse. The boy was quiet and somewhat obedient, never rouse his voice and was always very

calm but he was odd. Freakish. Like hail and blizzard during a sunny day.

The man shivers slightly, narrowing his eyes. He would've loved to throw the kid out years ago, but it had been

impossible. That man, that old crackpot from their world, had threatened them in that letter. And despite everything,

Vernon wasn't a stupid man, and Petunia wasn't a stupid woman. They knew that against the things those people could

do, they were weak. They could throw Harry away, leave him at the streets, in front of a police station, in steps of

some orphanage but those people would find out about it in a flash. Vernon and Petunia had never been daring enough

to try to see how they would retaliate if they would do it.

Outside in the back yard, Harry holds his new doll up, against the light. His hand seems small, peaking out from the

sleeve of his too big jumper and he seems tiny in his baggy clothes. As he admires the doll he has made, turning it in his

hand, his messy hair falling to his eyes, Vernon clutches the windowsill in his hands and grimaces.

He knows Harry. For the boy it wouldn't matter if they would abandon him - he was so strange that he wouldn't care

either way. He would probably just shrug his skinny shoulders and take it all on stride - that was the way he had always

been. And Vernon would've loved to do it, he truly would've the boy was ruining their life with his mere presence. But

he couldn't. They couldn't.

Not yet.

6. Handcuffs Broken

They were elated. Harry eyed them from the side half curiously, his hair falling to his eyes - eyes which he now was

forced to hold wide open because they were getting blurry and he couldn't see right. Poor eyesight didn't matter that

moment, though; what mattered was the delight Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were apparently feeling.

"You're going away then?" he asks. They look at him with surprise but don't answer. He nods at them, because he

doesn't need explanation. He has seen their plan long time coming. "Where will I go?"

"We're going to leave you to an orphanage," Petunia says, and for the first time in a long, long while, she's looking at his

face. "We checked it beforehand; it's a nice place not far from here, just on the other side of town. They're going to

take good care of you there."


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Harry nods in understanding, though he doesn't particularly care either way. He's already six and can cook, do laundry,

he can shop if necessary and he can clean. He can count in his head and has already read every book in the house. He

can take care of himself. He doesn't need anyone. But he appreciates the sentiment. "I won't see you again," he says,

certain of it.

"Not if we can do something about it," Vernon nods in agreement and, surprisingly enough, crouches down to meet

Harry's eyes. "I can't say I like you much, Potter. You're a freak and have been like ghost haunting this house ever since

they dropped you to our doorsteps, but I'll say this. Take care of yourself. And make sure no one can control you."

Harry blinks and nods. He knows what he means. Take care of himself so that no one will again bother the Dursleys

with his wellbeing. Never let anyone make decisions for him, the way they had been done so far, the way that had ended

him in the Dursleys unwilling care.

"That rotten old man has been forcing our hand for five years now," Petunia murmurs darkly while heading off to pack.

"No more. Never again"

Harry nods again, vaguely aware of what they were talking about, whom they were talking about. Idly he traces his

steps back to his cupboard and gets his latest doll, bundling up his clothes and taking his favourite books from Dursleys'

shelves. They wouldn't mind. They never read them anyway. Finally, because he wasn't sure if his new home would

have any, he takes the last half empty jam jar from the fridge, before sitting down to wait.

Hour later, the Dursleys leave him to the doorsteps of the orphanage. He knows that little later, they would be boarding aplane. He didn't mind. He never minded. He was weird, freakish and odd. He could only feel jealous that his family, at

least, could get away from it.

7. History Beheld

Harry likes the orphanage. He hardly even notices how the kids around him quickly pull away from him and how the

caretakers give him little less food than they give to the other kids. The orphanage has two things which makes it better

place than the Dursleys. First, it has a yard full of grass and hay and weeds and he can make endless amounts of straw

dolls. And second, it has not only library but it held classes - and he could go to school.

When he is reading and learning and thinking, he can't hear the whispers in the back of his mind, doesn't see the endless

red behind his eyes - forgets that he is a freak. He twiddles a doll in his hand and turns a page, memorising anything new

he can. He likes history in particular. They're like stories, except true, and even if there is rarely a plot line or maincharacters, that's alright. They're detailed and complicated stories and he likes those best.

By the time he notices that no one talks to him and that he is sitting in his own, empty table during dinner time, and that

the other beds are so far away from his own, it has been like that for a while. He is once more the weird outcast no one

wants to approach. But he is already used to that, it happened with the Dursleys, in the day care centre, so it was only

natural that it would happen here too.

8. Homework Boycott

He likes school, and hates the teachers. He likes learning, but the teachers blame him for it. They say that he's cheating.

That he is reading the answers from somewhere. That he is using a calculator. That you can't count big numbers in

your head. They push him to the back of the class and never pick him even when he holds his hand up with the right

answer on the tip of his tongue. When he answers every question in the test correct, they take him to the principal'soffice and he's given detention for cheating.

He stops making effort not much after and brings his own books to the classes. While the others in the class are

learning how to add and subtract, he's learning physics and studying chemistry and reading more history. The teachers

glower at him, but never say a thing about it. Especially not after they start being wrong and he starts being right - about

everything.

9. Heavy Boon

Harry has always seen them. Letters and numbers hovering upon a person's head, writing their name and what he in the

beginning thought was just random bunch of numbers. For a long time he thought that everyone could see them. When


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the Dursleys had taught him otherwise, he had chalked it as being one of those things which were unique to him. Like

memories of a war he had never seen, acquaintances he had met, enemies he had never had and people he had never

killed. One more thing to make him weird.

It doesn't make sense in the beginning, though. What's the point in seeing someone's name like that, and what was the

point of the random numbers? He can learn a person's name through introductions just as easily. But then he meets a

man who calls him self one thing and the name upon his head is different, and maybe it makes a little sense. This way,

at least, he can tell whether people are being lying to him about who they are or not.

The numbers start making sense when, after watching how the numbers trickled down from the usual eight digits to

seven and then to six until going rabidly from five to four to two and vanishing all together, Harry witnessed one of the

girls in the orphanage dying of pneumonia.

10. Hesitation Beforehand

Harry has been in the orphanage for almost a year when it stops being an interesting place. By that time he has read

majority of the interesting books and gotten utterly tired of the teachers of the school he goes to - they never actually

taughtanything to him. Only one he actually liked there was the librarian, a middle aged old man who ordered him books

from other libraries and arranged odd entertainment for him like logic puzzles, tests and such when he got bored.

That is why the man's appearance, for him, is a relief.

The man introduces himself as Watari, but Harry can see it's not his name - and of course, instead of playing by the

man's rules, he addresses him by his real name. This seems to both intrigue and bother the man, but doesn't stop the

man from asking him questions and offering him new solutions. How long had he been in the orphanage, what were his

hobbies, what did he like to read, his school records were abysmal, why was that and if that is boring, what if he

would exchange to another, more suitable orphanage?

"The Wammy's House is meant for intelligent, gifted children like yourself," the man says, eying Harry thoughtfully. "I

believe you would be more at home in there."

He speaks lengthily about the orphanage, about the students, about the classes, about the hobbies, about the events.

Harry would have his own room, he could learn whatever he chose. Harry listens half interestedly, not sure what to

think of it, but certain it would be more suitable than the current orphanage.

"What if I'm weird?" he asks, thinking about the way people drew away from me. "What if people don't like me?"

The man doesn't understand what he means and instead of answering right, he smiles and assureds that he would fit in -

that there would be more kids like him there, that he would be able to make friends. Harry wonders if that was right,

suspects that it wasn't but in the end didn't care. The place he had stayed so far was boring and the school he was

going through didn't teach anything.

"Can I have jam at the Wammy's House?" he asks. The orphanage neverhad jam.

"You can have all the jam you want."

It wasn't much of a decision really.

x

I wasn't going to continue this, but I like the idea too much to quit while I'm ahead - and some expressed mild interest

towards this, so who am I to stop? Still, I encourage you to treat this story as half dead animal, ready to kick the bucket

any moment. That way you might avoid dissapointment.

My apologies for possible grammar errors and such. My excuse is being Finnish and beta-intolerant. If you pick some

mistakes which bother you, you can point them out and I shall fix them as soon as I can.


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*Chapter 2*: Bad Habit

Hell and Back

11. Bad Habit

He isn't introduced to people right away in Wammy's House - and the man who brought him in tells him not to tell his

name. "This is a very special sort of orphanage," he says. "Before you make the decision about whether you want

everyone to know you here for who you are, don't say your name."

The other kids seemed to have taken it to the heart. There is a boy called A there, another called Dee, he meet pair of

twin girls called Tinker and Tailor of all things, and so on. Most of the kids have odd names, usually no last name at all

and the names they went by weren't their real names. For the first time, Harry's ability of seeing people's true names

made perfect sense. A was actually Andrew Ainsworth, Dee was actually Devon Edward Edison, Tinker and Tailor

were Tasha and Tanya Petrov, and so forth.

For a moment Harry isn't sure which name to use. He doesn't care for the fake names, but the kids don't want to go by

their real names he would've preferred to use the real names, but isn't sure how the new orphanage's caretakers

would take that. Would they beat him for it, kick him out? And they were expecting him to pick a fake name for himself

so that they could call him something. He doesn't see the point. He likes honesty.

"It's because they don't want loose ends," a boy going by the name of L explains without looking up from his book."When we leave this place, they don't want us to be tied here."

"Why is that so important?"

"Because we will be important people. Ties to place like this will hinder us," the boy answers and looks up. He has a

messy hair and wide eyes with flatly staring pupils. He reminds Harry oddly of himself, down to the ill fitting clothing

and awkward behaviour. The other's posture was much worse than Harry's though, cupboard or no cupboard. "And if

we go bad, the Wammy's House doesn't want to be connected to us."

Harry got the impression that if the kids of Wammy's House would go bad, they would go bad in massive ways. They

were all geniuses of some sort there. A man could only turn into a mad man, but genius could do some serious damage

with his insanity, after all. The impact they could make was enormous, good or bad. He didn't care about that, though.

He didn't even believe in good or bad. He had seen too much blood in his dreams to believe in it. There were onlyinstincts and urges and those who could manipulate others better than some. Nothing more, nothing less.

In house of geniuses and fake names, what was he? Awkward, wrongboy with ability to see more than people usually

saw - ability see beyond lies and life. "Beyond," he murmurs and likes it. It was certainly better than picking something

that started with letter H.

12. Bothersome House

It's not surprising that he ends up alone once more. It's not exactly that the other kids avoidhim this time around,

though. It's that the entire orphanage by all appearances is full of very solitary children. A is too shy to socialise, Tinker

and Tailor prefer the company of each other, Dee rather buries himself in his books than bothers with other people, L

does whatever it is he usually does, and so forth. Aside from the first days when they were slightly curious of Harry, or

Beyond as they call him, they mostly ignore him.

Harry doesn't mind it, it's actually welcome change. The kids and the teachers - because Wammy's House doesn't have

caretakers, only teachers - don't whisper about him or circle around him to avoid touching him. They don't stare at him

or avoid him, exactly. They're just indifferent of him, they don't bother making any opinions of him - he doesn't

matterto them, in the exact same way they don't matter to him. And, at first, he likes that.

The teachers themselves are cool and professional - nothing like the caretakers of the last orphanage who had either

been patronisingly nice or jaded and thus easily irritated. These teachers just do their job, and Harry certainly prefers that

to being babied. He also likes the fact that during health inspection, they mention nothing about under nourishment or

bad eating habits and when his poor eye sight is brought to light they don't even mention glasses, just schedule a surgery


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for him.

In Wammy's House, there are no real classrooms or such, but there are lessons. They are all private lessons held one-

on-one and it feels more like private tutoring than schooling. Harry likes that, though. He learns more than he had before,

and he gets to choose what he wants to learn. And if the fact that he studies crime and murder and anatomy and history

of war and such bothers his teachers, they never say anything about it.

He also likes the library of Wammy's House and the fact that they make sure there is always a full jar of jam in the fridge

for him. The yard of Wammy's House is so meticulously well taken care off that there are no weeds to play with, butRoger, the head of the house, specially orders him some fine quality hay to play with. They don't call his dolls just dolls

in the house, though. They call them Wara Ningyo - habit started by Dee who read about similar dolls in one of his

books.

But in the end, there is something just as wrong about Wammy's House as there was about Harry. The house was big,

magnificent, he could do almost anything he wished there, but something about it was off. Maybe it was the way they

were being taught and trained for some future greatness or some position, maybe it was the fact that they were given so

much freedom despite the fact that they were young - all the while being sheltered and protected to the point of

imprisonment - maybe it was that the teachers in the house all wanted somethingfrom them. He wasn't sure. But the

house felt odd.

But he didn't care. It felt good to be in a place that fit him so well - and at the same time, so very poorly.

13. By Himself

Harry pokes the doll sitting in the ground beside him, his ankles folded and his shoulders hunched. He feels weird - like

back in the Dursleys when he still lived in a cupboard and learned how to care of himself so that he doesn't have to

bother Aunt Petunia with it. Like there's someone hovering behind his back, like his stomach is empty and like the

colours of the world are all wrong. Like there was a big hole inside his chest, filled with stuff that didn't belong there.

It was easy to ignore in the previous orphanage. He could listen and watch the other kids or the caretakers or read

something to occupy himself. It was usually easy to ignore in Wammy's House too, he could read something or have a

lesson or something like that. But the teachers weren't there and the library was closed and he couldn't even watch the

other kids because they weren't there either. The kitchen was closed too and he couldn't get any jam though that

would've helped.

It was the middle of the night now and there was nothing there to occupy himself - notching except his newest Wara

Ningyo which he had just finished, but which doesn't offer much entertainment. While holding it up and tugging on the

yarn he had used to tie it, he frowns. Usually the dolls were enough to make things stop bothering him. Was he growing

up from them? Would he soon stop making them all together - like Tailor who no longer carried her stuffed toy with

her?

"Beyond?" quiet voice interrupts his thoughts and he looks up to see one of his many orphanage-mates - and, most

likely, the most interesting one of the lot. "You cannot sleep either?"

"I could sleep if I wanted to," Harry answers, tilting his head a little to listen to the words closely, trying to catch an

echo. Beyond. He likes it, it fits him, but oddly enough it hasn't sunken in yet - he isn't familiar with it yet. How odd.

Like not being familiar with a heart beat. "I'm not insomniac."

L hunches his shoulders, not in defence or any other expression of emotion, but as a way of dropping his hair to shield

his eyes from the nearest source of light so that he can take Harry in to the fullest. Harry knows the action well. He uses

it as well. "Nightmares perhaps?"

No. Not nightmares, not quite memories either. Harry looks away, tugging on the straw arms of his doll, and wonders.

There is no correct wording for it, no way of describing. All he can really think or say that it's wrong. Inside him there

is wrongness. Maybe it's an illness. More probably it was some form of madness, break, remnant of a wound from

times before Dursleys, but after Potters. A scar deeper than the one his bangs hide on his forehead.

"I don't get nightmares," he just answers, turning his eyes to the doll and tugging its arms again. They have never really


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been nightmares. You fear nightmares, after all. He has long since gotten used to the blood and dead bodies.

L doesn't answer, maybe he doesn't know how to, or maybe he sees it as waste of effort. He steps closer for a

moment, crouching down beside the other orphan and looking at the straw doll. "You make lot of them. Yet I only ever

see you with couple, never more than four. Why not?"

Harry tugs the dolls arms off and drops them to the floor. "They don't last," he answers.

L doesn't understand. The look he gives Harry is thoughtful and ponderous, almost analytic, and Harry, Beyond, can tellthat the thought process going through his mind is that never ending linear tree, endlessly branching multitude of

theories, nothing ruled out. It's what makes L brilliant - the fact that he thinks so much, so many theories and solutions

in one sitting. But still still he doesn't get it.

And eventually he stands up again, leaving the other orphan sitting alone. Beyond looks down to the pieces of Wara

Ningyo, and thinks of broken bodies.

14. Bloody Homicide

They celebrated few things in the Wammy's House. Christmas and Easter were the main celebrations with random

birthdays, make belief birthdays and of course every time someone rouses a few steps in the IQ ladder, the endless

unspoken race for the seat of the bestamong them. One of the celebrations which weren't celebrated was Halloween.

Beyond, who was revelling in his new anonymity and in the ties his chosen name cut off, is rather curious about that. Is

it because it's more pagan like than rest of the holidays, or why? It is never really addressed, but aside from bowl of

black and orange candies which sat on the kitchen table for the day, there are no celebrations, nothing to mark the day

anyway special.

Not even though L had been born that day - fact which Beyond isn't supposed to know, but in the end there are lot of

things he isn't supposed to know and still does.

Beyond celebrates the day, though. He makes two dolls, drawing letter J to one and letter L to other. Then he makes a

smaller one, a baby Wara Ningyo, with letter H on it. A fourth doll is made from especially dark straw and letter V is

drawn to it. V doll tears J and L apart and H doll breaks V doll, leaving all the pieces scattered across the ground.

"Scene from the past?" L, who had been watching, asks, biting his thumb in thought.

"Who knows," Beyond asks, ripping the baby H doll's chest until the letter is unrecognisable and drawing the letter B into

it's place in the ragged hole in the doll's chest. He shows the doll to L, noticing that L seems to make the connection

immediately. "Perfect transformation."

"I wouldn't quite put it into those words," the other murmurs, crouching down to examine the doll. "It looks painful."

Beyond laughs.

15. Betting High

Beyond doesn't much care for the IQ race. He has the mind for it and to be honest if he really tried, he'd be the second

best in the orphanage. But he doesn't care about competing - not when the competition itself shows so many of the

cards you're holding. What he does like is the side effects of the competition.

L lives in the nicest room in the entire house because he's at the top, he gets the best toys, he always gets whatever food

he wants, he can do pretty much what he wants, can study what he wants, and if it's his word against another orphan's,

L is always right. In the meanwhile, the boy with lowest IQ whose chosen name is Veil, lives in a simple room, gets to

use the computers of the so called classroom, he eats the same food as rest, he gets taught only if the teachers aren't

busy with someone else and no one really listens to him.

Beyond is pretty sure that the reason why Veil's numbers are so low is because the boy is going to commit suicide

before his twelfth birthday. He doesn't much care about Veil one way or another, but it is interesting to see how the

atmosphere in Wammy's House had turned the lot of them into little monsters. It seems easy enough on the surface, but


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also knows that tomorrow another kid would be holding the bottom position, tomorrow another would pick Veil's

shame. And, of course, before the year would be over, Veil would die one way or another, probably by his own hand.

Maybe it is a little cruel. "That's humanity for you," he answers.

17. Brute Humanity

It takes some time to realise it, but Beyond had finally figured out all the things which were wrong with Wammy's

House and why the place felt wrong. IQ race, high expectations, cold teachers who pushed their students to betterachievements and lower mental stability and endless competition between orphans all that was just a side effect of the

real thing. In the end, Wammy's House isn't orphanage at all. It is a factory.

And the kids are the products.

In the end it is so painfully obvious he feels slightly ashamed it took him so long to get it, but once the realisation does

come, he is forced to dismiss its importance. Everyone already knows. They look at L and A and now B and they realise

the whole thing fully. Wammy's House is an orphanage which makes unfathomable geniuses for whatever purpose they

needed one for. It was as simple as that.

L is the perfect product - brilliant and emotionless, willing to learn and study and memorise endlessly, willing to

ceaselessly get better and better without much care for himself or his own stability. L will never fit in with society, but

he will never have to.

A and Beyond, or B as they had started calling him, are the failed products the orphanage is still hoping to make use off.

A is slowly getting more and more unstable as time goes by, flickering between shyness and outright paranoia, but he

will have his uses. And everyone knows what B is like and thus doubt that he'd amount to what the orphanage wishes he

would, but he still has his potential. The orphanage was still trying because they were still good resources and it didn't

want to waste them.

Of course, it doesn't look like that from the surface. It looks incredible, brilliant - a house of intelligent children who are

able to learn and do pretty much whatever they want to. Some of the children are still in that belief - or pretending that is

all there is to it. Some of them use a sort of self conflicted ignorance as a shield against the orphanage's true, hostile air.

Others are pretending that it doesn't matter to them, those who are away from the top and still a safe distance way from

the bottom. The rest deal it with however they could.

"This place suits you," L says one night when neither of them sleep - one can't and other doesn't want to. "You seem to

be enjoying yourself." The words would've sounded like accusation if L hadn't spoken them in such a thoughtful voice.

Beyond grins. The kids all deal with the hostile atmosphere however they could. But some, like Beyond, didn't need to.

"What about you?" he asks instead of answering. What does the stellar product of Wammy's House factory think?

L doesn't answer for a while, eying the dark room around them with expressionless, flatly staring eyes that don't seem

to see anything but in reality saw and memorised details normal people didn't even notice. "I suppose this place suits me

too," he answered before wandering off with shoulders hunched and thumb nail between his teeth.

Beyond supposed that was the only proof one really needed of L's mental state. Somehow, it made him like the other

boy a little more.

18. Blazing Hearth

Time in Wammy's House is a strange thing. It is measured and calculated and chopped to bits and they learned about all

the ways of keeping track of it, with or without clocks. But all the same, one loses track of it. The place is just timeless.

Weeks, months, seasons and years doesn't really matterwhen the goal in life is to be a little smarter than in the day

before. Thus, it is and isn't surprised when Beyond realises that he's celebrating his eleventh birthday and has been in

Wammy's House for four years.

Eleven years old. Just about the right age for miracles and fantasies.

Despite knowing all about it, Beyond hasn't really given any of it much of a thought. It hasn't really mattered to him, not


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at Dursleys, not at the first orphanage and certainly not here, where there were more important things to consider. Now,

with ten years under his belt since last meeting with that world and intelligence of which neither Voldemort nor Harry

Potter alone could've even dream off, he thinks oddly.

He thinks of magic and he thinks of thieves and tricksters. He thinks of wizards and cheating and using crutches. He

thinks of magical world and thinks of waste, ruin and uselessness. Without a purpose, it's all without a proper purpose

in his mind. The only reason all if existed was because it did, and though existence for the sake of existing was pretty

much all anyone could say ofanything, it was such a waste.

There is a world of miracles hidden behind the fire in every fireplace, and it doesn't have a meaning. At least in the brutal

house of intelligence, they have a goal - one Beyond happily ignores, but it is still there, it is substantial in its insubstantial

way. What do magicians have? Same as everyone else in the world. Life, progeny, death. An animal's life. In Wammy's

House he has thefuture.

Beyond throws a new log into the fireplace and stares, wondering if reliving a life of a magician would bear a meaning.

In his mind he had already done it and he had done it with style - been there, done that, got a kingdom's ruins for it. To

do it again would serve little meaning, except to perhaps quench a flickering curiosity and rekindle old grudges that

weren't even his to begin with.

In the dark living room he makes a new Wara Ningyo and draws the letters AD into it. As he throws it into the fireplace,

he wonders how to give something so pointless a meaning.

19. Beneficial Honesty

The kids in Wammy's House got often odd letters, packages and what not. Dee got them almost daily due to the fact

that he was in sort of employment of several organisations, Tinker and Tailor ordered so much stuff that their packages

were brought in by trucks. L probably would've gotten dozens of letters per day if he hadn't preferred the use of

computers, phones and general digital communication to physical one. Over half of the orphanages kids are either in

employment or are aiding who knew what organisations, so it's part of daily life.

So, when the lettercomes, no one is neither curious about why Beyond gets it nor why it is made of parchment. Or if

they are curious, they hide it well - it's against the unspoken rules to interfere with the business of others after all. Just

as L doesn't stick his nose in Dee's math proofs and Tinker doesn't toy with L's computers, no one even looks up while

Beyond reads the letter. It's a very short read, though, and the letter is burned afterwards. Aside from list of slightly

newer books, there was nothing new in it.

Where to go from there is still a bit open, though. For the first time in his life, Beyond is painfully aware of how

indecisive he is. He usually likes - loves even - the fact that nothing really moves him. Being able to take part of things

that held no emotional, sentimental or any other sort of value for him was interesting but now it proves problematic.

It leads him, for the first time in his life, to actively seek another's advice. "Do you think Wammy's House offers

something?" Beyond asks from L, whose room he had broke in deftly in the middle of the night.

If L is irritated to see him there, he doesn't show it - neither does he show any emotional reaction to reality that Beyond

had effectively broken the lock in his door. "Yes," he simply answers from the floor where he is sitting in front of a

computer. "Don't you?"

"No," Beyond says honestly while crawling towards the other orphan in all fours. "Well, amusement maybe."

"Education," L counters.

"I could learn the things I learn here in a publiclibrary, as could you," the other snorts, looking over L's shoulder to the

computer screen to see that L had already pulled up a screen saver to hide his work. He snorts again. "You can live

anywhere. You can get toys and tools anywhere. You can get food anywhere. If you're smart enough to get it. So what

does Wammy's House offer?"

"Opportunity," L answers, now looking at him studiously. "You think you could get something better somewhere else,

Beyond?"


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"Hmm" That is a good question actually. Hogwarts offers Beyond nothing he already didn't have, or couldn't get on

his own. He had the Potter vaults, simple test would give him access to them, and Diagon Alley would be his source of

anything magical he would desire. Hogwarts itself was nothing. And in the same time, it's something. "I don't know,"

Beyond finally says, and feels a bit irked about it.

L seems to understand - but it's L, he probably has already thought up all possible reasons why they're having this

conversation and figured what he's really being asked. "Can you test it?" he asks.

Beyond blinks with surprise. Test it? Test it? He starts laughing, leaning forward so that his face is close to L's. Whilethe other just stares back at him blankly, unwilling to be perturbed, Beyond grins. "You're brilliantL," he breathes,

smacking a wet kiss to the other boy's cheek before heading off and leaving slightly frowning L behind.

Really. If Hogwarts proves out to be boring who says he can't come back?

20. Back Here

Beyond has never taken part in this particular privilege before, but he is slightly amused by the fact that Wammy's House

chauffeurs its residents around wherever they wished to go. The other orphans enjoyed the privilege occasionally,

Tinker for one headed out often to find her materials and L sometimes headed off to do who knew what. Of course, the

kids at bottom had no such privileges, but whenever the kids at the top wanted to go somewhere, they got there in the

orphanage limousine. Beyond finds it hilarious that he uses it for the first time to get to Charing Cross Road.

"Do you wish me to wait for you, Beyond?" Watari asks while opening the door for the messy haired, wide eyed boy. If

he is curious about why Beyond is there, he doesn't express it, and for all the world to see he is nothing but a very

smartly dressed driver of a very messy boy.

Beyond considers it before shaking his head. "No need," he says while standing up. He glances down to himself, to his ill

fitting jeans, to his black jumper, to the worn sneakers he rarely used, and grins. Just to annoy the other boy he had

some time ago started mimicking L's habit of wearing strictly comfortable clothing, and now it would serve him in very

interesting ways. He looks like a muggle - a penniless, worthless, pitiful muggle. It's perfect.

"It's okay Watari," the boy says, dismissing the man with a wave of his hand. "This might take a while, so I'll just get

back on my own." With that said he turns to the Leaky Cauldron's entrance and heads towards it with a predatory grin

on his face and much suffered Wara Ningyo twisted in his fingers.

He had an everlasting first impression to make.

x

The half dead animal is still at it! Quick, get a stick, let's poke it! Thanks for the support, you creeps, I love you all.




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*Chapter 3*: Happy Bastard

Hell and Back

21. Happy Bastard

The nostalgia doesn't hit him before he is past the slightly crowded Leaky Cauldron and given entrance to the alley itself

by rather confused looking innkeeper. Beyond has known, remembered, reminisced it all before, of course, but to be

there in person is different. The smells, the sounds, the sights they are like breath of old and half forgotten, somethinghe hasn't even stopped to think at sterile Privet Drive or in the two orphanages.

He can't really say the first breath smells good though. In his memories he sees Diagon Alley in two ways. As it was and

as it could've been, and when he thinks of it from purely new, Wammy's House induced perspective, he can't really see

much glory in either angle. The place is stale. Has been for well over fifty years, well over it.

But everything has its purpose.

His visit to Gringotts is short and brutal and he finds Goblins to be more to his liking than he previously thought based

on his memories. Their abruptness and rudeness is refreshingto him in comparison to what Voldemort had felt of them.

Why wizards seemed to so dislike them, he had no idea anymore. They were quick and precise in what they did - unlike

some muggles in charge of other people's money. Wizards really didn't know how to appreciate a good thing.

With hand still dribbling blood after the vicious blood test and some gold in his pocket, he braves the Diagon Alley itself.

First in line of business is a wand. Ollivander's store hasn't much changed, except for the fact that it is a little bit dustier

than it had been "the last time around" and it isn't run by the same person. Though that maybe hadn't changed - he just

knows the truth this way around.

"Ah yes," the man says. "I thought I'd be seeing you soon, Harry Potter."

"Ah no," Beyond answers with a cruel smile. "You didn't think you'd see me, Guntram Gregorovitch."

Some spluttering and awkward explanations and unspoken suspicions later, he gets his wand - blackthorn with

phoenix's feather - with discount. Though he acts like it, he doesn't really care that the Gregorovitch family had

apparently taken over the Ollivander business when the last Ollivander had died seventy years earlier and were hiding it

from the rest of the world - though interesting, it is hardly relevant to him. He appreciates the blackmail material,though. With a new wand and tight grip on a man's livelihood and secrets, he heads off.

He gets his robes, trunk and course books from second hand stores - as new things didn't suit his image. With the robes

tucked away in the shrunken trunk, he directs his steps to where he really wants to go - Flourish and Blots. Half of his

remaining gold is spent there, under the confused eyes of the manager who sees him skip the beginner books and load

his basket with the more difficult - and more interesting - stuff.

"What about the first year books?" the man asks.

"Already got those," Beyond grins. "Ring 'em up, Edward."

In the house of fake identities it was easy to forget how much fun it is to just unnerve people.

After a quick visit to few other stores, like a place where he could get a pitifully old fashioned though very accurate

telescope, and another where he got some writing materials and third where he got his potions supplies and of course

handful of other shops where he could get what he really found interesting, he heads back to Leaky Cauldron. With his

things safely shrunken in his pockets, he orders a cup of tea, loads it with sugar, and perches himself at the counter to

wait.

"Yeh must be 'Arry," his guide to the life of wizards greets him half an hour later, giving him a slightly puzzled look as

Beyond apparently doesn't meet his expectations. "Well, ne'er mind, I hope I'ven't kept yeh waitin' fer too long. Come

right this way, and I'll show yeh around the alley."

The looks the shop keepers and the Gringotts' goblins give him are priceless.


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22. Hospitable Behaviour

Watari is probably a little confused when he drives Beyond to King's Cross in the first of September, especially when

Beyond says that he'd be coming back for Christmas, but naturally he doesn't show it and doesn't ask any questions.

The situation is odd, but in Wammy's House it was hardly the strangest thing that happened - and Beyond gets the feel

that the man is slightly relieved that the boy has finally found his "goal" in life, something he had always lacked. Either

way, Beyond doesn't much care. He is too concentrated on the following journey, so their goodbye is swift and

indifferent.

His introductions in the train however are nothing but.

"Want a hand there? Oy, Fred! Come 'ere, let's help the scary looking firstie to train." The red haired twins are much like

their deceased uncles, Fabian and Gideon. Beyond can still remember the irritating wizards, how long it had taken to

make them stay down. These two are just as loud. What is most interesting about these twins is the fact that they

seemed to have switched names somewhere along the way and Beyond isn't sure if it's intentional or not.

"One of you is going to die in six years," Beyond says as way of thanking the two for revealing his identity to half of the

platform, before heading off to find a compartment.

"Anyone sitting here? Everywhere else is full Are you really Harry Potter? And you really have the you know

where Voldemort" The red haired boy reminds Beyond of someone. He can't quite put his finger around it, but itirritates him just enough.

"Oh, I remember it all," Beyond gushes with impish little grin while pulling his legs to his chest, his sneakers abandoned

on the floor. As the red haired boy leans closer, avid looking expression on his face, Beyond continues excitedly. "My

mum, she let out this little croak. You know, when Voldemort killed her. With the killing curse. She kinda fell to the

floor, you know, like all limp and croaked. I'm not sure if she broke something when she fell, but she might have"

He gives the boy credit for turning interesting shade of green about half minute into the monologue - and still sticking

around to hear the rest.

"Sorry. Have you seen a toad at all?" asks Frank Longbottom's son - who is not even nearly interesting as his father.

"I've lost him! He keeps getting away from me!"

"Maybe he doesn't like you," Beyond offers kindly. Strangely enough, the boy doesn't stick around for long afterwards -

the question soon returns, though.

"Has anyone seen a toad? Neville's lost one" the girl's very tone is irritating and so is the way she stand - but she

manages to intrigue Beyond just for a moment because her appearance doesn't bring with her any memories. Then he

realises what it means about her and loses his interest again.

"We already told him we haven't seen the toad," Ron says.

"Frog leg?" Beyond offers a still wiggling chocolate frog leg to the girl. She gives him a strange look for a moment

before politely excusing herself, saying that she should continue looking for the toad. "Happy hunting," Beyond waves

the leg after her.

"You don't like people much, do you?" Ron asks flatly.

"No, not at all, I love people," Beyond disagrees, biting into the chocolate absently. "They're quite fascinating."

Draco Malfoy is the pinnacle of all the flashback inducing little magicians. He is like a carbon copy of his father. "You'll

soon find that some wizarding families are much better than others," he says, painstakingly trying not to look down on

him. Beyond can't decide whether he wants to see the smarmy expression and behaviour break, or just see the boy

break all together.

He can't quite decide the same about anyone else he has met so far, actually.


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Eventually the joyride ends and they arrive to Hogwarts. "Firs'-years, firs'-years here! All right there, Harry?"

"Just lovely," Beyond answers while distractedly slapping the stolen rat squirming in his pocket to try and make it

behave. The straw doll in his free hand is already breaking apart and he is starting to regret not bringing jam with him.

23. Half Blood

Potter is a freak. That is just about all Draco can think of the famous Boy Who Lived. He can't help it. It's the messy

hair, falling to the freak's face but failing to hide the blank stare in his equally blank eyes - it's like no-one's home andthey didn't even leave the lights on. The eyes are creepy, pupils blown wide open like he had been abusing potions or

something. It's unnerving - and definitely not how he had imagined the Boy Who Lived to be.

Though, if he was fair, his expectations might've been ridiculously high. After all the stories and fables and ballads made

about the so called vanquished of the Dark Lord, Draco had half expected Potter to ride to Hogwarts on a white steed,

wearing a silver armour or something. Snorting softly to himself, Draco clanged at the black haired "hero" who stood

among the crowd of first years with his shoulders hunched in despicable posture. The Boy Who Lived looked like a

human gargoyle.

Having heard about the sorting from his father, Draco didn't bother to listen to the explanation off it, merely kept eying

his fellow students. It was very pitiable punch in his eyes. Half bloods mostly, with too many mudbloods and over

half of the purebloods he either knew personally - or they were blood traitors. The level of Hogwarts really had gone

down, just like his father had said. At least in his father's time, majority had been pure.

They start calling names. Draco is, naturally, made Slytherin immediately and without hesitation - good thing too, had

that hat touched his head he would've had to spend the entire night washing the leech out of his hair. Taking his rightful

position in the Slytherin table, Draco sits back and waits to see where the freak of a Boy Who Lived would go. Majority

said Gryffindor. Few optimists voted on Ravenclaw. Rest bet on Hufflepuff - some joked about Slytherin, but no one

ever took it seriously. It wasPotterafter all.

When Potter's name is called, the gargoyle-like-boy of course makes a scene, acting as if he hadn't heard himself being

called until the deputy has to repeat herself. Draco growls with irritation as some of the student body laugh. Attention

whore, he thinks, watching intently as Potter slouches towards the chair like lacking human spine altogether. There he

sits on the stool - on his feet, crouching down like a retard. More people laugh and as the hat sinks to his head, almost

down to his nose, Potter grins in an unnervingly childish way. He looks utterly idiotic.

Then silence. The grin widens on Potter's face, going slowly from childish to maniac until he looks like a split pumpkin.

How he can smile like that without showing teeth, Draco doesn't even wantto know. But it is unsettling. The hat was

taking long too. That means that it was trying to decide between two houses - or, thought Draco doubts it, Potter is

actually capable of conversing with the hat and is arguing against its choices.

"SLYTHERIN!" the hat finally screeches out.

Silence falls before first confused and then slightly more enthusiastic applause starts from the Slytherin house which,

against all odds, had gotten the most famous wizard of their generation - and probably few generations back and forth

too. And if there is opportunity echoing in the applause, along with plans and strategies, only Slytherins can hear them.

Draco later swears he didn't join on principle, but his expression speaks against him

When slightly befuddled deputy takes the hat off from Potter's head, the shadows makes the blank green eyes seemalmost red.

24. Holding Breath

Beyond can't sleep. Hogwarts is too full of memories, they're bouncing off the walls and inside his head endlessly, and

for the first time in a long while, he cannotsleep. The floor is too familiar, the ceiling, the walls, the carpets and the

curtains around the four poster beds; everything is so goddamned nostalgic. He remembers his first night, his second

year, his prefect badge, his first murder, his head boy badge and his followers; the plotting and the maniac dreams, he

remembers it all.

And none of it is his.


16/67

Beyond has always known that he is insane, but for the first time he actually feels it too. Feels like crawling into a

corner on all fours would help, like hiding underneath a bed would block it all out, like holding his head and rocking

himself to oblivion would actually work. He feels trapped in a circle that's trapped within his skull, feels like he's

repeating the same motions over and over and expecting different results, like there were two separate people inside him,

fighting ceaselessly all the while making horrible, messy love to one another. There is a political, aesthetic debate going

inside him in middle of a mindless orgy in a blood bath. He hates himself and himself hates him, there's two of him,

three of him, more and more. And they all loathe him, and one another, and themselves, loathe their very existence,

loathe his blood, his parentage, his lineage, his tutelage, everything, anything

Beyond feels like screaming, but he doesn't, he isn't that weak. He lived with this before; he livedwith this for ten years.

He isn't weak enough to shatter now, when thing's are getting interesting. He won't give in, he doesn't even crawl under

his bed covers, doesn't move. Stillness is agonising and helps, because he remembers, remembers, remembers

remembers a greater human being than Voldemort and Harry combined.

And L would be still. L would not scream, would not beg or whine or whimper, he wouldn't rock himself to sleep, he

wouldn't do anything. He would stare at the madness until the madness would have no choice but to stare back at him

and get itself reflected from L's ever staring eyes. No one would even know something was going on in L's head

because he would be so bloody still.

L would be still.

And hating him for it helps Beyond a little.

25. Hello, Brother

Everyone is shocked about it. The Gryffindor common room is full of whispers about it all evening, for one. Harry

Potter, according to them doesn't belong in Slytherin. Ron silently disagrees. He is not only unsurprised that Harry Potter

was sorted where he was, but he is relievedabout it. Ron knows, after forcing himself to spend the train ride to

Hogwarts in the same compartment as the boy, that he wouldn't have been able to take it if Potter had slept in the same

dormitory as him. It isn't just the odd behaviour or the eyes - though they seem to make everyone anxious. It's just

something about Potter rubs him the wrong way.

The whole croaking mum tale might have something to do with it, though as creepy as it had been, there had been

something disturbingly enthralling in the way Potter had told it, which made it possibly even more unsettling. It's

disturbing enough that Ron quickly decides he doesn't even like Scabbers when he realises that the rat vanished just afterhe met Potter.

Still, he isn't really sad when, in the few classes Gryffindors share with Slytherins, he finds that Potter isn't exactly well

liked even among his own house. He understands that it's not harassment or abuse or anything like that, though - it's the

same with the snakes as it is with the rest of the school. Potter creeps them out too. The snakes neither laugh at him nor

cheer for him when he has a tongue slashing with Snape - even Snape seems to back down a little under the too amused

grin and too open eyes, soon opting to ignore Potter instead of antagonising him, as all aggression against Potter was

apparently met with disturbing enthusiasm.

By the time Slytherins and Gryffindors have a joined Defence Against the Dark Arts class, the students in silver and

green are giving their odd housemate a wide berth. When Potter sits in the back, the Slytherins go to sit in the front and

not one of them willingly pairs with him. In the end, Potter is left sitting alone because the Gryffindors don't wish to

work with him either. By the look of the grins he gives them all, it's a gesture Potter won't be soon forgetting.

That, however, doesn't bother Ron as much as the way Potter keeps staring at Quirrell the whole duration of the class.

26. Hope's Backhand

Hogwarts is full of dead people. And that didn't include only the ghosts. Everywhere Beyond looks, he sees oddly short

life spans. Snape will die in half dozen years, as will great amount of the students - and Dumbledore won't even live that

long, fact which Beyond celebrates by breaking into the kitchens and stealing some disgusting pumpkin jam. Curious, he

keeps looking, finding more and more dead people walking. Some in Hogwarts had longer, some shorter lives, but a

whole lot of them were going to die in exact same year - some even exact same day.


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There is a war coming, and only Beyond can see the timers ticking away on top of so many lives.

He doesn't much care, though. It's curious, interesting, but not really important. Not with Quirinus Quirrell there, with

his littlefriend. Beyond can see them both, two names hovering atop the teacher's head, facing different directions like

watching each other's backs. One of the names has expiration date coming up relatively soon. Another, judging by the

lack of it, has already passed it.

It's almost fascinating how little he likes having around another bit of the same soul that had driven Harry beyond. It's

the first time he actually starts to wonder if he can affect the death dates. He doesn't wonder for long, though. Hedoesn't need to. He simply decides to find out.

27. Halted Brilliance

Harry Potter is a genius - and scares her like no one else ever had. It is almost funny, that, because it is her housemates

that make Hermione cry, not Harry Potter.

She doesn't think it's fair. All she does is try. She's always been good at studying; things come easily for her - though

not without hefty amount of work, but when work is a delight, then success is easy. She knows it's not like that with

most kids - she saw it in her last school too - so she wants to help them here. She can, after all, so why not? It's a good

and right thing to do, to help those who couldn't do it by themselves

Why did that make her a Know-It-All, why did that make her a "bloody menace"? Was it really so wrong to try help

others, was it some sort of crime, were they really supposed to all work alone, was team work somehow forbidden, or

what was it? Even after few hours in solitude of a deserted bathroom and some doses of usually healing tears, she can't

come with an answer. Her classmates hadn't been this bad in her muggle school. They hadn't been exactly friendly,

but they had never really said it out loud like that.

Pulling her knees to her chest in the same way Potter does - the way that gets him yelled by McGonagall and Snape to

sit properly in classroom and Great hall - she wonders. She wonders about herself and about brilliant people. Did Potter

have similar worries? She thought about the boy and decided against it. Whatever moved the boy, peer pressure wasn't

it - he revelledin peer pressure if his behaviour was to be believed.

Maybe Potter was brilliant. Genius. He knew everything in every class and was never seen with a course book except

in classes. He hardly put effort into his work and it was always perfect- fact which the teachers oddly enough weren't

happy about. Had he too been like her, once? Maybe he too had tried to help. And no one had wanted it. They hadbullied him too - and eventually he had turned out like he had?

No, she decides. She's learned too many things, read too many books, seen too many documents to believe in that. It

takes something special to make a person like Harry Potter - something truly sinister. No one speaks of it, of course, but

they all still knew it. Harry Potter lived in an orphanage despite the fact that originally he had lived with his relatives.

Something had happened something had ruined the Boy Who Lived.

And now he was just too creepy for anyone to even try to help him heal.

Hermione shudders at that thought before wiping her nose and looking up determinately. However bad things are for

her, Potter had had it worse. She needs to pull herself together and brace herself. She's smart and she works hard. She

can work herself through this, she knows she can. And it's Halloween too. She shouldn't be moping - she should be out

there, enjoying the feast.

Split second later, she hears the troll.

28. Houdini's Breakout

It had beenperfect. The whole school in shock, teachers in alarm and rushing about, and a troll of all things rampaging

its way through the castle. A loud, huge, ugly troll an excellent diversion. Even if Beyond himself hadn't been behind

it, that didn't mean he couln't take advantage of it. He had a feel that the reason he needed a diversion was the source of

the diversion anyway, so that worked perfectly as well.

Then there had been Severus Snape, getting to his way and telling him to go to the dungeons, distracting him, belaying


18/67

him. And, just after Beyond had managed to lose the man, there was the bleeding troll itself, standing across the

corridor, dragging a club at its side. And that had been that.

Beyond curses stupid followers and idiotic beast keepers in four different languages as he pulls out his wand and takes

his revenge against the diversion, pushing all his bent aggression to the curses until the beast falls to the ground, its front

ripped raw by the bombardment of spells.

He stops for a moment, eying the corpse in wonder. It feels rather nice. Or would've if he hadn't been so annoyed.

Beyond laughs more out of frustration than any enjoyment while cutting the corpse of a troll one more time with a lowlevel curse. "Next time, then," he laughs, turning away. "There is always the next time."

Some time later the teachers find the corpse - and from a bathroom near by they find Hermione Granger, who for days

remains too shaken to be able to explain what had happened.

29. Hanging Behind

Neville can't say he much likes Hogwarts. Of course, the fact that he is there is miracle in a way, and he can't stop

being grateful for it - because he is, he really is a wizard, being in Hogwartsproves it but Hogwarts isn't anything like

he had imagined. His relatives had painted the image of a wonderful place full of magic and wonder and fantastical

creatures, and it's not really like that at all.

The boys in his dorm are rather mean to him. So were pretty much everyone else except for Hermione Granger, but

she was even worse than they were, thanks to her bossy ways. The teachers weren't exactly nice either, except for

Flitwick, who had offered extra lessons to him, and Sprout, whose class was the only one Neville enjoyed. The rest,

though they were bad and worse and horrible, to put it nicely.

But it's the castle itself which is nothing like he imagined. It's a dark place. And maybe the fact that he often is locked

out of the dorms when it is dark affects his imaginary, but he can't help it. Hogwarts had seemed to glow golden in all

his fantasies. In reality, it was rather dark shade of grey and the firelight does nothing to soften the shades of the

shadows. Then there are the ghosts, sucking all the warmth from the air, and the portraits, making it seem like he was

watched everywhere, and with Snape and Filch always catching him where he wasn't supposed to be

Still, he isn't as scared of the castle as he is of the notion of being inadequate, as Snape often put it. He can hear his

classmates laughing behind his back and making sharps comment and the teachers always seem to be looking down on

him whilst talking to each other in grave voices. He keeps flinching in near terror - even if it's not him they're talkingabout, it sure feels like it. It feels like he's reliving the worst days of his childhood, the days when it had failed like he

had disappointed everyone and even his ancestors were ashamed of him.

Then not much before Christmas, he finds that none of that - neither the people, the ghosts, the castle, none of them -

compared to one single person inside Hogwarts. It's the one of the most horrifying nights of his life. There had been a

Quidditch game and Gryffindor common room had been so full with after game celebration, that he hadn't fit in. He

hung back, hoping it to subside until he got lost in the endless secret passages. By the time he gets back, everyone is

already gone and he is locked outside again and can't think of the password no matter how long he tries. Eventually, and

certainly not for the first time, he ventures out in search of a teacher who would let him in

He finds one. Sadly, by the time he does, Quirrell is already unconscious and extremely vexed Harry Potter is standing

over the man with what looks like a battle axe in his hand. As Neville watches, the scary Slytherin brings the axe up and

then down with a mad grimace, aiming for Quirrell's neck. If the sight hadn't been so utterly, completely unbelievable,Neville would've screamed.

He has never been as relieved as he is the moment he sees that the blade hits the already pretty damaged stone floor and

not the unconscious man's neck.

"Damn it," Potter murmurs irritably, wiping perspiration from his forehead. "I guess I can't do it after all"

Then he looks up, to the door way, to Neville, who is frozen and unable to do anything but meet his gaze while shaking

like a leaf. Potter raises his eyebrows before giving him almost friendly smile. "Hello, Neville Longbottom," the terrifying

boy says sweetly. "You want to take a swing?"


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Escape, Neville thinks later, was probably the best answer he could've hoped to give anyway.

30. Home Bound

Death is like gravity. One can't make it faster or avoid it when they got too close. It just is. Whether or not it can be

bend is still unknown to Beyond, but he rather doubts it. He has two excellent samples about the gravity of death and the

information collected from those two examples is more than enough.

Example number one; Hermione Granger, age twelve, death date in approximately seventy eight years in the future.Beyond hadn't even known she had been there until he hard heard of it later on, but apparently the girl had been hidden

in a bathroom in the very same corridor where Beyond had vented out his emotions towards distractions. Later on, his

actions hadn't made sense to him - he wasn't thataggressive in nature and he certainly didn't express his aggressions so

crudely. So why had he killed the troll when it would've been easier just to distract it and the sneak away?

Theory one; his mental stability is getting worse. Though a valid theory, he doubts that his mental stability could have

this sort of effect on his behaviour - and if that is it, he probably wouldn't consider it abnormal. Theory two; he did it

unwittingly to save Hermione Granger from her literally untimely death. This theory he likes even less than the first one

as it means that he can be controlled without him noticing it at all. However, it is more likely than uncontrolled burst of

aggression.

Example number two; Quirinus Quirrell, container of a piece of Voldemort, age who-cared, death date in approximately

seven months. Beyond had tried, he really had. Quidditch game had been perfect distraction; with majority of the schoolconcentrated to that, it had been ridiculously easy to grab Quirinus - the fact that the man had apparently been "looking

for him", helped. But, in the end, the best Beyond had been able to do was to knock the man unconscious and give him a

headache with an obliviate. None of his spells or curses had worked; even the conjured axe had proven useless. He was

been simply unable to kill the man.

Theory one; it is his mental state again, and despite his natural behaviour, he is incapable of such cruelty. Interesting

theory and equally ridiculous. Theory two; Quirinus has some sort protection making people unable to harm him.

Intriguing, but impossible; there is no protection against Avada Kedavra. Theory three; a person simply cannot be killed

before their timer runs out; no matter the means, universe itself makes it impossible.

Thus, death is like gravity. It is unstoppable, it is unavoidable, it had its strength and wouldn't be accelerated and

apparently it couldn't yet be manufactured artificially. Death is an absolute.

And that is absolutely infuriating. Also, rather fascinating. The dilemma of the times of death occupies Beyond's mind

all the way from his first attempted murder to the end of the fall semester, and it's with him when he boards Hogwarts

express for the second and sixteenth time.

Beyond toys with a Wara Ningyo made of transfigured straw and smiles to himself in his deserted, undisturbed

compartment. He has had a fun first semester, and Hogwarts hasn't been as boring as he had feared - what more, it has

offered him something new, even. It was good to go home, though. He needs the break - as one can only handle the

inbred idiocy of his house mates for so long before snapping.

Maybe he would ask what L thought of predestined deaths. He has missed the other's input in the last months.

x

It's still moving! Kill it, kill it! Trying to cram eleven chapters and whole semester in ten drabbles is fun. All those scenes

you gotta castrate...

Now, some of you seem to be under the impression that Beyond is my creation, but I must inform you that he is an

actual canon character from Death Note universe. Here, have some spoilers; BB or Beyond Birthday, is the antagonistof a spin off novel of Death Note, called "Another Note, The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases". The case in question is

briefly mentioned in the manga/anime itself by L when Misora Naomi, who plays the main character in Another Note,

goes missing. Also, BB was born with the Shinigami Eyes, they're not my addition to this fic and no, Harry/Beyond isn't

some mixture of man, wizard and shinigami. He just has the eyes. And, in the novel it is stated that BB cannot kill a

person except on the day they are fated to die, so.. . Also, in original timelines L is born 31 of October 1979, and Harry


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is born 31 of July 1980, so canonically L is nine months older than Harry.




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*Chapter 4*: Bent Honour

Hell and Back

31. Bent Honour

In perfect world, there is a root, reason and result in everything. Why things happen, what is the purpose and what it

will end up. In perfect world everything is nicely organised and nothing goes out of control, nothing steps pass the right

lines, nothing, absolutely nothing, damages previously set plans.

Albus Dumbledore has known ever since he was four years old that he is not living in a perfect world. This world he

lives in is unorganised and outright chaotic at times, and he needs to adapt to it's never ending changes constantly. His

father's imprisonment, his family shame, his mother's new strict and slightly loony attitude, his sister's instability, his

brother's demands, his mother's death, the care of his sister and all the plan it ruins, the friendship with Gellert, the fall

with his brother, death of his sister endless, endless chaos.

But he is a man of order, has always been, and he doesn't adapt that well, much to his own irritation. So he makes

plans, for every possible turn of event, and has been doing them from since he was barely twenty. If this will happen he

shall do this, if that turn will come up he will go that way - if demanding situations will change he will have all the plans

ready and will only need to pick up the most suitable one.

It doesn't always work. It is hard to predict outcomes like his and Gellert's loss of relationship, or the war, or whathappens in them. He was more careful with Tom Riddle than with Gellert, but the boy was sneaky and working with

different rules than his old friend and Albus hasn't been able to make all the plans. Gellert started out subtle and worked

his way up there, until mass scale war. Tom, Voldemort, starts and ends with little subtlety. But then, he hardly needs to

hide himself or be subtle - unlike Gellert, he started out with followers. Gellert had to collect them.

It is sometimes impossible to plan ahead in the world of wizards. How can he predict such things as the Prophesy?

After it does happen, he can plan from there on, but its appearance itself pulls the rug under him. But he plans; hide their

families, prevent any more loss and if the prophesy does come true, where to go from there. If it is young Neville, if it is

young Harry, and how to work from there, how to accommodate to their parents and social standing, what to do, what

to do

He has planned ahead well; he has even taken into account the chance that the chosen boy's parents would die. In

Neville's case there is whole slew of relatives to take care of the boy, provide him with love and care and protection

But it is not so in Harry's case. Although, perhaps what he has is even better - ignorance which is quite often a

underrated bliss bliss which Albus eventually choose to give to the boy when the time to choose comes.

In the end it means nothing. He got his reports from Arabella and he knew the boy is wrong. Damaged. Odd.

Twisted. And it isn't just his personality but the boy's very being. The boy is wrong. No one likes him, no one can stand

him, no one can understand him - he is un-likable as an existence, not just as a person, though even that aspect of him is

rather unbecoming. Staring eyes which seem to see and know too much, bad posture, badly maintained appearance

otherwise, too messy hair, too big clothing, too thin frame too something, too everything.

At times, Arabella reports that the boy doesn't even seem human really, but something trapped in human skin.

Albus knew of the Dursleys' escape plans, and made his own to counter. But in the end he decides against interfering

with them. The situation isn't helping any of them and despite his many attempts, the blood wards kept falling aroundthe house, as if Lily's protection has already been spent and broken. The boy doesn't have blissful ignorance, he doesn't

have loving family, and he doesn't have protection. Nothing has gone according to plan, so Albus decides that he might

as well let the situation develop.

Then orphanage. Oddly enough, Harry seems to enjoy himself more in there than in the Dursleys. He is incredibly smart

boy, so maybe that has something to do with it. Every time Albus goes to check on the boy - who even to him seems

incredibly unnerving though he cannot quite figure out why - he is with a book or a straw doll and by all appearances

enjoying himself.

Albus is still more than glad when the boy is transferred to a better orphanage, one for genius children. Under his secret


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surveillance, the boy blooms there. Albus knows he doesn't know everything about what is going on in Wammy's

House, but he knows about Beyond - and knows that even whilst Harry Potter hasn't grown up as the innocent, ignorant

child he had hoped, he might've even grown up to be something better.

And, obviously, something much, much worse.

He decides not to give the Invisibility Cloak to the boy. Harry would've appreciated it, but Beyond would probably burn

it.

32. Brief Holiday

Beyond is back from wherever he has spent the last few months.

A school, L knows. It's not a theory, it's a fact, not only because the duration and the date of his departure and return,

but because of that little conversation he had with Beyond less than month before he had left. Beyond is going to a

private school. A very private school, as even after some research, L still doesn't know where it is or what it teaches -

or why of all people was going there. By the looks of Roger's and Watari's private computers, they don't know either.

They have their theories, but L knows they are false.

That, though interesting, isn't in L's mind when he leaves the solitude of his room to witness the other orphan's return.

What he is curious to see, is how much the last month's have changed Beyond. Beyond is constantly changing all the

while remaining perfectly same, making him one of the most interesting cases of study in Wammy's House. From the

moment Beyond joined them, he has been different and he has never been the norm in anything - and though some

would've said he is different in a bad way, L disagrees. Beyond is interesting.

And seeing what kind of difference would few month's cause, would be fascinating.

Beyond comes in the way he left. Shoulders slouched, head bowed, staring up from under his messy hair, somehow

looking down and up on people at the same time. He's wearing the same black jumper and the same jeans he wore when

he left, even the shoes are same. But he is different. L bites his thump, staring and trying to figure out the cause. It

comes to him pretty quickly when Beyond looks up to him, down on him, and gives him a happy little grin - disturbing

to some, revealing to L.

Before there had been an air of boredom around Beyond. He never studies for a purpose and L had always gotten the

impression that Beyond studies to entertain himself. It is in the choices. History, war tactics, strategies never math,

literature, chemistry, nor languages - though Beyond is fluent with several. Beyond only studies interesting things - they

even ordered several collections of biographies from soldiers, war veterans and such for Beyond to the orphanage

library. Though fascinating, it was all goalless. Only entertainment.

Then there are to Wara Ningyo which Beyond makes constantly, which he destroys just as steadily. Sometimes Beyond

re-acts scenes with them and usually the scenes end with lot of straw thrown around. Simplified theatre; entertainment.

The way Beyond watches and studies the space and people around him, like constantly making mental notes one

could've interpreted it as paranoia, but Beyond is the least paranoid person L has ever met. Beyond was the sort of

person who would grin and laugh and cheer if he would feel a knife in his back. No, he is aware of his surroundings

because he usually finds something amusing in them. Again, entertainment.

But the look in Beyond's eyes now, the smile they aren't bored anymore.

L tugs his lower lip with his thump and returns the smile. Beyond is back only for about two weeks. In that time, he

would figure out what is so interesting that it has managed to chase the boredom from the other boy's bottomless eyes.

33. Bleeding Headache

Severus Snape had fallen to expectations - and now, in secret, he feels just slightly ashamed for it. Usually he is ready

for everything, more adaptive than his employer, usually nothing is good enough to surprise him. But he had had

expectations this time; he had held onto a pre-conceived mental image, onto a fixed prospect, a self-painted mirage. And

he had believedin his own mental image so strongly that he had evenpreparedfor it. It was all fixed in the mould of

James Potter the perfect, arrogant, irritable, idiotic Gryffindor.


23/67

But Harry Potter is nothing like James Potter.

He isn't perfect, oh no, the boy is very clearly imperfect, flawed and outright deficient as a human being. He is ugly,

awkward and socially inept - even more so than Severus himself. He isn't exactly arrogant either - he is self sufficient,

easygoing in the way Fenrir Greyback is easygoing, and incredibly indifferent to what people think of him. He isn't

irritable - he is uncomfortable, childish, unnerving and sometimes outright scary, but it's somehow impossible to get

irritated with him unless that is his goal. He isn't idiotic - he is a genius and despite all attempts from Severus's part, he is

not only the top of every class he takes, but it probably would've been the same even if they had advanced him to any

other year levels. And he is most definitely not a Gryffindor.

And Severus can't feel gleeful for any of it. Potter has no friends, no one likes him, no one can stand him, he would

have even less friends than Severus himself had had he would've loved to be able to feel even slightly superior

because of that, but he can't. Because Potterdoesn't care. Not only does he not care, but he apparently enjoys it. If he

hadn't been still so young, Severus would say that Potter was the walking description of a sociopath, a borderline

psychopath.

It is hard to try and take out his aggressions on someone who would just enjoy the challenge.

It is also hard to consider a boy so evil a hero. Potter is still the Boy Who Lived, he still destroyed the Dark Lord, he still

ended the war, but Severus wonders how. How? Dumbledore's theories include Lily and protection of mother's love.

Severus cannot believe that, not anymore. There is no love in Harry Potter, neither given nor received, there is nothing

but gaping pit wearing a horrible smile. Is that it then? Is it so that the Dark Lord hadn't been able to destroy HarryPotter, because the boy is worse than him?

Judging by the looks Quirrell gives to Potter when he thinks no one is looking, Severus is starting to believe that the

latter might be closer to truth than any other theory he has heard so far. It also makes him certain that he would never

be able to take his revenge on James Potter out on his son. Because Harry Potter would not only enjoy it, but he would

take it as a challenge and pay back in kind, or worse.

34. Blessed Hymn

Beyond has gotten even worse in his absence, A quickly decides after the third best in Wammy's House returns. Beyond

has always scared him, because there was the sort of feel around the boy, like he was just waiting for people around

him to drop their guard - and with Beyond it was impossible to tell if he would attack by tickling his opponent, or

stabbing them. But now, it's worse than that. Beyond is forwardin way he wasn't before, pushing ahead ruthlesslywhen he before just skulked and sneaked around.

But Beyond doesn't care for A, and that is a blessing. A isn't stupid, he isn't ignorant and he knows that if Beyond really

tried, if he would have a reason to try, A would be no obstacle for him. That is probably exactly why Beyond is behind

him; because Beyond knows that he knows and that makes it fun for him. But even so, Beyond doesn't care about A,

not the way he cares about L.

L, the best of them all, the only kid in Wammy's House worthy of Beyond's attention. L is the one Beyond talks to, L is

the one Beyond follows, L is the one Beyond mimics. And he is a good mimic. The two look mo

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HPxDN - Hell and Back