Written for @tomarrymortevents purge xl prompt: remember who your real enemy is. I've been toying with this AU for ages and have a couple scenes drafted so I thought why not take this prompt and write another.
Very rough draft, major content warning for gore and murder and all the horrors accompanied with having your not-boyfriend come home eldritch-fied after a questionable summer family vacation. Also spoilers I suppose <3
[1.8k words] (p.s. congrats to all the Q2 purge xl survivors! we did it!)
It winks and wobbles in the night, through the snow, but he can tell that Tomâs porchlight is on. Thatâs their usual signal to meet up in the woods, although itâs been far too cold for that for the past several weeks during the depths of Februaryâs wintry squalls.
Still, it sits wrong with him and he tosses and turns for a short while before giving up.
He climbs out of bed, shivering, and throws on his thick winter jacket. He wraps a scarf around his neck for added measure and trundles outside. His boots squeak against the slick white wood of the Potter porch and then silently on the frosted dirt.
He moves quickly, the chill already creeping up his cuffs, past his gloveless hands and through the gaps in his clothes. As he does, snow continues to fall, steadily enough to blanket the ground within an hour. He hadnât bothered with a torch since thereâs enough light to see under the swelling crescent of the moon for most of the way.
Itâs darker within the woods, but even so, a gut feeling leads Harry further into the trees: to their usual spot. Their little patch of wood. In the spring, it would be overrun with wildflowers, blooming red and white and yellow. Home to a thousand picnics. Tonight, however, it should be empty. An expanse of glowing white lit only by the few stray strands of light filtering in through the patchwork cover of branches and clouds.
When Harry arrives, he immediately sees that itâs not that.
Lead pools in his stomach and his pulse pounds, a sudden sweat pouring down his back, turning his shirt into ice as a frigid breeze cuts through the dry winter air.
His mind canât make sense of what he sees.
A strange shape in the center, surrounded by blood.
If it wasnât for the viscera, it would almost seem like a dark lake had sprung up in their meadow. And in the center of the lake is a mass, like an island made of flesh. A looming figure stands beside it, not yet noticing Harryâs arrival.
Harry can recognize the shape of his back anywhere.
His gaze flits back to the mass at Tomâs feet. Itâs not quite limbed â at least not anymore â but his thought catches on what he does recognize: a thatch of dark brown hair sprouting from a bed of red and white. Not flowers but flesh and bone.
A person once, Harry thinks. Or maybe a small horse. A pony. Whatever it had been, itâs too mangled to properly tell anymore.
His gorge rises, and he barely manages to suppress his urge to turn and retch.
Something inside him screams that right now he needs to pretend.
Normal. Everything about this is perfectly normal.
Itâs Tom, and heâs known Tom practically since the womb.
The name tumbles out of his mouth.
Tom wheels around. For an instant, the temperature in the clearing plummets low enough that Harry could swear that heâs dead. That whatever wrongness possesses the place has simply struck him down where he stands.
Then he spots it. A shadow surges out from every corner of the woods, flooding in from beyond. Itâs a wall of black that doesnât belong, not here, not anywhere in this world. It crashes toward him, whistling with a pitch so high that he curls into himself, clutching his head, and then itâs on him. It crushes him and drowns him andâ
He whimpers, terror screeching through his nerves.
Everything stops just as suddenly as it had started.
The clearing goes silent even as it rings and rings inside his head.
He forces himself to look up and spots the unnatural dark receding so quickly that heâs suddenly uncertain heâd seen it right at all.
Harry jolts. But itâs just Tomâs voice, so warm and fond.
âWhat are you doing out this late?â
Harryâs eyes slide to his friend â his entirely normal friend â who begins moving toward him as if nothing is amiss. As if the entire front of him isnât drenched in blood and thereâs still gore splattered all around him, like petals flung from an infernal rose, one still stuck to the leg of his trousers.
Your light was on, Harry wants to say.
But the words wonât leave his mouth no matter how hard he tries, tongue refusing to unstick.
His knees knock together and itâs not just from the cold.
âHarry,â Tom repeats, more gently. Still walking.
Heâs just a few meters away now, nearly within armâs reach.
Each crunch of snow underneath rings out like a shot from a rifle.
Harry wonders if this is what it feels like to be one of the deer that live here during the summertime hunts.
The next complete thought that he manages is that Tom should be wearing warmer shoes.
His trainers must surely be soaked through by now, leeching his body heat back into the earth. Frostbite can set in within minutes if theyâre not careful.
Then Harry thinks that he must be out of his mind.
None of it makes any sense. Not the situation, or his thoughts, or the fact that heâs still pretending this Tom is the same as before.
Earlier today, during Snapeâs lab, Tom had added an extra vial of reagent to Hermioneâs beaker when she wasnât looking, and it had puffed into a cloud of noxious grey smoke. Hermione, naturally, had handled it poorly while Tomâs cheeks pinked from laughter, and when Harry had bumped into his shoulder, scolding him to stop egging her on, he had been warm.
Now, heâs so pale that Harry could be convinced he was a corpse.
Tom stops before him, unblinking and still. He might not even be breathing.
âAre you afraid of me?â
âFuck off,â Harry replies, teeth chattering. Itâs not a lie because heâs decided that it isnât. Of all the things in the universe that could come true, this is one thing that never will. He could never be afraid of Tom. âYou wish.â
Something passes over Tomâs face â something a lot like relief.
âThen promise me one thing. You canât tell anyone.â Blood drips from his shirt, punching little red dots into the snow. âTheyâll take you away. Theyâll separate us. You do understand that, right, Harry?â His voice is low and edged with something that Harry canât seem to understand; a maddening overtone that makes the ringing in his head worse.
âStop,â Harry croaks, throat raw. âYouâre not making any sense.â
Tom laughs, as though heâs just said something very funny, even though none of this is a joke at all.
âIâm sorry, Harry. I didnât mean to scare you. This is all just a bad dream, isnât it? Iâm not your enemy. Youâre far too important to me for that.â
Every word that he says is something Harry so desperately wants to believe. He wishes this were a dream.
But with tears prickling at the corners of his eyes, he shakes his head.
âDonât lie to me,â he pleads. âI know you know that I figured it out ages ago. You havenât been the same, not since the caves. But I havenât said anything, have I? Not a single thing to anyone.â Even as Tomâs gaze brightens and the air around them shakes, Harry pushes on. âPlease donât lie to me about this. Tell meâ What did you do? Who did youââ
He shudders, mouth snapping shut. He canât bring himself to finish the question.
Tom doesnât reply for a very long time. Long enough for the shadows to shift along the axis of the moon, transiting serenely in the distant sky above.
So it had been a person after all.
âSheâd been following me for weeks, and she attacked me first. Not that she wouldâve succeeded.â Tomâs voice drips with disdain. âNevertheless, it was becoming a problem.â
Harry quivers, rage flooding into his numb limbs with painful force. âSo you killed her?!â
Tom scoffs. âShe killed herself. What you see is a result of reflex â otherwise it wouldnât have resulted in this⊠mess.â
âOh, really?â Harry says, nearly shrill.
Tomâs nose wrinkles, the same way it always has whenever he finds something unpleasant â like the too-grey weather of their town or the underdoneness of their fathersâ cookout steaks.
âYes,â Tom states, expression flat. âReally.â
Itâs still his Tom, says the whisper in Harryâs thoughts. Itâs still him.
And Harry would cry if only his tears hadnât already frozen in place.
He brings his hands up and slaps them against both of his burning cheeks with a resounding crack. His palms sting and the impulse to sob surges even higher but he bottles all of it tightly inside. The hysteria bubbling underneath his skin cools just enough.
And just like that, heâs done.
One door closes and another one opens behind him â the one that lets him keep Tom.
He wouldnât have it any other way.
âAlright,â he says hoarsely. âHow do we hide the body?â
Tom blinks once. Then again. Surprised. âGo home,â he says after a beat. âDonât worry. Iâll handle this before daybreak.â
âDonât worry?â Harry echoes with a doubtful laugh. âDo you think Iâm stupid? I leave you alone for a few hours and this happens.â
âYou leave me alone for a few hours every day, and you have, every day of your life. I will handle it. Go home and take your histrionics with you.â
Harry stares at Tom with sheer disbelief. The thought of simply walking away from this and pretending he hadnât seen anything is impossible. The ends of all of his nerves feel as if heâs taken them and dipped them into a vat of battery acid.
Thereâs still a part of him thatâs terrified â utterly terrified and revolted and the first thing heâs going to do when heâs home is hug his toilet and put all of his dinner inside of it â but thereâs an even larger part of him thatâs just angry.
How dare Tom try to shut him out?
âNo,â he says firmly, shoulders pulling up to his ears.
Tomâs lips press into a thin line but he finally relents. âYouâre absurd. Do not come whining to me when youâre too short on sleep to function in class tomorrow.â
âI wonât,â Harry mumbles.
Then Tom runs through a thorough list of instructions â heâs always known far too much about how to hide a murder, even before everything had changed â and Harry does as heâs told.
Tom drags him home some three hours later, frozen to the bone, and Harry trips up the steps to his bedroom after puking out his guts in the first floor loo. Heâs never been more grateful that his parents have always been heavy sleepers.
When he finally slips into bed, before he settles in for the night, he peers out the window at Tomâs house one more time.
Finally, the sharpness under his ribs (the one that had driven him outside in the first place) fades.
Harry sleeps and dreams of a crushing dark.
