One Man's Trash is Dreamer's Treasure

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Story spoilers and introspection at the end in the A/N

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Finding the twins' stuff after class isn't too hard.

After consecutively searching 14 of the abandoned boys' bathrooms, I found one with a sizable amount of prank stuff in boxes stored in the stalls. It seems I've found their drug stash~!

Though not really…Well, actually? Hmm. They've made some stuff here, but nothing ingestible. That doesn't come until our seventh year. So…poisons? Eh, semantics. Doesn't matter.

Moonlight streaks through an almost-skylight, illuminating the crates of contraband. I bite my lip, contemplating my next move. I have a business proposition for these two, knowing their ambitions, but it might have to wait 'til later. They are slightly busy right now.

Hmm…tomorrow…

Slinking back into the shadows, the only noise that rings through the bathroom is the burble of a single toilet. Yet, is it made if no one hears it?

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I pace up and down the corridor—the seventh floor, to be exact—giving myself a slight case of multiple personality disorder just so I can think twice at the same time.

A door draws itself upon the wall, and with its task done, I command the spare mind to self-destruct and reassimilate into my main consciousness.

I walk into the Room of Hidden Things and am aptly met with a large pile of things.

I'm not here for the horcrux, exactly—that's Harry's problem—but rather out of sheer boredom and need for entertainment. Heck, if I do find it, I might just eat the soul out of the darn thing and make a day of…wearing the diadem? I guess?

I don't know. Something to cause trouble.

My arms split at the elbow, pasty-white flesh seamlessly transitioning into a black that defines the concept of light, eyes dotting each edge of the hundreds of arm-thick tendrils with enough suction and reality warping to grasp objects.

Each appendage ventures out, digging into the piles of garbage and treasure, looking for anything of value.

Hmm. Some socks. A spare pair of male robes. Hair gel that smells suspiciously like Snape.

…used stockings. Obviously worn, but only for a day. I'll…save these. Give them a wash. Find something to use with them.

Let's see… Uh, kelp? Okay. Might be able to do something with that.

What the heck is this? Some…yellow…ball thing? It has like two orange-ish stars inside. Probably useless. Winding up my tenta-arm, I spin it at a rate of very fast, and the centrifugal force cannot overcome the velocity as the useless sphere goes flying.

It hits the far wall with a satisfying shatter.

Let's see…more tossed papers, majority of them failing. More personal care products. Don't mind if I do. Warped cauldrons… I guess I could use the metal for something. A few broken time-turners. Some…personal, ahem, effects.

Going to save those, too.

Uh, books with blotches of ink. Ruined and moldy potions ingredients. Some…statue thing. It's an angel, I think? But it's covering it's face. It's radiating some kind of energy, similar to what Yuki uses.

Huh. Oh, well. Into the 'Maybe' stomach you go!

Moving on! Some muggle-born's ten-person tent. What the? A loom?! Why the… You know what. Never mind. Uh, some pack of vials? Oh, potions. What do they do though…

Oh, a contraceptive for females and a temporary impotency potion for males. All in a single kit. Handy!

Oh, here it is! The diadem. The one that Rowena Ravenclaw used. You know, the diadem that Moldy Voldy found and shoved a piece of his soul into it. One of his seven actions that sealed his fate.

Cassy gave me a few lessons on souls before. Some of which I remember.

Much like how using water to explain electricity is slightly bad, I'm going to use water to explain how a soul works.

It's a bucket with some differentiable and continuous function for how much water is in it at one time. Now, another function for a rate of refill and another function for that hole in the bucket that's always there.

Now, the refill energy comes from Cassy, through one medium or another. The hole comes from just energy expenditure of living.

Anyway, now, let's say this bucket is made of ceramic because the pottery guy has a particularly bad day. He got cut off in traffic, his son got sent to the principal, and he's pretty sure his wife is cheating on him.

When Tommy Gun decided to break off a piece of his soul, it wasn't like a sponge where he could tear off a piece. No… He had to shatter the entire thing, glue the remaining thousands of fragments back together, and shove the last fragment into an object.

Now, they're more holes. One from the missing fragments and from the cracks. Because you used…glue from… He used wood glue for ceramic.

Then he does it again. Another hole, shards are even smaller.

The again and again and again. At this point, Morty McChildInAnAdultsBody is already leaking more energy than he can regenerate. Then, he died. His main body, the home for a majority of the fragments is destroyed.

Now, he's seven, technically six as of this moment, shards holding together water that needs an entire ceramic metaphysical bucket.

Told you the metaphor doesn't exactly fit.

If he were to reform a body with the battery that is the Philosopher's Stone, it would only add to the energy he has. Just prolong him a little longer.

So, if things go as they are. Even past Harry's seventh year, he'd have two years…at most. Then he'd just…fade away.

Anyway, back to the diadem, I shove a tentacle into the diadem, easily phasing into where the shard is kept. Hmm, the shard's been in here for a while. It has bonded itself into the enchantments Rowena put on her jewelry. If I want to keep the diadem with original functionality, then I need to be careful. One little mistake and the bomb will blow.

I rip out the soul with the wrath of a horny god; the soul slips out, and the enchantments remain.

I dissolve the energy from the soul and toss the diadem into storage.