The Unbearable Weight of a Massive Ego

May 31st 1993

I thought about luring Harry Potter into the Chamber of Secrets by using Ginny Weasley as bait, but I was not quite done taking full control of her body. I decided to wait until the process was done, just in case. I needed my soul to be whole again, and I couldn't afford any accidents. Merging two souls into one, while maintaining my half as the dominant part, was no easy task.

June 2nd 1993

I, Lord Voldemort, am finally back among the living. It feels strange to once again inhabit a living body. Very strange… 

I can feel my other self through the Dark Mark. He is weak. Undeserving of the name Voldemort. He cannot even sense my presence. 

I had always thought of Horcruxes as second lives, but it seems like they have a secondary purpose. A soul cannot depart for the land of the dead while fractured, which means each Horcrux anchors the original's piece of soul to the land of the living. Since my soul is no longer exactly like the original's, it no longer serves to anchor him here, but luckily for him, he has made others.

I have trapped Ginny Weasley's soul inside this diary. I think I will keep writing in it, just to show her how it feels like. If my other self ever returns, Harry will have to destroy my other self's Horcruxes, if he ever finds out about them. He might even destroy Ginny's Horcrux, this very diary I'm writing in… I wonder how he'd react if he ever found out the truth?

June 3rd 1993

I no longer wish to kill Harry Potter. Ohh, how I abhor him! I want to make him suffer, suffer, suffer! Ahh, is this how it feels to love? Whatever the original has in store for him, I will not let him do as he pleases. Harry Potter must live, so that he can despair and curse his fate! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

June 8th 1993

I have acquired my first new follower. I've had my eye on him for a while. Utterly incompetent, but his one talent shines brightly in my eyes. He can utterly wipe out any person's memories. An ordinary Memory Charm can be undone, but Gilderoy Lockhart's magic leaves nothing. With my talent with the False Memory Spell, I can introduce memories in those empty shells. I can turn anybody into a fervent follower, no matter how much they hated me before!

As someone who spent the majority of their life as a living memory, no one knows this better than me: true death is to be forgotten. I wonder what expression Harry will make when he finds that his friends no longer remember him? 

But I'll shelve this idea for now; it'll be all the sweeter when it happens after he thinks he's won! When he thinks his bonds with his friends are unbreakable… 

Ohh… I'll have to torture him through other means in the meantime.

June 9th 1993

I have taken over a certain Mafalda Prewett. It was all too easy to worm my way into her mind. She's a Slytherin, talented, ambitious and has a grudge against the Greengrass sisters. Apart from the lack of pedigree, she's the perfect scapegoat to close the book on the affair of the Chamber of Secrets. 

On the last day of the exams, this body's older brother told me that he would be helping out at the greenhouse with the Mandrakes, if I ever needed anything. An idea sparked in me; the Greengrass's mother would also be there. Harry is friends with the Weasleys; he won't hesitate to help save one of them. 

And so, I controlled Mafalda and the Basilisk to attack the greenhouse, and had them take Percy Weasley and Iris Greengrass to the Chamber of Secrets, to serve as bait. Then, I had Lockhart erase the witnesses' memories. He insisted that I give him a glorious end, if he were to disappear from society. I obliged him, and depicted him as a hero in their memories, even though it would attract Dumbledore's suspicion. But it didn't matter; there was no way it could be traced back to me! Voldemort can show mercy to his… followers, when he; err— she, likes.

Just as I had planned, Harry and Oleandra, along with Ronald Weasley and Daphne Greengrass, found their way to the Chamber of Secrets. I stood nearby, invisible. I took control of Mafalda through the Imperius Curse and dueled them.

At first, I was terribly disappointed. Harry was still too weak, and the twins' rune magic didn't seem to do anything. But to my surprise, with the help of Dumbledore's pet Phoenix, they actually worked together to beat the Basilisk.

Well, what do you think, Ginny?

Please just kill me.

Not yet.

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Oleandra woke up with a start to find that she was dangling in mid-air.

"Woah!" she shouted.

"Will you stop wriggling?" said Daphne crossly. "Don't make it any harder for Fawkes! It's difficult for even a Phoenix to fly carrying seven people at once, you know!"

Oleandra did as she was told, and looked around to see what was going on. Fawkes, the Phoenix, was currently carrying a large mass of vines knitted into a sort of hammock, which carried Oleandra herself, Daphne, Iris, Ron Weasley, Percy Weasley, Harry Potter and Mafalda, who was trussed up in vines.

Oleandra followed the vines to their source.

"Um, sis, is that —"

Daphne's face blushed green.

"It's my hair, yes. Fawkes is taking us back the way we came, through the pipe that leads to the girls' bathroom."

"Well, would you look at who finally decided to wake up," said Potter. "You chose the perfect moment to fall unconscious, Sleeping Beauty. Didn't want to help the rest of us carry the others, did you?"

"Sleeping Beauty?" asked Weasley, confused. 

"It's a Muggle —" began Potter, "Oh, never mind."

"You'd better not make a habit of calling me that, Potter," warned Oleandra.

"Come on, Oleandra," said Weasley cheerily, "Only Malfoy calls us by our last names. I think we've been through enough together to call each other by our first names, yeah?"

"Fine, Cousin Ron," said Oleandra, wincing through the pain. "Have it your way."

The four of them burst into laughter, and soon enough, Fawkes had carried them back to Moaning Myrtle's toilet, who seemed oddly disappointed that they hadn't died.