"Okay," says Tom. "I'll say it."

"I'd watch your tongue if I were you," threatens Harry half-heartedly. The medi-witch, with a purpling bruise on her face and barely contained tears in her eyes, is casting a series of diagnostic charms.

Tom hums. "Precisely my case, I fear -- look at her. Her face. All over one little comment. Really, I'd punish her for her insolence, but it seems you beat me to the punch."

"Pun intended," mutters Harry. He rolls his eyes. "And it wasn't just one comment. It was a compilation of comments. You're downplaying."

"Maybe. Maybe you are overreacting."

Harry narrows his eyes. I'm not allowed to hurt him, he reminds himself. Not here. Not now.

"To finish my original thought: You have anger issues."

Harry snaps his head toward him. "I don't have anything, dude. I'm fine. I don't have anger issues. I don't have issues at all."

Tom just observes him. He gives no overt reaction to Harry's defensive -- almost aggressive -- position. "Interesting. If I had to pin a House on you, even without seeing your robes, it'd be Gryffindor. Has anyone ever told you you're rather stereotypical?"

"Has anyone ever told you to shut the fuck up?"

"Often," says Tom.

Harry sighs. "And yet you're still talking."

"Of course, Harry. I'm the President."

Harry is saved from responding when Sirius, finished dressing, walks over to them. He has a contemplative look on his face. (Harry, for whatever reason, doesn't like it.)

He asks, confused, hesitant, "Did you punch her?... Was that what I heard?"

Harry shrugs minutely. The punchee, the medi-witch, continues her work, acting (poorly, if the shake of her shoulders tells you anything) like she is not privy to the conversation.

Sirius stares at Harry, hands running down the wrinkles in his robes, smoothly them out absently. He's thinking, maybe, of Harry's third year. Harry had jumped at the opportunity to kill -- and not only kill, but do so with a Dark spell (one of the Darkest of all) -- because Harry had thought Sirius a traitor.

He'd probably assumed, like most people tend to, with this easy train of thought, that it was a one and done case; an in-the-moment reaction. Understandable, even.

He's probably thinking of what Harry said to him, before leaving him to Bellatrix. Kill her. He's asked him to kill her and Sirius had taken it as a joke. An over exaggeration, a more intensive form of "go get 'em!"

I wonder, thinks Harry, if he is reevaluating that assumption.

"What spell did you send at Voldemort," asks Sirius, rolling over Tom's protested 'I'm not --', "whenever you fell through the Veil?"

"A simple Expelliarmus, Sirius," he lies. Tom eyes him curiously but says nothing. (Harry never thought he'd be even the tiniest bit grateful toward Tom fucking Riddle but, hey. It is not the most absurd thing that's happened so far.) "What do you think I cast?"

I am not the enemy. Sirius. I'm not your enemy. An Avada or two doesn't change that. I wish you understood that. I wish I was given no reason to lie.

I am your godson ( son ) , aren't I? That is unchangeable.

Sirius stares at him a moment. Then that look -- the glazed over suspicion in his eyes -- clears and he is himself again. "Nothing," he says, laughing a bit, shaking his head, like the thoughts in it are being silly.

Harry changes the subject. "You didn't have any major injuries?"

"Oh, erm, no. I wouldn't have guessed I'd have gotten off better than you, but--"

"However touching this is," interrupts Tom, seemingly tired of listening to their conversation now that Harry is no longer lying through his teeth, "Sirius must be going."

"What?" snaps Sirius. "But -- you said something about shopping -- and Harry's not finished--"

" He's going shopping. You," says Tom pointedly, nose upturned, "are going back in your cell until my say so."

"I'm not leaving you with him." Despite him wanting Harry to use Tom's affections to find a way home, Sirius cannot shake his instinctual protective sense.

"It seems you hardly have a choice, Sirius."

Sirius looks pained. An angry. Harry winces, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. "I'll be alright," he assures.

"If he takes things too far--" Which comes with the absurd supposition that anything Tom's done so far isn't already. Harry guesses he thinks it is a necessary evil, Tom's feelings. He cannot bring himself to agree. "Then, well. Stop caring about... what we talked about last night," getting home, "and. Uh." He raises a fist weakly. "You know."

Harry grins. He squeezes Sirius' shoulders once. "I got it, Sirius. I can handle myself."

Sirius pulls him into a hug. Harry buries his head in the crook of his neck uncaring, in that small, special sliver of time, that he is trapped, miles (timelines) away from his home and his friends, and is sitting next to a teenage Tom Riddle. He has Sirius Black. Sirius Black is enough.

Sirius lets out a breath and it ruffles Harry's hair. "I know," he says, quiet. "I still worry." I worry because that's what fathers do. Worry greatly.

Harry tightens the embrace before slipping out of the hug.

Sirius opens his mouth to add something more, but Tom throws a sock at him -- a portkey, Harry assumes -- and says, "Klaus." Sirius vanishes with a pop.

Harry glances at him out of the corner of his eye. He looks, still, infuriating curious. "If you're trying to win my affections with this stuff," says Harry, "you're on the wrong path."

Tom cocks his head. He does not buy Harry's bait. "You lied to him," he says, a little awe in his voice, a little wonder. "I'm fairly certain you attempted to blast me with the Killing Curse, practically on sight, Harry."

"Really? Might have to get your head checked, Tom. Not sure that's how it went down."

"You told him it was a disarming spell," continues Tom, an unhinged (predatory) grin growing on his face. "You lied to your godfather."

"Well, I am fifteen. Us teens lie to our parents sometimes. It happens."

"Not like this," says Tom. "Not about this. At least... it's not something I'd expect out of you, self-righteous, Mr. Gryffindor."

"Maybe check yourself. Arrogance is a scary thing. You have literally only known me for -- what, three days?"

"You're a very blatant person, Harry," says Tom. He looks like he wants to grip Harry's chin in his hand and turn his face over like some sort of prized possession. But he restrains himself and Harry guesses it is deliberate (he's trying to win Harry over, after all.) "And I, an intuitive one. I thought I had you placed, to some degree. It seems, though, that every attempt to understand you makes you all the more a mystery."

Harry huffs. "Good. Your failure is my victory."

"You have so many strong opinions and beliefs but it seems to me that you betray them, time and time again. You're a ball of contradictions I intend to unravel."

"I'm no hypocrite," snaps Harry.

"But you are, aren't you? You hate politicians, their two-sidedness, their totalitarian-ness. Yet you yourself are two-sided."

"I have one side and it is screaming at me to beat the shit out of you right now."

"You are violent. A vigilante with anger issues--"

"-- I do not have--"

"-- and appear to be, at first glance, open about it. But you lied. You lied to Sirius Black. Is that not two-sided? You chide me for attacking you yet had no trouble, no qualm at all, doing so to me." Tom shakes his head condescendingly, tutting. "Sitting up on that high horse of yours, unknowingly just as bad as me."

There's two sides to Harry, he'll admit, and they are at war with each other, constantly. It is not in the way that Tom describes. His hate (not anger issues, because he doesn't have those and he never has)... and his love. He must ignore or hide one to protect the other.

It does not make him a villain. It does not make him as bad as Tom Riddle, the fucking dictator.

He's trying to elicit a reaction out of him, that's what Hermione would say. He's trying to wind him and see how he goes -- trying to make his description of Harry his very own self fulfilling prophecy. Trying to get Harry to prove him right.

This is a challenge. A fight. And Harry never loses those. He will not lose this one.

"I'll read up on your administration, Tom," says Harry, sounding far calmer than he feels. "And then, I guess, we'll see about that."

And Tom...

Tom looks flushed. He looks impressed and like he has just crossed the line between obsessed and downright consumed.

Harry turns his head away from Tom. He pushes all his emotions into the palm of his hands and crushes them with a white-knuckled clasped fist. Tom keeps staring.

The medi-which breaks up their silence. She says, shakily, that Harry has many injuries, but he will be out in a couple hours, max. Only the best, the quickest healings for anyone associated with Tom Riddle. (Of all the things money can buy.)

Of course, she adds, there are some things worrying her. She hands Harry a clipboard with questions to fill out while she catalogs his... ah, normal wounds.

Harry reads over what he was handed with a growing frown. "Hallucinations, emotional spikes -- what is this, a psych eval? Cause I've had these before, you know, my uncle almost got me locked up, and I ain't interested in a repeat."

Tom wants to ask after that -- every piece of information Harry reveals is valuable -- but the medi-witch says, "No, sir, uh... it's to determine if these changes are new in devolvement or a... longstanding issue."

" What changes?"

"Do you feel like yourself?" she asks.

"Duh," says Harry, rolling his eyes. Who else would he feel like?

She frowns deeply., taking the clipboard from his hands and writing something down on a notepad in hasty, worried strokes.

"What is the issue?" Tom voices. "Tell me now."

She goes pale. "It's... he has more soul than he should, Mr. President, sir.

"The fuck are you going on about?"

"Yes," says Tom, amused at Harry's language. "Elaborate."

"It's not his soul. It is extra... tacked on," she says, confused herself. "It's not from the Veil if he's experienced no shifts of mood -- as is expected if something like this would have just happened -- so... so, it is a long-standing issue. He's had it for a while--"

"Who?" Harry snaps. This information is troubling, deeply troubling. Harry's mind runs a million miles a minute. (Dumbledore, first year, telling him that Voldemort connected them somehow. Second year. He and Voldemort are so alike, he says, the only difference is their choices.

The dreams. The shared dreams with Voldemort -- the 'visiony ones' -- the rapid refusal to trust Harry with information valuable to the Death Eaters' side.

No. It isn't...

It can't be. It's not. )

"What?" responds the woman.

" Who," repeats Harry, "does the soul shard belong to? Who?!"

She pulls her lips taut. "It's, uh, hard to say--"

"Try anyway," prompts Tom. Harry resists the urge to wring his neck. This is my information! It's about me and it doesn't belong to you! I don't belong to you!

"It's very similar to yours, Mr. President, sir."

Harry's anger is replaced by an overwhelming humming void of grief.

Damning. Those words are damning and Harry feels his world fall apart around him. There is a monster in him -- a real one. He is all of a sudden glad Sirius was forced to leave.

Tom looks positively elated. "Does that mean we share a soul? How wonderful--"

"Not exactly, Mr. President, sir, sorry."

Tom's face falls. He says, blankly, "No?"

"No... It's similar -- there shared signature assets to your magical core, of course, let it be known -- but it is not... identical, sir." She adds, like it might be comforting, "It's likely the you from his universe, sir."

Harry does not catch Tom's expression. Harry is sharing down at his shaking hands.

I'm Voldemort. Voldemort's soul is in me -- I -- I'm part Voldemort, I am Voldemort.

"How did... this happen?" asks Harry. His voice wobbles. Tom moves to wrap an arm around his shoulder but Harry pulls away, angry. "How did this happen?"

How did this happen and what did it mean and does Voldemort -- his Voldemort -- know and would it matter if he did? So many questions and Harry is shaking and...

And desolate, simply desolate. If Voldemort has been with him for 'some time' then what part of Harry's personality really remains untouched, if any?

It's not fair. He has done nothing to warrant this.

"We're not sure. I'm certain there are ways to figure it out," she says, hurriedly. "I have--"

Tom cuts her off. He says softly, looking at Harry, who is bordering on incoherent, "A calming draught. Get him one."

"Uh--! Um, yes, sir, right away."

A potion is summoned and forced into him and although Harry is calmer, he's not any less fucked up. "I can't believe it," mutters Harry. His hands no longer shake and are now rubbing anxiously at the back of his neck. "I can't..."

"I'm sorry," says the medi-witch, and she does look genuinely upset, though the reason why is unknown. "I'm sorry if this is a bad time, or if you need some time to process, but there's more."

Harry lets out a dry laugh. Tom raises an eyebrow. "There's more? I find that hard to believe."

"This is... a more recent development, the chart shows, if it's any comfort."

"Depends," says Harry dryly. "Go on. Let's see if my day can be made any worse."

She laughs nervously. Tom gestures with one hand to continue. "There's time turner sand in your blood."

More confusing than devasting. Harry's oddly glad for the change of pace. "What?"

"And in your flesh and... well. Everywhere." She summons a scan result -- one of the tests she was running -- and hands it to Harry. Sure enough, his body -- his brian, his muscles, his eyes, even -- is littered with small, grainy dots, making the image look like it is more low quality than a medical mystery.

"How am I not dead? Or in pain?" asks Harry, letting Tom take the scan out of his hand. "I should feel it, and I don't. Why don't I?"

She wrings her hands together. "It is a result of the Veil -- Mr. Sirius Black had the same results. Time turner sand is largely untested in the human body, so it is entirely unlikely it's not affecting you in any way."

"Gross," says Harry. "Can you take it out?"

She shakes her head. "I attempted with Mr. Black. It's... it's otherwordly, I'd say."

Tom studies the scan deeply. "Fascinating," he notes, voice low. "I'll have to look into this -- I'll be holding onto this, if you don't mind."

"Of -- of course not, Mr. President."

Tom looks at her impatiently. "Get to it, won't you? He has other injuries yet to be attended to, am I correct?"

The medi-witch nods and ducks her head, "He'll have to... undress, sir."

"Alright," says Tom. He makes no move to leave or turn the other direction.

"Tom," says Harry, warning note in his voice. "I am not changing in front of you."

Tom tilts his head. "Whyever not?"

"Are you fucking stupid?"

"I've been told no."

"Then stop acting like it." Harry folds his arms over each other. "You don't get to see me in my underwear. Full stop. It's not happening."

"Why does the human body bother you?"

"It's not the human body," snaps Harry. "It's you. "

"I'll turn my back for you to change."

"No. You're leaving the room."

"You'll get to cover yourself with the blanket once you're done," supplies Tom. He acts like he is some savior, offering solutions to the very problems he causes. "And I'll only turn back around on your say so. What do you say?"

"I say you're a creep. A pervert, even."

"That's not a response, Harry."

"Fuck you," says Harry. "But fine."

Tom smiles, like he's won something, and when Harry undresses, covers himself, and allows Tom to turn back around, Tom smiles like he's giving something. Like Harry should be grateful for the small amount of self control he posses.

It is repulsive. Tom is repulsive.

The medi-witch take to healing Harry's wounds one at a time. His head feels better instantly. Harry hadn't even realized he'd hurt it. Falling to the ground and getting Cruio'd might do that to you. She heals his aching knees and sore thighs.

His hands take the longest. She heals his knuckles and the palms of his hands. Scar tissue is piled on top of scar tissue and Tom studies his left hand with care. His fingers graze lightly over the knobs of his knuckles. "Do you punch people a lot?" he inquires.

Harry shrugs.

"You seem like it."

"Yeah, well. When a Malfoy strikes you, it's only common courtesy to strike back."

Tom snorts. "You have a Malfoy, too, then?"

"Unfortunately."

She begins working on his right hand and it is going well until Tom grips Harry's wrist and yanks his half-healed right hand toward him. "What is this ?" he demands.

Harry tears his arm free, yelping, "Let go of me!" He hands his hand back to the medi-witch, hesitantly and slowly, moving his sleeve over the carved words. He glances away, jaw clenched. "It's nothing." ( I must not tell lies.) It's weakness. It's proof he is strong but not strong enough.

Tom looks at him. "I don't not," he says slowly, "understand you, Harry Potter."

Harry keeps his eyes fixed on the healer in from of him -- the bruise on her face, the murdered joy in her face -- and says, dully, "I don't know what you mean."

He does, of course. This is a mindset he's following. Able to stand up to Voldemort, to Tom Riddle, to medi-witches with too loose of tongues. He starts shit on the smallest of offenses and his body is stained from the ceaseless wars he partakes of.

But he's weak. Not in the body, but in the mind. There are some people -- those whose authority over him is personal -- that Harry will spark against in rage... And it will end there. They won't catch.

It is weakness. It is a weakness that now Tom knows, at least a little bit. And a weakness that Tom knows is a vulnerability.

When it is over, Harry is given privacy (semi-privacy) to redress and ordered to bed rest for the next few hours.

Tom eventually rises from his spot, planted by his side, kissing him on the forehead (to Harry's disgusted nose scrunch). Hells him he has places to be. "I am a very busy man. Riots to quell, orders to fill, papers to sign, you know how it is."

"I'm sure I don't." Harry's the kind to start riots. Quelling them is not in his agenda. "I thought we were going shopping?"

"Aw, Harry, were you looking forward to spending time together that much?" Tom teases. Harry flushes red and sputters. Tom smirks and relents, "I'm joking, Harry. You will be going shopping still, after some rest."

"Without you?" Being left alone, even just for shopping, is a dream come true.

"I'll send someone for you," Tom says, something mischievous in his tone. He waves and right before teleporting he adds, "I think you'll really like him."

...

"You're fucking with me," says Harry. He crosses his arms and stares at the boy (man? It's hard to gauge his age) standing in front of his hospital bed.

Draco Malfoy, dressed in navy blue, decorated and tailored robes, smiles. It's the look you give to a friend you have known for a long, long time. It's not a look correctly addressed at Harry. "Hardly," says Malfoy. He sticks out his hand to shake. "Draco Malfoy. I've been told we haven't met before."

"Not formally, no." Harry ignores the hand until Draco drops it to his side, looking considerably less happy to see him.

"I knew the Harry before you. The original."

Harry rolls his eyes. Of course you did. It's not hard to tell. "The original? Jesus, Malfoy, I'm not some fuckin' knock-off. "

"Apologies," says Malfoy. "The wording for your situation is hard to place."

"No. You're just slow."

Malfoy's smile tightens. "It's a shame, what happened to Harry. But I'm sure we can come to just as close of an arrangement--"

"You're not that subtle, Malfoy. You usually aren't, but this is something else." Harry looks him in the eyes. "I met your counterpart, too. Nothing much to say about him. Other than I know which one of you two is the knock-off."

Malfoy decides -- finally -- to drop all pretense of friendliness. "The reports weren't lying, then. You really are a right prat."

"Right back at cha. Tom asked you to take me shopping, right? Is that it? Following orders, Malfoy, what a good puppy dog you are." Harry sticks up his middle finger. "Here, boy, have a treat."

Malfoy is unimpressed (and unamused , Harry notes sadly). "How old are you?"

"Fifteen. You're, lemme guess, nineteen?"

"Twenty," corrects Malfoy. "Fifteen, huh? I never would have guessed."

"Yeah, I've been told I look a bit older than--"

"No. Because you act like you're twelve."

"Least I'm not a little evil henchman." Harry shudders. "Better a kid than an idiot, that's what I always say." (He's only not an idiot when Hermione is around, but what Malfoy doesn't know won't hurt him.)

Malfoy scowls. It's nice, this small piece of normality. Some things do not have to change drastically. Malfoy's Malfoy; transcending the multiverse.

"Get up," snaps Malfoy. "We've got some shopping to do, and we'd both like it to be over as soon as possible, I'd think."

"You said it, Malfoy." He throws the blankets off of him. He slips on his shoes and rises from the bed, stretching his arms above his head. Malfoy sticks out his hand, though he looks like he'd rather not touch Harry at all. ( Dirty blood is written on his face.)

"Teleportation," notes Harry, taking a hold of his hand. "What an odd thing to call it."

...

Diagon Ally looks like someone saw the place once years ago and tried to draw it from memory. There are a few key buildings the same, a few signs just as aged and rough, but alien around the edges. When once people would stare and gawk at him -- him, his scar, his form -- people's eyes now slide right off his face.

They are strangers. He is a stranger.

Draco walks beside him, just close enough that you wouldn't be able to tell that there's tension, but far enough apart that Draco doesn't have to risk touching him. Draco's eyes are locked ahead, one hand grasped onto the sleeve of Harry's robe, dragging him alone. An Auror issued gun is slung across his shoulder.

"You think I could talk Tom into letting me get one of those?" asks Harry.

Draco looks unhappy that Hary's decided to talk to him. Harry relishes it. Pissing Draco off has always been a pleasure of his (guilty or not.) "It's improbable."

"He likes me," says Harry, shrugging. "And I've got some good advice about using that to my advantage."

"He thinks you're dangerous."

"It's really flattering of him, isn't it? Kind of sweet, if you think about it--"

"He knows that you're dangerous. With magic, you're a threat as long as you're against him. Earning his trust, even falsely, will take time and patience that, quite frankly, I don't think you have."

Harry frowns. "You need magic to use a gun?"

"It's a magic gun."

"Yeah, but. It's still a gun."

"It channels the magic of the user through its core and shoots it out the other end a more focused version of the spell."

Harry frowns deeper. He kicks a rock and says, "That's a wand."

Malfoy glances at him. "A what?"

"Like..." he recalls Tom's response, "From the movies?"

Malfoy scowls, moving his eyes away from him again. "It's completely different."

"Well, wands have cores. Mine did. And they're wooden."

"Irrelevant."

"Your guns have cores and are wooden."

"So?"

"And they have a similar, almost identical, function. Which is the channel the user's magic in a controlled way."

"Wands are stupid."

"OH, AND WOODEN MAGICAL GUNS AREN'T?"

Draco laughs. He can't help it. "You're ridiculous," he says.

"You know what's ridicluous? Calling your glorified fancy wands guns. "

Draco Malfoy stops walking. He turns to Harry and says, sternly, releasing his sleeve, "Enough. Though we both know you're incorrect on this issue, no arguing inside the shop. It's unbecoming."

The sign above the shop door reads Madame Milkims. The font's different and wrong and the carpeting, Harry can tell by looking in through the window, is a different color, too. Harry rolls his eyes. "You purebloods never have any fun."

"Is that a promise to behave yourself or do I need to cast a Muffalo?"

"Relax, Malfoy. I'm not five."

Malfoy mutters something that Harry can't hear -- most definitely insulting -- and opens the door with a sigh. He motions for Harry to enter with a swallow bow.

(This place smells different too.) The door closes with a small clink behind Malfoy. "Milkims?" calls out Draco. The store seems to be mostly empty. "We're here for the appointment."

A large, bulky woman dressed head to toe in gold fabric appears from the backroom, nothing like the squirrelly girl Harry'd come to know. "Draco Malfoy, ain't it a pleasure." She nods her head at Harry. "Arry. You here for a fitting?"

"I need new robes," says Harry. "Apparently."

"New robes, eh? Didn't ye just order some last month?"

"Shit happens," says Harry.

She looks him up and down and Harry is tired, really tired, of people doing that. His weight is none of their business. Do people here never learn that? "Eh, I see Harry, I see. Outgrown em. But," she adds, thick eyebrows furrowing, "Ye've gotten taller, haven't ye?"

Draco slaps Harry hard, once, on the back. "It's like Potter said, Milkims." He grins, all teeth, "Shit happens."

A tape measurer appears in her hands. "Don't it?" she mutters, shaking her head once. She juts her head toward the fitting room. "Go on. Outer robes off, arms out."

Harry takes to the stance easy, Malfoy standing toward the back, leaning against the wall. "He's picked out what robes you're getting already," Malfoy tells him. "This is just a tailoring. And my, they need a lot of tailoring."

Harry huffs. "Pureblood actors are special, aren't they? Arguing in front of good company is taboo, but insulting someone's weight in front of them is fine."

"There are some fundamental aspects of our society you've yet to be exposed to, nor understand--"

"I don't think I'll ever understand," snaps Harry. The tape measures snakes its way around him. "Not your, or your people -- Tom Riddle and those like him, the people who follow him. Your needless cruelty."

"Any cruelty we have is calculated."

"Maybe your math's bad. Maybe you need a recalculating."

"You've been here three days and already want to change the world." Malfoy snorts. "You want to talk about arrogance? Then let's talk."

"I know enough about this place to hate it."

"Then you're on the bottom," says Malfoy. "Or you're gunna be. There's a top and it's great up here. You might not know it yet, but this is as good as it gets. It is a luxury. Keep it up... and Tom will get bored, like he always does, and he will tire of your rebellion, and he will break you. He will break you, put you at the bottom with the poor and the unlucky and unliked, abandon you, and move on to the next big thing. That's what Tom Riddle does." Malfoy shrugs. "That's what he'll do to you."

"If you think that speech would persuade me into thinking your society isn't fucked, then you chose some words wrong." Milkims rolls a deep green robe with gems on the collars and cuffs and magic begins weaving in and out of it; sizing itself to fit him. Harry laughs. A bitter thing. "Isn't that wonderful? A fine cloak. That material is cashmere, right? Expensive. Those gems, emerald."

He steps down from the fitting post -- his part on the work done -- and walks closer to Malfoy. "There are simple luxuries -- simple things inherent to life -- some people cannot afford. Those poor your mentioned would be so very happy to hear that money that could go toward helping them was squandered on obtuse fineries no one needs, and I don't even want." He stops right in front of Malfoy, chests so close they are touching. "People like you, " he spits, "are the reason there are people like me. And, by god, they are not the same."

Malfoy laughs. "People like me? People like me, Harry, people like Tom Riddle? It doesn't matter to us what you say or do." He pushes Harry in the chest, forcing him to stumble back a little. "It doesn't matter. We can bribe or lie or hurt -- of all the things money can do -- and all of a sudden, what you say doesn't matter because everyone is convinced you don't either."

Another push, another stumble. "People like me own this building. We own the ground you stand on, the water you drink, the robes you wear and the things you buy. You can act all ferocious while being entirely dependent on a system you don't understand if you want."

A harder push, a rougher stumble. "But while you do, be aware of one thing: People like me run this society. You don't. You'll never. "

He grabs Harry by the collar. "You will die alone, sick, poor, and stupid. And you will deserve it. "

Harry's hand flies to Draco's gut -- a sucker punch for a sucker -- and his elbows slams into Draco's back repeatedly.

Draco takes his punches and gives his own. Harry finds that no matter how hurt he is and how red Draco's face becomes, he doesn't want to stop.

(And if he did -- Draco wouldn't deserve it.)