HP/LV One Shot

Des-Purr-Ate Measures Chapter 1

Harry stopped dead as soon as he stepped foot in the Slytherin dorms.

He blinked once. Twice. Three times.

Just as he was about to call out into the common room to see whose idiot cat had ripped up his bed, he got a face full of fur.

"Yeuck-" he spluttered, as the claws digging into his shoulders forced the weight of this small, black kitten into his face, forcing him to almost swallow an obscene amount of cat hair. "Get off me, you little-"

Then, he stopped struggling.

Because this cat was looking at him in that irritated, condescending way that only two people in the world could pull off, and he was fairly sure this cat wasn't McGonagall's breed... He shut the dorm door behind him slowly, casting several silencing spells, and finally managed to shove the scrawny animal unceremoniously from his body to his bed.

He stared at the cat, and the cat stared defiantly back.

Naturally, he burst out laughing.

"T-Tom?!" he managed to squeak out between gasps, and the cat hissed at him reproachfully.

Definitely Tom.

"I can't believe you. Are you an animagus? Why didn't you tell me? Also, seriously? A kitten? That's hilarious. And surprisingly fitting, I suppose. But really, why wouldn't you tell me something that important?" he asked, but the cat just continued to stare, its feline features somehow managing to morph into a scowl reminiscent of Tom's humanoid face. Harry stopped laughing because oh yeah, cats can't fucking talk.

"Oh... right. No speech. Gotcha. Okay, time for a good old game of yes and no. Are you an animagus?" The cat continued to stare, because of course, even as a literal fucking animal, Tom Riddle would never do anything as plebeian as a nod or shake of his head. Harry knocked his glasses lower down his nose to pinch the bridge of it, sighing exasperatedly.

"Blink once for yes, twice for no."

Tom blinked twice.

At least Harry got the small pleasure of knowing how frustrating it must be for someone as expressive as Tom to be confined to such simplistic answers, especially since he couldn't even speak said answers. He pushed the thought away quickly as the response settled in. So, he wasn't an animagus. Harry frowned as he readjusted his glasses.

"How did you-" he started to ask, but was cut off by an indignant hiss. "Oh, shit, yeah. Sorry. Erm... was this an accident?"

Two blinks. A hesitation. Another blink.

"I wish we knew morse code, this is getting confusing. Wait, knowing you, you probably do know morse code. Nerd. Okay, so, I'm gonna use my big brain here-" Tom let out the feline equivalent of a snort, which sounded a bit like a minuscule and totally non-offensive sneeze, but Harry glared anyway. "and I'm gonna guess that you willingly transformed yourself into a cat - for whatever reason - but that you were an idiot and somehow screwed up and can't morph back. Blink once if I'm correct, twice for not."

Tomcat clearly didn't want to admit to being an idiot, or that he screwed up, as Harry so eloquently put it, but blinked once all the same. Not without a soft growl from the back of his throat, however, but Harry blissfully ignored it and smirked triumphantly at his small victory. He had to force himself to school his features to be more composed, thinking fast.

"Do you know how to get out of this?" he asked before he committed to coming up with a potentially unnecessary plan.

One blink. Of course. The control freak wouldn't do anything without having a solution for all possible outcomes to the situation first. Harry sighed again.