"To some, a monster, and to others, a leader. Either way, I became god."
"Did you really? Do you think God becomes trapped?"
Having just earned your doctorate, you decide to work in the Azkaban Secure Facility for the Criminally Insane. There, you...
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"Did you look for the signs?" Is the first thing he asks you, face impassive but his eyes full of something you couldn't quite comprehend.
You're taken aback slightly, even flinching as the heavy iron door swung closed behind you. Today, you didn't even get a greeting from him. "I don't understand what you want me to see, Tom." You say as you sit opposite him, shuffling through file after file.
He simply nods, looking irritated for a moment before the emotion simply melts away. "You will, one day. Will you keep looking? Really looking?" He implores you strongly.
"I will, Tom." You tell him softly. You briefly look over your notes from yesterday. They're always scrawled painfully messily when it comes to him. There's something transfixing about him that makes you get stuck on the way he talks rather than the content of his speech. "We talked about your death eaters yesterday."
"We did." He replies monotonously, ruffling his dark hair.
"I'd like to continue that conversation today, if you don't mind?"
"Not at all." He doesn't seem to mind – he doesn't even seem to be entirely mentally present. He's looking away from you distractedly, his jaw clenched.
Taking in a deep breath, you begin. "When did you form them?"
Because that's what they were. Formed. By him, for his own use. They weren't real – mere figments of his imagination for him to toy with as he pleased. Like villainous imaginary friends there to support and defer to him on his quest for power.
"I originally called them my knights of Walpurgis." He reveals. The word sounds familiar to you, but not so much so that you could bring any meaning to it. Though, a deep-rooted instinct that acted far too predatory for your liking gleefully told you it was something dark, something grand and evil. Tom's favourite kind of things. "They only became my death eaters once I'd finished school and moved onto grander things."
"Grander things meaning...?" You trail off, heart beginning to hammer wildly in your chest. God, you had hope. So much hope, because at times he seemed so broken, begging prettily for you to put him back together again. And then, he would turn into this immoral beast that you were equally interested in – an interest that you couldn't quite justify.
"I'm sure you can guess." And now his focus returns to you, like you've intrigued him more than whatever pattern of thought he was chasing earlier. Maybe it was better when he wasn't looking at you that way. Maybe it was better when you could pretend that sick interest that persisted even at the darkest of times wasn't mutual.
Changing the subject is the only escape you can offer yourself. "Why did you create them, your knights that is?"
"Power. They would give it to me. Connections, money. Anything I wanted." Tom says. It's the answer you were expecting.
