The Truth Behind the Human Mask

The rain fell, an endless torrent of needles falling from the heavens, and lighting forked its way across the darkening sky, like the tongue of a mighty beast of old, waiting for luckless prey to cross its path. The little boy did not care. He ran, unaware of the stones on his bare feet, uncaring of the stinging rain on his eyes, unheeding of his cold, wet clothes. Any discomfort was better than being there, being among them, being among the pain and the hurt and the angry words and blows that were thrown about without concern or care.

He hated them. He wanted them to suffer, to die. He wished to the gods that he were taller, or stronger, or smarter, that he could show them - he would show them.

He knew he would. He would make himself better, and then they would pay.

He willed himself to move faster. They would look for him, he knew. And they would find him, find him and lock him away with the old tables and chairs and rats.

He hated rats.

He could not will himself to hurt them, yet so many times they had nibbled at his unsuspecting toes and fingers, gnawed until they were raw and bleeding, gnawed until the tears blinded him, and he begged to be let out.

But they never did.

Alone in the dark with the rats, he had cried, cried for his dead mother, cried for his father that had left them alone and afraid, cried for himself. And when they let him out, jeering at his tears and his pain, he knew he would never cry again.

He kept his promise. He had not cried since then, he would rather die than let a tear force its way down his face. So when they punished him again and again, when the rats nibbled at his fingers and his toes, he killed them. Satisfaction it was, seeing their furry bodies flung against the wall, or crushed by a table leg, falling limply to the floor. He had a revelation then, that that was power - having such control over a life, over lives.

That was what he wanted. He wanted lives and to have complete mastery over them, to hold the blade against the thread of fate, and look into their eyes, look into their pleading, begging eyes as he cut.

Just then, he stumbled and fell. He cried out loud, like a wild animal, as sharp stones cut into his flesh, and he watched the blood leak down his arm, seeping into the ground. Biting his lip, he pressed his index finger into the gash, and felt the pain bloom down his arm, but he did not cry out again. He forced himself to his feet, and continued his course.

A human being, he realized, was only a mask, a cover, for the animal underneath. The only way to expose the animal, the truth, was to make the human suffer. Under pain, a man would discard that pithy veneer of civility and decorum that he used to set himself above the beast, and show himself for what he truly was.

Tom Riddle stopped running and stood for an infinite moment, under the pelting fury of the storm. Then he slowly turned around and headed back to the orphanage.

That, he decided, was what he was born to do - to find the truth behind every man, to strip him of his mask, and watch him writhe in his naked bestiality.

For now, he would just have to wait.

Author's Notes:

I want to thank my reviewers, and I appreciate the feedback I received on my previous one-shots. I know one thing was the shortness of these pieces, and I honestly tried to make this longer, but I could not think of anything more to add. Hopefully this was okay as is.

Please review!