Pandora's Box

Severus the ghost glared down at Lucius Malfoy. The man lay on a queen-sized bed with the blankets pulled up around his still body.

“He’s been like this since Friday,” Draco said behind Severus, trying to be as helpful as possible. Draco wore blue silk pajamas and rubbed his eyes tiredly. He stifled a yawn. “Mum says he took enough Draught of the Living Dead to stay asleep for the entire weekend. She’s staying in a guestroom so she won’t bother him.”

“Obviously he was hoping he could sleep through my visit to Voldemort,” Severus said darkly. Voldemort had a habit of taking some of his misery out on Lucius. Severus shooed Draco out the door. “You go back to bed; you need your sleep. I have something to do. Oh, and Draco?” Draco turned around and looked at Severus floating in his parents’ bedroom doorway, “Come Monday, should you hear screaming coming from this room, ignore it.”

Draco nodded. He never actively participated in Severus’ pranks, but he had come to admire the broad scope of Severus’ imagination. He wandered off to bed. Severus gleefully rubbed his hands as he surveyed the room.

“I,” he said softly, “never did like the arrangement of this room’s furniture.”

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In all of his other dreams, the first thing Harry was aware of was awareness itself, knowing full well that he dreamed. This was like the other dreams. He knew he was dreaming, but of what he could not be certain of. The room he stood in was fuzzy around the edges, as if its existence was only the shadow of a long-lost memory.

It was a bare room of dark oak, dark and dismal because of the lack of light. Everything was tinted a deep gray. Before Harry, in the very middle of the room, floated the Mirror of Rebounds in mid-air. The mirror itself spun forward, a small whirl of white light not too unlike the supernova Harry had pulled Francis Potter through. He squinted at it. Shapes and colors darted sporadically through the whirl of white light. They moved too fast for him to distinguish what they were.

“AAAAIIIIIIYYYAAAA!”

Harry jumped at the loud shriek of agony behind him and squeaked as a hurled bottle passed through him and slammed into an invisible barrier that surrounded the spinning Mirror of Rebounds. The bottle shattered upon impact and the shards of glass fell to the floor and the dark red liquid contained in the bottle splattered everywhere. Harry whirled around in time to realize that someone had just stumbled through him.

With the random thought of how Severus the ghost must feel, Harry looked over his shoulder to see a thin body, wrapped in only a sheet with sweat glistening on the bare skin, clumsily fall to its knees before the spinning Mirror of Rebounds. Harry winced in sympathy as blood stained the sheets where glass shards sliced viciously through both sheet and skin.

“Stop it,” a man’s voice mumbled. One hand reached out to press forlornly against the invisible barrier. The body slumped despairingly against the barrier. “Please, n-no more.” Shoulders shook as heavy sobs racked the thin body. “I-I can’t take any more of this!” As Harry observed the scene, he noticed how pallid skin was drawn tightly over bones, how every rib was clearly outlined, and spinal vertebrae were prominent. Harry slowly walked around to the other side of the mirror to get a glimpse of the man’s face.

Reddish-brown hair, liberally sprinkled with gray, hung in limp, unhealthy strands around the gaunt face. Years of drinking and years of living with the reason for drinking had taken a horrible toll on Cousin Quigley. The man’s sunken eyes were wide as he stared mesmerized with morbid fascination at what the Mirror of Rebounds told him. Tears streamed down his face. Harry felt a heavy weight settle upon his shoulders as Cousin Quigley openly cried at what he saw.

“What is it?” Harry asked softly, wanting to know what had driven his ancestor to such a state.

“The destruction of the Snape family,” a voice said softly behind him. Harry reeled around and saw a woman with black hair and the sharpest, most penetrating blue eyes he had ever beheld. “Or, more specifically, Tom Riddle’s first open strike against the Potter family, for therein lay the first strike against the Snape family. The results of my children’s deaths were devastating, but it is so much worse to see how it took place.” She stood before Harry, no taller than him, leaning on a curved cane. There was something as unsure of her existence as the room they stood in. She was handsome rather than beautiful due to the masculinity of her jaw, curve of her forehead, and shape of her eyes.

“Are you Pandora?” Harry asked.

“You’re dreaming, lad,” she said. “Pay attention. Every dream the Mirror grants is another piece of the puzzle. When you begin to understand the pattern of the dreams, then the pieces will fall together and you shall have a picture.”

“What do you mean?”

The woman ignored Harry as she limped around him to the back of Cousin Quigley. “Poor Cousin Quigley,” she said as she gazed at the man’s back with compassionate eyes. “He understood all too well of what the future contained but no one believed him. He is the only member of the family to ever look into the future; they all attested the ability as being illusion because he never fit in with the family. They claimed it was his way of getting attention. However, to see what would happen produces great damage to his gentle soul.” She smiled wryly. “One could say he is the black sheep of the family,” she said softly as she reached a hand out. It passed through Cousin Quigley as if she too were a ghost. “Too innocent and naive to be sly. Too happy and go-lucky to be manipulative. Too gentle to be harsh.”

“The mirror is important, isn’t it?” Harry asked. “And Cousin Quigley is the one who knows what to do, isn’t he?”

“Hmm.” Cousin Quigley, the room, and the Mirror slowly faded away until both the woman and Harry were left standing alone, surrounded only by wispy fog. “Cousin Quigley accepts everything that happens. Who is he, the little mortal Hufflepuff and the perpetual shame of the family, to argue with what is to take place? Because he accepts everything, so does the Mirror of Rebounds show him everything. However, you cannot imagine what he has done to ensure the family’s survival. It is the only time he has ever directly fought against what is to be. Though he is not a catalyst, he tries to change reality. But to do that, he must enlist the help of a catalyst.”

“Will the mirror show him where you are?”

The woman walked away from Harry, but she threw a look over her shoulder at him that he took as an indication that he was to follow her. “Why am I so important?” she asked. “Why do you need me to do what you are capable of doing?”

Harry stopped. Why did they need Pandora? “Well, because we need you to fight Voldemort.”

“But you are the one who defeated him so many years ago.” A boulder appeared in the distance and Pandora walked unerringly to it. She sat upon it. Harry’s eyes were drawn immediately to the base, but nothing was inscribed in it. “My power is nothing compared to Tom Riddle’s.” She tapped the base of the boulder with the end of her cane. “Come, sit a while with me. We have only a small bit of time before you stop dreaming, and I have a great deal of complex things to explain to you.”

Harry sat cross-legged at the base of the rock and looked up at his great-grandmother. She gazed off into the distance. “Power is an odd thing,” Pandora said. “Throughout the ages, the symbol of strength has been fire, which is true, and many people think that strength is also power. Not so. Strength is reliable and power is not. The true symbol of power is water, for it always shifts and is rarely steady. Water is not stable in the slightest, as power often isn’t. Time is air, for air is the one element no one may completely destroy or control, and time cannot be controlled. Air is space, and space is as endless as time itself. Time is space, space is air, and air is time. Earth is chance, not because there were no other elements to be tied together, but because earth isn’t as secure as we would believe, and people rarely think of chances any more than they think of earth’s instability. You don’t wonder that by crossing the road you will be run over and killed any more than you wonder if the ground you stand upon thinly veils a hole which you will fall through. We trust the earth as much as we do not think of the consequences our choices create.

“When you combine the four elements, reality is created. Power. Strength. Chance. Time. Fire. Water. Earth. Air. Without one or another, reality cannot not exist. The Mirror of Rebounds must use all four so the only thing it is able to reveal that which is real. Used in separate combinations, certain things will happen. All things that exist do so in a certain combination, and Tom Riddle is one of the rarest of combinations. He is primarily time, built upon a foundation of strength, tempered with chance, and fed by power. This means he has the draw of everything. I am primarily power, built upon a foundation of chance, tempered with strength, and fed with time. This has placed my in the position of being highly influential, as was my father. Indeed, it is a common-enough combination in the Snape family.

“When strength is switched with power in a structure such as mine, it is the most common combination to be found in reality. Primary is the success rate of that element. When a creature is primarily time, it means they are infinite by what they are fed. Tom Riddle was mortal, but he has a far greater capacity for power with a foundation strong and stable enough to hold it than almost all others.

“This is why Tom Riddle is the strongest Dark Lord anyone living has ever seen. Those who came before him had a foundation of power, which is unstable, and combine that with chance, they were not meant to last long in their conquest of domination or success. Tom Riddle is feared and more known than other Dark Lords from throughout time, though he certainly is not the only one who had such a combination. He is, undoubtedly, the strongest though, and this I suppose one may attest to his bloodlines. He possesses an endless supply of power, made his own choices without pressure, and all of this was stable because he was held together by strength. Such an odd combination, truly, but utterly powerful is he! Such power has not been known since Merlin himself, who is not a wizard, but a druid.”

“What’s the difference between a druid and a wizard?”

“A druid is a person of magic who has two or more elements of the same sort. A wizard is a person of magic that has all four elements. Because Merlin was primarily time and tempered with time, so was infinity and space doubled.”

“What about the other elements?”

“Merlin did not have chance, and because he had two elements of time, he created his own destiny and his own fate, and he shaped the destinies and fates of others. He did not need chance. He saw the future and all that it held as easily as he recalled the past and all that remained within it.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Very few do.” Pandora smiled tenderly at Harry and reached out to play with a single lock of his hair. “Time’s enemy is chance. When you are a primary creature of chance, time must bend to it. Destiny is not set in stone, and fate can always be changed, and that is because chance is much, much stronger than time. Time is the what-will-be, the what-has-been, and the what-is. Chances forces what-if into the picture and breaks up the what-will-be into the what-can-be. However, two elements of time together are strong enough to control chance, unless there is a catalyst, which is where chance is supported and backed by everything else. Creatures of chance are the catalysts and the wildcards. Because your primary element is chance, Tom Riddle, even powerful as he is, had to bend to your catalytic element. His time fell to your chance when you were but a child. He was destined to succeed in his domination, and you, my little wildcard, came along and destroyed that what-will-be with your what-if.”

Harry irritably rubbed his scar as he tried to work through the cloud of confusion within his mind. None of what Pandora told him made sense. On some level, he supposed a genius would understand what was being said, but Harry freely admitted that he was most certainly not a genius. “Wait, if druids only have three elements then technically they don’t exist. Reality has to have all four elements.”

“Very good; you are paying attention. And it is when something that does not exist occurs in reality, so then does reality become distorted. But merely because it does not exist on the plane of existence does not mean that it does not subsist. It only means that it is not affected by reality, for reality can only affect that which does exist.”

“But if it doesn’t exist, how can it subsist?”

“Magic itself is not a thing of existence. It is too remote, for magic does not contain the element of time. It has two elements of chances. However, there is no denying the existence of magic. It distorts reality. Magic distorts reality enough for the Mirror of Rebounds to operate.”

“Is that what magic is? A distortion of reality? Is that what everything is that doesn’t exist but subsists anyway?”

“Indeed. That’s how the unexplainable happens.”

“So, technically, magic doesn’t exist and neither do witches or wizards.”

“Yes, and no. Witches and wizards--that is truly an explanation for another time because the complexity of that is beyond this simple lesson. But the reason why Muggles have a difficult time in believing in magic is because magic does not fit into their concept of reality or existence. Such uncertainty causes distrust, confusion, and mental instability. Their minds cannot cope with the idea of subsistence without existence. For the Muggles’ sake, and for our sake, the wizarding world strives to hide itself.”

“Oh.” Harry plugged that information with what he already knew. “But, how does this mean that we don’t need you?”

“You don’t. What good would I be, Harry? I betrayed the trust Tom Riddle had granted me, and, once shattered, trust cannot be replaced. I am not powerful enough to fight him. The only person who is strong enough to directly face Tim Riddle and destroy him and live is Tom Riddle. It is commonly said that you are your own worst enemy, and in this case, it is quite true.”

“But what about your box? What of that?”

Something gleamed in Pandora’s eyes. She turned away from him. “That,” she said as she folded her hands over the top of her cane, “is what will lead you to Tom Riddle’s worst enemy.”

Harry looked at Pandora. If he was confused earlier, it was nothing compared to now. If he understood his great-grandmother correctly, the way to defeat Voldemort was by making Voldemort do it. How could the Pandora’s Box lead them to Voldemort so this Voldemort could kill Voldemort? Why would Voldemort willingly kill himself? “I don’t understand,” he said again. “How do we do that? Where do I come into this? If I’m the catalyst, shouldn’t I be the one to defeat him?”

“When reality is distorted, it becomes weak and flimsy. Many times it breaks apart and repairs itself because that is all it can do. Yet there are two broken parts of reality that repair themselves, and so thus reality becomes two. Then those realities become weak and flimsy, so they must break apart and repair themselves. That creates four realities, and so on and so forth. Reality is primarily time and is fed by chance. It possesses a foundation of strength and is tempered by power. Because it is primarily time, a catalyst easily forces reality to bend to what it is fed. That is why there are many different realities. Reality has the power to repair itself, and the strength to remain stable. There are many realities, and in each one there is something different.”

Pandora’s gaze turned to Harry. “Tom Riddle is tempered by chance. Chance molded him, and because he is a creature primarily of time, he had a free choice in all his chances; indeed, he had a greater control over chance than many others. Because of time, he knew exactly what sort of reality those chances would create. He was never forced to side with a choice but for a single catalyst’s action.” She slowly reached out and traced Harry’s scar. “Tom is primarily time and is tempered by chance. You are primarily chance and tempered by time. Your elements are the opposite of Tom’s. You are mirror images of one another. A mirror casts an inverse reflection, and as you are the inverses, you must exist together.”

“So Tom can kill Tom, but I can’t because I am like Tom?”

Pandora’s eyes bore into Harry’s. Hers were solemn and subdue while his were bewildered. “When the object is destroyed, the shadow is obliterated.”

A shiver ran down Harry’s spine at his great-grandmother’s ominous words. “But how was I protected the first time Voldemort was, well, sort of destroyed?”

“A piece of Tom existed within you at the time, enough to tie you together. It allowed you to survive. Yet Tom Riddle himself wasn’t completely destroyed, and that was because of that tiny piece within you that survived. In all the other realities you exist within, you came upon that piece and survived through different means. Yet your fate to die will always remain the same. When the object is destroyed, the shadow is obliterated--no exceptions to the rule.”

“How? How did a little bit of Tom get into me? How did the tiny piece survive?”

Everything froze as time stopped suddenly. It resumed, but Harry recognized that something strange had just happened. Pandora smiled slyly. “That,” she said secretly, “remains to be seen. I only show you what I want.”

Harry frowned. “What you want?” Harry’s surroundings began to fade to darkness. Pandora’s eyes glowed with a dark power.

“What I want,” she repeated. Her voice became thick and muddled, overlaid by another’s. Harry stumbled back. Her image superimposed itself over the fading surroundings, large and intimidating. “Since you do not come to me, I must come to you.” She pointed a finger at him. “Therefore you learn on my terms.”

The surroundings exploded into a maelstrom of jagged puzzle pieces over a black background. Harry slipped and fell backwards. He scrambled wildly to escape the maelstrom, but its pull was too strong. He found himself swept violently downward in to the spiraling vortex. Images and scenes shot past him almost too quickly for him to comprehend.

A baby wrapped in the colors of baby blue and deep green. Pandora as she mulled over scraps of paper in a mud hut where only a single candle cast light. James Potter with a cup in his hands as he was seated at a kitchen table across from a much younger and rather worried-looking Severus Snape. A human-looking Voldemort with his hands clenched tightly enough to draw blood where the fingernails broke through the skin of his palms as he gazed at a Muggle village. Francis Potter as he stared wide-eyed at a shard of metal that flew towards him. Dumbledore many years younger as he watched a young Tom Riddle study intently.

The images swirled past Harry, trapped the maelstrom just as he was. Then one scene floated downward, not trapped as the others were as they swirled around wildly in the precarious circle, but free-falling down the middle where everything was still and calm. Harry tumbled around wildly head over heels, but his eyes were captivated by what the scene showed.

Cousin Quigley gently led a boy who could not have been any more than two years old to the spinning Mirror of Rebounds. The boy clutched at Cousin Quigley’s hand, frightened of the supernova of light the Mirror of Rebounds gave off. In the very middle of it was a long street, dismal and run-down. Cousin Quigley dropped to his knees before the boy and pulled him into a tight hug. Tears streamed down his face and fell upon the curly black hair. Grief and misery seemed to ooze from every pore of Cousin Quigley’s body. He picked the child up and faced the Mirror of Rebounds. With a quick, desperate kiss planted on the boy’s curly black hair, Cousin Quigley ruthlessly shoved him into the supernova of light. The child stumbled to his hands and knees on the street floor and looked back at Cousin Quigley. His eyes were wide with terror. He jumped to his feet and ran back to jump through, but smashed against an invisible barrier instead.

Cousin Quigley turned away as the Mirror of Rebounds stopped spinning. The stark anguish in his eyes and the way his lip trembled told of a heart shattering into thousands of pieces. The last thing Harry saw of the boy’s face as the Mirror of Rebounds faded with the supernova of color was a look of bewildered pain and unshed tears trapped in two black eyes.

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author's notes: Yes, I know I am mean. This is my revenge for all the lack of responces. =) No, seriously, I extend a very, very big THANK YOU to my lovely editor, Crushafo. I wanted to explain how a person is created from a combination of different elements, and how Harry's elements opposed Voldemort's to Harry's advantage. Crushafo, brilliant darling that she was, came up with the idea behind pairing the elements with power, strength, chance, and time. After I incorporated the basics into the story, she went through the entire thing to actually force some semblance into the words. So if you can actually make sense of this, it's because of her work. If you can't--well, rest assured, I'm quite sure that you aren't the only one.