Colin Creepy

It rained for an hour in the Great Hall. Waves and waves of water came washing down from the concrete ceiling above. I watched the whole thing. The entire hour. I watched every single drop of rain that I, I Colin Creevey, had created. I watched them splash onto the coats of armor and the House tables (well, except for the one Ravenclaw table that had been splintered by lightning) and the benches where everyone at Hogwarts sat.

I laughed. I danced on the tabletops. I shouted and yelled for joy. And I cried. Cried tears of happiness. I had made the Great Hall ceiling rain. No one had ever done that. Harry Potter (stupid git) had never done that. I was special and I was smart and I had done something no one else had ever done in the history of Hogwarts.

I had made it rain. The rain had soaked everything in the Great Hall. Probably it would all have to be replaced and that would cost a bundle and wouldn't Dumbledore (stupid old fool) feel embarrassed having to explain to the governors of Hogwarts that he didn't know how the ceiling had rained?

The rain had soaked everything. All the banners were ruined and even the tables looked beaten and worn. There must have been something in the rain. My mind brought a vague memory of an old Muggle teacher explaining something called "acid rain" long years ago. That was probably it; I would have to look it up later. I glanced around the Great Hall and went back to the seat I had taken beside Harry at dinner, before I was special. I started to sit down. But then I noticed something.

My place on the bench wasn't wet. My place on the bench was bone dry. Not one drop of water had touched it.

Weird.

Look, even good, great Harry Potter's place was wet. Didn't all the strange things happen to him? All the dreams, all the burning sensations in that stupid scar on his forehead–weren't weird things reserved specifically for the Boy Who Lived?

Well, looks like Saint Potter isn't all that special after all. I grinned as I wiped away the standing water from Potter's seat. It had almost stopped raining.

As I wiped the water away, I noticed my hand tingling a little. That was weird. And some sort of mark had been burned into the place where Harry had sat during dinner. That was weird too. I didn't think Weather-Influencing Charms had side effects like that. I would look it up later.

I grinned again. I was special. I was great. I was wonderful, I was magical, I was powerful. I had made it rain in the Great Hall and no one, not Albus Dumbledore, not Tom Riddle, not even Harry Bloody Potter had ever made it rain in the Great Hall.

It had stopped raining. I blinked up into the sunny ceiling of the Great Hall. I was completely alone in the vast room. Alone with what I had wrought. I smiled to myself and skipped out of the Hall and to the Gryffindor Common Room.

Wormtail watched in amazement as one boy stood in the center of the Great Hall. Was this the boy Master had meant? Was this the great ally that would help Master? He watched the boy, watched him frolic among the lightning bolts and watched him cry out his happiness to the ceiling.

Yes, he thought to himself. This must be the boy. He waited patiently until the rain stopped. He watched the Boy, the Ally, the Great and Wondrous Ally, as he skipped out of the Great Hall. Wormtail made to follow, but something at the Gryffindor table caught his attention.

Wormtail waddled over to the place the Ally had occupied just moments later, all the while fighting painful memories of old friends at this very table. If Master knew what he was thinking...Wormtail shuddered. And then he gasped.

A snakelike face, with a serpent protruding from its mouth, was burned into the bench. Burned deep and glowing and almost alive. The Dark Mark. Had the Ally...? Hadn't the Potter boy been sitting just there during dinner?

Wormtail shook his head. It was all too complicated. But Master would explain. Master knew everything, had an explanation for everything. Wormtail waddled out of the Great Hall, hoping his memory would take him to the Gryffindor Common Room.

I stopped at the painting of the Fat Lady, absolutely beaming.

"Hello, dear. What can I do for you?"

"Hello, my dearest, darlingest painting. You've done so much for me since I've been here; I wish I could only repay you; but if it's not too much trouble, could you allow me entrance into the Common Room?" What the hell was I saying? What had gotten into me? I grinned up at the painting of the monstrous woman.

"Why, certainly dear, and aren't we in a chipper mood?" she smiled benevolently and fatly down at me.

"Oh, we are. Password's ‘Gorgon's head', by the way," I smiled sweetly at her. God, this was easy. I wonder if I could get into the Slytherin room this way...steal Malfoy's hair dye...

"Oh dear, I almost forgot to ask," the walrus said, sounding shocked. "Don't mention that I did that, will you?"

"Wouldn't think of it."

"What a nice boy..."

What a nice boy indeed. I felt like laughing my head off. Yes, I was so nice. So well-behaved. So very nice and polite and---

"Colin?"

I wheeled around quickly, knowing the voice before I saw its owner.

"Hello, Virginia."

She looked at me quizzically. I could have kicked myself. I used her real name. Not that damned pixie-sounding, perpetually babyish "Ginny" everyone else called her. Would she mind? Wait, I shouldn't care. I just made it rain in the Great Hall and I should be riding on the top of the world but instead I've got this horrible feeling in my stomach like it contains everything I've ever eaten and my entire happiness rests on whether Virginia Weasley with the doll eyes and the shiny hair thinks I'm "strange."

"Colin, are you okay? You're soaked. I'm sorry we all left you there in the Great Hall, but I was so scared and I couldn't see you and everyone was pressing up against me. Did you make it out okay?"

So she didn't think I was strange. She was worried about my safety. My stomach emptied and I had the most idiotic grin on my face and I wanted to smack myself and float away all at the same time. She had been worried about me. I could just see her, sitting on the edge of one of the couches in the common room, possibly biting her nails, her doll eyes brimming with concern and her hair a shiny cloud around her face.

"Yeah, I got out all right. I'm sorry you were scared. Didn't Potter or the Mug–er, Ron help you?"

"Well, they were scared too. They shoved out almost at the front."

Why, those dirty cowardly no-good wizard-trash good-for-nothing Gryffindor elitist slime! They left Virginia (and countless others) to save their own hides? The Muggle-lover, I could understand. He had always been the second banana, he wasn't very big on bravery. But Potter! The Boy Who Lived! Sir Potter, Defender of the Lives of the Innocent! Why hadn't he made sure all the women and children were safe? Wasn't that what he was so famous for? Stupid git!

I couldn't think of anything to say but "Oh."

"Yeah." She glanced around and twirled a section of her new-penny hair around her fingers. Even her fingers were beautiful. Beautiful like glass. I wanted to grab them, but I was afraid they would break.

"Er, Ginny?" God, I hated calling her that. "Is it okay if I call you Virginia?"

She smiled. She had beautiful teeth. I lost myself in her smile and almost didn't hear her say "Sure, Colin. You're the only one who'll call me that." I grinned and stumbled up to my room.

It was deserted, of course. No one else would be asleep at seven in the evening. No one except the disturbed Creevey boy. For once, I was glad of the stigma forced upon me at Hogwarts. It would give me several hours of privacy.

I lied down on my bed and smiled up at the ceiling. I drifted off to sleep, dreaming of copper hair and glass fingers and doll eyes so brown and deep they seemed to go on forever.

"Boy?"

I heard an unfamiliar voice. Was I still dreaming? I couldn't tell. I rolled on my side and slept on. I had been about to touch Virginia's hands and I wanted to see what she would say when I did.

"Boy!" More insistent. I groaned. Stupid dreams, keeping me from her. First about Mum's death, now just a stupid voice trying to wake me. Well, it wouldn't work. I screwed my eyes shut, waiting for the voice to go away and waiting for Virginia to return.

"Ennervate," I heard the voice say. Stupid voice. A pain hit me in my side and I shouted and put my hand over the injury. Dream voices weren't supposed to hurt, were they? I sat up and opened my eyes. Virginia and her beautiful glass hands would have to wait.

I was alone in the common room, alone except for a small, squat, beady-eyed man I had never seen before. Maybe I should've been scared. But he wasn't really all that threatening.

"What do you want?" I said, more grumpily than I should. Dad would've killed me for addressing a stranger so discourteously.

"Boy, you made the ceiling rain, didn't you?" the Man asked suddenly. I jumped a little. How could he have known?

"I don't know what you're talking about. Now, if you'll excuse me, I was having a very pleasant dream I'd like to get back to..."

"Tonight is not a night of dreams, boy, but of making dreams come true," the Man said cryptically.

"What are you talking about? I'm the happiest boy at Hogwarts! I don't need any of my dreams to come true, they already are!" I said, sarcastically. The Man seemed to know this.

"You mean it isn't a dream of yours to get revenge on the Potter boy?" he smiled.

I gaped at him. How had he known...?

"Come with me, boy, and you'll be more famous, more worshipped, more loved than Harry Potter ever could think of being," the Man said quietly.

I didn't want to be famous. I didn't want to be worshipped....well, that might be nice. But love...love would be wonderful. Could this man make me more loved than Potter? Could I be the Head Boy? Could girls giggle whenever I walked into the hallways? Could he do that? I thought of doll eyes and shiny hair. I had to try. I had to try.

"All right, I'll go with you," I said to the Man, and he smiled. A quick and evil smile. That couldn't be very good, but ah well. Too late now.

"We knew you would come. Master said you would come. Master is so smart," the Man said as he shuffled around the room. He seemed to be looking for something. I didn't think it wise to say anything to him; he seemed a bit unstable. Pot calling the kettle black, I know, but his eyes frightened me and so I kept my mouth shut. Four years of living in the Boy Who Lived's shadow had me well trained in being seen and not heard.

Along with all the other Hogwarts students. Because we all knew it was really Potter's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Stupid git. I'll bet he was telling everyone in the Common Room how he bravely saved all of the Hufflepuff first-years from being struck by a bolt of lightning. Hell, why not throw in some nuns and orphans, Potter? They'll believe you. They always do. Stupid
Gryffindors.

Not until the Man sent Nigel Leftwich's sculpture of Professor Sinistra flying against the wall
did I say anything. Secretly, I was glad ... it was rather uncomfortable trying to sleep while staring at a half-clothed Astronomy teacher. Nigel had gotten a month's detention after creating that in Muggle Studies.

"Hey, there are people in the Common Room, you know. Maybe you should keep that in mind as you destroy my room." I couldn't believe I was being so rude. Sounded like Malfoy, I did. Well, good. Better than sounding nice and polite like Saint Potter.

The Man fixed those strange eyes on me and stopped talking. They had a strange yellow glint to them. Almost ratlike in their appearance. I vaguely remembered Trelawney telling me to beware a yellow-eyed man in Divination last year ...
Well, she was a crazy old bat. The Man may have been unstable, but he had promised fame and riches and complete adoration from female kind. What had Trelawney ever offered, save a few stewed tea leaves and a murky crystal ball?

Yellow Eyes, one. Trelawney, zip.

"What're you looking for, anyway?" I asked when I thought it safe.

"This," the Man said as he pulled an old broom from behind a curtain. A Shooting Star? I almost laughed. Even the Muggle-lover had managed to get himself a Nimbus earlier in the year.

"We will meet Master soon enough, Boy."

This Master of his must be pretty powerful. I couldn't wait, really. I couldn't wait. I would come back from meeting this Master and there'd be something different about me and all of the girls would flock to me in the Common Room. I could see it. I could almost HEAR it.

"Colin, where have you been?"
"We've been so desolate without you, Col."
"Yeah, we've had to listen to Potter tell us about how he killed the basilisk ... AGAIN."
"Ooh, Colin, you're cold ... here, you can have my sweater."
"No, he's going to take mine!"
"No, mine!"

And then Virginia Weasley would see me, with her perfect glass doll eyes, and she would abandon Potter, the last to listen to his threadbare tale of the basilisk, and she would ma ke her way through the throngs, and she would stand two inches away from me, so that her hair was almost touching my shoulders, and then she would grab my arms and--

"Boy."

I frowned and wondered how many years it had taken the Man to perfect his completely rotten timing. He had gotten on the broom and opened the bedroom window.

"Yes?"

"We must go. Now."

Pushy, pushy. If his Master was really all that intent on seeing me, this servant wasn't pleading his case very well. But ... well, how many chances does a man get to have all of mankind fall at his feet? Virginia would just have to wait. But not for long.

I climbed onto the broom. The Man took up all but the tiniest space and so I had to ride side-saddle, pretty much. Rather embarrassing. I debated shoving him a little, since he seemed the kind of man others pushed around, but I decided against it. Which was good. For him.

The Man wobbled a little on takeoff, like he hadn't flown a broom in many years. I rolled my eyes. In a few moments, we were out of my bedroom and flying over the Forbidden Forest.
Flying rather slowly, but still flying.
I sighed and braced myself for a long flight. Shooting Star, indeed ...

Had this Man never seen Quidditch?

We flew for what seemed hours. The night had ceased being new and the stars shone brightly in the colorless sky overhead. If I hadn't been seated sidesaddle on two inches of splintery wood, I might have enjoyed it. When the Man finally touched down on a rather grassy driveway, I didn't bother to contain my sigh of relief. The Man looked at me sharply.

"So much alike ..."

"What's that?" I asked. The Man shouldn't mumble in front of guests. Hadn't his Master been wise enough to teach him that?

"Never you mind, Boy. Master is waiting."

Ooh, Master is waiting. Pardon me while I shiver with excitement, I thought dully. How anticlimactic: a broomride on a Shooting Star for hours to reach an unused driveway. At least Potter's enemies had style. I had to be content with a half-cracked non-flying old servant. With four fingers, even. His Master didn't even have the class to send a whole flunkie to get me. I got the leftovers. Potter got a whole army of Death Eaters to surround him.

Even when he was unlucky, Potter still had all the luck.

I followed the man, mentally cursing him as we walked up the driveway. After we passed a clump of trees, I could see our destination. There was an old manor up on the hill a little way.

"I suppose that's where Master lives, eh?" I asked the Man.

"Yes. He will be most pleased to see you."

"Oh, I expect he will," I muttered to myself. "I'll be sure to compliment him on his excellent choice of transportation."

We didn't talk again until we reached the door to the house. The Man shoved himself against the door and it opened stiffly. I suppose all-powerful wizards can just Apparate to grocery stores and the like and have no need for doors. I didn't have long to wonder about the finer points of Apparating into the seventh aisle of a Muggle food store ("Smith, cleanup on aisle 7 ... kid splinched himself." Man, talk about costing an arm and a leg ...). I grinned.

"This way, Boy," the man said and ushered me inside.

The rooms were all dark, of course. I suppose these maniacal Dark Arts types have an aversion to artificial light. It IS rather unflattering, I know ... particularly when one is pale and gaunt. Oh, and I'm sure all the late hours, going over Unforgivable Curses and making deadly potions, wreaks havoc with one's complexion. I sniggered and the Man glared at me.

"Sorry," I said, not sounding sorry at all. I tried to contain my laughter. But really, the whole thing was so cliche ...

Bet Potter would've been more than a little scared. Bet he would've been wondering just where the bogey-man would be hiding. I grinned again and choked back a laugh.

"Boy," the Man growled, trying to sound ferocious, "Control yourself. I will tell the Master you are here."

"Oh, please do. And if there are any tables by the fireplace, with a view of the graveyard and Bottomless Pit, I'm sure I'd make it worth your while. May I see the wine list while I wait?" I howled with laughter. What the hell was wrong with me? I finally got my chance at fame and love and here I was, tears streaming out of my eyes from laughter, doubled up in front of an embarrassed servant of some all-encompassing Master and I was absolutely in pain with laughing so much.

"Young sir, contain your laughter," came a voice from behind me. I instantly stood straight; that voice was not to be trifled with. Very cold and cruel, it was. A little part of me shuddered and I stopped laughing instantly. The Man took a few steps back. Oh lord, I had really done it this time ...

I turned around and I could feel my eyes widen. B-but it couldn't really be him. What would he want with--

"Hello, Mr. Creevey. I trust you know who I am?"

"Y-yes, sir. You're Lord Voldemort."