
dead things can't die twicenote
Harry: You weren’t meant to find out. Not for a while at least, not until I could—Deal with this. Surely you’ve noticed?
Hermione: Noticed what? That you’ve taken it upon yourself to become the next Tom Riddle?
Hermione: Noticed what? That you’ve taken it upon yourself to become the next Tom Riddle?
—Excerpt from dead things.
Harry Potter and Tom Riddle have always been too similar for their own good — both orphans reviled for their magic, their lives marred by war and human prejudice. But the icing on the cake is that both have come back from the dead at least once, and death is not a good thing for a person's soul.
dead things
by EclipseWing
is a Potter Verse Dark Fic that explores how the harsh environment Harry grew up in could turn him into Britain's next, feared Dark Lord.
Warning: Since this fanfiction is a one-shot, spoilers will be unmarked.
dead things provides examples of:
- The Ageless: Harry himself becomes this, forever looking like a 17-year-old. It's initially thought it's due to Harry being the Master of Death, however, the truth proves far more horrifying. When he died the first time, the piece of Voldemort's soul wasn't the only thing destroyed — a part of Harry's soul was lost to death as well. Nobody notices at first because magical people in general age more slowly than Muggles. Then, he's just parted ways with everyone by going abroad. When he comes back, nobody recognizes him because Harry Potter should be forty-five.
- Body Motifs: Harry's eyes are something the narration keeps going back to at key moments throughout his fall to darkness. It's noted that, by the time Hermione starts suspecting him, they are no longer his mother's emerald green, but have become muddied and reddish—those are the eyes of a Dark Lord. Then, when he's performing Necromancy or Sould Magic, they light in a golden glow that eerily shines in the night.
- Bright Is Not Good: In canon, when using Polyjuice to masquerade as Harry, the potion turns gold. In dead things, despite Harry being Britain's most recent Dark Wizard, the color of his magic (particularly, his Necromancy spells) remains gold. Hermione even Lampshades this in the narration."Necromancy shouldn’t be gold, [Hermione] thinks, but it is, [Harry's] magic has been gold for a long time and she remembers the polyjuice turning liquid gold and maybe gold has always been about Death, she thinks, watching the gold spin in the eve."
- Confession Deferred: Hermione proves her cleverness once more by connecting the dots about the Necromancer's identity way earlier than he would have liked. Harry retorts that she wasn't meant to find out yet; meaning that he was planning on letting her know but only when it suited his plans.
- Dark Fic: Although he defeats Voldemort like in canon, Harry becomes the next dark wizard with extremist ideals (he thinks change can only be achieved through force) and a concerning lack of ethics (he experiments with Necromancy and soul magic). The reason is that on top of suffering lots of trauma during his life, having the Horcrux in him so violently removed has left a mark on Harry's soul — he's (emotionally) incomplete. He's therefore Driven to Suicide but, alas, he already died, so Death won't embrace him. Moreover, the narrative proves Harry's radical ideas right: Hermione's efforts to rid the wizarding society of prejudice through lawful means (she's the new Minister of Magic) are ineffectual and challenged at every turn.
- Fan Sequel: dead things takes off shortly after the Battle of Hogwarts, narrating how Ron and Hermione, now acclaimed war heroes, go on with their adult lives, getting jobs and starting a family, while Harry is incapable of doing the same after dying for the second time. We then follow Hermione's perspective on how her once best friend is the newest Dark Lord terrorizing magical Britain.
- History Repeats: This is the fanfic's entire premise. On top of Harry and Tom's already similar backgrounds, they both lost a piece of their souls at some point, which leads them to a path of insanity and radicalized beliefs of violence being the only way to achieve societal change. They both also travel the world during a good chunk of their adulthoods to the point of everyone doubting their existence and then return as powerful, dark wizards who start a genocide for personal gain and the purpose of "improving" wizarding Britain. Oh, and neither of them can just die like normal people, both having attained some sort of immortality.
- Murder by Mistake: One of Minister Granger's plans to contain the Necromancer is to sneak up on him and get a metal bracelet portkey to touch him. Harry, who has been using wand and knife to tear through the Auror corps rather easily, lashes out instinctively when Hermione's plan succeeds. Since the one who managed to do it is Ron, Harry ends up accidentally dealing a lethal blow to Ron with his knife. It's tragic because, even though he's now a dark wizard, Harry never intended to kill any of his former friends.
- Split and Reunion: Subverted. Harry starts as a man with a good heart and great resilience despite the trauma he's endured. After he returns from Limbo the first time, however, he slowly realizes a piece of his soul was removed alongside Voldemort's Horcrux in the process. This renders him immortal and leaves him feeling incomplete and emotionally empty. He tries his hardest for years, eventually dipping into dark magic, to reconstruct his soul. The great tragedy of the story is that he's unable to do so.
- Title Drop:
- By Hermione when suspicious about Harry being The Necromancer.Give me someone who can tell me you weren’t there raising dead things.
- By Lily Potter while in Limbo and repeated by the narrative in the fanfic's very last line.Dead things can't die twice.
- By Hermione when suspicious about Harry being The Necromancer.
- Token Immortal: Harry Potter becomes this after Voldemort's defeat because not only does he become the Master of Death, but also because he died and came back; so he can't die again. This makes him the only immortal character amongst the Golden Trio and the human wizard population in general. It messes up with his head.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: As a result of losing a piece of his soul, Harry can't enjoy life anymore nor adapt and heal from all the hurt he endured during the war. He's also immortal through and through. Easy to see how much his existence sucks. The Deathly Hallows provide some measure of comfort, fitting though not perfectly the hole that bit used to be, but are not enough to prevent him from trying to kill himself several times. Sadly, he already died and dead things can't die twice. Growing more desperate, Harry starts experimenting with soul and death magic in the hopes of finding a solution to his problem.
