Paved with good intentions

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Summary: The way to hell is paved with good intentions. Or: "How Albus Dumbledore tried to send Tom Riddle to Hell but ended up being put there himself"-A drabble.

Warning: If you read the summary, you'll know that this contains Dumbledore bashing.

AN: I little amusing thought I had this morning which I decided to share with you. Enjoy.

-~-~- Paved with good intentions -~-~-

-~-~-by StillWatersAreDeep-~-~-

It was a usual working day for her. Since the beginning of time or more specifically death, she had been one of the spirits who decided where the ghosts of the death would dwell for the rest of eternity. And today she was met with two ghosts at once, who waited in front of her desk to get assigned to a place in the afterlife.

One of them was an old man with twinkling blue eyes and a long white beard, wearing colourful, eye-blinding robes. A wizard, she correctly guessed.

The second man, was standing by the other end of her table, looking rather annoyed. It was obvious that he didn't want to be in the present of the old wizard. He looked to be in his mid-forties, with his wavy, black hair getting its first grey strands. But at least this one knows how to dress without giving everyone looking at him eye cancer, the spirit thought, as she looked at his elegant dark green robes with silver trimming.

Wanting to get the pair done, seeing as other ghosts were already waiting in line to get assigned to a place, she asked out loud, "So, where should I place you two?"

"Tom obviously belongs into Hell," the older wizard immediately answered in a voice which didn't tolerate any disagreement.

"And why is that?" the spirit asked, curious.

"For one, he murdered his own family," the white-haired wizard argued, pointing an accusing finger at Tom.

"If I'm not mistaken, Albus," the dark haired wizard spoke up, "you killed your own sister. So we're even on that point," he said with his arms crossed, showing his boredom.

"Second," the man named Albus continued as if he hadn't been interrupted. "He's a power-hungry bastard."

"And having been the master of the Elder Wand, wanting to collect all three Hollows doesn't make you a power-hungry old man?" Tom asked rhetorically, racing an eyebrow in challenge. "Besides, my parents were married. So technically I'm not a bastard."

"Third," the older wizard gritted out between his teeth, starting to get annoyed by Tom's comebacks. "He tried to become immortal by creating Horcruxes."

"While you had your monthly doses of the Elixir of Life," Tom said in a bored voice. Dumbledore was making this far too easy for him.

"You," Dumbledore began, but stopped himself just in time. He was sure that if he mentioned 'killing innocent people', Tom would once again bring up his sister Ariana. So instead he said, "You torture your own followers!"

"At least I do it myself and don't try to hide it," Tom Riddle said. "But you, the 'oh so great Albus Dumbledore'," he said mockingly, "You instead prefer to torture your followers indirectly. Sending dear Severus to me to get Crusioed, sending Black to Azkaban without a trial to get daily visits from Dementors, sending Harry Potter to his magic-hating relatives to get starved and bullied," Tom counted, only naming some examples.

"You...you," Dumbledore stammered, speechless. "You don't know love," Albus finally accused when he got his bearings back.

"Really?" the wizard previous feared under the name of Lord Voldemort asked in challenge. "I would say that I had enough fatherly love for Severus to ask his annoying love-of-his-life thrice, TRICE, Albus!," he stressed. "To step aside so that I may spare her."

"You didn't do it out of love," Dumbledore answered.

"And what else, pray tell, should motivate an insane dark lord to ask a woman thrice to step aside besides love in some form or another? Honouring the promise I gave Severus?" he asked with a raised eyebrow. "Asking once would have been enough. Besides, it wasn't like anyone was there to check if I held up my end of the bargain," Tom answered his own question, making a dismissive gesture with his hands. And after a short pause he added, "However, I don't see how the lack of love should make one a candidate for Hell."

"You burdened young Draco Malfoy with an impossible task when you ordered him to kill me," Dumbledore said to change the topic, seeing as he wouldn't get his way with talking about love.

"And forcing Potter to protect the Philopher's Stone, to kill a Basilisk and to hunt down and destroy my Horcruxes before he even finished his NEWTs was just a walk in the park?" Tom asked.

Suddenly struck by a new idea induced by Tom's latest argument, Dumbledore said, "You endangered the pupils of Hogwarts by letting a Basilisk roam freely through the halls." Believing that he finally had found something to which Tom had nothing to counter with, the old man's blue eyes were twinkling with happiness, satisfaction and accomplishment.

Tom had to say that this accusation was much harder to counter than the previous ones. There was the incident with the Dementors which nearly killed Potter in his third year. But the blame laid more with the Ministry than with the old fool. Which reminded him...

"Wasn't it three, or in your case two, years ago that you let a pink toad freely roam through Hogwarts, endangering students and teachers alike?" he asked. As far as he was concerned, Dolores Umbridge counted as a creature as she was even less human than he.

"You stole Hufflepuff's cup from Mrs Smith," Albus pointed out, not able to come up with a better crime after Tom found a comeback to the Basilisk.

"Didn't you in turn steal the Gaunt's ring from me?" Tom asked, inspecting his nails in boredom.

"I didn't steal it. I just found it lying in an abandoned house," Dumbledore uselessly tried to defend his action.

"And there were no wards in place to keep stealing people like you out of it," Tom pointed out offhandedly.

"And Gringotts doesn't have wards to keep burglars away?" Dumbledore countered, referring to Tom's break in in 1991.

"They have," Tom admitted with a smirk, cleaning his fingernails. "But apparently they were too powerful for you, so you had to send Potter to do the dirty work for you." Tom's smirk grew when he saw Albus' bewildered face.

"You forced Harry into competing in the Triwizard tournament," Dumbledore stated. He was starting to run out of accusing things to say.

"And you helped plan the thing in the first place. Without you, Barty would never have gotten the opportunity to trick the goblet into choosing Potter as a champion," was Tom's answer. He even went so far as to give Albus a mocking 'Thank you'-bow.

"You possess people," Dumbledore accused, referring to Quirrell.

"You meddle with time," was Tom's answer, remembering the story Severus had told him about how Sirius Black had escaped with the help of a time-turner.

"That's something completely different," Albus argued.

As amusing as it was to listen to the two of them arguing back and forth with Tom throwing every argument back at the older wizard, the spirit still had a job to do and other ghosts to place. Besides, Albus' accusations were getting boring and their argument was starting to turn childish. Therefore, she thought that it was time to stop their little 'talk'.

"Thank you for your well-founded argumentation, Albus" the spirit said in a tone that made it clear that she didn't want either of them to interrupt her.

"As you two have so nicely pointed out, the crimes you both have committed during your lives only leaves me with one option. I'll send the both of you straight to Hell. Have a nice stay," she said with a friendly smile and with that both ghosts were instantly transported to their newly assigned place in the afterlife. Though, luckily for the other occupants of Hell, they were placed at different ends of Hell, otherwise they wouldn't stop arguing until the end of eternity.

AN2: I hope you enjoyed this little drabble and had a laugh or two. If I forget an important point in their argument, feel free to leave me a review.