He woke too an unfamiliar surrounding. A bedroom he realised, an unfamiliar bedroom. White walls, a grey carpet on the floor. A window with bars in front. An open door looked like it led to a bathroom. Besides the bed there was a dresser, an armchair, a desk with a chair in front and a nightstand beside the bed. Also at trunk in at the foot of the bed he realised as he sat up. No wand on the nightstand he noticed.

His head hurt like hell and he slowly lifted his hand to touch it, only to yank it away quickly as his hand came in contact with hair. Hair? What in Merlins´ name was going on? He looked at his hand. It was younger, healthier and normal looking. Unsure he looked at the other one that was identical. Something was really wrong.

Slowly he made his way out of the bed. He was dressed in dark pants and a dark t-shirt, barefoot. He was quite sure he didn´t own any clothes like the ones he was currently wearing.

He tried to remember, but his memory was fussy at best.

He swayed as he stood and had to support himself against the foot of the bed until he was sure he could stand on his own. Carefully he wandered over to the door. It was of course locked. Well, seeing as no one would dare to lock him in a bedroom in his own house, he could be pretty sure he wasn´t at home.

That meant someone had somehow captured him, not that he could remember being captured. He could even remember anything about the last few hours. He did remember having a meeting. Had he gone to the meeting? Hadn´t someone gone with him? Snape of course! Snape had gone with him. Was this Snape´s doing? In which case the damn spy would pay. Still he couldn´t remember Snape attacking him. And he was pretty sure he would have been more than capable to ward of an attack from the professor and kill him.

If the Light had captured him then he should have been in Azkaban, being interrogated. And waiting for his followers to break him out.

Irritated he raised his hand towards the lock and muttered an unlock spell under his breath. He couldn´t do advanced magic without his wand, but a few simple spells he could easily manage. The unlocking spell was one of them, which came in hand when people thought if they took away your wand and locked you up then you couldn´t get out.

The moment he felt the magic in his body activate, he also felt like he got slammed against a brick wall. The pain was overwhelming. It felt like his whole body was in flames. He took a couple of steps back, hit the bed, and sank to the floor beside it in pain. He gasped and tried to breath through it. What the hell had happened? The pain was blinding and he could feel tears forming in his eyes. He curled in on himself and concentrated on breathing. In, hold, out, repeat. The pain didn´t lessen, if anything it became worse. He wanted to scream. It felt too much like the night when he had tried to kill he Potter brat and had been ripped from his body.

He was still trying to get his body under control and did not notice the person entering the room. The pain swept through his body like tide waves with few seconds in between, each one stronger than the previous one.

Then he suddenly felt a hand on his neck.

"Easy, Tom, easy." Then he heard a spell being uttered but couldn´t grasp the words. The pain lessened immediately.

He gasped, and sputtered, but stayed kneeling on the floor next to the bed. He closed his eyes. The hand disappeared.

He had recognised the voice. He also suddenly knew exactly where he was. The feeling of the castle was unmistakeable. How in the world of merlin had he arrived here?

"What have you done you old fool?" He snarled, not opening his eyes. The moment the words left his mouth he felt a sting, like being hit with a stinging hex and an overwhelming feeling to apologise for the rudeness of his question. Confused over the feeling he ignored it. He opened his eyes and looked over the bed towards the armchair.

The older wizard smiled towards him, folding his hands in his lap. No wand in sight.

"I assume you have a lot of questions, Tom"

Riddle considered reminding the man that his name wasn´t Tom, but was pretty sure it would be a waste of breath. He was also pretty sure he actually looked like Tom at the moment, even though he hadn´t looked in a mirror yet. How that was he didn´t know, but he assumed the man in front of him was somehow responsible. The question was why Dumbledore suddenly felt the need to make him look more human. Not that he necessarily complained, he had never liked the body Wormtail had manage to produce for him, but had not bothered to try and find a way to fix it.

He didn´t answer, only waited for Dumbledore to continue. The pain was also almost gone, just a few strains of it lingering in his body. He felt exhausted after the ordeal, and as much as he hated kneeling on the floor with Dumbledore sitting on the other side of the bed, he couldn´t find the energy to stand.

With a sigh he dragged a hand over his face, noting the fact that he actually had a nose, and though his hair.

"I´m at Hogwarts I presume?" he finally asked, breaking the silence.

"Yes."

"Why?"

He looked over at Dumbledore and saw the damn twinkles in the older mans eyes.

"Why what?"

Riddle sighed again. He really wanted to kill the old fool. Perhaps he could strangle him? Or beat him to death before the Headmaster managed to get to his wand? On the other hand, he could barely stand at the moment so he doubted he would be a match for Dumbledore in this condition.

"Why am I at Hogwarts?"

"You were brought here."

Oh for the love of everything holly, what was this – playing 20 questions? He snarled and instantly regretted it when a pain flashed through his head. Confused he looked at Dumbledore but couldn´t se the man holding a wand.

"You do realise you are putting the whole school in danger by having me here?" he demanded to know. "My followers will attack this school to bring me back."

"Perhaps," Dumbledore seemed to concede.

Something was very, very wrong here, Riddle thought. For the first time in as long as he could remember he felt a stab of fear. Speaking of emotions, he suddenly thought, why was he feeling anything? He couldn´t remember feeling anything but hunger for power and bloodlust since he came back. What the hell had the bloody old fool managed to do this time?

"Why am I still alive? Why haven´t you had the Potter brat kill me?"

Dumbledore actually smiled sadly this time to Riddles annoyance.

"If it had been possible to kill you, Tom, we might have considered the option. I know about the Horcruxes you have made. We haven´t found all of them, so killing you at the moment is not an option."

"How, what…" Riddle closed his mouth and swore loudly inside his own head. How the hell had the man managed to find out about those?

"I assume you tried to open the door with wandless magic?" the old wizard asked.

Riddle glared. What kind of hex had the man placed on the door? It had hurt like nothing he had experienced before, except from when he was torn from his body after trying to kill the Potter boy.

"I would refrain from trying to do so again if I were you," Dumbledore said and rose. He smooted his robes and walked towards the door. "I´ll be back later."

"Wait," Riddle snapped, and winced as pain flash through his mind. What was going on? "How did I end up here?"

Dumbledore had reached the door and opened it. He smiled towards Riddle and answered before leaving, "You got shot Tom, by a muggle gun. One, bullet I think Harry called it, to the shoulder and one grazed your head, rendering you unconscious."