Chapter Text
“Friends, foes, and followers alike: welcome back to the Chamber of Secrets. And boy, do I have a good one for you today.”
Tom paused, savoring the dramatic tension, and checked his reflection in the full-length mirror behind his tripod: perfect, as usual. He once again wished that he could remove the stifling plastic masquerade mask obscuring the top of his face, but ‘Lord Voldemort’’s YouTube channel had accrued quite a few powerful enemies over the past five years, and it just wasn’t worth it.
Besides, his most consistent supporters—the girls and the gays, to his chagrin—adored the cheap white mask. The red-lined eye holes and impulsively sharpied snake had become iconic to his fans, who called it ‘cunty’ and flocked to costume and craft stores in droves to create their own replicas. Who was he to let them down?
“You all know that this channel is a safe space for equal opportunity hatred. I’m here to bring to light the darkest, dirtiest secrets of the world’s liars, regardless of background or political belief, and you’re here to despise them with me. I think that together, we’ve formed something beautiful, don’t you?”
He pressed a button on his soundboard, and a chorus of “Awwww”s rang out. He gave his trademark sardonic, sarcastic smirk, the one that had so captivated his (nearly) 400,000 followers. Tom’s audience loved him for how he made them feel: smart, witty, and above the fray; so much better than those base, simple humans who plodded dully through life, bogged down by things like caring, and sincerity, and feelings. Tom was a nihilist, and proud of it.
“Today, I have a special treat for you guys. We’re going to be talking about… PerkyPetunia.” He hit another button on his soundboard to call up confused and annoyed “Whaaat?”s.
“I know, I know, you’re probably thinking: ‘Voldy, are you losing your touch? PerkyPetunia has been called out this month already, didn’t you see Granger Nation’s hour long video about all of her plagiarized recipes, and numerous microaggressions towards the queer and disabled communities?’
“Obviously, I did. And as an autistic faggot, I don’t give a single shit about any of that.” He flashed bright white teeth in a charming grin.
“No disrespect to Hermy and her fans, but I’m not retarded enough to care about what somebody as boring as Petunia Dursley thinks about me. It’d honestly be more insulting if that cunt had a positive view of me. But I will credit Granger Nation for putting Perky’s channel on my radar, even if she chose the most lame bullshit to talk about. After finishing her video, I went to check this bitch out for a good laugh, and ended up accidentally noticing something that I found very interesting. I have a feeling that you guys will too.
“Now, stay with me here, because I’m about to say something so outlandish, so absurd, you’ll probably think I’m fucking with you. In fact, I’m waiting until April 2nd to post this, just to make sure you don’t assume I’m joking. I wouldn’t believe this myself, if not for the evidence I’ve seen, but here goes…
“Petunia Dursley has a child slave.” Tom paused to let the words sink in to full effect.
He didn’t actually believe it himself, of course; if he believed every ‘secret’ that his channel ‘exposed’, he’d have a lower IQ than Dudley Dursley.
Petunia most likely had just slipped up a few times when making her content while laborers worked in her home, and Dudley was probably friends with some spineless brown kid who was carefully excluded from any content that his right-wing darling mommy wanted to post. Occam’s razor said it was incredibly unlikely that in 2025, a middle-class family in Surrey was genuinely hiding a child slave.
But Tom’s success wasn’t due to honest, factual journalism. His channel had reached the heights it had thanks to his ability to comb through a digital footprint, cherry-pick what would best fit his story, and piece together an inarguably damning narrative to absolutely destroy his target of choice.
His followers and detractors alike even had a special term for it: if Lord Voldemort picked your channel for a takedown, you had been hit by the Killing Curse, and it was a near guarantee that your career as a content creator was over.
Some called him a soulless monster, heartless, even evil.
Tom slept guilt-free every night. His videos only used publicly available information, and if people didn’t want the content used against them, they shouldn’t have posted it.
“Petunia Dursley has a child slave,” he repeated for emphasis. “A brown one, even, for any retards here who think that makes it worse. You may not believe me, but the facts don’t lie,” he lied, not bothering to hide his smirk.
His fans knew how much Tom enjoyed ripping people to shreds, and they loved him for it, craved it. They had even named themselves Death Eaters, after an early TikTok went viral of a twink proclaiming that “Voldy is vile, but that Fenwick Killing Curse aaaate, left no crumbs,” before unsuccessfully attempting a backflip off a cliff into a lake, hitting the rocky ground instead. Tom would never understand why Regulus Black had posted something so humiliating, but couldn’t deny how fast his following had grown afterwards. He made the teenager one of his Twitch mods for the meme of it all; nobody could say Tom never did nice things. Besides, the poor kid was stuck in a wheelchair now, and he deserved a bit of clout.
“I first noticed him in Perky’s video for Dudley’s birthday, ‘16 for 16’. I watched it, expecting to merely disgust myself with a display of gluttonous excess, as seems fairly typical for any of her content regarding the Dursley men. I’ll admit that I was first toying with the idea of calling her out for her clear misandrist abuse and potential incestual leanings: overfeeding the males in her household so severely and obviously could only be a very slow murder attempt, or a feeder fetish, if not both. But before I could even begin to start forming a case on the behalf of poor Dudley and Vernon, some shocking evidence jumped out to indicate another victim of Petunia’s.
“In the clips on screen now, if you look closely in the red circles, you’ll notice a brown hand reaching from off-camera several times to remove wrapping paper and packaging trash, while Dudley is opening his gifts on the couch. It mostly struck me as funny, at first, imagining the sad little friend of Dudley who was pathetic enough to put up with his racist mommy forcing him out of sight from her videos, so I decided to poke around to see if I spotted him anywhere else. And oh, dearest Death Eaters; spot him I did.
“When you start to look closer at the doorways and windows in the background of Perky’s videos, you’ll soon be amazed that nobody else has called her out on this before: on at least a dozen occasions, pictured now, you can clearly see the same short brown boy passing by in the hallway. And here, it’s a bit blurrier with the glass’s distortion, but you can also see a dark head bobbing up and down outside in the living room window that we know overlooks the flowerbeds, evidently doing the gardening work that Perky brags so much about.
“Hermy did have one good point in her video: those manicured nails that are so prominent in Perky’s videos and Instagram posts could not possibly stay so pristine through the constant gardening, baking and cleaning that she claims to spend her days accomplishing. But Hermy’s wrong about the Dursleys being rich enough to pay for so much hired help. No, the truth is much worse than that: the Dursley family has a child slave.
“Don’t believe me? The finances are simple, as you can see from the numbers on the screen. Even if we assume that Vernon Dursley is somehow secretly an incredibly charming, charismatic and successful salesman, the absolute most that he could be earning currently as a director at Grunnings would still be just barely enough to cover tuition at Smelting’s and the average expenses of his household. Even if we assume that most of Perky’s new clothing, makeup, appliances and decorations are gifts from sponsors—something I highly doubt, as she makes half a dozen boasting posts any time a company is stupid enough to send her something—it still wouldn’t be enough to hire a regular gardener, chef or housekeeper, let alone all three.”
Tom felt no guilt about misleading his audience here. If they were stupid enough to forget about PerkyPetunia’s earnings from YouTube, TikTok, and frequent advertisements, that was their own fault. He was well aware that the Dursleys likely had more than enough money to pay for a couple of illegals to come garden, cook, and clean a few times a week, with Petunia legitimately doing some of the additional work herself… but nobody wanted to imagine such a boring explanation. Not when Tom was providing them with such a salacious one instead.
“I know my hypothesis sounds wild, but I challenge anyone to disagree with me: you can’t deny that the evidence adds up perfectly. We all can admit that this woman shows us some beautiful flowers, a sparkling home, and delicious looking meals. But can you really imagine the woman you’re looking at now, crouched down in the dirt and yanking weeds, with the store tags still visible on those unwrinkled gardening gloves? Can you picture her kneeling in one of those carefully ironed dresses to scrub a toilet? Do you really believe that those delicately painted nails and twiggy arms can pound and knead dough into those gorgeous Dutch loaves? I don’t know about you, but I can’t.
“Still not sure? Feel free to go investigate the videos and Instagram posts for yourselves. My description has time-stamps with the links to each referenced video or Instagram post, and I encourage any doubters to look into it further. I spent less than a week gathering clips for this video, and I don’t doubt that my Death Eaters will go and dig up even more proof of the child slave once this is live– assuming Perky doesn’t private everything immediately. But in case you’re not already convinced, I’ve saved the best for last.”
Tom leaned forward, clasping his hands and staring into the camera. He gave a long, slow blink, knowing this moment was sure to be gif’d. He’d spent an extra half hour perfecting his makeup before this video, aware that it was bound to be an instant classic. His darkly lined eyes with their perfectly curled and blackened lashes were the object of lust and envy of the entire internet, and he reveled in receiving their worship.
“How do you explain the glasses?” He paused, knowing that a supercut would now be rapidly flashing the 85 images he’d compiled of the ugly, taped-together cheap spectacles, found in the background of videos over the entire decade-long course of her channel, and on Petunia’s and Dudley’s Instagrams.
“Neither Petunia, nor Vernon, nor Dudley Dursley have ever worn glasses in her channel’s history. Yet over the past ten years, you can find countless instances of this exact busted pair being left in view on a counter or table. They often disappear by the end of the video, and occasionally are even seen directly snatched off-screen by a brown hand.
“How the hell do you explain the glasses– especially being in such poor condition?
“Perky Petunia has been sneered at by the online homemaking community for years, for proudly throwing away clothing as soon as it has the slightest rip or stain. Do you really believe she would let anybody in her household wear something like this? That is… anybody, except for her illegal imported child slave? I’ll let you be the judge.” He tilted his head and raised his eyebrows, holding the pose for several seconds before straightening again to sign off, trusting his editor to fix any awkward timing in post.
“I adore you freaks, and sincerely hope that you had a wonderfully terrible time watching this video! Give it a like if you think that Saggy Slaveowner would be a better channel name for her than PerkyPetunia. Don’t forget, you can catch me on Twitch every Sunday, and follow me on Instagram and X at TheDarkestLord. Until next time!
“Oh, and Petunia Dursley…? Avada Kedavra!” He smiled warmly, giving a humanizing chuckle as he signed off with his signature catch phrase (a beloved classic, after he drunkenly slurred Abracadabra on Twitch when celebrating one of his earliest online victories: running Bertha Jorkins off the internet entirely). He turned off his camera, and gave a sigh of satisfaction.
Tom truly did adore his Death Eaters for loving him so fiercely, so much that even his embarrassments became inside jokes and rallying cries. His appreciation was mixed with a healthy dose of contempt, sure, but he couldn’t deny how much his rabid fanbase had directly improved his quality of life with their Patreon support and merch purchases, and he wasn’t nearly proud enough to stop catering to them.
He had seen how badly so many other men online had squandered their accidentally earned support of ‘the girls and the gays’, and Tom refused to let go of such a goldmine. He had long ago realized that as long as he claimed to be part of the ‘community’ himself, they would stick with him through anything. Tom had done much worse things in his life than this form of virtual gay for pay, and felt entirely comfortable carrying out the deception.
He smiled, anticipating his upcoming success. This video was sure to be an instant hit, especially targeting somebody as inherently hateable as PerkyPetunia: the libtards despised her for her tradwife content, the tradwives despised her for presenting an unrealistically polished and perfect life, men despised her for being such an ugly and uptight cunt, health bloggers despised her for pushing her family further into morbid obesity, plus-size bloggers despised her for her judgemental comments about it…
There were infinite reasons to think she was awful, and every demographic would hate her even more now for owning a child slave. Nobody would look hard enough to confirm or care that the supposed slave was really just a dishonest amalgamation of one or two of Dudley’s childhood friends, and some undocumented workers doing paid jobs. His story was so scandalous that even when Petunia inevitably brought out the receipts and proof that it wasn’t true, her reputation would likely never recover.
He sent the footage off to Barty, along with his accrued clips, screenshots, and notes detailing the composition he expected for the video. His editor was a bit of a whack-job, but had more than earned his trust over the three violent and bloody years shared in a group home in their late teens. Tom trusted nobody else in the world to stay as utterly loyal as Barty was, and the former gang leader was well-equipped to manage Lord Voldemort’s dedicated team of Twitch, Reddit and Discord mods. The small group of fanatic creeps that the two had affectionately named the Inner Circle often spear-headed campaigns of their own volition against Tom’s targets, proudly keeping track of their victories in their private server, and Barty made sure the trails were never obvious enough to lead back to Tom directly. It was a beautiful system.
He felt a small, rare pang of sympathy for whatever poor brown kid hung out with Dudley Dursley, knowing he’d surely get the brunt of Petunia’s wrath once Tom’s video dropped, but shrugged it away quickly. The self-hating loser deserved it for hanging around Dudley for so many years, and the controversy would probably be a blessing in disguise for the teen. Hell, if he reached out, Tom would even let him be a guest on his stream.
He switched over to Fortnite, all thoughts of PerkyPetunia blissfully fading as he loaded up his Sabrina Carpenter skin, ready for some simple scamming pleasure. Men loved to flirt with him on voice chat and drop items if he put the slightest effort into acting like he was just some brainless chick, and there was little in life that brought him greater joy. He’d never get tired of the rush of a deep voice calling him ‘baby’ and letting him steal their most precious weapons; if he were actually a faggot in real life, his type would probably be a stupid, doting himbo. It was almost a bummer that he’d end up with some hot but irritating chick someday.
Tom wrinkled his nose at the thought, and switched his attention over to the game as the countdown started. Male voices crackled to life over his headset, and he grinned at the palpable surge of dopamine. Tom sank into the world on his monitor, and gladly let the rest of life slip away.
StrangeTrixie: voldyyyyyy. ur not gonna fucking believe this shit.
StrangeTrixie: voldyyyyyy @LordVoldemort im actually serious, u gotta check this out.
StrangeTrixie: voldemort
StrangeTrixie: voldemort
StrangeTrixie: oh voldyvoldyvoldyvoldemort
StrangeTrixie: @CrouchingLiger can you call him or something, im not fucking around this time, he’s gonna wanna see this asap
LordVoldemort: What.
StrangeTrixie: perkycunt responded, she just posted a video 8 minutes ago
LordVoldemort: Idc
LordVoldemort: Next time you ping me, especially for something so retarded, I’m kicking you from the server. Who gives a fuck.
StrangeTrixie: the child slave is in the video
LordVoldemort: What??
LordVoldemort: I’ll be back later. Don’t ping me again.
Tom shook his head in disbelief, pulling up YouTube. Sure enough, PerkyPetunia’s channel had a new video, posted only 11 minutes ago, with less than a hundred views: “Harry Is Not A Secret”.
In the thumbnail, a solemn-faced Petunia sat next to a slender, brown-skinned boy with atrocious dark hair, wearing the now-infamous round black glasses. Tom’s brows raised against his will; he hadn’t actually considered that there might have been some genuine truth to his outlandish claims.
Over the past week, his latest Chamber of Secrets video had gone just as viral as he had predicted, and brought an absolutely massive backlash against PerkyPetunia and the entire Dursley family. She lost nearly 60,000 subscribers on YouTube, was forced to disable comments on all platforms, and her follower count on Instagram had just dropped below 1 million the night before. The child slave story had been picked up by Buzzfeed, The Cut, and even The Daily Mail, and Barty verified that Vernon Dursley was quietly let go from Grunnings. The Killing Curse had struck again.
He clicked on the video, curiosity rising over the contents despite himself. It opened in the Dursley’s familiar, sparkling-white kitchen, with bright natural light shining in from the windows to illuminate the two figures seated at the table. Petunia’s hair hung loose around her shoulders, rather than in its typical tight ballerina bun, and she wore an uncharacteristically wrinkled light pink blouse that clashed horribly with her complexion. Tom found the attempt at a more humanized and relatable persona far too transparent, and expected the rest of the internet to feel similarly.
The boy next to her practically radiated shyness and insecurity; though Tom would usually have been repulsed by this, something about the fidgeting, coltish teen was oddly captivating, and he couldn’t help but lean towards his screen for a closer view. In contrast to Petunia, he wore a starched white button down, so crisp and neat that Tom wouldn’t be surprised if it had never been worn before. It was a bit too large for his slight frame, hanging off his shoulders, and he mindlessly fingered the buttons on his sleeves, glancing sideways at Petunia before shifting startling green eyes up to the camera. The boy swallowed and licked his lips as Petunia began to speak, face shifting into a carefully blank mask that Tom recognized far too well from his days in foster care.
This situation was much, much more interesting than he had suspected.
“Good morning, YouTube,” she said, and let out a long, clearly forced sigh. “You’ll notice I’m skipping my usual intro today– that’s because this isn’t one of my usual videos. My apologies to everybody anticipating another one of my fun lifestyle videos, but unfortunately, one wretched, lying degenerate is forcing my hand.
“I am deeply upset to be pressured into revealing private, personal information about one of my dear family members-” Tom noticed that the teenager’s mouth gave a miniscule upward twist at this, before immediately snapping back into its composed neutral set, “-but as this vicious misinformation has had real life impacts on every member of my household, I will do whatever I must to protect us.
“Many of you have been following me for a long time, and you know just how dedicated I am to making a comfortable, beautiful home for my family. Today, I proudly present you with the fourth, previously unfilmed member of this family: Harry Dursley.” Harry gave the slightest flinch when she said the name, eyes widening and flicking towards Petunia, before he stilled again, even more than before. Tom laughed aloud; if this was Petunia’s best attempt to assure the world that there was nothing untoward happening in her household, it was a pretty pathetic one.
“Harry is my nephew, and has lived with us for most of his life, due to personal circumstances. He has requested to stay out of sight-” another flinch, “-of the public eye, which I have respected for many years. Unfortunately, one particularly nasty troll has left us no choice but to disregard Harry’s boundaries, and expose him to the vitriolic internet from which he had desperately wished to remain far away. Mister Voldamore, I hope you’re happy with yourself: your lies have stolen a young boy’s peace and privacy for good.
“I ask that you all please respect Harry’s wishes going forward, and cease this harassment of our family at once. This is a very difficult time for us, and I would like the public to be aware that we are currently consulting with lawyers. I highly recommend leaving the Dursley family in peace, not just for our well-being, but your own.
“Now, Harry darling, would you like to say anything to YouTube?” Petunia turned with a pleasant smile and steely eyes, and Harry swallowed hard. He nodded, and offered a weak smile to the camera, expression still tight and strained.
“Um, hi Youtube.” His quiet voice was rough, and he cleared his throat before continuing, thickly-lashed eyes darting to his aunt before fixing on a point somewhere behind the camera. “I’m Harry. I appreciate your concern for my well-being, but I am a happy and well-loved member of the Dursley family. It is my own choice to stay off-camera, and I ask that you please respect my wishes in this regard, and leave my family and I alone. Thank you.” He smiled blankly again, eyes dull, and visibly stiffened when Petunia patted his shoulder firmly and awkwardly. Tom was reminded of watching an old foster sister who had never pet a dog before, but still tried her best to convince a new boyfriend that she loved them.
“There you have it,” she said, voice unnaturally bright. “No great secret to be revealed, just an honest, loving family that has become the target of a lynch mob.” Tom barked out a laugh, anticipating the Granger Nation call-out that was sure to follow over her use of that particular term. The bitch was massively annoying, but he couldn’t deny her talent for whipping her followers into a frenzy that nearly rivaled Tom’s own when she put her mind to it.
(Both creators steadfastly ignored the large overlap in their fan bases, resolutely refusing to acknowledge that so many of their dedicated subscribers also loved a YouTuber with such a diametrically opposed viewpoint to their own. They had a somewhat bitter, unspoken truce to never truly attack each other with anything more serious than snarky snipes at each other in their videos, to the absolute delight of the subsection of girls and gays who had christened them 'Internet Mommy and Daddy')
“Thank you so much for watching. Please like, subscribe, and share this video to help restore my family’s damaged reputation. I’ll be back with your regular home and garden content next week. Until then, have a perky day!” Her clenched-teeth closing smile was closer to a sneer, and Harry’s lips twitched again before the video cut to black, ending abruptly.
Tom tapped his fingers on his desk, considering. Then, going off instinct, he swiped on some mascara, grabbed his Lord Voldemort mask, and opened his computer’s camera. He downloaded PerkyPetunia’s video in case it was deleted later, and started his own, trusting his gut and not bothering to form a mental draft of a script.
“Hey there, friends, followers and foes; Lord Voldemort here, with a response for PerkyPetunia’s fresh video, posted just twenty minutes ago. I’m here with no edits, no script: just an innocent boy, with a simple question.
“Who the hell do you think you’re fooling?” He let out a snort, mildly embarrassed at the indignity but knowing the Death Eaters would, well, eat it up. “If you’re trying to convince the world that you don’t own a child slave, you probably should’ve hired a better actor to play the part. I’ve literally seen happier prisoners in Al Qaeda hostage videos. Seriously, what the fuck have you done to that kid?
“Harry, if you need help, let me know. I won’t even charge… not money, at least.” He gave a flirtatious, over the top wink and smirk to the camera, playing up the role of the handsome gay Disney villain that the internet loved so much from him. Absolutely ridiculous that they let faggots get away with sexual harrassment like this, when he’d be cancelled in a heartbeat if making similar remarks about any femoid, let alone an underage one. Though, he had to admit, if he had been gay, a skinny, wide-eyed twink like Harry would have probably been right up his alley.
“But really, kid,” he continued, serious again, somewhat surprised at the words coming out of his mouth. “It’s clear that you’re not okay– whatever’s really going on in that house, I hope you’re able to get the hell out of there, and soon. Can’t believe I’m about to say something this fucking gay, but it really does get better. Good luck.”
He ended the video, saved it, and without sending it to Barty for edits or even watching it back once himself, posted it on his main channel. It only took a second for him to come up with a title. “Hang in there Harry– just not with a noose, please.”
Proud of himself for completing his good deed of the year, he clicked over to the gay section of Pornhub, scrolling until he found a promising video with a couple of slender, dark haired young men, one white and one brown. He unzipped his jeans with a content sigh, mildly surprised to find himself already half erect before the page had even finished loading.
(All of the women in porn videos were ugly or clearly not enjoying themselves; only a gay man would be able to get off to that shit. Tom was comfortable enough in his heterosexuality to let himself watch only the most authentic and hot pornography on the internet, which happened to mostly exclusively involve men. It wasn’t all that surprising, if you really thought about it: men were more comfortable in their sexuality, and it only made sense that they would make the best porn.)
In only a few minutes, Tom’s release came fast and hard, rising unexpectedly as he watched one dark-haired twink pound the other. He groaned aloud as he spurted on his stomach, absent-mindedly wishing all the while that the darker actor had green eyes.
After a few minutes' rest, he cleaned himself up and moved on to researching his next video. The famously private and wealthy Longbottoms must have some secrets to expose, and he threw himself into scouring their profiles’ tagged photos for any hints of impropriety. Harry Dursley had left his mind just as quickly as he had entered it.
Tom genuinely believed that was the end of it. He didn’t spare Harry any further thought for the rest of the day, and if it weren’t for Barty messaging him later that weekend, he very possibly never would have again.
CrouchingLiger: hey tom - checked through lord voldy’s junk mail, and found something that you’ll probably want to see for yourself. might be nothing, but also might not…