this is my first every fanfiction story so please be kind

DISCLAMER: I DO NOT OWN ANYTHING

chapter 1 - in the chamber

Harry climbed through the final part of the passageway leading to the Chamber of Secrets, after this he found himself standing at the end of a very long, dimly lit chamber. Towering stone pillars entwined with more carved serpents rose to support a ceiling lost in darkness, casting long, black shadows through the odd greenish gloom that filled the place. Heart beating fast Harry stood listening to the chilling silence. Where was the basilisk hiding, round the back of a pillar? And where was Ginny?

Keeping his wits about him, Harry pulled out his wand and moved forward between the columns. His eyes were narrowed, ready to shut them at the smallest sign of movement. The snakes on the columns unnerved him as he walked past them. More than once he thought that he saw one of them stir into life from the stone, ready to jump out and attack.

Drawing level with the last set of pillars, he noticed a statue looming into view from the back of the chamber; it stood as high as the chamber itself. Moving his head to look at the face of the giant statue, his face was ancient and had a look of a monkey about it. He had a long beard falling to his feet.

Harry's eyes followed the beard down to the feet of the statue when he could see a figure clad in black with a dot of flaming-red at one end. Eyes widening he started to run towards it, dropping to his knees in front of it.

"Ginny" he called to her, while shaking her. "Ginny – don't be dead – please don't be dead." He flung his wand aside grabbed Ginny's shoulder and turned her face up.

Ginny was pale almost ghost like, transparent .Touching her face softly she was cold as stone, her hair fanned out around her head forming a halo of red. Her eyes were closed so she wasn't petrified or dead at least not by the basilisk.

"Come on Ginny wake up" shaking her again and again all the while muttering to Ginny or himself, he wasn't really sure.

"She won't wake." said a soft voice.

Harry jumped and spun around on his knees.

A tall, black haired boy was leaning against the nearest pillar, watching. He was strangely blurred around the edges, as though Harry were looking at him through a misty window. In addition to this he had a strange glow to him almost angelic. Confused Harry looked from the boy to Ginny for a brief moment until it clicked in his memory, "Riddle, she was the one that raided my dorm, so she had the diary originally. Although that still doesn't answer the question of how and why you are here and why she is- she is"

"Ah, you have a sharper mind than everyone said. No, Ginny is alive but only just. Yes little Ginny did have the diary, she loved me you know, couldn't even live without me for a week." he paused to look with a slightly affectionate look which then turned to disdain.

"You're not a ghost so then what are you?" Harry said in wonder.

"A memory," Said Riddle quietly. "Preserved in her diary for 50 years."

He pointed towards the floor near the statue's giant toes. Lying open there was a little black diary Harry had found in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Harrys mind began racing.

"Interesting isn't it, that you are the one I find down here after you set Hagrid up, oh yes I know about that, then I find you here in the deadly chamber of secrets and you don't even seem to be blinking an eyelid not only to the fact that it exists but also you seem very calm about the fact that the person you have just admitted to talking to is slowly losing her life. You really do seem very calm about all that. CARE TO TELL ME WHY, or is it more likely that you want to tell me that you are in fact Lord Voldemort. Which is it?" Harry said

When Riddle didn't make a move to say anything Harry decided to just leave. Harry, sweating, picked Ginny halfway of the floor before reaching around to pick up his wand again.

But his wand was gone.

Sighing Harry looked at Riddle who at this point was pointing Harry's wand at Harry. "Oh well that's just great." Harry sighed

A small smile curled at the corners of Riddle's mouth. He was staring at Harry, twirling the wand idly.

"So I see we're waiting for the Basilisk to come and kill us." Harry said sighing in defeat before lowering Ginny to the ground before he dropped her on the floor.

"She won't come until she is called, and she won't kill me. I am the heir of Slytherin." said Riddle calmly.

"Well yes I suppose that you won't, considering you're not really alive. That does pose a little bit of an issue for you in the long run though doesn't it?" he said

"Do you know Harry I have always wanted to meet you?" said Riddle "For the chance to talk to you. So I have decided that were going to spend the next few minutes talking," said Riddle smiling broadly, and he put Harry's wand in his pocket.

Harry wasn't too surprised by this. Riddle was probably trying to get Harry not to leave because in reality he wasn't human at the moment. Although, Harry wasn't sure if he could use magic or call forth the basilisk, so he thought that it was better just to go along for the time being. "Right how about you start by telling me why Ginny is currently lying on the floor" he said slowly

"Interesting that you should mention that," Riddle said pleasantly. "And it may take a while to tell you the whole story but I suppose that since this is your best friends little sister you probably would want to know. I suppose the real reason Ginny Weasley's like this is because she opened her heart and spilled all her secrets to an invisible stranger."

"The Diary, yes I already knew she had it get to the point" Harry said irritably

"Not just any diary. My diary, Little Ginny's been writing in it since the end of summer , telling me all of her worries about her brothers teasing her, her mother trying to change her, the embarrassment of coming to school with second hand robes and books, how-" Riddle's eyes glinted "- how she didn't think that the famous nice Harry Potter would ever notice her…"

What was scarier than anything, even the basilisk at the moment, was the look on Riddles face; it showed a kind of demonic hunger in them.

"It is very boring having to listen to the silly little troubles of an eleven year old girl," he went on. "But I was patient. I was sympathetic, I was kind. Ginny really did love me, she said that. No one's ever understood me like you, Tom… I'm so glad I've got this diary to confide in… It's like having a friend I can carry around in my pocket… she was happy to talk to me seeing as Luna was her only friend."

Riddle laughed a cold laugh that didn't suit him, yet at least. It was cruel and it made the hairs stand up on the back of Harry's neck.

"If I do say so myself, I can charm people incredibly well they can't resist for long. Ginny poured her soul out into me and that was exactly what I needed, because right now poor little Ginny is losing her soul. The more problems she poured into me, the more her soul fed into me. I was getting more and more powerful and when I became powerful enough, I started to give a little bit back pouring a bit of my soul into her."

The realisation dawned on him suddenly "You wanted to control her it's the only logical explanation, and she tried to tell me to and I didn't listen. It just proves everything she thought, nobody cared enough to notice."

"Finally he understands," Riddle commented sarcastically "so I suppose you realise now that it was in fact Ginny Weasley that opened that Chamber of Secrets. She strangled the school roosters and daubed threatening messages on the walls. She set the Serpent of Slytherin on four Mudbloods, and the Squib's cat."

"She didn't know what she was doing" Harry whispered.

"Well of course," said Riddle calmly. "well when I say of course she didn't know at first, but she is also a lot smarter than many people give her credit for, at first ooh let me tell you about her entry's, they were far more interesting than later… Dear Tom," he recited, "I think I'm losing my memory. There are rooster feathers all over my robes and I don't know how they got there. Dear Tom, I can't remember what I did on the night of Halloween, but a cat was attacked and I have paint all down my front I think that I might have something to do with the attacks. Dear Tom, Percy is telling me that I am pale and not myself. I think that he might be right. I think he knows the same things that I do… There was another attack today and again I don't know where I was at the time, it is one of the scariest things that has ever happened to me. Tom, I'm almost sure that it's me that's attacking me and do you know what I think I think that you are the reason, I was fine before you came along!"

Harry was fast losing his temper, and his respect for Ginny was rising she went through this entire thing all on her own.

"It was still a long time before she lost all of her trust in me and stopped writing," said Riddle "but she did lose all of her faith and she tried to dispose of the diary. That's where you came in, you found me and I couldn't have been more delighted. I had always wanted to meet you…"

"I suppose being Voldemort and the fact that I sort of killed you or at least the older you, I can imagine you wanting to get your revenge on me." Said Harry, it was taking a lot of restraint not to raise his voice at this moment.

"Ginny told me all about you, Harry," said Riddle. "Your whole fascinating history." His eyes roved over the lightning scar on Harry's forehead, and their expression grew hungrier. "I knew I must find out more about you, talk to you, and meet you if I could. So I decided to show you the capture of that great oaf, Hagrid, to gain your trust-"

Harry interrupted Riddle in the middle of his rant, "Well Tom that didn't work. I guess I'm not as stupid as you think. You framed him took away his chance to be a wizard."

"It was my word against Hagrid's, Harry. Well, you can imagine how it looked to old Armando Dippet. On the one hand, Tom Riddle, poor but brilliant, parentless but so brave, school prefect, model student… on the other hand, big, blundering Hagrid, in trouble every other week, trying to raise werewolf cubs under his bed, sneaking off to the Forbidden Forest to wrestle trolls… but I admit, even I was surprised how well the plan worked. I thought someone must realize that Hagrid couldn't possibly be the Heir of Slytherin. It had taken me five whole years to find out everything I could about the Chamber of Secrets and discover the secret entrance… as though Hagrid had the brains, or the power!"

"Only Dumbledore seemed to think that Hagrid was innocent. He persuaded Dippet to keep Hagrid as the gamekeeper. I think that Dumbledore might have guessed. He never seemed to like me as much as the other teachers did…"

"Well of course he did, he would have seen right through you." Said Harry, through gritted teeth.

"Your right he did keep an annoyingly close watch on me after Hagrid was expelled," said Riddle carelessly. "I knew that I couldn't open the Chamber again while at school, I had nobody to blame. But I wasn't going to waste all the time I spent looking for it. So I left behind a diary keeping my sixteen year old self in its pages, so one day someone like her," he said looking towards Ginny. "Would lead another in my footsteps, and finish Salazar Slytherin's noble work."

"But you gave up on that months ago, I know that, you know that. So you gave up on completing Slytherin's work, what that makes you is a traitor Riddle. Everyone that was petrified will be given the Mandrake Draught." Harry said while staring at Riddle mockingly.

"YOU DARE MOCK ME I only wanted to meet you because soon you will be dead and so will she," pointing to Ginny. "I was so angry with her when the next time after you wrote to me I found that it wasn't you it was Ginny who was writing to me. She saw you with the diary, you see, and panicked. What if you found out how to work it and I repeated all of her secrets to you? What if, even worse, I told you that she was the one that was responsible for attacking not just members of her own house but your and her brother's best friend? So the foolish little brat waited until your dorm was empty and stole it back. But I knew that you were going to figure it out. You were on the trail on the Slytherin's Heir. From what Ginny had told me about you, I knew you would go to any lengths to solve a mystery – particularly if one of your best friends was attacked. And Ginny had told me the whole school didn't trust you because you were a parsletongue…

"So I made Ginny write her own farewell on the wall and come down here to wait. I must admit that she was incredibly strong almost threw me off a few times, but I prevailed in the end I always do. I do wonder though that was with not much life at all in her… she put too much into the diary, into me. She gave me enough to let me leave its pages at last. I was waiting for you to come since we have been down here. I knew you'd come. I have some questions for you, Harry Potter."

"What are those then?" Harry spat, fists still clenched.

"Well," said Riddle, smiling pleasantly, "how is it that a small child with no extraordinary magical talent – managed to defeat the greatest wizard of all time,"

That was the point that Harry interrupted "Albus Dumbledore is the greatest wizard of all time, not you, not Voldemort and definitely not me."

"Let me finish before you talk about your precious leader," Riddle spat. "How is it that you escaped with nothing but a scar while Voldemort lost all of his power?"

There was an odd red gleam in his hungry eyes.

"He died because my mother lost her life. How does it fee knowing that if you hadn't killed my mother you might have been able to kill me?" Harry said pride in his voice.

"You know that I am Voldemort, yet still you stand before me and defy me, mock me, let me tell you something you will die by my hand it doesn't matter about your mother it will be me that kills you." Riddle said forcefully. "I would never have kept the name of my filthy muggle father for the rest of my life. Through my mother's side I have the blood of Salazar Slytherin himself running through my veins, why would I keep the name of someone that left me even before I was born, just because he found out that his wife was a witch? I fashioned myself a new name, a name I knew wizards everywhere would one day fear to speak, when I had become the greatest sorcerer in the world!"

Pity folded through Harry's mind for a moment. An orphan from a young age never loved by anyone. He knew something about that.

"Twice in your past, in my future – we have met. Twice I have failed to kill you. Trust me you will not survive a third time," Harry watched as Riddle walked away from where he had been standing. Fear began to spread through Harry's limbs, watched Riddle stop between the high pillars and look up into the stone face of Slytherin, high above him in the half-darkness. Riddle opened his mouth and hissed, but Harry understood what he was saying…

"Speak to me, Slytherin, greatest of the Hogwarts Four."

Harry stared at the stone statue in horror. Slytherin's gigantic stone face was moving. Harry saw his mouth opening, wider and wider, to make a huge black hole.

Something was stirring inside the statues mouth. Something was slithering up from its depths.

Harry stood staring as he watched the head of a snake the size of a muggle car emerged from the mouth of Salazar Slytherin. The snake moved down, when it hit the floor, the shudder hit Harry. Keeping his eyes fixed on the floor, and then Riddle's hissing voice:

"Kill him"

The basilisk was moving towards Harry. He could hear it. It made a sudden leap towards him. He reacted before he even realised what he was doing. Harry threw his arms in front of his face, in a defensive position.

"Stop" the hissing came out of his mouth, even though he knew that it was futile.

He closed his eyes waiting for the impact he knew was coming. After about 10 seconds of waiting Harry opened his eyes confused as to why he hadn't been killed.

He slowly moved his eyes from his feet towards the stationary shadow a few meters in front of him. The basilisk was frozen a few meters in front of Harry head poised for strike. Riddle was stood staring at the basilisk in a mixture of rage and confusion.

"What are you doing I told you to attack, Kill NOW" Riddle was Hissing so loudly even if you couldn't speak parsletongue you could tell that he was shouting. The basilisk didn't move. Instead it bowed its head to Harry as if in respect. Slowly it began to move towards Harry at a slow speed, and this time he didn't feel the fear that spread through him like last time, he felt a calm comforting feeling spread through him.

The giant snake reached Harry, lowering its head to stroke the side of his face in an affectionate manner. Slowly looking up Harry raised his hand to rub it nose, when he did a light emanated from the point that his hand touched the basilisk's nose, he felt a tingling go up his arm before coiling around his bicep. Keeping one hand on the basilisk he moved his other hand to pull up his sleeve which revealed a green and silver tattoo of the snake in front of him.

"Look at me Harry Potter" the hissing voice made him turn to Riddle for a moment but then he realised that the voice came from a lot closer. Harry moved his eyes to the largest and most feared snake in the world, and then did something that no one had done unless they were forced or had a death wish. He looked into its eyes.

He waited for death to claim him. Chuckling rang in his ears "I'm not going to kill you, master would be very angry if I killed his heir" the snakes mouth wasn't moving but it was still talking "We are now bonded, I cannot hurt you so please don't be afraid of me, I'm Natalia, Salazar Slytherin's familiar and now yours. Are you ready to take down the dark lord?" She was smirking by the end of her little speech.

"What," Harry shouted in his head. "I'm not the Slytherin's heir you're looking for that one over there," he said pointing to Riddle which made Riddle give him a strange look which proved they were speaking in his head "but I suppose if you're on my side we had better take out Riddle and save Ginny, talk will come later"

Natalia nodded her head slightly before speaking "Good you realise that, you were the right person."

Harry ignored that comment, in favour of thinking of a plan to get them all out of here without anyone but Riddle dying. That was when the thought struck him, the diary. "Natalia what about the diary, he said that he preserved himself in his diary so if we destroy the diary he dies, am I right?"

"Correct Harry, what would you have me do?" she asked

"I want you to bite the diary but can you not actually eat it, I need it for something."

Natalia made a disgusted face before answering "I know that's how we have to do it but it's going to taste horrible."

Harry started to laugh at her which earned him a nudge of her head before removing his hand from her head and turning back towards Riddle who while they had been having a rather long conversation had been getting increasingly irritated. When Harry turned to him Riddle was becoming dangerously human looking, losing the glow that was about him because of this Harry could see that his cheeks were getting red, his eyes were narrowed and in Harry's opinion was he ready to explode.

"What the hell have you done Potter?" Riddle snarled

"Nothing yet Riddle. I'm sure that I haven't done anything yet." Harry said smugly

He turned his gaze to Natalia giving her a nod, she slowly moved until Riddle had followed Harry's gaze to her, then she shot forwards towards the diary. By the time Riddle had even realised what was going on Natalia had sunk her teeth into the diary.

Riddle released a long piercing scream; Harry could see ink dripping to the ground from Natalia's mouth, Riddle was writing, twisting and screaming…

And then he was gone.

The chamber was silent for a moment except for the sound of Harry's wand hitting the floor and ink dripping from Natalia's chin. Harry sighed, he walked up to Natalia reached out and rubbed her nose.

Before he could move to Ginny he heard the echoing clap of a single person…

Well that's the first chapter of my story, please R&R

Thanks to my BETA because I suck at spelling you're a real help :P