Chapter 12 - Of the Chamber of Secrets
"You can observe a lot by watching." Yogi Berra
Remus walked up to the hospital wing to see Killian. Killian had been unconscious since the Hogsmeade attack nearly thee weeks and had only woken earlier that afternoon. Everyone had been concerned, but as Madam Pomfrey had examined her and told them nothing was physically wrong with her apart from exhaustion she only had to sleep off the effect of the dementors.
Whilst Killian was recovering on the hospital wing, everything went on as normal at the school. The villagers, once ensured that Hogsmeade was dementor free after the Unspeakables took the rotted creatures cloaks away, went back and tidied up and re-opened their business; many setting extra wards and as many safety features as possible to prevent something like that happening again. They also know that there was a route through the Shrieking Shack through to the school should they ever need it, which Dumbledore had put on extra ward on himself, along with a few Weasley products that would stop anyone from gaining access without permission.
The students who had stayed behind to help by casting their Patronus had spent a full night in the hospital wing at the Matron's order stuffing themselves sick with chocolate had recovered without any undue effect, and had, rather resiliently, carried on with their normal routines, including the Gryffindor vs. Slytherin quidditch match. Classes and had continued as normal, mostly, with the other Defence teachers taking over Killian's classes while she recovered.
Nicolas and Perenelle had been especially worried about Killian, it wasn't unusual to see one or the other at her bedside. Gallagher was also a frequent visitor. It was a relief to finally hear that she had woken up.
Lost in his own thoughts it took him a while to realise he was hearing loud voices as he stepped closer to the hospital wing. Well it was only one loud voice, but it couldn't be who he thought it would be. It couldn't be. He quickened his footsteps and walked into the hospital wing, the door slamming behind him with a resounding bang.
Startled, the occupants looked around to see who the intruder was, but Remus only concentrated his eyes on one person.
"Sirius?" He wasn't sure what he was feeling.
"Remus, old friend," Sirius smiled bitterly.
"Sirius!" he said and walked quickly over to him, not knowing where to start. They embraced and he though back to where when he'd seen Sirius after 12 years in the Shrieking Shack.
Harry and his friends walked into the Great Hall Friday morning; around them many students were debating the important announcement would be that they all had to attend at breakfast.
"Maybe Snape's getting sacked," was Ron's hopeful guess.
"You wish," Ginny said.
"I've been wishing that since first year," Ron said glumly.
Harry and Neville laughed. Hermione only cracked a smile. Harry sat down amused, eating at his normal pace as Ron wolfed down his food as if the house elves would vanish it before he'd had his fill. He was probably the only student who had any idea what the announcement would be.
Once all the plates had been cleared away, most of the students having finished long ago, waiting only on the teachers, who Harry knew were deliberately taking their time of the smirks on the faces on Tonks and Gallagher were anything to by, Dumbledore and Moody stood up to address everyone.
"May I have your attention please?" Dumbledore said, rather needlessly as most of the Great Hall had sat there impatiently. "The defence professors, along with a few members of staff have come up with a task, of sorts, for all of you to participate in. Rest assured that this is completely voluntary and there is no pressure to take part if it isn't your wish to do so."
Dumbledore sat down leaving everyone's attention to Moody.
"I can you're all jumping in your seats wondering what the task is. Well, I'm not going to keep you in suspense much longer. You have all heard of the Chamber of Secrets. We have among us three people who have been down to the Chambers" at this everyone looked in the direction of Harry, Ron and Ginny, "and we are all going to go down to the Chamber of Secrets together; thanks to our resident parselmouth."
"Tomorrow morning at 10am you are all going to come down to the Great Hall and we are take the trip down in groups. Like the Headmaster said, this is completely voluntary. But those of you who do go down will receive extra credit for Defence, Care of Magical Creatures and also Potions. You will be supervised by many teachers, including Head of House and we be spending the majority of the day inside. We are not simply going to down there to have tea and biscuits. We are going down there to do some work. Inside the Chamber the corpse of the basilisk still resides. If you are going to join us in the chamber, you will be expected to help the professors harvest parts of the creature and help clean the chamber in general. We are going to go down the unearth all of its secrets; not for the faint hearted. Aurors from the Ministry will also turn up at some point to help.
"So tomorrow you will all come to the Great Hall wearing your sports kit that you wear for Professor Killian's lessons and with your dragon hide gloves and of course armed with your wands. No robes or lose clothing. No jewellery including watches, for safety reason. We don't know what we're going to find down there apart from a dead serpent and we rather err on the side of caution. The Chamber is still a dangerous place and we will need to be careful.
"Well then, off you go to your lessons then. Any classes who have Professor Killian today will remember that the lessons are still cancelled. Use the time to practice your cleaning spells and anything that you think will help you down the in the Chambers. All lessons will be centred to helping you with whatever charms and spells we think will be most useful to you. Oh, and will be fourth years and above only. That is all," he dismissed them.
The noise after he was done speaking was deafening. Everyone talked excitedly about going to see the Chamber of Secrets; looking over at the Slytherins who seemed the most enthusiastic about going down their historical mentors secret lair. The younger years complaining that they wouldn't get the chance to go down.
Harry and Ron were immediately crowded by students from other houses as well as their own, asking why he never mentioned it.
Harry didn't think anyone was going to be paying much attention in classes today.
McGonagall and Flitwick diligently prepared them teaching the different kinds of cleaning spells and charms for repelling odd creatures such as spiders and other creepy crawlies. Ron especially made sure to learn these, lest any spiders dared go near him.
Ginny, out of all the excited students, was the only one who was subdued. Harry understood why, the Chamber of Secrets probably featured in her nightmares. But he didn't know how to broach the subject and thought the best he could do was leave her alone to work out her feelings the best she could. Besides, there was nothing he could say that Hermione hadn't already tried.
Early Saturday morning after Harry and his friends (minus Ron, Hermione and Ginny) came back from their morning run to the Common Room fuller than usual at that time of the morning. Everyone was already dressed in their sports kit, waving their wands to get their last minute spell casting. Harry and the others headed up to get showered and dressed, and then walked down together to get some breakfast.
Everyone had eaten quickly, more looking forward to visiting the Chamber than lingering over breakfast. No one left the Great Hall after they'd finished eating, even though there was still over an hour to go before they needed to head down.
The professors, who must have already eaten earlier, were all standing around the Head table already making their plans. Most of them had forgone the robes. Killian and Tonks were wearing black jogging pants and a half sleeve t-shirt that clung to their bodies. Harry looked around to see many members of the male population were staring.
The girls, however, were paying more attention to Shacklebolt, Gallagher and Lupin. Both wore black jogging pants and sleeveless vests that clung to their muscles. "Wow!" he heard Parvati and Lavender breathe somewhere down to his left. To Harry it seemed like a deliberate action, but at that moment Gallagher stretched, causing his biceps to flex.
McGonagall, Flitwick, Moody and the Flamels still dressed in the robes, but these looked more appropriate for the Chambers rather than their normal teaching robes. The other teachers were dressed similarly.
Finally, Moody got up and asked them for their attention.
"Now you all look like you're ready. Good, very good. You all look excited and have very good reason to be. But before we head down we have a few ground rules. The Chamber has been abandoned for years. The basilisk might be dead but there will no doubt be other dangerous things down there. Keep your wand ready and your guard up at all times. Anyone found fooling around will forfeit the trip for everyone. You'll all be out of there quicker than you can blink. I won't lie to you. This will be messy job. Out main aim today will be get rid of the serpent's corpse and clean up as much as possible, with the help of the house-elves. I don't want whiners down there making things even more difficult. Any students who will not be venturing down will be here; Madam Pomfrey has a different task lined up for you.
"Prefects and Head Boy and Girl up here please. Potter, you too. We need you to open the Chamber," he barked.
Harry made his way to Moody; Ron and Hermione following him, the other prefects gathering there as well.
Moody, Hagrid and Harry made their way to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom by themselves; Moody and Hagrid clutching large canvas bags, leaving everyone else to take their instructions from the teachers left behind. He gave the command to open it at the sink. The structure sank down just as he remembered it, revealing the large gaping hole that was the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets. They stood waiting for the others to arrive.
Draco looked around at the other Slytherins. Everyone had been told to split into house groups and report to their Head of House. Killian and Snape were standing near the entrance waiting for Slytherins to get together. Lupin and Flitwick were gathering with the Ravenclaws. Sprout and Shacklebolt stood off with the Hufflepuffs, whilst McGonagall and Gallagher at the stood at the head of Gryffindor.
"All right children. Walk with us," said Killian. The Slytherins walked out of the Great Hall first and made their way to the second floor.
Draco made sure to stay near the front so he could hear Snape and Killian talking.
"… the Headmaster?"
"I didn't do anything. Nicolas did all the convincing. It was Perenelle's idea to take the students down there. Nicolas just wanted the basilisk parts. I just wanted to see if there was anything salvageable."
"Why do you think you have an ulterior motive Killian? What really prompted you?" Snape sneered.
"A vision. Curiosity, and you're right. An ulterior motive. And…"
"And…?"
"And something more."
Snape didn't say anything more for a while, and neither did Killian. They entered the girl's bathroom where Hagrid, Potter and Moody were already waiting for the first group.
"Who's going first?" Moody asked gruffly.
The teachers all looked at each other.
"How big is the tunnel?" Killian asked.
"Hagrid can fit in there 7 times," Moody said looking down with his magical eye.
"Fine. I'll float down with Harry and Severus. We'll give you a shout. You come down after the Slytherins, Alastor. Hagrid, you come down after the other houses have made their way down. Is that okay?"
"I will at that, Professor."
With that she levitated herself, Potter and Snape down the pipe. Draco felt a shiver of excitement. Finally he would also get to see the Secret Chamber of Slytherin.
Harry enjoyed the feeling of floating. He wished he had Killian's ability to fly for himself. Without a broom.
When his feet touched the ground Harry looked around. The Chamber looked evermore grimier. Dirt, grime and damp clung everywhere from the walls to the ceiling, casting down shadows everywhere. Harry and Snape lit their wands whilst Killian looked up at the foot of the tunnel and called the others down.
The Slytherins came down in year order, finally followed by Moody, copying Snape and Harry in casting a lumos.
"The best thing about your powers Killian, is that you avoid the crap coming down the tunnel."
"The best thing coming down after everyone else Alastor us that they already scraped all that crap before your turn."
Moody grinned, making the scars on his face look more gruesome in the wand light. He looked at the wall and ground.
"Scorgify," he intoned, pointing his wand at the wall. A section of the wall became lighter. There was plenty of grime still surrounding it.
"This will need more than just cleaning spells," Moody said as Snape cast his own cleaning spell and on small part of the ground, making some of the debris disappear. "This will need some good old fashioned elbow grease. Is there anything we can do for some light before the other come down?"
They all looked at the walls and ceiling to see if there was something they could light. The walls didn't even have brackets for the torches to hang like the corridors of the school did.
Killian conjured a ball of fire in her hand looked around. They all watched as she looked around and paused spotting something at the far wall. It was a small hole, the size of a light bulb. She floated herself up to it and placed the conjured ball of fire into the hole. Nothing happened for a minute.
Then slowly balls of light spread around them, a straight line that started at the crevice that Killian lit and ran along all the walls. The increased light only made the tunnel more depressingly filthy and foul.
Moody instructed them all to cast one cleaning spell each. The tunnel only looked marginally better. Moody looked up tunnel where Hagrid was waiting for their signal to let the next house come down.
They moved forwards, Moody sending his signal and leaving a message scribed into the wall.
CAST ONE CLEANING SPELL BEFORE YOU MOVE FORWARD.
Harry grinned at Moody's humour.
They stopped as they came to cave in that had blocked Ron's path, stopping him from joining Harry in rescuing Ginny. Ginny had decided not to come and had stayed behind with the younger years who had not been allowed to come in the Great Hall.
They were quickly joined 10 minutes later by other houses and their supervising teachers.
Harry saw the tiny amount of path that Ron had managed to clear back then to let Harry come back through with Ginny and Fawkes.
"Is the structure safe?" Gallagher asked, looking at the ceiling.
"There won't be another cave in. We can cast a stabilising spell to stop too much from falling down. Shift some of this snake skin that we can salvage and start at that gap at the top work our way through. Snape," he turned to look at the Potions Master who had already snapped on his dragon gloves and was eagerly taking massive jars he could slip the snake skin into. "You grab some students and start working on the basilisk skin. Minerva, Kingsley you two do the stabilising spell to keep the ceiling intact. The rest of us will start shifting this rock to make a bigger gap to let more people thought."
They all nodded and got to work. The Slytherins helped Snape place the basilisk skin into the jars. He wanted to make sure it done right and watched them carefully.
Harry and the others made slow work on moving the rock and other debris. It was slow work and made them hot and sweaty in minutes. No one, not even the Slytherins picking at the skin escaped with sweating pouring down their faces and cheeks streaked with dirt.
Eventually they made a large enough gap to more people through but the structure was weak. McGonagall and Shacklebolt cast their stabilising charms. Moody decided some of them would move forwards. He told them there was more snake skin on the other side. Leaving Sprout and the Flamels behind with the fourth and seventh years to finish gathering the remaining skin and moved forwards.
Harry had to once again open the second door to the chamber. He remembered the life-like snake vividly. He still felt as if they were watching him.
The door slowly creaked open, inch by inch revealing the offering within. Moody who could already see what inside hissed a "Merlin's beard."
Eagerly they all craned forward to see what the Chamber would reveal. But Harry knew what he would see. What they would all see.
They would finally see the monster that had haunted and petrified the students for a year at Hogwarts. They would see the dead basilisk.
