Ello' there. Would like to thank my reviewee people for reviewing as always - you're all a great help. I love hearing your thoughts of these chapters.

And that's it really. This marks the start of the 'under Big Ben' chapters. Hope you all enjoy it. Oh plus, should probably just warn everyone that if you are someone of a delicate nature then there is a bit of gory description in this one.

Ok then - on with ze show!

Disclaimer: No owny!

Potentially Problematic_ Chapter Twelve_The First Room

"Lumos," Harry uttered as soon as he was passed the stairwell entrance. Hermione came down the first two steps and did the same with her wand. The darkness seemed to surround them - utterly oppressive - and the wand-light did very little.

The top of Hermione's head cleared the entrance and, automatically, it began grinding to a close. She spun around, watching as the last rays of sunlight were blocked out and the entrance lid fused with the surrounding concrete until it was no longer an entryway. A low rumbling started up from above them, actually causing loose debris and rock dust to rain down. Hermione was sure that it was Big Ben moving back into its rightful place. She gulped. That was it then. They were trapped. Hermione felt suddenly like a panicked, caged animal. Had the oxygen in the area just lessened? She was certainly breathing faster.

"Hermione, come on!" Harry cried, breaking the girl from her anxious thoughts. She turned, putting her back to the stupidly sealed non-entryway, and followed Harry down the steps. She took care. The stairs were steep, misshapen and covered in grime and dust.

There were solid earthy walls on both sides of the stairwell and a little while on, the path thinned to a point where the pair had to slide through it sideways in order to continue forward.

When Hermione had finally decided that the track was never going to end, Harry stopped abruptly, causing Hermione to plough right into the back of him and almost sending him flying.

"Whoa Hermione!" he cried, grasping at her robe to keep from falling.

"I'm sorry - you stopped -"

"There's a drop here," Harry said, getting down to his knees and shinning his wand over the edge of the path.

"A drop?"

"I don't think it's very high. I'm just gonna -" he sat down, legs dangling and before Hermione could stop him, he hopped off.

"Harry!" she screamed, rushing forward to the verge. Hermione's eyes were wild as she searched the darkness for him. "Harry!"

"I'm ok!" he shouted up. "I'm alright!… It's all squishy down here!"

"What?"

"It's like a big mud hole - I'm up to my knees in it."

A look of disgust crossed Hermione's face.

"If you sit down and jump off, it's not far at all. I'll catch you."

Hermione shot a look in Harry's general voice direction. "Oh right, because the mud bath sounds so appealing and all."

"Just come on! It's the only way forward!"

She sighed. "Alright," she mumbled and sat down on the ledge. "Right. Ok." She stared down into the black and willed herself to be brave. "Harry's going to catch you - come on. You'll be alright. …Oh I just know that this is going to end very badly," she muttered. "Extremely badly." Closing her eyes, Hermione sucked in a breath and jumped.

Terror was all Hermione knew for a moment and then her feet struck a mass of some kind of wet, cold substance and kept going until they hit the solid bottom and her legs were lodged in place. Momentum sent her upper body lurching forward, but instead of a mouthful of gunk, Hermione found herself fall against Harry's shoulder. His arms were around her back and, gently, he pushed her back up into a standing position and Hermione finally allowed herself to breath.

"That wasn't quite catching me," she gasped, but even so, she felt very much relived that she hadn't died.

They had both managed to hold onto their wands in the fall and now held them up to the others face in order to see one another.

Harry nodded in the wand-light, a slight smirk on his lips. "Oh - you're welcome." His face was dirty. Obviously, Harry hadn't fared as well as Hermione had, with no one around to catch him.

She smiled. "But thank you for stopping my fall in any case."

"Yeah well…it seemed kind of…gentlemanly I guess. …But next time, you're catching me."

"Hmm. That whole 'gentleman' thing lasted a long time then, I see, "Hermione joked satirically, attempting to swat at his shoulder, but Harry, smiling, intercepted, grabbing hold of Hermione's attacking hand.

And then, the strangest thing happened - Harry didn't let go. He just held her hand there. There was a peculiar expression on his face - something not unlike surprise. Hermione looked at her hand, all nestled in his and then to Harry's eyes, where they remained. Hermione liked Harry's eyes -they twinkled quite magnificently in such low light she noticed. Mood lighting, she thought dryly. She just about managed to take a step closer and the mud, which had actually come up to just above her knees, squelched incredibly loudly. That's when Hermione realised where she was - a dark, badly lit room, wading in mud, grimy and sweating and what had she thought? A kiss in the mud bath? A romantic embrace in the two feet of dirt? The idea struck Hermione as so ridiculous that she couldn't help but laugh.

Harry blinked, looking bewildered, and, seeming to snap out of some kind of trance, he dropped Hermione's hand as if he'd suddenly just realised that he was clutching fire. "Wh- what?" he stammered.

"Would you look at us? We're in up to our knees in mud!" she cried, her voice caught somewhere between hilarity and hysteria.

Harry looked around the mud-lake room as though he was seeing it for the first time. He smiled. "You're right," he said. "This is mental!"

They both laughed then. It might have been nerves getting the better of them or just the need to break the silence of the room, but laughed they did.

There could have been anything lurking in that area - creeping about in the darkness - and yet, for that second, where they were just two young friends playing around in the mud, they were children again, and everything beyond it was temporarily forgotten.

"So what are we waiting for then?" Hermione asked. She felt a bit lighter - as if her fit of laughter had helped release the tension she was feeling previously. Her jaw set and she struggled to get her legs moving forwards through the thick slime, with Harry at her side.

As was quickly becoming the norm, they couldn't see too far in front of them, and Hermione only hoped that they were going the right way. It was slow progress. The mud seemed a being all its own - sucking and clinging to her and making her legs feel unnaturally heavy.

After a lot of wading, Hermione finally hit something solid. It was a low wall and the light from her wand revealed a path stretched on from it. "Ok, I've found a path," she said for Harry's sake. She grasped her wand in-between her teeth and heaved herself up onto the raised pathway. She ripped away from the muddy pool with a loud 'slop.' A couple of seconds later, Harry did the same. The two sat together on that edge, regaining breath and then helped each other up and continued on.

Initially the path was as pitch black and damp-feeling as the rest of that gloomy place, but as they progressed, torches flashed to life on either side of them and Hermione could finally make out that they appeared to be in a kind of stone tunnel. The ceiling curved above them in an oval shape and the walls were layered with smooth, green bricks. It felt like this part of the underground had been newly reinvented compared to the part they'd just left.

At the end of this tunnel was a large, bulky-looking, wooden door - and as they got closer, Hermione could see that it had elaborate engravings all over it.

"What a strange door," she muttered, running her hand over the wood and outlining certain pictures with her fingertips. Her eyes landed on one particular engraving - it seemed simpler than the rest somehow and showed a human figure inside a square. They were on their knees - their head tilted up to the sky and their mouth wide open, as if screaming to the heavens. She frowned and then shivered, though was unsure exactly why.

"Weird door," Harry corrected next to her. "Come on, let's just -"

But whatever Harry was going to suggest they just do, was cut off by a sudden and terrible wailing from beside them. Hermione whirled around. Her eyes grew huge and, horror-struck, she backed up quickly into Harry.

In front of them was a ghost of someone once a man, floating four feet off the ground and screaming incomprehensible things. He was thrashing about wildly - his hands clawed at his head as if trying to rip the thing from his very neck. The worst of all was that there were no eyes where eyes should be - but gory, unseeing holes instead.

Hermione felt like screaming, but only a very scared little whimper escaped her lips. She pressed herself against Harry's chest and felt his hands grasp her forearms.

"Killed them!" the ghost cried suddenly. "I did it! Killed them all!" His hands felt around those horrible, empty sockets and he smiled. "But it's ok. I made it ok again. I can't see to care now. No, no - no seeing!" His whole body quaked with fits of laughter. "They're so stupid - but I won. They can't get me if I can't see!"

One long, misty finger stretched out to level at Harry and Hermione.

"You'll do it too I'd wager - oh yes. You'll do anything to make it stop." He gave another gasping laugh and brought his hand back to rest at the front of his eye socket. "It's easy when you're forced to. You'd think it would be hard, but it's not. Just one little cut…" His voice had lowered to a whisper, and for a moment he did nothing - just floated with his hand up to his face. "One cut," he croaked, before thrusting his arm backwards in a cutting motion across his eye hole. The pair jumped.

"Gotcha!" he laughed. "Even the mightiest will fall! Oh yes. You best be on your guard!" With that, his image flickered in and out, smirking savagely, before eventually disappearing completely.

Silence filled the tunnel.

Hermione felt her breath come in shallow, quick fits. She couldn't stop staring at the spot where the ghost had been. "What in heaven's name was that?"

Harry dropped his hands from Hermione and shifted backwards so that she turned to look at him. His face was ashen. "I don't know that I want to know."

"We've both seen ghosts before Harry, but that one -" she shivered. "That one was tortured. You often hear about ghosts forced to remain on this planet due to unfinished business…perhaps he stayed to warn us, or anyone…"

She looked back down the tunnel the way they'd come. Harry's gaze followed. "Did you see his eyes?" she asked in a hoarse kind of whisper.

"Yeah."

There was a beat. "We have to keep going though Hermione. You know that. …What do you reckons in there?"

Hermione shook her head. She didn't even want to imagine.

Harry let out a breath, turned and grabbed the door handle in one fluid motion. "I guess there's only one way to find out. Just stay close ok?"

"Harry wait." Hermione had noticed something - right to the door was a message carved into the green-bricked wall. The letters were clear and fresh-looking and Hermione wondered how she hadn't seen the words before. "It says 'facing our deepest fears can lead even those of the strongest mind to the brink of insanity.' Hermione's eyes flashed in alarm as she turned them to Harry.

"Well isn't that sunny?" he remarked dryly.

"Deepest fear…" Hermione muttered. "I've heard that somewhere before…"

"Boggarts," said Harry. "I bet that's it. This room is filled with boggarts."

Hermione's mouth turned-up sceptically. "Would boggarts really make you cut your own eyes out when they can be so easily deterred?"

"Perhaps. Maybe if there were loads of boggarts…"

Hermione swallowed. "What a great comfort you are Harry."

"Well yeah, I think so, cause' if it is boggarts we can just ridiculous them away, can't we?" said Harry, opening the door. They both peeked inside but saw nothing but an empty room.

"Well if we ever want to save Ron we've got to make it through this room," Hermione whispered. The lack of nasty things jumping out on them should have relieved Hermione, but it only made her anxiety worsen. She had the sneaking suspicion that as soon as they stepped inside then something bad would most definitely be happening. Every instinct in her was telling Hermione to turn back.

"So come on then," urged Harry, though there was no disguising the quiver in his voice.

They entered the room with extreme trepidation, walking side by side - Hermione pointed right and Harry pointed left, both with their wands out and ready.

And yet, far from Hermione's preoccupations, the room remained empty and still. Another large door stood closed on the opposite side from the pair.

Hermione stared around suspiciously. Surely that couldn't be it - surely it wouldn't be so easy as to just cross a room? "There must be a some kind of trap in here somewhere…Harry we should -" Hermione was about to say 'we should be careful,' but the brunette had turned to find her friend with such a look of stricken terror in his now incredibly wide eyes that the sentence died in her throat.

"Harry?"

"Voldermort," he uttered suddenly, voice hoarse.

Oooooh. Those darn cliff hangers are such meanies. Well this is an interesting situation then - one completely empty room, two scared wizards and apparently the Dark Lord to boot. It'll be all the fun of the fair next chapter no doubt!

Please do review and thank you in advance.