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Author's note: Have fun! And thank you all for the reviews, I love hearing what you think of my little story!.

jamie

xxxx

Chapter 13

4th year.

"You're all talk and no action, Potter," Davies said, addressing Al with a sneer.

"No idea what you're on about, Davies," Al retorted.

"You strut around this school like you think you own it, and yet when Samuels dared you to do something yesterday, you chickened out, like the big girl you are."

Al saw red. Davies was really pushing this school rivalry thing too far. He supposed that at least this time, Davies' vitriol was directed at him and not Scorpius, but it didn't make all that much difference. He narrowed his eyes and hissed.

"I refused to do that dare because it's breaking about fifty school rules, not to mention, it's bloody dangerous."

Scorpius was beside him, staying silent this time; he'd expected his best friend to remind him that Davies was just goading him into something by insulting him, but Scorpius just stood there, solid as a rock beside him.

'Your father did it in his second year. And he went down there to fight a basilisk. All you have to do is go down there and bring back some shed skin from that monster. It's not even alive, Potter."

Al doubted that the little Parseltongue his dad had taught him would be enough to even get the Chamber of Secrets to open, but he was too angry at Davies' insulting words to worry about that now.

"Fine," he snarled.

"I'm coming down with you," Scorpius whispered as they entered Myrtle's bathroom later that night. They'd opted to go at night, as there'd be fewer people around that might think to come into this bathroom. Whilst it was still a disused bathroom, in deference to Moaning Myrtle, it was still functioning and more than once had helped a caught out student.

"Sshh! She'll hear you!" Al admonished, also in a whisper. He didn't want to attract her attention, because Myrtle had a tendency to reminisce about how she had liked his dad and how he would come and see her, sometimes with that blond boy that cried a lot. There were so many more interesting things he could be doing than listening to Moaning Myrtle moan about his dad and some mysterious crying blond. "And you don't need to come with me, I can do this on my own."

"If you think I'm letting you go down there without me, Albus Potter, then you can just damned well think again."

Al gave in gracefully. Truth be told, he'd rather not go down there alone. That was assuming he could open the Chamber in the first place.

They found the sink that had the snake scratched out over one of the taps, which identified it as the entrance and, not wanting to waste any time, he hissed the well practiced words, hoping to get them right, but not expecting anything to happen.

Nothing did.

"Damn."

"Try again," Scorpius said. "Don't give up. Maybe it's just not been opened for a while and is a bit rusty," he said, doubtfully.

Al tried again, this time making the hissing noises louder.

Then the tap glowed and the sink dropped down and disappeared, leaving the entrance wide open.

"You did it!" Scorpius exclaimed, excited.

Al was shocked more than anything else. "You got my broom?"

Scorpius nodded and patted his pocket. They'd need that to get back out.

Al took a deep breath and climbed onto the edge of the pipe. "Well here we go!" He was sure his voice hadn't trembled. He wasn't anxious or worried or maybe even frightened. Scorpius was with him anyway - nothing was going to happen.

Letting go of the edge was hard but he did it, and took off sliding down a long dark tunnel. Down and down he slid, hearing Scorpius behind him screeching in excitement. Had that boy no fear? Eventually, he shot out the end and landed on a stone floor, remembering to move out of the way so Scorpius wouldn't land on top of him.

"Disgusting!" said Scorpius, scrunching up his nose at the slimy walls when he'd picked himself up off the floor. "But the ride down was amazing! Imagine how much fun that would be if it was clean, Al!"

"Yeah," Al breathed, finally relaxing a little and catching on to Scorpius' excitement. "Come on, lets go find the Basilisk skin and get that prat Davies his trophy."

They set off up the tunnel, their footsteps loud in the deathly silence. Up ahead they could see a pile of fallen rock and Al remembered that his dad said that was where him and Uncle Ron had got separated and he'd had to go on alone. There was a hole through it now and he and Scorpius climbed through and continued along tunnel after tunnel until they came to a wall, where, set into the rock was two snakes whose gleaming emerald eyes seemed to watch them.

"Your dad must have been so brave to come down here all by himself to rescue Mrs. Potter," Scorpius breathed.

"Yeah." Al raised his lit wand and let the light wash over the wall, accentuating the snakes. He concentrated and spoke the command again, sounds like hissing coming from his mouth. Shocked, he saw the walls spilt apart and open, leaving them clear to enter the Chamber of Secrets.

Al heard Scorpius' breath catch when he saw the cavernous expanse of the chamber. There were tall pillars rising lost into the darkness, snakes twined all around them and numerous tunnels heading off in every direction. Albus looked at it in awe and tried to imagine a twelve year old Harry Potter down here.

As he took it all in, he saw a great shape to one side. Quite breathless with a mix of awe and trepidation, he approached it to find the skeleton of the long dead basilisk that his father had killed. It had decomposed to the point that the bones were holding parts of the skin still intact, but there was so substance to it, just decaying matter faintly scaled.

"Al, this place is incredible! How could your dad have gone up against that," he pointed to the remains of the Basilisk "with only the sword of Gryffindor?"

"He had a Phoenix, too, but it seems pretty hard to believe doesn't it? He must have loved her even then," Al mused. Perhaps he could remind his mum and dad of that and they'd stop fighting.

"I'm sure he did," Scorpius said softly, and Al was sure he could hear some wistfulness in that agreement. Scorpius walked off to have a look around the chamber, while Al pulled clear a section of the scaly snake's skin, gone dry and brittle with age. He cast a stasis spell on it so that it wouldn't disintegrate any further and put it in a bag in his knapsack.

"Al! Come quickly," Scorpius yelled. Al rushed to his best friend's side and looked to where he was pointing.

There on the ground were the remains of what looked to be a huge egg.

"You don't think…" Al said, looking worriedly into Scorpius' face.

Scorpius shrugged. "I don't know. Probably not."

"I don't care, I don't like it down here, any more. Let's go." Al grabbed hold of Scorpius' wrist and dragged him away quickly, not letting go until they reached the bottom of the slide and Scorpius had to enlarge the broom so they could exit.

"You all right?" he asked when he looked at Scorpius and found he was pink and flushed.

Scorpius nodded. "Just the adrenaline of being down here, I guess," he said, unshrinking the broom and handing it to Al. Scorpius climbed on the back of the broom behind Al, slipped his arms around Al's waist and hung on.

"Right, lets go and rub this skin in Davies' face," said Al, exultant now he'd faced the challenge and defeated it.

tbc