Author's notes: We have reached the climax of the story. Hurrah! I was very surprised by how it turned out.

Harry half-wished he hadn't found out how to work Tom's diary. It had been nearly four months now since the last attack by the basilisk. Tom had shared more of himself with Harry, his likes and dislikes, how he was fantastic at Potions and other Dark Arts. Harry thought he was a very amiable fellow, yet he still didn't share as much as Tom shared with him. Something felt wrong, but Harry couldn't put his finger on what that was.

A week ago, Harry had finished the scroll on chess pieces and handed it to his guardian. Professor Snape seemed pleased that both he and Professor Dumbledore had been placed on Harry's virtual chess board, as a rook and knight respectively. Snape had even asked for verbal clarification on the five other pawns: Padma Patil, Gilderoy Lockhart, Julianne Dresden, and Fred and George Weasley. Once the interrogation was over, Harry was just glad to be done with the ungraded assignment so he was done with detention and was able to watch the Hufflepuff-Ravenclaw Quidditch match that weekend. Hufflepuff actually won for the first time that Harry had seen, all thanks to Seeker Diggory's quick reflexes and keen eyesight.

In the meantime, nearly everybody seemed to think that the attacker, whoever it was, had retired for good. Peeves had finally gotten bored of his song and dance routine and was terrorizing the first years as usual.

Unfortunately, Draco's complaints to his father about the Petrified Muggle-borns had been heard; Harry had been filled with dread when Headmaster Dumbledore had been removed from his post by a unanimous decision by the school governors. Even worse, poor Hagrid had been carted off to Azakaban again. Harry supposed he should have been happy that he wasn't the one being dragged off to Wizard prison, but he hated the thought of Hagrid going there without any real proof that he had had a hand in the two students' Petrifications. It wasn't fair.

Ever since, Harry felt sick with worry, while Draco seemed quite happy that the two adults had both been kicked off Hogwarts' grounds.

It was March. The Gryffindors were matched against the Hufflepuffs in a few weeks. If the Lions lost by a large enough point margin, the Quidditch cup would practically belong to the Slytherins.

Double Herbology class was going well despite the loud party the Mandrakes were having a greenhouse over from theirs. Professor Sprout seemed quite happy with the hoopla.

"The moment they start trying to move into each other's pots we'll know they're fully mature," she told the class. "Then we'll be able to revive those who were Petrified in the infirmary!"

The Ravenclaws clapped, but some of the Slytherins looked a little annoyed by that.

After class as Harry and the other second-year Slytherins walked back to Hogwarts after several Cleaning Charms, Draco said, "I wish the Heir of Slytherin would do another Muggle-born in or else his supporters might start losing faith in him!"

Harry ignored the taunt. He hadn't heard the basilisk once since the previous term. He was rather looking forward to Easter holiday that would soon be upon them.

Besides, he had other things to worry about. Harry and the other Slytherins in his year would soon be choosing their subjects for their third year at Hogwarts.

Draco had been of the opinion that only Potions really mattered; Theodore suggested Ancient Runes, while Sally-Anne told Harry that a strong base in Arithmancy helped with nonverbal, or wordless, magic.

He was curious about those courses but noticed that other ones were available as well, like Divination and Care of Magical Creatures. It was too bad he couldn't take them all. Snape had told the second years to pick three of the new courses to go with their standard program of Herbology, Potions, History of Magic, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Charms, Astronomy, and Transfigurations classes. Harry was all-around uncertain.

It was the following night, the night before the match between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff, that he finally asked Tom for his opinion.

Unless you're a seer or have a gift of Prophecy, Divination, Astrology, and Numerology are a waste of time. And Muggle Studies, well, what do you need that for if you were raised among Muggles? Stick with your core classes and add on Ancient Runes and Arithmancy. The Runic Arts is a very fascinating field of magical study especially given its cross-field uses.

"What about Care of Magical Creatures?"

I suppose if you're creating your own stock of potion ingredients that could be useful to take as well.

"Thanks, Tom."

Harry…?

"Yes?"

Tom didn't say anything for a long time.

"Is something the matter?" Harry asked, watching the Self-Inking Quill write his question.

Well… I want to lead you to the Chamber of Secrets, but I didn't press it because I like talking to you and was afraid that you'd abandon me.

Harry could well understand Tom's fear. He couldn't imagine being left inside a book without outside contact.

You're not angry, are you?

"No, I understand."

There was a pause and then scarlet ink began to ooze up. May I show you where the Chamber of Secrets is?

"Show me? What do you mean?"

I can take you inside my memory. It would be easier than describing the place to you.

"Alright," Harry whispered at his Self-Inking quill.

The pages suddenly flipped noisily to 'October 24th'. A bright crack appeared in the centerfold of the journal. Wondering what that was about Harry leaned forward.

The crack widened into a window Harry couldn't quite see through, and then he felt his body leave the bed. He pitched headfirst through the page in a whirl of bright light and shadows.

His feet hit solid ground and he straightened, feeling suddenly anxious. Blurred shapes around him, like ink in water, spread out and then came into sudden focus.

"The girl died here," a boy with jet-black hair like Harry's said to himself as he walked around Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. He circled around the sinks and stopped by a stall.

"Excuse me?" Harry asked tentatively. "Are you Tom Riddle?"

The tall boy turned, revealing his Slytherin prefect badge, and stared at the sinks. He turned each one off and on and then found that one of them was not connected to water. He inspected the spigot. He straightened. "Avery!"

A muscular and tanned boy with brown hair and blue eyes stepped over to the sink. "What is it?"

"I want you to open this. You see here? There are tiny snakes etched into the faucet."

Shooting him a puzzled look, Avery leaned forward and said with perfect inflection, "Open."

Suddenly the sink moved back and sunk to the ground. A grate covered it. Behind it was a large black hole.

"Pipes," Tom said. "There are pipes all over the school! That's how it gets around, that clever beast." His tone sounded similar to Parkinson's when she spoke about Stela.

The scene whirled around Harry, and he felt himself get pulled backwards. With a crash, he landed spread-eagled on his bed. Riddle's diary lying open on his stomach.

"Harry, practice your spellwork when we aren't all trying to sleep," Draco's acidic voice crankily cracked out.

"Sorry," Harry whispered quietly.

A grumble was all Harry heard. Closing the journal, Harry kept it in his hands. He wanted to keep writing to Tom. It was almost a compulsion, like how he wanted to keep visiting the Mirror of Erised in the previous year. Compulsions were not a good thing. That was when Harry decided he would hand it over to Professor Snape after he woke up that morning.

Closing his eyes, he fell asleep, still clutching it.

Theodore shook him awake. "You'll be late to the match if you don't get up, your Grace!"

Groaning, Harry groggily sat up. He had the strangest idea that he was going to do something that morning and that it wasn't anything Quidditch-related.

"I can't believe you've slept so much. Are you alright?"

"Yes. Don't fret; I don't feel sick," Harry said as he stood up sluggishly and put on his glasses. "Hang on… where's my diary?"

"That old thing you fished off Myrtle's floor?"

Harry frowned. There was something else he was supposed to be remembering to do. "Yes."

"Haven't the foggiest idea."

Wiggling off his bed, Harry got to his knees to check to see if it'd fallen underneath the bed.

"Anyway, I don't want to rush you, your Grace, but you'll miss the kick-off at this rate."

Having only half an ear on the conversation, Harry looked around growing increasingly panicked. The diary wasn't there, nor was it under his pillow or by the table. Where was it? Only taking a moment to throw on his outer robes, Harry stumbled down the stairs as Theodore continued to jabber next to him.

The common room was empty.

There was a grinding noise over by the far corner. "Kill this time… let me rip… let me tear…"

Harry's insides froze. "Theo, someone set it free again!"

"What? You mean the basilisk? But I thought you were done scaring the other students now that the headmaster's been removed?"

Harry closed his eyes and willed himself to wake up. "I've never had control of it, like I've been telling you this entire time! I've never set it on anyone!"

The door leading to Snape's office swung open. Professor Snape stalked out.

"Professor, it's Avery who's opening the Chamber of Secrets. He knows Parseltongue!"

His guardian paused. "Avery, senior, is dead. Avery, junior, is currently living out a sentence on Azkaban, a prison which I might add from which no prisoner has ever escaped."

Harry frowned. There was more than one Avery? Oh, he thought dumbly. Riddle had shown him a memory that was over fifty years old, but then who was opening the Chamber of Secrets?

"How did you get that name?"

"I found a journal."

"A journal?" Professor Snape bared his uneven and yellow teeth. "What did it look like?"

"Er, it's small and thin and black." Much too exhausted to stand, Harry sat down heavily. "You could slip it into your pocket. It had Vauxhall Road, London, printed on the back of it."

Professor Snape impassively looked at Harry, stepping closer to crouch beside him. He tilted Harry's chin up and peered at his watery eyes. Then his guardian took Harry's pulse with two fingers on his wrist. "Have you eaten or drunk anything in the past four hours?"

"No, sir."

Snape straightened and quickly snapped his wrist to robes, pulling out his wand. "Nott, fetch Madam Pomfrey immediately."

"Yessir!" Theodore immediately darted through the portrait-hole.

"Are you absolutely certain?" Snape drew his wand, nonverbally casting a familiar diagnostic spell.

"How could I have? I slept in." In fact, sleeping sounded like a good idea. Closing his eyes, Harry leaned against the wall next to him…

"Stischium!"

Harry abruptly jerked awake with a gasp of pain. His entire left arm was on fire. Harry drew his wand and was about to use the counter-hex when Snape snatched his wand from his weak fingers. Harry made a noise as the relatively mild Stinging Hex continued. "What the bleeding hell?! It hurts!"

"As it's meant to."

He couldn't very well muster the strength to get his wand back either. He held his left arm tenderly. "What for?"

"I thought you might wish to avoid slipping into a coma that would lead to almost certain death."

Moments later, Madam Pomfrey had arrived and Professor Snape stepped aside after turning Harry's wand over to her.

"Relax, dear. Let's have a look shall we?" She did a series of diagnostic spells, some of which Harry recognized from last year. "Oh, dear. Harry, have you found something unusual of late? Something that you couldn't put down?"

He really wished they'd cancel the Stinging Hex already. "I found a leatherbound journal a few months ago. Someone threw it through Moaning Myrtle. She was quite upset about it. I thought about giving it to Professor Snape but it didn't seem so bad, until I got sucked into it last night."

Madam Pomfrey looked deeply troubled. "Where is it, Harry?"

"I don't know. When I woke up this morning, it was gone. Please, can't you do something about the pain? I just want to sleep for a bit."

"Once you're in the infirmary, dear." Madam Pomfrey immediately cast a Levitation spell on him to place him onto the stretcher she had conjured for just such a use.

Harry hardly noticed the number of Slytherins flooding into the common room. He wondered if the match was over early... The faint green light was beginning to hurt his eyes as well.

Soon enough, Harry was transported to the infirmary and levitated onto a bed. Madam Pomfrey forced him to drink various revolting potions. Finally, she cast the counter-hex, and Harry relaxed. He was still quite tired, but when he closed his eyes he found he couldn't sleep at all as if he'd drunk a great deal of coffee. Madam Pomfrey must have given him a Wideye Potion.

He looked around and saw a great many sets of framed curtains around what were normally empty beds, hiding the Petrified students. He frowned, there were too many framed curtains... Two more beds were hidden from view.

Harry saw that his wand was on the table next to him. He sat up groggily, picking it up.

"All students are to return to their House dormitories at once. All teachers report to the staff room. Immediately," Professor McGonagall's voice announced throughout the infirmary.

Taking out his Invisibility cloak from his robes, Harry shook it out and wrapped it around him. He slowly pushed himself off the bed. Just in time too, since Madam Pomfrey came around the corner. She let out a shocked gasp to see the bed empty. "Harry? Harry, where are you?" She looked around and then bustled out of view. "Severus, I'm—I don't know where he's gone."

Professor Snape walked around the corner and looked around with an irritated look. "It appears that he has slipped out right beneath our noses."

"You don't think… that he knows about that poor girl who's been taken into the Chamber of Secrets?"

"Who knows the mind of a misbehaving child? He really ought to stay put, if he knows what's good for him." Snape looked around again scowling. "Finite Incantatem." He waved his hand in Harry's general direction with no effect, of course.

"He's long gone, Severus." Madam Pomfrey patted his arm and gave him a matronly headshake. "Besides, there's never been a Disillusionment Charm I couldn't see through."

The two adults turned and went back into the Healer's office obviously not heading to the staff room.

Harry snuck by the open door. He didn't care who had been taken into the Chamber of Secrets. He was going to stop whoever was opening it once and for all!

Remembering Riddle's memory, he ran up the stairs to the second floor and entered Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, walking directly to the tap that didn't work. He looked closely at the spigot and saw the snake. "Open up."

Expecting something to happen, Harry frowned when nothing did. He took off his cloak and shoved it into his pocket. "I said, open!"

"Harry, why're you telling that broken tap to open?" Myrtle chortled in amusement.

Oh! He must be speaking English! He closed his eyes and imagined that the snakes engraved on the spigot were real. "Open," he told it, except this time he definitely heard a hiss escape his lips. That was truly a strange sensation.

The tap spun and glowed a brilliant white. Just as Riddle's memory had shown him, the sink sank down into the floor and a large hole appeared behind it.

"Brilliant," Harry said to himself.

He peered down the hole and felt a strange sense of vertigo.

"I should go get the teachers," he told himself. "That's how Wizard chess goes, right? I shouldn't force a stalemate or I lose." He frowned at the hole. He disliked the thought of gallantly taking a leap of faith into the dark hole especially with the threat of a basilisk down there. He wasn't even sure what a basilisk looked like, besides big.

Myrtle giggled as she floated by him. "Harry, are you thinking about death? If you end up dying and become a ghost… you're always welcome to share my toilet."

"Er… no thanks, Myrtle." Then it hit him; he could notify the teachers and stop whoever kept opening the Chamber of Secrets. He was the only Parselmouth in school other than whoever was releasing the basilisk. Harry had to be the one to do it! "Myrtle, go get the professors! Tell them the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets is right here in your bathroom!"

She squealed with excitement. "Have a good death, Harry!" And then dove straight through the wall.

"That's… No." Harry pressed his hand against his face thinking he might be feeling too out of sorts to do this. "I can do this." He peered down into the darkness. "I can do this," he said to himself again and then stepped off into darkness. Not far down, he landed against a steeply-angled, slippery slope. From there, he just kept endlessly sliding and sliding, down, down, down.

As his eyes adjusted, he saw small pipes branching off, but none as large as the one he was in now, twisting and turning as it brought him deeper than even the school dungeons. These must be the pipes that had brought Slytherin's creature through the walls of Hogwarts.

The pipe leveled itself and Harry shot out, skating across the slimy wet floor. It reminded Harry a bit of the Underground, except dark, unpaved and littered with broken, sharp rocks.

"I must be miles beneath the school," Harry said to himself. His voice echoed through the blackness. He lifted his wand. "Lumos!" The bright light from his wand-tip momentarily blinded him. Thinking twice, he slipped the cloak around him and pointed the light out in front of him. He imagined that it'd look very strange if anyone saw part of his wand floating in midair.

Once his eyes adjusted, Harry realized he was in a sort of cavern.

"At any sign of movement, close your eyes straight away. Avoid the stare of death. You don't really want to end up in Myrtle's toilet, do you?" He whispered in the vast emptiness, trying to quell the burgeoning panic in his gut. He shouldn't be down here by himself. Harry knew he shouldn't be, but who else would be willing to face a basilisk?

Beneath his feet were numerous animal bones, crunching loudly with each step he took. Then something was lying on the ground in front of him. "Nox!" Harry whispered, crouching down. He didn't hear anything move in front of him though… He turned slightly when he heard something CRUNCH behind him.

Harry waited but heard nothing else for several long moments. He thought it must have been a rat.

"Lumos," he whispered and moved forward while his heart beat so fast it hurt. "Snakeskin, no…" Harry thought of what the Potions Professor had instructed on potions ingredients. "Basilisk shed-skin?" The dried out scales on the skin were a poisonous green, and it was gigantic, curled and empty across the floor. It had to be at least fifty feet long! "How the bleeding hell am I going to kill that?!" He cried out. Dust suddenly dropped from above Harry. He raised his wand. A deep rumbling noise emitted from above the misty dust clinging to the ceiling.

Trusting his instinct, Harry ran forward out of the way.

The ceiling buckled behind him in a loud reverberating clatter of boulders. A cloud of dust overtook him, and he coughed hard to clear his lungs. "Brilliant. I don't know any handy spells to move that."

Harry stared at the wall of rocks blocking his exit. He silently turned and moved forward, just he and his queen wrapped around him. Harry really hoped that his luck would hold out, since every nerve in his body tingled unpleasantly and his instinct was telling him to run as far and as fast as he could in the opposite direction. Still he went forward.

At last, Harry crept around another bend. From the light of his wand, there was a solid wall ahead of him with two great entwined serpents carved into the rock. Their eyes were great glinting emeralds.

Harry's throat was very dry as he approached them. He didn't have to pretend they were alive. He swore he could feel their eyes on him. He swallowed thickly and cleared his throat.

"Open," Harry said in a low, faint hiss.

The serpents parted and slithered away from the locks as the wall cracked open right down the middle. The two halves slid smoothly out of sight and Harry, shaking clear to the ends of his toes, walked inside.

He was at the very end of a very long, dimly lit chamber. There were towering stone pillars carved with serpents that rose to support the ceiling. Pools of black water were on either side of the long walkway leading to an immense, menacing carving of a severe-looking man with a beard. An odd greenish gloom filled the place, murkier than the light in the Slytherin common room.

Harry listened to the chilly silence. Where was the basilisk? Where was the girl who'd been abducted? He raised his wand, feeling exposed, as he slowly made his way down the tiled walkway. Every deliberately quiet footstep was amplified by the walls. He kept his eyes narrowed, not wanting to die without a fight on his part. The serpents' eyes on the columns followed him unnervingly.

As he passed the last set of statues, the great bust of the wizard at the far end of the room hovered over another pool of water. Harry swung his wand around, trying to make out his surroundings. On the wet floor was what looked like a pile of Hogwarts' robes and long brilliant red hair.

"Ginny Weasley?" He murmured curiously and dropped by her side, wand firmly in his grip. He turned her over. Her skin was completely grey and her temperature was as chilly as the air around them. He held a hand over her mouth and nose as he'd seen Head Girl Pitts do with Parkinson. "You're alive…" Harry said with relief. He holstered his wand; the wand tip still provided light through the gap at the bottom. "Let's get you out of here."

"But you only just arrived, Harry."

Harry spun around. A tall boy with jet-black hair like Harry's smiled at him.

"Tom—Tom Riddle?" Harry asked, thinking he was mistaken. The other boy was strangely blurred around the edges, but only a little bit.

Tom nodded his head, his smile unwavering. His black eyes didn't leave Harry's face, not even once.

"I thought…" Harry looked around and saw the journal lying on the ground. "I thought you were in the journal?"

"Oh, I was. Your help was most appreciated."

Harry didn't understand what Tom meant, but he was singularly focused on Ginny's safety. "Look, there's that basilisk, the one I warned you about, in here. I would like to leave with Ginny before it kills us."

"It won't come until it's called," Tom said calmly.

"What?" Harry looked down at Ginny's pasty face. "Oh, I see. I guess not if the attacker isn't here."

Tom's smile broadened even more. "I've waited a long time for this, Harry Potter," he said. "For the chance to see you. To speak with you."

That was really strange, Harry thought while his instinct screamed about the danger he was in. That made it very difficult to form sentences. "Er. We're in the Chamber of Secrets. We can talk later, after Ginny's gotten help."

"We're going to talk now," Tom said darkly.

Harry stared at Tom. Harry had a very peculiar notion, but no… but… could it be?

"Go on, Harry. I want to hear you say it." Tom raised a hand to his ear and cocked his head smugly.

"…It was you who opened the Chamber of Secrets last time, wasn't it? You did."

Tom clapped his hands slowly. "Bravo, Harry. A little slow on the uptick, but not even Professor Dippet figured it out."

"But, that doesn't make any sense… I thought it was Voldemort who opened it."

"He is my present and future… and I suppose my past. You see my birth name, Tom Marvolo Riddle, is an anagram... for I am Lord Voldemort. This is my true name, not that filthy Mudblood name bequeathed to me by parents who never wanted me," Tom said, spitting the word Mudblood into an obscenity far worse than Draco ever managed.

"You-you tricked me," Harry said reeling with shock.

"Oh," Tom tsked with a face of heart-wrenching concern. "And here I thought you'd be worried about the girl?" He smiled smugly.

"I am!" Harry yelled, "You've done this to her! Made it so she won't wake up!"

"Of course," Tom said matter-of-factly, "Little Ginny's been writing to me for months and months, telling me all her pitiful worries and woes—how her brothers tease her, how she had to come to school in secondhand robes and books…" Tom's eyes took on a nastier glint. "How she didn't think the famous Harry Potter would ever like her… a mere first-year Gryffindor."

Harry was taken aback.

"It was very boring listening to the silly troubles of an eleven-year-old. But I was patient, sympathetic, kind. Ginny simply loved me. Poor Ginny Weasley opened her heart and spilled all her secrets to me." The pitch of his voice changed to a young girl's. "It's like having a friend I can carry around in my pocket... No one's ever understood me like you, Tom." He laughed a high, reedy laugh that made the hair on Harry's neck stand up. "Her soul sustained me, fed me on a diet rich with her deepest, darkest fears and secrets. I grew powerful, so powerful that I began feeding her a few of my secrets, a little of my soul back into her…"

"You possessed her." Harry's mouth had gone dry. "You made her open the Chamber of Secrets, made her write the threatening message on the wall. It was you who had her set the basilisk on the other students and Mrs. Norris."

"Yes…" Tom said with relish. "Of course she didn't know it at first, but her diary entries became far more interesting." His voice went high again as he recited, "Dear Tom, I think I'm losing my mind. There are rooster feathers all over my robes and I don't know how they got there."

Tom's eyes were watching Harry's horrified face with glee. "Dear Tom, I can't remember what I did on the night of Halloween, but a cat was attacked and I've got paint all down my front."

"Stop it," Harry said, his fingers clenched around Ginny's cold arms.

"Dear Tom, Percy keeps telling me I'm pale and I'm not myself. I think he suspects me… There was another attack today and I don't know where I was. Tom, what am I going to do? I think I'm going mad… I think I'm the one attacking everyone, Tom!" He barked out a laugh. "Do you know it took stupid, little Ginny a very long time to stop trusting her diary? But she finally did and tried to dispose of me. And that's where you came in, Harry. You found me, and I couldn't have been more delighted. Of all the people who could have picked it up, it was you. The very person I was so anxious to meet."

Yanking his wand from its holster, Harry pointed the wand at Tom, but Harry wanted to know why. His brain was searing in his fury and fear as he tried to make sense of the suspicion and accusations he'd had to endure during his second year at Hogwarts.

"In comparison," Tom continued as if he didn't see the wand in Harry's hand, "You were guarded to begin with, suspicious of my true nature. You barely shared anything. Merely consoled me as if you were my support rather than the other way around. I rather liked that about you. There was so much of my soul already in you, so much darkness waiting to ripen. It was too easy to use your body this morning to lure Ginny Weasley down here as you slept blissfully."

Sickened and numb, Harry's knees gave out. On the wet floor, he clutched Ginny's too-cold arm with his left hand. This was his fault. Why hadn't he given the diary to Snape straight away? It might have prevented all of this. "No."

"Yes," Tom hissed, "I preserved myself so I might lead another in my footsteps to finish the Great One's noble work."

It was Parseltongue. Harry could hear it now and understand it. He responded in like, "You haven't finished it! No one's died, and the Mandrake Restorative Draught will be ready in a few days and everyone will be all right—"

"Haven't I already told you," Tom said quietly in perfectly spoken English. "That killing Mudbloods doesn't matter to me anymore? For many months now, my new target has been—you."

Harry felt the blood drain from his face. He'd walked right into Tom's trap. Right into it!

"Oh, yes. At first, after Ginny told me so much about you, I was curious. How was it that you managed to defeat the greatest wizard of all time? How did you escape with nothing but a scar, while Lord Voldemort's powers were destroyed? After meeting you, I believe I understand what happened that night."

"Understand what?"

"You and I share pieces of the same soul, Boy. That night you destroyed my future self you had done so by using your mother's sacrifice to grab a shard of his soul. In the process, you tore Lord Voldemort apart," Tom hissed, "Extremely dark magic for an infant's first bout of wild magic."

"NO!" Harry screamed with horror, finally releasing Ginny to stand. He pointed his wand at the apparition. "NO! I'm NOT like you!"

Tom clucked his tongue. "Poor Harry. Afraid of your dark side? Afraid you might become a great wizard like me?"

"Dumbledore's the greatest wizard in the world, not you. Never you!"

"You must be feeling brave standing there when I have no wand of my own…"

"You don't need a wand to be dangerous," Harry said. "And you're wrong about me. I know why you couldn't kill me. You lost your powers because my mother died to save me, my Muggle-born mother." Harry shook with suppressed rage. "I didn't do anything at all. She stopped you from killing me. And I've seen the real you. Oh yes, I saw you. You're a wreck, barely alive. That's where all your power got you. You're in hiding, barely eking out an existence!"

Tom's face contorted in disgust. "Ah, so that's what it was. It explains why a skinny boy with no innate magical talent managed to defeat me. There is nothing special about you, is there? Just a powerful counter-charm cast in the last throes of life. How extraordinarily lucky of you."

Harry nodded curtly.

Tom's eyes lingered on the scar on Harry's forehead and then his lips stretched back into a relaxed smile. "I really do like you. So humble despite your thirst for power. Why don't you stop playing hero and join forces with me? We could be great together, you and I. Together we could change the world…"

Harry's blood froze in his veins as the hair stood up on the back of his neck. "I'm not like you!" He raged, the spitting hiss threatening of itself.

"You aren't? How silly of me to forget to mention that I intimately know your soul. Or did you think entering the journal held no consequence for you?"

Harry's breathing came in sharp gasps. He forced himself to use English. "I'm not like you! I'm not!"

Tom clucked. "I appreciate how you think, how you justify your actions, what scares you… And Harry, we're not so different you and I," Tom said serenely.

"I'm nothing like you!" Harry vehemently denied in Parseltongue, sweaty hands tightly gripped on his wand.

"Both half-bloods, orphans, raised by abusive Muggles… Sorted into Slytherin. Probably the only two Parselmouths to come to Hogwarts since Merlin…" Tom continued with that soothing tone. "Face it, Harry. We could be brothers."

Harry's wand was shaking. "No!" He hissed. He gulped down air. "No, you're wrong!"

"But I'm a generous soul, Harry. I'll show you what it means to be an Heir of Slytherin and then you can no longer deny my words."

Tom turned to look at the stone face of Slytherin, high above him in the half-darkness. He opened his mouth wide and hissed in undulations, but Harry understood every last utterance.

"Speak to me, Great One, greatest of the Hogwarts Four."

The statue's mouth was opening, wider and wider. Something stirred from inside it and slithered up and out.

The instant that the watch on Harry's arm had gone ice-cold, Harry shut his eyes tight.

Something huge hit the stone floor of the Chamber. He could sense it through his feet on the floor even without seeing.

It stopped just short of him and pressed its snout against his side.

"I hunger… I ssmell blood…" It hissed lightly.

Fear shot up through Harry's legs. "I'm not food!" Harry thought for a moment that he would die. Then, the snout pulled back, and the beast slithered away from Harry.

"Why don't you open your eyes? Show a little trust."

"I'll pass," Harry snarled out.

"You bring treat?" The basilisk asked.

"No, Boy did," Tom answered.

"She's not food!" Harry blurted out.

"The girl is practically dead, Harry. Give it up. You're trapped and powerless here."

"Petrificus Totalus!" Harry cried, blindly pointing towards where Tom was.

"Did I mention that I'm not really here? Not yet, at any rate. I am immune to your magic... and the girl is dying... Soon I will be at full strength and my reign of power will begin again."

He could hear Tom breathing next to him, and Harry blinked his eyes open.

Tom looked like he wanted to touch Harry's scar, as his fingers hovered over his forehead. Perhaps Ginny had learned from Hermione what had happened with Voldemort last year… perhaps Ginny had told Tom about it and he was afraid to touch him. Harry stared at the apparition.

With a wry smile, Tom leaned closer, and Harry took several steps back. "How is it you manage to have eyes such as yours despite everything you've experienced? You should be brimming with hate and spite by now. Yet here you are mocking me with your pitying eyes. Tell me, given half the chance wouldn't you want to avenge your mother's murderer?"

"You didn't kill her. As you said, you've been in that journal for fifty years. You're only a forgotten memory!" Harry cried out, wishing his magic could hurt the apparition in front of him.

"Yet, it was Lord Voldemort who killed her while she begged to have your life spared. I saw your suppressed memories, Harry. Why I gave her the option to stand aside, instead of ridding the world of her tainted blood outright, is a mystery to me. She muddied your bloodline, strengthening the weakness within the Potter bloodline, and yet I hesitated. Lord Voldemort never hesitates to kill a Mudblood."

Viciously lunging forward and expecting stabbing pain in his scar, Harry grabbed Tom's neck with both hands. Unlike the dark hope festering in his chest had wished, his touch didn't burn Tom, didn't blister his skin. Tom toppled backward onto the ground, Harry above him.

He felt Tom laugh beneath him in amusement. "So, it appears that your mother's protection has no effect on me." Harry's fingers tightened around his throat, but Tom was still able to breathe, still able to talk. "How curious…"

"SHUT UP!" Harry yelled at the pleasantly smiling Tom.

"Do you want me to die, Harry?"

The basilisk screamed somewhere beyond them and Harry shut his eyes tightly just as he saw the massive body rear up. He heard the faintly musical trills of a phoenix and the fleshy ripping noises of something ghastly occurring across from him.

"Vipera exsanguina!" A familiar voice rang out.

The basilisk shrieked out a roar, and then fell over in a loud thud and a great splash of water.

Harry's heart was in his throat when his watch became warm once again.

"Clever, Harry. Very clever. You distracted me so thoroughly that a pawn of yours snuck in and killed my only mature basilisk." Tom whistled high and clear. "But I have more, Harry… Plenty more…"

Harry heard a great number of things grinding from beneath the bust of the statue.

"Silence, Great One, greatest of the Hogwarts Four," Harry ordered in a rush. He heard the statue's mouth begin to grind shut as the sound of many slithering snake bodies welled closer and closer to the narrowing opening. The watch was growing so unbearably cold that Harry nearly tore it off.

"Speak to me—" Tom stopped suddenly.

Surprised by the noise of pain from Tom, Harry opened his eyes to see that a bright hole of light had formed in the middle of Tom Riddle. Harry jumped off of him.

"No!" Voldemort's memory snarled, turning onto his belly towards something that was spurting fluid onto the tile floor next to them. Then, Tom abruptly let out a long, dreadful scream. He writhed about, his limbs flailing as cracks of light spread from the central hole. With one last cry Tom's body arched off the floor, and his body exploded in sparks of light. There was a howl and a strong breeze... and then silence.

Harry grabbed his wand and turned its still-active Lumos spell upon the object. It was the journal and black, reddish ink was flooding the floor to Harry's great satisfaction. There was a wickedly curved fang plunged in the center of the black leather cover. The basilisk venom had burned a sizzling hole right through it.

Breathing raggedly, Harry fell to his knees next to Ginny. Remembering the spell which had finished the basilisk, Harry recognized the voice of the spellcaster. "Forget rook, you're a bleeding queen!" He shouted into the darkness.

The darkness didn't respond. Beside him, Ginny moaned and then her eyes cracked open. Her bemused eyes traveled from the huge form of the dead basilisk, over Harry who was relatively unscathed, and then to the diary on the floor. Ginny drew in a great, shuddering gasp and tears began to pour down her face.

She rolled over onto her stomach. She was crying so hard that Harry could barely understand her through all her blubbering. "I-it was m-me—but I s-swear I didn't mean to—R-riddle made me, took me over—How did you kill that—W-where's Riddle? He… he came out of the diary—"

"It's all right. He's finished. Him and the basilisk." Harry patted her shoulder trying to comfort her. "Why don't we go see Madam Pomfrey?"

"I'm going to be expelled!" Ginny wailed and wept. "I've w-wanted to come ever since B-Bill came and n-now I'll have to… have to…. W-what'll Mom and Dad say?!"

Harry helped her up and led her down the walkway. "I think they'll be glad you're okay."

She clung to him tightly and went along with him willingly.

They were both lucky to be alive.