Rolling slightly as she came to a stop at the bottom of the tunnel, Hermione lifted her wand as several other bodies came to lie beside her on the floor, all groaning in slight irritation. Pushing to her feet and summoning a 'lumos' on the tip of her wand, the wide cavern was illuminated,

"Is everyone ok?" Hermione questioned, helping Sirius to his feet as he slowly got up beside her and brushed himself off,

"If the landing weren't so rough I'd think this would've been a lot more fun," he snarked happily, causing Hermione to roll her eyes and walk to Lily. Helping her up, James and Remus stood as well, all of them lighting their wands as they looked around and up,

"This tunnel must be at least 50 meters high," James breathed, "how big is this thing again?"

"Big enough to kill you, Prongs,"

A collective shiver went through the group as another small figure came bouncing down into the hole. The wards on the Chamber were enough to keep Quitz from apparating inside, that, and he had no idea what it actually looked like. Going to the elf and hoisting him up by the armpits, Hermione swiped a bit of blood off a cut on his forehead, "we need to be cautious from this point on. I don't know if that snake is asleep, or out roaming around,"

"Do snakes sleep?"

"Yes. The Basilisk was dormant for years before being awoken by Tom in my second year," Hermione mumbled, ignoring the stinging of her arm with the Diary and Diadem nearby as she looked at her feet. The skeletons of small and big animals alike littered the floor, causing her to wince. The pile was a bit more fresh then it had been the first time Hermione had visited, as she could still see bleeding fur on some of the carcasses,

'The Basilisk must wake to feed, and then retreats,' she thought, striding over the bones and onto the opposite floor to take a look down the main tunnel, 'I didn't notice all these smaller tunnels here before. There must be an exit somewhere or the snake would starve to death,'

"The main chamber should be down this way, try not to get separated."

There were only mumbles of agreement as Hermione lead them through the wide, cavernous space. The smell of decay was strong, and mucus lined the high stone walls as water sloshed around in troughs dug in the ground. It was truly a glorious piece of engineering, creating something large enough for the Basilisk to be comfortable, but still preventing any sort of water backup or flooding. The stones were all cut to be the same size, and Hermione was only just noticing that large carvings of snakes curled around the occasional pillar holding the tunnel up,

"H-Hermione, I-is that it?"

Whipping around at Lily's frightened tone, Hermione saw what she was pointing at. A large, whitish clear thing was laying on the ground, pushed up against another pile of animal remains. It was curled, but it easily stood over both James and Remus who were fairly tall,

"That's it's skin. When a Snake grows too much it sheds, this is what's left over,"

"Fascinating, isn't it?" Remus questioned, ghosting a hand over the side of the skin where monstrous scale bumps protruded, "so this thing is still growing?"

"I don't think it will ever stop growing," Hermione admitted, "similar to an Occamy, the Basilisk will grow and shrink to fit the space its in. The only reason it's so large is because this chamber allowed it to spread out,"

"Truly incredible,"

"Yeah, yeah we know you're in love with the snake skin, Moony. Let's just try and kill the thing that left this behind, shall we?"

Everyone agreed with Sirius's logic as they all continued through the Chamber. It was descending now, the air becoming crisp as Remus took hold of Hermione and kissed her temple,

"It'll be alright, love," he whispered, "I'm sure the five of us can do this,"

"I just don't want any of you killed," Hermione croaked, "not again,"

"We won't be," Remus mumbled, clutching his shield a bit tighter as they came upon the massive steel door sealing off the entrance to the main chamber, "is this it?"

"Yep," Hermione exhaled shakily, waving to Quitz who had been trailing along behind the group, "use the Diadem. It seems to speak the loudest,"

"O-ok, Missus,"

Removing the blue velvet box from the bag, Hermione winced and felt her arm clamp up. The obsidian in her veins protested the Diadem as Quitz opened the box and held it to the door. There was a moment of silence before the intricate snake lock began to move. Reaching out and shutting the Diadem box with a snap, Hermione couldn't help but sigh in relief as Lily came to take up her arm,

"You said it didn't hurt," she snapped angrily, watching as the obsidian of her friends veins became dull once again under her skin, "I should have taken you to Madame Pomfrey right away-"

"It only hurts when there is dark magic nearby," Hermione retorted sharply, flexing her fingers and frowning, "this is ancient magic, Lily. Even if I had gone to Pomfrey, there's nothing that she could have done,"

"Why didn't you tell us about this?" Sirius questioned, furry eyebrows knitting together in concern. Shaking her head, Hermione tuned to look through the sewer door,

"Because we have more important things to think about. Come on, we need to kill that Basilisk,"

Nodding their heads reluctantly, Sirius and James mounted their brooms before flying through the hole, followed by Lily, Hermione and Remus who crawled over the threshold. The space was just as Hermione had remembered it. The long stone path was flanked on either side by many open-mouthed snake heads, settled in troughs of water which seeped out from different tunnels. Standing at the other end of the room was the bald forehead of Salazar Slytherin himself, wild hair spreading out in stone as his mouth was closed. Hearing the boys flying about overhead, Hermione tensed up slightly and listened,

"Do you think we need to draw it out?" Remus questioned, "you said only the Heir of Slytherin could control it?"

"Yeah, but I'm not the heir of Slytherin. Tom is...wait, maybe the Diadem will do the trick?"

Motioning to Quitz again with a hand, the little elf nodded and pulled out the blue box once more. The air seemed to get even colder as the group of Gryffindors tensed up. Salazar's mouth was slowly lowering as a horrible hissing noise came from inside. Stepping back into an alcove as to not be spotted, Remus and Lily did the same, watching the shadows on the walls as a large silhouette slowly appeared in the chamber,

'C'mon Fawkes, please,'

Just as Hermione thought it, the sharp cry of a bird pierced the cold air of the chamber. Wincing as something was dropped on the ground before the first alcove, Hermione could hear screeching and roaring as Fawkes clawed and bit at the Basilisk's face. Soon enough, the shadow of the great bird could he seen vanishing back into the tunnel as Hermione glanced at what he had dropped. She knew that the sword appeared in the Sorting Hat, as both Harry and Neville had pulled the enchanted blade from its worn burlap. But as the Basilisk yeowled in pain, and shouted spells came from above, Hermione felt nothing but stinging in her arm. It was horrible, enough to remind Hermione of the pain Harry's scar caused whenever he was near Voldemort,

"Hermione!" Remus called, "what do we do?!"

"Attack!"

Swallowing her own discomfort, Hermione stumbled from her hiding place to take in the beast. It was the biggest thing she had ever seen, and looked to be even more dangerous then the Hungarian Horntail used during the Tri-Wizard Tournament. It's face was shredded apart and bleeding, it's eyes screwed shut as it's head whipped around in panic. Pulling her wand, Hermione began to cast her own charms, only to duck and roll out of way as they ricocheted back at her,

"Bloody hell,"

"What happened?" Lily asked, hauling Hermione to her feet and against a side wall as the Basilisk snapped at James, who had smacked it with what looked to be a spare beaters bat,

"The skin is too thick. Spells won't work against this thing - duck!"

Hermione pulled Lily to the ground as Sirius went flying over them, skidding across the floor as his broom snapped into many pieces. Alarmed, Hermione pushed her bag into Lily's hands,

"Make sure he's ok. I have to help James!"

"Ok. Don't die please,"

Nodding with an offset smile, the redhead bounded towards Sirius's unmoving figure while Hermione flicked her eyes around. James was buzzing about the Basilisk's face like an insect, but was nearly knocked off as the snake used its large body to smack at him,

'What to do, what to do?'

Eyes trailing up the walls and to the ceiling, Hermione's gaze fixed on the long pointed stones hanging there. Gasping and pressing up against the wall as a long horned tail smacked into the wall above her head, Hermione turned to Remus. He had taken hold of something,

"Remus! That's the sword!" Hermione cried, ducking again as the tail slammed closer to her head, "help James!"

'Hopefully the prat doesn't do anything stupid,'

"Aaarrrggg!"

Remus flew past Hermione, shield and sword in hand as he charged head on at the Basilisk. There was something alluring about that, a boy in flowing robes, charging at an attacking monster like some medieval knight. Shaking out of her thoughts, Hermione rolled again into another alcove, wincing as her arm acted up suddenly. Looking up, Quitz was against the opposite wall, hiding,

"Quitz, I have a plan. Do you think you could help me?"

"Of c-course m-missus,"

"See those stalactites up there?

Leaning from the alcove slightly, Quitz nodded, "ok, on three you need to help me get those down,"

The little elf nodded again as Hermione called out,

"One...two...James, Remus! MOVE! Three. Bombarda!"

There were many flashes of light as James was caught off guard and was knocked off his broom into the water, knocking his head against one of the snakes as Remus yelled out as he kneeled and used his shield to deflect falling rocks. The Basilisk got the grunt of the blow, screeching as heavy rocks fell down upon it. That wasn't before it's jaw snapped forward, catching Hermione herself by surprise as the ends of her cloaks were grabbed between its teeth and she was hauled halfway across the room. Skidding on her knees and palms painfully, the Basilisk leaned in for another attack. Throwing up an arm and screwing her eyes shut, she waited for the teeth to dig into her chest,

"GAH!"

There was a deafening howl as Hermione opened her eyes, seeing the gleaming tip of Gryffindor's sword passed through the bottom jaw and up through the head. Remus had left the sword by now and scrambled in a wolffish manner towards her, shield forgotten as he pawed over her,

"Did it bite you? Are you ok?"

"Remus!" Hermione grabbed the boy by the collar and pulled him to one side as a large body nearly came to crush them. Remus leaning over her with his hands on either side of her head, the pair stared at each other before passionately snogging. Hermione remembered her kiss with Ron that night, as it was under a similar circumstance to this, feeling lips against hers as Remus clutched her waist to keep her still,

"Ah gross! We have a whole freaking Chamber and I haul ass over here only to see that!"

Remus pulled away and whipped around to glower at Sirius, who was limping badly and holding a loose shoulder. Smiling with a heavy sigh, Hermione patted her boyfriends cheek with a hand and sat up slowly. Beside them lay the Basilisk, dead with a sword jammed up through its forehead,

"You got it good, Mate," Sirius mumbled, taking in the giant snake, only to turn as Lily called out from somewhere in the distance,

"Guys! Are you dead?"

"Not yet!" Sirius called back, "is James ok?"

Just as he asked that, Lily came around the corner, supporting a beaten up and soaking wet James Potter,

"You look just like your son," Hermione blurted unintentionally, getting to her feet with a wince and holding her ribs, "come on, we should get the sword and a few teeth before someone comes looking for us. I'm pretty sure all of Hogwarts heard that thing die,"

"Probably. Here Mia, let me help,"

Remus supported his lover as the group made their way towards the bleeding carcass, alive and a little worse for ware. Smirking, Hermione glanced at Quitz who was standing off to the side holding the Horcrux's close to him,

'We need to destroy them immediately,' she thought, 'and hopefully luck will be on our side form there on,'

"Remus, you have the sword?"

The werewolf nodded as he walked towards the snakes upper jaw. Hermione herself took hold of one of the slimy Basilisk fangs and yanked it forcefully from pink gums, ignoring the saliva and blood smearing onto her fingers,

"Ok, lets take the Horcrux's and put them here,"

Hermione assisted Quitz in setting up the Diary and Diadem opposite one another as she kneeled down before the black book on the wet stones. Remus remained standing as he, in turn, dragged the sword towards the Diadem as Lily treated Sirius and James for injuries nearby. Looking at her boyfriend, Hermione clutched the fang tightly in one hand,

"On three? One..."

Hermione raised the tooth up over her shoulders Remus raised the sword,

"Two,"

The pair made quick eye contact before Hermione nodded slightly,

"Three!"

There were two loud screams as the weapons plunged into Voldemort's soul, killing them as thick smoke enveloped both Hermione and Remus and everything went black.