Harry couldn't believe how lucky he was when Dumbledore, Snape, Michael Wood, and McGonagall showed up at the scene of the crime to save him from the screaming of Argus Filch.

He knew they wouldn't believe he had cursed Mrs Norris and written the warning in blood on the wall. No, surely they would instantly realise he was only in the wrong place at the wrong time.

As it turns out, he was right.

Dumbledore might have given him a week worth of detentions with Snape, but other than that he did not believe any further punishment was necessary. Instead, he chose to defuse the situation by instructing the professors to lead the students back to their respective common rooms.

What really surprised Harry though, was what Dumbledore did after everybody had left. He didn't try to press him for answers, he didn't even ask a single question. He just simply said that he'd take care of the whole thing before he walked off down the hallway.

Harry couldn't believe the old man had so much faith in him that he didn't even need to ask for his word. While a part of him was honoured by this realisation, another part of him was slightly disturbed.

Dumbledore was almost revered by the wizarding world. His ability to diffuse a situation like he'd just done was yet another example of how quick everyone was to follow his lead. His word was the closest thing to written law. While at that specific moment he was extremely grateful that more people didn't question the man's judgement, as it would most likely have been to his detriment, he couldn't help but feel as if Dumbledore had just made a mistake. No-one should simply be blindly trusted. So what if he didn't petrify Filch's cat, he easily could have. Frowning, Harry decided to bring up the man's sudden unwavering support in him the next time he spoke to the Headmaster in private. However, Harry couldn't think on the subject for much longer, as he suddenly felt a stinging pain sear through his right cheek.

"Ow! What the hell was that for?" said Harry as he rubbed the side of his face. Instead of an answer, he merely received another similar smack, only this time on his left cheek.

"Okay! Okay! I'll take the charms off of you," said Harry hastily as he recoiled away from his invisible attacker.

Almost as soon as he took the disillusionment and silencing charms off of his friends, Harry wanted to reapply them to himself.

In all the years he had known her Harry had never seen Hermione seething mad, or at least never seething mad at him. Until now, he didn't even know if it was possible for her to reach such a state of emotion, but the furious witch in front of him was certainly confirmation. She looked like she was about to tear him limb from limb.

"What in God's name did you do that for?" screamed the young witch. "Honestly I can't believe you! Taking all the blame to protect us, sometimes you're too bloody noble for your own good, you know that Potter?"

Rubbing his cheek, Harry could only look downcast. "You don't believe me, do you?"

"Harry, of course, we believe you, we're best friends," said Neville, who stepped forward and released his hold on Hermione's hands (he had managed to restrain her after her second hit on Harry as to prevent her from actually harming him in her rage).

Immediately, Hermione felt awful for her initial reaction. She was appalled that she had actually hit Harry, but she had just been so mad that he'd let himself take the fall for everything again that she'd reacted before she could even stop herself. She apologised profusely to him, but couldn't convince him that his actions were not in his best interest. It was becoming a growing pain of hers, getting him to realise the importance of his own self-preservation, and she worried that if she didn't manage to get that lesson through his thick skull soon, Harry was going to get himself killed. Knowing his luck, it'd be in some ridiculous too like a Quidditch accident. It was just frustrating that he was always there to look out for them and she rarely got to return the favour.

"Okay, maybe I could have handled the whole thing better, but I'm still the one at fault, and I didn't want to be responsible for you guys getting in trouble," conceded Harry.

"What trouble Harry?" asked Hermione. "We've just seen that Dumbledore trusts you completely and even Snape is now on your side. The worst that would've happened to us is that the student body would make up all sorts of rumours about us."

Harry was about to retort, but Neville cut him off before he could. "Harry, you know I hate to pick sides in an argument but I'm going to have to go with Hermione on this one. You do kind of shelter us a bit, and while I know you're just trying to look out for us, you have to let us stand up for ourselves. We're our own people. If we want to stand by you or put ourselves in trouble, then that's our decision. You don't get to make it for us."

Harry could only close his mouth and bow his head. Ever the soft-spoken one, Neville hardly ever intervened in an argument, but in doing so just now, it helped him realise that he and Hermione were right. Maybe he was a bit overbearing with them, but he was just looking out for their best interests.

"None of this would have happened though if it wasn't for that damned voice," said Harry, as he kicked a loose stone with his foot.

"About that, you should probably just let the whole thing go, even in the wizarding world being able to hear voices that other people can't isn't a good sign," said Susan, a sad reassuring smile on her face.

If Harry were to have been looking anywhere else but his shoes, he would have seen the look of understanding that dawned on Hermione's face at Neville's words.

"Susan that's it," shrieked the witch as she pulled them into an empty classroom, casting a few silencing, detection, and privacy charms on the door." Harry's a parselmouth remember, he can speak to snakes. That voice he hears is probably a snake because no one else can hear it."

As the realisation dawned on them, the others couldn't help but smile, thinking that they'd come one step closer as to finding out the identity of this mysterious Malfoy threat.

"Hermione, have I ever told you how brilliant you are?" asked Harry.

Hermione just laughed. "Once or twice maybe."

"Well remind me to say it a lot more," said Harry, flashing her a brilliant smile, before the four friends set off down the hallway, eager to return to their dormitories and the beds that awaited them.

They paid no attention to the students that were gathered in the common room waiting to question them for their story; they just simply walked past them and headed to bed.

It didn't even bother Harry that he could hear Seamus and Ron whispering about him late into the night. As far as he was concerned, this was just another day in the life of what it meant to be Harry Potter.

"So how you holding up?" questioned James, as the parents spoke to the kids on their mirrors the following evening. Michael Wood had floo-called them in the morning to inform Amelia of the scene that had happened at Hogwarts the night before, and she, in turn, had informed the rest of the family of the full story.

Harry just shrugged his shoulders in response. "It's not so bad you know? There are the kids like Colin Creevy and Lavender Brown who are constantly in my face trying to hear my side of the story, and then there's Ginny Weasley who is down right scared of me. The worst would probably be the one's who are spreading rumours about me behind my back like Ron Weasley or Seamus Finnegan, but even that isn't bothering me as much as it used to. I guess I'm just finally getting used to all the attention everyone seems so adamant about giving me."

The parents just smiled at him reassuringly.

"Good for you Harry," said Lily. "I'm glad to hear that you aren't off brooding in some corner, shutting off everybody from your life."

Harry just coloured a little, while his three friends started chuckling.

"So you didn't see who petrified Mrs Norris?" questioned Amelia nonchalantly. It wasn't that she suspected Harry, she had outright told Michael that Harry was not to be considered a suspect in this case, but she was still hoping he might have some information to give her.

Unfortunately, Harry just shook his head. "No, by the time we got there, the hallway was empty. Only some water on the floor and writing on the wall."

Amelia just nodded her head, having heard as much from Michael Wood before. Now all she had to do was speak to Dumbledore about the problem.

"You guys wouldn't happen to know anything about the Chamber of Secrets would you?" asked Neville nervously.

The parents frowned, knowing where this was going.

"You're not going to try and solve the mystery are you?" asked Frank, already knowing that the kids were going to tell a fib. Sure enough, they did just that.

"We uh… we just want to know," said Hermione, wincing at how pathetic that sounded. "The whole castle's talking about it, and there are all sorts of crazy rumours flying around. It'd be nice to sort the facts from the myth."

The parents seemed to consider them for a brief moment, before deciding that they could tell them what they knew.

It was James who spoke.

"The legend is that out of the four founders, Salazar Slytherin was the only founder that felt the need to limit the acceptance of new students."

"Let me guess, he only wanted purebloods to attend Hogwarts?" said Harry.

James just smiled sadly and nodded his head. "Yes, Salazar believed that only those coming from proper bloodlines should be able to study magic. When the other founders refused, it was said that Salazar left the castle forever, but not before he built a secret chamber that only his heir would be able to open. It's said that this heir will be able to unleash the monster that is housed there, and effectively purge the school of those Salazar would deem unworthy of studying magic."

Dan and Emma looked horrified by the time James had finished his tale, but what was even more troubling was that the kids weren't looking the same way. If anything, they looked almost defiant.

"How much of this is fact and not just legend?" asked Hermione.

James just shrugged his shoulders not knowing the answer and looked around to see if anyone else in the room did. Alice and Frank didn't seem to know and surprisingly neither did Lily or Amelia. Surprisingly, it was Sirius of all people that had an answer.

"It's true, every word of it," said Sirius his eyes downcast yet his hands balled up into fists at his sides. "My mother used to read us stories like this from the Black ancestral library when we were kids. She would always gloat about the return of Slytherin's heir, said the last time the Chamber had been opened a student had been killed. I didn't believe her, so I went and found the book in the library myself. It's true, every last word…"

The others could only stare at Sirius horrified by the revelation that the Chamber had been opened once before, and that somebody had lost their life as a result.

"Did she… did she ever say when it was opened?" asked Harry unsurely.

Sirius just shook his head, still not willing to meet anybody's eyes in the room. They knew how much he loathed his family's history, so this was exceptionally difficult for him to recount memories from his childhood.

Hermione immediately noticed the looks her parents were sending her and she was quick to respond to them.

"Don't even think about it, mum and dad. I'm not leaving my friends. We're the only ones that know this is Malfoy's scheme, and we're going to help bring him down," said a determined Hermione Granger.

"I know Hermione, but don't you think this is something a little over your head," asked Emma, immediately cringing at the look her daughter gave her.

"You have to understand the severity of the issue," said Amelia. "We already have Michael stationed at Hogwarts to help deal with this problem, but if the security of the school becomes threatened, we'll likely have to shut it down."

"But how are we supposed to get Malfoy convicted before then. It's hard enough getting dirt on him, but the man has more allies in his pocket than I've got gold in my trust vault," said Susan.

"Actually, I think I have a way around that," said Lily, with a devilish grin on her face. "We know this is Malfoy's work right? So Draco probably knows something about it. I'm willing to bet he's bragging about the whole thing right now in the Slytherin Common Room."

"Well how are we supposed to get inside the Slytherin Common Room?" asked Neville. "It's impossible, the doors are charmed to only allow entrance to students from their house. Even if we were to get the password, the Slytherin portrait wouldn't grant us acceptance."

Lily was amused to see that the Marauders themselves, Hogwarts most notorious rule-breakers, were nodding their heads dejectedly at these words, having been unable to break into the Slytherin Common Room themselves, during their time at Hogwarts.

"Well, what if there was a way for you to become a Slytherin student temporarily so you could gain access to the common room and listen in on Malfoy's blabbering." She was disappointed to see that the rest of the family was still looking at her in confusion, clearly waiting for an explanation. "Duh, I'm talking about Polyjuice potion, it allows you to temporarily become another person. You'll essentially take the form of their body identically, but you'll still sound and act the way you do, so you'll have to study your targets and learn how they act, so you can pull off the interpretation."

"Lily that's brilliant!" exclaimed James, jumping up to hug his wife.

Sirius and Remus themselves were both grinning at Lily as they voiced their recognition.

"I dare say, Remus, I think with this plan, we might just have to induct Lily here as an honorary member," said Sirius.

"Quite right my friend," said Remus, as he gave Lily a heart-warming smile. "To be honest I've felt like she's had the title since she and James first started dating all those years ago."

James was now grinning madly from ear to ear, at his wife. "I remember the day like it was yesterday. It was in our seventh year, after Charms class, when the great Lily Evans finally relented and agreed to accompany this poor fool on a date to Hogsmeade, and I've been hers ever since."

"Actually my dear husband I would say you've been mine ever since our third year. Even back then you were constantly going out of your way to try and impress me – though all you did was make me hate you even more," said Lily, a perfect smirk written across her face. "Besides, who's to say I'm going to accept this title?"

"You can't turn it down. People are willing to chop off their left arm for such an honour," gasped Sirius, eliciting a round of chuckles from everyone in the room that wasn't a member of the Marauders.

"Uh, if you guys are done acting like kids, can we get back to telling you about the problems we're having here," asked Neville, a small smile on his face that let them know he wasn't irritated by their distraction.

Nonetheless, Lily and the others hastened to get back to the subject at hand.

"Right, Polyjuice Potion, it's a pretty standard procedure. They taught it to us when we were in 6th year as part of our preparation for our NEWTS. The materials needed to brew the potion are fairly straightforward but it takes a very long time to make, and it's also a banned substance, so you can't make it outside of class in Hogwarts. And you're choosing to ignore all of these warnings aren't you?"

Harry, Susan, and Neville nodded their heads, prompting James and Sirius to start laughing with more of the other adults following soon after.

Lily just rolled her eyes and began pleading with them to let her brew the potion, or at the very least have Michael Wood supervise them if they were insistent on doing it themselves. She just wanted an adult present in case things went wrong.

"Mum, don't worry," said Harry casually. "We're not going to brew the potion ourselves, we're just going to take some from Snape's private store-room."

Once again the parents started laughing as Lily's jaw hung open slackly, the only difference was that this time James and Sirius both fell out of their chairs clutching their stomachs.

Obviously Lily didn't normally condone such behaviour, but in truth, she preferred it to an alternative of having four-second years brewing the potion themselves, so her worries were alleviated.

"Look we've got to run," said Harry, drawing the long discussion to a close after they'd talked for nearly an hour. "Curfew's in thirty minutes and we still have Herbology homework to finish before we go to bed."

The parents just nodded and said goodbye before Harry got up and turned the device off, watching as the image of the parents faded out of view.

"We're not actually going to steal from Snape's shop are we?" said Susan, highly amused at the prospect of stealing from the professor's private store.

Harry just shrugged. "Why not, he's got plenty of it, and it would be a lot easier than making it ourselves."

"But what if he catches us?" speculated Hermione. "That'll ruin the trust we've established with him and he might threaten to stop giving us lessons."

"So then why don't we just ask him to give us some?" asked Neville, prompting the girl's to roll their eyes at his naivety. "What he's on our side, remember?"

"Snape's not going to just give us Polyjuice Potion," said Hermione. "At the very least he'd want to know what we're using it for, and I don't think he'll give it to us just so we can sneak into the common room of his own house to spy on his students."

Harry and Neville just shrugged. "Well then what do you suggest we do?"

"I don't think we should involve Snape at all," said Hermione.

"But wouldn't this whole thing be so much easier if we did," questioned Susan, not wanting to miss out on an opportunity to steal from a professor. It had been far too long since her last prank. She felt like she was beginning to lose her touch and the Weasley twins were constantly heckling her about it.

"Well for starters, Snape is Draco's godfather, which means that he can't intentionally harm him in any way without suffering retribution against himself," explained Hermione.

Harry and Neville just frowned in frustration. "Well then what, are we going to take Lily up on her offer to make the potion for us?"

Hermione just smiled. "I think we should make it ourselves."

Immediately, Harry, Susan, and Neville began stumbling through all the reasons why they couldn't, but Hermione was not to be deterred.

"Oh come on it'll be fun," reasoned Hermione. "You guys have said yourselves that we're not being challenged in school, and this potion will do just that for us. Just think of it as an independent research project, plus it's a chance to do something productive, something that will actually help protect people."

"Hermione, even if we do decide to brew the potion, where are we supposed to make it when it takes an extremely long time to brew and it's illegal to make outside of class," reasoned Neville.

Hermione just exchanged a look with Susan and smiled. "Don't worry about that, I've already got the perfect place in mind."

"Okay well, what else have you figured out in this brilliant plan of yours," said Neville, failing to hold back a smile at the look of excitement on Hermione's face.

"Well whatever ingredients we can't get from Snape's store we can always owl order, plus if we have any problems the parents said we could go to Professor Wood and he'd be able to help. Susan and I can search through the forbidden section of the library to see if we can find a book on how to brew the potion with are old passes that Lockhart signed for us," said Hermione.

"Wait, they haven't revoked those yet?" interrupted Harry. "It's been over a month since that guy was here, plus the whole country knows he's a fraud."

Hermione and Susan just smiled, not wanting to admit how they'd found a way around that little problem. Unlimited access to every section of the library was simply too big a thing to give up so they couldn't let something as simple as Lockhart's firing ruin their good fortune. They'd already gone to Professor Flitwick to have him sign a new form for them, which had worked out without a problem, as their charms professor was always only too happy to help two of his favourite students.

Shaking their heads, Harry and Neville just let the topic slide as they acknowledged defeat.

It looked like they were going to be making Polyjuice Potion after all.

They should have known better than to try and argue with Hermione Granger. In all the years they'd known her they'd still yet to beat her in an argument. That girl was just too damn smart for her own good. It was like she had a plan for everything.

"Well that was a disaster," said Hermione, throwing her hands up in the air as the four friends left the unused classroom on the 3rd floor the next day.

They'd just had another one of their weekly S.P.H.E.R.E meetings during their free period, and because it was the first one after the whole writing on the wall incident, the whole meeting had been extremely unproductive.

"Well it could've been worse," said Neville, taking care to jump the trick step on the staircase as they continued to walk down to the Great Hall for lunch.

"Oh, and how do you figure," said Susan, finding the whole thing quite funny. "All everyone talked about the whole meeting was trying to get Harry to tell his tale of what happened on Halloween. Parvati looked like she was going to wet herself when he wouldn't tell her anything."

"We didn't even get to brainstorm about how we would plan to abolish house elf discrimination laws, nor did we get to work on our petition to the ministry about establishing a tax against anyone who abuses their elf. How are we supposed to reform labour laws if everyone's too distracted to even focus on the issue," huffed Hermione in frustration.

Harry, seeing how worked up his friend was about the whole thing, just put his arm around her to try and soothe her down.

"Just let it go, Hermione. So we had one unproductive meeting, I'm sure this whole phase will have died down by the time we have our next meeting."

Hermione just smiled at Harry, not noticing the looks on Susan and Neville's faces at this simple act.

But if Hermione thought she was having a bad start to her day, it was nothing in comparison to what the parents were feeling back home.

They'd just received another report from Michael Wood that morning, as he'd been privy to a Hogwarts staff meeting the night before.

He'd reported that there was a moderate level of concern amongst the teachers, though Dumbledore assured them that the castle had been searched high and low countless times, with no such Chamber being found. Apparently, it was his belief that couldn't rule out the possibility that this was simply some sick prank by a disturbed student that was just looking to cause chaos.

While part of them wanted to just pull the children out of school and not have to worry about this whole mess, they knew they couldn't simply close down Hogwarts simply because a cat had been petrified.

In all the years it's been operational, Hogwarts had never been shut down, and chances are it never would be. It was the only magical school in Britain for Merlin's sake. It was responsible for the training and development of virtually every witch and wizard in the country, and virtually nothing was going to compromise that kind of longevity.

Considering there had been students using unforgivable curses within the castle while they were at school during the beginning of the last wizarding war, it was going to take quite a substantial event for them to even consider such an act as a possibility.

With that gruesome thought, the parents were left consoling Dan and Emma as they brainstormed how best to deal with the situation at hand.

While the suitable option they'd agreed on was stationing extra Aurors as guards at the school if Michael reported anything discouraging, there seemed to be an unspoken agreement that they'd throw caution to the winds at the first sign of injury.

There were approximately three hundred students at Hogwarts, four of which belonged to their family, and they were going to do everything in their power to make sure they were all protected.

"Where are we going anyway?" Neville asked, as he re-adjusted his backpack. He and Harry were following Susan from underneath the invisibility cloak after having just successfully rummaged through Snape's store for all the ingredients they'd need for the potion. They even had the quick thinking to take a few extra items so that Snape wouldn't be able to tell what potion was being made from the missing ingredients, plus they thought it would be pretty useful to have a bit of veratiserum to play with. While they hadn't yet thought of what they were going to use the powdered dragon tooth or root of asphodel for, they were fairly set on force feeding Malfoy the truth serum if he didn't give them the answers they wanted.

"How should I know, Susan's the one with the map," said Harry, trying not to trip over the bottom of the cloak as they hurried to keep pace with the witch in front of them.

"You know it kind of defeats the purpose of being invisible if you continue to insist on whispering so loudly," said Susan, not even breaking a stride as she continued walking down the hallway.

Harry and Neville just glared at her, though she couldn't see it. "Maybe if you explained to us why we have to be invisible in the middle of the day. It's not like we're exploring after curfew or anything," said Harry.

Susan just sighed, doing her best to hold back her laughter at the boy's frustration. "It'll all make sense when we get there, I promise."

Thankfully, Harry and Neville both shut up after that comment, though a minute hadn't even passed before she heard Neville grumble, "you still haven't told us where there is."

"You guys really don't like surprises do you," said Susan, shaking her head at the boy's impatience.

Harry and Neville just continued grumbling as Susan lead them down the hallway, finally shutting up after she threatened to stop and wait for them to finish before she continued.

Eventually, after what seemed like an eternity to all three Gryffindors, they arrived at their destination.

"What're we doing outside a girls bathroom," questioned Neville, looking down the hallway to where the writing on the wall was still ever present.

Susan just raised an eyebrow and waited for the revelation to sink in.

"You can't be serious," said Harry, though he already knew the answer.

Susan just smiled as she pushed open the door. "Harry, Neville, welcome to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom."

Following the strawberry blond into the room, Harry and Neville got the first glimpse of the place they'd be using to brew the illegal potion for the next month.

There was a very large sink in the centre of the room, with stalls on both sides of the walls. In the middle of the room sat Hermione, her cauldron laid out at her feet.

However, it wasn't Hermione that held both boys' attention.

There could have been a death eater in that bathroom and it would be hard to notice over the sobbing of the ghost that sat in the corner. It didn't take a genius to figure out that she must've been Moaning Myrtle.

Harry and Neville just covered their ears and turned to stare at the two girls.

"Really this is the best place you could come up with?" asked Neville.

However, the two girls were completely undisturbed by the boy's reluctance.

"Well thanks to Myrtle, nobody ever comes in here," said Susan shrugging her shoulders.

Harry and Neville just shook their heads as the girls smiled at them.

"Come on why don't you make yourself useful and help me set up," said Hermione.

Sighing, Harry and Neville got to work. They weren't too happy at the prospect of having to spend so much time in the bathroom of some deranged ghost but they understood how important the Polyjuice potion would be to discovering who was behind the mystery to the chamber of the secrets.

What the two boys didn't know, was that they were standing just meters away from the chamber entrance.

AN: Not really sure how I feel about this chapter so I'd appreciate any feedback you guys could give me. Next chapter will have a lot more going on with the Quidditch game, Dobby, and another important talk between Harry, Dumbledore, and Snape.

Also, If anyone is interested in beta reading my story that would be greatly appreciated as my last one is no longer available. Cheers,