Author's note: I will be slowly building up Harry's character, but yes, he does the start off quite childishly. He is still only 12.

ATTENTION: There have been a couple of issues regarding the posting of this chapter, and I'm trying my best to get it to work properly in order to post.

Enjoy!

CHAPTER 2: Plan into action

Harry quietly shut the old classroom door behind him and made his way back down to the entrance of the corridor. He had asked Dobby if there was any way that food could be brought into the chamber, and after various far-fetched ideas, harry decided that the best one was like those used for long-distance trips. Dobby had found two identical storage containers, and food could be magically sent between the two. Harry was relieved that he wouldn't have to stash food or something like that, as it would have proven quite hard to continue to use for as long as he needed.

Dobby had decided that he would stay up in the kitchens once he had come and gone from the Chamber but would continue to help Harry from afar. He knew that Dobby would still help him down in the chamber is something went drastically wrong. Harry found that he really loved the magic that helped in these kinds of situations and was extremely grateful that Dobby was able to help him get away with it. The aim of sending over one meal at a time meant that it wouldn't notice how much food was actually going missing. Dobby had readily agreed to go up and subtly sending food from the Hogwarts kitchens, but had pointed out that it might not come consistently as he needed to avoid the other Hogwarts elves.

It also means that I don't have to come out and get food, and if I need to come out between now and then, it won't be because I have to go to the kitchens! If there is a search still on, which there probably will be, then coming out as little as possible will throw all of the Professors off.

Harry slowly made his way up to Gryffindor tower. He would need to make sure that both Ron and Hermione believed that he would be coming on the train, as usual, so he would have to make sure that neither noticed that his trunk hadn't made it downstairs.

Hopefully, my friends won't notice what I'm doing, if they think I'm just getting ready for the train, then I won't have to avoid them…especially Hermione, if she notices something is up, she'll start giving me the third degree!

Muttering the password to the Fat Lady, he watched as the portrait swung open, to be greeted by what could only be described as organised chaos. Many sixth and seventh years seemed to be trying to herd younger students towards the portrait hole, whilst others ran around looking for possessions that they had just realised had gone missing. Harry thought he saw Fred and George over near the other side of the common room, but they were quickly obscured by another group of fourth years all trying to drag various books and stationery back up to their dorms.

"Harry! What on earth took you so long? You need to hurry up and pack your trunk! The train is leaving in two hours!"

Hermione's voice rang out across the common room, and Harry turned to see her sitting over by the fire waving to him, her trunk neatly packed and sitting next to her. Ron was nowhere to be seen.

"How was your meeting with Dumbledore?" Hermione asked, gesturing for him to sit in the seat next to her.

"Yeah it was good… he helped me figure out my problem…"

Hermione raised a questioning eyebrow. Seeing the way harry had closed off at this line of questioning, she was just about to change the subject when-

"Harry! Hermione!"

Fred and George sauntered over from where they had obviously just finished up helping some of their classmates.

"And what would-"

"You two Gryffindors-"

"Be doing at a time-"

"Like this?"

Hermione sniffed. "I'm sitting here because I've finished packing my trunk. Have you Harry?"

"I'm just going to do that now…" Harry then looked around the common room again "-wait, where's Ron? I thought I saw him near Fred and George."

"He's up in the boy's dorm, trying to find all of his clothes that he dumped in various places around the room. Like you, he seems to have forgotten that the train is leaving today, he is only starting to pack now!" She crossed her arms over her chest and frowned up at Harry, looking at him like he should be appalled as well.

"Well knowing you Hermione, you've probably been packed for weeks!" He joked, and it was true, Hermione's organisation was second to none, and the thought of not being packed the night before was scandalous. Harry knew that she had probably been ready to go since yesterday afternoon.

Fred and George watched between the two, for once keeping silent and watching the verbal sparring match.

"I'll just head up and help him then yeah? I also need to finish packing, I'm almost done anyway," That was a straight-up lie and he knew it because he had done absolutely nothing despite Hermione's nagging. With the way Hermione's eyebrow rose, she seemed to know this as well.

"I'll just… be right back," with that, he dashed over and up the stairs, leaving Hermione to continue talking to the twins. Harry stopped on the landing just outside the second-year boy's dorm. Inside he could hear Ron swearing about various possessions that he seemed to have misplaced.

"-the bloody hell are my robes? I had it just on the bed! where could it have gone in five minutes?-" Harry pushed the door open and was greeted by more of Ron's mumbling, but he was nowhere to be seen.

"Ron? Are you in here?"

THUMP.

"-OUCH! Bloody hell Harry, could you warn a man next time?" Ron emerged from underneath the bed, rubbing a sore spot on the back of his head.

"And how was I supposed to do that Ron?" really, his friend could be quite silly at times.

"-err, good point." He grinned sheepishly. "Have you been sent up here by Hermione to pack as well?"

"Kind of… I was already coming up and she stopped me on the way. She's talking to Fred and George now." Harry paused for a moment.

"Uhhhhh…Ron, what exactly are you doing?"

By this point, Ron had finished his hunt for his missing clothes underneath Harry's bed and had moved on to look under Neville's as well.

"Packing Harry, what does it look like?" Harry personally thought he looked like he was going on some sort of treasure hunt but choose to keep that thought to himself.

"O…K… then, I'll just go and start packing then will I?"

Ron seemed to have not heard him, as he was now rooting around under Dean's bead on the other side of the room.

Harry shook his head fondly as he moved to start gathering all of his clothes from his drawers. Slowly and methodically he went around his area and removed everything from his wardrobe, draws, desk and even under his bed (how the hell did that get there?) until it was all stored somewhat haphazardly in his trunk. Ron had found his robes while Harry was doing this, where they had been sitting in between the sheets of his bed, (to which he vehemently denied having put there in the first place). Now that Harry was packed, all that was left was letting his trunk be taken out of the dorms. The same couldn't be said about Ron.

"Ron? You need any help?"

Ron still looked to be in the same position as when he started, except his robes had been thrown haphazardly into his trunk next to all of his textbooks.

"Ummmm… how 'bout I find stuff, and you put it in?" Ron answered, looking bewilderedly around the room, gauging where he was at, as if he was on some sort of obscure quest.

Harry snickered as Ron continued to climb around the dorm, finding all sorts of things in extremely odd places.

"Why the hell are my socks in Neville's desk?" Harry snorted at Ron's confusion; god knows how half his things got anywhere.

"What on earth is Scabbers doing in Neville's desk?"

Harry burst out laughing at the utter astonishment on Ron's face, as he looked down at Scabbers sitting in a little sock nest in the drawer he had just opened up.

This was going to take a while.

After an hour of various confusion inducing discoveries, Ron had finally managed to unearth everything the was his, now safely locked in his trunk.

"Well, that's another year then,-" commented Ron as he started walking towards the door. "-I'm outta here!"

Once he reached the door he turned back to Harry, who was now sitting on his bed.

"Mate, you ready to go?" Harry jumped and looked up, before glancing around quickly.

"Are you alright?" Ron continued.

"-Yeah I'm fine, you go down, I just need to check I didn't leave anything behind."

Ron eyed him suspiciously, before turning around and starting down the stairs.

"Hermione and I will start walking down to where we're supposed to meet in the Great Hall, we'll be waiting for you there."

With that he continued on harry could hear the dull thumping of his feet going down the stairs. Harry shook his head exasperatedly before going and silently shutting the door to the dorm.

"Dobby? Can you come out for a minute please?"

Dobby popped up in front of him with a slightly quieter crack this time. He glanced quickly at the trunk before turning back to Harry.

"What do yous be's needing Master Harry sir?"

"Do you know any way that I can make sure that my trunk doesn't get put on the train? I don't want Ron or Hermione to notice that it's gone missing though,"

Dobby thought for a moment. "You could be's doing different things Master Harry Potter sir. You could be's shrinking it in your pocket now, or I could's be taking it straight to the chamber instead?"

"That would work, my friends wouldn't notice that I didn't leave my trunk up here." Harry thought for a moment "could you shrink it to put in my pocket then please?"

Dobby nodded enthusiastically. "Of course! I's be's doing that right now!"

"Wait! Hang on a second Dobby," Remembering that he probably needed to be just a little bit stealthy in order to be able to pull his plan off, Harry quickly opened his trunk and grabbed his invisibility cloak, stuffing it in his pocket as went.

"Thanks." Harry shut the trunk and then moved to the side so that Dobby was in full view of the trunk. He watched as Dobby pointed a finger, and then it rapidly shrank until it could fit snugly in the palm of his hand.

"I really need to learn that spell," Harry muttered. "It would be quite good to do this by myself."

Harry picked up the shrunken trunk and slipped it into the other pocket.

"Perfect, thanks Dobby," With a crack, Harry was alone once more.

He made his way out of Gryffindor tower and headed down towards the Great hall. Various students from all the houses were mingling all around the hall, and Harry spotted Ron and Hermione standing over near the Ravenclaw table having a conversation with Susan, Fred and George. Waving to them, Harry grinned as they excused themselves and slowly weaved their way over.

"Students, could you please prepare to get into the carriages, the Hogwarts Express will be leaving in half an hour."

Harry jolted at the sound of McGonagall's voice over the crowd of students gathered in the hall. All at once, everyone started pouring out of the doors and down to the nearest carriages, preparing to ride into Hogsmeade. Harry pretended to get swept away from Ron and Hermione in the rush, calling out that he promised to come and find their compartment once they both got on the train. He quickly stepped out of the main flow of students and watched as they continued to make their way outside. Checking that no-one was looking in his direction, he quickly slipped the cloak over his head and he quickly headed towards the grand staircase.

Once he up the first staircase, he made his way over towards the other moving ones that were in the hall of paintings. Hopefully, one of these can get me to the second floor.

Spotting the path that was the quickest and only way up at the moment, he quickly took the steps two at a time as he raced to get up there before the staircases changed,

Ground floor…

He ran around the landing that signified his change from the first floor to a staircase to the second. A loud groaning sound issue from the top of the staircase that landed on the second floor. No! Hogwarts, you really aren't helping me here!

"Come ON! seriously?"

Harry could only watch in frustration as the staircase began to shift, meeting up with the one on the fourth instead. This is just what I need! Now I have to try and get past the hospital wing without anyone noticing me! I hope that there are no other teachers in there at the moment.

He slowly went up the staircase, and once getting onto the landing, he peered around the corner of the hallway. Waiting, Harry watched for a couple of minutes to see if anyone emerged from the double-doors of the Hospital wing. All was quiet. Hoping that it would stay this way, he crept along the corridor making sure to be extra quiet, despite still wearing his invisibility cloak. It doesn't hurt to be extra careful now, does it?

As he neared the door, he started to walk a little faster in the hopes he could pass any as quickly as possible. Picking up speed, Harry gained more confidence as he got closer, still noting that there was no visible movement near the door. But just as he walked right in front of the doors, in the corner of his eye he glimpsed a blur of black emerging from the infirmary.

Snape.

Ron and Hermione had finally made it to one of the carriages, and Harry was still nowhere to be found.

"What did he yell at us just before we lost him?" Ron asked again, as he had been too busy trying to locate Hermione to actually hear what Harry had shouted.

"He said he would meet us on the train Ron, you were right there when he said it. Honestly, you need to pay attention!" Hermione replied exasperatedly, still looking out both of the carriage windows.

Dean, Susan, Neville and Luna all eventually joined the two inside of the carriage, and it started to move away down the hill before either of them could spot Harry in the rush of students.

"We'll just have to meet him on the train Hermione, He'll be fine," Ron reassured her as they passed out of the school gates.

"But what if he can't find the compartment that we're in?" she questioned, still attempting to peer out of the window.

"Hermione, you can't see him anymore, he'll be able to find us on the train." Hermione then gave up looking around, and they both fell into easy conversation with the others as they rode to Hogsmeade.

Harry gasped in horror as he attempted to manoeuvre out of the way of his incoming Potions Professor. However, he was unable to move completely out of the way and instead Snape's foot caught on the corner of Harry's cloak, yanking it off his head and exposing him to his suitably startled teacher.

"Potter!-" he growled, fixing Harry with a stony stare.

Snape attempted to grab at Harry's arm - probably to take him to Dumbledore, - but Harry just managed to just dodge out of the way and his fingers closed around thin air. "-Care to explain the need to go gallivanting around underneath that infernal invisibility cloak instead of boarding the train with the rest of your peers like you should be?"

Harry's mind went completely blank. Oh Merlin, I'm done for.

Stalling for a reason while Snape continued staring at him, he did the first thing that came to his mind. Run! Turning, Harry grabbed his cloak from where it had fallen to the floor and sprinted down the hallway as if his life depended on it.

"POTTER! Come back here!" Snape shouted after him as he ran.

"POTTER!"

Harry turned the corner and kept on running, intent on losing him as fast as possible. However, he couldn't hear any footsteps that signified that Snape was taking chase-

wait no, he could.

Snape was following him. Damnit! How in Merlin's name am I supposed to get away from him now?

TBC…

Sorry for the Cliffhanger!

(I'm not really)

- Cay ;)