Discliamers: Blah, all the usual as well as the song performed by today's guest star is again a product of the genius of Monty Python.

A/N: Well, here I am, trying to keep my promise stated on my user lookup. I had every intention of updating this before midnight on Wednesday, July 7, 2004. It's just my luck that the site was 'experiencing difficulties' at that exact moment…grr…So instead, here it is now. I posted as soon as I woke up. Is that any better?. Anyhoo, hope you enjoy number three.

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Chapter Three

Life's a Laugh and Death's a Joke

Harry wheezed as he wrenched the fang from the crook of his arm, the basilisk's venom seeping rapidly throughout his veins. Blood poured out of the open wound, drenching his robes as his vision began to fail him. Just as Harry was murmuring the tearful good-byes his loved ones would never hear, the smallest of pressures was lain atop the burning hole. He looked down to see that Fawkes' magnificent scarlet and gold head hovered just above the searing pain of the rotting puncture in his flesh. Large, silvery tears slid from the phoenix' eyes onto the wound.

"Don't cry for me, Fawkes," Harry choked. "Go, fly away and be merry. Always know that my heart will go on…" the teen Dark Lord-slaying sensation gave an extremely cheap, melodramatic sigh.

"You're dead, Harry Potter," came the calm, yet coldly gleeful voice of Tom Riddle. "Dead. Even the bloody bird knows it. Look, Potter, he's crying for you. I'm going to sit here and watch you die, so make it slow and painful. I'm in no hurry and I've got plenty of popcorn." Suddenly, Riddle's spiteful face broke into a maniacal grin. "Hawr hawr, the Boy Who Lived shall live no more! I could just sit here and gloat, but I do believe this deserves musical accompaniment!"

Harry looked up into Riddle's handsomely cruel face in horror, as the faintly glowing apparition began to sing, bouncing merrily on the balls of his feet and tossing his head from side to side.

"Some things in life are bad
They can really make you mad
Other things just make you swear and curse
When you're chewing on life's gristle
Don't grumble, give a whistle
And this'll help things turn out for the best

And…always look on the bright side of life
Always look on the light side of life

If life seems jolly rotten
There's something you've forgotten
And that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing
When you're feeling in the dumps,
Don't be silly chumps
Just purse your lips and whistle-that's the thing

And…always look on the bright side of life…Come on…
Always look on the bright side of life…

For life is quite absurd
And death's the final word
You must always face the curtain with a bow
Forget about your sin-give the audience a grin
Enjoy it-it's your last chance anyhow

So always look on the bright side of death
Just before you draw your terminal breath

Life's a piece of shit
When you look at it
Life's a laugh and death's a joke, it's true
You'll see it's all a show
Keep 'em laughing as you go
Just remember that the last laugh is on you

And always look on the bright side of life
Always look on the right side of life..."

"Come on Harry, cheer up," Riddle spoke with a malicious grin.

"Always look on the bright side of life
Always look on the right side of life..."

"Worse things happen at sea, you know."

"Always look on the bright side of life..."

"I mean-what have you got to lose? You know, you come from nothing, you're going back to nothing. What have you lost? Nothing!"

"Always look on the right side of life!"

"Thank you, thank you, I'll be giving out Dark Marks in the lobby during the reception," Riddle crowed as he bowed with much unnecessary twirling of his arms.

Harry, however, was more interested in the return of feeling to his limbs, and focus to his eyes. "Fawkes! You weren't crying for me, you were healing me, weren't you, you clever boy?" Fawkes barked and wagged his tail in his greatest impression of Lassie™. The twelve-year-old Boy-Who-Hasn't-Died-Yet gave a great "HA!" of laughter as he and Fawkes skipped off to rejoin Ron, Ginny, and Lockhart.

Riddle cried out and shook his fist menacingly as the heroes, accompanied by a desperately thick and bewildered Gilderoy Lockhart, soared through the stench of sewage pipes on the super-phoenix strength of Fawkes' tail feathers. The future Dark Lord sobbed "I'll get you, Harry Potter, and your little owl too!" before dematerializing with a loud bang, due to the fact that Harry had decorated Tom's diary with the previously discarded fang, thus destroying his whole world of private yet extremely unhealthy boy band worship.