A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed the first chapter! It means a lot to hear so much good feedback! :) I'll be uploading the last chapter this weekend. Also, I made a few small edits in the first chapter about the broom Harry saw Ron holding when he met up with them. So you can go back and read that first if you want to!
The first thing that Ron noticed as they entered the Chamber was that it stunk. A lot. The room was dark, but his wand helped a bit. He heard Hermione mutter, "Lumos," and the tip of her wand lit up as well.
Now the Chamber was illuminated enough that Ron could see the outline of a giant snake at the far end of the room. He started walking towards it, Hermione's hand held tightly in his. He was grateful for the touch, and it gave him some extra confidence. His head was racing with thoughts of what could go wrong during the next 24 hours, and holding Hermione's hand somehow kept him from becoming overwhelmed by everything. He wasn't looking forward to when he would have to let go.
Ron and Hermione walked the length of the Chamber, past the tall pillars, and up to the basilisk. Ron knew immediately that this had been causing the awful smell in the room. The body was mostly bone, but there were several spots still covered in rotting flesh. They walked toward its head cautiously, since they knew that the fangs were as dangerous now that the basilisk was dead as they were when it had been alive.
Ron reluctantly let go of Hermione's hand and bent down next to the basilisk skull, setting his broom and still-lit wand next to him. He turned towards Hermione and said, "I think I'd better do this by myself. You know, just in case..."
But he knew from the stubborn look on Hermione's face that she wouldn't listen to him. He was proven right when she haughtily retorted, "Ron, I'm more than capable of removing a few teeth from a dead basilisk. Besides, my parents are dentists."
Ron smiled at the last part of her statement and he decided not to argue about it. As much as he enjoyed occasionally bickering with Hermione, now definitely wasn't the time. So he nodded to her to show his agreement, and she knelt beside him.
He still thought it would be best if he were the first to take out a fang. Carefully placing his hands on either side of one, he made sure he had a firm grip before yanking hard on it. But it was far looser than he'd been expecting, and he almost impaled his leg with the force of his pull. He carefully put the fang down next to him and reached out a hand to stop Hermione as she moved to dislodge one as well. "How many of these do we need?" he asked her.
She thought for a moment before replying, "We should probably take as many as we can carry. I'm sure there won't be enough time to come back down here and get more. And it can't hurt to have extras." Ron nodded at her again, and she reached out her hands to remove a fang. She was obviously being careful not to repeat Ron's mistake and pull too hard, and got it out easily. She put it down next to Ron's fang.
For about ten minutes, they sat on the floor of the Chamber, plucking fangs out of the basilisk's skull. After awhile, they realized that they already had a huge pile of the fangs; many more than they needed. Hermione started to collect the fangs in her arms, but Ron stopped her by saying, "Maybe we should just destroy it right here. Who knows when we'll get another chance, and personally, I'd love to get this thing off our hands."
Hermione nodded in agreement, and Ron handed her a basilisk fang. She looked at him, shocked, and asked, "Wait, you want me to do it?"
Ron replied, "I've already killed one, and so has Harry. You should get a turn."
Hermione didn't look pleased with this turn of events, but nevertheless, she took Hufflepuff's cup out of her bag and put it gently on the ground. Ron thought that the cup might sense the basilisk fangs nearby, because he could hear a faint humming noise issuing from it.
Hermione gulped loudly, looking extremely apprehensive. She turned to look at Ron, and he smiled encouragingly at her. This seemed to strengthen her resolve, and she raised the fang in her hands, faced the cup, and rammed the fang into it.
Or at least she tried to. But before she had even brought the fang halfway towards the cup, a huge blast like a cannon sounded and she and Ron were both blown backwards across the Chamber.
O—O—O—O—O—O—O—O—O—O
Hermione felt as if she was halfway between sleep and consciousness. She could see the blurry outline of the ceiling and pillars in the Chamber above her, but what she saw most prominently were memories. She was reliving every bad incident she had ever experienced. There were some from her years before Hogwarts, such as the first time she had a tooth pulled and being tripped by a bully at the park. She could deal with these, but that was until her Hogwarts memories began.
She saw and heard an eleven-year-old Ron mocking her and talking about her lack of friends. Even though this was no longer true, she felt her eyes fill with tears simply because it was Ron saying that. She tried to focus on the Ron she knew now, the one who wouldn't say such terrible things, but she was soon faced with a new memory.
It was from their second year and she was walking down the halls with a curly-haired Ravenclaw behind her. She had a mirror in her hand and was using it to look around corners. She was waiting for what she had only just realized was a basilisk. But they had only walked for a short time before she stuck the mirror around a corner and briefly saw a pair of enormous yellow eyes. She felt her body seize up, and the last thing she remembered was feeling utter terror...
Suddenly, the memories seemed to speed up, and she was pushed into several new ones in quick succession. There was Ron yelling at her about Crookshanks, Snape calling her an "insufferable know-it-all", and the aftermath of the Yule Ball. Then came all of the miserable moments from her sixth year. Ron kissing Lavender, the time when she dated Cormac to make Ron jealous, and then, worst of all, Ron being poisoned. She saw him lying in a bed in the hospital wing, so pale that he could have been dead, and she couldn't tear her eyes away from his face. She felt them filling up with even more tears, and through the haze of her memories, she felt them drip down her face.
She knew what was coming next. Every horrid memory from this past year. The announcement of Mad-Eye's death, Ron getting splinched, Ron abandoning them, the near-miss with Voldemort in Godric's Hollow, getting captured by Snatchers, and then—
Hermione felt like her head was splitting open. Her entire body was in agony and she was screaming. She clawed at her arms and her face, trying pointlessly to end the pain. She saw Bellatrix's snarling face above her, and she realized immediately that she was reliving her torture. She didn't know how to make all this misery go away, and she was getting especially desperate. She writhed on the dirty floor of the Chamber, screaming even louder as the already intense pain increased.
But then, she felt a pair of warm arms wrap around her and keep her from squirming. She knew right away that they were Ron's. The agony started to lessen, and she stopped screaming. When she leaned into Ron's chest, Bellatrix's torture disappeared completely. In its place she could see good memories: Ron and Harry befriending her after their incident with the troll, buying Crookshanks, reconciling with Ron about Scabbers, DA lessons, hearing Ron say her name in the hospital, Ron returning to her and Harry, and Ron comforting her after she'd been tortured.
With these memories flying past her eyes, she slowly started to stand up, grabbing the fang she had dropped in the process. Ron removed his arms, but she knew that he would stay behind her in case she fell. She made her way back across the Chamber, following the faded image of the cup that she could see through the still-flashing memories. When she reached the cup, she moved the fang over it. Without any hesitation, she stabbed it, falling to her knees as she did.
An ear-splitting scream filled the air and Hermione's vision finally cleared as the memories disappeared. She blinked several times and watched as the mangled cup let out one long hiss before falling silent.
Hermione turned around to see Ron standing right behind her. She stood up again, walked over to him, and proceeded to sob into his shoulder. Even after seeing her happy memories, she hadn't forgotten the pain from the bad ones. He put his arms around her and held her tightly, comforting her.
Eventually, Hermione forced herself to stop crying. They still had work to do. So, after drying her eyes, she collected her wand and some of the other basilisk fangs in her arms. Ron looked at her apprehensively, clearly not sure if she was in as good a state as she now seemed to be. She smiled kindly at him, and said, "Don't worry about me, Ron. I'm fine." This seemed to help, and he picked up most of the remaining fangs, as well as his broomstick and wand. He waited for her to start walking first, and she headed towards the exit of the Chamber.
When they were about halfway there, Hermione turned around to face Ron and said, "Oh…by the way, Ron. Thank you." She stepped toward him and kissed him lightly on the cheek. Before she turned back to the door, she saw Ron's face light up with a huge smile. A small grin appeared on her face too as they walked out of the Chamber of Secrets and back into the dark passage beyond.