Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter nor am I attempting to make any personal gain from this story.
Harry Slithers-in; Chamber of Secrets: Chapter 11: The Secret of the Diary
That evening Harry and Tracey slipped away from the Common Room hidden under Harry's invisibility cloak and carrying the diary. They found a deserted classroom and locked the door behind them. That done they removed the cloak, lit a single candle and opened the diary.
"Any ideas on how to get the diary to reveal the information it must be hiding?" Harry asked.
"Nothing we haven't already tried," Tracey admitted.
"I wonder if it will respond if we write something ourselves?" Harry wondered out loud.
He took out his quill and ink and wrote 'Hello' on the first page. The word glowed faintly in the candlelight before disappearing from the page. A moment later the word reappeared, but in a different writing style. Tracey gasped while Harry stared in amazement.
Next Harry wrote, 'My name is Harry Potter.'
The words glowed once again then vanished. This time a new phrase replaced it. 'Hello Harry Potter, my name is Tom Riddle.'
Tracey grabbed the diary and wrote, 'My name is Tracey Davis.'
Her words were replaced by, 'Hello Tracey Davis. Are you and Harry Potter a couple?'
"This diary has its own consciousness," Tracey said. "Be careful, this could be very dangerous."
"How can a diary be dangerous?" Harry asked.
"People will put curses on anything they want to protect. If Tom Riddle wanted to hurt someone who found his diary there are many things that could happen. He might pretend to be a friend while leading you down a dangerous path to self-destruction."
"Ok then. Do you think we should answer the question?"
Tracey thought for a while. As she was doing this new words appeared in the diary. 'You don't have to answer if you don't want to, I am merely curious.'
Harry wrote, 'We're friends.'
'Friends are always good to have,' the diary wrote back.
"Do you think we should ask it if it knows anything about the chamber of secrets?" Harry asked.
"It should be safe enough," Tracey replied. "But if it starts asking more questions we should put it away and never use it again."
Harry wrote, 'Do you know anything about the Chamber of Secrets?'
'Yes,' the diary replied. 'In my time it was considered a legend. Nobody really believed it existed until someone opened it. It happened during my 5th year and several people were attacked. I was the one who caught the person responsible.'
Harry and Tracey stared at the writing. This was more than they could have hoped for.
'Can you tell us what happened?' Harry wrote.
'No, but I can show you.'
"Do you think we should trust it?" Harry asked.
"I think it should be alright. I think we should watch this together. Just remember to be very careful and don't take what you see as the literal truth."
'Let me show you,' the diary was now showing.
'Ok' Harry wrote. He and Tracey held hands.
The pages of the diary began to blow as if in a strong wind. Eventually they stopped on a day mid-way through June. A small window like square began glowing much like a miniature TV screen. Harry and Tracey bent forward as the screen began to get bigger. A moment later they both found themselves sucked into the screen.
Their feet hit something solid and they stood up, looking around them as the blurry shapes came into focus. They soon realised they were in an office, standing in front of a desk which was occupied by an elderly wizard they had never seen before.
"I'm sorry, sir, I didn't…" Harry began but Tracey cut him off.
"Harry, don't bother. He doesn't know we're here," she explained. "All we can do is observe what happens. We can't interact with him or anyone else in any way. I think we're in Tom Riddle's memory."
Harry looked around the room. He soon realised it matched the brief description of Dumbledore's office that Pansy had given them several weeks ago, except that the man behind the desk wasn't Dumbledore. There was a knock on the door.
"Come in," the old wizard said in a feeble voice.
A boy about 16 entered, removing his pointed hat. He wore a silver prefect's badge pinned to his tidy but obviously 2nd hand robes. He was tall with jet black hair similar to Harry's.
"Ah, Riddle," the man, obviously the Headmaster, said.
"You wanted to see me, Professor Dippet?" Riddle said, looking nervous.
"Sit down. I've just been reading the letter you sent me," Dippet said.
"Oh." Riddle sat, gripping his hands together tightly.
"I cannot possibly allow you to stay here over the summer holidays. Is there a reason you don't want to go home?"
"I live in a muggle orphanage, sir," Riddle explained. "I really don't want to go back there; I'd rather stay here."
"Are you muggleborn?"
"Half blood, sir. Muggle father; witch mother."
"And are both your parents -?"
"My mother died just after I was born, sir. She only lived long enough to name me Tom, for my father and Marvolo, for her father."
"The thing is, Tom, special arrangements might have been made for you, but in the current circumstances…"
"Do you mean the attacks, sir?" Riddle asked. Harry jumped slightly and glanced at Tracey. She seemed to be just as enthralled as he was.
"Precisely," Dippet said. "My dear boy, surely you see how foolish it would be for me to allow you to remain in the castle, especially after yesterday's tragic death of that poor little girl. Indeed, as we speak the Ministry is considering closing Hogwarts. We are no closer to locating the source of the, er, unpleasantness."
Riddle's eyes widened. "What if - the person was caught and it all stopped –"
"Do you know something about it?" Dippet asked urgently.
"No, sir," Riddle quickly replied. Harry was certain Riddle was not telling the truth.
"You may go, Tom," Dippet said, sounding disappointed.
Harry and Tracey followed Riddle as he left the office. He appeared to be deep in thought. Abruptly Riddle seemed to come to a decision. He set off through a series of corridors, stopping only once when a teacher called to him. "What are you doing, wandering around this late, Tom?" Harry was surprised when he realised the man was Albus Dumbledore.
"I had to see the Headmaster, sir," Riddle replied.
"Well, hurry off to bed," Dumbledore said. He appeared to be studying Riddle intently, as if trying to see into his soul. "One shouldn't be roaming the halls this late at night, especially since…"
With a sigh Dumbledore bade Riddle farewell. Harry and Tracey continued to follow Riddle into the dungeons, past Snape's office and classroom and into a tiny broom closet near the end of the corridor. Another door, probably leading into a storeroom, stood nearby.
They waited for quite some time before they heard someone creeping along the corridor and opening the other door. Next they heard a voice, "C'mon, gotta get yeh outa here. C'mon into the box." the voice sounded familiar.
Riddle burst out of the closet, pointing his wand at a huge boy holding a very large box.
"Evening, Rubeus," Riddle said.
The boy slammed the lid down on the box and stood up. It was clearly Hagrid.
"What are yeh doin' here, Tom?"
"It's all over, Rubeus. I'm going to have to turn you in. Even now they are talking about closing the school," Riddle said, stepping closer.
"What do yeh mean?"
"I don't think you meant it to kill anyone, but monsters don't make good pets."
"He never killed no one." Harry could hear a strange clicking sound coming from the box.
"Come on, Rubeus, the dead girls parents will be here tomorrow. The least Hogwarts can do is ensure the thing that killed their daughter is slaughtered…"
"It wasn't him," Hagrid shouted. The corridor rang with echoes of his voice.
"Stand aside," shouted Riddle.
A blinding flash filled the corridor. The box flew out of Hagrid's hands, the lid coming off as it landed. A huge, hairy, black body dropped to the floor and scuttled off, running on eight enormous, hairy legs. Harry gasped in shock as Tracey screamed next to him. Hagrid lunged at Riddle, knocking his wand away before he could cast another spell, allowing the giant spider to escape.
A few moments later Harry and Tracey found themselves back in the classroom. Both were breathing heavily. They looked at each other in shock.
"Hagrid opened the chamber of secrets?" Harry said.
"That can't be right," Tracey replied, shaking her head. "Slytherin's monster can't be an Acromantula."
"A what?"
"That's the common name given to giant spiders. Salazar Slytherin was known for his rare ability of being able to talk to snakes whereas Acromantulas are capable of learning human speech. Anyone can talk to them, assuming, of course, the Acromantulas aren't trying to eat you. That's another reason Hagrid can't be responsible for opening the chamber; they only kill to eat, or to provide a food source for their young in which case there would have been spider eggs nearby," Tracey explained.
So you are convinced Hagrid isn't to blame?"
Tracey nodded. "I am, yes."
"Riddle seemed certain it was Hagrid, and it's obvious he was trying to raise a monster. Do you think it is possible Hagrid was set up?" Harry asked.
Tracey nodded. "It's a possibility. Who stood to gain the most from Hagrid being expelled, though?"
Harry couldn't think of an answer to that one. He thought about it for a while as he and Tracey returned to the Common Room.
"What if we look at it in another way," Harry began. "Who stood to gain the most if Hagrid was caught and falsely accused of being the Heir of Slytherin?"
"The real Heir, obviously," Tracey replied.
"We know from that memory Tom Riddle had a lot to gain through the Heir being caught," Harry said. "They were going to close Hogwarts unless the mystery was solved, and Riddle would have been forced to return to a muggle orphanage. From his perspective catching the Heir was important to his future. Do you think he was the one to frame Hagrid?"
"Possibly. Harry, are you implying that Tom Riddle may be the Heir of Slytherin?"
Harry nodded. "Yes. If you look at it from that perspective, everything seems to fit together much better than from any other point of view."
"That means it is likely that this diary is the means by which Slytherin's monster is being controlled," Tracey stated, sounding shocked and even a little frightened.
Harry felt the same way. "We were lucky we found this diary together, and that we have only ever looked into it together. If one of us had been alone it may have tried to possess us. Thank you for that warning to be careful."
"I think you should keep the diary, Harry. You are the Heir of Slytherin so you can control Slytherin's monster and, while you have the diary, it cannot be used by anyone else; nor can it use anyone else."
Harry agreed. "Let's go to bed. It's long after midnight and I am feeling tried. In the morning we can get together and see what else we can determine about this mystery."
Harry and Tracey said goodnight. Harry changed as quietly as he could and climbed into bed. Despite being tired he had trouble getting to sleep. The events of the previous few hours weighed heavily on his mind. Although they had partly solved the mystery of the chamber there was still a long way to go.
And there were other mysteries as well. Why were the spiders behaving the way they were? What could be causing them to seemingly flee in large numbers? What creature could petrify people and how could it move around unnoticed? Whatever it was must be either very small, able to make itself invisible except when it attacked or be able to move through solid walls. There were so many unanswered questions. Obviously they needed to do more research if they were to solve this mystery.