Harry Potter

As he was sitting in the compartment of the Hogwarts Express, finished with his second year of education at Hogwarts and forced to return to Privet Drive for summer vacation, Harry couldn't help but think about the various misadventures and troubles he had gone through during the school year.

When the second year began, Harry didn't expect it to be as bad as the first. While the previous year had been extremely hectic, he assumed that the murderous maniac in the DADA teacher's position would be the exception to the norm, and yet, as it turned out, he was very wrong. Supposedly their seemingly harmless teacher, Gilderoy Lockhart, was in fact the Heir of Slytherin, someone he and his friends had been trying unsuccessfully to stop for most of the year. The man apparently stole other people's ideas by erasing their memories, and in addition was a dangerous terrorist who fought for muggle-born rights by petrifying pureblood students.

It didn't make much sense to Harry, especially since his own investigation hadn't provided any clues pointing to Lockhart, but after so many people in charge, including Professor Dumbledore, declared Lockhart to be responsible for the attacks, Harry assumed they would have a better idea of the culprit than he did, since he was just a student. After all, it was hard to argue with a recording where Lockhart explicitly admits his guilt. He still had some doubts, but he was willing to accept the official explanation and move on.

Unfortunately, even if Harry accepted it, there was a person in his group who was much less willing to admit defeat...

"How can you two give up like this?! It's obvious that Brown is the true heir to Slytherin! We can't just let everyone think Lockhart was the culprit!" shouted Hermione, looking pleadingly at Harry and Ron.

After the February reveal, the three of them met to discuss the next steps. Hermione was, of course, convinced that a wrong person had been accused and that Lockhart was just a scapegoat provided by Michael Brown to cover his tracks. While this was not entirely impossible, especially given what they knew about Brown and their interactions with him, both Harry and Ron found the idea too controversial and ultimately decided not to pursue the Michael Brown investigation. Partly because they trusted Dumbledore, and partly because they were a little afraid of Brown. For such a little twerp, he was surprisingly menacing.

Hermione seemed to disagree with their decision though, as she spent the next few months investigating Brown on her own, while at the same time trying to convince the boys to join her. Her attempts have unfortunately yielded no results so far, only confirming the official version of Lockhart being the culprit, but this did not discourage Hermione, as she pursued Brown with increasing fervor, increasingly convinced of his guilt.

"Hermione, they have a recording of Lockhart's confession," said Ron wearily, clearly tired of Hermione's continued persistence. He didn't even look at Hermione anymore, instead focusing on the view outside the compartment window "That's a pretty solid proof that he was an Heir"

"Oh, wow, Ronald, I forgot about the recording," Hermione said sarcastically, somewhat annoyed by Ron's lack of attention, "You mean the recording provided by Michael Brown, our prime suspect? The person who had previously manipulated events to record and blackmail us, by making it sound like we were responsible for the attacks? You're right, it's pretty solid evidence!"

"Okay, can you just drop it?" asked Ron, exasperated himself "You say a lot of things, but you have no proof that what you say is true. Do you know who it makes you sound like right now?"

"I'm not like Michael Brown!" Hermione exclaimed standing up, clearly offended by the insinuation "I have a lot of evidence! His suspicious behavior during our investigation! The muggle propaganda he spread during his lectures! The fact that he knew the monster was a basilisk! The fact that he bloody kidnapped and blackmailed me! Everything points to Brown as the culprit! I don't care what everyone believes! I won't let it end like this! I...!"

Harry sighed. He suddenly found himself really eager to get back to Privet Drive as soon as possible.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

The End

A short epilogue to end this year.

In addition to the Harry part, there was also supposed to be a part about Michael, where he summarizes everything that happened during the year and admits to Luna that he knows the true Heir of Slytherin, but it accidentally became a chapter, so I didn't really have much to write.

I will now take some time to rest and think about where to take the story next. There are certainly a lot of things to cover in the next year, with Sirius, Lupin, Pettigrew, dementors, thestrals, boggarts, recorder and diadem, so I'll have to plan how to approach them. I have some idea about how to end the year, but not how to reach that ending.

See you next time!