Before Harry could even get closer to the spot where the writing were written, he heard many feet leaving the Great Hall and coming up to them, as the feast just ended some moments ago. Daphne and Hermione came just around the corner as the rest of the students, who had to go up the castle to get to their common rooms, came around the opposite side of the hallway. He staggered for a short moment, as this many sensations were overwhelming him while he still had his senses dialed up.
Thankfully, Callie could turn them down fast enough so the others would not notice him swaying in place. But he noticed just before his senses became normal again the unique scents of two people that put his mind at ease. He did not know why the scent of a spring morning in the forest, a field of roses or the smell of a fire burning with oak-wood in the castle.
Unbeknown to Harry, Daphne did notice him stagger for a short bit, even if it was only for the fraction of a second the other students arrived in the hallway. She would not leave Harry alone until he answered her question what was going on, as his speed was not in the same class as a normal human being.
As the other students noticed what was going on in the hallway with Harry in its center standing in a puddle of water and a seemingly dead cat hanging on a torch bracket, the murmur did begin with someone even asking what chamber was meant. Soon, Filch came around the corner with the other teachers, as even some Slytherins came back up from the dungeon as they were curious what the sound in this hallway was.
One of those was Malfoy, who repeated the words on the wall and then issued a warning. "You will be next, mudbloods!" While Professor McGonagall was looking angrily at him, Filch was going after Harry, accusing him of doing this to his cat. "You killed her! I know you did!"
John stood between Filch and Harry, showing the caretaker of the castle that he should calm down before he accused anyone of a crime without any proof. When John turned to Harry, he could see in the boy's eyes that he was also just as confused as the rest of the castle to what happened to the cat. Soon, the headmaster stood next to Harry, taking the cat off the torch bracket and told the students to go back to their common rooms, except for Harry, Hermione and Daphne as they did find the cat like that. How he would know that, Harry would have to ask him later. He then asked the teachers to come with him as they had to investigate what happened to Mrs. Norris, when Professor Lockhart told him that they should go to his office, as it was the nearest.
As they arrived in the office, Dumbledore placed the cat down on the table and looked at it closely, with McGonagall sitting right beside him and looking over her glasses at the still cat. Meanwhile, John and Triss asked Harry what he knew about what happened, and Harry told them that he was outside training when he heard the voice again and wanted to see if he could find out what it was when he arrived in the hallway. He even told Callie to make a report and she sent it to Cortana, of course he made sure that the other teachers could not hear him at this moment.
Hermione and Daphne were both nervous what would happen to them, as they had no believable alibi for the time where that could have happened. But Dumbledore soon told them to relax, then whoever did this to the cat, would have to use a very dark magic, nothing some second year could master. Also, Mrs. Norris was not dead, only petrified by something that would need more investigation, but she could be healed thanks to the mandrakes that Professor Sprout was growing up in the greenhouse this year. That calmed Filch down a bit, even if he still wanted to catch the one responsible for this situation. John thought that he would install some monitoring sensors around the castle to see if he could catch the culprit, he would have to inform Dumbledor in private of his intentions. Dumbledore told them that he wanted to talk with Harry personally, to which Daphne asked if she and Hermione could also stay, as they had also some questions for Harry.
Harry could think what kind of questions these would be, as he did speed up too much to go up the castle to follow the voice, so they may have figured out that something happened over the summer. He was still debating with himself if he should tell them, as Dumbledore nodded and told the other teachers that he would send the students back when they were finished. They left Lockhart's office and walked to an empty classroom, where Dumbledore put a privacy charm on the door so they would not be overheard of any straggler.
"Now Harry, I take it that you already talked with the Master Chief and Miss Merigold about the situation while we were looking at Mrs. Norris. I wanted to ask you if you would tell me why you ran to the hallway." Dumbledore looked at Harry with his grandfatherly look on his face, hoping that Harry would feel safe enough to tell him the reason. He was lucky, as Harry saw him to be responsible for the safety of the students together with John supporting him.
"I heard something talking about wanting to kill someone as we walked inside the entrance after being outside until sunset. As I thought it would be better for me to run up there instead of searching for help, I sprinted up the stairs and could only arrive at the scene that already happened. The only strange thing beside the writing on the wall and the cat hanging was the water on the floor, as there should not be any reason for it to be there as it was not raining today. As it came out from under a door, I guess that this is a bathroom" At this question, Dumbledore nodded and added that it was a girl's bathroom. Thanking him for his honesty, Dumbledore now looked to the girls for conformation as they told him that they did not hear anything talking, only a small hissing that they thought was just some pipe in the wall. Then when Harry ran off, they noticed that he was way faster as he was outside on the obstacle courses and wondered if they are allowed to know why this was.
Harry, deciding on the spot after Callie told him that they could be trusted and told them what he was went through during the summer. How he trained with another friend from John and how they discussed after the events of the previous school year that they should accelerate their plans and let Harry decide if he would take the ritual to mutate him into a Witcher. Leaving out the part where he also got a neural interface implanted into his neck, so he could talk better with Callie. He just mentioned that to make the procedure more efficient he was put to sleep so he would not thrash around as much because of the pain the mutation brought with them. After all, it took his body and would almost build it from ground up with all the benefits of the mutagen. When he finished with his explanation, Hermione walked up to him and hit him with her fist as she angrily yelled at him.
"WHY DID YOU THINK YOU WOULD NEED TO GO THROUGH SOMETHING SO DANGEROUS?" Hermione was getting angrier with every word, while Daphne tried to remember every detail her father told her about Witchers of old, as she pieced together why Harry decided to go this way. She then placed her hand on Hermione's shoulder, trying to calm her down a bit.
"Harry, could you be honest with us? Was this really your own choice? And if it was, were you influenced that the Death Eaters could come after you or that, Merlin forbid, He-Who-Should-Not-Be-Named would return?" Daphne could read between the lines and what happened at the end of their first year and what the accused Death Eaters were doing in the magical world could only indicate to these conclusions.
Harry was looking at her with his stern face and told her that it was his choice, as her reasoning were correct and so he told her what happened back then, as Hermione would already know after she had visited him in the infirmary and was talking with Callie about this.
Daphne was now staring at Harry and admired his courage when he decided that he was preparing himself for a fight that was almost unavoidable. Hermione was also in awe after she recognized for herself that Harry was doing this to defend the magical world in case the dark lord would really return to his past strength. Both decided for themselves that they would do what they could to help him in this endeavor.
Dumbledore waited patiently for Harry to explain his situation to the girls and when Harry was finished, Dumbledore explained to the two girls that the knowledge of Harry being a Witcher is not ready to be public information. He explained to them that only Professor McGonagall, as Harry's Head of House, and himself are the only two Hogwarts staff who know. Dumbledore didn't need to clarify that Triss and John already knew as they lived with Harry in Kear Mohen. Dumbledore looked seriously at the two girls as he offered his feelings of Harry being a Witcher. "While I understand Harry is quite young to undertake the ritual, but it was agreed upon by those involved in Harry's life that this would give Hogwarts an extra layer of security. Harry is obligated to report any and all suspicious behavior to the Master Chief as his role as head of security for Hogwarts."
Dumbledore stood up from the desk he was sitting on and asked Harry and Hermione to wait for a moment until he brought Daphne down to the dungeons. So, Harry and Hermione just sat in the classroom and waited for Dumbledore to return. Harry felt a bit awkward after she was this angry with him before, and now she was just sitting silently beside him.
Before Harry could apologize Hermione turned toward him and asked him if he could forgive her outburst before. "I know that you had thought about this step long enough to be sure, and you did it to be better prepared for the future. It just felt like you do not trust us to look after ourselves, you know. And as far I know, becoming a Witcher was always dangerous and becoming one our age is really rare. Now, I would understand why you would have trained more to become stronger and looking after yourself, but these mutations were a big risk after all. I would have to read up on them a bit more to understand everything that you can do now to know how I could help you in the future. I mean, I saw how Mr. Geralt was almost depending on Miss Yennefer to help him heal if he would be injured. Also, we need to analyze how these mutations affect your magic and if you even could learn new spells in the future." Hermione was once again in her learning mode, already looking through the book list of the library in her head. A beeping in her bag got her attention as Luke, who was listening to them thanks to his sensors in his device, wanting to tell her that he could compile the list for her and then show her when they will be alone in the library tomorrow. Hermione thanked her AI, as he did all he could to help her.
Harry was glad that they took the information about his mutations this good and did not shun him for it. Geralt had told him that in the older days, Witchers were only welcomed when there was a monster to slay, any other day they were asked to leave as soon as possible, sometimes even with pitchforks raised. And even more frequent, they were not even allowed to enter a village that thought that they were the ones who brought the trouble with them. Luckily, in today's society Witchers were likely hired from some Wizards, and they knew that they did a good job and paid as much as they wanted. But for his friends and teachers accepting him like he is now, that was something special.
Soon, Dumbledore came back to get them, answering the unspoken question why they had to wait with that whatever attacked Mrs. Norris could still be inside the school. John was already going through his patrol route and even asked Michael to return and help him for a while. Harry could understand this safety precaution to make sure that the students returned to their common rooms.
Meanwhile, John was once again in his Office / workshop with Quit Bouncing making better surveillance cameras for John to place in the hallway where the writing was. He also made them able to be shot from John's rifle and transmit the signal wirelessly directly to the computer where Cortana was residing when they were in the castle, so she could watch for anything suspicious. Not that this was the only one Quit Bouncing was now fabricating for this task, as John told him that he would need enough to be placed at different spots in the castle. It was a good distraction from another project he was making, as he noticed that there where now more AI in the castle then by the beginning of the last year. He also saw that the four AI that were now in the castle were with the girls who were friends with this Harry boy, the one his handler was so strict with and trained him to fight like him. His idea was the same as Doctor Halsey was now working on, he wanted to make lenses they could wear on their eyes so they could talk with their AI's, like the boy did with his glasses before he got his neural link. As this solution was not possible, due to secrecy reasons, Quit Bouncing decided to help Doctor Halsey from afar. But with the materials they had at their disposal on this planet, this endeavor was proving itself to be difficult. But he thought that he had a breakthrough for the question how to power those lenses in the first place. Now the only thing left was how those lenses should receive the signals from their matrixes and how they should display the information that the AI would send to them. Also, the communicating was still a problem, but he found out that they could just have the same method as Harry had, nano transmitters that would send out the sound directly to the section of the human brain responsible for their hearing. If this worked, they could also heal deafness back in their home.
Soon, John walked with 6 cameras through the castle, while Cortana was scanning his surroundings with the sensors in his armor to look if the culprit was still around. They did not find anything yet, so he hoped that these cameras would help them. He was even thinking on calling Geralt to look at the traces around the scene because he had more experience then Harry did, as when he looked at the place with the thermal image sensors, it did show that something was dragging itself behind a person on the floor, but the data did not include what it could be, as the size was bigger than anything they registered until now.
To his surprise, he saw Dumbledore standing in the corridor looking at the writing on the wall, as the headmaster let out a deep sigh. John heard the headmaster murmuring to himself as the old man stroked his beard. "How did he do it this time? According to my sources, he should be in Albania by now." Dumbledore was interrupted from his musing as he noticed John walking up to him, the first camera mounted on the muzzle of his rifle. John pointed it towards a corner of the corridor near the ceiling and pulled the trigger, as the camera attached itself there and connected with Cortana, who told John that it worked.
"Headmaster, I could not help to hear what you just said. Would you please tell me who you think is responsible for this?" John pointed towards the wall, still not knowing which chamber was meant.
"Yes Chief, you should hear about this. You see, 50 years ago, this Chamber was opened at least once. It is called the Chamber of Secrets, and according to legend was built by none other than Salazar Slytherin himself, as for what reason or what monster is in there, history lost this important information. As for who opened it, my suspicions do not have any proof as of now. But 50 years ago, Tom Riddle was in this school, and if you recall the briefing I gave you and your companions, he called himself later Lord Voldemort. But you know as much as me that he should be in Albania right now. So how could he open it this time around?" Dumbledore asked this question knowing full well that John could not answer him with a satisfactory answer. But to his surprise, John had a good theory as he told the headmaster that Voldemort could have told someone in his organization and one of their children could be in this school now.
Cortana listened to this theory and was surprised how plausible this was. She wrote a report to the ONI detachment that they should investigate this, as it was the best answer they had for now. Of course, she knew that Voldemort telling anyone what he did is rather low, but they had no other clue except that Voldemort would control another human like he did last year. But this left the question why he did not open the chamber the year before, as this could have tied them to protect the students instead of chasing him down in the room with the mirror.
After John placed the last camera in its place, Cortana checked once more if they were working correctly and was satisfied with the quality and that it also transmitted sound in a clarity that was uncommon for such devices. She would have to thank Quit Bouncing for his work for making these. John said his goodbye to the headmaster in front of his office, reminding himself to make service his armor in preparation for the Quidditch game in a few weeks. Also, he read over the message once more that the captain sent him, asking him if he could arrange some pilots of their space fighter wing to watch a game, after they had heard that some of the players could fly better than them. He was just wondering why this fighter captain Maverick was pushing this hard and almost ordered the Chief to make it happen. His record did show some strange behavior and a habit to disobey orders during combat, but his skill was undeniable as he had flown since the beginning of the Human-Covenant war and was still alive.
The next day, Harry was walking with Hermione and Neville down to the Great Hall, while Ron walked behind them and watched their backs to make sure they were not attacked. The reason was what they learned from the older students about the rumors now flowing around the castle, that the reason the cat was petrified is that Harry would be the heir mentioned on this wall.
Harry was sure he could just ignore the talking behind his back, as it was not new to him as the seeker of the Quidditch team he was used to it. But he kept his guard up, just in case. Callie had told him what Cortana did find out the previous night from the headmaster's talk with John, that this chamber was built by Slytherin himself. And as he was, magically at least, really the heir of Slytherin the rumors were true for once, not that the students would know of course. He just hoped that this attack would be the only one before they would find out what monster it was and where it came from. He had asked Callie to help Cortana watching those cameras around the castle to speed up the process working on these inputs.
When they arrived at their house table, he noticed a small gap on the Gryffindor table where a single person was sitting right in the middle of that gap. "Ginny? Whats wrong?"
A/N: and another chapter in this almost epic tale. thanks again to HowInMadHowie for the edit on this chapter and also for the added sections that deepens the story. Hope you all still like this story.