First major divergence with canon will be in this chapter. Hope you guys enjoy it!
It was definitely the first time that Harry was happy to see Moaning Myrtle as she floated forlornly above them in her bathroom.
"What do you want now?", she asked with a shaking voice.
Harry, Ron and John exchanged looks while Lockhart looked both terrified and confused.
"To ask you... how you died", said Harry. Myrtle's demeanour changed instantly. To Harry's surprise, she looked delighted and flattered. He'd never seen that look on her face before. It was bizarre.
"Oooh! It was dreadful!", she said gleefully. "I'd run away from the others, because Olive Hornby was teasing me about my glasses! I'd run in here, crying about it. I heard someone walk in and tried to ignore them, but they started speaking! Some sort of made-up language and I knew that it was a boy's voice. I told them to go away and then... I died!"
"What? You told him to go away and just... dropped dead? You didn't feel anything?", asked John.
"Not at all! I did see a great big pair of yellow eyes, but that's all", said Myrtle, happily. John exchanged a grim look with Ron while Harry thanked Myrtle.
"Oh Olive Hornby regretted ever making fun of me after that day! I haunted her, following her everywhere she went! She did go to the Ministry and I was forced back here, but I bet she never forgot me after that!", said Myrtle, gleefully.
"Right... thanks for your help", said Ron, having no idea what else to say.
Harry, Ron and John looked over to the sink that Myrtle had referred to. Harry's heart seemed to do a somersault when he saw that on one of the taps, there was a carved snake.
"This is it", Harry whispered. "This is the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets"
"The damn sink? Seriously?", asked John. Harry nodded.
"Say something", said Ron, Harry and John looked at him, quizzically. "Say something in parseltongue", he clarified.
"But... I don't know if I can", said Harry. The only times he'd spoken parseltongue were times when he'd been facing living, breathing snakes.
"We need to get in there", Ron pressed. He was starting to look desperate. Harry couldn't blame him. Ginny was down there.
Harry gritted his teeth and looked at the carving of the snake, trying to pretend that it was alive.
"Open", he said.
"English", said Ron, shaking his head.
Harry looked at the snake again, willing it to be real, remembering what real snakes' eyes looked like, with their slit-like pupils, the scales that surrounded them, the calculating look they always had in them.
"Open", he said again. This time however, the English word did not seem to leave his mouth. Some form of strangled, hissing sound escaped from between his lips. If they got out of this in one piece, Harry vowed to ask someone how on Earth the gift of parseltongue worked.
The sink he was looking at, in fact... sank into the floor, revealing what appeared to be the entrance to a secret dungeon.
Or chamber.
"Well... brilliant work Harry, I must say. Now that you've found it, there's... no need for me to stay!", said Lockhart, who tried to make a mad dash for the door, only to be stopped by Ron and John, who gave an almighty heave together and forced him towards the entrance to the chamber.
"Boys... what good will it do?", Lockhart whimpered.
"Better you than us", said Harry savagely.
Lockhart, not having any options, leapt into the hole. To their surprise, they never heard the thud of a hard landing. In fact, they heard Lockhart calling back up to them.
"It's rather filthy down here", he said.
"Right... cover your face and head", said John, who did as he said, before jumping down the hole. Ron and Harry quickly followed, also covering their heads and faces as they slid down what turned out to be a long, slimy tunnel. They landed in a small opening in the chamber where Lockhart stood. Ron, Harry and John stood up, pointing their wands at him.
"I... I think we're under the lake", said Harry, listening carefully. He could hear water flowing far above their heads. What was particularly bizarre about this was that there was no doubt that it was all man-made. Did Slytherin really build this on his own?
"Shit, it stinks down here", said John as the four of them slowly ventured deeper into the chamber.
Ron accidentally revealed why. He stepped on something that made a loud crunching sound. When he looked down, it turned out to be the skeleton of a small animal. This was where the basilisk took its prey. Not its human victims, but its food. The air was thick with the scent of decay.
"Let's keep moving, I can hardly breathe", said Harry. When they reached the next section of the chamber, they froze. A massive, serpentine figure lay in front of them, completely still, but John was the first to calm down.
"It's not the basilisk. This must be the last set of skin that it shed", he said. The others breathed a sigh of relief, but they weren't entirely reassured. If this was the last set of skin that the basilisk shed, then the real animal would have been more than fifty feet long. Bigger even than what the book said. If they could get Ginny out of there without actively facing the creature, then that would be a victory unto itself.
"Snakes shed skin when they get too big, right?", asked Ron.
"Yeah", said John.
"It's sixty feet long... Or more", said Ron, paling with the realisation.
Lockhart, upon hearing Ron's realisation, fainted.
"I feel so good that this man was teaching us how to protect ourselves against dark forces", John quipped, hoping to at least partially ease the tension.
"Yeah. He should change his name to Lionhart", said Ron, dryly.
The laughter died in Harry's throat as Lockhart sprang to his feet, snatching Ron's wand on his way up. A mad, triumphant grin was now adorning his face. Harry had never seen him look quite so deranged.
"The adventure ends here, boys! I shall take a piece of this skin back to the castle and inform them that I was too late to save the girl. I will explain how you three tragically lost your minds at the sight of her mangled body. You first, Weasley, after all it's your wand! Say goodbye to your memories! Obliviate!", said Lockhart.
Ron's half-destroyed wand once again failed its user, just as it had when Ron tried to curse Malfoy all those months ago. The memory charm backfired, blasting Lockhart off his feet. His back slammed into a cave wall, causing some rocks to start falling. John, realising that Lockhart had caused a small cave-in, grabbed Ron and Harry by the arms and dived forwards, dragging them with him.
More rocks continued to fall and the three boys desperately rolled out of the way, with Ron barely preventing a boulder the size of his chest from crushing his head while he was on the floor.
"Shit... thanks", Ron gasped as John pulled him and Harry to their feet.
"You don't have a wand", Harry said, looking at Ron.
"After what my wand did to that idiot, I'm glad to be shot of it", Ron said, darkly.
John nodded.
"Let's keep going. I don't know if I'm making things up but I swear I heard something moving", said John, warily looking around.
The three boys followed the path through the labyrinthine tunnels, eventually coming to a door that looked like it had been locked in place by iron snakes. Harry knew exactly what to do and had little trouble speaking parseltongue this time. The iron snakes' eyes seemed to follow his every move.
They slid away from the door, which opened on its own, revealing a long hall with a multitude of man-sized holes in the side walls. At the front was an enormous statue of a man's head, while the path down the middle had many statues of snakes on the sides. Lying just in front of the statue of the head however, was-
"GINNY!", Ron yelled, sprinting towards her with John and Harry hot on his heels.
By the time they'd reached Ginny's very still form, they'd realised with abruptly rising senses of dread that Ginny was deathly pale.
"No no no no no... this can't be happening, no no", Ron babbled, coming very close to Lockhart's earlier hypothetical story of Ron losing his mind. John laid down his wand and knelt at Ginny's side, placing his head just above hers.
"She's unconscious, but she's alive", John said, looking Ron dead in the eye. The relief brought Ron to his knees.
"Why won't she wake up?", asked Harry, gently shaking her by the shoulder after dropping his wand too.
"She may not be dead, but she won't wake", came a soft, well-spoken voice from behind the shadow of a statue. The boys turned around, but only Harry recognised the owner of the voice.
"Tom... Tom Riddle?", Harry asked. It couldn't have been anyone else. There he stood, in his pristine Hogwarts uniform, prefect badge pinned to his chest, handsome and dark-eyed. A green and silver Slytherin tie hung around his neck and a pleasant smile accentuated his already handsome features. Somehow, he didn't look a day older than sixteen. But that wasn't important now.
"Listen, we've got to get her out of here. There's a basilisk!", Harry explained.
"It won't come until it's called", said Riddle, simply. The three boys looked at Riddle. He knew more than he was letting on. He'd also picked up Harry and John's wands.
"Thanks", said John, holding his hand out for his wand, but Riddle merely smiled again and pocketed it.
"Listen. I don't think you understand. We're in the chamber of secrets. Whether the basilisk won't come until it's called or not, it can't be far. We need to get out of here and save Ginny", Harry explained, trying to force a measure of calmness out of himself.
"I'm afraid I can't do that, Harry. You see... as poor Ginny grows weaker, I grow stronger", said Riddle. John looked straight at Ron, who'd balled up his fists and stared at Riddle, rage etched deeply across his pale, but reddening freckled face.
"You've got one minute to explain what the hell Ginny's doing down here", he forced out through gritted teeth. Riddle looked at Ron, still smiling.
"That is an interesting question, you know. I suppose that Ginny is down here, weakening by the moment, because she laid bare her heart and soul for an invisible stranger", he replied.
"Uhh... what?", asked John, who was looking more and more lost by the second.
"My diary. She'd been writing in it. The entries were rather boring, you know. It was difficult to listen to the petty worries of an eleven year old girl. How her brothers teased her. How her robes were second-hand. How she'd never thought that famous, good... great Harry Potter would ever like her. But I was patient. I was kind. And in time, with my diary, I was able to put a bit of myself back into her", Riddle explained.
"You... possessed her! You opened the Chamber using HER BODY!", Ron roared.
Riddle laughed. The laughter was high and cold. It didn't suit him at all. In fact, it made the hairs on the back of Harry's neck stand on end.
"Of course, Ginny told me about you as well. Her hot-headed older brother Ron. Best friend of Harry and his brother. Did you know, Ron? Did you know how envious of you she was? How she wished she could spend as much time with Harry as you?", Riddle said, in a plain, but very successful attempt at taunting Ron.
Ron had lost his patience, charged at Riddle and swung a fist at him as hard as he could, but his fist, and indeed, his entire body went straight through Riddle, as if he were a ghost.
"I am not here. Not yet, of course", said Riddle, who looked down at something the boys hadn't noticed yet. Riddle's diary, lying at Ginny's feet.
"You're in there", John breathed.
Riddle nodded, his smile now turning into a frightening leer.
John didn't hesitate. He picked the diary up and began heaving at it with all his might, trying to rip it apart. But nothing he did made the slightest difference. Still, Riddle looked impressed.
"Very good, Potter. But I'm afraid my diary is now made of much stronger materials than paper and leather bindings. But enough of that. I need to ask you something, Harry Potter", Riddle said.
"What?", Harry asked, flatly.
"I need to know. How did a baby survive one of the most devastating curses devised by wizardkind? How did an infant with no extraordinary magical powers survive an attack from Lord Voldemort, who had to contend with his own body and powers being destroyed irreparably? How did you escape with nothing but a scar?", he asked. Riddle's laughter had vanished, replaced by a cold fury. A flash of scarlet gleamed in his eyes for just a second.
"Voldemort showed up thirty years after you did... why do you give a shit?", asked John, squaring up to Riddle, but knowing that he couldn't hurt him.
Riddle's smile returned.
"Voldemort is my past, present and future", he said, before using Harry's wand to write his full name in flaming letters.
TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE
With a wave of the wand, the letters rearranged themselves in front of their eyes.
I AM LORD VOLDEMORT
"You... you're Voldemort", Harry whispered. He looked at the handsome sixteen year old boy who had grown up to murder his parents. The boy who would age into the most feared wizard of all time. A wizard who destroyed families, terrorised an nation and brought its people to their knees.
"You couldn't possible believe that I'd keep my filthy Muggle father's name, could you? I fashioned myself a new name. A name I knew wizards the world over would fear to speak when I'd become the greatest sorcerer in the world!"
John let out a harsh, hollow laugh. Riddle looked at him, a blazing look of rage in his eyes.
"You dare...", he hissed furiously.
"You think you're the strongest? You haven't seen yourself lately, have you? All that power you thought you gained? It's gone! We've met you! You're weak! You're foul! You're barely alive! You're so far below humans that you had to share someone else's body! You're so pathetic that I can't even feel sorry for you!", John said, taunting Riddle to a level where he looked ready to lose control.
"Even at your strongest, you weren't a match for Albus Dumbledore!", Ron piped up, realising what John was doing. "Everyone says he's the greatest wizard of our time! And everyone knows that you were always afraid of him!"
"Dumbledore's been driven out of this castle by my mere memory!", Riddle snapped, gesturing to himself, with his faded outline.
"He's not as gone as you might think!", Harry shouted back. He was remembering words that Dumbledore had once said.
I will only be truly gone when none left here are loyal to me.
He was playing for time. He knew it. They were trying to keep Riddle talking while they figured out a way to destroy him and save Ginny.
But then, they heard the calls of a bird. They all looked up to see a flash of gold and red feathers. Fawkes, Dumbledore's phoenix had arrived and it dropped something straight into Harry's hands.
Riddle began to laugh again.
"So this is what Dumbledore sends his most loyal defenders? A songbird... and an old hat!", he said, continuing to laugh.
Harry had to admit that a phoenix and a hat weren't a match for Riddle, the heir of Slytherin. The one who could call out the basilisk.
"Now... to business then. Let's match the powers of Lord Voldemort, heir of Salazar Slytherin against Dumbledore's most loyal and the best weapons he could send them!", said Riddle, before he looked to the statue.
"Speak to me, Slytherin! Greatest of the Hogwarts four! Unleash your greatest weapon! Through me, see your will be done!", said Riddle.
Harry saw Ron and John, looking to him, not knowing what he was saying.
"He's called it! Run!", Harry yelled. Riddle laughed again.
"That's right, flee! Know your place before Lord Voldemort! You will flee like rats and you will die, begging for mercy!"
Harry got a brief glimpse of the statue opening its mouth and movement from behind it. Knowing what was about to come out of it, Harry turned tail and continued running.
"Split up! Get to a hole!", John yelled. Immediately, the three of them did just that, heading towards tunnels that the basilisk used to get to the Hogwarts pipes.
They heard the giant serpent's scales sliding across the wet floor, heard its unfathomably loud hissing and then heard... Fawkes again!
"No!", Riddle yelled.
Harry couldn't help it. He turned around and looked. To his immense relief, he saw that the basilisk's eyes were being clawed at by Fawkes' two-inch long talons. It hissed and snarled in pain as the claws of the fearless bird punctured one of them and ripped the other eye straight out of its socket with a horrific, squelching 'POP!'.
Blood dripped down the snake, which Harry got a good look at for the first time. It really was over fifty feet long. Pushing sixty feet, in fact. Its body was thicker and wider than the shoulders of a rugby player. Its scaly skin was dark green, with a lighter, yellow-tinged green underbelly. A row of short spines jutted out across its back and the remaining, punctured eye was yellow where it wasn't covered in the dark red, oozing blood.
It was monstrous. It likely weighed as much as a bull rhinoceros.
"Leave the bird! The boys are behind you! Sniff! Smell them! Hear their steps!" Riddle called in parseltongue, starting to panic. The basilisk shook its massive head, shaking off Fawkes, who had done more than enough. He had disabled the basilisk's deadliest weapons.
All they had to do was steer clear of its mouth, which was filled with dagger-like, probably venomous fangs.
It was easier said than done though. John seemed to have spotted something near Ginny and he was trying to tiptoe his way towards her. Immediately, the basilisk struck at him with frightening speed and accuracy for a blinded serpent. John dived out of the way, only just in time. Harry knew that with the snake having closed the distance to John, he wouldn't be able to dodge another strike, he opened his mouth.
"HEY!", he yelled, forcing the giant serpent's snout to face towards him. Harry knew he was far enough such that the snake would have to chase him, but he didn't anticipate the incredible speed with which it moved. In the blink of an eye, it had slid across the chamber and was already within striking distance while Harry backpedalled as fast as he could. He wasn't fast enough -
"GAHH!" John's yell of pain stopped the basilisk in its tracks. It was getting confused by the multiple targets and Riddle couldn't keep up with his parseltongue-spoken instructions. He called out Harry's position, then Ron's, then John's, but the snake, unlike Fluffy, didn't have three heads.
Harry peered out from behind the statue he had taken cover behind and saw John cradling his right hand. He had tried to punch the basilisk in a desperate attempt to save Harry, but by the way he held his hand, he'd broken it with the force of his strike.
"The fucking thing's covered in armour! Those scales are harder than bricks!", he called, his eyes watering while he backed away from the basilisk's mouth.
Where had Ron gotten to? Harry looked around, panicking and assuming the worst; that Ron had somehow been crushed under the basilisk at some point, but he did not expect to see what he saw next.
Ron was kneeling near Ginny, next to the sorting hat which Harry had dropped in his mad dash to escape the basilisk as Riddle called it. He pulled out... a sword.
That was what John spotted earlier.
They had a weapon.
"Keep it busy!", Harry yelled to John, throwing pebbles at if it were the troll they'd knocked out last year.
John, with only one working hand, ran circles around the basilisk, always staying behind its tail as it whirled its head around, trying to catch him. But with Harry throwing pebble after pebble at it, its ears were of little use. The pebbles clearly didn't hurt, but they were confusing the great snake to no end.
It gave Ron the time he needed. He reached the point at which the snake's chest would be and plunged the sword down, aiming to hit either its heart or lungs. To Harry's horror, the sword bounced off. Ron in fact, hit the snake with the sword so hard that he lost his grip and the sword landed on the other side of the snake's body, landing with a clatter on the floor. The armour was too strong even for the shining, silver blade.
"Get over the sword!", Harry heard Riddle yell. Even Harry's pebbles couldn't distract the basilisk's ears from locating the clanging metal. The basilisk curled itself around the sword so that the only way to get it would be to jump over it, directly into the basilisk's curled body, where the life would have been squeezed from anyone foolhardy enough to try.
"Move it!", John yelled. Looking at him, Harry could tell that the pain in his hand was getting to him. He was less surefooted and much slower. He held his hand close to his chest and Harry saw that it had gone purple and swollen to nearly twice its normal size.
As one, the three boys ran to the other side of the chamber, so far from the sword that the battle was now a stalemate. The basilisk didn't want to leave the sword, on Riddle's orders. But it also couldn't kill the boys from this far away. It was a deadly game of patience.
Lord Voldemort never had much patience. He ordered the basilisk to chase them down and the three boys scattered once again. John and Ron ran together and the fact that the basilisk heard two sets of feet running together enticed it to chase them, not Harry.
Harry seized his chance and dived for the sword. He got to his feet and heard Riddle, directing the basilisk towards Harry once again. It was over. There was no escaping the strike that was sure to follow. Harry closed his eyes, awaiting the inevitable. But it didn't come. Harry opened his eyes and to his shock, he saw the basilisk stop and turn its head. Ron and John had started pulling on its tail. They weren't strong enough to actually stop the basilisk in its tracks, but the animal was so confused by the two humans doing something so stupid that it had stopped in its tracks.
Harry rushed forwards, planning on plunging the sword into the basilisk's empty eye socket while it was distracted, but he wasn't fast enough. The giant snake swung its head around like a titanic, living warhammer, slamming straight into both Ron and John, who were thrown aside like ragdolls.
"NO!", Harry yelled, as Ron and John's bodies landed, crumpled on the ground some fifteen feet away. He sprinted forwards, sword raised as the basilisk turned to him, mouth wide open enough to swallow him whole-
A searing pain consumed Harry's arm and he felt a warm trickle of blood seeping down his arm. Harry had driven the sword deep into the roof of the basilisk's mouth. So deep in fact, that it jutted out through the roof of its skull. But in the process, one of the fangs had pierced his arm.
Harry removed the sword from the now dead snake's mouth and pulled the fang from his arm, which had in fact penetrated so deep, that it had been wrenched from the gums of the great serpent.
Immediately, Harry felt his body weaken as the venom of the basilisk coursed through his veins.
"You feel it now, don't you, Harry Potter? The venom of the basilisk is in your body and you don't have much time. Perhaps a minute? Maybe two? You were given nearly twelve years of borrowed time, but you knew that I would claim your life in the end. You will die. Lord Voldemort will return. And he will finish your broken and crippled brother and best friend. The four of you will be forgotten, your bodies rotting in the great Slytherin's chamber. And I will be unstoppable", Riddle said... almost chanted.
Fawkes returned, singing as he did so. The song was beautiful, Harry realised now that he wasn't fighting for his life. He landed next to Harry, looking directly into his eyes.
"You were amazing Fawkes. Amazing", Harry said, sincerely.
"Even Dumbledore's bird knows your fate! Do you see what he's doing? He's crying!", Riddle said, sneering as he did so.
If this was death, then it wasn't so bad, Harry realised. But... was this death? The pain was leaving him. The chamber, which was blurring and spinning in his eyes came back into sharp focus.
"Get away, bird! Stop! I said GET AWAY!", Riddle yelled, starting to panic once more.
It was too late. Harry felt the strength to stand up again, by Fawkes' side.
"Of course... The healing powers of phoenix tears. I forgot, Riddle muttered.
Fawkes walked over towards Ron and John's unconscious forms, likely to heal the two of them as well. Meanwhile, Harry and Riddle stared each other down.
"It makes no difference. I will return soon. Lord Voldemort will rise again. And he will kill all three of you once stupid Ginny Weasley's life leaves her!
Harry noticed that Riddle's outline was growing firmer, his voice louder. But Voldemort wasn't back yet. It was still Riddle. John's words from earlier filled Harry's mind.
You're in there.
Harry looked to Riddle's diary and somehow, knew exactly what to do. Basilisk fang in hand, Harry picked up the diary, ignored Riddle's fearful protests and jammed it into the open pages. Riddle began to scream in agony. Holes appeared in his 'body' and Harry stabbed the diary again. And again. And again. More and more holes appeared until finally, Riddle's form vanished. With that, Ginny finally woke up.