Hello, welcome to my first story.

Please enjoy!

Disclaimer : I do not own Harry Potter.

$Talking$ = Parseltongue

Harry didn't know who he hated the most: Ron, for forcing him into this situation, or himself, for not having expected it (or, at least, for not having expected something to happen) and prepared accordingly. Both mentally and strategically.

He had dropped his wand twice already because of his sweaty fingers twitching in anxiety. He had also sworn to himself to buy a wand holster first thing in the Summer Holidays, with waterproof shoes and warmer clothes (or, at least, to learn the spells to waterproof and to warm his clothes himself. If anything, it would be useful for Quidditch).

In the hypothetical case in which he survived his latest 'adventure', of course.

After ten minutes of walking and tripping every third step, he was wishing that he could strangle the Weasley girl if she survived the night. She was ruining Hogwarts! What would he do if the school closed? Would he have to stay at the Dursleys' house for the whole year? He couldn't allow that!

And that was why he had gone to fetch Lockart instead of McGonagall when he had discovered that the stupid girl was lying down the Chamber, waiting for death: it would be easy to pin everything that went wrong on the useless man. Stunning Ron from behind had been easy and when the fraud had asked for answers Harry had not been willing to give...

Well, let's just say that Lockart had been a great source of inspiration with his little trick to gain fame quickly. He had casted the Obliviate spell on the man... and discovered that it wasn't an easy spell to cast – it was a N.E.W.T.-level spell, after all.

Lockart's mind had been beyond healing after Harry had finally gotten the spell right and Harry considered it a lucky coincidence that he had managed to get a correct Obliviate before his last spell completely destroyed Lockart's mind (though he did casted a last bad, over-powered Obliviate to finish the job). He had almost worried that he would have to try his hand at modifying Ron or Ginevra's memories – one badly done Obliviate case was suspicious enough, but two ? It would be like admitting that he was the one to blame. No, one 'accidental' case of obliviation was suspicious enough.

After Lockart had became nothing more than a drooling moron, Harry had picked up Ron's faulty wand and had carefully casted one Stupefy and one Obliviate on the ground, planting the necessary pieces of evidence for his cover-story if a Priori Incantatem was ever used on Ron's wand – he did wonder if it would work on a broken wand, but didn't ponder on it too long as, if it didn't work, they would have to rely on his word and everything would still go on perfectly.

After all, Lockart was a fraud. Surely it wouldn't seem weird if he thought he could claim another story for his books at the price of two small Obliviates. Lockart wouldn't consider two Second Years as obstacles between him and his goal – he had tricked and bewitched stronger and more experienced witches and wizards to gain his fame, and wasn't that a feat? Who would suspect two students without their O.W.L.s to be more of a threat than someone who defeated a banshee (before their memories were modified, of course) ?

Apart from Dumbledore, who obviously thought that a First Year had enough training to fight the Dark Lord upfront, nobody would think about Ron and Harry being anything but victims of Lockart's ambitious scheme. And Harry would be thought brave (read: reckless) for saving Ron's sister... or trying, if he 'happened' to fail.

Harry inwardly winced as he recalled the fraud's pained eyes as Harry removed years after years of memories from his mind. Harry's attempts at the memory spell had been painful at the beginning, but after half an hour of intense practice he had not been as horrible as he would have thought – he had assumed that it would take hours for him to learn the memory spell, but it seemed that Obliviate was only a simplified form of a more advanced technique, despite still being an advance spell. He would need to research it later... maybe in a few nights if he could manage? Or else he would need to sneak into Diagon Alley during the summer to buy a couple of books.

With Lockart as an excuse, nobody would find it suspicious if Harry was curious about the spell. After all, it wasn't as if a below-average Second Year could cast a N.E.W.T.-level spell, right? Hermione was the talented one, not Harry. No, the only way Harry could learn to cast the spell would be with intense training, if the hero he was could even stomach the idea of breaking into someone else's mind. Even though Harry wasn't the Harry people knew, it had still taken him quite some time to figure out the spell, and he was still far from having mastered it.

Time wasn't an issue, luckily, and Harry had not stressed over controlling the obliviation spell before Ron's sister's death. Earlier that year, Harry had stumbled upon a Third Year Ravenclaw's strange necklace that allowed him to go back in time and he had, multiple times that year, borrowed it (the Ravenclaw, one girl named Marietta Edgecombe, was extraordinarily stupid for a Raven and never noticed the necklace missing, which Harry considered as a continued permission to borrow it when he wanted to). He would give it back to her once he was done, of course, but until then he had used it to go back one hour so he would have better chances at getting Ginny back alive. Whether he would strangle her or not was still up to debate.

Another skull broke under his foot and Harry lost his balance, almost falling to his knees. Again. Surely there must be another entrance to the damned place? He somehow had problems picturing a proud Slytherin sliding down a slimly pipe then walking across a field of dried corpses. Even Marcus Flint, with his lack of care of what was 'proper' during Quidditch, had a holier-than-thou attitude when it came to manners and what was acceptable for a Pureblood (and Harry doubted that anything dirty or slimly had anything to do with those, no matter what Ron said).

Of course, Harry could have brought his broom like he had the last few times he came down the Chamber, but he wasn't supposed to know how it looked like down here. It was just...

What were the odds? Hermione decided (he was uncertain about that. Had Dumbledore put a spell on her or something? Like he did to make her choose that book that talked about Flamel and other subjects a muggleborn First Year couldn't possibly understand, no matter how smart they were?) to brew the Polyjuice in a bathroom that happened to be haunted by the ghost of the Slytherin monster's only known victim in Hogwarts' history – which happened to have been killed in that bathroom during the strange diary-memory's studies at Hogwarts.

Once again... What were the odds? A strange and self-thinking artefact suddenly appears – in the same damned bathroom! – and the Chamber is reopened. Not to mention the fact that the original Tom Riddle had been the one to knowingly frame Hagrid so Hogwarts wouldn't close. Really, was the damned Wizarding World stupid? Or was it just that Dumbledore's (and other people's, Harry doubted Dumbledore could be responsible for a whole community's ineptitude, though you never knew) throwing Obliviate and other spells right, left and center that had rotted their brains?

Harry sighed as he came to a stop. His eyes ran over the greenish door to the Hall of the Chamber – the snakes were still there and were waiting for his command.

$Open$, Harry hissed at the door.

He tensed slightly and readied his wand as the door opened, slowly showing the pipe-like corridor that leaded to the Chamber's Hall. It was empty but Harry stayed cautious – there was a book down there that had kidnapped a First Year Gryffindor fan girl.

...not very impressive said like that, sure, but it did bad intentions and a Basilisk at his beck and call, which was particularly bad. And Harry wasn't willing to run blind (or, well, any blinder) into danger no matter the old spells still working in him to 'protect Hogwarts'. The impulses he had felt last year to 'protect the Stone' and, before that, to 'discover the corridor's secrets', had left him a bitter taste in the mouth on top of their signature headaches. He wasn't willing to fight a deranged Dark Lord again, but the memory an insane Sixth Year didn't look so bad compared to the possible closure of Hogwarts, so he had not fought the spells as hard as he could have – as he should have, really.

Of course it made Harry even warier, if only because it sounded so innocent, but he wasn't willing to back down.

If they took Hogwarts from him, he would have to go back to the Dursleys. Like, all the time. And he was sure that the 'right people' would take measures to 'protect him' – a.k.a. keep him prisoner in his relatives' house. It just wouldn't do. Just because he happened to have vanquished someone nobody else had bothered to try and destroy before didn't meant he didn't want freedom. No matter what Dumbledore wanted, he wouldn't let himself be controlled. He was a Gryffindor, yes, but he wasn't stupidly bold. He had simply known that Gryffindor was his best shot if he wanted a peaceful school life... not that it had worked that well, right?

If he had let the hat send him to Slytherin he would have been treated like a Dark Lord in training, as a Hufflepuff he would have been either a 'disgrace' or a soft guy who would do anything he could to help, and as a Ravenclaw... well, Harry was no bookworm and his intelligence was better off hidden, lest it made things more difficult for him. As a mediocre student and an oblivious person he would be under-estimated and wouldn't be watched in fear that he learnt something he wasn't supposed to know. This was how it had worked at his muggle school and this was how it worked at Hogwarts too.

He wished that he didn't have the Dursleys to thank for being so good at deceiving, faking and surviving. Because, despise all their flaws, they had been thorough teachers in these subjects. He had learnt quickly not to show his cards early in the game or else.

Now, as a Gryffindor, he had almost all the freedom he needed. At least he had it before being dubbed the Heir of Slytherin and a Squib-hater, but this isolation had at least managed to give him some alone time. During those few moments he had no one to fool, no one to please and he could simply walk alone and in peace. As for the little bullies who dared hex him when they thought him vulnerable...

He remembered their faces and had looked up their names. He would bid his time and take revenge when they least expected it.

After a few minutes of walking on the wet floor of the tunnel, Harry finally arrived in the Hall. Giant statues of snakes greeted him and the walls and pools were greenish from to the small green fires here and there.

The Chamber must have been spectacular in another time, but Harry almost couldn't see it. The water damages were too important and it was obvious that Hogwarts' House Elves had no access to the place. It would give many of them grave depressions should they learn that they had neglected one of Hogwarts' most historical rooms, but Harry wasn't about to tell them about it. For one, the Chamber must have been isolated for a reason and, secondly, it would keep people from following the elves down here.

"Oh my", a girl's voice said, sounding both surprised and amused. Harry jumped in fright and turned toward the standing body of Ginevra Weasley – however her eyes weren't hers. Harry didn't know what eye color Ron's sister had, but he was pretty sure it wasn't blood red. No, he only knew one person who had red eyes and he had hoped to disappear from Britain before meeting him again. He wouldn't have minded never seeing him again, too. Or never hearing about him again. Or dying of old age before he returned – he wouldn't have minded, really. Really.

"V-Voldemort!?" Harry chocked. He was so shocked that he simply watched as his wand was pulled from his hand by some wandless spell and flew right into Ginny's hand. Silver sparks erupted at the tip of the wand, causing Harry to pale and the possessed girl to raised a surprised eyebrow.

"Interesting." The girl – no, Voldemort said. "What is it made of?"

Harry swallowed the lump that had suddenly appeared down his throat. He wasn't prepared for that. He didn't wanted to die... He blushed when Voldemort threw him an annoyed look, obviously not taking well at being ignored.

"H-holy and phoenix feather." Harry stammered. His voice broke as he started to speak and he cursed his body for going into puberty right when he was about to fight (and die?) with the Dark Lord Voldemort again. It made him sound weak and scared and, if the amused and condescending smile on Ginny's lips was anything to go by, he was humouring the possessing spirit quite a bit. Bad for his pride, good for his health, he supposed? "It's... It's your wand's brother wand. They both have the same Phoenix's tail feathers as a core."

"Mmm. Interesting." The possessed girl twirled the wand between her fingers while looking at it with curiosity. Then the red eyes were back on him and he flinched, again amusing the Dark Lord. "Stupefy."

Harry jumped out of the way and immediately started jumping around and feinting, not unlike a mad bunny on drugs, avoiding the now wordless spells thrown his way – it reminded him of that time when Dudley had gotten fake guns for his birthday, then shared them with his gang. When the Dark Lord finally figured that Harry wouldn't be hit easily, he spelled the ground frozen and caused Harry to fall on his knees – but again, Harry had been chased by Dudley's gang during winters so he knew how to handle icy floors.

"Will you just stay still!" The possessed girl finally hissed after two minutes of unproductive spell-casting.

Harry didn't reply, panting too hard, but he supposed that the question was a rhetoric one. He kept his wand in his line of vision, thinking that he could still continue the 'game' for another few minutes. He would've tried running for the door to get help, even if he had to use Lockart as a meat shield, but he wasn't willing to turn his back to a Dark Lord with a wand – had the Dark Lord been wandless, he might've taken his chance. He knew quite well that one second of inattention was all the possessing spirit needed to off him.

"Oh, well." At that Ginny's body fell on the ground, leaving the slightly blurred form of one Tom Riddle in her place. Harry rushed for his wand as Ginny fell, but had to throw himself backward when Voldemort's long fingers wrapped themselves around the wooden stick a second before it touched the ground. He slipped on the icy ground but managed to keep his balance on one knee, panicked eyes following his wand as it now pointed Ginny's unconscious body. "Now, will you stand still?"

Harry narrowed his eyes and snarled, jumping back to his feet and readying himself for the Dark Lord's next attack. "So you can have both of us at your mercy? I'm not that stupid!"

Amusement shone in the now darker red eyes. He, the confident bastard, thought that Harry was completely at his mercy anyway... and he might, might, be right, but Harry wasn't about to admit it.

"Not that stupid, mmm?" The red-eyed teenager chuckled. "At least you can figure that much, hero."

Harry blinked at the name, then made a decision. After all, he could have recognized a Slytherin's baiting while blind, body-bound and deaf. It had a certain vibe to it, like a special magic. But Harry wasn't brave enough to say that aloud, in fear of being called a sap.

Gryffindors didn't do sappy. That was Hufflepuff.

Still, it wasn't Voldemort's usual style of baiting: last year's spirit had indeed been more focused on tempting him with sweet words and promises that Harry knew were false... But for an obviously teenager and human-lookingVoldemort, it seemed that House rivalry was still enjoyable. If this meant putting the guy in a good mood... and gaining a few more seconds to plan an escape... or simply being alive a bit longer... What harm could it do to humour him a little bit more?

"Well, yes. You can't help but catch idiocy in the Tower." Harry drawled in his best imitation of Malfoy's posh voice. "It's the red and gold, you know... It drains your brain cells."

Voldemort raised an eyebrow. "Oh? Is that so?" The teenager moved his wand ever-so-slightly, but the movement still caught Harry's eyes and he adjusted his position.

"Well, I think so." Harry continued in the same uncaring tone all the while eyeing the still moving wand. "Just take Dumbledore, for example... If all that gold had not rotten his brain, he wouldn't be wearing those horrible... clothes. He must've been blinded or traumatised so badly he went crazy."

Voldemort laughed. Actually laughed! Then his eyes landed on Harry with so much intensity that Harry literally felt a weight on his chest – it was difficult to breath... all of his thoughts vacated him... Were his knees shaking? "What about you, hero? Did the red and gold rotted you brain?"

Wha... what? Harry blinked owlishly, before forcibly bringing his wits back together and attempting to think of a proper reply. What were they talking about, again? Something about red and lions... Oh, right.

The idea he came out with brought an ironic smile on his lips. "I came here, didn't I?"

Riddle's face transformed in front of Harry's eyes: when he had looked angelic the second before, the bloodthirsty grin that instantly widened his lips made him look more like an animal than a human being.

A very dangerous, enraged and rabid animal.

"Yes, yes you did." Voldemort whispered in a slow and sweet voice, almost tender, that didn't quite fit with his feral expression.

Harry gulped loudly and yelped when the purple curse flew his way. It narrowedly missed and caused Harry to land harshly on his butt, but he wasted no time in rolling away when Voldemort started throwing more curses his way.

They danced around each other a little longer before annoyance won Voldemort again. "Enough!"

Harry froze in shock and fear, an occasion to curse him that the Dark Lord thankfully missed since he had his back turned on him and was now walking toward the giant statue of Slytherin in the middle of the Chamber. Harry took the opportunity for what it was and rushed toward Ginny's forgotten body, hoping to find her wand. He touched her cold skin and felt her weak pulse... and came across a small object he was surprised to find.

Why would Voldemort bring the diary with him? Wasn't the thing nothing more than a tool to open the Chamber? The Chamber was open, now, he didn't need it...

Or he did. Which meant that he had a weakness that Harry could hopefully take advantage of. He silently slipt the diary in his robe's pocket and continued his search for Ginny's wand, but it was curt short by Voldemort's sudden use of Parseltongue.

$Speak to me, Slytherin, Greatest of Hogwarts' Four!$

Harry's eyes widened as the statue's mouth opened. He heard a slithering sound a second before he lowered his eyes on the ground, so very unwilling to meet a very old Basilisk's gaze. He had no desire to be turned to stone before becoming snake food – after all, he was looking at the world through panels glass, like Colin.

$Kill him!$ Voldemort ordered, pointing at a running Harry Potter who had every intentions of leaving behind a very helpless Ginevra Weasley to save his own hide. Ron would be upset, but hey... He'd just say he arrived too late or never found her... if he survived the damned thing, that is... something that wasn't looking very promising, right now...

"Shite, shitshitshitshit! Shite!" Harry whispered under his breath as he ran between two snake statues and hissed a low open in Parseltongue to the wall – he made sure that Voldemort didn't heard him, it might give him a second or two that could very well save his life. He heard Voldemort gasp when he walked into the now untangible wall, before he hissed a louder close behind himself. He started to look around what he had, a few months ago, discovered to be something alike a weaponry, but had stayed away from. The reason was written on the wall, right above the displayed weapons.

The Cursed Ones obey only to those of Slytherin

He was pretty sure that he wasn't of Slytherin blood, unlike Tom Riddle, and, from what he had deduced from the writings on the wall, the weapons were linked to Slytherin's family or something. But, right now, he really didn't cared about what would happen to him should he touch one of the cursed blades – he was about to die, he was wandless, and so Slytherin's warning didn't bore as much weight as it had before.

Harry gave one quick look to the writtings on the wall before he ran toward his favorite weapon – one he had spend a long time looking at it with his hands dying to touch it. It was a short and thin katana-like sword, less than two feet long, and looked rather light and graceful. He didn't know why he liked the small thing better than the heavy claymore a few feet further (the one he was sure his housemates would have prefered), but he was well aware of his short and malnourished body. A heavy sword wouldn't be of any use to him anyway – and if he liked the shorter sword, then it was only a bonus because he doubt that a dagger (about the only other thing he could lift, nevermind use, in the weaponry) would be of use against a Basilisk.

Harry took a deep breath, well aware that he was wasting time. A sudden noise made him jump in fright and he quickly grabbed the small sword, before running away. The short katana burnt his hand and sent horrible jolts of pain up to his shoulder, but he ignored them. He used another hidden door to escape the weaponry and ran into a very muddy pipe that, if his memory was right, lead to the Master bedroom. He had no intentions of leading the Basilisk there as it was a dead end (meaning: he had not found the secret passage yet, since he was pretty sure that a Master bedroom was a very important place to have secret ways in and out of) so he turned into an unexplored pipe and hoped it wouldn't backfire on him.

It did. Oh-so-horribly.

Not even two meters away the pipe curved and stopped, blocked with rusty bars he had no hope of cutting with his short sword. Harry turned to jolt away but only saw the red of the Basilisk's open mouth

trying to eat him whole fuck he was small enough to fit in its mouth he will die no matter what he sure as hell wouldn't die alone oh god why did he had to play hero please oh god please he didn't want to die please please please

He swung his short sword into the Basilisk's mouth and right into its brain. His arm was already painfully dumb because of the sword's curse and he didn't felt much more pain when the Basilisk's fangs pierced his skin and flesh, at least not until the dying beast pulled its head out of the pipe, trembling and jerking as it died. A fang was still sunken into Harry's arm, right into his bicep, and pulling it out almost had Harry whimpering in pain as it teared bits of flesh on its way out. It seemed that the Basilisk's fang was broken, meaning his arm now looked like minced meat. His whole sleeve had also been ripped and Harry could see the green venom moving in his veins as his heart pumped it through his body...

A few tears fell on his cheeks as the pain intensified, but he refused to make a sound.

Just like when Dudley and his gang managed to catch him, hold him back and happily beat the shit out of him, Harry wouldn't make a damned sound.

As he was about to let out more tears, Harry's eyes fell on the diary in his pocket. Hot rage filled him and he pulled the book out, opened it with his trembling fingers and, with the desesperation and anger of a dying person, stabbed the book with the same fang that had scealed his death.

It was only poetic to destroy Voldemort's weapon with the same thing that had destroyed his supposed vanquisher.

Harry wasn't sure, but, as his eyes closed in what he was sure was the last time, he thought he heard someone screaming in pain and anger. With a little smile he imagined Tom Riddle falling to his knees as his innocent little book was destroyed by one sneaky Harry James Potter.