It Could Have Gone That Way; A Harmione Fanfiction

Chapter 23: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Ron and Harry ran up to the infirmary so quickly that Harry was surprised that neither of them had tripped up on the stairs.

"Hermione!" The boys burst through the infirmary doors and Harry waved Riddle's diary in front of Hermione's face for the second time that week,"It was Hagrid! Hagrid opened the Chamber of Secrets fifty years ago!"

Two days before then, Harry and Ron had found Riddle's diary in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. She told them that someone had thrown it at her, however, Harry knew it could not have hurt her at all, for she was a ghost. ("It still hurt my feelings!" She had screeched when Ron had pointed this out.) They had hurried up to the infirmary and shown it to Hermione, though she hadn't had any idea who Tom Riddle was.

But now more light had been shed on their situation; Harry had just been shown that, fifty years ago, Hagrid had let a rather large creature roam loose in the school, and Riddle was the only one who'd known it. Riddle had told a tall boy whom Harry had learnt or be Hagrid that the teachers would all believe him over such a monster-obsessed lump of a boy, so he should really confess before Riddle handed him over. Hagrid was in denial, so Riddle took matters into his own hands and got Hagrid expelled, but not before Hagrid was able to let his creature free into the school.

"But...but Hagrid would never..." Hermione gaped as Harry told her and Ron what he had seen.

"Mate, that's mental. Hagrid wouldn't let a wild beast into the school!" Ron agreed.

"Not on purpose."

"Oh." Hermione said.

Ron objected,"But you said he let the thing go just before he left! Not exactly an accident of you ask me."

"It wasn't a viscous beast then." Harry explained.

Ron nodded slowly in comprehension,"So, it must have grown up."

"No!" Hermione frowned,"That doesn't make any sense. Remember what Professor Binns said? "Fifty years ago, a Muggleborn student was killed by the beast inside of the Chamber." And what Harry saw was after she had died. Hagrid's baby beast couldn't have killed her if it was with him all along."

"Maybe. It still sounded like Riddle was accusing Hagrid of opening the Chamber too, though. Not just having a pet monster." Harry rubbed his forehead.

"So there's two beasts?" Ron shrieked,"Mate, this school can only take so many monsters!"

"But we all know Hagrid likes dangerous creatures..."

"Why don't we just go and ask him about it?" Hermione suggested gravely.

The boys shot her equal looks of disapproval, so she didn't bring it up again.

***********

It wasn't long before Hermione was out of the hospital wing, and the Easter holidays came around rather quickly. Second year students had to pick the subjects that they were going to start the following year. Hermione had decided that she was going to take all of them.

"You can't do that! They overlap!" Ron held in a laugh,"You'll need to be in two places at once!"

Hermione shrugged.

Ron, Harry and Hermione were sitting in the common room on the first day of the Easter holidays, trying to decide what subjects the boys should choose, when Neville ran down and flapped his arms about frantically.