Hadrian's True Potential

Chapter Thirteen

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling does.

Only a day after Hadrian had finished his grounding, a message on the wall near the great hall was written in blood, 'Her Skeleton Will Lie in the Chamber Forever'. Hadrian was then told by Ron that it was Ginny who was taken. He thought through all the knowledge he knew, it then hit him, the girls bathroom. He has been collecting facts in his head whenever he had free time, but couldn't piece together where the chamber was, but now he thought about how he found the diary in the bathroom it would be a perfect place for the chamber to be.
     Hadrian ran to find Draco and his father, he had a rough idea on what he needed to do, so with determination he sped quickly to the dungeons.
     He found Draco with ease, as he was hanging out with Theo and Blaise playing exploding snap. Hadrian made an excuse of needing Draco to check something in the library with him, and Draco followed him out of the common room.
     "What do you really need, Hadrian?" Draco asked, then seeing the look on his friend's face asked, "What's wrong?"
     "I need to get Dad, and we need to go into the chamber of secrets." Hadrian said in a rush, while pulling Draco down the hall. "Ginny was taken down there and I have to save her, I can't let Ron's sister die."
     Not listening for Draco's response, though he did hear some swearing, they entered his father's office and Hadrian started to quickly explain what happened.
     When it didn't appear his father was on board with the idea with him and Draco going down with him, he explained the need of a parselmouth to open the chamber, and the need for Draco to wait at the entrance in case something happened to them.
     With much reluctance his father caved, and they made their way up to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, and Hadrian hissed open, hoping it would open the chamber. To his luck the sink started groaning, and slowly moved, leading to a big dark hole. Hadrian looked down it, and hissed, 'stairs', and to his luck again, stairs appeared.
     "Draco, you are to wait here, and if anything happens to us, you are to explain what has happened. Only under dire circumstances are you to tell the headmaster, he cannot be trusted. Do you understand?" Severus asked Draco, in a firm voice.
     "Yes, I understand. Do you think anything will happen to you guys?" Draco asked, a little fear creeping through his Malfoy mask.
     "Don't worry, Dray. It'll be fine." Hadrian put in, trying to reassure both Draco and himself.
     Draco pulled Hadrian into a hug and whispered a "be safe" into his ear before releasing him. Hadrian smiled at him, before starting to walk down the stairs. Severus quickly followed behind him, and the pair walked down the very unsafe looking steps.
     When they finally reached the bottom of the stairs the pair lit up their wands with a 'lumos', and began walking towards what they hoped to be the right direction. Hadrian opened a door which creaked to life and moved aside to allow them through. What the door revealed was a large chamber, and a very weak looking Ginny Weasley lying in the middle of it. Hadrian was about to run up to her, when a hand on his shoulder stopped him.
     "You must proceed with caution, you don't know what's down here." His father supplied. And Hadrian nodded his head in response, and walked towards her taking in the chamber as he went.
     In Hadrian's opinion even as destroyed as the chamber was it was a beautiful place, and would have looked incredible when it had been built. As he approached Ginny he saw the diary he had had in his possession and wondered when Ginny had managed to get it out of his trunk. He went to her side and felt for a pulse, he quickly found one, even though it was weak.
     "Dad, I don't know what's wrong with her. She's cold and her pulse is weak, and how did she even get down here?" Hadrian asked, even though a million questions ran through his head, he knew these were more important.
     "I don't know, Hadrian, but our main priority is to get her out of here." Severus replied, although he had just as many questions he had swimming through his head.
     "I don't think you two will be leaving, it is a shame I have to kill the girl, but she is essential to gaining my power." Said a figure who appeared behind them, who seemed to be holding Severus' wand. He had dark brown wavy hair, was almost as tall as Severus and was slightly transparent.
     "Tom Riddle? What are you doing here?" Hadrian asked. "Why do you have my dad's wand? What's wrong with Ginny?"
     "I have been draining her of life for a while now, she has only minutes left, it was surprisingly simple. All I had to do was write back to her in the diary she's holding, hearing all about 'Harry Potter' and how great he is. How she wants nothing more than to be noticed by you, she told me many things about you, like your preference of treacle tart and the colour purple. But the most valuable information was about how smart and powerful you are. I always wondered how a mere baby could take down such a powerful wizard, but if you are as powerful as she says, it would make sense. So I had to plan accordingly, if you are powerful, throwing spells at you won't do much, but no one could take on something as grand as I have tasked you to take on." Tom Riddle said, in a drawling tone, as if exasperated by talking to them.
     "Why would you want to hurt me? What have I ever done to you?" Hadrian asked.
     Tom Riddle spelt his name in the air, and rearranged the letters to spell 'I am Lord Voldemort' and spoke, "It seems you understand now, I must take you down once and for all." Tom Riddle said, he then spoke in parseltongue to bring forth the basilisk. "Now we shall test the power of great Lord Voldemort, against Harry Potter."
     As the stones started to move away to reveal a large gap, fawkes swooped down and delivered the sorting hat into Hadrian's hands.
     "Hadrian, run back to Draco, I will hold him off as long as I can." Severus said to Hadrian.
     "No, Dad. There's no way I'm leaving you here." Hadrian said, his voice filled with defiance.
     "You will do as you're told, Hadrian, or you will not like the consequences." Severus said in a stern voice.
     "I don't care, I am not leaving you here. Punish me all you want when we're out of this mess, see if I care." Hadrian replied, knowing he was being rude, but couldn't seem to care, he wasn't letting his dad get killed.
     Before Severus could reply a huge snake slithered out of the gap in the wall and headed towards the pair.
     "Dad! Shut your eyes!" Hadrian yelled, then ran in the opposite direction hoping the snake would follow him. To his luck, it followed him as he ran down different halls. Fawkes then came up to the snake and scratched at its eyes, quickly blinding the large serpent.
     Hadrian changed direction and threw a stone in the opposite direction, hoping the snake would follow. The snake, being momentarily thrown off course, gave Hadrian the chance to run back to the main chamber to get the sorting hat, he knew there must be some reason he was give it.
     In the main chamber he passed his dad dodging Tom Riddle's curses, and threw his wand at his dad, who caught it, and began firing curses back. Now, with his dad occupied, Hadrian opened up the sorting hat, and found the sword of Gryffindor. He grabbed it and ran, knowing the snake would have heard all the noise he was making and would have followed.
     It was a few minutes of running later before Hadrian unknowingly made his was back to the main chamber and was able to stab the sword through the roof of the snake's mouth. Luck was not on his side though, as a fang dug into his arm as the snake dropped dead. He knew he would die shortly as basilisk venom was deadly, so with a large effort he made his way to the diary that was sitting a few feet away from him, and stabbed it with the basilisk fang.
     A scream from Tom made him know he was successful in destroying the memory of Tom Riddle. His dad ran over to him and began to cry when he saw the large gash on Hadrian's arm. 
     "It's okay, Dad, don't worry." Hadrian said, trying to console his father, even though he was crying himself.
     Severus was about to speak when the cry of a bird interrupted him, and Fawkes landed on Hadrian's arm, and began to cry on it.
     Slowly the wound began to seal and Hadrian's world became clearer.
     "Of course, Phoenix tears have healing properties. See I was right, it's fine, Dad." Hadrian said.
     "You are far from fine, Hadrian. You almost died, I could have lost you." Severus said, pulling Hadrian closer into his lap, tears still running down both of their faces. The pair sat there for a moment before they heard movement beside them, and remembered about Ginny.
     "Miss. Weasley, how are you feeling?" Severus asked, sincerity in his voice.
     "I'm so sorry, I shouldn't have touched the diary once I learned it could talk to me. But I was so lonely and it knew exactly what to say. I didn't want to kill any of the roosters or hurt anyone, and I tried to get rid of it but I couldn't." Ginny said in between sobs.
     "Shh, it's fine, calm down, let's go see your family now, they're all worried." Severus said. He went and picked up his wand from where the memory of Tom Riddle had dropped it, then handed Hadrian's wand back to him.
     Severus levitated Ginny Weasley up the stairs, all while keeping a hand on Hadrian's hand on his shoulder. When they made it to the top Draco was there waiting, pacing up and down the bathroom.
     "Thank goodness you're alright, I was so worried." Draco said in a rush before pulling Hadrian into a tight hug, who hugged back just as hard.
     "Let's all go to the hospital wing, Ginny needs to see her family, and needs to be checked out. Then we shall drop Draco off at the Slytherin common room and then head back to our chambers for a long talk." Severus said, looking pointedly at Hadrian for the last bit.
    
     The Weasleys were all happy to see Ginny alive when they walked into the hospital wing, and all pulled her into a hug. Hadrian, Severus, and Draco revived much praise for saving Ginny by the Weasleys.
     After a long talk with the headmaster about what happened in the chamber, they were finally allowed to leave. After dropping Draco off at his common room, with strict instructions to not tell anyone what happened, Hadrian and Severus made their way to their chambers.
     When they arrived Severus called a house elf to make them tea and a light supper, knowing neither of them could stomach too much right now.
     "I don't even know what to say to you, Hadrian. I could have easily lost you, you didn't listen to anything I said, what would I do if you had died down there? I love you, and I would be devastated if you died. I have no idea how to punish you, clearly grounding you doesn't work, as you just finished a two week grounding yesterday. I refuse to spank you, as much as you deserve it, I won't turn out like my father. You tell me, how should I punish you, nothing I have done yet has worked." Severus said, his voice held his displeasure, and was much more stern than Hadrian had ever heard.
     "I don't know, Dad, I'm sorry I didn't listen, but you need to understand that asking me to leave you and Ginny was unfair too. I would prefer to die for you than live without you. I might have not listened, but we wouldn't even be having this conversation if I left because you'd be dead, so it's not entirely my fault." Hadrian replied.
     "As true as that may be, I believe we will meet at a middle ground, you will be writing 1000 lines saying 'I will listen to my father' and I will apologize for trying to make you leave, as I don't think that was entirely fair on my part, but I only want what's best for you. And after that basilisk bit you, I was more afraid than I have ever been in my life. I didn't want you hurt, and was mad at myself for allowing you to be in a position where you could be hurt, so I thought getting you to leave was the best decision. But you are right in the fact if you had left, I'm not sure how the outcome would have been." Severus said. When he was done talking he pulled Hadrian into a hug and they just sat and held each other until the house elf popped back in with their tea and supper. And if Hadrian fell asleep on the couch in his dad's arms, no one was the wiser.