deathtocapslock | CoS Chapter Seventeen

*Harry makes it to the Chamber of Secrets. Unsurprisingly, it is an awesome spot for a Goth party. A big cave with snakes carved everywhere, lit by an eerie green light. I’ll bet the Slytherins come down here all the time on the weekends and do the monkey man dance.

*Harry sneaks into the Chamber with his wand out—but don’t worry, if he sees the snake he’ll shut his eyes really fast. Or he would, if he wouldn’t already be frozen by then, maybe.

*Slytherin looks monkey-like. As in, less than human. What a shock.

*Ginny’s lying under the statue. We know something is wrong because while her red hair is still flaming, it is not dancing.

*Harry throws his wand aside. As a Gryffindor he knows what’s called for in a dramatic rescue.

*I can see what everyone means about Harry having a super-sensitive instinct about people. He figured out Tom Riddle was evil the moment Tom finally told him in no uncertain terms that he was evil.

*Ginny II resents the implication that Harry is staggering under Ginny’s dead weight. Ginny II would be lithe and easy to carry no matter what state she was in. That’s another reason Ginny I had to die.

*It’ s a little depressing to think that an 11-year old’s actual *soul* is contained in her shallow whining about her brothers and the boy she has a crush on. Well, I’m a woman. I know what we’re like.

*Yes, Harry. It was a Gryffindor who did all those things. We won’t wait for you to admit that, though. We’d be here all night. Ginny was completely blameless, even for the parts where she consciously decided to act in a way that would endanger others.

*Yes, those diary entries are really interesting. Ginny thinks she’s attacking everybody and her response is to get paranoid around that evil Percy for "suspecting" her and to not tell anybody at all.

*Tom tells Harry how he easily framed Hagrid since it was his word against Hagrid’s. Oh Tom, how things have changed. Nowadays Hagrid could be found feeding a student’s head to one of his monsters and he wouldn’t get fired. The student might get detention, though.

*Tom forgets to mention that luckily Hagrid was indeed raising a deadly monster at the time.

*Ginny’s motivations have been pretty cold throughout this story. Stealing the diary back to prevent Harry finding out she liked him and to cover up her own crimes.

*The real reason, of course, was that Ginny was afraid Harry might discover evidence of her actually personally. Years later she will have created a false diary where she spent second year confiding things like, "What ho, Diary—my Potions class contains seven losers, an idiot, a bimbo and a freak. I hexed them all thoroughly, of course. Thinking of trying out the new bat bogey hex. I’ll tell you how it went. Cheers, Ginny."

*And why, exactly, did Ginny starting writing in the damn thing again once she stole it back?

*LOL! I’m sorry, we’ve got to take some time out here and imagine young Tom Riddle telling his friends that from now on he wants them to call him by his super Goth name, Lord Voldemort.

*Though I suppose since they were Slytherins they probably all had Goth names, just like the Gryffindors all have, like, frat boy nicknames. Lord Voldemort, Count Sepulchre, Lucifer Anibestus, The Viceroy of Doom…

*It’s actually a little known fact that Tom developed his name as part of a long-running game of Dungeons and Dragons the Slytherins were having.

*How I wish I could actually play D&D so I could describe a scene of Tom’s character, Lord Voldemort, actually in the game, rolling the dice and gaining powers for himself with Cornelius Crabbe as Dungeon Master.

*Harry’s brain seems to have jammed. It does that a lot. He might want to have it checked.

*Tom’s backstory sounds a whole lot more interesting, and totally different, when he tells it here. He makes it sound like Tom Riddle, Sr. was like Darrin Stevens in an alternate universe, abandoning Merope because she was a witch. (Not realizing how much help she could be in getting him advertising accounts!)

*Fawkes’ appearance might be moving if I didn’t know he’s only showing up because Harry spontaneously decided to kiss Dumbledore’s arse.

*The longer they stand there, the more life is dwindling out of Ginny. Oh, see, now I’m totally on Tom’s side because I know that what awaits Ginny if she survives is a fate worse than death.

*Tom says he and Harry look something alike. Ooh! Is Harry as fanciable as you, really? Because you’re quite fit.

*LOL! The Hogwarts Four? Bwahahaha! That’s awesome! They must fight crime. "Salazar, use your Parseltongue to talk to that giant anaconda. Helga will drill us a secret passage out of its lair with her badger digging power. Rowena will calculate exactly where we need to surface to save the Chinese ambassador in time using Arithmancy. And me? Just get me to the opera house and, I’ll take care of Mojo Jojo."

*So…that statue of Slytherin is basically a giant Pez dispenser. Cool. As adults maybe Crabbe and Goyle can open a candy shop and sell miniature ones. (I can picture them wearing chefs aprons and hats like the guys in In the Night Kitchen.)

*Riddle has to remind the basilisk that it mostly finds prey through smelling.

*Tom Riddle’s going to sit there and watch Harry die. He’s in no hurry. Oh Tom. Super villains never are.

*Yeah, like Tom would forget that phoenix tears were healing. Because it’s not like he’s obsessed with everything having to do with immortality or anything.

*I’m sorry, but why couldn’t Ginny tell Harry she was the one opening the Chamber in front of Percy? Why is Percy always the bad guy in this family?

*And why the fuck was she determined to tell Harry rather than, say, McGonagall? Oh right, I forgot. Nothing else matters except what Harry thinks.

*Priorities straight as always, Ginny begins whining about getting expelled and not, you know, whether she hurt anyone else.

*Ron tries to hug Ginny but she holds him off. Only Harry will do.

*Ron asks Harry if he’s thought how they’re going to get back up the pipe. That’s why Ron’s the lamest of the Trio. What kind of hero would consider something practical like that? A cowardly one, that’s who!

*Lockhart says flying is just like magic. Apparently when Wizards lose their memory they become Muggles. He can’t remember he can do magic, but he remembers somehow what magic is.

Hero’s Death Battle Exemption
OMG, I totally forgot that the bird crying over you cries tears that will bring you back to life! Dang it!

IITS
Yes, I know that’s just the sort of thing I would know, but IITS!

James Bond Exposition Rule
"So then, when I was sixteen I discovered that my great great great great great great Grandfather was a member of the Hogwarts Four, who ran bootleg whisky from Canada into Chicago. And I decided…"

Light Bulb Moment
Wait, you mean you’ve taken my wand and are smiling wickedly over this unconscious girl in the Chamber because you don’t want to be my friend?

Nut o’ Fun
Does anything else come out of Slytherin’s big giant fun house mouth?

Final score: 5

Signs of things to come: Some people just don’t have to think about how their actions affected others. I mean, who cares if a couple of Mudbloods might have died? Ginny’s wanted to come to Hogwarts since Bill did! (Which I think would have made her something like -5 years old.) No, Tom Riddle will never learn to stop speechifying before killing somebody, and neither will any of his friends.