Harry lay in his bed calmly staring at the ceiling above him whilst his roommates had fallen asleep, it appeared that everyone in Gryffindor's house wanted nothing more than to discuss the Triwizard tournament. When Harry and the others finally got into Gryffindor Tower, the whole place was immediately drowned in noise. The older years all talked about how they would enter the tournament and how it would obviously be a Gryffindor representing the school, meanwhile, the majority of the Gryffindors started to moan and complain about the age limit that had been placed on the tournament.
Ron, in particular, had been very loud about it, feeling he had a pretty good chance at winning. On the other hand, Hermione was stuck between worrying about apparently being the only person who heard the part about people dying in the tournament and worrying about what she believed to be a horrific reveal about house elves. All of Harry's roommates had been excited about the tournament, even Neville was looking forward to watching it.
But Harry wasn't excited, not at all. Past experience told him that if something could go wrong then it was likely to go wrong. In his first year of school, he had nearly been killed by a curse on his broom, a troll, a three-headed dog and a possessed teacher. In his second year, he had to survive enthusiastically unintentionally near manslaughter by a crazy house elf whilst also dealing with a cowardly fraud, an evil book and a giant snake that could kill with a single look. In his third year, he had to deal with soul-sucking demons, werewolves, an escaped prisoner and a dickhead disguised as a rat. Meaning, Harry was not liking his chances of a quiet year, not to mention the fact that nearly everything goes wrong on Halloween and that's when the selection process would take place.
'Don't worry, we'll be fine.' Venom reassured him.
'Doesn't mean it won't be annoying,' Harry replied irritably. 'Something's bound to go wrong. I know it.'
'You need a distraction,' Venom decided suddenly. 'It's been a while since we last saw the spiders, let's go visit them.'
'And do what?' Harry asked.
'Maintain our dominance over them,' Venom answered in a voice that made it clear he was surprised that Harry hadn't immediately understood.
'You know what...I could do with a distraction.' Harry agreed, pushing his covers off of him before he got out of bed. A second later his body was covered in a familiar black goo, leaving him in his 'slim' Venom look. 'Ready whenever you are.' Harry said.
Venom leapt out of the nearest open window and dove downwards, relishing in the feeling of the wind. A large tentacle shout out of his arm and grabbed onto the side of the castle, allowing him to swing away from it. Venom released it at the highest point of the swing, his goo form shifted and soon he had a pair of squirrel-like wings attached from his wrists to his hip. Venom glided away from the castle and towards the direction of the Forbidden Forest, he gently landed outside of the castle and retracted his glider wings and turned himself invisible before making the rest of the way on foot.
Once he had entered the forest he had allowed himself to become visible again as he leapt into the air and began swinging through the trees, after a short while he had managed to reach the acromantula's nest. The spiders all bowed their heads to him as he passed them before landing in the centre of the nest.
"Your kings have returned," Venom announced, each and every spider giving him their full attention. "We still run this place, we still rule you all. Let any spider who challenges us, step forward." He said challengingly, looking around at the spiders. After a few moments when none of the spiders moved, he continued speaking. "Tell us, what news do you all have for us?"
"My king," One spider hesitantly crawled forwards. "The centaurs, we are at war with them, they shoot us with their pointed sticks, killing us spiders, young and elderly alike."
"Centaurs," Venom repeated thoughtfully. "Send some spiders to them, we shall arrange for a meeting."
"A meeting?" The spider repeated.
"A peace meeting," Venom replied. "We shall give them a chance to end this without bloodshed. Is there anything else to report?"
"No, my king," The spider answered with a small bow.
"Hmm, report to me if anything changes," Venom grunted. "And from now on you shall all refer to us as 'kings'.
"Yes, may we ask what you plan to do now, my kings?" Another spider spoke up.
"Are you aware of the creature that Slytherin held in his secret chamber?" Venom asked, looking around at all of the spiders around him. "The very enemy of spider kind, a basilisk!" Venom growled dramatically, and the spiders all immediately began hissing. "My other half killed it!" Venom roared proudly, his face retracting to reveal Harry's.
"You're welcome!" Harry grinned before Venom's face covered his once more.
"We have removed your biggest predator," Venom growled at the spider that had spoken up. "Don't you dare question us!"
"I apologize," The spider said quickly, crawling backwards fearfully.
"What we do is not your concern!" Venom yelled. "Continue as you have, contact us when the centaurs have responded," Venom growled before leaping in the air and swinging away.
'We can't fight the centaurs!' Harry hissed.
"I know," Venom growled. "That's why we'll try to arrange a peace meeting with them. The spiders are too valuable a resource."
'They're a problem,' Harry replied. 'I don't trust them, they could turn on us at any time.'
"We're their kings!" Venom argued.
'So was Aragog, not to mention the fact that they're a danger to the rest of the forest.'
"What do you suggest then?" Venom asked, realising that Harry had a point.
'We need to find a way to get them out of the forest and somewhere else,' Harry said. 'It'd be even better if we could do it legally, acromantula silk makes a ton of money.'
"Hmm," Venom hummed appreciatively as he landed and stuck to the side of a large tree. "We like money." He whispered as if only realising that fact.
'Yeah, we do,' Harry agreed.
"Fine," Venom said after a few moments. "We'll add it to our to-do list."
'Next time we go out at night we should make sure to prepare a pepper-up potion beforehand,' Harry thought as he covered a yawn whilst sitting down at the Gryffindor table for breakfast.
'You could just let me take over while you sleep,' Venom pointed out.
'Nah, you might end up eating someone you shouldn't.' Harry yawned once more before piling some food onto his plate.
"Are you okay, Harry?" Ron asked suddenly. "You look pretty tired, mate."
"Didn't sleep well," Harry shrugged. "I blame Snape."
"What did Professor Snape do?" Hermione blinked.
"I don't really know to be honest," Harry admitted.
"Then why are you blaming him?" She couldn't help but ask.
"Because if he wants to blame everything on me then I can do the same with him," Harry declared before his gaze caught Professor Flitwick sitting at the teacher's table and conversing with Professor McGonagall, the rest of the teachers weren't there with the exception of Professor Sprout who had walked off to go chat with someone at the Hufflepuff table. "Excuse me, I'll be back in a moment," Harry said, standing up.
"Where are you going?" Ron blinked.
"I'm going to go talk to Professor Flitwick," He told them before walking straight to the teacher's table.
"And then I told Miss Goldstein that I..." Professor Flitwick's voice trailed off as he saw Harry approaching.
"Can I help you, Mr Potter?" Professor McGonagall asked.
"I was hoping to talk to you and Professor Flitwick, if that's alright, Professor?" Harry asked.
"What is this about?" Professor McGonagall raised an eyebrow. Harry opened his mouth to respond but was quickly interrupted.
"Potter!" Snape said, walking up to them. "What are you doing here? Get back to your seat!"
"I am opening the chamber of secrets!" Harry said sarcastically. "What do you think I'm doing?" He asked whilst gesturing between himself and the two teachers in front of him.
"Mr Potter," Professor McGonagall said in a firm voice. "Speak respectfully to Professor Snape," She told him, earning a smirk from Snape that only lasted a brief moment before the Scottish witch turned her attention to him. "As for you, Severus, you should remember that Professor Flitwick and I have been teaching at this establishment since before you were born, if Mr Potter was doing anything that he shouldn't be doing then we would have handled it ourselves. We don't require your assistance right now so please feel free to leave us and eat your breakfast." Snape stared at her with narrowed eyes for a moment before turning and walking off, his cape billowing behind him.
"That's the guy that I have to call 'Professor'?" Harry couldn't help but ask.
"Nobody said you had to like it," Professor Flitwick shrugged. "Now, Mr Potter, what can we do for you?"
"I wanted to talk to you both about Luna Lovegood," Harry started. "She's a Ravenclaw and I suspect that her fellow Ravenclaws are bullying her."
"And why is that?" Professor Flitwick frowned, looking quite upset.
"On the train, I saw a girl older than her threatening her and when I asked Luna, she said it was something that happened every few weeks. The older Ravenclaws told her that it was normal, she didn't want to bother you." He told Professor Flitwick.
"Really?" Professor Flitwick asked slowly, an odd tone filled the usually cheery man's voice as he stared at the Ravenclaw table. "Thank you for bringing this to my attention," He said, not pulling his eyes away from the Ravenclaw table.
"Thank you, Mr Potter," Professor McGonagall told him in a soft voice. "Take twenty points to Gryffindor."
"Thank you, Professor," Harry nodded respectfully. "Before I go, I wanted to let you know that Mrs Tonks has asked me to inform you that she'll be in tomorrow on time for my lessons, she asked me to tell you early in case her owl hadn't arrived yet."
"I received it this morning, but thank you for informing me." She nodded to him before he turned around and walked back to his table.
"What was that about?" Hermione asked as soon as he had sat down.
"Was talking to them about my potions lessons and about the Ravenclaws bullying Luna," Harry answered honestly.
"Somebody is bullying Luna?" A feminine voice asked, Harry looked to his right and saw Ginny was now staring at him questioningly. Harry was somewhat surprised that the shy girl had finally managed to speak to him without blushing but ignored it and pressed on.
"A few people in her house," Harry told her. "I told Professor Flitwick about it."
"Thanks," Ginny frowned before staring at the Ravenclaw table and spotting Luna slowly slurping up a spoonful of cereal whilst also drumming her fingers on the table.
"Are you two friends or something?" Harry asked curiously.
"We are," Ginny nodded. "We haven't talked as much since school started but she does live close to our house. I'm going to go talk to her." Ginny decided before standing up and heading over to the Ravenclaw table.
"What have people been saying about Loony anyway?" Ron asked before tossing a bit of bacon into his mouth.
"Doing things like calling her 'Loony'," Harry said with a mild glare before he noticed Hermione's plate was empty. "Still not eating, huh?" He asked whilst resisting the urge to roll his eyes.
"I'm not eating another spoon of anything made from slave labour!" Hermione said stubbornly, crossing her arms.
"Well, if you're okay with your grades being lowered then that's up to you." Harry shrugged in a relaxed manner before he continued eating.
"What do you mean?!" Hermione said quickly, her eyes widening.
"Well," Harry took a moment to swallow his food. "Food is essential for the physical well-being of your body, right? And if you don't have a sufficient amount of food then that could make things harder on your body, making you more irritable and tired and if you become more of those things then your studying will be affected. Then your grades will naturally go down. But if you think starving yourself for this cause is worth it then have at it." Harry told her in a casual voice before he focused on eating. Hermione didn't eat for the rest of breakfast, though her stomach did rumble quite a bit.
'I bet you she eats something before the day ends.' Venom told Harry.
'Nah,' Harry said confidently. 'She'll at least last the day due to pure stubbornness before breaking tomorrow when she decides to come up with a better alternative than starving herself.'
"Anyway, I'll see you guys in class," Harry said as he stood up and started walking away only to be interrupted by Malfoy and his two bodyguards, Crabbe and Goyle.
"So Potter," Malfoy drawled as he stopped in front of him. "Good morning?"
"Fan-fucking-tastic now that you're here," Harry said sarcastically.
"You know what's interesting?" Malfoy smirked.
"Your mother's hips," Harry told him with a straight face before shoving Draco in the shoulder as he pushed past him and walked out of the hall. 'Venom,' Harry mentally called to his alien companion.
'Yeah?'
'There is a high chance that one day I am going to let you eat him,' Harry informed him. 'Do what you will with that knowledge.'