This first chapter is heavily expositional. Sorry about that. Now let's get started.
"Normal speech"
"Telepathy"
1) AWAKENING POWER
"This is it" Harry Potter said to himself as, sword in hand, he faced the basilisk in the Chamber of Secrets, "I'm going to die."
Harry was a wizard and he was in his second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry learning how to use his magical power. Unfortunately things were never simple for him. His parents had been killed when he was 15 months old by the fearsome dark lord Voldemort who then tried to kill him. It didn't work. The curse rebounded on Voldemort and left him virtually powerless and without a body while Harry was left with a scar on his head shaped like a lightning bolt. Overnight Harry had become a celebrity and was known all over Great Britain as the 'Boy-Who-Lived'
He had grown up with his aunt and uncle, Petunia and Vernon Dursley, and their son Dudley, his cousin. They had abused him, calling him a freak, beating him whenever something happened that couldn't be explained, treating him like a slave by forcing him to do all of the chores around the house, even the cooking, and never feeding him nearly enough to ensure good health. However there were times when, rather mysteriously and for unknown reasons, the abuse would suddenly stop for a while but it always started up again in the end.
When he had turned eleven and had left for Hogwarts it was like escaping from Hell. Hogwarts, however, had its own dangers. At the end of his first year he had come face to face with Voldemort, or what was left of him, who tried to kill him again. Now in second year someone had unleashed a basilisk from the Chamber of Secrets which had been terrorizing the school for months. Finally Ginny Weasley, the younger sister of his best friend Ron Weasley, had been abducted and taken to the chamber. Harry and Ron had followed. They'd been separated by a rock fall and Harry had gone on alone to the chamber where he discovered who the culprit behind all the attacks was. It turned out that a memory of Lord Voldemort as a teenager (real name Tom Marvolo Riddle) that was hidden in a diary that had been possessing Ginny all year and making her release the basilisk without her knowing it. Now Harry stood in the chamber facing the creature.
The basilisk loomed over Harry, its mouth opened wide, venom dripping from its jaws as it prepared to strike him. Harry faced it with the sword he had obtained along the way but the situation looked pretty hopeless.
"No!" Harry said, "I can't die here! I won't let Riddle win!" Driven by both fear and determination his adrenalin levels shot up so high that something had to give. He raised the sword above his head with both hands and as he did so something woke up in him. He felt a new kind of power which was unlike his regular magic fly along his arms and out of his hands up toward the basilisk which suddenly stopped moving. Harry looked up at the monster and saw that it was almost frozen in place. Some force seemed to be holding it there although it was struggling to free itself.
"What now?" Harry asked himself, "that magic won't hold it forever – "
He felt a different, almost static-like, feeling in his hands and looked at them to see that sparks of what looked like electricity were dancing around his fingers. Without knowing how he channeled this new force up from his hands through the sword and up towards the monster. A bright lightning bolt flared up from his hands and struck the basilisk right in the head stunning it into unconsciousness.
Unfortunately this meant that the basilisk fell straight down onto Harry. Its mouth, which was still open wide, came right down on the sword that Harry was holding over his head. The sword went right through the roof of the basilisk's mouth and into its brain, killing it. But at the same time one if its poisonous fangs pierced deep into Harry's arm...
"Fawkes saved my life" Harry told his listeners in Professor McGonagall's office afterwards, "when he used his tears to heal me. Then I stabbed Riddle's diary with the fang which destroyed it and him. When Riddle was gone Ginny woke up. We left the chamber, rejoined Lockhart and Ron who had cleared a hole for us to get back through the rock fall and Fawkes brought all of us back up into the castle."
Molly and Arthur Weasley, Ginny's and Ron's parents, looked gobsmacked at what they were hearing but also very thankful to get their daughter back alive. Ginny had been crying over the whole business even though it hadn't really been her fault. Ron was glad to be back in the castle, Professor McGonagall looked like she might have a heart attack, Professor Lockhart, who had lost his memory during the ordeal when he tried unsuccessfully to obliviate Harry and Ron only to have the spell backfire on him, stood in a corner with a vacant expression on his face, and Professor Dumbledore, the school headmaster, simply twinkled at everyone in his usual way without seeming all that surprised by everything.
"Most remarkable" said Professor Dumbledore, "a very impressive display of accidental magic. Well done Mr. Potter."
Dumbledore sent the Weasleys to the hospital wing so Ginny could be checked out to make sure she was really all right. Lockhart went with them. Professor McGonagall was sent to alert the kitchens that a feast was going to be held. Harry, however, stayed behind at Dumbledore's request.
"Headmaster" Harry asked Dumbledore when they were alone, "was that really accidental magic that I used? It didn't feel like my usual magic."
"What did it feel like my boy?" asked Dumbledore.
"I don't know" said Harry, "it felt different somehow, like I wasn't using magic at all but something else."
"Hmm" said Dumbledore looking at Harry thoughtfully, "I don't know what else it could have been although if you want we can investigate it and see if we can find another explanation. In the meantime I would advise you to keep your thoughts about this to yourself. If anyone asks you just keep telling them it was accidental magic."
"All right" said Harry nodding his agreement as the conversation turned to other topics.
At the same moment that Harry was dealing with the basilisk a man in a wheelchair in the American state of New York suddenly sat up in surprise. He was Professor Charles Xavier and he was one of the top authorities on genetics and mutations in the world. Unknown to almost everyone Xavier was a mutant himself, a very, very powerful telepath. He was so powerful that he could contact people on the other side of the world through the power of his mind alone. He was also powerful enough to sense when a mutant's power suddenly manifested itself for the first time. He had recently found two other mutants that he had taken under his wing to help cope with their powers and was looking for more.
He had been relaxing in his office when he felt the initial spike of a new mutant's power. He immediately sat up and tried to trace the power spike to its source but couldn't get a detailed location. All he could tell was that it was coming from somewhere a few thousand miles to the east. He quickly wheeled himself over to his desk where he activated his office outlet to Cerebro, a machine capable of searching the whole world for mutants, to see what data it had picked up. His eyebrows rose when he saw what it said.
"Scotland?" he said to himself, "but not an urban area. I must see."
He sent his mind out across the ocean to Scotland and, following Cerebro's direction, he traced the spike back to its origin where he found –
"Oh my" he said to himself. He sent his mind out again, this time to make contact with a specific person. As it happened that person was Professor Dumbledore.
"Albus? Are you there?" he called, "it's Charles."
"Charles?" came the answer, "it's been far too long since I've heard from you old friend. How are you?"
"I'm fine" was the reply, "and yourself?"
"I am well" said Dumbledore, "although I'm better now than I was a short time ago. We just stopped a crisis at Hogwarts that might have shut down the school if we hadn't."
"Oh?" Xavier said, "maybe that's connected to why I'm calling you. I've just sensed a powerful new mutant and he's at your school."
"Really?" said Dumbledore, "that's interesting. We've just dealt with a non-human attack so I don't see how that relates to a new mutant. But it's curious that these things should happen at the same time. Is the mutant one of my students? Or staff?"
"One of your students" said Xavier, "mutations very rarely wait until adulthood to manifest. Not only is it a student but it's a younger student."
"Who is it?" asked Dumbledore.
"The student's name is Harry Potter" said Xavier, "and his powers manifested earlier today."
There was a long silence before Dumbledore replied.
"I see" he finally said, "this complicates matters although it also clears up certain things. You're right. The two events are connected. I think it would be a good idea for you to come to Hogwarts as soon as possible and I can explain everything to you. If you'll let me know when I should expect you I'll send you a portkey that will take you directly to my office."
"I'm rather busy at the moment" said Xavier, "The soonest I can come is three days from now. Will that be convenient?"
"That will be fine" said Dumbledore, "school will still be in session and Harry will still be here."
"Then I look forward to seeing you again" said Xavier, "and to meeting Harry."