Three twelve-year-olds are gathered in a bathroom, copying a diagram from a book onto the floor in chalk.
"Do you know what all this writing means?" asks the green-eyed boy.
"No," says the bushy-haired girl, "and that worries me too, but we need to find out who the Heir of Slytherin is and this ritual is the best we've got."
Eventually, one or another of them draws the last bit of the outer circle.
Cam spends the spiral staircase escalator ride trying to figure out how a spiral staircase escalator works. Are steps disappearing at the top?
Yup! He has to go a full turn above the door they're going toward to see it, but there they go, phasing into what is in all other ways indistinguishable from a solid stone ceiling.
Inside is a very old man who looks like someone decided the wizards in this universe weren't stereotypical enough and set out to rectify the error.
"Hello Minerva, hello Harry. And who might you be?"
"My name is Cam and I am a differently magical entity from an alternate universe that is also in the future but that's not important right now."
"This is why I never say I have seen everything. I take it you were involved in uncovering the matter that has Minerva so concerned?"
"Ginevra Weasley, one of my first-years, was possessed by a cursed diary inhabited by one Tom Riddle, who was using her to open the Chamber of Secrets. Mister Swan and I destroyed the item and miss Weasley recovered, but mister Swan then used his unique form of magic to determine that Tom Riddle was in six separate locations--and that one of them was inside mister Potter's forehead. He is showing no symptoms of possession, but I am nonetheless concerned."
"The model wasn't high res enough to distinguish 'inside' from 'right on the surface of'," Cam clarifies, "for all I know it's a dermatological condition. Is the scar magic? Can scars be magic?"
"Mister Swan also determined that that state of affairs has persisted for several years, which suggests to me that it does involve his scar. Unless he has encountered Dark magic on some other occasion before coming to Hogwarts."
"No, I believe you are correct. This is very concerning. Did you say six locations?"
"You'll want to reproduce them, I vanished everything on the way out. Also I suspect Albus wants a look at your magic."
with increasing concern.
"This is . . . not entirely unexpected, but the magnitude of the problem is greater than I thought. However, I can say that mister Potter is in no immediate danger."
"...okay, cool. What is going on exactly, 'not in immediate danger' leaves so much room."
"I believe he can be trusted. He has been nothing but helpful so far, and without him we would still be unaware of the problem."
Dumbledore gives Cam a long, searching look, his eyes twinkling, then turns to Harry.
"The matters we are about to discuss are distinctly unpleasant and unlikely to require you to do anything any time soon. I suggest you go enjoy your dinner."
Harry gets out (and determines the door to be inconveniently soundproof, and gets the rest of the way out).
"Before anything else, I should inform you of the events of today in more detail." She explains about Ginny, and the basilisk, and the fiendfyre, and about Lockhart and her unilateral decision to sack him ("I have secured Remus Lupin as a replacement"), and Malfoy's unfortunately unprovable involvement, and the business with all the excess Tom Riddles.
"Unpro- okay, I guess you probably don't have a system to make forensic conjuration admissible but I'm starting to really dislike what I've seen of wizard mechanisms for keeping your preteen children safe."
"I'm afraid you've seen a rather unusual series of events. I've had more trouble keeping my students safe today than in the entire rest of my career to date."
"And today is, I am afraid, not over. To begin with, Minerva, your suspicions were correct: Tom Riddle and Lord Voldemort are one and the same."
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