Snakes & Ladders

[heathernmoore]

No: HPFGUIDX 31879

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., James Andrewartha <trs80 at t...> wrote:
> 
> Ok, I've been vaguely following the alchemical discussion about Harry
> being the Living Stone, but what I don't get is how this explains why V
> wants Harry dead (when he killed Harry's parents, end of GoF). Basically,
> how can Harry be the *living* stone if he's dead? Unless you have to kill
> the Living Stone (and then use the corpse somehow) in order to utilize its
> powers? Even so, it doesn't really add up, given the stuff that V did when
> he had the chance in the graveyard. 
> 
> 
> James Andrewartha 


  Voldemort is a literary-style psychotic lunatic; don't expect consistency from him all the time. 
Rather like Snape and Sirius and everyone else, he can sliiiiide into highly irrational behavior. Like wanting to torture his victim if he believes he has the upper hand; he's got a score to settle with this little Potter bastard.  

Besides, he has now been resurrected: he may feel that he has completed that stage of his Great Work. Just as Flamell in real life *and* in the Potterverse was the only one who ever allegedly produced the mineral Stone, nobody has ever been able to lay claim to producing or discovering its spiritual counterpart. Voldemort would have to be going on a lot of guesswork and experimentation. He's just the sort of sociopath who wouldn't give a crap who he hurt in the process; they're all just tools to him.


The label of the "Living" Stone doesn't actually refer to that entity's necessary continued existence, but to the idea that the "living stone" is a person, rather than a mineral alloy like the Philosopher's Stone -- and that it has the power to transmute and perfect another soul/human into true immortality, rather than merely turn base metals into gold and produce a longevity elixir. So "living" as opposed to "material."

 He used Harry's blood in GOF, which isn't at all inconsistent with his single-minded "Kill the Potters" rampage prior to PS. We've seen from Harry's Dementor "visions" that LV was severly dismissing the idea that Lily Evans (that "silly girl") could possibly pose a threat to his plans *at the time,* and then he got the nasty shock that his plan didn't work.  

So he's had fifteen years to skulk about delusionally wondering what went wrong -- because he's TOM RIDDLE, the badass HEIR OF SLYTHERIN, the great and powerful LORD VOLDEMORT, and it's patently impossible that his plan failed because he's full of shit, right? Perish *that* thought. No, no, no, it failed because he had jumped the gun and acted too early, perhaps, maybe there was some protective magic in that house that he hadn't counted on. No way did he get his ass soundly kicked in that round because he's destined to fail. 

Well, that was a humiliating setback, but the *next* time he goes after Potter... say... maybe this is all part of the process, anyway.... 

And then as Quirdemort he gets outsmarted and gets his butt kicked by Harry Potter...  and then Lucius tells him, 'no go - he defeated the basilisk and from what I hear, he kicked your echo self's butt,'  and then Peter comes whining to him that 'Oh, that Potter kid and his friends kept defeating those Dementors, and they all know the truth, and oh, did I mention they kicked Severus' butt....'  And then Barty goes in to test and test Harry (with some assistance, sure, but he didn't hold the kid's hand).... and over the years Voldemort starts thinking to himself "woah... okay, I'm going to give this child a chance or two to join me first; it would be a shame to have to destroy him... imagine, I almost lost out on a piece of that....  but it just goes to show I've been right in my larger plan all along; that kid MUST be the transmutational force thingy...."

  AND he's got a cadre of malicious, slavering yes-men feeding his malice in some sick fascist group folie a deux expecting to get bookoo rewards out of it (like Lucius), or at least avoid getting steamrollered and sent straight to wizard hell (like Peter). Alchemy? You want to experiment with unicorn blood and hair from the bodies of virgins? On it, sir, right away, master. Torture and kill muggles? Of course, you're so bloody BRILLIANT! That's PERFECT! Campaign of Fear? I'm your man, Master. Please, more Crucio! I'm tougher than Peter, let me prove it!

  and the rest of us smartypants get to stand about saying, "Ooooo! They're so DEPRAVED!! Just look at all the totalitarian psychology allusions! Lookit all the alchemy! Lookit the sweetly confused romantic descants!! Lookit the charming personableness of the kids and the intriguing complexity of the adults!! JKR IS SO BLOOODY CLEVER!!!"

 -- heather (uma)

   (who wishes she were one tenth as clever as JKR)