The Triwizard Portkey

[ssk7882]

No: HPFGUIDX 40489

David and I were poking holes in the theory that Voldemort planned to 
use the Triwizard Tournament Cup Portkey to transport himself and all 
of his Death Eaters right into the heart of Hogwarts and launch an 
immediate assault on the creme de la creme of wizarding society.  

Little did we realize that a Geist was watching.

Amanda wrote:

> Hrm. You two are laughing at one of my pet theories. **geist rolls 
> up sleeves**

We are indeed, Amanda, but you know, the only reason that we're able 
to do that without even bothering to set *forth* the theory in 
question first is because everybody knows it already.  Why, it's 
practically canon!  It has achieved deuterocanonical status on this 
list.  So take heart.

I'm glad you're here, though, because maybe you can help me out with 
some of my problems with this theory.  I've always absolutely *loved* 
this one conceptually -- in fact, it was one of the things that drew 
me to this list when I saw it cited on the Lexicon -- but I have a 
few problems with some of its details.  So maybe you can help me out 
with those.

(Way back in March I tried to ask you about this, actually, but that 
was when Yahoomort was doing its nasty thing of eating half my posts 
and delaying the other half for over a week.)

First off, I certainly agree that the Tournament audience makes an 
absolutely perfect audience for a really BIG "I'm back" terrorist 
message.  As you wrote, it has:

> (1) the heads of the three most prominent wizarding schools in that 
> part of the world;
> (2) the top officials of the Ministry of Magic;
> (3) the children of probably the entire wizarding population of the 
> UK;
> and
> (4) the children of several wizarding families from France and 
> wherever Durmstrang is.

Absolutely.  It's perfect.  And I also agree with you that the timing 
of the entire "how to abduct Harry" plot really does suggest that 
this was indeed the plan.

What I can't see, though, is quite how the plan would *work.*

You wrote:

> I believe, therefore, that the whole plan was something along these 
> lines:
> (a) get Harry through the tournament as a winner
> (b) get Harry to the graveyard for Voldemort's reanimation
> (c) use the portkey to return to the grounds of Hogwarts
> (d) make major offensive action against the gathered, unsuspecting 
> might of the free world.
> (e) sit back and mop up.

> It broke down at (b).


That it did.  But if it hadn't broken down at (b), wouldn't it have 
broken down at (c)?

Voldemort has thirty some-odd Death Eaters.  They all need to be 
touching the Portkey simultaneously for this plan to work.  The Cup 
just isn't that big.  I have serious trouble imagining how thirty 
grown men and a newly reincorporated Snake Dude would manage to all 
cluster around the Cup and lay fingers on it at once.  It just 
doesn't seem feasible to me somehow.

Even if they could manage it, they would hardly arrive in any 
condition to launch a credible attack.  As David wrote:

> And the thought of thirty DEs all landing in a jumble on the 
> Quidditch pitch as they try to hold on to the portkey seriously 
> endangered my reputation for sanity in the office.

It is hard to imagine how that could work, isn't it?  I mean, on the 
purely physical level, it's problematic.

But even if they did manage that, then there's the problem of (d).

Voldemort and his thirty some-odd Death Eaters all appear, right 
outside of the hedge maze.  Preferably with Harry Potter's corpse, 
just for psychological effect.

Okay, so what then?  Assassinating Dumbledore would seem an obvious 
first move. Dumbledore is a serious thorn in their side.  You suggest 
that they could also have started taking the children of the 
assembled audience members hostage, just to forestall any attacks 
against them and ensure the compliance of Important People of the 
wizarding world.  Fair enough.

But, but, but...but they wouldn't really be appearing in the 
immediate vicinity of any convenient hostages, would they?  All of 
those important wizards, as well as their hostage-worthy children, 
are watching the contest from high up in the *stands.*   They 
therefore have the advantage of both height *and* visibility over a
group of DEs suddenly appearing right in front of the maze on the 
ground.  And the audience would also be likely to have their 
attention utterly fixed on that particular spot.  I assume that the 
audience knew that this was where the winner of the Tournament would 
appear.

While I certainly agree with you that the sudden appearance of the 
reborn Voldemort and a bunch of masked and cloaked Death Eaters would 
be likely to cause panic and dismay, I don't really know if I believe 
that the element of surprise would be quite enough to prevent some of 
the more competent members of the audience (members of the Department 
of Magical Law Enforcement, for example) to take advantage of that 
height and visibility advantage to smack Voldemort and the Death 
Eaters down with curses before they'd even had a *chance* to take any 
hostages.  

Just look at how quickly members of the Ministry manage to 
triangulate on the source of the "morsmordre" spell in Chapter 9 of 
GoF, for example.  People are panicking at the sight of the Dark Mark 
too, but the Ministry guys still manage to keep their heads, and
they hardly hesitate before firing off their "Stupefy" spells.

I also don't know if I agree that the Tournament audience wouldn't
be armed.  Wizards seem to carry their wands with them *everywhere.*
The spectators at the QWC weren't anticipating trouble either, and 
yet even people like Arthur Weasley and Amos Diggory -- not exactly 
Special Forces types -- did have their wands with them.  

It just seems like a *very* risky plan to me, particularly as 
Voldemort and the Death Eaters would have had no way of making an 
effective retreat should they meet up with competent resistance.  
They can't Disapparate away, and even if we assume that the Portkey 
was programmed to allow them to escape, we're left with an even more 
slapstick version of that humorous image that David proposed: over 
thirty people, in the middle of a combat situation, falling all over 
themselves in their effort to lay hands on that Portkey.  For all of 
them to touch it at once would have been tricky enough in the no-
pressure atmosphere of the graveyard.  For all of them to touch it 
at once while under fire?  Not likely.  They'd be elbowing each other 
in the *throats* trying to get to the thing before being stupefied.

I really do love this theory, always have.  But I just can't seem to 
make it work.


-- Elkins