Evil Draco? Dead Draco?

[Eric Oppen]

No: HPFGUIDX 38871

I count myself in the camp that says that Draco Malfoy _can_ be
redeemed...true, _when we see him_ he's generally being a pretty obnoxious
brat, but we see him almost always through Harry's eyes (or Crabbengoyle's
eyes, when the Trio have brewed Polyjuice Potion).  For all we know to the
contrary, he's not getting better grades because he's working very hard to
make sure that his two idiot friends Crabbengoyle won't flunk out of school
and be sent to a Magical Home for the Evolutionarily Challenged.  He sounds
rather exasperated with them in the Polyjuice scene, but that's far from
inconsistent with the idea that he's taken them, academically, under his
wing.

For that matter...let's just suppose for a minute that Draco _did_ want to
turn against his daddy's view of things.  So, he goes around saying things
like "Oh, Muggle-born wizards and witches are just peachy---and so is
Hagrid!  The Dark Lord's got to have been on drugs!  I think that all Death
Eaters should go snog a Dementor!"  _How_ long do you think it would take
for the Stones-that-Speak (an Effinger reference there---R.I.P.) to shop him
to their fathers, or to his?  We only ever see him without them at the
Quidditch World Cup---and there, if you'll recall, he warns Hermione to
"keep that big bushy head down, Granger," when the Death Eaters are
tormenting the Muggles.  For that matter, he makes a point of warning the
Trio that the DEs don't distinguish between Muggles and Muggle-born mages.
True, he _could_ just be being his usual nasty snarky self--but he could
also be trying his best to keep someone he knows has more courage than
common sense (Hermione) from charging into a situation where she'd be in
real danger, which he figures she'd do.  If he were Evil Clear Through,
wouldn't he have done something to encourage Hermione to go out and tangle
with the DEs?  It wouldn't have been that hard.

His actions in regard to Hagrid are comprehensible, particularly in the
context of the wizarding world's attitude about people with giant
blood...I'd bet that he had a fairish old idea of just who Hagrid's parents
were a long time before it was confirmed by Rita Skeeter.  Face it, Hagrid's
_not_ very responsible in a lot of ways (taking first-year students into the
Forbidden Forest when there's real danger around, insisting on raising
Norbert, and so on and so on) and I can understand how he might want a Care
of Magical Creatures teacher who actually knew how to teach and what to
teach.  Professor Grubbly-Plank is not reported as having any trouble with
Malfoy, as far as I remember.  I don't _like_ what he does to Hagrid, but I
can see the logic of it.

However...I must say that I like the idea of Dead!Draco.  How about this
scenario:  Draco tries to break away from his daddy's idea that he will be a
DE, and reaches out to the Trio...and just as they are deciding that it's
all a trick to fool them, they stumble across Draco's lifeless corpse, with
the words "Death to all who repudiate the Dark Lord!" written on the wall.
In Lucius Malfoy's own handwriting, no less...could anybody at Hogwarts ID
that?  That would be rather an unexpected twist, and provide a lot of
interesting angst and guilt for the Trio.

--Eric, who has a very vivid, morbid imagination.