[HPforGrownups] Was Percy's sickle /Ginny's best friend/Slytherin redemption/Neville

[manawydan]

No: HPFGUIDX 150851

Magpie wrote:
>I have a problem with calling it a bungle at all, whatever Harry thinks it
>was.  There's no reason a minor young assistant at the Ministry should
>notice anything amiss with Crouch.  It's not Percy's business to know
>whether his boss' attendence record is poor or whether or not he should be
>communicating through notes. It's the higher-up people who should have

Ah, but this is _Percy_ we're talking about, the person who more than anyone
you'd expect to know the rule book off by heart. I'm sure that he took the
personnel handbook home on his very first weekend and memorised it!

>noticed something wrong.  Granted Percy probably enjoyed Crouch's absence
>far too much to even allow himself to think about speaking up about it; he
>was running the department.  Imperius is hard to detect, we know--and
Arthur
>and Bagman barely reacted to Bertha disappearing.  That's a bigger flub,
>imo.

Though Percy did seem more ratty than usual at this time. I wonder if he was
going through a fairly deep internal struggle that on the one hand, the
rules are being broken right and left and on the other hand, Mr Crouch could
do no wrong for him so everything must be ok. And yet not ok.

>I always find it ironic that Harry thinks about Percy's "not noticing his
>boss was under Voldemort's thumb" for a year as if this is a big screw-up

Perhaps even more tragic than that. Just suppose that Barty, desperately
trying to resist the Imperius, managed to do something that was so
dramatically against the rules that his uptight snotty young assistant
_must_ notice something wrong and bring it to someone's attention. Only
hero-worshipping Percy just ignores the breach of rules, because Mr Crouch
could do no wrong.

>when Dumbledore didn't even notice his old friend and new teacher was not
>only under Voldemort's thumb but not even the same guy.  Maybe we're
>supposed to think Percy's promotion is suspicious but unfortunately it
makes
>sense to me--he proved himself during a bad time by keeping the Ministry
>running.

And maybe even thereby doomed Barty. Just suppose once again that the second
string to his fight for survival was that "Weatherby", his callow and
inexperienced young assistant for whom he has so little regard that he can't
even remember his name, would foul up so badly that someone would notice
that Barty was missing. Only Percy is a Weasley, and proves that he's very
intelligent and capable, so capable that he's able to do the job of a head
of department without getting it wrong.

Percy's promotion makes sense to me too. Crouch obviously recognises that
despite what's happened, Percy is obviously a bright young man who can do a
good job. He's also someone who will be firmly under Crouch's thumb. The
investigation could easily have damned Percy for ever, if not sent him to
Azkaban as an accessory to the kidnap and murder of his superior. Offered a
second chance, who can blame him for taking it?

hwyl

Ffred

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