TBAY: BlackWidower!Snape retuned (long)

[dungrollin]

No: HPFGUIDX 160721

> Dung:
> > Snape and Reggie are old pals, united in their hatred of Sirius 
at school, so Snape (foolishly – he hasn't learned too much about 
> > Voldy yet) tries to help Reg, save him, hide him, whatever. 
> > Voldemort knows that Snape and Regulus are thick as thieves, so 
he questions Snape, who is still wet-behind-the-ears, [11] and as 
yet unable to hide his lies with Occlumency [12]. Voldemort knows 
he's lying, Regulus is quickly discovered and killed within days of 
> > Voldy shouting "Off with his head!" [13]


> SSSusan:
> Hmmmm.  Is it in Snape's character to side with Regulus over 
Voldy? 

Dung:
He's terrified of Voldy. Anyone in their right mind is terrified of 
Voldy, particularly those who work for him. Do I need to refer you 
to the kid-glove bowing-and-scraping I'm-not-worthy treatment they 
put on for him in the graveyard in GoF? That's fear. 

While Regulus and Snape are lowly minion outer-circle easily-
sacrificed DEs, their loyalty to Voldemort doesn't need to come 
above their loyalty to their friends; mostly because while they're 
outside the inner circle, Voldy isn't asking them to choose, he's 
not giving them important missions like heading the prophecy-
retrieval squad, or killing the only one he ever feared, they're the 
grunts who go along to make up the numbers. 

Snape was naive in the same way that Regulus and Draco were. If 
Draco was unable to kill DD, and Draco didn't even *like* DD, and 
fully knew that Voldy would kill him for his failure, it's not 
impossible that Snape found he couldn't betray Regulus, if he were a 
good friend. 

Besides, we have canon - a whole chapter of it - which suggests that 
when DEs are in trouble with Voldy they're not incapable of going to 
their DE friends for help.

SSSusan: 
> Has he already begun to think "It's not worth it" with regard to 
> being a Voldy supporter?  

Dung:
I think at this point he's still all for Death Eating in principle, 
he just doesn't want it to adversely affect his friends, and he's 
certainly realising that his master's a psycho. Snape has presumably 
managed to keep the fact that he's a DE under wraps from the WW at 
large so far, but is realising that joining Voldy is for life, that 
he's not going to be able to sit and cheer him on from the 
sidelines - he's going to be *involved*, and that he has little or 
no control. 

SSSusan:
What will have had this effect on Snape? The prophecy? his wife's 
pregnancy?

Dung:
His wife and child's death, and the death of Regulus. That's my 
premise. 

> Dung:
> > Voldemort is therefore very much displeased with Snape. He 
orders Snape to be killed (that'll learn him!). However, Lucius 
Malfoy, still grateful to Snape for his tip off about the prophecy, 
> > intervenes (at great personal risk) to persuade Voldemort to 
spare Snape. Lucius's strategy involves pointing out to Voldy how 
very useful a talented young wizard like Snape could be. [14]


> SSSusan:
> Hmmm again.  Is it in Lucius' character to go out on such a limb 
for Snape, even if he did provide the tip-off about July?  I can't 
> *quite* imagine it.  

Dung:
You seem to be forgetting that bad people (in this case DEs) have 
friends too. Being a bad person doesn't automatically make you a bad 
or disloyal friend. And frankly, with someone like Voldy at the 
tiller, you need all the chums you can get amongst the other DEs. 
You don't want one of the ones who doesn't like you to stab you in 
the back and push you in the poo, and have no-one around to help you 
out. 

That's how life works, you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. You 
save my neck, and when the chips are down I'll do my best to save 
yours (or do my damnedest to ensure that the chips stay up). You 
help people out in the expectation that they will do the same for 
you when it matters. That's what friends are for, surely? And I gave 
two bits of canon that Lucius and Snape are *old* friends, going 
back to before they joined Voldy, and I didn't even *mention* the 
twitch in GoF. 

It's certainly noticeable that we have canon for Snape and Lucius's 
friendship, but that JKR has very carefully made sure that we 
*never* see the two of them interacting.

SSSusan:
But perhaps the thought of having an heir is 
> enough for Lucius to risk it, to actually consider someone else's 
> life?  ...Eh, I think I need more convincing.

Dung:
Having an heir has nothing to do with anything. Lucius is a nasty 
piece of work, sure enough, one of Voldy's followers who was in it 
for the "more refined forms of torture" IMO, but he's not a rat like 
Peter. He doesn't spit on his chums. He didn't leg it from the MoM 
to safety like Bella did, he stayed with the DEs who were under his 
command, and was captured with them (though it's obviously 
debateable whether it was just incompetence that got him caught).

> Dung: 
> > Unfortunately, in the process of defending and arguing for 
Snape, Voldemort, the expert Legilimens [15], discovers from Lucius 
that Snape has told him about the prophecy, and that baby Snape is 
due around the end of July, and they've kept it secret from him. 
> 
> SSSusan:
> One question here.  If Voldy Legilimenses (did I spell that 
right??) Lucius enough to discover the existence of EarlyArrival!
Draco, would he not also have discovered the existence of Pregnant!
Mrs.Snape?  It seems unlikely that those two things, surely so 
intertwined in Lucius' mind, would not *both* come to the surface 
for Voldy to discover.
> 

Dung:
Yes, that's what I said (or at least, what I meant). Voldy discovers 
that Snape told Lucius the prophecy, and that baby Snape is due 
around the end of July.

 
> Dung: 
> > I don't think Voldy trusts anybody [18]. And since Bella 
certainly doesn't trust Snape [19], I don't see why Voldemort would. 
I think one of Voldy's aims in HBP (which I've gone on about before 
[20]) was to test Snape's loyalty - "He expects me to do it in the 
end, I think." HBP, 2:39). At the end of HBP, Snape has killed DD, 
the only one Voldemort ever feared. Voldy trusts him now, as much as 
> > he will ever trust anyone. 
> 
> SSSusan:
> I can definitely agree with this possibility of a loyalty test of 
> Snape.  And wouldn't it be fascinating if, in the end for Snape, 
> that loyalty test of Voldy's turned into a loyalty test of DD's as 
> well!  That is, if you & I are right about Snape being DDM and 
about DD "commanding" Snape to do the deed, then killing DD was 
> DD's "loyalty test."  How convenient (but how very painful for 
> Snape) that killing DD will satisfy *both* loyalty tests in one 
deed.
> 

Dung:
You reckon DD didn't trust Snape?!?


> Dung:
> > DD, however, suspects that Snape is a Death Eater (though he 
> > doesn't let on), and refuses him the job since he suspects that 
> > Snape is there on Voldy's orders. But he leaves options open, 
> > because he doesn't want Voldemort to kill Snape for failing to 
> > secure the job. 
> 
> 
> SSSusan:
> One final question.  WHY would DD do this for Snape?  Why would he 
> care what happens to him?  Do you think he already saw the hint of 
a chance that he was regretting his decision to become a DE or to 
> follow Voldy?
> 

Dung:
Sort of. DD strikes me (particularly after the happenings on the 
Tower) to be the kind who'll always leave options open on principle 
(particularly other people's options, and particularly *young* 
people's options), rather than close them off before he's certain 
that they're blind avenues.


> 
> Dung:
> > And the rest is history. Working in a school, watching children 
> > growing up would have been torture. Every time he looks at Harry,
> > he sees James, the man who was allowed to die defending his 
> > family, while Snape was forced to survive his family and always 
be alone. And of course, he always wears black.
> 
> SSSusan:
> It's fun, Dung! 

Dung:
I rather like it. If the outline is right, I'd bet anything almost 
all the details are wrong, but having Snape's kid a suspect for the 
prophecy is a way of keeping RevengeDriven!Snape while accepting 
DD's "I believe it [discovering how Voldy was interpreting the 
prophecy] was the greatest regret of his life and the reason he 
returned -" at the same time.

It would give Harry a good example of how it's not only his life 
that was ruined by the prophecy, and that there were others in the 
same situation as he and Neville who didn't make it.

Dungrollin