Will the Real Severus Snape please step forward?

[Dana]

No: HPFGUIDX 167699

wynnleaf
> "Slight chance??"  Remember that Voldemort would have seen Snape's 
> actions regarding Quirrell in SS/PS.  He'd know from Pettigrew that 
> Snape had sought to have Sirius kissed by dementors -- who everyone 
> including Snape thought was a loyal Voldemort supporter.  He'd know 
> that Snape had done nothing to search for Voldemort in the interim, 
> and hadn't come when Voldemort first called.  Further, there was 
> always the risk that Voldemort's occlumency skills were now a lot 
> better (living 12 years in spirit form).

Dana:
LV also knows Snape did not know LV was in the back of Quirrell's 
head and therefore it was not an action against LV but against 
Quirrell and in the end Snape did nothing that prevented Quirrell 
getting to the Mirror. 

I do not see what LV would care about Snape trying to get Sirius soul 
sucked, he knows Sirius was never on his side and getting Sirius soul 
sucked would therefore HELP LV because now no one would be looking 
for Wormtail and with it Wormtail had no where else to go then to LV 
and maybe you missed it but this helped LV get back to power.

Snape indeed doesn't come at the first call but Snape has a good 
excuse for LV to buy; that he was waiting for DD's orders because 
only then could he remain his position at Hogwarts and Barty is soul 
sucked so he can't tell LV Snape was involved in his capture. 

I think you meant LV's legilimency skills are now better but Snape's 
occlumency skills are now better then when he was 22 too. 

Snape has information on DD and Harry from a close objective and he 
will be useful as a spy and therefore the chance that LV would kill 
him on the spot where very slim and besides Snape had more chance 
trying to convince LV of his usefulness then not trying at all 
because if he hadn't his death was a sure thing. 

Besides we see LV not killing Wormtail on the spot either not just 
because he is to weak but because he is useful and he did much worse 
then Snape did. 

wynnleaf
> So I assume you don't believe Dumbledore when he told Draco that he 
> could hide Draco and his mother and that Voldemort wouldn't be able 
> to find them?  Surely if Dumbledore could have hidden Draco and 
> Narcissa, he could have hidden Snape just as well.

Dana:
Snape was not hidden over these years, he was still in regular 
contact with Lucius and maintaining of old ties.
Snape sudden death just because LV rose back to power would not be 
very believable now would it. And just being in the protection of DD 
would not keep Snape safe at all times either but going back to LV 
and convince him of his usefulness would.

Besides what has Snape done that LV knows about, that would grant a 
killing on the spot. As we see other DEs have done far worse things 
and LV does not kill them. Avery fails to get him the prophecy but LV 
does not kill him. Lucius destroyed the diary and went against LV's 
orders but he doesn't kill him on the spot. The only one we see 
ending up death is Karkaroff and he ran instead of rejoining and he 
actively took out several of LV's DEs after LV's down fall and this 
is common knowledge while if Snape has ever contributed to the 
capture of DEs, it isn't known. 

Nothing would suggest Snape would not get away with what he has to 
offer and therefore he was at greater risk defying LV after his rise 
back to power then joining him even if it was late.

wynnleaf
> Dumbledore appears rather worried when Snape left at the end of 
GOF, 
> and Snape looks pretty stressed as well.  Since Dumbledore 
> completely trusted Snape, his concerns were far more likely to be 
> for Snape's safety.
<snip>

Sure why would Dumbledore not worry but if he thought the chances for 
Snape's survival were as slim as you want to suggest then why would 
DD even suggest him returning? 

wynnleaf
> I'm not sure what you mean.  The DE's at the MOM weren't at risk 
> when Snape sent the Order?  They certainly did fare badly didn't 
> they?  Malfoy ends up in prison, and supposedly he was a friend. 

Dana:
Was that Snape fault or Lucius? If Lucius hadn't let Harry thwart him 
and swooped in and out as he was supposed to do, was sending the 
Order, at the time we see them arrive, really to prevent Lucius from 
performing his task successfully? 

First we have to believe Snape didn't think Harry would be able to 
get to the DoM but now we have to believe Snape thought Harry would 
be giving Lucius such a hard time that he fails to get the task 
preformed swiftly? The one contradicts the other. Snape does not 
think much of Harry and would have believed the DEs would be able to 
handle 6 teenagers and finish the job before anyone arrives to 
intervene. Him sending the Order would not have caused the DEs 
trouble if they had preformed there task as they should have. It was 
not an active attempt on Snape's part to thwart LV's plan because if 
Snape really wanted to thwart LV's plan then he would have alerted 
the Order sooner and made sure someone was at the DoM just in case 
but we see no Order activity before they show up at the DoM. They 
were just gathering at HQ for a meeting with DD. 

wynnleaf
> Dumbledore is starting to sound very wishy washy in your scenario.  
> He trusts Snape even though Snape's been a death eater, even though 
> Snape delivered the prophecy to Voldemort, even though he made an 
> unbreakable vow with Narcissa (and yes, Dumbledore had to have 
known 
> about it eventually), yet he looses his trust over this?  

Dana:
To some extent he indeed does sound wishy washy for still wanting to 
believe in Snape's good side but to me DD's actions in HBP does read 
that he knew something was up and that Snape let his personal 
feelings get in the way from performing his Order duties as he 
should. DD knows the DADA job is jinxed and according to JKR herself 
DD never gave the job to Snape because he thought it would bring out 
the worst in Snape. So what changed? Why did DD change his mind? Why 
did he no longer consider Snape to be valuable enough to protect him 
against the pull the Dark Side had on him? 

I believe because he did know but he didn't want to give up on Snape 
because he hadn't done anything yet that would not allow him to come 
back. I still believe the argument in the forest was an attempt of DD 
to secure Snape on his side but he failed and him not wanting to let 
go and truly see he lost Snape on his side, is what got him killed. 

I think the ironclad reason DD though he had was not so ironclad 
after all. 

wynnleaf
> So basically, you're saying that Dumbledore has it all wrong when 
he 
> thought Snape (in the first war) was taking great personal risks, 
> because Dumbledore didn't figure out that Snape really had no other 
> choice.  

Dana:
We do not know what Snape did in the first war, only that he gave DD 
information on who the target family would be and DD himself states 
it was because he owed James a debt because James once saved Snape's 
life. We do not know if besides this Snape did anything else. We 
certainly do not see him being responsible for the capture of DEs 
after OotP and he would surely know the locations where some of them 
were hiding out. 

No, we actually see no one get caught as a direct result of Snape 
actions because the DoM fiasco was due to Lucius failure to get out 
in time not because it was an active attempt on Snape's part to get 
them caught. 

wynnleaf
> Huh?  Canon?  We know he hates the Maruaders, but that's only two 
> Order members.  
<snip>

Dana:
We see his relation with Moody was not fine and dandy in GoF either 
and to Snape it was very believable he was the real Moody. We do not 
see him react in a normal fashion to Tonks in the beginning of HBP, 
insulting her for no apparent reason and if he doesn't like Tonks 
because she is involved with Lupin, then him transferred his hate for 
Lupin onto her without her really deserving it is just like what he 
does with Harry.

We see him express himself about Dung after he was put into Azkaban 
and it was more than just not being nice, it should have caused him 
distress for losing another Order Member but it doesn't. We know he 
will not like DD's bother very much after their only encounter. If he 
is truly friends with Lucius then he will not like Arthur much for 
harassing his friend. He claims to have helped in the capture and 
death of Emmeline Vance and canon does not proof he is lying about it 
but if he was then he must not have liked her very much too even WANT 
to claim having anything to do with her death. So for now it looks 
pretty much like Snape has no personal investment into anyone 
concerning the Order, while we do see him being friendly with people 
known to be DEs. 

And we also see at the end of HBP that many had doubts about Snape's 
loyalties and only trusted him because DD asked them too. Such a nice 
man, how could no one believe Snape being loyal while he treated any 
of them in such trust worthy way? Providing them with so much 
information, that prevented so many horrible things from happening, 
all at great personal risk. <G> 

wynnleaf
> How could you possibly know this?  Harry is not an Order member, 
and 
> therefore we never see one Order meeting, where presumably any such 
> information is passed along.  We have no particular information 
that 
> Lupin is doing any good as a spy, either, because we never see his 
> reports.  

Dana:
We know this because the knowledge of LV's plans is not contributed 
to Snape providing information. Nothing Snape did caused the Order to 
be one step ahead of LV. They were not at the DoM to intercept Harry, 
just in case against all odds he would find a way to get there. We 
see no activity while the Order has MoM employees, which could have 
raised the alarm that it seemed someone broke into the DoM. In HBP we 
see no activity to actively prevent Draco from getting DEs into the 
castle. How come Snape never found out Draco was doing something in 
the RoR while Harry could. Snape knew more about Draco's task then 
Harry. He could have secured the RoR so Draco would no longer have 
access, even if he did not know what he was doing in there. And if 
Draco could not get DEs into the castle then it would have been slim, 
Snape would have ever had to take over Draco's task and kill DD. 

These reports do not seem to contain any valuable information. One 
could even conclude that Snape provided information that it made the 
Order conclude guard duties where no longer necessary because no one 
is there watching the DoM while just a few weeks there was someone 
there every night. The MoM caught one of them there so how is it, 
that the alarm could not be raised because Lucius had broken into the 
DoM? 

There is absolutely no indication that information provided by Snape 
was of any significance to the Order and keep them ahead of LV. The 
only thing that is claimed is that Snape send the Order and that it 
helped prevent LV getting his hands on the prophecy but as I stated 
above it was actually Harry and to some level Neville that prevented 
LV getting his hands on it by causing Lucius to have such a hard 
time. It is surely not proof it was Snape's intention to prevent LV's 
plan from being successful. Maybe it was just bad luck on Snape's 
part that Lucius was still there. At least canon does not dispute 
this view. 

wynnleaf
> Snape must have contacted Sirius the first time.  When Snape 
> contacted the Order the second time, 4 Order members were present 
> including Sirius.  They certainly must have heard from Sirius 
> whether or not this was a completely new situation to Sirius (he'd 
> heard nothing previously), or whether he'd gotten an earlier 
> communication from Snape. 

Dana:
DD was due there shortly it makes equally as much sense that the 
Order Members where there to have a meeting with him. 
To me it doesn't make sense if Snape truly informed Sirius on the 
current situation that Sirius did nothing but sit there waiting for 
Snape to contact him again, while we see him rush out the second time 
(supposedly) without much hesitation. We see him wanting to come up 
there just because Snape did not want to teach Harry occlumency 
anymore. Do you really believe Sirius would not have taken the risk 
to get to Harry if he had known what was going on? I must certainly 
do not believe that at all. 

To me it makes sense that if Snape indeed contacted Sirius, it was to 
ask if he heard any news on DD and how he knew to ask Sirius to stay 
behind to inform DD about what was happening. 

To me your generalization of the Order having to check with Sirius, 
to confirm Snape's second message was genuine, makes no sense to me 
at all. Why would they doubt Snape message Harry went to the DoM. 
Besides I do not believe they needed proof even if Harry wasn't at 
the DoM, it would be enough for them to go and check it out. 

JMHO

Dana