Sirius' body WAS:Re: Dumbledore in book 7

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 164904

Carol:
> How is invading the mind of the evil wizard who needs to be 
> destroyed, making him feel the power of Love that is Harry's chief
> weapon, "vile"? It's much better, IMO, than murdering him with an
> Unforgiveable Curse or forcing LV to have his soul sucked out by a
> Dementor, the only other ways I can think of to kill or destroy a
> post-Horcrux LV. 

Jen:  Harry will take over Voldemort's will, control him more 
completely than if he used the Imperius and 'force' him to feel love 
in order to destroy him?  Love is not Harry's weapon, it's what 
protects him from Voldemort's invasions and from becoming like 
Voldemort.  Harry doesn't control this power, the power propels *him* 
to save others and value their lives above his own.

There is another way introduced--the locked room--which conveniently 
holds the power Harry is full of and which Voldemort 'detests'.  
Perfectly in keeping with all the knowledge Dumbledore has passed on 
to him, Harry could realize this power is Voldemort's greatest 
weakness and is capable of destroying him while at the same time 
Harry will be protected.  Whether this turns out to be the way the 
story ends or not, I belive it is consistent with everything 
Dumbledore has told Harry so far.

Carol:
> Harry acquired *powers* (plural) from Voldemort, and he's not going
> to kill or destroy him via the scar link or using Parseltongue. 
> There has to be some point to JKR's giving Harry peculiar powers 
> that make him uniquely qualified to defeat the Dark Lord. 

Jen: Dumbledore already explained the powers Harry was given by 
Voldemort, the 'weapons', the 'tools for the job' as he called them 
in HBP:  'It is Voldemort's fault that you were able to see into his 
thoughts, his ambitions, that you even understand the snakelike 
language in which he gives orders, and yet, Harry, despite your 
privileged insight into Voldemort's world...you have never been 
seduced by the Dark Arts...' (chap. 23, Horcruxes)  

Even without a specific name for what Harry is doing there, 
Dumbledore directly states Voldemort gave Harry this ability when he 
attempted to kill him.  It's not the power of possession given the 
descriptions so far.

Carol:
> Possession would be a vehicle for "the Power the Dark Lord knows 
> not," a way of getting Love (which we know he can't endure) into
> Voldemort? Why else have the scene in which he tries and fails to
> possess Harry in the MoM, driven out by the beautiful and terrible
> of Love?

Jen: Because it's one of the most moving scenes in the series and 
explains exactly what separates Harry from Voldemort:  That Voldemort 
forces himself upon people, causes them excruciating pain and takes 
over their will while Harry, instead of hating Voldemort for causing 
this pain or succumbing to his will, feels his heart open with 
emotion for a man he loved and lost and wishes to be with again more 
than anything. 

Carol again:
> Any idea how he could do it without using Voldie's "living" body to
> get in and Sirius's dead one to get out? 

Jen: No one would pay me billions of dollars for my imagination <g>, 
so the best I can come up with is Luna may know something about the 
Veil, perhaps something gained from her mom who was supposed to be a 
powerful witch.  

I don't have to see Harry go down in the Underworld even though I 
believe it would be moving.  Rowling said OOTP was Harry's burning 
day in a sense, his darkest hour, and like the phoenix he would rise 
stronger than before.  So in my mind he has already gone figuratively 
into the Underworld whether he takes the journey behind the Veil or 
not.

Carol:
> If all Harry needed was the compassion for LV's victims that we
> both agree that this death provides, why not have Bella AK her dear 
> cousin? Why have her almost accidentally send him beyond the Veil.
> There's a reason that he died *in this particular way.*

Jen:  Actually, what made Harry amazing to Dumbledore from the 
beginning was his inherent compassion for Voldemort's victims.  Harry 
went after the Stone because he knew Voldemort would resume 
destroying lives as he'd done before.  So I don't believe Sirius' 
death brought forth some compassion Harry wasn't fully capable of 
before.  If anything it hardened his heart even more toward Snape.

And regarding the way Sirius died, I like Rowling's description 
here: 'What I was trying to do with the death in this book was that I 
wanted to show how very arbitrary and sudden death is. This is a 
death with no big deathbed scene – it happens almost 
accidentally.'(Royal Albert Hall 2003)

I read that to mean she didn't want an AK or something more 
definitive, she wanted an almost accidental death scene as if it 
didn't really happen.  And we see Harry doesn't believe it and runs 
around the Veil to the other side.  

 
> Carol, understanding that you find possession distasteful but not
> seeing why possessing Voldie to get him behind the Veil and using
> Sirius's body to get back wouldn't work to kill Voldie and save
> Harry, surely the ideal ending for those who want Harry to live.

Jen:  I would say rather than distasteful I find it morally 
inconsistent with what Dumbledore has told Harry and with Harry's 
actions so far.  I'm better able to see Steve's version in that 
respect, where Harry's power repels Voldemort and almost accidentally 
takes LV over in an echo of what happened with the brother wands or 
even with the Occlumency lessons.  The main problem I see with this 
version is why Voldemort would attempt to possess Harry again after 
finding out he can't reside in Harry's body.  

Jen R.