ChapDisc: HBP30, The White Tomb - What if...???

[Steve]

No: HPFGUIDX 165873

---  "justcarol67" <justcarol67 at ...> wrote:
>
> bboyminn wrote:
> > <snip>
> > > Now back to Dumbledore; what if Dumbledore was 
> > > already dead when Snape threw the Killing Curse?
> > > ... Also, if Hermione and Lupin probe Harry at 
> > > depth for the details of what happened on the tower,
> > > Harry might let it slip that it was the Killing 
> > > Curse that threw Dumbledore off the tower. 
> > > 
> > > Indeed as Carol points out, that might lead Lupin 
> > > to conclude ...Dumbledore was already dead. ...
> 
> Carol responds:
> First, let me point out that I'm only hoping that Lupin will realize
> that the AK did not behave normally. I didn't suggest that it did so
> because Dumbledore was already dead. 

bboyminn:

Precisely, I've had the 'Dumbledore was already dead' 
theory for ages and have presented it here before. The
problem was, what good did that knowledge do? Harry still
wasn't going to trust Snape. In the past I have always
speculated that actions 'X', some unknown event, would
occur and that would change Harry's mind.

What I got from you was that mysterious Action 'X', 
that allowed my orginal theory to work. Lupin and
Hermione would figure out that there was something
wrong with the Killing Curse on the top of the tower.

Now 'Lupin figures it out' works for many potential
theories. If Dumbledore is really alive, then Lupin
could deduce that from the same block of information.
If Dumbledore was already dead, Lupin figures it out.

I have the theory, you gave me the missing element to
make it work. That's all I'm saying.

> Carol continues:
>
> The delayed response before the Freezing Charm on Harry
> wears off suggests the opposite--that DD wasn't dead 
> yet when the supposed AK sent him over the ramparts. 


bboyminn:

A fair assessment but not necessarily true. Harry is in
shock, plus he is a little distracted; he is not 
actually sure when the Body Bind wore off. 

> Carol continues:
>
> ...
> 
> Anyway, all I know is that that AK differs from the 
> norm in more ways than one and that DDM!Snape had good
> reason to get the body off the tower: .... 

bboyminn:

In general, I somewhat dispute people's claims of what
is a normal Killing Curse. To my knowledge, we have 
never seen a Killing Curse actually occur. For example,
when Cedric was killed, Harry's eyes were closed; so
to some extent, we get Harry's preception rather than 
his knowledge.

In addition, we know from general references to other
spells, that the normal spell action doesn't prevent
substantial secondary action. For example, when Harry
stuns Ron during practice, Ron simply falls over. 
However, when Dumbledore stuns fake!Moody, the same
Stunning Spell has enough force to splinter a 
substantial wooden door and still has enough reserve
to knock Moody over and Stun him. Same curse, 
dramatically different secondary results.

> ....
> 
> Carol, who really wants someone to put Harry's memory 
> of DD's death into a Pensieve and figure out what's 
> really going on
>

bboyminn:

That is actually a pretty good idea. How better to give
people exact unbiased objective knowledge of the event 
than to let them view it in a penseive.

Just passing it along.

Steve/bboyminn