The Battle of Hogwarts - Who are the Good Guys?

Thu Aug 11 20:31:07 UTC 2005

I'm crossposting this from The Big List because they are discussing 
Time Turners over there and, well, that will consume all attention 
for quite some time as we all know. I'd really like some discussion 
on these guys.

At the Battle of Hogwarts, there are two suspiciously unnamed DE's.
JKR loves names and gives names to even the most insignificant
characters, so two who are only described but never named are
unusual. As I began to look at the activities of these guys, I got
even more suspicious of them. Let's look at the sequence of events:

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DE's arrive. Lots of fighting. Gibbon goes to the top of the tower
and sets off the Dark Mark. He comes back down and is killed by the
Killing Curse from Blondie which Lupin believes was aimed at him.

Malfoy goes into the tower stairs followed by the brother and sister
(Amycus and Alecto) and Greyback and a brutal faced man. They lock
the stairs behind them. Neville tries going through the lock and
gets tossed in the air. Blondie is sending curses everywhere which
do a lot of property damage but miss all the people. Snape goes
through the locked door. Lupin tries to go through the lock and is
tossed in the air.

Blondie sends a hex that collapses the ceiling and breaks the curse
lock blocking the stairs to the tower roof. The Order head for the
tower stairs.

Draco is not killing Dumbledore. The four death eaters reach the
top. Greyback starts to finish Dumbledore off but the Brutal Face
stops him. Snape arrives. Snape AK's Dumbledore.

Malfoy, Snape, Greyback, Amycus and Alecto leave the tower. Harry is
unfrozen. Brutal Face is leaving the tower. Harry freezes him. We
never hear from him again.

Snape and Malfoy come out from the tower. Snape yells "It's over,
time to go" There is a big fight going on. Snape and Malfoy get
through it unscathed. Greyback attacks Harry. Somebody freezes
Greyback. Someone sends a green jet towards him, but Harry dodges
and takes off after Snape, running safely through the melee.

Amycus is fighting Ginny. Harry Impedimentas him. Ron, McGonagall
and Lupin are battling Death Eaters. Tonks is fighting Blondie.
Amycus and Alecto flee.

Harry hits Blondie with a hex. Blondie howls with pain. Blondie
flees after Amycus and Alecto. The Room Of Requirment is apparently
blocked. Harry takes a short cut through the Great Hall.

Harry chases them out the front doors which have been blasted. The
Gryffindor hourglass is smashed. He has overtaken Amycus and Alecto
but Blondie, Snape and Malfoy are still ahead.

Alecto hits Harry with a curse. Harry falls. Harry gets back up and
trips Amycus and Alecto.

Hagrid suddenly appears. Blondie hits him with lots of curses which
do no harm. Harry runs past Blondie and Hagrid towards Snape.

Harry attempts a Crucio against Snape but Snape parries. Blondie
ignites Hagrid's house, possibly stopping Harry from attemptingany
more unforgivable curses.

Harry attempts many jinxes against Snape who parries them all. Snape
advises Harry: Keep your mouth shut and your mind closed.

Someone (either Blondie or Amycus or Alecto) crucios Harry. Snape
cancels it and berates the DEs.

Malfoy, Snape, Blondie, Amycus and Alecto escape. We do not know
what happens to the other DE's in the battle.

--------------------

Summary of activity by ambiguous DE's:

Snape: Stuns Flitwick, AKs Dumbledore (results under debate),
saves Malfoy, gives Harry good advice, (maybe) smashes Gryffindor's
hourglass, cancels a Crucio on Harry, stops DE from doing any more
damage to Harry.

Blondie: Kills a Death Eater, trashes Hogwarts, unlocks the door to
the tower, stops Harry from using an unforgiveable by burning
Hagrid's house.

Brutal Face: Stops Greyback from killing Dumbledore. Is frozen by
Harry.

-----------------

My conclusion:

All three are Good Guys undercover. Each of them do something to the
advantage of the Order or Harry. None of them do anything harmful to
the Order. Well, Snape's AK is still under discussion, but I'm
solidly on the side of it was a fake AK and Dumbledore is alive.
Something about dragon's blood being used to fake a death earlier in
the book. A trickle of blood from Dumbledore's mouth. 12 uses of
dragon's blood. Hmmm. But I digress.

We know from an earlier book that Dumbledore has spies (note the
plural) in the DE's. I think we are witnessing three of them in
action.

So, does anyone agree that these guys' actions are counter to Death 
Eating?

Wild-eyed theorizing:

Blondie (and maybe Brutal Face) are metamorphmagi of people we
already know. I'm guessing that Blondie is Shacklebolt. A Black man
might enjoy the irony of becoming Very White as a disguise and he is
a big man, so becoming even bigger wouldn't be too tough, if that is
even a problem. Brutal Face? Who knows.