alyndra | HBP speculation

Eta: This creeped me out to write, and not in a pervy way either. If you're easily disturbed, be warned: I don't think it's any worse than the lake full of dead people, but it's hardly any better either.

This has been bugging me for a while, and I kind of put off saying anything because I thought I might turn it into a well-researched essay, with, you know, quotes and page numbers and footnotes and stuff.

Ha! As if! I'm waaayy too lazy.

So here's the quick and dirty version, and if anyone else would care to come up with research and quotes and footnotes, more power to you, but I probably won't.

I've heard people (I honestly don't remember who, don't mean to offend anyone though) postulating that perhaps one reason why What Snape Did Wasn't So Bad was that Dumbledore was already dying from the Evil Potion that he drank, and was just about to Fall Down Dead Anyways, and therefore asked Snape to kill him (by means of Legilimency, because they were staring into each other's eyes at the Crucial Moment) because he was already Dying From The Irreversible Poison, so why not?

I think that this is unlikely.

Not that there was some Legilimency going on there, I think that's quite reasonable, but that the terrible substance Dumbledore drank was deadly poison. This is based on a gut feeling, but it's a damn strong gut feeling and hear me out, 'kay?

Dumbledore specifically said that he didn't think it was a poison, because Voldemort would not want whoever got that far to die, at least not in the immediate future before they could be interrogated, etc. Leaving aside the issue of how Voldemort would know there was someone there (did he have wards alerting him when someone was there, or did he check it every week like a mousetrap?) and how long they might have before he got there, it seems unlikely that he would want someone powerful enough to make it there in the first place to be under an irreversible poison, because if you are in the middle of interrogating somebody and they Suddenly Fall Down Dead before you get your answers, you are going to be one Very Unhappy Dark Lord with nobody but yourself to blame.

Also, poison seems awfully anticlimactic, and I just can't buy it (now we're back to the gut feelings) because it seems like there are so many other good candidates for what it could be, that Dumbledore would consider worse than death, and therefore have good reason to ask Snape to kill him through Legilimency. I'm not talking physical pain, either: he's already shown he can deal with his hand and consider it a small price to pay. I don't know, of course, what the potion actually was, but I have a few different speculations.

It could have been something that progressively and irreversibly saps one's will and strength of mind.

This would leave one weak and easy pickings for whenever Voldemort got around to dealing with them. We do, in fact, see something like this, when he cannot make himself continue drinking and Harry must feed the rest to him. I think Albus Dumbledore, a Gryffindor in his youth, would have considered this one the 'fates worse than death' that he has mentioned before.

We also see evidence of physical weariness, but I think it's a mistake to assume that the end result of this must be death. Perhaps the Headmaster would have merely become less and less able to move, until he eventually became completely paralyzed, unable even to communicate unless a Legilimens (like Voldemort) chose to invade his mind.

Would Albus have thought death a better fate than this? I admit I don't know for sure, but I think it's possible.

Or, to approach the matter more circuitously, most agree that Regulus is the likely candidate for RAB, and at least one discussion posited that Kreacher was the companion who drunk the potion for him. Kreacher is, when we meet him, insane. He has turned against his nature to such an extent that he does not even clean his house, he is living in filth, and he even betrays his master to his death. Not even Dobby attempts to harm his masters, only to warn others of their own danger. From what we know of house-elves, Kreacher's behavior goes so far beyond atypical, it seems his madness actively fights everything a house-elf is, by nature and by upbringing.

Sirius did say that it was Mrs. Black's death that sent Kreacher 'round the bend, but Sirius was in Azkaban at the time (wasn't he? Pfft, research) and had been kicked out of the house since sixth year, so I think it's safe to assume that Sirius was making an educated guess rather than speaking from first-hand knowledge.

Was Kreacher's madness the effect of the potion?

Would Voldemort have considered a shattered mind turning on itself, and on everything it had believed in, to be a useful outcome of the potion?

Such a mind would likely be incapable of effective Occlumency. Might even turn into the kind of minion Voldemort would find useful, in time. Certainly would never be a threat on the side of Light again. (Recall that by assisting Regulus, Kreacher was actively working against Voldemort, and I'm guessing that he did it willingly). Perhaps even Kreacher's habit of speaking his thoughts out loud can be attributed to the potion; Voldemort would probably enjoy that too.

Did Dumbledore know (or guess) that something like Kreacher's fate might be his too, because he drank the potion?

If he did, would he have chosen death over that future?

I don't pretend that I know the answers, or that the above is anything more than speculation. But it seems to me that there must have been a lot more going on with a potion like that than simple, straightforward death. Dumbledore didn't fear death. He stated, repeatedly, that there were worse things. The idea that the terrible substance was really poison -- Sorry, but I don't think that cuts it as a literary device.

Um. Or maybe it would have worn off in a week. I don't really know. And you'll notice I'm neatly skipping by the whole question of What The Hell Was Snape Thinking And How Much in Cahoots With *Insert Character Here* Was He? That's a topic for another post, I'm afraid. ;D

HBP speculation

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