Chapter 2: In Dreams
I had a big, busy weekend, so no post on Friday, but I'm back now, so it's time to continue the annotation of Harry Potter and the Time of Good Intentions (or: The Last Temptation of Harry Potter) with
Chapter 2: In Dreams
1. For some reason it had never occurred to him before that this [the Dark Mark] meant Malfoy had a connection to Voldemort too. Harry wondered what would happen if the Death Eaters were summoned. I'll probably start clutching my scar and Malfoy will start clutching his arm and Nigel will think the pair of us are barking mad.
Foreshadowing for later in the fic! However, since it's foreshadowing for an event in the Alternate Universe (AU) it's Harry and Draco reacting to both of their Dark Marks causing them pain, not the scar for Harry and Dark Mark for Draco.
2. "When she went backwards, she smashed right through the French doors, they just went flying open. She tumbled over the balcony rail, taking a couple of the flowerpots with her. Landed in a heap on the bricks, five storeys down. Broke her neck; died on impact." His voice had gone very soft. Harry heard him grunt before standing. "And that," he said, still speaking very softly while audibly crushing out his cigarette, "is why Sam Bell went to prison for ten years."
Sam's story echoes the one Sirius told Harry at the ceilidh, about the MacGregor clan chief and the clan Lamont man who killed the MacGregor's son. This motif will be important again later. I found it interesting that in DH the disarming charm was designated Harry's "signature" move, since that's what I'd thought for a while. Disarming became a significant event in canon for different reasons than I have here, though, chiefly because I hadn't caught on to JKR's Wand Game as early as the fourth book, despite the whole brother-wand effect in the graveyard. (Did ANYONE know where she was going with disarming and wand-loyalty?)
I also like that she decided that Harry wouldn't want to stun Stan Shunpike whilst he was on a broom, because even if it wasn't the killing curse, it would have been fatal to him. We never really get any info about wizarding law and the consequences for killing accidentally, or via a curse that isn't an Unforgivable, so I was working in the dark a bit here.
3. Malfoy looked at Sam, then back at Harry. "That's enough for now, Harry," he said. "Lunch is over. Let's get back to work. Leave Sam alone."
Harry nodded and drew his lips into a line, picking up his shirt and pulling it over his head, hiding the basilisk amulet as he pulled it down all the way. Malfoy pulled his own shirt on. As he was turning to pick up his work gloves, he whirled on Malfoy. Frowning, he said, "What did you call me?"
Ha! More foreshadowing for Harry and Draco being 'best mates'.
4. He watched the clock change from 11.59 to 12.00. It's my birthday, he thought. Whoopee. Happy birthday to me. Now if I could only get some sodding sleep...
Two o'clock. He'd actually been lying awake for two hours, trying desperately not to be awake. He tried counting backwards from one-thousand. The last number he remembered thinking was five-hundred fourteen...
Is there anyone with insomnia who hasn't done this? Watching the numbers change on a digital clock, counting...
5. "He bought a house in Hogsmeade, that big old pile at the end of the High Street that's been for sale for ages. The twins have moved in with him and they've made it the world-wide headquarters for Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, Limited. Percy's the president and chief investor, Fred and George are the creative department, of course, Angelina is overseeing production and delivery, and Lee Jordan is the sales department. With his gift of gab, they've already got enough advanced orders for things that they'll be working the rest of the summer to fulfill. WWW Ltd. is going to be huge."
I loved that, already in the fifth book, JKR had Fred and George using their product line as weapons! (Mainly against Umbridge.) It seemed inevitable (at least to me). And Percy being the business head made sense to me too. Someone I still doubt the twins' ability to manage the business side of things. They seem strictly creative.
6. "I'm kind of glad that we didn't go to the village school, Gin, but why didn't we?"
Ginny froze, her dark eyes very large as she swallowed the food she'd been chewing. "Oh, there was no need. You know. Since Mum used to be a teacher." Her voice shook a little and she didn't meet Ron's eyes as she spoke.
More foreshadowing, suggesting Ginny knows something Ron doesn't. Poor boy--everyone's always keeping him in the dark!
7. "Harry," Lupin said again, "Snape’s missing."
With hindsight, the whole Snape-is-missing storyline is something I was never terribly happy with. If I were radically overhauling the story, instead of just fixing typos, formatting and Britpicky things, I'd have drastically changed the way this part of the story played out so that it might have been a wee bit less convoluted (or a lot less convoluted). Oh well.
8. Hermione looked Mrs. Weasley in the eye sympathetically. "Mrs. Weasley--when did Annie and Peggy die?" she said softly.
More backstory/foreshadowing. (Much as Sam's tale was both backstory and foreshadowing.) And, of course, the events Molly tells Harry and Hermione about are fleshed out in The Lost Generation, though Molly never knew that both Lily and James (plus Sam) were part of the search party in Ottery St. Catchpole, so she couldn't tell Harry that this had occurred.
9. "Many people, when they see large families, they assume that they just grew haphazardly. They don't think any planning went into them. Arthur and I planned everything quite carefully."
This was absolutely true both for my own family (five kids) and the family of a former co-worker. She was Irish-Catholic, too, so most people assumed that her family of six kids was pure accident, but no, she told me once, every kid was planned. (In fact, it was planned almost exactly the same as the Weasleys, minus the twins. And, I just realized--the co-worker's name was Peggy! Perhaps that influenced me just a little. :D)
10. "Ron doesn't know, does he? He seems to think the girls were his cousins, and he just doesn't see them now that they're grown up."
She shook her head. "No, he doesn’t know. Do you think I want to tell him I was disappointed he wasn't a girl when he was born?"
What really freaked me out a little was that, even without missing Weasley sisters, this is pretty much EXACTLY what JKR did! Ron was supposed to be a girl, Molly still wanted a girl, and on the next try she finally got Ginny. Spooky!
11. Malfoy entered, happily tired. "That's the stuff!" he said with a satisfied air, throwing himself into a chair at the table. "Helluva lot--" he caught Mrs. Weasley's eye. "I mean, a heck of a lot more fun than that Muggle gardening we've been doing, Potter. Very satisfying, once you get the little buggers really flying through the air..."
I don't know why, but it seemed about right for Draco Malfoy to enjoy a good de-gnoming.
12. "I didn't say you don't love her. Of course you do. And I love the two of you and she loves the two of us. We're friends, we love each other. That's different. I said that you're not IN love with her."
And here's the conversation between Harry and Ron that had all of the H/Hr shippers screaming about how evil Ron was, while all of the R/Hr shippers were punching the air and screaming, "YES!" Not that I wrote this just to wind people up, but the reactions were extremely entertaining to me. :D
13. "And if there's one thing in the world Hermione's terrible at other than Quidditch, it's admitting she's wrong."
I gave Lily this trait as well, in The Lost Generation. Hence Snape's having to break up with her.
14. "Another thing," Harry repeated, ignoring him. "I think that from now on, my best friend will be--will be Draco Malfoy. There! How do you like that, former friend?"
More foreshadowing!
15. He whirled around at the familiar voice. Amidst the frozen people, only he and one other person in the world seemed to still be moving in a normal fashion. Harry looked up at him, his heart beating painfully fast. It was as though in all the world, only two people existed. It was just him and--
Voldemort.
If there's something almost everyone said they hadn't seen coming so early in the story (Chapter 2!) it was Harry encountering Voldemort. I did sort of give it away in the summary though: "Is giving Harry exactly what he wants Voldemort's ultimate revenge?" I mean--when did they think Voldemort would be giving Harry something, in the final chapter? It had to be early to entirely mess with Harry's world.
Chapter 2: In Dreams
1. For some reason it had never occurred to him before that this [the Dark Mark] meant Malfoy had a connection to Voldemort too. Harry wondered what would happen if the Death Eaters were summoned. I'll probably start clutching my scar and Malfoy will start clutching his arm and Nigel will think the pair of us are barking mad.
Foreshadowing for later in the fic! However, since it's foreshadowing for an event in the Alternate Universe (AU) it's Harry and Draco reacting to both of their Dark Marks causing them pain, not the scar for Harry and Dark Mark for Draco.
2. "When she went backwards, she smashed right through the French doors, they just went flying open. She tumbled over the balcony rail, taking a couple of the flowerpots with her. Landed in a heap on the bricks, five storeys down. Broke her neck; died on impact." His voice had gone very soft. Harry heard him grunt before standing. "And that," he said, still speaking very softly while audibly crushing out his cigarette, "is why Sam Bell went to prison for ten years."
Sam's story echoes the one Sirius told Harry at the ceilidh, about the MacGregor clan chief and the clan Lamont man who killed the MacGregor's son. This motif will be important again later. I found it interesting that in DH the disarming charm was designated Harry's "signature" move, since that's what I'd thought for a while. Disarming became a significant event in canon for different reasons than I have here, though, chiefly because I hadn't caught on to JKR's Wand Game as early as the fourth book, despite the whole brother-wand effect in the graveyard. (Did ANYONE know where she was going with disarming and wand-loyalty?)
I also like that she decided that Harry wouldn't want to stun Stan Shunpike whilst he was on a broom, because even if it wasn't the killing curse, it would have been fatal to him. We never really get any info about wizarding law and the consequences for killing accidentally, or via a curse that isn't an Unforgivable, so I was working in the dark a bit here.
3. Malfoy looked at Sam, then back at Harry. "That's enough for now, Harry," he said. "Lunch is over. Let's get back to work. Leave Sam alone."
Harry nodded and drew his lips into a line, picking up his shirt and pulling it over his head, hiding the basilisk amulet as he pulled it down all the way. Malfoy pulled his own shirt on. As he was turning to pick up his work gloves, he whirled on Malfoy. Frowning, he said, "What did you call me?"
Ha! More foreshadowing for Harry and Draco being 'best mates'.
4. He watched the clock change from 11.59 to 12.00. It's my birthday, he thought. Whoopee. Happy birthday to me. Now if I could only get some sodding sleep...
Two o'clock. He'd actually been lying awake for two hours, trying desperately not to be awake. He tried counting backwards from one-thousand. The last number he remembered thinking was five-hundred fourteen...
Is there anyone with insomnia who hasn't done this? Watching the numbers change on a digital clock, counting...
5. "He bought a house in Hogsmeade, that big old pile at the end of the High Street that's been for sale for ages. The twins have moved in with him and they've made it the world-wide headquarters for Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, Limited. Percy's the president and chief investor, Fred and George are the creative department, of course, Angelina is overseeing production and delivery, and Lee Jordan is the sales department. With his gift of gab, they've already got enough advanced orders for things that they'll be working the rest of the summer to fulfill. WWW Ltd. is going to be huge."
I loved that, already in the fifth book, JKR had Fred and George using their product line as weapons! (Mainly against Umbridge.) It seemed inevitable (at least to me). And Percy being the business head made sense to me too. Someone I still doubt the twins' ability to manage the business side of things. They seem strictly creative.
6. "I'm kind of glad that we didn't go to the village school, Gin, but why didn't we?"
Ginny froze, her dark eyes very large as she swallowed the food she'd been chewing. "Oh, there was no need. You know. Since Mum used to be a teacher." Her voice shook a little and she didn't meet Ron's eyes as she spoke.
More foreshadowing, suggesting Ginny knows something Ron doesn't. Poor boy--everyone's always keeping him in the dark!
7. "Harry," Lupin said again, "Snape’s missing."
With hindsight, the whole Snape-is-missing storyline is something I was never terribly happy with. If I were radically overhauling the story, instead of just fixing typos, formatting and Britpicky things, I'd have drastically changed the way this part of the story played out so that it might have been a wee bit less convoluted (or a lot less convoluted). Oh well.
8. Hermione looked Mrs. Weasley in the eye sympathetically. "Mrs. Weasley--when did Annie and Peggy die?" she said softly.
More backstory/foreshadowing. (Much as Sam's tale was both backstory and foreshadowing.) And, of course, the events Molly tells Harry and Hermione about are fleshed out in The Lost Generation, though Molly never knew that both Lily and James (plus Sam) were part of the search party in Ottery St. Catchpole, so she couldn't tell Harry that this had occurred.
9. "Many people, when they see large families, they assume that they just grew haphazardly. They don't think any planning went into them. Arthur and I planned everything quite carefully."
This was absolutely true both for my own family (five kids) and the family of a former co-worker. She was Irish-Catholic, too, so most people assumed that her family of six kids was pure accident, but no, she told me once, every kid was planned. (In fact, it was planned almost exactly the same as the Weasleys, minus the twins. And, I just realized--the co-worker's name was Peggy! Perhaps that influenced me just a little. :D)
10. "Ron doesn't know, does he? He seems to think the girls were his cousins, and he just doesn't see them now that they're grown up."
She shook her head. "No, he doesn’t know. Do you think I want to tell him I was disappointed he wasn't a girl when he was born?"
What really freaked me out a little was that, even without missing Weasley sisters, this is pretty much EXACTLY what JKR did! Ron was supposed to be a girl, Molly still wanted a girl, and on the next try she finally got Ginny. Spooky!
11. Malfoy entered, happily tired. "That's the stuff!" he said with a satisfied air, throwing himself into a chair at the table. "Helluva lot--" he caught Mrs. Weasley's eye. "I mean, a heck of a lot more fun than that Muggle gardening we've been doing, Potter. Very satisfying, once you get the little buggers really flying through the air..."
I don't know why, but it seemed about right for Draco Malfoy to enjoy a good de-gnoming.
12. "I didn't say you don't love her. Of course you do. And I love the two of you and she loves the two of us. We're friends, we love each other. That's different. I said that you're not IN love with her."
And here's the conversation between Harry and Ron that had all of the H/Hr shippers screaming about how evil Ron was, while all of the R/Hr shippers were punching the air and screaming, "YES!" Not that I wrote this just to wind people up, but the reactions were extremely entertaining to me. :D
13. "And if there's one thing in the world Hermione's terrible at other than Quidditch, it's admitting she's wrong."
I gave Lily this trait as well, in The Lost Generation. Hence Snape's having to break up with her.
14. "Another thing," Harry repeated, ignoring him. "I think that from now on, my best friend will be--will be Draco Malfoy. There! How do you like that, former friend?"
More foreshadowing!
15. He whirled around at the familiar voice. Amidst the frozen people, only he and one other person in the world seemed to still be moving in a normal fashion. Harry looked up at him, his heart beating painfully fast. It was as though in all the world, only two people existed. It was just him and--
Voldemort.
If there's something almost everyone said they hadn't seen coming so early in the story (Chapter 2!) it was Harry encountering Voldemort. I did sort of give it away in the summary though: "Is giving Harry exactly what he wants Voldemort's ultimate revenge?" I mean--when did they think Voldemort would be giving Harry something, in the final chapter? It had to be early to entirely mess with Harry's world.