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deathly hallows uberwank

Deathly Hallows uberwank: Chapter 11, The Bribe

OBI-WAN: You were the chosen one! It was said that you would destroy the Sith, not join them. You were to bring balance to the Force, not leave it in darkness.
ANAKIN SKYWALKER: I hate you!
OBI-WAN: You were my brother, Anakin. I loved you.

- Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

Harry starts off this chapter on the assumption that Kreacher is going to find Mundungus Fletcher right away, but by the evening he's not back, and Harry is not happy. His filthy mood isn't helped by the fact there wasn't any Angel Delight in the kitchen after all, so they've been eating mouldy bread, which Hermione tried and failed to transfigure. I wonder how long the bread has been there - I guess the Order must have still been using the house as HQ up until Dumbledore's death, if only because any longer and the bread would have a face by now.

A few days go by and still no Kreacher, although there are a couple of blatant death eaters lurking outside the house. Hermione points out they're probably just waiting to see if Harry shows up, but everyone is worried and grumpy anyway. Hermione sits around reading the book Dumbledore gave her, while Ron tries everyone's patience by flicking the lights on and off with the deluminator. He says he doesn't know he's doing it - I guess like when you sit there cracking your knuckles or clicking a pen without realising you're doing it, and it only becomes apparent how irritating it is when someone says, "Oh for fuck's sake WOULD YOU STOP THAT" - I take his point but I think if the lights are going on and off, it's hard to not notice you're doing it. Ah, whatever. This is another one of those moments where it doesn't matter in the slightest, but it does come across as unrealistic or badly thought out. And, ultimately, these moments add up, to the point that suspending your disbelief becomes increasingly difficult.

Harry tires of their bullshit, so he wanders in the direction of the kitchen. On the way down the stairs, though, the door opens! A shadowy figure stands in the doorway, and, despite shaky hands, slurred speech and a reduced sense of balance, dispatches Dust Zombie Dumbledore with ease. The dust obscures the mysterious newcomer, and Harry pulls his lightsaber right out and stands there with it humming. "Show yourself, biatch!" he bellows (and of course, Mrs Black's portrait begins shrieking in return: "Filthy gay werewolves! My own flesh and blood, a cocksucker!" Man, her routine just never gets old, does it).

Ron and Hermione come running, but are satisfied with this shadowy figure's claim that it's our old chum Remus Lupin. Harry, though, is a badass and demands proof. Remus doesn't have time for Harry's bullshit, but to keep things sweet, bellows a bunch of stuff about himself in order to prove who he is. It's all stuff we know already, like his name and who his wife is. (I'd be more interested in seeing him prove his identity by telling us something disturbingly intimate - length, say.) "Wife?" he slurs. "Fucking wife! How the Christ did I end up with a bloody wife?" He glares at our intrepid trio out of unfocused, bloodshot eyes. Then he staggers foward into the light, bumps into a door frame, throws aside with a resounding smash the bottle of Bushmills he's just sucked dry, and, with a massive grin, calls Harry "you useless bastard".

"Hi, Remus," Hermione says gingerly. "Cup of tea?"

"Whisky if you've got it," he answers, glancing around the hallway. "... Fuck. Back here again. Sirius..." He slumps against a wall and stares dejectedly at his feet. "Ah... Sirius," he says again, more quietly, rubbing a hand over his face.

They make their way down to the kitchen, where they force Remus to eat some raw coffee and perform a number of sober-up spells and hangover-be-gone charms on him. Exposition time then - so Remus promptly pulls out a few bottles of butterbeer for the occasion. (He actually does! I didn't make that part up.)

The kids explain all about what happened back on Tottenham Court Road, how they were pursued by death eaters and also how they had some really bad coffee. At this, Remus dumps half his drink down his front, inwardly cursing at his own stupidity for wasting all that precious alcohol. Once he's recovered from the shock of that, he explains what happened after the wedding: most of the guests got away unscathed, but anyone who didn't get away in time got interrogated, Dedalus Diggle's house got burned down, and Tonks's folks got crucio'd. Nobody died, but it sounds like a pretty badass action-movie-style time was had by all. (This is one of those times when I wonder if maybe sticking with Harry's POV most of the time is a little too restrictive.)

Hermione asks if the death eaters have a decent excuse for looking for Harry. Remus produces a copy of the Daily Prophet, which features a very sexy picture of Harry and a headline about how he's wanted on suspicion of having killed Dumbledore. Man, the wizarding world must be really out of touch. I mean, I know they don't have TV or any official homosexuals, and people seem to find stuff like stinkbombs and marbles entertaining beyond the age of six, but really, SNAPE KILLS DUMBLEDORE!!!!! is old meme, dude. How could they not know?

Um. Anyway. Harry, then, is a wanted man! An outlaw! A rebel! Living outside the law! In response to this slander (or is it libel?) both Ron and Hermione give Chewbacca-style roars of anguish, but Harry could give a fuck. Remus goes on to explain that the death eaters have control of the ministry and the Daily Prophet now - and Voldemort is effectively Minister for Magic, even though he's not the one behind the desk. Moreover, he's drumming up suspicions against Harry and has started a full-on campaign against muggle-borns. Remus instructs the kids to look at page 2 of the paper, where they see an article describing how muggle-borns are now required to prove magical ancestry or be deemed to have stolen their powers. Voldemort has even pulled a Hitler Youth, and all magical children are required to attend Hogwarts. Harry feels ANGRY. I'm a bit confused - he feels angry and sad that there are loads of eleven-year-old kids who will currently be unaware they will never see Hogwarts and might never see their families again either, but I'm not sure why it would be both? Either they don't get to go to Hogwarts, or... why won't they see their families again? Unless "weeding out muggle-borns" means killing them, but I don't think that's made clear. Anyway, Harry splutters over that for a bit, then Remus changes the subject with a giant pull on a hipflask and a crunching of gears. He wants to know about some mission? That Dumbledore left Harry? Maybe? Just 'cos I'd maybe heard a rumour? Etc. Harry refuses to tell him what the mission is, and Remus is all disappointed. He offers to join them on the mission anyway, even if they don't tell him what's going on.

Hermione, with a frown, is all, you know, YOUR WIFE? And Remus brushes off the very concept of Tonks. She'll be fine, she's at her parents' house, don't worry about her. Even Harry, he with all the perceptiveness of a rock, notices something strange in Remus's voice (other than the slurring of speech), like he's not really down with this whole wife thing. Hermione has clearly noticed the same thing, so she asks him WTF is going on. Finally, and I quote: "with an air of forcing himself to admit something unpleasant", Remus admits that Tonks is... ugh... pregnant.

Uuuuuurrrrggghhhh!!! That means they must have had sex!!!!!!!

Congrats are offered, but Remus simply grimaces and changes the subject back to whether he will be able to join them and come backpacking in Thailand or whatever it is they've got planned. He points out that he was their Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, which makes me feel very sorry for him (that is, in those brief moments in between being smug and being cynical). I can easily imagine/fanwank over Remus clinging desperately to his identity as DADA teacher, because it's the one thing he's done as an adult that he can feel proud of. Then he plays the "Dumbledore would have wanted it" card (well, why not? It worked on him...) and even stoops so low as to bring out the "Harry, your father would have wanted this!" guilt-trip. Harry is like, no, my father would be wondering why you're not looking after Padme and the twins, biatch. BUUUURRRRNNN!!!!

Remus leaps to his feet, and Harry sees "the shadow of the wolf upon his human face" which I can't decide if I like or not. I think mostly it sounds like the sort of cliche that shows up in MWPP-era fic (up there with mating for life, "amber orbs" for eyes and Lily's gaydar) so I'm a bit wary. Can't we just leave it as he's an angry drunk? Anyway, Remus emos that Harry just doesn't understand, and Harry challenges him to explain. Remus says that he totally n00bed up when he married Tonks, and it was the dumbest thing he's done this side of patting that big doggy by the light of the full moon when he was a kid. Like Morrissey, Remus started something he couldn't finish - and now he's not too sure. (Insert further "girlfriend in a coma/I know it's Sirius" joke here to your own liking.) Harry does not give a shit. Remus kicks aside the chair he knocked over and wangsts about how he's made his wife and yet-to-be-born child outcasts; get a fucking Livejournal, Remus, you twat. Your username could be "Romulus". He emos some more about how nobody understands him and he's, like, an individual and stuff (again: Livejournal). Oh, and he says, "My kind don't usually breed", which makes me wonder: is it that they're not allowed to (but he did anyway), is it that they're assumed to be sterile (clearly they're not), is it that werewolves tend to be members of childfree communities (as we've established, Remus doesn't have a Livejournal), or - when he says, "my kind", is he or is he not totally talking about being gay, yes or yes?

Um, anyway, Hermione gets teary and tries to comfort Remus, telling him his kid won't be ashamed of him at all. Harry pisses on her bonfire right away but saying, well, no, Remus's kid will totally be ashamed of him, because he's a big fuckwit who abandons his kid to take a midlife gap year. Remus is like - no wai! I am trying to save the world, bitch! Harry pwns him with the killer comeback that he wants to be like Sirius (presumably this involves having a nameplate on your bedroom door). In fact, his exact words are: "You fancy stepping into Sirius's shoes", which can easily be modified into "You fancy Sirius" with a bit of creative strikethrough action. Therefore this is a worthwhile burn. Hermione begs Harry to stop with the razor-sharp ripostes, but Harry is on a roll and he goes for the jugular, calling Remus a coward. WOAH! This causes Remus to totally flip out and he slams Harry back into a wall before fucking off. Here is some footage of this scene from the upcoming Deathly Hallows film.


I don't know how I feel about this whole section really. On the one hand, I am - naturally - absolutely delighted to discover that even Remus doesn't ship Remus/Tonks and that their whole relationship is a mistake. On the other hand, it's a bit of a pyrrhic victory for the anti-Remus/Tonks brigade, considering that she is pregnant and he plans to run out on her, making him officially a fuckwit. I've seen arguments scattered about concerning whether he's a coward or not, and I'd argue he is. Oh, sure, he wants to join Harry et al on their mission from Dumbledore, and provide them with protection and advice, but I think it's pretty clear his primary aim is to escape a pointless relationship and not face up to his responsibilities. I do feel bad for him, but I also think - well, that's what you get when you drink yourself blind and then have unprotected sex with a woman half your age who's pretty vulnerable, who's in love with you and who, let's face it, can make herself look like your dead boyfriend.

Plus, as cool as this scene is, I still think it would have worked better as a rap battle.

So, Remus fucks off and Harry immediately feels REMORSE!!!!!!!!1! as Ron and Hermione tell him he was a bit out of order. Apparently Remus' pale face seems to hang in the air in front of Harry, like in those old 50s romance comics where the girl is lying in bed and the face of the guy she is in love with floats about in her room and it's weird. Harry is all worried about what James would have thought about Harry pwning Remus and stuff. Meh.

To distract himself, Harry starts reading the paper. There's an extract from Rita Skeeter's biography of Dumbledore, and a picture of his family. The dad is good looking (Harry is such a girl), baby Ariana looks like bread (seriously. WTF?), the mum, Kendra, has sparkly purple eyes and hair (well, no, actually she looks like a Native American, which is also a bit WTF), and the boys, Albus and Aberforth, look alike and are wearing stupid clothes. The article itself tells us the following:

• The dad went to Azkaban
  
• Therefore the family moved to Godric's Hollow
  
• After this, Ariana was kept hidden away from the world.
  

On account of being written by Rita Skeeter, the whole thing is told in a really tabloidy style - so there are lots of bits like, "Kendra - whose German-born uncle was an alcoholic - then moved to Godric's Hollow". OK, that's an exaggeration. One of the things I think JKR can write well is this type of gentle parody (another example is in book 4, I think, where Hermione is reading a book called "Men who love dragons too much"). Anyway, Harry is just starting to wangst over the article when Kreacher finally arrives back with Mundungus. Mundungus immediately tries to run, but is brought down by Hermione's disarming charm and Ron's use of brute force. Harry plays the bad cop, striding about the kitchen and pwning Mundungus, who first starts trying to excuse himself for running out on the mission back in chapter four and then for taking a load of goblets from the house. (He says that "Sirius never cared about any of that junk", and every time I read that line I get "My Humps" by the Black Eyed Peas caught in my head. DAMMIT!) Kreacher takes the opportunity to attack Mundungus with a saucepan; despite my better judgement, I can't help finding this bit sort of funny, mainly because Mundungus is screaming in agony and Kreacher asks if he can hit him again, "for luck". The humour goes out of it a bit when Ron laughs, because I didn't need to be told it was funny.

The kids press Mundungus for information. He wants to know if the locket was valuable; Hermione thinks he's still got it, but Ron "shrewdly" argues that Mundungus is probably just wondering if he should have asked for more money when he sold it. (I get the odd feeling from that bit that JKR switched Ron and Hermione's lines so that Ron would seem more clever. I have no evidence for that, it's just that the way he says it sounds Hermione-ish. If this were a better-written book, I'd probably think it was quite nice that Ron was starting to take on Hermione's habits, the way that couples do. Meh.) Anyway, Mundungus argues back - he couldn't have asked for more money, since he gave it away for free in exchange for getting away with selling magical crap without a license. And who did he give the locket to? Why, it's our old pal, Dolores Umbridge, of course! The scars on Harry's hand ache, because Umbridge is just that evil, or possibly as a cheap dramatic device that's worked in the past, who knows.

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PS. I'm going on a quest to darkest Plymouth this evening, so there might not be another post for a few days, and if I don't reply to comments it doesn't mean I don't love you. There will be ample opportunity for me to work on the uberwank during long and boring train journeys, though, so sit tight. :)