me every time i finish a ted talk and i still don’t know shit about the subject but come out of it thoroughly impressed: cool cool cool cool cool tight tight tight tight no doubt no doubt
I just came to a very grim realization that makes a ton of sense. (Note: This might have been realized by others as well.)
We know that in the Tale of the Three Brothers, Death’s main goal was to kill the brothers right? He was pissed because they had cheated him and he wanted to take their lives once and for all.
And so he gives the eldest brother the wand, knowing that someone would end up killing him for it. The youngest brother knows what Death is up to and takes his Invisibility Cloak, much to Death’s reluctance, so that he can hide from Death until he’s ready to face him. And the middle brother? The middle brother was given the Resurrection Stone.
And what did the stone do?
It brought back his wife (sort of) and gave the brother such a huge desire to be with her that he ended up taking his own life.
Pfft. Can you imagine? The sort-of-kind-of appearance of your dead loved one convincing you to go die.
Hahahaha…ha…yeah…
And here’s where it gets dark.
We know that Harry was willing to die for his friends because he’s a noble git whose face pops up in the dictionary next to the word: “self-sacrifice”.
The only thing he was missing was the stigmata. (In fact, I’m surprised Jo didn’t put something like that in; she wasn’t exactly subtle about it.)
Anyway, we know that Harry begins walking to the forest and though he is determined, he also begins to have second thoughts:
And then he activates the Resurrection Stone - the stone that Death intentionally used to kill the second brother.
And what happens?
Harry’s loved ones appear to him, though they look odd (and that’s important; we’ll come back to that later) and they’re totally fine with him dying and even convince him that they’re proud of him for what doing what he’s doing, that it doesn’t hurt at all, and that it’ll be quick.
So in conclusion, the four people who have gone above and beyond multiple times to protect this child are completely fine with him dying.
I mean Lily, the woman who leapt in front of her child and demanded to be killed in his place, only tells him that he’s been brave and doesn’t say anything else. The woman who repeatedly pleaded for Harry’s life supposedly stands there and just lets him go die.
Yeah, that’s in character (//sarcasm).
But of course, that’s not Lily, is it?
It’s not James.
It’s not Sirius.
It’s not Remus.
I don’t even think it was the middle brother’s wife.
I don’t think that the Resurrection Stone brings back your loved ones at all. I think it shows you whatever it can to convince you to die.
That’s why James, Lily, Remus, and Sirius were all described as looking different than how they had died. (As opposed to say Nearly Headless Nick who looked exactly how he looked when he died, semi-detached head and all). And why the wife of the brother was described as looking/acting odd as well.
They weren’t really there. They were basically magical holograms who said what they needed to say so that Harry wouldn’t have any second thoughts as he marched towards death. And Death.
I mean…no actually there’s been this really amazing theory going around for a while now that Dumbledore = Death and it actually makes a lot of sense.
Especially if you add my theory that Dumbledore intentionally gave Harry the Resurrection Stone so that when he was about to die, he would see magical holograms of his loved ones who would convince him that he was making the right choice, that it wouldn’t hurt, that they were proud of him, etc.
Because we know that Dumbledore wanted Harry to die. Harry was raised like a pig for slaughter. Note: He didn’t want Harry to be dead. He just wanted Harry to go through the action of dying so that Voldemort would be destroyed.
And so Dumbledore added this little detail to make sure that, well, the job would get done.
So in conclusion:
Centuries ago, Death wanted someone to die. He gave the person a stone that made an image (just an image) of his loved one, which convinced said person that he needed to die.
Centuries later, Death wanted someone to die. He gave the person a stone that made images (just images) of his loved ones, which convinced said person that he needed to die.
I’m gonna be honest at first I thought this theory made no sense bUt like read it all it actually is something to think about. holy hell..
There’s a thing: we’ve seen ghostly James and Lily before. They emerged from Voldemort’s wand during the duel in Goblet of Fire and their shades then, the echoes of their dead selves, are there to help Harry and clear a path for him.
This makes so much sense, because this resurrectio-stoned James and Lily are smiling and placid and too amenable to Harry’s plans. These are not the ghosts who gave him a way out when he would have died in that graveyard. These are not the people who leapt in front of him when he was a baby.
The faces called up by the resurrection stone are Death’s own ghostly sirens. He’s luring people to their end and they say what you need to hear to encourage you to join them. It’s tempting and it’s peaceful and it’s not frightening. You only need to step out and die.
Man. I feel so thirsty lately. I can’t drink enough water. I feel like the senator guy in that X-Men movie after getting exposed to Magneto’s mutant machine, and he keeps drinking drinking drinking water uncontrollably until he dives into the ocean and becomes a terrifying jellyfish creature and explodes. Freaking Magneto. I was already sympathetic to the mutant cause. Why you gotta hate?
You’re not a mutant, honey, you’re a mermaid. It’s all right. Once your scales start coming in, you won’t be as thirsty.
You know, being a diagnostician in a world with more public magical creatures must be a trip and a half.
“Extreme thirst has a lot of causes. Let’s check your blood sugar, and let’s take a skin sample to see if you’re developing scales.”
“Joint pain is pretty common when someone’s pushing themself that way with training, and I’d definitely recommend some rest, but it sounds like it’s been coming on with the moon so we might want to do a blood test to check for lycanthropy.”
“I’m going to give you this journal. Keep track of how often you’re near bodies of water and copses of trees – not single trees, there needs to be a cluster.”
“Bear with me, I know you’re lactose intolerant, but buy a pint of milk and keep it in your kitchen. If it spoils faster than expected, we’ll have a better idea of what’s going on here.”
“Have you considered that you may not, in fact, actually be a mammal?”
“Okay, I’m going to have to refer you to a specialist. It looks like your tertiary dentition is coming in.”
“I think we need to check for allergic reactions to silver, iron, a few types of wood, garlic, and holy water. That’ll help us rule out some possible causes for this rash. In the mean time I think you should avoid Italian food and holy ground.”
“Have you noticed clusters of birds following you? Were they corvids? Hm, interesting. You ought to come in to the office so we can discuss this further.”
“That itching sensation might be a rash, but I think we ought to give you an MRI and see if you’re about to grow horns.”
So basically, medicine in the Dark Ages, upgraded.
This is literally my dream as a writer and my worst nightmare as a nurse
So I imagine a supernatural version of House where almost every episode someone is like “it’s lycanthropy” and the House character goes “it’s never lycanthropy” except for the one episode it is where the title of the episode is lycanthropy.
