OVERANALYZING THE TEXT

Cindy wrote:

OK. So under my timeline, Neville is born sometime in 1980. Let's pick the middle of 1980. That makes him a proper toddler when the Potters are killed because he is 16 months old or so.

<Elkins the childless strains her (almost as bad as Neville's) memory to remember what her young nieces and nephews were like at that age.>

Weeeellll...

So if the torture happens ::Cindy pauses to think of a torture date that will give the greatest possible Bang:: on Christmas day 1981, Neville is 18 months old, and still a toddler.

Ooooh. You almost got me there, with that Christmas Day thing. I imagined a decorated tree crashing to the ground, gaily wrapped parcels trodden underfoot...it was all good. Very Bangy, and my featherboas liked it as well.

But then you offered me this:

Can you give me June 1982 as the latest date for the torture? Can we have the Lestranges caught quickly, so that it is more likely that Neville's evidence caused their capture? Can Neville be just turning two when the torture happens? Can we have Mrs. Lestrange burst through the door as Neville is blowing out his birthday candles or something?

Okay. Tell you what I'm gonna do, since you're being so accomodating here. We'll push Neville's birthday back to the very late winter of 1980, the Event can occur in 1982, and it can be Neville's second birthday. Okay? That way, I don't have to swallow down any more of that Everything-Happens-In-1981 that annoys me so much, you can still have things happening reasonably quickly, the Lestranges can have been reasonably swift-to-take-action, Neville can be unquestionably a toddler (I like to think that he was just entering that horrid "NO!" stage at the time), and we can still have gaily-wrapped parcels trodden underfoot.

Also, that way we can declare Neville to be a Pisces. This is actually strongly suggested by canon as JKR, in spite of her apparent distaste for divination, nonetheless seems to enjoy giving her characters apt sun signs (Hermione the Virgo, Harry the Leo, Ron the Taurus, and so forth).

Also, this would explain why we never hear a word about Neville's birthday in canon. He's never told anyone when it is, see, 'cause Neville just hates his birthday. It brings back bad memories.

Now that Kimberly and her Faith, they're definitely squeamish. Something needs to be done about them, don't ya think?

Faith lacks Edge. She definitely lacks Edge. But I'm afraid that she does have the author on her side, so she probably outranks us. ::sigh::

I'm not too sure about ToadKeeper. Don't tell Judy or anything, but she stung me pretty good with her assault on ToadKeeper.

'Stung' you? She sank Toadkeeper straight to a watery grave, actually, but ssssshhh. We'll keep that our little secret, shall we?

I'm just putting on a brave face at this point. I'd love for you to come up with something for this Neville/Trevor issue so that I could scuttle ToadKeeper, 'cause it is seriously taking on water.

Mmmmmm. Well, I was working up a Neville backstory, but now I realize that it has no Trevor Oh, no!

Note to self: revamp backstory to include Trevor. Preferably with Big Banginess.

I'll, uh...I'll be getting back to you on that.

Hmmm. If Reverse-Memory-Charm Neville is repeatedly re-living his parents' torture, doesn't it, uh, help, if he actually saw it?

Two options here:

1) He could see little bits and pieces of what was going on through a crack in the closet door, just like the kids on all of those made for TV movies.

2) He couldn't see a thing. It was pitch black. All he could do was hear what was going on — which might be a whole lot worse, really.

How about if the torture happens right there in front of Neville (with toddler Neville wearing his pointy birthday hat and all), but someone tells Mrs. Lestrange to spare Neville?

You still haven't sold me on the entire group of DEs being willing to spare Neville. I do like my DEs grey, it is true, but I also like them vile. If they had known the kid was there, then they would have brutalized him.

How about option (3): Neville was sitting right there at the table, birthday cake in front of him and wearing his pointy hat and all, but hidden under the Invisibility Cloak that Frank had hastily thrown over the kid when the DEs first burst through the door? Moody had an Invisibility Cloak, so Frank might have had one as well? Seems like something that an Auror might have had lying around the house.

I don't like option (3) though. It's hard to reconcile with my Life Debt To Barty Crouch theory.

Also, if we stick to Crouch Lying To The Others About Neville In the Closet, then we can add to our supposition that young Crouch, fearing that the kid might start snivelling or screaming or otherwise giving the game away, also smacked him with a full Body-Bind, to keep him quiet.

In this way we could account for Neville's expression of utter and complete horror when Hermione does the exact same thing to him in SS/PS, as well as for his appearance—"white with shock"—when he wins the House Cup for Gryffindor and gets praise and hugs from all of his classmates at the end of the novel. Harry's dead wrong about what's happening with Neville there. He's not shocked and pleased to be receiving all that unaccustomed praise. He's shocked and appalled that he is actually being stroked for having been victimized in this particular way — yet again!

As an aside, I am having some trouble closing the loop on Reverse-Memory-Charm Neville, and now that Elkins is back on board, maybe she can help. Why is Neville's memory so bad, exactly? Was his memory actually damaged by the charm? That's possible, I guess.

Hmmm. Well, how's this? The Reverse Memory thing wasn't actually a charm at all. It was a potion. A new and experimental potion, in fact, which had just recently been invented by that young hotshot of Dumbledore's — Severus Snape.

The Memory Retrieval Potion was still in the testing stage when Crouch authorized its use on young Neville. It hadn't actually been cleared for use on human subjects yet. But did Crouch care? Are you kidding? He wanted this case wrapped up, and fast.

The reason that the Memory Retrieval Potion has never been mentioned in canon, of course, is that as it turned out, it had some...unfortunate side-effects. The initial tests on the lab rabbits and such had all gone fine, but apparently when used on human subjects you start running into problems. Problems like permanent memory damage. Problems like suppression of natural magical talent. Big Problems.

Because of these problems, the substance was in the end never cleared by the Ministry for use at all, and everyone would really much rather it just be forgotten about altogether.

And that's the real reason why Snape's so cranky about Neville's incompetence in his potions class, you see. That's guilt, is what that is. Guilt, and anger that he was made to look like such an incompetent by that blithering moron Crouch, who simply would not listen to him when he had tried to explain that his tests had not yet been completed, and that he could not therefore make any promises at all that his new potion would not, in fact, turn the boy's brain to mush.

It's also why Dumbledore's asking him to brew up that Wolfsbane Potion for Lupin was such a very big deal to Snape, and why he became so very irritable when Lupin seemed to be hesitating before gulping it down. And why it was really quite kind of Dumbledore to insist on using Snape's "strongest" veritaserum on Crouch at the end of GoF.

That was a gesture of trust, that was. And I'm sure that Severus appreciated it.

—Elkins