The Dark Lord Tom (or whoever; insert ‘Lord Dick’ jokes here) definitely wants Harry to use the Killing Curse or otherwise stop wanting everyone to live. This would likely make their magic compatible and Doom-free, since Harry would no longer have terminal values directly opposed to those of Avada Kedavra and the curse’s master. So in theory it would allow Q to possess Harry’s body. It would also explain why Q doesn’t just kill Harry indirectly, having tested his ability to affect the boy with a paper-cut.
But we know what Q wants in part because he wanted to kill the Auror (as a terminal value). Actually doing so seems stupid at first glance. If allowing this to happen destroyed Harry’s Patronus, which seems like the goal throughout, Q would almost certainly have died. But he may have five backups. Hell, he could have six—we haven’t established if he’s possessing Quirrell or using that body as a puppet from somewhere else. (Azkaban argues strongly against this, but by then he could have copied all skills to his secondary body so the main one could stay out of it.) So losing one brain and even a few memories to break and then Dement his nemesis may count as a win. Why accept his self-serving explanation when the prerequisite and range of the curse argue against it?
Had he killed his target without thereby breaking Harry, he could still have used some rationalization to excuse his actions. Or he could have trusted in his ability to do so.
The fact that Harry continues to breathe makes more sense when you recall that One Does Not Mess With Time. (In the Company novels by Kage Baker, the physical law that history cannot be changed causes a time-traveling organization complete with immortal cyborgs to pop into existence. I get the impression that the cosmos ‘saw’ this as the simplest way to stop a particular change.) This could readily extend to prophecy. By the natural interpretation of the first prophecy, Q can’t kill him—and he may have other evidence for this, though I’m still confused about what happened in Godric’s Hollow. (I’m confused about how prophecy works, come to that.) This seems like a great reason to refrain. Q could very easily decide to focus on breaking the part of Harry that opposes him.
The Dark Lord Tom (or whoever; insert ‘Lord Dick’ jokes here) definitely wants Harry to use the Killing Curse or otherwise stop wanting everyone to live. This would likely make their magic compatible and Doom-free, since Harry would no longer have terminal values directly opposed to those of Avada Kedavra and the curse’s master. So in theory it would allow Q to possess Harry’s body. It would also explain why Q doesn’t just kill Harry indirectly, having tested his ability to affect the boy with a paper-cut.
But we know what Q wants in part because he wanted to kill the Auror (as a terminal value). Actually doing so seems stupid at first glance. If allowing this to happen destroyed Harry’s Patronus, which seems like the goal throughout, Q would almost certainly have died. But he may have five backups. Hell, he could have six—we haven’t established if he’s possessing Quirrell or using that body as a puppet from somewhere else. (Azkaban argues strongly against this, but by then he could have copied all skills to his secondary body so the main one could stay out of it.) So losing one brain and even a few memories to break and then Dement his nemesis may count as a win. Why accept his self-serving explanation when the prerequisite and range of the curse argue against it?
Had he killed his target without thereby breaking Harry, he could still have used some rationalization to excuse his actions. Or he could have trusted in his ability to do so.
The fact that Harry continues to breathe makes more sense when you recall that One Does Not Mess With Time. (In the Company novels by Kage Baker, the physical law that history cannot be changed causes a time-traveling organization complete with immortal cyborgs to pop into existence. I get the impression that the cosmos ‘saw’ this as the simplest way to stop a particular change.) This could readily extend to prophecy. By the natural interpretation of the first prophecy, Q can’t kill him—and he may have other evidence for this, though I’m still confused about what happened in Godric’s Hollow. (I’m confused about how prophecy works, come to that.) This seems like a great reason to refrain. Q could very easily decide to focus on breaking the part of Harry that opposes him.