Dumbledore's Job
A jet of green light shot from the end of Snape's wand and hit Dumbledore squarely in the chest. Harry's scream of horror never left him; silent and unmoving, he was forced to watch as Dumbledore was blasted into the air: for a split second he seemed to hang suspended beneath the shining skull, and then he fell slowly backwards, like a great rag doll, over the battlements and out of sight. (From HP and the Half-Blood Prince, by JKR).
Relief flooded Dumbledore as he fell from the ramparts. Relief that young Mr. Malfoy hadn't become a killer, that Mr. Malfoy now had a second chance. Relief that Severus had been able to fulfill his vow. He had forced Severus into agreeing to fulfill his unbreakable Dumbledore had known that he was a dead man walking - the curse on his arm couldn't have been held back much longer. And this way perhaps young Mr. Malfoy will be spared from becoming a killer. Relief. Severus still didn't hate him enough to make the killing curse work.
It gave him hope that Severus had forgiven him for his meddling. For all the pain, the suffering the man went through. The nerve-racking anxiousness of spying on Tom. The number of crucios that Severus endured. Why Severus never went prematurely gray, Dumbledore would never know. But Severus had been brought back to the light. Or at least to the gray. And that gave him hope - if Severus was redeemed, maybe there was still hope for himself.
That hope - so fleeting - had first appeared in the form of a phoenix. Fawkes had first appeared to him after he had killed for the first and last time with the killing curse. The old, comforting ache took him again. The anguish of killing his best friend, his lover.
What wonderful plans they had. It would have been a utopia - life really would have been better for everyone. There wouldn't be orphans. No one would be homeless. No one hungry. No crime - no need for crime. Everyone would have been taken care of. They would have sen to it. Dumbledore still didn't know where it had gone wrong. Somehow it had gone from only removing the staunchest of opposition to uncounted millions dead, seemingly in the blink of an eye.
How could he absolve himself of the guilt? He couldn't. For what he had done, there was was no redemption. No forgiveness possible. And yet when Fawkes appeared, there was suddenly hope again. Maybe salvation was out of reach, but that didn't mean he couldn't work towards it, even if it was unattainable. If a phoenix didn't think we he was unforgivably dark, then maybe, just maybe... working towards being acceptable to a phoenix, that was was something worthy of his effort.
And so he threw himself into his new job at the Ministry. It was a difficult job, and he had to make many hard choices, but someone had to do it. And if he was that person, then he could save someone else from having to make those choices. Those choices that had no right answers, just wrong ones. But it also gave him the opportunity to give second chances. He had been given a second chance, how could he fail to forgive others? How could he not give the same chance to others?
And in first war against Tom the choices got harder. And it seemed that none of the choices led anywhere except death. It wasn't until that prophecy, that damned blessed prophecy that things changed. And it only cost him two young couples that he genuinely liked. But it bought him time, and gave Severus a second chance. That wonderful reminder that there was hope for himself.
He now had time to shape and mold Harry. Harry was a Horcrux, and only Tom would be able to destroy it. And this had to happen before Tom could be killed. And so Harry had to be molded. He couldn't be too weak, but also not to strong. Magical strength wouldn't be enough to beat Tom. No, he had to love the magical world enough to die for it. To willing walk to his own death at Tom's hand. Nothing else would be able to destroy the Horcrux embedded in Harry's scar. He should know. He had tried. It was his job to try.
And what a balancing act it had been. To limit the amount of support and friends he had. To provide just the right amount of antagonism. Keeping Harry's godfather in jail. Sirius escaping was unplanned, but he had been able to use that. It had even been better when Sirius had died. A reminder of his parents' last act. Love. Sacrifice. Just as this, his last act was. A sacrifice born of love, to save others.
Relief. That his job was done, that he no longer had to do that which he knew was unforgivable. It had been his job. Everything that he had done. It wasn't just his job title, it was the job description. He had been an Unspeakable, and what he had done was -.
Fin.