Intro:
I am not exactly someone who always checks out tags... to my detriment every so often BUT this time I actually looked at the tags (as of the date of this work's publishing) for Leave Ancient Magic Alone Idiots by morey971 and well - they mention "no torvak conspiracy (I think)" for now and that got me into overthinking possibilities. Because while the starting point in their fic is interesting and nice, well - it is! And I like that work so far, but I am also fond of possibilities and overcomplicating things and there was a distinct lack of HP/Marvel crossover plotlines in my recent private writing and it got me into this:
Bunny:
Since there is no Torvak conspiracy, I think there can be more 'chance' for some things to turn out one way or another, while also not necessarily going with Evil!Dumbledore (maybe more of an old idealistic fool who is a senile old man and can't accept that abuse happens and it isn't fine to leave children in such a situation, his insistence on Harry staying with Dursleys for a childhood of normalcy and anonymity be damned).
In this world there are many events that hold great Power and some are happening more often (births?) and some are much rarer. We want the rare one - The Convergence (Marvel timeline in 2013). What if the pathways opening up between realms on Yggdrasil aren't the only ones? What if pathways to other realms, even to Nevarah's borders open up due to the Space Stone having been used on Earth just a year before (and possibly several times before that making radiation, energies, leylines and magic slightly wonky in multiple places)? What if a certain trouble magnet ends up falling through several pathways only to end up... much changed? And starting off events that result in chaos, much chaos and hopefully happiness indeed.
Who is the trouble magnet? [tl:dr: OC or Harry Potter?] Well, I do love a good OC and my 'recent' design for HPxDragelxMCU-verse was a child:
- born between:
- Loki's child - Loki's paramour was an Elven Huntress who wouldn't have cared for Loki's position if not for the fact that Odin was a heavy-handed manipulator and his orders were clear; her own parents ended up giving the child away to Odin's soldiers shortly aftr birth, some enchantments later the babe ends up on Earth, adopted by someone who wished to have a child but for whatever reason couldn't have them - they do end up keeping their access to magic,
- someone that is a Magical Being (human or wix-passing at least, but their nature is different) from Earth (alternative was that they were like a branch family that stayed on Earth while the main family kept to their original home in another realm?); I didn't want them to be Dragel, more like a feline- or Fox-Shifter, possibly what amounts for a Desert Fox on magical buffs? In a way their nature was supposed to be such that they have issues to conceive with just Loki's child (their spouse?) mostly because of the lack of balance between their natures - not that they know it about Loki's child, as Asgardian enchantments simply never shown up on all medical scans they ever really did.
- someone who is dragel or part-dragel (preferably Storm or Shadow) to basically give them that 'huzzah' of a power up to brute-force through the issue of somewhat-unbalanced natures.
- I had too many variations to really flesh out details, but details would really depend on the timeline synchronization between HP and MCU, as well as age of OC when the whole Convergence happens + more specific place they are in when they pass between realms. This character was also supposed to be a chaotic mess of conflicting nature that ends up either not being full or half-dragel [but maybe with enough of that magic to be a possible bondmate], but rather something else.
Leaving alone the OC I will mostly focus on if Harry Potter ended up being the trouble magnet, so:
Version 1) Child Harry (like pre-13-years-old Harry, I think, even if I have him in mind as a 9-year-old, it would be making him a bit of disservice if he ends up pushed straight into weird things since 'there is no such thing as magic'):
- He is absolutely running away from Dudley and his sidekicks, as one would have it, he ends up maybe both wish-magic-apparating and falling through pathway between realms, the landing is painful, travel disorienting, and there aren't exactly any clear ways to track him down anyway.
- Harry ends up being the one claimed by Aether,
- Aether finds his seals and for whatever reason is both capable and 'willing' (as willing as a supposedly semi-sentient rock could be) to break some of them or at least loosen them somewhat,
- Harry comes into his inheritance,
- There is no soul's scream.
- There can be a divergence:
- Scenario A: Malekhit finds him soon enough in that realm and things somehow go on (no idea, Harry might end up having a millenia-old King as an aggresively claiming parental figure from there on. Sirius wasn't met so far so it seems better than nothing)
- Scenario B: Harry regains consciousness and attempts to find his way back to the 'entrance' he used. He ends up falling through another pathway.
- Scenario B1: pathway leads him back to Midgard and things can turn very dangerous, especially if he is found SHIELDRA or HYDRA. He could also end up found by Thor and taken to Asgard and Frigga might end up recognizing Loki's magic (Odin better end up on a couch, Frigga lost a chance to claim her grandchild and grandkids-in-law and great-grandchildren)... things can happen either way, but at least I would hope that Frigga and her healers provide enough magical healing to help out Harry (and they might just be able to take down some of the asgardian seals from him at this point).
- Scenario B2: pathaway leads him to somewhere in Nevarah (Border? Death's Court?) and they in turn have a not-so-nice fright with someone entering the realm in an unprecedented way (they might have been mostly lucky to not have more people accidentally walking through pathways to Nevarah OR the fact that Aether is a Reality Stone made the Pathway's destination slightly less rigid and hence the weird travel). Medical emergency (what basilisk poison?! there can be a Hunt for his school situation) later they can put Harry as Aiden's problem as there is a death seal. Lady Death could be reminded that there is a brute 'courting' her with all that extra work and that he wants to get all Infinity Stones, so Aether in Harry isn't exactly safe.
Hopefully much chaos can happen with all that there is. Also, if Harry ends up directly in Nevarah - Asgardians have issue tracking him down, so Thor can be running around like a headless chicken, go to Stark for help only to find out that the man is post-surgery (never remembered the timeline for those events) and that the 'Team' isn't a team since Stark just managed the whole Mandarin arc with his friends not the team or SHIELD's input.
I might be considering the possibility of the story being about fem!Harry (or maybe Potter twins?), so the cuteness factor goes up significantly.
Version 2) Adult Harry
- I have more issues with this version, simply because Harry can have too many issues if he is post-war.
- I would say him being a hit wizard or an auror and basically pursuing a criminal is a good enough situation to stumble into the pathway.
- It is a question what really happens and what sort of pathway is it - it is similar to child Harry (get Aether -> unlock inheritance -> find out about the betrayal -> in one way or another end up sowing chaos, likely landing himself in Nevarah) or completely different.
- He could just end up stumbling directly between realms, no Aether needed.
- He could be a 'Master of Death' so he ends up falling directly to Helheim or Death's Court.
My biggest issue with crossovers with MCU is the number of possible bad guys and HYDRA being a problem. So I wouldn't personally go anywhere into the direction that our trouble magnet could end up in their hands... unless we wish to get ourselves a Winter Soldier (I am partial to the idea of "Bucky Barnes" not existing while what is left outside of the triggered Soldat goes by "Yasha") for a cuddle pile and some bloody hunts once they do their daring escape. Maybe one of the HYDRA experiments included giving Winter Soldier some elixirs with dragon/dragel blood and they changed his nature enough (with the Serum and other things kicking in) to have him perfectly capable of bonding as a Companion, even when Barnes begun as magic-unaware maybe-a-squib-born? Not sure, never really thought it through, but the main part of the idea remains.