By: dellacouer
This is an Harry Potter X-Men crossover that actually makes the crossover work.
I love this fic and I have read it over and over. The plot is amazing. Harry in the story is amazing and badass. The characters are believable and not ooc. It's such a great read. Though I'm warning you now this fic has not been updated in a long time. You might read what is there and wish for more like I do every time I reread it.
Synopsis
A shell shocked but triumphant Harry Potter decides to leave his world behind for another. Someone should have told him that AUs can be really, really different. HP/ X-Men crossover.
Excerpt
Chapter One: Old Worlds
Nobody leaves this world alive.
Muggle Proverb
Proof that, once again, wizards know better.
He should be given a medal. A big Order of Merlin First Class. Just for what he was currently having to endure. All that other stuff didn't matter. He should get a medal for sitting in this bloody-uncomfortable-ministry-issue-straight-backed-chair-from-hell. There simply wasn't a way to get comfortable in it. And he'd tried every way. He'd been shifting uncomfortably for the last three hours. Nothing worked. Voldemort really could have taken lessons from the Ministry of Magic. Give him the Cruciatus any day.
Harry rubbed his arms. He wished it had armrests at least. Still, he had to admit the auror robes were nice. He examined the material. Not wool, something softer. When Kingsley had tossed him this robe, Harry had put it on greedily. The warmth of the cloth felt almost sinful. He hadn't been warm in…almost a month. They said it had only been a month, less than a full month actually. Harry frowned, it had seemed longer. Lying in that damp cell had felt like years. Hogwarts had seemed so far away, like he was looking back on a memory from his childhood. But it had only been nineteen days.
Tearing himself away from unwanted thoughts, Harry focused on the real problem. He shifted his body again…maybe if he leaned back more? It was the way the chair's back didn't curve he decided, it just didn't line up with his spine. Sigh, it was no use.
Trying to distract himself, Harry examined his current cell. No, not cell Interrogation Room. The auror who had shuffled him into it had called it such,
"It's quiet in there you can have some privacy, maybe rest for a bit", the man had said somewhat kindly.
Rest. Ha. He'd gotten used to sleeping on stone floors, but this chair…never. Hmm, maybe the floor would be comfortable? No, he had longed for a chair for a month/ nineteen days/ forever, he wasn't gonna give it up now just because it was the worst chair in the world.
The walls were gray, but not stone, they were painted and they weren't wet. Much better.
Dudley had always loved crime dramas. Harry had often wondered if Dudley considered them training videos for later in life. Dudley would sit, his pudgy face next to the telly, and yell advice to the criminal. Hey don't say that he's bluffing. You idiot, they can't really toss you out the window. Harry, mid-cleaning, had paused a few times. He'd often wondered how the cops chose who got to be the good cop or the bad cop. Did wizards have its equivalent? Good auror, bad auror perhaps. Maybe they did, they had certainly copied the muggle interrogation room design. The only thing missing was that two-way mirror.
"Why's he just sitting there?" asked a burly auror with sandy hair. He turned to the man beside him with raised eyebrows. The two men had spent the last hour gazing through a special window into the next room. To them, it looked like any window but the other side was charmed to look and feel like a stone wall.
"What would you expect him to do?" was his partner's gruff reply.
"I don't know, throw a fit, fall asleep, ask for a lollipop? Anything really."
"He was held prisoner by You-know-who for almost a month. I don't think we'll be able to do anything to intimidate him." The older auror turned to his young partner with upraised eyes. The sandy haired man merely blinked.
"It's just creepy, you know." The burly auror shivered slightly which looked rather comical. His partner didn't laugh.
"Well, I think we should go talk to him, he's rested enough."
"Uhh, sure. The boy-who-lived… geez."
"Don't get star struck son," said the veteran auror firmly. The younger auror gulped and straightened his broad shoulders. Still, the older man couldn't blame him. These young people had grown up listening to the great legend of Harry Potter, The-Boy-Who-Lived. He was the closest thing to a hero their generation had ever known. Heck, the kid even impressed him. Still, it was a sad state of affairs when the world's hero had more kills tallied than most deatheaters.
Harry put his head down when the door opened, but his eyes looked up from the fringe of his messy hair and watched whoever was coming in. His eyes slid over the faces, he didn't know them. He'd been hoping he might be able to see Tonks or maybe Kingsley. He let his gaze settle on the younger man for a moment. He might know him, or maybe a brother or something. There was something about the big build that seemed familiar. The other auror was short and slim, he looked tiny next to other man. This smaller auror had neatly combed black hair, white streaking the temples and a slim nose. Harry subtly watched his eyes and noticed an intelligent, calculating quality to them. Harry had little doubt who would be in charge. After awhile, he'd grown used to gauging people. Knowing what to expect from them. The large blonde man was new; the older man was the one to watch out for.
Harry growled at himself in his head. You aren't a prisoner anymore. They aren't going to…They're the ministry, they can't very well inflict serious harm.
But Harry didn't trust the Ministry, hadn't since he'd learned Sirius wasn't given a trial. And he certainly wasn't going to trust it after the problems Fudge had caused. It was just like the Ministry to try locking him in Azkaban. So he decided that a little caution on his part wasn't terribly paranoid. It wasn't paranoia after all, not if they really were out to get you.
"Hello Mr. Potter, I'm Auror Cadwallader, this is Auror Proudfoot," introduced the larger man. Harry frowned softly.
"Cadwallader…do you have a brother in Hufflepuff?" asked Harry. The young auror paused, flicking an unreadable look to his partner.
"Uh, yes. Michael." Cadwallader was hesitant, which seemed odd to Harry, he'd expect the auror to know his own brother. They looked alike too.
"Chaser, right?" prodded Harry.
"Mr. Potter," interrupted Auror Proudfoot. "We were wondering if we could ask you a few questions about the circumstances under which you were found.
Harry raised an eyebrow. "Found?" He coughed slightly. "I wouldn't exactly call it being found…I mean I wasn't exactly lost was I?" Harry's gaze shifted from auror to auror, Cadwallader swallowed. They had indeed known where Harry Potter had been for the last month, knowing hadn't been the problem.
"Yes, well… when the Ministry stormed the Riddle house of Little Hangleton, Mr. Potter you were the only living person."
"Yes," Harry agreed. He waited.
"How did that come to be?" questioned the older auror. Harry looked down at his palms.
"That is a very long story," Harry said. His voice was low and the two wizards before him strained to hear. When his face lifted a wrinkle creased between his eyebrows, revealing a somewhat puzzled expression.
"I don't really know." Harry's statement seemed to echo throughout the small room. The two aurors turned to each other.
"You don't know? Mr Potter that excuse isn't going to fly. You were found in a home with over twenty bodies, and the Unspeakables are telling me that the…the fragments you were located with belong to You-Know-Who. Now, the Ministry needs– "
"Oh well, that was Voldemort," conceded Harry. Once again the two aurors shared a glance.
"Ah…good, now we're getting somewhere. Now, Mr. Potter what happened to…well, you know who."
"I killed him," replied Harry. The two adults gazed at the young wizard with shocked expressions. He was just a kid. It was the strangest thing in the world to have this young man calmly reveal that he had blasted a man to bits. Not just any man but the most powerful dark wizard for centuries, a man who caused Aurors to soil themselves on a regular basis. It was creepy, Proudfoot was starting to understand what Cadwallader had meant.
Eventually the older auror managed to grunt. He cleared his throat before asking another question.
"And, how did you manage to…eh. We have it well documented that your wand was snapped when you were captured nineteen days ago…" the question was left rather open. Neither auror seemed comfortable pressing the-boy-who-lived. Personally Proudfoot was of the mind that You-Know-Who deserved whatever he got. He wouldn't loose a wink of sleep if he let Harry Potter go right now. But his supervisor had wanted answers. Proudfoot was a ministry man, through and through.
Finally Harry spoke, his voice weary. "He just blew up, can't that be enough, boom, nothing bigger than a matchbox," Harry muttered in a distracted way. He lowered his head again, looking at his lap. The aurors exchanged glances which Harry didn't see. The boy looked deep in thought. The two men seemed to reach to the same conclusion at the same time. The sent each other commiserating looks. The poor lad must be feeling guilty. He'd killed a terrible dark wizard, worst in history, and the poor boy felt guilt for taking another man's life.
They couldn't have known that Harry wasn't feeling guilty or repentant, rather he was still considering his chair. What if he pulled his legs up and sat with knees folded? Nope. Had someone jinxed this chair on purpose?
The aurors had watched Harry frown, cross his legs, frown, then uncross them. They wisely stood up and slowly backed away.
"Um…could you excuse us for a moment Mr. Potter" Proudfoot managed to say without a stutter.
Harry nodded without looking up. The aurors, once again using slow steady movements, backed out of the room. The larger man even seemed to be attempting to tip-toe backwards, resulting in a sort of awkward ballerina-like prance. Harry raised an eyebrow. He'd known Moody was a few cards short of a full deck, and understandably so, but he hadn't imagined mental instability would be a requirement for all aurors. Oh well, maybe he'd make a good auror after all.
It didn't really matter. He liked what aurors stood for, but most of them seemed to get rather caught up in the rules. That was one thing Harry had a problem with. He'd even lied to those aurors…he could have told the truth. Nothing much mattered anymore.
Well almost nothing. He certainly had to do something about this chair.
Harry's eyes shifted around, he rubbed his fingers together nervously before raising his right hand. He lifted his palm into the air, looking around once again.
He didn't know if it would work. It had been so terribly hard the first time, like he'd been breaking down a stone wall with his fists. It had hurt, a terrible ripping feeling inside of him. It came from the same place inside that had ached while the Deatheaters had been having their fun. A place somewhere deep in his chest which had ripped out his arm, harpooning through muscle and sinew.
Oh well, pressing matters to attend to, Harry thought to himself. He had to try it again, what was a little more pain? Reaching this decision, Harry's hand slid through the air, a white sparkling wash of magic in its wake.
It had been different this time.
Harry couldn't avoid the small smile that crossed his lips. His first smile in a month. He sighed in relief and utter comfort. He leaned back, relishing the plush upholstery of his newly transfigured chair. He should have tried this hours ago. Harry closed his eyes. In the space of less-than-a-month his world had fallen down around him, he'd killed Voldemort, fulfilled his retched destiny, and somehow managed to master wandless magic.
And Harry didn't care. Just another abnormality to add. Really, all he wanted to do was sleep. With a comfortable sigh, Harry Potter let himself slip into the peaceful, hazy world where grief, pain, fear and loneliness could not reach him.