People Love To Shit On The Failings Of A Classic Protagonist In Favor Of More Interesting Side Characters

WIP Wednesday

Thank you @cindle-writes for the tag! 💕

Tagging (no pressure!): @st-lady @hazelnut1 @solavonn @leafiloaf @cringe-queasy @racfoam @mishqua @youknowmevj

So this is the last one of Mermay, still in its ugly phase (Also the way merpeople look is valid, I just don't like their design jsdjlakd)

There's this scene in the movie where, after Harry saves Ron and Gabrielle and is attacked by squid creatures, the gillyweed stops working. He begins to sink and he seems to be losing consciousness. Until he suddenly recovers and casts a spell to get out of the water.

In this mermaid AU, Tom saw Harry struggling and he was the one who made him recover (maybe with a kiss?)

Idk the specifics. Maybe Merman!Tom was the result of a horcrux in the Black Lake gone wrong? Maybe he wants to learn magic so badly that he wants to become a human, and he's an outcast among the merpeople because of that. Maybe he saw Harry threatening the merpeople with his wand, using his magic against the other lake creatures and Tom hated him because he wanted to do that and life was so unfair.

And yet, he saved him because he was also captivated.

Vitae Redux, Chapter 19: The Goblet

Bartemius lifted his head, meeting the Dark Lord’s eyes. Lord Voldemort ripped into his mind without hesitation, gleeful at his servant’s eager acceptance of his presence, passing through snippets of memory, images of the two boys he sought swirling around him. Holding hands in the hallways, smiling at each other over meals in the Great Hall, hidden in an alcove, kissing. Vile, disgusting – Lord Voldemort had never deigned to kiss someone, not when it gave him none of the pleasure he could seduce or force out of others. He flew away from these memories, seeking the one Bartemius had offered.

“… a bit mad, isn’t he?”

Harry Potter and ‘Tom Riddle’ were leaving their Defence Against the Dark Arts class, unaware of the man who shadowed them and hand in hand once more. Voldemort snarled at the sight.

“Yes,” the taller boy sighed, “it certainly seems so. All those years of fighting Dark witches and wizards must have addled his brains. Still, I find it gratifying to know that you can throw off the Imperius Curse – even an accomplished Occlumens can find it difficult to resist the suggestions placed in their mind by the caster. I have to wonder about Dumbledore’s decision to hire him, however.”

“Do you think it’s because –" Harry broke off and glanced around furtively before sliding seamlessly into Parseltongue. “Because Dumbledore suspects Voldemort is coming back?”

‘Tom’ frowned. “You may very well be right, darling,” he replied, stroking his free hand against Harry’s face. “I know for a fact that the headmaster has spies who once were loyal to Voldemort – surely they’ve alerted him to the fact that their Marks are darkening once more. A smart move, all things considered, to employ one of the most feared Aurors of his day.”

“So we’re safe then,” Harry concluded. “As long as we’re at Hogwarts, Voldemort can’t get to us.”

“Darling, I trust your safety with Dumbledore as much as I trust him not to kill me on the spot if he ever worked out who and what I am,” ‘Tom’ replied. “Which is to say, not at all. Now come, we’re late for lunch.”

Lord Voldemort withdrew from Bartemius’ mind, the effort having exhausted him but giving him the information he needed. Harry Potter was indeed a Parselmouth, and furthermore, it seemed he understood the nature of ‘Tom’s’ existence and somehow didn’t mind. How very interesting. Lord Voldemort’s plan had been to kill the boy, of course, but plans were always subject to change.

“You have a new objective, Bartemius,” he said, easing his fragile body back into the armchair. “You will continue as you have thus, ensuring the boy’s success in the Triwizard Tournament. However, I wish for you to also assess Harry Potter’s aptitude and attitude towards the Dark Arts. I wish to know if he can be turned.”

hey hey hey what if when voldemort took harry's blood for the resurrection ritual, they actually became family because they now share blood????

like, as far as magic's concerned, they're kin now. blood-bound. and with that come a lot of complications (and pleasures?). perhaps voldemort is now an honorary potter-slash-peverell and can use the invisibility cloak.

and/or perhaps harry is now an honorary gaunt and is, like, voldemort's official heir--which comes with a whole bunch of advantages for harry, like voldemort not being able to hurt him without serious magical consequences, because that would be unnatural and tantamount to hurting his own child, and magic's like:

"nope. can't do that. or you can, but golly gosh it'll hurt a lot! and will also magically incapacitate you since your magic is bound to your heir's, so you'll feel every bit of the damage you do. not to mention that you were already bound by a horcrux bond, so now you're doubly bound, which basically means you're fucked. congratulations, lord voldemort! 😇"

what if harry accidentally finds out that he has access to voldemort's sekrit gringotts vault under the gaunt name?? or gets a letter from gringotts informing him of it? what if he visits gringotts before voldemort realises what's up and literally drains all of voldemort's finances to fund his war?

or what if, what if, the death eaters, who swore lifelong fealty to voldemort, now have to follow harry's orders too, since harry is voldemort's heir and the magical vow of fealty transfers to him, too? what if harry inherits control of the dark mark?

just picture harry summoning bellatrix lestrange with her dark mark and, like, making her buy muggle children ice creams or something. and she can't even say no??? imagine her simmering and then boiling in rage as she treats innocent muggle kids and gets hugged like some sort of beloved neighbourhood grandma while she fucking hates having all those filthy little hands on her.

lmfaoooooo harry would totally pop off and voldemort wouldn't be able to do a damn thing about it. lucius malfoy kneeling before harry and freeing all his house elves after buying each of them a cute little manor. severus snape (bc even though he's a spy, he's still bound by the mark) actually having to be fair in potions and having to be nice and genuinely helpful to neville. fenrir greyback (let's imagine he has the mark, too) having to quit his perverse kid-hunting and eat nothing but veggies for every meal.

meanwhile, despite all of these enraging, humiliating scenarios that make voldemort want to explode harry into itty-bitty pieces, voldemort also feels the absolutely fucking bizarre urge to protect harry bc harry is his family now and voldemort's never had family before. and that, of course, escalates to insane amounts of possessive protectiveness when he discovers that harry's his horcrux, too.

also, while trying to figure out how to undo this stupid fucking kin-bond, voldemort discovers that the only alternative is to convert it into a marriage bond, which would simulate the kin-bond closely enough to satisfy magic, but still wouldn't solve the problem of harry being able to command voldemort's servants as his spouse (and thus his co-lord).

just imagine voldemort slowly losing what remains of his mind as he realises there's no way out of having his life revolve around potter... and not in the vengeful way it's been until now, either!

voldemort has to resign himself to teaching harry how to be a proper heir and/or spouse and how to dance/eat/talk as per pureblood culture, but harry's just over here literally thumbing his nose at tradition, deliberately botching up which forks to eat with, stepping on voldemort's toes at every waltz, and relishing being able to make voldemort's death eaters grit their teeth in disgust while still having to bow and scrape to him.

and then dumbledore finds out about this nonsense and simply passes away and/or has an existential crisis and/or tries to figure out how to twist this to his advantage so that voldemort is finally contained and controlled, but little does he know that sweet li'l bby harry doesn't need any help with that.

oh, harry controls voldemort, all right. yeah, being voldemort's heir/kin means he has to listen to his "sire" to a degree, but that's only the surface stuff--lessons, rituals, socialising, etc.--but his spirit is entirely his own and, increasingly, so is voldemort's heart.

this would be such fucking comedy gold lolololol. gotta write it one day

Or drop a chandelier on his head 😂

I'll see my favourite character happy and smiling just once and be like omg I never want him to get hurt or feel pain ever again, give him peace 🥺🥺 and then the very next day be like, okay, back to pushing him down the stairs

Harry James Potter the beauty you are!

Reminder that communications in all of Gaza have been cut off for the past three days. This means no one can make calls to check on family members within Gaza or to report and call for help/ambulances following Israeli airstrikes. As a result, many end up dying due to injuries or being trapped under the rubble with no possible way of notifying anyone. Of course this also goes hand in hand with Israel intensifying their bombardment of every part of Gaza after having isolated it from the world.

You can help by purchasing e-sims. I will share a long post with all the details and instructions shortly and you can also Venmo smaller amounts if you're unable to buy a whole bundle so that bigger plans can be bought for families.

OMG I LOVE THESE

Harry Potter Illustration Series - Created by Dan Elijah Fajardo

These designs are available for sale as shirts, cases, and more at his TeePublic Shop.

Cursed idea: The Little Mermaid AU with Lily Luna as Ariel and Voldemort using her to get not only the King's trident, but Harry as well.