Harry Potter Harry Potter and His Ordinary Life

[zerohour]

Moved frm misc, since I'd like some more in depth feedback, and I'm considering toying around with this a bit.

The essence of the idea is that Voldemort somehow gets a hold of the prophecy shortly after OotP. Maybe he steals it from Harry's mind, maybe Snape leaks it, it doesn't really matter. I suppose it could happen shortly after Voldemort's resurrection as well, sinc the basic premise wouldn't be too affected.

Rather than trying to kill Harry, Voldemort decides to remove him from the equation in a different way. He obliviates Harry, transports him out of Britain, gives him a basic fake ID, cloaks him in obscuring charms, maybe hides/removes his scar, and is on his merry way.

Harry wakes up, and has no memory of Hogwarts, the Dursleys, or anything related to his old life. He establishes a life, gets a job and apartment, goes to school, all the normal stuff. Cut to some time later, when a couple of crazies show up, claiming that he's a wizard and is fated to save the world from a great evil.

The story would start 1-3 years after Harry disappears, so he's 16-18.

The general situation is that Voldemort has essentially won in Magical Britain, and is busy purging/enslaving/consolidating/whatever. There is still a significant resistance, but they're fairly weak, and limit themselves to saving others instead of stopping Voldemort.


I think post OotP is best, because Sirius is dead, and Dumbledore is dying. Sirius, as he can't really do much for the Order, would likely spend all of his time searching for Harry, while Dumbledore, knowing he is dying, wouldn't be able to devote all of his time to finding Harry, and would have to do what he could to prepare for dealing with Voldemort once he's gone.

What do you guys think?

 

[shout27]

I think post OotP is best, because Sirius is dead, and Dumbledore is dying. Sirius, as he can't really do much for the Order, would likely spend all of his time searching for Harry, while Dumbledore, knowing he is dying, wouldn't be able to devote all of his time to finding Harry, and would have to do what he could to prepare for dealing with Voldemort once he's gone.

If Sirius is dead, how can he spend all his time looking for Harry? I haven't read the last book so I don't know if he became a ghost. . .

 

[icefire]

This idea has OC written all over it. Don't know why, just something about this plot rubs me the wrong way.

 

[zeebee1]

Od course he's an OC. He doesn't remember who he is so he'd become someone else.

 

[zerohour]

I think post OotP is best, because Sirius is dead, and Dumbledore is dying. Sirius, as he can't really do much for the Order, would likely spend all of his time searching for Harry, while Dumbledore, knowing he is dying, wouldn't be able to devote all of his time to finding Harry, and would have to do what he could to prepare for dealing with Voldemort once he's gone.

If Sirius is dead, how can he spend all his time looking for Harry? I haven't read the last book so I don't know if he became a ghost. . .

Poor phrasing on my part. The timing was chosen because if Sirius was still alive, he would look for Harry. Likewise, if Dumbledore wasn't dying he would be able to devote more time to finding Harry.

The risk of OC is there, but as it is a known risk, it can be avoided with enough effort, especially if time is taken to show Harry post mindwipe. I on't think it is an inherent part of losing his memory, since his basic persona would still be there.

 

[airfire0]

his basic persona would still be there.

Maybe you're doing something different in your HP-verse, but personality, which can be defined as habitual responses to similar environmental stimuli, is pretty much completely dependent on past experiences and memory; and without said memory, Harry's personality would necessarily be different.

 

[SoftRogue]

This idea could work if it was done with the POV from the people looking for Harry and how they fix/deal/help him after he's found so they could drag him into a war he apparently knows nothing about. The OOC-ness would still be there, but it wouldn't be the focus of the story, and it would lessen as Harry's memories are returned slowly (if they ever are).

Edit: Ok...the Harry's OOC-ness would actually be the focus of the later part of the story...but it would at least be more contained from the reader's POV.

 

[Chuckg]

Why is Voldemort keeping Harry alive at all?

Granted that Voldemort consistently scores a zero point zero on the Evil Overlord List, still, the prophecy bloody tells him flat-out that Harry Potter is the only guy who can kill him. At this point, Mr. Obsessed With Immortality should have AK'ed Harry in the back of the head, cut his corpse into pieces, Fiendfyred the pieces, invented a charm that can burn things that have already been burned and do that, taken the ash-ashes and baked them into some bread, Apparated the bread to parks all across the world, and fed it to ducks.

But, there is at least one solution! Have Voldemort get a partial or misheard variant of the prophecy, to the point where he is under the impression that Harry's death is what dooms him, and voila, every reason to keep Harry Potter alive.

Granted, at that point common sense would argue for the Draught of Living Death, a six-foot-thick armored lead coffin, and the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, but Voldemort's never used common sense in his life and there's no reason for him to start now.

 

[zerohour]

The reason Voldemort is keeping Harry alive is because killing him will fulfill the prophecy. Once the prophecy is fulfilled, any regular Joe can kill Voldie, but while it's unfulfilled, Harry is the only one who can. So as long as Harry is alive and not a threat, Voldemort is invincible.

@SoftRogue: That actually sounds a lot better than focusing on Harry, and makes more sense. The world has essentially been passing Harry by, so focusing on others is a good idea.

 

[Chuckg]

That makes sense.