Invincible

An HP/2012/nBSG Crossover.

Author's Note: I don't normally borrow ideas from other fanfics, but I cannot deny that the idea behind this story is clearly inspired by Ynyr's Voyage of the Starship Hedwig. Ynyr's fic had an original crisis and plot (even if the abandoned sequel was a SW cross), while this one I chose to fuse with elements of the movie 2012, and cross with elements of the new Battlestar Galactica after that. Nonetheless, Ynyr's story planted this seed, and so I give that author my thanks for writing an enjoyable piece, and inspiring this one. You'll find Voyage of the Starship Hedwig in my C2, and the well-named but sadly abandoned sequel, This Crude Matter, in my favorites.

Please note that the nBSG elements are fairly far off. Don't expect Adama to come storming Hogwarts. Although I admit that would be cool.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Chapter One: Revelations

July 31, 2008

Harry and Hermione stepped off the deck of Her Majesty's Ship Cavalier, the only surviving British destroyer from World War Two. The ship rested now in Chatham Historic Dockyard as a museum ship, and Hermione took Harry on a tour for his twentieth-eighth birthday.

Harry Potter at twenty-eight looked distressingly similar to Harry Potter at seventeen, insofar as he had gained little in the way of height. He was heavier and stronger by several kilos of muscle, but the deprivation of his youth had forever robbed him of his father's height. In fact, Hermione was exactly as tall as he was.

Ginny was two inches taller than he was barefoot, and four inches in heels; this distressing height difference was his primary excuse for their breakup. "It's not right I had to stand on my tip-toes to kiss my girl," Harry was known to complain to his co-workers. Of course, none of them believed it any more than Harry himself did.

At least Hermione was the same height, and he appreciated that she usually wore flats. She told him it was because they were more practical, but he often suspected it was because she was just that nice. Harry appreciated her thoughtfulness—no one else in the DMLE had remembered his birthday, mainly because he made a point of downplaying it. As the youngest director of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement in its history, he was sensitive to anything that marked just how young he was.

Once upon a time, Harry and Hermione dreamed they would be happily paired with their respective Weasleys—Harry with Ginny, Hermione with Ron, and would be spending many happy birthdays together. The few times they all went out together were some of the happiest times Harry had ever had.

But then they finished growing up and realized without school and Voldemort they had nothing in common with the Weasleys. That wasn't to say that they didn't stay in touch, or that they had horrid rows.

Well, that wasn't true. The row that proved the last straw for Hermione and Ron was when she decided to continue on to her Ph.D., despite Ron's insistence that they get married and start having kids. Her "I'm not ready to be a housewife, Ronald," clashed with his, "I've been waiting for four years already!" and it was just not possible to bridge the two irreconcilable views on life.

Harry remembered holding Hermione's hair back from the loo the next morning as she sicked her guts out after a wildly uncharacteristic drinking binge that followed the row.

For him and Ginny, it wasn't an abrupt change. He started work as an auror the month after the Battle of Hogwarts, skipping training and his seventh year entirely. Within five years, he made captain; two years later, he made head auror. And a year later, Shacklebolt named him as the director. While Harry had no doubt there was political favoritism involved, he hadn't earned the grudging respect of his older aurors by being lazy or resting on his laurels. He regularly put in sixteen hour days and learned the ropes of the business quickly and well. His success in rounding up renegade Death Eaters and preventing more would-be Death Eaters from rising, went a long way to earning the respect of his department.

Ginny never saw him, and after a while stopped trying. He laughed about how tall she was, but Harry knew that, just as he did at the end of their sixth year, he pushed her away with the excuse of work. She was beautiful, vivacious, and everything he thought he needed, and yet he pushed her away anyway. And this time, Ginny couldn't wait for him.

So, they drifted apart. They remained friends, all of them, and Harry saw Ron on a regular basis working with Fred at the joke shop. But what had once been the closest friendship had turned rather casual. He found he had a lot more in common with his aurors Dennis Creevey or the older Davin Proudfoot than he did with Ron or Ginny.

"I wonder what it would have been like on that ship, during the war," Hermione wondered aloud, breaking his reverie.

"Crowded and boring, most likely," Harry said. "With occasional, short bouts of terror."

"Boring?" Hermione asked.

"Hermione, don't you remember how bored we were in that bloody tent? I mean, sure, we were scared, but the thing I remember most was boredom. And glimpses of you in the shower."

Hermione hit his shoulder, hard. "You didn't!"

"Blimey, let's think about this. Seventeen-year-old virgin sharing a tent with a beautiful, older woman? Hell yes, I looked. I always thought you knew."

Hermione huffed angrily a moment as they continued walking down the quay. A moment later, still frowning, she said, "Well?"

"Well what?"

"Did you like what you saw?"

"Merlin yes!" Harry enthused. "I was tempted to put it into my pensieve, but that felt wrong somehow."

"Harry James Potter!" Hermione growled. "If I ever even think you did anything like that, I will make sure you never have need to wank again!"

Harry held up both hands in surrender. "Like I said, Hermione, it felt wrong even to me. I'm just saying…you're beautiful is all."

Hermione sniffed haughtily. "You had your chance, Harry."

"When?"

"Fourth Year. I waited for a week for you or Ron to ask me. I sat in my bed and cried for five nights straight. Do you think I wanted to date Viktor? The man's nose was larger than Snape's!"

"If it makes you feel better, I was a horrible date that night," Harry admitted.

"You wouldn't have been if you'd just asked me," Hermione pointed out, still bitter even after all these years.

"Well, we're on a date now, aren't we? After all, it is my birthday."

Hermione thought about it. "What about that girl you were with last week?"

"Remember that bloke that attacked me, Shumar?"

"He hurt her?"

"No, he just scared the piss out of her, is all. Said she couldn't handle the stress of dating the DMLE director."

Hermione sniffed again. "Obviously not fit to date you, then."

Harry laughed, and said, "What about you and that Ravenclaw bloke, Dickley?"

"Dickerson, Harry. Michael Dickerson. He was quite pleasant, well mannered, cultured and a half-blood, so he wasn't opposed to doing things in Muggle London."

"And?"

Hermione frowned and pulled a strand of hair back from her face. "He was boring," she finally admitted. "Wanted to stay in each night reading and drinking port. I had to beg him for sex. What kind of bloke doesn't want to shag his girl?"

"A gay one," Harry said without blinking an eye. "He was pushing for a Ministry job, wasn't he? There's still a lot of intolerance in the Ministry. Probably hoping for a sham marriage to hide his inclination, and a link to a war hero would really help his cause. You broke up, then?"

"Yes," Hermione admitted.

"So there you go!" Harry said. "Let's go to dinner tonight! Your choice, my treat. Consider it another birthday present that you don't even have to pay for!"

"Harry, I'm not going to shag you."

"Who said anything about shagging?" Harry said with a grin. "I'm just talking dinner."

~~Invincible~~

~~Invincible~~

"Oh God, how could Ginny walk away from that?" Hermione said as she bit face down into her pillow, while Harry collapsed naked and sweaty to the mattress beside her.

"I keep telling you, I broke it off," Harry lied, though his happy, sweaty smile belied any heat to the statement. "Merlin's balls, Hermione, why didn't we ever hook up before this? That was bloody awesome!"

"I'll tell you why," Hermione said. "You didn't know a thing about girls, dating, or basic human interaction. And neither did I."

Harry's grin faded at the bitter, angry tone in her voice. Alarmed, he placed a hand on her shoulder and said, "What do you mean, Hermione?"

She rolled onto her side to face him, pulling sweaty hair from her face. "Think about it, Harry. You were raised in a bloody cupboard, for God's sake! I was an only child of two detached, loveless dentists. Dentists, if you didn't know, have one of the highest suicide rates of any profession in the world. My parents were miserable. Do you know Mum actually thanked me for wiping their memories and sending them to Australia? She thanked me after they divorced because when I restored their memories, it made them realize how unhappy they were. She also apologized for doing such a pissy job raising me."

Concerned over the increasing level of anger in her words, Harry reached over and pulled her close. "Where's this coming from, love?"

"Love," Hermione snorted. "That's just it, Harry; what did either of us know about love? Think about it. I've loved you since I was twelve years old and you were only eleven. I loved you, Harry. I would have—and did—anything for you. But because of how we were raised, we never realized what it meant. You were always so passive. That bint last week—I bet she came onto you, didn't she?"

"Well, yeah," Harry said.

"All your girlfriends do, Harry. It was Ginny who came onto you, though you might not have realized it. But she was sending you so many signals even you saw them. And Parvati after you and Ginny broke up just walked right up, kissed you, and said you were taking her out."

Harry grinned. "Yeah." The grin died as Hermione hit him.

"Listen, you prat," she said. The fact that slapping him made her breast jiggle momentarily blanked his mind. "Harry," she said more quietly. "Look at me."

The shift in tone broke his contemplation of her perfect breasts and made him look up. "Yeah?"

"You asked why we didn't hook up sooner? The answer is because we were broken, and never realized we should, or even could."

"And now?"

"We're together because your last girlfriend left you, and mine was using me to get a job," Hermione pointed out. "Did you think we'd be shagging like rabbits when you woke up this morning? It's been over a decade, Harry. We could have had the last decade together, if not for...for."

He stared as she squeezed her eyes shut in frustration and pain.

"I didn't see any of this coming," Harry admitted. Leaning forward, he cupped her cheek and kissed her tenderly. "But now that it's happened, I don't think I could even look at anyone else again, because Merlin strike me down if I don't love you with everything I have."

Hermione blinked back watery eyes. "You'd better, after all the shite I did for you."

Harry laughed before bouncing up and over her. Hermione flattened out onto her stomach with a groan of anticipation. "Like bunnies," Harry said happily.

~~Invincible~~

~~Invincible~~

They married six months later on December 31, 2008, to the cheers and applause of all their friends from Hogwarts and the Ministry. Almost the entire Auror Corps attended the lavish ceremony, while Neville as Harry's best man started off the traditional toast with, "It's about bloody time!"

Harry and Hermione both grinned and blushed at the wild cheers that erupted from their assembled guests at this basic truth that everyone could see but them. Ginny and her current flame were there, as was Ron and his new wife Lavender, and the two clapped as loudly and happily as the others.

~~Invincible~~

~~Invincible~~

Hermione was promoted to Senior Unspeakable in early February of 2009, and her first assignment was to assist the Indian Ministry of Magic with the mysterious die-offs of the Akupara tortoises.

She arrived by International Portkey in the sweltering humidity of Lake Kandgal, within the Bagalkot district of southern India. The first thing that caught her attention was an exquisite temple within walking distance. The second thing that caught her attention was the mountain-sized tortoise that was decomposing on the shores of the lake not fifty meters in front of her.

The smell struck within a heart-beat of her seeing the giant creature, and she had to cast a bubble-head charm to keep from gagging. The Indian Ministry Liaison appointed to assist her was one of a group of witches and wizards casting containment wards over the Akupara, a race of massive turtles that gave rise to many of the Indian creation myths. She saw Hermione and waived, walking toward her quickly.

"Hermione!" Padma Patil said with a smile despite the death on the banks of the river. She greeted her old schoolmate with a hug. "Congratulations on your promotion, and I heard from Parvati that you and Harry finally stopped being stupid!"

"Thanks Padma," Hermione said. Finally the Indian ministry officials completed the containment wards and instantly the air cleared. Hermione dismissed her bubble-head charm and stared at the two hundred meter tall, eight hundred meter long creature—the largest vertebrate on the planet, magical or otherwise. "God, it's so large."

Padma's face sobered. "I know. How does a supposedly immortal being die? That creature was at least four thousand years old. And not just one, this is the third we've found dead. The shamans are claiming it's the end of days."

"It's easy to believe when you see something like this," Hermione whispered.

"Thing is, Hermione, it's not just the Akupara. We found an entire nest of Nagas dead north of Mumbai, and in Rajahumndry, a flight of four Sampati eagles just fell dead out of the sky. Their magic…it was gone. Their bones were ruptured from within, as if something boiled the magic right out of them. We won't know for sure with the Akapara because its bones are so large, but we suspect something similar has happened here."

Hermione stared at her old classmate in horror. "How many species?"

"Come with me to the Ministry, and I'll show you."

Hermione surrendered control to Padma, who side-along Apparated her to the Indian Ministry of Magic building south of New Delhi. The Ministry occupied a former palace of some long lost khan and was more magnificent than anything England could ever boast of. Its golden domes rose high over the mostly flat Muggle neighborhood that had sprung up around it, ignorant of the magically warded structure in their midst.

Visits to places like India were good for Hermione, not because she enjoyed travelling (although she did) but because it was a good way for her to remind herself that Britain was not the center of the Universe. The Indian Ministry of Magic was easily five times as large as the British Ministry, both in terms of space and people, because the Indian population of magicals was easily ten times that of Britain, and in fact larger than all of Europe combined. Because of the crackdowns in China and the violent intolerance for magic in Islamic nations, India boasted the largest magical population in the whole world.

Walking through the vast, gilded halls of the palace, Hermione saw that huge population was terrified. From among the many workers approached an older man in white cotton churidars and Sherwani with a white turban that had the man's wand tucked into it. He bowed to Hermione. "Mrs. Potter, I am Senior Undersecretary Pandit Pradesh, welcome to our humble ministry."

"It is an honor," Hermione said, beaming. "When Padma told me about the wonders of her home, I could never have imagined it was even more spectacular than she described."

"And it is dying," Pradesh said with a tone of despair that made Hermione's heart stop. "Come with me, please."

He led them through the maze of the palace, through multiple lifts and stairs, until they arrived at a vast subterranean cavern. The cavern was lined with runically powered cooling charms that made Hermione shiver when she stepped through the sealed doorway into the cold air.

Her next shiver had nothing to do with the cold. Before her, spread across the cavern floor that stretched several times the square footage of a football field were white sheets covering what she could only guess were bodies. From the size and outline, some of the bodies were human. Beside her, Padma hissed in alarm. "Sir, these are new! How many?"

"The entire village of Tsurtisini fell dead," Pradesh said grimly. "Muggle food animals were unaffected, but any magical creature simply fell dead where they stood. The village was built over a Ley Line. We began looking at other magical enclaves on Ley Lines, and while not as drastic as Tsurtisini, there have been other deaths and severe illnesses, all involving magic. Two young children have been rendered Squibs, though they at least will survive."

Hermione walked to the nearest body in a stupor, leaning down to lift the sheet. Below was an older woman with iron-grey hair. Her eyes were open but sightless and gray, her skin gray while at the back of her head it had begun to turn black as the blood settled. With a glance back at the two others, Hermione removed her wand and began casting both diagnostic and recording spells over the body. Moments later, Padma knelt by the next one—a girl a decade younger than either of them, and did the same using Indian equivalents of the same spells.

"Padma," Hermione said softly, whether from respect for the dead or fear she couldn't say, "are you detecting radiation?"

"Yes," Padma said tightly, in the same soft tone. "Evidence of radiation. The radiation has burned the marrow of their bones completely away."

"That is the case for all the bodies," Pradesh said, obviously having performed the same tests.

Hermione closed her eyes and swallowed. "What could cause this?"

"I know a man who might be able to tell us," the old Indian Unspeakable said. "He is a Muggle, but he is a good scientist who works for the Muggle government. I shall give you his contact information."

"Thank you, sir. I agree, we need to go see him," Hermione said. "Let's go see him right now."

~~Invincible~~

~~Invincible~~

Padma and Hermione arrived by apparition at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics in Koramangala, Bangalore. They arrived on a small lawn surrounded by blocky white buildings. If anyone noticed their sudden appearance, no one commented on it.

"The Ministry has declared this a national emergency," Padma explained as she led Hermione toward the blocky white buildings that made up the Institute. "The man we are looking for has advised both the Muggle and Magical ministries in the past and is one of the few Muggles the Minister for Magic will actually listen to."

It took a brief search to find the desk, manned by students, so that they could make a call to Dr. Satnam Tsurutani. They were told he was in class, but at a flash of Padma's Ministry Badge, which like Hermione's Unspeakable Badge was charmed to show whatever the viewer would take most seriously, the student told them to go right in.

The auditorium where Dr. Tsurutani lectured was large enough to house fifty students comfortably, and it still had standing room only. Hermione noted with some contempt that it was filled with young men only. Hordes of dark eyes turned and stared as the two attractive witches quietly made their way into the lecture.

Tsurutani noted them but did not interrupt his lecture, which was on the particle emissions caused by solar flares. At last, he clapped his hands and said, "And that is enough for today. Thank you; remember your labs are next Tuesday."

His students clapped in appreciation, something that seemed very foreign to Hermione, before making their way out of the room. Almost all of them stared pointedly at Padma and Hermione. When the last was gone, Dr. Tsurutani smiled charmingly and said, "Ms. Patil, it is a pleasure to see you again. And who is your companion?"

"Dr. Tsurutani, it is my pleasure to introduce you to Mrs. Hermione Potter of the English Department of Mysteries. Mrs. Potter was recently assigned to help us with some recent tragedies that have occurred."

"Tragedies?"

"Magical beings are dying," Hermione said without preamble. "The magic appears to literally be boiled out of their bones."

"Most recently, an entire village dropped dead," Padma explained. "Hermione and I were just there, and during the examination of the bodies, we detected what appeared to be radiation."

Dr. Tsurutani stared at the two witches with wide eyes for a long moment before he said, "Come with me. Quietly."

He led them from the auditorium, through a series of narrow halls, until they arrived at a cramped, crowded office lined with full bookshelves and what looked like three networked computers and monitors. "Sit, please," he said.

The two witches took the rickety wooden chairs in front of his desk, while he walked around the desk itself and sat. "Tell me, do you know what effect radiation has on your people?"

"It's not widely published, but there were witches and wizards in Nagasaki," Hermione admitted. "A small magical enclave…" Her eyes widened as she brought a hand to cover her mouth. "Subsequent investigations showed that the entire village died with the first flash of the bomb, even though most Muggles initially survived in their area with burns. Many Muggles later died of radiation poisoning, but the magical enclave was wiped out instantaneously. Dr. Tsurutani, are you suggesting these people were killed by a fission device?"

"No, Mrs. Potter," Dr. Tsurutani said gravely. "They were killed by a fusion device. For the last six months I have been studying a series of massive solar flares that have been shooting microwave radiation into our planet. It has been heating the planet's core, to the point that in areas of thin crust, there has been a liquidation of the crust itself. This village, was it in a valley?"

"Yes," Padma said.

Tsurutani nodded sadly. "I have already informed my friend, Dr. Adrian Hensley, of what is happening. He is a geologist with the United States Geological Survey. The USGS, and the Indian Ministry, have both modeled all available data, and I must say things do not look good."

"What do you mean?" Padma asked.

Hermione, though, was processing what he already said and felt her stomach churning in terror. "God and Merlin," she whispered. "Are the flares going to stop any time soon?"

"We project the flares will continue unabated for another three to four years," Tsurutani said. "And if that is the case…it will be too late when they finally stop."

"I don't understand," Padma said.

"The liquidation of the tectonic plates would result in catastrophic continental displacement," Tsurutani said.

"The end of the world," Hermione translated. "Padma, he's talking about the end of the world."