Minor Paradoxes & Major Inconveniences

[MoonyNightShade]

Chapter 1: Is It A Bird? Is It A Plane? No, It's Harry Potter!

Disclaimer:

I don't own the characters or the world appearing in this story. They are creations and property of J.K. Rowling. I'm not sure if I can claim any OCs as my own, so I'll play it safe and dedicate them to her as well.

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Author's Note:

You can find free illustrations for every chapter and read early drafts over at my Patreon!

patreon.com/MoonyNightShade

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The silence was the worst part.

In the months since the wizarding world had been saved—or what was left of it, anyway—silence had become a predator. It stalked the empty corridors of Grimmauld Place, crouched in the corners of his too-large bedroom, and feasted on the space between Ron's booming laugh and Hermione's exasperated sighs. They were trying so hard, both of them, to stitch the world back together with cheerful normalcy and plans for the future. He loved them for it, which only made him feel more like a ghost at their victory feast.

While they talked about Auror training and re-taking their N.E.W.T.s, Harry found himself wandering. He'd Apparate to the cliffside near Shell Cottage or pace the grounds of a Hogwarts still scarred by battle, the silence there thick with the memories of screams. Tonight, he had sought refuge in the one place whose silence was meant to be sacred: the Hogwarts library.

He was deep in the stacks, far beyond the sections any student—even Hermione—would bother with. This was the territory of forgotten theories and banned treatises, where books smelled less of parchment and more of dust and decay. Under the shimmering invisibility of his cloak, he ran a hand along a row of cracked leather spines, feeling restless and adrift. Kingsley wanted him for Ministry press events. Ron wanted him for games of Quidditch. Hermione wanted him to talk about his feelings. Harry wanted none of it. He wanted to feel like the war was actually over, but the quiet it had left behind was just a different kind of battlefield.

A loose flagstone caught the toe of his boot, and he stumbled, his hand shooting out to steady himself against a shelf. The entire section groaned in protest, and one heavy, unassuming tome was jostled free. It fell not to the floor, but backwards, vanishing into what should have been solid wall.

Curiosity, that old, treacherous friend, was the one part of him that hadn't died in the forest. He pulled the cloak tighter and peered into the gap. Behind the row of books was a dark, hollowed-out space, an alcove no bigger than a broom cupboard, clearly meant to be hidden. And inside, sitting on a small stone pedestal, was another book.

This one was different. It was bound not in leather but in what looked like polished obsidian, held shut by two interlocking silver clasps shaped like coiled serpents. Very clearly of Slytherin origin. There was no title, no markings at all. It felt ancient, heavy with the kind of magic that made the hairs on his arm stand up. He reached out, his fingers tracing the cold, smooth surface. It pulsed, faintly, with a cold, rhythmic beat, like a heart made of ice.

He lifted it. The weight was substantial. With a click, the clasps sprang open. Inside, it wasn't a book at all. There were no pages. Instead, recessed into the stone-like material, was a crystalline structure of breathtaking complexity. It looked like an insect, some kind of prehistoric beetle or mite, fossilized in flawless amber. But it wasn't amber. The crystal was humming, glowing with a faint, internal luminescence. And it wasn't a fossil. As he watched, a minuscule leg, thinner than a hair, twitched.

"A Chrono-Mite," he whispered, the name surfacing from an old Hermione rant, something she'd found in an obscure text. Not for travel. For observation. A temporal parasite that could, in theory, let one peer into the past. Insanely dangerous, catastrophically unstable. It was a containment device.

He should have closed it. He should have put it back, walled it up, and told Hermione where to find it. But he stared into the creature's crystalline prison, thinking of Sirius. Of his parents. Of Remus. Just one look. What would he give for just one, fleeting glimpse?

His grip on his wand, tucked into his robe's sleeves, loosened. It was a stupid, thoughtless movement. The wand slipped out, clattering onto the open device.

The reaction was instantaneous and violent.

The world wasn't torn, it shattered. A flash of blinding, white-hot light erupted from the device, swallowing the library, swallowing everything. The sickening lurch of Forced Apparition was a gentle nudge compared to this. His entire being was hooked and dragged through a non-space of screaming, agonizing friction. There was no air to breathe, only a torrent of pure, unrefined time rushing past him.

Images burned themselves onto the inside of his eyelids, too fast to comprehend. A younger Dumbledore, his beard auburn, arguing with a stern-faced man. The chilling sound of Bellatrix Lestrange's laugh, high and girlish. The flash of green light, seen not from his own eyes, but from his mother's. A girl with sharp, intelligent eyes and a contemptuous sneer he'd never seen before, turning her head. The roar of a crowd. The scent of rain on stone.

Then, just as suddenly as it began, it stopped.

For a moment, he knew nothing but the abrupt return of sensation. The overwhelming warmth of a thousand candles. The scent of roast chicken and potatoes. The deafening roar of hundreds of conversations crashing back into existence. And gravity. Gravity, which had been absent, now reasserted itself with a vengeance.

He was airborne. And then he was falling.

The Great Hall of Hogwarts looked exactly the same, yet completely alien. Hundreds of young faces, upturned, mouths agape. A sea of black robes, splashes of house colors. He saw a flash of brilliant red hair—Lily Evans, impossibly young and beautiful—her green eyes wide with shock. He saw a boy with untidy black hair and glasses—James Potter—mid-laugh, his jaw slackening in disbelief. A devastatingly handsome boy beside him, Sirius Black, pointed a fork at him, a wide, incredulous grin spreading across his face.

There was no time to process any of it. He was a human missile, trajectory pre-ordained by a magic he didn't understand. He wasn't aiming for the Gryffindor table, or the space between the benches. His arc was carrying him straight, unerringly, toward the sea of green and silver.

The pandemonium of his arrival was surpassed only by the sheer indignity of his landing.

He crashed onto the Slytherin table with a sound that was a sickening symphony of splintering wood, shattering porcelain, and wet, percussive squelching. A massive tureen of mashed potatoes erupted like a miniature volcano, showering the surrounding students in a hot, starchy rain. A silver jug of pumpkin juice spun through the air, drenching a sneering boy who looked suspiciously like a young Evan Rosier. Salad greens flew like confetti.

His momentum carried him forward, skidding through the culinary wreckage on his stomach. He was a human toboggan on a luge run of gravy and shattered hopes. He slid past a furious-looking Slytherin prefect, past a calm, assessing Severus Snape whose greasy hair was now flecked with parsley, and finally, mercifully, came to a halt.

His face was inches from the stone floor, his body half-on, half-off the table. A piece of wilted lettuce was stuck to his cheek. He was drenched, humiliated, and utterly, profoundly lost. He pushed himself up slowly, his muscles screaming in protest, the silence in the Great Hall now absolute and suffocating.

And that's when he saw her.

He had come to a stop directly in front of a girl who was the very picture of poised, aristocratic perfection. Her black hair was sleek and immaculate, her posture ramrod straight. Even amidst the chaos, she hadn't flinched. She'd been in the middle of a sentence, a delicate, long-fingered hand raised to emphasize a point to the boy beside her.

Now, her hand was frozen in the air. Her eyes, a sharp, piercing shade of grey, were fixed on him. He watched, as if in slow motion, as she tracked the trajectory of a single, thick droplet of brown gravy arcing through the air. It landed with a tiny, obscene splat right in the center of her pristine, perfectly pressed white shirt, just below the knot of her silver and green tie.

For a single, solitary second, her mask of composure vanished. It wasn't anger that flashed in her eyes. It was a flicker of pure, unadulterated disgust, the kind one might reserve for finding a slug in their salad. It was the deepest, most profound revulsion he had ever witnessed.

Then, just as quickly, it was gone. The shock receded, the disgust was locked away, and a new expression clicked into place with chilling precision. Her face became a perfect, beautiful mask of icy, impenetrable contempt. Her lips, which had been parted in surprise, pressed into a thin, dismissive line.

She didn't scream. She didn't shout. She simply looked down at the stain on her robe, then back up at him—this strange, pathetic boy covered in her dinner, panting on the floor at her feet.

"Unbelievable," she whispered, her voice low and laced with venom, meant only for him.

A sharp, authoritative voice cut through the stunned silence like a whip crack. "Mr. Filch, kindly clear this… mess." Professor McGonagall was on her feet, her face a thunderous mask of disapproval.

Dumbledore rose slowly, his own blue eyes no longer twinkling. They were sharp, piercing, and fixed entirely on Harry. There was no anger in his expression, only a terrifyingly intense curiosity.

Pinned by the collective gaze of the entire school, the disgusted glare of the girl in front of him, and the analytical stare of a Dumbledore he did not know, Harry Potter wished, for the first time since the war had ended, that Voldemort had just finished the job.

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The walk from the Great Hall was a unique and excruciating form of torture. McGonagall led the way, a rigid black pillar of fury, while Dumbledore walked beside him, his expression one of placid, unnerving curiosity. Every single student and professor watched them go. The whispers followed them like a swarm of invisible doxies, nipping at his heels. He could feel hundreds of pairs of eyes boring into his back, a mixture of shock and amusement.

But the reaction from the Slytherin table, however, was a far more complex and chilling tapestry. There was derisive laughter from the edges, sharp and mocking, from those who enjoyed the chaos from a safe distance. Closer to the epicenter of the splash zone, where students were dabbing at ruined robes, the looks were of pure, disgusted disdain—personal, acute, and aimed directly at him. But from the older, more powerful students—a young Evan Rosier, a stony-faced Snape, and especially the girl whose robes now bore a prominent gravy stain—there was no amusement at all. Only a cold, reptilian assessment, the kind of stillness that precedes a strike. It was not simple loathing; it was a mixture of outrage, suspicion, and calculation, sizing him up as either a pathetic joke or a dangerous new variable.

As they passed the Gryffindor table, he risked a glance. James Potter wasn't even trying to hide his laughter, covering his mouth with a hand while his shoulders shook. Sirius Black offered him a dramatic, sympathetic wince that was completely insincere, followed by a double thumbs-up behind McGonagall's back. Even Remus Lupin, who looked weary beyond his years, had the ghost of a smile on his lips. Only Lily Evans looked genuinely concerned, her brow furrowed as she watched him pass. The sight of her kind face, so alive and so achingly familiar, was like a physical blow. He snapped his gaze back to the floor, focusing on the rhythmic tap of Dumbledore's boots on the flagstones.

He didn't need to be told where they were going. He knew the path to the Headmaster's office as well as he knew the path to his own dorm room. The gargoyle sprang aside at Dumbledore's crisp, "Fizzing Whizbee," and the moving spiral staircase carried them upward. The feeling of being back in this office, alive and yet not, was profoundly unsettling.

Everything was the same, but different. Brighter. Newer. The silver instruments on the spindly-legged tables whirred and puffed with more vigor. The portraits of previous headmasters were all present, though they feigned sleep with less practiced ease, their eyes cracking open to peer at the strange, gravy-spattered boy. And on his perch, preening a magnificent scarlet feather, was Fawkes. The phoenix met Harry's gaze, let out a soft, questioning croon, and blinked slowly. He looked exactly the same. An anchor in a sea of temporal madness.

"Please, sit," Dumbledore said, gesturing to the chair opposite his desk. Harry sank into it, acutely aware of his damp, sticky clothes and the faint scent of salad dressing that now clung to him. McGonagall remained standing, her arms crossed, looking as if she had personally discovered a troll attempting to teach ballet in her classroom.

Dumbledore settled into his own chair, steepled his long fingers, and peered at Harry over his half-moon spectacles. The twinkle in his eyes was gone, replaced by a calm, powerful intensity. This was not the familiar, eccentric headmaster who had guided him. This was Albus Dumbledore in his prime, a wizard who had defeated Grindelwald and commanded the respect of the entire world. He was terrifying.

"An impressive, if somewhat unorthodox, arrival," Dumbledore began, his voice mild. "One might even say unprecedented. Now, perhaps you would be so good as to tell us who you are, and how, precisely, you came to apparate within the walls of Hogwarts?"

Harry's mind raced. He needed a story. A good one. One that was just strange enough to be plausible in a world of magic. Panic gave way to a cold, hard focus, a survival instinct honed over years of deadly confrontations.

"My name is Hadrian Thorne," he said, his voice a little hoarse. He cleared his throat. "And it wasn't Apparition. Not exactly. It was… an accident."

"Thorne?" McGonagall's voice was sharp. "I've taught every witch and wizard in this country for thirty years. I do not know any Thornes."

"My family values its privacy, Professor," Harry said, latching onto the lie and spinning it out. "We live in… isolation. On a small, unplottable island in the Shetlands." He hoped his geography was right. "We haven't had contact with the broader magical community for several generations."

Dumbledore's eyes narrowed slightly. "A self-imposed exile? That is a path few families choose. And your education?"

"I was tutored privately," Harry continued, gaining a sliver of confidence. The key was to keep the details sparse. "My magical education has been… unconventional. My practical skills have outpaced my theoretical knowledge, I'm afraid. I was practicing a complex transportation charm. An experimental one. I believe I overloaded it."

It was thin. Merlin, it was tissue-paper thin. But it was the best he had.

"An experimental charm that managed to bypass every ancient ward placed on this castle for the last thousand years," McGonagall stated flatly, her disbelief a palpable force in the room.

"Indeed," Dumbledore murmured, his gaze unwavering. "A truly remarkable feat of accidental magic. And your wand, Mr. Thorne? If I may?" He held out a hand.

Harry's heart hammered against his ribs. No. Not that. Never that. The holly and phoenix feather wand was a part of him, but worse, its twin feather belonged to the phoenix on the perch not ten feet away. It was a direct, irrefutable link to a future that shouldn't exist.

"I apologize, Headmaster," Harry said, trying to sound respectful rather than terrified. "But my father has strictly forbidden me from ever allowing another to handle my wand. It's a… a family tradition."

McGonagall made a sound of utter exasperation. Dumbledore, however, simply leaned back, a thoughtful expression on his face. The mental chess game continued in silence. Harry knew he was being evaluated, his story dissected for every possible flaw. He met Dumbledore's gaze directly, channeling every ounce of Occlumency Snape had ever tried to beat into him, creating a surface of calm, confused sincerity over the roaring panic beneath.

Finally, after what felt like a lifetime, Dumbledore spoke. "Well. It would seem we have a conundrum. A young man with no records, from a family we cannot contact, who has appeared in our school through means unknown. We cannot simply turn you out, Mr. Thorne. Until we can verify your story and make contact with your family, it seems the only responsible course of action is to have you join our student body."

Harry's stomach clenched. This was the last thing he wanted.

"Minerva," Dumbledore said, turning to McGonagall. "If you would be so kind as to retrieve the Sorting Hat."

McGonagall looked as though she'd been asked to fetch a basket of Blast-Ended Skrewts, but she gave a curt nod and swept from the room. A few moments later, she returned, holding the familiar, frayed, and filthy hat.

This was it. The one entity in this entire timeline that could shatter his fragile cover story with a single word. Dumbledore placed the Hat on the corner of his desk.

"After you, Mr. Thorne."

With trembling legs, Harry walked forward and picked up the hat. He sat on the stool McGonagall had conjured and placed the artifact on his head. It slipped down over his eyes, plunging him into familiar darkness.

A voice immediately echoed in his mind, sharp and clear. 'Well now, this is a turn up for the books. It has been a very, very long time since I have found a mind so… complicated. Full of echoes. Full of ghosts. And full of a future I should not be ableTo see. What have you done, Harry Potter?'

Harry's mental voice was a desperate, silent scream. 'Please. Don't tell them. You can't. It'll destroy everything.'

'Destroy what?' the Hat mused. 'This reality? Or the one you left behind? The threads of time are tangled around you like a nest of Fwoopers. It is a dangerous thing you are.'

'I didn't ask for this,' Harry pleaded, feeling tears prick at his eyes. 'I just want to go home. Please, just put me somewhere I can stay quiet. Hufflepuff. I'll be a great Hufflepuff, I promise. I'll work hard, I'll be loyal…'

The Hat gave a dry, mental chuckle. 'A Potter in Hufflepuff? My dear boy, you are many things, but you are not built for quiet. There is ambition here, oh yes, enough for Slytherin, if you had not already set your heart so firmly against it. There is a keen mind Ravenclaw would prize. But overriding it all… foolish courage. A recklessness that could level mountains. A talent for finding trouble that transcends even time itself. There is only one place for you. It has to be…'

"GRYFFINDOR!" the Hat shouted to the room.

Hadrian's heart sank like a stone. He pulled the Hat from his head, his hands shaking. Of course. Of course, it was Gryffindor. The universe truly did have a sick sense of humor.

McGonagall, looking profoundly unhappy about gaining another troublemaker, took the hat from him. "Very well, Mr. Thorne," she said, her voice tight with resignation. "Follow me."

The walk to the Gryffindor common room was a silent daze. When they reached the Fat Lady's portrait, McGonagall turned to him, her lips pressed into a thin, stern line. "Wait here."

She gave the password—"Fortuna Major"—and the portrait swung open to reveal a wall of noise and chaotic warmth. McGonagall stepped inside, her presence immediately commanding a degree of attention. "Quiet down!" she called out, her magically amplified voice cutting through the din of the party. The chatter and music sputtered to a halt.

"As some of you already have an empty bed in your dormitory," McGonagall announced to the suddenly silent room, "it will now be occupied. This is Hadrian Thorne. He is a new transfer student and will be joining you as a seventh-year. See that he is… acquainted with the tower." Her tone made it clear that "acquainted" did not mean "interrogated," though she must have known it was a hopeless request. With that, she gave a curt nod and stepped back out, gesturing for Hadrian to enter.

He took a deep breath and stepped through the portrait hole.

It felt like stepping onto a stage. The entire Gryffindor common room was packed, and every single person was staring directly at him. The boy who fell from the sky. The boy covered in gravy. He was already a legend for all the wrong reasons. A wave of whispers erupted through the crowd, his new name spreading like wildfire. Thorne. That's him.

Before he could even process the overwhelming sight of the familiar red and gold room, a crowd of curious older students began to converge on him.

"Is it true you landed right on Vexley's lap?" a tall boy he didn't know asked with a laugh.

"How'd you get through the wards?" another girl, who he vaguely recognized as Marlene McKinnon, chimed in, her eyes wide with curiosity. "No one can Apparate in!"

He was surrounded, a flurry of questions hitting him from all sides. He felt a wave of claustrophobia, his instincts screaming at him to find an escape route.

Then, two figures pushed their way through the throng with the easy, parting-of-the-waters confidence of people who owned the space they were in.

"Alright, give him some air, you lot," James Potter said, clapping Hadrian on the back with a familiarity that made him flinch. He had a proprietary grin on his face, as if he were laying claim to the most interesting new toy. "Can't you see the man's had a rough evening?"

"Thorne, is it?" Sirius Black said, coming to stand on his other side, his grey eyes alight with manic glee. "I don't know how you did it, but that was the best entrance I've seen in seven years at this school. Worth fifty points to Gryffindor, I'd say!"

"And the look on Snivellus's face when that potato hit him!" James crowed, picking up the thread seamlessly. "Pure poetry! You're alright, Thorne. A bit messy, but you're alright."

Harry couldn't form a sentence. He was standing in front of his seventeen-year-old father and his seventeen-year-old godfather, both so vibrantly, painfully alive it felt like staring into the sun. He managed a weak, noncommittal shrug.

"That was quite a fall," another voice said, softer this time. He turned to see Lily Evans approaching, her green eyes—his eyes—filled with genuine kindness. "Are you sure you're alright? You look a bit pale."

He opened his mouth to reply, but no words came out. He was here, in this room, surrounded by ghosts. They weren't just alive; they were happy, carefree, their biggest worries being Quidditch scores and N.E.W.T. exams. They had no idea of the darkness gathering outside, of the fates that awaited them. And he, the sole survivor of their future, was trapped here with them.

The laughter of the common room, the crackling of the fire, the cheerful banter—it all faded into a dull, meaningless roar. He had never felt so completely and utterly alone in his entire life.

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Author's Note:

Hello there, you brave brave soul.

So, you decided to pick up Minor Paradoxes & Major Inconveniences… I thank and wish you well. This is a sort of Marauders fic, a story where Harry Potter gets accidentally yeeted back to 1977. If you're expecting him to meticulously plan how to save the world, you might be in the wrong place. If you're expecting him to stumble into a vicious conflict with a brilliant, ambitious Slytherin that escalates from witty banter to questionable life choices in dark corridors... well then, welcome home.

I hope you're enjoying this story as much as I'm enjoying writing it.

Be warned: this fic contains explicit content, sarcasm, bad ideas fueled by adrenaline, and an ending that might make you want to throw things. We're here for a good time, not necessarily a long time.

Buckle up. It's going to be a bumpy ride.

Just a quick note on what to expect: This is a short, completely planned story, and I'm aiming for about 15 chapters in total. My goal is to update weekly, with the next chapter planned for Friday, July 25th, 2025.

Thank you so much for your time and support!

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You can find free illustrations for every chapter and read ahead over at my Patreon!

patreon.com/MoonyNightShade

 

[Maragas]

Looks to be fun. I have a soft spot for HP time travel stories. (I hope you are posting on other sites like Ao3, non-NSFW Creative Writing on this forum doesn't get that much attention)

 

[MoonyNightShade]

Looks to be fun. I have a soft spot for HP time travel stories. (I hope you are posting on other sites like Ao3, non-NSFW Creative Writing on this forum doesn't get that much attention)

Click to shrink...

Great, I love time travel fics as well! I am posting on other sites, including ao3 and ffnet, thanks a lot for the consideration.