Admittance to Hogwarts is technically based not on age, but on some whacky magic milestone. It's just that, because its students have all been human, that milestone happens at 11 for all of them. For Immortals it happens after 5000+ years. Methos gets an invitation to Hogwarts, and decides to go because it's something new.

The Marauders' Map is a horcrux of its creators.

The Leverage crew all got killed in the pilot, but they all stuck around as ghosts and don't realize that they're dead. And they're so awesome at acting that they fool everybody, even though normally it takes decades for ghosts to figure out how to affect the physical world or be visible.

And then the Winchesters figure it out.

When Kal-El landed on Earth as a baby, the Kents somehow got Kryptonian powers and the instinctual knowledge of how to use them. Although it's interesting to contemplate how things might be different in the big picture when his powers aren't a unique thing, but rather a family thing, I'm more interested in a random domestic scene where they all...heat up their tea with laser vision, or something, extremely casual about it

Variation on an earlier idea:

After the most recent fun with thieves disguised as terrorists (which could be any of the movies! :D), John McClane gets a new partner. He keeps getting stuck with the undesirables because nobody else can handle his crazy, so it's not really a surprise that he gets stuck with the new guy...who just moved to New York from the UK. How much of the city will be destroyed in the name of saving lives before John McClane and Harry Potter get split up?

Starfleet Academy (well, technically, everybody, but only SFA or possibly just the students remembers it) gets caught in a time loop before all the craziness. Things, um, get a little bit crazy. Especially since it's one of their emergency simulation days and Kirk's in charge.

I've never seen Joan of Arcadia, but I'm pretty sure that she was a nice and normal girl before god started talking to her. What if she wasn't? What if she was more like Dexter, only faking being normal, and holding off on her darker impulses as long as she could because if she could love anybody, she'd love her family?

Somehow, Luke and Leia ended up getting raised by Han (er, might need some age juggling, there) and Chewbacca. And then, they give Ben Kenobi a ride...

Harry Potter isn't the only new student at Hogwarts who was left with relatives as a baby--Luke Skywalker was, too. In the Star Wars universe, not ours; Hogwarts serves only Tatooine.

One of the Highlander characters on Pandora or as a red shirt, getting killed over and over and over again but with no place else to go even if they desert or whatever. Comedy.

Terry being Bruce Wayne's assistant is just a cover story, but this is Bruce Wayne we're talking about; do you really think he doesn't expect Terry to actually do what he's expected to do? Yeah, Bruce covers for him sometimes, does the job instead when nobody else can see, but if he creates the cover story of grooming Terry to take over then he's damn well expecting Terry to learn how to do so. So Terry has to go to meetings and stuff, and take on ever-increasing responsibilities there as well.

I read this summary of a Criminal Minds/Big Bang Theory crossover: "Gideon recruited a different genius to the BAU, and nobody is particularly happy about it." I don't know BBT, but there are so many interesting geniuses that could have been (possibly minus that last part). Personally, I favor Shawn Spencer (who could be interesting in the changes to him from working that kind of case, as well as differences from canon--AU, or preseries with a later 'BAU comes to Santa Barbara' plot). But, since I haven't watched Criminal Minds...*shrugs*

The more you practice magic, the more you have to use it. So...there's somebody who has to use magic. Normally it's not a problem; they just use it for little things throughout the day, most of them not anything that would be noticed even by somebody looking right at them. But then there's something tha prevents them from doing magic: a curse, or they're trapped in a warded house, or something. They're not alone. And because they can't use magic, it builds up in them. The first side effects are small, easily ignored, usually a sign to use magic. Later, they start acting like they're on drugs. If it goes on long enough they'll die.

Sentinels are (and perhaps always have been) known to the public. John Watson awakened as a Sentinel while he was in the Army, where they take a very military approach to things (which is more than a little bit different from things for civilians); he's never experienced life as a civilian Sentinel until he's discharged. His therapist thinks his limp is because he's so traumatized by the death of his Guide. John never told anybody that he never really saw the point of a Guide, since he was so new to being a Sentinel; all of the Sentinel experts insisted that all Sentinels needed a Guide. Just because his Guide never really seemed to do a thing for him (not that the guy was incompetent or anything; he just felt the same with or without the Guide) didn't mean John knew everything. Maybe it was just a subtler effect than he'd been told that it was; after all, he'd never really had any problem with zoning, but maybe that was because he got hooked up with the Guide right away. And certainly, after he returned to London he started to have problems with zoning.

Sherlock refuses to believe that Sentinels need Guides, and from the first day sets out to prove it to John. (Either he's just a normal person or he's a Sentinel who couldn't take a normal job if he wanted to because he doesn't have a Guide...I think I prefer the normal person).

Once John is in "London is a battlefield" mode, his zoning problems disappear completely. Most people don't realize that he's a Sentinel, because he doesn't do obviously Sentinel things like zoning or having a Guide going everywhere with him. Lestrade and Co. realize, because at the first crime scene (and all subsequent ones) Sherlock has no problem ordering him to use his senses. People who do know keep taking him and Sherlock for a Sentinel/Guide pair, to which they keep going "um, no"; Sherlock doesn't have the Guide genes at all, and even if he did he'd be the worst Guide ever.

John can't get a job (at least as a doctor...nobody would care if he was trying to become a janitor or something, but there's liability involved if he zones out during something important) unless he has a Guide. John really doesn't want to put Sherlock down (and there's nobody else he can put down), but if he doesn't he won't be able to get a job. He gets really irritated at that and other ways that civilian Sentinels are treated; he has his senses under control, he doesn't need to be treated like he's going to break if he does things like a normal person. Sherlock treats him like a normal person, which is awesome even if Sherlock's usual way of treating normal people leaves something to be desired.

Sherlock is NOT John's Guide, and he's totally right about (some) Sentinels not needing a Guide.

Methos moves on to his next life, deciding he wants to be a tailor again, and starts up his business somewhere close to some community of mutants. Slowly word gets out to the mutant community that he's good, professional, cheap, and discreet. On the side he teaches a few mutants how to make alterations that aren't covered in sewing books. And then, without warning, he disappears, and the next time anybody sees him he's "Sgt. Lyman".

Harry Potter was raised (with great difficulty) by dragons. No, not around dragons, or by dragon keepers. By dragons. Who are sentient, intelligent, and baffled by humans, but know that, as Harry is a human, they need to raise him in a humanish way: clothes (before he can dress himself, it's very difficult for them, and since he doesn't see other humans except from a distance, his clothes are weird), teaching him human skills (they're not sure which ones are important, so they teach what they've observed and whatever they have books about, and some of it's inaccurate or rare, and they miss some major things), etc. And then, when he turns 11, he goes to Hogwarts.

Okay, so I just read In the Dark (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6373793/8/Toil_and_trouble), and now I kind of want to write something along those lines but extended--starting back in the HP'verse, year 4 when Harry and the horntail met, show how it went AU, and then follow it into the Temeraire verse. But the research...!

Gryffindor!Snape

Before they go through 7 years of being stereotyped for their House while attending Hogwarts, witches/wizards are a lot more balanced. Snape was no exception (as a character who approximates a normal human, you can see elements of all four houses in him even in canon). He wanted to be in Slytherin like his mom, and didn't want to be anywhere near Potter & Black after meeting them before getting to Hogwarts, but the Hat disregarded that and stuck him in Gryffindor anyway, where he was even less able to escape from his tormentors than in canon--thus, he still gets pushed towards joining the DEs, because the smarter, more Slytherin ones realize that they can use him--he's already inventing spells and potions while he's still in school, after all.

But how does being a Gryffindor change him? On the one hand, changing Houses is a pretty big thing; on the other, he's pretty much dead set against having anything in common with the Marauders.

Simba grew up, ruled the Pride, yada yada...and then later he somehow became Aslan. Support:

• Simba and Aslan are both of the Jesus archetype
• both have a noncorporeal father that they talk to
• lions
• both rule over assorted animals, not just lions

The apocalypse comes, and it's even worse than a lot of people are expecting because, hey, in the real world all of the fruit and vegetable plants they sell (including, or perhaps especially, those sold to commercial farmers) are designed to be sterile--as in, after the crop that's currently in the ground gets harvested, if there isn't any more seed to be bought then we're not going to have anything to live off of other than domestic animals and whatever we can find out in the wild.

Wizards cosplaying muggles.

Immortals can only sense pre-Immortals if they have a certain degree of compatibility. So, for instance, if Duncan had been holding some sort of Immortal party when Richie dropped by, only two or three of them would have been able to sense him. This pre-Immortal sense also draws at least one compatible close when it's close to the time for the pre-Immortal's first death. Of course, even with some amount of compatibility, it doesn't always work out well, and after the first death there's nothing to say who's compatible or not, so it's a bit of a crapshoot, but at least there's more of a chance and unscrupulous Immortals can't go around finding all of the pre-Immortals, killing them, and taking their heads.

AU: Buffy is not a cheerleader-type person. Instead, she's a straight-A nerd who is interested in moldy bookage in its own right, not just as a means to saving lives. She may or may not play on the "dumb blonde" image like in canon with people who aren't her close friends, but her in-group won't take long to realize what a nerd she is.

After the apocalypse, most people are freaking out and running in circles like chickens with their heads cut off. Most Immortals don't freak out, just immediately start doing what they know has to be done. Preferably from the POV of Richie or an OC (Richie might be best...or a rotating POV) for contrast.

Mulan & co. get bored of being ancestors, so they recorporealize in the modern day. (which, of course, takes away all of the fun issues of Mulan)

Would preferably involve a lot of annoying the descendants, both on purpose and on accident.

(Hmm, I guess I could do the last part in the Dinosaur verse...suddenly, Mulan shows up at the house of the descendants of one of her adopted kids/one of her friends' descendants. And proceeds to annoy the shit out of them, who are used to thinking of her as an honored ancestor/honorary ancestor.)

Potions Conference

Severus frowned as he surveyed the crowd at the annual International Potions Masters' Guild Conference. Not that he'd be making any other expression anyway, as he would rather be any other place if the Conference wasn't the best (and nearly only) place to learn about the latest potions research, but he had more of a reason to frown this year than in years past.

The Guild had always been more than a little bit of a boys' club, not only because of tradition. The fact of the matter was that the Guildhall was considered a territory of its own, not subject to the laws of any country including the one it was located in. As a potions guild, there was explicitly no limit to what was allowed to be done with potions in the Hall, and pranking was only the least of it. Even the muggles had figured out how to drug a woman to rape her, and the Guild had a tendency to attract the kind of people who had no compunctions about doing that or worse, at least as long as there would be no punishment for it.

Women were targets within the Hall, and every girl who showed much promise in potions knew it. Some few of them braved the Hall to attend the Conference for the three days required to attain their Mastery, but even at his young age Severus had lost track of the number of women who he had seen give up on their dreams and settled for being no-name brewers despite their talent. It didn't matter that he didn't know the woman or that he wasn't a Gryffindor, he'd seen enough people treated as nobody should be in his life. If a warning could save her that, at least he'd be able to do something this time.

She had a drink in her hand already, apparently failing to notice the wide berth that everybody else was giving the provided food and drinks.  Severus hadn't thought that there was anybody who was stupid enough as to not bring their own nourishment—it would still get potioned, but at least it was potioned less that way. She must not have been warned. In a way, that was good; if she wasn't prepared for the dangers, she'd be easier to convince to leave before she got hurt.

As if she'd heard him thinking, or somehow felt him approaching from halfway across the room in the crowd, the woman turned and looked him in the eye. With black, curly hair framing a pretty face that couldn't be older than eighteen, with wide blue eyes, she was in more danger than he'd thought. It would have been bad enough if she'd been hideous, but as it was Severus doubted there'd be more than three people at this conference who wouldn't be targeting her.

"What exactly," he said scathingly, "possessed you to do something so stupid as to come to this conference?"

She widened her eyes in what could almost be passed off as innocence, but Severus had learned the difference between false innocence and the real thing long before he'd begun his teaching career. "What do you mean? I have to attend this conference and present independent research before I can be certified as a Potions Master."

"You know perfectly well what I mean," Severus almost growled, but was careful to keep from showing anything other than his usual demeanor. Even if he could convince the idiot to leave, he'd have to stay, and the best way to make things bad for himself was to piss off the rest of the Potions Masters.

"I-" Before she could finish, a man 'tripped' and spilled the contents of his goblet on her.

Severus winced internally, waiting for the potion to take effect, but the only effects were on the man who tripped. Severus could have sworn he hadn't gotten any of the potion on himself, but he started acting as if he had. A strong confusion and lust potion, obviously, Severus thought, seeing the man writhe on the floor until some opportunist led him off.

"As I was saying," the woman said calmly, dabbing a potion onto where she'd gotten splashed, "I can take care of myself. JJ Sheppard-McKay; call me JJ."

Severus clasped her outstretched hand; it was early to tell, but it seemed at least possible that she would survive the conference, now. "Snape."

Her face lit up. "Severus Snape? Oh, this is so great! I read your paper on aconite interactions, and it sparked off a couple of ideas in my head."

Severus arched an eyebrow; the Potions journals were restricted, with spells that no few people had unsuccessfully tried to break, to being read by Potions Masters only.

Not realizing (or, possibly, not caring) why Severus had raised his brow, the woman continued.  " I think that I'm about a third of the way to figuring out how to allow werewolves to remain in control at the full moon, thanks to your research."

Severus snapped from vague amusement at the woman to sharp interest in what she was saying. "What did you say?"

"I still have no idea how to actually cure them—and that would bring up certain ethical issues that I really don't want to have to deal with, anyway—but I really do think I'm on the right track. And given your research, I think that we could do it faster if we worked together."

Merlin knew that there had been enough half-cracked werewolf cure ideas already, none of which had panned out, but if there was even half a chance that she was right, the faster it was accomplished the better, in his opinion. Much as he hated to give any of Potter's group any credit, even he had to admit that the wolf wouldn't have tried to attack him if he had still been human in there. "Tell me more," he ordered.

In alternate-history Kansas, all of the fields have hedgerows around them. (because in our world there are trees, and they're there for windblocks, right? So why not hedgerows?)

There's a something which is a huge danger because to trap its prey/victims it creates a perfect representation of a place that feels safe & happy to them, with something to help make them believe it. It works better with people who feel very safe most of the time, but almost everybody has a place where they feel safe or that they can be convinced to feel safe in. Naturally distrustful people and people who have learned to be distrustful can pick up the minor glitches within a few hours, when something pings their memory wrong and they start pulling threads and unravel it. So, if you knew this all, and then you saw somebody get whammied and barely pause for a second...wow, must suck to be them.

House elves invented LOLcats.

Nicholas and Perenelle Flamel were targets for most of their lives because of the Stone; it might make them unaging and immune to nearly everything else, but there were still a few ways they could be killed. So whenever they got sick of it, they did their own little witness protection program and set themselves up as new Hogwarts students. This time around, they chose to be James Potter and Lily Evans (which...needs an explanation for Petunia. Still a relative, maybe, but not a sister.). But somewhere along the way, Dumbledore learned who they were, and either set them up or just capitalized on their deaths to steal the stone.