So, I changed this story because I didn't like some things about it. In this story, there's no 'FemHarry ends up in another world' thing – the HP characters are already in the Daredevil/Defenders world, in a true crossover. But there's no wizarding world here, no HP-magic. But characters (or 'variants' of HP characters, I should say) will appear in this story (not the entire cast though, obviously – lots of familiar faces though).
FemHarry will replace Jessica Jones (Jessica's parents never died in a car accident, she never was experimented on by IGH and she was never 'adopted' by Trish's mother, though they both exist in this world, just not in the 'roles' we know them as; Trish and Jessica don't know each other and Trish kept being an actress, she doesn't have a talk show) and Elektra Natchios in a way as well (but not really; still, there's no Elektra Natchios in this world, she doesn't exist); In fact, lots of HP characters will replace minor Marvel canon characters of the shows.
Also, in this story Narcissa and Sirius are siblings, not cousins. FemHP was adopted by Sirius at 11, after the Dursleys died. In fact, Sirius is FemHP's biological father. He and Lily had a relationship when they were young, Lily got pregnant and Sirius abandoned her. Lily gave birth to FemHP but she left soon after and FemHP grew up with the Dursleys until they died when she was 11, in a car accident.
FemHarry will replace Karen's role as well, mostly only in the pilot episode and the investigative stuff that Karen gets involved in (FemHP's a P.I. after all), but she won't work at Nelson & Murdock as a secretary; but she will collaborate with with N&M. But Karen will still be the office manager/paralegal/secretary at Nelson and Murdock.
(BTW, I really love these characters, especially Jessica and Elektra, but it's necessary for this story and the way I plan to twist canon events to fit my story. You'll see).
I also changed slightly the time setting of HP. FemHarry is born the 31st of July, 1985 instead of 1980. Matt is born in 1982, so they're 3 years apart. FemHP is almost 30 when the story starts, Matt is almost 33.
By the way, I imagine FemHarry to look like Barbara Palvin (though curvier in the chest department and with emerald green eyes). Also, I imagine Hermione to look like Nathalie Emmanuel, Draco to look like Will Tudor, Neville as Jake Abel and Luna as Emily Kinney.
This story will follow, in order, season1 of Daredevil and season1 of Jessica Jones pretty much at the same time, season2 of Daredevil, some elements of season2 of Jessica Jones and season1 of Iron Fist pretty much at the same time, then the Defenders events, and, finally season3 of Daredevil and Jessica Jones pretty much at the same time.
This story will ignore the events of Luke Cage season1 and 2 (they still happen but in the background and they won't be mentioned in this story). Basically this story will take place between Hell's Kitchen and Manhattan (mostly in Hell's Kitchen though).
Also, warning, MENTIONS OF PAST RAPE/NON-CON (mind-control stuff, you know, like in canon with Kilgrave – but different), PTSD and child abuse (Dursleys stuff like in canon) but nothing graphic. Also mention of human experimentation.
Anyway, read and review! Tell me what you think!
Chapter 1
8th January 2015, The Docks – Hell's Kitchen, NYC
Rose observed from her position, lying flat on top of a shipping container, the thick shadows around her and her black outfit hiding her presence, two Russian men dragging four girls – one for each arm – towards another container. There were two other men there, one black man standing in front of the open container that she recognized as Turk Barrett – usually a petty criminal but he was rising in the world, it seemed – the other sitting on a chair, eating a sandwich.
If only she had known her latest case involved the Russian mob, she wouldn't have taken it.
But she knew she was only lying to herself. Of course, she would have taken it, her reckless nature and her damn need to play the hero, wouldn't have allowed for anything else.
Not even himhad been able to squash it out.
She hated her powers because of everything they reminded her of, but she had them and she could use them to do good. Perhaps she was already damned, a monster, but at least she would become the monster the other monsters feared.
It had all started that morning when a young woman, Martha Nielsen, had showed up at her door. She had wanted to hire Rose to find her missing friend and roommate – and colleague as well – Sasha Kirova, a young Belarusian woman who had moved to the USA two years ago. Sasha Kirova had been denied the renewal of her Visa so she was technically in the USA illegally. That meant that Martha couldn't go to the police for help in finding her friend. Hence why she had chosen to hire a P.I. instead.
Sasha worked as a waitress in the same place as Martha – in fact, Martha had been the one to help her find the job – but yesterday morning she hadn't shown up at work though she had left her house at her usual hour. And she hadn't returned home that night either. A whole day and night she had been missing. No phone calls, no texts – her phone went straight to voicemail every time Martha had tried to call her.
Rose's method of finding missing people was rather…unusual to say the least. People thought her a psychic and she had never contradicted them.
But she wasn't a psychic, she was a fucking lab experiment. One of the two 'lucky' children who had survived that place – Project Black Sky, that was what I.G.H. had called it. And then she had been rescued. But her rescuers hadn't done that out of the goodness of their hearts. No, their intent had been to exploit her abilities and that of the other surviving child to turn them into soldiers for some kind of mystical war she still didn't understand nor she did want to. Until she had escaped. She had left Neville behind though – she had no other choice – but she felt that remorse every day. Was he even still alive? Would Rose ever see him again?
Her abilities had saved her that day but she still was far from glad to have them.
Rose's method of finding missing people was just one of her powers. When she touched an object – an object of personal significance to the missing person – she would get visions of that person. Those visions were always violent in some way, filled with fear and pain. But they were still able to pinpoint to where the person was, or at least where she had been when she had felt those emotions. As long as that person was alive and still in New York City, Rose was always able to find them.
Martha had brought her Sasha's silver dolphin necklace, the one her mother had given to her on her sixteenth birthday. And when Rose had touched it, she had received a vision of Sasha inside a black van, her hands and feet tied and tape on her mouth – and with her a dozen other girls. The vision had shown her the plate of the van and she had been able to track it. From there she had just followed it until it had stopped at the docks.
So, here she was now, donning a cotton spandex catsuit, leather gloves, knee-high flat boots and ski mask to cover her face, leaving only her eyes uncovered, – she was wearing dark contact lenses to hide the distinctive color of her eyes – her hair styled into space buns, left uncovered by two additional holes in the ski mask, on top of her head. Comfortable, practical, easy to move in. And able to hide her identity.
She looked like a cat burglar or a vigilante, but it was better than be recognized by people that worked for the fucking Russian mob. She was reckless, not stupid.
"Help! Help! Help me! Help! Help me!" one of the girls screamed.
"Hey! Hey! Man, shut up. I'm getting $1,000 a head for y'all. So, you be quiet I let you have a bucket," Turk was saying, a bucket in his left hand. "You don't…" he threatened, holding a taser stick with the other hand.
"No. Please, no," the woman kept pleading.
Turk used the taser on the woman to shut her up. The Russians threw the women inside the container and Turk laughed. "Scream all you want. Come on, let me hear you scream. Scream loud. Nobody gives a shit down here."
Rose decided that was her clue. She was just about to intervene when a man dressed all in black with a black mask covering his eyes jumped from one of the other containers – how did she miss his presence there? – and punched Turk squared in the mouth. Turk fell down and lost his taser.
"The hell…?" Rose muttered to herself, but decided it was time for her to join the fight, she had remained watching long enough.
The man in the mask was fighting one of the Russians so Rose took on the other.
After a quick exchange of kicks and punches, the man fell on his knees. One final kick to the head brought him down, unconscious.
The man in the mask knocked down his opponent as well, breaking his leg. He turned around and tilted his head in her direction, mouth now open but before he could say anything, Turk retrieved his gun. He pointed it alternatively at both of them, seeming undecided on whom to shoot. He decided on the man in the mask, at last, – probably considering him the bigger threat – and Rose heard him pull the trigger.
"Watch out!" she shouted but there was no need. The man leapt out of the way of the bullet with an impressive somersault before jumping between containers with an agility that Rose was convinced was superhuman like hers.
Rose knocked the gun out of Turk's hand with an axe kick. Before she could hit him again the man in the mask, who had retrieved the taser Turk had lost, used it as a baton; it bounced with incredible precision from container to container, until it finally struck Turk, knocking him down again.
The man in the mask retrieved the stun baton from the ground and used it to hit the man in the chair, making him fall into the water.
Rose approached the container, her questions about the man in the mask having to wait for the moment. "Who among you is Sasha Kirova?" She asked in Russian.
A girl with long, blonde hair and vivid, blue eyes, raised her hand as if she were in class.
"Your friend sent me to look for you," she explained, still in Russian, before switching back to English though her voice was lower and huskier than her usual voice to disguise her identity, her words directed at all four girls. "You're free now. Go!"
The girls just looked at her, still frozen in fright.
"Head towards 48th. Stay in the lights," the masked man, now standing next to her, told the girls. "Flag down the first officer you see."
When the girls still didn't move, the masked man smacked the side of the container, shouting, "Now!"
The girls scattered away immediately.
"Who the hell are you?" Rose asked, staring at the man in the mask in disbelief.
His mouth turned into a crooked grin before he answered "You don't really think I'm going to answer that, do you?"
And to be fair, he was right. A man who went around beating criminals, using a black mask to cover half his face, wanted to keep his identity a secret, especially to someone he had barely met.
His voice was raspy but warm. It was a rather sexy voice, Rose couldn't help but think, and the rest of him wasn't any less attractive: well-defined jawline, slight stubble on his cheeks, full mouth, straight, white teeth, and lean but muscled body underneath his black outfit. And the air of danger and confidence that he exuded only served to make him more attractive.
While they were distracted by each other, Turk retrieved his gun. Before he could fire it, Rose jumped on him in an inhumanly fast movement, like a cat on a prey, left foot landing hard on the wrist that held the gun – she was rather sure she had broken it. She knocked him unconscious with a well-placed kick to the face.
"Who are you?" he asked her, sounding impressed. He didn't sound winded in the least.
"You don't really think I'm going to answer that, do you?" Rose threw his words back at him.
He sent her a smirk in answer. "Touché," he conceded.
"This was fun and all, but let's not do it again, yeah?" Rose said then.
The man kept smirking, looking amused. He tilted his head again – a gesture she was starting to recognize as something he did when he was listening for something. He nodded in farewell at her, before hopping over one of the containers. He started running and, in a few moments, he was gone.
Rose shook her head, puzzled and intrigued at the same time. Then, with a shrug – the shadows thickening around her until she was completely engulfed in it – she disappeared into thin air.
10th January 2015, Nelson & Murdock Law Office – Hell's Kitchen, NYC
Matt was emptying the boxes in his office when he heard the phone ring in the other room.
"Hey, buddy," Matt heard Foggy pick up the phone in his office.
"Homicide," Matt recognized the voice on the other line as belonging to Brett Mahoney, the cop Foggy had 'bribed' earlier with cigars for his mother. "Female suspect found at the scene. Definitely qualifies as interesting."
"She's been charged yet?"
"Assistant DA hasn't made the call yet."
"Do you have a name on the suspect?"
"Yeah. It's Evans. Rosalie Evans."
10th January 2015, Interrogation Room, 15th Precinct Police Station – Hell's Kitchen, NYC
Rose sat in the interrogation room of the Hell's Kitchen police station, her hands cuffed to the desk – as if they'd be enough to hold her if she really wanted to escape.
She was a failure and she had gotten her client killed after she promised she would help him.
Daniel Fisher didn't deserve this. It was all her fault. She should have been more careful. How didn't she notice they had been followed?
The door opened. Four men entered the room – the two detectives that had arrested her and two men she didn't know.
"Okay, can we please take the handcuffs off the 110-pound woman?" A blond, chubby man asked the detectives.
If you only knew this 110-pound woman could snap you like a twig, you wouldn't say that, Rose thought with a misplaced sense of resentment.
His companion, a handsome, brown-haired man with red glasses obscuring his eyes, and a cane – blind, then – followed him inside.
"Miss Evans, can you tell me who these men are?" one of the detectives asked her.
Rose didn't answer. I would like to know the same thing.
"We're her lawyers," the handsome one said. "Uncuff our client and give us the room, please."
There was something familiar about him – in his voice, in the way he moved and in the lower part of his face, his jawline, his mouth – but she couldn't remember ever meeting him before. And she would definitely remember meeting someone who looked like that.
One of the detectives uncuffed her. "Thank you, Detective," the handsome lawyer said – and then both detectives left the room.
"Miss Evans, my name is Matthew Murdock. This is my associate, Foggy Nelson. Do you mind if we sit down?"
Rose shrugged, keeping her face void of expression.
"She gave a vague shrug," the blond man – Foggy Nelson – said. "I say we go with it."
"We understand you're in some trouble," Murdock said, once he and Nelson had sat down. "We, uh, may be able to help."
"Can you tell us what happened?" Nelson asked her.
Rose kept mum.
Nelson sighed at her stubborn silence. "Why don't we start with what we know, then? You were found in your apartment with one Daniel Fisher."
"Who appears to be the victim of a homicide," Murdock continued for his colleague. "And currently, you're the only suspect, Miss Evans."
"Okay, one – who the hell are you? And two, who sent you?"
Murdock smiled at her, a cocky, lopsided smile that suited him very well.
Even that smile looked familiar. Huh, this was going to drive her crazy.
"I'm Matt," Murdock said, before pointing at Nelson next to him. "He's Foggy. And, as for, who sent us. No one sent us."
"So, what? You're just a couple of Good Samaritans? Today's just my lucky day?" She scoffed.
"I bribed the desk sergeant with a box of cigars for his mom," Nelson explained.
"Our practice is relatively young, Miss Evans, and we are aggressively pursuing new clientele," Murdock said before addressing Nelson. "You gotta stop giving Bess cigars."
"She likes to smoke, Matt. It's a free country."
Rose observed them, a little bewildered. They were clearly friends as well as colleagues, she could tell from their banter. Perhaps, what they had told her was the truth. Perhaps, they were simply looking for a client to represent, nothing more, nothing less.
If that was true, then, she found it strange that they hadn't chosen someone easier to represent, someone who didn't look as guilty as she did – someone whose innocence would be easier to prove.
She didn't trust lawyers, as a rule. They were just a step below politicians in her list of categories of people she didn't trust, and one step above journalists. Mostly because, instead of being interested in defending innocent people, they always cared more about making money. Most lawyers would represent the most awful human beings on the planet, as long as those awful human beings would be able to pay them.
"So, how long have you been practicing law?" Rose asked them.
Murdock grinned and asked Nelson, "what time is it?"
Nelson checked his watch. "It's 12:22 AM."
"About seven hours," Murdock answered, turning in her direction.
Nelson scoffed. "Well, if you go from when we passed the bar…"
"I was going from when we got our own desks."
Nelson nodded at Murdock's words. "Oh, then, yeah. Seven hours."
Rose widened her eyes. "You've never done this before?"
"If you were to hire us, then, yes, you would be our first client."
Rose didn't verbally answer in the affirmative but she had to admit she was impressed. There were very few lawyers who would take on a case such as hers with so little experience – the risk was just too great for their new firm's reputation.
Murdock took her silence for assent and asked her, "tell me, how did you know Mr. Fisher?"
"I didn't," Rose answered, without really elaborating.
"You didn't know him?" Nelson asked her, sounding skeptical.
Rose shrugged. "Not really, no. I met him a few days ago—" not a lie, "and he asked me out for drinks—" also not a lie, technically. "We met a total of three times. I didn't know much about him, except his place of work and that he had moved to the city recently. He was single, didn't really know anyone in the city except for his co-workers and not that well either." All of that was true and yet, of course, it wouldn't really tell them anything.
But she couldn't tell them the truth, it would only put these two lawyers, who seemed like genuinely good people, in danger – also, she wasn't 100% sure she could trust them so it was better they knew as little as possible; after what had happened to Daniel Fisher, she had no intention of being responsible for someone else getting hurt or killed.
Nelson pulled a notebook out of the pocket of his jacket, ready to take notes. "Ok. And what was Daniel Fisher's place of employment?"
"Union Allied Construction. He worked in the finance department. He was an accountant there."
"And what about your place of employment?" Murdock asked her.
"I work from home," Rose said, once again technically not lying.
"And what happened yesterday?"
"I met with him at the Three Roads bar, on 49th Street, at 10 pm, give or take. We had a few drinks and then…" Rose raised her hands in the air. "The next thing that I remember is waking up on the floor of my apartment covered in blood. His blood." At the lawyers' meaningful silence, she added, "Look, I'm not stupid. I know how this sounds. But it's what happened. We met at the bar. We had a few drinks and I have no idea what happened after that. I only know that it wasn't me.
"Someone is clearly going out of their way to make it seem like I did, though. They must have drugged my drink or something, it's the only thing that makes sense." They had caught her off-guard, whoever they were. And it must have been a potent drug too or a very heavy dose, since, with her accelerated metabolism, drugs and alcohol wouldn't really affect her in the way they normally would a woman of her build.
She deserved to go to jail, she knew that, but if they arrested her for this murder, nobody would bother looking for Daniel's real killer. If everyone believed her guilty, Daniel's murderer would remain unpunished. "I swear I didn't kill him."
Murdock nodded. "I believe you, Miss Evans."
10th January 2015, Nelson & Murdock Law Office – Hell's Kitchen, NYC
"I'm friends with Gary Feinstein in the DA's office. I'll give him a call first thing in the morning, see where their heads are at," Foggy said, walking up and down the office, a ball in his hand he would throw in the air and then catch again. "I'm guessing they're gonna puff their chests, but they have to know murder two's a risk. We end up at manslaughter, we get the right judge, - maybe she's out in five to 10."
Matt shook his head, hands on his hips to emphasize his unmovable stance on the situation. "We're not taking a deal."
"No, this is why they have deals, Matt," Foggy protested. "So, the straightforward cases don't waste everybody's time."
"I don't think she did it." Matt knew she didn't. Rosalie Evans was innocent. He heard her heartbeat, strong but steady, when she swore she didn't kill Daniel Fisher – she was telling the truth. Not that he could tell Foggy that. Therefore, someone was trying to frame her. But who? And why?
Matt heard Foggy stop his pacing. He shook his head in exasperation, blond locks slapping his cheeks. "She's the sole suspect, found at the scene, covered in blood, with the murder weapon and no defensive wounds. If they offer anything it'll be a gift, and we will take that gift. We do not want this to go to trial."
"They don't want this to go to trial, either. Why hasn't she been charged yet?"
"They have 24 hours. And it's the weekend. They're gonna take every last second to collect the evidence before they move."
It was Matt's turn to shake his head, denying his friend's words. "They've got the evidence. You just laid it out yourself. This is a good arrest, Foggy. We should already be reading about it in the papers. There's something not right about this case. I can feel it."
"You can feel it?" Foggy's words brimmed with skepticism and something else he couldn't identify. Matt frowned in confusion.
"All right, I'm just gonna say this once, and we can move on," Foggy said. "You don't necessarily show the best judgment when beautiful women are involved, Matt."
"How would I even know if she's a beautiful woman?" Matt immediately replied, though, of course, he knew Rose Evans was beautiful. Beautiful and dangerous.
He had recognized her immediately as soon as he had stepped foot into the precinct that morning. That scent – even amongst all the other smells in the busy precinct – had lingered. Sea breeze, lemon and rose water. Delicious, intoxicating, lingering on his tongue every time he'd take a breath until he could taste it.
It was her, the woman he had met as his other self at the docks. The woman he hadn't stopped thinking about since then.
That encounter had left him confused, intrigued, suspicious but most of all excited, almost exhilarated. It had been brief but it had certainly left a mark.
And now that same woman had been accused of murder and he had become her lawyer. She didn't seem to have recognized him and for that he was grateful. Perhaps it was a little unfair, he knowing her name while she didn't know anything about him, but he couldn't say he felt at all guilty for it. It wasn't like he had deliberately planned to discover her identity.
Matt would have taken such a case anyway, whoever the accused was, but knowing that it was her, of all people, he couldn't pass the chance up of discovering more about her, unravel the mystery that she represented.
Though, of course, he couldn't tell Foggy any of that.
"I don't know," Foggy answered his question, bringing Matt out of his thoughts. "It's kinda spooky, actually. But if there's a stunning woman with questionable character in the room, Matt Murdock's gonna find her and Foggy Nelson is gonna suffer."
Matt chuckled. "All right, I don't disagree with anything you're saying."
"Thank you," Foggy said.
"But I need you to back me, anyway," Matt continued, almost speaking over Foggy.
Foggy groaned, the sound muffled by his hands. "All right. Fine. Let's start with the obvious, then. If she didn't do it, who did? We're dead in the water if we don't give them an alternative."
"Agreed," Matt said, happy he had convinced Foggy to see it his way.
"We need to take another run at our client," Foggy continued. "She may not be guilty, Matt, but that doesn't mean Miss Evans is telling the truth."
Oh, Matt knew for certain she wasn't telling the whole truth. That made him even more determined to figure out all her secrets.
10th January 2015, Jail Cell – Hell's Kitchen, NYC
Rose was lying in her prison bed, feigning sleep. She heard the door of the cell opening. She remained immobile, on her side, her eyes closed, waiting.
A hand covered her mouth, to stop her from screaming, while a figure got on the bed, poised over her, attempting to strangle her with a bed sheet rope. "I'm sorry," the man attacking her said.
Rose fought back, kicking her assailant in the ribs and poking him the eye, using just enough of her strength to set herself free but without revealing any of her superhuman abilities. The man was startled enough to let her go.
"Help," Rose screamed. "Help me!"