"Doctor, diagnostics for Subject 757 are complete."
"Classification?"
"Level Two."
"Level Two? You mean to tell me that even at peak potential, he's capped at superficial telepathy and magnetokinesis strictly under fifty kilograms?"
"Affirmative, Doctor. According to our current metrics on the X-Gene, that is his ceiling."
"It seems fusing the genetic templates of Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr to create the ultimate weapon is truly a fool's errand. Terminate this line of inquiry. From now on, shift all resources to the X-24 project. He is the future."
"And Subject 757? Shall we dispose of him like the failed prototypes?"
"Keep him. Quarter him with the other whelps and run him through the standard regimen. He is, after all, a chimera of Xavier and Magneto. Even as a Level Two, he might serve some utility if properly broken."
"Understood, Doctor."
"757! Strike with intent! Go for the kill, don't hesitate, you useless waste of space!"
On the training floor, a hulking instructor, muscles rippling under his shirt, lunged forward with a combat knife. His target was a young man of about seventeen or eighteen, currently fighting for his life.
The youth, Subject 757, used his telekinetic grip to manipulate a floating dagger, clumsily parrying the instructor's strikes while looking for an opening to counter with his fists. But his movements were raw, his judgment clouded by the relentless assault.
Same power, different league, the youth thought bitterly as a blow sent him stumbling. Compared to Magneto, my control is pathetic.
The young man's name was George. He was a transmigrator. Three months ago, he had awakened in this body—an artificial mutant designation known only as Subject 757.
His powers were a watered-down cocktail of telepathy and magnetism. The telepathy was barely functional; it required the target to be completely unguarded to even have a chance of success, and even then, he could only skim surface thoughts, not deep memories.
His magnetism was even more insulting. Currently, he could lift maybe ten pounds. With finesse, it could be lethal, but compared to Magneto lifting entire stadiums? It was the difference between a firecracker and a nuke. Against standard infantry, he might survive. But against heavy hitters like Colossus or the White Queen? He wouldn't even scratch their paint.
His only goal was escape.
Brrrring!
The harsh shriek of the facility buzzer cut through the air. A researcher in a white coat stepped in, halting the session. He approached George and clamped a high-tech collar around his neck.
"Subject 757. Chow time."
"Yes, sir," George replied, his voice deliberately stiff and hollow. He followed the staff member out of the room with practiced obedience.
The collar was a Mutant Inhibitor. The moment it locked, his connection to the magnetic spectrum vanished, leaving him as weak as a baseline human. Except for training and combat drills, the collar never came off.
As he walked down the long, sterile corridor, other doors opened. Staff members escorted other subjects toward the mess hall. Most were younger than him—children, really, no older than twelve or thirteen.
The Marvel Universe, George mused, glancing at the sombre procession. Hell of a place to die.
From the moment his X-Gene manifested, he knew where he was. He wasn't a hardcore lore-master, but he'd seen the movies. He knew the multiverse was vast, and rarely safe. Whether it was Thanos snapping away half of existence or Incursions wiping out entire realities, safety was a myth.
But he was here now. And he intended to survive.
Who doesn't want to live? He loved life. If possible, he wanted to live forever. Some called immortality a curse, watching loved ones wither and die, but George considered that a small price to pay for eternity. Even the First Emperor of his homeland burned the world looking for the Elixir of Life. It was a universal craving.
Based on his observations over the last month, George had pinned down his location. This felt like the timeline of Logan. He had spotted a specific girl among the children—X-23, Laura. She possessed the same healing factor and Adamantium claws as Wolverine.
However, there was a discrepancy. The year wasn't 2029, as it should have been for Logan. It was 2009.
Furthermore, overheard gossip from the guards confirmed the existence of Tony Stark and Captain America in this world. In the Logan timeline, by 2029, the X-Men were history and mutants were nearly extinct. Yet here, Laura looked to be about twelve years old in 2009.
This wasn't the Cinematic Universe, and it wasn't the Fox timeline. It was a divergent reality.
Timelines don't matter, George decided, steeling himself. Events matter.
2029 or 2009, it made no difference. All he needed was for the jailbreak to happen. In the movie, a sympathetic nurse helps the children escape. That chaos was his ladder.
Maintaining his persona of a broken, compliant tool, George ate his dinner in silence and returned to his cell. He lay down, ignoring the camera lens staring unblinkingly from the corner of the ceiling. He had to bury his emotions. Even during training, he held back, throttling his dagger speed and suppressing the true versatility of his powers.
If he looked too dangerous, they'd kill him. If he looked too useless, they'd scrap him. He had to walk the razor's edge.
"Gah—!"
In the dead of night, George woke to a searing pain, as if his soul was being bisected. It was agonizing, but brief.
As the pain receded, it was replaced by a profound, disorienting sensation.
He opened his eyes.
Two distinct fields of vision flooded his mind simultaneously.
One was the familiar, sterile gray ceiling of his laboratory cell. The other was the rotting wooden beams of a cramped, dimly lit cupboard.
He felt his body lying on the facility cot. But he also felt another body—one that responded to his will just as fluidly.
It was like growing an extra limb, only the limb was an entire person. A clone. An avatar.
George closed the eyes of his main body and focused his consciousness on the new vessel. Instantly, memories that weren't his crashed into his mind like a downloaded file.
When the mental dust settled, George could only whisper in disbelief.
"This... this is the Wizarding World. Harry Potter."
The body belonged to an eleven-year-old boy named Dorian. An orphan, Dorian had been picked up from an asylum by a wizard living in Knockturn Alley.
The wizard was no philanthropist. He was a practitioner of the Dark Arts. He had adopted Dorian solely to use him as a guinea pig for potion testing and dark rituals—a disposable lab rat that wouldn't attract the Ministry of Magic's attention like a Muggle kidnapping would.
If Dorian died? An unfortunate household accident.
Furthermore, certain dark curses reacted differently to magical blood than Muggle blood. The wizard needed a magical subject.
Under the wizard's cruelty, Dorian had grown up broken and terrified, living a life worse than a House-elf. His only beacon of hope had been his eleventh birthday—the day the owl would come. Admission to Hogwarts was his escape route.
The letter came. But the dark wizard had no intention of letting his test subject leave.
For Muggle-borns, Hogwarts attendance was mandatory to prevent them from becoming Obscurials—destructive entities born of suppressed magic. But for children of magical guardians, the Ministry was lax. Parents could choose homeschooling, or send them abroad to Durmstrang or Beauxbatons.
When the wizard told Dorian he would never see the inside of a school, the boy's spirit finally shattered. That night, in his cupboard, he drank a vial of poisonous potion stole from the lab.
Dorian died. And George's fractured soul moved in.
"Kid didn't stand a chance," George muttered, processing the grim backstory.
"Accio water."
The thought was instinctive. George felt a parched dryness in his throat—likely a side effect of the suicide potion. He stared at a tin cup on the rickety table and reached out with his mind.
The cup flew into his hand with a metallic clink.
He downed the water in one gulp, then froze.
"Wait."
He looked at his small, pale hand.
"That wasn't a spell."
He hadn't used a wand. He hadn't channeled magical energy. He had used the magnetic field manipulation of Subject 757.
"The powers... they're shared?"
Heart pounding, George shifted his focus back to his main body in the Marvel lab. He probed his internal energy. There, mingling with his X-Gene, was a new, warm current.
Mana. Magic. The innate power of a wizard.
"If the abilities stack..." George's eyes gleamed in the darkness of the cell.
A web of schemes began to spin within his mind.