Non-Crossovers that Should Be, or Plotbunnies Free to Good Home

[The Wanderer]

I keep coming up with non-crossover fanfic ideas that I'd really like to see done, and would like to share in any case - but I don't remotely have the ability to write most of them, and since they aren't crossovers (which could go in the CTSNB/CTSMB threads), I haven't had anywhere to post them. So I thought I'd make one.

Some of these are definitely more complete than others. Some aren't even real story ideas; they're more plot elements, or even plot devices, than anything else.

I know I've got at least half a dozen ideas floating just under the surface, and I'll be posting them when and as I remember them and can put them into words; there will probably be more over time. If this thread winds up being just me dumping the detritus of my mind out for all to see, oh well, at least it's out there somewhere; if anyone else has anything to share, please do.

[The Wanderer]

Let's start out with a "fill in the blanks of canon" series, set in the backstory of a fandom that doesn't get much fanfic, probably told as a series of short stories. It's an episodic chronicle of the day-to-day work of a pair of brothers named Edward and Theodore, working in partnership as private investigators, specializing in what is almost certainly one of the most unusual communities/subcultures their world has to offer.

From the Casefiles of Valiant and Valiant

(I originally came up with this back before I discovered fanfic, and possibly before there was a publicly-accessible Internet, as an idea for a TV series - but that's almost certainly never going to happen, especially without the original actors and voice actors being available.)

[The Wanderer]

Another "fill in the blanks from the backstory" piece, this one from Firefly. It focuses almost exclusively on Simon Tam, and is told as a series of more- or less-disconnected scenes.

It begins in his early life, when he is still his parents' only child. It shows us the innate brilliance that led him to be recognized as "gifted", and the founding layers of his relationship with his parents, childhood friends, and so forth. It shows us a few scenes here, skimming along rather than going into too much detail, until the time where he first hears the news: he's going to have a little sister.

It covers his initial reactions to that news, and to the later birth (River's birthdate isn't clear AFAIK, but he would have had to be at least four at the time), and to the discovery that River's genius not only rivals but overshadows his own - and then it shows the relationship between them, and his development into one of the most devoted brothers fiction has ever seen.

It covers his decision to go away to medical school at the age of sixteen or seventeen, shows elements of his life there, and then of his phenomenally quick post-graduation internship. It probably also covers his and his fellow interns' ill-remembered drunken post-internship "we're finally licensed surgeons!" party, though that may be best left at least partly to the imagination; regardless, it goes on to cover his acceptance as a surgeon at a major hospital, and the beginnings of his working life.

It covers the point where River went (and/or was sent) away to boarding school, and the correspondence Simon carried on with her while she was there - both the early (presumably genuine and unwarped) letters, and the later misspelled and factually inaccurate ones.

It covers his observation that those letters were odd, his realization what that meant, his deciphering of the code, and his reaction to the coded message. It covers his attempt to tell his parents about it, and their reaction, and his reaction to that.

It covers his decision to go find her and get her out, and his two-year quest to do that, including at least one arrest. It covers his interactions with the group who promise to be able to smuggle her out to him, and his own role in the rescue itself.

It covers his escape and flight, with River in tow, and their early days evading the Alliance, with a warrant out on Simon's head.

And it ends either shortly after, shortly before, or just as he first boards Serenity.

[The Wanderer]

It is the night of Halloween, 1981, in a house in the small town of Godric's Hollow, and the events which are unfolding are soon to become famous - despite few of the details being known. Let us examine some of those details more closely.

Lord Voldemort casts the killing curse, and his already damaged soul begins to tear. The curse strikes home, ripping James Potter's soul from its body; his life is snuffed out.

Shortly afterward, Lord Voldemort casts the killing curse again, and the tear in his soul widens. The curse strikes home, ripping Lily Potter's soul from her body; her life is snuffed out.

Mere moments afterward, Lord Voldemort casts the killing curse once more - and a piece of his own soul rips free, to be carried along with the curse. The curse strikes the protection of a desperate mother's sacrifice and rebounds upon its caster, jarring the infant Harry Potter's soul loose from its moorings.

The rebounding curse strikes home, ripping the remainder of Lord Voldemort's soul from its body, and somehow destroying that body in the process (a matter worthy of some attention on its own).

The loose fragment of Voldemort's soul, seeking an object to house it as other such fragments have already been housed, embeds itself within the first thing to hand: the body of Harry Potter.

Harry Potter's own soul, recovering something like a normal equilibrium, returns to its proper place - but with the fragment of Voldemort's soul already in residence, there is not, quite, enough room.

It settles in anyway, but due to the lack of space, cannot quite fit entirely back within Harry's body.

As a consequence, Harry will go through life with his soul extending just slightly beyond his body, and somewhat less securely attached than is usual.

What effects this may have on him, on his magic, and/or on those around him is undetermined; the answer to that question is left as an exercise for the reader. (Or, as the case may be, the author.)

(I originally came up with this as a possible explanation for a super!Harry idea - which I'll post eventually, once I manage to write it up to my own satisfaction - but it could be applied as an explanation for many other things than the one I designed it for, and could serve as the seed of a fair variety of stories.)

[Black Aeronaut]

Hmmm... recently watched Studio Ghibli's offering of The Borrowers (or, as they call it, The Secret World of Arrietty). Rather bittersweet end, I think, and it led me to do a bit of research.

And now I am sorely tempted to write up some shorts about Arrietty's descendants and how they befriend a youngster in a military family (always traveling, never much time to make friends). Simply put: Borrowers in modern day with nomadic human family. Getting through US airports and customs is fun.

[The Wanderer]

(I'm not especially happy with this write-up of this idea, but it's better than any other I've managed to come up with so far.)

A common plot element in Harry Potter fanfic is for Harry to inherit great power, of one sort or another; sometimes it's political, sometimes it's financial, sometimes it's magical, sometimes it's a combination of the above. The inheritance is sometimes by literal line of descent, through one or both parents (and/or Sirius Black), and sometimes by way of magic - "child of prophecy" or some other such. In many cases, this power is of sufficiently staggering magnitude that not much can ultimately stand against it.

An even more common plot element in Harry Potter fanfic is for Headmaster Dumbledore to be scheming and manipulative to an extreme degree.

In fics which use both of these plot elements, Dumbledore generally is power-hungry, more or less runs the wizarding world (to some degree or another) from behind the scenes, and hides the existence of Harry's inheritance from him - often with the goal of stealing it for himself.

In such fics, Harry's less than entirely pleasant childhood and the "shouldn't Dumbledore have been able to prevent this?" mishaps and adventures at Hogwarts are fairly often arranged intentionally, by Dumbledore, as a way of trying to keep Harry beaten down and cooperative or at least ignorant.

Despite this, in most cases, after Harry discovers his inheritance and puts it to good use against his problems (often including Dumbledore at that point), he almost universally turns out to have developed into the rare sort of person who can safely be trusted with the enormous power he has inherited - the sort of person who can have it, even wield it, but not succumb to the temptation to abuse it.

What if that was exactly the goal?

Imagine a scenario in which Harry is going to be heir to even greater power than usual - vast wealth (sufficient to topple nations if used properly), noble titles (or otherwise significant historical ancestry) and the associated political influence coming out of his every orifice, magical power and/or talent fit to outmatch any wizard since at least the Founders if not Merlin, yadda yadda yadda.

Very early on (quite possibly before Harry is born), Dumbledore puts the various pieces together and discovers this fact, and realizes that no one and no group of someones could stand against Harry once he comes into that power. (Not counting people who would already be on his side, whether from the political influence or the wealth or whatever else.)

Rather than deciding to try to prevent Harry from inheriting that power, Dumbledore draws on all his own power, all his skill, and all the experience gained over his long lifetime, and sets out to shape Harry's life so as to mold him into someone worthy of being trusted with that kind of power.

This probably involves hiding the fact of the inheritance from him, among many other things; it may well not resemble the events of canon all that closely. (The end result of a realistic plan in that direction probably wouldn't, but for fanfic purposes it's nicer if we at least sort-of stick to the known lines, and Harry's canon childhood does seem to have done a surprisingly good job in that regard - though not necessarily a good enough one for this context.)

Harry does eventually discover the fact of his inheritance, and gain all of the power to which he is heir, and discover that Dumbledore has been manipulating him and those around him his entire life - and he's very possibly quite angry about that.

But by that point, Dumbledore's plan has worked. Harry has become the sort of person who can safely be trusted to hold that kind of power without abusing it (at least not in ways that actually hurt anybody).

Dumbledore knew that the truth would have to come out eventually, and when Harry confronts him about it, views his own death - or his life, with whatever retribution Harry may visit upon him personally - as a price he is quite willing to pay in exchange for that fact.

I've got fragments of a scene in my head (told completely in the lines spoken by Dumbledore, for some reason) of Harry, and probably his friends, confronting Dumbledore about this in the Headmaster's office. Unfortunately I don't have any details; I just know it ends, and probably the story does too, before we find out how Harry actually reacts.

[classicdrogn]

Here's another element that could go with that: Gilderoy Lockhart, Dumbledore's secret triumph. Sure, he's a douche who got money and popularity by claiming the work of others and in all likelyhood a serial rapist in the conventional sense as well as mentally, but picture what someone with that kind of ambition and subtlety (how many times has he done this, put the result up in a big glowing marquee, and yet never found out? It's like he stole the entire planet's worth of Sneaky from the Narutoverse) and utter lack of morals if he had any actual skills besides obliviation? It wouldn't be Voldemort's name people feared to speak any more... As matters stood, Albus was even able to get his new hope for a better future to take care of the problem in a fairly final but still merciful way.

- CD
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

[GreggHL]

"What if He had Listened?"
Instead of going that fateful night to Godric's Hollow to kill Harry, Tom went that night to surrender.  Because someone- maybe Malfoy, maybe Snape, maybe even Dumbledore himself, confronted Voldemort about the prophecy and made him actually realize what he was becoming.  More than likely, it would be Dumbledore- carrying the guilt he held from the last war, unwilling to see it spiral out of control, he takes the initiative and confronts Tom, besting him in an epic duel and letting him know what he has become, the monster he is becoming.  And tells him the full prophecy, because he is fated to fail.  And finally, gives him an out, a chance at redemption- show himself to have some final scrap of humanity, or he will end him.
So, that halloween night, Voldemort apparates to Godric's Hollow, blasts open the door with his followers...and then stuns his followers, falls onto his knees, and begs for mercy.
His connections in the Ministry prevent him from being Kissed.  He spends the next decade and a half inside Azkaban.  Dumbledore comes to visit him every month, to talk, hoping for some show of humanity, or redemption.
And during his Third Year, Tom Riddle finds himself on the run, and trying to find the boy who was fated to destroy him or die trying- and trying to find if there's a way for him to be saved.a

[The Wanderer]

Oh, I like that one, Gregg.

[Bob Schroeck]

Oh, yes. That is a Potter tale unlike any other I have heard of.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[The Wanderer]

Much is made of Ron's jealousy over Harry's fame (and wealth, when applicable). On at least one occasion, I believe Harry points out to Ron at least once that he would gladly trade his fame, wealth, et cetera, for what Ron has always had: family, and the ability to live without being constantly harassed.

So. Take another of the classic "go back and do it over" fics. This time, both Ron and Harry are going back - maybe together, maybe separately, maybe even from separate timelines.

Only when they arrive, they discover that they've landed in each other's bodies. As infants. (Probably right around the time of the legendary scar-inducing Killing Curse.)

They both say they've wanted what the other one has had. Now they have the chance to find out what it's like.

[Sirrocco]

Harry Potter's own soul, recovering something like a normal equilibrium, returns to its proper place - but with the fragment of Voldemort's soul already in residence, there is not, quite, enough room.

It settles in anyway, but due to the lack of space, cannot quite fit entirely back within Harry's body.

As a consequence, Harry will go through life with his soul extending just slightly beyond his body, and somewhat less securely attached than is usual.

What effects this may have on him, on his magic, and/or on those around him is undetermined; the answer to that question is left as an exercise for the reader. (Or, as the case may be, the author.)

Sounds like a Potter/Dead Inside crossover, really.

[DHBirr]

Here's a Harry Potter story idea that's been hanging around in my mind for some time:
It begins in Order of the Phoenix, when Harry doesn't get banned from Quidditch for trying to punch out Draco Malfoy. This is because an older Slytherin boy told Draco to shut up with that scurrilous song about the Weasleys -- it was one thing to sing it as psychological warfare during the game, but continuing after they'd lost is bad form. And Draco does shut up ... not right away, but after a warning to "Remember my Potions marks," he turns pale and closes his mouth quickly.
Harry and friends are curious, naturally. Who is this fellow, was he really threatening to feed Draco a harmful potion, and why doesn't he go along with typical Slytherin behavior? After a few weeks, the guy -- identified as 6th-year Jeremy Penardis -- agrees to meet Harry, Hermione, and Ron in the library for explanations.
Well, he agreed to meet Hermione, and didn't mind if she brought her friends. Young Mr. Penadis finds Hermione very attractive, enough so to override his normal caution. He's at Hogwarts under a false name, you see; Dumbledore would never have allowed him to enroll if he'd known who the boy's family really is. They're wizard assassins, and have been since before "assassin" was the word for it. Penardis says to Hermione, "I'm sure you've wondered, among all the conflicting stories, what really happened to Merlin. One of my ancestors happened to him." Dumbledore considers this family to actually be worse than Voldemort, because they murder without malice, simply for money, whereas Voldemort is compelled by his nature. Or something like that. Voldemort, meanwhile, regards them as a threat to his power, and they feel he's just another sick monster with pretensions, who's too insane (and/or cheap) to hire professionals to kill for him.
As for the Potions threat, no, he wasn't threatening to dose Draco with something humorous. He was threatening to fatally poison Draco's mother with something no detection magic would spot. It was a bluff, though. His family would literally kill him if he murdered someone without getting paid for it.
Which brings a thought to his mind. Since he's now blown his cover just because of a pretty girl, maybe he could at least drum up some business out of the matter. Harry has a lot of gold, and some very nasty enemies. If Harry offered some of that gold to the "Penardis" family, some of those enemies could suffer tragic fatal accidents.
Jeremy's attentiveness to Hermione naturally rubs Ron the wrong way. Hermione, though, is thoroughly creeped out; although Penardis is moderately good-looking in a nondescript way, the fact that he comes from a long line of murderers and is proud of it squicks her. And Harry ... Harry is torn. On the one hand, hiring an assassin against Voldemort and the Death Eaters would get at least some of them off his back. On the other, if Dumbledore disapproves of these people so much ... he really doesn't want to go against Dumbledore's wishes.
After a while soul-searching, Harry turns down the offer, but agrees to keep Penardis' true identity secret. The rest of Order of the Phoenix and most of Half-Blood Prince goes more-or-less just as canon. Until Harry's kneeling beside Dumbledore's corpse. Jeremy comes up and kneels beside him, saying he's just heard about the horcruxes, so it seems hiring his family wouldn't have done a lot of good. But Harry looks up with a not-quite sane expression in his eyes and says that Voldemort couldn't have done as much damage if several Death Eaters had been killed earlier....
And that is where the story as I envision it ENDS. It's not about the results of Harry hiring assassins; it's more a character study about what brings him to that point. Probably not a very good story idea, but....
-----
Big Brother is watching you.  And damn, you are so bloody BORING.

[Bob Schroeck]

No, no, that's a great idea. It would end up screaming for a sequel where we see the "Penardises" in action, or the effects thereof, but it's still a great idea for a story.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[Sirrocco]

You'd have to play it judiciously - it would choke and die if you tried to actually write your way through years worth of main-plot-with-small-changes, but if you kept it in the "series of scenes" format, it could be pretty cool.

...and it might well be one of those stories that leaves people screaming for a sequel, where writing the sequel is a mistake.

[Bluemage]

Or the sequel could just be a series of vignettes, which could be titled "How I did it."  Basically, each chapter is the assassination of a DE, (as told after the fact, as sort of a debrief) Harry's reaction, and a bit of what it means in the big picture.  Keep it simple, keep it short, and keep it episodic, and it could stay interesting.
You could spin it several ways, even.  One, Harry gets used to making his opponents disappear.  Another, he uses the assassins to clean house, and drops it after that.  Still another, one or two revenge killings, and then drop it.  If you were really good, present them in sequence- start with the limited revenge plotline, mention some deaths in the background, and then reveal that Harry lied about his motives, and the (previously background) deaths of DEs X, Y, and Z were hits, too- not for revenge (he says), but to break the pureblood supremacists' power.  Then take it a step further, and reveal how the death of J. Random Opposition Wizengamot Member was also a hit, put out because the guy was a threat to Political!Harry's power.  You could get a lot of mileage out of it, especially by playing up the unreliable narration, and the sort of deceptive ruthlessness that that version of Harry would have to have.
It sounded better in my head, honestly, but I was going for sort of a Rashomon plot, sort of a Joker-style multiple-choice past, and a dash of Harry tragically being corrupted by power.

---

My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Brother Atom Bomb of Courteous Debate. Get yours.

I've been writing a bit.

[DHBirr]

Well, it'd have to be somebody other than me who writes it, because I can't do characterization and character interaction well -- I can't write dialogue and narrative that properly shows rather than telling us what the characters are feeling. I try, but it tends to be flat, lifeless, stilted....
As far as the "main plot with small changes" was concerned, I more-or-less envisioned that everything from Harry originally turning down the assassin's offer to the point where they're kneeling over Dumbledore's body could be covered in two or three brief paragraphs. They'd mention how Harry every now and then thought about it again, especially after Sirius Black died, or during the spate of Death Eater attacks mentioned in the beginning of Half-Blood Prince. Or he'd notice Ron or Hermione giving him a thoughtful look and realize they were thinking about it.
One thing I didn't make clear in my original write-up is that, properly, Ron and Hermione would actually be somewhat more ambivalent than I described. Ron's a good chessplayer, so he's tactically minded, and he's been shown to be not entirely scrupulous, so that'd incline him to think hiring the assassin family might not be such a bad idea -- except that unadmitted jealousy argues against it. Hermione is creeped out by Jeremy's pride in his family's tradition of murder, but it's got to be at least a bit flattering that he's attracted enough to put himself at risk for a chance to talk with her. And I did try to indicate that he admires her intelligence as well as the fact that she looks like a young Emma Watson (no, of course he wouldn't say that).
-----
Big Brother is watching you.  And damn, you are so bloody BORING.

[classicdrogn]

HP timetravel/Groundhog fic, alternates Luna and Harry centered by chapter

First chapter, Luna gets up, goes to breakfast, notices people are much kinder than usual but takes it in stride, then goes to History of Magic and... it's beoing taught by Professor Selene Lovegood (AKA her mum) rather than Binns. Cue emotional scene, class dismissed to deal with the disturbance, later when Luna is coherent again (rather late at night) Selene explains how Harry appeared just in the nick to save her, and hands over a copy of the McGuffin he used to do it created in the time since. Luna rushes to find Harry but barely has time to shove it into his hands and and begs him to save her mum before midnight when it activates.

Second chapter is Harry, saving Luna's mum and explaining how it came about to her, then glimpses of how they cover up his time travel (the Ministry has quite enough power with an army of heliopaths let alone access to a time traveller after all) she takes him as an apprentice spellcrafter/enchanter rather than the more modern Hogwarts education, and they make the new version of McGuiffin to send him back in the first place. Closed time loop and done, right?

No. Third chapter, Luna wakes up, remembers the wonderful dream she had of her mum being alive, and wanders down to breakfast deep in her personal worold. She doesn't really notice that people are being kinder than usual, until one of them points out that she's going the wrong way to get to History of Magic, it's tomorrow that thye have Trasfiguiration first thing. She rushes to the classroom to find that yes, it IS her mum teaching, cue emotional scene, class dismissed early to deal with the disruption, etc... but Luna calms down earlier this time, having already been through it once, and asks Mum to take her to meet Traveling Harry to thank him. They do so, and one of them gets the idea to give Luna the notes from building the McGuffin to give to Young Harry when they send him off in hopes of developing a better version of the McGuffin, though they only get back just in time to give it to Young Harry and send him off.

Fourth chapter, still Luna, Selene holds up a more refined McGuffin for her to see as she walks into History of Magic and waves her to her seat. After classes, she has Luna find Young Harry so he can get a proper briefing rather than a desperate last-minute rush. On a last minute impulse, though, Luna grabs onto Young Harry and the McGuffin and goes too, wanting to be able to know her Mum growing up. They land a few years early and quite far away, and spend a chapter or three getting back to Britain without attracting the wrong sort of notice, and get the bright idea to try to save the Potters... in which they succeed, but the results are horrible since that means Voldemort doesn't get defeated, kills the Longbottoms, and takes over Wizarding Britain within a few more months. They try to work on a new McGuffin with both Lily and Selene, but don't finish before Voldemort starts working on taking over the Muggle government openly, and the last thing they notice is a light so bright it's shining through the boards of the muggle safehouse they're working in, and then...

Luna wakes up, in her Hogwarts dorm. Skipping breakfast entirely (and for that matter dressing beyond grabbing a robe to throw over her jammies) she runs for the History Professor's quarters, finding them dank and spiderwebby in the sort of ambieance preferred by ghosts. There is no McGuffin. She collapses and cries until she falls asleep from exhaustion, well after dark has fallen again.

Luna wakes up, in her Hogwarts dorm. She throws a robe over her jammies, and rushes to the History Professor's quarters - same as loast time. But, she's spent years studying the design of the McGuffin with Lily and Travelling Harry and her mum - she knows how it works. Ignoring her classes, she hunts up the materials it needs, but can only make a really simple version (she recognises it as the original) due to time constraints. She rushes to find Harry, shoves it into his hands, and warns him that even after bringing notes back and making one that can take him to save his owbn parents, if Voldemort isn't stopped it's worse than the Dursleys. Harry is shocked, but there's no time for questions before it activates...

Luna wakes up, etc. History apartment is in good shape, her mum is there in a magical floating wheelchair, being paralysed below the waist due to Harry being stunned with shock when he arrived and just a hair slower. She does have both new McGuffin and notes on hand, though.

A few loops happen offscreen, until they have a McGuffin able to send Harry & Luna back to the sixties or seventies, when most of the Death Eaters were in school and Tom was just starting to agitate them. Loops of various length as they try various plots to stop him from becoming a problem, then to fix the social issues that make it so easy for other members of the BLood Purist crowd to take the place of upcoming Dark Lord/Lady in his absence.

My original idea included alternating History of Magic or Wizarding Culture lessons that covered what the timeline looked like at the current state of changes with chapters in the past, but it's kind've grown away from that direction.

Still, it's at least a vaguely new twist on the old chestnuts, right?

Maybe kinda?

- dNN
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

[ECSNorway]

(snip long HP timeloop bunny)

It's got potential. Reminds of Time Braid, sommat. Go for it.
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[jpub]

I got two minor ones, and one larger one, all Mass Effect:

1) What if a Reaper went rogue, decided to betray the others and help the organics?

2) What if the Mars Archives had a Prothean VI active like Vigil or Victory?

(If I was writing again, I'd probably do one of those for a ME God's Toy entry.)

3) This one requires a bit more explanation:

According to the lore in the game, Humanity had only been part of the Galactic community for a fairly short time before the cycle ended. IIRC, the First Contact War with the Turians was only 25 years ago, and Humanity had only been exploring relays for a few years before that.

This is an awfully tight timeframe considering that the Cycle was due to end right around 2200. So, what if the purge had started well before humans discovered the Mars Archive, and since the Charon relay was still encased in ice, the Reapers had no reason to come purge Earth? What would it had been like if humans were the first race to explore the ruins of these civilizations MERE DECADES after the purge had been completed? Would there still be enough evidence that they'd be warned? Would a civilization that's had the full cycle to mess with the tech have an advantage?

[Bluemage]

1.  "We are your salvation through destruction."
I look up at the projection, worried.  "Destruction of what, precisely?"
The hologram- why did it look like nothing more than a mechanical cuttlefish?- wriggled its tentacles, looking oddly sheepish.  "Ourselves, actually."
2.  Am I the only person who thinks that V's introduction speech is a goldmine of Prothean VI names?
(I'd name the Mars VI Vestige, myself.)
3.  Good idea.  Needs writing. 
...Too many options.

---

My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Brother Atom Bomb of Courteous Debate. Get yours.

I've been writing a bit.

[Niteflier]

#3 could have happened... if the Protheans hadn't messed with the Citadel. Sovereign would have activated it remotely, Reapers would have swept through sometime around 1200 AD, and probably been gone by the time humanity opened the Charon Relay.

[Black Aeronaut]

3) This one requires a bit more explanation:

According to the lore in the game, Humanity had only been part of the Galactic community for a fairly short time before the cycle ended. IIRC, the First Contact War with the Turians was only 25 years ago, and Humanity had only been exploring relays for a few years before that.

This is an awfully tight timeframe considering that the Cycle was due to end right around 2200. So, what if the purge had started well before humans discovered the Mars Archive, and since the Charon relay was still encased in ice, the Reapers had no reason to come purge Earth? What would it had been like if humans were the first race to explore the ruins of these civilizations MERE DECADES after the purge had been completed? Would there still be enough evidence that they'd be warned? Would a civilization that's had the full cycle to mess with the tech have an advantage?

... But then we'd miss out on a lot of the really fun non-human characters.  Like Tali.  That'd be kind of a bummer, and you'd be really hard pressed to come up with characters to fill in those kinds of voids.
Not that I don't like the idea.  Actually, now that I'm thinking of it, it would actually be a whole new cast of characters...
...You know what?  I just realized something.  The main setting of the story should not be in the scant couple of decades after the purge.  It should be the decade of the next purge.  And all throughout, you can leave scattered entries from mission logs and journals of people that went out there and found the tragic remains of all those societies... and the mounting evidence of what happened until someone makes that climactic connection.  It'd be like a side-plot.
But the plot of the main story line?  That discovery was lost somehow, but there are still clues that point at it.  Our story would start out much like ME itself does, and with everyone knowing that at some point everyone got wiped out somehow... but the how and why is still out there, locked away on some shipwreck's computer.  The data on this computer is credible - it shows no signs of being tampered with and the scientists on the expedition were very credible themselves.  Once it is discovered... the shit hits the fan and Humanity and their allies go into DEFCON 1 to prepare for the coming of the Reapers... and this time they're gonna be ready.

[jpub]

My take was that we'd be seeing what happens when an entire cycle has warning from almost year one.

[Valles]

Hmm.

Y'know, the immediate-discovery scenario would make it trivial for the species we know to still have deeply hidden enclaves like the Ilos facility unscathed, letting particularly favorite characters show up as survivors, whether from camping as hermits (Liara, Wrex) or spending years 'on ice' (Garrus, Tali). That could be... pretty interesting.

...I'd be horribly tempted to write it with Doctorate!Shepard and N7!Kasumi, though.
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"V, did you do something foolish?"
"Yes, and it was glorious."