I forgot just how hard transition chapters can be, so here have a snippet that’s a lot more cooperative and will show up later on:
Dr. Steven Strange, Sorcerer Supreme, sat down abruptly after doing some magic thing with the shiny green rock he kept waving around.
He had a very strange [ha, accidental pun] look on his face. One that went from blank shock to horror to horrified fascination and disbelief before the man buried his face in his hands and his shoulders started shaking.
Tony...was at a loss of what to do, in the face of their resident expert on magic’s imminent breakdown. He couldn’t tell if the man’s breathing was hitched because he was crying or laughing hysterically, but that that was Strange’s reaction to checking to see if their plan would work did not exactly inspire confidence.
He tried not to tense, tried not to panic at the prospect of being back at square one. [So much time and effort and it wouldn’t have even worked? So much wasted on something doomed from the start? Oh fu—]
“That bad?” He asked, and at that, Strange finally looked up with an unreadable look and huh, he’d been laughing, that was...good?
Strange shook his head slowly. “Not...exactly.”
“What is it?”
“I’ve looked into countless other timelines, thousands upon thousands.” Strange started, and the shadows in his gaze gave credence to the severity of the situation. “Millions of other alternate realities, to see if we have a chance. And Stark?”
Tony tensed at the note of blank horror in his voice, at the way his shoulders started to shake again, at the way his hands twitched as if he wanted to bury his hands in his face again.
“What?” He warily replied, and tried push back the coiled warmth that was Extremis preparing for whatever threat he was reacting to.
“This is one of the good timelines.” Strange replied, then started laughing as if there was something funny about it all. “Thousands upon thousands of realities, and this is the one where it works, where everyone lives and it’s thanks to—”
He cut himself off, and wiped his eyes. Then he turned back and gave Tony one of those searching stares of his, equal parts assessment and disbelief, and continued. “Well, long story short, it’ll work. I can’t believe it, but what you’re doing? It’s going to work.”
That was good enough for Tony. He thanked Strange, and booked it to the lab before he could forget, and a few more ideas for JOCASTA already percolating. Better to be safe than sorry, and all that.
.
”Thor help you with what comes after though,” Strange muttered where Tony couldn’t hear, and shook his head as he ran a still-slightly-shaky hand through his hair. “I don’t know where we went wrong that robot armies and Skynet are the way to go, but between Dormammu and this idiot running things, I know who I’d vote for.”
“Skynet, doctor?” A familiar voice replied with no small amount of humor from the walls, and Strange snorted.
“Oh, don’t you start.”
