Chapter Text
Ever since Stephen became the Master of the New York Sanctum, he’d been caught up in more than a few weird occurrences.
From bargaining with a dimensional entity to stopping The Mad Titan from wiping half the universe, each incident was somehow more bizarre than its predecessor. This one particular event, though? It was out of this world.
Well, out of this Universe, to be precise.
It started on December of 2016, a month after the Kaecillius incident.
He was meditating by the Window of the Worlds. The streets were wet with half-melted snow, and the sun’s rays filtering through the Window were warm and comforting. It was quiet, the outside noise dulled into a muffled distant sound inside the Sanctum.
That was when the Sanctum alerted him to the presence of two people at the front door. He couldn’t believe it at first.
For, the Sanctum had alerted him to his own presence, as well as the presence of his very non-existent bondmate.
Outside the door.
The next moment, the Sanctum trustingly opened its door to allow the two individuals. Alarmed that the Sanctum was being tricked by imposters, Stephen used the Sanctum’s short-range teleportation to immediately deposit himself in front of the door.
By the stairs stood a clone of himself, next to Tony Stark who donned the Cloak.
He studied the clone in bafflement, the clone studied him back in reserved curiosity. He looked exactly like himself, if a little messier hair and a couple more wrinkle lines around his face. He was in casuals that should be too thin for the December weather. His soul’s aura was identical to Stephen’s own. His magical signature, though?
His magical signature was way. More. Powerful.
This was no clone, and if it came down to fighting him, Stephen might never stand a chance.
His gaze shifted to Tony Stark. Stark was biting his lip, eyes trained on the phone cradled in — was that a metal arm? Not just that, this Stark looked.. way older than what the media photos of him suggested, and... with a lot more scars on the right side of his face and visible neck. That was definitely not supposed to be a thing. His other arm was holding the Cloak’s hem. The fickle fabric happily stuck close to his body, protecting him from cold December winds. And, albeit mostly hidden under the Cloak, Stark appeared... weak. Exhausted. Like he’d just survived through a hurricane and was immediately tossed into the middle of a desert.
But the most enigmatic thing was the fact that Stark had a broken Soul Bond, the severed strands of his soul’s aura trying to reach out to both Stephen’s, desperate to bond back with its rightful bondmate.
“You’re not from here,” Stephen concluded.
“We’re from the Multiverse,” his other self confirmed. “And all that we request of you is access to the Sanctum’s library.”
“Couldn’t find the books you were looking for in yours?” He narrowed his eyes at his counterpart.
“Sorry for crashing in,” Stark spoke up, finally looking up from the phone whose brand Stephen still couldn’t identify, “Our Universes kind of got deleted, so we didn’t have a Sanctum to go to, so we’re raiding yours.”
Stephen spluttered in disbelief. Stark had just relayed it so casually, like it was just another day in Avengers business. “I— hold on, did you just say your Universes got deleted? ”
His counterpart shrugged. “I suppose ‘reset’ should be a more accurate word. Our Universes no longer exist in the Multiverse.”
“How?”
“We can’t tell you anything, I’m afraid.”
Two multiversal travelers claiming that their Universes got erased, and declining to share any further information. He did not like this, in more ways than one.
“Why not? What if whatever it is threatened to reset my Universe?”
Stark was tapping his foot frantically, while his counterpart just exhaled a long suffering sigh. Something told Stephen that the sigh wasn’t because of his own words but because of Stark’s antics.
“It won’t,” his counterpart promised. Stephen saw the confidence in his counterpart’s eyes which he was intimately familiar with. They were the same, after all. He almost instinctively knew that his counterpart knew what he was doing.
But confidence didn’t always equate to good deeds, or in general, not-breaking-the-fabric-of-reality deeds. Stephen had his own reality to protect. He bit the inside of his cheek, contemplating what to do.
“And.. what if you end up threatening my reality?” Subtly, he allowed dimensional energy to course through his hands.
His counterpart slowly shook his head, the confidence in his features slipping ever so slightly to reveal the broken, devastated man he was inside. “We won’t,” he said. “We have no intentions to threaten this reality, or to interact with it in any way at all. We’re only here for knowledge, you have my word.”
Well, Stephen Strange always valued his promises.
Stephen tried to give it a serious thought. Even if his counterpart had no intentions to harm this reality, there was a reason traveling across the Multiverse was forbidden (and never documented in the first place). The mere act of being outside your own Universe was believed to threaten the fabric of reality.
How exactly, though? His logical part nagged.
It was never documented either, except for vague and unclear descriptions of a phenomenon called ‘The Incursion’.
People continued to move by on the street, oblivious to the conversation going on at the porch of a sentient magical building in the neighborhood. Stephen wanted to tiredly rub his eyes.
“Our presence won’t threaten this reality,” His counterpart seemed to read his mind, “As long as you pretend like we never existed, once we’ve left. That way our presence causes no consequences or shifts in events, and reality doesn’t divert from the path it’s meant to follow.”
Technically that did make sense. If an action had no consequences whatsoever, it wouldn’t matter whether or not the action had ever happened. But..
“...How do I trust that that’s how it’s supposed to work? Can you prove it?”
“Without causing the annihilation of a Universe, no. You’ll just have to take my word for it.”
Inwardly, he wanted to believe himself. That was simply how Stephen Strange worked: he fully trusted and believed in himself. But he had to remind himself that this man standing in front of him wasn’t him. He was a version of himself, yes, but it wasn’t him. He couldn’t just hand out trust to him.
The two must have read his expression, because Stark spoke up.
“You’re the only one we could ask for help, Stephen. Please.”
Stark and ‘Please’, seriously? It was not a word he would have ever associated with the man.
“Pardon? I think I didn’t quite hear the last word,” he said in a demeaning tone.
Stark gave him a smile, which Stephen had expected to be mocking, but instead it just looked.. endearing? Fond? “I said please, Stephen.” Stephen jerked a little upon hearing his words. The tone was clear and concise. Not scathing, not begrudged, just straight.
Fine, so apparently Tony Stark could do a proper ‘Please’. This was unbelievable.
Stephen relented and handed out trust to his other self.
But allowing this duo in his Universe came with two very important clauses. One, do not let them interact with the rest of the Universe. Two, Pretend like they didn’t exist. His counterpart seemed to have the first one nailed. The second one would have to be for Stephen to live by for the rest of his life.
Eh, he’d had to deal with much worse before.
“But.. I have just one question.”
“I’m sorry, but we really can’t answer—” Stark was cut off by his counterpart raising a hand his direction. He looked up at Stephen expectantly.
“If you can’t stay in a Universe without threatening its integrity, and your Universes don’t exist anymore, then where will you go from here?”
Other Stephen shifted his gaze to Stark and quirked a subtle eyebrow at him, who smirked in return. They both turned back to Stephen together, and Stark replied.
“We’re going to avenge them.”
How theatrical, Stephen huffed mentally.
He stepped to the side and gestured them to come inside.
The second time it happened was on September 2017, right after he’d sent the Odinson brothers to Norway through a portal.
He was about to go back up the stairs to meditate by the Window of the Worlds, when the Sanctum alerted him of the same strangers he’d met a year ago. And just like back then, the doors opened up by themselves in welcome. Stephen saw the figures conversing outside from where he stood at the foyer. The same clothes (plus the Cloak on his other self’s shoulder and an arc reactor on Stark’s chest), the same magical signatures, except, Stark was now soul bonded to his counterpart.
The thought sent a shudder down his spine. He would never bond with someone as self-centered and non-committal as Stark. Perhaps his other self had done it out of pity, since a severed soul bond was the same as a permanently damaged soul: extremely painful. Soul Bonds were meant to be permanent, staying even after death, and severing one would require literally destroying one of the bondmates’ soul.
And if he realized a second late that Stark’s severed bond had previously connected him to some other Stephen in the Multiverse — one that was so completely gone that even his soul didn’t exist anymore — he decided to shove that thought away.
“I assume you’ve come for knowledge again?” He greeted, walking up to the door. “Come in.”
“No, actually,” his counterpart replied, stepping in along with Stark. Stephen noted the baton hanging by Stark’s waist. “We’re going to do research in the undercroft.”
“Your wizard’s dungeon?” Stark perked up.
“It’s not a dungeon!” Both Stephens replied in unison, and Stark jumped in surprise, looking between them.
His mouth opened as he raised the metal hand to point a finger, but the hand couldn’t decide which Stephen to point to, so instead it fiddled with Stark’s non-existent collar while he huffed. “It’s clearly a dungeon. You use it to trap creatures sometimes.”
“That’s not the primary purpose.”
“Then why use a place reserved for powerful spells as a cellar?”
“At least I don’t lock up potentially dangerous creatures in guest rooms.”
“That was one time and I didn’t have a lot of options!”
Stephen didn’t even want to know what the last one was about.
They quipped back and forth easily, and as he watched them, he noticed a certain fondness in the voice of his other self. His other self didn’t even try to mask it, as Stephen would have. Quickly, he sifted through his memories and reassessed all of his interactions with them the first time they had visited.
It was unmistakable. How had he not noticed this back then?
A Stark and a Stephen from some corner of the Multiverse had managed to grow close. This Stark had managed to wear down his counterpart’s walls, and wearing down Stephen Strange’s walls was no minor feet, something he would have only allowed for Christine and ..Donna.
For a second, he wondered if his world’s Stark—
He stopped that track of thought.
Pretend like they didn’t exist.
That was the condition he’d set upon himself to help these Multiversal travelers while also keeping his own reality intact. He couldn’t break it to pursue the likely rare possibility of friendship with Stark; the act would categorize itself as a consequence of the action of meeting this duo.
A shame, he thought as he watched the two disappear into the stairs leading to the undercroft.
The third time it happened on April of 2018.
It wasn’t often that Stephen slept, as in really slept with his astral form inside his body and all. Tonight was one of those rare instances when he allowed his mind to rest.
Of course, rest had a certain resentment with Stephen, so he was rudely awoken at midnight by the Sanctum, who alerted him to the presence of a certain strange duo right outside the door. And as always, the Sanctum opened its door right away.
“Why do you have to wake me up if you’re gonna allow them anyway!?” He yelled at the ceiling while lying in his bed. Of course, the ceiling wasn’t the offender here. The real offenders were standing outside the door.
So he should go and yell at them.
With half a thought, he summoned his sorcerer robes onto his body and didn’t wait for the Cloak as he teleported himself to the door. There his Multiversal guests were, Stark holding the still unidentifiable phone model in his hand while both stared at its screen contents.
He groaned, rubbing the heels of his hands at his eyes before blinking them open again. Stark’s eyes were still trained on the phone, while his other self regarded him cautiously, his hands fully hidden behind the hems of the Cloak. It was a nervous gesture Stephen had recently gained self-awareness about.
He sighed. “Why are you just standing there? Get inside already!”
His other self’s shoulders fell in relief while Stark murmured a low “It’s stable,” and looked up at his other self with wide eyes.
His counterpart nodded with a certain satisfaction. “Quantum superposition,” he murmured back.
Stephen’s lips twisted with impatience. “Look, I don’t know what you’re talking about, nor do I care. Just get inside, do whatever you want, and if the Sanctum is going to allow you anyway, then don’t bother waiting for me at the door next time!” He snapped.
“I’m sorry,” His counterpart voiced, raising his palms non-threateningly. “I know you were sleeping after a long day.”
He tiredly rubbed shaking fingers over an eyebrow with ebbed irritation. “Just— get inside.”
His counterpart nodded and stepped in. Before passing Stephen, his counterpart stopped by his shoulder and mumbled, “Wake up at 7:12 am.” Stephen furrowed his brows and opened his mouth to speak, but his counterpart was already moving along.
Then his attention was caught by a hand on his shoulder. Stark. “You’re the living embodiment of quantum physics, Stephen.” He patted once, and just like that, he moved on too, trailing after his counterpart as he climbed up the stairs, leaving Stephen puzzled and fully woken up.
He wished he could pretend like they didn’t exist, but he was starting to develop a petty grudge against the duo.
Pretend like they didn’t exist.
The more he repeated the phrase in his mind, the less it sounded like a sentence. It started to sound incoherent, meaningless. Not even a real language.
As he lived through more and more possible outcomes of their efforts against Thanos, he could no longer pretend like they didn’t exist.
They had made it clear in the beginning that they couldn’t share anything at all. After all, Stephen simply knowing things he shouldn’t could lead to consequences. Consequences could break reality, although how, he still didn’t know. His other self sure seemed to know, and he wasn’t evil, so Stephen had simply extended blind trust to another version of him and never questioned anything.
Now, though, as he spent years scouring through possible futures, getting closer to Tony over and over again only for things to be reset, he found himself wondering about the versions of himself and Tony who had lost their entire Universes and come to him for help when they couldn’t go anywhere else.
At some point, as he found himself falling for Tony, he started drawing conjectures on his Multiversal guests. The other Stephen definitely knew what was going to happen in the morning of the last date they had visited on. For, after Stephen had woken up at exact 7:12 am, gone about his routines and then asked Wong to get some tuna melt with him, a Hulk had come crashing through the Window of the Worlds, feet away from there heads.
And now he was here, condemning himself to time loops, watching the people he’d come to care about lose and suffer and die, over and over and over again.
He wondered, as he watched Tony die saving the Universe, if he could save his Tony just as some other Stephen in the Multiverse already had.
So he tried again. In the 14,000,606th outcome, he tried to save Tony. He offered to create a Soul Bond between them, which would then allow Stephen to mitigate the shock of him wielding six infinity stones. He offered to save Tony, and Tony accepted it.
But the Soul Bond failed to form.
Of course, it failed. It’s not something that merely required verbal consent. It required the consent of your subconscious. In his subconscious, in this outcome, Tony didn’t trust Stephen.
Again, Tony died saving the Universe.
So he tried again.
14,000,607.
Again.
14,000,954.
Again.
14,013,570.
Again.
14,121,389.
And there were no more. He’d pushed to the very boundary of his limit of using the Time Stone.
In the end, there was no other way.
He wondered, as he watched his Tony die in the battlefield from distance, how his other self had managed it. He wondered, as he watched the arc reactor float away over the lake, if in that Universe they had been something more than professional acquaintance. He wondered, as he stood the last man in front of the lake, what had happened to his other selves’ Universes.
There were no answers, and he knew there never would be.
But as he sat by the Window of the Worlds meditating in the quiet of the Sanctum, he could no longer pretend that they didn’t exist. He kept wondering and wondering and wondering.
Would he see them again? In all the futures he’d lived, even the rare ones spanning over decades, he never saw them again. Perhaps, he’d thought, it was because even the Time Stone, as powerful and all-encompassing it may be, couldn’t cross the boundaries of its own Universe.
But when he’d come back and asked Wong covertly if there had been any strange occurrences in his absence, the most enthusiastic thing — according to his colleague — had been a cat possessed by a magical entity that stole people’s chocolates.
No mentions or hints of another Stephen and Tony visiting the Sanctum.
He wondered if they had been able to avenge their fallen Universes and move on.
But a hidden, selfish part of him wished that they hadn’t yet. He wished to be visited by them again, if only to see Tony one more time. A Tony who had survived after Snapping, now left without a place in The Multiverse.
So one morning, when the Sanctum alerted him to the presence of his supposed bondmate at the front door as he was carrying books over to his study, his heart fluttered with something that was as sweet as it was agonizing. He abandoned his stash of books, letting them drop to the floor in a messy clutter, and instantly teleported himself to the foyer.
Tony was already coming in through the open door; oh, good, they listened to what he’d said the last time—
All thoughts were knocked out of his mind when a frantic Tony grabbed him by both arms and looked straight at him with hopeful eyes.
“I need your help,” he pleaded.
Belatedly, he realized that his other self had not accompanied Tony.
He quickly opened his ethereal senses and studied Tony’s bond. It was not severed, but it was not humming with connection either. It was present, but the connection was dead. As though the bond had been ...blocked.
Death of a bondmate did not block a Soul Bond, ever.
How would one even block a Soul Bond?
“Please,” Tony begged, and the tone alone made Stephen’s heart stammer, filling him with an overwhelming urge to just take all of this man’s problems away.
But — and after being responsible for Tony’s death, he resented this part of his rationale — he had his own reality to protect too.
“What about the integrity of reality?”
“It’s fine,” He assured. “The reality will be fine—I’ll explain you everything, just please, come with me.”
Stephen believed him, and nodded. “Alright.”