Chapter 19
America Chavez doesn't dream. Not like everyone else. Instead of a window into the multiverse, she gets the replays. The good. The bad. The ugly. The usual.
Any moment could be relived once she closed her eyes.
Stephen could tell something was bothering America. He could initially wave it off as post-nap grogginess but she was dragging along and her few comments were flat. Adding to that, the kid just looked exhausted and defeated.
He didn't like it. Was this still about that weird situation with the fish thing?
Was it the Scarlet Witch being alive? Or that she’s technically on the run again for the umpteenth time?
Did he do something? He’s mentally flipping through their interactions like a Rolodex of memories. He’s not 100% sure he hasn’t been a dick—he probably has—but enough to upset her? The silence was unnerving.
She didn’t even pry about Christine, which he fully expected.
“Why don't we find that pizza ball guy after this?” Stephen offers, breaking the silence since the two of them started their walk from Christine’s to the Sanctum. It's still dark, but the street lights illuminate the path. America shrugged, the toe of her sneaker kicking a pebble aimlessly.
Bad. Very bad. Stephen frowns at the back of her head as she nudges the rock in front of him. She’ll come to him if she needs, he reassures himself. He blinked the frown away, trying to ignore the growing ache near his frontal lobe. Center of his forehead, to be exact.
838 Strange was resourceful. He put Waypoint doors all over New York, for easy access to the items he’d hidden in there, the Book of Vishanti was just one of many. They were headed to the closest. The door in the Sanctum was located in the basement, according to Christine.
The only tricky part would be getting into the Sanctum. He had left things with this world’s Sorcerer Supreme a little...tense?
Karl Mordo(r) wasn't one to forgive easily, in any of the versions, it seems. Which is why it is incredibly convenient that Mordo isn't actually present at the Sanctum.
No one is.
Equally convenient if not for the enchantment put on the door to keep trespassers away.
“Have you learned about this yet?” Stephen asks, raising his hands as golden ruins circle his arms. The building glows in response.
“It’s a variation of a protection spell, right?” She questions as her eyes squint at the symbols. She thinks she remembers them from one of the dozens of books towered in her room. (Stephen has assigned her more books than she's ever read in her life)
Stephen made a noise of confirmation as his wrist twists. “Usually only breakable by the caster.” She watches as the symbols shift around on his arms and he pushes forward the rings against the Sanctum door. The glow on the building dimmed and flickered away. “Unless you're that good,” he teased dryly.
A tiny bit of tension releases in his chest with she rolls her eyes and scoffs. He pushes the door open, stepping inside.
Four months isn't long enough for Mordo to have done any rearranging. The layout looks exactly the same as it did but there is a citrusy smell lifting throughout the Sanctum.
They're walking in the same footsteps as before and hoping for a better outcome.
Quietly, assuming there is someone asleep or in the study or tending to the artifacts, they tip toe to the door leading to the basement.
“Stephen,” America whispers in the darkness as they’re going down the creaky stairs. They can hear the dryer rattling. “Doesn’t this feel a little too easy?”
Her words leave a heavy feeling in his chest. The third eye aches. “Let’s just get what we need and go.”
His hand runs along the wall until his fingers catch on the light switch. A dingy yellow light illuminates the basement from the dangled bulb.
Wong keeps his kayak in the basement in this universe, along with a few artifacts in need of refurbishing, and stacked boxes labeled ‘kitchen’ ‘Thialand souvenirs’ and ‘Stephen’s crap’ in sloppy font. There's a mountain of dirty robes parked beside the rattling dryer and a few dusty bookshelves filled entirely with magazines from the 80s.
Along the far wall is a metal door with a divot shape matching Stephen’s watch.
“That’d be us,” Stephen says dryly, gesturing towards the door. He quickly glances at America from the side as they approach the door. She's holding herself differently. More slouched. Unsure.
“Should be easier than last time, right?” She mumbled beside him as he's plucking the watch off.
“In and out,” he agrees with a sigh, placing the watch in the correct placement. They silently wait as the wheel turns and creaks. America shifts on her feet, her bottom lip wedging between her teeth as she feels her heart thump a little faster.
She's squeezing her hands into fists out of habit, digging her nails into the meaty parts of her palm. The door opens to a multicolored dimension.
Pillars and chunks of concrete and stain glass windows float and shift in the atmosphere. Clay roof shillings trail past them. From the doorway, they can see the area where 838 Strange kept the Book of Vishanti on a artistically tiled piece of courtyard—though the chestnut stand is empty now and Stephen can almost swear he sees burnt remnants of pages.
This is America’s third time in the Gap Junction. The split between worlds. It's gorgeous. It's terrifying. The rules of gravity are shaky, which makes traveling from point to point nerve wracking.
Like what happens if she falls? Will she just be slowly falling for an eternity? That sounds actually terrible. America swallows the anxiety that's crawling up her throat like ants on an old tree trunk.
Stephen is actively scanning for other items from the doorway until spotting a piece of cobblestone ground floating from the left side. “Bingo,” Stephen gestured towards the drifting chunk. His eyes catch her whitening knuckles.
Stephen Strange is a neuroscientist—once even an employed neuroscientist—he understands the mechanics of the brain but the people part he never quiet nailed down. He can feel the lines in his face deepen as his ward subtly trembles.
He wouldn't ever deny America’s toughness or the fact that she surprises him daily with how much of a badass she is—but he knows the brain. He knows the physiological signs of panic and anxiety.
“Okay, lets go,” America says after the second of hesitation feels too long. She's moving to jump when Stephen’s hand catches her upper arm.
Her attention snaps to his face, suddenly matching his pinched look. “You stay.”
Her face twists again. “Why? It's right there.” She emphasizes by looking over to the platform and back at him.
He forcibly softens his features. “Exactly,” releasing his hold, he adds, “it's a one person job.”
Gritting her teeth and perhaps any reply, America nods and steps slightly back. Her fists remain balled tightly but she has less of a panic in her eyes.
“Be right back,” he tells her as he's turning and leaping onto the first hunk of land.
America watches him run and leap, the cloak helping keep him airborne during longer jumps. Her stomach is knotting around itself.
She can't shake the memory off or the string of dread it brought with it. They haunt her, it seems. The happy ones are decayed by the bad. Even Nila, the first person she cared about and cared about her since her parents, causes a terrible ache in her chest.
And it must be all coming to an end.
Because they were going to the TVA now. A place that once held all the answers to unasked questions.
Would they instantly recognize her? Would she pulled away from Stephen the moment they stepped through? What was the punishment for killing one of their agents?
Her mouth has gone dry.
“Got it,” Stephen announced, stepping into the basement once again. He holds up a device that looks like a phone sized computer. Rita carried the same one.
America feels like she's going to pass out.
At least if she's dead Chthon will have to find a different meat suit. It’d buy everyone else time. Maybe she's okay with that.
Stephen closed the Gap Junction door and slipped his watch back on his wrist before examining the device. He fiddles with the controls until an orange, rectangular portal opens in front of them.