Yeah, No.
Summary: There was only one thing more terrifying then somehow appearing (alone, penniless, and lacking an identity) in the Marvel Universe: having a certain trigger-happy, filthy-mouthed, fourth-wall-breaking mercenary of questionable conscience notice you on the metro ride home from work.
Chapter 1: Game On
Let's play a game.
It's a good one.
You've suddenly appeared in the middle of a busy thoroughfare in downtown New York. You have nothing but what is on you. Stark Tower juts into the skyline directly to your left, which is odd, because even though you've never been to New York, you know it doesn't belong there.
You have thirty seconds to answer.
What do you do?
You stand still for a moment, staring blankly, because spatial relocation is disorienting. Then you move with the crowd, because the light is turning and even you know that one does not simply Stop in the middle of a busy intersection during traffic hour in The City That Never Sleeps.
So you drift, suddenly finding yourself seated in a coffee shop whose logo blazes on nearly every street corner, but whose name shall-not-be-mentioned due to copy right infringement. You wave away the hassled looking employee who comes to check on you, because you've been there for fifteen minutes already and aren't you going to order something? smiling sardonically as you "rest your feet" because, dammit, you've worked retail and you're not going to snap at someone to get the fuck out of my face, moron, I'm having a moment here, because you're having a bad day.
They blather on about free wifi for customers (their emphasis) and that reminds you that your phone is still in your back pocket, so you pull it out and dial every number on your phone list, in the hopes that someone (anyone) answers, but you get nothing but endless ringing, not even a sim card error. Your phone is about to die, but there's a conveniently placed universal charger at your booth, which you use, before connecting to the, aforementioned, free wifi and tearing through every social media outlet and app you can think of, because you're a millennial, dammit, and that's your life line.
Nothing turns up, by the way.
Then, after ordering a hot chocolate (because caffeine is so not what you need right now), with an almost forgotten gift card that you found shoved in your phone case along with your drivers license and debit card (Did you even have any money?! Shit.), you wait until the energy bar on your phone reaches 100% before eventually pulling up Maps and speed walking to the nearest police station.
After discovering that you, apparently, don't exist, you get placed in a nice empty room. It has wide, open windows, even if the bars on them are ornamental and stylish, and the seat you sit on is just shy of being uncomfortable. You wait for an hour (thank god for that hot chocolate) before two mooks in suits show up to help you. They don't tell you who they are and you don't ask, because one does not blurt out the acronym SHIELD like some dumb ass, even though you have a sneaking suspicion creeping up on you.
Still. You tell them everything. Everything relevant anyway. They ask you the year and when you answer wrong, they invite you into their nice black car.
When you come to after being tranquilized, you find yourself in a room more like what you were expecting: metallic walls, bright florescent lighting and all. It starts all over again with the questions once your hosts return, which you answer like a good little citizen, because you are scared out of your fucking mind.
They determine, after weeks of tests, some invasive, some not, that you are just the unfortunate victim of Time Displacement, and that what you know as a civilian makes you completely worthless, now that they know that you are, in fact, a nobody.
Which you had told them. Repeatedly.
Still, they offer you a job, because if there's one thing those paranoid fucks know, it's to keep your friends close, but your enemies closer. Not that you're an enemy or whatever, but apparently Loki had happened, and Winter Soldier and Civil War and Ultron (You think? The internet kindly informed you that the Avengers split up so...). Yeah. They weren't taking any chances.
And since you have (had? Fuck.) an oh so helpful degree in creative writing (the irony is so not funny anymore) and since they can't really trust you to the PR department for content, they demote you to the lowest reaches of Hell instead.
Customer Relations.
In case you haven't noticed, it's been longer than thirty seconds.
Don't worry. It took me thirty minutes to even walk out of that coffee shop.
