A/N So I'll try to update once a week but I make no promises.
Disclaimer: I don't own Justice League, Avengers, or Doctor Who, which I stole a few lines from since I simply couldn't resist. The lines are from the episode The Doctor's Wife featuring the 11th Doctor. Idk what season.
"Hey, guys," Tony said, as he walked into main room of the Avengers Tower to find Clint, Natasha, Steve, and Bruce already there. "The weirdest thing happened yesterday. Somebody played Ding-Dong-Ditch at the Avengers Tower."
Silence answered Tony, and he gave them all a look. "Come on, that's at least a little weird," he said as he sat down in a chair across from Natasha.
"No?" Captain America replied, as if he wasn't too sure what he was talking about.
"Do you know who the culprit is?" Natasha asked.
"Ah…No," Tony replied.
"Don't we have cameras for that sort of thing?" Clint asked.
"Well, we did but-" Tony started to explain but was cut off by Steve.
"Uh, question," Steve stated.
"What?" Tony asked.
"I'm afraid I'm not really sure what we are talking about here. I thought I did but, now I'm not so sure," Steve replied. "So, what exactly is Ding-Dong-Ditch?"
"Come on, Cap!" Tony said, "Surely they had that around in your day. I'm pretty sure its been around since doorbells were invented. Before that, it was probably Knock-Knock-Run-for-your-life-before-they-get-the-musket."
"I believe what Tony is trying to say," Bruce cut-in, "is that it's the name for the game kids play when they ring the doorbell and then disappear before you can answer the door."
"Oh," Steve replied, "I didn't know that had a name."
"Glad that's cleared up," Natasha replied, "Now, what was this about the camera, Tony?"
"Oh, right," Tony cleared his throat, "As I was saying, we did have a camera but then a couple of our…um…colleagues made some poor life choices."
"Hold on just a minute," Steve said, jumping to his feet, "that was not at all my fault. I told you, the Hulk stole my shield."
"Are you sure about that?" Tony asked. "Can you even remember what happened that night?"
"I have a photographic memory," Steve said proudly, before continuing, "…and as it pertains to that night, it's completely blank."
"So…no?" Clint asked.
"Pretty sure that's what he just said," Bruce replied.
"Well, the shield was pretty bad," Tony said, "and, as much as love to blame the Cap, the camera probably would have survived had the Hulk not proceeded to puke into the shield shaped hole."
"So that's what that smell is," Natasha commented.
"Umm…no, that smell is the new puke scented candles that I bought and placed strategically throughout the room. Apparently, it's a new fad that's sweeping the nation," Tony responded.
"Shut up, Tony," Black Widow commanded, throwing him a dark look.
Tony decided that it was best he didn't respond.
"Where's Thor?" Steve asked.
"He should be here," Natasha responded.
"I saw him earlier," Clint said, "He was looking for Jane."
Just then the elevator doors opened and an upset Thor strode into the room. "Have any of you seen Jane?" he asked somewhat frantically. "I went to her lab, her house, and searched the surrounding area, but I couldn't find her anywhere. Finally, I contacted Heimdall. He couldn't find her, Selvig, Darcy, or that boy who keeps hanging around Darcy."
"Ian, Darcy's intern," Pepper provided, suddenly walking into the room.
"Pepper, what are you doing here?" Tony asked, "Not that I'm not happy to see you, but I thought that you were working?"
"I am," Pepper replied. "I came to ask if you had heard from Dr. Fridder? He didn't come into work today, and I know you two had some project going last week."
"Last week? Fridder?" Tony asked, furrowing his brow, trying to think of who Pepper was talking about.
"Oh, Henry!" he shouted out, suddenly. "Really, he didn't come in today? He was supposed to track the abnormal readings that some of our researchers had noticed."
"Actually now that I think about it, you may be interested in them Bruce. They have Gamma signatures similar to that of the Tesseract, but more random."
"More random?" Bruce asked.
"Well, the Tesseract is one thing with one weak Gamma signature, but these are lots of tiny Gamma signatures that we have observed popping up all over the globe. They put off the same kind of Gamma radiation in the same pattern as the Tesseract. The only difference being that they put off less radiation overall." Tony explained.
Bruce simply nodded, "I'll look at it tonight."
"So, wait," Steve said, "we have people missing and random Gamma signature popping up around the globe. Could those be connected?"
Tony and Bruce both thought about it for a second. They looked at each other for a moment or two and seemed to be telepathically speaking. Finally, Bruce responded with, "Based on our experience with the Tesseract and the little we know about it, yes, they could be related."
"It's also possible that the phenomenon we observed is simply some aftereffect of the wormhole opened above this building last year. Of course, that certainly doesn't rule out the possibility that it's linked to the missing people," Tony added.
"So, basically, all we have is a theory?" Natasha asked.
"I guess you could call it that," Bruce replied.
"None of this helps me find Jane," Thor interjected. "Even if this is related to the Tesseract or the mini-Tesseracts that you have been detecting, we still have no way of finding her. Also, Heimdall could find her and all of the others if they were in any of the Nine Realms, so the fact that he couldn't means that they are not in this dimension."
Tony restrained himself from correcting Thor on the mini-Tesseracts comment. Just because their Gamma signatures were fairly consistent did not mean that the small abnormalities had any other qualities similar to the Tesseract. Sometimes it surprised Tony that Thor could claim to be from an advanced society when he seemed so oblivious to all that Tony knew as science.
"If they aren't in this dimension, then where could they be?" Steve asked.
Thor looked uncertain, and this wasn't really Bruce's element so Tony responded, "Another dimension, stuck between dimensions, a pocket universe, a bubble universe," Tony paused for a moment. "I think that's it."
"A bubble universe?" Clint asked. "Haven't heard of that one."
"Imagine a great big soap bubble with one of those tiny little bubbles on the outside," Tony explained.
"Okay…" Steve said in response.
"But it's nothing like that," Tony added.
"So, the missing people are possibly trapped in a tiny bubble universe stuck to the side of our bigger bubble universe?" Natasha asked, trying to wrap her head around the situation.
"Yes!…No! But if it helps, yes," Tony said, leaving everyone looking at him as if he were crazy. There was a slight chance that he was.
There was a moment of silence
"But, wait…how is that different from a pocket universe?" Clint asked.
Tony sighed and was about to launch into another- no doubt confusing- explanation when Bruce stopped him by saying, "For the moment, it doesn't really matter. What does matter is finding out whether we are right or wrong, after that we can figure out what to do next."
"And how do you figure out whether you are right or wrong?" Pepper piped in, making Tony feel bad since he had pretty much forgotten that she was there.
"Well-" Tony started to explain that he wasn't really sure when he was interrupted by JARVIS.
"Sir," the AI started, "there's a situation in Times Square."
"Show me," Tony ordered.
A two-foot tall 3-D holographic picture appeared on the coffee table. At first glance, there seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary. The picture was just an aerial view of Times Square. As the hologram started to zoom in, however, the Avengers noticed that something was very wrong indeed.
"Is that a tiger?" Clint asked, squinting at the small figure that an entire crowd of people was fleeing from.
"And an ostrich?" Bruce added, looking at another place in the holographic picture.
"Ostriches are pure evil," Steve commented, looking at the same spot in the picture as Bruce.
Resounding silence greeted him, causing him to glance up and find everyone except Thor looking at him with a myriad of expressions.
"What? They are," Steve said in his defense.
"I think we would all like to know the story behind that, Cap," Tony said.
Again, all except Thor nodded their heads in agreement.
"I think that we should go save those people, first," Steve responded, gesturing to the hologram.
"I think Steve is right," Thor added. "Those humans look like they are in a dire situation."
"Hold on just a second," Tony said, as he noticed something in the picture that the others had seemingly missed.
"JARVIS, can you get audio?" Tony asked.
"Just a moment, sir," the AI replied.
Less than a minute later, the sound of screams filled the room along with a single shout, "I am the Zookeeper, and you shall fear me!"
"Where is that coming from?" Bruce asked.
"Probably him," Natasha answered as she picked up on the same thing that Tony had just a moment before and she pointed to a lone figure in the middle of the mostly abandoned square.
"The Zookeeper?" Thor asked. "What does that mean?"
"I do know that one," Steve said.
"Let's go," Clint said.
The rest of the team nodded their agreement.
Tony summoned his suit. "Thor and I will meet you there," he said before pushing his faceplate down into place. He was about to take off when he turned, looked at Bruce, and added, "Try not to Hulk out in my building," in his electronic Ironman voice.
A second later, Tony was gone with Thor following suit.
"Gee, thanks Tony," Bruce said, before following the other three to the elevator.
I'll admit this chapter was mainly here as a set-up for the next chapter, but it was also pretty fun to write. Also, I know way more DC characters than Marvel and I'm trying to keep X-men and Fantastic Four out of this fic (Spiderman may come in), so I came up with an original lame-ass villain since I couldn't think of a good Marvel one. Anyway, if there is a particular DC hero or villain that you want to show up later in the story just let me know in a review. That's all for now.