"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.
"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here." -Alice's Adventures in Wonderland,
-Line-
Phil Coulson isn't Paid Enough
This universe was stupid.
Earthquakes were stupid, dimension travel was stupid, this flu was the king of stupid, that cat was Stupid, and right now, everything was fucking stupid.
He didn't even get to drink his fucking coffee.
Tony stalked down the hallway grumbling under his breath and possibly scaring the interns. He paused and glared at one such unsuspecting SHIELD agent.
"You!" Tony shouted, causing the poor guy to jump and nearly lose the papers he was carrying. He looked around then pointed to himself in a 'who me?' gesture, which Tony would've found amusing had he not felt like crawling into a dark abyss right about now.
"Uh, do you mean me, Mr. Stark?"
Tony growled, "Yes, you! Do you see anybody else around here? That was rhetorical." He deadpanned when the agent looked like he was about to look around again, and strode toward the agent. "Gimme your phone. Now." He tacked on when the guy hesitated.
Agent-man squeaked and fumbled for his pockets. "A flip-phone?" Tony accused in disgust, "Seriously? You know what? Doesn't matter -hand it over." He snatched the outdated tech out of the now panicky man.
He flipped the phone open and told the agent to 'scram' while he dialed a number by heart and retreated to the only place in this stupid building that wouldn't have any security cameras.
A janitor's closet.
Don't judge him.
He growled from where he sat on a bucket when all he got was dial tone.
He redialed. No Answer.
He redialed again, and waited.
Third ring there was finally a click, and a familiar voice sounded through the speaker, "I don't know who you are or how you got this number but-"
"Coulson!" Tony cut in, not wanting to hear that particular rant again, at all, in his lifetime. Ever.
There was a silence.
"…Stark?"
"Yes. Well, sort of." He wasn't entirely sure if he still counted, what with dimension travel and all. Somewhere in that range though, probably.
"How did you- you're not supposed to know that I'm even alive. Wait, what do you mean 'sort of'?" Agent questioned tensely.
Tony blinked, "What, really? I'm not supposed to –what year is this?" He looked around as if the closet would tell him anything about the time and place he was currently in.
"Stark. What do you mean 'sort of'? The year? Have you been drinking? Where are you right now?" Agent shot out rapidly.
"I'm in a closet right now." Tony answered, "I'm not actually from this universe, so 'Sort of' comes into place," He continued, "As for drinking, I wish. Really, I do."
He really, really did.
There was sigh on the other end of the call, "Honestly, I'm not even surprised. Have you contacted SHIELD, or was I your first call?"
Tony was a little miffed that not only had Coulson not mentioned the closet at all, but had also implied that he would be Tony's first call if he ever go into to trouble.
Not that it wasn't true -case and point, this conversation, but it still irked him.
"If it makes you feel any better, I am currently in SHIELD HQ."
"It does, actually. I assume the Director as everything under control. Now why did you call me?"
Oh, right.
"Darcy's being mean to me!" He whined, clutching the phone close to his face.
Silence. Then, "What?"
"Darcy. She is a cat, who is being mean to me. And it's not just her, either! I'm being mean to me, too! All three of me! And everyone keeps calling me sniffles because I'm sick -those assholes- and you need to come back from whatever hell-hole you're hiding in and make them stop!" His words came out quicker and louder as he spoke until he was near shouting at the end.
"…I think I'm missing something. There are three of you?" Coulson sounded calm, but Tony could detect a small amount of panic.
"Really, that's what you take away from that?" Tony asked incredulously, "And there's currently four of me, if you count, well, me." He huffed.
"Riiight, listen Stark, I need to make a call-"
"Wait! You can't hang up! I haven't told you about the two Loki's yet!" Tony crowed.
"And now I definitely need to make that call." That was undeniably panic this time, "It involves national security."
"But-" There was click, signifying the end of the call. Tony grumbled.
Asshole. See if Tony ever called him ever again.
"This sucks."
A/N: There are two versions of this chapter. I like this one better, myself, hence why I'm posting it. But. Yeah. Hope you like it ^.^'
