How Strange It Is

I liked Multiverse of Madness, but it only served to convince me that Dr. Strange is an evil self-centered maniac. Thus, this was born.

Warnings for slightly out of character Strange. I isolated his worst traits. Namely when he dealt with Pizza Ball Guy.

Dr. Stephen Strange didn't think he'd ever screamed so loudly in his life. It was loud enough to make the passerby around him pause and cringe and run away. Or maybe those reactions were because of the third eye. Normal people did tend to be a bit squeamish around extra body parts.

"Sir, are you all right?"

Then again, many New Yorkers weren't normal.

Stephen had to blink his eyes, all three of them, in order to see properly again. The pain was receding now, no longer blinding him. A young man stood in front of him, hand outstretched to help him up.

"Thank you." Stephen allowed himself to pulled up and steadied. His new third eye was already making him dizzy. After several attempts, he managed to keep it closed for the time being.

"Dr. Stephen Strange," the stranger said in a whisper. His eyes widened in surprise, making him look even younger, a mere boy. Then his surprise faded and his face looked older, not because of any physical features, but because of a deep weariness in his natural expression. Regardless of his age, this boy had seen much.

Frankly, Stephen didn't care. He'd just spent the past few days running around the Multiverse with a teenager. His yearly allowance of compassion for young people was all spent. There was only one thing he found weird.

"You know my full name," Stephen noted. "Tell me, have I gained popularity? Perhaps I'll get a statue here like in that other universe . . ."

"A video of you is trending," the boy admitted.

"Ooh, which one?"

"Your costume change when you went to battle that one-eyed octopus thing. Here." The boy held up his phone to show the clip. The video was rather embellished with an excess of animation.

"Did someone try to make this look like an anime scene?" Stephen murmured as he watched the subpar animations around himself. "That feels weird, but I'll allow it so long as I finally get a statue in this world."

"There are weirder versions of the video, like a Wonder Woman themed one." The good samaritan watched him with interest. "How have you been?"

Stephen blinked at him, his new third eye reopening briefly before he got a handle on it. "I'm sorry, do I know you?"

"You . . . helped me once."

"Ah, yes, I've helped a lot of people now. I don't remember you at all." Stephen adjusted his scarf. "Well, you're welcome for whatever it is I did, but I probably ought to get home to check for any new powers or—"

"Wait," the stranger interrupted. "Could I buy you a drink?"

Stephen surveyed him. He had indeed been planning to head to a bar tonight. And he did so love to rant to mortal strangers about his problems. No one ever believed the poor folk he gushed his heart out to, if he allowed them to remember anything. There was just one problem with this offer though. "Are you even old enough to be in a bar?"

"My ID says I am."

"Okay then, that's enough proof for me. Come on, I know a place."

Stephen led the way to an old pub. It was the kind of local place that was quaint and homy, with plenty of secluded areas. All sorts of sorcerors used to frequent the place for those exact reasons, but many avoided the New York area now. They claimed there was too much going on to focus on their magic. This was, of course, entirely true, and the reason why Stephen stayed.

With a conspiratory nod to the bartender, he and his latest drinking buddy were assured the finest spirits in the place.

Ugh. Spirits. Stephen didn't want to think about those at the moment.

The young man hopped up onto a barstool, and Stephen was growing quite tired of calling him a stranger. He needed a name for any memory spells anyway. "What's your name, kid?"

"Peter."

"Peter," Stephen repeated as he sat at a neighboring stool, resting an elbow on the rich mahogany bar. "A friend of mine had a brother named Piotr. He's dead. And she's dead inside now."

One of Peter's eyebrows raised. "I see. Do all of your friends have such bad luck?"

Stephen barked out a laugh. Bad luck? The fates of his friends were beyond bad luck. "Not all of them, but quite a few." The bartender poured them both a glass of scotch on the rocks. Stephen swirled his. Despite everything he'd been through, the sound of ice clinking on glass was still pleasant to the ears. "Tell me, Peter, have you ever made plans for your future that were completely and utterly crushed?"

"Why yes, that has happened to me before," Peter replied with such formal nonchalance, it made Stephen smile. This kid had style.

"And have you ever succeeded in reworking your future, only for it to end up completely wrong anyway?"

Peter nodded. "Almost as if you were never meant to be happy."

Stephen's eyes widened. "Yes! Yes! That's it! That's exactly what this feels like!" He sighed. "I suppose the feeling has become more common since the Blip, hm?"

"Definitely."

"I would argue mine is a special case, though," Stephen continued, finishing his current drink and raising his hand for another. "You see, I actually saw my future, or a glimpse of it anyway. I saw it and I did everything in my power to get myself there."

Peter's eyebrow was raised again. "That must have been some future."

Stephen hesitated. "Yes, well, it seemed amazing at the time. In it, I had fixed my watch, this one right here." He pulled back his left sleeve to show the newly repaired watch. "It's the one I wore during that fateful car crash. For years, I left it broken to freeze that moment of loss in time. But in that future, I fixed it, and I was talking to Christine . . ." He trailed off, remembering the look of love and concern on her face, and how closely they stood together. Sure, she hadn't been his Christine, but they had just saved each other's lives. The moment was so perfect, yet she refused him again!

"That's it?"

The short question brought Stephen out of his reverie. "What do you mean, 'that's it'? I thought that was a future in which I was moving on and rekindling the love of my life! That's everything I've ever wanted!"

"Hm, interesting." Peter sipped his drink.

"What's interesting?" Stephen demanded.

"Nothing. It's just that you're this powerful wizard guy who's fought literal gods and demons, and all you wanted was to fix a watch and get the girl."

Stephen rolled his eyes. "Perhaps you're too young to understand. People do a lot for true love."

Peter nodded, in agreeance with at least one of those statements. "So, this future was super appealing to you," he summed up. "What did you do about that? Take a class on watchmaking and get relationship advice?"

"Ha, funny," Stephen deadpanned, and he somewhat meant it. It was hilarious when ordinary people thought they could judge him. "No, this future required me to follow a very specific path. It was far from ideal, but it was worth it even for the chance to be alone with Christine."

"Wow, you really do love her. All right, so what great decisions and sacrifices did you make for your true love?" Peter asked with far too much grandeur and sarcasm.

Stephen smirked to hide his anger. Peter's sass was really getting on his nerves. It was a good thing Stephen's story was going to make this poor young man furious. Then the ensuing fight would be self defense. "I made several sacrifices. The first thing I had to do was relinquish the Time Stone."

"Relinquish, as in you gave it up on purpose? To who? Why?"

This boy wasn't very bright. "Yes, I gave it up. As to whom, I think you know a certain purple someone who was in the market for such Stones."

"Barney the dinosaur?!"

Stephen nearly choked on his next sip. "No! Not Barney! Thanos!"

"Wait, you just gave him exactly what he needed to become all powerful and wipe out half of life everywhere?"

Peter was more surprised than angry right now, but it would only be a matter of time before he gave the first punch, and then Stephen could have some fun. "Yes, I did exactly that. I gave some other excuses to the heroes, but the truth is that I did it for the one future where I spent any considerable amount of time with Christine."

"But then you were turned to dust too," Peter pointed out. "Your plan went wrong."

"That's not when my plan went wrong," Stephen shook his head. "No, that was a risk I was willing to take. Alas, the fifty-fifty odds were against me, and I lost five years and my position as Sorcerer Supreme."

"Serves you right."

There it was! Peter's anger was rising! And he was young enough to be an Iron Man fan, so this next part would only rile him up further. "It's not so bad to be a regular sorcerer. There's a lot less work, I'll tell you that. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The next part of my plan required Thanos to be defeated in one specific way. Tony Stark had to be the one to end him."

Peter's fists clenched. "You told him that was the only way?"

"I couldn't tell him. It wouldn't have worked if I did. But I certainly made sure he thought it was the only way."

"I thought you were a good guy!"

Stephen outright laughed. "Just because I stopped a few demons from destroying this world doesn't mean I'm a good guy. It just meant that I wasn't done with this world yet."

Peter glared at him. "What else did you do?"

"I honestly don't know. The last part of my plan required me to open up the Multiverse, and I did so, but I can't remember how. Maybe I ruined some people's lives, maybe I didn't. Who knows?" Stephen sighed. "Alas, none of that mattered. Sure, I got my time with Christine. We were alone together in the scariest most bizarre version of the Sanctum Sanctorum I've ever seen. It was like a Tunnel of Love. She saved my life, I saved the Multiverse, and we touched, just for a moment—"

"And then she realized what a monster you were," Peter snarled.

"No, it was worse," Stephen admitted through clenched teeth. "She insisted we go back to each other's respective universes and live our separate lives. All she wanted me to do was move on. So I went back home. I fixed up my watch to complete the timeline, and I even went to the Christine of this world even though she's married now. She was happy that I learned to keep moving forward despite everything. Then she turned me away too." Instead of setting his shot glass down, he transformed it into paper and began tearing it.

Now it was Peter who laughed. "You went through all that just to learn the same lesson that was in the Meet the Robinsons movie?!"

Stephen felt magic flash in his eyes. Even his new third one was open now. He was ready for some stress relief now. "How dare you mock me?! I will make you rue the day you—"

"I've heard enough," a quiet yet forceful voice cut through all other sounds. Stephen looked around to find a strikingly beautiful woman in a purple jumpsuit. She stepped out of a portal more akin to America's than any sorcerer's.

"Who are you?" Stephen demanded, already preparing his spell. He had originally intended to make Peter beat himself up, but perhaps he could make him and this new girl fight each other. That would be an entertaining end to his day.

"You won't know who I am," the woman said. "However, I know you, Dr. Stephen Strange. You are responsible for setting the Multiverse on a collision course."

Stephen rolled his eyes. "I already had my Multiverse adventure, thanks."

"Oh, I'm well aware of your travels." The woman's eyes narrowed. "You caused irreparable damage to multiple universes."

"Those Illuminati bozos had it coming. Now if you'll excuse me." Stephen stood to make his getaway portal, but the sling ring was pulled from his fingers by a white thread that Peter shot out from . . . his wrist?

"You still don't remember me?" Peter asked as he snapped the ring in half. "Figures, since you did the memory spell yourself."

"You're the one I opened the Multiverse for?" Stephen asked. "Didn't I help you?"

"Not in the slightest," Peter replied with vehemence.

The woman came forward and put a comforting hand on his shoulder. "Thank you for getting him to confess, Peter. I'll take it from here. If there's anything Strange can do in restitution, please let me know and I'll add it to his sentence."

"Thank you, Ravonna."

Stephen didn't like the sound of this. Luckily, he had one last trick up his sleeve. He tugged at his scarf, initiating his epic costume transformation—

And somehow, the woman, Ravonna, was already behind him cuffing his hands together, and Stephen felt his magic draining. What—? How—?

Ravonna spoke loudly in his ear as she pushed him towards the portal. "Dr. Stephen Strange, you are charged with crimes against the Multiverse. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you."

Just like that, Stephen was pushed into one more unknown universe, unprepared to face his greatest adversary yet.

Justice.