A/N: We're still in the set-up phase (there's quite a few characters I plan on kidnapping to kick off the plot, but we're getting there). I have so many ideas. Thanks for reading and reviewing and I hope you like what comes next.

"So what's up with the third eye?"

Stephen sighed and placed the stack of books on the table. He should have seen this coming. "That is something I'm still trying to figure out." Since its appearance, he sometimes studied his reflection in the mirror and imagined a more sinister face staring back at him.

America's gaze flickered to his hands then back to his face. "You don't think the Darkhold's…corrupted you?"

Stephen's fingers twinged. He forced a smile. "Of course not. I only read it once." Once was enough, of course, but there was no need to worry America unnecessarily. He went through the books in the stack – A Treatise on the Splinter Realms, Les Rêves et Les Moyens de Les Diriger, The Lesser Entities Volumes I and II – and pulled out a slim volume. "This one's for you." Her handed her A Study of Form.

America cracked it open. "Great. Homework."

Stephen tried to think of what else he might need. A book on the theory of incursions would be nice, though if such a thing existed, it wasn't in the Sanctum. He might have to browse Kamar-Taj's library. Until recently, very little had been known about the multiverse and less about incursions but certain sorcerers throughout history had experimented with spells and written down theories on practical and theoretical multiversal events. Cagliostro, for certain. The multiverse, as they had barely glimpsed, was full of untold dangers. Actually, it couldn't hurt to grab a book on the Greater Entities, just to be safe. He walked off.

"You know, I can tell when you're changing the subject," America said, walking after him.

"I'm not changing the subject. I'm just preparing for a very complicated, very extensive preventative measure."

"He's avoiding," Bats said.

Stephen shot the dog a look. "Who's side are you on?"

"I'm just doing my job."

"And what is that exactly?"

Bats floated so he was eye level with Stephen. "The Doc from my universe…he's done a lot. He saved the world so many times, but doing so took him down some dark paths. And when that happened, I got to be there for him. But when he needed help the most, I wasn't there. I couldn't save him."

Stephen's mood softened. It couldn't be more clear to him that this dog had been important to another version of him. That Bats had been a good friend. And Stephen understood what it was like to lose and carry on with the guilt.

"The Darkhold is gone," Stephen said, addressing both Bats and America. "Its power is no more, its dark spells lost forever. It can't hurt anyone anymore."

He wasn't sure if they believed him but that's all they were going to get. It took extended use to corrupt the soul. It wasn't like he was suddenly going to go Scarlet Witch on them all. Anyway, he had more important things to think about right now.

"Some of these forms are wild," America muttered as they passed a comfy reading nook, which was occupied. "It's like a dance."

Stephen was no longer paying attention. He did a double take, retraced the last couple of steps and saw that, yes, there was indeed someone in the reading nook whom he did not recognize. It appeared to be a young man in a hoodie. He was sitting in an armchair and reading a Captain America comic book.

"Hello…" A quick check confirmed this man wasn't a sorcerer. "How did you get in here?" The Sanctum was warded against intruders. Only sorcerers or those granted entry could enter the Sanctum. Anyone else would find it an untraversable maze.

"I let him in." Wong appeared by Stephen's side and handed him a cup of tea. "I see I am not the only one gathering allies." He passed a cup to America and the stranger, keeping a fourth to himself. He could carry them all because he was levitating them. Stephen didn't waste time wondering how he knew to bring enough.

"I'm Shang-Chi," the young man said with a wave. "Is that a ghost dog?"

"Yes, this is Bats," Stephen said after a beat. "I'm Dr. Strange. America Chavez." He gestured to America. He still had no idea why this man was here but whatever. He trusted Wong not to bring psychopaths into the Sanctum.

"Hi." America waved. "I like your hoodie."

"Thanks. I like your jacket."

"Thanks."

"We have a situation here," Stephen told Wong. "Dormammu is no longer bound to the Dark Dimension."

Wong was not an expressive man but that certainly got a reaction from him in the form of widening eyes and a small frown. "That should not be possible," Wong said. "You're sure?"

"Pretty sure. And I think his influence is spreading. America and I took a stroll through a universe that's already trying to stop him."

Wong nodded. "This is grim news. A being of such power loose in the multiverse…it could cause an incursion."

Stephen briefly closed his eyes then opened them. "Yeah."

Wong was watching him closely, maybe with concern. It wasn't what Stephen needed. He straightened and held his hands behind his back. "Fortunately, I have a plan. Shang-Chi, what's your deal? Apprentice? High-tech suit of armor? Smart aleck with bug powers?"

"You do?" Wong asked incredulously.

"Uh. Monster-killing mystic rings I don't fully understand?" Shang-Chi said.

"Perfect. You'll do just fine." Stephen turned back to Wong. "Wong, I need volunteers, lots of them. As soon as possible."

Wong's frown deepened. "Kamar-Taj is still recovering. I don't think it's a good idea to pull sorcerers away for the time being."

Stephen shook his head. "Not sorcerers. Think more diverse."

"You want the Avengers."

"Not sure the Avengers are still a thing technically, but yes. We're going to need everyone we can get."

"Just how dangerous is this plan of yours?"

"Fairly safe, surprisingly." At Wong's cynical look, he amended, "It might get dangerous later on."

Wong drank his tea. "Alright, I'll see what I can do."

"Some heavy-hitters might come in handy," Stephen quickly added. "See if you can find Captain Danvers." That was something he'd like to see actually, Captain Marvel against Dormammu. Sure, he wasn't planning on sending anyone into danger any time soon, but it would be nice to have the option.

"Don't press your luck," Wong said. "I haven't seen her in months." He spun open a portal to Kamar Taj.

"Thanks," Stephen called after him as he vanished. He felt slightly guilty for making the request of Wong when he was no doubt supremely busy with the repairs to Kamar-Taj. They'd taken a heavy blow when the Scarlet Witch had decimated their numbers and it was all Wong could do to keep everything in order. The guardians of the New York and Hong Kong Sanctums helped where they could and Stephen leant his aid whenever he could, but it would be a long time before things returned to normal in their mystical part of the world. Sometimes he wondered if the sorcerers shouldn't try and work more closely with whatever was left of the Avengers, rather than keeping separate. There was a lot to be done and there were a lot of threats. And much strength in numbers. That would be something to consider in the future, starting with his campaign against Dormammu.

"So what's this plan?" Shang-Chi asked. "And did Wong say multiverse?" His expression said a multiverse full of infinite dangers was something to be excited about.

"Yup," Stephen said. "But it will be easier to explain once everyone else gets here. It's a lot to swallow. In the meantime, you mentioned rings?"

Shang-Chi nodded. "Yeah. Wong took a look at them earlier but even he doesn't know what to make of them." He grabbed a wooden box that sat by his chair and opened it up. Inside sat ten identical rings that looked more like bangles than anything. "They belonged to my father who found them thousands of years ago. He said they hold an ancient power."

Fascinating. Stephen made a complicated series of finger movements and passed his hand over the rings. A ripple of energy passed through his fingers, warming them. He hummed. "Definitely not a relic I'm familiar with. This is not a power I would trust in just anyone's hands." He flexed his fingers, dispersing the spell, and he looked Shang-Chi in the face. "You must be pretty special to find yourself worthy of them."

Shang-Chi straightened. "Thank you, sir."

Stephen waved a hand dismissively. "I also trust Wong's judgment."

The doorbell rang. It wasn't something that happened very often. Sorcerers usually just portaled in. No one even used the front door. The bell was a deep, rich gong that reverberated through the Sanctum and left its inhabitants mostly silent, wondering who it could possibly be.

"That was fast," America said while the echo of the bell hung in the air.

"Too fast." Stephen headed for the foyer. He didn't mind taking the stairs, he really didn't, but the Cloak always seemed to delight in picking him up and carrying him majestically down to the first floor. Which, well, it was faster. Bats floated down after him while America and Shang-Chi took the stairs.

There was no need to build suspense so Stephen, mentally prepared for everything and nothing, opened the door to find –

"Hi Dr. Strange, uh…sir. It's, uh, it's me…Spi–"

"Spider-Man?" Stephen said, eyes widening.. Huh, maybe Wong really was that fast. Though of all the people to recruit, he hadn't counted on Spider-Man coming. No one knew the guy's real identity so he was virtually unreachable. "Come in. Is anyone else with you? Is Wong…" He peered out the door, half-expecting to find a group of costumed people on his doorstep but there was no one else there.

"Uh, no. I don't know where he is."

"Oh my god, Spider-Man?" Shang-Chi laughed. "For real? This is so cool. I'm a big fan, man."

"Thanks." Spider-Man raised a hand in an awkward but friendly little wave.

America stayed back, eyeing Spider-Man with much suspicion.

"Okay so actually I came here to tell you what happened to me today. Because it's kinda about you. Anyway – oh this is dumb." Spider-Man casually pulled off his mask and took a freeing breath. "Okay so –"

"Hold on." In all the time Stephen had known Spider-Man, he'd never taken off the mask. He'd always assumed the guy valued his privacy and wanted to keep his identity a secret and Stephen had respected that. Yet now… "How old are you?"

"Eighteen," he said defensively.

Eighteen years old and already a veteran of the war against Thanos. But Stephen couldn't really say anything, could he? Fourteen and America had survived the Scarlet Witch.

Stephen sighed. "Sorry, kid. You caught me by surprise. What was it you wanted to tell me?"

Spider-Man didn't look like he knew where to regain the thread of his thoughts now that Stephen had derailed him. He looked…geez, he was looking at Stephen with a peculiar expression like he wanted to say something deeply important but whatever it was refused to come out. Something clearly had him shaken. The Cloak waved at him in a concerned manner.

"You alright?" Stephen asked, trying to get him to focus. Maybe he'd had a bad day. Stephen thought about putting a reassuring hand on the kid's shoulder, thought better of it because they barely knew each other, then thought what the hell. He put his hand on Spider-Man's shoulder.

That seemed to fortify him. He nodded and blinked a few times. "Okay. Yeah," he said, his voice steadying. "So I was taking a break, right? I was just eating a hot dog on a roof when I heard this crash. It was a car. That's not important. What's important is who crashed it. He was a sorcerer." Now that he'd started, it all came rolling out like a stone down a hill, his hands helping to illustrate events. "So I chased him cause 'what the heck, man?' And I caught him but this other guy showed up and wanted to beat him up. I said we shouldn't but anyway, the sorcerer looked all weird, like his eyes were bleeding but they were purple and he was all like 'tell the Timekeeper Dormammu's coming' and then he died."

Stephen stilled. Oh. Oh yeah, this was bad. "You're sure he said Dormammu?"

Spider-Man nodded vigorously. "Definitely. He turned to dust. Who's Dormammu?"

Stephen's mouth drew into a grim line. The Cloak's collar gently brushed his cheek bone as if trying to reassure him. "Well if we had any doubt about Dormammu escaping the confines of the Dark Dimension, we sure don't anymore." And he made no secret what his plan was. Timekeeper obviously referred to Stephen. Was this revenge for the bargain Stephen had tricked him into? It could be, but it seemed like more than that. No, his goal was still multiversal in scale but probably he figured to scratch payback off his to-do list while he was at it.

"We just can't catch a break," America said. "I take it this means the homework can wait?"

"It means I'll be divvying out the defensive spells for the time being. Thanks for bringing this to my attention."

Spider-Man scratched the back of his head. "No problem. Anything I can do to help, Ste-Dr. Strange?"

Stephen narrowed his eyes but a soft brush of cool wind interrupted his train of thought. There shouldn't be a draft in the Sanctum.

Spider-Man was edging toward the door, but Stephen stopped him. "You mind sticking around, Spider-Man? We could use your help."

The kid seemed to brighten at that. "Really? Yeah, sure. And you can call me Peter, if you want. Peter Parker."

Huh. The identity of Spider-Man, just like that. Stephen wondered what had changed.

"Oh and about the other guy," Peter said. "I think he's involved somehow too and wanted something from the sorcerer. I don't think he's a villain but he might be bad news."

The wind shifted again. Stephen's Cloak fluttered. Bats' ears stood up.

"You hear that?" Bats asked softly.

Stephen stood frozen. "No." He didn't hear it, he felt it.

With an ear-popping lurch, the Sanctum Sanctorum shifted. Floorboards skittered an inch. America gasped, Peter swayed, and Shang-Chi kept his balance by grabbing the end table. Stephen's boots were no longer touching the ground as the Cloak lifted him up.

Now he could hear it. The grinding of wood and stone and tinkling of glass. The rhythmic ticking of a metronome that rolled into the thunk thunk thunk of a hammer and then crashed into a sound with the weight of dumbbells against the floor above. Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! A timer. Counting down.

"Someone's got past the wards," Bats said, his ears flattening.

This day was never going to end. "Alright. Stay close. Do not lose sight of me or you will get lost" Stephen rose into the air. He raised one hand and drew a bead of liquid light from some hidden pocket of reality. Giving it a twist, he let it cascade down over him, pricking his skin and settling onto him like a second cloak and bathing him in an ethereal glow. But it was more than just a light, it was a beacon for his allies.

The countdown continued to crash through the silence. The sound came from the relic room. At the top of the stairs, the floor groaned and slid. He gently touched down and the floorboards stilled. The lights were muted up here as if a deep fog fought to keep them away. Relics stood on their pedestals and in glass cases behind a cracked façade. Without hesitation, Stephen stepped through the barrier and into the Mirror Dimension.

"Whoa," Shang-Chi said, his voice echoing. "What is this?"

"The Mirror Dimension," Peter said since Stephen had only half a mind to give them. Only a hostile intruder would trigger this ward and force the Mirror Dimension to encase a portion of the Sanctum.

"You don't want to get stuck in here," Bats added. "It's like a maze but it shifts. We won't find our way out without the Doc."

Masonry rippled, coming closer. Display cases folded in on themselves and glass kaleidoscope forms blossomed outward. The walls tilted, tilted, falling down toward them. Stephen gestured the walls back upright with a groan and tamed the bursting glass. The whole room spun, the floorboards stretching and making the space bigger. Stephen grounded the section of the floor where he and the others stood so they wouldn't get separated.

He stepped through shifting floor tiles and between moving displays seconds before they merged together behind him, and came to the display case at the heart of the maze where things were still. Behind the glass, nested on a pedestal, was a golden bird mask of unmistakably Egyptian design. Known as the Third Eye of Horus, it let the wielder see things beyond the physical plane. Much like his newfound power seemed to. And even though it was nearly evening, the relic sat bathed in silver moonlight.

A wind gathered up Stephen's Cloak and it billowed out behind him. He shielded his eyes. The floor stretched. Something was definitely here, an otherworldly power that had been caught in his trap. And it wasn't happy.

"Stephen!" America shouted, pointing beyond the display. Edges of glass bordering the Mirror Dimension glinted and reflected there for a barest instant was the skull of a great bird.

The wind blew harder and the lights flickered, but all of that was a ploy, a distraction to keep him from noticing – there! A flash of movement disappearing behind shifting windowpanes.

"Got you." Stephen grounded himself and twisted the room in half, sending the distant edge of it spiraling into a perfect Fibonacci spiral, out and out and out. The floor tilted beneath him and gravity followed, keeping him in place. Every piece of furniture slid away and out into a gray sky.

A figure in black and white plummeted through the air like a bird in a dive. At the last second, it spread its wings and crashed feet-first into Peter, who spun back into a void of chandeliers. Webbing sprayed and latched onto one of them, stopping Peter's fall into nothingness. The figure, not a bird but a man, landed on a bookcase which, while still upright on the floor, spun horizontally.

Stephen rose into the air and spun the unraveling room about faster while keeping the sections of the floor beneath his allies still. This kind of gall required a little drama. He pulled bits of wood and glass from the spiral and spun them toward the would-be thief to cage him in fragments.

The man launched himself between two wooden spurs and bolted forward. Shang-Chi was the closest. He intercepted the thief with a fluid move that redirected his momentum. The thief thrust one hand up at Shang-Chi's face, a crescent blade gleaming in his grip. Shang-Chi's hand darted out, wrapping around the man's wrist while his other delivered a punch to the man's ribs. It would have been enough to finish the fight if he hadn't lost his footing on the shifting floor and slipped over the edge into the spiral that was now so fast it was like a tornado.

"I got you!" Peter appeared from nowhere, shooting two webs, one that caught Shang-Chi by the hand, the other latching onto the non-moving floor piece.

This was beginning to get dangerous. Taking advantage of the thief's momentary distraction, Stephen stepped toward him and gathered up the spiral – the thief drove the knife at him, he deflected – and struck the man square in the chest, just as the room slammed back to normal.

Three things happened then. The first was that they were no longer in the Mirror Dimension. Sounds fell flat and surfaces regained the rigidity of solid matter under the strict guidance of physics. The second was that the thief's astral form was ejected from his body and thankfully looked like a normal human man.

Oh yes, and the third thing was that the physical body continued to move.

The costume melted away in an instant, leaving a very bewildered-looking man standing there. "What the hell? Who are you? Did you just hit me?" Quick glances darted about the room as if he had only seconds to decide where he was and what to do about it.

Stephen's eyebrows shot up. That shouldn't be possible. "Okay." He tried it again and a second astral form appeared. Yes, so there was nothing wrong with his power. This man had two astrals. Two spirits?

"Oh my god."

Three. Make that three. Stephen stared incredulously at the man and wondered how many more spirits might pop out if he kept this up.

"Please don't hit me again," the man said.

"Oh for the love of…" Stephen pinched the bridge of his nose.

"I am so sorry," the man said, holding his hands up, all murderous intent gone. "I don't know how I got here. I…Marc?" Fear flickered in his eyes. "What's happening? I can't hear him," he muttered.

The two spirits meanwhile, were staring at each other, one with a hardened determination and the other with fear.

Peter, who couldn't see the astral forms, looked between the frightened man and Stephen. "What is happening?"

With a gesture of his wrist, Stephen pulled the spirits back into the body. Instantly, the man's expression hardened but it didn't quite reach his eyes. What had just happened had really rattled him.

The man took in those arrayed before him: Stephen; master of this house of horrors; America, who was ready to put her newly acquired fighting skills to use; Shang-Chi, in a fighting stance that hinted at how dangerous he was even without super powers, Peter; webs ready; and Bats, who wasn't a fighter but could float menacingly; and seemed to reconsider his options. "I can see this looks bad."

Stephen snorted. "Yeah. You break into my Sanctum, you brought an ancient power in with you, and I was hoping for a quiet evening for once which I did not get. Who are you? What are you?" His remaining patience could be measured with a teaspoon.

"My name is Marc Spector. Look, I don't want any trouble. I don't even know who you are. I should not be here."

"They why are you? What do you want with the Third Eye of Horus?"

"I don't know!" Marc snapped. "I don't…I don't know." He took a deep breath through his nose. His hands were shaking and a little of Stephen's anger and indignation slipped away. When next he spoke, his voice was more subdued and carried a British accent.

"I think…I think I'm not well. I'm sorry. I'm not a thief. I don't want to fight. I just want to know what's going on." The sincerity in his eyes was genuine. And Stephen found that he believed him. Having witnessed the dramatic shift in the man's bearing, he thought he had an inkling of what was going on. But it was more than that. An ancient power clung to him with suffocating force.

Stephen sighed. "Alright. Everyone downstairs," he said, resigning himself to a busy evening. "I'll get the tea started."

*Les Rêves et Les Moyens de Les Diriger; Observations Pratiquesis a real book written by a guy named Marie-Jean-Léon and translates to Dreams and the Ways to Direct Them; Practical Observations. Could this relate to Stephen's mystery plan?