Work Text:
Tessa Anitra didn’t believe in magic.
She believed in the explainable, and if something stepped outside that realm, then it simply hadn’t been explained yet. That wasn’t the fault of the universe. That was the fault of mankind, and it was most rude, in her opinion, not to admit it.
Tessa lived in a world that was dedicated to the unexplainable. Aliens and superheroes and apocalypses and un-apocalypses. It was Tessa’s own badge of stubbornness that had her clinging to her disbelief and faith in the explained after the last little-cataclysm-that-couldn’t. Nothing weird and impossible had happened to her while she was out getting groceries in almost a year, and Tessa considered that a good sign.
Her streak was broken on the doorstep of an old, dramatic-looking house on Bleecker Street when the door ate her carrots.
Tessa stopped, staring at the manifested hole in her shopping bag. The door creaked at her until she looked at it. It was ajar, swaying in the slight wind, and it opened further when she looked at it. Like it was beckoning her.
“Can I help you?” Tessa asked in her customer service voice. Just because you didn’t believe in something didn’t mean you should be impolite.
The door creaked again. One of the spilled carrots rolled inside, which was the opposite of the direction the wind was blowing. The whole building seemed to sway toward her, and Tessa wondered how bricks could look desperately concerned.
Carefully, Tessa set her shopping bags down on the corner. If a building had decided to stop her on her way to ask her a favor, she expected it to extend her the courtesy of keeping her groceries from being stolen.
Tessa approached the door cautiously. She pulled her keys out of her pocket, flicking open the miniature multi-purpose tool to its knife extension. She placed a hand flat on the door. The wood was cool and smooth. It felt old, and Tessa half expected it to start glowing.
It didn’t. The slight pressure of her hand sent the door swinging open further, and she saw a sliver of a wide interior. Tessa squinted.
Something flashed, glowing orange and winking like a firefly, and she jumped. Were these embers? Was something on fire? Maybe the potential of burning down was enough to make a building develop a tendency to waylay strangers—which Tessa was sure there was a completely logical explanation for.
Slowly, she peered around the edge of the door, knife clutched tight. What faced her was not fire.
In the corner of the wide room, in the shadow of a large staircase and nearly hidden behind a set of old chairs before an unlit fireplace, was a figure.
They were curled tight around themselves, forehead pressed against their knees and arms curled around their middle like they were holding something back. Protecting something vulnerable. Their shoulders shuddered with uneven breaths. And flickering around them like snow lit aflame were lights.
The little glowing sparks, like droplets of gold, drifted weightless throughout the space. Tessa thought they might’ve been beautiful—but there was something lost about them. The gold was pretty in the way the ruby shine of blood was pretty.
Tessa lowered her knife and moved.
She was across the room and on her knees in front of the figure before she could question the unexplainable. Magic didn’t exist, but people who needed her help did.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” she said. “Nothing’s going to hurt you. You’re safe.”
The figure froze at the sound of Tessa’s voice. As one, the lights blinked. They were definitely… emanating from the person, and there were more as she watched.
“You don’t know me, but I’m safe,” Tessa said. She kept her voice steady. “Do you know where you are?”
They raised their head, slowly, haltingly. A bright, multi-colored eye peered at Tessa, shining with a helpless, resigned sort of fear. Tessa raised her hands so they could see.
“I’m a friend,” she said. Her husband looked like this sometimes, on bad days when even the sound of the toaster popping made him flinch. “Can you tell me the date?”
There was a long silence, broken by hitched breaths. Then the figure shook their head. Over and over, almost frantic, but Tessa kept her movements slow and calm.
“That’s alright,” she said. “It’s May 10th, 2026.”
A nod. The lights drifted, and a few landed on the wood of the railings and furniture. They were absorbed in flashes. The wood changed color where they touched. As Tessa watched, one landed on her knife and turned it into a book on the anatomy of the brain.
She tried not to stare.
“Okay,” she said. “Okay. It’s May. I like late spring; all my favorite fruits are in season about now. What’s your favorite part of May?”
For a moment, she thought the figure might not reply, but a deep voice answered distractedly. They sounded shaken, confused. “The Alabaster Festival,” they said quietly.
Another of the floating lights fell on Tessa’s shoulder. She jumped as it turned a circle of the fabric to a deep blue color, embroidered with golden runes.
“That sounds fun,” she said. This was normal. Just a totally normal Sunday. “Tell me more about it?”
There was a scraping sound, and it took Tessa a moment to realize it was a laugh. “Happens at the same time as Tony’s birthday,” the figure said. “So I get to take him to Grass Jelly. Makes me… take the day off.”
It was more detail than Tessa expected. That must be a genuinely good memory, untainted by whatever it was that had sent this individual spiraling.
“What in god’s name is Grass Jelly?” Tessa said, and gave her best laugh.
“Mmm. One of my favorite dimensions.”
Dimensions. Tessa glanced around at the swirling lights and their sharp bite of metamorphosis and really hoped there was a logical explanation for all this.
“What’s your name?” she asked.
There was a pause, a hesitation. “Stephen,” the figure said eventually. Like they weren’t quite sure.
“Okay, Stephen. Can you look around and tell me where you are?”
Stephen raised their head a little further, eyes sliding across Tessa’s face to the space around them. The lights pulsed, as one, and froze in the air.
“This is the New York Sanctum,” they said. Then, more firmly, “this is the New York Sanctum. 2026.”
“Yes.”
“2026?”
“Yes.”
A nod. Stephen straightened, shoulders knocking against the wooden slats behind them, and their eyes were clearer when they looked at Tessa. “Who are you?”
“Um,” Tessa said articulately, because all the lights had suddenly elongated into ribbons and turned toward her. “Nobody. Your door ate my groceries. And I saw you need help, so I came in.”
Stephen blinked at her, a little vaguely. “Oh,” they said. “Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize.”
“Thank you, then.”
Tessa shifted. “Yeah,” she said. “How are you feeling? Is there someone we can call? You mentioned a Tony.”
“Yes. Yes, that would be good. I should… I should.” Stephen lifted a shaking hand and flicked their fingers through the air, and half a moment later a smartphone materialized in their palm. Tessa jumped.
Just a perfectly normal Sunday.
The phone dialed sharply, and it startled Stephen enough that they dropped it. Their fingers probed the floor blindly for a moment, until Tessa realized and reached out to tap the speakerphone button. Stephen relaxed.
The dial trilled thrice, and then there came a surprisingly familiar voice. Tessa couldn’t place it.
“Hey, Merlin! What’s up?”
“Hi,” said Stephen. Tessa’s fidgeted, daring another glance over her shoulder at the lights.
“You okay?” the Tony guy asked. He must have heard something in that single syllable, and Tessa felt her heart unclench. She was glad Stephen had someone who understood.
Letting their head drop back against the wall, Stephen made a nervous sound in the back of their throat. “Can you…” they began.
“Of course. Are you in any shape to portal? I can be there in five otherwise.”
The floating lights winked out, one by one, with every word Tony spoke across the phone line. Like something taunt coming unstrung. Something explosive coming to rest. Tessa smiled a bit.
“I’m okay,” Stephen said. “Someone’s here with me.”
“That’s good. I’m on my way, alright?”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome, asshole. I’ll see you in five.”
The vague look on Stephen’s face had softened into a half-smile, and they raised their head to look at Tessa. They frowned when they saw the spot of blue on her shirt. “Oh, was that me? I do tend to let a couple of things… escape. When I’m distracted.”
Tessa found herself covering the circle with her hand when they reached out to it. “No, it’s alright. I like it.”
Stephen looked surprised. Then they shook themselves, gave Tessa a somewhat strained smile, and stood before she could protest. “You said you had groceries?”
“Yes, but—”
“How violent was my Sanctum? Is there anything I need to replace?”
“It’s fine, and would you listen to me a second?” Tessa dropped into her customer service voice, and it had the desired effect of making Stephen shut their mouth.
Tessa ran her hand through her curls and looked them in the eye. “It’s really fine,” she said. “And I’m not going to ask you to explain. You’re entitled to your privacy; you don’t have to pretend to be unaffected so I’ll go away fast. I understand.”
A blink. Stephen averted their eyes, and Tessa took a step back to give them space.
“I’m a stranger in your space,” she said. She could read the discomfort in their stance. “I will go if that’s what you need; just ask.”
She wasn’t part of this individual’s safety net, and that was fine. She’d done what she could, and so long as someone was coming to stay with them, she was perfectly comfortable leaving Stephen to their own business. It was none of hers, after all.
“Thank you for your help,” Stephen said. It sounded truly genuine. “But…”
“Understood,” Tessa told them, inclining her head. She moved to pick up her no-longer-knife, then decided better of it and just tucked her keys back into her pocket.
She left, then, without another word. The door creaked in thanks when she passed through it. Tessa waited on the doorstep until she saw someone on the threshold, not quite willing to leave until she’d made sure.
And sure enough, exactly five minutes since he’d hung up, honest-to-God Iron Man landed on the sidewalk next to her grocery bags. He dissolved his suit, gave Tessa a wave with his prosthetic arm, and stepped through the door. It opened familiarly for him.
Tessa Anitra believed in the explainable. Really, she did. She ran her fingers over the blue dyed into her shirt, the fabric soft on her calloused skin. Then she stood up, gathered her bags over one arm, and looked once more over her shoulder at the grateful building and it’s occupants.
She wished the unexplainable the best.