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America hadn’t been in this universe long. Well, that was somewhat of a lie because this was probably the second longest she had spent in a new universe but that was beside the point.
America had been staying in this universe for the past nine months after she stumbled out of one of her star-shaped portals and directly into a superhero named Spider-Man. Understandably, they were both startled at suddenly running into someone midair in New York City. He had quickly caught her though and they sat perched on a rooftop for a few hours. America explained how she was looking for her mothers through the multiverse but with no luck. Spider-Man explained that he was a superhero and no his webs came from his web shooters and not his butt. Eventually, he took off his mask and introduced himself as Peter Parker, 16 years old (only two years older than she was) and offered his apartment with aunt as a place to stay.
She took the offer.
May was immediately smitten by the girl and doted on her after finding out her life story. There were only two bedrooms in the apartment but America didn’t mind taking the couch. Peter’s mentor, Tony Stark, found out about a day later when questioning Peter why he had been near such a weird energy signature.
The man was apparently also a superhero (because this universe focused on science more than the magic she had grown used to in the last dozen universes she had passed through) and also apparently a billionaire. He took over from there and practically barged into the small Queens apartment wanting to find out about the girl who came from a different universe. She explained her story again and Tony said he would take care of things.
Tony taking care of things meant that in 24 hours, America Chavez had documents, a digital trail, and Tony Stark for a legal guardian like she had always existed there. It was probably the nicest thing someone had done for her but he shoved off her gratitude by pushing her towards Peter to go do ‘teenager things’ but not ‘ teenager things ’. Whatever that meant.
Being moved into and then living in Stark Tower was certainly different than anything she had ever experienced before. May demanded America twice a week for ‘girl bonding’ while Peter and Tony did superhero stuff and they had family dinners on Sundays.
America was also enrolled into Peter’s school after Tony personally tutored her as she had never had a formal education before. She had only been at Midtown for about a month but Ned and MJ quickly became some of her closest friends along with Peter.
It was because of this that she found herself in her current situation.
“So, apparently there’s this old abandoned place in Greenwich Village with a ghost haunting it.” MJ drawled as she sat down with her lunch tray. It was the middle of October so it was no wonder that urban legends were starting to pop up.
“What kind of ghost? A friendly ghost?” Peter asked, inhaling the first of many pizza slices. Ned looked freaked out at the topic.
“I already know what you’re thinking, MJ! I’m not going ghost hunting, they are absolutely real and I don’t want to die!” He exclaimed. America and Peter hid their laughter as MJ leveled a blank look at Ned.
“You’re overreacting. If anything, I want to go sketch the decaying architecture.”
“I want to see a ghost!” Peter exclaimed and America nodded eagerly.
“I haven’t seen a ghost anywhere before. If anyone could find one it’d be us.”
Ned groaned in despair as the rest of the quartet began to scheme.
It was a Friday night so after giving an excuse to Tony about why Peter couldn’t make internship night and why America wasn’t coming home right away, the group set off to Greenwich Village. It was a brisk and windy evening. The sun had already begun to set and America was both excited and slightly worried. If there was a ghost, how could she be sure that she could control her powers enough if she was frightened? These thoughts caused her to begin to fidget uncontrollably.
It was Peter who noticed her discomfort and offered her a smile. She gave a nervous one back in return and went back to wringing her hands.
The building was rather large and decrepit. There was a large round glass window with an odd symbol up near the roof. A number of the spots of the red and cream brick exterior seemed chipped or destroyed entirely. There were a number of smaller windows on the exterior but at least half of them seemed shattered, ripped curtains blowing gently in the breeze. It almost felt as if there should be gargoyles on the place but, unfortunately she thought, there were none to be seen.
Probably the most intimidating thing was the large dark wooden doors at the entryway where the four teens stood.
“Alright, I have been swayed to Ned’s side. This place is setting off the Spidey sense.” Peter said bluntly, rubbing his upper arms in discomfort. MJ smirked at him in response.
“You mean your Peter-Tingle ?”
“Every day I hate May just a little bit more for starting that-“
“Guys-“ Ned interrupted, “I really don’t think we should be here. It does not pass the vibe check.”
“It really doesn’t…” America added. There was just something…off…about the place.
“Listen, we’re just going to go inside a bit, take some pictures, then leave.” MJ sighed and America was about to respond when she noticed something odd and the blood froze in her veins.
“Guys-“
“MJ come on, we can come when it’s daytime or something!” Ned whined and America was doing her best not to panic.
“ Guys -“
There was a creaking noise however no one but America noticed it, the others too involved in their bickering.
“I’m usually fine with this stuff but there’s something wrong.” Peter said with a frown and MJ looked ready to retort when she finally spotted America and the argument died on her lips.
America seemed to be floating in midair as if she were suspended in water. There was terror in her eyes but seemed unable to do anything. Then, as if pulled by an invisible rope, the girl was pulled into the now open doors. Peter reacted on instinct and dove into the building after her and barely made it before the doors slammed shut.
Ned and MJ yelled their names and tried forcing the door back open but it was not budging an inch. When it was clear they couldn’t make it in, Ned gave MJ a withering look who looked properly ashamed at what had happened.
“You get to explain to Mr Stark why his superhero kids got eaten by a haunted house.”
“Yeah,” MJ sighed, “that’s fair.”
Peter glanced back in resignation as he heard the door slam behind him. Honestly, he couldn’t say he was surprised but was rather glad he had made it in at all. There was no way he was going to leave America alone in this place. He’d be terrified if it were him all by himself. His senses were going haywire as it was.
He watched warily as his friend drifted silently through the foyer of the abandoned mansion but kept close. The place seemed broken and decayed but had an air of melancholy to it. As America drifted by, however, the energy of the place seemed to…perk up if Peter could give feelings to a building.
America began to drift up the grand staircase leaving Peter to swear under his breath as he attempted to follow while not through the stairs themselves. He didn’t dare try and web himself up when it could bring the entire roof down on them.
“MJ owes us soooooo much if Mr Stark doesn’t kill all of us first.” He groaned and the stairs groaned in response. “Yeah, I know. We can all be dead together, creepy house.”
He followed behind America quietly as they traversed the seemingly endless hallways. There were clearly too many for a normal place for it to rationally fit within the confines of the walls so it was very much nonsense on a grand scale. On a whim, Peter pulled out his Starkphone and was unsurprised to see it had absolutely no signal.
“Looks like we ended up in a different dimension or something, America. I didn’t even get to see your shiny star portals you were telling us about.” The boy said with a sigh. He was about to continue his thought when something at the end of the hallways caught his eye. About two hundred feet away (and wasn’t that some anti-science BS) seemed to be a man staring at them. Not just that, a transparent man.
“America, if you could wake up now so we can escape this Disney ride that’d be great.” He rambled nervously. America continued to float forwards and he was honestly terrified of what would happen if he startled her. It felt like a ticking time bomb with another bomb at the end of the tracks. Fucking trolley problem.
“America- it’s time to wake up!” He exclaimed a bit louder and looked back to his friend before returning his gaze to the end of the hallway.
Empty.
Fuck.
“ I was only looking for one assistant, not two.”
Peter leapt so high he stuck to the ceiling and let out an unholy screech. Catching his breath, he looked down to find that America had stopped moving but she was still unconscious. Next to her, however, was the glowing and transparent man.
Double fuck.
“Hey man, I know you don’t have much to do in your afterlife but stealing young girls off the street is not the way to go.”
The man seemed extremely offended at this but sputtered to find a response. Peter took the brief moments to study him. He seemed to be dressed in some sort of robes with a bat-like symbol near his chest. He also had facial hair to rival Mr Stark’s. Two discolorations in his hair revealed he must have had gray streaks staring by his temples. It was hard to tell as he looked as if he were in complete grayscale. He also seemed to be studying the boy on his ceiling.
“ You wouldn’t happen to be an apprentice sorcerer with a new relic, would you? ”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, sir.”
The man pinched the bridge of his nose.
“ Great. Can you tell me what year it is at least?”
“…2017?” Peter replied, drawing it out into a question but the man appeared to become more frustrated.
“ Fucking hell. Mordo keeping me trapped in a box for 49 years.”
W h a t.
“But sir, I regret to inform you that you’re dead. The only box you’d be in is a coffin.” He pointed out, dropping down from the ceiling and the man actually took his other hand and raised a finger, asking for a moment.
Okay, Peter understood having a mental crisis but: rude .
“ Listen, kid-“
“Peter.”
“ Okay, Peter , one: don’t give out your name so willingly you never know if a Fae could be trying to keep your soul-“
“What the fu-“
“ Secondly, I’m not dead. I’m trapped in a sarcophagus that keeps the inhabitant in the exact state they were in as when it was sealed. For bodies it would preserve it. For someone who is alive, it merely means I am still in there and alive. I’m just astral projecting to try and get someone to let me out of the fucking box . ”
Peter stared at the man who looked to be at the end of his rope. Kinda literally but not? Schrodinger’s metaphorical rope. If he was trapped and wasn’t dead then obviously he had to help him.
“My name is Peter Parker.” He held out his hand to shake, “If you let go of my friend the. I’ll help you get free.”
The man stared at him for a moment before offering a hand in return. He couldn’t physically feel it but it felt ice cold.
“ Doctor Stephen Strange. Protector of the New York Sanctum Sanctorum. Well, at least until a rogue sorcerer trapped me. I guess I have been the ‘ghost’ haunting it since then.”
The air around America rippled and Peter took that as his cue to catch her as she slowly drifted down to the ground. It only took a few seconds for her eyes to flutter open.
“ Peter? ” She groaned and stretched slightly before she realized what had last happened and she shot up, nailing Peter in the nose with the top of her head.
She stared at Doctor Strange in shock before Peter started to see his friend’s eyes glow blue.
“Nononono it’s okay! Doctor Strange isn’t a ghost he’s just trapped! No reason to freak out! He just let you go as soon as I asked!”
America glanced between him and the transparent Doctor and steadied her breathing until the glow disappeared. Peter let out a sigh of relief at preventing the nuclear option.
“ Fascinating. Two teenagers with powers who wander into the Sanctum but are not magic. Not that any sorcerers can get in right now.”
Strange seemed very interested in the two of them and Peter let out a cautious shrug in reply.
“Radioactive spider bite and teen with dimension hopping powers! No magic here! Just science!”
Strange seemed to hum in thought for a moment before gathering himself.
“ I can take us to the chamber where I am trapped. It is at least a better place to talk than a drafty hallway.” Doctor Strange drifted with purpose towards the end of the hallway where Peter had first spotted him. With a quick shared glance with America, the two teens raced after the spirit.
“ There have always been sorcerers protecting this world and this reality. There are three points in which magic is the strongest to form a barrier or wall of energy.” Doctor Strange began to lecture as the teens caught up to him. “ Hong Kong, London, and- “
“New York!” Doctor Strange looked back at America with a soft smile before collecting himself and continuing on.
“ Correct. The anchor points in which a web of protection is placed. When I was trapped, Baron Mordo, my former teacher turned enemy, brought down the New York Sanctum. The earth is not nearly as protected as it once was. ”
“Oh is that why Loki attacked New York in 2012?”
America and Doctor Strange both looked at Peter in shock.
“What-“
“ There was an attack?”
Oh yeah, neither of them would know about that, duh.
“It ended up being fine! The Avengers came and saved the day!”
“Oh yeah! That’s why superhero’s are such a big thing here!” America exclaimed but Doctor Strange just looked more amused and confused.
“ What are these…Avengers and what do they need to avenge?”
That was actually a great question.
“Honestly, I have no clue what they’re avenging but they had a good lineup at the time. Captain America-“
“ Steve Rogers?” Doctor Strange asked in disbelief, “ The man has been dead since the forties. ”
“No, sir. He was apparently only frozen in ice until 2012.”
Doctor Strange paused again and pursed his lips for a moment.
“ Odd, but I’ll allow it. And don’t call me sir. Stephen is fine. ”
The teens looked at each other as they walked before sharing a secret smile. It was always weird having adults tell them to use their first names.
“Okay Stephen!” America chirped and the ghostly man frowned for a moment before shrugging.
“ Still weird but moving on.”
“There’s also Tony Stark-“
“ Howard’s boy?”
“Yeah, he’s my mentor! He has a suit of armor that is amazing!” Peter exclaimed and America smiled shyly.
“He took me in when I didn’t have a place to go after Peter found me.”
“ Hmm. A kinder man than his father was. Who else?”
“Well there’s Thor, yeah that Thor, and then there’s Hawkeye who is an archer and Black Widow. She’s a spy. That was the original group, then there was-“ Peter began to ramble as he explained all of the heroes and enhanced that had been showing up. America was content to listen and occasionally add a comment or two where she had her own opinions (such as War Machine being very kind and an amazing cook) and Doctor- Stephen responded nonverbally in all the right places.
It took another twenty minutes of walking when they finally came across the room. It was in an even worse state of decay than the rest of the sanctum.
“ The coffin exudes a sort of dead energy. It almost kills magic and pushes it away. It is likely that is why no sorcerers have been able to breach the wards of this place despite it falling into disrepair.” Stephen floated over next to the main point of the room, the coffin. It seemed to be made out of a thick black marble with little glowing runes and patterns carved into it on all sides. It rested unsuspectingly in the center of what seemed to be a library. The books all seemed to be destroyed on purpose and the ones that weren’t seemed to be taken by the elements.
Peter was about to ask a question when the entire building lurched with a groan, dust and debris falling from the ceiling and rusty trinkets falling from shelves.
Stephen seemed dismayed and angry and fluttered about the room but unable to affect anything.
“ What the hell is going on? Are we under attack?”
America suddenly stiffened and turned to Peter.
“It has to be Tony. We got kidnapped into a haunted building and he can’t contact us.” She exclaimed and Peter frowned.
“He’s going to pull this entire place down.”
America turned to Stephen.
“Am I allowed to leave to explain what happened?”
“ I give the permissions necessary for the Sanctum to respond to what you need. Both of you. So long as we save this place, the Sanctum Sanctorum and the sorcerers within will do you no harm.”
There was a sort of ripple of energy in the room that seemed centered on the two teens. With a nod and a thumbs up, America ran out of the room the way they came. Peter turned to Stephen who looked more and more transparent by the second.
“What do I need to get you free?”
“ The coffin itself weighs tons. When active, it negates magic which is what is used to open the lid. It was meant to permanently preserve what was inside. We would have to have a tool or machine to lift that much weight.”
Peter looked back at him with a smile.
“Or a super powered teen who can lift ten tons.”
America couldn’t remember how she had gotten into the sanctum in the first place, but she had a feeling it wasn’t nearly as short as the three minutes it took to go from the ancient library to the front room. The walls continued to shake as what she assumed Tony was causing the incredibly loud repulsor noises at the door. Luckily, the large wooden doors seemed to be holding up just fine.
“ PETER! AMERICA!”
Yup, that was him alright.
She ran up to the door and paused, waiting for the latest attack to finish before she yelled back.
“Mr Stark?! It’s okay I’m here! Don’t blast the door anymore!”
There was a pause before she could hear Tony’s voice, not nearly as mechanical as when he was shouting before.
“Kid?! Are you okay in there? We’re gonna get you out of this bullshit house soon, don’t worry!”
“It’s okay! I’m not trapped!”
She pulled the doors open to find Tony in his armor with his helmet retracted, a terrified Ned, and a somewhat worried MJ all on the top step.
“You’re okay!” Ned cried and Tony took the moment to pull America out of the doorway and gripped her by the shoulders, frantically looking for any injuries.
“I’m okay Tony. Someone just needed our help and couldn’t contact anyone except how we got in.”
“I’m calling bullshit on that-“ Tony muttered but America caught his eye and held it. They kept up eye contact for a moment before he huffed out a sigh. “Fine. Who needs help and where is Peter?”
America smiled at her guardian and started to pull him inside. “He’s a sorcerer named Doctor Strange. A bad sorcerer trapped him in here like 50 years ago and he’s been trapped as a ghost while is body is still alive in an unspeakable thing.”
Tony groaned as Ned and MJ perked up with interest.
“Why do we get pulled into all of the nonsense?” He looked down at America who had her pleading eyes on. “Fine. Let’s go find sleeping beauty. Ned and MJ; stay out here in case we need a rescue party.”
‘Okay,’ Peter thought, ‘this is harder than it looked.’
He was attempting to get a grip on the lid of the damn coffin that didn’t want to cooperate.
“ You may have more luck sliding it?”
“Oh my goood.” He groaned as he got into a better stance. He began to lift directly up again and was about to give up his attempt when he felt it move slightly. Now determined, Peter pushed himself harder. It felt heavier than the collapsed warehouse for sure. He shut his eyes tightly as sweat spilled into them, burning just like his lungs.
“ You’ve almost got it Peter! Just one last push!”
With a guttural scream, Peter put everything he had into it and with a loud scraping noise and a huge thud, the lid was off. He could hear running getting closer to him but he merely slumped to the floor. He had never used his full strength before and he was absolutely exhausted.
“Peter!” The teen opened his eyes ( he didn’t remember closing them in the first place… ) to see Mr Stark propping him up on his lap. “You okay, kid?”
“Haven’t moved something that heavy before.” He replied wearily with a small smile and Mr Stark frowned a moment before looking over at America. She was standing next to the coffin, looking inside. There was no trace of Stephen in his ghost form which meant…
“America, back away from the dead guy.”
“Tony, Stephen isn’t dead! He’s just been stuck!”
“I don’t care how many people get frozen in time, we are two for two of people like that being douchebags we should have kept on ice.”
Mr Stark must have been extra on edge to mention Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes. It made Peter feel a bit worse but he couldn’t feel bad about helping Doctor Strange. As he sat up on his own, Peter noticed something.
“Hey, look at the room!”
The dead excuse library seemed to be slowly knitting itself back together. Wood became unrotted and slotted back together, walls healed themselves and looked brand new, the ceiling patched its holes, books mended themselves and went back to their rightful places. There wasn’t any other way to describe it other than magic.
“Stephen!” America exclaimed. Peter scrambled to his feet, Mr Stark following slowly after him. Inside the coffin was a fully whole and alive Stephen Strange, waking up for the first time in decades.
The sorcerer blinked as he took in the people surrounding him and smiled.
“My, what a welcoming committee.”
And so, the Phantom of Greenwich Village was solved. The quartet would come to visit the sorcerer at least once a week. Mr Stark would visit every other week to bicker and possibly flirt with the man (not that Peter paid attention to that because gross ), and the world was back at full magical protection again.
Well, until MJ found another haunted house. But that’s a story for another day.