entrancelogs | all that's left behind [closed]

Entry tags:

all that's left behind [closed]

Who: Steve Rogers & Natasha Romanoff, Bucky Barnes, Pepper Potts, Lydia Martin, Darcy Lewis, Billy Kaplan, & Carol Danvers
Where: Starting in the hedge maze, then all around the mansion.
When: 05/11
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Steve is back from a year-long trip home and has a lot of people to catch up with. Possible spoilers for Age of Ultron within! This is a closed log, but if you want to be added to it, feel free to contact me.
The Story:
One moment, Steve is in the middle of a training session at their new facility. It's what most of his days are made up of lately, him and Natasha putting their new group of Avengers through their paces. It's all about learning to work together as a team, to act as one unit instead of six separate entities. It's been going well, all four of their new additions ready and willing to show up every day and put their all into it --

But the next thing he knows, he's looking at nothing but green. Steve's grip on his shield tightens as he spins in a quick circle, only to find that Natasha is there with him. But it's just the two of them, and it takes a few seconds of puzzled staring before he realizes that they're in a maze. A hedge maze.

There's only one place he knows of that has a hedge maze, and it's a place he'd forgotten about entirely until this exact moment. To have a year's worth of memories crash back into him all at once is almost enough to send Steve off-balance, and he definitely doesn't have the coherency to speak as it rushes back. This place, the events, the people. Bucky is here. Bucky, who he's spent a year searching for back home to no avail, had been right here all along. Trapped in time. Peggy had been here too, and then there are those who he met and befriended here: Pepper and Darcy, Sansa and Evelyn, Lydia and Carol.

He snaps his head to look at Natasha when he remembers that Bruce had been here too, and they had found something here together, carefully working their way into a relationship long before it happened back home. They'd had the peace and quiet and security to actually make something of it here, whereas at home Natasha has been doing her best to accept that Bruce took off without her. (To keep her safe, Steve knows, but it's not like it stings any less that way.)

So many people had described to Steve what it would be like to go home and then return here, but even with all that he hadn't really been prepared for it. He rubs at the side of his head with his free hand as he finally finds words. "Looks like the two of us are doomed to come and go from this place together." At least, that's what Steve figures happened, but he'd better be sure. "What's the last thing that you remember?"

If it's training their team after cleaning up Stark's hugest mess, then they'll be in business. Or on the same page, at the least.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Billy is on his way back up to his room from the theater. Teddy had sent him to raid the movies because they were planning on spending the night in. Apparently Billy had been training too much and Teddy was demanding date night. He was in charge of snacks, Billy was in charge of movies.

He was a little surprised to see Steve walking towards him but he immediately broke into a smile. He'd been upset to hear Natasha and Steve had disappeared, even if their stuff was still here and that usually meant they would be back, sometimes Wonderland would throw them curve balls. "Hey! Welcome back. I think you can get away with long time so see, its been about a week here I think. How long were you home for?"

Steve eyed the stack of movies that Billy had in one hand and figured that he'd been planning some quality time with Teddy. He didn't want to get in the way of that, but it made sense that Billy had a few questions for him too. Even if they were from different worlds, there were enough similarities to make anyone curious.

"Thanks. I think," Steve said with a shrug. It wasn't really a good thing that he'd been sent back here, but Steve had been focusing on the bright sides, and Billy happened to be one of them.

"It's been about a year. This whole time thing is pretty screwy." Not that Steve hadn't had to deal with it plenty of times in the past, but it wasn't something you ever really got used to.

Billy nodded. The last thing Steve probably wanted was to be back but he was glad to see him none the less. "A year? Wow that's- well at least it wasn't three? Teddy was home for three years when he left. How was home?" He asked cautiously. It might not be the same world he's from but...well he knows what it's like to be an Avenger. Sort of.

"Did Natasha come back with you? She disappeared at the same time." And wasn't that interesting that Wonderland would send them back home together.

"Yeah, and I know someone who was gone for nine years before coming back here," Steve admitted, his brow creasing with sympathy just at the thought of it. He only had a fraction of an idea of what Evelyn had gone through, and that was bad enough.

He nodded at the question about Natasha, since that one was easier to answer. "It looks like Wonderland thinks we should move around as a pair." Steve didn't really mind that, though. Better than having to go it alone.

Steve sent a glance up and down the hallway. "I can tell you about home, but we should probably find somewhere more comfortable to do it." He looked back to Billy and shrugged. "If you have the time for that, anyway."

Billy couldn't imagine going home for nine years only to end up back here. A lot happens in nine years. And so far Wonderland seemed content to keep him here, he wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing.

He nodded and glanced down the hall as well. He would track Natasha down later, or send her a text. "No one was in the theater, we can go in there."

The theater would work just fine. It was a pretty big space just for two people, but Steve and Billy had once had a pretty serious conversation there, so it felt fitting.

"Works for me." Steve took off in the direction of the theater. He was pretty sure he still remembered where it was, and he turned out to be right.

The room was outfitted with plenty of comfy furniture, so Steve picked a couch near the door and took a seat, leaving room for Billy. Once they were both settled, he launched into an answer to Billy's earlier question. "Anyway... home was as good as can be expected, I guess. I spent most of it with the other Avengers. We were on the search for Loki's scepter." Steve had no clue if Billy had heard about the staff before or if there was an equivalent in his world, but he waited to see how he responded.

Billy followed Steve's lead and took a seat on the couch, turning so he was facing Steve and making himself comfortable. He had a feeling he was in for a story. He nodded along when Steve started to speak until he needed to ask a question.

"Loki's scepter?" He didn't think Loki had a scepter in his world. He tried to think back, pulling up knowledge that he had tucked away after the first Loki died, before the one that was his friend showed up. Access his his Wikipedia would be useful right now. "I don't think he had a scepter in my world or at least if he did he never used it in public." Which was not likely.

So that was something that didn't overlap between their worlds. Steve leaned back and ran a hand over his mouth as he tried to figure out how to explain it. He wasn't the best person for the job, but hopefully Billy would be able to make sense of his description.

"When he tried to take over Earth, the scepter was a big part of it. It could blast out huge amounts of energy, but more than that, he could use it to take control of another person's mind and make them do his bidding." Steve got angry just thinking back on it, but the only sign of that was how he tightened his jaw.

"He got Hawkeye with it, and tried to do the same thing to Stark."

Billy took that information in and filed it away. That was...something he hadn't known about Loki's attack on New York. "Well, that's new. I don't know if he ever used mind control in my world, I'd have to look into that. He liked to manipulate people more than actually control them. Though I can see why that would appeal to him. The old Loki that is, our new Loki is trying to be good." Or so he said, and Billy hoped.

"So did you find the scepter?"

Whether it's mind control or manipulating people, it's bad news, and Steve's not exactly thrilled that Loki has once again become a thorn in his side now that he's back in Wonderland. Granted, he's been keeping to himself for the most part, apparently having learned his lesson after the last time. There's the other Loki too, but both Billy and Verity insist that he's searching for redemption.

"Yeah, we found it." Steve nods slowly, closing his eyes for a second as he recalls the mess that find had led them down. "Stark and Banner decided that they wanted to study it for a few days before Thor took it back to Asgard, but they used the data they found to work on something else -- without telling the rest of us."

It's something that still stings when Steve thinks back on it. They were supposed to be a team, but when his subordinates decided to sneak around or go over his head, that's when the entire thing fell apart. He thought that taking down SHIELD would fix that, but obviously not. It makes the muscles in his throat go tight, and he swallows around it.

Billy could see the troubled look on Steve's face. Something had happened that clearly didn't sit right with him. What exactly had they gone through back home? It was a little startling to see Steve looking like that, betrayed, he hadn't seen that look on Cap's face since the superhero registration act and everything that went down with that...oh he really hoped they hadn't gone through that as well. There was something so innocent about the Avengers he'd met here. The ones that hadn't betrayed each other yet, that hadn't realized what levels they could reach just to prove they were right, or wrong.

He resisted the urge to rub his ears. Scars there that were just a reminder of people were capable of.

"What happened?" He asked hesitantly.

Betrayal had become almost commonplace for Steve, unfortunately. Existing in an organization based around subterfuge had been one thing, but all of his suspicions had turned out to have merit when they learned that HYDRA was a part of SHIELD. But to have his own teammates, some of them even friends, keep things from him -- it was getting really old.

Steve could only hope that after the mess with Ultron, everyone on the team (the new team, because the old one had splintered) would be open with each other and with him.

"They were trying to create an AI program... something that would defend the Earth from any more extraterrestrial threats," Steve explained. "But something went wrong." He glanced down at his hands in his lap and forced himself not to coil them into fists. "The AI took on a life of its own and almost destroyed the whole human race in the process."

Unexpected but not unsurprising. This was worse than what he was expecting. From what he knew about Steve's world there were some key players to this missing, but he guessed it didn't really matter.

"Ultron?" It was still a guess but he didn't know of any other AI that wanted to wipe out humanity.

A guess, but a good one. Steve should have been past the point of shock at the similarities between their worlds, but it was difficult to know where they would overlap and where they would deviate. Loki's scepter, for instance, didn't exist where Billy came from, but apparently Ultron did.

"So he terrorized you guys too?" Steve found it strangely frustrating to know that the AI had given people Hell even in an alternate universe, but he shifted to face Billy, attention seized. "How did it happen?" Was Stark doomed to make his own monster no matter what world he was in?

Billy nodded. "Yeah, well not my team directly, we never had to fight him but he's been around since the 60s. The Avengers are always defeating him but he keeps rebuilding himself." Billy shook his head, Ultron was a pain in the ass. "Hank Pym created him in our world and he also went wrong and thought humanity would be better with him as our leader."

Since the 60's? That sounded like a nightmare. It also put the seed into Steve's head that Ultron could come back in their world too, but they'd killed every last one of those robots. Vision had confirmed it. But what if Ultron had tucked himself away on some private server where he couldn't be tracked? Granted, worrying about it now wouldn't do Steve any good, but he still ran his hand over his mouth in contemplation.

Hank Pym wasn't a name that meant anything to Steve, and he didn't know if that was because Pym didn't exist in his world or because Steve was still catching up on his seventy-year-long sleep.

"I've never heard of any Hank Pym, but it sounds like Ultron is pretty much the same, even if he was created by a different person. Anyway, we managed to stop him, but now I'm wondering if he might crop up again sooner or later."

Nothing could be done about that possibility here in Wonderland, though.

Another person who didn't exist in Steve's world, or at least no one knew about. It was strange the things that were missing despite so many similarities. He wondered if he would ever exist in Steve's world, probably not for years if their timeline was anything to go by.

"Hank Pym was one of the founding Avengers, he's Ant-Man. Who I'm also assuming you don't have in your world, yet at least. I feel like slowly you guys are catching up, even if you still don't have mutants. Anyway, hopefully you stopped him for good. Though Ultron has a nasty habit of popping up after he has time to lick his wounds, metaphorically. The Avengers always manage to stop him at least. Even the androids he creates wind up fighting against him. He's destined to fail."

Ant-Man? Steve wanted to believe that was a joke, for how ridiculous it sounded, but Billy's expression didn't give any indication of that. He raised an eyebrow and would have dug further into that if it weren't for the more relevant information that Billy followed up with.

Destined to fail, that had a nice ring to it when it came to a homicidal maniac of an AI, but there was something else that picked at Steve's brain about what Billy said.

"The androids he creates?" He frowned slightly. "Like what?"

Because Steve knew of an android, one that Stark had also made, although Vision had turned out to be on their side, an accepted member of the team now. Could it have happened differently in this other universe?

Billy saw Steve's face when he said Ant-Man, and he could understand he always thought it was a ridiculous name too. Though he couldn't judge, his first code name was Asgardian.

"Yeah, I'm not too sure of the specifics, but he created a synthezoid we call Vision. Ultron used the brain patterns from another human to create him and I guess because of that it gave Vision humanity and he turned against Ultron. He became an Avenger himself after that."

Billy wondered exactly how much information Steve wanted, he doubt he needed to hear about Jacosta. Because that was just strange. He opted to stick to what he really knew. "He was dismantled for a short period of time and actually a younger version of him was a Young Avenger for a while, until he was killed. Tony and Hank rebuilt him, I think it was them, and he's taking a break from the Avengers for a while, or so he told me when we last saw each other. I was just getting to know him before Wonderland pulled me here."

Like a lot of similarities between their world, there's just enough to distinguish them that it's kind of headache-inducing. Then again, Ultron had started the process of creation the Vision -- Stark had just been the one to finish it off.

"It happened that way for us too... sort of. Ultron was trying to make a more human-like body for his own use and was planning to upload himself into it. We stole it and got it to Stark, and he ended up putting JARVIS in it instead. He became the Vision."

Not without a lot of grief and arguing, rightfully so. It's a good thing that they'd learned Vision could wield Mjolnir, because otherwise Steve might not have allowed the AI onto the team so easily. It's all turned out fine, though.

The rest of the details that Billy offers are kind of hard to imagine. A younger version of the Vision? But technically he was still only a few weeks old at most.

"He's one of us," Steve adds after a pause. "Actually, our whole lineup got rearranged after we stopped Ultron." Only Steve and Natasha had remained. It's taking some getting used to, that's for sure.

More than headache inducing, migraine inducing sometimes. And he always thought time travel was confusing, this is a whole different level. He nods along listening to Steve'snstory before something makes him pause. "Jarvis? As in the Avengers butler Jarvis?" Why would they put Jarvis in Vision? That didn't make a lot of sense, or any sense really.

"Whose on the new team?" Maybe there were more people Billy would recognize now. Little does he know...

The Avengers' butler? Steve frowns and draws his head back in surprise, then shakes his head slowly. Maybe JARVIS had been a butler in a sense, given that he'd done just about everything for Stark, but somehow Steve doesn't think that's what Billy means. "JARVIS was Stark's AI, who helped him with developing the Iron Man program and also served as a security system."

JARVIS as they knew him is gone. Vision is something more than that, or at least, that's how the android himself (itself?) had explained it.

The team is something that's much easier to explain, and Steve sits up straight, some pride entering his voice as he lists the members off. "It's me and Natasha -- we're the two who stuck around from the original team -- and Vision, Sam Wilson, James Rhodes, and Wanda Maximoff."

Little does Steve know the kind of bombshell he just dropped.

JARVIS is an AI, that wasn't what Billy was expecting to hear but knowing Tony Stark it makes sense. "In my world Jarvis is a real person, he's worked for the Starks for years and now he works for the Avengers."

He would have elaborated if Steve hadn't named the new members of the team. "Wait. Wait back up. Wanda Maximoff?" The name makes his heart stop for just a second and if he hadn't been sitting down he would have had to. That was not a name he was expecting and he doesn't know how to process it just yet. She's alive in their world, she exists. That's some of the best news he's heard.

For all Steve knows, the name JARVIS comes from an actual person, but it's not something he's ever heard Tony mention. It's not like he can ask about it now either, since it looks like Wonderland's got no interest in Tony Stark for whatever reason.

Out of all of those names, there's one that Billy zeroes in on, and there's a stunned look on his face like he can't quite believe it. So Wanda exists in the alternate universe too, and must have some kind of connection with Billy.

Steve nods. "That's right. She was working with Ultron at first because she had a vendetta against Tony, but when she realized what Ultron's ultimate plan was, she switched to our side." Which might have been a more contentious issue if they'd had the time to debate it, but at this point it's water under the bridge.

"That sounds like- well that's both surprising and not surprising." He's still stunned and he wants to make sure this is the right Wanda. "Does she have abilities? Like almost like mine? And a twin, does she have a twin brother named Pietro?" Because that right there would tell him everything he needed to know. But Steve hadn't mentioned Pietro when he named the team, which didn't seem right.

all that's left behind [closed]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no civil war yet billy!!

Ultron isn't much better!

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)