open | if every constellation above us has a counterpart below.

[portalling]

WHO: Stephen Strange & you
WHAT: yet another new rifter arrival
WHEN: nowish and throughout his quarantine period
WHERE: Around the Gallows
NOTES: Catch-all spot for the month and to continue TDM arrival threads; feel free to tag in tho!

arrival (a variety of prompts).

It begins as an anxiety dream.

He’s experienced no end of nightmares about no end of trauma, but this time the stakes are banal: Doctor Strange is dressed sharply in a formal suit with a scarlet pocket square, giving a speech at a medical conference, standing at a podium staring at the hundreds of faces staring back at him, and finding that his iron-trap memory has suddenly failed and he’s forgotten his entire damned speech. It’s almost a relief when the enormous tentacled eyeball monster barges into the conference center, sending people screaming and scattering, and just as the Cloak of Levitation reappears around his shoulders, Strange finds himself —

somewhere else —

What ensues is a disorienting battle on the outskirts of Orlais, with a rifter appearing in anachronistic formalwear and a red cloak gone inanimate, with a conference lanyard hanging around his neck and a little adhesive nametag (‘DR. STEPHEN STRANGE, MD, PHD, NEW YORK METRO-GENERAL HOSPITAL’ now rendered in Thedan script). And in the fight, Strange realises that almost none of his magic behaves as he expects it to. It’s not the first time he’s found himself unexpectedly dumped in another universe, but this is the first time his own capabilities have failed him. Even after the battle ends, wraiths banished and his dream-monster killed, he keeps trying to light a spark of fire between his hands and finding it more difficult than it ought to be. On the carriage ride back to Kirkwall, with both him and the Riftwatch agents covered in horrid black ichor and gore from the eyeball monster’s innards, at least Strange has the decency to look a little sheepish while the other agents scrutinise him.

“Done this sort of reception a lot?” he asks, lightly, while he keeps unconsciously kneading at his left palm. His hand aches. This is normal. What isn’t normal is the green shard embedded in it like some kind of ethereal splinter, and it makes the usual pain in his scarred hands even worse.

Afterwards, during his quarantine, he can be found in the library at all hours, surrounded by stacks of books, devouring them even late into the night – he’s an avaricious student, and wants to learn everything about his new circumstances. He breaks the polite silence when a glob of hot wax from a candle lands on his wrist, and he curses with a sudden sharp “Oh, what the fuck.”

Strange goes for long walks around the Gallows. You might literally run into him where he’s crouched in a hallway in the lower levels, examining the cleansing runes embedded in the floor which prevent the growth of red lyrium, puzzling over the clearly-magical symbols, feeling that faint hum of magic in the back of his teeth. “Do you happen to know what these do?”

He also inevitably winds up poking his head into the infirmary, morbidly curious; one might walk in on him peering through the bottles of potions and jars of dried herbs, and surveying the surgical tools with a thoughtful little hm in the back of his throat.

wildcard.

feel free to toss me anything (late-night insomnia wandering the halls? new dorm roommates? mealtime in the dining hall?) and i’ll roll with it! or hmu @ quadrille to confab. i’ll match prose or brackets.

Comments

Infirmary

[sprent]

Gela, to her credit, did not mean to walk in on somebody already occupying the infirmary; she thought that it would be empty. She thought that she might snoop through it first and talk to a healer second, in private, but as opportunity presents itself– having already strode with much purpose inside of the door and stopped dead upon the realisation of some unexpected company–

she may as well just go for it.

"Pardon, Messere." She flashes her teeth in a polite little smile, rolling with the punch. "Do you work here?"

[portalling]

“I— no.” The question takes him aback and he jolts slightly away from the shelves, guiltily, like he’s a child caught with his hand in the literal cookie jar. Except it’s not cookies, but carefully-labeled jars with unfamiliar names like embrium, spindleweed, and elfroot. Strange had been squinting at the latter when Gela walked in.

“I am technically a doctor, but I’m not sure my training applies here.” He keeps introducing himself with the title around the Gallows, but it seems particularly important to deliver that cautionary disclaimer while he’s in the infirmary.

“I was looking for someone myself, but it seems unstaffed at the moment.” He casts his gaze over her, and there’s a clinical edge to it, old triage instinct searching for visible injuries: “It’s not an emergency, is it?”

[sprent]

Gela looks confused for half a beat before it clicks. She is not the first to come and snoop! This eases her considerably. She might have had to really explain herself to anybody else, or at the very least lie convincingly, and truly she's dreading to have to do that to the folks at Riftwatch, kind enough to open their doors and share their food-

Now is not the time for wool-gathering.

Strange looks at her, and she straightens instantly underneath of his gaze. She lifts her chin too, though she is much shorter than he is and there's no disguising it. Her dark, curly hair is scooped back from her face, but pieces have escaped here and there. She tucks them behind her ears (to no avail) before she answers, "No."

Not at all. She has no visible injuries, only old marks left behind. There is a particularly impressive scar on her upper lip, jagged and thick. "I'm new here," will be her explanation, "And I'm still findin' rooms I haven't been in yet! Thought it would be a good idea to know exactly which one is the infirmary."

You know. For emergencies. "Yourself? You're quite alright?"

[portalling]

“Mm, true. It’s useful. If your arm’s falling off, you don’t exactly want to waste time getting lost running around all the towers first.” He sounds dry, bemused. But then there’s a hesitation at her question, a reluctance to tip his hand and reveal what he’s actually after. The urge to say It’s nothing and simply wave it all off—

“I’m fine,” Strange says crisply. Then after a moment, grudgingly relenting: “But I was wondering how typical painkillers worked here. I’m a rifter.” He gestures with a hand, fingers splayed and revealing that glimmer of green in his palm, although he knows an anchor shard doesn’t guarantee someone being from another world.

“If you know of something as simple as, here, chew on this non-toxic root, then I might not need to wait for the healer to get in.”

Over-the-counter painkillers never touched that perpetual neuropathic pain in his hands back home, but maybe things were different here. Worth a shot.

[sprent]

Her eyes track that brilliant green, and Gela draws a quick breath in: he is a magic user, as every other rifter has been. Her eyes grow slightly round, thinking. She adjusts herself to be politer, on her best behaviour.

"I'll have that exact root for you in moments, Messere." It is doubtlessly in this room with them, "Let's see..."

Sentence trailing away, she steps past him toward the shelves, shifting through the collection of bottles and jars. Gela has visited many healers, from many different cities, and her eyes know to go toward the familiar things. After a little search, she produces a jar, and passes it to him.

"Elfroot," in explanation, her fingers touching the glass, pointing out, "Slice away the leaves and chew slivers of the root. It takes away pain reliably. And you can put the rest into hot water and make a tea, if that suits you- and it's a common plant. Don't you feel bad about takin' that with you."

Scanning the jars once more... she plucks a second out, but keeps it in the cage of her fingers while she judges his reaction to what she's about to say. "Add a bit of blood lotus to such a brew and you'll forget you were ever in pain in the first place."

[portalling]

Oh, this is exactly the ticket. The man accepts the jar and holds it up, turning it from side-to-side, scrutinising the plant and memorising the look of it for the future. Florid and green, with a thick stem.

“That’s perfect, thank you. And— not messere, please. You can call me Doctor. Doctor Strange.”

He sounds grateful, but also half-distracted, still looking at the root. With a kind of despairing exasperation, he realises he’s going to have to learn everything about new, unfamiliar herbal compounds in this world and their effects on bodies and non-human bodies. Restart part of his medical training from scratch, in a way. Jesus christ, what an annoyance—

But her next few words draw him out of wondering exactly what is an accredited healer in Thedas and should he even bother; and then he looks up, sees the way she’s considering that scarlet flower. One of his eyebrows arches up, amused and curious. “Does that mean soporific, or more… recreational?”

[sprent]

Gela, unthinking, looses a small giggle. Embarrassing! Reassuringly, "I'm not goin' to call you that." She may privately think that the Rifters can be an odd bunch at times, but she wouldn't go about calling them strange to their faces... that's a bit much, "How about your name? Mine is Gela."

She holds out her hand, to shake. Not the one with the blood lotus bottle in it, mind, even though his reaction is a positive one. "It can mean either," she says, and smiles, "Dependin' on how much you add to the tea."

Ha ha.

[portalling]

Her words ping something, some buried recollection in his memories, a voice saying Oh, we’re using our made-up names? but when Strange tries to remember how Spider-man had initially introduced himself, the details are gone. Like it’s smudged charcoal. But he doesn’t have time to think about it too closely, because he’s distracted by the misunderstanding, amused.

“No, that is my name.” Why does this keep happening to him? “Doctor Stephen Strange. A pleasure, Gela. No surname or family name?”

Like Cher or Bono or Beyonce, but he can’t crack that joke again, let alone with someone unfamiliar. He’s realising the single names more common here with everyday people than back home.

He reaches out and takes Gela’s hand, gives it a firm and professional squeeze; his grip is sure but there are ugly scars running down the lines of his fingers and the back of his hands. (And he hasn’t forgotten about the drugs, there’s still a pin in that—)

[sprent]

Well then.

Gela makes a funny face but supplies her own back to him: "Baynrac," without thinking. He won't recognise it. There's no reason that he would but it still makes her heart skip a beat, to have said aloud something that she is not supposed to tell people about.

Pushing through it, ignoring the clammy feeling on her palms when they shake hands, she grasps for anything to shift the conversation toward instead. They best be off the business of names. Their scarred hands are not unlike each other: Gela's are smoother, but she bears old, jagged skin along her knuckles. She notices his. "Looks like we've both been through the wars."

[portalling]

His expression remains reassuringly blank throughout the introduction of her surname, just a blank nod, complete non-recognition; although he does file it away, with that steel-trap memory where he’s been noting as many details as he can recall about everyone he’s been meeting here. Faces, names, other worlds, he’ll practically need a rolodex to keep it all straight.

The distraction works, though, and he glances down where Gela’s looked at their near-matching scars. He arches his own eyebrow.

“Literally, maybe,” Strange says. Having let go, he flexes his hand self-consciously. “The elfroot’s for this,” he adds, voice carefully breezy and neutral. “Nerve pain. It’s been a few years. Doesn’t really get better.”

A beat, then: “Does that mean you’re a fighter? In Forces?”

[sprent]

Gela clucks her tongue in sympathy, and takes her hands back too, keeping them loose at her sides, hopefully not so awkward. "Maker," she laughs, "No, not me. I'm in Diplomacy. Much better at talkin' my way out of things than I am fightin'."

And completely unwilling to pick up a weapon besides, shh. She sizes him up for a moment, determining, and then asks, "Could you be in Research, I wonder?"

He looks like a studious person to her.

[portalling]

“What gave it away?” Sardonic, a little, but gently so. Strange tucks his hands behind his back, spine straight. He does have the look: built tall and lean, fingers long and delicate even besides the scars.

“Still making up my mind, actually. I could probably go into Forces if I felt like it. Slinging fireballs, cracking eldritch whips, it’s all old hat,” he’s joking, probably not realising how terrifying those things sound to someone not really accustomed to magic, Stephen,

“but it’s not really what I’m passionate about. I’m more interested in how everything ticks under the surface. Research, as you say.”

[sprent]

Gela laughs over a sudden wash of dread: this is what she finds the hardest to bear of mages. Knowing the extent of their power and that they can unleash it at any moment; should he 'sling' a fireball at her right now...

She's already regretting all the little jokes she's made.

"Good," she says, forcing herself to sound both warm and friendly still. She's had much practice at it over the years. "We're very glad to have you here." On our side. Gulp! "I am not from Kirkwall, but I am from here. If you need anythin' else, want to know the use of a plant or two, I could help you with that."

lol whoops i forgot he was holding a jar, fixes that

[portalling]

“It’s appreciated. Genuinely.” One hand behind his back, the other cradles the jar against his chest for added support, not trusting himself to hold it without suddenly losing his grip strength and dropping it. It’d be just the thing, accidentally shattering the damn jar right after Gela had been kind enough to hand it to him.

And Strange doesn’t notice how ill-at–ease she is. That laugh and that smile is warm, and he’s bad enough with people that it’s easy enough to take on face value.

“The plants aren’t the same here — it’s not just a naming thing, they’re physically different from anything I’ve ever seen — but the days of the week are, somehow, the same. Fascinating differences, really. But this’ll teach me the difference between a painkiller and a poison, so. Thank you.”

And now he knows how to get a little high later. Y’know, as a treat.

jarring experience

[sprent]

"Any time." Truly. She's happy to help people out is truthful, but in this particular circumstance it also endears her to him. Makes her less of a target. Gela has been doing this for years now, digging out spaces wherever she goes and making herself small inside of them. She is harmless and agreeable to all who come across her. It is exhausting, but it tends to work.

"Best keep movin'," she says. Need to come back later, when nobody is around! Just for a look, a snoop, to see what the infirmary is all about, and Strange need not worry why. "But good meetin' you. I hope the root helps, with the pain."

wrap!

[portalling]

“Until next time,” he says, mildly, because it’s a small organisation and relatively small set of towers and so they’re bound to rub elbows eventually and run into each other again. And the woman scurries off, and he duly turns back to poking around the infirmary and waiting for one of the local healers to show up; a little impatient, but resisting the urge to dig around too much. It’d be the quickest route to piss off a fellow professional by rearranging their workspace, even if they are probably medieval as hell and into, well, leeches or something.

And in the meantime that’s one more name and face of one more Riftwatch colleague, committed to memory, jotted down for later: Gela Baynrac.