Sepsis

[in_extremis]

WHO: The Archivist, Captain America, the Wasp, and...Tony
WHERE: The Upside-Down, downtown Temba
WHAT: Tony checks out the gates, makes some mistakes
WHEN: Stranger Danger--AFTER the gates open, Oct 11-12th
WARNINGS: Event warnings (blood, mouth related body horror, sentient vines/tentacles, choking, 'animal' attacks), Tony warnings (alcoholism, suicidal ideation), Jon warnings (eye horror, no butt).


a. the library [for Jon]
Iron in the air could have explained the red skies, and the magnetic reaction. It could have even explained the curling, blackened plants around the foundation of the department store. Iron could be a poison. From above Tony came a warning cackle, making him glance up anxiously, searching for the beating wings of those things that had come to roost on the chimney of the forge, then decide he didn't have to wait to find out how many of them there were. He could get out of sight instead, and duck inside.

It seemed colder yet in the dark behind closed doors, and Tony scolded himself for not bringing a flashlight. He pulled his scarf up around his head for some comfort, tight to his ears and making his still carefully slow breathing sound like a wail that would draw the creatures straight to him. He held his breath, listening intently for any sign that he had been spotted, eyes straining in the low light to scan the abandoned shelves for any movement. It was just when he was deciding that he'd rather face some flying horror than the dark that he realized the crimson gleam reflecting so subtly off of tarnished and dusty cups and picture frames was not from some crack in the roof letting in the tainted sunlight.

There was a wound in the wall. Split through the stone and glowing, radiating its own sickly light, framed with slick, arterial tubes. It looked like an infection in the beams and plaster. Maybe it had started as a fracture from the earthquakes, but now it was a hole that should have let Tony see through to outside. Instead, it kept going.

It was even colder on the other side.

Almost everything else was the same, if Tony had to rationally quantify it, which of course he did in a running list constantly at the back of his mind while he moved. He knew exactly where to go, for example, to find a carefully packed bundle of survival equipment, including a flashlight to correct his earlier mistake, and cast the beam around the welcome centre to confirm it was the same dimensions, the same arrangement of burnt out lights, even the same camera mounted in the corner though it watched Tony with an unseeing eye. It was the infection that made any difference, mapping the city with those swollen arteries, tainting the air enough to make Tony wrap his scarf over his mouth as he slipped back through the square along the dry fountain, and choking out any sign of life. The trees were dead. The few people that Tony had expected to try to avoid as he made his way through the streets were gone. This city was empty.

To Tony, it was the library where this was the most evident. Jon's very presence that had become such an oppressive force that it had permeated the concrete slab was gone; a power so invasive that Tony's skin crawled the moment he crossed the threshold now leaving these halls feeling starkly empty and expansive. The walls were at least closer as he made is way down to the basement, intending to pass straight through to his workshop and the equipment inside. He paused at the door to the bedroom, his hesitation fractionally brief in his conviction that he was entirely alone, then picked his way carefully around the vines to climb into the hammock that hung there, abandoned.

The relief in the familiar comfort was so immediate and foundation deep that Tony considered he might have been dreaming. That this was a premonition, of what the city would be like after he finally succeeded, and gotten everyone home or on their way, and he was left to watch the city crumble on his own. He wouldn't be able to maintain the power grid, or the water processing alone; he probably couldn't manage the greenhouse, but a few plants to keep him alive enough to watch over the certain end of this miserable experiment. It wasn't so terrible, even alone, if he could be surrounded like this with the relics of the brief joy he had found here. He needed a drink.

The moment his eyes slitted open he saw the movement; a shimmer of dust knocked loose from the ceiling near the door. Tony kept still, watching its slow descent, feeling the anxiety ratchet slowly up his spine again until it was abruptly a taught, singing wire as the second one came; directly above him, it was easier to hear the distant thud that precipitated the shower of debris, and then the creak of the floorboards. Something had been watching his journey across the city, and it had caught up to him.

In that same room where the hammock barely swung with dying momentum, and simultaneously impossibly far away, the lights flickered and buzzed erratically. When they finally stopped, their faulty guttering jumped to the hall, dancing with the crackle of a live wire from one bulb to the next, making toward the stairs in a slow, waltzing rhythm. The lamp at the bottom of the staircase buzzed, pulsing with a held breath of anticipation, the light dim like the filaments were on the verge of burning out.

b. the garden [for Steve and Jan]
What had started as open, empty streets were becoming unavoidably populated. The beasts that roamed there must have felt similarly closed in, occasionally breaking in snarling scuffles between them, or bursting into cacophonies of Jurassic cries that left swarms in the sky scattering. More of them were going through those glowing gates, especially at night when the noises all seemed to swell and Tony could hear them through the door of his workshop. The distraction slowed his already pessimistic work, his shoulders tight and hair on end, listening for the first sound that came too close. He had to seal those wounds, stop the infection from spreading into the city that was still alive, and stop the tide of those creatures that poured out to terrorize whoever was on the other side. Nothing seemed to effect the torn walls, though. The closest Tony had managed so far was triggering the alarm that brought the snarling and screeching down on him, a jolt through the arteries like he was the virus that needed to be cleansed. The argument felt increasingly convincing.

What he didn't properly anticipate was the traffic moving in both directions. The creatures pouring out should have been an effective detriment to anyone considering going in, like some idiots. What he didn't expect to hear was a very human shout, the thumping and clattering not a feral chaos of teeth and nails in hot, quick strikes to gain territory. Tony's busy hands stilled as he strained to listen like he hadn't been the entire time, eyes up on the ceiling like he could make out some detail of this new configuration of fight through the boards. That was definitely a man. What kind of asshole had walked into this nightmare?

Comments

B

[winsomelosesome]

This was one hell of a confusing mess. Jan was hardly sure where she had she been to start with, but this alternate space was so much worse. Wings buzzing, Jan zapped the demobats that were hot on her heels and dove back down, escaping into a large building through a broken window. She heard the glass shatter as the creatures rammed into it after her, but they appeared to be down for the count. Letting out a sigh of relief, Jan flit about, taking in the space for a brief moment before a low growl had her turning slowly.

"...Nice creepy dog thing?" she ventured, but the thing lunged, trying to catch her in it's strange mouth as she darted away, the demodog in hot pursuit.

[pursuitofcappiness]

If the question was, what idiot(s) would be out here fighting these monsters out of their own free volition, then the answer would be Jan Van Dyne and Steve Rogers, obviously. Honestly? After these last few days, he'd rather be like this and out fighting than the alternative.

Lucky or unlucky for Jan that she's running towards where Steve's currently engaged with a pup of his own, trying to pick it up and throw it as far as he can, which in this case, is over Jan's head and directly into the other one.

Honestly, this just seems to anger the both of them, and draw a few more creatures their way. "Any chance you've got something that can attack more than one of these at once?" he asks, as his eyes flit around for any sort of weapon that he could find. He picks up a piece of rebar that he'd ripped out of one of the downed buildings from the volcano, but it's not exactly his favored choice.

[in_extremis]

"Cap!" It was a clipped, sharp sound, as short as the strange, buzzing zing off of the wall just behind him where the transparent shield struck to bounce into his hands. Down the hall, Tony stood looking just as surprised as anyone else that he had just thrown it. His wide eyes were on Steve, like he hadn't quite processed yet what he was looking at before his instincts had leased the shield, and he certainly didn't have the time to do it right now. Steve had been talking to someone, and Tony had to get them both somewhere more secure. Someone incredibly small. "I didn't bring anything for you, sweetheart, I'll have to make it up later," he tried to keep jovial, but it mostly sounded breathless. Maybe he could forge up a little more conviction as he instructed, "Both of you, on my ass," and turned to lead them back through the library.

It was a mostly empty space, with tall ceilings and wide halls, and shelves toppled with nothing on them to weigh them down. It offered plenty of room for more of the snarling beasts to spread themselves out and circle the prey.

[winsomelosesome]

Cap??? Jan had to stare for a moment as that familiar voice called out what should have been obvious but had been clouded by the beard. It was a good look on him, and Jan grinned. "Like the beard, Captain," she quipped zapping a spray of wasp stings at the monsters, "How's this?"

She flew round to circle tony, lighting briefly on his shoulder to press a quick kiss to his cheek. "Shoulda known I'd find you down here," she admonished playfully, darting off again to fight.

[pursuitofcappiness]

Steve turns when he hears his name - he doesn't recognize that voice but he recognizes that sound, though he looks at the shield for a whole 0.3 seconds with confusion since it's not opaque. Still, he reacts quick enough to catch it, enough force as if he'd thrown it himself, the same weight and distribution and even the straps feel right. Despite it being translucent, she feels exactly as he's used to, and that could really only mean one thing.

A thought clicks into place - "Tony," he says, allowing himself this epiphany and reprieve for a brief moment as he lifts the shield and slams the side of it into one of the dogs, tossing it back. It seems to be weakened, but it won't be long before it recovers.

He wants to argue with Tony's plan to retreat but apparently he's got more weapons - stashed at the library? - so who is Steve to not go with them, stalking close with his guard all the way up, putting as much barrier as he can between them and the creatures as more thoughts processing through his mind. It doesn't immediately come to him who the woman is, though she seems to recognize him, which he'd feel a lot more guilty about if not for the fact that they seem to be from a world in his future. At least, Tommy is. "You must be Wasp! I don't think we've been introduced!" he calls.

[in_extremis]

The momentum of a familiar dance kept Tony moving, despite feeling like he had come entirely untethered from himself, watching the feather-light kiss transform his own face to slant of a smirk and wink of one eye, all this from the crushing void of a black hole under his own ribs. Cap usually played the steady percussion in this piece, knocking Tony's rhythm off when he couldn't identify what Cap was playing at by feigning ignorance and forcing him to try to bring them back on beat before he stumbled, "She does know how to make an entrance, doesn't she?"

Without his armor, he felt perpetually vulnerable and exposed, a feeling that was briefly alleviated despite the flying demon that came swooping down from a broken window above them. With Cap at his back, he didn't even look around to check that they were secure to keep going. "Get us a clear path to that door, would you, darling?" he asked, pointing past the stacks to the small, unremarkable door that would get them to the security of the basement, where Tony knew none of the creatures had yet breached. Between them, before that reprieve, they faced another trio of those teeth with legs.

[winsomelosesome]

For a beat Jan was struck with the oddity of that reply from Steve, eyes flitting over those visual differences again. "You forget me that fast??" she quipped with a pout, kicking a beast away with a comical show of force considering her size.

"This a memory wipe thing, or is this a multi-verse doppelganger deal?" she asked Tony, zipping off to clear the way, wondering what had become of any of Tony's suits.

[pursuitofcappiness]

Steve throws the shield with precision at the flying creature, which makes a horrible sound as its wing is sliced, and it comes stumbling madly forward, Steve finding that it clings on quite fiercely so he has to throw both it and the shield in order to knock it back. "That where your suit is, Iron Man?"

The pet name is new - and so is whatever's going on with Jan - but there's time to unpack team dynamics once they've gotten to safety.

"Multi-verse doppelgänger," he answers affirmatively, as he cuts down one of the hounds and wipes its blood off his forehead where it'd splattered. He really misses that cowl at the moment. "More like clone," he says, between kicks. That doesn't sound right, either. "Alternate version." That's better.

Once he or Jan dispatch the last creature, it seems to calm down for the moment, enough for them to breathe, but they have to move quickly because Steve can hear the screeching in the distance. At the very least, the path is clear. "Either of you know where these came from? What they've got to do with the storm?"

[in_extremis]

There was enough for them to deal with that maybe they could all ignore the question about his armor, if Tony sailed elegantly right passed it with a flutter of his hands that was quickly cut short as he had to dart behind the cover of one of the bookshelves to avoid being tackled. It felt just as bad to address, "Wait, you actually don't know her? I thought we were doing a bit," just without the tarnish of his own guilt to keep it repressed. There was probably a way this was somehow his fault, he just hadn't worked out the math on it yet, and his computing power had to be dedicated at the moment to working out how Steve knew of the Wasp and called Tony by name.

They had to keep moving if he wanted to keep that harddrive intact, though, so Tony waved an impatient hand to encourage Steve along to where Tony could take him by the shoulder and rush them both into the basement. The door slammed behind them, on Jan's tiny heels, plunging them into darkness. The stalking and snarling of the creatures outside was muffled, quiet under Tony's shaky breath as he warned, "Stairs," so Steve didn't go pitching down them before the sound of fumbling in the dark was followed by a click and the watery beam of Tony's flashlight. Keeping his voice low, he explained, "All of the storms are different. Different ways to torture us. They're engineered. Working a specific pressure point." The exact reaction that this pressure was supposed to elicit was not yet clear, bringing an end to what Tony could share with a tight press of his lips together and apologetic shake of his head.

[winsomelosesome]

"Those are all pretty different things," Jan noted with a teasing tone as they worked, and her Cap or not, he looked the part with his moves.

"Never seen anything quite like 'em before," she answered belatedly after just making it inside. She landed for a breather on Tony's shoulder as he explained and kept them moving in the dark. "Sounds like we came at great time then."

[pursuitofcappiness]

He is only slightly concerned that Jan pretty much said they had clones, multiversal variants, and doppelgängers. Just what kind of world did they even come from? Keeping his voice equally low and his footing equally soft, he asks: "Did you just arrive? The storm took out my serum. I'm not sure how long we have it back, or how long we'll have your," he doesn't know what to call the stings. "Blasters."

Naturally, Steve thinks that the lack of powers is something to do with this particular storm, but it sounds like Tony's also unfamiliar with the monsters, which doesn't bode well because they don't know how many of them there are or if there are bigger ones coming and this is just the preview. Plus, there are a good handful of civilians out there.

He gently reaches out a hand to the shoulder that Jan's not sitting on, and rests it there. "Tony, now would be a really good time to suit up and get an aerial scan of combatants. They're not all that smart, but we don't know who's controlling them." No escaping the suit talk.

"Hope, right? Sorry we haven't met before, on my world. But I've heard a lot about you, from Scott." Now's not really the time, but they both seem confused and put off by how Steve didn't know her, so. He's gotta defend himself a little.

[in_extremis]

At the bottom of the stairs was a sort of office, mostly occupied by an oversized desk stacked with papers and an ancient looking tape recorder. It wasn't exactly cozy, but Tony visibly relaxed, at least until Steve was touching his shoulder and Tony was dropping it to dodge aside and catch his wrist instead. Then he didn't know what to do with it, all of his defenses back up and holding Steve's arm, his quick breathing sounding very loud in the stillness, and having to ratchet tighter yet, "There is no suit." Though he didn't want to linger there, he let it hang long enough with his gaze fixed on Steve's so they were all clear there was not the time to argue the armor into existence, and they were moving on to plan B. "Wasp can fly. But--If there is a central control, it's going to be obvious. They're all communicating, like a hive mind. Including those vines," he explained, pointing the flashlight toward the wall that was spidered with the slick arteries. "If they're like wires, they're all going to lead to the source eventually."

As Steve tried to get his footing with the founding Avenger, Tony looked around at Jan with a grimace of confusion, then back at Steve a little hopelessly. He was definitely making it worse. "Lang?" Tony barely wanted to clarify, because he had to be talking about an Ant-Man, which only made this unfamiliarity with the chairwoman more bizarre. They must not have found him in the ice for a very long time.

Oh, there it was. That was why this was Tony's fault.

[winsomelosesome]

"Hope?" she repeated, the name meaning nothing to her, though like Tony she seemed to show recognition of Scott. It felt so strange, hearing one of her oldest friends introduce himself to her, like she wasn't a fellow founding Avenger.

"Janet," she corrected with a smile, "You are Steve, right? I got that part right at least?" There was a belated nod to his actual question. "Seems to work in here." In the slightly more...monster-y version of this place.

She could feel Tony's quick pulse beneath her, and pressed her palm to his shoulder to offer a reassuring stroke. This was clearly a high anxiety moment for all of them.

"I can try and see where they converge?" she offered, looking over at the roots curiously.

A

[beholding_archivist]

“Countess, what are you-“ Jon starts as he walks into bedroom where not only the Countess but also a small group of additional mothcats have gathered to stare at the hammock. The gathering has Jon stop in his tracks to consider both the winged felines as well as the still pretty sparse furniture in turn before his attention is drawn upwards to the flickering lights.

Jon grimaces. “Don’t tell me it’s one of those ghosts. They haven’t appeared down here before!” He complains and the light begins to move, drawing not only Jon’s eyes with it but also the attention of every present mothcat who immediately begin to trot and flutter after it.

“H-hey. Stop!” Jon calls out, leaving it unclear if he is talking to the animals or the light.

[in_extremis]

Tony's light was steady. It was a cold, narrow beam barely reaching up the height of the stairs, fixed on the door leading out into the library that he stood watching, and listening for another step with his heart in his throat. He didn't anticipate a voice, so close that it had him whipping around to throw the light back down the hall he had tiptoed his way up, where there was nothing but the swirling ash that fluttered in his wake. "Boss?" Tony tried, a hissing whisper, cringing at the noise and glancing anxiously back up the stairs before he continued, "I'm not doing anything--I was just leaving, okay, I thought I'd go to the shop--," trying to rationalize what Jon would want him to stop doing. Up until he accepted that he was talking to a dark hallway and had to admit to it, "I'm going crazy."

[beholding_archivist]

There is a loss Jon finds himself at as he looks at the gathered mothcats staring up at the single burning light. Eventually he sighs, inwardly bothered by not simply knowing what's going on - Again.

"It's probably just the storm." He assures the mothcats, earning himself the attention of at least some of them. "Guess I have to ask Tony to check the wiring anyway once this is over. Pretty sure the lights shouldn't be doing this. Even during a storm." Jon pauses a moment and the Countess comes fluttering up to him. "You wonder where he is as well, don't you."

[in_extremis]

Two things could be true at once; Tony could very well be losing his mind, and that could actually be Jon's voice he could hear, too quiet to make out the words and only distinct in the rich burr that seemed to catch in Tony's chest and try to tip his head toward it, longing to press his face into Jon's throat. He must have been walking away--was that him up there, this whole time? What was he doing here? Tony got as far as bracing a foot on the bottom stair, ready to race up, flashlight swinging back around to the door at the top as he called, "Jon!" The only answer he got was the creak of the boards under his foot, then the burst of the door into splinters above him.

The flashlight hit the ground before the shards of the door made their full descent, and it went rolling across the floor until it was halted by a thick vine roping across the room, where it was left shining benignly down the long hall. In the dark behind it, Tony's retreat was a rapid few steps then screech of metal on the cold floor as he bumped into the desk, and groan of protest from the wood as he vaulted over it, scattering papers and sliding across a tape recorder to drop down and press himself into the black void underneath. He clasped a hand over his mouth and tried to listen past the pounding in his ears as heavy footsteps thumped ponderously down the stairs.

[beholding_archivist]

With the Countess settling on his shoulder and the remaining mothcats still busy with the unsteady light, Jon is about to head back upstairs when his attention as well as that of every present feline is drawn to the nearby deskwhen one of the tape recorders left there turns on, playing back a recording Jon made some time ago. The appears to have fixed itself in the meantime.

But Jon notices the light less and steps back to the desk, picking up the recorder with a scowl that then gets directed at the ceiling. "If you're trying to tell me something, you have to be clearer!" He announces and turns the recorder back off before lowering his voice again. "It normally gets blocked out by the storms..."

[in_extremis]

That was definitely Jon's voice, completely incongruous with the heavy footfall down the last step onto the basement floor, and the strange, throaty gurgle that followed. Worse, Tony couldn't figure out what exactly he was trying to tell Jon right at that moment; it didn't seem like the best time to try to make his apologies, and he certainly didn't have any convincing excuses prepared. Was that Jon? Whatever was out there seemed to have gone still, so Tony had to be very careful to make no shuffling noise as he tried to contort himself over and peer through the sliver of space between the floor and the facade of the desk, where he could see his breath swirling the strange fog that clung there, and creating a ghost of condensation on the concrete. There was the flashlight, pointing down the hall. And there was a very alien foot, that he really hoped was not Jon's. The voice must have been coming from somewhere else, possibly just echoing in his guilty head, his version of his life flashing before his eyes except it was just his failures. Just as Tony was considering that the failures were his whole life, that was just a normal life-flashing, he spotted the tape recorder.

That was a normal place to hear Jon's voice. Was it still on? Abruptly, before the tape recorder could make any more noise and lure the alien foot toward him, Tony flung a hand out and clicked the first button he touched.

[beholding_archivist]

The recorder in Jon's hands clicks on again, but this time it's the record button that is being pressed and Jon hurries to stop the device from recording over his already present recording. "Hey! This is not the time to throw a fuss! If you haven't noticed, there are monsters out there. Monsters that want to eat me and I can't do anything against them!"

Jon huffs and scowls at the device. The mothcats have all gathered on and around the desk, inspecting everything thoroughly. "I can't even find Tony. If you want me to do something for you, you have to do something for me first: Find Tony. Let me know he's okay." Jon growls and puts the recorder back on the table.

[in_extremis]

Tony didn't think he was being unnecessarily fussy, under the circumstances, and would also prefer that the recorder, or the Jon in the recorder, was not eaten by monsters, which was why he really needed it to be quiet, because the first sound had the thing in the room with them charging so viciously at the desk that the whole piece screeched across the concrete and almost shoved Tony over as they collided. He could hear the thump of the thing bracing itself on the surface above him before it let out an intimidating shriek. There was a pen in Tony's hands seconds ago, already disassembled by the time the creature ran out of breath, the spring twisted and mounted to expertly sling the plastic case of the pen under the desk and between the creature's feet. It went sailing across the basement floor to start pinging against the walls of he illuminated hallway. With a grinding tear of claws through the wood above Tony's head, the creature whirled around with another scream and went bounding after the sound, crashing after it with such determination that it tore plaster from the walls.

In the din, Tony snatched up the tape recorder again, bringing it so close that his nose was pressed against it and he could hiss under his breath, "Jon?" He was not completely convinced of his sanity, but he was determined that there had to be some logic to the exact way he went crazy, and even if his brain was a pool of slag he was not confused about where he was. "I'm right here," he might have been desperately telling both himself and the Jon he was pretty sure was some kind of real, even if he only existed in the tape recorder. Which was possible. They did just...appear because of him. Frantic to make some sense of this, he tried pressing several buttons, possibly recording himself for the object's convenience, repeating, "I'm here."

[beholding_archivist]

It hasn't been long since Jon had put down the recorder when the device suddenly springs to life, it's various buttons pressing down and jumping back up at random, causing Jon to back away in bewilderment. "W-wait. Hold it! You will only make them stuck!" He calls out and quickly picks the recorder back up.

Jon waits for the recorder to settle down, considering what may be happening. By all rights the Eye shouldn't be reacting like this. It isn't meant to understand what's happening. The most plausible thing Jon can currently think of is this being one of the ghosts, the apparitions they all see every storm, to try and make contact? Are these specters in the end more than images drawn from their memories?

"Okay." He says at last. "I- uh- I suppose you can hear me. So..." His fingers glide over the recorder's buttons. "If that's true, press fast forward, please."

[in_extremis]

The recorder was evidently not aware as Tony was that it was a recorder that was talking to him if it needed to test Tony's responses. He stared at it with some bewilderment for a second he didn't really have, wondering where the wiring was misaligned, why they could hear each other and not understand. He didn't have long for that question to settle into guilt (maybe that was what Jon meant when he said Tony wasn't listening, he could hear just fine, he just never understood), shocked out of it by the creature in the basement with him crashing back into the desk, sending it spinning around the pivot of Tony's shoulder against the wood. He did as he was told as the beast roared, swinging out from under the desk with the Jon Recorder clutched protectively against his chest were he could mash the fast forward button, then rapidly try to tap a stuttering S.O.S. as he went sprinting down the hall before the beat could notice he'd even left.

[beholding_archivist]

Since Jon doesn't have to deal with any monsters trying to eat him at the moment he has settled down at the desk with the recorder now placed on said desk before him as it gives him an affirmative reply.

So whoever is using the recorder to communicate with him understands him. That's helpful.

"Okay." Jon nods once. "Are you one of the-" He starts voicing his next question, but then the recorder starts tapping out a rather frantic rhythm which catches Jon by surprise. "W-wait! No- Wha...?" He stumbles over his own words but after a moment catches on. Which is when the flickering of the lights in the hallway picks back up again as well with the mothcats yet again being drawn after the andering lights. Jon remains with the recorder, however, frowning down at it.

"...S.O.S. ...?" He wonders aloud at the code only someone from Earth would even know. "Can you tell me who you are?"

[in_extremis]

In an act of desperation, Tony flung the spring he still clung to through the door to the bedroom, hoping that made any kind of noise, while he ducked the other way and had to stop himself from flinging the door of Jon's office closed behind him. He caught it just before it slammed, leaving him panting against the wall just inside, where he could peek through the sliver of the door at the creature throwing itself back down the hall after the commotion. Where he could also hear that very small voice, like it was getting further away, even though he had the Jon Recorder pressed up against his collar, possessive and desperate. "Why are you getting quieter now?" he hissed irritably at it as the creature screamed hungrily through the bedroom door, hunting the scrap of a pen.

The voice was getting further away, Tony did not enjoy realizing, because he should have known before now that the recorder probably wasn't talking to him, and he had just fled from some other source of Jon. He tipped his head back against the wall, eyes up at the ceiling with a frustrated plea for answers, like why Jon didn't know who he was talking to.

This city must have still been connected to the one that Tony had left. He hadn't gone far, after all. Those glowing doors must not have been the only way to get through.

It was a very slow and tedious process to convince the tape recorder to tap out T-O-N-Y while a monster grew restless in the room next door.