ourladytrees: ๐˜ธ๐˜ฉ๐˜ข๐˜ต ๐˜ฅ๐˜ฐ๐˜ฆ๐˜ด๐˜ฏ'๐˜ต ๐˜ฌ๐˜ช๐˜ญ๐˜ญ ๐˜บ๐˜ฐ๐˜ถ (Default)
แดŠแดœสŸษชแด€ แดกษชแด„แด‹แด‡ส€, แดแดœส€ สŸแด€แด…ส แดา“ แด›สœแด‡ แด›ส€แด‡แด‡s ([personal profile] ourladytrees) wrote2022-06-18 12:21 am
portalling: ษดแด แดกแด€ส สœแดแดแด‡. (pic#15631672)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-18 05:08 am (UTC)(link)
[ The building, as she walks up to it, is still humming faintly with ethereal energy, despite the fact that all her peers' magic has dried up like a faucet being turned off. The Sanctum Sanctorum stands out from all the other buildings on the block: it's a sprawling townhouse, almost a mansion, jostling elbow-to-elbow with apartment buildings and bodegas. It's a curious, near-gothic sight and yet none of the other passersby seem to notice it or stop and goggle, as if their gazes slide right off it.

It's a similar illusion as that cast on the Brakebills University for Magical Pedagogy and other nexuses of magic throughout the world, wreathed in discretion and in the cracks between perception. There's still that familiar touch of magic in the air, the leylines thrumming beneath her feet.

Julia rings the doorbell, and the door swings open by itself — but as she steps into the entrance hall, she'll see that there's no one around. If she calls out, no one answers.

Several storeys up and on the other end of the building, an aggravated shout: "Wong, would you get the door?"

"The Sorcerer Supreme has far more serious topics to concern himself with, Strange."

"Wong, I'm on the toilet."

"Well, better hurry!"

More grumbling complaints. Soap, running water in the sink, Doctor Strange shaking off his hands, hurried footsteps out of the third-storey bathroom, then the quick decision that he's not going to go scurrying down all the staircases like some kid running to catch the pizza delivery. Why did the doors open? They were supposed to wait, and not swing open before a sorcerer was ready to receive a guest. He'd have to check the wards later.

Just as Julia reaches the middle of the foyer, there's a hissing spitting circle of orange light carved into the empty air, and a tall, dark-haired man comes hurrying through the portal. He's dressed in black-and-grey robes (he shoots a quick surreptitious glance down to make sure his fly is zipped up, oh thank god, it is), but he looks a little hurried, still buttoning the clasp of his red cloak. The cloak ripples in an invisible breeze.
]

Sorry, normally there's someone here, we've been a little short-staffed lately—

[ The unnamed man sounds quick, distracted, as he glances around. But there's no one. They're operating on a skeleton crew lately; most of the apprentices are at Kamar-Taj, assisting with repairs. ]

May I help you?
portalling: ษชษดfษชษดษชแด›ส แดกแด€ส€. (pic#15643388)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-18 07:03 am (UTC)(link)
Magical problem? Well, you've come to the right place, although that doesn't narrow it down much. Is it gremlins in your closet, you unearthed a cursed artefact, a family member got transformed into a frog, maybe a spat of lycanthropy...

[ The man rattles off suggestion after offhanded suggestion — all the great many varieties of banal problems he gets to handle, now that Wong is devoted to more serious topics — until a corner of the cloak seems to poke him in the side, like a friend elbowing him to shut up. He, perhaps surprisingly, shuts up.

But then his blue eyes squint, taking another closer look at the young woman. He tilts his head. It's a little like looking at one of those Magic Eye pictures, but when he concentrates he can see the faint limning of magical ability around her, too, which might explain why the doors opened for her. They'd thought they were opening for a fellow Master Mistress of the Mystic Arts.

Hm.
]

Are you a witch?
portalling: ษดแด แดกแด€ส สœแดแดแด‡. (pic#15601047)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-21 03:45 am (UTC)(link)
[ Terminology and names are important. Just chalk it down to any moment he's corrected others about himself: he's a sorcerer, not a wizard; he's a doctor, not a mister. So he simply nods and mentally jots it down for future reference. ]

Doctor Stephen Strange. At your service, Julia, [ he introduces himself, but doesn't reach out for a handshake, his hands instead still folded into the depths of the lcoak.

He could have cast a divination spell and wrung all the relevant information out of her skull more quickly, but the others have had to remind him that it's far more polite to ask. To talk it through. So, Strange lifts a hand and spins it in midair, carving out another portal; on the other side, she can see a comfortable sitting room resembling a Victorian parlour, all squashy armchairs and a fireplace and overcrowded bookcases.
]

Step on into my office, and you can tell me about your troubles.

[ 'My office', as if he's still a consulting physician— but in a way, isn't that still true? ]
portalling: แด…แดแด„แด›แดส€ sแด›ส€แด€ษดษขแด‡. (pic#15624643)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-21 05:36 am (UTC)(link)
[ Strange hides his laugh in a cough. Normally Wong is the only one who catches onto it so quickly and, more importantly, also has the nerve to point it out and skewer Strange's inherent sense of flamboyance. He likes to show off with his abilities, particularly after losing the title of Sorcerer Supreme. And particularly when his guest is a good-looking woman, so sue him. ]

We're in another corner of the building. [ A twinkle in his blue eyes. ] I'm showing off. It's the little things, sometimes.

[ As if to reinforce the point, he snaps his fingers and the fireplace roars to life by itself, as he settles down in one of the armchairs. Leaning backwards and an elbow against the arm of the chair, chin tipped in hand, observing Julia across the space of the comfortable room. ]

But in fairness, the Sanctum Sanctorum tends to rearrange itself on a whim and occasionally the stairwells lead to places you wouldn't expect. It's just faster and easier to portal.
Edited 2022-06-21 05:36 (UTC)
portalling: แด›สœแดส€: ส€แด€ษขษดแด€ส€แดแด‹. (pic#15613383)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-22 03:12 am (UTC)(link)
[ Grudgingly, because Strange hates to be compared to Harry Potter shit but dammit, it's apt: ] Yes. Sort of. Don't stop and look at any of the portraits if you can avoid it, though; if they move, then you really don't want to meet their eye.

[ He doesn't actually sound flippant when he delivers that piece of advice; it might be a genuine warning, after one too many novices had been swallowed up into the paintings. Julia's wide-eyed astonishment and excitement is contagious, though, and he remembers then what it had been like. Starry-eyed, mindblown. Stephen had tried too hard at the time to seem cool and blasรฉ and unaffected, but the whole time, he'd felt his awe almost overwhelming him.

To answer her question, he doesn't count it off on his fingers, but he does tip his head as he tries to tally them up:
]

We're smaller than Hong Kong or London. So it's only Wong— that's the Sorcerer Supreme— [ ugh, credit where well-deserved credit is due, ] and myself full-time. There's currently three other masters which cycle in and out, and about five apprentices, but they're on loan to headquarters at the moment. Finishing up their training with the Brakebills exchange cohort.

[ The Masters of Mystic Arts hadn't been eager to parley with the Dean of the college, decades ago, but the proximity of the New York Sanctum to the upstate campus meant they were bound to run headfirst into each other. Leylines tangled and knotted; magician graduates accidentally threw interference into the sorcerers' spells when they strayed too close; and all in all, it meant the two institutions had to roll up their sleeves and shake hands eventually and cut a kind of deal. And so Kamar-Taj had been pitched as a destination for exchange students and vice versa: spend a majestic semester in faraway, foreign Nepal! try to learn portal magic! (it's far warmer and more pleasant than Brakebills South!) ]

I take it you haven't visited any of our nexuses before?
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[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-22 05:09 am (UTC)(link)
Ah.

[ Strange straightens slightly then: composed posture, shoulders back, trying to look a bit more official. So she's a hedge witch. A pejorative, but one which they often took to wearing proudly. The curiosity is there, needling just behind his eyes: he wonders about that constellation of blue stars, and he wonders how many she has. What level of practicioner he's dealing with here.

He's come across them often enough in the last few years, paths crossing whenever he wound up having to head out and help smooth over a spell gone amok. The Hedges could be reckless, ambitious. (And isn't that the pot calling the kettle black, Stephen?) They also took care of their own, though, so perhaps he wasn't summoned out to deal with them anywhere near as often as it could've been. All things considered.
]

A wise warning. Spell boundaries can work themselves into knots if the sorcerers work too closely to a safehouse, and if either of us doesn't account for thaumic surges in the vicinity.

[ And you're not trained, he thinks, but he bites back that instinctive bit of arrogance. He'd leapt into his first perilous situation half-trained and half-cocked himself, after all: everyone else at the Sanctum had been dead. ]

So what brings a hedge to my doorstep, Julia?
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[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-23 07:57 am (UTC)(link)
But you just said—

[ Baffled, for a second — of course he doesn't miss that flicker of white-hot rage, and it even sparks in her aura like a matchstick flare of irritated red — but then the sorcerer smooths out his own expression, and lets it go. Alright. She's allowed to say the word and he can't. That actually makes a kind of sense. So he ducks his head apologetically. ]

Sorry. Tell me more. Define "completely fucked"?
portalling: แดแดœสŸแด›ษชแด แด‡ส€sแด‡ แดf แดแด€แด…ษดแด‡ss. (pic#15646954)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-23 07:00 pm (UTC)(link)
[ His eyebrows practically climb into his hair. ]

It's gone?

[ he asks, incredulous, with the same tone of voice you might use for what do you mean, the sun is gone? Magic just doesn't go away. It's everywhere, in everything, in each beating heart and plants photosynthesising and cells dividing. It's the logic underpinning all the systems of the universe. It's without limit.

But not all magic is the same as the rest, he reminds himself. The multiversal energies he taps into are different from Wanda's chaos magic, which in turn are different from the Asgardians' spells. So Strange has already shot to his feet and he's crossing the room to go rifling through the drawers of a massive oaken desk at the back of the room, searching for some equipment. When Julia drops in those last two words, though, then he goes motionless. Perplexed, again.
]

Don't you use the same magic as your other magicians?
portalling: แด›สœแดส€: ส€แด€ษขษดแด€ส€แดแด‹. (pic#15613386)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-23 08:01 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Strange goes back to rummaging. There's so many tangential questions he already wants to ask out of sheer curiosity ("you lost your Shade? more importantly, you got your Shade back from a god?" — his own Shade is locked down and tethered to his body with uncountable arcane wards, to be on the safe side), but he can't afford the distraction. He sticks to the problem at hand, with his usual laser focus.

And he finally finds what he was looking for in the desk. He pulls out a monocle, an old subway map of New York, and a standard scrying object: a crystal on the end of a chain. He arranges them on the tabletop (all at neat angles and lines, like a surgeon setting out his tools), then beckons Julia to join him by the table. He holds up the monocle and tries to squint at her through it.
]

Try a spell for me.

[ Open your mouth, say ah. ]
portalling: แด…แดแด„แด›แดส€ sแด›ส€แด€ษดษขแด‡. (pic#15624632)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-23 11:34 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Strange surveys her efforts through the monocle. He could've done it with his third eye alone, but it's just a little easier with a conduit: it makes the magic flare brighter in his vision, the colours more saturated, easier to read. And it's...

Not the same kind of magic as all the other magicians he's met before. He can't put his finger on what's different about hers, couldn't describe it to any onlooker, but it tastes different. (The smell of crisp dew on the loam of a forest floor, ancient woodsy earth, tree bark—)

And it is, indeed, sputtering feebly where it shouldn't be. A tiny spark cradled between Julia's hands, when she should be a forest fire.
]

Hm.

[ Which isn't a very illuminating comment, all things told. But he sets the monocle down, then reaches for the crystal instead: lets it sway aimless circles over the subway map on the table, circling and circling and not being tugged in any particular direction at all, while Strange's mouth purses tighter and tighter.

The crystal should be pinging all over the place. It should be drawn to the Hedge safehouses on the map like a magnet, all those loci of magical energies and talents. If the map extended further north, Brakebills should be lit up like a goddamn sun, but he wonders if it would even show.
]

And this is happening at the school too? With all the students and teachers as well?
portalling: ษชษดfษชษดษชแด›ส แดกแด€ส€. (pic#15613395)

[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-24 12:40 am (UTC)(link)
[ Strange had been on the verge of cutting in, interjecting something — If this is happening, then why haven't I heard of it sooner? — but his mouth snaps shut again as Julia explains further. Which also probably explains why it hasn't landed on his doorstep until now. No magic means no messengers sent through the astral plane; no telepathic telegrams or magical messages winging their way into his dreams. Everyone in that entire ecosystem cut off, and rendered back to... well, phonecalls. Walking here and simply ringing his doorbell like a mundane civilian.

Also, Dean Fogg would probably chew off his own foot before he turned to Doctor Strange for help. Pride cometh, etc.

He's never felt more grateful for the source of his own organisation's magic, their own untouched wellspring. This so easily could've been him, if the sorcerers had followed a different academic regimen.
]

Ah. Well, that's a... greater issue than I thought. I have a few contacts I was thinking I could pursue, but I'm less able to call up the Old Gods and lodge a complaint with their manager.

Do you know why they did it? This is the nuclear option. I haven't heard of this happening before.
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[personal profile] portalling 2022-06-24 01:22 am (UTC)(link)
[ He stares at her.

And then, in probably a most unexpected response: Stephen Strange bursts out laughing in sheer startled surprise. It's a bark of surprised laughter before he's able to reel it back in.
]

Whatever I was expecting to hear, it wasn't that.

[ He doesn't sound judgmental or angry. It's the phrasing of his parents are punishing us, he thinks. Like the kids have been grounded. Bad humans; bad. But if they'd killed a god, he's assuming they must have had a good reason. ]

I promise, I'm not trying to be flippant. Godkilling gets around. Well. Christ.

[ He sets the tools of his trade aside and moves back to his own chair, settles back into it with his elbows against the arm, fingers steepled. ]

To be frank, Julia, I'm not sure if I can reopen those pipes for you. I'm not a Plumber. I don't even connect to your Wellspring, so resuscitating it wouldn't be my area of expertise. I can talk to some diviners and they can try to appeal to the Old Gods for a reversal, but that doesn't sound likely either, if they're as pissed as you say. I can keep looking into it, though, and I can reach out to some older magicians of my acquaintance to hear what they've tried.

And we can take a closer look at your own magic, too, if you like. Try to discern a bit more where it's coming from. If it really is just a residue — or if perhaps it's a door, and we can kick it open wider.

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