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DoorMan (MCU SI) - #117 : Portal Warfare!
🕑 Added 2025-08-08 12:42:02 +0000 UTCDisclaimer - I don’t own Marvel or any of its characters. The Mighty Mouse does =and I hope it is not standing behind me with a shotgun cocked and ready to blow my brains out the second I have the audacity to press PUBLI——
DoorMan #117
Stark Residence, Malibu [May 2008]
–Colin Baxter–
Floating down the stairs, since it was so much easier than walking, he came face to face with Tony in his Iron Man suit, standing still, with no screens in front of him but he supposed that with the integrated HUD inside his faceplate, external screens were made redundant.
Still, he knew that Tony was not analysing anything inside, likely on the verge of a panic attack. “Tony?” He asked cautiously, staying away from the door, just in case Tony thought it to be overwhelming.
Iron Man whirled around, locking eyes with him before Tony turned away, “He tried to kill me,” Tony remarked in a small voice.
He nodded, “Yup. That, he did. With your weapon, no less.”
“Ha! Very funny,” Tony chuckled bitterly. “I’m assuming he was here for the Arc Reactor?”
“And your suit, but he clearly wanted to make sure that the most important piece was secured before going for your suit's designs. After all, once you were dead, getting the data from the servers should not have been that hard.”
Tony’s faceplate slid off, revealing the man’s troubled expression, “He disconnected Jarvis from everything.” Gesturing at the sole active screen, showing a small orange wavelength, barely moving.
He shrugged at that, “Well, it was kind of your fault to let Jarvis remain so centralised, whilst keeping him dependent on a single hardline connection.”
“You know, you are kinda shit at this consoling thing,” Tony remarked, turning around to work on holodisplays that popped up out of nowhere.
“Not my job. It’s Pepper’s. She’s on the way, by the way. Also, Stane, he will be–”
“I don’t care about him.” Tony snapped, then took a deep breath, “I just want him gone, that’s all.”
“Fine. Your call. I assume the suits will want a statement from you. Should I just shoo them off the property and tell them to come tomorrow or do you want to do it now?”
Tony chuckled a bit at that, “Yeah, tell them to come tomorrow. That sounds…nice.”
“Fine. Just don’t let that suit of armour fool you into thinking that you are safe from the feels. Dealing with them in an open and safe environment, that’s how you deal with your feelings.”
“I don’t remember asking for a shrink.”
“Well, the first session’s free. See ya!” With a mock salute, he turned around and floated up to the first floor, landing in front of a clearly waiting Coulson, with no agents in sight, likely having cleaned up the area along with taking Stane into custody. He wondered who that ninja really was?
The Hand, maybe?
“I am sorry to inform you that Mr.Stark is indisposed as of this moment and is in no condition to make a statement. He wishes to inform you that he deeply regrets the inconvenience and to reconvene for this at a later date, likely tomorrow.” He said, hands folded in front of his body, and droning off that statement in a monotone, bored voice.
Coulson just deadpanned at him before slowly nodding, “Alright. Please inform Mr.Stark that if he needs anything from the agency, here’s my number.”
He took the offered card, “I will let him know.”
“You will not do that, will you?”
He grinned, behind the mask, “No, I will not.”
With a mental request, a purple portal opened up behind him as he slowly floated backwards, watching Coulson clearly angle himself better to take pictures of the portal with the hidden cameras on his suit.
“See ya!”
____xx____
As soon as the portal closed, he sighed as he found himself, not in the portal room of the Red Hearth but the courtyard of Kamar Taj. The portal was not hijacked, which meant Jin’Ya meant to send him here. It was a very nifty skill, to create two layered portals, and then stitch them together so tightly that one couldn’t even feel moving between two portals, a rare skill.
Another book he’d read in his quest to get better at the Mystic Arts. Portal Warfare, written by one of the Vanir Witches during her stint at Kamar Taj. She might even still be alive, if, you know, Odin didn’t kill her because of her threat levels.
The woman could straight up create microscopic portals to different parts of the planet, creating purely physical attacks that were a menace to her enemies as they thought them to be spells. He had read written reports about her annihilating a Deviant colony with just a jet of pressurised lava, sped up to the point that she carved through the earth and killed the entire colony with that single portal.
A clear example of someone becoming absurdly strong if they pursued their field of mastery to the extreme.
Shaking his head to get rid of the unreasonable expectations of ever reaching that level of portal warfare, he turned around, to find the Ancient One and Wong looking at him. Wow, Wong did not look happy, not at all.
“Um, is this an intervention?” He asked, smiling a bit in an effort to lighten the mood, which clearly fell on its face since Wong still looked mad.
“In a manner of speaking, yes. Master Wong would like to speak with you,” The Ancient One informed him and just walked right off, with Wong turning around and walking into one of the meeting rooms adjacent to the courtyard.
He sighed, and followed Wong, having an inkling as to what this was about. Once the door was closed, he sighed and said, “Look, is this about college?”
“Yes. Yes, it is. Why have you not shown your face to anyone? Your client's deals have been terminated, and your account is sitting there, collecting money. You have not called any of your friends, and you have returned none of the university’s emails. Nothing.”
Knowing this was coming and knowing that his reasoning would not satisfy Wong, he had tried to prolong this confrontation for as long as possible, but apparently, Wong was the person who confronted the problem head on. So, he explained his side.
“Because of this,” He wiggled his shoulder, drawing Wong’s attention to his arms, or lack thereof. Wong winced at that.
“Even still–”
“No, Wong. It is not because I don’t have hands now. It is not just that. It is the fact that I lost my hands, and not because it was planned and I had prepared myself for any eventuality because the payoff of that fight would have been worth it. No, this just came straight out of the blue and I had to cut off both of my arms for that mistake.
God, it felt weird to offload all of that, but if there was someone he could rant to, it was Wong.
“I was cocky and arrogant, and despite the Ancient One turning that around into a net positive, I should not have done that. Confronting Dormammu, at my current level, was the height of foolishness, even if I did not know it was Dormammu when I began.”
Wong remained silent, letting him speak. He did not know when a chair and table were in front of him, and a cup of tea was in his conjured hands as he continued to speak.
“I don’t mind the lack of hands, I have clearly overcome that problem. But it is just a stark reminder of just how dangerous things can be in this universe and how easily I can get killed despite the level of preparations I know I can do. I know I should have done better, I just….I just don’t know what I was thinking,” He then chuckled and added, “If I was thinking at all.”
Once he was done, he took a large sip of the tee and waited for it to regenerate as silence reigned for a minute or so.
It was Wong who broke it eventually, “I did not know you felt like that. Look, despite what you may think, no one here blames you. How could we? When you had to deal with Dormammu’s forces, something that no one here other than the ancient One herself can boast of?”
He nodded at that but he knew something that Wong did not. The fact that the villain from Ta-Lo was a B tier threat at best, someone who was taken out by Shang-Chi wielding the Ten Rings. Someone, who, by all means, should have been little more than a footnote for someone of his powers.
And yet, in that same Ta-Lo, he somehow died and took Shuri with him. Oh, god, Shuri, with her brainwashing.
He groaned out loud at that, drawing a weird look from Wong. That was yet another can of worms he was in no mood to open, and yet, he knew that if he did not do something on his own, that particular problem would rear its ugly head soon enough.
It was always better to confront them on his own terms, instead of having to eat a faceful of Vibranium because he let the problem fester, to the point that Wakanda’s Xenophobia was weaponised against the rest of the world.
He was going to have to go to Wakanda, wasn’t he?
To venture into the den of Bast, huh?
