Owner Pose
Victor Von Doom Moments before, there'd been chaos in City Hall Station. A wizened old man wielding a staff imbued with powerful magic had disintegrated into a cloud of dust upon touching the crystallized sphere of golden light that had been houses in the head of said staff. The Sorcerer Supreme had vanished, and those heroes who had stopped the villainous Ljott's attempts on the mild-mannered public had given chase through a portal to parts unknown.

As the group enter the portal, they find themselves in a simple room. A childhood bedroom, by the looks of it. Outside the dusty window, an endless cornfield rustles under a dull and grey sky. A boy in a striped t-shirt and shorts sits under a gnarled tree reading a book on biology. A younger child runs to him, emerging from the corn.

"Stevie! Stevie! Look what I - "

"Mom told you you're not allowed to bother me when I'm studying, Victor."

"But I - "

"Ugh!" Stevie says with a roll of his eyes, turning about to put his back to the younger boy, "Leave me alone!"

Around the group, the house creaks and groans. Everything seems to have an almost sepia tone, as though the color were drained out of the world.
Mary Jane Watson Entering in has Red Sonja with the others and wary. Blade out in hand as the group goes through the portal. Out the other end and she would look out cautiously. Seeing then the children, blade being lowered. <<Not going to say 'what sorcery is this'?>> ~Now is not the time to be jovial, girl~

Red Sonja would chide Mary Jane along the link the two shared in body. But just as something looked like a child had no remote bearing on if it was. So weapon is kept ready, but lowered. And Red Sonja would slowly maneuver about, the somewhat threadbare remnants of Mary Jane's original day outfit not in particularly good shape.

"And what are we dealing with?" An open faced inquiry to the others, even as things seem to take on a more dulled, greyed tone.
Elsa Bloodstone Right before the portal jump, Elsa nods her head. "So, Illyana Rasputina? Queen of Limbo? X-Woman. So forth badass?" Elsa asks to confirm. Recollection is not confirmation. The other women get nods asss well though she doesn't know their names yet.

"Elsa Bloodstone. Monster Hunter. Immortal. Ready to go kick some bloody arse with you ladies!" she offers as she collects her guitar case from where it had been kicked about in a stampede it's strapped too get back while the guitar itself is hefted over shoulder, and one of her revolvers is drawn, and with a speedy one hand juggle, reloaded with a spin of the cylinder clicking to a stop as she aims down into the portal to their oddly toned destination.

A look around gets a hmm. "Soo, this looks like a memory dreamscape time. Probably not the first time the Doctor has had sexy women traipsing around his brain? We might even see it!" she guesses based on the kids mentioning a Stevie. "The joys of jumping in blind." Elsa adds and shrugs.
Illyana Rasputina How a person reacts to setbacks says much about them. Screaming in rage and tearing at clothes or flesh defines a different character than a dumbfounded expression or floods of tears. Confusion can take a back seat to action and there's no crying in Limbo. Illyana restrains herself from incinerating the train station or scattered furniture made for someone considerably shorter and younger.

"Illyana Rasputina-Strange." Hyphenate. Tiny clarification for Elsa with undoubtedly significant ramifications. "You, I like. Women skilled with swords also. Doctor MacIntyre is already liked." Safe. Tell the monster inside where priorities lie. She runs a gloved finger over the wood to test for dust, orienting herself after stepping through the portal. Twinking lines collapse into almost nothing, a pinprick hole she consciously sustains with minimal effort. "Do not go far. We do not know where we are," warns the Demon Queen in a cool, restrained voice painted in Russian tones. A full circle takes in everything about the room, ceiling to floor. "No active sorcery except our own." Terse statements made aloud help orient the others and check her instincts.

"You see the same lack of colours, da?" They have the option of a door and a window, or punching their way greatsword style through the floor. "Keep everything with you. If you see a girl anywhere near water, do not approach her." A warning, flickering bright in the ponderous tumble of memory. "Some things must be borne."
Illyana Rasputina "The doctor's memories more than dreams. But a reality of their own." Illyana adds on Elsa's point.
Morrigan MacIntyre Morrigan's generally quiet and after the fighting has calmed down that doesn't change. There is a bit of a frown when she sees that Strange has disappeared and there's no real trace of his magic hanging about. "I'm Morrigan." she offers with a dip of her head to Elsa and Mary Jane before she looks over the sepia colored scene in front of them.

She listens to Illyana's warnings and there's a quiet hmm, "Noted, I'll keep an eye out for anything like that." she states. "And it's like Sepia...like it's a scene from an old photo album or something." the Irish woman frowns to that.
Stephen Strange Bleah. Sepia. Shades of the Wizard of Oz. The lack of color, the child....even the farmhouse is present. "All that is needed is a whirlwind to carry us all to Munchkinland so we can go find the Wizard." Stephen utters the commentary out loud...and yet no one seems to hear. "Oh, how splendid. Welcome to your own personal episode of 'This Is Your Life', Stephen. Sit back and enjoy the show."

It doesn't really take much for Stephen to figure out that hey, no one can see or hear him. Of course, the fact that he is standing in what should have been direct eyesight of the quartet of women that emerge from a rather familiar style of portal ('Of course, Illyana. Clever girl...') without any response from them would be a pretty big clue. Though, the comment of the beauties walking through his mind gets a chuckle.

If only they knew.

Still, Stephen turns his attention to the little boy. Yes...him, at an almost forgotten time. "Let's see why we are visiting this memory, shall we?" The use of the name Stevie does get a slight wince from Strange. "Just watch, once we get out of this situation, Illy is going to be calling me Stevie. I never did like that..."
Victor Von Doom "Stevie," Victor says with a plaintive whine, "It's important, Stevie!"

The older child with the book frown, brows furrowing: "I'm Stephen, Victor! Stevie is a kid's name. I'm practically an adult now."

Victor seems to ignore this, stepping up to the boy under the tree and holding out his hand. Even from this far away it's evident what he holds in it. A golden crystal, as though the most brilliant light in the universe were somehow solidified. It shines bright, the only real color in this strange, sepia-toned world.

"I found it, Stevie. Out in the corn."

Stevie doesn't look up, only burying his nose deeper in the book.

"Stevie! Pay attention to me!"

The last words seem to cut through the air like a blade, and the world itself seems to flinch. At once, Victor stands impossibly tall. Taller than the corn. Taller than the gnarled, old tree. Taller than even the house, stretching up into the sky and blotting out the weary sun as it strains through the clouds. His voice so loud as to be deafening. The gem, clutched in his massive hand, sheds brilliant rays of light through the gaps in his fingers.

Stevie scrambles backwards, book forgotten in the dust. Eyes wide.

And then it's happening. A child's sneaker the size of Greyhound bus rushes through the air - aimed square at the window the heroes are looking out of!
Mary Jane Watson A look is given from Red Sonja to the Soulsword, "Impressive blade. I have never seen any like it in my travels." She would offer as (to her) a very high compliment. At the exchange o fnames, she would go, "Red Sonja." Seemingly in contrast to the girl that had earlier looked like a model when the night was still young.

Weapon in front of her, she would pause to watch, "We're seeing the nightmares and visions of a child." Spoken as if it were a fact. She's taking a step back over as the shoe goes to strike out at the window, if need be ready to grab Morrigan and Elsa to yank the two along with her if they had to evade!

"What form of sorcery is this!?" She would speak to the sorceresses in the group. While Mary Jane would laugh in their head.
Elsa Bloodstone "Ahh, then extra stakes for you. Though if we need a New Sorceror Supreme for our realm I'm sure you can do the job.  Illyanadear! And I'm sure many would be happy to console you and help you readjust to the single life." Somewhere in another universe a Blonde mutant in Westchester feels her ears burning.

"We shall have to endeavor to save your husband and prevent oh so much complications. Hopefully you made sure Stephen isn't in line for the Limbo throne by marriage. Men do hate when they find out they do not get to be King just cause they married a Queen." she says with a chuckle.

The warnings and instructions are heeded. "So we can affect what gets remembered? So we leave the stuff behind to big and he might remember things wrong?" this is new ground for Elsa.

The other ladies het nods. "Hopefully the floor and walls are thin enough to cut through clean and we can just cover the divots like on a gold course. I do not have large swords stashed away. A knife at the most. So maybe we try doors normally first." she suggests to Morrigan and Mary Sonja.

This manages to make Elsa frown and even look ready to snarl as the vision changes and the boy they see looks like he's about to be stepped on. "Come on you little dirt magnet, jump out of the way!" she encourages quietly while clearly looking like she's about to dive tackle the kid out of the way of stoomping shoe sole.
Illyana Rasputina Someone present has plenty of experience dealing with children and ambitious surgeons. Deferring is practically worse than extracting teeth without anaesthesia for Illyana. "You would advise we go out there?" she asks Morrigan in a low, perfunctory tone. No petulance or irritation as the boys outside show; this is all ruthless busines.

She tightens her grip on the Soulsword and shifts, blade held pointdown. She's about to tell MJ-Sonja something about the compliment. Hiding it to avoid frightening Stephen or Victor if they look at the house becomes a non-starter, and she flings herself bodily at the door to crack it open for Red Sonja to haul the other women through. Supposing that refuses to open, then magical artifacts might be required.

"That was his brother, I think," she warns, preparing for a crash landing onto stairs or giving a helping hand to catch the rest. "Only other magical Victor seeking his approval wears a mask." A savage smirk for that. "I have better things to do than hide in a mirror to see his face, but even he was a little boy once. Four women, we are smart enough!"

Here's hoping they all manage to roll out of the way. If not, punch upward.
Morrigan MacIntyre Morrigan's focused on the two children for the moment and there is a soft frown, her violet gaze alighting on the fact that it's Strange and...a sibling? She didn't know a lot about the Sorcerer Supreme outside of his magical and surgical workings. That and she didn't want to snoop. She gives a soft nod to the conversations that go ahead. Her feet draw her back though when Victor gets HELLA big.

"Oh that's no good." she points out the shoe that hurtles there way, "Not sure if things can hurt us here...but no reason to not take precautions." she tells them as she attempts to throw out a magical net of sorts to catch the shoe, much like a fly getting caught in a web. "We could try to go out and see if we can de-escalate the temper tantrum, I'm unsure if they can hear us in here is the only issue." she tells them.
Stephen Strange "Victor, you always were somewhat needy." Well, when no one can hear you, you tend to just speak your mind. And yes, this certainly does seem like something that could have happened in Stephen's past. Even the petulant tone that little Stephen used was on point. However, the glowing orb did not seem familiar, at least in the context of the memory. Recent memory, sure...but not back on the farm. "That is not right..."

Neither, then, is the giant sized brother, who is now upset that Stephen did his typical ignoring. Now that...that certainly was not in his past. "damn it, Stephen, move it!" The phantasm-Stephen shifts to lunge, to push his younger self away...only to pass through him. Well, at least the ladies didn't see that. Who knows when the embarrassment would end with that.
Victor Von Doom As the ladies pour through the door into the hallway, the childhood bedroom is destroyed along with a good portion of the house by the giant's foot. They're left standing on a ledge of ruined floorboards and a dangling staircase, the wind from outside catching them. And looking up, up, up at the towering figure of Victor Strange.

Down in the dust, Stevie Strange clambers to his feet and takes off towards the corn. Victor doesn't spare the ruined house a moment's glance, instead striding off after his fleeing sibling.

"Stevie!" he calls, in a deafening voice from an oversized larynx, "Stevie! Come back!"

In the other place, the spot just outside this reality where the Sorcerer Supreme finds himself stuck, a croaky voice chuckles. Suddenly, standing alongside him, is Ljott. Well, some of Ljott. Half his face and body seems to be missing, as though dissolved away by some powerful acid and tinged with gold-leaf foil.

"It's not your memories, Seidhrmann," he tells the Doctor with a rasping chuckle, "It's a real world. Real as me and - well, poor choice of words, huh? This is it - the place within the Sibreytilegt. And thanks to your lovely lady in red, now the Sibreytilegt is in me. I am the Sibreytilegt."

He coughs, wheezing and reaching out to steady himself against Strange's arm.

"You never had much time for your brother. Would you think of him more if he squashed the pretty blonde under heel?"
Mary Jane Watson Red Sonja would look over at Illyana, "What is best for us to do here?" Her own blade at the ready over while she would take in the fleeing children, befuddlement on her face. All that was left to go to the rot.

She would circle around, ready to go in pursuit of the two fleeing recollections of whimsy that were children. In a memory, a flashback, or an experience. Her deferring over on this to whether Morrigan or Magik would indicate for her ot go. This was more their domain than her own! Ready to pursue or try and stay to see whom she might be able to quite merrily stab!
Elsa Bloodstone Elsa winces as the foot comes down and crushes a good chunk on the house. The scream that could deafen most people. That does affect Elsa as she clutches hher lobes and screams. "Not so LOUD!" she yells back as her ear drums need a moment to actually heal.

"Ugh, did you guys say anything?" she asks the group and looks around.

"WHAT?"
Illyana Rasputina Nothing like the bellowing shout so loud that it sends them all tumbling to the ground, a set of bowling pins for a tempest. A wonder the house hasn't fallen in, nor that the cornfield remains intact. "Reminds me movie about how bad cities and roommates are! With the flying monkey-demons and Howard Stark robot!" Gods, she's talking about the Wizard of Oz, someone help her. "We find mayor of the city, pull the curtain back, and you two," a gesture at Elsa and Red Sonja, "punch him many times, maybe?"

Her suggestion could be serious or an attempt at levity, be as it may. "If that is the Sorcerer Supreme as a child, we must make sure he is not hurt. Quick!" Living in a household of mutant children and teenagers begets a kind of expediency.

If "Stevie" is running, then so be it, time to play a game of seven-league boots. Her fingertips sketch a ragged path to invoke a simple spell, giving the non-casters greater speed to keep up with. The spell she intends to kindle comes to pass, though not exactly as intended. Reality answers the Demon Queen's call, it just does it... differently.

The flying monkeys, at least, look friendly.

They're all wearing cloaks of levitation.
Morrigan MacIntyre Morrigan's wobbling from the shoe catastrophy and there's a look around as she states something in Gaelic and then straightens, brushing the dust off her jacket. "I got nothing for the moment." she tells Mary Jane. Then Elsa is yelling and there's a wince, "Oof. That must have hurt." she shakes her head. She looks over to Illyana as she explains the flying monkeys and things...yes, that was the Wizard of Oz.

When she looks down and sees that she's wearing a cloak of Levitation there's a bit of a cheering on the inside, but on the outside she remains her quiet self.

"Let's go find them." she nods to the others before she zips off!
Stephen Strange "Oh, fabulous. Here I thought I would end up just watching on my own." Those grey eyes of Stephen's take a moment to look over Ljott, at least what little there is to actually still see. "I do see that Illyana did you no favors, it would seem."

And...speaking of her and the others, Stephen turns to watch the giant foot just crush through the house, only for Victor to turn to follow Stevie. "So, would you be the Tin Woodsman, in this little charade? Certainly not the Scarecrow....nor the Cowardly Lion. If we do make it to the Wizard, are you going to ask for your body back?" Well....seems someone is leaning heavily into the Oz parallels. There is just a slight annoyance in the tone, too. After all, it was Ljott's handiwork that got Strange into this situation...and now Stephen has to listen to him, too? Yeah, Stephen has a reason to be just a little perturbed.

"Victor meant well enough. He just had unfortunate timing." Meaning that yes, Stephen might have cared...but probably not as much as he should have. But, then again, he was still a kid. "I do not think you will find Illyana so easy to step on...or push aside. It wouldn't help Victor's cause, nor would it be needed. I do care for my brother."

The choice of flying monkeys. That catches Strange's attention. "Why would she summon the monkeys? That doesn't make any sense." That...sets the wheels of thought in motion. Was it monkeys because Illyana was thinking Oz? or was it because *Strange* was thinking Oz?
Victor Von Doom "Spare me the Midgardur nonsense," Ljott says with a roll of his one remaining eye, "But, if you insist, I've combed through your mind to find the right analogy for what this is. I'm not going to ask the Wizard for anything. Nor am I the Wizard. No, Seidhrmann. Here, I am God. Capital G."

As the winged monkeys are conjured into being, Ljott watches Strange eagerly and bursts out into a hideous cackle mixed with rasping, gasping breaths.

"What's wrong, Seidhrmann? The laws of your seidhr don't work the same here? It's almost as though someone else is writing the rules!"

The ladies find themselves running through the cornfield, pursuing both Steve and the striding colossus that is Victor. The tall stalks whip at them from the side, and the wind begins to rush hard enough to send hair and clothing fluttering in all directions. The sound of rain - a storm- fills the air. The screeching of tires.

A flash of light.

They're standing on a roadway now, somewhere rural. The air is thick with wind and rain, and the asphalt is slick. Off the side of the road, a luxury sports car sits overturned on its roof. The color is more vivid now, and one can see through the smashed driver's side window a younger Stephen Strange. His face bloodied, his hands a mangled mess on the wheel before him. Up above, a railing on the side of a mountain roadway is broken and the cliff-face partially collapsed in mud and stone. The winged monkeys come with them, soaring through the stormy air above.

There, dangling from the rear-view mirror in defiance of gravity, is what looks like a small keychain. Something Stephen never had in his car (too tacky). A golden crystal, suspended on a gawdy gold chain.
Mary Jane Watson And Red Sonja is running. As if carried or not by the wing monkeys on cloaks, the redhead is simply racing. Blade slung up over and behind her back, she is pumping and going to flip through the air to go in over towards the car if she could make it. She would speak, quietly. "So what is the purpose of showing this pain? These memories?" That spoken more quietly over to Illyana.

The Mary Jane that is part of Sonja for the moment takes ever so much a shimmer of aspect and goes, "I feel like we're intruding.." A shift in her perspective, Sonja's hard tone softening as her body language would change as the two would switch sides, Mary Jane taking a modicum back of her own body.

"So why are we going through.." Her expression thoughtful. "Because I'm pretty sure that we're well past Kansas, Toto. All the way out on the interstate."
Elsa Bloodstone When the ringing in her ears stops and she realises she can hear herself she shakes her head and pinches her nose. "My senses are a bit on the enhanced side." she says and looks a little embrarrased at the moment of weakness.

The new change of scene. The road, the crash. Elsa might be able to guess what is going on. Exactly how long ago compared to how old Elsa was she has no clue but there's looks to the redheads and thhen to Illyana. "You know my blood probably could have healed him. Fixed his hands. Father's too. Wouldn't have lasted, but for a briief time. It's how I can cure vampires or werewolves if they aren't too old." she says with a sad look. "I feel like a bitch knowing and not being able to do stuff. Good people doing nothing." she states and looks way more apologetic to Illyana.

Ulysses Bloodstone, her father may well have met Stephen. But being how much of an arsehole her father is. He likely would not have offered on the grounds of 'Shake it off son' and called the doctor a Ponce.
Illyana Rasputina The blonde snaps to a halt, careening motion hammered to a complete halt around the swirling vision of monkeys in Cloaks of Levitation helping the others to fly. There's almost an audible screech of needle over a record. Illyana doesn't need them, not really.

"Punishment. A lesson of pain to establish control." Loose locks whip around her shoulders as a black headband spans her head, the back-swept forks echoing the hilt and the angular lines on the Soulsword. "<<Stupid little snowflake. What would Big Brother say? At fourteen you were smarter than this!>>" Castigation in the darkest of the infernal languages threatens to make the air bleed, and she holds out her hand. "This is what we created Infinity Watch for. To look out for the big problems. You are welcome to be counted as part of it. We will have to work together to get out, though."

Her wrist flicks, gesturing to the damaged car, the ruined hands, her lover in a bloody daze. "We are prisoners in creation. That creation is that crystal, the keychain you see." She needn't point, they can all see it in the storm as she starts to float, the torn scarlet dress buffeted back and forth. "Da, Doctor MacIntyre, we are trapped inside a miniature world in a world. Oz is reality."

A rolling, glittering laugh carries falling snowflakes and ruthless acknowledgment, on the cutting edge of a sword. "Congratulations. We are inside one of the fundamental forces of being - a crystal. Mister Doctor's reality is a gloss for reality." A portal pirouettes between her outspread fingertips. "Make it your own, solnce."
Victor Von Doom "It has many names," Ljott tells Strange, "We call it the Sibreytilegt. A witch - Grattauga - discovered it. Somewhere, legend doesn't tell where. She captured it in a root of the World Tree and made of it a powerful staff to bend nature to her whim. Then she lost it, of course, as happens in those old tales. Only for me to find it now."

His one beady eye glows golden, and that light once more shimmers through the mottled holes in his flesh.

"It's older than all that, though. The oldest force in existence. You've heard whispers of it, haven't you, Seidhrmann? Only the faintest whispers. Maybe you never even believed it was real? And it's power is unfathomable."

Ljott gestures down at his ruined body, giving another rasping chuckle that sounds more like he's choking.

"As you can see."

On the road, the gem continues to glimmer temptingly. The light it sheds much brighter in the darkness, and in that darkness, it casts shadows. More than four shadows. Six. One diminutive and dwarf-like, the other tall and lean. Right there on the roadside alongside the heroes.
Mary Jane Watson Finally. Red Sonja is hitting the ground and landing. The aspects of the mind, of trauma, of agony.. All those in her persona fade away. Everything falls back and away. There is only the bloodlust.
    "WIZARD! I WILL HAVE WORDS WITH YOU!" Sonja's form is bleeding over as the threadbare remnants of Mary Jane's outfit would disintegrate over in the realm of magic and the mind, changed by Reality as energy would charge about her. Body glistening, erupting over, sheathed in light! Hand slashing up into the air as clothes would disintegrate, fall off and reform about her. Sturdy gloves. Blade made of Cimmerian steel. Boots of rough cut leather that had seen her over a hundred campaigns throughout all of Hyborea.
    Interlinked chain mail upon her body covering precious little - if even that. Once more Red Sonja is bathed over in the fires of Scathach, the goddess which she had sworn herself to so long ago in her quest for vengeance.
    "WIZARD!" Red Sonja would scream over as she would hit the ground running, over towards the things appearing in the road in front of them.
    "CROM FEAST UPON YOUR ENTRAILS!" Going to a full speed, full on rage as she would let loose those furies that Mary Jane always kept bound up inside her. That the redhead locked away.
    Here Red Sonja is free to engage in her baser, primal instincts. And she goes to charge over at those things over that were but shadows.
    She is running, sword forged of strong Cimmerian steel twisting in the air like a scythe. Intent on leaving nothing but bodies in passing, skewered and rended clean through!
Elsa Bloodstone "I'll take that offer up. I'll make sure Cullen hasn't trashed the manor in England. We run a pretty nice disposal site. To be honest it's just my sister. She's bound to the Nullgem. Needs to eat magic to survive. So anything too dangerous but not important to the great scheme of all bloody things goes home."

More transitions. "Soo how  oldis the Doctor? I mean we're skipping ahead and missing the minutia and anything we probably shouldn't see but older men do have a lot of memories." Elsa ponders as things move along.

The group of shadowed figures getting a hmm. "The short guy is Wolverine isn't it? That geezer gets everywhere?" she ponders.

Sonja, making herself known abundantly gets a wide eyed look. "Deary, Sonja. Dial it back. We're not at that part yet I think!." there's a look back to Illyana and Morrigan. "Bloody hell in a damn handbasket. We better follow before I have to knee cap her for her own safety!" she states and starts running to catch up with the barbarian ginger. This is easier with super speed thankfully.
Illyana Rasputina "Forty-ish." Probably not the best question to ask someone whose lifespan shot up a decade in the twinkling of an eye, really. Parallel to everyone else. Her gaze flickers over the shadows up the road. Illyana has already identified the potential nature of the stone, though her arbitrary shaping of the portal gives her a brutal, wicked purpose that altogether may or may not work. "Do not fight Wolverine. He is too good at it and smells like old bushes and cigars."

Mystical sparks fly around her hands as she reaches for the gem, arcane spell snapping into place.

The rapid shift of Red Sonja running ahead of them while invoking a proto-Celtic goddess of shadows means keeping up. Possibly, but the English ginger chasing the barbarian ginger while the partly vampiric ginger follows is only fair.

Gods, she's going to tear Belasco apart secondly to the orchestrator of this getting a thorough thrashing.
Victor Von Doom "She's an odd one," Ljott tells Strange, gesturing towards the chainmail clad Red Sonja, "Formidable and brutish. I like her fashion sense, though. It's funny. It's almost like she can ... "

The dwarf's jaw drops, and the light shines more brightly. He's visible now. Fading into reality there on the roadside. The gem, in close proximity to Illyana, glows more brightly as though reacting to her.

"What?! No!" Ljott cries, turning to glare at Strange, "It wasn't real! What have you done, you fool - "

The dwarf is cut off, as the red-headed warrior woman's sword sings through the air. A moment later, Ljott's head is severed quite neatly from his body. It bounces a couple times on the ground, looking from side to side before glaring up at Red Sonja.

"Now look what you've done!"

And then the world around them changes. The roadside scene melts away, replaced by a writhing hellscape as far as the eye can see. Limbo.

"Now we're in for it ... "
Mary Jane Watson Her blade going to cleave through one end of the man and out the other, Red Sonja goes to spit at her adversary, and goes to make as how of kicking him over in the face - if there was any left as everything goes to shift to Limbo.

"Take that Wizard." She would go to a defensive stance.

"Red Sonja has no fear of things in Hell. Hel. Or ANY Hell." Blade in front of her, defensive stance, circling over wiht her comrades.
Elsa Bloodstone The gun toting guitar slinging redhead skids to a halt as Sonja takes a swing and decapitates a troll of a dwarf. "SONJA! This might harm the Doctor. And I think our blonde guide through her husbands memories will not appreciate us messing up important memories!" she tries to advise the amazingly more agressive woman. Mostly by putting on her best British School Teacher tone. Picked up from some of the most expensive boarding schools in the United Kingdom and Europe.

"At least save it for his ex-girlfriends. Less decapitation and maybe more memory cock blocking." she turns and winks at Illyana. "Be the only woman he remembers being with." she states and grins. "Cheating is only fine when we do it." she adds sagely. "And if you get caught it's polyamory. They better bloody not judge!" wow she's one sided about it.

That must have been a bad break up.
Illyana Rasputina Too bad, so sad, gods that bloody stone stings. Its outreach to her /hurts/.

Pain, though, is an old friend. Away slips the lifeline of Doctor Strange's existence, the shattered remnants of a car on the twisting road that stole his career replaced by the starless skies and eldritch nightmare of a once beautiful place. A landscape bleeding away from her boasts a ring of wildly sculpted peaks, crashing on horrifying vertical drops to cracked chasms and wind-shrouded hoodoos. Stone glitters with fell promise, burning dark striations capped by nightmarish veins. What grows here is perverse, not quite fully realized as echoes of terrestrial plants, but twisted in all the wrong ways.

All but one, a broken, splendid tree far more vast than the rest, scorched up its massive trunk and so many of the boughs splintered as if by repeated lightning strikes. Shadows move wherever she is, sharp-eyed and resolving into ghostly entities. She could tell the head separated from the dwarf to shut up, but to what purpose? Sonja already has it taken care of.

"The staff," says the Demon Queen, in the site where she assumed that mantle. Her younger self rose from this place to become a teenaged tyrant, broken-souled and fearless. That broken soul is still shattered in the woman, though they probably don't see it, and likely don't know the Hell Lord holds onto her humanity with one brilliant azure shard. Something borrowed, something blue...

"We plucked it from the staff. The gem needs a place to rest once more. The dwarf burned when we claimed it." Clear thoughts, wiser ones than would be found with a gamine, blonde girl hunting vengeance in Belasco's accursed shape. "If you get too close, the stone will react to either of you. Be wary. Do we bring the staff to us again and try again? Strange, where /are/ you?"
Victor Von Doom This is Limbo. A facsimile within the stone, one might assume. But then, it feels real. Too real. And the gem no longer feels like an illusion, but the real thing - the pain it gave is certainly real. The curiosity of reality's nature remains thick in the air.

"If you want my suggestion," Ljott says indignantly from the ground, his body gone now and only his severed head remaining by Red Sonja's foot, "Don't touch it. I touched it and, well, look at me. And you Midgardians are fragile things."

He takes a moment to look from face to face, as much as he can without a neck to aid him.

"What? I would consider this well and truly beaten. Take me with you."

The head frowns.

"Just don't leave it lying around here," he sniffs the air, "Dreadful place."
Mary Jane Watson Mary Jane Watson would consider and turn over to Magik, "Sorceress, I have a request from you." She would go to stab her sword over into the ground a few inches away from the severed head of Ljott. "Get a pike and put his skull, or what remains of it on the pike. Enchant it so that he will be in agony the likes of which a wretch such as he cannot imagine. IF he has something useful in this realm then we can ensure that he is in such a state where he does not attempt to play tricks. For his ilk often do."
    Mary Jane would then take over for a moment to add in a quip, "NO offense."
    Red Sonja taking over. "So where do we depart to now?"
Elsa Bloodstone "Needs a home? Or just storage?" Elsa asks curiously and hmms. "Temporary. I think I can manage that!" Elsa states and extends a hand. "Eldritch Immortal Bitch with a job handling Eldricth artifaccts. I should be fine till we can get it back where it belongs." she offers.  

"Hopefullythe Bloodgem's power on me acts like a nice anchor!" she states. "The head we can totally put on a pointy stick." she offers and grins. "Or play cricket with it. Just have to use the guitar as a bat. Any of you girls bowl spin?" she asks and grins as she looks at the head with a very very malicious looking expression.

It's not that difficult passing the time when you have an eternity. You just gotta think a head.