"Please."
The sorcerer at the door didn't answer Rowan's question. He simply stepped aside with a polite smile and gestured inward. He didn't know who Rowan was, only that the Ancient One had instructed him to receive a guest. That was reason enough.
Rowan inclined his head and stepped into the Sanctum.
"Thank you. And your name?"
"Mordo," the man replied as he led the way.
The interior of the New York Sanctum unfolded around Rowan like a quiet paradox. The space was larger than the building should allow, expanded by layered spatial enchantments. Not as extreme as Rowan's own work, but elegant and stable. Relics lined the walls. Charms and artifacts hummed softly, their magic restrained but unmistakable.
They entered a sitting room.
A bald woman in white robes stood by a low table, calmly preparing tea. She looked up and smiled, her expression warm and unhurried.
"This is the Sorcerer Supreme," Mordo said, then withdrew without another word.
"Please, Mage Mercer," the Ancient One said, gesturing to a seat. "Would you like some tea?"
Rowan sat and accepted the cup. "Thank you."
She didn't waste time.
"I know why you're here," she said. "And I'm willing to help you. But there is a condition."
Her tone was gentle. Absolute. She had observed him for a long time, across many possible futures, and understood that directness was the only language that would reach him.
Rowan set the cup down. He had known this moment would come the instant he decided to walk through the Sanctum's door. Against someone who could see the flow of time and held the Time Stone, initiative was an illusion.
Still, he smiled.
"I'll need to hear the condition first."
Who held the upper hand didn't matter. Only the outcome did.
The Ancient One took a sip of tea.
"People like to say the future is uncertain," she said. "But that wasn't always true. When the universe first took shape, its stories were set into the river of time. Deviations were corrected. All paths returned to their origin."
She looked at Rowan steadily.
"That changed when someone gave up everything so that every universe could grow beyond a single script."
She set her cup aside.
"My successor is named Stephen Strange. You've met him. In this universe, he has a fixed point in his destiny. If events proceed along that path, something terrible happens."
Rowan's breath caught.
"I don't want that future," she continued. "I want it changed. And you are the one I've seen with the greatest potential for divergence. If anyone can alter that point, it's you."
Rowan's mind raced.
Fragments aligned. Patterns snapped into place.
"So that's it," he murmured.
He finally understood why no force had moved to correct the changes he'd caused. Why the timeline hadn't resisted him. Somewhere else, in a parallel strand of time, Loki had already torn down the old system and taken control of the narrative itself.
And that meant only one thing.
This universe.
A dark one.
In this reality, Stephen Strange never lost his hands. Christine Palmer died instead. Her death drove him to Kamar-Taj. Her death made him the Sorcerer Supreme. Her death was the point that could not be changed.
No matter how many times Strange rewound time, she always died. Because saving her erased the very path that led him to gain the power to try.
A closed loop.
And yet, Strange had refused to accept it.
He had turned to forbidden knowledge, hunted creatures across dimensions, absorbed their power, climbed beyond the limits of a single universe. He broke the fixed point by force.
And destroyed everything.
Rowan looked up.
"If I agree," he asked quietly, "what do you need me to do?"
"Nothing," the Ancient One replied with a small smile. "Your agreement alone is enough. Once you choose, the future begins to branch. Possibility re-enters the system."
She had watched his futures multiply again and again. Not only his own, but the universe's. Most people couldn't touch a fixed point. Some destinies were too heavy.
But Rowan was different.
He existed across worlds. He grew constantly. And wherever he went, fate bent.
"I agree," Rowan said without hesitation.
If this truly was the universe that birthed Dark Strange, then changing it wasn't optional. Even without her guidance, he would have tried.
He understood now why his presence mattered.
People who should have died were alive. Wolverine. Charles Xavier. Their fixed points had already shifted.
The river had changed course.
And Rowan Mercer was one of the reasons why.
...
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