Saint Olga's Orphanage is a small and old but well-kept, brown brick, building in down town Kansas City, Kansas. Currently the residents of the orphanage are preparing for bed, with the sounds of protesting children and exasperated adults and older kids. Twilight was giving into darkness when a short, brown haired teenage girl walked through the rickety front door after a hard day at ballet class.

"I'm home!" Piper called out.

Various people who had the time to acknowledge her presence greeted her warmly.

"How was ballet," asked Daisy, the head caretaker of Saint Olga, as she wrestled with a three-year-old boy to put on his night pants, "Learn anything new?"

"Oh, nothing new but it was especially brutal today." Piper answered with a tired smile.

Then Piper squatted down on tip-toe to be level with the struggling tike on the floor.

"So, what's the trouble Trouper?"

"Piper!" Squealed the little doe-eyed boy.

"Come on now Tom. You've got to get your pants on so you can get some sleep," Piper chided.

"I want to stay awake though," pleaded Tom.

"You can do that when you become taller than me." Piper leans in closer to Tom. "And just between you and me, that won't be for much longer," she said with a wink.

Tom giggled as Daisy got his night pants on and stood him back on his feet. Then Daisy proceeded to guide Tom to his shared bedroom.

"Goo' night Piper."

"The showers are free Piper," Daisy told Piper over her shoulder.

"Thanks, and good night to you too Tom."

After saying goodnight to everyone and taking another cold shower, Piper found that she was alone in her shared bedroom and decided to savor the moment. Piper's bed held an old red teddy bear her grandmother gave her when she was six. Her large collection of marvel comic books were stacked high around her bed with an old IPod on top of one of the piles of comic books. Piper could hear the TV blaring from the living room with the shuffling of feet downstairs.

Closing the door behind her Piper walked over to her bed, sat her flip phone, wallet, and ballet shoes at the foot of her bed and pulled out a new Avenger's Comic that she bought that day. She picked up and plugged in her headphones, on her Ipod, to tune out the noises down stairs and fell backwards onto her bed. The comic was called The Avengers #23 From the Unknown. The cover art was a picture of your typical science portal glowing blueish colors and a dark human figure silhouetted inside it. In the forefront were the backs of Tony Stark, Bruce Banner, and Hank Pym facing the silhouetted figure in the portal.

# # #

The tech lab was full of charred metal, unfinished bits of machinery, and black explosion marks on the ceiling and walls. Bruce Banner and Hank Pym walked into Tony Stark's Tech lab as Tony was tinkering on a giant metal "O" in a cleared-out area of his lab. Tony was covered in grease stains, coffee, and determination.

Tony greeted his fellow scientist. "Ah! Gentlemen, glad you could make it. I'm about to test out my latest version of the Stark Portal."

"So, this is what you wanted to show us Stark," Dr. Pym inquired staring at the portal. "It's impressive."

"How long has it been since you've last slept," questioned Dr. Banner as he took notice of the several disposable coffee cups around the area.

"Not important. Right now, I'm in the midst of evolutionary travel," Tony remarked as he threw down his wrench, "Now follow me behind my explosive durable clear wall. I'm going to turn this bad boy on."

The two-scientist followed Tony. Remote in hand, Tony pressed a button and the machine started to hum. A light blue glow started to emit from the center of the "O".

# # #

Piper was starting to feel a draft in her room and was confused because she knew the door was closed. Looking around her bedroom door was a light blue glow. Thinking it was one of the kids poking a toy under the door Piper decided to ignore it.

# # #

A gentle wherring sound reverberated throughout the tech. lab, like a large fan was on.

"It's looking good, Tony!" Dr. Banner yelled over the engine noise.

"Are you using an Arc Reactor to power it!?" Shouted Dr. Pym.

"Yep. I've been having troubles with stabilizing the machine with the reactor so it doesn't explode. So far, it's doing great. It would have exploded by now." Tony replied over the growing noise of the portal's engine.

# # #

The breeze was becoming stronger in Piper's room and she turned away from her comic to see that the blue light was becoming bigger. Keeping an eye on the light Piper got up slowly, then she folded her headphone around her IPod and placed it in the breast pocket of her night shirt. Then Piper grabbed her flip phone and walked over to the light with her comic still in hand. Cautiously Piper looked to her comic and back to the light. At first, she hesitated then she called Joy's, Piper's best friend, cell phone and proceeded to read the comic.

# # #

"Tony, I think we should turn it off," admonished Dr. Pym, "We don't want it exploding with such force."

"Don't worry so much, Hank. We're perfectly safe. I had this thing Hulk tested." Tony reassured his colleagues while casually beating the clear wall with the side of his fist.

Tony continued to push the portal machine to its maximum strength. The turbulence in the lab was becoming extreme as tools, metal parts and disposable cups were flying around. The Stark Portal was humming away and almost fully formed.

"Almost. There." Gritted Tony.

After one last push of a button, the humming had stopped and the portal had formed fully.

# # #

You have reached Joy. I am unavailable right now; please leave a message after the beep. Beep.

"Yah, Joy. This is Piper. Just wanted to say that I found something weird and it would be hard to explain so I'll tell you about it later. See you." Piper told the answering machine.

The wind whipped at her short brown hair as the fully formed blue "O" glowed in front of her bedroom door. Tossing her comic aside Piper placed her phone with her IPod and took a deep breath. Then she walked into the light.

# # #

"Ha, ha! Yes! I've finally figured out the amount of power input my new baby can take," cheered Tony.

"You should celebrate by going to sleep," Dr. Banner suggested.

"Hey, do you see that," Dr. Pym asked while pointed at the portal.

The three men saw a dark humanoid silhouette within the blue light. Next thing they knew the emergency sirens were going off. The machine was starting to go haywire.

"Tooooneeeeeey!" Dr. Pym shouted with unease.

"I think I see someone in the portal Stark," Yelled Dr. Banner.

"What!? No! It's not ready for people to enter it yet. I haven't made an exit portal," Tony stated horrified as he tried to shut down his portal.

The machine was shaking violently and coming apart. The light was starting to fade but the silhouette was getting stronger.

"Guys, the emergency shut down system is dead! Get down!" Shouted Tony.

The three-scientist hunkered down behind the clear wall as the machine continued to degrade. Finally, whatever it was, passed through the portal. The three men looked up to see a confused looking teenage girl in floral pajamas. In a panic the three of them tried to get her attention to run over to them but she couldn't hear.

"This is ridiculous. I'm getting her," Dr. Banner yelled.

Just as he was about to leave from behind the clear wall the machine made a god-awful noise followed by an explosion. Huge chunks of shrapnel went everywhere and finally the portal machine had shut down. The three men ran over to the wreckage to look for the teen.

"Oh God! Do you think she's even alive?" Fretted Dr. Pym as the smoke cleared.

"She was so close to the explosion. It'll be a miracle if she is alive," replied Tony as he shuffled through the debris.

"Guy's I see her!" Dr. Banner called to them, "Give me a hand!"

# # #

Piper, feeling sore, slowly woke up, lying in a bed on her back. Opening her eyes, she felt like she's been out for a while as she looked around the gray lit room. She knew she wasn't in a hospital since everything would be whiter and she would hear hospital noises outside the door. Maybe it's a new type of hospital? It certainly was a fancy place with wood floors and a small chandelier in the middle of the ceiling and a giant curtain that was covering a large window that is also a wall and fancy carved furniture.

There was a glass of water on the bed side table. Reaching for it she finally noticed the gauze wrappings on her arms and felt the rest of them on her back, torso, and legs.

"Oh, that's right. There was an explosion," Piper said to herself.

She took a small sip of water and slowly got into a sitting position to look at her bandages under her nightgown. Every slight movement hurt as Piper looked over herself. She notice that the pajamas she was wearing weren't her own, they were nicer and felt like silk. Realizing this made her conclude that complete strangers have seen her naked. Not the greatest thing to think about. She hoped that who ever saw her naked weren't creepy.

Finishing her self-examination, Piper got out of the bed and she could feel her entire body start to slightly tear like scabs on an elbow or knee would. Piper took a minute to steady herself, then she forced her bandaged body to shuffle over to the curtained window and pulled it open. The sun was shining beautifully in a cloudless blue sky over a city of skyscrapers, business buildings, and bustling people, with what looked like the occasional flying human being.

"Which city am I in?" Piper asked aloud.

Piper would have stood there all day looking out the window if she hadn't been interrupted by sounds outside the bedroom door and someone coming in.

"Ah, your finally awake, good." Stated a man's voice.

Piper turned away from the view to see a tan man with a blue turban covering his dark hair wearing a snappy brown suit and holding a black suitcase. He held a sincere smile on his lips, but Piper was uncomfortable with the strange man anyway.

"Hello miss, I am Dr. Bava. I've been takin' care of you and your burns since you've been here. Mind coming over here so I can reapply this burn ointment." Dr. Bava stated as he got out his equipment and showed Piper the burn ointment bottle.

Piper was silent for a moment then replied, "Can you first show me where the bathroom is?"

# # #

"And there we go. Fully ointment-ed and wrapped up," Dr. Bava stated as he finished wrapping Pipers left arm, "Now hold still as I give you this tetanus shot."

"Okay," Piper said as she looked away from the needle.

"There you go," Dr. Bava said as he finished giving Piper her shot, "You are one lucky girl. You sustained third degree burns, from that explosion Mr. Stark told me about, but you're healing beautiful. You even managed to sustained no shrapnel wounds at all. To bad you'll have deep scaring from this."

Piper looked at Dr. Bava, unbelieving of the name, "Mr. Stark?"

"Yes, he's the man paying me to keep you healthy. I think it was very kind of him to let you stay here and I'm sure he has lots of questions to ask of you now that you're awake," He said as he put away his doctor supplies.

"…So where's my stuff?" Piper asked, hoping she didn't lose the flip phone her Grandmother gave her before she died.

"Oh, you'll have to ask Mr. Stark when he gets here. You've been out cold for seven day's so the man is very eager to talk with you," Dr. Bava replied as he sat his suitcase on his lap.

Piper did not know how to process this information. She didn't have long to think before the door to the bedroom flew open. A dark-haired man with a scruffy, half shaved beard who looked in his late thirties and dressed like he just got back from a very expensive business meeting strutted into the room. Trailing behind him was a tall woman with red-ish, bronze hair also dressed in a business savvy suit, and was also holding a holo-clipboard.

"Good afternoon. This is my personal assistant Pepper Potts and I am Tony Stark. I'm sure you've heard of me," Mr. Stark said confidently and posed dramatically. Ms. Pott rolled her eyes at his dramatic entrance.

"No. I haven't." Piper lied. "But don't worry, you don't know who I am either." Even though she was acting calm on the outside, Piper was fangirl-ing hard on the inside.

"…Oh. Well, have you heard of Iron Man?" Tony asked, slightly put out by Piper's answer.

Piper shook her head. "Sorry. My name is Piper Thatcher by the way." After she finished her internal fangirl-ing, Piper firmly ingraining into herself that she will never tell any of these people that they are watched across dimensions by people who enjoy their suffering and victories, cause who wants to know that shit.

"Where do you live, under a rock?" Tony asked looking hurt.

"Tony!" Ms. Potts exclaimed.

Standing up from the bed he was sitting on with Piper, Dr. Bava patted Piper on the head and walked out of the following conversation.

"No. I live in Kansas City," Piper replied while pointing a thumb over her shoulder.

"Oh, you poor thing. You're so far away from home and your parents must be worried sick," Ms. Potts cooed at Piper.

"Ma'am. How old do you think I am?" Piper asked in a deadpan tone of voice.

"Twelve?" Ms. Potts tentatively answered.

"I'm actually seventeen Ma'am." Piper replied still in a deadpan tone.

"Oh," Ms. Potts squeaked, "I'm sorry."

"And you've never heard of Iron Man or Tony Stark? Billionaire, philanthropist, defender of Earth, the Avenger?" Tony probed.

"Hey, I don't think walking through a blue light requires avenging and what is that in your hands Ma'am. It's kind of disorienting me," Piper said trying to hint at the idea that she wasn't from this dimension.

Tony sighed and rubbed his eyes with his forefinger and thumb. "Okay, we are getting off topic of why we are here. You said you came here from Kansas City. Do you know where you are?"

"The Doc said we're in New York City," Piper replied as she pointed in the direction that Dr. Bava left.

"That's right. You're the first person to enter though the portal that I made. What can you tell me about how you felt when you walked through it?" Tony asked.

"Well it felt like I was walking through a lot of electricity. It didn't hurt or anything it just gave me a ticklish feeling in the pit of my stomach," Piper replied as she struggled to remember her walk through the portal.

"Anything else?" Tony asked.

"Nope, nothing else," Piper shrugged.

"Did you get that JARVIS?" Tony asked aloud.

"Recorded, Sir," JARVIS's synthetic voice replied.

Piper started to fangirl internally again.

"Alright, then you tell Ms. Potts here where in Kansas City you live and we'll send you straight home," Tony replied as he started to leave.

"Oh, does that mean you've fixed the portal?" Piper asked, once again trying to get across subtly that she's not from this dimension.

"No, no. The portal's still down. You'll have to go back the old-fashioned way. Don't worry though, we'll pay for your flight back and escort you home. Once you've healed of course." Tony replied before fully exiting the bedroom.

"I'll get your stuff so you can call your parents," Ms. Potts stated. Then she left the room.

Piper didn't know what to do. She had to make it obvious that she wasn't from this dimension but she didn't want to destroy these people's lives by telling them that they're a form of entertainment from where she lived. Now that she was thinking about it, being in this universe means that she is also a form of entertainment through her pain and success. She felt a sudden sense of depression, but was quickly distracted by the distant sirens and screaming from down below.

She shuffled over to the window as quickly as she could and looked down. Stories below she could see people running away from a giant figure in the crowd. Then she got a stupid idea. She knew it was stupid but she had to reinforce to these people here that she was not from this dimension. All those years of lying and acting when she was a child will finally pay off. Piper took off towards the danger down below.

# # #

The streets were decimated, a water hydrant a block away was gushing water, street lamps were bent or torn away and a few parked cars were turned over. Police were quarantining the area as Piper walked out of the grand building of Stark Tower onto the streets.

She thought to herself how stupid she was being for leaving the safety of Stark Tower but she knew if she could pull this off she'll be able to go to her proper home and not an alternate dimension home.

Piper looked around for the person who was doing the property damage. It was strangely quiet when a giant gray rhino man burst through a building wall across from her. She gulped down any sudden regrets she felt and proceeded with the plan.

"Woo! That was fantastic! But, uh, was that legal?" Piper shouted at the Rhino.

From a distance Piper could hear the policemen shouting at her as Piper started to slowly walking over to the Rhino as he focused his sights on her.

"Legal? I don't care about legal! I want my pretty diamonds back," Roared the Rhino before he charged at Piper.

A minute before the Rhino could run her over Piper jumped to the side knowing that the Rhino couldn't make turns when he charged like that. She landed on her stomach and was engulfed with pain as she felt some of the burn scabs tare. She got up and saw that the Rhino had barreled through what was left of the entrance of Stark Tower.

"What are you trying to do! Get yourself killed!" Shouted some young man's voice from above.

Looking up Piper saw a man wearing a red and blue spider themed suit squatting on top of a bent lamp post holding a large web sack. It took every ounce in Piper's body not to fangirl right then and there. Instead she decided to reply with sarcasm at Spider-Man.

"Oh wow! Fantastic sleuthing their detective. That is exactly what I was trying to do," Piper shouted at Spider-man.

The Rhino burst through the same building making a new exit. "Damn you Spider-Man! I want my diamonds back!" Then he started charging at Piper again.

"Hey! Watch out," Spider-Man shouted as he slung a web above and dove down to scoop up Piper before Rhino could crash into her.

Spider-Man swung Piper a block away from where Rhino was and hid her among some rubble. "Stay there and don't move."

Piper nodded.

She heard Spider-Man from a distance shout taunts at the Rhino and the Rhino yelling back in anger. Piper heard small jets and had to look over the rubble to see Iron Man and Spider-Man taking on the Rhino. Iron man shot repulsor beams from his hands at the Rhino as he charged Spider-Man. Jumping out of the way Spider-Man ran sideways on a building, flinging webbing at the Rhino's feet. Then while the Rhino was distracted Iron Man tackled him from behind to get him to the ground so Spider-Man could cover him more with webbing. Finally, Iron Man super punched the Rhino in the head with double repulsor beams making the Rhino pass out.

Iron Man and Spider-Man were talking to each other like old colleagues as policemen arrive and were backing up a containment unite for the Rhino. Piper walked up to the two superheroes.

"Oh God, you're bleeding profusely. We need to get you to a hospital," Spider-Man said noticing Piper first.

"Ms. Thatcher, what are you doing down here?" Stark flipping his face mask up in surprise.

"Hold it, hold it, hold it. First of all, what is all this? Is this why you call yourself Iron Man, because you have a metal suit?" Piper knocked on his metal suit. "Are you sure I've been passed out for seven days because last time I checked we aren't technically advanced enough for this sort of shit. And you, spider boy—"

"—It's Spider-Man good citizen."

"Whatever. How the hell were you able to run along that building like that? And This!" Gesturing to the Rhino. "Is this some kind of bad guy!? Why is he a walking, talking, Rhino? Now I know Kansas City isn't anything like New York but I'm for god damn sure that shit like this just doesn't happen. I mean, I know I just witnessed it but— You know— Ugh, I'm so confused." Then she covered her face with her hands.

As Piper stood their bleeding she hoped that she was convincing enough to get the idea across that she was not from this plain of existence.

"Oh no." Iron Man gasped. "Ms. Thatcher, I am so sorry. We'll have to discuss this more later, but we really should call Dr. Bava.

Just as Piper was mentally celebrating her success the Rhino had gained consciousness and suddenly ripped himself from Spider-Man's webbing screaming. Surprising everyone especially Piper. In her surprise Piper unconsciously punched the Rhino as hard as she could in his gut. Which was extremely hard, as the Rhino was sent flying through the air and into a building, who then passed out again.

Everyone turned to Piper as she stared at what she just did.

"Did I— Did I just—" Then Piper fainted from blood loss.