Chapter 1

Have you slept on a bed oh so comfortable, and the pillow ever so soft, so much so that you felt like you were actually sleeping on a bed made out of cloud nine?

Well in my case that fantasy was still that, a figment of my imagination. Like, what is this shit on me! It felt like I was covered in a wet and thin blanket infested with bedbugs.

It was torture!

Here in this very moment, I had never felt so miserable and longed for the sweet release of death than anything in the world, to take me out of this godforsaken hell that I now inhabited. This is the worst thing to happen to me!

But Murphy seemed to have taken that declaration as a challenge, for there was indeed something that was worse than that waiting for me as soon as my consciousness returned.

"AH-AHHHHH!!!"

I shot up into a sitting position as I woke up, panicking and screaming at the top of my lungs to an unfamiliar ceiling, or the lack thereof. Indeed, only the darkness of the night sky between a pair of buildings graced my eyes.

I was lying in an alley.

Breathing raggedly, I wiped the sweat running down my face, only to be covered in a foul smelling liquid that quickly took its chance to sneak into my mouth.

Ppth-pthew!

I spat out a fat glob of spit in an attempt to save my taste buds of the disgusting liquid, but even after several spits it still lingered in my mouth. I loooked at my hands, and screamed once more.

My bin juice covered hands! They are so...different.

"Is this reincarnation? Did I die? Then why am I still...alive?"

Flashes of blood, bright white light, a female face, and a...truck? assaulted my mind as i tried to remember what had happened to me.

'No. Gotta stay calm here. Can't think of that shit. Fuck. FUCK!'

I pushed against the ground in a vain attempt to get on my feet. My goo soaked hands slipped, the dirty bin bags embracing me once more.

"Ah shit, fuck, who in their right mind would leave me here in a trash heap! Wait...why do I sound like this, what happened to my manly, sexy voice?"

I grumbled as I wiped the bin juice off my hand on my t-shirt and at finally got up on my feet.

At first, I thought with the impossibility of the circumstances that I now found myself in, I was either lucid dreaming or tripping on something that was highly expensive and illegal.

But I'm a realist, and it didn't take long for me to accept the situation.

The realisation of what had happened made my legs weak. I sat down on an empty milk crate, held my head in my small hands and cried.

***

The light of dawn slowly lit up the alley, but it proved to not be strong enough to dispel the darkness.

Last night, after a while of reconciling with the fact that I was alone in an unfamiliar world and would never see my family again, I tried to reminisce about all the good times I had with them.

However, I was met with only blanks. I could only remember my name and flashes of the accident that took my life. The names of my family, friends, even classmates and teachers, eluded me. Any attemps to even visualise them just formed a black and white outline of their bodies, their faces a bundle of black threads.

The only thing that was available to me were pieces of fiction, my hobbies, my likes and dislikes, stuff like that that made the core of my being.

Taking a deep breath, I made my way out of the alley.

Even at this early hour, a sea of people were already moving about; office workers speedwalking to get to their jobs, a few homeless people sleeping in nearby tents or just sleeping bags, with some already scurrying to their next spot, buisnesses opening, and other stuff of that sort that I couldn't care less about.

Yep, there's no doubt 'bout it. I'm in New York. How cliche.

Judging from the fact that I couldn't see the twin towers of the iconic World Trade Centre, I hadn't ended up in some alien planet.

Then again I could be wrong looking at the buildings around me, all dingy and dilapidated. No wonder there was a high number of homeless people and gangs.

'Right, focus. I need to find a library.'

Discarding these unnecessary thoughts, I decide to do what anyone in my position would do: search for information. With the resources there I would hopefully be able to get a computer that would shed light to whatever year I'm in and reveal just how fucked I really am.

Now all I need to do is figure out where it is. Scanning the people walking by I decided to talk to a man walking quite leisurely down the sidewalk and block his path. Almost instantly the look on his face changed from a half-smile into a frown at my appearance.

"Hello there! I was just wondering-"

"I dont have any money for you."

Immediately, he shut me down, eyes darting around for a possible ambush, before briskly moving past, still walking. I frowned at the accusation before composing myself quickly and sidestepping, blocking his path yet again.

"I don't want your money, okay, I just want to know the where the library is. Just tell me where one is and I'd be on my way."

A moment of awkward silence passed by as a look of embarrassment crossed the man's face. I raise an eyebrow, still waiting for the man to respond.

"Eherm...I see" he coughs into his hand, composing himself, "Sorry 'bout that. Yes, you mentioned something bout a library? There's the 115th Street library just a couple blocks behind me straight from here. You can't miss it."

"Thanks big man." I say, patting the mans shoulder before running away myself, leaving the man a bit stunned. He looked at his shoulder and sniffed his jacket, quickly recoiling from the foul smell.

"..."

[A few minutes later]

I underestimated the endurance this body had.

So, I wasn't wrong in my initial assumptions, that I had been transmigrated to another world... Or is it reincarnation since I'm in a new body?

I finally caught a full glimpse of myself in a mirror placed in the lobby of the library. 6 and a bit feet tall, short black hair, brown eyes, and an above-average face, for a teenager at least. His age was 16, atmost 17, and pushing it, 18.

However even if I could bluff my age, no sane business owner would hire a homeless 18-year-old, or if they did they wouldn't pay enough for me to afford even the shittiest apartment.

'The government could help.' I said to myself, speaking like a true British citizen.

Although that was also an option, I would more likely end up being interrogated by the FBI or CIA, whatever the name is, or some sercret organisation that would experiment on me considering that I popped into existence in the middle of New York out some alley with no government records to my name.

Since reincarnation is real, then its safe to say that anything is possible.

My hypothetical demise to the side, I had to wait 10 minutes before the library opened. Since i had nothing to do, I used the time to catch my breath. Can't be looking like a crackhead suffering from severe withdrawal symptoms can we?

[20 minutes later]

Library pass secured, I made my way to computer area the kind old librarian had shown me. It was strange, I thought she would discriminate against me like the man ealier but she just gave me sad look and told me to come look for her later.

I wonder what that was about.

Anyways, after waiting for the old machine to boot up, I made myself comfortable and got to researching.

[2 hours later]

After two hours of researching this world, there are two words to describe what im feeling right now.

Despair, utter despair.

The first thing I did was look at the date shown on the taskbar when the computer booted up before searching for more information. It was April 17th 2008.

'18 years into the past, huh. My orginal body should be five years old right now in Sweden. I wonder if I even exist in this timeline...'

'Luckily, that leaves me with a lot of companies that arn't too popular right now, like Youtube and Netflix. Heck, I could invest in Fortnite in 5 years and still make it big. I still have a chance!'

Hope and happiness at the vast opportunities that had just opened up for me bloomed in my heart, and I started searching the Internet for the latest news and articles.

The 2008 Olympics happened last year in Beijing, war is still ongoing in Afghanistan, Tony Stark got kidnapped two months ago, Obama becomes president of USA, blah blah b-

'Wait Tony Stark?!'

My eyes widened in incredulity. Since when was Tony Stark a real person?! I started reading the article and I found out that Tony Stark got kidnapped somewhere outside of Kabul in Afghanistan after some missile testing, and that Obadiah Stane was the new acting CEO of Stark Industries.

Just to be sure, I searched up the history of World War II and look who was there in black and white star-spangled spandex a with his shield and soldier with a weird hairstyle next to him. Captain freaking America and Wolver fucking Rine!

Though they both kinda look like the combination of their MCU and comic counterparts, infact now that I think about it the image of Tony Stark on the news article earlier also did not fully look like Downey Jr.

For one he looked much more healthy and a bit muscular than the uncle that his MCU counterpart was, RIP.

The good news is that the world isn't on the precipice of destruction as it was every other Tuesday in the comics, so this world was relatively more MCU than comics, which = saf-ER in my books.

S.H.I.E.L.D seems to doing a good job in keeping the public oblivious to the supernatural, atleast no alien invasions has occured so far from what I can see.

Of course, this is where the bad news come in. While there aren't any earth-destroying super-beings flying around, that didn't mean it that it would stay that way. Arghhh there are so many things to do and prepare for.

The Chitauri Invasion, Thanos, Apocalypse and damn Hydra and all those other secret evil organisations. The only advantage I have is my future knowledge and even with that its not reliable; I haven't even read a Marvel comic in a while, only DC ones, let alone a Marvel movie since Endgame.

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AN: And done! Best first chapter I've written, if i do say so myself. How's the discord server? I spent a good amount of time ironing it out but if there are a few kinks here and there please let me know; i'd appreciate it.

If you arn't in it already, what are you doing? Here's the link: https://discord.com/invite/FUREsGzY3f

Anyways, onwards to the next chapter!