Chapter 2: The World I

|New York, September 2015|

A young boy was sitting in front of the bar in a rather luxurious kitchen. He was staring at a bowl of oatmeal with milk. The boy appeared dazed. It was his tendency to be deep in contemplation wherever he went. The young boy wore black-rimmed glasses and a plain black t-shirt; he had raven hair, blue eyes, and a thin build.

This is the young man who met Philemon. Since leaving that room, the young man has gained an identity; his name is now Duncan Plagmann, and he is the sole child of Dr. Catherine Plagmann, a British doctor and single mother who immigrated to the United States for work.

He'd been in this world for nearly ten years. He was roughly 5 years old when he first remembered some things from his previous encounter with Philemon. He had just forgotten his childhood, like many individuals do not recall what they did as babies.

His mother is the only relative who resides in the United States; the others are in the United Kingdom, but they are fairly distant from his mother. His family was pretty wealthy in this life, as his mother earned a lot of money from her career.

"Duncan!" A woman's voice came from outside the house. "Are you done yet?! I haven't got much time left!"

"Coming mum!" Duncan shouted back. The boy simply left his unfinished cereal on the bar and grabbed his bag, before rushing towards the door. When Duncan opened the front door, he saw that his mother was waiting inside a car. She was sitting in the passenger seat, along with a man in the driver seat.

The man in the driver's seat was his mother's helper. He usually drove his mother and him around the city, as his mother usually doesn't have the energy left to drive around the busy city.

"Good morning, Duncan," said the driver, whose name is Paul."Woke up late? It's unlike you to do that."

"No, I just had a lot on my mind," shrugged Duncan.

His mother snorted at his response. "Aren't you always? Come, we're late."

Abiding by his mother's wishes, Duncan entered the car, and Paul started to drive it. Their first destination is his new high school, the Midtown School of Science and Technology. Since he was a child, he was homeschooled, but because of his mother's increased workload, he was now going to Midtown. Their home is in the more private neighborhood of Forest Hills, so the school, while close, is not quite close enough to justify walking there every day.

As the car was on the road, Paul looked in the rearview mirror towards Duncan. "First day of school in your entire life, and you're wearing that?"

"What?" questioned Duncan. "It's a t-shirt."

"It's bland," his mother commented. "Why can't they just wear uniforms? American schools are quite lax in terms of discipline."

"Well, freedom and all that," said Paul.

Catherine sighed at the answer. She then turned towards her son and asked him. "How are you feeling?"

"Fine," said Duncan. "It's not the end of the world by any means. It's just a school."

Catherine sighed again, making Duncan turn to her, confused. "Why are you sighing so much?"

"Your accent," said his mother.

"What's wrong with it?" questioned Duncan.

"She doesn't like that you don't have a British accent anymore." Paul chuckled, joining in the conversation. "You sound like a true 'Murican boy."

"What? You want me to say "wo'er" every time water is mentioned?" Duncan chuckled.

"My accent isn't that thick…" Catherine murmured.

The rest of the ride was quiet after that chat, allowing Duncan to think to himself once more.

He returned to his previous thoughts. It had been years since he began his 'journey,' yet all he had done was observe the world he was in, and he had learned a few things about it.

To begin with, this is not the usual world.

Duncan's gaze was drawn to a tower in the heart of New York, visible from Queens. It was the Avengers Tower.

Last May, the destruction of Sokovia was all over the news, and the Chitauri's destruction was still apparent in portions of Hell's Kitchen. It doesn't take a genius to see that this world is based on the Marvel universe, but Duncan is still unsure whether this world is truly just the world he had seen in the movies, with which he was quite familiar, or whether it is an amalgamation of the comics and the movies, with which he was not quite familiar.

He swiftly discovered that, while he is an anomaly in this world, he is not truly unique. This universe is populated by many strange people. Gods, aliens, super soldiers, sorcerers... while he is an anomaly, he possesses no powers, at least not yet.

He feared the sorcerers, who may label him as a threat to this reality. Duncan has no idea what type of existence Philemon equates, but the sorcerers have yet to come for him, so he's safe for the time being.

He grew irritated with Philemon while thinking about him. He remembered that he had promised to provide him with a 'guide' in this world, but nothing had appeared so far. He didn't grant him any skills, abilities, or anything else. So all he can do now is observe, avoid detection by individuals he doesn't want to be enemies with, and 'act' normal.

He was, in a sense, hiding behind a mask of normalcy.

—

Duncan was now standing in front of a crowd of adolescent humans. He was now inside the corridor of his new high school, to be precise. Many students were searching around the classrooms for door labels in order to find their respective rooms. Duncan, of course, was one of them.

He was moving gently to prevent colliding with another student and injuring himself. His first lesson of the day was biology, which was much easier to locate because it was held in a lab.

The seats in the lab-turned-classroom were nearly all occupied when he entered. He appeared to be the last person to enter, and when he did, everyone in the room immediately began to look at him. After shaking off the awkwardness brought on by the stares, he moved toward the vacant seat in the center of the classroom.

The setup of the room resembled a standard lab, with two seats at each table, so the person seated next to him will serve as his lab partner for the duration of the semester. It was a girl in this instance. The girl had blue eyes and blonde hair, and she had a black hairband on her head.

Being in the condition he was in, he initially believed the girl to be Betty Brant, but she didn't resemble the actress from the movies he had seen at all.

In an effort to be polite, Duncan asked if he may take a seat.

The girl simply smiled and nodded. "Yeah, sure."

Consequently, Duncan sat down. When he gave it some thought, he realized that it was indeed odd that a girl like her would sit by herself until almost the beginning of class. His past experiences showed that either her partner or a flirtatious person would try to sit with her. But then again, perhaps they were merely put off by her.

His train of thought was disturbed when the teacher entered the room. The instructor had a laid-back vibe about him; he had a beard, brown hair, and glasses. He carried a few books as he passed the board before letting go of them and placing them on the teacher's desk.

"Good morning everyone." said the teacher with a forced smile. "Excited for the first day of school?"

He received no replies.

Uncomfortably laughing, the teacher exhaled. "Yeah, neither do I."

The teacher then picked a marker and walked towards the board, where he wrote his name.

"My name is Roger Harrington," the teacher introduced himself. "This semester, I will be your biology teacher. I am also the coach of our school's Academic Decathlon team, so make sure you do well in my class if you want to join. Do you have any questions?"

He received no replies once more.

Mr. Harrington stepped back towards the teacher's desk, awkwardly playing with the marker in his hands. "All right, if you don't have any questions, let's start with attendance."

Mr. Harrington then brought out the attendance sheet and called out the names of each student in alphabetical order.

"Charlie Murphy?"

"Cindy Moon?"

Weirdly enough, Duncan was one of the first ones to be called..

"Duncan Plagmann?" called the teacher.

Duncan merely raised his hand and nodded to the teacher. With a strange glance, the boy's gaze swiftly shifted to the girl beside him. Should Betty be called first if she is Betty?

"...Flash Thompson..."

The teacher kept calling out students in his class. It seemed normal at first, but soon a specific name appeared.

"Gwen Stacy?" Mr. Harrington inquired.

In an instant, the girl beside him raised her hand, to which the teacher just nodded.

Duncan's pupils contracted. He was confident that this was not the world he had imagined. Gwen Stacy exists, so there must be some differences between who exists and who does not.

If this trend continues, the X-Men may also exist.

"You're Gwen Stacy?" Duncan blurted out.

The girl just looked at him, a bit confused. "Yeah. Have we met before?"

Duncan quickly shook his head. "No, I just saw your name somewhere else."

Gwen raised her eyebrow in curiosity. "And where did you hear my name?"

"I heard about Captain Stacy." Duncan shrugged. He risked being labeled a freak in order to investigate whether or not "Captain Stacy" existed and whether or not he had made any form of news.

Gwen groaned; Duncan had hit the jackpot. "Yeah, ever since my father arrested that serial killer, people have been asking me about it."

Duncan raised an eyebrow; he wondered if there was such news, and it appears that there is, though he doesn't think about the name "Stacy" in the news because there are so many Stacys.

"Are you new?" Gwen inquired abruptly.

"Huh?"

"It's just that I never saw you in middle school." Gwen elaborated.

"Oh, I was homeschooled." Duncan responded. "However, as you can see, not any more."

Gwen only chuckled at Duncan's response. "That's cool."

Another specific name is called out among the whispers of the students. "Peter Parker?"

Duncan looked at the boy, who appeared to be rather average. He was quite slender, had a nerdy appearance, and was always engrossed in his book; he didn't appear to have been bitten by the spider yet.

"You know him too?" asked Gwen.

"No, not really." Duncan answered. "Just trying to remember my classmates' faces is all."

"You know, you don't have to do that." Gwen stated so.

"I know." Duncan shrugged and returned his gaze to the girl. "Just in case."

Gwen laughed yet again. "Well, "just in case" if you need any help, you can find me."

Duncan cocked his brow. "What kind of help?"

Gwen shrugged. "Well, that's up to you. I just assumed you'd have a hard time adjusting since you were homeschooled."

"Oh," Duncan responded simply. "Okay."

Duncan then returned his attention to his book. He could hear the teacher begin explaining the course subject for the rest of the semester, but he wasn't paying attention.

He was now considering how he would handle his issue. Is it possible for him to merely "observe" and do nothing? What good would he be if he could do anything? He lacks any capabilities or abilities on which he can rely in an emergency.

He is deep in thought when he realizes the classroom is suddenly silent. He looked around; the lights had gone out, the outside was dark as if it had just turned night, and the people around him didn't move at all, as if frozen in time.

"Gwen?" Duncan tried to elicit a response from the girl sitting next to him, but nothing came up.

Duncan perked up, obviously perplexed by the scenario.

But just when he was ready to turn around, blue butterflies that emit a faint blue light suddenly appeared, and a feminine voice rang loudly in his head.

[I am Thou, Thou art I]