The Universe's Mixer

“This is not the TARDIS.” Dorothy McShane, better known as ‘Ace’ stood in the middle of the street with her hands on her hips as she looked around. She had no idea where she was or how she had gotten there. She had a few theories, but had no real idea. She decided that her arrival was do to either a) this was a room in the TARDIS that was just as big as a city; b) there was another glitch in the TARDIS systems and the front door had moved and she had stepped outside. Or c) the last door she had gone through took her through some rift in the space-time continuum. Whatever the reason, she was here now.

Ace pulled the backpack she was carrying higher up on her shoulder and got out of the street. She needed to think and figure this all out.

Last thing she remembered, she had been in her bedroom in the TARDIS mixing up a new batch of nitro-9. The Doctor had come by and told her he had a surprise for her. Since he had told her not to make explosives in her bedroom and he knew she would never do anything he asked her not to, he set up a chemistry lab for her. He said he would feel better if Ace did not make her explosives in the same room she slept in.

She had grabbed her jacket and her backpack and followed the Doctor’s directions. Down the hall off the control room, take the fourth right, go down twelve doors and take another right. Go seven door and then open the fourteenth one on the left. Ace had done that and when she had stepped through the door, she was here.

She knew the Doctor would find her eventually. He never left her alone for long, he was never sure what she would do without supervision. But in the meantime, she had a whole new City to explore and have fun with. She grinned and started walking down the street.

“Wicked.”

This one is loud. She is entitled. She's a supreme bitch with a great rack. It's almost a shame to kill her, but The City wants what The City wants. I can't do anything but what it requires.

Besides, like almost every other kill, it's set up way too perfectly.

I could do this one up close, because she's incompetent. She's not a killer, not a hunter, not anything that should be able to stand up to me. But something, The City I'm guessing, is telling me to not get close to her. That she's dangerous now somehow.

The shot is lined up.

There's nobody else around.

Perhaps too confidently, I start to squeeze the trigger.

Unexpectedly, a flock of birds explodes onto the scene.

The shot goes low.

Jennifer had found "her" apartment. It was in a building called The Manchester. The inside of it sort of looked like her house, only smaller. Some of her things were here. It was a tiny bit unnerving, but nice. It was as if somebody wanted her to feel comfortable. When she stopped thinking about that somebody being the City itself, it stopped being creepy and started feeling a little nice.

Somebody caring about her for a change.

When she felt settled, she made her way to work. It was one building. Everything was here. In this one building. Compact. Easy to get to. It was a little bit like back home, mostly because back there they'd tried to shove everything they didn't want to deal with in one place. It was in the same police station that she'd found herself in when she'd arrived here. Which turned out to be the only police station in the entire place.

Government here, it turned out, was pulled apart. Made into the departments she'd read about in the library. CIA, FBI, the ATF, and some she'd never heard about. They all had their own hallway here.

Jennifer was apparently a part of the FBI.

The library Simon had taken her to had given her a lot of information, but she'd had to go back to learn more specifically about the FBI. For the most part, it sounded like her old job. Just with better cases, more interesting cases. And lacking the part where she had to find funding. Plus a whole lot more power.

She was a little surprised when she got to work, found an office with her name on the door, and a file on her desk.

There was a serial killer on the loose.

"My first case is a serial killer." She said with a smile. Thinking about how she wouldn't have to track down families of the victims. Which was extra super because she was pretty sure that most of these people didn't have family here.

But then she realized what she was going to have to be looking into.

"My first case is a serial killer." This time, she said it with a sigh.

Early morning light spilling down across her bed and over her closed eyes was what first began to rouse Pepper from her drowsy state that morning.

She shifted around in her bed, face buried deep into her pillow against the intruding brightness. All too soon her alarm clock would be going off and she'd be forced to drag herself out of bed. Force herself to get up and greet a brand new day of mind-numbing work and having to deal with whatever new and ingenious way Tony managed to get himself into trouble today. Force herself to go into her office, only to find a stack of papers at least three feet high, all with headliners on "Iron Man" emblazoned across their black and white pages.

Soon enough she'd be forced to deal with all of that...but for right now, she just wanted a few more minutes of sleep. Just a few more minutes to snuggle deep down into her silk sheets and smell the sweet lavender perfume of her pillow.

Wait a minute. Silk sheets...lavender...?

Outside she could hear the sweet, melodic chirping of birds and something that faintly sounded like the pleasant tinkling of wind chimes blowing in the breeze on a nice, summer day.

Wind chimes..? I don't own any windchimes!

Bright blue eyes snapped open wide and Pepper gave a startled cry as she sat bolt upright in her bed.

No...not her bed...a bed.

"Good morning, Miss Potts," the droll voice that could only belong to Tony's A.I., Jarvis, spoke suddenly, earning him a startled cry from her as she jerked the sheets up around her body in reflex. "I trust you slept well."

Pepper gaped, looking around the unfamiliar room with rising anxiety. Sure, she'd had just a little bit to drink last night...but nothing more than her usual nightcap before going to bed! How could she have possibly come to be in a foreign bed...and with Jarvis?

"J...Jarvis? What...what on earth is going on? Where the hell am I?"

"It seems, Miss Potts, that during the course of the night, something rather odd has taken place. I advise you to look out your window."

The blinds that covered each individual window slowly parted as Pepper eased herself out of the bed, wrapping the silk sheet around her body as she moved and padded over to the glass. Her eyes widened at the sight that greeted her and her jaw dropped at the same rate as her stomach.

All around, she had a full, panoramic view of a vast, magnificent City.