What If? 18-A

"What If Dr. Strange Had Been a Disciple of Dormammu?"

Stephen Strange was a proud, arrogant, boastful bore of a man. A brilliant surgeon, who cut those around him down like chaff. One night of Bacchanalian revelry and driving under the influence brings his glittering career to an abrupt end.

A car smash had damaged the nerves in Strange's hands rendering him capable of nothing more dextrous than knocking back glass after glass of liquor.

In one sleaze bar or another, Strange overhears what sounds like "Salty Dog" tales of an ancient healer located in the Himalayas. Strange seizes on this tidbit and ploughs the rest of his depleted fortune into finding the miracle worker.

Strange is welcomed into the Ancient One's abode and left to the auspices of Karl Mordo. Mordo is laboring under the clandestine sponsorship of dread Dormammu. The other-dimensional demon soon has designs on Stephen Strange's own over-reaching ambition.

Mordo is callously shrugged aside as Dormammu chooses to make Stephen Strange his vessel on Earth. Umar, the Unspeakable - sister of Dormammu, sees her chance to escape banishment by her brother and seduce the catspaw at the same time.

Fearing that the end of all Eternity is nigh, the Ancient One gathers the major adept magic users from around the world together to form a last bastion of occult defense.