Eliot tries some portal shit. He's glad he carries various spellcasting components on his belt nowadays, even if it makes him feel like someone's dorky Dungeons & Dragons character or some kind of stupid fantasy Batman. The words and gestures come to him as easily as ever, after being drilled into him by Mayakovsky.

When he's finished, a portal wobbles queasily into being behind and around the clock, but nothing's on the other side. It's blank and white, like a Word document. Eliot touches it, experimentally. Nothing happens.

"Well, don't be mad," he says.