This is essentially a write-up of a cracky headcanon of mine for this particular scene.


Ashley eyed Druitt warily as he moved further away from her, screwing the cap back onto the bottle of water he had offered her. "We knew each other in London, your mother and I, when we were young. In fact, we were rather close." The smile that graced his features was disconcerting to her, even if it did seem sincere.

She shook her head slightly in disbelief, "See, now I know you're full of crap." She allowed herself a small smirk.

"Because she's a hundred and fifty-eight years old?" he asked her, genuinely curious.

"First off, she's a hundred and fifty-seven," she replied in a tone just short of sarcastic, "and I get that she's special, it's some sort of accident of her genetic makeup. But the chances of two people having the same defect-"

"Are much higher if it's no accident," he interrupted, walking slowly towards her. He lifted the bottle of water and held it in front of her, "You're sure?" He barely had a chance to react when she knocked his hand to the side with a yell and leapt off her chair, her foot connecting heavily with his stomach before it swept his feet out from under him. He landed on the floor with a grunt and grimaced.

As the former killer struggled off the floor, Ashley took the opportunity to throw himself across his back, wrapping her arms around her neck in chokehold. He used her momentum to roll her them over so she was pinned to the floor by his back, "This is tedious." He grumbled before making them disappear in a swirl of pink-hued energy. He dropped them into the middle of a busy intersection and glanced back at her, "Should we talk here?"

"What are you doing?!" Ashley yelled over the sounds of the heavy traffic. She barely had time to register the feeling of teleporting again before she was engulfed in a thick, stifling heat.

"Or here?" Druitt yelled at her, rolling slightly towards the edge of the outcropping that overhung the oozing lava flow below.

"Oh my god!" the air rushed from her lungs in a scream as he teleported them for a third time, and sent them plummeting in a free fall towards the street below, "Stop it! Stop it!" they landed on the floor of the warehouse with a hard thud that left Ashley gasping for breath.

"As I said, there's little time, I need to know where Helen is!" Druitt reiterated as he rolled to his feet.

Back in the fiery mountain, two small figures, both covered in weeks worth of dirt and grime, stared in a mixture of confusion and curiosity at the tip of the rock outcropping that had been occupied for a split second by a strangely dressed man and woman.

"By the Shire, what in all of Middle Earth was that, Mr. Frodo?" Samwise Gamgee asked, his eyes wide.

"I have no idea, Sam."