Carmen here.
Now I look back on it, I'm rather surprised I didn't scream from terror when I realized the door was locked.
Instead of screaming, however, I took my hand off the knob. "Why are you here, Doctor?"
"I saw you before. From the window."
Watching him tap out messages to Dottie. Wonderful.
"I'm afraid I didn't see much of you. I was too tired to do much aside from just sit there. I was attacked earlier today, and my head hurts too much to do much of anything."
When they had decided to finally have someone take a look at my head, they'd undone my hairstyle. I'd kept the bobby pins by sticking them onto the edge of my sleeve. Now, I pulled one off and put my hands behind my back, unbending it.
"Doctor, I'm not a stupid girl. What do you want?"
He frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I mean just that. What are you trying to do?"
Jack and Miranda would know what to do, but they weren't here.
"What do you think I'm trying to do?"
"No offense, but you're really starting to act a little creepy." How solid was the door? I could probably knock it down if I had to... if they didn't stop me. Which they would.
"Creepy?"
I think he actually didn't know the English word.
"It means, uh..." I stood in front of the door, sticking the pin in the lock. "How do I explain this..." I gave it a hard twist.
The door clicked swung open.
I ran like I'd never run before.
Turns out, you don't really notice the skull splitting pain you're causing when you're trying to run away from the crazy guy who's trying to hypnotize you.
Anyhow, I ran down the hall as fast as I could.
Footsteps pounded after me.
I don't like fighting – I took karate once and found I didn't have the guts to hit anybody.
When a hand closed onto my hair, though, I thrust my knee forward at him – the thing they tell all girls to do when a guy attacks them.
Unfortunately, he sidestepped, yanking my hair with him.
I went with another piece of advice I'd picked up somewhere – claw the opponent's eyes out.
Turns out, even if you don't quite manage that, it still hurts a lot.
He let go of my hair.
I ran again, realizing I'd just done hurt someone intentionally – something I don't think I've ever done before.
I screamed at the top of my lungs. Not an actual word, but a long, loud, shrieking sound – the kind that is really annoying and gets everyone's attention.
Both of them decided to make a speedy exit.
I kept running, all the way into the main room.
Everyone was standing around, staring into the office, where Chief Dooley had the bomb strapped to him.
Miranda here.
After we saw the agents exiting the building where Dottie had signaled Ivchenko, we stayed out of the way – I had rather not have a person jump out of a window above me and then explode.
For the record, if we had tried to communicate it to him, we would have destroyed the time line. Bad things happen when you mess with time lines. If you don't believe me, watch Dr. Who.
Actually, watch Dr. Who even if you do believe me.
We stared up at the windows. "You think Carmen will get out first?" asked Jack.
"I have no idea." Carmen didn't seem the type who would deal well with watching someone die... I shuddered. "Did she ever say where she and Ivy went?"
Jack shrugged. "It's odd, wouldn't Ivy have told us about it?"
"She didn't tell any of you about meeting Jack Frost."
"Who?"
"Rise of the Guardians. She met him while she was out of town."
"Ivy didn't tell us about that?"
"No. I only know because I was on the phone with her when she figured out what was going on. Pitch Black was hiding under her bed."
"What?"
"It's a long story, or so I'm told." I shrugged. "But I suppose none of us were totally honest with her. I certainly wasn't. I even lied on our first recording because she was listening to me record it."
"What did you lie about?"
"You've heard it. You remember that bit after I... went missing and I woke up?"
"Yeah."
"I may have left out a few parts... like that he punched me in the face a couple times."
Jack's jaw tightened.
"He was under mind control, Jack. Don't even think about whatever you're thinking."
"What else have you left off?"
"Oh, not much. Just bits and pieces. Softened things to make them a little easier for Ivy to digest. Don't tell me you haven't done it."
"We've agreed to do it. Once. And I'm really not sure about whether we should have lied to her about that. You really think she believed you went looking for her during Iron Man 3?"
"Ivy believed everything I said." She had trusted us and believed everything we said – she herself could not and would not tell a lie to save her life.
"How many other times have you lied?"
I shrugged. "Lost count, really."
There was a moment of silence. He might not like or agree with me, but he understood why.
"Jack... have we done the right thing? Was any of this ever right?"
"Now's not a time to be questioning ourselves."
"If there ever was a time, it's now. I've played along and supported Ivy until she... died. But was it really right? Are we doing the right thing?"
He shrugged. "I don't really know if we can know for sure what the right thing is. We can guess and try to do our best to know, but I don't think we'll ever know for sure whether it is. I believe it is, but it's hard to be sure, isn't it?"
There was a sound of glass shattering. An explosion.
I felt suddenly sick.
