Her adversary had left her and Irene was now alone with the angels. She stared into their eyes, plotting the demise of the consulting detective through artifice. She let her ideas fallow, musing about how to perpetuate them, when suddenly, an idea came to her. She was no craven, had turned deceitfulness into an art to rival the culinary talent of the most famous French chefs, and often received exhilaration from The Game, but she was reluctant to ask the Consulting Criminal for help- especially not when her plan would involve his own personal downfall. She thought maybe, just maybe, if she could say it right, she could coerce James Moriarty. Together, they would delete Sherlock Holmes from the universe. Before that however, she would have to alienate herself from Sally. Irene ran upstairs and met Sally as she was locking the door.
"Get out," Irene said with a coldness in her eyes that suggested a deeper distress.
"What?" Sally asked with a punitive tone in her voice.
"I said get out. I don't need you anymore. You are negligible."
"What brought this about? Why am I suddenly nothing to you?"
"The reason doesn't matter, just leave," Irene said, blinking back tears.
"Fine. I'll go to the Doctor, he won't think so little of me."
Sally grabbed her coat, and as Irene saw her open the door she felt an intense need to redress the situation- to call her best friend back and make things right- but she repressed it. There were plenty of precedents where she had done a similar thing, but this made her hurt worse than any of the others.
As Sally was about to open the door to leave, she stopped and turned back to look at her friend.
"I thought I meant something to you, but I guess not."
The door slammed behind her and Irene fell back on the stair handle. She gathered herself after a moment and planned out how she would contact Jim. She must not harass him at a poor time or risk an explosion of his inclement temper. She decided on calling him in the past, when he first met Sherlock at the pool where little Carl Powers died. She picked up her phone- a special phone that could call anywhere in time and space- and dialed Jim's number and a date and time. The phone rang.
"Hello?" Came a voice with a soft Irish lilt on the other end.
"Dearest Jim?"
"Yes, of course it is, what do you want?"
"Oh, it's not what I want, but something that might interest you. I have a band of angels time locked in my basement. They're willing to make an alliance to bring about the downfall of the man currently pointing a gun at you."
"SAY THAT AGAIN!" Jim suddenly screamed, "say that again and know that if you're lying to me, I will find you and I will skin you."
"I'm not lying dear, I'll be waiting outside with a vortex manipulator to bring you with me. You can sojourn at my house while we flesh out this little plan of ours."
"Alright."
Jim left the pool after threatening Sherlock and Irene. When he walked outside he saw the urbane figure of Irene Adler standing outside.
"Coming?" She asked as she held out her wrist with a bulky black bracelet attached.
"Of course. But remember, Miss Adler, I owe you. I owe you big. And you never want to be on the receiving end of one of my I-owe-you's."
"I have nothing to fear, Jimmy," she said as the criminal clasped onto her wrist.
She pressed the button on the vortex manipulator and the pair disappeared into the night.