Carren's POV

Two weeks went by. And I learned a few things.

One of those things positively alarmed me.

I stormed into SHIELD headquarters, and for once I had taken the care to dress a little bit more formally. (Meaning that I wasn't decked out in my usual "just-rolled-out-of-bed-and-didn't-give-a-crap-about-how-I-looked" outfit.)

This time I had shoved a T-shirt over my head and worn jeans.

Anyway, even in this, I was drawing quite a few looks among the various agents and businessmen dawdling in the lobby with their leather briefcases and manilla folders undoubtedly filled with the latest news on our bases on the outskirts of Jakarta, or wherever else SHIELD was spying on.

The annoying secretary at the desk (Becca, I think her name was) looked up and scowled when I walked in. Since our first meeting, she had never failed to toss a scathing comment at me (usually degrading my morality or sense of fashion) whenever I came in for my job.

But this time I cut her off before she even had a chance to open her mouth. "I need to see Fury."

Her face soured as if she had been force-fed a lemon. "Director Fury doesn't see little girls like you."

Her cracks on my maturity were starting to get a little old. I was in a bad mood today anyway. "Oh, he'll make an exception for me. Now, I would greatly appreciate it if you quit questioning me. Last time I checked, I'm a rank higher than you."

Again, Becca scowled, making her pretty face look a lot less pretty. "I can't let you in even if I wanted to, stupid. He's in an important meeting about Laufeyson."

"Even better." I pushed passed the reception desk and headed down the hall, flashing my SHIELD badge at the guards who tried to stop me. They fell back to their posts.

Like I expected, Becca got up from her chair and tailed me, hissing like a punctured tire. "You can't just barge into a meeting! This is important; it's about the safety of our city."

"Save it for someone who cares."

"There are some very important people here– the board members of SHIELD sent some representatives to speak to Fury."

"How about a little less talk and a little more shut-the-hell-up?"

"You're a disgrace to SHIELD, Paradizo. It's a case of insubordination. How could you be so–!?"

It was at this moment that I glimpsed a "Meeting In Progress: Do Not Disturb" sign on the door of room A7. So naturally I pushed it open, Becca still at my heels.

No matter how many times I did it, I would never get tired of the shock on people's faces when I did outrageous things. Barging into important meetings with important people, for instance, was especially entertaining.

Nick Fury stood at the head of a long glass table, standing up, gesturing animatedly to a diagram being projected at the front of the room; I caught a few words about security. About ten other men and women in business suits were sitting around the table, holding glasses of water, briefcases open and spilling various sheafs of paper filled with numbers and calculations. The surprise on their faces as they took in my appearance was rather amusing.

I've been told I have a strange sense of humor. I now believe it.

"We have a time limit," I announced, knowing and delighting in the fact that they had absolutely no idea what I was talking about.

"Agent Paradizo," Fury said, and I heard a warning in his voice. "What are you doing here?"

It was at this time that Becca decided to speak up. A quick glance over my shoulder told me that her face was pink with anger. "I tried to stop her, sir, but she just wouldn't listen." She paused, obviously relishing the idea of getting me in the trouble I deserved. "She just flits around, sir, not listening to anyone–"

"I have news about Loki." I cut her off, looking straight into Nick's eyes, taunting him. "But I'm sorry that I interrupted something of undoubted importance..."

The lure of possibly vital information was my security. Humans were too curious for their own good; I knew that and used it to my advantage.

Sure enough, Fury gave a tiny sigh. He knew I had won him over and I knew that he hated it. I smirked as he spoke. "Miss Robinson, you are excused."

Becca blinked in surprise. I don't know what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn't a dismissal. If anything, she would have expected me to get dismissed.

"But Director–"

"Now, Miss Robinson."

Her pink complexion grew to a shade resembling salmon. "Yes, sir." She muttered furiously. And left.

"Aget Paradizo, what's this so-called information?" Despite his bored tone, I knew he was intrigued.

I allowed myself a brief, triumphant smile before changing my demeanor to something a bit more sober. "Well, it's more of a warning than information."

"What kind of warning?"

The businessmen and women in the room were eyeing with skeptical looks plastered onto their faces, no doubt wondering how a girl like me could have any type of information.

One had the courage to speak up. "If I may interrupt–"

"You may not." I said bluntly. "But you were planning on interrupting if I gave you permission or not, so what is it?"

His face flushed but he forged on. "Who are you?"

Director Fury spoke for me. "This is Agent Carren Paradizo; in charge of supervising Loki Laufeyson during his working hours."

I shot him a sharp look at so casually tossing out my name like that; he knew I preferred to stay an enigma. He pointedly ignored it.

Fine. He wants to play that way?

"Ladies and gentleman," I began. "During the couple weeks that I've known Loki Laufeyson, I've learned a few things." I swallowed. "Loki is a time bomb."

Dead silence. I took this as my cue to continue.

"His sentence here is three years, correct? That's the time we have left, at the maximum. Between now and three years from now, I will guarantee you that he will escape from this facility- at least try to- and wreak havoc on our world."

"How would you know about this?" A woman asked, leaning forward. 'Kavanaugh', read her name tag.

"It's simple, really," I replied. "I put myself in his shoes. Use your brains! He is trapped in our captivity, on our world, until the allotted time of three years has expired." I held up three fingers for emphasis, and then retracted them one by one. "After that, he will be transported back to his world, Asgard, and kept in a dungeon for all eternity."

I placed a manilla folder on the table and flipped through it, producing a piece of paper. "I did some research through SHIELD's files on Asgardian magic."

"You were never authorized to access those files." Fury said immediately. I scoffed.

"When has that ever stopped me? You really need to get more powerful firewalls, Fury. Up your game or drop out. But your online security incompetency is beside the point. The point is, after extensive research and calculations, I came to a conclusion."

"And what would that conclusion be, Agent Paradizo?"

I gritted my teeth at the title but kept my cool. "That Loki would have a much better chance of escaping our little prison of steel and concrete over here than he would in Asgard."

There was silence again. Then,

"Laufeyson surrendered. That's it. Game over. Why would he try to escape?"

This came from a corpulent man smoking a fat cigar. I laughed at his remark.

"My good sir, have you ever lost an argument? Not the best feeling, is it? Now imagine that the winner of the argument followed you everywhere, mocking you, rubbing your defeat in your face and tearing down everything that you because of that one loss. Now amplify that tenfold. Wouldn't /you/ want some revenge?" I looked over each face of the people gathered. Some of them looked skeptical, others merely blank– but the collective emotion in their expressions were fear.

They fear Loki, I realized. I'll bet most of them are very uneasy, having him here on earth. Well, they were right to be scared.

"Our security is top-of-the-line. Laufeyson could never escape, even if he tried it a thousand times. I organized the security myself."

I turned to the speaker.

This one was another woman, this one with short golden hair cut in a bob around her head. Her cheekbones were high, her features sharp. Her eyes reminded me of the ice that settled above a pond during winter. The ice that concealed the freezing waters that lay beneath.

Her demeanor was easily recognizable; it was one that I had seen many times before. Haughty, cutting, succinct.

"It doesn't matter." I dismissed her; her personality type was one that hated to be ignored or looked over. She wouldn't like it if I took her or her efforts lightly, so that's exactly what I did. Did I mention that I have a bit of a sadistic personality? "Loki will have mapped this out. He is extremely intelligent– a genius, actually. And he is a god." My throat tightened at god.

"He will have every little detail, every little variable planned and controlled. Everything mapped out to the second. And this guy doesn't just have a Plan B. He has a Plan C, a Plan D, a Plan E, a Plan F– all the way to the end of the alphabet. After he makes a plan, nothing you throw at him will be able to stop him. And you've been giving him an awful lot of reasons to plan. Once he gets out of that cozy little cell you've rented for him, there will be nothing standing in his way. He will tear this world apart and love every second of it. At that point, I'm guessing that consequences will be trivial to him. He won't care what happens to him afterwards as long as he gets as much revenge as he can against our world." I paused. "He must be fun at parties."

My synopsis had the desired effect. Everyone was dead silent. After a long moment, someone spoke.

"So what you're saying is that Laufeyson is plotting our demise at this very moment, and nothing we do will be able to stop him." This was the Director. It was more of a statement of fact than it was a question.

I flashed Fury a smile, trying and succeeding at appearing as if all of this had absolutely no effect on me. "Pretty much."

"So there's nothing we can do?"

"Well, no. You have two options. Well, three actually."

"Give them to me."

"They're not pretty, Director." I knew that my cautions were unnecessary. He would hear me out no matter what. I had captured his attention, hook, line, and sinker.

"It doesn't matter. Just throw them out there."

I had to hide another smile. I held up a finger. "Option number one: you do nothing."

Nick gave me his famous one-eyed glare, which I had to admit was pretty intimidating. He was rather good at giving people evil looks. "How is that supposed to help?"

"It's not." I replied, and my lips twisted into a smirk. "But it's an option."

"No, it really isn't. Stop screwing around, Carren."

"Oh, are we on a first name basis now? What happened to Agent Paradizo?"

"Stop screwing around, Carren."

"You really are no fun at all, Director." I held up another finger. "Option number two: you call in Odin and Thor to retrieve Loki and take him back to Asgard. This would throw off Loki's scheming immensely, and I doubt that he would have finished with his escape plan on such short notice."

Everyone in the room visibly relaxed. They were already internally deciding that this was the wisest course of action. Fools.

"However, there are two crucial flaws with this plan. The first one being that you have to get ahold of Asgard first. And how would you do that? It's not like you have Lord Odin in your phone contacts, right? And if you contact him, there is no guarantee that they would call you back in time. Immortals have a terrible sense of time.

"Even if they did manage to contact you in time, there is always the possibility that Loki- after hearing of his move- will throw caution completely to the winds and just make a break in the transition period."

I saw Fury tighten his grip on the edge of the table. "And the last option, then?"

"Well, this one is a bit far-fetched, but..." I hesitated and made my pitch. "You change his mind."

"What?"

"You change Loki's mind. You show him that earth isn't worth destroying, show him that he shouldn't take his vengeance out on us."

"Ridiculous." Fury turned around, back facing me. "He's beyond reason."

"On the contrary. We are making him beyond reason. Don't you see, Director? He's lonely. He's isolated. He is surrounding himself with sarcasm and anger and bitterness because he's simply lonely. And everything that we do just further convince him that earth should be destroyed. So you had better make him change his mind for the better, or else thousands of innocent people will die and it will be all SHIELD'S fault!" I stopped to take a breath.

My argument had the desired effect. All of the men and women present were considerably paler.

Finally, Fury spoke. "Thank you, Carren, for telling us this." He surveyed the people gathered. "We shall take you and your... opinions... into consideration."

I knew a dismissal when I saw one. And I would leave. My job was done. I had them convinced.

I left.

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