Chapter 5
Lieutenant Vertigo watches from across the room, taking note of how the air around the quartet is . . . off. It’s like looking through water at something, where, for the most part, the item appears to be normal, yet, on closer inspection, there’s a slight hint of distortion playing along the item’s edges. It’s not the most accurate of descriptions, sure, but how are you supposed to describe to someone something that they’ve never themselves experienced?
Vertigo frowns, cocking her head. The distortion’s something that would be visible only to those with enough inherent affinity for perceiving magic visually to have been trained in all the ways that it came appear out in the real world. Thus, she concludes herself to be the only person present capable of seeing the magical barrier that’s been put up around the quartet - because lord knows no one else in this godforsaken place has shown even the slightest hint of being able to do anything even remotely close to what she can do.
She’s grateful for that, at least. It’s nice to be unique among magical beings for once, even if that’s only because of a decidedly less than desirable talent. On the other hand, it’s also a talent that’s currently allowing her to observe the fact that there is definitely something going on, something that the few in charge of this whole operation don’t want everyone to know.
After all, why else would they be communicating via notes instead of out loud if they had nothing to hide?
Our forces at the Sanctum have been compromised, the note reads. We’re looking into moving the four of you to a safe house where we can be sure that we can keep you safe.
Two pairs of fearful eyes stare back at Agatha as she finishes reading the note aloud. They can’t quite comprehend what’s going on - they’re still so young - but they’re still able to grasp that there’s something big, something dangerous going on.
“How will mum find us if we go away?” Tommy asks.
Agatha puts down the note and reaches out to squeeze Tommy’s hand, hoping above all hope that it comes across as the gesture of comfort that she intends it to be. “Your mother will find you, no matter your location. She would die before giving up on finding you.”
Billy cocks his head at her as she pulls back from his brother. “What about you, and Irena?” he asks, observant of her word choice, as always.
“She would do for Irena what she would do for you. You are her children, and she would do anything to keep you safe. As for me?” Agatha hesitates, unsure of how to answer. “I don’t know.”
“Why? Don’t you trust her?”
“It’s not that. It’s . . .” her eyes flicker over to where Jimmy stands around a table with Strange, Wong and a small handful of others. “I’ve heard it mentioned that a version of your father still exists out there. I don’t know where or how, or if it’s actually true, but if it is -” a tear slips free, trickles down her cheek. “If it’s true, there’s no guarantee that there’ll be a place for me in Wanda’s life anymore.” She bites down on her bottom lip, looks down at her hands where they rest against her calves. “If there’s no reason for her to keep me around, why would she?”
Tommy’s frowning at her now. “You’re scared?”
She nods, wipes the back of her hand across her cheeks to clear away the tears. “I know who and what I am,” she answers softly. “And I know that I am not the one best placed to make her happy.”
Tommy squints at her, uncertain about whether to buy her answer. “Okay,” he says slowly. “Why are you doing all this then?”
She smiles, wet and unhappy. “Because I love her, and even if she leaves me, I’ll do whatever it takes to make sure she’s safe and happy.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s what you do when you love someone.”
Billy’s nose wrinkles in confusion. “But why?!” he presses.
Agatha lifts a shoulder, half-hearted. Her lips are fixed into a downwards curve, her shoulders slumped and curled inwards from the way her torso has involuntarily curled forwards over her legs where they’re folded on the ground before her. “When you decide to pursue love, in its truest, most honest form, you’ll find that it is selfless and painful. You will do what you must for the other person, regardless of what the cost might be to you, because you want what’s best for them, even that’s where things between you must come to an end.”
Neither of the boys seem happy with her answers, or the direction that this conversation appears to be going in. “How do you know when you’re feeling that kind of love?” Billy asks.
“The signs are different from everyone, and can come in many forms.”
“What was yours?”
Agatha hesitates, reluctant to share the memory she has of that day. She licks her lips, tugs at the thick knuckles of her right hand. Rough bones crack audibly, even from deep beneath the thick flesh that coats those very same bones.
“We went to visit a English-style country estate just before Irena was born,” she begins slowly. “Wanda wanted to see what the houses I grew up with might have been like, even if the buildings I lived in were separated from that estate by several socioeconomic classes.”
Tommy opens his mouth, ready to interrupt with questions. Billy elbows him in the side though, making a face at him that screams shut up! at the same time as he shakes his head. Tommy huffs grumpily at him, but complies anyway. She smiles, somewhat bemused by the interaction.
“On our way home,” she continues, “we encountered a . . . an anomaly. It lured Wanda in and offered her everything she wanted - in exchange for my life.” She draws in a breath, glances over at where Irena’s sucking absently on her teething ring, eyes drooping sleepily. “And I was ready to give it to her, if that was what she decided she wanted from me.”
Distress marks Billy’s features, unease distorting Tommy’s. “You thought mum would’ve asked you to die?” Tommy asks quietly. Agatha nods. “What about Irena?”
“The being behind the offer was willing to let Wanda keep her.”
“Do you know what they were going to give her?” Billy asks.
Agatha nods. “They were offering her the life she’d had in Westview with you and Vision. I don’t know how they were going to do it, or if they actually were going to give it back to her, but I suppose that’s not really the point.”
“You would have died to bring us back earlier?” Tommy’s still openly sceptical of what she’s saying, but at least he seems to be warming to her.
“If Wanda had asked that of me, yes.”
Billy’s frowning at her, the gears in his mind clearly spinning. “Why did it have to be mum’s decision?”
“It had to be solely Wanda’s decision because magic was involved, and magic is intent. If you’re not sure of whatever decision you’re making, or it’s been made by someone else on you behalf, the outcomes of the deal can be radically different to the ones intended had the decision been made by the person who has supposed to make it.”
“So, mum had to make the decision else bad things might have happened?”
“Essentially, yes.”
Irena gurgles something half-heartedly around her teething ring. Her tiny lids are heavy and droopy, in the early stages of winning out against her desire to not go to sleep. Agatha smiles a litte at this, reaching out and setting the carrier to rock faintly on its runners. The motion is one that has proven time and again to be soothing to the infant, both when she’s distressed and when she’s actively trying to stay awake, though Agatha can never quite figure out why she’d want to do that.
“Well,” Agatha concedes, when she turns her gaze back towards the boys. There’s a look of melancholy on their faces now, as they absorb the information she’s just laid out on the metaphorical table before them. “That and the fact that a decision like that can only really be made by the person who has to chose between the options presented. People have killed and committed suicide over feeling like they weren’t the ones who actually made the decision in instances that were and are not too dissimilar from the one your mother found herself in.”