The circle starts
“Master Strange.”
“Stephen. Please.”
He put a few books onto the desk in front of Wong. The man looked through them.
“The reason of life. Is there a special purpose for you reading into this?”
Stephen looked up at him and shrugged.
“I- I don’t know. I want to understand it. This reason we are here. Why I am here.”
Wong nodded without a change of expression.
“Very impressive how you overpowered Master Mordo today”, Stephen smiled.
“Thank you.”
“You still have tons to learn.”
He gave Stephen the books.
“I- Yes. I know. But I think I’m on a good path.”
The doctor nodded his goodbyes and left.
“You think it really is him?”, Wong asked while writing down which books Stephen had taken with him.
“I don’t know who else it would be”, the ancient one said as she stepped out of the shadow of the corner she had stood in.
“He needs to find himself.”
Wong nodded.
“What was his deepest wish? You saw it, didn’t you?”
The ancient one bit her lip.
“Something he probably would never admit. Love.”
Stephen read through the books like a marathon runner. He couldn’t stop. Not until he understood. He was cursed with a photographic memory but somehow the words he read didn’t want to stay inside his head. After hours he sighed and looked up from his book.
“Oh, shit!”
Stephen put his hand over his heart in shock.
“How long have you been looking at me?”
“Long enough”, Mordo smiled.
“She wants to talk to you.”
Stephen got up from his chair and followed Mordo to another room. The ancient one was already waiting.
“Ah. Stephen. Please, have a seat. Thank you, Master Mordo.”
The man nodded and left his student and the woman alone.
“You look tired.”
“Yes, well- I’m trying to understand all this stuff.”
“But?”
“But it doesn’t make any sense and I swear to god, if you say your usual sentence right now, I’m gonna riot.”
She smiled at him sadly.
“You can’t let go of your ego. That’s the problem You think you have to immediately understand everything. You still do.”
“Well, my ego got me pretty far.”
“Are you aware of your deepest wish? What it is?”
Stephen frowned.
“Honestly, whatever you think you know, you’re not as clever as you think you are. We all have longings. But realistically, most of them would bring us even more pain. I would like the function of my hands back. And my work. And my reputation. All of it. And don’t come at me with emotions”, Stephen said in disgust.
“Emotion. Funny. Love. Devotion. Sentiment. You know what sentiment is? Sentiment is a chemical defect found on the losing side. And love, as you call it, is a dangerous disadvantage. Everything that makes you vulnerable can and will be used against you at some point. You can’t run from your mind. That’s what I have learned in life. I didn’t need this place for that. Or your books. I don’t want you to turn me into something you think is good for me. Because I know better than that.”
She looked at him with serious eyes.
”You will be stuck in your downfall until you accept it, Stephen. That you as a human being need to feel. You divorce yourself from all emotion yet it is all buried deep down in your heart. And it makes everything heavy. Horrible.”
He got up angrily.
“I tend to not think so. I tend to be very happy with things how they are. Keep your dirty fingers out of my life. Because I know where they were before. How does it feel to have bad magic inside of you? The dark dimension”, He grinned.
“Funny how you are a bundle of mistakes who thinks they can fix perfectly functioning geniuses. Excuse me now.”
She stared at him with big eyes.
“Stephen.”
She took his hand.
“I am doing what I have to do. Sometimes the rules are doing us no good.”
He ripped his hand away.
“Exactly. Sometimes the rules are doing us no good.”
Then he walked away. The woman looked after him with tears in her eyes. She could feel Stephen’s pain. His unbelievable pain and fear. And then she felt something big. Something unexplainable. A change in time. A change in her surroundings. The pages in the books around her turned back to where they were days ago, food that had been gone appeared again, the sun was vanishing and coming back up in seconds and the words of the letter she had written slowly vanished word after word. And suddenly it dawned on her.
“God, no-“
Stephen had something around his neck when he had come in. Probably because he was practicing magic. That wouldn’t be a big deal but- if he truly was the chosen one, the Sorcerer Supreme, the man that they all had waited for- then the Eye of Agomatto would listen to him.
“No.”
She rushed to Stephen’s room, just to find it being untouched. The Eye of Agomatto was gone though. And with it the time stone.
“Master Wong! Master Mordo!”, she called for the two of them.
All three were overwhelmed by what had just happened but they soon understood their situation.
“The Eye of Agomatto is protecting the Sorcerer Supreme. With Stephen feeling this much pain- it would start a time circle. A time circle that would go on until he fixed whatever causes him this pain."
It would go on until Stephen Strange would fulfill his deepest wish.