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𝐄𝐩𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐝𝐞 𝐓𝐰𝐨, 𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐎𝐧𝐞

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> London, Uk, 1977 was the first place Ivy, Loki, and Mobius set out to find Sylvie. Here the plan was to blend right into the movie premier that was happening right around the corner. Ivy decided to wear a suit just as Loki and Mobius did for practicality. She opted for a navy blue one instead of a boring black and white combo.

"Thoughts?" Mobius questioned as the three exited out of a time door.

Loki looked around and sighed, "Sylvie's not here."

"We just got here." Mobius pointed out.

"It doesn't feel right."

"I know, but why?"

"In the past Sylvie has chosen apocalyptic areas." Ivy noted. "This seems to be the exact opposite to that."

"Maybe she's changing tack." Mobius countered. The trio began to walk to the front of the premier. "Plus, we got a hit on a TemPad that belonged to Hunter X-5 before it went dark."

"Well, if the TemPad went dark, then she found him first. No question." Loki stated.

"Yeah, I don't disagree." Mobius nodded. "But you said you both said you wanted to find Sylvie, right? With Dox and X-5 not responding, this is our only lead."

The trio made their way around the swarm of movie fans outside of the venue and snuck in through a door just off to the side of the main door. Once they were inside, they were met with even more of a crowd. This crowd however consisted of nicely dressed actors, producers, and other celebrities all standing around engaging in small talk.

The uniformed caterers standing off to the side reminded Ivy of a mission she did once years ago where she was disguised as a waiter. A ball was being held in honor of a very wealthy businesswoman who hired SHIELD to help make sure no funny business went down. Unfortunately for everyone involved there were a group of people who poisoned some of the drinks. Ivy hoped this mission would go a lot smoother than that.

"X-5 is an actor now?" Loki questioned.

"Or he's undercover." Mobius countered.

Ivy looked over to see X-5 walk through the main doors and immediately began greeting everyone with brief small talk. "Yeah, not too sure about that."

As X-5 was going around the room greeting everyone, Mobius decided to sneak into the line of people the hunter was talking to in order to catch him off guard. Ivy and Loki's jobs were to stand guard in case the hunter tried to walk off. Which is exactly what X-5 did the second Mobius confronted him.

"Let's catch up now, maybe." Mobius suggested as X-5 walked right into Ivy and Loki. "What are you doing down here?

"Hi." X-5 nervously greeted, trying to play off to the others in the room that everything was okay. "I'm actually really glad to see you three."

Loki seemed to notice the cameras flashing in their direction to which he seemed very smug about, smirking back at them. Ivy noticed this little moment to which she lightly elbowed him, earning a small "Hey!?" from the god. They were here for information, not an ego boost, Ivy thought.

"Um, I need to catch you guys up on what's going on here. But I think first we could all use a drink, right? What are you drinking?" X-5 questioned Mobius.

"Surprise me."

"Okay, how about you two?" The hunter turned to the other two. Both Ivy and Loki turned down the offer. "All right. We'll do whiskies." He then walked away.

"It's okay to have a drink while we're down here because we're still working." Mobius made note.

"Is he running now?" Loki questioned.

"He is running." Mobius realized suddenly.

All three took off after X-5 in separate directions in hope of cutting him off. Despite this both Mobius and Loki crossed paths and just barely missed him out the side door. Ivy on the other hand thought more about where the hunter would most likely end up. She remembered that when the three first came through the time door she made note of a half-abandoned building near where the premiere was happening. Originally, she made note of it as a place Sylvie could potentially be hiding at but now, she saw it as the perfect place someone might run to. This prediction ended up being proven correct by the fact that X-5 ran right to where she was keeping guard over the exit gates.

"Oh, come on!" X-5 yelled.

"How'd you know he'd come here?" Loki questioned as he too ran into Ivy.

This time it was Ivy's turn to smirk, ego rising just a bit. "I'm a trained spy, remember? I know a thing or two about catching someone."

Before Loki could make a remark back X-5 cut in. "Hey sorry to interrupt whatever you two have going on," He waved his hands around. "But I'd like to get going now." He then pulled out a device, switched a few buttons, and then vanished into thin air.

Ivy shook her head in disbelief, "What the hell just happened?"

"I don't know, but I have a plan. Follow me." Loki then turned and walked back down the dark hallway.

Ivy noticed the particular look in the god's eye before he turned away, it was one that reminded her that he was in fact capable of heinous things. She wasn't sure what scared her more; what that look meant in this particular moment or the fact that she wasn't exactly mad about it.

Once Ivy and Loki made it back out of the building Loki walked over to where he somehow assumed X-5 would wander to. A dimly lit alleyway between two businesses that were closed at this hour.

"Stay hidden." Loki whispered to Ivy as he himself hid on the side of one of the buildings.

Ivy looked around confused for a moment, wondering what his plan could possibly be. She decided to listen to what he said anyway and hid alongside the opposite building.

Loki's plan then revealed itself when all of a sudden about two dozen men appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the street. Ivy gasped to herself when this happened. She knew Loki had powers, he was a god after all, but these people looked and sounded so real that it was hard to grasp that what was happening wasn't real. These people were just lounging around having full conversations all the while they were entirely fake. At this moment Ivy thought to herself that her little roadblock move just minutes before looked minuscule in comparison to this. She also wondered why in the world Loki never pulled anything like this in the past.

Eventually after a minute or two X-5 did show up just as Loki predicted. Loki then made the illusion of people begin to heckle the hunter as he tried to push past him. This angered him so much that he began to try and fight one of the fake people. X-5 grabbed a pipe that was laying on the street and swung it at the person. When the pipe "collided" with the person a bright green light flashed signaling to the hunter that he was being played.

"So unsophisticated, X-5." Loki stepped out of the shadow,

"Of course." The hunter grumbled, throwing the pipe to the side.

"You're doing your own stunts now?"

"Real cute, real cute." X-5 began to take out the device from before but this time, with a wave of his hand, Loki magically swatted it away.

"You quit with the magic and fight fair." X-5 yelled, turning to run again. This time running into Loki who appeared right in front of him. This time Loki let him have a head start.

"It's not a fair fight." Loki sighed.

Ivy took this moment to also come out of the shadows and approached Loki with an expression that signaled that she was severely confused by what in the world was happening.

"I'm a god, remember? I also know a thing or two about catching someone." Loki winked and then walked away to go torment the rouge hunter more.

Ivy stood there for a moment, a million different things rolling around in her head. She was so stunned by whatever the last five minutes were that she wasn't able to make out anything from the million different thoughts. And she stayed there frozen until she heard Mobius talking to Loki and X-5 around the corner.

Snapping out of her jumbled thoughts, Ivy turned the corner just as Loki was making the two other fake clones of his disappear. Safe to say her confusion only escalated when she noticed not only were there clones in the first place, but also that Hunter X-5 was being restrained by what she assumed was two of Loki's shadow clones.

"Yeah, I'm going take a nap." Ivy nodded to herself.

****

Once everyone made it back to the TVA X-5 was taken into processing while the other three got dressed back in their TVA "uniforms". Eventually they met up with Hunter B-15 and Hunter D-90 as they escorted X-5 into his holding cell.

"Suits you." Loki joked in reference to X-5's prison uniform.

"You must love this." X-5 grumbled.

"It's tighter than you think it's gonna be, isn't it?" The god continued to pester.

"Yeah. I'll get you a looser one next time."

"What is this?" B-15 interrupted the two's bickering by holding up the device X-5 used to teleport with.

"That's a TemPad."

"What did you do to it?"

"I put some colorful buttons on it for you"

B-15 was losing her patience. "You will tell us if you found Sylvie when you've had time in holding."

"Right. 'Cause I'm a criminal, right?"

"Okay, come on. get in there." Mobius waved for X-5 to be locked in the holding cell.

D-90 sighed once he returned from dragging the other hunter into the cell. "I see X-5 didn't go quietly."

"Quietly is not his strong suit." B-15 pointed out. "But he will talk once he's had time to marinate."

"If I've learned anything from the dozen or so questionings I've done, it's that they all eventually talk." Ivy referenced her SHIELD work. "It's all a matter of how and when at this point." The others all nodded in agreement.

"So, what about this?" Loki pointed to the TemPad.

"Have O.B. check it out." B-15 suggested.

And with that Ivy, Loki, and Mobius were left to do a side mission that was to figure out what in the world X-5 did to the TemPad. Once more they found themselves going through the maze of hallways and elevators to get to the Repairs & Advancement room.

"O.B.? Hello?" Mobius called out to the seemingly unintended room.

There was no reply back but the three began hearing quiet muttering and the sound of random things clinking together. When they peered over the counter, they were met with the man they were looking for surrounded by random wires and gadgets.

"O.B.?" Loki questioned.

"Oh! Hey, guys." O.B. smiled up at them.

"Uh..." Ivy paused, leaning over the counter more to see what in the world the guy was messing with. "How are things looking?"

"Well, the Loom is in rough shape." O.B. answered. "But I'm trying to figure out a retrofit device to handle all those new branches."

"Uh, O.B., could I get you to take a look at this Tempad?" Mobius asked.

O.B. jumped up quickly and took the device from Mobius, flipping it around to inspect it. "Ah. Interesting. Yeah, I can definitely get into it. Do you think this is a higher priority than preventing a Temporal meltdown?"

The three all at once spoke over each other to confirm that no, the meltdown was definitely of higher priority.

"Seems prudent. Okay." O.B. nodded and then held up a TVA guidebook. "Everything you need to know about this, I wrote about it in here." He then went back to meddling with whatever it was before they got there.

****

At this point the trio had spent several minutes trying to understand what the hell the guidebook was trying to tell them about the device with zero luck.

"I'll screw this back in, right?" Loki questioned Ivy and Mobius who were trying to read the book. "That's what it said on page seven."

"No, no. Section 42 should match with the system manager." Mobius correct, flipping through the book of gibberish.

Ivy snatched the book, flipping through it her own self, "Wait, wasn't that page 50?"

"Well, either way is that the one with the red light? Cause we've tried that already." Loki pointed out.

"Well, try it again." Mobius snatched the book back; Ivy gave an offended look at this. "Cause you didn't have that pressed back, did you?" He pointed to a specific spot on the modified TemPad.

"It's too complicated." Loki sighed, hating every second of this. "You're the super spy agent here." He looked to Ivy. "Don't you have experience with this kinda stuff?"

"Yeah, I may be able to tell you how to disassemble a loaded gun, but not a time travel device I didn't know existed until quite recently." Loki nodded sadly at this.

"Wait, am I on the wrong page or..." Mobius began talking to himself. "I was just seeing upside down."

"I literally just said a minute ago the page was wrong." Ivy shook her head, down with this whole situation. There was a man sitting in a cell not far from here ready for questioning and yet they were here deconstructing the seemingly impossible.

"If we don't work this out, this place is gonna be destroyed. Temporal meltdown or not." Loki remined.

"Casey, tell them what you just told me." B-15 came around the corner with Casey, temporarily stopping the three from their investigating work.

"Miss Minutes is helping Renslayer." The three all looked up in alarm.

"Hang on." Loki looked to Ivy for help on how to explain something. Ivy in return had no idea what he was going to say. "Um, when we were in the past, we heard something. An old conversation between Renslayer and He Who Remains." So much has happened since then that this piece of information slipped Ivy's mind. "It sounded like they were partners.

"She really is... Full of surprises." B-15 fake smiled, annoyed.

"You can say that again." Mobius mumbled. "Where are they, Renslayer, Miss Minutes?

"Not sure, but I'll keep searching." Casey answered. "If there's a hit on the TemPad, I'll let you know. But it'll take some time, so..."

"How are things going here?" B-15 noticed Loki who was struggling as he fiddled around with the modified TemPad.

"No, not that great..." Mobius began.

"It's all right." Loki cut in. "We'll get there."

Ivy leaned her head to the side, eyebrows knitting together. "Will we really though?"

"What is that?" Casey questioned.

"It's just a rigged TemPad." Mobius answered.

"What does it do?"

"That's what we've been trying to figure out." Ivy looked over to see that Loki knocked something loose on the device. "X-5 somehow got it to block TVA tracking.

"That's not what it does." Casey reached to take the device from Loki. "Yeah. Haven't you read the TVA Guidebook?"

"I mean, I haven't memorized it, but..." Mobius admitted.

"Uh-huh..." Casey began to inspect the TemPad. "I mean, it'll take me a while to analyze the modifications, but this definitely doesn't block any trackers, that's for sure."

"That's where we'll start with X-5." B-15 stated.

Loki dropped his pen down on the desk and began to stand. "Let's take a run at Brad Wolfe."

Mobius did the same thing. "Let's take a big run at him."

"Ooh, interrogating." Ivy smiled, taking her jacket off of the back of the chair. "Now the fun begins."

Mobius momentarily stopped in his tracks, looking at the spy with a slightly alarmed expression. "You know, sometimes you scare me more than him." He pointed at Loki. Ivy smiled, taking this as a compliment as Loki frowned, offended by the statement.

****

"Okay, keep it simple. Where's Dox? Where's Sylvie?" Mobius began telling Ivy, Loki, and B-15 the plan. "And what did he do to that TemPad? That's all we need to find out. Okay? But of course, Brad knows us, and he knows our tactics. But that's what makes for an interesting chess match. Okay, most of all, Brad's an asshole. So, don't let him get under your skin, all right? Okay? Loki? Ivy?"

"What?" Loki seemed genuinely confused by the accusation. Ivy chuckled at this while rolling her eyes.

Once the four of them entered the room they stood around where X-5 was sitting on a stool. The room was entirely empty except for them, the stool, and one folding chair in the corner. The lights were dimly lit which made the already dark orange walls and floor even darker. Ivy was reminded why she never liked orange in the first place.

"Oh, welcome back." X-5 turned around to face them. "Why don't you go ahead and take this Time Collar off and start treating me like somebody who outranks you?"

"I don't work here." Loki corrected.

"And neither do I." Ivy gave a fake smile.

"Oh, that's a good point. You both should stop talking." X-5 shot back.

Ivy just rolled her eyes in annoyance. She had been through enough interrogations to know not to let lame insults get to her.

"Hey, what were you doing down there on the Sacred Timeline?" Mobius questioned, trying to get the interrogation part started.

"Making movies."

"Don't waste our time, X-5." B-15 stated.

The now ex-hunter turned the stool towards her. "It's Brad. Bradley."

"Right, Brad. Let's cut to the chase, shall we?" Loki took this chance to start questioning more. "What did you do to this TemPad?"

X-5, Brad, sighed. "It blocks your trackers."

"No, it doesn't." Loki corrected.

"Yeah, no shit."

"What is it designed for, X-5?" B-15 cut in.

"It's Brad."

"Like we give a shit." Ivy quietly muttered under her breath, staring at the floor. And though she didn't notice, Loki overheard this little comment and had to hold back a laugh.

"And under whose authority are you holding me here." X-5 began to rant. "Because looking around, I do not see anyone ranking high enough to make that call."

"I don't need approval to detain a hunter that abandoned his post." B-15 defended.

"Oh, that's good. That's good. But weren't you the one blabbering on and on about how we all had lives on the timeline?" X-5 mocked. "Well, I went down and got my life. What exactly are you mad at me about?"

"There are lives at stake." Loki cut in.

"There are lives at stake?" The prisoner played dumb. "Oh, you've got some nerve. 'There are lives at stake'."

A wave of discomfort washed over the room. Everyone knew exactly where this conversation was going to go, and they weren't sure how things would end. Ivy seemed to instinctively and subconsciously walk a little bit closer to Loki.

"Everyone here knows what you're doing, you know?" X-5 continued. "You're just trying to make up for all the terrible, awful shit you've done in your life, you pathetic little man."

"Okay, that's enough." Mobius tried to interrupt.

"No, no, Mobius. No, it's..." Loki interrupted him, smiling. "It's riveting. Keep going. I want to hear more."

"Good." X-5 nodded. "See, everything you have ever done to try to help, has only ever made it worse."

"Is that right?" The almost completely blank face Loki held made Ivy feel on edge. She had no idea what he could possibly be thinking and no idea how long he was going to keep it up. She herself certainly wouldn't be so calm looking while being targeted like this.

"See, I've read your file." X-5 continued his speech. "It's you. You're the problem. Every time we've ever found a you. Problem is, you think you're special, but you're not. So, it doesn't matter what outfit you put on, play dress up or what little lies you tell your friends or even the lies you tell yourself. At the end of the day, you just make everything worse. For Mobius, for B-15, for Ivy, for your