May 25th - Headmistress' Office

[Nailah Weaver]

Putting away her cell-phone after having send Victoria a mail Nailah knocks on the door to Sam's office and steps inside without waiting for the door-trick.

[Samantha McManus]

"Went about as well as expected, I assume?"

[Nailah Weaver]

"Better, yet worse. It seems Doom has been stealing artifacts all over the place and somehow I doubt he is just looking to start a museum. I asked Miss Valentine to meet us here because she knows more about this than I do, but you remember how she gained her 'position' in the future? I think we might still be headed towards that."

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria knocked on the door, more than a little apprehensive about this meeting.

[Samantha McManus]

"She did what she had to, love. I think we ought to trust her for once."

She looked up at the knock.

"Come in, Miss Valentine."

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria entered, looking tired but (surprisingly) unruffled. Granted, her tired look might be due to pregnancy issues (and the fact that she seemed more pregnant than she should be did seem more obvious lately, as time went by), but with all of the magical problems, it wasn't likely.

"You rang?" she said with a slight smile.

[Nailah Weaver]

"Sorry for having to call you here, but I think we might have a problem concerning Doctor Doom and I don't yet trust my capabilities enough to discern what the scepter he tried to steal from the British Museum could be used for in conjunction with a variety of artifacts he apparently gathered before arriving in London."

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria sighed. "I can only guess. They may be to protect him, or to arm underlings, although that one I doubt. Or it may just be that he can't move the ley lines by his power alone... that seems the most likely to me."

[Samantha McManus]

"Is it possible that he needs something tied to each ley line, a local artifact to claim ownership over each?"

[Nailah Weaver]

"The question is if there is a way around that and he goes ahead with whatever his plan or if he will be coming after the scepter first."

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria considered that. "It... might stand to reason," she said, thinking it over. Then she shook her head. "I wouldn't be able to know without seeing the artifact, I think. But... even if he doesn't have it, it would only slow things down." She waved a hand over Sam's desk, and a web of fine lines of light appeared over it. "This is... a crude way to represent it, but it's all I have. If this was a sort of hook to make it easier to move a confluence, he could just do what he wanted." To demonstrate, she touched one place where several lines converged and tugged it to another spot. "But if he doesn't... all things being connected, he can still do what he wants, it'll just take him longer." She put the convergence back, and then set to work tugging other areas of the web, pulling, rearranging, until those movements had tugged the original convergence to the place she'd moved it to the first time, distorting the rest of the web in the process. "Honestly..." she hesitated. "If he tries to do something like this again, makes a grab for an artifact to help him, it might be better to let him get it and figure out how to follow him and stop him in the process instead of having him fall of the radar and... well, do that," she said, gesturing to the damage to the rest of the web that she'd done. "I could be wrong, of course, but I think that's how it would work."

[Nailah Weaver]

"Do we even know more moving of the lines is what he is planning to do? It isn't entirely reliable but one of the women he had attempt to steal the scepter mentioned something about drawing in energy and she at least believed that to be the truth, so to me this seems what he was preparing for with moving the ley lines. Either way would likely be catastrophic if we don't interfere."

"As would sending Victoria along if she would even agree to in her current state." she mentally adds with a glance to Sam, not having had a chance to get to that particular worry before Victoria had arrived. "But if she insists on helping we should keep in mind that even if she does have the potential to face Doctor Doom, the possible consequences of that are almost as worrying."

[Samantha McManus]

"From what we do know about how this could turn out, if we let this get too far before confronting him then the question isn't about whether this energy gets gathered, but instead who it goes to."

"Even though that's a victory, I think it's one that all of us want to avoid considering the price, aye?" She asked, looking to Victoria.

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria smiled, slightly and unamused. "Ah, I see where this is headed. Are we going to face Doctor Doom, and then have to worry about a threat that some of us might not want to hurt, and that some of us will be far too willing to hurt." The fact that it was being laid out like that stung a bit, but she wasn't about to show it on her face.

[Samantha McManus]

"Not my point, Victoria."

"Rather, the reason we all got involved in this, yourself included, is because your future self rather hoped she wouldn't have to take up that mantle, aye?"

"And as I said, if we wait until he's gathered all that energy, then that ship has sailed."

[Victoria Valentine]

"Oh, if we wait until he gathers the energy up, there won't be a point to anything," Victoria confirmed. "Just Victor Von Doom, lord of a barren, dying rock." She considered. "Of course, he could probably make off with that power to a different world. Wow... that is a good plan. Maybe he's not an idiot," she added thoughtfully.

[Nailah Weaver]

"The point remains that we need to stop him. No one is implying that you would jump at the chance that might present itself, Victoria. For my part I am worried that it may not leave you a choice if we're not careful. We have begun to deviate from that future, but I feel we are still being pulled towards it, especially when dealing with an energy like this that, in a way, has a mind of it's own."

"There's a storm brewing and we have to be careful for the lightning not to strike anyone. Whether they plan on it or not."