THE OLDEST MAXIMOFF | Stephen Strange

3.8

"Strange! Nadia!" Mordo shouted over to the pair. "You're both okay," he sighed in relief upon seeing them amble through the sanctum.

"A relative term but yeah, we're okay," responded Stephen to Mordo after gazing at Nadia for a moment.

Mordo gestured his finger to the burgundy cloak wrapped around Stephen. "The Cloak of Levitation. It came to you."

A new feminine voice appeared next to the three, her hands resting behind her back. "No minor feat. It's a fickle thing," the Ancient One spoke calmly while watching Nadia and Strange.

The former surgeon turned back to look once more to the abandoned chains that was holding Kaecilius captive. "He's escaped."

"Kaecilius?" The Ancient One questioned him.

Nadia couldn't hold back the sarcastic response waiting on the tip of her tongue. She spewed off a response to the Ancient One before her brain could keep up and hold back her words. "Who do you think Stephen's talking about? The Joker?"

The Ancient One merely only stared at the Maximoff woman before Stephen started to talk, responding to the Ancient One's question. "Yeah. He can fold space and matter at will."

"He folds matter outside the mirror dimension....in the real world?" The Ancient One asked, not having known this fact about Kaecilius before. "How many more?"

"Three. I stranded one in the desert as Nadia shoved one into a random forest."

"And the third?" She queried the two.

"Dead in the hallway," Nadia answered her when she noticed Stephen's shift in emotions. He became quiet and she could tell he felt bad about the zealot's death despite him working with Kaecilius. "Master Drumm is in the foyer."

"He's been taken back to Kamar-Taj," Mordo informed the two about the master of the New York Sanctum's whereabouts.

"The London Sanctum has fallen. Only New York and Hong Kong remain now....to shield us from the dark dimension. You two defended the New York Sanctum from attack. With its master gone, it needs another," at her words, Nadia glanced over to the man next to her with her hand only a few centimeters away from his, her body itching to reach over and close the small gap between their fingers. She knew the Ancient One's words were more so aimed at Strange than her but she wasn't upset or angry at that. "Master Strange," the new title rang in both of their ears but Nadia could tell he didn't want to take that position.

"No. It is Doctor Strange. Not Master Strange. Not Mister Strange. Doctor Strange," he corrected her, fed up with everyone getting his name all wrong. "When I became a doctor, I swore an oath to do no harm and I have just killed a man! I'm not doing that again. I became a doctor to save lives, not take them."

"You became a doctor to save one life above all others. Your own." Ancient One snapped toward him and Nadia felt the need to inch closer to Stephen and would defend him against the Ancient One if she said anything else.

"Still seeing through me, are you?" Strange asked with a sigh.

"I see what I've always seen: your over-inflated ego. You want to go back to the delusion that you can control anything....even death....which no one can control. Not even the great Doctor Stephen Strange," the older woman chorused through the sanctum.