It All Started In A McDonald's...

talking to disembodied voices - first sign of madness

And finally, it was the moment of truth. I made the last turn and found myself face to face with the front gate of the Tower. Half an hour early, but who cared? It proved my punctuality was on point.

I inhaled deeply and allowed myself a moment to reflect on what I was about to do. The miniscule percentage of my mind which was programmed to flight (like, 0.5%, about 99.5% of my brain was programmed for fight) started subconsciously considering plans of retreat, but now there was no way I was backing out. How could I? I had had the phone call. I was here. I was wearing the fucking hoodie, never mind the t-shirt. I was going in.

That thought had just about passed through my mind when I realised that, in fact, I didn't know how to go in.

I frowned as I examined the entrance. A plain double door about twice, maybe even three times my height, and a security panel to the left of it. I headed over, as though there might be some instructions. Of course I was disappointed. There was nothing but buttons and more buttons and a speaker and... a camera. I jumped at the sight of this, then felt stupid, certain whoever was manning security at the moment was wheezing. I stepped away slightly, out of the camera's view, and frowned. Come on, Jamie, use your brain if you have one.

No answers came to me. So I did the old-fashioned thing and knocked on the door.

A pause. Then I knocked again, a little louder. Suddenly conscious of my appearance, I turned to look over my shoulder. I was a sixteen year old kid with bright purple hair and a bright yellow hoodie knocking on the Avengers' front door. I know I'd be suspicious if I saw me.

I was about to knock again when something near my left ear crackled. It was so quiet most would've disregarded the sound, but for me, being super sensitive and all, the sound made me jump into a combat stance. It just made me even more shocked to hear Loki's voice afterwards.

"Jesus, Jamie, stop waving your arms. You'll attract attention," he said, and I only just pinpointed the source of the noise as being the speaker in the security panel. So he manned security? I thought it's be a lower level agent dude of some description. Whatever the case, I let my arms drop.

"I'm attracting attention already, let's be honest. Anyway how do you know it's me?" As far as I knew, I was out of the camera's line of sight.

"This is The Avengers' HQ. It's built by Stark. Did you really think he only has one camera for his entire security system?" Loki said, and even through the speaker, he sounded exasperated. I guessed for good reason.

"So, um, hi anyway," I said, choosing to move on. "So how does one request entry to the Tower?"

There was a silence on his end. "Ring the doorbell?" he suggested, as though it was the stupidest question he'd ever heard in his life. It was, but the answer didn't help one bit, as there were approximately fifty buttons on the security panel.

"Which one's that?" I asked, examining the panel. I realised too late that my face being so close, and the position of the camera, would allow whoever was watching the cameras (and at the moment this was Loki, I suspected) to have a perfect view up my nose. I stood back at the arrival of this thought.

Loki's voice faltered again. I had the uncomfortable feeling I'd already let him down, for some reason. "Right, never mind this, I'll just let you in."

I barely had time to take a deep breath before there was a flash of bright green, temporarily blinding me, and then the doors slid open rapidly. As soon as my sneakers passed over the threshold, they slid quietly behind me again. I found myself in a disappointingly underwhelming parking lot... shouldn't the Avengers have a more interesting entrance to their Head Quarters? Maybe this wasn't the main entrance. Oh God... I hoped I hadn't gone through the tradesman's entrance. That could be embarrassing.