Never As It Seems

Meanwhile...

It had happened so quickly. There they were, standing in line like the innocent people they were, when Flames had been forcibly grabbed out of nowhere and taken to the room next door. 

Rick had barely had time to comprehend that it was happening before Flames was gone; otherwise, he might have shouted a few useful words of advice at him on the subject of interrogation rooms. Too late, though. He did shout, mostly at the men who had grabbed him, and they, of course, did not listen. Or hear. 

He pushed through the line past many startled people to the desk that it led to and looked the lady sitting there, who was looking quite surprised and concerned, directly in her eyes. 

"What was that?"

"What was what? I'm sorry..."

He indicated the door. "Did you not just see that? They just took a guy away."

She nodded in understanding. "Oh, yes, that. Well, I imagine they're holding an interrogation."

"Yes, yes, I get it. I want him out. Now. I need him for something, something pretty big, and I can't just stand here and wait around for him to get out. Time. It goes by quickly."

"I'm sorry, sir, but I can't do anything. You can't do anything but wait for your friend to be released, I'm afraid. In the meantime, do you need anything else?"

"No, it's fine. I don’t care anymore." He turned to Annmarie, who had followed him and was looking at him like he needed urgent medical attention. "We're going to have to wait here, I'm sorry."

She shrugged. "It's okay. We don’t need uniforms, then?”

“Nah, it’s not that big a deal. Want to grab a chair?"

"Sure." They walked over to the more comfortable looking chairs and sat down. 

"So," said Rick. "Fun turn of events. Well, we've sure got a while. Want to talk?"

"Can we do anything else, really?"

"No."

"I know, it was a rhetorical question. So. How did you get involved in all of this?"

"In all of what?"

"You know. Everything around here. How did you find out about it? Did you come here when everyone else did, or what? Flames hasn't really told me about what he did. So. That's my first question."

"Hey, Flames is the one getting interrogated here, not me."

She laughed. 

He scratched the area behind his ear and leaned back onto the couch. "Anyway. It's kind of a weird story, actually. No, I didn't come over here when everyone else did, but you know that guy we mentioned earlier? Adam?" She nodded. "He did. He was the one who got us in to this whole mess. See, he needed Flames - younger Flames - to come with him to the future to fight the Fuzzy Guys - ha, they weren't even a threat then compared to now. And before they left they went to Owatonna, I don't know why, I guess they needed something. I had stolen my friend's car - you've been in it - and it crashed right in front of them. So that's how we met."

"It just crashed?"

"Yeah. Almost into a fence. Wasn't really near them at all, but still close enough that I could see them. And I was super confused, as you can imagine. Especially by Adam, although Flames came as a pretty big shock too."

"Why?"

"Why? Come on, you're telling me you wouldn't be surprised by that?"

"Well, what was it about it that was confusing?"