Stark exhaled through his nose, One Hand resting straight along the edge of the table, fingers lightly tapping the surface.
"We all feel sorry about it." Natasha propped her head on one hand. "But everyone has misfortunes in their past. To keep them from affecting the future, we absolutely cannot make up for our regrets by traveling through the timeline."
Stark suddenly looked up. Natasha had already risen from her chair and begun pacing behind the desk, while Stark's eyes tracked her back and forth.
"All employees of the Time Variance Authority follow this principle: we can only be observers of time. We must never influence the people within a timeline, because once someone's Destiny changes, everything connected to them in the future will change as well."
"That change may not necessarily be for the better. More often than not, it could bring about an even greater disaster. It is merely a question of prolonged pain or brief pain. A moment of weakness will only create more tragedies..."
Natasha had never been such a talkative person. Alarm bells rang in Stark's mind.
In the past, Stark's brilliant genius mind would never have turned in this direction. He had never spent even a moment using his intelligence to unravel those complicated interpersonal puzzles. He simply let them rush past him like flowing water. Even when the torrent of noise had completely submerged him, he could still amuse himself with the genius ideas in his head and pay it no mind.
That was the kind of person he was. He cared intensely about others' opinions and basked in their praise, yet in truth, he did not care about any of it at all. He discarded it like an old shoe and turned a blind eye to it.
But now, at this very