Ladies and gents, please review if you can - if I don't get any reviews for this chapter, I have decided to discontinue this FanFiction just because there's no point in keeping on writing it if no one is reading. Thank you.

Thanos

This isn't love. Her last words. His Gamora's last words. He can still remember the resolution in her eyes. He knew he would have to act quickly. Before he changed his mind. Just as he freed his beloved Jairus all those years ago. He grits his teeth when he thinks of the child. Khalide. She abandoned her physical body soon after and was forever jumping bodies for years afterwards, trying to get away from him. But Destiny always catches up. He learned that the hard way.

"My Lord." One of the Chitauri approaches him as he returns to the ship. "The Android has escaped."

"Leave me in peace."

It doesn't matter. Not now. Not when he is so close to finally getting what he has waited all this time for. It was in secret that he violated the laws of time and space itself, to find her. The throne room lies humbly in silence as he tears the cloth from the cube. Yes . . . he stares down at the Soul Stone. This day has come at the highest price he has ever had to pay. But if this works, it will all be worth it.

Pointing the gauntlet at the stone, he reaches out to the ominous dark cube atop the pedestal. And almost instantly, he is aware of another presence in the room. A presence filling every nook and cranny, saturating every fraction of air, nowhere, and yet everywhere.

"Who are you?" He growls.

Whispering. "No name . . ."

Not that it matters. But a name has power. "I . . . request your aid."

"Progeny?" They whisper. "Seek you, to defeat Raze?"

"Raze?"

"You who kill . . . and torture . . . the humans . . ."

"They were necessary," he says. "Fear is like a weed. If you don't pull it out, it corrupts the entire crop. Every moment she fears me is a moment that she is not discovering her true power."

"And now you seek?"

Is it necessary? Is it absolutely necessary? "How do I harvest the stone from Khalide's blood?"

Silence. And then what was once a whisper rises to a battle cry. "Do you know how many laws you break by asking for this?! We cannot violate our commands . . ."

His head snaps up. "Who commands you but me? I possess the Soul Stone now. And you will do whatever it is I command without protest."

"We made a promise," the voice moans in agony. "A promise to him . . ."

"Your promises mean nothing to me. You will tell me how I may obtain the stone from Khalide or I will rain fire and smoke upon you!"

"There is only one way for you to harness the power of the Seventh Stone!" The voice weeps. "But the price may be too much even for you . . ."

Gamora is dead. What more can there be to pay? Too far, to ever dare look back. "Tell me."

Phalaesia

No!" Again And again she claws her skin drawing blood as she stumbles out of the chasm. "Fight it! Fight it!" She grasps her head, trying, pleading, forcing.

"Set me free!" The voice of the most evil creature she has ever had the dishonour Of meeting. But where once she was able to silence it, now a furnace attacks her very heart. She can't hold it.

"So you can join him?!" Phalaesia cries. Where is she? This isn't where she came out and W'Kabi is nowhere to be seen. Her vision blurs in and out, and no matter the pain of her wounds, Khalide will win if she doesn't do something soon.

"Fool! I am your best hope against him! I can unite our powers . . ."

"I don't want your help!" She roars. "I don't want anything from you . . ."

"Then watch me take it from you . . ."

That's when the real struggle starts. A struggle where in the dark, she tosses herself to the ground, writhing, sobbing, like an invalid. She knows she can't! To surrender means death to T'Challa. It means death to Wakanda and everything she knows and loves. But even Phalaesia cannot fight forever. And the strength she once thought ran forever, is finally starting to snap as the ground burns under her hands.

"Baba," she murmurs under her breath. "Please don't let it end like this, please don't let me go this way . . ."

"Laesia!"

His voice must be a dream. It must be her body saying goodbye and even that she cannot abide. But sure as the sun rises, there T'Challa runs to her side, throwing his arms around her as he bursts into tears. And only when he draws back does she truly grasp why. There's a blade easily over three feet long, driven into her stomach. Her laughing is the only sound as a broken T'Challa picks her up and carries her off towards the capital.