A/N: I swear I chatter more in these A/Ns than in any other story's... anyway, most of what I have to say'll go to the bottom, so just enjoy!

Thank you to Dark Cat Food Lover, DeathbyFandoms, and neah20 for reviewing!

Title: Fear of Infinity

Author: liketolaugh

Rating: T

Pairings: None

Genre: Drama/Adventure

Warnings: None

Summary: When Loki mentions two more Infinity Stones, aside from the Tesseract, that fell to Earth thousands of years before, the Avengers are thrown into a centuries-old war between Dark Matter and Innocence - also known as the stones of Mind and Soul.

Disclaimer: I only wish I owned D. Gray-man, and the Avengers are but a dream that is not my own.

Oson nearly collapsed in relief. "Oh, thank god."

Alexei scowled at him. "Be quiet." He looked back at the akuma, teeth bared in angry challenge. "Come on, monster. Fight me and be done."

The akuma grinned, feral and terrifying. José squeaked. "Very well, little exorcist."

Alexei drew back and fired, again and again and again, but the akuma was expecting it this time, braced against the assault with that same menacing grin. Alexei paled, but he didn't stop firing for longer than it took to draw.

"Oh god, oh god, oh god," José muttered, frantic.

The akuma chuckled, and, with only a little effort, straightened up, raised both its arms above its head - the level ones paused in their firing - and then its arms began their terrifying descent downward. At the same time, the akuma fired.

Oson covered Alexei's eyes and shut his own, and José flinched and covered his face.

But nothing hit them; a roar of agony sounded less than three feet in front of them. Alexei frowned and pushed Oson's hands off of his eyes.

The Hulk was crouched down over them, hunched over, breathing harshly and looking worse for the wear where the akuma's blades had dug deep into his back. But they were already healing - even if it looked like something was digging them back in at the same time, pentacles scattering over his flesh and disappearing just as fast in flashes of green - and the Hulk opened bright green eyes again, met Alexei's startled blue, and grinned ferally.

Then he stood up and roared to the skies, turning around to face the akuma.

"HULK NOT LET PUNY MONSTER HURT LITTLE BOY!" he bellowed.

And both his fists smashed down on the akuma. Green light blazed so bright it hurt their eyes, and then the akuma crumbled to dust, unable to retort.

"Wow," José breathed. Alexei agreed.

Then the Hulk roared again and slumped to the ground, and slowly, he deflated into the small man Alexei remembered talking to. Hard to believe they were the same person, sort of.

For a long moment, they all stared at him, unconscious on the ground. Then Alexei took a deep breath and a few steps forward, face setting firmly, jaw clenching.

"A-Alexei?" Oson worried, taking one faltering step after him.

Alexei stopped right over Bruce's prone form and looked up, glaring at the akuma, and then at them.

"Are you going to be coming?" he asked archly.

And he lifted his slingshot and went back to firing while the finders hurried over.

Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit… Tony stared, frozen, at the akuma braced over him, grinning.

He was going to die. He was going to die right here and shit, he hadn't called Pepper since the mission started, she was going to be so mad at him, and Rhodey didn't even know he was here, and neither did Happy, and-

"Man of Iron!"

The akuma's grin vanished as it was surrounded by green and ripped off of him, just as its hand settled over his reactor, icy-smooth and lacking any sense of human warmth. Tony breathed.

"Loki?" he managed after a moment.

"Good, you are alive," Loki replied, swiftly recovering from his moment of panic. "Do not get yourself killed while we fight, understood?"

"...Yep." Tony, too, recovered quickly and smirked, faintly amused and maybe a little in shock. "Don't die. Got it."

"Good."

He backed off, trying not to feel too relieved, and heard a groan that drew his attention. Marie was waking back up.

"I'm down for now, Loki's fine, and Hulk seems to be protecting Alexei," he said quickly, before the man could ask. Marie nodded and pushed himself back up, grimacing and stumbling only a little before rejoining the fight.

Activate.

Tony started, hard; now really wasn't the time for shocks, and that voice in his head… Tony was sure he'd never heard it before, but it sounded familiar for some reason. Like he'd heard it in a dream.

Activate, it repeated, just a whisper in his mind. Level two activation. You can do it.

Tony looked down, frowning. He couldn't activate, his armor was burst to shit-

But his arc reactor was still glowing bright green.

Of course. The Innocence was in his reactor, not his armor. His brow furrowed slightly.

"Stark!"

Tony!

Tony jerked his head up sharply, just in time to hastily avoid a stray bullet. He really hadn't been paying attention; he was lucky that Marie and Loki were keeping the akuma well occupied, binding it and doing their best to strangle it to death, essentially. They were failing, and the strain was showing on both their faces, while Tony ran around like a goddamn chicken with his head cut off, trying not to get in the way.

Tony hadn't realized it before - it had just seemed a retrieval mission - but they didn't have a lot of firepower on this team. Mostly him and Bruce. And both of them were out, now.

He might be out of immediate danger, but he still wasn't sure they'd get out of this, and it froze his blood better than the cold ever did.

Tony couldn't die here. He had too much debt.

Bruce couldn't die here. He was a good guy, and life was too crappy to him as it was.

Loki couldn't die here. He'd just redeemed himself.

Alexei couldn't die here. He's just a kid.

Activate, his Innocence whispered.

The words came to his mind without his prompting or his knowledge. Holding both hands out, he commanded, voice low and tight, "Merchant of Death: Machine Gun."

Yes, it whispered, satisfied.

Green light poured from his reactor like a mist, coalescing in his hands and forming a machine gun he recognized as being one of his own make. He grinned ruthlessly and aimed.

Loki caught his eye and smirked, almost a mirror image of Tony's own, and drew aside slightly. "Marie," he called out.

"I heard it," Marie returned, expression intense. "Now!"

Loki poured power into the spell with a grunt, Marie's Verse of the Saints blasted through the air, and the sound of machine gun fire covered them both.

The Level Four let out a furious scream, loud and long, but it was helpless to resist and crumbled to pieces, scattering across the destroyed landscape as if blown by wind.

When the exorcists finally got themselves together and reached Alexei, who was shooting down the rest of the akuma, guided by the finders as they watched his blind spots, he was pale as death and shaking with exhaustion, but looked ready to keep going until he dropped.

"It's over, Alexei," Tony said heavily, feeling pretty tired himself.

Alexei shot him a wide-eyed, slightly uncertain look, testiness drained by exhaustion. "...Are you certain?"

Tony smiled a little. "Yeah, kid. I'm sure."

Alexei let out a shuddering sigh of relief and released his Innocence, stumbling slightly at the same moment. "Dizzy," he murmured under his breath.

"That will happen," Marie rumbled, looking pretty tired himself. Then, "It is not much farther to the Ark door." He nodded to Oson, who looked to be the more steady of the two finders. "Carry him. Long battles with this little training are a strain on a new exorcist, and even maintaining activation is most likely still difficult for him."

It was a statement of how tired he was that Alexei didn't resist as Oson obeyed, and Tony grimaced.

Well. Hopefully it wasn't as far as it felt like it would be. He was pretty tired himself, and he wanted to talk to his Innocence. It was still talking to him.

And that wraps up this arc. Sorry, Alexei's not going anywhere. (Though I swear to you that he's one of only two OCs that survive. There's one more, but he'll show up quite some time later. There will be more but they won't last long. Because. DGM.) Anyway, that's that, and chapter 1-10 have been revised. There's only like, one major change, in which I dropped a plot point that I didn't have anywhere to go with. (Remember the too-many-minds/souls thing? That. I dropped it.) On the other hand, Innocence is getting a more active, character-type role, as is evident in this chapter. So I might have to revise more chapters to accommodate that.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and please review!