Hey, guys so I actually re-wrote this chapter because I didn't like the one I posted first, so this has the same gist, just better writing. After this we have one last chapter, so we're almost done!
"No, no, no, no," Quill whispered harshly under his breath and dropped Gamora's wrist. Tears pricked his eyes when he couldn't find a pulse, and his chest tightened when he put his hand under her nose to check for air. There was nothing. No breath, no pulse of a heart beating. She was dead.
"C' mon, don't do this to me," Quill cried, moving his hand out from over her face to her chest, pushing down and started chest compressions. He remembered learning it, but not exactly from who. It must've been on Earth, shown with vague memories of someone showing him how to hold his hands and where to put them. He started pressing down in the compressions, Stayin' Alive playing in his head. Each beat of the song was a compression, a really easy trick to remember. Something in the back of his head whispered doubts that it would even work. She was Zehoberei, not human. They had a different structure than humans, but as far as Quill knew, there was only one anatomical difference, and it wouldn't affect any of them.
"Doc!" Quill practically screamed, before pinching her nose and tilting her head back and breathing for her. This wasn't like any kiss they've shared before, this was the kiss of life, and it wasn't working. Quill shouted for Strange a second time and started more CPR before he looked over his shoulder to see Strange just as occupied. He was pressing onto the bleeding chest of another fallen man, and Thor was following Strange's direction and doing CPR on Loki as well.
"Give me a second, Quill," Strange muttered under his breath. He heard the other man's cries and he saw that Gamora was stuck in the same situation, but he was a little preoccupied.
"Banner, I need you down here!" Strange shouted, trying to stem the slowly decreasing blood flow. Which was another bad sign, beside the fact that was a gaping puncture hole in his heart? With the blood flow slowly decreasing, that meant the heart wasn't pumping anymore. It was really hard to get a heart to start beating again and paired with the amount of blood that had been lost, it was near impossible.
Someone had heard him call for Bruce and the resident Avenger's doctor came running over, a small bag of medical supplies that he had grabbed in the amount of time he had. "What happened?" Bruce was given no answer but immediately dropped and took over Strange's position over Heimdall. The gauze pads that he brought and used to press against the wound. Getting no progress Bruce grabbed a small knife and cut down the middle of Heimdall's shirt, getting a better look at the mess. He pressed down against the wound, similarly alarmed about the slowed rate of the blood and soaking up with clean gauze.
"Quill, keep doing CPR, I'll be there in a moment," Strange shouted as he sprinted from Heimdall to where Loki was laying. Strange pressed two fingers against the Asgardian's neck, not missing the intense bruising indented on the skin. Chokehold, or, by feeling around the back of Loki's neck where things seemed a little out of place, snapped.
"Keep doing compressions," Strange ordered Thor, quickly showing him what to do. Stephen ran a hand over his face, wiping sweat from his forehead as he ran over to Quill and Gamora. Nothing here was scientifically possible, so scientific methods like CPR weren't going to work. But he had to try something until he figured it out.
Strange dropped down to Gamora's side and ordered Quill to keep doing chest compressions while he checked out the rest of her. Quill had said what killed her, pushed off a cliff and she fell to her death. Bruising marred her body everywhere, but Strange was really at a loss.
"How'd this happen, Strange?" Quill asked desperately, not letting up from CPR. Strange was almost at the point to tell him to give up. They weren't dealing with regular injuries here. All three of them had died, somehow managed to come out of the stone world for a few moments, until they died again. The soul stone was still a part of this, it was just up to Strange to figure it out.
Strange sat back and stared at the three bodies. Thoughts flew through his brain, offering scenario after scenario, but none of them seemed right. "I guess… it's possible that the transition from the Soul World back to Earth kept them alive for a small amount of time. Some of the stone's powers probably glitched when they came out of the stone, letting them 'live' for a certain period." As he spoke, Strange got more excited. He was going somewhere. While he pondered the moment, Quill broke through his thoughts.
"I don't need what's possible, Doc, I need something that's going to bring her back!" Strange was running out of ideas and time was running even faster. While the three bodies in front of them weren't necessarily human, nobody could last long without oxygen and blood flow before there was absolutely no hope of bribing them back. But at the same time, they weren't exactly dealing with the regular here. They had crossed the reality line long ago, and there was no turning back now.
Every idea he had didn't seem to have a plausible outcome, all except for one. He wouldn't even have considered the possibility of it had there not been very important lives at stake.
"Being them all here," Strange ordered, and out of the corner of his eye watched as the three bodies were lined up next to each other, shoulder to shoulder. He sprinted up to Captain Marvel, who was the only one powerful enough to truly hold the gauntlet and not be completely corrupted by its power. No regular person could hold an infinity stone without some magical aspect, and the wielder of the infinity gauntlet had thoughts implanted in their brains by the power, and they weren't exactly pleasant.
The gauntlet, paired with the power of all the stones minus one spoke even unspeakable stories, sharing secrets and thoughts with the person that came in contact with it. After he had come out of the stone, it finally cracking and Wanda's piers helping them all escape, he was told how Thanos died. When he looked at Nebula, he couldn't ignore the haunted look on her face. Even now, as he came to a running stop in front of Carol—who held the gauntlet tight in her grip—he could see the mental battle for control in the expressions of her face.
Stephen knew what he needed to do, as much as he didn't want to. With only a haphazard explanation of his plan to Carol, Strange took a breath and grabbed the gauntlet from her hands. Instantly, her face relaxed from the constant bombardment of her brain and she let out a sigh. But while she got quick relief, Strange got the same mental load she just had. Strange knew about the effects of holding nearly all the stones, but none of that knowledge prepared him for the complete end laughs of thoughts the poked and prodded at every corner of his brain.
Suddenly, he was thinking things that he never dared to bring up, and for half a second, he almost saw Thanos' reasoning and logic for wiping out half of humanity. He pushed that aside, not wanting to accidentally get rid of all the hard work they had been doing just because his mind decided to wander. However, it was dangerous to have that much power. He could control the universe with it. He would never be mocked, ridiculed, or laughed at. He would have all the power in the universe, and everyone would be under his control, with just one snap of his fingers.
To his horror, Strange snapped out of his thoughts and looked down to see his gloved hand aimed to make that fatal snap. He shook his head and forced the gauntlet's probing thoughts to the back of his mind, focusing on the mission. In a mix of awe and horror, the rest of the heroes took a step back as Stephen stalked to the bodies. He stood over them, gauntlet outstretched and eyes shining. He wasn't sure it was going to work, but he was going to try.
Strange had gotten his idea back when he first started learning about the time stone and its powers. It had confused him, there were too many variables unaccounted for, too many things that could go wrong. But he had immediately became intrigued when he started testing out the capabilities of the stone on the apple that had sat on the desk in front of him. The correct spells, hand movements, and concentration let him take the apple with the single bite travel forward in time. One bite became another, then another, until all that was left was the core, and then the core itself started to mold and grow grey. Leaving the apple there to rest for a moment, Strange changed the spells and the movements until he was going backward in time, bringing it not only back to the singular bite it had, but even further, to where it was a full apple.
The principle itself was mind-blowing, but after going head-on in a continuous time loop with Dormammu and fighting Thanos, Strange thought it was nothing more than a regular Tuesday afternoon. Except for the fact that this wasn't an apple he was trying on, it was people.
Everyone was behind him, except for Bruce. His hand hovered over Stephen's shoulder, not touching but letting him know that he was there. Strange needed to focus, but Bruce had one final question. "Are you sure this is going to work? Have you done it before?" Bruce asked worriedly. They were about to use the time stone to fix injuries and restart a still heart. Not something anyone had ever done before. Strange sighed, and Bruce knew the answer.
"Technically, yes. I've done it before," Bruce gave a half smile and stood back with the others as Strange finished his own sentence. "On a piece of fruit."
When he was ready, Strange kept his eyes shut and his face pulled tightly together. He shouted out the spells, getting louder and louder as the gauntlet glowed brighter. Slowly, the time stone shot out green energy, and with the same motion that put the apple back together, Strange started putting the people back together.
With Bruce standing as close as he could, the impossible seemed to happen. The sluggishly bleeding wound on Heimdall's chest started to close up from the front to the back, and the bruises around Loki's neck slowly started to fade away. One by one the injuries started to fade out from the dead heroes, and the rest of the living heroes held their breath. Strange didn't know how much longer he could hold on. His legs were turning to rubber and his arms shook with strain. Sweat dripped off his forehead, and he was so close. They were almost done: everyone was almost safe and they could go back to living as 'normal' lives as possible.
With three sharp gasps, Loki, Heimdall, and Gamora each took a breath and opened their eyes. Strange dropped his hand and let his eyes open, sweat and what could've been tears rolling down his cheek. It was over.
Strange was allowed a moment of reprieve, just a chance to see loved ones reunite and embrace. The bodies were healed and healthy, back to the condition there were before they died: just like the apple. However, the moment of the break was over almost as soon as it started. The gauntlet grabbed the reins and took control once again. Strange had used the time stone to bring them back, but he was sure there was influence from the other stones as well.
Fighting to keep the thoughts of world domination aside, Strange walked over to where Vision's broken body lay still, forehead crushed in and gray. Strange couldn't let him have the mind stone back, it was too powerful and too dangerous for him to have it out in the open like that. But Wanda's powers came from the stone even though she didn't have it with her, so couldn't he do the same thing? Strange took a breath and dove back into the mind of the gauntlet, using the time stone to return color and form to Vision's body, while some of the mind stone's powers to transfer memories and abilities that he had back to the android's brain.
When Vision started to move, Strange walked back out to the middle of the Wakandan field, with one final task. Nobody had enough control to actually wield the stones and keep a rational mind about them-even Strange could feel himself slipping down into the mind gutter. He argued against doing this earlier, but seeing hand first the destruction the stones were capable of there was no way all that power could wind up in some egomaniac's hands again.
The pounding in his head and ears grew louder as the stones seemed to know what he was about to do, and they tried to fight it. Suddenly he felt wind blowing and Carol touched the ground beside him. She placed her hands over the gauntlet, red and yellow plasma energy floating around her. With a final destructive thought, the infinity gauntlet with all the stones floated up off Strange's hand with the help from Carol's powers and exploded in a flash of blinding white.