Alice watched from the City, the lab specifically where Shuri worked tirelessly to remove the stone from Vision as Wanda looked on. She'd begged the woman to be allowed to stay there and eventually Shuri had agreed. She had been asked to evacuate with the others but had refused, she was tired of running and even though she knew Steve would be pissed at her she also wanted to be close to him. She had to see him with her own eyes. She spotted him with the others, lined and ready for battle. Huge monsters were bombarding the force field, squeezing limbs and bodies partly through only to be severed, seeing them begin to circle Steve and the others Alice couldn't help but squeeze her hands together tightly and stop herself from shouting out in anguish.
"How much longer, Shuri?" she heard T'Challa's voice over the comms.
"We've barely begun, brother." Shuri answered as she delicately constructed something out of gold light with her hands which reproduced her commands on the Mind Stone itself.
"You might want to pick up the pace" Alice heard the reply and looked back to the field quickly. A deep rumbling could be heard even at their height. As Alice looked down on the battlefield, she could see movement through the blazing forest between the troopships and the dome. When the disturbance reached the edge of the trees, it turned into vast moving mounds of earth that easily bypassed the force field and emerged.
"Oh God!" Alice whispered as she saw the sets of massive, motorized spiked wheels, intended for nothing more than shredding everything in their paths. She watched on helplessly as at least one set of Threshers separated into individual wheels and started veering all over the battlefield and then looking anxiously at Wanda she saw that she was looking back at Vision.
"I have to go!" Wanda told Alice as she began walking from the lab.
"Are you sure?!" Alice replied and immediately closed her eyes at her own stupidity. "I mean… yes. Be careful!" she added. "Can I do anything?" she asked Shuri when Wanda had left.
"Just keep an eye on what's going on down there!" Alice nodded and turned back to the window but turned back quickly when she heard a commotion coming from outside the lab.
"Behind you!" Alice shouted as Shuri hastily started disconnecting her equipment from Vision's systems. Seeing him gasping at the sensations Alice went over to his side, just as Shuri finished her shutdown she grabbed one of her sonic panther-paws and fired at Glaive who was now stalking towards her.
"Help me," Vision told Alice as he tried to stand. Alice grabbed his arms and helped him up as the Dora attacked again but Glaive sent both them and Shuri through the balcony railing and onto the main lab floor. As glass flew everywhere Alice focussed on Vision. "Thank you," Vision said as he moved Alice to one side and charged at Glaive, knocking him out the window to fall many meters down the face of Mount Bashenga. Alice ran to the now open window with her mouth agape but quickly turning to see Shuri still on the floor she made her way over and began helping the woman.
"Are you alright? Wait, stay still. You're hurt!" she said as Shuri started to sit up.
"I'm alright," she said with a pained voice.
"What do we do now?" Alice asked.
As Thanos studied the completed gauntlet, a massive bolt of lightning hit him, digging him into the ground and grinding him back for meters. Thor, eyes glowing with power, stooped down from the sky like a bird of prey. The God of Thunder paused his attack, reversed his position and raised Stormbreaker above his head hurling it at Thanos who fired the whole might of the gauntlet against it. A rainbow-like bow shock appeared and not slowing the axe it slammed right into Thanos' chest.
"I told you, you'd die for that!" Thor shouted at Thanos who was down on his knee. Taking hold of the back of Thanos's head and forcing Stormbreaker deeper into his chest Thor stared angrily into his eyes while Thanos cried out in pain.
"You should have... You... You should have gone for the head!" Thanos said as he raised the gauntlet and snapped his fingers.
"NO!" Screamed Thor as Thanos looked down at the now scorched and distorted gauntlet, the stones no longer glowing. "What'd you do? WHAT DID YOU DO?!" Thor shouted as Thanos seemingly no longer noticed Thor before he used the Space Stone and teleported away, leaving Stormbreaker behind on the Wakandan ground. Steve stumbled into the clearing, holding his left side.
"Where'd he go? Thor... where'd he go?" he asked.
"Steve?" Bucky suddenly stumbled over and collapsed into ashes as Steve stood shocked. Walking over he touched the ground where Bucky's ashes lay. As Rhodey, Natasha, Bruce and Rocket appeared and saw Vision's dead body Steve knelt beside him.
"What is this? What the hell is happening?" Rhodey asked in disbelief.
"Oh God!" Steve rasped out as he sat beside Vision's body. "Alice!" coming to stand he looked at Nat who already had tears in her eyes. Holding his earpiece Steve radioed Shuri. "Alice is she…?" he asked as there was a pause.
"I'm sorry Steve, she's gone. I don't know…" Letting out a roar Steve turned and slammed his fists into the tree nearby, the trunk splintering into a million pieces.
Avengers Compound – Twenty Two Days Later
Steve stood in the bathroom shaving. He studied himself in the mirror, he looked exhausted. Going to tap his razor in the sink's water he stopped when he noticed the water rippled. Steve stared at the water puzzled, not before noticing the lamp next to the mirror gently swaying. He found himself outside a moment later with the others as the silhouette of The Benatar raced past, propelled by Carol Danvers. As he ran towards Tony Stark as he came down the ramp supported by Nebula, Steve took Tony's arm.
"I couldn't stop him," Tony told him with anguish in his voice.
"Neither could we," Steve replied trying to keep the lump in his throat from cracking his voice.
"I lost the kid," Tony whispered and Steve could do nothing but nod.
"I...lost..." Steve couldn't say the words but was gratefully interrupted by Tony who was looking around.
"Is Pepper...?" he asked as Pepper Potts threw her arms around his neck. Steve could only stop and stare and get lost in his own thoughts and how he would feel if only he had Alice's arms around his own neck.
"It's been twenty-three days since Thanos came to Earth," Rhodey told the others as he and the rest of the team who weren't in the room were seen on a holo-display. Tony sat in a hi-tech wheelchair, IV dripping into his arm he listened carefully.
"World governments are in pieces, as you can imagine. But the parts that still work are trying to take a census. It looks like he did what he said he was going to do." Natasha said quietly as Tony could no longer look at the pictures of people who had been lost were displayed. "Thanos wiped out fifty percent of all the living creatures on Earth." She continued.
"Not just Earth," Carol added.
"You sure about that?" Rhodey asked her angrily.
"You never have to ask me that," Carol replied flatly.
"Where is he now?" Tony asked weakly.
"We don't know, he just opened a portal and walked through." Steve replied as Tony looked up and saw Thor sat outside on the patio.
"What's his deal?" Tony asked no one in particular.
"He's pissed," Rocket answered as Tony noticed him for the first time. "He thinks he failed. Which, of
course, he did. But there's a lot of that going around, ain't there?"
"Until this second, I literally thought you were a Build-a-Bear." Tony said as he creased his brow in confusion.
"We've been hunting Thanos for three weeks, deep space scans, satellites, we got nothing. Tony, you fought him…" Steve started but the look on Tony's face made him falter.
"Who told you that? I didn't fight him, he wiped my face with a planet while a Bleecker Street magician
gave away the store. There was no fight because he's not beatable." Tony said raising his voice, obviously in pain both emotionally and physically.
"Did he give you anything to go on? Clues, co-ordinates…" Steve asked seeing that the man before him was losing his cool. Tony just stared, barely acknowledging Steve.
"I saw this coming, few years back. Didn't wanna believe, I thought I was dreaming..."
"Tony, I need you to focus…" Steve tried.
"And I needed you, as in past tense. That trumps what you need. It's too late, buddy. You know what I need? I need a shave and a burger, not a bowl of soup." As Tony struggled to stand Steve looked on in pain himself. "And I believe I remember telling all of you, alive and otherwise, that we needed a suit of armour around the world, whether it impacted our precious freedoms or not…"
"But that didn't work out, did it?" Steve couldn't help but reply angrily.
"I said we'd lose, you said we'd "do that together, too." Guess what, Cap, we lost, and you weren't there. But that's what we do, right? Our best work after the fact? We're the "Avengers", not the "Pre-vengers…"
"Tony, take it easy..." Rhodey told him, not only because he was worried for his health but also knowing what Steve had lost, what they'd all lost.
"I've got nothing for ya, Cap. No co-ordinates, no clues, no strategies, no options. Zero, zip, nada. No trust." Ripping out his RT he pushed it into Steve's hand. "Here, you take this. You find him, you put this on, and hide." Steve looked on in horror as Tony dropped to his knees.
"When Thanos snapped his fingers, Earth become ground zero for a power surge of ridiculously cosmic
proportions. No one's seen anything like it." Shifting the map and crossing billions of light years to an orange planet Rocket continued. "Until two days ago."
"You're saying he snapped his fingers again. Where?" Nat asked as Rocket zoomed the holo-image toward a cluster of stars.
"Planet is unnamed, but inhabitable. Rich atmosphere, good soil…"
"A garden," Steve finished, in his mind's eye he could see their garden in Wakanda but the bridge and pond had been added that Alice had asked for. Clearing his throat and shaking his head he hoped the others hadn't noticed.
"Thanos is there and he just used the stones. You know, we'd be going shorthanded." Bruce said.
"Because he killed all our friends," Rhodey said glibly.
"Are we saying they're dead? We're using that word now?" Rocket asked shocked.
"He's still got the stones," Rhodey added quickly.
"So, we take them. And we use them to bring everybody back." Carol answered confidently as Steve looked up at her and nodded slowly.
"Just like that?" Bruce asked disbelievingly.
"Yeah, just like that." Steve agreed, for the first time in a long time feeling that there was light at the end of the tunnel. No one spoke, each one of them lost in their own thoughts until Nat sat up.
"If there's even the smallest chance we can undo this, then we owe it to everyone who's not sitting here to try." Everyone looked around the room at one another, silently agreeing.
"If we do this...why would it end any differently than it did before?" Bruce couldn't help but ask.
"Because before you didn't have me," Carol answered.
"Hey, new girl. All of us in here are about that superhero life. Where've you been all this time?" Rhodey couldn't help but ask her.
"There's a lot of people in the universe, and they didn't all have you." Steve stared at the planet for the longest time and then looked to the group standing before him.
"Let's go get that son of a bitch."
Benatar Flight Deck - Space
Natasha looked at Steve who was staring at a compass with Peggy Carter's faded photo inside. Catching her eye Steve smiled and put the compass away.
"Alice told me to always keep it with me, said it was my good luck charm…" he trailed off, not knowing or wanting to explain his feelings for the only two women in his life that he had loved.
"This is going to work, Steve." Nat told him quietly.
"I know it will…" he replied. "Because I don't know what I'm going to do if it doesn't." Seeing Carol fly up to the other side of the glass the pair listened to her on the comms channel.
"No satellites, no ships, no armies. No ground defences of any kind, it's just him." She told them.
"That's enough," Nebula whispered as the Avengers exchanged a look.
As smoke curled from the chimney of the solitary lodge Thanos limped towards it, his left side paralysed and arm blackened. Stirring the pot over the fire he was suddenly grabbed from behind, preventing him from closing his fist around the gauntlet. Thanos jerked back as the Hulkbuster sprang inside and Carol and Rhodey crashed through the roof followed by the others. Thor, swinging Stormbreaker cut off Thanos' hand without a second thought. As the Gauntlet landed at Rocket's feet and he picked it up Steve noticed his face go slack. Turning the glove over towards the others Steve saw that the stones were gone.
"Where are they?" Steve asked angrily, not answering Carol forced him to his knees.
"Answer the question!" she told him as she held her arms round his neck.
"The universe required correction. After that, the stones served no purpose beyond temptation." Thanos finally replied.
"You murdered trillions," Bruce muttered.
"You should be grateful."
"Where are the stones?" Nat asked him again.
"Gone, reduced to atoms." Steve's felt like he was going to be sick.
"You used them two days ago!" Bruce asked in disbelief.
"I used the stones to destroy the stones, it nearly killed me but the work is done." Steve stumbled back as Rocket searched frantically for the stones.
"No...they can't be gone..." he said as he continued to look.
"He's lying," Rhodey said in disbelief and Nebula stepped forward.
"My father is many things, a liar is not one of them." She whispered as Thanos looked at her, almost lovingly.
"Thank you, daughter. Perhaps I've treated you too harshly," Steve stared in horror as Thor's axe severed Thanos' head from his body.
"What did you do?" Rocket asked aghast as Thor just stared at nothing.
"I went for the head," he whispered as he walked away. Steve could do nothing but look at Thanos' head on the ground. It was all over, they had lost.
Hi, hope you're still enjoying this?! Please let me know what you think by laving a review it would be very much appreciated? Thank you for reading and the follows/favourites XOXO