"What are they doing?" Tony asked, his red and gold armor shining under the war room lights.
Steve pointed to two figures on the surveillance screen, a horned woman with a regal staff and her companion, a wiry ghoul. "Waiting for us, I think."
"No," Loki said, assessing the two and then the spacecraft hanging in the sky behind them. "They wait for their master."
"It's time," Jane Foster said, reaching for Loki's hand. He entangled their fingers but was not brave enough to look at her face. He had shuttered their connection to protect his heart from what this day meant.
Each head turned to her soft voice, an echo in the cavernous room.
"Kids, you ready?" Tony asked, and Shuri and Peter Parker came forward.
"First of all," Shuri huffed, "I am no kid."
Her brother chuckled from his place by Steve Rogers, earning him a glare.
"Second," she continued. "We are ready, though we still do not know everything about the devices Peter stole from the spaceship. I have equipped them as we discussed."
Tony gave a thumbs up. "Okay. So, now you just have to sneak back in and reinstall them, Spiderboy."
Peter dropped his head. "Spiderman, Mr. Stark."
"Uh huh. We pull this off, and I'll upgrade you. Promise. But first rule today is don't die." The two young Avengers started to shuffle away. "Peter!" Tony said from across the room.
Peter turned back. "Yeah, Mr. Stark?"
"I mean it. Don't die on me, okay?"
Peter's face lit up, pride and courage and everything Tony loved and hated to see on a face so young. "Yes, sir."
He watched Peter Parker jog back to Shuri, and the two poked and prodded further at the alien devices. Tony sighed. "Don't die," he whispered to himself.
Steve motioned for the group to gather. He looked at his friends, his enemies, some he didn't know well at all. But all were allies today, and all were fighting toward the same goal.
"Speech time," Tony coughed, and Steve glanced his way. Surprisingly, Tony was grinning, and there was a small measure of healing in the look they shared. Steve nodded once, and Tony returned it.
"No big speeches today. You all have your assignments. First order of business is-"
"Don't die," Tony piped up.
"Right," Steve said and cleared his throat. "We get the stones, then we take out Thanos. Jane will walk us through the next step after that."
"Sounds so simple," Stephen Strange mumbled, and Wong rolled his eyes, using his long sleeve to wipe a line of sweat off his forehead.
"I hope it is," Steve said. He turned his head. "Bruce? What's your status?"
Bruce Banner shook his head and threw his hands on his hips. "He's not feeling cooperative."
Steve nodded. "Then you're in here with Vision, Shuri, and Wong. No one gets anywhere near Vision unless they're standing in this room right now."
"Even then, do not trust them," Loki said. "Our adversaries wield magic, and Thanos possesses the Reality Stone." He squeezed Jane's hand. "Most of it."
"Good point," Steve said. He faced the group of four. "Once we leave this room, trust no one until it's done."
They each nodded, and Vision stepped through a protected area that the Wakandans had worked through the night to construct. An electronic grid slid into place after him at Shuri's prompting, and Vision looked through it at Wanda as she stood on the other side. No words. No tears. Just a look of pure devotion passed between them.
Steve eyed the barrier. "You've programmed who can get in that?" he asked Shuri.
She nodded and waved a hand toward Vision, Bruce, and Wong. "Only the four of us can pass through."
"Okay." He turned to Strange. "And you know where you're headed?"
"Surveillance wing, sure. Who's my team?"
Steve tipped his chin over his shoulder. "You'll have King T'Challa and Okoye."
"And me," a tense Natasha Romanov said as she stepped from the shadowed corner of the room.
Steve sighed. "Yes, and Natasha."
"I'm not happy about this, Steve. I should be out there."
With you. He heard the unspoken words as though she had shouted them.
"Nat, please."
She nodded once, the soldier he needed her to be, but her eyes…for a split second…they pleaded.
Then she turned away, and he wanted to grab her hand, beg her to listen, tell her she would be okay, make her see that he had to do what needed done.
He wanted to say goodbye.
But he stamped down his own wishes, and he watched her move toward the group. Strange opened a portal, and she stepped through with a single look back at him. One look, but a million words behind it. Then the group was gone.
He anticipated the metal hand on his shoulder. "She'll understand," Bucky said. "But after we win, you gotta promise me you'll tell her how you feel. Deal?"
Steve nodded once, clearing his head, and gave Bucky his best grin before turning to Loki and Jane.
Loki stepped forward. "If I know him as I believe I do, Thanos will pursue the Reality Stone first. His lieutenants will have educated him on Vision and Strange. Jane will seem a simple target in comparison."
Steve nodded. "You'll watch her back."
"I will," Loki said, "though I do not believe she will need assistance. The larger issue is that Thanos believes me dead, so I will take my…true…form until I have secured the Space Stone."
He swallowed, closed his eyes, and reached deep within himself. The Jotun was waiting patiently, not dangerous or detested. Simply a part of him now, like an appendage or an organ. Accepted and useful. The pale blue of his skin darkened, deepened, as ridges grew along his arms and legs, his back, and created a crown of runes above his eyebrows. His canines poked into his bottom lip. The cold of his heritage did not chill, but energized his magic to almost a boiling heat.
When he opened his ruby eyes, he met Jane's chocolate brown ones. She was standing directly in front of him, her delicate hands feather soft against his raised brow.
"Jane," he whispered, the first time he had looked her in the eye since waking with her in his arms. She smiled, and he allowed their connection to burst open. They both gasped from the pressure of their emotions, their thoughts, their fears, their damned hopes, rushing into each other. Loki pulled Jane into a shaking embrace, and he silently thanked those around them for this quiet moment.
Jane pulled back slightly, again raising her fingers to the runes carved along his face. "You are stunning."
Without warning, her skin began to turn first a pale robin egg then a royal then finally a midnight navy. Bumps and markings rose from her skin, patterned after his own, and her eyes swam with the same blood red as his.
"Wow," a voice breathed from behind them. They turned their heads as one to stare at James Barnes.
He was watching Jane, then looking between the two, and the awe in his expression would have made Jane's pale skin blush if she had been wearing it. Beautiful, it said.
Loki found no jealousy toward Barnes, not anymore. He stood proud of his heritage, proud to have this extraordinary woman in his arms, the illusion the Aether created boiling the blood of the beast within him. Jane Foster was his in every way.
"And you are mine," she whispered in response to his thoughts. "Forever."
She spoke to Steve Rogers, but she did not turn from Loki. "I know my mission, Captain. If this disguise buys us only a single extra second against Thanos, it will be enough."
Steve watched silently, allowing precious minutes to pass for the doomed couple. He seemed to be the only one in the room unable to forget what was coming. Except perhaps Wanda, who still stood outside the barrier that protected Vision, her eyes shining and cheeks wet.
He nodded to Jane and turned to Tony Stark. "Tony, you'll be in the sky. Bucky will be on the ground. Cover me?"
Tony nodded, no snide remark. For once, he was all business. Perhaps it wasn't only Steve and Wanda who couldn't brush off what was coming.
"Buck?"
Bucky nodded. "End of the line."
Steve patted his shoulder once, then looked at his team. "Let's move out."
.
.
.
Two hundred Wakandan troops waited on the hill outside the complex, men and women dressed for battle with the no-nonsense expression that all Wakandans wore, save for Shuri and occasionally her brother. They watched seven figures emerge and climb the hill, the unmistakable Captain America at the lead, missing helmet and star-spangled shield but not determination. The White Wolf stood to his right as the Iron Man hovered to his left with a young boy squatting on the ground below. Two alienlike creatures held each other to one side, and a lone beauty, her red hair streaming behind her in the wind, stood on the other. The group's appearance intimidated, but it was the raw power emanating from them that energized the Wakandans. They were not regular people. They were heroes. And they would defend the Earth, no matter the price.
A crack like thunder tore the air and drew every eye across the lush fields to where two grotesque figures stood outside the protective barrier. No, not two. A third appeared out of a cloud of swirling black and blue, dwarfing those gathered, his armor pierced by light but refusing to shine. He lifted a massive hand to the shimmering barrier and ripped it away as though tearing a spider's web. Like raindrops, hundreds of dots of black fell from the massive spacecraft, each one landing and unfurling and then sprinting on all fours through the open barrier, oversized wolves scenting a fresh kill.
The seven looked to each other. Words were left unspoken. Glances were exchanged. Silent messages were sent with eyes and hearts and souls until Steve Rogers stepped forward once, twice, and then began to run. The others followed by foot and by flight.
A guttural cry of Yibambe! from one warrior began an echoed chant across the troops, and they fell in behind the heroes. Ready to fight. Ready to win.
.
.
.
"I am Groot."
Rocket sighed toward the ceiling before snapping his snout toward Groot. "No, we're not there yet! And I told you three hours ago to stop asking that."
"What devil approaches us?" Drax said, ignoring the potato chip crumbs across his mighty chest.
"What? There's not…wait! Kraglin, what is that?!"
Kraglin frantically pressed a panel of buttons on the central console. "I'm not sure, other Cap'n."
Nebula had been watching the flashing green button for longer than she cared to admit. It was the sole point of sanity on this hellish road trip with the large moron, the tree moron, the rodent moron, and the finned moron. Mantis had stayed in the med bay with Thor and Peter Quill.
She sighed. Nebula longed to escape this cockpit, but she did not trust this brainless quartet to successfully navigate them to Earth.
As the green light continued to flash and the idiots wound themselves into a greater frenzy over the approaching ship, she tapped the green button.
Do you copy?
The noise in the cockpit ceased, and all heads turned to the source of the voice. She pressed the button again.
Do you copy?
She pressed the button again and again, and again and again they heard, Do you copy?
"The green light indicates incoming messages," she said with no inflection in her voice.
Kraglin scratched his head along the edge of the fin. "Huh. Hey, Drax! You told me it was defective."
"I did not. I would remember that," Drax said, staring intently at the lanky man before him. "Also, who are you? And what is wrong with your hair?"
Nebula reached for a gun, then thought better of it. Rocket flipped a switch, and a second green light began to blink on Nebula's side panel. She pressed it and leaned forward. "Identify yourself."
The message button blinked almost immediately. Kraglin tapped it gingerly, then scurried behind Drax.
Finally! the voice said. We're here on behalf of Loki. We…wait. what? seriously!?...FINE...on behalf of Prince Loki. Dock with us for a conference.
Nebula snapped her chin to Rocket, and he shrugged. She pressed the comm button. "Identify yourself."
My name's Sam Wilson. Heimdall is with me. We have orders to swap ships and give you instructions on your rendezvous with Loki and the Avengers.
Rocket still looked unconvinced. He slid from his seat, came to Nebula's side, and pressed the comm button. "Here's the thing. I don't know what an Avenger is, we don't trust you, and I'm not giving you my ship. So, figure out some way to convince us or we'll blast you out of our way." He released the comm and turned to Nebula. "Good plan?"
She resisted rolling her eyes.
A second voice flowed through the intercom. I am Heimdall. You provided shelter when I, Prince Loki, and his brother needed it. Now, you protect Thor and travel to help defeat Thanos. I saw your team briefly in the void I created to communicate the AllFather's message. I can offer only this information to convince you of our purpose. This, and a renewed promise from my prince to honor his part of the bargain made with Gamora.
Rocket moved to press the comm button, but Nebula stopped him. She pressed it with shaking fingers.
"Tell me the bargain."
Heimdall's voice boomed over the comm. To protect her sister. No matter the cost. In exchange for care and safe passage of his brother.
Rocket nodded. "Hate to say it, but it seems legit. If the big dead guy with dredlocks we pulled outta space is also the big alive guy we saw in that white place, then yeah, we better…what did he say...conference?" He shook his head, mumbling. "Conference. Geez. What are we now, diplomats?"
Nebula again pressed the comm button. "We will dock. Send instructions immediately."
Rocket sprang back into his seat and navigated based on the instructions provided. The ship was smaller than the Benatar, but sleek and pointed like an angry eagle. He salivated a little thinking of piloting a vessel like that.
Nebula pulled both guns from her holsters and made her way to the boarding door as the docking completed. Kraglin followed, and Rocket gave Drax orders to stay in the Med Bay with Mantis. Groot crept behind Rocket with wide eyes.
A lurching sound announced the door opening, and Nebula took aim as a puff of steam rose and a whistle sounded from behind her.
The steam cleared to reveal a single, striking figure, goggles on over a serious face with a defined jaw and even more defined goatee. A leather uniform showed off muscled forearms and two impressive guns while something stuck out from his shoulders, but she could not identify them exactly. Wings? Were those wings on his back?
"Identify yourself," she yelled through the haze.
"Sam Wilson. Who are you?"
"Show us Heimdall."
She watched as a shadow darkened Sam Wilson, and then a gigantic man strode forward, ducking under the doorway. His eyes found Rocket first. "I am Heimdall."
Rocket's jaw dropped. "You sure are." He turned to Nebula. "That's our guy. No idea he was that big."
Heimdall bowed slightly. "I owe you and your crew my life, but my thanks must wait. You will take Prince Thor to Earth on our ship. Sam Wilson and I have a separate mission and must take your larger vessel. Please, show me to my king."
Rocket and Groot led Heimdall toward the Med Bay.
Nebula did not take her eyes from Sam Wilson as he held his guns pointed at her.
"You wanna lower those space pistols?"
She held his eye. "Not particularly."
"Then we're just gonna stand here like this?" he asked.
"It appears that way."
"Alright then," Sam said and got comfortable in his stance. He let his eyes roam the woman's severe face. She was some kind of machine, but feminine. And she held those guns like she knew exactly how to use them. He was both impressed and, though he wouldn't dare admit it, a little intimidated.
Kraglin stepped behind Nebula and whispered in her ear. At full voice. "So, we don't trust them?"
"No," she answered.
"No, we don't? Or no, we do?"
"We don't."
"But Rocket trusts them?"
"I don't care."
"And the big guy's on the ship?"
"Yes."
"So, we only trust the big guy?"
"No."
"So, we trust them both."
"NO."
Sam groaned loudly. "Is he always like this?"
She sighed. "Yes."
A moment of silence swirled between them.
Then Sam Wilson grinned.
And Nebula returned it.
"So, we trust them?" Kraglin said.
Sam and Nebula dropped their weapons and yelled "NO!" and "YES!" at the same time. Then they both tensed and took aim once more.
"Sam Wilson, please lower your weapons," Heimdall said as he moved past the pair, carrying Thor onto the Guardian's new ship.
Sam watched a petite figure, some kind of woman maybe, follow Heimdall. He lowered his guns slightly and looked back at the machine woman. "Were those antennae?"
Nebula tilted her head. "Yes." She eased her weapons down slightly.
Rocket passed her next carrying a box overflowing with what appeared to be junk and trash. "Have you had guns on this guy the whole time? Really? Geez," he mumbled. "Oh, by the way, we're swappin' ships, and it kinda sounds long term. Grab anything you wanna take with us."
Nebula startled. She pushed Kraglin out of the way as she stepped confidently toward Peter Quill's quarters. Gamora's quarters. She inched inside and closed the door behind her. Very little in this room spoke of her sister, but there was one thing that Nebula refused to leave behind.
She found it under the bed, wrapped in the long duster Quill wore over his uniform. She scoffed. Forever a ravager at heart. She unfolded the leather and held Gamora's sword to her chest. Her sister was much more skilled in close combat than she, but she knew this sword, had used it many times when her sister was not watching. It would not be left on this ship, away from her, away from Gamora if…when…they found her. There was an extra scabbard across the room that Nebula strapped over her shoulder. When she sheathed her sister's sword, she felt…something. Not whole. Simply less empty.
She did not dwell on the feeling or on the slight hope that pulsed in her chest as she returned to find Sam Wilson talking to Drax at the entrance to the new ship.
"Flying in five," Sam said as he noticed her approach. "Nice sword."
"If you have wings, why do you require a ship to fly?" Drax asked him, continuing their conversation.
Sam stared straight at Nebula with a long-suffering expression. "I met Drax."
"Yes," she said and shook her head in understanding.
Drax turned to her. "Nebula, we are leaving Peter Quill with this chocolate man bird and the impressively large one from the white room."
Her tolerance, even friendliness, toward Sam Wilson evaporated. He raised his hands, palms up. "Hey, that's Heimdall's call."
She marched onto the new ship, Sam following close behind as Drax asked again about his wings.
"Rocket, we are not leaving Peter Quill behind."
Rocket laughed once, then sobered. "Oh. You're serous? You hate Quill."
She nodded. "But my sister does not."
He looked down then, guilty once more. He reached a hand toward Heimdall. "Want to take this one, big guy?"
Heimdall nodded and stepped toward Nebula. She drew one blaster but did not aim.
"I have seen many potential futures, my lady. The battle with Thanos demands the help of your team, but Peter Quill walks a different path. He is crucial to our mission." He waved a hand between himself and Sam Wilson.
"Explain," she demanded.
"Time does not allow that. But we aim to save lives and bring about balance across all galaxies." He touched his hand to her shoulder. "Just as you do."
She shrugged him off and looked at Sam. He threw his arms in the air. "Yeah, I'm a little lost on this mission bullshit too, but he sees the future. Literally. So, I guess I'm in."
Nebula stared at his face, open and proud and trusting and humble. But also closed and uncertain and suspicious and arrogant.
She holstered her weapon and watched the two men as they headed for the exit. Sam turned just before he closed the door. "Nebula, right?"
She nodded, barely.
He unfolded a smile just for her. "Give 'em hell."
And he sealed the door behind him. She felt the rocking motion as the two ships separated, walked into the cockpit, and watched Rocket and Kraglin marvel at the controls, the autopilot, the glowing blue of a distant planet as they shot across the stars toward Earth. She crossed her arms and focused on the memory of that swaggering smile.
Give 'em hell.
She grinned and savored the cool weight of the sword across her back. Oh, I will.
