Avengers: Don't Get in My Way

Chapter 4

Wanda sat at the top of the hill near the Barton farmhouse under the velvet night sky, dotted with white dots of light so far away, staring into the infinitude that it represented. Her breathing was fast, labored, and she ran her hands back through her hair, her body wracked with the fear of what she had just done.

Behind her, the house still stood, no thanks to her. In her nightmare induced rage and fugue, she'd almost destroyed the home of the people that took her in as family, that were her friends. She'd almost done only God knows what to them, all because she couldn't handle the terror and rage of the dream she'd been having.

Their home was almost completely destroyed, and they could have been killed if Nathaniel and Lila hadn't snapped me back to my senses. What if I hadn't snapped out of it? What if I lost all sense and control and destroyed this entire place? Why have I become like this, so powerful, powerful enough to destroy on such a large scale? How did this happen to me? she thought as she wiped her cheeks several times and curled her arms around her knees to try to stop shaking.

The cold grip of fear tightened around her, and now she understood why everyone had started to fear her after the explosion she accidentally caused while trying to apprehend Crossbones. She understood why Vision had told her that if she left the safety of the Avengers compound, people would never stop being afraid of her. She'd responded that she couldn't control their fear, only her own.

Only I can't control my own fear, can I? Since I returned from the oblivion that I was sent to when Thanos enacted the Snap, I've been different, much different. Am I even the same person I was before then? Does the true Wanda Maximoff even exist anymore? If not, what returned in her place? Who am I? What am I now? These thoughts raced through her mind as she shivered in the passing wind, but her shiver wasn't from the chill in the air. It was the chill within herself.

The sound of light footsteps in the soft grass behind her brought her thoughts back to the then and there. Before she could speak, Clint came over the rise and sat down next to her on the hill. He sat close to her, but not close enough to crowd her personal space.

"Hey, Wanda, how are you feeling? You okay?" he asked in a light tone in the hope that maybe it would help her calm down and relax. He drew a deep breath and let it out in an exaggerated sigh of relief. "Man, dreams can really get to you, you know? I haven't slept right since old Scrotum Chin snapped his fingers and the world went to shit. Nightmares every time I close my eyes, it seems like."

Wanda closed her eyes a moment, trying to hold on to some sense of composure, before she opened them once more and replied, "I almost destroyed your home and killed you and your family. I'm feeling like shit, so no, I'm not okay." She ran her hands back through her hair once more as her gaze returned to the infinite star field above them.

Clint nodded softly and reached up to lightly rub the Sokovian's back. After a moment, he spoke quietly, "Yeah, maybe. But you didn't Wanda. You managed to get yourself together. With powers like yours… well, I can't pretend I know what it's like, but from what I can see, they're not so easy to control. They seem like they mirror pretty much what you're feeling. If you're pretty calm and mellow, no problem. You get angry or excited, something like that, you can keep them in check. Get royally pissed off or hurt, you're like everybody else, it's hard to control yourself.

"Your powers are just part of that, like punching a wall or something. You aren't your powers, Wanda. They don't control you or dictate what you do. The person you are isn't going to let something bad like that happen. You scared the bejeezus out of us, maybe, but that's all it was, a scare. The Wanda I know, and that I'm sitting next to right now, is a great person. Scared, angry, pissed off, whatever you want to call it, but that doesn't make you any less a great person. It doesn't make you any less our friend, or our family."

He paused, letting those words sink in, before he patted her shoulder and waited for her to turn towards him once more. "Now, besides the obvious, what do you think is messing with your head?" he asked with genuine concern. He thought that maybe if she had calmed down some, maybe she could put a finger on what was going on with her.

The young woman turned her head towards him once more, but there were several moments of silence as she seemed to be collecting her thoughts. Finally, she exhaled and answered, "Since I came back, I've been… different. Changed in some way." She spread her hands wide as if to encompass something before going on, "My powers are stronger, and they seem to be changing too. I can do things that I wasn't able to before. At least, I don't think I was. In either event, I'm doing things I've never done before, or knew that I was capable of."

She trailed off again, so Clint finally nodded and gave her even more of his undivided attention. "Yeah, you said that before, after the funeral," he replied, still watching her eyes and face. "You seemed like you were going to say something else there. What's wrong? Are you trying to get a handle on it, or are you afraid of it?"

"Both," she answered candidly, fixing her eyes on him. There was a combination of certainty and dread in them. "I can sense… something, I'm not sure what. As crazy as it sounds, I think I can sense the stones, as I told you before. Now, though, it's more than just sensing them. I can feel them. It's not just some vague impression; it's something concrete, something real. Their power feels like it's building, I just don't know what it's building towards. It feels fragmented, broken… but it's as if they're rapidly healing, I don't know how else to describe it. I can feel them pulling towards something, towards each other, maybe."

Clint listened, and the more he heard, the more concerned he was becoming. The stones were something to be locked away and kept out of the reach of everyone. Their power was too strong a temptation, and as mad and corrupted as Thanos was, it was possible that they made it worse with him or could cause it to happen to someone else. That wasn't something anyone wanted to find out.

"I'll tell you what," he said as he drew out his phone and started scrolling through contacts. "Let's get in touch with the big brains and the magic guys, and see what they think. Ask them whether such a thing is even possible, and if it is, what would be making it happen. Sound like a plan?" He began dialing a number as he spoke.

Wanda nodded but suddenly stiffened and froze in place. She was staring up towards the stars, and her breathing increased to a rapid rate, almost to the point of hyperventilation.

Wanda…

Thus far, Clint hadn't seemed to notice. He was busily talking to someone, presumably Bruce or one of the other resident geniuses they had at their disposal, completely oblivious to what was going on with the young woman.

She felt a chill run down her spine like cold lightning, and she blinked rapidly. Her eyes were welling up and there was a torn feeling growing inside her. It felt like she was going to be rent asunder from the inside.

It shouldn't have had to be you, but it was…

The voice echoing in her mind was impossible, but one she'd yearned to hear again since that day in the Wakandan forest. She drew her knees up high and buried her face in her hands, whispering to herself over and over, "It can't be, it can't, it's impossible."

You didn't hurt me, Wanda. I just felt you. I need to be whole again. Bring me back to you…

Clint finally heard the whispered mumbling, though it was indistinct. Indistinct or not, it raised his concerns, and he reached over to touch her shoulder. "Wanda, are you okay?" When she didn't answer, he spoke rapidly into the phone, "Bruce, I don't know what the hell is going on, but there's something happening here. Wanda needs our help, I just don't know what that help would be. She's starting to spook me a little, she's like she's in her own little world."

The Sokovian girl pressed her palms against her eyes while her fingers gripped and tugged at her hair. "How?" she asked in a strangled and cracking voice as her body shuddered violently. "Viz…? How do I do that?"

You said you just felt me. Feel me now, find me… Your heart will show you the way…

"Viz?" she called out louder, staring at the sky as she rose to her feet abruptly. She frantically searched the sky, as if expecting to see her fallen lover somehow. The sight made Clint jump back a little in shock.

He stopped talking into the phone for a moment, ignoring the excited and concerned voice on the other end and looked up at her. "Vision's gone, Wanda. You know he's gone. I'm so sorry, I'd do anything to help you get him back, to get them all back. Vision, Nat, Tony… all of them. But we can't, Wanda."

Find them all to bring back the one… Reality is askew, it needs to be put right once more…

The girl could hear nothing except the soft voice whispering in her mind. She could hear his voice, she could feel his presence. As she felt him when she examined the stone, she could feel him then. She could feel him as surely as the sun rose and set day after day. Clint's words were lost in the cacophony of echoes that spoke to her in Vision's voice. Nothing reached her except the whispers only she could hear.

"Big Guy, I think all hell's about to break loose," Clint said quietly into the phone as he watched Wanda with widening eyes. "Wanda's in La La Land, and it's not looking like the trip is a pretty one. So, the faster you can all get here, the sooner we can bring her back from wherever it is that she thinks she is at the moment. Put it to the floor, okay?"

Wanda's hands stretched up towards the sky as she lowered her head with her eyes closed. Red energy began to slowly swirl around her hands as she whispered incomprehensively to herself. "They call to me," she finally said quietly as her head began to rise once more. "He calls to me. I can feel him… I can feel them. I will put things right again. Things will be as they should be."

"What calls to you? Who calls to you? The stones?" asked Clint with more than a little trepidation. His call to Bruce Banner had ended with the team on the way, so he was trying to placate and stall Wanda from whatever it was that she was about to do. He didn't believe she was going to conjure a midnight picnic or anything, so most likely, it wasn't going to be nice.

Wanda's eyes began to glow the same red they had before, and the glow slowly intensified. She fixed her gaze upon Clint and nodded. "The stones, yes," she confirmed as she continued to weave the patterns with her hands. "With their help, I can fix everything. I can make everything the way it's supposed to be instead of this broken half life we are living now."

Clint's brows rose as he listened to her, and he was unsure of how he should react, because he had no idea of how she would react. "There are no stones, Wanda," he said sadly. His friend was obviously slipping into a very bad mental state brought on by intense, unimaginable grief. "They were destroyed. Thanos used the stones themselves to destroy them, to blast them into atoms. They're gone."

Wanda's expression hardened as she lowered her arms, though her hands still moved in the odd intricate patterns she used when she used her powers. "You can't truly destroy anything. You can only change its state of existence. I'm going to go find them and bring them back," she said quietly, though her expression was cold and set hard. "I'm going to show you, show all of you. All I can say is don't get in my way."

Wanda's expression softened a little, and even through the glow of her eyes, Clint could see the warmth that he knew was in there. She thought she could do this crazy thing she was intending to do, and if she'd been in her right mind, she'd never have even conceived of such a crazy idea. He knew that despite her cold expression and the rather obvious warning in her voice she wasn't planning to hurt him or anyone else. She simply believed that the craziness she was talking was actually possible. Whatever it was that she thought she heard had her going on wild goose chases.

Before Clint could say anything back, she waved her hands in a circle and a light appeared in front of her and expanded. It spewed out a reddish hazy fog fading to black in the center, and after a split second's hesitation, Wanda stepped into it and disappeared. Behind her, the reddish haze dissipated like fog in morning sunlight. In seconds, it was gone and so was Wanda.

X

Twenty minutes later, the quin jet had set down not far from the hill. Bruce Banner stepped down the ramp, followed closely by Dr. Hank Pym. Hank's wife Janet was right behind him, and several of the others were there as well. They approached Clint as he came down the hill with a rather frazzled expression on his face. Bewilderment was written all over his face.

After a couple of moments of quick greetings, Hank and Janet approached him as they cast a couple of looks up the hill that Clint had come down from. "What, exactly, happened when you say she disappeared?" Hank asked as he adjusted some sort of meter he held in his hand.

"Just that, Doc," replied Clint as he rubbed the back of his neck and looked up the hill a moment. "She did that thing she does with her hands when that red stuff is swirling around her, her eyes started glowing, and this red light opened up in front of her. There was a lot of red and black fog, then she stepped into it, and right after that, the fog went away and she was gone. It looked kind of like when Thanos would do his vanishing act."

"Can you show us where it happened, please, Clint?" asked Janet, who also held a handful of equipment. She and her husband exchanged looks, and seemed to be almost talking without saying a word.

Clint nodded and started back up the hill, where he and the Pyms were followed by Bruce and the heavyset man from the Sanctum, Wong. As they walked up the incline, Bruce adjusted the sling that held his damaged arm and asked, "What did she say? You said she was talking kind of deliriously and that she thought someone was talking to her?"

As they reached the top of the hill, Clint pointed out the exact spot that Wanda had disappeared from, and turned to face his teammate. He shrugged at his friend, and replied, "Yeah, she kept calling out Vision's name, and then said she was going to get the stones and bring them back. I told her that the stones had been destroyed, they were gone, but she said nothing could ever really be destroyed, you could only change its state of existence or something like that."

"Our young friend is correct," chimed in Hank as he scowled at the readings on the equipment he and his wife were using. "Matter can be broken down into atoms, but atoms are still matter. If the atoms were used to create molecules, and those molecules in turn were constituents of elements, the elements then comprise a type of matter when combined. When you reduce something to atoms, you are essentially dismantling the matter down into its smallest form. Its state of existence has changed, but it is still part of the matter that it was broken down from. Theoretically, it's possible to take a given set of atoms, and reconstitute them one step at a time back into the form of matter that it was originally. Both processes are, of course, affected by some form of energy."

At Clint's dumbfounded expression, Bruce smiled lightly and shrugged. "Think like the transporter on Star Trek," he explained. "Thanos used the energy the stones produced to break the stones down into atoms. As Hank said, it could be possible to employ a similar energy to rebuild those atoms back into the stones. It'd be one hell of a trick, but it is theoretically possible."

Clint nodded in understanding at the transporter example and frowned lightly. "Well, she's got the energy, and we've all seen her manipulate stuff without a lot of effort. I don't know if she's ever manipulated atoms or anything, but I don't know that she hasn't, either."

"Since Wong has a lot of knowledge about the stones, I thought maybe his input might help us along with this," Bruce said as he laid a large green hand on Wong's shoulder. The Chinese man stepped up to the rest of the group at the encouragement.

"Great, just what we need. Voodoo dolls, chicken bones, balloon animals, and card tricks. That'll explain everything," grumbled Hank under his breath as he kept scanning the area, looking for some sort of clue that most present couldn't even guess at.

Janet slapped his shoulder lightly, and then looked back at Wong apologetically before turning back to her husband and whispering in a low voice, "Be nice, Hank. Magic is what got us to the fight against Thanos, and just because you don't deal with it doesn't mean it's fake or bullshit."

Wong shrugged and gave a quick smile to Janet before he got himself prepared. He watched everyone's face for a moment, and then began, "When the universe was first formed at the explosion of the Big Bang, the six singularities that prompted the explosion itself were scattered across the new universe as six elemental crystals that we know as the Infinity Stones. These stones each control one of the essential aspects of existence. Space, Reality, Power, Soul, Mind and Time. To wield all these stones at once is to wield the power of a celestial being, a god if you will. As we've already seen, even with an exceptional container, a mortal using the stones is more often than not a fatal result of trying to use such power."

Bucky Barnes, the Winter Solider, had been listening quietly from behind the main group of people. Magic and science weren't his thing and weren't in his wheelhouse. He was basically a loaded gun; you pointed him at a target and let him go. While he, Steve, and the others had been on their own, he'd gotten to know Wanda a little, enough that he was pretty confident he knew the kind of person she was.

He stepped forward, and regarded each of them in turn. "Wanda struck me as a good kid," he said, watching each face for some sort of hint as to their thoughts before he looked up at Clint once more. "Did she say anything about what she was planning on doing with the stones? Did she seem just upset, or like she was going crazy, becoming a terrible person and destroying a planet or something?"

Hawkeye shrugged, and stroked his chin thoughtfully. Bucky brought up good points, he thought. He couldn't deny that. "She is a good kid," he answered finally. "She said something about she was going to put things right again, that she was going to make things like they were supposed to be and fix the broken life we were living now. Maybe I'm crazy, but to me, she just seemed really upset. She was also pretty damned determined. She warned me that I didn't want to get in her way. It didn't sound like a threat, more like when you tell your kid not to lean over the bar too far when you're at Niagara Falls or something."

As everyone seemed to mull that over, Hank looked up from his equipment. "It looks like she somehow warped reality in some way, like maybe folding space so that she could go from here to somewhere else. It'd be kind of like one of those portals our space faring friends use to travel great distances. However she did it, she's upset with a lot of powers we don't understand, and she probably doesn't completely understand them either." He lowered his meter and cracked his neck in a tired sort of way. "So, if she did warp reality to move from here to there, where did she go, do you think?"

"The place where she'd be closest to what's left of the stones," answered Bruce as he rubbed the back of his neck in a pensive manner. "The planet that Thanos called 'The Garden.' It's where he said he destroyed the stones. If she were going to pull them back from wherever they are, that'd be the place to do it."

Wong cleared his throat and added, "Because of the nature of the stones, the universe would crumble without them. So, the old legends have it that the stones would simply reform themselves somewhere in the universe if they were 'destroyed.' But, my money would be on the Garden for where they'd most likely reform since that's where they were scattered."

Clint looked around at each in turn, and then sighed softly. "Then I guess that's where we're going. The Garden it is."