Ch. 5. Blazing the trail
Thor looked out of the spaceship window. Besides your usual view of stars and whatnot, there was Carol’s glowing form as she flew outside the ship. After they had gotten through the last jump point, Carol had gotten out to fly on her on beside the ship. Just with her powers in the dead of space.
“Hmph.” Thor mused. “Show off.”
“Okay, I think we’re just about there.” Came Rocket’s voice from the front of the ship.
“The coordinates Tony calculated point here, but there seems to be nothing showing up on the scanners.” Nebula spoke besides Rocket.
“I’m not surprised.” Thor said. “This is structures of space itself were inspecting here.”
“But the space stone itself is not here?” Rocket asked.
“Stark and Bruce couldn’t find any traces of the essence of the space stone. Even when Carol’s energy signature should be pretty similar, due of her powers originating from the tesseract.” Thor explained.
They had been making headway much slower than expected with finding the lost essence of the infinity stones. It had been about two years since Thanos had destroyed the original stones and despite some good leads and some ominous discovery in Wakanda, they had practically nothing concrete to show from their efforts.
“They think that it’s because space is technically all around us. Everything exists inside the space. Makes it kind of hard to then find it.”
“Like trying to draw water from the ocean while you’re floating deep inside of it.” Nebula noted.
“Hey, that’s a pretty good analogy.” Came Carol’s voice through the speaker.
“So, this point we’re on is then…what did you call it?” Rocket asked.
“It’s the nexus point Yggdrasil.” Thor answered. “The world tree, which paths the Bifrost, crosses strongest here. Bifrost is a way to skip travel in space by bending the dark matter. Stark thinks it might be the key of tracing the essence of the space stone.”
“So, what do we do now that we’re here?”
“Give me one of those body shields that can protect me outside. My axe needs to touch the space.” Thor answered.
Once outside in the top of the ship, Thor raised the Stormbreaker like an antenna, while Carol floated besides him. Multicolored light started glow from the metal of the axe.
“Is it working?” Carol asked.
“Stormbreaker is the only weapon still existing that can summon the Bifrost. This is new ground. I’m trying to fine tune it bring out the dark matter of cosmos.” Thor answered.
As they looked, a small vortex of light and shadow formed above them. The space around it started to bend and curve. Thor looked to Carol.
“I think it’s working. Any of that thing feel familiar?”
“Not sure. But let me get a closer look.” Carol said.
Carol floated closer to the vortex and carefully started implying some of her power into the vortex.
“Is anything happening?” Rocket’s voice came through coms.
“It’s definitely reacting. But I’m not…”
Carol’s speech came to a halt as there was suddenly an explosion. Waves of energy stroke out from the vortex hitting the heroes and their ship.
“Thor!”
“Carol!”
The last thing Thor saw was Carol’s body being pulled into the vortex. Then there was a blinding flash of light. Once everything came back to view, the vortex was gone. And so was Carol.
“What happened? Where’s Carol?” Thor boomed.
The ship was still there, as was Thor next to it. But Carol was nowhere to be seen. Nebula’s voice came through coms.
“The ship’s scanners can’t locate her anywhere near here or on anywhere on the way we arrived.”
“Well, this ain’t good.” Rocket said to Nebula inside the ship.
Earth, later.
Tony, Bruce and Steve were standing and sitting in the lab at the Avengers compound. Having heard about Carol Danvers’ disappearance in space from Thor, Rocket and Nebula had made them uneasy. This whole operation, tampering with powers that made up the existence itself. Had they bitten off too much than they can chew, after all.
“Look, guys.” Bruce said. “We shouldn’t give in on the desperation when we hit the first roadblock. We never have.”
“Bruce is right.” Steve concurred. “Carol Danvers is one of the most capable superheroes, especially when it comes to surviving in space. And we don’t even now how bad the situation is with her.”
Tony only nodded. Rocket, Thor and Nebula had returned to Earth already and it seemed that there would soon be another space journey ahead of them. But this time Tony was going to make sure they take precautions.
“Hey, big heads.” Rocket walked into the room.
After Jane Foster and Erik Selvig had moved their research into the Avengers facilities, Dr. Foster had agreed to scanned for any possible traces of the reality stone, which had once been hosted by her body. As it turns out they had managed to get a faint energy trace form her. The equipment set up by Rocket had started to search similar energy sources from spaces. Just as they had returned to Earth, there had been a finding. Rocky had started to calculate the exact coordinates from where the discovery had come from.
“The place is called Knowhere.”
“Nowhere?” Steve asked confused.
“No. Like knowledge. Knowhere. I’ve been there when we first put the guardians together. And I’m not actually surprised that it came up.”
“Why so?” Bruce asked.
“The place was run by this whackjob called the Collector. Like Thanos, he was also hunting the infinity stoned at one point. We actually brought the power stone for him briefly and Asgardians brought the reality stone to him for safe keeping. Much did that do since that’s where Thanos got it from.”
“So, this place has connection to the stones. How far from here is it?”
“Well, you could say both Earth and Knowhere are in what’s equal to periphery. Unfortunately, in completely opposite directions.” Rocket explained.
“So, it’s going to be long trip.” Bruce concluded.
“Nebula and Rocket are not both going.” Tony cut in.
“Why not?” Steve asked.
“After what happened to Danvers, where not sending more than one space traveler on the same mission. We can’t become stranded on Earth. It would ruin this whole thing.”
“Fair enough.” Steve said. “I will take Rocket and Rhodey with me. We’ll see if there is anything to recover.”
Tony only nodded to this. He was getting anxious on getting back to his family. Truth to be told, Tony Morgan’s birth had made Tony doubt their plans a bit. Slowly but surely world was also moving on. He believed in their attempt to get back those whom had been lost, but it couldn’t come with the price of losing what had since been gained.