In Any Given Moment
Yankee Stadium
Star Lord was finally making progress towards his delivery. It wasn’t that Ironman was keeping the strange sorcerer’s complete attention; portals continued to open up in front of him. But they were fewer and easier to dodge. Partially that was due to how hard Stark was pressing him. Mostly it was because of how far from the stadium their aerial battle had taken them. It was clearly affecting the sorcerer’s depth perception; several of his portals opened up nowhere close to Quill’s path.
That almost worked once, when Quill’s randomly evasive flight almost had him juke into a portal that wasn’t actually in his way. He managed to roll below it before contact. Barely.
He made it to the edge of the area Antman and Black Dwarf had claimed as their arena just as Dwarf charged the larger, yet squishier human. Lang caught the charging creature, took one step back, pivoted, and used its own momentum to throw it across the field. It was a good move, but one look at Lang’s massive heaving chest was enough to see that he was running on fumes.
“Hey, you might want to give this a shot,” Quill called out, tossing the package down to the oversized human. Lang caught it by the haft, examining it.
“Is this, what I think it is?” Antman gasped.
“Part of it,” Quill replied before blasting back to the portal Thanos had created.
Antman grabbed the haft of the bifurcated glaive like the handle of a knife in a reverse grip and turned to Dwarf. The creature halted in its tracks as it recognized the only weapon to ever have hurt it before. The normally simple, sadistic grin it kept on its face twisted to one of apprehension.
Lang took a few moments, to get his breathing back under control. “Not so tough now, are you?” he taunted the creature. It bellowed in rage and resumed its charge.
>>
Bucky finished off yet another minion from the portal Thanos had opened and exchanged a quick glance with T’Challa. He saw his own concerns reflected in the monarch’s face: they couldn’t hold for much longer.
The defensive fire from the stands had slackened as the soldiers there were forced to deal with breaches in their own lines. They’d lost Cap. Ironman was fighting to a draw against the new sorcerer. Loki was keeping Thor busy, but the same could not be said in reverse; more than once he’d been tricked into attacking an illusion. None had been fatal yet, but any could have been. And now Drax had wandered off.
What had started as a perimeter around the enemy gate had turned into a defensive circle that was being pressed ever tighter. They were holding that formation for the moment, with the help of the rest of the aerial unit and Spiderman, but the cost of that had been to leave the gate virtually unguarded.
Then another portal opened just off of the first. Bucky’s heart dropped even as the fact that this was a different type of gate than the one they’d been defending registered. That had been a clear plane, surrounded by crackling blue electricity. This was a shadowy formless gloom. It seemed to both take space and not at the same time. And a frigid cold was issuing from it.
He'd barely taken in those differences when the first Frost Giant charged through, crashing into the largest of Thanos’s minions.
>>
Bucky wasn’t the only one to note the sudden unexpected reinforcements. The difference being that Thanos recognized what that passage was -and meant for his army- far quicker. And he’d just socketed the last stone.
“Deal with that,” he ordered, turning from the sibling rivalry he’d created to Obsidian Maw. Maw nodded, holding his communicator up to his face.
Another, larger, ring of fire opened in front of the shadow portal. The narrow gap between the two was barely large enough to see blue somethings exiting one portal and entering another. There was no telling where that second portal led.
Thanos started to turn back to his entertainment, stopping as he noted Drax and Mantis’s mad push for the silver tongued general. Nor were they alone. It was clear that Scarlet Witch, Spiderman, and Falcon were lending aid to their efforts. He started forwards, to deal with that threat.
He’d made it only one step before a katana cut through a chink in his leg armor. “You’re not going so soon, I hope,” Deadpool asked. Thanos turned to glare at him, enraged. Usually, when he killed someone, they had the good sense to stay dead. But he could see that sense had little to do with the being standing before him.
“Admit it, you missed me,” Deadpool stated.
“I will wreak such pain on you that you will wish you could stay dead,” Thanos growled.
“Been there,” Deadpool replied with a shrug. “Oh, and I have a message from your girlfriend,” he added. “She’s my girlfriend now.” Thanos’s eyes flared at that. Without thinking he slammed his fist down on the red suited maniac.
Deadpool didn’t even try to dodge it. “Hup, going on another date,” he stated, watching the torso sized fist drop.
>>
“No Drax, don’t kill him,” Mantis yelled as they cleared the last minion between them and Maw. He shot a quizzical look backwards. She ignored it, brushing past him. Instead, Drax focused on defending her. The sudden, short, influx of Frost Giants had made that relatively easy.
“And what, pray tell, are you going to accomplish?” Maw asked with an air of superiority.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” she said, taking a step towards him.
“Oh? Come to plead for your lives?” he asked, sounding quite amused at the prospect.
“No, I’ve come to help you,” she said, taking another step.
“What help do you think I need from you, child?” he asked, voice dripping with condescension.
Mantis took one more step forward, just out of arm’s reach. “I want to help you see what you’ve done,” she said, pouncing forward. He reflexively moved to block the perceived attack, but she simply grabbed the closer of his wrists. It was cold, and clammy to the touch, but she held on anyway. Her antennae flared. “You feel guilt,” she stated.
The expression on his face morphed instantly, from cold amusement to pain. Every harm he’d ever inflicted to every one of his targets rolled through his head like a tidal wave. His gut felt as if it contained a singularity. His head pounded. He couldn’t think. He could barely breath. Every muscle seemed to quiver as if exhausted.
It was clearly an emotion he was unaccustomed to. He dropped to the ground, making little panting wheezing sounds. “Please,” he muttered pitiably. “Please make it stop.”
“You know what you have to do,” Mantis said, matching her victim’s coldness, maintaining her grip on his wrist. He looked up at her helplessly. To do what she asked would mark him for a slow death. But, like all of the family, he knew Thanos’s methods of torture intimately. Those were preferable to this feeling. Anything was better than this.
He nodded slowly, and raised his communicator back to his mouth. Anything to appease this pain, even risking Thanos’s ire. “I release you,” he stated.
>>
Obsidian Maw’s words reached Strange and seemed to unravel something in his brain. He blinked and shook his head, momentarily disoriented. Tony saw the change, but couldn’t be certain what it meant.
He considered waiting to see if Strange was coming to his senses, yet knew he couldn’t take the chance that whatever sense Strange had regained might be short lived. Instead, he hit the sorcerer with a maximum power chest arc. The blast knocked the sorcerer out and sent him tumbling into the distance. After a few seconds his cape righted his tumble, stopping his fall entirely. But, it did nothing for his horizontal movement. Strange’s unconscious form hung from it as he slid further away.
Tony considered several options. He considered killing Strange. He considered leaving him bound. He considered gambling that the sorcerer would remain unconscious long enough to finish things. In the end he fired a couple sets of manacles at him. The cape dodged the dumb projectiles adroitly and accelerated further away.
“Shit!” Tony muttered before turning around and jetting back towards the stadium at maximum thrust. He’d already lost too much time battling Strange. Bad enough that their fight had taken them so far from the stadium. He’d just have to hope the sorcerer stayed out of the rest of the fight. Somehow, he didn’t think that would be the case.
>>
“No!” Thanos bellowed in rage at Maw’s treachery. He snatched Nebula back up as she dodged another of Gamora’s attacks. He grabbed the sword he’d given Gamora as well. It was little more than a small dagger in his hands as he hurled it at Mantis.
“Mantis!” Drax yelled, interposing himself upon the flight path. The sword pierced clean through his chest up to the hilt. He slammed limply to the ground, rolling more than once.
“Drax!” Mantis yelled in turn, going to the fallen berserker’s side. She never saw the minion that beheaded her.
“As for you,” Thanos continued, holding Nebula high over his head. He focused the entirety of his telekinetic abilities to cause the molecules in the air around Nebula to create such static friction that they became a plasma. Nebula screamed in as much surprise as pain as the flames scorched her skin, and burned her clothes to it. Thanos continued exciting the air molecules as she writhed in pain.
Again, Banner fell from his invisible cage. But this time Thanos failed to catch him. Punishing Nebula had taken every ounce of his focus. And punishing her beyond the point of the repair protocols he’d installed took it for too long.
The diminutive scientist deliberately kept himself from bracing for the coming impact with the ground; if he was going to coerce the Hulk out of his sulk, he was going to need every advantage he could find. Broken bones seemed like a good start.
It turned out to be unnecessary. As he reached a height five feet above ground level one of Thanos’s minions backhanded him away. The blow slammed him into the stadium wall near the top, lodging him in the very hole his body had created.
And still The Hulk would not come. He glanced at the field of battle frantically. His body was broken in more places than he’d believed possible. But the Hulk would not come. He tried to claw his way out of the hole himself but a sharp stab of pain in his back forced him to stop. He yelped in pain, a response that in no way dictated the vision blurring amount of pain that singular action had caused.
As the pain lowered itself back to simply excruciating, he opened his eyes again. As he watched his friends fight, he found something to fear that was far worse than his fear of the Hulk: an inability to help his friends.
>>
Tony had made it within unassisted visual distance of the stadium by the time Thanos finished with his immolation. He watched as Thanos spiked Nebula’s burnt body onto the ground in front of Gamora. Nebula continued trying to reach Thanos as that massive foot continued hammering down on her, crushing her bones, breaking her limbs.
As Gamora watched the destruction of her sister the blue light faded from her eyes. Gone from her face was the calm of the mind control. In its place was a horror at what she’d unwillingly helped Thanos do.
Thanos saw the look and grinned sadistically. Then he looked back down at Nebula’s crumpled form, repair protocols futilely trying to put her back together. “This is what your good deeds have bought you,” he sneered. “All you’ve accomplished is to protect the very source of your own destruction.”
His words hit Gamora like hammers. She knew what he was saying, but she didn’t want to believe it, normally wouldn’t believe it. But something about it rang true. She looked between them, searching for something to say.
“You didn’t know that she was sacrificing herself to protect you?” Thanos gloated. “Strange; she’s not that good a liar,” he added before turning away from her.
>>
Meanwhile, Tony was having a slightly different moral conflict. Thanos’s systematic destruction of Nebula’s body had evoked feeling he hadn’t expected. Not romantic feelings by any shot. It was more like she was his friend’s girlfriend. His friend who wasn’t there to help her because he’d sacrificed himself to save Tony.
“Her self-repair systems will take care of her, right?” Tony asked as he continued jetting towards them.
“Not from that much damage,” Friday said quietly. Tony winced at that, hesitated. He watched Thanos taunt Gamora, recognizing that he’d taken both of them out of the fight. And there was only one thing he could think of to change that: a sacrifice he wasn’t sure he was prepared to make. Even the thought was terrifying to him. Yet it felt like the right thing to do. He couldn’t explain it.
“What about including the suit’s healing protocols?” he asked finally. He found himself hoping the answer would be no.
Friday hesitated. “Possibly,” she admitted at last.
Tony’s mouth twisted with his internal struggle. A day ago, this would have been an easy choice. Back when Nebula had simply been a psychopath, he’d have kept his suit. But now everything was more complex. He knew what Steve would say. He could almost hear it from his friend’s voice: ‘trust her’ was all it said. He considered that. He considered the losses they’d already taken. He considered that his heap of guilt was high enough already.
“Rocket,” he almost barked just as Thanos turned away from Gamora “I need a gun.”
“Oh, what’s that?” Rocket asked acidly. “The super-humie needs one of my guns?”
“ROCKET!” Gamora screamed.
“All right, all right,” Rocket said placatingly, taking a small device out of his pack. “Catch,” he said, pressing a button on its side and tossing it into the air. It began expanding as it followed its trajectory.
Tony altered course slightly. Then, as their paths intersected, the suit opened. Tony fell from the suit, caught the gun, hit the ground in a roll, and came up firing. The suit adjusted again and plowed into Thanos before he could react. As he rolled backwards it dropped to the ground and began enveloping Nebula. It couldn’t completely envelop her; too many parts were jutting at odd angles. It was forced to wait for the Luphoid’s repair protocols to snap those parts back into place first. Green light spilled from the open portions of the suit.
“No!” Thanos bellowed, getting back to his feet. “You will not alter their fate!” he yelled, stomping on the suit.
Before his foot could land the suit was yanked out from under his foot by one of Spiderman’s webs. Thanos moved to grasp it telekinetically, but another strand of webbing covered his face. Thanos bellowed in rage, swiping the stuff off with one hand. Peter reapplied.
On the third try Thanos was able to block the globule of goo and hurl it back at Peter. He set off to finish Nebula, but was intercepted by Star Lord, shooting him in the face. He grabbed one of his minions and hurled it at the space rogue, continuing on. By then Thor was there with his hammer. Thanos knocked him away only to be confronted by Brunnhilde.
Gamora spied one of Deadpool’s neutronium katanas laying near his transient corpse. Impulsively she snatched it up, charging after Thanos. She attacked madly, uncoordinatedly. Her hatred for Thanos ruled. There was no thought. She would never have survived if it hadn’t been for the constant stream of allies Thanos kept having to brush out of his path. She found herself beseeching Nebula, begging her to get up.
Tony knew better than to take on Thanos with nothing but a pea shooter; he’d fallen back from the others, watching their backs. Not that he didn’t take the occasional pot shot at Thanos, but even those were solely designed to let one of the heavy hitters get a shot in on him. When he heard Gamora he recognized the pit it came from. But he also saw something else: a possibility.
Tony had told Steve he thought the sisterly duo had the best chance of keeping Thanos busy. Steve had warned him about the difference between ability and capability to confront their long-time tormentor. He’d said they’d tell them when they were ready. Perhaps they already had.
He keyed the bone induction communicator wrapped around his head on, regretting for at least the tenth time in two minutes the loss of Steve; he was much better with people. But Steve wasn’t there.
“Nebula,” he said, firing the cannon in his hands “get up.” He dodged a wild swipe coming up swinging. He dodged yet another attacker. Rocket strafed in to finish it off. Tony took that reprieve to do two things: fire a shot at Thanos’s face, and continue cajoling an unconscious woman.
“Nebula, the suit’s not pajamas,” he said, nervous eyes on the battlefield for the next threat. He’d never been completely exposed in battle like this. A quick poll of his internal voices confirmed that he didn’t like it.
He liked it even less when a piece of rebar shot out of the crowded enemies at him. It had to travel more than fifty meters to him, yet he was still only barely able to dodge it.
“Dammit Nebula,” he added, suddenly irritated “you never backed down to him before. You’ve got my suit. Make it count!”
Whether due to Tony’s words, or the beseeching of the two of them, or simple coincidence, Nebula’s eyes popped open. She sucked in a lungful of air and groaned, rolling slowly over in the suit. Her entire body hurt worse than it ever had before, but the feeling subsided quickly. She noted the metal covering her body had obtained as she got to her hands and knees.
“Why am I alive?” she asked quietly.
“Your friends wouldn’t let you die,” Friday answered. That statement made Nebula look up. She saw Thanos trying to get to her. She saw her allies, her . . . friends, throwing themselves at him, buying her time. She saw the haphazard, uncoordinated manner in which they attacked, saw that their entire strategy had devolved into hitting him as hard as they could and hoping another would be there to stop Thanos from taking advantage of the opening their assault had made in their own defenses.
That sight untwisted something deep inside of her. No one had ever risked so much as a hang nail for her; not since her brother a lifetime ago. But these people. These people were spending themselves for her. They were risking the galaxy. For her.
There had always been this small part of her that believed she wasn’t worthy of help, that she was tainted, irredeemable. And, as she’d made her own sacrifices, that part of her self had become stronger, until she’d believed it wholly.
And now this.
“I’m connecting to your cerebral implant,” Friday said, interrupting Nebula’s chain of thought. “Deleting punishment protocols,” she added. Before Nebula could object a wave of relief spread throughout her body. She groaned in surprise; it had been so long since she’d felt no pain, a half-remembered dream. She’d forgotten how good it felt.
“Downloading suit specifications and tolerances,” Friday continued. Nebula found herself flooded with data about the tool Tony had made at her disposal.
As Nebula grappled with those changes Thanos was making adjustments of his own. He was too late to stop the reversal of Nebula’s sentence, and that failure burned through him. It flashed into a rage at the one who, more than any other, had brought about that pardon. He twisted to his new target, catching his assailants off guard; several missed him entirely. The others were easily batted away.
Before they could regroup, he’d closed on Tony. Tony saw the oncoming juggernaut and backpedaled, firing several shots into his face. Thanos ignored them. He took a series of quick strides, reached down and relieved Tony of his weapon, crunching it into scrap with one might fist. The other snatched the defenseless tinker off of the ground.
The rest of his assailants halted their attacks in fear of hitting their ally. The retaliatory threat was obvious. Deep down they knew the odds that Thanos wouldn’t crush Tony anyway were remote. They knew they could not afford to waste the time, even for him. Yet, they could not bring themselves to be the one that killed him. A classic Thanos no win scenario.
“Why don’t you try that with me?!” Thor yelled.
Thanos gave Thor a dismissive glance. “Deal with that,” he stated to no one in particular. A moment later, the pocket of peace surrounding Thanos collapsed as his minions attacked. The rest of the group quickly found themselves worrying about more personal threats.
“Do you see? You have changed nothing,” Thanos growled, turning back to Tony.
“Pissed you off, didn’t I?” Tony replied, glaring defiantly into that massive face. In response, Thanos tightened his grip, not to the point of breaking things, but enough to make Tony grunt in pain.
“She will still die, as will you all,” he stated as if stating the sun would rise in the morning. “Nothing can change that, for you lack true power. You lack the will to seize it. And, as your reward for failure, I will save for last. Your screams will compete with the memory of theirs.”
Banner watched his friend get seized by the massive purple gorilla, and instinctively tried again to lever himself back out of his hole. He wasn’t sure what he could accomplish exactly; all he knew was that his friend was in need.
His effort brought that raw pain back again, but he struggled through it. He groaned and growled in pain, but still he could not get his broken body to budge. He found himself beseeching . . . someone. Beseeching someone he could not see, someone that was not there.
Beseeching The Hulk.
“Please,” he begged “it’s Tony.” He could feel the beast stirring inside of his mind, but still it would not come. He collapsed back into the wall as the pain overtook him. “So, this is all we are, is it?” he asked the beast. “Just another bully that only fights when he knows he can win? Just like him?” he added, referring to his abusive father. The Hulk shivered at that. He could feel its rage.
“Please,” he said again. “I know I never trusted you. I tried to shove you in a hole. But Tony did. Tony believed in us. Maybe I’m not worthy of your trust, but I’m asking you to trust me anyways. We can do this. Together.”
>>
Nebula’s download finished. It had taken less than a second, but she knew everything about the suit, could have built one herself if she’d so chosen. She knew its limitation, both soft and hard. She knew its weak points, and strengths.
She looked up again to see Tony hanging from Thanos’s maw. Her armored fingers instinctively crunched handholds into the ground. For that moment all fear seemed to slip away. Her past, the future, all were rendered meaningless. There was only the present. There was only the target and the mission.
“Let’s kick his ass,” Friday stated. Nebula launched herself forward, thrusting well past the soft cap on the suit’s repulsors.
Thanos saw it. He responded by spiking Tony to the ground and turning to face this latest challenge. As Tony hit, the bones in his right arm fractured. He rolled off of it, holding the damaged appendage close this body. A familiar roar from the wall drew a pained smile on his face.
Thanos wasn’t the only one to see Nebula’s imitation of a rocket. She’d made it barely ten feet before Loki stepped out from the shadows. The illusion Thor had been fighting disappeared as Loki conjured a sorcerer’s portal directly in front of her. Even for her, there was barely time to perceive the gateway before she reached it. The ballistic cyborg disappeared through the passage.
Thanos turned back to Tony. “Do you see the true value of your vaunted cooperation?” he sneered. “The randomness of trust? The only true power is the power to rule and dominate. The only true strength is-” he said, stopping suddenly as Nebula appeared mere feet from him, still thrusting.
She braked with the suit’s palm repulsors, just enough to right herself, then threw her shoulder into Thanos’s. As Newton decreed, the result of her not insignificant mass, plus the suit’s mass, all moving close to three hundred and fifty kilometers per hour sent the much larger Titan tumbling away while nearly completely arresting her own momentum. Had it not been for the suit’s inertial stabilizers she would have passed out, augments and all.
“What was that?” Tony called out as Thanos careened away. “You mumbled that last bit.”
Nebula turned to Tony, revealing the flattened part of the armor’s shoulder where she’d impacted Thanos. Her eyes flicked to his wounded arm before she said “You can have your suit back.”
Tony nearly jumped at the chance to regain his armor. His broken arm, and cracked ribs all screamed for the suit’s healing abilities. Not to mention the fact that his only weapon had been destroyed. But-
He shook his head. “You can keep it for now,” he said, surprising even himself. She scanned his face for a moment, as if looking for something, some indication that he wasn’t just saying what she wanted to hear. He saw the look, understood its meaning. “You wear it better than I ever did,” he explained with a shrug. She held her inquiring gaze for another moment before returning a quick nod and turning back to Thanos.
By that point he’d managed to right himself again and was glaring across the field. Only now he wasn’t glaring at Tony. He wasn’t even glaring at Nebula, deliverer of the most awesome of shoulder checks. Loki had apparently become the brunt of his ire. His next words confirmed that appraisal.
“Loki,” he rumbled menacingly enough to unnerve even his own troops “you have forgotten the price of disobedience. I promise a refresher.”
“I doubt anyone could forget your gentle touch,” Loki replied evenly.
“Oh?” Thanos asked, seeming surprised. “Do you doubt that one broken with my . . . gentle touch,” he said with a slight grin for the euphemism “would even contemplate betraying me?”
“An excellent point,” Loki replied. “But it assumes that you broke me.”
“I looked into your mind,” Thanos rumbled. “I broke you.”
Loke straightened slightly at that, flashing his trademark mischievous smile. “I’m the god of lies,” he replied, as if that answered everything.
Thanos snarled and charged. Loki, Thor, Nebula, Gamora, and Bucky returned the charge. Falcon and Quill peppered Thanos with ranged attacks, keeping him from being able to concentrate on his telekinesis.
The Hulk/Banner combination started to follow, but thought better of it. Not just because the Hulk’s strength and durability hadn’t proved to be any kind of an asset in previous engagements, but also because he ran the risk of squashing the smaller allies already rushing to intercept Thanos.
He rushed to Tony, to help defend him. But the tinker merely shook his head in their direction, waving them towards Lang. Banner/Hulk hesitated. Tony was completely exposed. He was defenseless. And he was their friend, quite possibly the only friend The Hulk had ever had.
But he was also right: they were the only ones that could help Lang. And the mission was of far greater importance than any one person.
Had it just been The Hulk, that would not have been enough to sway him from going to his wounded friend. But Banner knew better. The battle over that decision nearly split the two recently merged personalities back apart, yet somehow, they held together.
Instead, they decided to help Antman with Dwarf. By that point, Lang’s exhaustion at operating enlarged was so severe that even the improvised knife/glaive couldn’t balance the engagement. As the Hulk/Banner combo charged Dwarf feinted left, drawing a wild swipe from Lang, before tackling the larger man to the ground.
Before he could pound the engineer into pulp Hulk/Banner tackled him in turn, throwing his larger body into the stadium wall. Lang got slowly to his feet, the two of them squaring off against Dwarf.
>>
This charge was different than Nebula’s last. For one she wasn’t alone this time. Instead of running at maximum thrust she’d slowed her flight speed to that of Thor’s. But that just gave her more time to contemplate what she was doing. On top of that, that determination to make a difference that had accompanied her last charge was missing. Thanos hadn’t been wrong about the effects of his brand of torture. A part of her still wondered at her breaking away from him at all. That part was shouted down by the knowledge that it was far too late to go back.
Another difference between this charge and the last was the moment she started braking. Last time she’d braked just enough to right herself. But she knew Thanos would expect that same tactic. He tended to think in terms of overpowering tactics. But she didn’t want to send him flying again. She wanted him surrounded.
Instead she braked earlier, aiming the suit’s overcharged palm repulsors directly at Thanos’s face. Sadly, that too was not a new tactic to him; he was able to get a hand up to block the product of her reverse thrust.
But that too blinded him, just long enough for Thor to bring Mjolnir into play. And as he reeled from that hit Nebula was there with a left cross, staggering him the opposite direction. Right back into Thor’s backhand swing.
For a split second she found herself hoping they could keep that up indefinitely. But even as she thought it Thanos countered. He used the momentum of Thor’s strike to make a wild swing in her direction. Nebula back-thrusted quickly, barely missing him.
But that wild swipe came at a cost: moving Nebula out of striking range. It would have been a fatal cost for Thor, if not for the arrival of the rest of the charge. Gamora was able to slide her blade into the chink under his armpit. He roared, trying to backhand her, but by then Nebula was back, deflecting the blow. Then it was Thor’s turn.
>>
While they kept Thanos busy a defensive group formed around Tony consisting of Spiderman, Vision, Bucky, Brunnhilde, and T’Challa. Quill landed just long enough to lend Tony one of his pistols before launching back into the air.
Despite that group’s throw weight, it found itself being pushed towards the stadium walls by the continuing stream of Thanos’s Reinforcements. Black Widow and Okoye led a small group of Wakandan soldiers to assist them.
>>
Stephen Strange awoke suddenly. He found himself floating over the Harlem River, confused about how he’d arrived in that position. Then, in a rush, everything that had happened -including his bizarre decisions- flooded back into his brain. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was thinking, or why he’d come to his senses. The only thing he was sure of was that he had to undo what he’d tried to do.
He quickly opened another portal leading back to the space above the stadium and flew through it. Upon arrival he moved the portal he’d placed in front of the Frost Giant’s shadowy passage to Thanos’s gateway. He then opened another portal to the Antarctic site where he’d been sending the preceding Frost Giants. Allied reinforcements began to stream into the site, pushing the masses of Thanos’s minions back foot by foot.
>>
For a few moments the spontaneous team up fighting Thanos was able to maintain their momentum, countering Thanos’s blows, hampering his movement, striking when the opportunity availed itself. But, for all their success, they weren’t really damaging him. Causing him some pain, yes. But doing any appreciable damage? No. Even Mjolnir, for all its power, did little more than move Thanos around, and only when he couldn’t prepare for the blow.
The moment he realized what Strange had done, that all changed. “No!” he screamed, backhanding Thor across the stadium, towards Tony’s group. He snatched Nebula out of the air yet again before slamming the ground with his other fist. With that fist came all of his telekinetic ability. The shockwave it produced was of such magnitude that it did more than just kick up dust, or create a pit; it launched his assailants away. Even the aerial unit found themselves along for the ride, madly trying to correct their flight.
Such was the power of that blast that it impacted the walls of the stadium and traveled upwards to damage the overhangs over the third tier. The angle with which the blast hit caused sections of the overhangs to rain down on the now mostly empty center of the stadium.
Nor did that shockwave discriminate between friend or foe. All around him were launched away, regardless of size. Tony’s group was far enough away that they were able to keep their feet, but their lines were suddenly inundated with enemy combatants. Enemy combatants that were quick in getting back to their feet. The wave had also had a secondary effect of canceling out the Frost Giant’s gateway.
>>
The three much larger combatants had been able to brace themselves against the blast, despite their larger volume. Lang took that momentary break to offer the weapon in his hand to Hulk/Banner. The recipient of such gave him a quizzical look as they reached out for it.
“Stick a fork in me . . .” Lang panted “I’m, done.” Hulk/Banner took the weapon and watched as Lang staggered over to the left field wall and all but collapsed, draped over it. He returned to normal and slid over into the stands, unconscious.
>>
Thanos seesawed his arms, raising Nebula into the air before slamming her onto the ground, pinning her there. There was a brief struggle, ending with him kneeling on her hips, his right hand pinning her left to the ground. Her right hand was clamped to his left wrist, trying to keep it from her throat, the motors in both arms whining terribly about the strain. She grunted with effort, agreeing with them.
The suit’s helmet had been knocked off in the struggle, leaving Nebula trying to match the cold malice in Thanos’s gaze with her own explosive rage.
“I understand resurrections to be immensely painful,” Thanos commented almost casually. Nebula failed to respond, instead focusing all of her effort on stopping his arm. She just had to hold out until her friends could get to her. “All just to die at my hands again.” He sounded almost sorrowful that he was going to kill her again. Nebula grunted in pain. She could feel the suit trying to repair her ripping muscles as she tore them.
That sorrow was absent from Thanos’s next words. “Only this time will not be the last,” he told her. “I released you once. Now you must pay for their defiance,” he said, inching his arm closer to her throat, making it clear that he wasn’t using his full strength.
Nebula’s eyes snapped to that looming pincer comprised of one thumb and forefinger as the realization that she couldn’t actually stop him when he decided to kill her sank in. A myriad of emotions swirled inside of her: fear at dying, helplessness at the thought of being brought back only to die again, rage at the knowledge that this was exactly what Thanos wanted her to feel, anger at the others for saving her, anger at herself for taking the opportunity when it came. It all swirled around inside of her like a tie dye of emotion.
“Was it worth it?” Thanos asked, forcing her to look back at his face. It was as if his voice had cut through the very emotions it had caused. In one moment of epiphany all her rage and fear, all her self-loathing and doubt seemed to burn away once again leaving only . . . the purpose.
She looked directly at him, as she’d been afraid of doing her whole life. “I would die a thousand deaths to kill you . . . monster,” she replied, giving special emphasis to that last word. Then she released his wrist.
As his fingers grasped her neck, her gauntleted fingers grasped The Tesseract in its housing on his gauntlet. As he crushed her wind pipe, she yanked the Infinity Stone from its housing. It hit the ground, emitting a blinding flash of light and stunning everyone in the immediate area, which was mostly Thanos.
>>
“Irani,” the sensor section shouted “sensors indicate that one stone has been separated from the Gauntlet.”
She nodded quickly, choosing to overlook the excitement the young tech had shown. “Stop the clock,” she ordered. “Status of The Sanctuary 2?” she asked.
“Considerable hull damage,” the Captain reported. “Her armor is a sieve.”
“Have the fleet begin targeting her power systems,” Rael ordered. The captain nodded agreement and ordered communications to relay the command to the rest of their fleet, what was left of it. More than half of the ships in the combined fleet had been driven out of action or destroyed outright.
>>
“Accuser,” the comm tech called out “the Novarians have signaled to begin targeting power systems.”
“It’s about time,” the Accuser muttered to herself. “Comply,” was the only thing the rest of her bridge crew actually heard. Shortly thereafter their target became riddled with explosions.
>>
Strange was the first of the flyers to recover from the tumble Thanos’s shockwave had caused, thanks to his magic cape of flight. He quickly assessed the plight of his fellow sky brethren. Most seemed in the midst of regaining control, but Wanda had been knocked out by debris from the blast. He created a portal under her that opened above and in front of him. He flew downwards, matching her fall before snagging her out of the air and reversing their course. Then he re-opened the portal to Antarctica. A moment later Thanos’s portal emitted a gout of fire before closing in on itself.
>>
The moment Nebula released Thanos’s wrist, Mjolnir abandoned Thor mid overhand strike, turning a blow that could have set a railroad spike in one hit into a still not insignificant bop on the head. A bop that sent his opponent’s chin into the ground.
“Have you considered renaming it ‘the doorknob’?” Spiderman asked Thor, referring to the Asgardian hammer’s sudden departure.
“What; why a doorknob?” Thor asked, as he shifted fighting styles. Before anyone could respond, a flash of light illuminated the entire stadium briefly. Fortunately, it was at enough distance to only create spots in the visions of anyone exposed.
“Because everyone gets a turn,” Widow explained, as she dodged an attack and fired her taser bolts at the attacker.
Thor grinned. “Kid, it is fitting that Tony was the one that found you,” he said.
“Gee thanks Mr. Asgardian,” Parker replied.
>>
Gamora had immediately picked herself back up after Thanos’s shockwave and begun charging back to her sister’s aid. She was halfway there when she saw the blue gem arcing from Thanos’s gauntlet. She instinctively held one hand up to shield her eyes as the blast went off, relying on her memory of the terrain between herself and her target to keep her on her feet.
Thanos recovered from the blinding light and immediately sought out the wayward Infinity Stone. He reached his left hand out, grasping the gem telekinetically. Before he could reel it in Gamora slid her katana into a gap in the back of his armor.
Thanos reared back, backhanding Gamora away with a roar. The moment his right hand was free, Nebula’s repair protocols kicked in, returning her flattened windpipe to its normal shape, resetting her vertebrae.
The process was still in action when the hammer slid into her outstretched -and now free- left hand. Her eyes opened. She spared one surprised look at the hammer before swinging it in a mighty arc that terminated with Thanos’s head. It was a swing augmented not just by her prosthetic, or her general body upgrades, but by the suit as well. A swing with an unstoppable force at the other end.
Thanos turned back from his backhand just in time to see it hit him in the face. His not inconsequential mass was lifted off of the ground and sent flipping end over end in the direction of the blow. Nebula continued the motion of the strike into a sitting, then standing position. Her repair protocols finished just as she turned to where Thanos had fallen.
She looked upon him calmly.
>>
“Thor, get The Tesseract,” Tony ordered, dodging a blow.
“Tony,” Thor started to argue then stopped. They still had enemies in their defensive perimeter. On three separate occasions Thor had been the only one able to keep Tony alive. If he left, there was a good chance his friend wouldn’t survive.
Tony turned to look at Thor, and for one brief moment a shared understanding flashed between them, almost as if they’d had an entire conversation. It was only for a split second, but in that moment, Thor could see the exact same appraisal in Tony’s eyes. Tony knew the risk he was running. And as much as Thor didn’t want to lose another friend, he also knew Tony was right.
“Finish the mission,” Tony replied emphatically. Thor paused for one more moment, then gave a quick nod, and sprinted across the field. “Peter, give him a hand,” Tony added. Again, there was a pause as that ordered felt the urge to obey. Again, it passed, this time without comment.
“Yes Mr. Stark,” Peter said stiffly. He webbed down a few of the bigger minions, then attached a strand from each hand to their backs. He pulled the strands taut and then launched himself after Thor.
The defensive group collapsed further around their vulnerable tinker. Wanda and Strange lent what aid they could, but the tightness of that group within the melee, and the speed with which everyone kept moving made it difficult for them to be assured of hampering the correct party. Rocket did what he could from the air, dealing with similar impediments.
>>
Thanos stood back up, glowering at Nebula. He reached up slowly to his jaw and reseated it without so much as a twitch in his murderous expression. He made no threats. His expression said it all; he was no longer amused. He snapped his hand out again, attempting to recall the stone once more, never taking his eyes off of her.
Quill shot the stone out of the air with his new and improved repulsor setting. As Thanos turned to deal with him Nebula hurled Mjolnir at him. Thanos expected it. He immediately turned back from the annoyance of the space rogue to deal with the minor threat of the hammer.
But it was not one mythical hammer that left her hand, but seven, each aiming for a different part of The Mad Titan’s body. Lacking the time to ascertain which was the real hammer, Thanos took his best guess, preparing to catch the one headed for his face.
He guessed poorly. As the various hammers intersected his body they disappeared. All but one; the non-illusory Mjolnir impacted his lower left leg, neatly sweeping it out from under him.
Thanos caught himself, with his left arm and spared a quick glare for Loki, an expression that was quickly being diluted with use. It also kept him immobile long enough for Mjolnir’s return trajectory to intersect with his left shoulder blade. The hammer decloaked just before striking him.
Thanos rolled with the hit, grabbing a large piece of debris from the ground -a mechanical arm shed by one of his children- and throwing it at Nebula. Without waiting to see if it struck, he pivoted to charge for The Tesseract, grabbing and hurling other opportune pieces of debris in Star Lord’s direction.
Nebula dodged to avoid the incoming missile, but a quick telekinetic redirect curved its path in the same direction. It hit her almost dead on, sending her careening into the stadium wall. Quill managed to avoid the barrage of missiles, but the constant influx kept him from being able to do anything else until it was too late.
Thanos reached The Tesseract and bent down to scoop it up, when his vision was suddenly occluded by webbing. He reached blindly for its location, but more webbing snapped it off of the ground. Parker yanked on the strand, sending the stone flying directly at Thor, before releasing it. He then webbed himself to the ground, arresting the flight path his makeshift slingshot had started him on.
As Thor caught the stone arcs of electricity began traveling down his arm eventually encompassing his entire body. His eyes began to glow with an electric light. Bolts of lightning began spilling from his body, hitting any nearby enemies. He held his free hand out, palm up, releasing the most powerful bolt of lightning he’d ever created. Except this was no bolt; t was a continuous stream of electricity even more powerful than any bolt that had ever sundered Mother Earth.
Thanos raised his right hand to block that blast just as Gamora and Nebula converged on him again. He fended them off with his free hand as best he could, a new feeling began creeping up from the center of his chest.
Nebula attacked with a calm she had never before known. For the first time in her life there was no past, no future. There was only this objective. It was as if time had slowed almost to a stop for her, as if she had all the time in the world to consider the many options available to her before making a single attack. Thanos’s feints, once so convincing, now seemed obvious. His attacks seemed completely predictable. She countered them with dodges, hammer strikes, and repulsor blasts as needed.
It was much the same for Gamora, yet different. There was no calm in Gamora’s attacks. Thanos had made her an unwilling participant in her sister’s near demise, which infuriated her. Then he’d gloated about how the very person she’d been forced to help kill had been her lifelong protector. She’d wanted to deny it, but a part of her knew it to be true. It was a part of her that she’d ignored for years, but she could ignore it no longer.
Now she had the opportunity to . . . not repay Nebula -nothing could repay that debt- but support her. Show her that she would stand with her, make her see that it hadn’t been for nothing. It was that determination to be there for her sister in all but blood that burned away all fear, anger, and self-doubt. But it left a cold malice with its purpose.
Thanos tried to maneuver to place one of his attackers in the path of Thor’s continuous lightning bolt but every time he tried to move Nebula would hammer him back into place. If he attacked her, Gamora would find one of the increasing number of gaps in his ravaged armor. Gaps that the minor arcs from Thor’s lighting stream took full advantage of. If he went for Gamora, Nebula would intercede.
On impulse, Nebula tossed Gamora the hammer. Gamora caught the fickle instrument and continued the motion into a backhand swing that staggered Thanos. They shared the hammer from that moment on. This cooperation was further complicated as Loki began making duplicates of the hammer, making it almost impossible for Thanos to keep track of which was real. It didn’t seem to affect the sisters though.
As their fight continued so did the unknown feeling growing in Thanos’s chest. It wasn’t until Nebula’s hand snaked out to rip the Mind Stone from the Gauntlet that he was able to define it. As she tossed it up in the air, he suddenly knew an emotion he’d caused in so many others: despair. The two sisters recognized the expression at once and were emboldened further by it. Their attacks doubled in ferocity.
>>
“Jarvis, you’re up!” Tony called out, firing Quills gun in repulsor mode to knock enemies away. Jarvis’s hesitation was even shorter than the others.
“I could use a lift,” he told Brunnhilde. The Valkyrie obligingly grabbed him by the arm and hurled him into the air. And the defensive circle shrank again. However, the influx of Frost Giants was steadily thinning the ranks of Thanos’s minions. The breaches in the stands had mostly been dealt with, allowing the soldiers there to refocus their fire back down onto the field. All they had to do was hold out a little longer.
Brunnhilde’s throw had been amazingly accurate. She hadn’t thrown Jarvis so that his head would intersect the arcing stone, but she’d come close enough for him to easily snag the stone out of the air. He started to reseat it, then paused, unsure if he really wanted to reincorporate that unknown into his being.
The pause that thought generated was short lived; in truth there was no choice. They needed him at full power, and for that he needed The Mind Stone. He jammed it quickly into the socket in his forehead. There was a moment of disequilibrium as the two halves of his being rejoined, before he was truly Vision once again. Then he flew over to the battle with Thanos, activating the stone’s energy beam.
>>
A quartet of the largest Frost Giants moved to help Hulk/Banner. For a moment the unfamiliar allies’ coordination fell apart. Dwarf capitalized upon their confusion with a wide swipe that sent three of them flying. The last was able to use the opening that created to spear him with a lance of ice. The ice penetrated his thick skin making him bellow, just as Hulk/Banner stabbed him in the side with his weapon.
>>
Two of the Frost Giants sent on assisted flights landed in open space harmlessly. The last was headed straight for Tony. The tinkerer looked to left, then to the right, looking for anywhere he could go to avoid the incoming multi-ton projectile; there wasn’t any. As pressed tight as their formation had become, he had nowhere to turn. Without any other option he raised his energy pistol and fired, knowing all the while that it could not arrest the creature’s flight.
It did slow its trajectory, making it fall short of their formation. It plowed into a formation of minions, crushing many of them, disabling all of them. Then its momentum rolled it over. Tony started to aim again, but another minion chose that moment to take a swipe at him. He dodge-rolled under its strike, grimacing as broken ribs grated against raw nerves. He managed to avoid that strike, but the roll did not get him completely out from under the tumbling giant. It landed on the tinker and his attacker alike. Thanos’s minion was crushed completely; Tony got off marginally better, his body being crushed from the stomach down.
Several more of Thanos’s ‘family’ charged through the hole its passage had created. They stabbed the prone Frost Giant several times before trying to swarm the remaining defenders.
>>
“Boss!” Friday yelled. The impact of that mass falling on Tony had knocked him out, but his eyes fluttered open at the AI’s call. He tried to move, but quickly amended that action to a gasp in pain.
Friday was not the only entity on the battlefield to note Tony’s predicament by far. “Mr. Stark!” Spiderman yelled, rushing to his mentor’s side. He carved through the remaining minions with a speed that was terrifying, dropping to his knees next to him. He looked up at Bucky, T’Challa, and Brunnhilde.
“Go,” he commanded. “I’ll watch him.” They looked at each other momentarily. There was a part of each of them that resented being given orders by a kid. None argued. It was not a tone that brooked argument. Instead, they nodded as one and sprinted towards the main event.
Tony lay back against the ground, looking up at the sky. “I guess . . . I rolled the dice, one too many times,” he muttered quietly.
“Hang on, I’m coming boss,” Friday replied, already unlatching from Nebula.
“No,” Tony said quietly, yet forcefully.
“But Boss,” Friday objected, halting her uncasing.
“She needs you,” Tony explained quietly. Friday paused far longer than any AI had a need to. “Complete the mission,” Tony gasped. With great effort he reached up to his earbud and switched it to the general channel. “All of you,” he added. “Finish the mission.”
“Yes Boss,” Friday replied, voice filled with concern for her maker.
“Mr. Stark, I . . .” Spiderman started before realizing he didn’t know what to say. What could he say? Sorry?
“It’s, okay kid,” Stark replied before breaking into a fit of coughing. When he finished there was blood on the edge of his mouth. “You were amazing.” Peter didn’t know how to respond.
“Mr. Stark,” Peter said again, still at a loss for words. He considered trying to move the giant’s bulk off of the tinkerer, but he was worried about doing more damage.
“Friday,” Tony said a moment later “when this is over, enact protocol 42.”
“Yes Boss,” Friday replied again, quieter than before.
>>
Banner/Hulk saw the Frost Giant land on Tony and bellowed in rage. And, for once, it was a mutual rage shared between both halves of their being. Their volcanic rage was vented on the source of Tony’s grievous injury, one Black Dwarf.
They charged their larger foe. Dwarf was caught off guard by the speed of their turnabout, and knocked down. As he tried to get up, they caught his arm in an arm lock. Then, standing on his side, they began to hack ferociously at the arm just below the shoulder with the glaive.
Dwarf bellowed in pain and struggled to get up, but could find no leverage. He clawed and hammered at his attacker, ripping huge gashes in its green skin. But the Banner/Hulk combo ignored it in favor of their own attack.
After half a dozen swings Dwarf found himself disarmed. Freed of that particular lock, Dwarf tried to roll away. But, the Banner/Hulk combo was on him again, straddling his body. They flipped the blade into a reverse grip and began stabbing at Dwarf’s face over and over until the general stopped moving.
>>
Nebula had also seen the Frost Giant land on Tony. She felt the suit begin to disengage itself from her, then felt it clunk back into place. She heard Tony’s last orders. She would not have begrudged Tony the suit, even as she agreed with his appraisal of the situation.
On some level she knew it was a sacrifice for the mission, for the galaxy. But she couldn’t help feeling that it was yet another sacrifice for her, or perhaps the continuation of the original. She compensated for the feeling of guilt by redoubling her attacks.
She managed to get Mjolnir through Thanos’s increasingly erratic defenses, rocking his head backwards with the blow. As he staggered from that impact, she plucked the red gem from the gauntlet and tossed it to Wanda.
>>
Wanda reached out to catch the Aether, but it dissolved into a fluid like cloud that formed around her arm, traveling up to her body. She gasped in fear as it melded itself with her body. But it didn’t hurt, necessarily. It was more like feeling a second presence within her, a presence of such power that it threatened to overwhelm her. Her hovering became erratic as she fought against it.
>>
Quill watched The Aether envelop the sorceress. He could almost feel the struggle raging within her. He knew firsthand how powerful Infinity Stones were, how strong their will to dominate a carrier was.
Under normal circumstances he’d have let someone closer to her, someone from her own team help her through it. Vision would have been ideal. Not only was he intimately acquainted with infinity stones, but she trusted him. But he was busy. Both halves of The Avengers’ leadership were out of the fight, one way or another. Gamora was indisposed. That left just him.
He flew over to her, halting within a few steps. Thor had warned them of the Aether’s unpredictable defensive measures. He had no desire to be impaled, or flung into a wall.
“Wanda,” he called out, letting himself fall with her. At first, she didn’t seem to notice him, then she gave a quick sideways glance in his direction.
“Don’t fight it,” he told her earnestly. “The stones respond to strong character. Focus on your sense of self.” She glanced his way before giving a curt nod. She closed her eyes, focusing her thoughts inward, towards who she was and who she’d been. She couldn’t say she was entirely happy with everything she found there, but for better or worse, it was who she was. She owned it.
After what seemed like an eternity, she felt the Aether shift within her. Suddenly it became less of a domineering force, more of a tool she could use. Her fall arrested itself. She opened her eyes to see Quill floating next to her, worrying over her.
“Thank you,” she said with a little nod. Then red tendrils flashed from her down to attack Thanos.
Quill barely had time to feel good about himself before Nebula ripped the purple stone from the gauntlet. She lobbed it in his direction without looking.
“Dammit!” he cursed, breaking off from Wanda to catch the stone. He muttered under his breath about her recklessness as he closed with the instrument. He would rather have been grounded when he caught the Infinity Stone; past experience showed it to be highly unlikely that he would be able to retain the presence of mind to land safely once he grabbed it.
In truth he didn’t know if the stone would destroy all life on a planet if it touched the surface bereft of any controlling influence. He also couldn’t be sure it wouldn’t. He had no choice but to hope his custom body armor would limit his fall damage.
He was beginning to entertain the idea of using the repulsor setting on the pistol to try and juggle the stone until he could land and catch it properly. It was risky for several reasons. For one, even the weapon’s lowest setting would impart significant kinetic energy on the target; he’d have to aim to launch the stone upwards, complicating catching it. Two, he had no idea how the stone would react to that energy discharge.
He’d just scrapped that particular plan when a ring of fire opened between him and the stone. He tried to twist around the portal to snag the stone, but it was too late. Reflexively, he looked down at Thanos’s position trying to locate where the stone had gone. But there was no portal there. In fact, it seemed as though the Mad Titan was oblivious to the entire exchange.
“Look,” Strange said, from almost directly above him. Quill instinctively looked up, raising his gun as he did so. “Not up . . . down,” Strange replied, ignoring Quill’s reaction. He pointed to a spot ten meters from Thanos.
Against his better judgement, Quill followed the finger to where not one, but two portals had appeared. They were both angled upwards at thirty degrees, opposing each other. As he watched the Power Stone emerged from one portal on an arc that landed it in the outer edge of the second. It then reappeared from the first, but this time it didn’t make it quite as far; simple air drag was slowing it down. Still, it would take a couple of minutes for the stone to lose enough momentum to fall short of the receiving ring.
Quill turned back to Strange, but the other only shook his head solemnly. The look on his face conveyed great regret and embarrassment, but all he actual said was “Go.” Quill nodded in return and wheeled around, charging for the portals.
Strange conjured a couple of shields and charged down to where Thanos was fighting the sisters. The shields were purely a precautionary measure; he had no intent on going hand to hand with Thanos. He simply wasn’t strong enough, or fast enough, to go toe to toe with him, even with help. Not to mention the fact that his current state of martial skill would serve to do little more than get in his own allies’ way. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t project any force into the conflict.
As Thanos readied a punch at Gamora a portal opened, engulfing his arm. That same arm emerged from another portal behind him. In effect, he punched himself in the back of the head.
>>
Quill keyed his comm unit with his empty hand as he streaked towards the juggling portals Strange had created. “Guys I’m going to need your help with The Power Stone again,” he said.
“I’m a little busy right now,” Gamora replied tersely. Which was a bit of an understatement. In truth, she doubted she could successfully disengage herself from the fight. The two sisters most definitely had a tiger by its tail. And even if she could have, she wasn’t about to leave Nebula again.
“We are on our way,” T’Challa said. Quill scanned the ground to find both Bucky and T’Challa charging for the same portals and shrugged. He had to hope they would be enough.
Quill landed in a slide that left him under the receiving portal just as the stone vanished into it. He ditched his gun, preparing to catch the stone like it was a baseball. The receiving portal disappeared just as the stone exited the pitching portal. He tracked its trajectory, adjusting his position a step or two to place himself directly under it.
He couldn’t help but wince in anticipation even as he reached his hands out to catch the stone. The memory of the pain that beautiful looking gem had caused flashed through his head even as the stone entered his hand, but the recollection only made him grip it tighter. The pain seared up his arm, just as before.
Just as before but different. If anything, the intensity was less than he remembered. He was unsure if that was due to his previous experience, or the awakening of something in his genes due to the events on Ego. Not that the difference was enough to allow him to control it on his own. He could still feel his body beginning to break apart, but he found he was able to resist it better.
A moment later Rocket, T’Challa, and Bucky made it to him. T’Challa and Bucky each grabbed a shoulder, Rocket grabbed Quill’s empty hand. For a moment they each jerked taut with the shared pain, but they quickly adapted to it, stabilizing each other just as the Guardians had done on Xandar. Only this time, with far less effort or time spent.
Quill opened his hand, revealing The Power Stone. The same purple fluidic lighting that had consumed Ronin leapt from his palm, spraying straight for Thanos. Wanda changed tactics, creating red tendrils around Thanos’s feet that quickly snaked up wrapping themselves around his legs. She could not immobilize his incredibly powerful limbs, but she was able to keep him from leaving the intersection of the three beams.
Thanos raised his other hand to block that stream, leaving himself open to both the sisters, and Vision. He used his elbows as best he could to block their attacks. It was a holding measure that could not last, a choice that virtually rooted him in place, unable to defend himself. He lurched with the impacts he could no longer defend against. He bellowed in rage at the pain caused by the yellow and red spectrum stones.
Vision focused his beam on Thanos’s neck, intent on beheading the instrument of Tony’s probable death. The two sisters followed suit. Gamora leapt into the air, aiming a slash at the back of Thanos’s neck, just above where his armor. The blade bit deep into his neck just as Nebula delivered a massive hammer blow to Thanos’s face.
The head came clean off, flying away from Nebula’s blow. The body disintegrated almost immediately, with all ending their attacks on it a moment later. Wanda levitated The Power Stone and The Tesseract out of their wielder’s hands, holding them safely above the ground.
Nebula watched the head spin away in shock. Despite her newfound friends, despite the emergence of her determination, despite her single-minded focus on the goal, she’d never really believed they’d kill him. It was a goal that hadn’t seemed real, just worth fighting for.
She fell to her knees in awe of the site of that twirling head as the armor that had helped enable that victory abandoned her body. Its constituent components arced across the field towards Tony’s failing body. Nebula didn’t even notice, so transfixed was she by that sight.
Then she roared, her body angled slightly towards the flying head, bent arms held out at her sides, forearms level to the ground. It was a stance that somehow combined the elements of victory and defeat together.
And the roar; none that heard it ever forgot it. It was more than just victory. It was more than just vengeance. It was the stress brokered from years of abuse. It was the defiance of the unbroken. It was a lifetime of fear and unimaginable stress, all trying to escape through the insufficient gap created by her jaws.
It was also vengeance and victory.
It was a sound that would send lions into their caves. It would send bears barreling through the brush in fear. It would send bilge snipe back into the seas. For one brief moment it was as if God himself were howling.
For one brief moment the entire battlefield turned to the source of that sound. It interrupted Gamora’s own head-gazing. It woke Tony from his pain induced sleep. His eyebrows furrowed momentarily in confusion, then smoothed in understanding. A smile began to form on his face just as the light went out of his eyes. The spark was not quite gone when his face was covered by his suit, green glow of the healing protocols already active.
“Help me,” Parker called, grabbing one end of the giant laying over Tony’s body. It wasn’t that he couldn’t lift that much weight; the body was just too big, and too limp, to do so without causing further damage. Several of them rushed to help. Thor retrieved his hammer and started to fly that direction. Hulk bounded over. Their efforts proved unnecessary as a moment later the body crackled in red energy and was lifted directly off of Tony. The suit pieces that hadn’t been able to reach those portions of his body rushed to cover them.
The assembling crowd watched, holding their breath in hope that Tony could be saved, yet certain that the damage done to his body simply wasn’t repairable in time even with the advanced healing his suit provided. For several moments there was only silent hope, counterpointed by Nebula’s roar.
“What’s protocol 42?” Natasha asked suddenly as Nebula’s roar ended abruptly.
“It is the gift he gave me,” Vision said quietly. “Self-determination, the right to choose the course of one’s own life.” They fell silent again at that.
Nebula roared until she nearly passed out. Eventually she sucked in a breath of air. That one act more than any other seemed to have exhausted her more than she would have imagined. And yet, she felt better than she’d felt in far too long.
She got shakily to her feet with Gamora’s help. The two of them started out for the crowd surrounding Tony. They’d traversed most of that distance when Friday’s voice began speaking to her through her implant.
“I’m sending you this recording because I need your help,” Friday’s voice said. “Tony’s injuries are beyond my ability to repair. His body will die. But I can save his mind with your help.” The recorded voice paused for a moment, as if the AI had hesitated.
“I can record his neural electrical activity,” she continued “preserve his consciousness”. “But there is not enough storage space for my program and Tony’s consciousness. Once I enact these protocols, I will be overwritten.”
A schematic overlaid itself in Nebula’s vision. “I need you to remove the suit’s memory core,” Friday continued as a spot on the back of the helmet began to pulse a different color. “Take it to Tony’s workshop in The Avengers Facility. Get Vision to help you; he’ll know what to do. Don’t tell anyone else, in case this doesn’t work.”
Nebula nodded, despite knowing that the only reason she was hearing a recorded Friday was because the real Friday had already carried out her portion of this plan. She was gone, and Nebula felt some sadness for that loss. She also couldn’t help feeling a debt to Tony. If Friday was willing to make this sacrifice for her maker then she certainly wouldn’t squander that.
“Thank you, Nebula,” Friday replied, despite being a recording. No doubt the AI had known that Nebula would comply before she’d initiated her plan.