Through The Fog I See Your Face
Stephen watched as Tony, Natasha, and a very different-looking Hulk researched where the infinity stones had once been. Morgan would occasionally come in, and Stephen could tell that she was the only reason the group hadn’t given up yet. Nebula came and went as well. She had been unable to find any useful information in her hard drive, and so she was helping various groups research. She refused to assist Rogers, though, and Stephen couldn’t help but respect her for that.
“Strange, what’s new?” Oliver asked, coming up beside him with Wanda.
“They’re on the right path,” Stephen answered. “They’re searching for the stones throughout time. It won’t be long before they go back to get them,” he said.
“And Nat dies,” Wanda whispered. They all fell quiet at that, and Stephen nodded shortly.
“Yes. Nat dies,” he said quietly. “We’ll have time to mourn, but right now we need to get ready. It won’t be long now until we’re out of here and fighting Thanos, so we have to get a plan,” he said, standing up.
“The wizard’s right, I want another shot at that grape-motherfucker,” Quill said.
“Um… now,” Strange said. “If I remember correctly it was you who messed up our last plan. You’re not going anywhere near Thanos,” he decided.
“The sorcerer is right,” Drax agreed. “You cannot be trusted.” Mantis nodded eagerly, and Quill deflated.
“How much time do we have, Strange?” Bucky asked.
“A little over a day I’d guess,” Stephen replied. “While they take a lot of time when in the quantum realm, it will only be a moment in our timeline.”
“Then we must get ready,” T’Challa decided. “When we are brought back, where will we end up? Will my armies and I be returned to Wakanda?”
“I believe so. Once I’m returned to the real world, I’ll get a message to the Sanctum and have the sorcerers get you to the compound to fight Thanos,” Stephen said. T’Challa nodded in agreement and Shuri looked excited. Clearly, she was planning to get some things from her lab. While she hadn’t been able to fight the first time around she had no plans of sitting this one out.
“Oliver, do you think that you’ll be able to fight without Frost? I believe that the magic he used to heal you will hold, but I cannot be sure.”
“I’m fighting,” Oliver decided. “Where will Frost be? Can’t I just be his host again?”
“You can, but I have a feeling that it’s going to be a bit hectic, so it may take a while for him to find you,” Stephen explained. “Alright, let’s get ready to finish this.”
~
“So, you’re the Mesti and Emilia from Frost’s stories,” Carol said, looking at Mestin curiously. Emilia was preparing the ship from lightspeed travel as Carol would soon be transporting them to Earth as fast as possible.
“Frost… I don’t know anyone by that name,” he said. “Is he of Enexion?”
“Yes, but I believe he had a different name when living there. He told us that you were a mage, but he didn’t talk about Emilia all that much. You say that she can take the form of the person you love the most?” Carol asked, interested. Mestin sighed, leaning back against his chair.
“It’s more than just that. When she changes form… it’s the real deal. One time when we were sparring I hit her in the face and gave her a nose bleed. she accidentally shifted and I could sense a different magical signature in the blood. I had one of my scientists run a few tests, and the DNA came back as Silven’s.”
“She changed her DNA?” Carol asked in amazement. Mestin nodded.
“When enemies attack her, they don’t stand a chance. I always thought that it was strange that no one was able to push aside their love for whoever they saw to get the job done. Now I understand though. It isn’t just an illusion. She truly does become them.” Carol understood too. Emilia had only appeared as Maria for a moment, but she could have sworn it was real. She had the same spark in her eyes that was unique to Maria and had smiled in a way that Carol knew no one could re-create.
“I’m guessing that that was very useful in the war,” she said.
“Yes, it was,” Mestin agreed. “I’m guessing that she would have been useful against Thanos as well. If what you said about his daughter is true, she probably would have been a good distraction,” he said. Carol nodded. Emilia would have been very useful during the Infinity War.
~
Mestin and Emilia watched the stars streak by them as Carol pushed their ship towards Earth at light speed.
“You sure about this?” Emilia asked. “If we do this, darling, there’s a very good chance that we won’t come home.”
“What’s left at home?” Mestin asked, successfully ending the conversation. They watched the stars pass in silence until Emilia spoke once more.
“Is that it? Earth?” she asked, pointing to a small, green and blue planet ahead of them. Carol had begun to slow down as well, so they supposed that he must be right.
As their ship sped towards the planet called Earth, Mestin felt a strange tug in the back of his mind.
“Mestin…” a familiar voice whispered. Mestin looked around only to find everything frozen. He peered out the window to see Carol stuck in time, the golden energy that she possessed suspended around her.
“Mestin, can you hear me?” The voice asked again. Mestin turned slowly around, eyes trained on the ground. The first thing he saw was a pair of black boots that seemed to shimmered orangey-gold. He slowly looked up until he was staring into a pair of familiar, hazel eyes.
“Silven?” he asked, voice small. “W-what is this? What’s happening?” he asked.
“We don’t have much time, I need to talk to you,” Silven said quickly, not giving Mestin much time to take in what was happening. “You are headed to Earth, correct?” he questioned. Mestin nodded. “Good. When you get there, the Avengers will be preparing to retrieve the infinity stones from the past.”
“What are you talking about?” Mestin asked. Silven looked back at him, and Mestin could find only pain in his eyes.
“I need you to listen very carefully,” Silven said. Mestin nodded and felt his eyes widen as Silven began to speak.
“I don’t understand,” Mestin said once Silven was done.
“You will,” Silven whispered. “I’m so sorry.” His form began to flicker and Mestin’s eyes widened.
“No! Please don’t go, please don’t leave yet!” Silven looked at him sadly and reached forward to wipe away the tears Mestin hadn’t even realized were leaking from his eyes.
“It’s going to be okay,” he said, flickering in and out of visibility as the soul realm’s pull intensified. “Remember what I told you. It will be alright,” Silven said. Mestin grabbed onto his sleeve, but his fingers just fell through empty air.
“I love you,” Silven’s voice echoed as he was thrown back into the soul realm. Mestin sank to his knees as time began moving again. He heard the sound of footsteps rushing towards him and felt Emilia’s hand on his shoulder as she pulled him to his feet.
“Mestin, what’s happening? Should I get Carol to come back in?” she asked. Mestin shook his head.
“No, everything is fine. We have to get to Earth as fast as we can though. We have a job to do.”
~
Tony had needed some time to take in Bruce’s new form, but he was beginning to find it quite interesting. Bruce seemed far calmer than usual, and the combination of raw strength and intelligence would definitely prove useful in the future. Currently, though, none of their minds were having any luck with the infinity stones question. Tony, Bruce, and Natasha were all lying on a table with old lore splayed out around them.
“Wait,” Natasha said, sitting up partially. “If the mind stone was Loki’s scepter, the space stone is the Tesseract, and Dr. Strange had the time stone, then that’s three stones in New York,” she said.
“Holy shit, she’s right!” Tony realized, sitting up with a start. Bruce got up as well and the group made their way to the main conference room where Clea and Wong were talking with Nebula.
“Guys, we’ve got three stones in New York at the same time,” Natasha said. “We're just going to need to hope that past-Strange is willing to give us the stone,” She explained.
“Well that would be a problem, Strange didn't have the stone at that point,” Wong said. “It was being protected by the Sorceress Supreme, and I doubt that he will purposely endanger her timeline.”
“Well then we take it from her, and bring it back before she realizes it’s missing,” Nebula said. Clea shook her head slightly but didn’t say anything. From what Stephen had told her about the Sorceress Supreme, she was unlikely to lose the time stone.
“Look, Stephen wouldn’t have let Thanos have the stone unless he was sure that we’d be able to do this,” Tony said fiercely. “We’ve gotta do this.” The others nodded and Clea looked thoughtful.
“Wait here, I have something that might help,” she said before portaling back to the sanctum. Tony walked up to the projected data and began filling in what they had found.
“So we have three stones in New York along with this planet, uh, Vormir?” he asked. Wong nodded.
“According to Rocket, it’s where Thanos killed Gamora,” he said. Tony nodded and turned to Natasha wearily.
“Natasha, I’m going to need to ask you to do something that I don’t think you’re going to want to,” he said. Natasha watched him carefully for a moment before nodding.
“I’ll get him back,” she said. With that, she headed down to find the quinjet and set her course for Clint.