ETERNITY. peter parker [2]

CHAPTER SEVEN

"How are you, Nikki?" Morgan asked with the accent Nikki had found herself loving. She and Tony had been restlessly working for the past few days doing some more tests with the first device they had made to see if it needed any more changes. Fortunately, the device was in optimum condition and they were ready to discuss how many more devices they needed and how they would retrieve the stones from the past. "I'm fine." Nikki whispered, looking around if anyone was in the living room at her. It wasn't surprising when she had noticed no one was there, it was two in the morning.

"Why are you awake? It's past your bedtime." Nikki whispered. Morgan shuffled her device for a few moments before looking around, with a terrified look on her face. "I had a bad dream. I dreamt that he took you away."

Nikki frowned, examining her sister who looked like she was on the edge of tears. "What bad guy?" she questioned, not even sure anymore. She had told Morgan most of her experiences with the Avengers and how she would always risk her life to protect people, which made Morgan look up to her. Morgan sniffled, looking at the camera. "The big purple guy who took Peter away." she whimpered.

Nikki felt her heart drop. She was damn sure that there was something going to trigger chaos in the time heist, and she had already pre-recorded some messages for her family if something had happened to her, just in case. "He won't take me." Nikki lied, not even knowing that much for herself. "But, if he does take me, I'll always watch over you." she smiled, trying to help out Morgan. Morgan sadly looked at her from the camera. "Okay. I love you, Nikki." she smiled. "I love you too. Bye." Nikki replied with a huge smile on her face, pressing her hand to end the video call she had had with her sister.

-
Nikki stared at the six stones plastered on the screen. As soon as she announced that the device didn't need any more revisions to everyone, Steve immediately set up a meeting for everyone, putting the plan in place. "Okay, so the "how" works. Now we gotta figure out the when," and the "where." Steve stated, looking across the room. "Almost everyone in this room has had an encounter with at least one of the six Infinity Stones." That was true. Nonetheless, the only encounter Nikki had was recently when Thanos had held her against her will and blasted the Space Stone into her body.

"Well, I'd subtitute the word 'encounter' for 'damn near been killed by one of the six Infinity Stones.'" Tony said sarcastically, looking over at the screens that had all of the stones pictures in it.

"I haven't." Scott, who sat beside Nikki spoke out. "I don't even know what the hell you're all talking about." he added. Nikki looked over Scott when she had noticed that everyone had ignored him. "You will soon." she stated plain and simple. Scott shrugged, placing his attention back on Steve who was discussing in front.

"Regardless, we only have enough Pym Particles for one round trip each, and these stones have been in a lot of different places throughout history." Bruce spoke as he made his way around the table. "Our history. So, not a lot of convenient spots to just drop in." he added.

"Which means we have to pick our targets." Nikki spoke out. Steve glanced towards the girls direction, a pleased smile on his face. "Correct." he dismissed, looking over to the rest of the people.

"So. Let's start with the Aether." Steve spoke out, his eyes not leaving the notepad he had in hand. "Thor, what do you know?" he questioned, but after a few seconds of silence, this caused everyone to stare at the man who was at the back of the room, with his usual glasses on his face.

"Is he asleep?" Nikki asked, looking at the man who held a half empty beer bottle on one hand. "I'm pretty sure he's dead." Rhodes commented, but the man started to stir, making them all realize that he was in fact, asleep. Nikki sighed, her eyes turning into a shade of red as she pushed Thor farther on his seat, making the man jump up in surprise and wake up from his slumber.

The man made his way infront of the room when everyone had seen him. "Where to start? Umm... The Aether, first, is not a stone." he chuckled.
"Someone's called it a stone before. Ahem... It's more of a... an angry sludge, sort of thing. So...
Someone's gonna need to amend that, and stop saying that." he pointed out.

"Noted." Nikki muttered sarcastically.

"Here's an interesting story, though..." Thor started to trail off the topic, tapping his finger on his head to pretend that he was thinking.  "About the Aether. My grandafther, many years ago, had to hide the stone from the Dark Elves. Scary beings. So Jane... " He started, until the system Nikki had build shown a picture of Jane on the screen. "Oh, there she is." his eyes glistened. "That's Jane... She's... an old flame of mine. She... she stuck her hand
inside a rock this one time... and then the Aether stuck itself inside her." He was definitely going off topic. Nonetheless, no one stopped him, unsure wether to be amused or annoyed.

"And, she became very, very sick. So I had to take her to Asgard, which is where I'm from. And we had to try and fix her. We were dating at the time, you see. I got to introduce her to my Mother...
who's dead, and umm.... Oh, you know. Jane and I aren't even dating anymore, so... These things happen though, you know. Nothing lasts forever." he concluded.

"The only thing that..." Thor was about to stir away from the topic once more before Tony stood up, deciding that they would handle Thor later on when he was sober.  "Why don't you come sit down."

"I'm not done yet. The only thing that is permanent in life, is impermanence."

"Awesome. Eggs? Breakfast?" Tony asked, looking at the man. Thor shook his head, a giant smile on his face. "No. I'd like a Bloody Mary."

Finding the stones would take longer than Nikki originally thought.