STARGIRL

twenty-seven.

Tony Stark was dead.

At first Eleanor thought that they were joking, but as she pushed her way through the crowd, her heart dropped seeing the body of the man that she had only met once. "Oh." she whispered, and she fell back into her dad's arms. Eleanor hadn't seen any death, but she had her fair share of dealing with it - she and Gamora had almost died back in 2014; they had killed her insane grandfather only a month later; and then Gamora was murdered five years ago.

Teddy searched through the crowd for her as his brother was being comforted by Pepper Potts - Tony's wife. "Hi." he said to the girl.

"Oh, Teddy, I'm so sorry," she said, "I know he meant a lot to you."

Peter let go of her, giving her a gentle push in Teddy's direction. She wrapped her arms around his chest and he hugged her back. He placed his head on her shoulder, "Yeah. I'm gonna miss him. Badly."

"I'm such a bad friend. I didn't find you to ask you how you were." Eleanor replied.

"It's okay," Teddy said, "I don't mind finding you actually."

She sighed in relief and the two hugged for longer, until Peter decided it was enough and removed the two from each other.

Two days later was Tony's funeral. Eleanor was dressed in a black dress that came down to her knees to show her respects to the man. She stood by her father, holding his hand, as they waited for Tony's family to come out of his little cabin house.

Pepper exited first, holding onto the hand of a small girl. Eleanor gasped, turning to her dad, "He had a baby, Dad. She's so tiny and she's going to have to live without her dad." Eleanor couldn't imagine her life without her own father, so it made processing this loss much harder now that she knew Tony had a small daughter.

Pepper had set a wreath of flowers and clearly something of Tony's onto the river. It started to float away, as everybody watched. Pepper and the small child stood at the very end of the dock. Pepper was crouching down next to her daughter, comforting the poor girl. Behind them was Tony's two best friends - his bodyguard, Happy, and his childhood best friend, Rhodey.

Steve stood behind them, staring tearfully down at the muddy water, watching the small wreath float away. Behind him were the two Parker brothers, linking arms, and their aunt stood behind them. She placed a gentle hand on the shoulder of the younger Parker, and the older one put his head on his brother's shoulder.

Next was Thor and Bruce. Both were looking worse. Thor had gotten a lot plumper than when Eleanor had saw him last, and Bruce had his deeply scarred arm held up in a cast. The wizard Strange and his assistant, Wong, stood behind them. Both had neutrally sad expressions on their faces.

Scott Lang - the massive antman - stood behind them, gathered with his family. He had spotted Eleanor earlier and commented on how she reminded him of his own daughter, Cassie. She had smiled back and given the man a quick hug before joining her family. His family included Hope Van Dyne, and her parents.

It was then Eleanor and her family. Mantis stood on the far left with Groot standing between her and Rocket, who was stood on a small tree stump. Right behind Rocket was Peter, who was sandwiched between Nebula and Eleanor. He still had a grip on his daughter's hand, after being separated from her so many times. Drax stood behind Eleanor, but a little to the left.

A bit away stood the Wakandan king, T'Challa, and his sister, Shuri, and the head of his army, Okoye. Further away stood Clint Barton and his family. Clint had both his hands on his eldest two's shoulders, and his wife stood by him, stroking their youngest child's hair. Eleanor had no clue that they were also mourning the death of another who had lost her life to help bring everyone home.

Further away still, stood a trio. Bucky Barnes, Sam Wilson and Wanda Maximoff. Sam placed a delicate hand on Bucky's shoulder as he stepped closer to his friend for some kind of comfort. A little behind him was a youngish boy called Harley Keener that Tony had met some time back in 2013 when the boy was young. He looked to be a couple of years older than Eleanor, but she had no idea whether the Snap had affected him or not. Behind the boy was Maria Hill, an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. who had known Tony, and stood next to her was General Ross, who had trusted Tony a long time ago.

Standing on the steps of Tony's family's little wooden cabin was the new woman - Carol Danvers. She had saved Tony's life back when the Snap had first happened, helping him to get home to his family, and behind her emerged Nick Fury. This man started Tony off as an Avenger and he was here to pay his respects to the fallen man.

Eleanor felt exhausted as she leant against Peter for the entire social event. She had witnessed too much in the past few years and she just wanted to have a break.

But the universe just simply wouldn't let her.

END OF ACT THREE