Wanda's POV
Steve and Vision led us out of the Quinjet, followed by Bruce and Rhodey, with me and Natasha slowly taking up the rear.
"Wakanda is beautiful." I whispered to Natasha as we walked towards a different building, Vision following us with Steve not far behind.
Shuri led us upstairs into her lab where she immediately started working with Vision. He laid on the table as Shuri used her kimoyo beads to scan Vision's stone. She flipped her hand over and studied the hologram projected over her palm.
"Whoa. The structure is polymorphic." Shuri said as she stared at the hologram.
"Right, we had to attach each neuron non-sequentially." Bruce responded as Shuri looked at him confused.
"Why didn't you just reprogram the synapses to work collectively?" She asked as Vision glanced Bruce as if to the same thing.
"Because we didn't think of it." Bruce said, uncertainty filling his voice.
"I'm sure you did your best." Shuri said as she smiled at Bruce.
"Can you do it?" I questioned as Shuri turned to respond.
"Yes, but there are more than two trillion neurons here. One misalignment could cause a cascade of circuit failures. It will take time brother." Shuri directed the last part at T'Challa as Steve spoke.
"How long?"
"As long as you can give me." She said as Okoye's kimoyo beads chimed an alarm.
Okoye flick one of the beads into her palm where it projected a globe with a pulsing location marker.
"Something's entered the atmosphere." She stated as we watched something hit the shield surrounding Wakanda.
A large shock wave rumbled through the area, debris from a ship destroying acres of forest. The lab that we stood in had a great view of the landing sites that ships had positioned themselves in.
"It's too late. We need to destroy the stone now." Vision said as he tried to get off the table.
Natasha quickly strutted over and nudged him back onto the table.
"Vision, get your ass back on the table." She growled as her eyes shot around to look at me.
"We will hold them off." T'Challa said as he, Okoye, and the guards headed for the door.
"Wanda, as soon as the stone's out of his head...you blow it to hell." Steve commanded as I replied with confidence.
"I will."
"Evacuate the city. Engage all defense procedures." T'Challa stopped for a minute, turning to look at Steve as he pointed. "And get this man a shield."
I walked up to the window watching everything that was going on outside. I glanced sideways to see Natasha staring at my arm for some reason. As she looked away, I grabbed her arm and pulled her towards me.
"Why were you doing that to my arm earlier?" I whispered, trying to not get the attention of the others in the room.
"I don't know. I was getting mad and nervous. I-"
"Natasha, we gotta go." Steve said as he cut off whatever Natasha was going to say.
"I love you." She mumbled against my lips as she kissed me and pulled away, glancing at me one last time before she walked out of the room with Bucky and Steve.
"Are they going to be okay?" I asked as Shuri worked on Vision.
She looked up and shot me a smile.
"Wanda, they are going to be fine."
As she finished speaking, a deep rumble could be heard in the difference. I looked down at the battlefield and saw movement through the blazing forest between the troopships and the dome. When the disturbance reached the edges of the tress, it turned into vast moving mounds of Earth that easily bypassed the force field and emerged.
Threshers. Big motorized spiked wheels.
I watched as one set of the threshers separated into individual wheels and started veering over the battlefield. I anxiously glanced at Vision, Shuri going quicker now as the battle intensified. As a thresher went for Natasha and Okoye, I smashed the glass on the window in front of me, shooting through the air as the thresher got nearer and nearer to the two women. I landed in front of them, my eyes glowing red as I lifted the thresher off the ground and slammed it into a humungous group of outriders. Natasha straightened with a smile, her body in a fighting pose as she held her escrima sticks in her hand, Okoye with an amazed look on her face.
"Why was she up there all this time?" Okoye said as she stared at me.
"Somebody get to Vision!" I heard Steve command threw my earpiece, my head nodding as I got ready to take off.
"On my way." I stated as I turned to fly off.
Suddenly, Proxima pushed me into the large ditch left by the thresher before I could even move.
"He'll die alone. As will you." She growled, jumping down next to me.
"She's not alone." Natasha responded as she and Okoye leaped down into the ditch, Okoye brandishing her spear at Proxima as she nodded as Natasha.
"Euuyaaah!" Proxima yelled as she ran at Natasha who joined her sticks in a staff.
Natasha blocked the blow with an electrical crack while Okoye ran around the slope to attack from the front. Proxima started alternating between opponents, but all three duck as a single-wheeled thresher went over their heads. Proxima used the distraction to kick Natasha in the face, sending her to ground roughly as I attempted to move from position that I was in on the ground. Proxima then grabbed Okoye by the shoulder and ripped her weapon away from her, throwing it a couple of meters away. Natasha split her staff back into the pair of sticks that she was using earlier, blocking Proxima's sword blows as she finally knocked the sword from Proxima's hands. The alien took to her bare fists instead, knocking down my girlfriend as she pinned her to ground. Proxima triggered an arm-blade from her left-arm armor and stabbed at Natasha who barely managed to block the blade with her crossed sticks. As the edge of Proxima's blade barely dug into Natasha's neck, I threw red energy at Proxima, raising her off Natasha and into the way of an incoming thresher. Dark blue blood splattered Natasha below as I sat up and sighed, the red color still visible in my eyes as my hands shimmered.
"That was really gross." Natasha said as she wiped the blood from her face.
"I have to go." I muttered as I lifted off the ground and located Vision.
"Are you okay?"
Vision flinched in pain before he could answer.
"What? What is it?" I questioned, looking him over carefully.
The wind picked up suddenly. It felt...different. Blue-black clouds appeared as Thanos stepped from them, the infinity gauntlet in tow. I watched as my friends attacked him one by one, everyone of them getting taken out as they tried to prevent Thanos from getting to me and Vision.
"Wanda. It's time." Vision spoke, my head turning to look at him.
"No."
"They can't stop him, Wanda, but we can. Look at me. You have the power to destroy the stone."
"Don't."
"You must do it. Wanda, please. We. Are. Out of time." Vision choked out, tears coming to my eyes.
"I can't." I quietly said as stared at me.
"Yes, you can. You can. If he gets the stone, half the universe dies."
"It's not fair." I whimper as I blink away tears.
"It shouldn't be you, but it is. It's all right. You could never hurt me. I just...feel you."
I extended a trembling hand and started beaming energy at the mind stone. From the side of my eye, I could see Natasha run at Thanos as he used the power stone to make tendrils of earth come off the ground and wrap her up tightly, slowly suffocating her. I turned back to Vision, tears running down my face as red beams shot out of my hands. I looked back over my shoulder too see Thanos approaching without any opponents. I swung my left hand around as scarlet energy shot out of it, hitting Thanos. He was pushed back despite his blue-purple energy shield, but he soon fought it, slowly moving towards me.
"It's all right. It's all right. Thank you." I heard Vision distantly say as the yellow mind stone started to crack.
Vision's face was overcome by an expression of joyful peace as the crystal fragments broke and a pulse of pure yellow energy exploded from him, shuddering the trees many meters away from us. Mine and Thanos energy died down as I dropped to ground, sobs racking my body.
"I understand, my child. Better than anyone."
"You could never." I snarled at him as he lightly patted my head as if to comfort me.
"Today, I lost more than you can know. But now is no time to mourn. Now...is not time at all."
I glanced up as Thanos used the time stone to make Vision appear.
"No!" I screamed as I lunged at Vision.
Thanos swatted me away with his hand, my body hitting a tree with a painful thud as I dropped to the drop, moaning in pain as Natasha looked at me through barely opened eyes. I closed my eyes, too weak to do anything. I could hear people battling near me as Thor appeared and attacked Thanos. Suddenly, after a couple of minutes, I watched as Thanos teleported away. The tendrils around Natasha disappeared, a loud gasp of air able to be heard as she clutched her chest and looked around. I followed her line of vision to see that people were turning to ash. They were turning to literal ash. I snapped my head around to look at Natasha, worried that she was going to disappear to, but she never did. Neither did I. Once she had finally caught her breath, she stumbled over to me, dropping to the ground as my breaths came out in gasps.
"What's happening?" I whimpered as Natasha pulled me up and hugged my head to her chest, my eyes closing as I relaxed on her.
Tears fell from her eyes onto my hair as tears rolled down my face. She picked me up suddenly making me whimper in pain as she walked over to the remaining part of the team, Steve, Thor, Rhodey, Bruce, and Rocket.
"What are we going to do?" Natasha asked as she held me close, sitting on the ground with me curled in her lap.
Little did we know that our lives were about to be a living hell.