IT WAS TIME TO PREPARE for the Time Heist. Their brainstorming session was held in the conference room with many screens displaying the six Infinity Stones.
"Okay, so the how works." Steve began, "Now, we gotta figure out the when and the where. Almost everyone in this room has had an encounter with at least one of the six Infinity Stones."
Tony joined Cap up at the front of the room, "Or substitute the word encounter for damn near been killed, by one of the six Infinity Stones." He pointed at Y/N, "I'm referring to you, kid."
Y/N smirked at Tony's remark.
"Well, I haven't. But I don't even know what the hell you're all talking about." Scott said.
"Regardless, we only have enough Pym Particles for one round-trip each." Banner explained, "And these stones have been in a lot of different places throughout history.
"Our history." Tony added, "So, not a lot of convenient spots to just drop in, yeah?"
"Which means we have to pick our targets." Y/N chimed in.
"Correct."
"So, let's start with the Aether." Steve looked at the sunglasses-wearing Asgardian sitting in the corner of the room, "Thor, what do you know?"
Everybody turned to him, and after a few moments of his silence, they noticed he was asleep.
"Is he asleep?" Natasha asked.
"No, no. I'm pretty sure he's dead." Rhodey replied.
They woke up Thor, and after collecting himself he began to explain the facts dealing with the Reality Stone.
"The Aether, firstly, is not a stone." Thor said, "Someone called it a stone before...it's more of an angry sludge sort of thing...so someone's gonna need to amend that and stop saying that."
Thor then explained how the Aether went inside his ex-girlfriend, Jane. It lead him to talk about his late mother, which made him sad and also admit that Jane isn't with him anymore. The room stayed quiet, and the situation got more awkward.
"Nothing lasts forever. The only thing that—"
"Why don't you come sit down?" Tony walked up and started pulling Thor.
"I'm not done yet. The only thing that is permanent in life is impermanence."
Tony clapped his hands, "Awesome. Eggs? Breakfast?"
Thor laughed, "No, I'd like a Bloody Mary."
"Quill said he stole the Power Stone from Morag." Rocket began to explain the next stone. The team sat around eating Chinese take-out as the raccoon walked across the table.
"Is that a person?" Y/N asked as he chewed his food.
"No, Morag's a planet. Quill was a person."
Scott's eyes lit up, "Like a planet? Like in outer space?"
"Oh, look." Rocket walked up to Scott's spot at the table, "It's like a little puppy, all happy and everything." He pet the top of his head, "Do you wanna go to space? You wanna go to space, puppy? I'll take you to space."
Scott lowered his head, embarrassed at the interaction with the raccoon.
"Thanos found the Soul Stone on Vormir." Nebula began to explain. The team sat in another room looking at the screen displaying the stone.
"What is Vormir?" Scott asked.
"It's another planet." Y/N answered, "Years ago Elias Konrad built a portal to Vormir in order to get the stone."
"Elias who-rad?" Scott raised a brow.
"He worked with HYDRA. We stopped him before he can get to it." Natasha answered, "But there was explosion..."
"And that's how I got my powers." Y/N finished for her. He shrugged his shoulders, "I'm starting to think letting Konrad get the stone before Thanos would've been better."
"He probably would've gotten it anyway." Banner replied.
"This planet is a dominion of death, at the very center of celestial existence." Nebula said, "It's where Thanos murdered my sister."
The room was silent, as nobody knew what else to say. A part of Y/N didn't even want to go near that place. Getting injected with its atmosphere and almost dying in an explosion was enough for him.
Scott also glanced around before finally abruptly speaking.
"Not it."
Banner laid on the floor while Natasha laid on the sofa near the cluttered table. Tony rested his head on a pillow while Y/N stood around throwing a ball back to himself using the wall.
They were discussing the Time Stone.
"That Time Stone guy." Natasha began.
"Doctor Strange." Banner corrected.
"Yeah, what kind of doctor was he?"
"Ear-nose-throat meets rabbit-from-hat." Tony answered.
"Nice place in the Village, though." Banner remarked.
"Yeah, on Sullivan Street?"
"Mm...Bleeker Street."
Y/N tossed the ball to himself, "A wizard could afford a place in the Village?"
"Well, he was a neurosurgeon." Tony answered, "But that place wasn't his to begin with...it belongs to the other wizards."
"Wait, he lived in New York?" Natasha asked.
"Yeah, on Bleecker and Sullivan." Banner replied.
"No, he lived in Toronto." Tony sarcastically told Nat, "Have you been listening to anything?"
"Guys. If you pick the right year, there are three stones in New York."
Banner began to think. The Tesseract containing the Space Stone, the Time Stone, and the Scepter containing the Mind Stone were all in New York in 2012.
"Shut the front door..."
The plan was made. The team looked at the separate screens that detailed where each stone was. Three were in New York in 2012, one was in Asgard in 2013, and two were in space in 2014.
"All right. We have a plan." Steve began, "Six stones, three teams, one shot."
The sunset brought a bright orange color through the windows of the hangar. The team, all in their own time travel suits, walked across the room towards the quantum tunnel. Upon nearing it, Captain America began to speak.
"Five years ago we lost. All of us. We lost friends. We lost family. We lost a part of ourselves. Today we have a chance to take it all back."
They all lined up in a circle on the machine. Steve looked at each of his teammates as he continued.
"You know your teams. You know your missions. Get the stones. Get them back." Everybody put their hands together in unity. They were determined to complete the mission.
"One round-trip each. No mistakes...no do-overs. Most of us are going somewhere we know. That doesn't mean we should know what to expect. Be careful. Look out for each other." Steve continued, "This is the fight of our lives...and we're gonna win."
Tony looked at Steve, and the Captain glanced back. He nodded, "Whatever it takes. Good luck."
Rocket was in awe of his speech, "He's pretty good at that."
"Right?" Scott replied with a smile.
Everybody got back in their positions as Tony began to speak, "All right. You heard the man." He pointed at Banner who was activating the machine, "Stroke those keys, Jolly Green."
"Trackers engaged." Banner called out.
He walked back onto the quantum tunnel and pressed a button on his wrist, starting the countdown on the machine.
"See you in a minute." Natasha smirked as she looked at Cap.
He smiled back, and the machine began to activate. Y/N's mask closed as did everybody else's. In a matter of moments, they all shrunk and traveled through the quantum realm.
• • •
THE POWER STONE ON MORAG was the mission assigned to Rhodey, Y/N, and Nebula. Clint and Natasha joined them on their trip back to 2014, but they were going to split from the group and travel to Vormir.
"All right, bring it down, Blue." Rhodey called out to Nebula, "Right on that line. That's it. Down, down."
One of their smaller ships lowered from the Benetar and was brought down to the surface of the planet.
A reptilian creature nibbled on Natasha's shoe, and she kicked it away. It let out a snarl before crawling away.
"Hey, can we hurry it up?" Clint asked.
"Guys, chop-chop. Come on. We're on the clock." Natasha said.
Y/N turned back to face his fellow assassin colleagues, "All that is very helpful."
Natasha chuckled as Clint shook his head and rested his hands on his waist.
"Couldn't have said it better myself." Rhodey muttered as he continued looking at the ship.
Once the ship was ready and Nebula joined the rest, it was time to bid farewell for the moment.
Natasha hugged the colonel, "Take care, okay."
"Yeah. Get that stone and come back, all right?"
She went to hug Y/N next, and the young man spoke during the embrace, "No messing around. All this time travel shit is still pretty scary."
Natasha pulled away and gave him a friendly peck on the cheek. Y/N smiled.
"We're gonna get everybody back." She replied.
"Didn't take twenty days, twenty weeks, or twenty months...but five years." Y/N remarked, calling back to her statement years ago.
Clint came up soon after and embraced Specter. He pat his back as he pulled away from the archer, "Let's get it done, L/N."
"Yes, sir."
Hawkeye and Black Widow began walking into their ship.
"You guys watch each other's six." Rhodey called out.
They both turned back and smiled, then entered the ship and shut the airstair. The ship ascended and then flew away towards Vormir.
"Coordinates for Vormir are laid in. All they have to do is not fall out." Nebula told Rhodey and Y/N.
"Okay, so uh...we just wait around for this Quill guy to show up and then he leads us to the Power Stone, is that it?" Rhodey asked.
Nebula stared at him before walking away, "Let's take cover."
"Um, that didn't really answer the question." Y/N said.
"We're not the only ones in 2014 looking for the stones."
"Wait a minute." Rhodey began, "What are you talking about right now? Who else is looking for these stones?"
Nebula turned back around to face the colonel, "My father...my sister...and me."
Y/N shook his head. He didn't think he'd have to worry about a past version of Thanos.
• • •
PETER QUILL DANCED across the puddle-ridden floor as he listened to the mixtape playing from his Walkman. He spun around and lip-synced as Y/N, Nebula, and Rhodey took cover behind a rock and watched.
Rhodey had heard stories of Quill and how he was a part of the Guardians of the Galaxy, mostly from Rocket. What was happening confirmed his assumption.
"So he's an idiot?" Rhodey asked Nebula, who gave a simple nod, "Yeah."
"Is he listening to Redbone?" Y/N added as he continued looking at Quill.
As Starlord was sliding, Rhodey came out of cover and hit him across the face with his gauntlet, easily rendering him unconscious. Nebula went over to his body and grabbed a tool from his pack.
"What's that?" Y/N asked.
"The tool of a thief."
They found the small temple that held the Power Stone nearby, and Nebula used the tool to open the stone door. Nebula was about to walk in before she was pulled back by Rhodey.
"Woah! Woah! This is the part where spikes come out with skeletons on the end of them and everything."
"What are you talking about?"
Y/N turned to Nebula, "Rhodes watched all of the Indiana Jones movies."
Rhodey rolled his eyes, "When you break into a place called The Temple of the Power Stone, there's gonna be a bunch of booby traps."
"Oh, my God." Nebula sighed and kept walking.
"Okay. All right. Go ahead." Rhodey said in defeat, the two men following the cyborg.
Nebula neared the steel orb within a force field. She inserted her hands into it, the lasers burning off layers of her robotic hand as she grabbed onto the orb and pulled it out. She handed it to Y/N, and she blew at her sizzling hand.
Rhodey stared at her, and she took notice.
"I wasn't always like this." She said.
"Me neither." Rhodey replied, "But we work with what we got, right?"
"Hmm."
The colonel nodded, "Let's sync up."
Y/N tapped on his wrist and activated his suit and mask.
"Don't lose that orb while we get sucked through time, Y/N." Rhodey remarked.
"I ain't got butterfingers, colonel."
Rhodey began to count down, "Three, two, one."
Y/N and Rhodey shrunk and transported back into the quantum realm, but Nebula stayed behind as her head began to glitch. She fell to the floor and groaned, and she laid their as events in her head began to play back to an unknown source far away.
Once the recordings were finished, Nebula realized who they played for.
Her eyes widened, "He knows..."