Aqua's P. O. V:
We all gather in the meeting room for a meeting on our next step, where we discuss the stones we'd encountered and what their powers are. I'm wearing a pink shirt sleeved Sailor Moon S shirt with a pink skirt, my pink combat boots, and Luna jewellery set, my hair in a high ponytail. I sit next between Rhodey and Rocket.
Tony stands before us with a coffee in hand while I take a swig from my cola. Cap stands next to him as he speaks up.
A screen has on it before it disappears, "Time Heist, Brainstorming Session."
Tony says, "So, the "How" works. Now we've gotta figure out the "When" and the "Where." Almost everyone of us in this room has had an encounter with at least one of the six Infinity Stones."
"Or, substituting the counter for, "Damn near getting killed," by one of the Infinity Stones," Tony feels the need to input.
"I haven't!" Scott says. "I don't even know what the hell you're all talking about!"
"Regardless," Bruce reminds us as he steps around the table, "we only have enough Pym Particles for one round trip each. And these stones have been in a lot of places throughout history."
"Our history," Tony inputs as Bruce stands behind him. "Not a lot of convenient spots to just "Drop in," okay? Yeah."
"I suppose we have to pick our targets," Clint states, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, causing Tony to point at him in agreement.
"Right."
Cap says, "So, let's start with the aether. Thor, Aqua, what do you know?"
I was surprised I was addressed, so I ask, blinking my blue eyes, "Me?"
Cap nods his head. "You were with Thor when the aether first showed up seven years ago. We could use your perspective on this, as well."
I nod in agreement before we turn to Thor. He was lounging back in his seat, and with the dark shades on his face, it was difficult to tell if Thor was asleep or not.
"Is he asleep?" Asks Nat.
"No, no. I'm pretty sure he's dead," Rhodey inputs.
I go over to Thor and say as I wave my hand in front of his face, "Heeelloooo? Earth to Thor!! Wake up!!"
I snap my fingers harshly, creating a loud snapping sound that startles Thor "awake."
"What?! I'm awake!" He exclaims, and I hear Tony snickering while Cap chuckles sheepishly.
"Good. Time to get to work," I say before I grab Thor by his ear and half drag him to the front of the room, ignoring his protests.
I stand on Thor's right as the screen shows the Reality Stone, the aether.
"Uhm, where to start?" Thor takes off his shades and taps them to the screen. "The aether is conversely not the stone. Someone called it a stone before." He points accusingly at Cap who narrows his blue eyes as he frowns in response. "It's more of an angry sludge sort of thing. So, someone's going to need to amend that and stop saying that."
Thor drops some eye drops into his left eye and rubs the side of his nose as I heave out a sigh of annoyance. Did he seriously forget everything Odin had told us about the aether seven years ago? I guess I can't really blame him.
I tell the others, "Technically speaking, the "Angry sludge thing" is what is called the aether and it's a fluid and ever changing." This causes our teammates to look a bit more interested.
Thor says to me, "I knew that. Here's an interesting story, though. About the aether. My grandfather, many years ago, had to hide the stone from the Dark Elves. Whooo! Scary beings! So, Jane, actually... there she is..." Thor brings up a picture of his ex girlfriend. "Yeah, see, Jane is an old flame of mine."
"She stuck her hand inside a rock this one time, and the aether stuck itself inside her. 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. She and I were dating at the time," I face palm and drag my hand down my face once I realise we were going completely off track here, "and I got to introduce her to my mother... who's dead, and, um... oh, you know, Jane and I aren't even dating anymore." Here, Bruce makes the gesture for Thor to be taken offstage. "These things happen, you know? Nothing lasts forever! The only thing that..."
Tony comes up and suggests to Thor, gripping his arm, "Why don't you sit down...?"
"No, I'm not done. The only thing that is permanent in life is that impermanence."
Tony claps sarcastically as he asks, "Eggs? Breakfast?"
"No. I'd like a Bloody Mary," Thor jokes before he's shown back to his seat.
I groan in my hands in slight embarrassment before Cap addresses me again. "Aqua, why don't you try explaining?"
"Okay," I say as I take a deep breath and drop my hands. "So, as I've mentioned before, the aether is fluid and ever changing. It's not in the solid form of a stone, like the other five." I point to the picture on the screen. "To give more detail in what Thor said, many thousands of years ago ago, Malekith, the king of the Dark Elves of Svartalfheim, (the scary beings, as Thor described them) discovered the Reality Stone. Through means unknown, he was able to liquify it, augmenting its properties so that it could convert matter into dark matter and absorb life force from host bodies." By now, Bruce and Rhodey were leaning forwards in immense curiosity. Everyone else has an expression of curiosity on their faces, too. "He intended to use the modified stone, now known as the "Aether", to revert the universe to its state of primordial darkness, a state of being in which the Dark Elves would resume their prior role as the most powerful beings in existence. However, he and his followers were thwarted and killed by Bor, Thor's grandfather. Following his victory, Bor hid the aether in a stone somewhere on Earth, in New Mexico. But, it was discovered seven years ago by Jane Foster when she went looking for her ex boyfriend, Thor, and it had absorbed itself into her, making her ill the longer it remained within her body. So, in order to save Jane and Asgard from Malekith, Thor and I busted my then boyfriend at the time out of jail and committed treason of the highest order (it was totally all of Thor's idea!), as Loki was the only one on Asgard who knew of a secret passageway to get us out of Asgard without being caught by Odin."
The last part causes my friends to stare at me shocked as Thor gives an indignant "Hey! You gladly went along with it!"
"I shouldn't have, even though it was my mission to guard and protect Loki. Anyway..."
"Wait! You mean to say, Ms. Perfect committed treason?! Hahaha!" Rocket laughs, hitting the tabletop and causing my face to darken. "I never saw you as the type, Frosty!"
"If you don't sit down and shut up Rocket, I'll skin you," I warn him, hating that I was interrupted.
"I'd like to see you try, Elsa!" Rocket just keeps on laughing, hitting the table as he says he couldn't believe I'd committed high treason, making me feel even more irritated and I feel my face darkening further, a deep scowl ripping from my throat that makes everyone else freeze.
"Rocket," Cap and Nat warn him and the raccoon takes one look at my dark face before he immediately falls silent, gulping audibly in fear.
"Whooo! If looks could kill, you'd be buried six feet under by now," Tony mocks.
Rocket dumps himself back in his seat but doesn't say another word, though I catch Nebula smirking at me. She and I have made pretty good friends since she returned from her mission.
"Now, as I was saying, we ended up committing treason of the highest order by breaking my then boyfriend out of jail in order to get Jane off of Asgard. We got Malekith to get the aether out of her and Malekith had ended up absorbing the aether. Then, this big battle followed suit. However, he was sent back to his realm along with his ship, and... well.... He was smushed by it. Then the aether was taken to The Collector to be kept safe on Knowhere," I finish, the shadow having now vanished from my face.
"I could've explained that easily," Thor mumbles as he nods.
I then sit down with my ankles crossed over each other on the tabletop as I take a swig of my cola and Rocket stands on the table to explain the stone he'd encountered next:
The Power stone.
"Quill said he stole the stone from Morag," Rocket begins as the rest of us eat noodles and Thai for lunch. Bruce us eating some ice cream.
"Isn't that a person?" Scott asks around a mouthful of food.
"Morag's a planet. Quill was a person," Rocket explains to him.
"Like planet? Like—Like from outer space?"
"Awe, look! It's like a little puppy!" Rocket mocks as he pats Scott's head. "All happy and everything! Do you wanna go to space? Do you wanna go to space, puppy? I'll take you to space!"
Up next, the next morning, was Nebula with the Soul stone. I'm wearing a dual dolphin in moonlight with a heart shaped moon printed shirt and blue jeans with a matching jewellery set.
"Thanos found the Soul stone on Vormir."
"What is Vormir?" Nat asks, writing it down on her notepad.
"The Planet of Death," Says Nebula. "The very center of celestial existence." This gains all of our attention. "It's where... Thanos murdered my sister."
At this last part, everyone falls silent.
"Got it," Scott utters.
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Later, I sit next to Bruce beside the couch but with my legs draped over Nat's as I'm sitting upside down, my blonde hair splayed behind me, Run The World (Girls) by Beyoncé playing on my phone as we figure out the Time stone. Tony was lying on the back of the couch with his arm over his eyes, Nat on the couch's seat, her head opposite Tony's, and Bruce was sitting next to me with his back to the couch.
Nat asks as she flicks her pen around, "That Time stone guy..."
"Doctor Strange," I say, flicking my feet casually in the air as I lie on my back, hair splayed behind me.
"Yeah, what kind of doctor was he?"
"Ears, nose, throats meets Rabbit from a hat," Tony mumbles with his arm over his eyes.
"Nice place in the village, though," Mutters Bruce.
"Yeah. Sullivan St.," I say, my feet flicking casually in the air to my music.
"Wait—he lived in New York?" Nat asks in surprise.
"Uh, he lived on Bleecker and Sullivan," Says Bruce.
"No, no! He lived in Toronto! Were you listening to anything?" Tony utters.
The song finishes and BoA's No. 1 comes on.
I say thoughtfully as I hold out my hand, "Guys, if you pick the right year, there are three stones in New York."
After a heartbeat of silence, Bruce exclaims as he and Tony sit up and the older brunette turns to me, "Shut the front door!"
We return to the room from the first day as we gaze at the screens with the stones displayed on them. I sit at the table with Nat as Cap speaks up while walking forwards.
"Alright. We have a plan. Six stones, three teams," Cap says as we all stand up, except Thor, and face the screens, "one shot."
Then, we leave to prepare for the Time Heist.
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After grabbing my black jacket, zipping it up, tugging on my gloves and throwing on some black pants and my cloak, tying my hair into a plat, I then go meet up with the others and we all put our time travel suits on.
Then we do the slow motion superhero walk to the time machine, like in those superhero movies right before the gang starts their big mission.
Cap gives a pep talk once we were all gathered on the altar. "Five years ago, we lost. We lost friends; we lost family; we lost a part of ourselves. Today we have a chance to take it all back. You know your teams, you know your missions."
I'm going with Tony, Cap and Scott to get the Tesseract. Nat and Clint are getting the Soul stone. Bruce is getting the Time stone. Nebula and Rhodey were heading for the Power stone, which leaves Thor and Rocket to get the aether from Jane.
"Get the stones," We bump our fists against each other in a circle, "get them back. 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. This is the fight of our lives. And we're gonna win. Whatever it takes. Good luck."
Rocket says, "He's pretty good at that."
"Right?!" Scott says.
"Alright. You heard the man," Tony calls. "Stroke those keys, Jolly Green!"
"The tracker's engaged!" Bruce declares, holding the tiny version of Rocket's ship in his palm.
"You promise to bring that back in one piece, right?" Rocket asks, arms crossed.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Clint says. "Okay. I'll do my best."
"As promises go, that was pretty quick."
Bruce then joins us and taps his palms together, starting up the time machine.
Nat says with a smirk at him, "See you in a minute."
This both the most awesome thing and scariest thing I'd ever experienced! I'm feeling both excitement and nerves bubble in my chest.
I've only ever read or seen time travel before; I never actually imagined I'd be experiencing it for myself in my lifetime.
The altar'stop and floor starts spinning as my friends and I close our helmets around our faces.
With a beam of light, we're shot through various moments in time.