Music is "Zero Hour" by Future World Music, composed by Armen Hambar.
Picture is Pietro's Pizza.
· ~ · ~ · ~ · ~ ·
"If your life depends on the aching of your legs,
On the sheer weight of gravity on your feet,
On the shaking of your hands,
Then so be it.
You keep running,
And when your legs contemplate giving out,
You give those legs marching orders.
No one stops until we're home.
And when your feet fall asleep under your watch,
Wake them up, and say,
"Soldier, we're not yet home.
The night is young and so we must go on."
And when your hands tremble
At the sight of the journey's end,
Relent not, relax none,
A time will come when you must run again."
- R. Wolf
· ~ · ~ · ~ · ~ ·
A/N:
Hey guys!
Okay, I know I'm super late posting this, and I'm sorry! The holidays have me so busy, so I apologize for the delay!
I know I'm late on this, too, but ERMERGERSH CIVIL WAR TRAILER I CANNOT EVEN. I CAN'T EVEN. "SO WAS I". NEWSPAPERS. SARAH ROGERS. WANDA FLYING. BUCKY AND STEVE FIGHTING TONY TOGETHER. SOKOVIA ACCORDS. TEAM CAP VS. TEAM TONY. I WILL NOT SURVIVE THIS MOVIE.
THEN AGAIN, FROM THAT ANGRY BUCKY VS TONY FIGHT AT THE END, NEITHER WILL STEVE.
ASDFGHJKL; I CAN'T.
And the picture is just asking for it xD
Love and Light,
- Save_Pietro_Maximoff
· ~ · ~ · ~ · ~ ·
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
It's been hours since we arrived. Luckily, the world hasn't erupted into chaos since then, and Tony thinks he's closer to a solution to fix Vision.
While we wait, the Maximoffs are talking between themselves. Clint and Nat are discussing little Alianova Barton, who has just taken her first steps towards crawling around. I'm on an untraceable phone talking to my mother, Rebecca Sokolova. She keeps asking about the wedding. How big? When? Are they invited? Where? Have you found a dress?
"Rebecca," I chuckle, replying to the question about the dress, "I'm kind of on the America's Most Wanted list right now. A wedding dress is close to the bottom on my list of priorities."
"Have you set a date, at least?" she asks.
I bite my lower lip. "Um..."
"You haven't, have you?" She laughs. "Perhaps, I could be of some help...?"
I smile at the though. My mother and I planning my wedding. I never thought I'd say that, and surprisingly, I'm okay with it. I have to remember what Pietro asked of me: "Give her a chance," he'd said. A chance. That's the least I can do.
"Sure," I finally say. "Sounds like fun. Let's wait until this whole Civil War thing blows over first. It's not safe for me to be seen with family or anyone I care about. They could use you to get to me."
"Of course, of course! I understand. Please, be safe- Oh! your sister just asked if she could help as well?"
I chuckle to myself. "Of course. I'll have the help of Wanda, Pietro's sister, as well. The four of us will have to plan this baby."
"Speaking of baby, how are your two? Due anytime now, yes?"
"The due date is in two weeks, but it could be anytime, really."
"I know this might be too much," Rebecca starts, "but could we come and see you when you have the twins? Just Bex and I, of course. I won't let Roosevelt ruin another family, especially not yours."
I rest against the sofa cushion and smile. Maybe she really has changed. "Of course you two can come. I'll have Pietro call you if I go into labor, and I'll have my friend Clint Barton fly you in privately."
"Alright, ladybug. My little Божья коровка. When will you call again?"
I sigh, pulling my legs close to me and laying a hand on my stomach. "I don't know. We're trying to get my friend fixed right now. We're at Stark Tower, but we won't be here long. Tony's sneaked us in, but as soon as he's fixed, we'll be in the wind again. Who knows where. I shouldn't tell you over the phone. It isn't safe for either of us." I pause. "I'll call as soon as I can,... Mom."
I can almost hear the smile in her voice. "Thank you, my Божья коровка. For everything. For just a single chance. You won't regret this. Give my love to Pietro."
"I will. Tell Bex the same."
"Of course. Goodbye, ladybug."
"Goodbye, Mom." I hit end call on the holophone that Nat gave me, secret spy tech from S.H.I.E.L.D.
I sit and contemplate my thoughts for some time. Where do I begin? Erik Lensherr? This Civil War? Or do I start with my family? My own twins? Perhaps the alternate universe in which my clone now resides? The life she had that I now know of?
When will Erik strike again? And for what cause? We still don't know what he wants, what he's after. World domination is just a guess, an educated guess that, but still merely an assumption. What did he want with my friend, Vision? If he has a stronghold in Genosha, who knows what he would've done with him. Experimentation most likely. But to what end? What is his target, his endgame?
If we're lucky, Civil War will end before the worst begins. The Act had just passed under the Sokovia Accords just two weeks ago, and since then, Peter Parker has come out as Spider-Man; Tony, Peter, Rhodey, Carol Danvers, Reed Richards, Maria Hill, and Sam Wilson, along with many other Inhumans, Enhanced, and Mutants have registered under the Superhuman Registration Act.
There are riots in the biggest cities in America: New York, San Francisco, San Diego, Los Angeles, Boston, Miami, Denver, Baton Rouge, Austin, and surely others. People on both sides are being very vocal and active about their beliefs, but what else is new.
People are on the run, people like the half of the Avengers. Are we really broken so quickly? Just a year ago, I helped pull together this rag-tag team of misfits, warriors, and spies. But now? Now... now I don't know.
I'm beginning to accept the fact that my mother might have changed, my sister as well. As broken and scarred as my heart is from my past, it's unfair to say that they haven't changed. It's been almost a decade with my sister, and more so with my mother. I'm going to let them in, I'm just scared I've made the wrong decision. I don't think I could bare being hurt like that again. Not again. Not with my own family in the making.
The twins. Oh Frigga, my twins. I cannot wait until they're here! I have so much to do. Stuff to get, a home to make for them. They can't be on the run like me. I won't raise my kids on the run from the government. I think that that would break me. My kids, grown up to be fighters, warriors, killers. That would kill me.
I'm twenty-six, yet I have no home, I'm expecting, nothing prepared for the twins, my soon to be father-in-law hunting my friends and I, and the government after us, too. The only thing that makes this hurt and tortuous burden remotely okay is Pietro, Wanda, Steve, and my other friends. My surrogate family. The one's I still have left, that is.
How much did my clone, Gloria, know? Did she know all about me, or only parts? Does she still know about me? Are we more the same than different? These questions may never be answered. Would she have fallen for Pietro as well, or is it simply the crossing of stars that Pietro and I met? An event as rare as a supernova.
I wonder how she's fairing, Gloria, I mean. What is she doing? How is she handling my lonely, average, human world? What of Aspen? Will she survive that world, since no Gregory Killbane will be there to... to murder her?
Oh, Aspen...
"Возлюбленная," Pietro whispers, coming to sit beside me.
My head jerks up, realizing I've probably been staring off into the distance for some time. "Yes?"
He rests his arm around my shoulders and pulls me close to him. "How is your матушка?"
"My mother? She's well. Worried about us, but she's good otherwise."
He tucks a strand of short, red hair behind my ear. "It's nearly ten."
I look out the window to the cityscape, the lights bright as the sky shows a spread of twinkling stars. "It's ten already? Man, time flies when you can't go anywhere." I groan and lean my head onto his shoulder. "I'm bored. Or hungry. Or maybe both. It's hard to tell sometimes."
Pietro laughs and kisses my cheek. "How about we get out of here?"
I roll my eyes. "Pietro, we're wanted criminals. We can't just go waltzing around New York City."
"Sure we can," he replies with a smirk. Quickly getting up and pulling me with him, he turns to his sister. "We will be back in a while. Cover for us?"
She nods, smiling slightly. "Do not make me have to bail you out of prison again, dear brother, and be safe, Glory."
We nod back and head for the doors. "Bail out again?" I enquire.
"Let us just say that, while living in Sokovia, I was not the most well behaved youth."
I roll my eyes. "Why am I not surprised?"
Once outside, after ducking behind some guards and grabbing some hats, glasses, and scarves to keep our faces at least partially covered, I link my arm with Pietro's as we walk down the streets of New York. "I miss New York," I mumble. "It's so pretty here."
Pietro nods in agreement. "I agree. We will come back, hopefully sooner rather than later."
"We will. One way or another, we will." I look up at him. He has a blue ballcap on and sunglasses covering his eyes. "Where to, Mr. Silver?"
"I am in the mood for pizza for some reason."
I laugh. "Finally getting used to American food, I see. Alright then, pizza it is! I know a really great place just around the corner. Nat, Carol, Wanda, and I used to go there all the time for girl's days out." My smile falters.
Carol Danvers, also known as Captain Marvel. My friend. My idol. Now she stands with Tony. I took a lot from her comics, how to stand up for yourself, how to be a strong woman, how to not take crap from anyone. Of course, I knew she sided with Tony. She did in the comics. I guess I just didn't expect it to happen with me in the mix.
"We will all be friends again," Pietro says, interrupting my thoughts as if he read them like his twin. "When this is all over, and feelings have been hurt, words have been said, we will cool off and reunite once more. The Avengers will become one entity again."
"You think so?"
"I know so. If I am wrong, I will let you name both of our twins."
I roll my eyes as we walk closer to the restaurant. "That's cute, Maximoff. What makes you think I won't name them both now? They're in my body right now."
"I did have some part to play in that, as I recall," he smirks and opens the door for me. "Ladies first."
"Mudak," I mumble under my breath. Mudak just happens to be Russian for asshole.
"I heard that, Возлюбленная."
· ~ · ~ · ~ · ~ ·
{Third Person P.O.V.}
Tony Stark walks silently through his lab, glancing over and over at the schematics. "Something isn't right," he mumbles to himself. The interior wiring of the Mind Stone is off, almost like someone had it hooked up to something. "Crazy mutant terrorists."
Tony looks from the side of his eye at Vision, laying almost lifeless on the table. His feelings are high strung and confused. Vision is a new person, but also Jarvis. Either way, Tony will do anything to save him.
Quickly turning back to work, he takes his fingers and touches the Mind Stone schematic. Enlarging it by stretching his forefingers further apart from one another, he zooms in on a particular portion that holds the most damage. The upper part of the stone is fried, if it's even possible for a gem of indestructible power to be fried. Tony taps the schematic and writes a formula beside it in the margins. "This might just work," he mumbles.
"Sir," Friday asks over the com.
"Yes, Friday?" Tony takes a sip from his coffee cup, letting the caffeine take over his system. When was the last time he slept? Forty-eight hours? Sixty? He can't recall the last time he had a good sleep.
People may assume that Tony Stark is a heartless, soulless monster who just wants to lock supers up, but this could not be farther from the truth. Tony has lost more sleep over the Superhuman Registration Act than he ever did about the Battle for New York all those years ago. "Am I doing the right thing?" he asks himself nearly every other hour. "What if I'm not? What if this is... wrong?"
"Helen Cho has just arrived with the cradle," Friday says in her Scottish voice.
Tony sets his coffee mug down and pushes his thoughts of doubt aside. Now isn't the time to be distracted. A man's life is in the balance. "Let her in and tell her to bring everything to Lab 12."
"Aye, Sir."
Tony turns back to his formula. With any luck, this will fix Vision. He's going t attempt to hook up the Mind Stone to his Tower's Arc Reactor, the power source of all Stark Tower. With any luck, he will be able to hit the broken portion of the gem with just enough power to recharge it and bring it back. Just to be safe, Tony has a untraceable, unhackable filter of sorts that all the power coming in or going out will go through, just to be certain that no viruses or Trojan Horses come from the Mind Stone. Who knows what Magneto did to Vision while on Genosha.
Tony's theory about why Vision is unresponsive is that the part of the Mind Stone that's chipped is where his memory and power banks are stored. Power keeps him alive, and memory makes Vision, well, Vision. If he can give those portions enough power, it should bring Vision back to the land of the living.
Helen Cho enters the room with a smile and a large cradle rolling in behind her. "Hello, Tony. It's great to see you again."
Tony smiles and shakes her outstretched hand. "Likewise, Helen. I just wish it wasn't under such horrible circumstances."
Helen looks behind her as the cradle comes to rest beside Vision. "You're breaking your own rules, Tony. You brought the Avengers here without arresting them?"
"And I don't intend to. This is Jar- This is Vision's life at stake. I'm willing to bend the rules slightly. Just this once."
"What is the point of rules if you bend them whenever you please?"
"I know what I'm doing, Helen."
Helen gives him a knowing smile, turning towards his formula on the screen. "Oh, Tony."
"Yeah, yeah, I know."
Helen does as Tony suggests, first helping him lift vision into the cradle, then hooking up the wires to the Mind Stone. Once the cradle is linked to the Stark Tower Arc Reactor, everything is set and ready to go. "Shouldn't we tell the Avengers?"
Tony shakes his head. "We do this like I put in the formula, and we won't need to ask permission. This will work, and they'll be thanking us."
Helen looks concerned, but she nods in agreement. "Alright. What next?"
"I do this," Tony says, flipping the switch to the Arc Reactor, and the power starts to surge through Vision's Infinity Stone. "And now you turn on your cradle of miracles. If we can do both at the same time, the combination of the power from the Arc Reactor and the healing from your cradle will fix him. All the power will go through," Tony points to the small, metal box with the complexity of his own Iron Man suit, "here. It's a filter for viruses, that sort of thing."
Helen Cho turns on her cradle and looks back to Tony with concerned eyes. "How sure are you that this will work, really?"
Tony stares into the cradle, watching the Mind Stone glow bright yellow. "On a scale of one to ten? Somewhere around a nine." He looks up to her. "This will work."
She hesitantly nods. "What about that ten percent?"
"Let's just hope we don't blow up New York to save one man's life."
Just as soon as Tony says this, and before Helen can reply, the lights blow and the entire Lab 12 collapses into darkness. The only thing glowing is the cradle, the Arc, and the Mind Stone.
Little did they know at the time that all of New York lost power.
"Wait!" Tony shouts, smiling to himself as the cradle glows brighter. "It's working! Something's happening!"
The cradle grows brighter until the two scientists can barely look at it. "Tony, we should get out of here!" Helen shouts. "It might blow!"
"No, look!" The cradle starts to decent into darkness like the rest of the city. "It's finished."
The cradle door opens, and the only thing still glowing is the Mind Stone. Vision still remains on his back.
Tony and Helen walk closer, cautiously. Peaking inside, Tony smiles and sees Visions eyes slowly open. "Hey, buddy! Take is slow. Don't get up too fa-"
"-Where am I?" Vision asks. "What is this place?"
"You're in Lab 12 of Stark Tower, Vis," Tony replies. "You were kidnapped by Magento. You've been unconscious for over two weeks. The Avengers brought you to me to be fixed."
Vision looks to Tony with hazey eyes. "You should not have fixed me. I remained in slumber for a reason, Mr. Stark. You have to put me back to sleep right now." The tone of the android's voice is almost panicky, the look in his eyes reflecting this.
Tony's brows furrow in confusion. "What do you mean?"
"Erik Lensherr, he did something to the Mind Stone. He wanted something from it... He dug around... He pulled things out and put new things in..." Vision looks straight into Tony's eyes. "You have to destroy me."
"What? No! We just saved you!"
Suddenly, Vision falls back to the cradle, passing out. "Vision?" Helen says, urgently.
"Vis, wake up!" Tony shakes his shoulders, trying to get the android to come back.
"What did he mean by destroy him?" Helen asks in a panic.
"I don't know-!"
The light of the Mind Stone goes out, shocking both Helen and Tony into silence. The golden glow that once was in Vision's forehead is now moving from the Stone up the wires on his head to the small, filter box that Tony put in place for safety.
Once there, they hear a voice they thought, they prayed, they would never see again. This voice destroyed a country, killed an Avenger, and nearly destroyed the world. This voice, one of pain and anger and rage, once filled the Avenger's hearts with fear and dread, and to Sokovia, is the devil in the flesh.
Well, not exactly flesh. More like metal.
"This is so strange," the robotic voice says lowly. "Where am I? What is this place?"
"Oh, no," Tony whispers, almost a whimper. "What have I done?"
"Oh!" The robotic voice says, suddenly. "I know that voice. Tony Stark, my creator. Hello, Dad. It's wonderful to see you again! How are things? How's Mom?"
"Is that who I..." Helen drifts off, her eyes growing wide with terror.
"Speaking of Mom, hello, Dr. Helen Cho. Did you miss your old friend?"
"Not in the slightest."
"Ultron," Tony whispers. "Not again!" he shouts, pounding his fists against the cradle.
"Now, now, Tony. That's not very nice to say to your old friend. I am sorry about Vision, though. It's not everyday you have to kill your own son to get back to the real world."
"You won't get out this time, you sick bastard," Tony growls. "You can't escape that box."
"Oh, ye of little faith."
The roof of the Lab 12 caves in. Tony grabs Helen and they both duck for cover in the corner of the lab. Out from the dust floats Magento himself. He turns to Vision and sighs. "My daughter could have done so much better." He then pulls the metal box from the cradle with a swift flick of his hand. "Thank you for doing what I could not, Tony Stark." He turns to Helen and Tony. "I owe you a debt."
"You?" Tony growls. "This was all you? You can't control that thing! It's evil incarnate."
Magneto chuckles. "Maybe you cannot, but you are only a man." Erik looks at the metal box and smiles evily. "I suggest you stop fighting amongst yourselves. The true inhabitants of this planet are coming for their birthright. It's time for the old man to move aside and let the new man take the throne."
"We're coming for you," Tony says, glaring holes into Magento's skull. "All of us!"
Magneto chuckles. "Goodbye, Tony Stark. Give my best to my children."
After Magneto has left with the metal box containing Ultron, Helen and Tony rise to their feet, brushing off themselves. "Are you okay?" Tony asks, looking over Helen for injuries.
She nods. "What do we do now, Tony?"
Tony grabs a prototype Iron Man glove and blows open the locked Lab 12 doors. "Get help. Get Vision out of here and into another lab. I'm leaving him in your care. Take care of my boy. Assemble the Avengers. Get everyone. Tell them Ultron is back. The Registration Act is null and void for now. We need everyone!" Tony flings off the glove and hurries down the hall, heading for the nearest window or door.
"Where are you going?" Helen shouts after him.
"I'm going to take down Ultron, for good this time." To Friday, he says, "Friday, send me Mark 7!"
"Mark 7 on it's way, Sir."
Tony finds the door to the balcony on the twelfth floor and runs out to the edge. Pulling himself over the edge just as Mark 7 comes around the building corner, Tony jumps, letting the Iron Man suit form around him in his decent.
"Alright, you ugly bastard," he says. "You're not getting away this time."
END OF CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.