The monstrous alien growled, his lips spreading into a slight grin. He clapped his hand against the axe in his other hand and began to approach us.
"Banner, want a piece?" asked Tony.
"No, not really, but when do I ever get what I want?" said Banner honestly, shaking out his arms. He clenched his fists to generate the Big Guy.
"It's been a while," said Tony nervously, looking between Bruce not turning into the Hulk and the closely approaching Alien. "Good to have you back, buddy."
"Okay, shhh, I'm trying to concentrate," said Bruce, his voice deep— a mixing between his two personas.
I turned to look, anxious about the timing. Bruce was bending backwards, clutching into the palms of his hands, teeth bared. His veins were turning green and creeping up his neck, but every time he inhaled, he lost it.
The Alien nudged a car with his axe. The car went flying.
Strange and I looked at one another, wondering what our plan was going to be if we couldn't rely on Hulk to take him out.
"Where's your guy?" asked Tony, confused.
"I don't know, we've sort of been having a thing," admitted Bruce.
Tony nudged Bruce hurriedly, pointing at the incoming Alien. "There's no time for a thing, that's a thing right there, let's go!"
Bruce continued to try to release the Hulk, each attempt getting more embarrassing than the last, until Wong, Strange, and I were all looking at Tony with equal levels of annoyance.
"Dude," said Tony, through the side of his lips, "You're embarrassing me in front of the wizards."
Bruce then began a bumbling mess of apologies which tempted Tony to tell him to stand down and nudge him behind Wong, with a slight, "Keep an eye on him, please?"
Tony donned himself to fight the incoming alien. When he began to run, Tony tapped the reactor on his chest, igniting the suit to spread out across his body.
A shield materialized from his arm and he blocked the first hit with the weapon, took a few hits of his own to knock back the alien, then stood tall, igniting four levitating barriers to exert from his suit and fire a beam so powerful it knocked the alien back to where he first stood. He was on the course to hit the smaller alien, but was knocked to the side with a subtle curl of the fingers by the smaller alien.
"Ebony Maw," whispered a voice in my head. "Cull Obsidian."
"You know them?" I whispered.
"I'm learning," whispered Agamotto back. He sounded pained. "Focus."
Bruce's face was twisted. He asked Tony, "Where did that come from?"
"It's nanontech, you like it? It comes--" but Tony was cut off when Ebony Maw moved his hand and shot him high into the sky.
"Telekinesis?" I sighed, readying my stance to fight. "Why does everyone have to have telekinesis?"
Ebony Maw focused the fight on the remaining heroes. He uprooted a nearby tree and tossed it, to which Wong threw himself in front and opened a portal big enough to contain it.
"Doctor Banner, if the rest of your green friend won't be joiing us, " said Strange, opening a portal and shoving Banner through.
Wong closed his portal after swallowing the tree. Together, we stood, the two of them with their Mandalas for protection; myself unsure of exactly how to use my powers anymore.
With the capabilities of Agamotto, I was unsure of what to do. Portals, I could leave to Wong and Strange. I had energy, loads of it, flowing through my body. Now what was left was to exert it in helpful ways.
"I don't know how good this fight is about to be," I admited honestly.
Strange powered up his Mandalas. "Just try."
I raised my hands to my chest and extended them out slowly, drawing a blue light from my body. As it extended further from my skin, it turned to green from blue. I began to hold it with one hand and circling it with the other, siwlring it, gaining momentum, and then Tony flew into the party, gliding dangerously close between Strange and I that we were startled and both lost our lights.
"Stark!" I groaned.
As a distraction, Tony shot up a car with repulsors and threw it at Ebony Maw.
He turned to look at Strange. "You gotta get that Stone out of here now."
"It stays with me," snapped Strange.
"Exactly. Bye," he said, then shot off into the air.
Ebony threw cement blocks to block Tony's path while Obsidian got to his feet and threw his weapon, which extended with a chain, and knocked Tony through the air. Obsidian went after him, which only left Ebony Maw for us to defeat.
"And then there were three," I sighed, frowning.
Ebony Maw didn't seem to be phased in the slightest. He simply raised his hands, stripping the first layer of rubble from around him, wiggled his fingers so the raised cement shredded into daggers, then pushed them at us.
In sync, Wong and Strange opened portals.
My own first instinct was to raise my hand, exhibiting a slight gasp. I stopped clenching my shoulders and noticed a circular green barrier exerting from my forearm. I smiled. My first instinct was to divert my energy into a shield.
Wong had opened an exit portal that redirected the daggers at Ebony Maw. He was quick to throw a car in front of himself as a barrier, but one had broken through the windshield and sliced his cheek. Baring his teeth in frustration, he popped the fire hydrant beside Wong and sent Wong flying, out of the fight momentarily.
Strange conjured a lasso that wrapped around Ebony and he pulled him forward. Ebony made use of his telekinesis and used it to fly, grabbing Strange and trapping him against a brick building. He soaked Strange into the brick, leaving only his face and chest open. He floated opposite of him. He grabbed the casing of the Eye and screamed, pulling his hand back in pain.
It was at this point where I decided the only way to help was to throw my body into the mix. Long distance attacks weren't necessarily in my arsenal, so I jumped through a portal and flipped the exit above where Strange and Ebony were. I came crashing down on Ebony, grabbing his head and using gravity to land us back on the ground.
Ebony's hold over Strange ended the minute I fell on him, and Strange came down, too. We were all quick to get back on our feet. I was getting too old to be using my body as a offensive measure, I knew that, I didn't feel pain as I used to. I couldn't think too much into it, as I had to to throw a shield up to block debris Ebony threw at me. The weight of the cement bounced off my shield, but it pushed my body back down the street.
Strange opened the Stone. His arms were grabbed by discarded metal and held open, leaving the Stone wide open. It closed quickly once the coils began to wrap around his entire body, closing in his arms and legs together.
I jumped through a portal and lit up my hands with green energy. I grabbed onto the coils, burning off the ones on his chest and around the Stone, but Ebony was quick to rip me away and send me flying down the street.
He threw a car on top of me. I was trying to wiggle my body out from underneath it when Strange flew above me, free from Ebony's grasp, but being wheeled away by his Cloak of Leviation.
"No!" Shouted Ebony, soaring after him.
Desparate, I wiggled my body excessively. I didn't have the strength to lift the vehicle. Frustrated, I lit up my hands with green energy once more, I placed them on the car, and I let out a desperate scream, forcing any energy I had to push it off. No green even lit up my hands. The car went flying off of me.
"Okay," I said, stumbling to run away from the scene. I ran for Strange. "Super strength now? Force exertions, shields, portals. And they're hot. Got any other cool abilities you want to tell me I have?"
"You've gained all my capabilities, my love. You're adapting my strength, my intelligence, my durability. My powerful energy."
"When do I get the full capability?" I asked.
"When I die."
I faltered. "Does that mean our transference is you dying?"
"Yes," admitted Agamotto. He felt my uneasiness. "Do not fret, my love. I'm giving you all I have to give but enough to keep surviving so you can fight for the Stone."
"Then help me now," I begged, opening a portal to run into. "Take me to them."
I hopped through the portal and landed in the grass of Central Park between Tony, Obsidian, and Peter Parker, the little SpiderLing. I dropped to my knees to avoid an axe to my head, then dove between his legs, ready to attack from behind, but Strange zipped above us, pausing the fight.
"Kid, that's the wizard, get on it!" yelled Tony.
"On it!" said Peter, shooting webs after Strange.
I had to settle for portal-jumping to keep up with where Strange was headed. Peter passed over my head and tried to attack Ebony, who shoved a billboard in his face and knocked him to the ground.
"Not cool!" said Peter.
I leapt over him, portalling myself to the next block when I saw the corner Ebony had turned. I watched Strange fly straight at me.
Ebony curved the streetlights to trap the cape and succeeded in grabbing it, causing Strange's body to detach from it. I grabbed his body in a portal and dropped him from a higher height so Peter could grab him.
Peter shot a web at Strange and another at a light post to steady himself, and was about to swing his body towards my open portal, our escape, when he suddenly flung backwards because of his web attachment to the light pole that was uprooted by Ebony.
A blue beam of light had caught Strange's body and was sucking him up to the ship. The Cloak untugged itself to follow, and Peter was caught in the middle of Strange's body and a web attachment to a lightpole.
"Kid!" I snapped urgently.
I sprinted towards Peter and threw a portal in front of Ebony's quickly approaching body, too fast for him to divert, and deported him to the Sanctum to buy Peter and I some time.
I dove into the beam and got immediately swept upwards. I bumped into Strange's body, grabbed ahold of the Cloak's bottom, and we tried to shimmy ourselves out by pulling towards the web attachment on Strange's back while Peter pulled. I had wiggled my body out of the barrier when Ebony returned and uprooted the street pole, Peter's last hope to getting out of the beam, and the four of us fell back into the beam.
"Uh, Mr. Stark, I'm being beamed up!" yelled Peter worriedly.