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ADVENTURES IN BABYSITTING
xix. HOW THE COOKIE CRUMBLES
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STEVE ROGERS FELT DISCOURAGED. He loitered outside the Avengers Compound with a hard look in his eye. After Riley's attempts at convincing Tony to help them failed, Steve gathered Bruce Banner, Natasha, and Scott to make the dream of time travel a reality. Just as Tony predicted, their efforts were... futile. To an extent. The furthest they got involved Scott turning into an old man, then a teenager, then a baby. You had to be there. Whatever they managed to discover, it wasn't enough to turn back time. Maybe there was no hope after all...
The deafening noise of music broke the silence outside. Steve looked over into the distance, his royal blue eyes landing on an Audi speeding towards the building. It swerved back and forth in the road dangerously. Luckily, no one else was around to get injured by the reckless driver. Steve observed as the car drove right past him, braked for a moment, then reversed speedily until the driver's side was directly in front of him.
Steve stuffed his hands into his pockets as the window rolled down, revealing a widely smiling Riley Stark. Beside her was her father, who looked like he was about to pass out. A rock song had been playing, which seemed to be standard with all of Tony's grand entrances.
A moment of silence passed before Tony slipped on a pair of expensive sunglasses and announced, "You are never getting your license."
Riley rolled her eyes. Her sunny exterior remained. "I'm not that bad," she disputed, twisting off the radio that had been blasting The Smiths. The beaming teenager glimpsed back at Steve. "What's up, old man?"
Steve offered a tiny smile and nodded wordlessly in return. Tony leaned forward. His seatbelt stretched across his torso as he wondered, "Why the long face?" Steve could detect the slight judgemental edge to his voice. "Let me guess: He turned into a baby."
"Among other things, yeah," hesitantly admitted Steve as the Stark pair exited the vehicle. Riley tossed the keys over to Tony, who caught them smoothly. "Not that I'm not delighted to see you, but what are you doing here?"
"That's the EPR paradox," Tony continued. "Instead of pushing Lang through time, you wound up pushing time through Lang. It's tricky. Dangerous. Somebody should've cautioned you against it."
Steve sighed. "You did."
"Oh, did I? Thank God I'm here," Tony haughtily declared. Riley rolled her eyes thinking about how much of an effort it had taken to even get him in the car. "Regardless, I fixed it." He held up his right hand, a strange device attached to it. "A fully functioning Time-Space GPS."
"Soon with its own Siri," Riley added. She looked almost too happy, but that might have been because convincing Tony to do something he didn't want to do happened about once in a blue moon.
"I just want peace." Tony made a peace sign with his fingers. "Turns out, resentment is corrosive, and I hate it."
"Me too," agreed Steve.
"We got a shot at getting these stones, but I gotta tell you my priorities," Tony continued. "Bring back what we lost? I hope, yes. Keep what I got? I have to. At all costs. And... maybe not die trying will be nice."
Steve nodded. "Sounds like a deal." He extended his hand, to which Tony silently shook. Then, Tony turned on his heel and opened up the trunk of his car to pull something out. Riley grinned at the sight of the shiny, new and improved Captain America shield. Tony offered it to Steve, but the man out of time hesitated. "Tony, I don't know..."
"Why? He made it for you," Tony pointed out, forcing it into Steve's hands. "Plus, honestly, I have to get it out of the garage before Riley convinces Morgan to take it sledding."
Steve fit his arm into the shield's inner straps, sighing. It was like nothing changed. "Thank you, Tony."
Tony lightheartedly quipped, "Will you keep that a little quiet? Didn't bring one for the whole team." He faltered. "...We are getting the whole team, yeah?"
Steve revealed, "We're working on that right now."
Riley clasped her hands together. "Perfect! Now, I don't know about you guys, but I'm ready to go back in time to tell myself the answers on the homework I should've cheated on for Mr. P's class." Tony and Steve shot her matching fatherly glances, to which Riley dismissively laughed. "I'm kidding! I'm a genius, you know. Straight-A student, actually. Geez, old men are a tough crowd." She turned to the doors of the compound, pacing toward them. "Let's pick up the pace, ladies! We have a universe to save!"
Riley didn't wait any longer for their responses. Instead, she marched into the HQ with an eager grin plastered onto her youthful face. She smiled, exuberantly greeting each person who looked her way. The gang was getting back together. The world was going to be saved. Riley walked with a pep in her step like she was on Cloud 9. At this moment in time, nothing could bring her—
Riley stopped in her tracks. She had followed the sound of music into the kitchen, where she presumed her friends and fellow colleagues were. When she entered the room, nevertheless, her eyes landed on the back of a giant, green individual. Hearing her gasp, he turned to see her, revealing the Hulk's face. Riley wasn't an idiot. She knew exactly what she was meant to do next.
"Shit!" Riley yelled, prepared to break out into a sprint.
"Riley!" a loud voice gleefully greeted. Riley paused. That sounded a lot like Bruce Banner, but... that made no sense if the Hulk was standing right in front of her.
Riley peered back, her eyes nearly popping out of her head. Bruce walked forward with a wide smile. The sight was unbelievable. Bruce and Hulk had combined into one entity. "What the... Bruce!?" Riley cried, her jaw agape. "Or... did Hulk develop an alter-ego? Is that even possible? An alter-ego developing an alter-ego?"
Bruce leaned down, his giant hand patting her head. "Oh, Riley, I'd been meaning to see you!" he energetically greeted. She soundlessly stared at him in awe. "You look great! I can't believe you're alive!" Bruce pulled her into a hug, squeezing the life out of her as he swept her off of her feet.
She squirmed in his grasp. "And I can't believe you're..."
She had read some interesting things about Bruce and Hulk on that anonymous blogger's page, but she thought it was just clickbait. In all her years of knowing him, she never once thought he had a chance of controlling his Hulk-side. But her eyes weren't deceiving her. This was real life. Maybe it was time Riley threw away the idea of "impossible" forever.
"I know! It's crazy, right? This is crazy!" replied Bruce. Riley laughed, staring at him some more as she finally finished processing what she was looking at. Bruce was still the same, just with a more civilized Hulkish appearance. He turned to the kitchen counter and picked up a taco that looked ridiculously small in his hands. "Have a taco!"
Riley smiled. "You seem happy, Bruce."
"I am. I hope you are, too, Riley. You deserve it." With that, he exited the kitchen with two more tacos in tow.
Riley observed as he left before glimpsing down at her taco. "The Hulk just gave me a taco," she said to herself. She broke out into an even bigger smile. "That is so cool. I have to tell P—" Riley faltered. "Never mind..."
"Are you talking to yourself?" a husky voice wondered. Riley looked over her shoulder to see a blue woman. It was Nebula. She must have just gotten in from space with Rocket, wherever he was. "Humans get queerer and queerer by the day."
"Oh, Nebula," Riley teased. "Most humans are queer, indeed." Nebula didn't understand what that meant.
"Neb, the idiot in the landing zone was just Scott," Rhodey called as he entered the kitchen. He paused when he noticed the Latina, nodding at her. "What's up, Riley?"
"Hi, Rhodey," greeted Riley. She was bouncing on the balls of her feet. First, Tony. Now, Bruce, Nebula, Rocket, and Rhodey were here? "This is great. We're really getting the whole team together?"
Rhodey nodded, his robotic suit squealing as he walked. "That's the dream."
Riley hadn't felt this exhilarated for something regarding the Avengers in a long time. They had all been separated for so long. The Avengers hadn't been a cohesive team since Ultron, which was years ago. Everyone had been separated, whether it was because they were on missions, on the run from the American government, or other specific reasons.
The Avengers were coming together once again. Riley couldn't wait to see everyone in the same room again, even if the itching feeling in the back of her head had her thinking more about the loss the team would face more and more. At this point, she wondered if she'd even be surprised when a team member would die. She only ever expected the worst, after all.
Not much later, Riley stood in one of the side rooms near the Testing Chamber. Nebula and Bruce tinkered with the Quantum Suit on Scott's body. It was white with red and black accents. The style of it reminded Riley of Scott's Ant-Man suit.
As Rhodey entered the room, he said, "Time travel suit? Huh, not bad."
"It's a little ugly," admitted Riley, peeping over at her old friend, "but I think that gives it character. Still, if we pull this off and have to do press with these suits, we're changing them up last minute."
Riley had done Avengers press before, but it wasn't much compared to her teammates. She had stayed in her suit every time, concealing her face. Ever since she confirmed her survival (and identity), doing press was a nightmare.
"That's what you're worried about? Press?" Rhodey jokingly wondered. "Geez, you really are Tony's kid."
Before Riley could reply, their attention was pulled back to Scott and Bruce.
"Hey, hey, hey. Easy, easy!" Scott barked.
Bruce had been holding a glass tube with red Pym Particles in it. "I'm being very careful."
"No, you're being very Hulky."
"I'm being careful."
Scott took the tube from Bruce's hands. He was obviously on edge, antsy with nerves. "These are Pym Particles, alright? And ever since Hank Pym got snapped out of existence, this is it. This is what we have," scolded Scott. "We're not making anymore."
"Scott," said Rhodey, "calm down."
"You're sure these modifications are safe?" Scott continued.
"I reran my calculations three times—" Bruce said.
"Because the guy who invented this thing is pretty much a genius—"
"I have seven PhD's, an MD, the Hans Bethe Award for Physics, and I'm personal friends with Bill Nye the Science Guy," Bruce said. "We're good."
"Yeah," Scott snapped. "And you look like that on purpose."
"A couple comments," Riley chimed, raising her hand.
"Oh, great," Rhodey grumbled. "Here she goes—"
"One, did you know that Bill Nye dude isn't even a real scientist? Everyone at Midtown High was obsessed with him, but he's literally just some guy," Riley said. "Two, Bruce, I'm a little concerned about you having that many degrees. Yeah, it's impressive, but at some point, you gotta get new hobbies or something. Having that many degrees makes it look like you're not ready to be a real adult, and that's not good for our image. Or yours."
Bruce groaned. "When did this turn into Everybody Hates Bruce?"
Scott sighed. "Sorry," he mumbled. "Look, we've got enough for one round trip each. That's it. No do-overs. Plus two test runs." As he said this, Scott disappeared, only to reappear seconds later. "One test run," he corrected.
"Are we positive this is gonna work?" Riley wondered. "I mean, I've gone over the research we have and all, but there's so much we still don't know about the QR."
"...QR?" repeated Bruce.
"Quantum realm," Riley explained matter-of-factly. Bruce and Rhodey exchanged judgemental glances, to which she shrugged. "What? Quantum Realm is a mouthful."
Rhodey shook his head. "What is up with you Gen Z kids and abbreviating everything?" he wondered. "LOL, IDK. It's exhausting."
Scott had hardly been paying attention to them. "Yeah, I'm not ready for this," he muttered. He was pale, breathless. Even with his experience with the Quantum Realm, he had a hard time adjusting.
"I'm game. I'll do it."
Riley's entire body tensed as she looked over. Clint Barton stood tall, leaning against the doorframe in a tank top. He looked like a completely different person—not because of the tattoos that covered his entire left arm, the questionable haircut, or the wrinkles that came with age. There was a dark cloud looming over his head that was unrecognizable.
"Clint?" Riley called, mostly surprise.d She was taken aback furthermore when Clint walked forward, not bothering to spare a glance toward Riley.
For the next few minutes, Clint Barton ignored Riley for reasons that were beyond her. She couldn't figure out why. All she knew was that he refused to look at her, respond to her, and overall refused to acknowledge her presence. It was like Riley wasn't even there.
Now adorned in the Quantum Suit, Clint stood with a hard look on his face, deep in thought.
Bruce explained, "Now, you're gonna feel a little discombobulated from the chronoshift. Don't worry about it."
Rhodey raised his hand slightly. "Wait, wait a second," Rhodey spoke up. "Let me ask you something. If we do this, you know, go back in time, why don't we just find baby Thanos, you know, and..." Rhodey was silent as he made a hand gesture that seemed to suggest that the Avengers strangle baby Thanos with a rope, killing him.
Riley slapped a hand over her mouth, unable to prevent the laugh that escaped her. Bruce replied in disgust, "First of all, that's horrible."
"It's Thanos."
"It's also hilarious," Riley added.
"And secondly," Bruce continued, "time doesn't work that way. Changing the past doesn't change the future."
Scott seemed to disagree. "Look, we go back in time, we get the stones before Thanos gets them. Thanos doesn't get the stones. Problem solved."
"Bingo," Clint agreed.
Jokes aside, Bruce was right. "It's not that simple," Riley argued while Nebula said, "That's not how it works."
Clint shrugged. "It's what I heard."
Bruce was baffled. "What? By who? Who told you that?"
Rhodey proceeded to count off on his fingers as he listed a series of movies involving time travel. "Star Trek, Terminator, TimeCop, Time After Time—"
"Quantum Leap," added Scott.
"A Wrinkle in Time, Somewhere in Time—"
"Hot Tub Time Machine—"
"Hot Tub Time Machine, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure," continued Rhodey. "Basically any movie that deals with time travel."
Riley tilted her head. "Hey, have you guys ever thought about how that one guy in Hot Tub Time Machine looks exactly like Bucky?" queried the raven-haired teenager. She tapped her finger against her chin. "What's the actor's name?"
"Sebastian Stan," answered Rhodey. "I remember that. Poor guy had to have constant security until we found Barnes."
Bruce shook his head, speaking expressively as he waved his hands around. "I don't know why everyone believes the movies, but it isn't true. Think about it," he told them. "If you travel to the past, that past becomes your future and your former present becomes the past, which can't now be changed by your new future."
"Exactly," Nebula said.
Scott paused. "So... Back to the Future's a bunch of bullshit!?"
With a small sigh, Riley decided she'd rather not have another existential crisis over time and space. Walking out, she announced, "I'm gonna check if Tony and Rocket are done constructing the model."
She glanced back at Clint, hoping he'd say something to her, but he didn't. Thankfully, her mood flipped around again once she overheard Tony and Rocket bickering in the Testing Chamber.
"For the last time, it's Rocket! Not Ratchet!"
"For the last time, I don't care!"
Riley approached Natasha, who had been silently watching. "Those guys really are a match made in heaven, aren't they?" Natasha commented, a small smile playing at her lips.
"Something like that," Riley replied. "...So Clint's back."
"Mhm."
"How'd that whole thing go? Anything out of the ordinary?"
"Well, by the time I got to him, he had just murdered another Japanese gang. Why? Did he say something?"
"No, that's kinda the problem. He's ignoring me. He won't even look at me."
"He's ignoring you? That's not like him at all."
"Right?" Riley sighed. "He's being really weird... but I guess he's been acting weird for the past five years."
Still, Riley didn't understand the sudden cold shoulder. Riley and Clint had been a close pair for a long time. He was one of the few agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. who had accepted her without hesitation. He had always shown her kindness when it felt like no one would. Did Riley do something wrong?
A large hand clamped down on her should, but it very obviously didn't belong to the Russian spy. Riley looked to her right to discover Thor. Riley still wasn't used to seeing Thor's new look, which consisted of long, greasy hair, dirty sweatpants, and a protruding beer gut.
"That's just how the cookie crumbles sometimes," Thor ominously said to the teenager. Though his eyes were concealed by sunglasses, Riley could see how Thor gazed out into the distance longingly.
She eyed him curiously. "Why are you wearing sunglasses indoors?" she asked, ignoring his statement entirely.
Thor peered down at the girl. "Why aren't you?"
Soon, everyone gathered around the Testing Chamber once Tony and Rocket were finished. Clint made his way to the glass platform. Bruce stood by one of the machines, his fingers on some switches. It was time for Clint's time-travel test run.
"Alright, Clint," called Bruce. "We're going in 3... 2... 1!"
Suddenly, Clint vanished into the Quantum Realm.
They watched, restless. No one wanted to know what would happen if this all went downhill, yet they anticipated it regardless.
Seconds later, though, Clint reappeared on the glass platform. He landed flat with a grunt, gasping for air. Riley sighed in relief, sprinting alongside the others to greet him. Natasha reached him first.
"Hey, hey, look at me," Natasha ordered. She offered a hand to help him up, steadying him. "You okay?"
Clint stiffly nodded. His small eyes looked around until they landed on Tony. He held up his son's baseball glove. "Yeah," Clint unveiled. "It worked. It worked."
Riley's eyes widened as Clint threw the glove toward Tony, which he caught with ease. Silence draped over the entire room. Astonishment colored their faces.
It worked.
○ ○ ○
The heroes gathered around in one of the conference rooms. Bodies filled the black office chairs around the long table. Notebooks and varying pieces of paper were spread out with pens beside them. The room smelled like cleaning product mixed with Thor's strange odor that no one wanted to comment on.
Riley stood at the front with her back facing her friends and colleagues. Her arms were outstretched to adjust the hologram displays. She set them up so that each Infinity Stone's file was opened up for everyone to see. On either side of her were Steve and Tony. Bruce walked around the backside of the room.
Riley continued to disperse the holograms as Steve spoke up, "Okay, so the "how" works. Now we need to figure out the "when" and the "where". Almost all of us have had an encounter with at least one of the six Infinity Stones."
Tony, with a styrofoam cup of coffee in his hands, added, "Well, I'd substitute the word encounter for damn well near been killed by one of the six Infinity Stones."
"I haven't," Scott said, responding more so to Steve and Tony. "I don't even know what the hell you're all talking about."
Rocket leaned forward in his seat, which seemed to swallow the raccoon whole. "Which is why our assistant, here, has the files opened up," the raccoon imperiously told him.
Riley spun around with a daring gleam in her eyes. "I know you did not just call me an assistant," she asserted.
"And what if I did?" challenged Rocket.
Riley clenched her jaw. "Don't test me," Riley threatened. "I'll taxidermy you and make sure your body's used on Sesame Street." Rocket snared his teeth at the girl in response, even if he didn't know what Sesame Street was.
"Moving on," deferred Bruce. "Regardless, we only have enough Pym Particles for one round trip each, and these stones have been in a lot of different places throughout history."
"Our history," Tony tolled.
"Which means we have to pick our targets," Clint realized, putting the pieces together.
Riley added, "We have to do our research and make sure we know exactly where we want to go. Everyone needs to make sure they don't leave out a single detail about their experiences with the stones. All it takes is one screw up."
Steve nodded, encouraging Riley's words. He looked around the room. "Let's start with the Aether." Steve glanced back. "Thor, what do you know?"
Everyone turned to face Thor, who had been sitting in the back corner with his sunglasses over his eyes. His entire body was stiff. Riley furrowed her eyebrows together at his unresponsiveness.
"Is he asleep?" Nat queried.
"No, I'm pretty sure he's dead," Rhodey retorted.
Riley crumbled up one of the papers on the table into a ball. She chucked it at Thor. As it bounced off of his beer gut, the God of Thunder awakened again. It took a minute, but Thor eventually rose to his feet and made his way to the front of the room. The file for the Reality Stone outshined the others.
"Where to start?" Thor wondered to himself, pulling off his sunglasses. He grumbled and slurred his words as he spoke. "Um... The Aether, first, is not a stone, someone called it a stone before. It's more of a... an angry sludge sort of thing, so... someone's gonna need to amend that. Riley?"
Sighing, she gave him a thumbs up. Thor put in some eye drops, mumbling, "Great. Here's an interesting story though. Many years ago... My grandfather had to hide the stones from the Dark Elves... Wooooh, scary beings."
Thor wiggled his fingers to imitate a spooky ghost, trying to scare everyone. The Avengers all glanced around from where they were either standing or sitting, judgemental looks on their faces. Scott, contrarily, was nodding along enthusiastically and watching Thor in adoration.
"So Jane," Thor continued. As he did, he poked at the display until an image of Jane Foster popped up. "Oh, there she is. That's Jane." He nodded toward the screen. "She's an... old flame of mine... She stuck her hand inside a rock this one time... and then 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. We were dating at the time, you see. I got to introduce her to my mother... who is dead." A flash of despair struck Thor's face. He looked like he was on the verge of tears. "And, oh, you know, Jane and I aren't even dating anymore. These things happen though, you know. Nothing lasts forever." Tony took this as a chance to walk forward and usher him back to his seat, but Thor refrained. "No, no, I'm not done yet. The only thing permanent in life is impermanence."
"Awesome. Eggs? Breakfast?" Tony offered, hoping to snip away the discomfort in the room.
Thor smiled at Tony. "I'd like a Bloody Mary, thank you."
Riley frowned, extremely concerned for Thor and his depression that had manifested over the years. She wished she could have been there for him to act as a shoulder he could cry on. God knows he needed support more than anyone else in the room.
"Pfft, what could possibly happen? Like Thor, of all people, would let Asgard get destroyed or something," Peter Parker's voice echoed in Riley's head. She almost laughed out loud. Things seemed so much simpler then. Riley wished Peter was still here.
After breaking off to acquire food, knowing the planning process would take quite some time, the Avengers eventually reconvened in the conference room again. This time, it was Rocket's turn to talk about his experiences. He stood on the table, pacing around as everyone else ate. Riley stabbed her chopsticks into a takeaway box of Chinese food like the others, excluding Bruce, who was digging into an unnecessarily large bowl of ice cream.
"Quill said he stole the Power Stone from Morag," Rocket described.
Scott looked up curiously. "Is that a person?"
"Morag's a planet," Rocket explained. "Quill was a person."
Scott's eyes widened. "A planet? Like in outer space?"
Rocket scoffed. "Oh, look. It's like a little puppy, all happy and everything." He changed his tone of voice to a higher pitched on you'd use to speak to a baby or a small animal. Rocket patted Scott's head. "Do you wanna go to space? You wanna go to space, puppy? I'll take you to space."
Without warning, Rocket fell onto his butt with a yelp as a forcefield opened up underneath his feet. It lifted the raccoon before catapulting him into the wall. Riley wondered what that must have looked like for the others. After all, she could see every UV ray in existence, whereas the others couldn't see a thing, excluding how Rocket was flung like a cannonball. Rocket's yells rippled in everyone's ears as all eyes befell upon Riley. She smiled innocently at them, shrugging whilst slurping up a noodle.
Nebula was next to step up to the front of the room. By now, everyone had finished eating.
"Thanos found the Soul Stone on Vormir," Nebula revealed.
Natasha, whose head had been lowered as she had been taking notes the entire time on a sperate notebook, glanced up and inquired, "What is Vormir?"
"A dominion of death, at the very center of Celestial existence," she revealed. Nebula's gaze fell. "It's where... Thanos murdered my sister."
Quiet showered down on the Avengers. Riley looked up, empathetic for the woman. This was one of the first new pieces of information she had heard about what happened up in space. She and Natasha wore matching blank expressions—something Riley had picked up from Natasha's training.
Natasha moved her attention back to her notebook, scribbling this information down. Scott cleared his throat, taking it upon himself to break the awkward silence, "Noted..."
Researching and connecting together the information everyone knew was the longest part. It was tricky to ensure that everyone reported every little detail they knew. The Avengers had a terrible habit of thinking the others knew what they already knew at times, so this step was crucial.
The current plan was to travel back in time to a day in which Thanos hadn't yet achieved the Infinity Stones, bringing them back to 2023 in order to find a way to reverse the Decimation. Once all was said and done, they would return the stones back to their respective timelines where life would go on as it already had.
Everyone spread out across the Avengers Compound to either take a break or work on their developing plan. Riley wasn't sure how long it had been since they started. All she knew was that she wasn't planning on leaving until their plan was at least solidified.
She laid on a flattened forcefield in one of the conference rooms, her face pressed into a pillow. Bruce laid on the floor, leaving Tony and Nat to lay next to each other on the table.
Natasha twirled a pen in her hand. "That Time Stone guy..."
"Doctor Strange," Tony corrected.
"Yeah, what kind of doctor was he?"
Tony rubbed his eyes, weary and nursing an awful migraine. "Neurostuff meets rabbits from a hat," he summarized.
"Nice place in the village, though," added Bruce.
Riley snorted. "I'm sure it was before you put a giant Hulk-shaped hole in the roof," she pointed out. "Sullivan, right?"
"Mm, I think Bleecker Street," corrected a very disoriented and exhausted Bruce. "Wait, not Bleecker. It's Sullivan. Actually, it might be—"
Natasha perked up slightly. "Wait, he lived in New York?"
"No, he lived in Toronto," Tony sassed.
Natasha shook her head. "Guys, if you pick the right year, there are three stones in New York," she disclosed.
Everyone fell mute as the realization struck. Bruce sat up in shock. "Shut the front door!" shouted the green man.
Riley adjusted her sitting position. She sat up, holding the pillow in her lap. "Wow," she mumbled. "All six Infinity Stones in the same place again... And they're not being used for some weird murder mission." She paused, yawning. "The last time all six stones were together was on Titan II when I..." Riley's sentence fell, but not because she was reminiscing on darker memories. A thought had come to mind. Riley's eyes widened. "Holy shit, I'm a genius."
Natasha didn't move from where she laid. "What now?"
"I'm a fucking genius, that's what!" Riley exclaimed, suddenly very energetic. She stood on her feet, dismissing the forcefield behind her. She chucked the pillow in her hands at Natasha and Tony.
"I'm sorry, how many Ph.D.'s do you have?"
"No, seriously, listen to me!" Riley insisted enthusiastically. "The last time all six stones were together, Thanos was on Titan II for about three weeks, give or take. He was incredibly weakened and there was no one around besides me."
Tony sat up slowly, eyeing her cautiously. "What are you suggesting?" he queried.
"Why don't we go back to Titan II in 2018 and take the Gauntlet from Thanos?"