We around the table in the conference room with the holotable, showcasing each of the six Infinity Stones. Tony, Steve, and Bruce paced at the front, leading the planning of the mission. In my newfound excitement of another mission with the whole team, my body had a hard time keeping the ice at bay, leaving me to sit upright in my seat, holding a snow flurry in my hands. 

"Okay, so the "how" works," Steve began. "Now we gotta figure out the when and the where. Almost all of us have had an encounter with at least one of the six Infinity Stones."

"Well, I'd substitute the word encounter for damn well near been killed by one of the six Infinity Stones," Tony added.

"Right on." I pointed to Tony, remembering each of our encounters with Thanos in Wakanda. 

"I haven't, I don't even know what the hell you're all talking about," Scott stated, looking at each of us. 

"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." Bruce went on. 

"Our history. So, not a lot of convenient spots to just drop in," Tony said. 

"Which means we have to pick our targets," Clint concluded. 

"Correct." Tony pointed to him. 

"Let's start with the Aether," said Steve. "Thor, what do you know?"

We all turned to see Thor sitting on a chair with his sunglasses on. It was impossible to tell whether he was awake or asleep. 

"Is he asleep?" Natasha asked. 

"No, I'm pretty sure he's dead," Rhodey stated. 

"Oh, Jesus..." I shut my hands and the snow flurry disappeared.

I stood up from my seat and walked over to Thor and gently placed my hand on his arm to lightly shake him awake. Regardless of the many times that I was able to gently wake up Bucky in Wakanda, my light touch to Thor served no purpose as he jolted awake, startling me. 

"Huh? What?" Thor stood up and looked around. 

"You're gonna tell us about the Aether," I said, taking the beer can from his hand. 

"Oh, right," Thor meandered to the front of the room and stood in front of the projector. I replaced his seat on the armchair, finding it rather comfortable and I didn't blame him for falling asleep. "Where to start? Umm... The Aether, first, is not a stone, someone called it a stone before. It's more of a... an angry sludge thing, so... someones gonna need to amend that." Thor pointed to Steve, who furrowed his brow. "Here's an interesting story though, many years ago... My grandfather had to hide the stones from the Dark Elves..." He wiggles his fingers to imitate a spooky ghost. "Wooooh, scary beings. So Jane," An image of Jane Foster popped up on the screen and Thor pointed to it with a smile on his face. "Oh, there she is. That's Jane... She's... an old flame of mine..." It was taking everything in my power not to laugh at this. 

"She... she stuck her hand inside a rock this one time... and then the Aether stuck itself inside her... And, she became very, very sick." The confusion in the room was at an all-time high at this point. "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's dead..." Thor started to look broken and seemed on the verge of tears. I leaned forward in my seat in case I needed to make an emergency rescue. "And, oh you know, Jane and I aren't even dating anymore, these things happen though you know, nothing lasts forever." Thor's voice shook and I stood up to push him back to his chair. "I'm not done yet, the only thing permanent in life is impermanence."

"That's great, Thor." I smiled. "Eggs? Breakfast?"

"I'd like a Bloody Mary, thank you." Thor nodded to me with a wink as if I were a bartender. 

"Celery? Perfect." I patted his arm and retreated to the kitchen. 

I quickly put together a Bloody Mary skewer of ham, provolone cheese, pepperoncini, a cherry tomato, and a celery stick. When I returned, Thor was back in his chair and Natasha had taken some notes. I handed Thor the skewer and peeked over Natasha's shoulder to read her notepad. 

Aether- Not a stone. Hidden from Dark Elves. Jane had encounter with Aether from a rock?? 

Great progress. 

~~~

That evening we had ordered Chinese food and all gathered in the dining room, eating from the boxes and listening to Rocket. He paced on the table as he told us about the Power Stone. 

"Quill said he stole the Power Stone from Morag," Rocket explained. 

"Is that a person?" Scott asked. 

"Which one?" I piped in through a mouthful of noodles. 

"Morag's a planet. Quill was a person," Rocket answered. 

"A planet? Like in outer space?" Scott asked, his face lighting up. 

"Oh, look. It's like a little puppy, all happy and everything." Rocket mocked, petting Scott's hair and imitating talking to a puppy. "Do you wanna go to space? You wanna go to space, puppy? I'll get you to space."

Nebula and I exchanged glances and Steve looked down to hide his laugh. 

~~~

The next day, we sat in a small study on a couch facing Nebula. I sat in between Clint and Nat who was writing her notes. 

"Thanos found the Soul Stone on Vormir," Nebula said.

"What is Vormir?" Natasha asked in a flat, business-like tone. 

"A dominion of death, at the very center of Celestial existence." Nebula described and I furrowed my brow, trying to understand what she meant. "It's where... Thanos murdered my sister."

Nat looked up, and an awkward, dead silence fell upon the room. I cleared my throat and looked away to avoid eye contact with Nebula. I wasn't sure if I should comfort her or not, I didn't know her as well as everyone else in the room, well, besides Scoot. Nat wrote down what Nebula had just said, and Scott made to break the awkward moment.

"Not it." 

"Scott!" I hissed. 

~~~ 

Steve and I stood in front of the projector which showed a picture of the Tesseract. The rest of the team sat at the conference table again. Steve and I stood with a little distance between each other, the unspoken tension between us was still in the air and we weren't sure how to go about explaining the Tesseract. I decided to start it. 

"So, Johann Schmidt, the former Head of HYDRA," I began and a picture of the Red Skull appeared. "Yeah, him. Anyways, he too wanted to get a hand on the Infinity Stones. He stole the Tesseract in 1942 and tried to use its power."

"And he was pretty successful," Steve added. 

"What's up with his face?" Rocket pointed at the photo of Schmidt. 

"For someone from outer space, I'm surprised this is a question," I commented. "He used the Super Soldier serum."

"How come Captain America doesn't look like that?" Scott asked. 

"Because Schmidt used it before it was perfected-" I continued. 

"How did Schmidt get a hold of the serum?" Nebula asked. 

"He worked with the doctor who made it," Steve answered, trying to get this presentation to move on.

"Wait, but he's the bad guy?" Scott tilted his head.

"Oh, my God!" I shouted, pressing my fingers to my temples. The room went silent. "Schmidt worked with Erskine on the serum, was corrupt with power, used the serum before it was completed, burned his face off, then went psycho with HYDRA. Got it?" 

Everyone slowly nodded, their eyes wide. 

"Great..." Steve nodded. "Uhm, so Schmidt had the Tesseract," an image of the Tesseract reappeared. "And used it to make fancy weapons with Dr. Arnim Zola." A portrait of Zola popped up and I grimaced at the sight of my first abuser. Steve noticed this and swiped the picture away. "Using these weapons they tried to get ahead in the war effort, but Ellie and I fought against them with the Howling Commandos." A picture of the Howling Commandos appeared and I smiled. 

"After Steve crashed the plane into the sea, the Tesseract was lost for about a year until Howard Stark and I recovered it while searching for the plane wreckage." As I said this, a photo of Howard Stark popped up and Tony glanced at it, a look of disappointment on his face. "From then, it was SHIELD property until Loki stole it in 2012 and we all know how that went down." 

There was a murmur of agreement from the six other Avengers. 

"So, there are a number of years that we could retrieve the Tesseract from," Steve stated. 

"Not all of them too convenient," I added. 

Natasha finished her notes with a big dot, signifying the end of a sentence, before looking up and sighing. I pressed my lips into a thin line, knowing how hard this was actually going to be. 

~~~

I checked the clock on the wall and seeing that it was almost midnight, I took the last sip of my iced coffee and hung my head upside down off the dining room table, nearly touching my hair to Bruce's glasses where he laid on the floor. Tony and Nat were laying on the table surrounded by papers. The Time Stone popped up on the display, and I attempted to turn my head to get a better look at it but gave up. 

"That Time Stone guy..." Natasha began, her notebook pressed against her chest as she stared at the ceiling. 

"Doctor Strange," Bruce said. 

"Yeah, what kind of doctor was he?" Nat asked. 

"Ear-nose-throat meets rabbit from a hat," Tony answered. 

"Magic-Doctor..." I said in a dramatic whisper. 

"Nice place in the village, though," Bruce added. 

"Yeah. Sullivan Street." Tony nodded. 

"Hmm... Bleecker." Bruce corrected. 

"Oh, Manhattan, not so far from where I used to live," I said. 

"Wait, he lived in New York?" Natasha looked over. 

"No. He lived in Toronto," Tony said sarcastically. 

"Guys, if you pick the right year, there are three stones in New York," Natasha narrowed her eyes. 

I whipped my head around to look at her and Bruce sat up in surprise. "Shut the front door."

I slid off the table, hitting my head on the pillow where Bruce had rested.  

"Ow!" 

~~~

 The holograms displayed the different locations that we had picked out. The Soul and Power Stones in space in 2014. The Reality Stone in Asgard, 2013; and the Space, Mind, and Time Stones in New York City, 2012. Steve, Tony, Bruce, Scott, and I were headed to New York in 2012; Nebula, Rhodey, Natasha and Clint were headed to space in 2014; and Rocket and Thor were headed to Asgard in 2013. 

"All right. We have a plan. Six Stones, three teams. One shot," Steve said. 

We walked in a file to the Quantum Time machine, wearing the Quantum Suits, albeit with some minor differences for different people. Rhodey had a bulkier repaint of the War machine armor and I was given different boots for obvious reasons. We stepped up on to the Time Machine platform, a couple of us looking to Steve for his usual motivational speech, which he delivered very well. 

"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. You know your teams, you know your missions. Get the stones, get them back. One round trip each. No mistakes. No do-overs. Most of us are going somewhere we know. But it 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." We all glanced at each other with hopeful expressions. "Whatever it takes. Good luck."

"He's pretty good at that," Rocket commented. 

"Right?" Scott replied in excitement. 

"All right. You heard the man," Tony said before turning to Bruce. "Stroke those keys, jolly green."

"Tractors engaged," Bruce announced. 

Rocket addressed the shrunk Benatar in Clint's hand. "You promise to bring that back in one piece, right?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. I'll do my best," Clint answered and I snorted. 

"As promises go, that was pretty lame," Rocket muttered. 

"You guys be careful," I said to Nat and Clint. 

"Minimal damage," Clint said with a wink. 

"See you in a minute." Natasha smiled excitedly. 

The mirrored panels above us rotated and the platform lit up. The teams all shrank and we entered the Quantum Realm. A whirlpool of colors and different branches of time that formed tunnels. The three teams split up and we headed into different points in our history.