Ash's POV

We'll be arriving in a few hours tops. Steve had told us after we called him and he told us to meet him at the Compound while he went to rendezvous with Nat and others.

"Do you think they made it in time?" I asked Dad as we walked along the side of the road entering the grounds of the Compound from where a taxi dropped us off, the driver eyeing us weirdly the whole trip there.

"Hopefully... The less stones Thanos has, the better a chance we have of stopping him."

"He already has two, that's too many for him to have as it is..." I muttered looking down at the ground in worry and just as he was about to ask me what I meant I explained, "When I was taken by him, I could sense how set he was on 'balancing' the universe by extinguishing half of life on all planets... he's ruthless and will do anything to see his goal through to the end... he's already proven that with the attempted genocide of me and my people..."

"Yeah..."

We both stopped right as we arrived at the front door to the Compound and I hesitantly raised my hand up to the scanner and placed it against the screen.

Welcome back Ash. I heard FRIDAY'S voice as an old picture of me popped up on the screen and after Dad scanned his hand as well she announced a welcome for him too and the doors opened.

"Huh..." I smiled slightly thinking that it wasn't going to work before saying, "I guess Tony was hoping we'd come back someday..."

"And I for one am glad to be back..." Dad pulled me into a side hug as we walked into the facility and we heard people talking down a hallway so we followed the voices.

When we arrived at a conference room, we saw that Rhodey was talking to a hologram video call Ross as he was talking to Steve as he led the group of him, Nat, who now had short blonde hair, Wanda, and Sam helping to carry an injured Vision.

"The world's on fire. And you think, all is forgiven?" Ross questioned Steve seriously and, at his stern voice, my hand subconsciously tightened around Dad's from my last encounter with him, even though we were still hidden in the shadows of the hallway and he squeezed it back in reassurance.

"I'm not looking for forgiveness. And I'm way past asking permission. Earth just lost her best defender. So we're here to fight. And if you wanna stand in our way... We'll fight you, too." Steve told Ross with no lack of hesitation in his voice at the mild threat.

After a moment, hologram Ross turned to Rhodey to order,

"Arrest them."

"All over it." Rhodey ended the meeting with a swipe of his hand before telling Steve, "That's a court-martial. It's great to see you, Cap."

"You too, Rhodey." Steve gave him a handshake before Nat came in to give him a hug and he turned to look over everyone else to bluntly state,

"Well... You guys... really look like crap." Making everyone smile a bit before he added, "Must've been a rough couple of years...

"Yeah, well, the hotels weren't exactly five-star." Sam admitted.

"Uh, I think you look great. Don't you think... Ash...?" Dad spoke up as he stepped closer to the group, revealing himself, before he looked back to me to signal for me to follow so I stepped forward too,

"Yeah I mean.. given the circumstances I'd say so..."

"Yeah... We're back..." Dad told everyone and there was a moment of stunned silence before Nat greeted us with a quick,

"Hi, Bruce... Ash..."

"Nat." He greeted back and there was some more awkward silence before Sam broke it with,

"This is awkward... And I see Nat's not the only one who got an extreme hair makeover."

"It wasn't my choice, but it's kinda growing on me.. for now anyway..." I sheepishly smiled while tugging a short strand of hair to "look" at it before I couldn't stand the awkwardness anymore and ran over to hug Nat.

I was half expecting her to push me away and yell at me for being reckless and nearly getting myself and Xay killed by going after my armband power source alone, but she surprised me by returning the hug and tightening her grip on me as if she were afraid to let me go again.

"Nat, I can't breathe..." I slightly choked out as her hug tightened to the point where I couldn't breathe normally.

"Call this punishment for being irresponsible and nearly getting yourself killed..." She whispered to me but it was loud enough for everyone else to hear so they all chuckled a bit.

Aaahhh there it is... I thought to myself ruefully before she let go to look me over and I smiled at her sheepishly before going around to the others to give them hugs too.

"Hey kid..."

"Glad to see you really live up to your nickname..."

"Diggin' the new threads."

"I never doubted you..."

Steve, Rhodey, Sam, and Wanda all told me respectively but when I got to Vision he held his hand out saying,

"It would most likely be best not to embrace at the moment."

I looked and saw him holding his side where I could see some glowing where his internal circuits were slightly exposed and I questioned slightly frantic,

"What happened?!"

"One of their weapons prevented me from phasing and continues to prevent me from fully regenerating."

"Let's get to the lab and we can at least get some minor repairs started." I suggested and we all headed to one of the labs so I could get started analyzing Vision's wound while Dad started talking with the others,

"So we gotta assume they're coming back, right? And they can clearly find us. We need all hands on deck. Where's Clint?"

"After the whole Accords situation, he and Scott took a deal. It was too tough on their families." Nat explained to him making him question,

"Who's Scott?"

"Ant-Man." Steve answered.

"There's an Ant-Man and a Spider-Man?"

"Who's Ant-Man again?" I asked from my spot near one of the monitors turning to face everyone.

"Ash c'mooon you were there when he got big." Rhodey pointed out but I just avoided eye contact before responding with a hesitant,

"I don't.. remember much from that day after I put that device on my head and before waking up in that cell..."

"I'm sorry 'cell'?!" Dad questioned in disbelief before I set him back on track with a simple,

"Dad."

"Right right okay, look... Thanos has the biggest army in the Universe. And he is not gonna stop until he..." He stopped before saying as delicately as he could, "He gets...Vision's stone..."

"Well then, we have to protect it." Nat stated before Vision corrected her to say,

"No, we have to destroy it." He stood up from the examination table, despite my protests to explain to everyone, "I've been giving a good deal of thought to this entity in my head, about its nature. But also, its composition. I think if it were exposed to a sufficiently powerful energy source, something very similar to its own signature, perhaps... Its molecular integrity could fail."

He looked to Wanda and I at the end of his sentence and Wanda voiced what we were both thinking,

"And you with it. We're not having this conversation."

"Eliminating the stone is the only way to be certain that Thanos can't get it." Vision tried to reason but Wanda wasn't having it,

"That's too high a price."

"Only you both have the power to pay it. Thanos threatens half the Universe. One life cannot stand in the way of defeating him."

"But it should." Steve spoke up before telling him, "We don't trade lives, Vision."

"Captain, 70 years ago, you laid down your life to save how many millions of people. Tell me, why is this any different?" Vision asked and just before Steve could answer, Dad spoke up to answer for him,

"Because you might have a choice."

And I caught on to what he was thinking as I voiced,

"Riiiight... when you were created, so many different overlays went into the development of your mind, each one its own complex construct based on the people and programs that influenced it."

"Jarvis, Ultron, Tony, me, Ash, the Stone. All of them mixed together. All of them learning from one another." Dad emphasized.

"You're saying Vision isn't just the stone?" Wanda asked.

"I'm saying that... If we take out the stone, there's still a whole lot of Vision left. Perhaps the best parts."

"Can we do that?" Nat questioned.

"Not me. Not here."

"You better find someone, and somewhere fast. Ross isn't exactly just gonna let you guys have your old rooms back." Rhodey told everyone.

"I know somewhere." Steve spoke up and I looked at him with a small smile to ask,

"You mean...?"

"Yep, time to see some old friends..."

A beeping sound rang out and a hologram alert pulled up in front of Rhodey that he tapped and swiped to the side before saying with a grin,

"Speaking of old friends, some more just arrived."

I heard some footprints approaching from down the hallway and when I turned away from the monitor to face the sources, I was met with two familiar faces; Xay and Zaruk.

"Xay!" I ran over to him and tackled him in a hug but was surprised when he didn't return it.

"Xay?" I stepped back to look at him and I saw he was now wearing the bright orange, yellow, and red uniform of a fire wielder Protector and Wickity was still in the patterned satchel on his side, but his facial expression was unreadable and he spoke with a voice that seemed so much deeper and more monotone than his old cheerful one,

"I am relieved to see you are unharmed Lumna."

I looked over at Zaruk, slightly distressed at what was happening but their facial expression was just as remorseful when they pulled me aside to tell me,

"After you disappeared, he poured himself into his Protector training and he just graduated to official Protector a few weeks ago, the youngest one to ever receive this title."

"Then why is he so..." I made a vague gesture to where Xay was professionally greeting everyone with a handshake, not a hug or high five.

"We all thought you had died that day... but, for him, the pain of losing you a second time was too much and, at first, he coped with it through emotional outbursts but, after some time, he began to turn to emotional suppression and detachment to lessen the pain..."

"But I'm back now so shouldn't he-"

"Be back to his old self? I would have assumed so, but I believe he is still in denial that you are really here. Tell me; after everything you went through wherever you ended up, do you still feel like yourself?"

I stopped and took this question into thought and realized that, while I might be back now, but I will never really be the same as I was before after those years of having to fight for my life every day, seeing good people fall battle after battle, and spending what felt like countless hours locked in the cold, wet darkness that seemed to smother whatever hope I had been struggling to cling onto that continued to fade and became harder and harder to hold onto as the days went by...

"I guess not..." I finally admitted out loud and Zaruk put a hand on my shoulder before telling me,

"You both must be patient with one another, you've both been through so much for younglings and you can't expect things to go right back the way they were before..."

"I guess so..." I admitted as I looked back to where Xay was now standing sentry by the window and Wickity had crawled out of his satchel to fly over to me and land on my shoulder, nuzzling my cheek with his head affectionately.

"Thanks for looking out for him... both of you..." I told Zaruk and Wickity and they nodded to me while Wickity let out a happy squawk.

"Alright." Steve got our attention with his authoritative tone making us walk back over to the group as he announced to everyone,

"Grab your things and head for the Quinjet, I've let them know we're coming and we need to get there as soon as possible. Let's move it out."

We all started filing out of the Compound and I walked next to Xay and, even though he walked facing forward with his eyes blankly staring ahead of him, I still took ahold of his hand to let him know I really was there and, thankfully, he at least enlaced his fingers with mine in response.

I'm here now... I told him telepathically and, even though he didn't respond, I could tell he was relieved that I was really there and I leaned my head on his shoulder before falling asleep from the day finally starting to catch up to me.

2129 Words