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ᴇ ᴘ ɪ ᴘ ʜ ᴀ ɴ ʏ

"Y/N!!"
I think the world stopped for a second.

Just stopped moving. Just froze completely on its axis.

I didn't feel a thing when the knife plunged into my stomach.

Neither did I feel a thing when it was yanked out.

I just remember peeling back blood soaked fabric, and staring at a 3cm stab wound.

Bucky, taking off his jumper and pressing it to my stomach. He was talking, but the bullets and gunfire drowned him out.

I remember crawling, and flicking my wrist at them.

A glow of black, iridescent and looming, shot out from my hand, curling like a snake through the air. It coiled around their necks and stomachs, and entered their eyes. I heard their groans as they thudded to the floor, writhing with unimaginable pain.

I remember looking behind me at Bucky, his face covered in blood and metal arm all scratched.

Then i collapsed.

****

I woke up a couple of hours later.

I wasn't taken to the hospital, because I'd told them not to once before in conversation. They reminded me too much of HYDRA.

I recovered slowly, barely talking to anyone.

Only Bucky knows what really happened, knows more than me actually.

He would stay with me, hold my hand. Be there on my bad days. But I still wouldn't talk to him.

Bruce and the team think I'm in shock.

There were secret conversations. Discreet whispering. They were always holed up in a conference room.

I didn't mind.

BUCKY

Being stabbed was just added to the list of shit she's had to deal with.

I don't know how a person can actually survive through all of this trauma.

She wouldn't talk to me, but she wouldn't ask me to leave. I'd just sit on her bed and be with her.

The team were tense.

There would be countless meetings, Tony was always working on a computer. Working on tracking the ones that escaped.

I told them about what I'd seen y/n do. I told them to refer to the night when Loki first gave her the ring, and that glow surrounded her.

I knew that standing there with her, watching that, I shouldn't have been scared.

But I was terrified.

NATASHA

Tony said what attacked y/n and Bucky 'weren't of this world'. And what stabbed y/n was actually a some sword not forged of any metal from earth..

So basically, aliens attacked y/n.

I think what made us all extremely tense was the fact that we all lived, we all survived, through Thanos. And we knew what it looked like.

They were the ones who used swords, they were the ones who attacked unprovoked and cunningly planned. It was about 3 years ago now.

Y/n was sent to live with some distant relatives ( who also happened to be S.H.I.E.L.D agents ).

They were lucky not to be a part of the vanished.

Y/n stayed in contact with me the whole time, and really she was what kept me going.

When Bruce brought everyone back, and we fought the last battle, that was when y/n came back.

She says she doesn't remember it. That she was too young to remember.
But it was only a few years ago.

Because HYDRA did do something right.

BUCKY

I'd been called to yet another team meeting.

I only left when I knew y/n was comfy and fallen asleep.

When I entered late, the team just regarded me with nods as tony carried on talking.

"What I'm saying is, we wiped out purple and his army. I know we all remember it as clear as it was yesterday. He's dead, for sure." Tony walked around the huge glass table, and swiped a finger in the air, bringing a floating screen up in-front of him.

I still don't understand how that works.

"So you're saying HYDRA is working with aliens?" Steve crossed his arms.

"Yes." Vision responded, and at once the team were quiet, turning to look at him. "Yes it would make sense."

Bruce chipped in, leaning back in his chair.

"Portals between realms. They seem to be getting easier and easier to make, and easier to be undetected. If HYDRA did this in Russia." He raised his eyebrows, throwing up a hand.
"We wouldn't know."

Bruce's words were still being processed gravely when Thor spoke.

"The bifrost. When....Asgard was destroyed, supposedly, that was too. But I managed to summon it one last time with the power from a dying star. HYDRA can make weapons like y/n's, they can create a portal."

I finally spoke, walking to stand over by Steve, sitting after what happened would make me feel too on edge. I felt like I had to be alert.

"Well if this- portal does exist, how do we find it?"

"That's," I saw a cloaked figure step out into the room from a corner in the shadows, where I could've sworn there was nothing but dust. I knew who it was in an instant. "Where I come in."

Really, out of nowhere, had appeared.

"Strange." Tony addressed.