I Thought You Were Different: Part 3

Hope

Wanda had spent most of the days at the hospital with the kids, tending to their needs and helping them to rest when their emotions wouldn't let them sleep. They refused to leave the hospital despite her urging, but she knew that leaving you now would only cause them more grief, and she didn't want to be the cause of that for them when they were under so much strain already. Regardless of their maturity, they were still children, and they needed someone to care for them as such when their own father couldn't do it.

"How long have they been asleep?" Vision asked her quietly, taking a seat at her side. He looked at the trio, stretched out across the cots that hospital staff had brought into your room for them, each of them covered in a hazy red glow as she kept them in a deep slumber.

"Only for a few hours. I hope to allow them to rest until sunrise, but they sometimes fight against me."

"I'm certain that their need to be with her is quite strong."

She simply nodded and looked past him to see Steve, ever present at your bedside, his eyes looking heavy and red, dark circles around them that aged his appearance. "He won't allow me to help him," she sighed, "and he has yet to realize that by not sleeping, he is only harming himself. He will not listen."

"He can't hear you, Wanda. He can't hear anything other than the thoughts filling his mind. I can only imagine that their volume is deafening to him."

"Hmm," she agreed, "have you spoken with Tony? I worry about him, too."

"No, I have not," Vision answered heavily, "and I'm not aware of anyone who has been able to reach through to him. He is very much lost to us right now."

Wanda looked away at the sound of one of the children stirring next to her, sensing that Anthony was fighting against her control once again. He had become so much stronger, and this used to be much simpler for her to do; rather than continuing to push against him, she lessened her power over him and allowed him to wake, leaving his siblings to sleep.

"Anthony? What is it?" she asked in a whisper when he bolted upright in a gasping urgency, turning to her and Vision with a look of panic in his eyes. The sudden shift caught Steve's attention as well, bringing him to stand next to Vision in the first time that he had left your side since your arrival.

"Ant, what's wrong?"

"Dad, you can't do this!"

Steve dropped his shoulders, the weight of the discussion that he was about to have feeling as if it were driving his body into the ground. He had been open with the kids from the very first moment, no matter how painful it was for them to hear. Today was going to be the worst day of all, and he hoped that they would at least have a few hours of rest to gather their strength for it. "Son, we talked about this. There isn't anything else that they can do. We have to let Mom go."

"No, Dad, please," the boy panted, trying to regain his composure as he pleaded with his father, "just wait one more day. Give me one more day, please."

"Ant-"

"Dad, I need to talk to Stephen. Just please, let me try."

~~~

"No, absolutely not," Stephen argued, emphatically waving his hand to dismiss Anthony's idea, "I will not use the Eye to heal her. I'm sorry, Anthony, but I can't do that."

"You can change time! You can turn it back to save her! I've read the books and know that there are spells that will work!"

"Do you understand what you're asking of me?" Strange snapped back, standing up over the boy to look down with a stern expression to stop him before his temper flared even more. "Do you realize the precedent that will be set if I use that for just one person? It's altering the laws of nature just to save your mother."