War

Chapter 12

The group walked down the ramp of the jet with Steve leading them the way towards two figures waiting for them. Raptor stayed in the back of the group with Pietro, Wanda, and Vision and stared around at the city tensely. Soon this beautiful place would be up in flames of battle if they couldn't hold off the attack as planned... She tried to shake the thought from her mind and focus on the current situation however- they were about to meet the king of Wakanda after all.

Ahead of her Bruce looked slightly nervous as they got closer to T'Challa and turned to Rhodes beside him. "Should we bow?"

"Yeah, he's a king." Bruce awkwardly started to bow while Steve shook hands with Wakanda's king and Rhodes covered up a laugh and mocked the scientist. "What are you doing?"

T'Challa took notice of Bruce and dissuaded the action as well. "We don't do that here... How big of an assault can we expect?"

They began to walk back as they continued to talk and Bruce quickly regained his composure at the question. "Er, sir, I think we can expect quite a big assault."

"Will we be enough?" Pietro worried, though Raptor knew it was over the possibility of forcing Wanda to destroy Vision.

"You will have my King's Guard, the Border Tribe, the Dora Milaje, and-"

"A semi stable one-hundred year old man." A familiar man with a metal arm came walking towards them and gave Steve a hug.

"How've you been, Buck?" Steve questioned.

"Not bad for the end of the world.

Raptor gave a laugh and looked up at the sky before following them inside. Bucky was right though... for the end of the world being in one piece was 'not bad'. "Can we make it stay that way is the real question though; Thanos is so strong..."

Steve had Sam, Bucky, and Rhodes stay outside to keep watch while the rest of them went inside with T'Challa. They had a quick introduction to Shuri as she took them into her lab but she quickly got to work with working on separating Vision from the gem. Naturally Wanda stayed at Vision's side while they watched the process closely from the other side of the room.

Shuri finally broke her silence as she stared at holographic information in front of her. "Woah, the structure's polymorphic."

Bruce walked over to join her in observing the data. "Right. We had to attach each neuron non-sequentially."

"Why didn't you just reprogram the synapses to work collectively?" Raptor stared between the two confused while Vision was staring at Bruce now for an answer to what was probably an easy solution the three could accomplish.

"We, uh, didn't think of it..."

"Can you do it?" Wanda asked Shuri.

"Yes, but there are more than two-trillion neurons here. One misalignment could cause a cascade of circuit failures." Shuri looked up from the data back to T'Challa. "It will take time, brother."

"How long." Raptor could tell by the look on Steve's face he'd try to hold the army back no matter how long it would take- true determination.

"As long as you can give me."

One of the guards looked at their watch. "Something's entered our atmosphere."

A second later Sam's voice came over the com-link. "Cap, we got a situation here."

From their window they could see one ship hit the glowing force-field and implode but further outside more were landing. Raptor shuddered at the sheer amount of them; would their army really be enough?

"It's too late, we need to destroy the gem now." Vision ordered.

Pietro turned back to him. "No. You're staying on that table. We can hold them off and save you."

T'Challa and his guards headed for the door. "We'll hold them off."

Steve gave Wanda a stern look. "As soon as the stone's out of his head... blow it to Hell."

"I will."

"I'll stay here to help." Raptor spoke up suddenly. "I know you can hold them back but in case something happens... Wanda can't fight and destroy the stone at the same time."

"Raptor..." Pietro

"Let's go." Cap nodded to her before motioning for the others to follow after him.

Pietro ran over to them at the last second. "If anything goes wrong I'll find both of you..."

"Just come back." Wanda responded, her voice tensed with stress for Vision and her brother.

"Always." He was gone in a flash to catch up to the others.

Raptor looked back out the window nervously. "We have to do this. But will destroying one stone even be enough to stop Thanos? He still has the rest."

"You don't need to stay behind." Wanda commented. "There's nothing you can do here. They need everyone out there to help."

"If anyone gets past the army I'm helping the guards remaining back here to defend Shuri and Vision with you until that stone is destroyed."

"You mean if I have to kill him and destroy the stone." Her voice was cold and Raptor could see her glare in the faint reflection on the glass.

"Last resort... Everyone agreed to that."

Wanda stormed over to her, abandoning Vision with Shuri. "I won't have to do it."

"I didn't say that-"

"But you're thinking it."

Raptor scowled at her and half growled a response. "Do you think I want you to lose someone you love? I've lost my pack multiple times! I know what it feels like to lose something I care about. I don't want it to happen to you let alone make you be the one to do it!"

Wanda backed off and collected her emotions. "...You're right. I'm just stressed right now..."

"Everyone is. And we're all doing our best to help Vision and kill Thanos." Raptor assured her as she calmed her own voice and went back to watching the battle below. "I'll do everything in my power to prevent you from needing to destroy him."