The Prince and the Sol

Chapter 22

ELIZA's POV

"Okay, so the 'how' works. 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." Steve paces in front of us. This is the logistics part of the Time Heist, the planning. We don't have room for mistakes. Not anymore.

"Well, I'd substitute the word encounter for damn well near been killed by one of the six infinity stones," Tony corrects, getting a laugh out of a few. He's right. I've been in contact with at least two infinity stones closely. And I almost died once.

"I haven't," Scott says, shoveling food into his mouth. I steal a fortune cookie from him, and he makes a face at me. "I don't even know what the hell you're all talking about."

"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 says.

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

"Which means we have to pick our targets," I say reasonably.

"Correct," Tony nods.

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

A soft snore is the only answer he gets. Everyone turns to see Thor slumped on a chair, sunglasses on. "Is he... asleep?" Nat asks as if she isn't able to believe it.

"No, I'm pretty sure he's dead," Rhodey responds. Loki teleports over, smacks Thor in the back of the head, and instantly reappears in his chair. Thor jolts awake and tried to pinpoint who woke him up with no success as we all laugh. He gets up to talk.

"Where to start? Um, the Aether, first, is not a stone. Someone called it a stone before. It's more of a... an angry sludge thing, so someone's gonna need to amend that. Here's an interesting story though, many years ago..." Loki groans and puts his head in his hands, like he already knows what his brother is about to say. "My grandfather had to hide the stones from the Dark Elves... Whooooh, scary beings. So Jane. Oh, there she is. That's Jane... She's... an old flame of mine... She... she stuck her hand inside a rock this one time, a bit before we had the whole Ragnarok problem... and then the Aether stuck itself inside her... And, she became very, very sick. 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, and oh you know, Jane and I aren't even dating anymore, these things happen though you know, nothing last forever." Tony starts to push him back towards the chair. "I'm not done yet! The only thing permanent in life is impermanence," he finishes triumphantly.

"Awesome. Eggs? Breakfast?" Tony asks.

"I'd like a Bloody Mary, thank you."

"How about no?" I toss him a bottle of water instead.
"Okay, then," Steve says, still slightly put off from Thor's speech. "Space stone. Loki, you know the most about it." Loki nods and moves to the front.

"The Space Stone was held in the Tesseract. We've all had problems with it over the years. The time it mattered was 2011, when I was sent to Midgard under Thanos' control." He freezes for a minute. I know why. He never talks about this. Remembering it still haunts him. "He offered me dominion over Midgard in exchange for it. I was in a bad place to accept his deal, and he took over my mind. After that, it was stored in Asgard's vaults, until about seven years ago, when I returned to Midgard. I took it back with me, Thor being the only one that knew. I was supposed to keep it a secret, because Thanos wouldn't expect it to be there. He came to possess it when he attacked our home. I gave him the Tesseract in exchange for Eliza's life."

I always try not to think about that night. It's scary to remember, to think about Thanos' hand around my neck, to imagine how close I really was to death.

"All right. Rodent, you're next," Tony says, pointing to the scowling Rocket. He hops on the table and starts to pace as he speaks.

"Quill said he stole the Power Stone from Morag."

"Is that a person?" Scott asks curiously while shoving noodles in his face.

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

"A planet? Like in outer space?" Rocket walks over to Scott and pats him on the head degradingly.

"Oh look. It's like a puppy, all happy and everything. Do you wanna go to space? Do you wanna go to space, puppy? I'll get you to space."

Nebula's next. "Thanos found the Soul Stone on Vormir," she says quietly. Her metallic voice carries through the small room.

Nat looks up from her notes. "What is Vormir?"

"A dominion of death at the very center of Celestial existence." She hesitates. "It's where Thanos murdered my sister." Everyone pauses to feel properly uncomfortable about this. Of course, we've been talking about the dead all day, but those are potentially dead. Unfortunately, I think Nebula's sister is gone for good. Nat's pencil slowly scratches against her notebook, recording what she just said.

"Not it," Scott mumbles.

Hours later, the brainstorming group has severely dwindled in size. Tony and Nat are both laying on the table, covered in papers, while Bruce and I have opted to just spread out on the floor. I'm just exhausted, mentally and physically. We need to make teams, but we can't until we figure out how many places we actually need to go to.

"That Time Stone guy..." Nat thinks aloud.

"Stephen," I say through a yawn. "Doctor Strange."

"Yeah, what kind of doctor was he?"

"Neurostuff meets rabbit from a hat," Tony jokes.

"Nice place in the village, though," Bruce says, tossing another paper airplane at my face. Luckily, I dodge this one.

"Yeah, Sullivan Street."

"No, Bleeker," I correct.

"Wait, he lived in New York?" Nat asks, suddenly interested in our pointless chatter about Stephen's home.

"No, he lived in Toronto," Tony sarcastically says.

"Guys, if you pick the right year, there are three stones in New York." We all take a moment to digest this new revelation until Bruce breaks the silence.

"Shut the front door."

IT'S HAPPENING SOON! TIME HEIST TIME!

Which teams do you think Loki and Eliza will be on???