Saving Grace

Ninety

It had been a journey of anxious anticipation, coupled with a sense of excitement. Worry mixed with wonder at the sight out of the windows. But, now, finally, the ship is approaching a planet, almost Earth-like on one side, a cloud of purple-tinged smoke on the other, with a concentrated purple light striking the center of it. It becomes quickly obvious that it's Vormir with how the ship keeps getting closer.

"Wow," Clint says. "Under different circumstances, this would be totally awesome."

Nat shrugs. "Still pretty awesome."

The ship lands, and they get off onto a desert-like terrain, only with water. Small lakes — ponds maybe, by definition — litter the spaces between something like sand dunes, a purple tinge to it all. Light wind blows the alien sand around. It's dark, though a sort of eclipsed sun shines, along with that purple light. In the distance is a mountain, the place Nebula instructed them to go to. Towards the light, where it hits at the top.

Nat groans a little, her wonder beginning to dull. "Why couldn't we land on the mountain?" she asks.

Clint chuckles. "You took the words right out of my mouth."

They trudge on, hardly talking — hardly needing to — and then they finally reach the mountain. A sense of relief floods Nat before she remembers that she now has to actually climb up it. She groans again, and Clint laughs, going ahead of her.

"Not so awesome now, is it?" he says.

She follows after him, up the steep path. "Oh, shut up."

It becomes colder the higher they go, the blowing sand turning to snow. Nat grows weary, worry and anticipation now increasing.

They stop — now high up and near the light— next to two tall pillars. Nat sighs. "I bet the raccoon didn't have to climb a mountain."

"Technically, he's not a raccoon, you know?" Clint replies, a bit breathless.

"Oh, whatever; he eats garbage," Nat says, and Clint doesn't get a chance to reply.

An echoing voice behind him says, "Welcome." Clint draws his sword and Nat draws her gun, both of them aiming at a floating, hooded figure that wasn't there a few seconds ago. He speaks again. "Natasha, daughter of Ivan. Clint, son of Edith."

Clint moves first, heading towards the figure, his sword now in front of him, and Nat follows not a second later, both of them cautious. He's said no more, so Nat lowly asks, "Who are you?"

"Consider me a guide," he answers, "to you, and to all who seek the Soul Stone."

Nat's voice is laced with sarcasm. "Oh, good. You tell us where it is, then we'll be on our way."

He sighs, stepping forward, revealing his face. "Liebchen... if only it were that easy." His face is red — bright, blood red, like the worst sunburn anyone ever had, and his nose was gone, only the holes left, his bones almost poking through his red skin. Nat recognizes him not only from photos, but from Steve's description, when he'd told her about crashing the plane, what happened before the ice.

Red Skull.

He turns and walks through the pillars, and, cautiously, Clint and Nat follow. The ends of his hood look like smoke as they blow in the strong wind.

What he leads them to is a cliff edge, the ground with straight lines carved into it. One leads to the edge, where two stones just out almost like a plank on a pirate ship. A circle was carved in the very middle, in the stones behind the plank.

"What you seek lies in front of you," Red Skull says, "as does what you fear."

Nat walks to the edge of the plank, looking down over it, at the long, long way down to the bottom. The purple light hits there, and she knows.