The King: T'Challa.

Chapter 34: Old Friends.

Emily crested the rise of shattered steel and smoking earth just in time to see Steve Rogers hurled aside like a rag doll. He had rushed Thanos with the kind of desperate courage only Steve possessed, but the Titan swatted him away with a lazy backhand, contemptuous.

Thor followed, bellowing, Stormbreaker flashing in his grip. Their weapons clashed in a flare of sparks, but Thanos' double-edged blade caught the axe in its teeth. He twisted and forced Thor back, faster, stronger, relentless.

Emily froze as she saw the Allfather's son stumble. Thanos wrapped one massive hand around Thor's throat, crushing the breath from him. The Titan's free fist hammered down again and again, driving the thunder-god into the dirt, into rubble, into silence.

Thor clawed for Stormbreaker, but Thanos wrenched it from him. Slowly, horribly, he turned the axe against its master, pressing the blade into Thor's chest, inch by inch. Thor strained, teeth gritted, eyes wide with terror.

And then—Mjölnir stirred.

At first Emily thought it was smoke, dust shifting on the battlefield, until she saw the hammer lift itself from the wreckage, floating as though called by an invisible hand. It shot forward, slamming into Thanos' temple, knocking the Titan aside. The hammer arced through the air, curved back—

—and landed firmly in Steve Rogers' hand.

For a moment, everything stopped.

Thor, beaten and bloodied, looked up and let out a bark of a laugh, a grin splitting through his agony. "I knew it."

Emily's heart leapt, despite everything.

Steve stood taller, wielding both his fractured shield and Mjölnir, determination carved into every line of his face. He advanced on Thanos. The hammer crackled with lightning, the shield gleamed, and for a moment the Captain of old was every inch the god the world believed him to be.

The clash that followed was titanic. Steve moved with precision, each swing of the hammer landing with bone-rattling force. He hurled the shield, striking Thanos square, then whipped Mjölnir after it, the hammer colliding with the vibranium in a shattering shockwave that sent the Titan stumbling. Steve pressed his advantage, calling down lightning itself, channelling it into Thanos' armour.

But inevitability had always been Thanos' true weapon. He recovered, tore into Steve with brutal efficiency, drove his blade deep into the Captain's thigh and tore Mjölnir from his hand. He hacked at the vibranium shield, each strike ringing out like a death knell. Fragments flew; the unbreakable shield was breaking.

Steve staggered, breath ragged. Still, he tightened the ruined shield to his arm with trembling hands, preparing to stand, alone, against the universe.

Thanos removed his helmet and cast it aside, his voice low, certain. "In all my years of conquest, violence, slaughter... it was never personal. But what I'm about to do to your stubborn, annoying little planet—" He paused, savouring it. "—I will enjoy it. Thoroughly."

He raised his sword. Behind him, the earth trembled.

The sky tore open with fire as the full weight of Thanos' army descended—legions of Chitauri, Sakaarans, Outriders, the Children of Thanos themselves. The battlefield, already scarred, now drowned beneath an ocean of enemies.

Emily stumbled towards Steve, reaching him as the shadow of the Titan's war host stretched over them. He gave her a look, grim but unbroken, and she returned it. If this was how it ended, then at least they would face it together.

And then—

"Cap, it's Sam. Can you hear me?"

The voice cracked through the static of Steve's comm. He blinked, stunned, searching the battlefield.