Author's Note: This story takes place after my story Aftermath and contains LOTS of Infinity War SPOILERS, so if you haven't seen the movie, you probably don't want to read this one.

I don't own anything to do with Marvel. Obviously…

Please enjoy.

INFINITY

Chapter One

Tony Stark sat behind his desk and rolled his neck to loosen the knots that had formed while he scrolled through an endless stream of emails. He was nearly boring him to tears and he was grateful for the distraction when his door opened without a knock.

"You can pretend to read your emails and whatever all you want, Tony, but I know you've been hiding in here moping. It's been nearly two hours and, quite frankly, its pathetic," Pepper Potts said as she crossed the room and perched on the edge of his desk. "You could just, oh, I don't know, call them. Or, really, call her."

"That is not what the phone is for, Pep," he replied.

The redhead sighed. "That was from way back when. Things ended so much better."

"But, it's not the same," he pouted.

"You can be petulant, but it's going out in the news tomorrow. I know you want to tell her about our engagement yourself, so you'd best just pick up the phone. You don't want her to hear about it on TMZ, do you?"

She leaned down and gave Tony a light, chaste kiss on his lips. She straightened back up and looked down at him in silence.

"Maybe we should try another one. It could kick me out of the funk I'm in. Do you think you could…"

She leaned down once more and pulled her into his lap. She laughed in surprise, but it was silenced as he kissed her hard.

"So, how about now?" she asked when they broke apart.

"I don't know. We might need to run a few more tests," Tony said with a smirk.

Two Years Prior…

"…But it's home, Share. There must be something I can do or say to convince you to stay," Tony said. "You wouldn't have to stay here, you could live uptown."

Sharon Carter had been given the full bill of health and since Sin and Cathy had been moved to their permanent home in a maximum security prison, the band was breaking up once more. She smiled sympathetically at her godfather.

"Yes, it is home and it always will be. But being that there are orders to bring me in at the CIA and the Accords are still in effect, we need to lay low again."

Tony looked sad. "So, what's the plan? Where will you go?"

She shrugged. "We, uh, don't know that part yet."

"That's comforting," Tony said sarcastically.

Steve Rogers joined them in Tony's office. "It's going to be better for everyone, including you, if you don't know our location," he said. "Ross will never let you be if he even thinks you know a possible location. Sharon and I, and Wanda, Nat, and Sam – we'll manage."

"But…"

"Tony, we're on the wanted list. Clint and Lang – they had to take a deal and go on house arrest just so they could go back to their families. There is no budging and no negotiation."

"At least, not right now," Steve added.

Tony sighed deeply.

"Keep doing that all you want, but this has to be this way," Sharon said.

"I hate this," Tony said.

"Uh, duh? You hate everything and anything not done the Tony Stark way," Sharon smiled even though she was tearing up.

"You owe me five hundred big ones, little girl. I trademarked the phrase the Tony Stark way in the nineties just in case," he said.

Steve cracked a small smile while Sharon rolled her eyes. "That doesn't surprise me in the slightest."

"Are you at least going to tell your mother where you're gallivanting off to?" Tony asked.

Sharon let out a small bark of laughter. "Oh, hell no."

Tony composed himself and gave Sharon a side-eye.

"This will always be home," he said. "That goes for the both of you." He reached out and shook Steve's hand. "You take excellent care of her, Rogers," he said, fighting the fact that he was choking up.

Steve nodded affirmatively. "Yes, sir," he said before looking over to Sharon.

"And you," Tony turned back to Sharon. "A signal or message that you and Rogers and the others are all right every now and then wouldn't hurt. I know you know how to do it."

Sharon nodded.

"But if we're being…real…with one another and I like to believe that you and I, us, we always are. I love you, Sharon. Like you are my own kid," he said. He pulled her into a tight hug and she sniffled into his shoulder. While he was still holding her, he looked up to Steve. "I'm really holding you personally responsible for anything that happens to her and that is not limited to: hang nails, mosquito bites, split ends, all the way to injuries that occur from acts of otherworldly beings. Do you get me?"

"Got it," Steve said.

Tony released her and held the woman at arm's length to look her over. "All right, get the hell out of here before I decide to throw you both in one of Banner's cells."

"See you later, Tony," Sharon said and kissed him on the cheek.

He sighed deeply again as he watched Steve take Sharon's hand in his and lead her out of the room and out of sight.

Tony sat in his office staring out of the window for a long time after that. Even when he got the notice that one of the quinjets was being started, he didn't move. He watched the jet streak into the sky and turn into a pinpoint on the horizon until it disappeared completely. Tony knew they were right, but he definitely wasn't ready to admit it.

…

Present Day…

"I've got something, Cap," Sam Wilson said as he read the radar in front of him. "Not sure what, though."

The group of them, nomads as they were, had been holed up in a very tiny flat in London while Wanda and Vision were trying to escape reality in Edenborough. They were trying to keep their distance, but things had been off for the last couple of weeks, so Steve had them sticking a little tighter.

"Alien?" Steve asked with an almost-amused smile.

"It's not not-alien," Sam said. "Isn't it always alien?"

"Except for when it's not," Natasha Romanoff added. "Just got the signal from Share. She is safely back to the States; had no problems."

Steve nodded. He wasn't at all excited about being thousands of miles from Sharon, especially since they hadn't left each other's sides in two years. But she'd gotten word that her father had fallen ill and Steve insisted she had to go. It had been a doozy of a fight, but Sharon Carter, in heavy disguise, had flown commercial back across the Atlantic and was there now.

"Incoming distress signal from Wanda," Sam said.

Steve closed his eyes and sighed. "Let's move."

…

New York. Avengers Compound. Twenty-four Hours Later…

"Sharon, you can stay with your family. I really think you should…" Steve said into the phone he held. There was momentary silence, but he knew what was coming.

The group of them: Steve, Natasha, Sam, Wanda, Vision, along with Bruce Banner and Rhodey were headed to Wakanda to help protect the Mind Stone and Vision. Steve knew that T'Challa and his brilliant science team could do something so Vision could be removed from the stone and vice versa. They could destroy the stone and keep Thanos from destroying the universe. Steve didn't want to tell Sharon any of that and he decided that he wouldn't.

"Steve, Tony went missing after a donut-shaped spaceship from who knows where shows up in New York and you're going to Wakanda and you think I'm just going to sit idly by?"

"I know you want to come with us, but you need to stay with your family. They need you," Steve said.

"I need you," Sharon said. "I know that is cheesy, but it is what it is."

Steve smiled, despite everything. "You, of all people do not need me. The number of people that…"

"Shut up, Captain," Sharon said and Steve could tell she was smiling as well. "What aren't you telling me?"

"I…I'll let you know when we get to Wakanda but our contact might be a little sparse after that. Do you trust me?"

"Of course I do," Sharon replied softly. "I love you."

"I love you, too," Steve said back. "And I will see you when we get all of this sorted out."

…

Avengers Compound. Eighteen Hours Later…

Sharon groggily awoke to people screaming. It wasn't the first time that it had happened, but she was never totally prepared for it. But staying at the Avengers compound, well, it was almost par for the course.

She was dragging herself out of bed when someone began pounding on the door.

"Oh, my god! Sharon! Sharon? Please tell me you're in there!" a voice shouted. It was Pepper Potts. The reason Sharon had come back to New York. Sharon's dad was on the mend and she took the first flight to New York to be with Pepper who had been distraught since Tony had told her she'd gone up in the ship.

Pepper was clearly sobbing while she continued to pound on the door and Sharon rushed to open it. She caught the redhead before she completely collapsed a moment later.

"What's wrong?"

"G-gone," she said between sobs.

Sharon was not prepared to see Pepper this way.

"What? Who's gone?" Sharon said as she helped Pepper to the bed to sit down. "Pepper, who is gone?"

"So…so many people," she whispered.

"What?"

"FRIDAY, tell Sharon," Pepper said quietly.

"Yes, ma'am. At approximately oh-eight hundred hours Eastern Standard Time, approximately fifty percent of the compound simply ceased to exist," FRIDAY said.

"What do you mean they ceased to exist?" Sharon said while looking at Pepper with a perplexed face.

"I have been running tests and there is not an explanation," FRIDAY said.

"I was talking with one of my staff and he just turned to dust. There are piles of dust all over the compound. And it's not just here. It's happened all over the world," Pepper continued. "This is why went up on that damned ship. What do we do now?" she asked Sharon.

A chill went through Sharon's entire body as the reality of the situation settled on her. People were disappearing all over the world and she had no idea who would have been spared and who was gone. She thought she was going to be sick for a moment as she peeked into the hallway and saw multiple piles where people had once stood.

"I, um, well, I don't know, Pepper. I need to think," Sharon said. In all of Aunt Peggy's stories and the SHIELD and CIA training, nothing prepared her to deal with this.

"Okay, uh, who came for Tony," Sharon said suddenly.

"What?" Pepper said.

"In the park the other day. Who was it?"

"Strange," Pepper said quietly as silent tears were running down her face.

"What is strange?"

"No, Dr. Steven Strange; he's the man who showed up and Doctor Banner was there and Tony went with them."

"All right," Sharon said as confidently as possible. "We'll see where Steven Strange lists his residence and start there. Do you think Happy…?"

But the question as answered quickly. "What the hell is going on? What happened do everyone?" Happy said as he came running to the open bedroom door. He breathed hard, from running and from sheer panic. "I was talking to a bunch of my guys and poof! They were gone. And I thought I'd seen it all…"

"We gotta go," Sharon said, pulling on a hoodie.

"Where are we going?" Happy asked.

"I'll tell you on the way," she replied. "Come on, Pepper. We have to go."

Sharon pocketed her cell phone, grabbed her wallet, and helped Pepper to her feet. "Okay, let's go."

…

Wakanda…

Steve Rogers, bruised and bloodied from the battled, looked out at the battleground below. He'd seen his friends disappear, one by one, into dust. They'd lost and Thanos had had destroyed half the population on the planet. He couldn't shake the look on Bucky's face as he disappeared and he felt just like he had so many years ago.

Somewhere inside him, he knew he needed to think about the big picture; that if it had happened to them in Wakanda, that people all over the world were suddenly gone as well, but he felt powerless now. No matter how hard they'd fought, they still hadn't been able to win.

"Steve?" he was mildly aware of someone saying his name. He'd closed eyes and must have drifted off to sleep. Steve opened his eyes and looked up at Natasha.

"What is it?"

"You should come see this," Natasha said. The woman turned on her heel and Steve held his sore side as he pushed himself eventually to his feet. He looked around at their remaining team as he passed by: Thor was with a talking raccoon, and Doctor Banner sat with Rhodey. All of them wearing the same defeated expression. Steve clasped Thor on the shoulder as he passed by but no words were exchanged.

Steve followed Nat into another room, while T'challa's sister, SHuri, frantically typed into the computer.

"Shuri will be taking over as ruler in Wakanda," Nat said quietly. Steve nodded.

"I don't think anyone is dead," Shuri said suddenly.

"So where are they?" Steve asked.

….

Author's note: y'all know what to do…