Soli Deo gloria

DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own the Avengers. Or The Wizard of Oz. Or Mad Max.

I saw the movie on Saturday, so I'm on . . . day seven of mourning Tony Stark. Yeah . . .

Message #1, 01:49 AM, April 28th, 2018

Tony wished that he felt completely numb. His overwhelmed mind, his inanimate limbs, the searing stab wound in his abdomen. If it could all go numb and just stop searing every nerve end and corner of his brain with pain, you know, that would just be great.

"We must get off this planet," Nebula's low voice, usually unmarred by any inflection, was tainted by bitterness of emotion. The loss laid even her low. The cyborg, the daughter turned more machine than flesh, watched her father destroy half the entire world. Not just this world, but all worlds. In the wake of her sister's cruel murder, no less.

Tony couldn't speak. If he closed his eyes, he couldn't see the sprinkle of dust (Peter) scatter in the hot breeze of this post-apocalyptic planet. What did it matter, if they got off this planet or not? If they left or not? Got back to Earth or not? Did it matter if the stab wound currently screaming at him claimed his life? Who would want to live in this world after this? How could anyone—?

Who knew what Earth was like right now. If anyone he loved lived. He could go to all the effort of dragging his half-dead ass back to his home planet to find out that Pepper Potts was dead. That his fianceé was dead. If he said, "Rhodey?" and was met with someone's pleading eyes that told him everything, he didn't want back. Nope, he couldn't.

Then, he felt selfish. Look at him, bitching about not wanting to live while everyone around him, save this alien girl, disappeared right in front of them—and there was nothing he could do to stop it. He was so used to winning, so used to fighting in this suit and saving the world, that seeing his worse nightmare play out in real life made him want to never open his eyes again.

But that was selfish.

"You can sit here and mourn all you want. But I won't stay here." Nebula commanded her limbs to move. Maybe this Terran didn't want to live, but she did. She always fought to live. So did Gamora. Nebula staggered. She viewed this broken Terran with his closed eyes and wrinkled forehead with an ill combination of sympathy (an emotion she was new to) and annoyed determination in her eyes. "Despite what we've seen, we need to move on. I am all that you have left." She swallowed, refused to acknowledge her voice cracking a little. "Circumstances demand we become allies."

They'd been allies, briefly. An enemy of Thanos was a friend in battle. But the battle was over—over too quick, before it really began. It happened too rapidly, at such a heavy cost. For a plan of so many years, it culminated too quickly.

Tony didn't want to go home and see how many friends of his were dead. Banner, Romanoff, Rogers. . . It was bad enough knowing that he dragged Peter Parker on this one-way ticket trip. Happy, May Parker. . . It was almost better not knowing.

Nebula approached him like he was a wounded animal, her pure black eyes analyzing him, anticipating a strike attack. But no. Underneath his crumbled armor was a wound that would've killed any other man not used to the fight—and the face of a man who had to take it all, and then some.

Tony met her eyes and inhaled. She was right. All they had was each other. And until they fought with their last breath to get back to Earth, that was it.

"All right, Tin Man. Let's go home to Kansas," Tony said, offering a hand.

Nebula's eyes squinted in confusion as she pulled him up. He quickly realized this was a terrible mistake as he almost fell over, his head ringing. Nebula supported his weight as he said, "Nope, that was a terrible idea."

"You've lost a great deal of blood," Nebula said.

"Yeah; strange, I noticed that, too," Tony murmured.

Yeah, numbness was a great wish. Also, impossible. It was a wish, anyway. Wishes were supposed to be impossible.

Why didn't he pass out? Why did he have to feel every wrack of pain every time he breathed as Nebula practically dragged him back into the Guardians' ship? He didn't ask why they were taking their ship instead of hers. All he could see were those pains-in-the-ass dissolving into thin air, one by one.

"Did you know them?" Tony murmured from the seat Nebula dumped him in.

Maybe she couldn't hear him as she rummaged through the ship, turning on flickering lights and examining power screens as she pressed buttons on the main dashboard. Maybe she was ignoring him, more focused on flying to Earth to gather an army of the rest of Tony's friends to take on Thanos. Maybe she knew where the hell Thanos even was and they were going after him right now. Yeah, sure, right now was fine. Tony was just digesting the news he'd been haunted by for years that was just now happening; forget about the wound that he should've succumbed to by now. Nope, let's go after the bastard and take him on, just two against one!

Or maybe his murmur got caught in his throat and he hadn't made a single sound at all.

"They were my sisters' compatriots. I think they were more her family than I was, or so she thought," Nebula said, her voice cool and seemingly detached. She had a half-dead Terran on her hands; she had a mission. She needed his allies, since she had no other allies in the world. Go to his Earth, collect his allies, and go after Father. That was the plan. She pushed all thoughts of her sister having a family outside of her and focused on the task at hand. It'd be easier to rally allies around her if their ally, her responsibility, didn't die of his stab wound. Or of his broken heart. Either seemed a possible probability.

If he wanted to get all sentimental and give in to grief, fine. She was used to being the strong one. If she gritted her teeth and didn't think of her only sister being flung to death as a means to an end, used in a trade for one of those accursed Infinity Stones . . . If she had known that her father would succeed at the cost of her sister's life, would she have helped him? Probably, at the beginning. But definitely not now.

Not now; she had to get this piece of junk into functioning order, fly them to the nearest jump point, navigate to Earth, and hope that the Terran didn't die by the time she landed this bucket of bolts.

It was hopeless; after an hour of digging through the ship's functions and listening to the labored breathing of the dying Terran, his worn face and his blood-soaked shirt in her peripheral vision, Nebula felt like screaming through her gritted teeth. The explosions and blasts of battle left a broken shell of a ship in its wake. Its battery lights flickered like false hope; the choking light of the dying sun around this world faded away into plunging night.

"There's no chance of getting this ship flying in this darkness," Nebula said, finally sitting her heavy limbs in the seat next to Tony. "We cannot waste the ship's dying batteries to light the way. We'll have to wait until sunrise." Her black eyes searched out the driver's window for a star. She couldn't spy a single one. Of all the stars she'd known her whole life, not one of them showed up today.

Her eyes fell on Tony and she flew from her seat. The Terran laid against the chair with his blood adding more red to the sparking mask he held in his lap. "Wake up. Wake up!" Nebula demanded, smacking him. Her heart pumped painfully; no reaction. All slumped limbs; was it exhaustion or defeat that gave in to release? "Terran, wake up!"

She shook him and finally, desperate, sparked his wound with her metal hand. He released a primal groan from deep within his gut. His eyes popped open. Nebula refused to feel sorry as he cursed. "The hell was that, Furiosa?!"

"The name is Nebula," she seethed, "and the next time you fall unconscious will be the last time!"

"Yeah, well, the name's Tony Stark, not Terran—so let's get that straight—and is that a threat? 'Cause I thought we needed each other?!" Tony barked.

They stared at each other, Nebula with suppressed anger and relief that he woke up, Tony with exhaustion and adrenaline fighting for dominance within him.

"We do," Nebula said.

"Okay. Good. Let's start acting like it," Tony said.

"I need to fly this ship to Earth. It needs repairs but we won't get adequate light until morning," Nebula said.

"So we wait until morning. Fair enough." Tony closed his eyes and Nebula slapped him. Again. "Okay, what is wrong with you?"

"I won't let you fall unconscious while you have an open wound." Nebula stared past Tony as she pressed the correct buttons on her head to cast a light in the few inches in front of her eyes. Tony showed no betrayal of surprise. He was the one with constant new additions to his suits. Hers were just installed in herself, instead of a suit. She cast the light on his wound as she examined it with the cold, calculating eyes of a soldier who'd seen many wounds. "You can heal, but I must act quickly." She eventually located the medical kit while Tony fought to keep his eyes open. Further analysis caused Nebula to meet his eyes and say, "Do your hand blasters still work?"

Tony examined his palm. The blue energy glowed. "Yeah, why?"

"I think you know why," Nebula said in a low voice.

Yeah, he did. Nebula took an educated guess on what were the painkillers in the kit, but he still stifled a tortured scream as he turned his blaster on his own body. Maybe he thought the pain of the day couldn't get any worse. Maybe the smell of the red heat baking the desert wasteland, the battlefield his friends and quick-allies died upon, wasn't the worst smell he'd ever inhaled. Turns out that your own scorched flesh could be even worse.

"It's cauterized," Nebula said, once the deed was done and his ribs covered in white gauze.

"Now can I pass out?" he demanded through gritted teeth, like he wouldn't dare pass out under the pain without her knowing that he could stay awake through the whole procedure.

"Be my guest," Nebula said.

Tony woke up a couple of hours later, the pain too there, demanding to be felt, to let him stay blissfully unconscious for long. He pushed away all the sudden memories, remembering how his life had been just twenty-four hours ago versus now. His sleep was dull but deep. He didn't have a single nightmare. Which was weird. The first break of restless sleep he got in five years.

Nebula slept in what looked like an uncomfortable position, curled away from him. If he tilted his head to look, he would've seen trails of tears down her cheeks.

He switched on his Iron Man helmet. Bruised, grey, sparking. Maybe he could fix it later. Pretend that he had anything left of what he used to have.

His fingers absentmindedly switched the recording device on. Huh. It still worked. His voice was soft. "Hey, Pep. It's me. It's . . . it's me. I'm stuck on some alien planet named Titan, previously undiscovered by anyone from Earth. I . . . you can probably tell—we lost. My worst nightmare come true. Literally. You, of all people, know that. Um, no, that's the second worst nightmare. My first is losing you and—" He looked away from the eyes of his mask, looked off into space. He blinked away tears and fought against giving in as he said, "I really hope that stays just that. Just a nightmare. I'm . . . I want to go positive on this. Sometimes I'm too positive but oftentimes I'm not it enough. Not that I'm not taking this all very seriously. I-I couldn't take it any more so . . . but . . . I am choosing to believe that you're still out there. That you're waiting for me. That you will receive this message someday. Whether or not you ever see me alive again is another thing but . . . maybe this mask will survive long after I do. So maybe you will hear this message one day. I hope you do. I love you, Pepper Potts. It's the end of the world right now, and I love you, so much." He stopped the voice recording to conserve its battery—who knew how long they'd be out here?

He set the mask down in his lap. He held it tightly to him, like a child with a security blanket or something. He felt the dull burning pain in his side as his eyes looked out into the blackness.

Tony wasn't religious. Never had. Never wanted to be. But right now, he said, "Hey God, if you're out there, do me a favor. Just, one thing. Protect Pepper Potts. I don't care if I make it back or not, just—make sure she's okay." 'Cause right now, she couldn't possibly be.

The pain claimed him back into its dark world. No longer would he enjoy the soft gift of mindless slumber. The physical pain mixed with the untouched grief; its depth mixed with the fire in his gut, and Tony endured the senseless, endless suffering until he saw the rise of another world's sun.

ANGST.

'Cause everything is ANGST right now. Just is. Couldn't not be.

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