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Wanda stared in desperate disbelief at Vision’s corpse. Her mind did not register the continuing sounds of battle around her as Steve went toe to toe with the Mad Titan. She did not blink when her erstwhile leader was swatted aside like a nuisance. She did not comprehend as Thor descended from above like the Gods of old and buried Stormbreaker in Thanos’ chest. She no longer cared as the monster taunted her teammate.
“You should have aimed for my head.” Thanos brought his massive digits together and smirked as he snapped his fingers. He stared in disbelief at the Infinity Gauntlet and the life still in abundance around him. “I… I don’t understand…”
“Blimey, that was close…”
The incongruous words pierced the fog in Wanda’s mind and she turned as they all did towards the sound of the voice. Shimmering into existence, an otherwise unknown duo stood before them, the speaker’s hand extended with a darkly glowing ring on his hand. “Who?”
The woman, her hair a riot of curls and attitude, turned towards her companion, “I told you we didn’t have time to stop for tea with Luna.”
He rubbed the back of his head, “Yeah, well… It was tea time. It’s only polite. Besides, I’m pretty sure I could have done this from anywhere, Hermione.”
The newly identified Hermione rolled her eyes, “Right, and he might have gotten away. Speaking of…” She turned to the massive purple figure staring in confusion at them. Whipping her wand straight at him, she incanted, “PETRIFICUS TOTALUS!” And the Avengers and other assorted people fighting for the Earth stared as the titan’s arms snapped to his sides and he fell onto his face.
“Wait, what?” Bruce blurted as he staggered into view. “Wait, so the guy… the big guy who kicked the galaxy’s ass gets a stick and bad Latin pointed at him and he just… falls down?”
Hermione rolled her eyes, “Hardly. It would be more of a challenge if he could use the stones. Speaking of…” She picked her way carefully across the field.
Dragging himself to his feet, Steve began to walk towards her, “Excuse me, miss. But what do you think you are doing?”
She stared crossly at another interruption, “Harry is negating them. I am going to fix them and take them away. Now stop stopping me.”
Thor stared at the woman briefly before turning to Harry, “I was unaware that the Infinity Stones could be countered.”
Harry chuckled, “Well, once Hermione is done you can ask all the questions you want. She LOVES answering questions.”
“Prat.”
“You love me.”
She sighed, “Sadly, yes I do.” She began waving her wand over the gauntlet, unseating the gems in the process. She then started muttering an eerie incantation as they began orbiting faster around each other, until with a final syllable and a thrust of her wand they fused into an octahedral white stone. She quickly snatched it from the air and placed it in her handbag. “There we are. Now. You had questions?”
Thor nodded respectfully, “Indeed, my lady. I was inquiring with your companion as to how you could counteract the infinity stones. I am sure my companions here would like to know as well.”
She looked down at Thanos, who struggled against his binds. “Certainly.” She pointed her wand at his head, “STUPEFY.” She pocketed her wand and sat on a stump beside Harry, no longer extending his arm. Nestling into his side, she began, “Well, what you and apparently a lot of people call ‘Infinity Stones’ are not quite what you think they are. From what we gather, most people think they are the core of singularities, which…. not entirely wrong, but not right either. To us, they are the Shards of Creation, the fragments of the Life Stone. When the universe began, there were two entities, Life and Death. They each had a… core… if you will. A primordial manifestation of reality. Life, in the interests of spreading creation, shattered their stone causing the forces of creation: Power, Time, Reality, Mind, Space, and the Soul to ripple throughout the universe. Broadly speaking, creation is an impersonal process. It happens all the time. Death, on the other hand, kept their stone whole as the End is something that we all must face and we must face it alone. My ridiculous husband here, through a long and tedious process that unfortunately was our childhoods, became what was known in our culture as the ‘Master of Death’ as Death was growing tired and wanted to tap a successor. Harry collected the artifacts of Death, including the Death Stone.”
The group stared in shock, and Thor nodded. “It seems that a valiant successor was indeed found. You have our thanks for averting this catastrophe. If I may, what will become of the Life Stone.”
Hermione smiled warmly at Harry, then looked back to the Asgardian, “Upon becoming Death, Life gave Harry a dire warning. The Shards would be discovered and collected. If their purpose was perverted by a dark will, then creation would spiral into entropy and be unmade. And so, we had to wait until the right moment and reforge the Life Stone. Then, well…” She pulled the stone from her bag and socketed it into her pendant. The assembled people watched the light manifest around her as a white cloak draped around her body. “I get a new job.”
The pair stand, a black cloak manifesting around Harry. “We’ll be around. You may not see us, but we’ll be there, and at the end, I will greet you as an old friend and take you to your next great adventure.”
They turned to leave as a choked cry halted them in their tracks, “Wait!”
Turning they look at the tear streaked face of Wanda Maximoff, “Please… Can you restore him? I am not asking you to resurrect all of the dead, but please… just one.” She stroked Vision’s face, “Just him.”
Harry shrugged at Hermione, “He’s not one of mine.”
Hermione walked to the fallen android and placed her hand on his ruined face. Wanda watched in awe as the ravages of battle were reversed and Vision gasped the air once more. “How?”
Steve smiled at the joyful couple, “Just a good friend passing by.”
Harry stared at Vision with an intensity that froze the blood of the assembled heroes, “Fascinating. Take great care in the future, Vision. Should you fall again, I will be there.” He smiled gently, “Congratulations on your soul. You are truly alive.” He pursed his lips, “Hmm..”
Hermione glared at him, “I know that face. I don’t like that face. It usually means you want to go haring off on some foolish crusade.”
He scratched his head, “Yeah well, this wanker caused a lot of damage with the shards. I feel like we have a duty to fix it.” He stroked his ring, “The voices cry out for justice, and they were taken before their time. Also… You’ve got a little something stuck in there…” He made a claw gesture with his hand and the Life Stone flared briefly, ejecting an energy mass that coalesced into a humanoid figure on the ground below.
“GAMORA?!” “I AM GROOT?!”
Harry turned and stopped in shock at the odd duo of tree and raccoon. “Nope. Not gonna touch that one. Let’s go, love. Things to do… People to save.”
Hooking his arm around her, the pair spun on their heels and vanished.