Inevitable (Bucky Barnes x OC) [Book 3]

8. The God of Thunder vs. The Doctor

"It's been twenty-three days since Thanos came to Earth," Rhodes said as Pepper wheeled Tony into the meeting room.

Natasha had pulled up the world's census board, images of people that we knew popping up, listed as snapped.

I wiped my eyes after seeing Bucky and Sam's pictures pop up, holding onto my belly under the table.

"World governments are in pieces," Natasha said. "The parts that are still working are trying to take a census and it looks like he did..."

"He did exactly what he said he was going to do," I said, hearing Natasha struggle to continue her sentence. "Thanos wiped out fifty percent of all living creatures."

We all looked around the room, staring at one another, but unable to make eye contact, disappointment and failure flooding the air.

"Where is he now?" Tony asked aloud.

"We don't know," Steve said, leaning on the back of a chair with his arms folded over his chest. "He just opened a portal and walked through."

Tony sighed, looking over at Thor who was sitting in a corner, isolating himself from everyone.

"What wrong with him?"

"Oh, he's pissed," Rocket the Racoon said to Tony. "He thinks he failed. Which, of course, he did, but there's a lot of that going around, ain't there?"

"Honestly, until this exact second I thought you were a Build-A-Bear," Tony said to Rocket.

"Maybe I am," he said with a monotone.

"We've been hunting Thanos for three weeks now," Steve said. "Deep space scans, satellites, and... we got nothing."

I looked up at Steve, and he gave me a short nod, and I sighed.

"Tony, you fought him," Steve said.

"Who told you that?" Tony asked him. "I didn't fight him, no. He wiped my face with a planet while the Bleecker Street Magician gave away the stone. That's what happened, there was no fight because he's not beatable."

"Tony..." I urged him to calm down, but it was too late for that.

"Did he give you any clues, any coordinates, anything?" Steve asked, and I shook my head.

Tony made a series of sarcastic noises, and we all shook our heads at him.

"You know, I saw this coming a few years back," Tony said. "I had a vision; I didn't want to believe it; I thought I was dreaming."

"Tony I'm going to need you to focus," Steve said, pushing up from the chair to make his way toward Tony.

"And I needed you," Tony said through his teeth. "As in past tense. That trumps what you need. It's too late, buddy. Sorry."

Tony got up from his wheelchair, and we all hastily tried to get him to sit back down.

"You know what I need? I need a shave."

Tony got up into Steve's face, but Steve just let him take out all of his pent-up anger at him. 

"And I believe I remember telling you something," Tony said to Steve, trying to rip out his IV.

"Tony, stop," I said, trying to get him to calm down again, but he pushed me out of the way as he ripped out the IV.

"Alive or otherwise, was that what we needed was a suit of armor around the world, remember that?" Tony continued. "Whether it impacted our precious freedoms or not, that's what we needed."