Hidden | Bucky Barnes

thirty six

•••

It had been a couple of days, and the machine that could put them through time, had been completed. The morning after Steve had got drunk, he had apologised to Ellie profusely, over and over again, even though she had forgiven him the first time he said it.

Today the Avengers were going to be testing the machine, and Clint had volunteered to be the subject, sadly claiming that he had nothing left to live for anyways. The rest of the group were stood around the much larger quantum tunnel, whilst Bruce and Tony made their final checks of the machine.

Bruce turned to the man stood in the middle of the glass floor, "Alright, Clint. We're going in 3... 2... 1!"

A helmet similar to Ant-Man's, but white and more visible face slid down onto Clint's head, and he nodded, signalising that he was ready to go. Natasha nervously grabbed onto Ellie's hand, and she placed her other onto Nat's arm in a comforting manner. The team watched in awe as Clint disappeared through the tunnel and then rematerialised on the glass platform a couple of moments later, breathing heavily before collapsing to his knees.

Natasha quickly ran up the ramp with the team following behind her. She held onto one of Clint's arm to steady him and she placed a hand on his cheek as she pulled him up, "Hey, hey. Look at me. You okay?"

Clint held up the baseball glove and threw it to Stark, "Yeah, it worked. It worked."

- - -

The Avengers sat in a room with some hologram displays, showcasing each of the six Infinity Stones, sitting around a table. Tony, Steve and Bruce were pacing at the front, clearly leading the planning of the mission to find all 6 of the stones.

"Okay, so the "how" works." Steve nodded before continuing, "Now we gotta figure out the when and the where. Almost all of us has had an encounter with at least one of the six Infinity Stones."

"Well I'd substitute the word encounter, for damn well near been killed by one of the six Infinity Stones." Tony interrupted sarcastically, making Ellie laugh slightly.

"I haven't, I don't even know what the hell you're all talking about." Scott raised his hand awkwardly.

"Regardless." Bruce waved him off dismissively, "We only have enough Pym Particles for one round trip each, and these stones have been in a lot of different places throughout history."

"Our history. So, not a lot of convenient spots to just drop in." Tony commented.

"Which means we have to pick our targets." Ellie concluded, twirling her pen in her hand.

"Correct." The Iron Man pointed at the Elementist with a smirk.

"Let's start with the Aether. Thor, what do you know?"

Ellie turned to look at Thor who was slumped in a nearby chair with his sunglasses on.

"Is he asleep?" She asked, tilting her head to the side.