Now or Never

Chapter 9 ~ Get lost, Squidward

I gaze down to the floor at the mention of Dad's name knowing Tony probably still hasn't forgiven Dad for what he did.

Strange sighs in exasperation, knowing this too. "Oh, great." He mutters.

"Maybe. But..." Tony sighs.

"Call him," Bruce says, completely confused about the situation.

"It's not that easy. God, we haven't caught up in a spell, have we?" Tony turns to Bruce.

"No." Bruce answers.

"The Avengers broke up. We're toast."

Bruce is surprised by this new information. "Broke up? Like a band? Like, like The Beatles?"

"Cap and I fell out hard. We're not on speaking terms." Tony says.

Bruce turns to me. "What about you? How come you're not with him?" Bruce says.

"He uh... he wanted me to stay back and to live my life without him holding me back. Thought that a life on the run wasn't for me and I deserved better. So I got cuffed." I explain to Bruce as I try not to get all weepy and show Bruce the cuff.

"Tony, listen to me. Thor's gone. Thanos is coming. It doesn't matter who you're talking to or not." Bruce says, pleadingly to him.

Tony looks at Roy and me.

"He's right. There are way bigger things than your pride right now so stop being petty and call him." Roy says.

Tony hesitates before pulling out the flip phone Dad mailed to us, more like Tony, two years ago. "Flip phone," Tony mutters as he gets Dad's contact up. He hesitates to press the call button and hands the phone to me. "He'll probably be more willing to answer to you." I take the phone and am about to press the call button when we hear rumbling noises. My hair starts to move and I see Strange's start doing the same. "Say, Doc, you wouldn't happen to be moving her hair and yours, would ya?"

Strange looks up at his hair. "Not at the moment, no."
We all look to the hole in the ceiling and see debris flying by outside. Tony steps outside first with Roy and I following quickly behind. Roy grabs his katanas he placed on the floor earlier. We see the chaos as soon as we step outside, people running and screaming in fear. A woman falls by Tony and he helps her up.

"You okay?" He asks her, but she only screams as a car crashes into a pole near them. "Help him! Wong!" Tony says, referring to the person that crashed into the pole.

"Go, go! We got it!" Banner tells him.

Tony then puts on some glasses and starts talking to FRIDAY. "Hey! You might wanna put that Time Stone in your back pocket, Doc!" Tony shouts back to him.

"Yeah, Sherlock. Shouldn't you be running away from the fight to protect that thing or at least leave it at the Sanctum somewhere?" I ask him as we follow Tony.

"Might wanna use it." He says as he prepares a spell to fight.

There's a loud humming sound as we turn a corner to see a giant circular spaceship, that looks like a flying donut, come floating down the street.

"Tony this is gonna get ugly real quick. You might wanna take this thing off of me. I need to help you fight." I tell him.

"You sure? You haven't used your powers in two years." He says to me.

"Take the cuff off and we'll see," Roy says to him.

Tony looks at me and I nod. "It's now or never."

He nods, coming over and bending down to my ankle, where the cuff is. "You know if you get killed Spangles won't be happy about that." He says to me as he opens up the hatch on the cuff and types in the passcode, unlocking the cuff.