#event 3.3

[theblacksky]

@hellsguardiandevil

Something heavy presses, pushes insistently at the edges of her awareness that she dismisses as exhaustion. With far more downtime than either of them were used to keeping warm had been a full-time endeavor, though one she shamelessly welcomed.  However, genuine rest had still been sparse since arriving in this place.

First had been the shelter of the caves with their thoroughly haunted shadows. Now it was only the endless, biting cold of the tundra. One could likely debate as to which was worse, but Elektra’s preference is built on a simple premise. He’s moving again.

During the heroic theatrics of portals opening, the tunnel collapse, and an active volcano, she’d discovered a remedy to her only real concern in all this. With a little persistence she found Mantis- a healer capable of giving him relief from the fragile state he’d arrived in. The assistance was akin to a minor miracle, not that she believes in such a thing, but he does.

On another run for firewood they walked together along the edge of the encampment area. Sharing an arm as though she were an official accomplice in the ‘unassuming blind lawyer fallacy’, the assassin turned to him with a surreptitious expression. “You know, I think I was just getting used to having you all weak and vulnerable.”

[timestonegone]

Something had seemed off to Stephen -- though he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Whatever it was though, he was going to remain incredibly weary of it. Still, he felt changes coming on around and within him. Dark changes, things that crept up within his mind and things that just sort of... needled away at the far recesses of his mind.

Things that he never wanted to see the light of day.

His brother plagued him again, his mother, his father, even his dear sister were all there whispering to him and making him feel more isolated and insane than he’d ever felt before within this wretched place. Growling softly to himself, Stephen began to conjure the Winds of Watoomb and send the pushing spell out when he felt the presence of someone approaching him.

Turning slowly, he armed himself and decided to pull up a shield. “Whoever you are, beware that you are approaching a Master of the Mystic Arts and I will not hesitate to destroy you.” He couldn’t trust anyone, not even himself -- and that truly frightened him.

[devildog-punisher-blog]

@hellsguardiandevil

Frank Castle had been in some real shitholes before, but this place was working really hard at taking first place. It was starting to make the kind of stuff he saw when he went to sleep look like sweet dreams. At least he still had his gear with him, made dealing with the bone chilling cold a lot easier.

Course the fact they no longer had caves to shelter in meant he could find his own space. He'd never been much of a people person. In this place alone was when his ghosts found him. He remembered telling Karen that his wife brought on the pain, that was cranked up to 11 and playing all the time now.

He found ways to deal with it until the rage and hate started filling him up inside. It burned so hot he swore his skin should be blistering with it. After long enough he had a plan. He'd told Russo that the man would know pain. Now it was time to end it. Put that asshole down so hard he never got up again.

Someone dropped into his path when he was looking for the rock that that piece of shit was hiding under. "Should have known you'd put on your pajamas sooner or later, Red," he said. "Get out of my way. My problem isn't with you, but you aren't stopping me."

[thegalaxyoutlaw]

Peter had begun to hear voices again -- he tried to ignore them and knew that it was because of the Stone that they were entering his mind and plaguing him. But it wasn’t until the one that sounded an awful lot like Yondu came to life and then began to push him around that he realized this was more than just voices.

These shits were real.

Breathing heavily, Peter withdrew one of his guns and pointed it at the fake Yondu. “Listen, you’re not my dad -- he died saving my life, you’re just some impostor fake person trying to be him-!” He yelled, still aiming the gun at them.

Of course what his mind didn’t tell him was that this wasn’t Yondu, and in fact just someone else within the Stone that was currently being guised as his dead father figure to his own eyes. “So either make like a ghost and go away or watch me shoot you until my gun overheats!” He grit his teeth as he aimed the gun and began to start it up. “So what’s your choice, A-hole?”

[empathictouch]

There was a small rational side of Mantis that knew this was a trick. She knew this wasn’t real, and she knew she could snap out of it. But the tensions, the fear had been building for so long that all it took was a moment of touch and a sight of someone she never wanted to see again to tip the scales and send her over the edge. Mantis had left to be alone, she was panicking before this and she needed to calm down.

But Ego was everywhere.

He was always there, he made up the world and she felt him with every step she took. Every deed seeded egotistical and dark emotion that made up the man she felt her whole life, and in this world of lost souls she saw the roots he made, she saw the life he always bled into his world and her fear grew. It was overflowing inside her, she thought she heard him call to her, she thought she saw him in the distance, an ever-growing shadow. Her mind worked millions of thoughts through her head all of them more terrifying than the next and each got worse and worse. 

All it took to have that flowing out of her was a touch, someone touched her, they felt familiar or at least friendly and that was fine maybe the distraction could help her but when she turned...she saw him. She gave a terrible wail, as though she were wounded or hurt, she did not mean to. She knew the touch was of someone that would not harm her or had no intention to but see his form instead of the one she felt terrified her. 

But they had his form, his smile. One of false security that hid the cruelty of his being. “No, No, No,” She repeated hands going to her ears cause she feared them. The stranger wanted to take another step but she screamed for them to stop. “Please, I know not who you are now. You are not who you are to me and I cannot-I cannot have you close please-” Her breathes were ragged as if she was not receiving enough air. Her legs gave way underneath her, as she continued to chant ‘no’ once more.

[timestonegone]

@colonelwarmachine

Stephen knew James Rhodes as Tony’s best friend and under normal circumstances he would be delighted to meet the man and speak with him over a plethora of things; especially to get to know the Tony Stark before he knew him.

However, this was not normal circumstances and Stephen had grown weary and mistrustful of everyone, including himself, within the Soul Stone. Slowly, he turned to face the other man with what could only be described as a Cheshire smile. “Good to finally speak with you, Colonel Rhodes,” he nodded to him -- deciding to keep things formal and at a distance, not using Tony’s nickname for the man.

“Though I must admit, I had the opportunity to meet you years before, when you had your fall. But I declined to work on you because your case wasn’t something I was interested in nor was it even successful.“ Straight to the point and out with the formalities. If Rhodey wanted to speak with him, then he’d need to get used to cold callousness that Stephen sometimes and remarkably ruthlessly had.

“I assume you’ve approached me to talk about Tony, yes? What would you like to know or should I just go ahead and get down to the details of it all?“

[thegalaxyoutlaw]

@empathictouch

After the bouts with seeing Yondu and confusing himself when he actually thought Yondu was there, Peter ran as far from everyone as he could -- uncaring whether he actually ran into anybody else or not.

He inhaled sharply when he came across a familiar face and though he contemplating leveling his gun at her face, he hesitated first and plopped himself down on a rock as he glanced over. “Look, after the day I’ve had, I just really hope you’re real and not some stupid ghost thing again.”

Peter frowned and glanced away from Mantis, taking his gun and holding it lazily in his hand as he pointed towards the rock he was sitting on. “I already thought I saw Yondu earlier and if you morph into my mom I swear to God I’ll do something I’ll regret later.” He wasn’t going to mention Ego -- as he was a sore spot for the both of them, and if this really was Mantis then he wasn’t going to torture her too.

[thegalaxyoutlaw]

@itsnanotech​

“What the hell are you two doing?“ Peter asked as he climbed to the top of the volcano, carefully glancing over the edge and making sure to keep himself as far from it as possible before looking over towards Tony and Stephen. He’d watched them ascend the mountain and wondered what it was that was driving them to do something so dangerous and stupid -- which of course led him to do something dangerous and stupid.

“I hope you weren’t planning on doinkin’ or anything because if so, I’ll go ahead and leave now and--“ but he stopped dead in his sentence and train of thought as he finally really looked at the two of them with caution. All the warning signs began to flare up within him and Peter began to reach casually for his guns on his belt, but made it look as if he was just resting his hands on his hips. “Why’s Magic Fingers there working on something?” He raised a brow and nodded towards Stephen before sliding his gaze to Tony. “Huh? What’re you planning?”

He knew he didn’t have much of a right to ask for anything from Tony, but he hoped that the other was going to be kind enough to at least explain himself to him. Bells and alarms began to scream inside his mind -- something was off, something was wrong.“Tony?” He asked, his voice softening as he realized that whatever was plaguing him was likely plaguing Tony. “Come on...”