Tony Stark felt his mind expanding. If it was a wave, it could be detected, and therefore, it could be shielded.
Meanwhile, the scene hadn't ended yet. Captain Rogers was returning home in a Quinjet—a true homecoming, to the Avengers' base.
There, a projection of General Ross, now Secretary of State, asked, "Still no contact with Vision?"
"Satellites show his last known location was Edinburgh!" War Machine Rhodes, Colonel James Rhodes, who remained at the base, replied.
"On a stolen Quinjet!" Ross said, reviewing data. "And with four of the world's most wanted criminals!"
Hearing this, War Machine Rhodes let out a cold laugh, his expression darkening. "They're on the most wanted list because of you, sir!"
"Good heavens, Rhodes, since when did you learn to talk back?" Secretary of State Ross said coldly.
"If it weren't for the Sokovia Accords, Vision wouldn't have left!" War Machine Rhodes said resentfully.
"I recall you signed the agreement as well, Colonel!" War Machine Rhodes reminded him.
"That's right!" War Machine Rhodes stepped up to Rose's projection. "And I paid the price."
Though War Machine Rhodes appeared normal on the surface, his lower body was paralyzed. Only through advanced technology developed by Tony Stark could he walk and run like a regular person.
But regardless, this was merely a facade. In truth, he was now a cripple.
"Any further objections?" General Ross asked.
"None!" War Machine Rhodes replied.
At this point, everyone's faces turned grim. After the Avengers' split, both Captain Rogers' faction (now fugitives) and Tony Stark's faction (which appeared to have won, at least on the surface) were viewed by the authorities as equally problematic.
The fact that Vision was still being tracked by satellite... what did that imply?
It meant they were all being treated as criminals or potential criminals.
This only made everyone feel worse.
While it was highly probable that Captain Rogers would become a wanted criminal—given the entire cause and development of Civil War, which everyone was well aware of—to the uninformed United Nations, these people were simply criminals.
But for Tony Stark and his allies to resort to such tactics? That was truly sinister.
No wonder Captain Rogers had shed the uniform that symbolized the American spirit.
A moment later, the base gates swung open, and Captain Rogers and the others walked in.
Though they were now wanted criminals, this place remained their home, unchanged after all these years.
At that moment, Captain Rogers received a call from Bruce Banner, informing him that Tony Stark and Spider-Man Peter Parker had already pursued the alien spacecraft.
The entire Avengers needed someone to hold the fort, so he had returned.
Without hesitation!
With a great enemy at their doorstep, dwelling on petty grievances seemed small-minded.
When humanity itself was on the brink of annihilation, such personal squabbles truly amounted to nothing.
"Mr. Secretary of State!" Captain Rogers addressed General Ross.
"You're truly audacious! I'm truly impressed by you!" General Ross's anger flared as he saw Captain Rogers and the others.
Even though they were separated by a screen, he still despised these rebels.
For a former general, nothing was more detestable than deserters.
In his eyes, these were all traitors, all cowards.
"How about I lend you some courage?" Black Widow Natasha retorted sharply.
She found it absurd that this general, who had caused so much trouble in the past, could still rise to become Secretary of State.
"The world is in turmoil, and you think it's time for a general amnesty?" Ross's projection moved closer to Captain Rogers, staring at them.
One had to admit that future technology had reached truly astonishing levels.
"I'm not here to confess, and I no longer need to obey your orders!" Captain America declared. Having left S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers behind, he now answered only to his own sense of justice. "Earth is vulnerable. We're here to fight. If you stand in our way, don't blame us for being impolite!"
"Arrest them!" Secretary of State Ross turned and immediately ordered War Machine Rhodes.
"No problem!" Rhodes cut the projection off without giving General Ross any courtesy. "This is court-martial material. It's good to see you, Captain!"
Though Civil War had left him paralyzed, Rhodes clearly held no resentment toward Captain America and the others.
After a brief exchange of pleasantries, Bruce Banner began to explain the terrifying threat of Thanos.
Everyone fell silent. Faced with such a threat, the only solution seemed to be destroying the Mind Stone.
"Forget that for now. Listen, Thanos is assembling the most powerful army in the universe. He won't stop until he gets the Mind Stone from Vision!" Banner tried to make them understand the full scope of Thanos's power and the scale of the threat.
"Then we need to protect him!" Black Widow Natasha reacted immediately.
"No, we need to destroy him!"
Vision disagreed with this idea. He leaned against the window, gazing out at something unknown, and then said, "I've been studying the properties and composition of this gem in my head. If it resonates with a sufficiently powerful energy source and its own properties, its molecular structure might be destroyed."
"Yes, but you'll die! Don't even think about it!" Wanda immediately rejected the proposal, knowing it would mean losing her lover.
"This is the only way to prevent the Mind Stone from falling into Thanos's hands. There's no other option besides destroying it!" Vision remained unmoved, his resolve as firm as ever, for the sacrifice would be his own.
"I can't accept that price!" Wanda looked at Vision, voicing her feelings.
Vision gazed at her with a sorrowful expression and said, "Only you have the power to do this!"
But Wanda refused to engage, turning and walking away.
"Thanos threatens half the life in the universe. Sacrificing one life is a small price to pay to defeat him!" Vision stated, presenting the only viable solution.
"One life is precious. We don't trade lives!" Captain Rogers retorted, his values unable to accept such a proposition.
"Captain, didn't you sacrifice yourself seventy years ago to save millions of lives? Tell me, what's the difference?" Vision countered, using Rogers' own words against him.
The group was impressed by Vision's argument. Their lingering disgust towards him as an artificial intelligence—especially after witnessing his actions in the altered timeline where he fed people to a zombie Wanda—began to fade.
Vision might not be perfect, but perhaps he wouldn't have gone mad if Wanda hadn't been involved.
Ultimately, Bruce Banner proposed a completely new solution.
"Your consciousness is a complex superposition of many structures—including Jarvis, Ultron, Tony, me, and the Mind Stone—all mixed together and interacting!"
"You mean Vision isn't just that one gem?" Wanda, standing nearby, suddenly her eyes lit up as she seemed to grasp the meaning of the explanation.
This also suggested they might be able to achieve their goal without sacrificing Vision.
"I mean, if we remove the Infinity Stone, Vision will still be himself—and might even become better!" Bruce Banner tried to explain the concept.
Soon, they found a place to perform this procedure: Wakanda, the nation inexplicably possessing advanced technology.
Tony Stark, watching from off-screen, fell into deep thought. Perhaps things were exactly as he'd suspected: Vision's creation had been, in a way, an accident.
It was a complex fusion of Jarvis, his and Bruce Banner's ideas, and the Mind Stone itself. Because of this, he wouldn't easily try to replicate Vision, fearing they might create some kind of monster instead.
*Though Captain America's last-minute save in *Avengers: Infinity War* was impressive, Thor's arrival from the heavens with Stormbreaker was the true showstopper. It's a bit of a stretch to say Star-Lord punched his way into *Avengers: Endgame*, but saying Thor split the path to *Endgame* with a single axe strike? That fits perfectly. The tragedy is, Thor always arrives a step too late, forever chasing the moment!*
Just as the crowd was eager to continue reading, they noticed that Lin Feng seemed to have lost interest in recording the diary, and everything came to a halt.
The crowd was furious. They desperately wanted to know how Thor, the God of Thunder, had supposedly split the path to *Endgame* with that single axe strike.
"No! I have to make him tell me!"
Thor, the God of Thunder, suddenly sprang to his feet.
He refused to accept this failed ending, refused to accept the death of his brother at Thanos's hands.
Even if the Sacred Timeline held the only path to victory, and this was the method to reach it, he would never accept it.
He had to know what went wrong, how that axe strike had gone astray.
(End of Chapter)