Looking at the portal floating in front of her, America Chavez couldn't hide her confusion. Opening portals was supposed to be her power. Yet for her, it had never been easy.
Most of the time the portals appeared when she was scared, stressed, or in danger. No matter how hard she tried, controlling them consistently had always been difficult.
Yet Luke had casually opened one with a snap of his fingers.
"Umm... how can you do that so easily?"
"Control over your mind." Luke stepped toward the portal. "At the end of the day, it's your ability. You should be the one controlling it, not the other way around."
Before America could ask anything else, he gently pushed her toward the portal.
"Questions later."
America stumbled forward and disappeared through it. Luke entered after her, motioning for Tony to follow. A few moments later all three emerged on the other side.
America looked around. They were standing near a peaceful house surrounded by trees. Everything looked normal, which somehow made her more nervous.
"So this is the universe the witch is in?"
"Yes." Luke looked at the house. "And also the place where many things happened."
This timeline was familiar to him — the universe where Tony Stark had sacrificed himself after Endgame, where Wanda Maximoff had eventually become the Scarlet Witch. America didn't know any of that. What she was focused on was something else.
"But didn't you say my powers were unique?" She pointed at the portal behind them. "How can you do the same thing?"
"I said unique. I didn't say there was only one existence capable of doing it." Luke continued walking. "My powers allow me to do things you can't even imagine."
America narrowed her eyes. That sounded suspiciously vague, and to her, it sounded like blatant bragging. Luke ignored the look completely.
Tony was looking around the area. The place felt strangely familiar — not because he had been here before, but because it looked like something he would have wanted.
A quiet home, away from the chaos, away from politics, away from endless battles. A place where he could simply live with Pepper and raise a family.
"So where are we exactly?"
Luke pointed toward the house. "You can go knock on the door and find out."
Tony gave him a suspicious look. That answer alone guaranteed he wasn't going to like whatever was waiting behind it. Luke folded his arms and said nothing.
After several seconds Tony sighed and walked toward the house. America followed while Luke stayed behind.
Tony reached the front door and knocked. A few moments later it opened. Standing there was a little girl, no older than five. The moment she saw Tony, her eyes widened, then her face lit up.
"Dad!"
Before he could react, the little girl threw her arms around his leg. Tony froze, staring at her. The child looked completely happy. Completely certain. As if there was no possibility he could be anyone else.
"Dad!"
Tony slowly looked down at her, then back toward Luke, his expression clearly demanding an explanation.
Before Luke could answer, another voice came from inside. "Morgan, who is at the door?"
Pepper walked into view. The moment she saw Tony, she froze. The color drained from her face. For several seconds neither of them spoke.
Finally Pepper said, "What is happening?"
Luke stepped forward. "Let me explain. This is going to take a while."
***
About ten minutes later, everyone sat in the living room. Morgan refused to leave Tony's side, glancing at him every few moments as if afraid he might disappear again.
Pepper sat across from them, still looking somewhat stunned even after Luke's explanation. Finding out that a version of her husband was sitting in her living room after watching him die a year ago wasn't easy to process.
America remained quiet, mostly listening.
Luke leaned back. "To keep things simple, we're not from this universe. You can think of us as variants of the people from your reality."
Tony looked identical. Sounded identical. Carried himself the same way. The only difference was that he wasn't her Tony.
"So that's what this is, huh?" Pepper's voice was softer than before.
For a brief moment, when she'd first opened the door, she had thought the impossible had happened — that Tony had somehow come back. Now she knew that wasn't the case.
"Yes," Luke replied.
Pepper lowered her eyes slightly. There was disappointment there, hidden well. Tony noticed anyway.
"Ummm, Luke." He finally broke the silence. "What exactly happened to me in this universe?" He looked around the room. Nothing about this made sense from his perspective.
"In this universe, you died a year ago."
The room went quiet. "I died?"
"Yes. To save the Earth and the universe."
Tony didn't say anything immediately. Morgan hugged his arm a little tighter. Pepper looked away — even though Luke was talking about another Tony, hearing it spoken out loud still hurt.
"What happened?"
Luke thought for a moment. "In this timeline, Thanos succeeded in collecting the Infinity Stones."
Tony understood where this was going. "The final battle happened."
"Yes. During it, the Tony of this universe took the Stones from Thanos."
"And then?"
"He snapped his fingers."
Tony already knew the consequence. A normal human body wasn't meant to channel that kind of power — the energy released by all six Stones at once was catastrophic.
"He erased Thanos and his army. Earth survived. The universe survived. But the damage killed him."
The room fell silent. Pepper looked toward Morgan. Morgan looked down at her hands.
"In this universe there isn't another version of me," Luke continued. "There is only one me across all universes. So when that battle happened, nobody else could step in."
Tony slowly nodded. For once there wasn't a joke, no sarcastic comment. Just understanding. Looking at Pepper and Morgan, he could already see what happened afterward. The world survived. His family survived. The cost had simply been himself.
*****
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