MARVEL's Avengers: Infinity War: Thanos

by Barry Lyga

  A moron’s fable.

  A bedtime story to recite to credulous children, who could believe such things existed in the cosmos.

  But…

  “Six Stones,” he said slowly, as though contemplating the seriousness of it. “One each to control different aspects of the universe.”

  “Oh yes!” the Lorespeaker said excitedly. He gesticulated wildly with sudden passion. “The Space Stone, for example, is blue. That’s the one I believe Odin has had in his possession, though I have been told an interesting tale of how he came to send it to a place called Earth. A sort of cosmic backwater, really. Nothing worth noting, except that there may very well be an Infinity Stone in the midst of all the monkey-men there.

  “And then there’s the Soul Stone. That one’s orange, and I know for a fact where it is, and I will tell you the story now—”

  “Don’t bother.”

  The Lorespeaker’s wounded expression almost—almost—induced Thanos to change his mind, but he remained resolute. He had no more time for fairy tales.

  Still the Lorespeaker prattled on, now twirling his scepter like a baton. He had broken out in a sudden sweat along his brow and his words came almost too fast: “The Reality Stone was acquired by the Dark Elf Malekith during one of Svartalfheim’s many wars with Asgard. And those, Thanos, are tales I shall regale you with shortly, for they are truly awesome. In any event, this is the Aether of which you spoke. Taken from the Dark Elves by Bor, father of Odin, who hid it far from any living being, for it was too powerful to entrust to anyone. So, no, I don’t believe you would have found it, even if you’d been able to breach Asgard’s defenses.

  “The Time Stone was lost millennia ago but resurfaced in Kamar-Taj, in the possession of the Ancient One. Put a pin in that—lots of stories to tell there! And the Mind Stone… Well, you wouldn’t believe—”

  “I don’t want to believe any of it,” Thanos interrupted forcefully. “Rocks that predate the universe? That control the fundamental forces of reality?”

  “Believe what you wish,” the Lorespeaker snapped, miffed. “The universe does not care what you do or don’t believe.”

  That was beginning to sound suspiciously like Cha’s insistences. Thanos clenched his furrowed jaw.

  “If these Stones exist, why are they not used more often?”

  The Lorespeaker offered a short bark of laughter without a hint of mirth. Something had changed. Something in the air itself.

  “They are hidden, Thanos,” the Lorespeaker said, as though badgering a child, “because they are too powerful. And because the Celestials and the others, the ones whom the Celestials fear, keep close watch on the Stones from afar.”

  “This is complete madness.”

  The Lorespeaker smiled indulgently. “Of course. Rise, Lord Thanos.”

  Thanos stood. “Are you trying to prove a point?”

  “Why not hop on one foot?”

  Thanos grunted. “I am not here for your amusement.”

  “And yet you’re amusing me.”

  Looking down, Thanos realized with sudden horror that he was, in fact, hopping up and down on one foot.

  His eyes darted to the Lorespeaker. As Thanos watched, helplessly hopping up and down, the Lorespeaker slowly unwound the strips of hide from the top of his scepter, revealing an ornate top quarter that split into two tines, one longer than the other, both curved. Nestled between them was a shining blue stone of some sort, vaguely egg-shaped.

  A stone…

  He riffled through his memory. “I thought the Space Stone was blue.” Thanos realized he no longer had control over his own limbs. He was still hopping up and down like a marionette wielded by a puppeteer with too few fingers.

  “What?” the Lorespeaker asked absently, then glanced over at the Scepter as though seeing it for the first time and… giggled. It was a horrendous, haunting sound that chilled Thanos’s blood. “Oh. No, no. This is merely a protective shell, to keep the full measure of its power from—” He broke off. “Stop hopping; it’s annoying me now.”

  Thanos came to rest on both feet. He fought mightily to move his arms but could not. He was frozen in place.

  “It’s the Mind Stone, Thanos,” the Lorespeaker intoned, leaning in, leering. “The Mind Stone.”

  Thanos’s eyes were still under his control, and he shot a glance over at the Mind Stone, which glimmered in the light of the Lorespeaker’s domicile. He couldn’t imagine how such a thing could be possible, but he was living proof. The Infinity Stones were real.

  “How?” he asked.

  The Lorespeaker flapped his hands exasperatedly and began walking slowly around Thanos, occasionally touching an arm or his back. His demeanor had changed. No longer was he gentle and curious; even his amusement was disturbing and intense.

  “Oh, the details would bore you. And I’m not sure of them anyway. I… acquired the Stone millennia ago. Before I could truly put it through its paces, my cousins ambushed me and trapped me on this godsforsaken speck of space dust. Imagine it, Thanos—trapped on this mud-ball with one of the most powerful artifacts in the history of the universe… and no one to use it on.” He screamed quite suddenly, bellowing to the ceiling and to the dead sky beyond, then just as suddenly snapped back to fix his gaze on Thanos with a truly happy and satisfied grin. “Until you.”

  “Fine. You have me.” Thanos’s heart raced, but he worked to keep a tremble out of his voice. “Now what?”

  The Lorespeaker ignored him, standing back and pointing at Thanos with the tip of the Scepter. “Your eyes… Do they always glow blue like that?”

  “I… No.”

  “I’m still figuring out exactly how to use it,” the Lorespeaker confessed. “You’re my first test subject since my exile, so many years ago. Truly, I can’t even say how it would work in the hands of another. For me, with my brain already configured the way it is, it allows me to control you. To read you. But you know that, don’t you?”

  Thanos felt compelled to answer every question, even the rhetorical ones. “Yes.”

  “What does it feel like, Thanos?” the Lorespeaker whispered, coming in close. “Does it feel like… spiders eating your brains from the inside? Does it feel like… a great, churning wheel in your skull, grinding your free will to powder? I really want to know.”

  It felt like both of those and, yet, at the same time, it felt like a vast ocean of peace in which he could wallow. His independence and individuality were being overwritten by the Lorespeaker and the Mind Stone; the psychic pain was tremendous. And yet, he also felt warm and comforted at the same time. It felt as though he—the essential core he—was being pulled from his own body and his own self, to be replaced with something else. And at the same time, he welcomed it.

  The Lorespeaker leaned in closer, still whispering. “As I told you, Thanos: Sometimes I lose my mind. It’s different every time. And this is what it looks like this time.”

  He stepped away and withdrew a long, wicked knife from the folds of his robe. “And now, the test!”

  With a bloodcurdling blurt of laughter, he plunged the knife into Thanos’s chest.

  Everything in Thanos’s mind and body screamed to move, to dodge, to flinch, to crumple, to cower, to lash out, to strike back. A thousand different responses roared through him, every single one of them nullified by the control of the Mind Stone. He could only stand there as the blade struck him, as it rammed through his clothes, cut through his flesh, his muscle…

  Blunted against his rib cage. He actually heard the sound of steel striking bone—shhhuuunnnggggkk—at the same moment that the vibration of it ran up his sternum, spread along his clavicle, and rattled his skull.

  The Lorespeaker released the handle, leaving the knife embedded there. He shut his eyes and took a long, deep, shuddering breath. “Oh. Oh. Yes, yes. If you had even the slightest bit of free will left in you, you would have at least tried to avoid that. I think… I think if I pushed the Stone just the tiniest bit, you would lose all sense o
f yourself in an instant.” He smiled. “But I must confess, Thanos: I like the idea of it taking time. I like the idea of you suffering as every last bit of you slips away.”

  “You’re truly insane.”

  “That’s what my cousins said,” the Lorespeaker responded, dreamily, eyes still closed. He tittered at the memory. “Cousins. Cousins. Stupid, stupid cousins… Two of them teamed up to strand me in this forsaken place. They wanted the Stone for themselves, but didn’t dare get close enough to take it. So, we stalemated….” He drifted off and sighed in discontent. “Well, enough about that. They thought I would die here. And I didn’t. Haven’t.” He opened his eyes and grinned, baring his teeth, his voice gone creepily singsong. “Won’t. Thanks to you, Thanos. My savior.”

  The nerves where the knife had struck Thanos had gone into shock at the moment of impact, but now were awake and screaming. He could only grit his teeth. He’d suffered worse—this pain was nothing compared with that visited upon him by Yrsa, for example—but the inability to move made it nearly unbearable. He was completely helpless for the first time in his life.

  “I’ve had time to do nothing but plan,” the Lorespeaker went on, “and now that you’re here, I’ll… Oh, is that knife bothering you? Take it out.”

  Unbidden by his own mind, Thanos’s hand reached up and pulled out the knife. It dripped with his blood. A river ran down his chest and fell in fat droplets on the floor.

  “I can’t have you dead. Not yet. But you’re a hardy sort, aren’t you? Big and strong and tough and unapologetic about it. Good. True strength neither needs nor makes excuses. You’re going to need to be strong. It’s going to be a long, painful process by which I figure out how to transfer my consciousness into your body.”

  Thanos managed to keep his eyes from widening in shock. What?

  The Lorespeaker smirked. “You have a remarkable poker face, but I can still read you. We have a two-way connection now. I know what you’re thinking. I’ve known since you landed here. All that nonsense about ‘cosmic awareness’? It was the Stone all along. It can do so many things!” He spun around and snapped the Scepter forward. A beam of energy shot forth and exploded against a wall.

  “See? It’s made me smarter. It lets me see into your mind. It lets me control you… I suspect it could also generate life itself, Thanos.”

  “It’s driven you mad,” Thanos said.

  “Probably. But that’s all right. Madness is no inhibitor to one with an Infinity Stone. I’ve always seen the world differently. A jumble of stories and myth, endlessly mashed together…” He shook his head, a troubled look on his face. “When you have so many narratives up here”—he tapped his forehead—“sometimes it’s tough to keep them in order. I perceive the world differently than you do. Since I have all of the stories in my head at once, I can relive them in any order. We live in a prism, not a line.”

  Thanos realized that he had precisely one weapon at his disposal: his own voice. The Lorespeaker, probably in a desperation borne of his long, lonely exile, was allowing Thanos some modicum of thought. It wouldn’t last. Thanos had to use it while he could. Stall. Distract. Until… until…

  Something. Maybe. He’d been reduced to raw hope. Cha would have been both amused and pleased.

  “You will not best me,” Thanos promised him.

  “Oh, but I already have! Because in my time here, I have mastered myself. Conquer yourself first; the world will follow, I always say.”

  “The universe is large and time is long,” Thanos said. “And you are ill equipped for it, having been stuck here.”

  “The universe doesn’t frighten me. The universe is not infinite. It merely pretends to be so.” He reached out for the knife in Thanos’s hand, thought better of it, and said, “Cut your face. Not too deep. Just enough to draw blood.”

  With no command from his mind, Thanos’s hand rose. He watched it come closer and closer, the bloody knife glimmering. Then the point of the blade caught the flesh just under his right eye and dragged down, carving a shallow, weeping furrow along his cheek. He shuddered involuntarily. Then again, everything he was doing was involuntary.

  “Now down your arm,” the Lorespeaker ordered. “Again, not too deep. I want you alive.”

  Thanos drew the blade down his arm, parting his flesh along the sharp edge. A stitch of fire raced along the path. Then, at the Lorespeaker’s command, he dragged the blade across his chest, bisecting the wound already there.

  “Why torture me?” Thanos asked. “You can read my mind for anything you want to know.”

  “I’m just making certain that my control is absolute. As I said before, I haven’t been able to test it. I spent many centuries looking for a way to leave this place and work my mischief on the universe. I always believed it was possible, but I never made any progress until I started doing things, Thanos. We are the sum total of our decisions, not of our beliefs. That is the truth. And truth is a mistress harsher than death. As the universe will learn when I walk it as you.”

  It took an effort, but Thanos managed a weak chuckle. Anything else would have required more control over his throat and gut than he currently possessed. “I think you’ll be surprised by the sort of welcome you receive from others with my face. I’m a bit famous.”

  “Don’t try to talk me out of this!” The Lorespeaker balled up a fist and punched Thanos in the nose.

  Thanos’s nose wasn’t broken, but it felt out of joint. Blood ran in twin streams down the lower half of his face.

  “Do not try to talk me out of this,” the Lorespeaker growled, cradling his injured hand. “I’ve been planning this for”—he tilted his head back, lips moving as he counted—“well, for more centuries than I can count up to. Once I’m free of here, I’ll use you to bring more and more people to me for the controlling… Soon enough, I will control entire populations. Entire worlds! And eventually…” The Lorespeaker’s breath came faster and faster as he spoke more and more excitedly, his eyes dancing. “Eventually, I will control the universe, Thanos! I will be in every living, thinking being in all of creation!”

  “That will take just about forever,” Thanos said quietly. “Trust me—I’ve done the math.”

  He struggled with those words. The warm ocean around him was everywhere, and the wheel in his mind was spinning faster and faster. He was losing every last piece of who he was. In moments, he would cease to be. “I’m exceptionally long-lived,” the Lorespeaker said mildly. “I don’t mind taking forever.” Then, with a chortle, he swung the Scepter in a wide arc, then brought it to his lips and kissed it. “I’ll finally understand it all. The entire universe. I’ll combine all its disparate chapters and forms into one grand story, where the only character is me.”

  Drowning in his own brain, his body alight with pain, Thanos reached out for something—anything—to cling to.

  Sintaa’s smile… No. Only pain and loss there.

  His mother… She was gone, too. As was Gwinth. And Cha.

  And then…

  His daughters…

  “The pathway between us is so powerful right now….” The Lorespeaker inhaled deeply, as though captivated by the scent of a fragrant bouquet. “You’re thinking about those girls up on your ship. Oh, Thanos! Thanos! Oh, the horrible things you’ve done to them. Do you truly believe that is love? Poor Nebula, more machine than person now. You don’t deserve those girls. Or anything else, for that matter. And now you’re thinking about the atomic structure of genes, trying to block me from learning more about your daughters. Worried about them, are you? Don’t worry. When you take me up to your ship, ‘Father,’ I will take good care of them. They will be mine, too.”

  Thanos pressed his lips together and let out a low, grinding moan that caused the Lorespeaker to tilt his head to one side. “And now… you’re… Are you really in that much pain, Thanos? Stars above, Titan—I’d’ve thought a powerful warlord such as yourself would be used to a little blood every now and again. I have to say I’m a bit disappointed
.”

  “You should get used to disappointment for the little time you have left to live,” Thanos managed to tell him, focusing mightily.

  The Lorespeaker threw back his head and cackled. It was a giggly, depraved laugh, one that knew no boundaries or morality. “I applaud you, Thanos! Brave to the end! Tell me: Why are you so confident?”

  Thanos enjoyed the fact that he could grin; his own blood—dried now—cracked as his lips peeled back from his teeth and turned up. “Because I managed to stop thinking about my daughters.”

  “What?” said the Lorespeaker, right before Nebula shot him in the back with a blast from a Chitauri battle-staff.

  The Lorespeaker stumbled forward, barely able to keep his balance. He nearly collided with Thanos but caught himself right before he did so.

  “It’ll take more than that,” Thanos ordered the girls over the Lorespeaker’s shoulder.

  The Lorespeaker opened his mouth. To order Thanos to kill the girls, no doubt. And Thanos could have and would have, had he been so commanded. But there was panic in the Lorespeaker’s eyes, pain in his expression, and he stumbled over his words as they fought to spill out of his mouth.

  Before he could manage a sentence, Gamora had cut off his head with a single, efficient stroke of her battle-staff. Thanos would have watched the head fly off its neck and bounce on the floor, but the explosive gout of blood that erupted in his face blinded him, so he missed enjoying that sight.

  He heard the splat-thud , though, when the head hit the floor. That was nice.

  A moment later, his limbs loosened and his body came back online. The controlling pathway between his body and the Lorespeaker had been severed as neatly as the Lorespeaker’s head. Thanos wiped blood from his eyes and beheld his daughters before him, his pair of demons, his perfect assassins.

  “Well done, girls,” he rumbled.

  “Thanks, Dad,” Nebula said in that tone of voice that indicated she was too disaffected to care, but cared nonetheless.

  “Especially you, Gamora.”