I sat on one of the chairs in the ship, cleaning and sharpening my sword. It was the only Kree weapon I still had. I loved it too much to give it up, it belonged to me.

'You're obsessed with that thing.' Carol stood in the doorway, casually leaning against the doorpost. Her hair was still wet from the shower she just came out off. Our mission had been a little more violent and risky than we had expected. With unsuspected enemies showing up. So we were tired, dirty and bloody.

'That's true', I laughed, putting the shiny sword down on the chair next to me. 'Had a nice shower?'

'Would've been better with you there.'

I shook my head in disbelief, chuckling.

'What?'

I didn't answer her question, she knew I liked her flirting, even if I acted like I didn't. 'Next time, okay?' Her brown eyes lit up, happy she got her way.

To say we got even closer in the past twenty-so years would be an understatement. I found new things to love about her every day and was so happy we didn't have to hide anymore. Cause I didn't think I could have gone back to Hala and pretend again. Pretend nothing was going on between us.

We were always together, never one leaving without the other. Even though we had taken care of the Kree, we could never stop looking over our shoulders. I would be worried sick if she left for days, weeks even. Being with her, if only to be back-up, was the only way to stay sane.

Ever since we left Maria all those years ago, we hadn't been back on Earth. There was simply no time. We were always busy. With missions, people who needed our help, or simply with each other. I could see she missed her home, her friend, even though she tried to hide it well. She had missed Monica growing up, graduating high-school, going to college, getting her first boyfriend -or girlfriend.

We didn't talk about them often, knowing it would only rip open certain wounds, but every now and then we would speculate what Fury was doing at the moment, if Maria was still flying planes, if Goose had thrown up the Tesseract yet. The pager we gave Fury had never gone off, letting us know he was doing okay. At least that was something, right?

The ship we had been living in, we bought with the money we got from the Skrulls after we had helped them find a safe home. It wasn't too big, just big enough for the two of us. It held everything we needed; a bedroom, a pretty large bathroom, kitchen, small living area, storage for lots of weapons for me.

I loved my weapons and my collection had grown bigger and bigger over the years. Knives, guns, swords, things you could throw or shoot. I didn't need any of it, but I liked it. Carol just rolled her eyes every time I came home with a new one or was cleaning them obsessively, like she just walked in on.

'You know-', Carol started while she made her way over to me. But she cut herself off when we heard sudden commotion outside. The ship was parked somewhere on a planet on the other side of the universe, waiting for a next mission to pop up. The people here were very friendly and kind. Maybe also because we have become quite the legends in space. The two ex-Kree fighting for anyone who needs their help.

I quickly stood up, my head whipping towards the door. Something was wrong.

Carol gave me a fearful look when she passed me, heading for the lever next to the back door to open it. A heavy feeling weighed on my stomach when the ramp lowered slowly. What we saw was indescribable.

People running around, screaming, crying. My fingers itched to pick up the sword next to me, but something stopped me. They weren't running in one direction, like they were running away from something, they run around searching in a panic. Names were called and people held each other tightly when they found who they were looking for.

Carol and I shared a confused look, still not knowing what was going on. Our eyes scanned the scene in front of us, trying to make sense of everything. That was when both our gazes fell onto a couple only a few feet away from us, kneeling on the ground, hugging tightly.

My eyes couldn't believe what they saw when the woman slowly began to fall apart. Like literally, fall apart. The best way I can describe it was that she started fading, crumbling. First her limbs, starting from her hands and feet, slowly up to her chest and head.

Only ash remained in the man's arms, sobbing for his wife.

Only now I registered the darkening sky. Ash clouded the air, blocking the sunrays from falling onto the planet. When my eyes met Carol's, I had never seen such fear in hers. We didn't know what to say, o do, we just stared at each other, waiting for something to happen.

An annoying bleeping and buzzing sound pulled us out of our world. It was the sound I had feared for the last twenty years and knew would come one day. It looked like Carol was frozen, so I broke away from her and walked to the device where it lay gathering dust. It was always in the same place, right next to the controls in the cockpit.

What was already obvious, was confirmed when Fury's name flashed on the screen. No message, nothing, just his name.

Suddenly, the world started spinning, my head feeling like it was floating. I stumbled backwards, but before I could fall, she had already caught me. Nausea set in and I swallowed hard to get rid of the bile rising in my throat. 'Are you okay?', Carol asked me, voice filled with anxiety.

'I don't-', my legs couldn't carry my body anymore. The woman holding me felt the sudden change in weight and gently set me down on the ground, kneeling in front of me.

My gaze shifted from her face to my hand, where the feeling in my fingertips withdrew slowly. Her eyes followed my own and water filled them when she too, saw my fingers turn a sickening, ashy gray. 'No. No, no, no', she let my hands go and put her own on the sides of my face, making me look anywhere but my slowly dissolving body.

I wanted to put my own hands over hers, but knew they were already gone, so instead, I used my eyes to say what I wanted to. The tears flowed down her cheeks, not wanting to lose me and be left behind on her own. 'Listen to me.' Brown connected with purple. 'It's okay. You're going to be fine. Promise me that you are going to be fine.' She nodded faintly, unable to do anything more.

She was sobbing now and I felt my own tears fall down. 'I can't lose you', she stuttered.

'I will always be with you', my eyes flickering to her heart for a second, my voice thick with emotions. 'Someone has to keep an eye on you', I tried to joke. But she didn't laugh, didn't even register it, just studied my face carefully, as if to take in every line and feature.

'I love you. I should have said that more often.'

'Don't worry.' A tiny smile reassured her. 'I know. I love you too.'

Those were the last words I ever spoke and the last ones she heard from me. Her sad eyes were the last thing my own saw, before I became nothing but air, disappearing from the cosmos.

~~~~~~~~

Carol didn't know how long she sat there, ignoring the people outside and just staring at her hands. The same hands that felt her girlfriend disappear from under them and were now stained with ash. Water kept flowing out of her eyes in an uncontrollable flow and she just let them. She didn't want to do anything, not moving, not standing up, and definitely not going on with her life. But she had made Aayala a promise, that she would be fine, only she had no idea yet how difficult that was going to be.

Slowly, the tears stopped and her vision cleared and she dared look up from the floor for the first time. The pager still lay on the floor from where it fell out of Yala's hands and she picked it up, studying it the same way the other woman had done before everything became a big mess.

Maybe Fury would have the answers about what the hell was going on, why people just started disappearing into thin air. Pushing her emotions down, she tried to forget about her girlfriend and closed the ship's door. For once, she was going to do something selfish, leaving the people in space behind and setting course for the planet she had longed for for years, but now dreaded going back to. They had always wanted to go together, now she was utterly alone.

The closest jump-point to Earth was more than a day away, but Carol never stopped to rest. She wasn't important right now.

A deep sigh left her lips when Earth finally came into view, the blue planet still floating around in space. She didn't know what she had expected, maybe for it to be gone, but it was still waiting for her. Following the pager's signal, it sent her to the east-coast, meaning Fury wasn't stationed in California anymore.

Leaving the ship in orbit, she jumped out the hatch in the floor, flying the last part down on her own. It was safer, not knowing if Earth had had other encounters with aliens after her.

It was immediately clear that the same thing had happened here on Earth. The sky was the same dark grey as she had seen before. Whatever was going on, it affected the whole universe.

A big white building rose up from the ashes. It looked new, clean, but what put her off was the big 'A' on the side of the compound. It wasn't the SHIELD logo like she had expected, but this still looked like something official, so maybe Fury had changed organisations?

It would have been easiest to just knock on the front door, but since she had no idea what or who she was dealing with, she took out the security system with a little electrical surge from her hands and pulled on the glass doors. Cold, fresh air hit her face. The place was luxurious and spacious, definitely meant for multiple people.

Nobody came to welcome her and the foyer was empty, so her feet followed the pager's signal her Com was still tracking. After a couple turns left and right, still without seeing anyone, her ears picked up on a couple voices. Three different men and one woman. The voices became louder the closer she came to the room and just before she made her way in, she peeked around the doorpost.

A woman with short, blonde hair stood next to a broad man, also blond, staring at Fury's pager they had hooked on some sort of battery. Another man with glasses and a tablet stood next to it, explaining that it stopped working. The last man she thought for a minute was Fury, but he was too small to be her old friend.

'What have we got?', the woman spoke up. She looked strong, a fighter.

The man with the glasses answered her with a sigh. 'Whatever signal it was sending finally crept out.'

'I thought we bypassed the battery', the man next to the woman asked.

They all looked stressed, although the woman hid it well. Their shoulders were hunched over and a deep crease was between all their eyebrows. Carol had no doubt they lost people too.

'We did. It's still plugged in, it just... it just stopped', the man who was not Fury explained to him.

'Reboot it, send the signal again.' It was an order, not a suggestion. It made her think that he was somehow the leader of everyone here, but where was Fury?

'We don't even know what this is', the scientist protested.

'Fury did', the woman sighed. So they did know Fury and it sounded like they all trusted him so much that they blindly wanted to send the signal again. This was the right time for Carol to walk in, quietly making her way behind the blonde, waiting for her to turn around and notice her. 'Just do it, please. You tell me the second you get a signal. I want to know who's on the other end of that thing.'

She didn't have to wait long, the woman immediately turning around after her sentence and stopping dead in her tracks when she saw Carol standing there. She looked shocked and surprised, too occupied to notice someone come in. 'Where's Fury?', Carol demanded.

When the woman in front of her recovered, she answered in the same demanding way. 'Who are you?', narrowing her eyes in distrust.

'Fury didn't tell you about me?'

'No. How do you know Fury?' The questions fired rapidly, both woman hostile against the other. The other men didn't say anything, just stared at the woman that somehow made her way into the compound unseen.

'I met him in '95, back when he was an agent for SHIELD. Went on a space-mission and kicked some Kree-ass.'

The blond man finally decided to speak up, crossing his arms in front of his chest. 'Kree?'

Carol's eyes flickered between all of them. 'Oh god, you guys don't have any clue, do you?'

The woman in front of her, now offended, crossed her arms too. 'Why did Fury never tell us about you?'

'I don't know. I came here because he paged me', she gestured to the pager behind them, 'told him to only call me in emergencies and I guess this counts.'

The dark-skinned man spoke up from the side of the room, studying her face carefully. 'Who did you lose?'

The vibe in the room immediately changed from hostile and confusion to pure sadness and distress. The weight of losing the people closest to them was hard on everyone, some handling it better than others. But even though she wanted to act strong, her eyes couldn't help but fall to the ground for a minute. 'My girlfriend.'

When she looked up again, she saw surprise in their eyes, especially in the eyes of the men. The woman in front of her had more understanding on her face, not really caring about that topic. But there was also pity, and if Carol hated anything, it was pity. So she closed her emotions off again and her eyes hardened evidently. 'It's not only here, it is everywhere. The whole universe is affected by whatever happened.'

This caused the other people to glance at each other, like they knew something she didn't. 'You know something, tell me', she demanded to know what caused this.

'You may want to sit down for this.' The dark-skinned man walked out of the room, gesturing for her to follow him, probably to some place where they could sit down and talk easier.

She had no idea who these people were, but they know Fury and that was the only thing she needed to know to stay with them, not really having any other choice too.

~~~~~~~~

Well this sucks. It hurts to even write this. I hate writing Endgame because I cried my heart out in the cinema while watching this movie and I promised myself I would never watch it again. But now I don't really have another choice because I have to see what is happening in order for me to write these chapters. So pray for me.

Oh btw, I am going to change some things. Natasha and Tony are both not going to die, because my heart simply cannot handle writing that.

Thank you for reading! Only a few more chapters to go.

(2717 words)