gonna give all my secrets away (an infinity saga sestina)

Summary:

What if there were no secrets between the Avengers? A Tony POV sestina using the words time, space, reality, soul, power, and mind.

Notes:

Yes, it’s another sestina. Clearly I have developed something of an addiction to writing these. This takes place in a world where the Avengers stuck together after the events of the 2012 film and truly bonded, keeping no secrets from each other. So Ultron never happened, Steve was honest about The Winter Soldier assassinating Howard and Maria Stark, etc… and when Thanos came for them, they were ready to defend the Earth. 

This was written for Flufftober’s alternate prompt twelve: “keeping someone safe.” It also fills my T1: AU: Canon Divergence square for the Tony Stark Bingo.

Thanks as always to tinysugacube for her grammatical prowess, as well as to Marvin for his official seal of approval.

Work Text:

Often it feels as though I’m running out of time,
as though I’m running out of capacity, out of space.
When I saw those ships, there was a fracture in my reality;
there was a change in my soul
as I realized how lacking Earth is in power,
and it sparked a new passion in my mind.

Many things came to mind
when I set myself to the task of finding time,
dedicated myself to increasing my power,
to growing and making space
to push forward with what my soul
knew was necessary to push the bonds of reality.

The sad truth is that in reality
having strength was not just about my mind,
not about appeasing the crushing weight of my soul,
but about slowing down, using the time
I had to unite us all, to make space
for each of us to make a change with our collective power.

Because it doesn’t just take power
to keep people safe: The reality
is that we have to share space,
to trust that we each know our own mind
and know that such trust takes time.
One battle does not mean we are united in soul.

And yet, this team found a way into my soul,
and with that honesty we found together power;
and while there is a world in which we broke apart, this time
we were on the same page, and in this reality
there are no secrets between our minds—
and we find home in each other’s space.

United as we were, we sought allies in space.
Being an alien does not mean lacking a soul;
and with our relative strengths and weaknesses in mind,
we joined forces and had enough power
that true peace became a reality,
and the Titan was easily defeated this time.

I’ve learned that making space to share power,
to using united souls to shape reality,
will bring us peace of mind in our time.