Chapter Text
Bruce Banner. Also known as the Hulk, he is a green giant humanoid who becomes stronger with each spike of testosterone. He chose himself to use the infinity stones to snap everyone back into existence. Everyone around him wanted to see what the future would hold after this moment, where he would bring everyone back from the previous snap.
'Okay, got to do what Tony said. Bring back everyone, but don't change anything about these past five years. I was made for this. I… was made for this.'
He repeated this in his head several times, but the doubts lingered in his brain. He wasn't made for this. His desires to see Natasha alive and breathing, and to see her next to him, kept him from doing the right thing immediately.
'I… wish I could bring them back.'
His thoughts, though unspoken, had reached everyone that surrounded him. Everyone looked at him with sympathy. But, several years later, he would end up finding that isn't possible. People will die. Sacrifices will have to be made. Natasha would only be the first sacrifice made. He eventually would give his own life for the sake of a child.
He snapped his fingers, and, until several seconds had passed, time stood still. However, his thoughts, they were transmitted across the multiverse, spreading throughout it.
In the woods of a demon world.
Emma. She looked upon the burning smoke that came from the desert. When she saw the smoke, she knew what was happening.
'Wait, what? No, No, NO!'
Emma spirit had collapsed on the ground. Her will and determination, at that moment, had waved, and she had lost the friends she had promised to save. Yuugo, Lucas, they weren't coming back. They were dead, and she blamed herself.
"I… wish I could bring them back."
She heard the soft yet masculine voice that had echoed across the forest. Emma shot up from the grassy floor, turning around as if she expected a person to carry the voice she had heard. However, the emptiness that she had seen suggested that she had just thought of it, even if she would eventually see the person who carried it.
'I wish I could bring them back.' She cried, wetting and forever staining the forest with her tears, forever reminding it of the friends who had passed, and giving their deaths and their lives meaning in this demon world.
In the sandy beaches outside of the walls
A brown-haired, green-eyed person looked out beyond the ocean. Eren's eyes reflected his soul, showing the cloudy emptiness present within it. While the people behind him were splashing around in the ocean water, exploring the sight to behold, all he could remember was the memories of his father and the previous Attack Titan.
"If we defeat our enemy," He said, slowly lifting his finger towards the ocean. "Will we finally be free?"
Then, everyone heard something.
"I… wish I could bring them back."
Everyone looked around them. Hanji dropped the organisms she was inspecting, Jean, Connie, and Sasha stood up, the short yet strong Levi stood up, and Mikasa and Armin's expressions had fallen. However, after a few seconds of reflecting on their fallen comrades, with Eren, they looked beyond the horizon.
'How many deaths did it take to get here?' Eren remembered his memories of his father and Eren Kruger, remembering the Attack titan ripping the life out of the Marleyain soldiers who were doing their job, and of his mother being eaten by his step-mother. He would later have to grapple with the deaths of Sasha, Mikasa, Armin, and Levi.
'I… wish I could bring them back.' The rest of the survivors thought, reminiscing of the fallen soldiers. The 1st Levi squad. The over 200,000 people who were sent out to claim Wall Maria. Most of the 104th trainees. Erwin Smith. That last name rang in their minds, especially in the mind of the blond-haired man who was chosen over the commander. They all knew that worse times were coming, as the blue sky shifted to grey. Over Levi, an ominous black cloud appeared.
In a piano competition.
Kousei Arima had finished playing Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 23. As he had finished, memories surged of a violent, bipolar violinist named Kaori Miyazono. Their first competition together, where they fought in their styles instead of playing the piece. The time they jumped off the bridge to enjoy the river's cool, calm waters. The time where Kousei had run to race against the train. Walking through school at night, seeing it mysteriously. The snow falling around him like the falling of cherry blossoms. These were all things that he ordinarily wouldn't remember, but thanks to Kaori, he couldn't forget it as it had been burned into his mind. As the memories flooded his mind, the supposed human metronome started breaking down as his shoulders fell and tears left his face. The audience looked at him in surprise, their mouths slightly agape, as they hadn't expected him to shed tears in a piano competition of this degree. However, Kousei kept playing and kept moving forward through the song even as the tears fell on the piano keys. He remembered one last thing about Kaori, and that was to keep moving forward. Even when there was no reason to play, he had to keep moving forward. He remembered it because, somehow, he knew that the person who hit him multiple times, called him a pervert for something he accidentally did, loved caneles from her bakery, loved to play the violin her way, regardless of what the skeptics would say, and someone who had and always will hold a place in his heart, was now no longing among the living. Just like his mother, the people he loved were slipping from his reach. Kaori Miyazono is dead.
"I… wish I could bring them back."
When he heard that, he looked up towards the heavens, tears streaming down his face, as he finally broke down, repeating the cycle that had happened when his mother's life had been taken from the living. He couldn't handle the cycle of suffering anymore. He cried himself turing his bright blue eyes red from tears, along with wetting his suit. Everyone who had seen his performance was entranced and brought to tears by Kousei's performance, however, they were slow to clap. When the clapping started, it ended with roaring applause from the audience, but he couldn't hear anymore, just like the time his mother had been taken away from him and he couldn't hear what he was playing. He couldn't hear or see anything besides the tears streaming down his face, and he felt that he agreed with what he had heard from the soft-spoken voice.
'I… wish I could bring them back.'
He wouldn't obtain his wish, but he would end up reuniting with his lover and mother in the heavens. The story begins with Rahul, me.