In 2018, 23 days after Thanos erased half of all life in the universe,[a] Carol Danvers rescues Tony Stark and Nebula from deep space. They reunite with the remaining Avengers—Bruce Banner, Steve Rogers, Thor, Natasha Romanoff, and James Rhodes—and Rocket on Earth. Finding Thanos on an uninhabited planet, they plan to use the Infinity Stones to reverse his actions but learn that Thanos has destroyed them. Enraged, Thor decapitates Thanos.
Five years later, Scott Lang escapes from the Quantum Realm.[b] Reaching the Avengers Compound, he says he experienced only five hours while trapped. Theorizing that the Quantum Realm allows time travel, they ask a reluctant Stark to help them retrieve the Stones from the past to reverse Thanos's present actions. Stark, Rocket, and Banner, who has merged his intelligence with the Hulk's strength, build a time machine. Banner says that altering the past does not affect the present, since any changes create alternate realities. Banner and Rocket travel to Norway, where they visit the Asgardian refugee settlement of New Asgard and recruit an overweight, despondent Thor. In Tokyo, Romanoff recruits Clint Barton, who became a vigilante after his family was erased.
Banner, Lang, Rogers, and Stark time-travel to New York City during Loki's attack in 2012.[c] At the Sanctum Sanctorum, Banner convinces the Ancient One to give him the Time Stone after promising to return the Infinity Stones to their proper points in time. At Stark Tower, Rogers retrieves the Mind Stone from Hydra sleeper agents, but Stark and Lang's attempt to steal the Space Stone fails, allowing 2012-Loki to escape with it. Rogers and Stark travel to Camp Lehigh in 1970, where Stark obtains an earlier version of the Space Stone and unexpectedly encounters his father, Howard, who he is able to have a conversation with. Rogers steals Pym Particles from Hank Pym to return to the present and sees his lost love, Peggy Carter.
Rocket and Thor travel to Asgard in 2013.[d] Rocket extracts the Reality Stone from Jane Foster. Thor is encouraged by his mother, Frigga, and retrieves his old hammer, Mjolnir. Barton, Romanoff, Nebula, and Rhodes travel to 2014. Nebula and Rhodes go to Morag and steal the Power Stone before Peter Quill can,[e] while Barton and Romanoff travel to Vormir. The Soul Stone's keeper, Red Skull, says that it can be acquired only by sacrificing a loved one. Romanoff sacrifices herself, allowing Barton to get the Stone. Rhodes and Nebula attempt to r