The nutrient bath exploded outward, and the organic computer shrieked as it started to bleed. The Accuser watched the vast face of the ruler of the Kree Empire as it wailed and shook, eyes wide with a real emotion for the first time in gods alone knew how long. The Supreme Intelligence knew fear.
“This is our moment.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
WAR AMONG THE STARS
A VICTORY in battle seldom guaranteed a victory in war. That simple fact haunted the Galactic Council. Though the Kree had reunited with their forces, there were planets aplenty the Builders had taken. Those planets needed the same chance to break free.
The first was Kymellia III. An army of Alephs waited there, mining the planet for its abundant resources and forcing the Kymellians to act as little more than slaves. The mechanical overlords did not anticipate the arrival of Ronan and his Accusers, nor were they prepared for the Kree’s savagery in battle.
On Centauri-IV the unexpected aid came in the form of the surviving Knights of Galador. Their home was gone, destroyed by the Builders, but the Spaceknights who survived did not retire to the shadows. There was still an enemy who had to pay for the sins they’d committed, and that payment could come in the form of blood.
On Korm Prime the Skrull warlords drove away the Builders, but it was not an easy battle; many of the shape-changers lost their lives. Even so, none paid as heavily as the Shi’ar, who often battled alongside the Avengers.
They won the fight on Rigel, but lost a great many of their ships in the process. More died on Formuhaut, including three of the Imperial Guard, yet the Builders were prevented from taking the planetary system. Avengers and Shi’ar alike were driven back from Chize, despite Thor’s presence.
* * *
“WE HAVE news from the Formuhaut and Chize fronts,” Mentor said.
“Go on.”
“We are at a stalemate on Formuhaut, but we are unlikely to hold that line,” Mentor continued. “We have lost Chize. Heavy casualties.”
“Damn,” Captain America said. “We’re losing all of our momentum. The Builder armada is still massive.”
“Yes.” The Majestor nodded, his expression grim. “So we have no choice any longer, do we?”
“We face diminishing probabilities,” Mentor replied. “If we wait much longer, it will not matter.”
“So are you going to do it?” Captain Marvel asked.
“What choice do we have, Carol? The enemy of my enemy.” Cap spoke to Mentor. “Send the word. Open the gates of Hell.”
The Shi’ar nodded. “We need to signal the advance team to power up the linked stargates. Are the emergency beacons prepared to be activated?”
“Yes, sir,” the communications officer said.
“Then proceed. Open the gateway to the Negative Zone. Release the Annihilation Wave, and Sharra and K’ythri save us all. How desperate have we become that Annihilus is one of our last hopes?”
The Annihilation Wave was Annihilus’ greatest weapon against a universe that had offended him time and again. A fleet of planetoid-sized warships and the planet-destroying Harvester of Sorrow, it had poured from the Negative Zone and raged across the cosmos. Worlds fell, billions died, and the wave had nearly succeeded. Annihilus had destroyed enough of the known universe to be reviled by many of the very beings alongside whom he now fought.
The deadly fleet came spilling through the stargates, overwhelming the first four Builder ships. Thousands of insectoids designed to survive the harshest possible environments destroyed everything that got in their way.
“They are released,” Annihilus announced. “They have orders to kill all the Builders.” Yet as the council watched, still they were gripped by uncertainty. Annihilus had made it clear he could not control the wave. If the claim was true, then there was no telling what might happen once the enemy was defeated.
And if he was lying, the outcome might be worse.
“Wait…” Annihilus’ image broke apart for a moment, and then coalesced again. “Something is wrong.”
“What could be wrong?” The Majestor frowned, and Mentor came to his side.
“They are breaking away from their projected path.”
“The Builders?” Gladiator asked.
“No, Majestor. The Annihilation Wave. They’re—”
On the projection, Annihilus screamed. Several forms amassed around him, insects from his vast collection of hatchlings. As they all watched, dumbstruck, the massive drones attempted to consume him. He hissed in outrage as he destroyed the things.
“Betrayed! I am betrayed! How is this possible?”
He disappeared from the screen.
“They’re attacking each other,” Mentor observed. “Consuming each other. The Builders must have found a way to control them, as Annihilus could not. At the current rate of assault, the Annihilation Wave will be wiped out in a matter of minutes.”
True to his word, the insect army began to cannibalize itself. The Annihilation Wave’s ships launched assaults against one another, even as the Builders continued on with minimal losses.
Before long, it was over.
“That was truly our last hope.” Gladiator stared at the screen. “Our final effort.” He turned his attention to Mentor. “Summon my son. Rally all the Superguardians, the Subguardians.”
“Majestor—”
“No. Not Majestor. I will die as I lived, as Gladiator, Praetor of the Imperial Guard. This is the end, my friend. Unless saved by some unforeseen miracle, we die… and I would face it head-on.”
* * *
ELSEWHERE ABOARD the same vessel, the Gardeners collected to look upon their god. Captain Universe lay in her medical pod and did not move. She remained in her slumber, and the pod monitored her vitals. She was only a human, after all—yet she was so much more.
“It’s all mathematics,” Ex Nihilo said. “A miracle to be sure, but only probabilities. Various races have different definitions.”
Abyss nodded.
“The Shi’ar on this vessel have defined it as the ‘Hol cipher,’ an event happening once in every one hundred million microcycles. The Strontians’ fifth maxim marks it as one in fifty million. The humans, by Littlewood’s Law, say a miracle happens once every million seconds.” He looked at his sister. “We know better. We have seen more, experienced more, and we know the odds are more on the order of a billion to one against. Have you ever wondered why that is so?”
Though the question was rhetorical, Abyss answered. “We also know, for a fact, that this is the rate at which life occurs on suitable worlds,” she said. “That the average sentient world in this universe was designed to hold roughly two billion inhabitants. And that all of my kind were killed off by the Builders. What are the odds of one Abyssil surviving? What are the odds of a person finding their perfect ‘other’? Does that not qualify as a miracle?”
“Enough.” He smiled at his sister. “We could discuss probabilities for days on end, and have often done so. All around us, the universe is dying.” He spoke to the others of his kind, who looked upon the body of a dying god. “How can we watch and do nothing? Are we not Ex Nihili? Are we not life itself?”
He reached out with his hands, and slowly the others joined him. They understood his words—but more important, they understood what he planned. “Brothers, sisters, the beings we have shaped and guided say they need a miracle. They are right. We need a miracle. We need life.”
The light that came from him was the same golden color as his skin, and it grew as the others joined hands. That light spilled forth and was directed.
For the first time in days, the body in the medical pod moved. Her eyes burst open, and the same golden light flared from them. She breathed deeply.
“Ahhhhhh…”
Captain Universe awoke and found herself surrounded by the devoted. The Ex Nihili looked upon their work and found it good. Abyss reached out with her mind and touched the universe.
The shape of the figure was human.
The mind inside
that fragile form was something very different indeed.
* * *
TAMARA DEVOUX had not been a well woman. She had known she would die, in time. When the Builders attacked Galador, it seemed as if that time had come—that Captain Universe would reach her end.
Then she awoke, surrounded by many of the ones she had created—ones who gave life.
“I was asleep,” she said to Abyss. “I remember a light, and then a crash. Shaking, violence… and then nothing.” Her head wrapped once again in a darkness that reflected the stars, she floated above the pod that very nearly was her coffin.
“A day is coming soon, when I will close my eyes forever,” she continued, “but not yet.”
“No,” Abyss agreed. “Not yet, Mother. Your first children have become unruly.”
“Oh… yes…” the Mother said. “I see.”
* * *
BEHIND HER the Shi’ar and their allies amassed their forces, and the Avengers joined them, prepared to die. Ahead of her lay the Builders.
There was no warning as a portal opened up in the middle of the Builder command ship. Out of it floated a being—a life force—they once had worshipped. The Creator in charge of the vessel stared at her with undisguised malevolence.
“Impossible!” it spat. For more than a million years, no one had seen such a manifestation.
“Hello.” The Mother looked upon her children.
“Alephs. Kill her.” The Creator pointed. Programmed always to obey, the Alephs powered up their weapons.
Captain Universe looked upon them and found them wanting. She lifted a hand, fingers splayed, and destroyed them in an instant. Bursts of white energy flared, and then they were gone.
“Why do you do this?” she asked their master with calm curiosity. “When did death become your way? Even after you stopped worshipping me and left my side, you revered life. Why this?”
“Because the universe is dying,” the Creator said, his eyes flashing blood-red. “You are dying.”
She smiled behind the mask covering her face. It was a sad smile, but it was there just the same.
“I know.”
The Creator looked at his brethren and then back at her.
“All of the universes are dying,” he said. “There is only one way to save this one: destroy the axis point and perhaps save them all.”
“Yes, but you are going to be too late,” she said. “And even if you weren’t, I still would not let you continue what you are doing.”
“Why?” the Creator raged. Energy burned behind those eyes and crackled across the body.
“Because I have lost something.” As if in response to that anger, she let the mask that covered her face fade away, and her expression was stern. When she spoke, it was with the voice of a mother warning her child against a foolish action. There was a memory there, too—of speaking to a different child. It wasn’t the memory of the universe, but of the host.
The Creator shook with suppressed fury. “Your cause is no longer ours! We will not stop!” It moved closer—hands clenched in anger, eyes burning with indignation. The mandibles scratched and clicked. “And I do not believe you are going to stop us. Are you… Mother?”
Had ever any single word become so contemptuous? Had ever any child so desperately demanded to be punished? All she had given the Builders, all she had taught them when they started their journeys, and this was what they had become?
The mantle of the universe once more covered her face. The Creator had lived for hundreds of thousands of years. Captain Universe had been around oh so much longer, and she would not tolerate this.
She pointed, and the Creator’s head and torso exploded.
Behind him several other Creators and Engineers tensed, looking at what she had done. The universe spoke softly to them.
“He will build no more.” She looked at each of them, taking the time to let them understand the gravity of her words. “Will you?”
The next of the Creators looked to his brethren.
“Kill her.”
As one they reached for her; their hands glowed white-hot, drawing forth the power to destroy. They had been left alone too long. They had lost their way. It was a sad thing, but the universe had experienced this sort of process countless times. Again she pointed, and all around her the Builders died, their atoms scattered.
Only one managed to survive. It protected itself, creating an energy globe rather than trying to destroy her. It peered at her from its supposed vantage point of safety.
“You destroyed us all,” it said. “If I retreat it is to the safety of another universe. What you have done changes nothing. It will continue.” The universe looked upon her child and said nothing. “If not here, somewhere else,” the Creator continued. “Somewhere beyond the Superflow. But I leave you a gift, Mother.”
The Creator breached the walls of the universe and shifted slowly to somewhere else, beyond her reach. Here she was all. There were others like her in their own places, and she did not go to where they existed. They were a part of the whole, as she was a part of the whole, but they were not meant to meet.
* * *
“DECLARATIVE: RECEIVING BLACK BAND COMMAND FROM THE BUILDERS,” the Aleph said. “DECLARATIVE: VICTORY UNACHIEVABLE.”
“DECLARATIVE: THE CODE IS LOST.”
Wherever the Builders had conquered and wherever they still fought, the message was the same.
“DECLARATIVE: ERASURE PROTOCOLS ENACTED.”
“DECLARATIVE: SELF-DESTRUCT ALL SYSTEMS.”
As one, the Alephs received the command, and they acted upon it.
“DECLARATIVE: DESTROY EVERYTHING.”
“DECLARATIVE: DESTROY EVERYTHING.”
* * *
CAPTAIN AMERICA stood still on the command deck of the Lilandra. The gathered Imperial Guard were listening to their praetor, preparing for a final battle to save all they loved, all they believed in, when Ex Nihilo joined them.
“Excuse me.”
Gladiator stopped speaking. As one the gathered assembly turned to stare at him.
“I am very sorry to interrupt,” the Gardener said. “I thought you should know your miracle has occurred.”
“What do you mean?” Captain Marvel was quicker on the draw than Captain America. It was the very question he’d meant to ask.
“You asked for a miracle, and we have arranged one,” he said. “The being you call Captain Universe is now awake and has gone to discipline her children. That is, she confronts the Builders.”
“What do you mean?” Captain Marvel asked him again.
“When the Builders first came to exist, they worshipped the universe and life. That was the way they were meant to be. The Mother has gone home to discipline her children. They have lost their way, you see—and if they do not find it she will find it for them.”
At that precise moment, the Builders’ command vessel exploded into a massive ball of flame. The image appeared on the screen as the local satellites documented the explosion and reported it back via the omnicast.
“There,” Ex Nihilo nodded. “Just so. I believe she has meted out her punishment.”
Gladiator looked to the golden-skinned Gardener.
“Are you saying the war is over?”
Ex Nihilo shook his head. “No. Not at all. Only that the Builders themselves, are, well… are over. Unless Mother was able to end them all simultaneously, it is most likely they will send out commands for the Alephs. If they haven’t already.” He frowned. “The Builders are nothing if not spiteful—I see that now. They will seek to destroy everything. I think you might yet be in for a war.”
“Seriously, is this a win?” Danvers asked Captain America.
“I’m going to put it in that category, Carol,” he replied. “Not the win, but a big win.”
“Then we must take advantage of the moment,” Gladiator said. He looked to his troops. “We have a war to fight. Let’s finish it.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
ON EARTH AS
IT IS IN HEAVEN
DOCTOR STRANGE stared down into the hidden valley where Orollan lay in secrecy, and located the man for whom Thanos scoured the stars.
“I’ve found him,” he said.
“Good,” the Ebony Maw responded.
The entity that served Thanos moved from the darkness of Doctor Strange’s cloak. He had hidden there, locked in shadows, an unobserved passenger. “That is excellent news. I am pleased, Stephen.” The Ebony Maw smiled and moved his fingers through Strange’s mind, sliding barriers into place that would hide what he had done. “I’m going to let you leave now. I’m going to let you live.”
He stepped away from the man he possessed and looked over the side of the cliff, down into the valley of the Lor.
“I think it would have been better for you, however, if I had slit your throat. Now you carry, somewhere in the back of your mind, awareness of what you have done. I can feel your mind fighting me even now. I can feel you fighting with the dread of your sins, of what you have given me, even if you are not conscious of that fact.”
“No.” Stephen Strange shook his head. Clarity began to return. “There’s been an incursion into the realm. This world will collide with others. The world will end.”
“Absurd,” the Ebony Maw replied. “There is nothing left for your world except the short season of Thanos. Stop imagining otherwise. Very soon my master will himself give you your apocalypse. He is here, and the end is coming soon enough.”
He reached again into the mind of Stephen Strange, a man who saw and understood more than most. The sorcerer’s eyes again lost their focus, and he looked down at a city he could no longer see.
“Now leave this place, Doctor Strange. Savor what life you have left. We will not see each other again.”
* * *
AS STRANGE departed, frustrated his search for the son of Thanos had ended in failure, he received a summons from the Illuminati. This call came from a location in Australia, but not Perth, where the Builders had caused so much damage.
The call came from a place called the Twelve Apostles, he discovered with a hint of irony. When he arrived, he saw what had prompted his associates.
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