The group looked at the beaten form of Ikaris, bound in magic and strapped to a rock before taking their seats once more on the ground.
"Do you have any idea what fate you are dooming this planet if you continue with what you are doing?" Ikaris yelled in anger and frustration as he saw them bickering amongst themselves.
He had rushed here after Ajax reached out to him in panic that she had felt something happening with the Celestial seed they were tasked with safekeeping.
The others might be blissfully unaware of their true mission but he knew. While they fought amongst themselves due to the pettiness and primitive actions of the humans, he alone focused on his objective – even more so than the Prime Eternal herself.
He could not afford to fail in his mission.. He could not afford to fail Arishem.
"If you think you can stop the emergence of the Celestial, I can assure you that Arishem won't hesitate to reduce this planet to rubbles." Seeing as they were not willing to listen, he tried playing into their fears of the unknown but they still didn't budge.
It was times like these that made him angry about the decisions of his brothers and sisters. Easily distracted and chasing after a life they could never have, they completely forgot the mission that they were made known to, choosing to live as humans even though they clearly knew they will never fit in their society. A façade was called that because you can't wear it forever.
He even wondered when the humans had grown this strong, or rather the new deviant race they called metahumans.
If he had his brothers with him, defeating the woman would be a very easy thing to do but then again there were four others, especially the white haired woman. His skin crawled every time he looked her way.
"I think he's checking Ororo out." He heard the whisper of the youngest of the group and while he would never admit it to anyone, not even to Arishem himself, but the moment her blue eyes fell on him, his heart skipped a beat… in fear.
"That was a tasteless joke, Yelena." Ororo said, not particularly offended by the younger girl's words but not exactly flattered by it.
"Oh come on. His reaction was golden. I think he's scared of you and you haven't even done a thing." Yelena prodded the Goddess' side until she cracked a smile.
"Do we have any idea what's supposed to happen during the process?" Steve asked as he gazed at the waves while trying his best to sense anything that was happening under the surface.
"It's Draul. What do you expect?" Was all Bucky said.
While they made light conversations between themselves, Ikaris was left to wonder how he was beaten so quickly by a woman who wasn't even 1/100th his age.
…
[Draul St. Cross POV]
"So you are trying to say that the Infinity Stones are more than just building blocks of creation and there are ways in which I can tap into the power of not one, but all Infinity Stones?" I looked at little T and I got the impression that he was shrugging. "You fucking with me, ain'tcha?"
The way the gold of his eyes dimmed made me think he was rather offended by that comment. "I see no reason to lie to you."
"The fuck you mean you see no reason to lie to me? What you are telling me is basically a cheat code to the multiverse. Why do you expect me to believe that you'll just tell me something like that except if you're just buggin'?" I was half the mind to knock some sense into the Celestial in front of me because he had no flair for tact.
"Just like everything else, all things are connected to one another, variant counterparts and alternatives, in the multiverse. If this is true like you know it is, why do you then doubt my words of the Infinity Stones being connected to one another? Normally such a thing would not be feasible to anyone but you managed to do something, that while simple, no one else had done – siphoning the power out of the Infinity Stones and using it to fuel your own. This way, the caveat of you not having the power of the stones in another universe is rendered useless and with it being so, you can find the connection with all the stones, imprinting yourself in all universes of the cosmos." The more he spoke the more surprised I became because I had thought that since I didn't have any disadvantage of the stones, going to another universe and taking their own was useless since I've already absorbed it and since Infinity was Infinity, there was no way to add onto it but Tiamut just flipped all that.
"And don't you think you telling me that might cause untold destruction to the cosmos? You don't know the kind of person I am after all."
"…That is true, but nevertheless, the aim of us Celestials is to ensure that mortals can continuously evolve as we do and someday reach us on the same plane. We promote, we promote advancement. Me telling you this is in a way telling you the obvious because if we had fought and you left here alive, I no doubt would be severely weakened and you will siphon a lot of my energy which will also further delay my emergence and doing that might give you a glimpse of the truth you are seeking. It's also entirely possible that you will easily come to the same conclusion should you visit another universe." Tiamut spoke with such an even tone that I had no idea if he was joking, teasing or downright serious. Sure, I wouldn't deny his words as it was entirely plausible but telling me straight to my face ought not to be a thing a Celestial would do. Or is it that my perception of them is so skewed or Tiamut is just different?
"You really know how to talk, don't you? Well then, I think it's pretty much established that I, unfortunately, won't be eating you. So what now?"
He tilted his gigantic head to one side in incomprehension. "I don't understand."
"I'm talking about your emergence. It's already established that I can't leave you in here to grow and destroy the planet anytime your lazy ass decides to wake up, now can I?"
He fell silent at my words, his four eyes dimming quite a bit, as he seemingly pondered on his choices of which there were only two; One was he dies and I absorbs him or the second being I find a way to remove his seed from the planet and put it in another.
"I see. I think this perfectly depicts the saying of your people about being stuck between a rock and a hard place. It was quite the hard decision to make as I would have loved to see the universe in its beauty… but I can't sacrifice the life of the people here to do that. I think I will be willing to have you 'eat' me."
Damn. This is the first time I've ever seen a guy so chill about dying apart from me. "Hey, you won't be against me sticking your seed in a zombie apocalyptic world will you?"
The way his eyes glowed made me chuckle as I was beginning to read this Celestial like a book. "I'm sure there's an abundance of fallen universes out there that won't be missed if you destroyed a planet or two whenever you decide to wake up. It might take a little while but all you need to do is chill in here for a sec until I find them."
I was a son of a bitch but I wasn't a monster. Sure if it doesn't work out then I might come back and just snack on Tiamut, The Buffet Celestial, but if it does then I don't see a reason to kill him when it is entirely possible that I might even be way stronger than him when my test is over. And besides there is always a Dormammu if I ever get hungry.
"That… is a very appealing proposal. I look forward to it."
"Yeah, you do that while I run some errands. See you later, T."
I disappeared from Tiamut's hand that I've been sitting on since we started talking and left the giant Celestial to himself.
"T?"
…
I opened my eyes and took in the view of nothingness before me since I was incorporeal and ascended to the top.
I appeared before the rest and it was Ororo who was the first to notice.
"You're still the same. Did something go wrong?" She asked in concern but I waved it off.
"On the contrary, something might be about to go a hell lot of right. I had a talk with Tiamut and he kind of straightened some of my misconceptions." I then explained what happened to me while I was under and the conclusion we both came to. I also conveniently ignored the person bound and gagged on the floor with a red face as if he was trying to scream for help.
"So what are we going to do now?"
I couldn't help the smile that spread through my lips at Bucky's question. "We're going to another universe, people."
The others were stunned at the conclusion except…
"Yes!!!" Yelena jumped and gave me a high five and making me laugh a bit at her enthusiasm. At least she knew how to react accordingly.
"Come on, don't just stand there. We're going to another universe so why are you guys looking dull." I mean how could they not be thrilled at the prospect of going to another universe, even I was and I was literally six Infinity Stones.
"Not all of us can afford to be as hyper as Yelena or as carefree as you so this is the only reaction we can go with." Was all Steve said as he picked himself up before pointing to the bound dude. "What are we to do with him?"
I looked at Natasha, the one who probably did it, and shrugged. "Don't care what you do to him."
Natasha looked at him and just waved away with dismissal, not even giving the guy any of her attention. "Well let's go. We're on a lock aren't we?"
I nodded and willed my power of space along with opening my eyes to look at all the infinite intersections that passed through this universe. I picked the one that was somehow familiar with ours since the changes there shouldn't be too outrageous and punched a hole through space that shattered the barrier between the two universes.
…
"Uhm guys? Where the fuck are we?" We appeared in the same spot we stepped out of but I was quick to notice the difference; one being that the bounded Ikaris was nowhere to be found and two came to me when I swept my senses over the planet.
"Uhm.. I think I know where we are." I was speechless when everything started playing in my head.
The first thing that caught my attention was the lack of mutants in this universe's Earth but that wasn't the only thing.
It looks like it might have worked on my intent too much that what was currently playing through my mind were the events of the Infinity War movie. The time was even different from ours since they were like a decade from ours.
My lips curled into a full blown grin as I saw Vision fall down in Wakanda as his Mind Stone reacted rather violently to me.
Further expanding my senses, I caught sight of Thanos' ship on its way towards Earth.
"Oh you guys are for sure going to love this." Before they could even ask me what I meant, I warped us towards the great stage of the ages.