There were four of them. They stood in a place beyond existence, beyond matter, beyond time and space. They watched the two spheres glow red and blue, the light illuminating their strange colors. Silence filled the vast emptiness as they marveled at everything that happened, happens, and will happen within.
“So, are we starting?” the man in red asked. He looked at the most powerful beings in each publishing companies, grinning under the mask. “It’s better if we start now in this page or this panel or this scene before the audience gets bored.”
“With that mouth of yours? We’d be lucky if they didn’t just drop this entirely.” The man in blue sneered at his colleague. He cannot fathom how he got sucked back into this after his resolution. But he guessed that if there was anything more profitable than bringing dead heroes back to life or bringing the paragons of good down a spiral of evil it’s returning characters to square one.
“We shall proceed,” said the woman with a celestial voice. The darkness swallows most of her visage. Only the stars dictate the outline of body.
The golden man nodded in agreement.
“Would you do the honors?” The man in red pushed his company. “Just one good smack like you did with that over-milked clown.”
His companion gulped as he loomed over the multiverses. He has done it before. Countless times even. But it isn’t easy this time around. He wasn’t just breaking it, he was trying to break it into specific pieces that would match. For the first time since breaking out that god-forsaken prison outside of time, he felt his fist waver with fear.
“Do it, do it, do it,” said his companion.
“Shut up! I’m focusing!”
Do it, do it, do it, do it—smash! With a strike, the yellow panels cramping his space shattered in a million pieces. He looked at his companion with glowing red eyes, warning him not to do it again.
As always, he promised, the panels saying more words than the blue man wanted to read. He gave two more hits before focusing back on the spheres. He took a slow deep breath of nothing, positioned his arms, clenched his fists, and punched.
For a second, nothing happened. Then an audible crack. the faintest tear from an inexistent point. It grew larger, larger, until it enveloped both spheres. Quadrillions of life forms screamed and shouted and prayed and panicked and tried the best they could to save their loved ones, to save their friends, to save themselves—but they were all fruitless. They could do nothing but stare at the massive cracks webbing their skies, webbing the very fabric of existence like glass. None of their smartest minds, nor their greatest strengths, nor their greatest protector can reach the boundless space in which the four masterminds kept their actions in.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
“It is our turn now,” said the woman.
Both the dark owner of her multiverse and the bright owner of his multiverse raised their arms. Their energies and powers swirled and kept everything from dying, from breaking further apart. It took great effort to exert their seemingly endless power to the most minute particle all across their multiverse—to their strangest and to their darkest. It was unbearable. They were stretching themselves too thin.
The man in red rubbed his hands together in glee. “Oh, boy do I want to see this made again since 1976 and 1996. Are you sure we won’t get sued?”
“Just hurry it up! They won’t get us here.”
“Alright then.” Fingers formed claws, carefully placing each piece in a specific part of the puzzle. This was a job only a madman can do, and he’s that specific madman. His inner voices dictated which part became which and which one to discard.
“Time-travel,” another batch of voices said.
“Alternate realities to weed out other versions of one character,” another said.
“Now, just to warn you all, there won’t exactly be a 1-1 copy in this work. And there’s so many characters I won’t be able to exactly add them all, but here it goes.” He placed the final pieces of the multiverses in one massive and glowing sphere.
The interchanging energies between the golden man and the dark woman merged the pieces in a smooth, glowing globe. It was flawless. Each part found an anchor. The man in blue had doubts this plan would work. There were so many things that could go wrong. Pushbacks, legal issues, even the goddamn incompetency of whoever set these things in motion, but as he stared at the mish mash things in this duo-verse, he can’t help but be filled with a childish wonder. It was the same feeling he had when he met his hero back in 1985. But this was more. So much more.
The energies died down. They marveled at the scene before them.
“There are many things I have known since time immemorial, but this seems to be so different that I cannot see what it will come to.”
The golden man nodded along his co-conspirator.
“Can we go there?” asked the boy.
“We sure can buddy!”
“I can’t wait.” A sad smile etched his face. This wondrous occurrence happened rarely, but it seems this time, he can experience it too. A new world full of heroes and villains and events never before seen or heard, something different but something familiar.
“Ready, buddy?” The red man suited up with everything he could suit up in his boundless collection. Two swords slid down his back. Two guns holstered to his waist. Two cheers from the panels next to his head, and a 360-degree snap of his head and he was ready.
“Sure.” His feet levitated from the ground. His heart filled with energy and yellow solar radiation. “Get ready, duo-verse, cos’ we’re coming down.” They both descended in a way that fit their characters. Everything whizzes past them. The panels turns black. To be continued.