The planet was illuminated by the spectral light of the ghostly sun. We were hovering above a stretch of ground that was regrowing pale green and white swathes of vegetation as great primal forms the size of small mountains rolled across the landscape, spilling native creatures long killed off by the presence of the Wraiths out of their bulk constantly as they moved along.
A normal version of the spell would have been much smaller and slower. These gigantic versions could do a hundred square miles a day... maybe cubic miles, I wasn’t really tracking what the one in the dying oceans was doing, although it was busy at work, too.
I watched the Silver Surfer frown as he sensed the environment. It was heavy with vivic residue, magic, and other forces, so he had to sift through them slowly to find the important stuff, just like me.
“This...” he murmured. “If there is a Seed here, it is... strange...” he murmured at last.
I nodded agreement as we drifted along. “Something Celestial, but not. Do they have an opposite number?”
His glowing eyes glittered with understanding. “I believe they do...”
I directed his eyes up towards the ghostly sun. “I can’t sense inside it.”
He stared at it for a full five minutes, sensing, and then slowly shook his head. “Neither can I. But there is... something...”
“I can’t really tell, but I think there’s something passively Aware of us in there, and it is watching this world.”
He returned his eyes to the planet below him. “A non-Celestial Seed?” he guessed. “And... there might be a Celestial hidden within the sun, watching it?”
“I don’t think either of us are old enough to know the truth of the matter.”
“This is true. I have only been serving the Master a couple of your centuries. It is literally an eyeblink of time to Him. He was born soon after the universe, and He is aware of more things than He could possibly convey to me...”
“So, a personal trip. If He can’t or doesn’t need to do anything, no skin off our nose. I’m just wondering if restoring the planet is worth it, given what lies below.”
“Master Lensherr could easily make a trip over here and perform the same service. But if the Master would not feed upon what is here...” The Surfer was not sure what might happen.
“Perhaps the Celestial concealed above might be interested, perhaps not.” If one was there, and if it was constrained by something, or not. Would mortals intervening change things?
“The creatures here bear no sign of Celestial tampering,” he pointed out, and earned a look from me. “No?”
“You look for signs of Celestial tampering?” I inquired.
“It is usually evident among many creatures who arise on worlds chosen by the Celestials. They perform great experiments on life, seeing what will rise and fall, and breed guardians and meals for the eventual birth of the Seed.”
I nodded slowly. “Do you routinely scan alien races for signs of such a heritage?” I asked leadingly.
“This... Celestial tampering is not normally as evident as it is among your people. The presence of so many extraordinary abilities among your kind is almost certainly caused by Celestial energies in your heritage.”
“Possibly. There is said to be a Celestial that died upon Terra during the very formation of the planet, and its energies have pervaded every atom and stone of it. It might be the reason why the planet is such a beacon for so much stuff.”
“That would indeed be a good explanation,” the Surfer agreed, still engaged in seeing if he could grasp anything of the elusive presences or energies around us. “I was not aware Terran technology could assay Celestial powers...”
“Oh, it can’t directly, but we can definitely draw parallels.” I let my fingers play a moment. “Hmm, I can probably incur two more debts from Galactus if I let go the locations of two more Celestial Seeds, including one that is pretty old, right?”
“That... is certainly possible,” Norrid Radd hedged cautiously.
“Mmm.” I looked off in a certain direction. “There are no Skrulls, only Skrull Deviants.”
He paused a moment in midflight, considering that. “I see...” he murmured at last.
“There are no Kree, only Kree Deviants.”
He twitched again, and sighed. “They also exterminated their Prime and Eternal counterparts?” he asked at last.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“There is exactly one Kree Eternal still alive. The last Skrull Eternal has become one of their two gods. The Prime subspecies of both has been completely wiped out, yes. Not even the genetic shadows of them remain.”
“Without the contrast between them, it is impossible to tell,” the Surfer slowly nodded. “Given the age of the Skrull Empire, Galactus has taken worlds under their purview before. To think their homeworld would be such a place...”
=============
Alas, that ours would be such a place as to steal mine own stories!
If you're not reading this on Royal Road, you're helping pay a thief. Please read it in its original home, it's still free! You get the foreword and afterword, author comments, and comments from people with questions! I have not given permission for this story to be copied by a bot and posted ANYWHERE ELSE.
=============
“It is interesting to consider how different they are from human Deviants. Human Deviants have a genetic structure that mutates with every generation. There is literally no heritage that passes on between generations, to the point that there is no inbreeding or incest possible between them. Yet, change is all they do. The race as a whole does not advance, although copious amounts of them gain abilities beyond Prime humans with every generation.
“Skrull Deviants gained their shapeshifting ability, and used it to infiltrate and destroy their rivals. It makes them ultimately adaptable, but without artificial genetic insertions or manipulations, they do not evolve at all, either.
“The Kree are superior baseline forms, clearly performing above merely biological limits... but that is where they are and remain, also never evolving without artificial genetic treatments. Their power, however, is when they interbreed with other races. They artificially enhance the genetics of the other race, and many of their hybrids are more powerful than either parent race.”
“That... is almost a gift that curses them to extinction by interbreeding with other races?” the Surfer considered thoughtfully.
“Hence why they are crazy proud of their bloodline purity, and especially protective of their women. The Pink Kree are mostly come from Kree men playing fast and loose with humanoid races, perhaps even including human slaves.”
“A sordid affair repeated endlessly throughout the cosmos,” the Surfer assured me, and I just nodded. It was what it was. Barbarism with laser pistols and starships. “Two worlds with literally galactic empires, and both with Seeds beneath our noses. You can see why we cover the universe searching for such Seeds...”
“I can, indeed. I have wondered why Galactus does not merely disseminate technology that senses the aura of Celestial Seeds, but that would probably just motivate the Celestials to destroy it and any race that used it, defeating the purpose. Galactus is quite aloof from mortals, save for the Feedings He does, but Celestials mess with us all the bloody time...”
“Mortal races would attempt to extort favors from Galactus and their rivals for revealing or concealing such information. Galactus does not involve Himself in politics. He goes about His task, and deals with threats at His level, nothing more,” the Surfer agreed. “As for the Celestials... they have their own morals and codes they live by, and they abide by little else, save more powerful members of their Hierarchy, to whom they give respect, if not obedience. I believe the Celestials are older than this incarnation of the universe...”
“Making them granddads to just about everything, yeah. Still doesn’t give them the right to mess with the kids as they deem fit, but they’ve got the power, so they use it.” I could only shrug. “I suppose it keeps them entertained over the eons. Since they can’t sit at the top, they attempt to make life more interesting...”
“Your Golden Hag sliced a Celestial in two. Your people have a foot very high on the rungs of the cosmic hierarchy!” he assured me.
“Doesn’t seem to stop idiots from going there, regardless.” I just shrugged. “We done here?”
He turned his head, senses expanding out through the system. “The other heavenly bodies in this system...”
“Yes. There are signs of a profound formation beyond my ability to conceptualize.” Ranks of a Skill meant something, after all. “Some idiot genius might be able to make the leap to understand what it is, but not why or how it works. But I’m no Savant, so I don’t understand it. Might be related to containing what’s there, concealing it, or involves what they were doing to the star, I don’t know.”
“I think my Master will find this place interesting...”
-------
The Worldship of Galactus hove to over the seething darkness of the Black Nebula. A moment later, the figure of the Eater of Worlds appeared outside of it.
At this distance, there was no concealing the Celestial power at work here. It was boiling and building, ready to come together and coalesce, birthing a new Celestial. It was only awaiting the final spark for this to happen.
A final spark... that was not going to come in time.
He could see the manipulation of Fate that was supposed to lead a suit of living armor, forged from a chip of Celestial Armor, here to catalyze the whole process. The subtle manipulation of Fate had escaped His attention before, but now He could see the careful ploys kept below His sight, the hands of the Celestials moving tirelessly as this Seed, of all those in Creation, neared culmination.
But now, He was here, and there was no need to worry about planets and stars and sentient populations. Such things were already dead or dying, waiting to be Consumed by a new Celestial about to rise.
It had been hundreds of millions of years since the last newly born Celestial had managed to escape His attention, and since then another had died forever to a greater force. Galactus entered the Black Nebula, and the seething energies, the nascent intellect born from igniting and consuming tens of billions of sapient beings, and the furnace of cosmic power that would be born from consuming an entire star, all began to gather and stir.
At first, it was the instinctive power of the Seed, so close to completion, trying to be born. But without that spark and model to follow of its progenitors, it did not have a path, and the aggrieved female Armor-wearer from a world cleansed by the Celestials was too far away, and could not be brought here in time. If a Celestial came directly, He would strike it down.
They had failed once again to increase their numbers. The power waiting to form a new life instead began to flow to Him!
Galactus the World-Eater opened His mouth and began to feed. This time, it was not the heart of a living world.
This time, an entire nebula was going to be devoured by Him, and a mystery of space vanish from the universe, just like that...