“So, a Doom.”

Briggs’ voice was both grim and resigned as he shook his head. He sighed heavily, cleared his thoughts, and refocused on Sama and me. “Describe what you think he is planning.”

“Owen Reece is with him, and so they are totally capable of making up another world out of nothingness after the last reality crashes and is destroyed. To stop him, the Beyonders will have to come out in person to do so. He has been amassing power from dead Owen Reeces, so they will sense at least some of the potential power and know it is a threat they cannot handle as individuals. Moment of triumph thinking and all, they’ll come, and he’ll detonate the bomb right in the middle of them, killing them all.”

“And what happens next becomes very important,” Sama murmured. “This is Doom, after all.”

“I assumed he would try to capture as much energy from the Beyonders as possible and use it for himself. However, there is no way a human body could contain that energy. During the Secret War with the Beyonder back then, Galactus prepped Doom’s body in advance with attuned cosmic energy. Taking in the Beyonder power was simply a step up the scale. But taking in multiples of that?”

“Owen Reece could do it. Molecule Men are basically proto-Beyonders,” Sama pointed out. “Let’s assume Reece takes in the needed power. What then?”

“If it were one of us, we would rebuild the universes with that power.” Briggs indicated the star-filled cube hanging at his side, already full of one Beyonder’s energy. “But that is not the way of Doom.”

“He will steal the energy and seize power. The 616 Doom has a very long track record of attempting to do that to cosmic beings,” Sama declared. “Reece does not have the mental capabilities to really do anything, lacking imagination, determination, and sufficient control and empathy. However, he could certainly grant the power to Doom to do as he pleased.”

“That Doom has already set himself up as a god to his followers, who believe he is responsible for the Incursions and thus all-powerful. When he actually is, it will doubtless go right to his head,” Briggs agreed sadly. “He will attempt to make a kingdom of sorts for himself, with himself as monarch and god thereof, likely for humans only, caring nothing for the quintillions and more other races who have perished in this disaster. Those who oppose him will die or be transformed into something useful, as he will tolerate no dissenters whatsoever.”

“I understand King Thor is preventing panicked gods from trying to emigrate to our dimension?” I asked carefully.

“Yeah, they are fleeing their dooms to any universe they can. Thor, Hercules, Perrun, and others are holding the doors they seek to come through. Even the other Skyfathers are getting involved, not wanting to be overrun by power-hungry alien pantheons,” Sama nodded toothily. I knew where she had been spending her time. “They will hold. They have a strong center of faith behind them, and mortal gifts worthy of gods.”

Rune King Thor had carved the Rune that Named his Shield into it himself. He had named it þórr, standing for Thunder in all its aspects, including heart, courage, power, and defiance!

“Their power wanes the instant their universe dies. They must come here and immediately form a core of faith in order to survive, thus their desperation. The best way to do so is naturally fear and slaughter of all who do not bow in worship to them.” Sama’s smile was even more cheerful. “The other way is total brainwashing of mortal hearts and souls. It is a cleansing experience to get rid of such beings!”

“Everybody has to stay busy with something,” I opined, scarcely about to judge her for god-killing. “What are we going to do about Doom? Someone who can wield the power of multiple Beyonders and has a fanatical need to be the unchallenged alpha is not someone we want to put up with.”

“That is actually not as difficult as it seems, largely because of who he is working with. Doom is naturally limited by Owen Reece. Doom has the skill and control, but his need for domination constrains his empathy and imagination. Reece has only power. You need only limit Reece’s ability to perceive, and Doom can be isolated from the rest of the Multiverse and not even realize it,” Briggs said calmly.

“Isolate him from the rest of the multiverse.” I smiled despite myself. “And how do you propose we do that?” I asked archly. “Stuff Uncle Ben full of Beyonder-juice?”

“That will be part of it, yes,” Briggs agreed, which, I thought, wasn’t a bad idea. “Also, he wants May to be his equal, not his dependent. This is a good chance to make that possible.”

That was also true. “But this goes further. You have a means to harvest the power of the dead Beyonders?”

Briggs just gestured at the Cube at his side. “I already have a direct conduit to Eternity, and knowledge of something. The Cosmos has been through six complete universal cycles, and is in the middle of its Seventh. The Beyonders were created by the Celestials back in the Second Cosmos, which had few universal laws and only lasted a scattering of millennia. The Beyonders want to destroy the multiverse because they are becoming more and more constrained with every iteration of the Cosmos that comes along.

“But the fact remains that their power and strength comes from the Second Cosmos, where they were created. Eternity is the Seventh Cosmos, and can absorb all their energy without any difficulty, simply needing a convenient conduit to do so.”

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

“Oh ho!” I leaned forwards. “The Great Bear has a very big mouth, I noticed.”

Briggs put on a big, cheerful smile. “So it does, so it does!”

“How are you going to kill the ones left behind in Beyond?” I asked Sama, knowing she’d be the one to do the deed.

“I’m a Null. I bring the constraints of Reality with me. Amplify that infinitely...”

She was showing all eight canines, her eyes alight with killing intent. Ding, ting!, Tremble contributed at the right moment.

The ones left behind might not be the ones who wanted to kill the multiverse, but they’d stood aside as the others acted, and might even want to defend or avenge them. There was no logical reason to let them live, and as another bit of goddamn Celestial stupidity, they should have died with the Second Cosmos and stayed that way.

They were going to fucking die, and have no idea how or why. It was only appropriate.

“What do you need from me?”

“Doom can only grab the power that’s coming in his direction. Reece will be much too busy absorbing and trying to contain it to reach out and grab more of it. Let him grab his little dribbles in his tiny little vector. I want all the rest,” Briggs stated firmly.

“If there was ever a moment for Underweb Casting, that’ll be it,” I had to say, imagining the sheer scope of what I was going to have to raise up out of the ravaged Underweb.

“I’d advise piggybacking on your own energy absorption powers into the Pocket, and using that as a filter. I think we can make a ‘white hole’ equivalent in the Great Bear, and simply start filling things up there.

“Once the process is complete, we’ll have more than enough power to rebuild the multiverse and simply isolate whatever Doom does in its own little pocket of chaos void he can’t see past. He’ll delude himself into thinking he’s all that’s left of the Cosmos while we go about rebuilding properly from up in the Infinity Abyss.”

“What if someone capable of doing a rebuild gets hold of the power?” Sama asked thoughtfully.

“By that time Eternity should be fully re-established and can simply delude them into thinking they are rebuilding what is already there. They will probably think they are building a whole new Cosmos instead of just rejoining the Seventh once again,” Sama sniffed.

“You realize that is probably going to make 1832 the Prime Timeline of the multiverse, right?” I asked them archly. “I’m not sure what comes with the status, but I’m sure it’ll mean something.”

“Everything has to start somewhere,” Briggs said fatalistically. “I’m sure all those Uni-minds are patient, but they still want their homes back.”

“Truth,” I sighed. “Oh, and I visited our Owen Reece, too.” I pulled a sparkling fifty-seven-sided polyhedron the size of an egg out of my thigh pocket and plopped it down in front of them. “Shifted his mind over into a new body, he doesn’t even know he’s a totally new person. Doom and Reece don’t even have to murder the alternate Reeces to take their bodies, just shift their minds into a new one and use the body as a casing.” I shook my head as Briggs reached forward and picked up the Hedron.

Expediency, the same way they didn’t bother trying to save any worlds. The multiverse had to die, was going to die, and killing the Beyonders was all they were focused on.

“This could destroy the whole universe,” Briggs rumbled under his breath as he examined it, and his scowl began to deepen, muscles rippling along his thick neck. He turned his eyes to the ceiling, and took a deep breath. “Our Celestials haven’t gone to war with the Beyonders yet, have they?” he asked grimly.

“For some odd reason, our timeline is beneath their notice at the moment, perhaps because it is so oddly incomplete. If they aren’t looking at it closely, they probably keep thinking it’s almost ready to collapse at any second, instead of plodding forwards one second at a time.” I shrugged.

“I really want all of them to just die. Thank you for shattering the First Cosmos and creating the multiverse, now piss off!” he growled, shaking his big fist at nothing.

“You must have been talking to Eternity,” Sama grinned, wagging her finger at him.

“He’s been very informative about certain things, even downright chatty after the Incursions started,” Briggs nodded slowly. “While the Celestials doubtless have their uses, they are independent of the cosmos, and totally willing to drain it down to create more of their own. Eternity said they justify what they do by claiming more of the Void with each Cosmos’ rebirth, so the Cosmos grows, regardless of what they take out of it.”

“I’m sure the Void loves them for it, too,” Sama chirped tellingly. “What with it coming in to end the multiverses again and again!”

“Only one Celestial needs to survive to revive all the rest, so killing them all is nigh-impossible. They just go hide outside the multiverse somewhere and work on bringing back their slain kin. There aren’t many beings who can actually kill them permanently, Galactus being foremost among them, because that’s actually one of his main jobs,” Briggs noted.

“If you can eat the eggs, you can eat the egg-layer?” I quipped.

“Exactly,” Briggs nodded. “Pity we couldn’t off a few of them during this disaster...”

“It only takes one Beyonder to wipe bunches of them. Making them not come back should not be that difficult for either of you, and if a Beyonder comes into this space, Sama can kill it, right?”

“If they came into this universe, I’d hand Sama the other Stones and she could kill them all,” Briggs declared matter-of-factly. “They are created beings, they haven’t evolved an inch since they were made. They can’t overcome her Null as it stands right now, which means it comes down to strength and skill... and they don’t really have any skill in personal combat, as opposed to throwing suns around at one another.”

I was suddenly hugely unworried about what was going to happen to Sama when she went walking into Beyond. “So the only thing preventing you from marching up to Beyond is them countering your sources of infinite power and thus your reach?” I asked of her.

Sama nodded shortly. “If there were hundreds of them, all I could do is get off maybe one stroke and run. But if there’s only a handful, they aren’t going to know what’s going on before they are all dead. After all, they can’t sense me coming, or any timeline tied to me.”

“I feel so bad for them.” Any area she entered became her area as a Null, so they wouldn’t sense her arriving, either. “How are you going to harvest their energy?” I asked brightly.

“I’ll collapse the Beyond down and Kubik will shuffle the energy back into Eternity where it belongs.” Her Cosmic Cube swung over from where it dangled on a chain under her long, dark hair.

It wasn’t like he was going to say no, I had to agree. He might be a baby Beyonder, but he would die if reality collapsed here, too. Loyalty among relatives didn’t seem to be very high in the family Beyond.