WHERE ANGELS FEAR TO TREAD - Mod Plot [Network post | 2]

[googledox]

Attention, Legion.

We've gathered intel and discussed plans. It's time for us to act. Please stand by for a full mission briefing.

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BRIEFING (Collected info)

[googledox]

Here's what we know:

At 14:35 this afternoon, the cosmic entity known as Galactus, native to the universe of several Legionnaires, came through the rift on Phelolu, the world where many of you dimensional displacees appeared. After destroying the Legion outpost in orbit and feeding on Phelolu's sun, he moved even farther into UP space, and is now on a direct intercept course with the planet Braal.

Galactus is a being that has existed before the known universe and is imbued with the power cosmic, reality-altering abilities that make him impossible to defeat with brute force. He is capable of feeding off of suns and planets, though his preference is worlds fill with living things, due to the abundant life energy. According to our teammate Richard Rider, Galactus appears to be from a time period when his appetite was considerably worse than usual, meaning there won't be months or years between feedings like we originally thought -- he will potentially have an urge to feed every few days.

Given the relative proximity of all UP member worlds, that means he could potentially destroy the entire UP in mere weeks or months.

He is served by two heralds that scout out planets for him to devour, The Silver Surfer and Stardust. Both hold only a fraction of his power but are still dangerously formidable. The former is encased in a metallic outer shell and the latter is a being made of pure energy. While the Surfer is an unwilling herald who has some regard for sentient life, Stardust believes being devoured by her Master is an honor and purposefully leads him to worlds inhabited by sentients. She will attempt to kill any sentients that try to evacuate Braal.

Galactus can travel through space and feed off worlds without it, but his ship is nevertheless a tool that aids him in doing both more easily. Once his ship's energy siphons hook into Braal and destabilize the core, there will be no way to save the planet. The compounded problems of Stardust potentially attacking evacuees and Braal being heavily overpopulated with Xanthan refugees mean that it would be impossible to evacuate the whole planet, leading to heavy casualties if Galactus manages to feed.

Due to their shared history, Richard asked for a chance to attempt appealing to the Silver Surfer before we pursued any of our potential plans, hoping to forestall any violence or casualties we might suffer. He...

[Here Brainy looks concerned.]

He's currently in critical condition, recovering in the Medbay. However, the injuries were...selective. The Surfer could've killed him instantly, instead he caused exactly enough damage to prevent Rider from participating in our endeavors, presumably so that the Surfer won't have to face him in combat. The Surfer also apparently tapped into our comms system using the power cosmic to contact the medicos in the Medbay. He claimed that Richard was a friend and they they shouldn't disappoint him by allowing him to die. Trying to get Stardust out of the way so the Surfer can make unilateral decisions as Galactus' sole herald, and using the Surfer to influence Galactus' movements, is still not out of the question as a viable tactic.

Currently, the UP is in a panic and because of this, the UP Council has made the fatal decision of sending the UP military in a direct confrontation with Galactus, an act that almost certainly guarantees their deaths.

On Braal, we're also getting reports from the Science Police that something is causing civilians to randomly attack each other. These civilians are displaying supernatural abilities that are not endemic to their species. They believe that this may be because of some kind of opportunistic psionic attack by a party or parties unknown.

If any of you have any further questions, now's the time to ask. Rider gave us all the information he could think of before his confrontation with the Silver Surfer left him incapacitated.

[headinjuries]

He's gonna be okay, right?

[googledox]

[Brainy presses his lips together in a taut line at first.]

Dr. Gym'll says they managed to successfully reconstruct his lung. They're currently monitoring him for any complications such as clots or emboli, but his vital signs are fairly stable.

Provided there are no major complications over the next 24 hours, he should be fine.

[headinjuries]

[ "Complications" is such an ominous word.

But right now, Sam really needs to hear something good, so he's electing to ignore that part. ]

Okay. Thanks.

[whyarewehere]

Just a friendly PSA:

Rich Rider is an idiot and I told him so.

[ringslinging]

It was stupid, but I've seen worse plans work. I can't blame him for trying.

[ Hal: also the kind of idiot who would take that chance. ]

[whyarewehere]

Do I need to yell at you too?

You guys really, really need my advice around here.

[sir_vancelot]

[There's a brief, pained look on Vance's face as he hears the information on Rich's injuries. Brief because he can't allow himself to dwell at the moment. Which doesn't stop him from muttering a heartfelt, "Damn it, Rich," under his breath before actually turning his mind to the matter at hand.]

[Compartmentalize. Deal with what's in front of him and get back to the rest of it when he has the luxury of time.]

It wasn't the worst plan I've ever heard.

[googledox]

It was ultimately his decision. He was the best judge of whether or not his relationship with the Silver Surfer would be enough to sway him.

Unfortunately, his assessment of the situation proved incorrect, but it's understandable why he'd make the attempt.

[sir_vancelot]

No, no. I understand why he made the attempt. In his place, with the information I had at hand, I'd have done the same thing.

[There's a reason why Vance still considers Rich one of his two best friends, even after the man's death in his own world.]

That's not going to stop me from chewing him out for leaving himself that flatfooted. Especially with his powers at their current level.

[fourstars]

[ The more he hears about this, the more he's reminded of Cell. And that comparison makes Gohan's features tighten, his lips pressing together into a taut line. ]

... What do we know about Stardust.

[googledox]

She is a being known as an Ethereal with similar superstrength, durability, reality manipulation, and energy projection like the Surfer. She holds enough power to hold off an entire fleet.

Her nature of being made of energy means that her material form cannot be truly destroyed. It will simply reform when her physical form gets disrupted. However, we may be able to trap her while she's disrupted into energy, and disrupting her form will at least remove her as a variable for a time. Directing her to be in the way of the sun cannon's attack may successfully disrupt her form if our individual attacks don't manage to.

Physical force seems to have limited efficacy when used against her. Richard said she's more vulnerable to energy attacks.

[deafleppard]

There is so much that's wrong with what you just that I don't even know where to start.

[googledox]

You may want to pick an entry point soon if you have any questions. Unfortunately, we don't have much time.

THE PLAN

[googledox]

I'm currently the only member of the team with enough functional knowledge to create such technology, and I believe that displacing Galactus to another universe using technological means is...currently beyond my capacity.

[Maybe in the past he would've tried it but not after accidentally displacing most of the team. It's not something he wants to risk trying again.]

We believe the most viable plan that arose in our discussions is potentially using the magical being known as the Spectre to displace Galactus from our universe.

The plan is as follows.

Dreamer will coordinate our efforts in the Mission Monitor room. Timber Wolf and Karate Kid are heading to Earth to appeal to the UP Council to recall the military. We believe this effort will be futile, but we have to at least make the attempt. Gates will be on standby for any emergency teleport requests for all teams.

As for the rest of us, we'll split into several teams:

Alpha Team, compromised of Kid Quantum, Bouncing Boy, Ferro, Umbra, Matter-Eater Lad, and myself will construct and defend a threshold gate cannon near Braal's sun that can direct its solar energy at Galactus. This is almost guaranteed to come under direct fire from Galactus himself, so it's likely that we'll only be able to get one or two blasts in before it's destroyed. However, this should be enough to damage Galactus' ship and forestall his destruction of Braal. This will buy the other teams more time.

Beta Team will confront and destroy Stardust, then collect her energies with two handheld threshold devices that will send them to containment units in two separate star systems, so that even if she breaks free of the units she can't easily reform. If possible, this team should attempt to get Stardust off the surface of Braal into an intercept position in orbit so that one of the sun cannon blasts directed towards Galactus' ship also hits her.

Gamma team will directly intercept the UP military fleet and infiltrate the ship with the general in charge of their mission and use any nonfatal means necessary to delay their attempt to attack Galactus head on.

Thanks to our allies on Sorcerer's World, we have a lead on potentially freeing a cosmic being native to this universe known as the Spectre that has the power to remove Galactus from this universe. Delta Team will follow this lead and attempt to free and appeal to the Spectre to come to our aid. They must also attempt to find out how he was contained in the first place so that we have a means to trap him again after our endeavors.

Team Epsilon will fight the Silver Surfer and prevent him from interfering in the fight against his co-herald Stardust. If she can be defeated, Epsilon will have to try to appeal to him to move Galactus away from Braal. Whether this is to redirect him to a world without sentient life or into a trap where he'll be faced with the Spectre depends on if Delta Team's efforts are successful. Epsilon will be given coordinates for both eventualities.

Team Zeta will be given psionic-blocking devices and investigate whatever is causing Braalian civilians to display unknown preternatural abilities and attack each other.

We have only a brief time to discuss any adjustments to the plan. Mission assignments will handed out momentarily.

[fourstars]

[ Something about this is both confusing and unsettling Gohan. ]

... Are we sure releasing the Spectre is such a good idea? I don't know anything about him, but... based on what I've heard, he didn't seem any better than Galactus.

[ringslinging]

The Spectre's merciless, but he works on a much smaller scale. Vengeance on the individual level, not targeting entire planets.

I'm not saying he can't be a problem, but he doesn't really operate as a force of mass destruction even if he has the potential to.

[sir_vancelot]

I know that we don't have a lot of options here, but I'd like to point out that, as destructive as he is, Galactus actually does serve a purpose. He's...basically a storage battery that's meant to kick off the next Big Bang at the end of our universe. From what I understand, even he hates what he is and what he does, but that doesn't change the fact that he has to do it.

On the other hand, given that, he may well be glad of the Spectre's judgment.

[whyarewehere]

This doesn't make us any less screwed.

[googledox]

The hope, albeit one that's very...thin, is that the two entities being similar in power levels will lead to the Spectre simply displacing Galactus from our universe.

[deafleppard]

See, that would be easier for me to believe if it wasn't for that first impression he made just now.

You kind of don't come back from that.

[notwithoutafight]

Who says our universe has to end? It sounds like if we don't get rid of Galactus that he's going to be the reason the universe ends.

[notwithoutafight]

I'm not hearing anything here that sounds like a permanent solution against Galactus. And if our timetable has changed from months to days, then we really need some more ideas here.

[kingtyrantranger]

He just ate a star. I don't think enough gun exists to do anything permanent.

[googledox]

I don't know that there is a permanent solution. At least not with the resources we have.

Using what resources we have to displace him from this universe may be the best we can hope for.

All that said, we should attempt to achieve the best possible outcome that we can. If we can convince the Spectre to displace Galactus into another universe where he can cause no harm to sentients...