After Galactus came back to life, he was terribly weak. Nearly all the life energy in his body had been siphoned away by Jormungand. Fortunately, his fundamental essence was still intact. He just had to start over from the beginning. Given a few billion years, he would recover his full strength. For him, and for the universe, that was barely more than a nap.
Galactus was preparing to take his daughter and granddaughter back to his cosmic fortress.
"Come home with your father, my Galacta."
He sounded like a successful father returning after years away, ready to bring his long-lost child home and give her an easy life.
Gally hesitated, then turned to look at Skyl. The young wizard stood by the window, gazing out at the lawn in the yard, with no interest in taking part in the father-daughter conversation.
"I think I'll stay here, Dad."
Gally did not feel all that close to Galactus. Strictly speaking, they were not related by blood anyway. Their bond had begun as something closer to parasitism.
Galactus noticed where she was looking. "What, do you like that wizard?"
Gally's eyes were clear and open. "Skyl is the best. And he's always by himself. I want to go see the world with him."
"But your father is alone too."
"You can stay here and live with us."
"How could I stay in a tiny little box like Earth?" Galactus said with disdain. "Little Gally, you need to understand. Our lives are long. Only the stars can truly keep us company. When Earth is swallowed by its red giant, we will still be here. One day, you'll understand that earthly attachments are meaningless."
"I don't care."
Galactus gave her a strange, indulgent smile. "All right. My daughter's grown up."
Then he asked Jormungand whether she wanted to go home with her grandfather. The little serpent only shook her head and refused to leave her mother.
"What a shame." Galactus sighed helplessly. "Then I'll be going alone. Come visit me when you have time."
He walked over to Skyl and nodded. "You're a remarkable man. Leaving little Gally with you puts my mind at ease. Take good care of my girls."
"They don't need my protection," Skyl said flatly. "And I'm just a drifter. I'm not really capable of taking care of anyone."
Galactus spoke to him earnestly. "If you ever want to settle down, contact me. I'm modestly well-off. I command over ten thousand starships, own one stellar fortress, have two hundred billion credits, and hold title to six thousand four hundred seventy-seven habitable planets. As long as you agree to look after little Gally, when I die, all of it will be yours."
Skyl almost lost it. What was this, some cosmic son-in-law recruitment pitch?
"With your lifespan, Lord Galactus, I'm pretty sure I'd never live long enough to inherit any of that. Not even by the end of the universe."
Galactus chuckled. "So you saw right through me. Fine then. We got off on the wrong foot, but now we know each other. Stay in touch."
Skyl casually took out a phone and handed it over. "Add me."
Galactus was not used to Earth's backward technology. He fumbled with it for quite a while, like an older man trying to figure out a new device.
Skyl helped him register an account on the Tower of Tomes' internal social app. Galactus's contacts list was completely empty. But the moment he and Skyl added each other, the system automatically pushed a new suggestion.
[People You May Know: I Am Eternity]
The profile picture for I Am Eternity was a Möbius strip.
Galactus froze for a second. "Who is this? Some arrogant wizard? I know a god named Eternity, and only that being deserves a name like this."
"Oh, that is Eternity. We're both on your mutuals list, so the app suggested him automatically."
Galactus sucked in a breath. "Who else do you know? Infinity? Death? Oblivion?"
Skyl waved a hand. "I'm not very familiar with this world. Besides Lord Galactus and Lord Eternity, I only know OAA."
Galactus went completely stiff.
"You okay?"
"O, OAA?! You have to be joking. That's just a legend. There is no god like OAA." Galactus looked at Skyl as if he had to be running some kind of insane con. "Unless you send me that contact right now, don't make me beg."
Now he had finally shown his hand.
Skyl only smiled and said nothing.
"You really know OAA? No way..."
Galactus muttered to himself. He was starting to regret saying he would leave. But a man had to stand by his word. Even if his insides were already twisted in regret, he still forced himself to look calm and breezy. That was what it meant to be a man. Even if the universe exploded, his mouth would still come out unscathed.
"I'm leaving. Don't miss me too much."
"Bye, Dad."
"Bye, Grandpa."
"Safe travels, Lord Galactus."
Galactus strode out the door and flicked a finger, firing a tiny beam of light into deep space as a signal.
Not long after, a silver meteor came streaking across the sky, dragging a pale gray tail through the clear heavens before dropping into the yard in an instant.
The cosmic energy shield around it scattered into a burst of cold wind, revealing a silver figure inside. He stood atop a silver board. It was Galactus's herald, the Silver Surfer.
"My lord." The Silver Surfer could not help taking a second look when he saw Galactus. "Have you lost weight?"
Galactus was speechless. "Next time you get a checkup, book an eye exam too."
He stepped onto the board. The Silver Surfer shouted for him to hold steady, and the two of them turned back into a meteor, shooting into the sky. In the blink of an eye, they had blown past solar-system escape velocity, then slipped into a spatial jump point and vanished into the depths of the cosmos.
After seeing Galactus off, Skyl got a phone call. It was Nick Fury.
"Wizard kid, you're back in New York?" The director of S.H.I.E.L.D. was still impressively well-informed. "Tell me what happened to Kingpin. My head's all messed up. I remember him being a villain, so how the hell did he turn into a lawyer?"
Skyl did not answer the question. Instead, he asked, "Is the Tesseract ready?"
"Of course." Nick told Skyl to meet him at the usual spot.
The so-called usual spot was really just a food truck stand.
The handoff went smoothly. Nick asked Skyl several questions in an unusually solemn tone to confirm his identity before finally taking out a briefcase. When he opened it, the Tesseract was revealed inside.
It was a blue cube, full of rich, flowing spatial energy. The radiation rolling off it made the skin tingle faintly.
Fortunately, it was not harmful ionizing radiation. Otherwise, the Tesseract would have been basically equivalent to a dirty bomb.
Skyl picked it up and played with it for a while.
Nick spoke in a grave tone. "Take it and go stop this damn disaster. I trust you, because you're a wizard who can make miracles happen."
Skyl answered casually, "That disaster? I already took care of it."
Fury froze for a second, then snatched the Tesseract right out of Skyl's hands and stuffed it back into the briefcase. "Are you screwing with me?"
"Hey, I wasn't done looking at that," the wizard muttered. "My fault for getting things done too fast. If I'd known, I would've dragged it out a few more days and waited until you handed the cube over."
A vein bulged on Fury's bald head. "S.H.I.E.L.D. only loaned you the Tesseract because we trusted you. Nobody said you didn't have to give it back."
He grumbled irritably, feeling like he had wasted a perfectly good mood. Even so, Nick was very curious about the universe-scale catastrophe Skyl had mentioned.
When he learned that the culprit had been an absurdly gluttonous snake, he touched his eyepatch and smiled. "Ha, a super-hungry little animal. I know the type. I used to have a Flerken, you know. Ever heard of one? Nasty little thing. It can spit out hundreds of tentacles from its mouth and swallow a person whole in one bite. Heh. Still, it behaved just fine around me."
Skyl ruthlessly exposed him. "It also clawed out one of your eyes."
"Tch." Nick's face darkened. "Even if that little menace was trouble, I still liked her."
"Hopeless cat dad." Skyl burst out laughing. "Funny enough, so am I."
//Check out my P@tre0n for 30 extra chapters on all my fanfics //[email protected]/Razeil0810