October 13th 2003

Ironwood

June's mother's hands had a quiet quake to them.

"So... um.. .what do you do for a living?"

Small talk, sober small talk. It's a start.

"Woody's a doctor, works with NASA and helps with various PRT things."

The children are playing with their grandfather, he's currently making funny faces.

"Oh yes... that slipped my mind."

Ever see a conversation with two people who loath each other and are trying to be polite?

"I'm sure it did mother, a that seems to happen quite a bit."

The smiles are forced.

"So a drink."

I shrug.

"We don't have any alcohol in the house."

"Why?"

I shrugged at my mother in law.

"June's rules."

"Really?"

I shrugged, as my mother in laws hands shook.

"Really mother, I just think its irresponsible to have that sort of thing around small children."

They glared at each other.

"So cake, I should really bring that in."

I left and went to set up the party, June's father waved and ran over to me.

"So, how's it going?"

I pointed at the house and shrugged, the man nodded.

"About as well as expected, she's not used to June standing up to herself."

He shrugged.

"So um yeah, how did you and your wife, um?"

"Meet? I was in the military, she was a party girl we hit it off, then when June was born... well she has issues."

They continued to stare at each other.

"Ok I know what's wrong with my family, but why are June and um..."

He sighed looking tired.

"Like I said, she was a party girl, then when she got pregnant she wanted June to be the kind of woman she could never be. I love my wife but she's never been well educated, so she just shoved that until June broke."

"And you let it happen?"

He shrugged.

"I wanted her to be sucessful to have what I never did, I've made my share of mistakes but I tried my best."

He looked tired and smiled sadly at his grandchildren.

"I think June's done all right for herself. Woody... take care of her for me."

"I will try sir."

He nodded his head and walked over to the kids, the sun was hidden by the clouds and in a way it felt peaceful.

November 5th 2003

Two people here, they're looking over my reports, about what is possible. Neil Armstrong, NASA director and Director Costa Brown, leader of the PRT.

"And you're sure you can do this?"

Neil has a hungry look on his face.

"Not by myself, I don't have the raw power to pull it off, or the finesse."

"Explain."

I sighed.

"Behemoth, Leviathan, Cronos, their bodies, the remains have the power of an entire solar system when properly harnessed. If I was given access to their corpses I could convert them into a core that could terraform Mars."

"How?"

"The bit of flesh from Terran, that Endbringer killed by scattering people across dimensons, Cronos' power is somewhat similar if enough raw power was put into it. If you could bring in mass, you could change the elemental structure of a world. Mars' problem is that it doesn't have the mass or the magnetic field to really hold on to an atomsphere."

I paused.

"We could fix that, and with Cronos' time dilation effect, a process that should take millions of years could be done... in less then a month. We could create an new world for the human race."

Costa Brown nodded.

"And you need help?"

"I can design the hardware but I can't make the software, I... I simply don't have that kind of background knowledge. I'm a biologist and medic, but if I had a small army of Thinkers, Tinkers and scientists in relevent fields helping me program the seedling..."

"And the terraforming process?"

"The world, the oceans, the new martian core, that's up to you... but evolution is unpredictable and the time dilation effect could create something nasty. The safe option is to create the world and then seed it with life later, a process also led by Thinkers and Tinkers."

She nodded, as did Neil.

"Can you build more?"

I leaned back into my seat.

"With more corpses um yes, It's possible that I'm being really inefficient using all three of them but is my first time and humanity needs a back up plan."

The director studied me.

"Explain."

"There are 17 of them and only one of me, right now 7 of them are out there, if they get over their egos and fight as a singular force... I can't beat those odds. I will die."

"The World tree system could be argued to be sufficient."

I shook my head.

"It won't save enough people or create enough resources. My sisters tactic is simple, she is going to find countries that are unstable and collapse them, this will cause a swarm of refugees to stable countries which will cause unstability there. She will also go after your industry, and resources. You will be chipped at until there's wide spread collapse and once that happens she will hunt you like animals until there is nothing left."

I paused.

"This cycle has happened numerous times, she enjoys it, breaking people hurting people. Individuals, nations, worlds. Her appetite for cruelity is without limit."

Neil grimaced.

"Not a big fan?"

"I defected for many reasons , but... even by our standards my sister is cruel and evil. She needs to die, the others I kill out of duty but the conflict with my sister is a personal one."

They nodded their heads, Costa Brown took the paperwork.

"We will bring this to the president and then the United Nations."

"Do you think they will give it a chance?"

She smiled.

"I'm sure people will at the very least appreciate the irony of having the monsters who tried to end our world die and then have their corpses used to create new worlds for humanity."

December 7th 2003

I continued to heal people, write notes, study and work with the PRT. It surprised me that it only took a month to bring this in front of the United nations. Then I remembered who was working behind the scenes to make this all possible. I stood amongst the assembled body of mankind. Many people looked nervous, a few looked scared, I stood tall my hands clapsed around my back.

I let the others talk, Hero, Neil Armstrong, scientists and others, the debate was fierce and heated.

"Ironwood."

The UN seceratary general called me forward.

"Please tell us why this project is necessary, especially with the war in full swing."

Was this the right time... ah fuck it.

"The avalance has already started. It is too late for the pebbles to vote."

This world doesn't have that show, Earth Aleph or Bet, the reference is going to go right over their heads. They stare at me.

"Excuse me?"

I move and pace in the ground, images of the Endbringers flashing behind me.

"The wolves are at your doors, the enemy is here, you face an enemy that has murdered over a million worlds. Civilizations, peoples and countless trillions of lives have fallen. Only by dreaming bigger, by embracing hope of a better tomorrow can humanity survive."

The man pauses.

"Do you really think that hopes and dreams can save the world?"

"They're the only things that can."