Chapter Two; The Rotten Snowflake
Commandos Part One
"What… what if we don't want to be a part of your team?" The Black Archer licked his dry lips. "What if we just want to go home?"
"Do you truly wish to go back home?" The Timebroker asked. "Where you are murdered in your sleep?"
"Come on Archer, who couldn't pass up on an opportunity like this?" Mask asked. "We get to see hundreds of alternate realities… more than we can count! Think of the adventure!"
"Not just the adventure." Nova said. "The Timebroker said whole worlds are at stake. If we don't help, they'll be destroyed. So put down the bow." He turned to the Timebroker. "How can we help?"
The Timebroker reached out and a watch appeared on Rachel's wrist. "This is the Tallus." He said. "It will take you to the worlds you need to save, and it will instruct you on what to do. Your instructions will be different on each world."
"Why's that?" The Mask asked.
The Timebroker stroked his chin. "Most people have… the wrong idea about alternate realities. They believe that when they make a choice, there is an alternate reality where he made the opposite choice that branches off from it. This is a false assumption. If this were true, mankind would have no free will."
He gestured, and a shining snowflake appeared in the room. "This is the multiverse." He said. "A theoretical snowflake arranging an infinite number of worlds into 196,833 points. Every time somebody makes a choice, he doesn't make another reality; the reality already existed. Here," He pointed at a small tip of the snowflake. "The worlds in this tip of the snowflake have been wethered and beaten and rearranged, but they endure, thanks to the efforts of heroes possibly greater than any in the multiverse." His finger shifted. "Here on this tip, a mad man with a box travels through time to ensure the safety of earth. The worlds on this tip are flat, carried on the backs of four giant elephants, themselves on the back of a giant space turtle. On this tip, Irish geniuses and fairy folk, on this tip, the superhumans of the world declare themselves the authority, on this tip, machines enslave humanity. Each tip of the snowflake has its own designs for the worlds it contains."
"Pretty." Impossible Man said. "But where are you going with this?"
"The snowflake is made up of worlds spinning in a precise order." The Timebroker said. "If one of the worlds spin off kilter, it throws off the rest. To throw off a world's spin, you need merely to disrupt one if its universal laws. i.e.; Good is greater than Evil."
"A long time ago, a group of transdimensional travelers accidentally prevented a child from being born that would have prevented a total apocalypse on that world. This started the chain reaction which is causing the multiverse's current collapse. Good universe succumbed to apocolypse and universes where evil already prevails only got worse." He gestured to one of the longer tips of the snowflake. It was rotten; a large portion of the worlds in the tip were black, and it looked like it was going to fall off at any second. "The laws are changing; evil is starting to prevail. If this continues, the worlds will spin into each other; spiraling out of control, shattering each other, until only a single worlds remains. These worlds will attract new worlds to them and form a new snowflake, but the laws will be changed, evil will triumph over good, and the loss of life both during and after the event will be massive."
"Woah." Pete Wisdom sat down.
"I'm feeling completely overwhelmed." Rachel said.
"How can we stop this?" Nova asked.
The crystals that made the walls suddenly came to life, showing multiple pictures of heroes. Each crystal showed six of them. Numbers hovered above them. "There are multiple teams of Exiles. Just the six of you aren't enough to police an infinite number of worlds after all. Some teams handle little tasks; stopping a child from taking drugs, getting an important man and woman to say 'I do', the things that seem inconsequential, but save the worlds. Other teams handle the darker tasks; killing a child before he grows up to destroy the world, assassinating a political figure before he makes a mistake. The six of you will be fighting villains, ensuring their schemes will come to naught. Essentially what you did in your old lives. It will be difficult; we already have Exiles trying to stop the cancer from progressing. What we ask of you, is to go to worlds already rotten and fix them. Look to the Tallus and it will tell you what to do."
"Alright." Nova clapped his hand. "What are we waiting for then? Send us off."
"First I must have a moment alone with the Mask."
The Timebroker took her aside down a hallway. The Black Archer jumped down off of his balcony to join the others. "Am I the only one who sees this as wrong?" he asked. "We're being press ganged into this suicide mission!"
"You call this a suicide mission?" The Impossible man laughed. "You've obviously never tried to steal something from an Asgardian. Try spending five days hidden from super-beserkers all around you, praying you'll get off of Asgard alive with your swag, and then you tell me this is suicide."
"Nobody's press ganging me." Nova said. "I'm glad I was granted a longer life. The fact that I get to save reality is just a bonus."
"Some bonus." The Black Archer snorted. "Listen kid, I'm a professional hitman for a shady corporation, so let me tell you how these things work. The shady corporation in question, (that would be the Timebroker) gets some kind of dirt on you. Then, he holds it over you until the end of your life. Which will probably be a whole lot shorter now that we've agreed to do this thing."
"No, let me tell you how it works." Nova said, face to face with him. "Good people, do good things, for the sake of being good."
"Oh wow." The Black Archer said. "Wow. I cannot believe it. Just how naïve are you?"
"Only naïve enough to beat back six alien races bent on invading the planet at the same time." Nova said. "I'm sure you're good at killing people, but I happen to be a pretty good judge of character."
"He's right though." Pete Wisdom said. "When he took me, I was in the middle of a case. How am I going to stop Dr. Doom from ruling my world now?"
"Easy." The Impossible man smirked. "Doom won't win. In case you didn't hear Mr. Timebroker, there are two possible explanations. First; your world is safe and good will always win. Second; your world is part of the cancer that's destroying the pretty snowflake, and a team of Exiles will be popped on over to fix it up."
"He's right." Nova said. "There's no reason to worry Mr. Wisdom."
"Of course there is." The Black Archer said.
"No, there isn't." the Timebroker reentered the room with the Mask. "You were all taken from clean worlds so you'd have a better chance of victory."
"Oh that's right." The Black Archer said. "We're going into worlds where the bad guys can win. Tell me, what's the mortality rating of your Exiles?"
"There have been… some deaths." The Timebroker admitted.
"There's really no need to worry." The Mask said. "Think of the adventure."
"Easy for you to say. You came here of your own free will, and you have an easy lifeline back home."
"Actually I don't anymore." It was pretty hard to read her face under her mask, but Nova would have bet she was glaring. "The Timebroker and I agreed that it was too risky to leave lying around. Somebody might break the multiverse again. Now, stop being a baby and enjoy the ride."
The Tallus began blinking on Rachel's arm. "Uh…" She tapped it. "What am I supposed to…"
Suddenly, the six of them were in a long tunnel of technicolored lights. The lights slowed to a stop and they arrived on the world.
The Black Archer threw up. "That was… something." Nova said.
"Guys." Pete Wisdom was holding his head between his hands. "People have died here. Lots of people."
"You can see dead people?" Rachel asked.
"I'm a medium, yeah." Pete said.
"Well, I can see our 'adventure' is off to a fine start." The Black Archer mumbled.
"What does the Tallus say Rachel?" Nova asked.
She checked. "It says... to keep the Avengers alive. They're going to fight something tomorrow, and they're going to lose. Unless they win, the world will be destroyed."
Pete turned around, eyes wide. "Guys, hide." They ducked into the bushed and a van drove by. The van was packed with armed soldiers, and there was a swastika painted on the side.
"Nazis." Nova breathed. "We've come right into World War Two.
They waited patiently as it drove by. "Alright, what do we do?" Rachel asked the Impossible man.
"Well, now we…" He trailed off into silence and sighed. "Alright, whoever you are sneaking up on us, come on out."
There was an audible snikt, and the Black Archer and Peter Wisdom felt three bloody bone claws pointed to their necks. The claws in question belonged to a grizzly soldier with wild hair. "Alright bubs." He growled. "You don't smell like krauts, so don't yell, and don't make any sudden moves. And maybe if you answer my boss's questions honestly, he'll let you live."
The Black Archer whimpered. "I told you this was suicide. Told you."