107 Chapter 107 Guardians of the Galaxy
*Author's Note*
Yes, there will be actions and things which don't immediately make sense. Questions you get during the chapter will be answered by the end of the chapter.
Chapter 107 Guardians of the Galaxy
Harry picked out a bench in his favorite park on Nova Prime and connected to the planet's network with his tablet before sitting down and finding out the list of events that led to the incarceration of three of the only people he knew in this Galaxy at the same time. What he found made him laugh.
Yesterday, Peter Quill had decided to leave the nest that was the Ravagers by taking a job the Ravagers were commissioned for before they could, and getting the reward himself. Yondu, the blue-skilled leader of the Ravagers, showed his appreciation by putting a 40,000 Units bounty on Quill, which is enough to buy a brand new, fully stocked space ship with a good amount of extras.
According to the security footage Harry hacked into, Quill made his way to sell his target to the buyer, a man creatively known as the Broker, but something Quill said scared the man, causing him to refuse the transaction and for Peter and the Orb he was carrying out of the store. Then things got interesting.
Gamora, adopted Daughter of the Mad Titan Thanos and one of the deadliest assassins in the Universe, assaulted Quill, probably for possession of the Orb. Then, Rocket coincidentally spotted Quill and used an Auto-search to determine Quill had a 40k bounty. He tried to toss Quill into a sack with Groot's help but fired his weapon while doing so which is a no no for the Capital City of the Nova Empire.
Harry really wondered how that Raccoon's brain worked. He could create a bomb or gun out of spare parts but forgot one of the easiest to remember rules of the Capital City of the Nova Empire. Then again, Rocket didn't usually hang out in classy areas, so it may have just been a force of habit. Spot a bounty, go into auto-pilot, collect bounty, turn in bounty.
Now Harry just had to do a little more hacking and he could find where they were. A few completely illegal hacks later, he found they had just arrived at the Kyln, a 90 floor High Security Prison located in Sector M2OH I19919142+0185112 in an asteroid field orbiting a white dwarf.
Harry calculated the position and made a portal from the park into the depths of space outside the prison and stepped through. From there, he used some clairvoyance to locate Rocket and Groot, since he liked them more than Quill. And last, he turned invisible and teleported into a large room filled with other prisoners.
Harry walked over to a wall and cast a weak Notice-me-Not on himself before removing his invisibility. The prison was the color of rust and dirt and all the prisoners wore orange suits. Why orange? This wasn't Earth. And who did it first? Earth Prisons or here?
Security amounted to a few guards with bullet shooting guns, more guards with tasers on a stick, and dozens of minigun wielding hover drones. Harry smiled at that. He loved drones. Especially ones coded and encrypted by underpaid government workers using outdated software and second hand hardware.
The new prisoners were led to their new cells in a line and it wasn't the most difficult thing in the world to spot Rocket and Groot behind Quill and Gamora. Each had a prison issued blanket since giving everyone a blanket was cheaper than turning the heater on in the space prison.
The moment Gamora was spotted, shouts of 'Murderer!' were called out from every corner of the crowded space.
Rocket seemed to have gone into tour guide mode and was explaining things to the unenlightened Quill. "She's got a rep. A lot of prisoners have lost families to Ronan and his goons. She'll last a day, tops."
Peter, apparently having developed concern for her, asked, "The guards will protect her right?"
Rocket answered, "They're just here to stop us from getting out."
Harry was sitting at an empty table he'd conjured, still under a notice-me-not and watched a bulking blue brute of a man walk up to Quill and make a number of not so innocent comments that clearly threatened Quill's chastity.
Without even waiting for a signal from Rocket, Groot walked up to the man and inserted his finger roots into the man's nose which grew before Groot lifted the man into the air, eliciting groans of terror and pain from the one who appeared to have bene the strongest grunt in the prison.
The scene silenced the whole room and as if he'd rehearsed this a dozen times, Rocket used the moment to boldly declare, "Let's make something clear." He pointed at Quill and continued, "This one here is our booty! Meaning if you want to get to him, you go through us! Or, more accurately, we go through you."
The blue man was released and the pain of having his sinuses utterly violated caused him to curl up into the fetal position and start sobbing.
Harry adjusted the Notice-me-not so it wouldn't affect their group and called out, "Peter, Rocket, getting pretty close to a daughter of Thanos huh?"
They all turned to stare at Harry who was clearly not wearing an orange prison uniform. In fact he was wearing jeans and a sky blue t-shirt with white letters printed on it that spelled out, "I'm Free on the Inside."
After taking only a moment to adjust, Rocket walked over to the table and asked, "The hell are you doing here Potter?"
Almost at the same moment Quill asked, "Harry?"
Peter and Rocket then turned to each other and asked, ""You know this guy?""
Harry tapped on the table to get their attention and repeated, "My question first, a daughter of Thanos?"
Peter was quick to answer, "Well she said she betrayed him."
Harry took a moment to read her mind, though it looked like he was just sizing her up. "Okay, I believe you."
Peter asked, "Really?"
Harry ignored him and turned to his favorite Raccoon and asked, "Why are you hanging out with Peter?"
"How do you know this loser?"
"He stole my video games."
Peter quickly pointed out, "Hey, that wasn't me, I had no say in that. It was Yondu and the Ravagers. It was their idea and I felt really guilty about that."
Harry gave him a smirk and asked, "Since you felt so guilty, you probably didn't play any of those games and your name would not be on the Score Boards right?"
"Well, I mean, Yondu asked me to show them how it worked so.."
Rocket rolled his eyes and answered Harry's question, "Yondu put a 40K bounty on him so I'm gonna break him out of here and deliver him to Yondu."
Harry noticed Gamora's look changed when Rocket mentioned escaping. It was a look of hope. This assassin apparently didn't have a lot of social interaction skills since she had no poker face.
Harry motioned to her and asked, "Something you wanna say?"
She answered, "Ronan will definitely get here by tomorrow. We need to get out of here before then."
Harry asked, "Why?"
She replied as if speaking to a foolish child, "The Dark Aster has three thousand chitauri, three thousand necrocrafts, A dozen elite Kree under Ronan's Commands, Ronan himself, and my sister."
Rocket stated, "Okay then, no time to lose. Later lady." Rocket turned to walk away, clearly showing that he had every intention of abandoning her.
Peter picked up on this and said, "Wait a moment hold on. We gotta take her with us."
Rocket gave a disgusted, "Huh?" Which was followed from his taller partner by, "I am Groot?"
Peter continued, "Look, she knows a buyer for my Orb." He turned to her and asked, "How much was he willing to pay?"
Clearly seeing there was no other way out of this, she answered, "Four billion."
Rocket nearly shouted, "What?" along with Peter's "Holy shit."
She continued, "That orb is my opportunity to get away from Thanos and Ronan."
Harry looked amused and asked Rocket, "Got a plan?"
"Oh, I got a plan."
Harry recognized that look and asked, "Let me guess. Screw with the security, get to the hanger, get a ship, and skedaddle?"
"Well yeah. Unless you got a better idea?"
Behind them, someone else said in a loud voice, "Yes!"
Harry and the rest turned to look at a muscular gray skinned man that wore no shirt and was covered in what appeared to be symbolic scars. Harry noticed he'd been staring at them this whole time from another table which went to prove that mind magic didn't work for all species the same way.
When he understood he had everyone's attention he looked at Peter and asked, "You know who I am, yes?"
Peter shook his head in the negative. Rocket on the other hand answered as if it wasn't a big deal, "Drax the destroyer."
Without caring for the lackluster tone, Drax continued, "And You know why they call me this?"
Harry asked, "Because you are feared when it comes to online video games?"
Drax replied, "No."
Harry asked again, "Because you are an expert in demolishing and explosives?"
"No."
"Because-"
Rocket interrupted Harry's game and stated, "it's because he's killed scores of Ronan's goons."
Drax nodded before locking his gaze on Gamora. "Ronan murdered my wife, Ovette, and my daughter, Camaria. He slaughtered them where they stood. And he laughed! He killed my family. I will kill one of his in return."
Harry shrugged and said, "If you're looking for someone precious to Ronan, look elsewhere. Gamora betrayed Ronan and he doubtlessly wants her dead, just like everyone else in this place. If you kill her, you're doing Ronan a favor. But I have good news! If she is not dead, Ronan will definitely come to kill her himself. In fact, he's definitely going to come tomorrow."
Drax asked for clarification, "Ronan is coming here?"
"Only if she is alive," Harry replied.
Drax stated, "Then she will stay here until Ronan comes."
Peter shook his head, "No no no. She's coming with us."
Rocket argued, "What us? We're getting out of here. You're going into a sack. And then we're delivering you to Yondu. I ain't staying around here to deal with Ronan!"
Harry asked, "What if I had a plan?"
Rocket stopped at this. He slowly turned to Harry and asked, "Oh? And what exactly do you have in mind?"
24 hours later when the colossal ship with four times the mass of the whole Kyln arrived and locked their weapons onto the prison, no one was surprised when the guys in charge surrendered and let the Kree in.
What the Kree did not expect was to find the entire place completely empty. In fact, even the guys who let them in had vanished. No, the place was not really empty. It was filled with small toys such as rubix cubes, troll dolls, teddy bears, and slinkys.
Ronan didn't hide his frustration at this impossible outcome and shouted, "Find Them!"
As the Kree soldiers emptied out of the Dark Aster, Harry teleported into the control room with a handful of toys he dropped to the floor. Before any of the Kree could register what was going on, the toys turned into people and Harry walked over to the control panel for the ship.
The fight broke out but the group coordinated easily enough and thanks to the element of surprise, they ended the fight almost as quickly as they started it.
At the control panel, Harry set the necrocrafts in the hangers to lockdown, preventing the pilots from leaving or doing anything. The pilots were the same kind of test tube lab grown soldiers that attacked New York and worked for whoever paid the manufacturer, so they obeyed the orders of whoever was at the controls.
While Harry was hijacking the Dark Aster, Ronan, Nebula, and the Kree were not having a good time. They were not in the slightest bit of physical danger, but that didn't mean they weren't using their weapons to shoot in all directions every other second.
"I wuv you." The Teddy Bears were attacking. The thousands of teddy bears scattered around the prison had gotten up and slowly walked towards the closest Kree. When they were close enough, they would latch on with an immovable charm meaning they basically became a part of the clothes the Kree wore. The blasters had no effect and the worst thing you could do was physically grab them or kick them as you would be unable to remove them once you had. If a Teddy Bear touched a Teddy Bear that was already attached to someone, it would stick to that surface as well so it would not be long before every target was stuck to hundreds of them. Every few seconds each would say, "I wuv you," in the voice of a child, and each teddy bear's voice was different. It was highly disconcerting.
The Teddy Bear was a non-lethal alternative to the Rabbit of Caerbannog and Harry wanted to test it. After transfiguring all the prisoners and guards into toys for their own safety, it was also the most appropriate and could restrain most things as the fibers were unburnable and nearly indestructible. The Elite Kree screamed as they were slowly engulfed in a mass of hundreds of Teddy Bears which echoed with the sound of children saying, "I wuv you."
After taking control of the Dark Aster, Harry linked the deck monitors to the prison cameras so that the others could watch Harry's masterwork. The funny part was that the Teddy Bears weighed as much as their cotton counterparts which wasn't much. A physically capable Kree could move tons without difficulty, so even if thousands of them attached themselves, it would not prevent them from moving around by dragging the mass. Though it did make getting through small doors nearly impossible.
Rocket was the first to state his opinion, "That's just wrong."
"I am Groot."
"I don't care how soft they look."
"I am Groot?"
"No! You can't have one!"
Harry turned back to see that other than Gamora, Peter and Drax were not in the control room. He turned to the green skinned assassin and asked, "Where are Peter and Drax?"
She sighed and said, "Peter said he forgot something in the Prison and Drax followed him to kill Ronan."
Rocket chuckled and said, "Well screw them. We got the Orb right? Let's just get out of here before the Kree show up and damage my new ship."
Gamora looked through Peter's duffle bag in her hand for a few moments before frowning. Everyone had the same expression a moment later.
Harry changed the monitors and showed that Nebula and Ronan were still holding out against the Teddy Bears. Nebula's sword cut through them with ease and Ronan did the same with a sword of the same design he seemed to have borrowed from her.
"RONAN!" Drax's voice over the screen was obvious for everyone to hear. They seemed to have already gotten whatever Peter wanted to retrieve and on the way back ran into Ronan.
The teddy bears ignored Drax and Peter and walked as fast as one would expect from a teddy bear, but Nebula moved like a predatory bird through over them and attacked Peter who barely had time to dodge.
The pair scuffled and Drax moved to slam his fist into Ronan's skull. The latter caught the attack easily, twisted the arm to force Drax's body to twist to the side, and slammed his palm into Drax's chest, shattering the ribs above the man's heart.
Rocket calmly observed, "Well that was anticlimactic."
The average strength of a Kree was incredibly varied. Some were only a bit stronger than humans. Some could give Captain America a whooping.
During Peter and Nebula's scuffle, the pair fell to the ground and a silver orb fell and rolled right over to Ronan. Rather than finish Drax off, he snatched it up and moved further from the gathering Teddy Bears. He observed the Orb for a moment before twisting it open. The Orb was locked of course but his strength allowed him to shear the metal of the locking mechanism completely off, so it didn't mean much. Within was a glowing purple stone that actually made Ronan smile. Through the cameras he could be heard saying, "An Infinity Stone."
Several teddy bears jumped at him but he grabbed the stone and was engulfed in purple lightning and seemed to be on fire. The energy weapon resistant fire proof teddy bears burnt instantly to cinders upon contact with him and he was free to grab the warhammer from his back. With concentrated effort, he slammed the purple stone into the warhammer and the flames on his body died down, showing he was no longer in pain.
Ronan sneered at the rabbits and swiped his hammer through the air. Seeing this, Harry snapped his fingers, activating the portkey on Peter and Drax which took them to his position a moment before the purple energy wave turned them into dust. Nebula jumped for cover and barely made it in time and the Teddy Bears had all been burnt.
"What happened?!" Peter felt ill as he appeared on the ground.
Harry flatly stated, "You appear to have gifted an Infinity Stone to Ronan the Accuser. Nice job."
Ronan seemed to have gotten the hang of the Stone's effect and burned the remaining Teddy bears off his bound forces before heading towards the Dark Aster.
Harry took control and undocked the ship right as Ronan approached. Ronan responded by shouting and sending a massive bolt of power from his hammer into the Dark Aster. The ship rumbled as the explosions got louder and louder. Harry sighed and threw a silver portal to his left. "We're leaving. Now."
The rumbling of the ship got louder and the computer monitors were all flashing red, so no one questioned it as they followed Harry through the silver portal. Just as fire engulfed the control room, the portal closed.
They arrived in what was clearly a deluxe hotel room and if one looked out the window they would notice the skylines of Xandar.
Rocket was the first to notice this and nearly shouted, "You couldn't have done that from the start?!"
Harry shrugged, "I was playing around. I didn't think there was an Infinity Stone involved, otherwise I would have tossed the thing back onto Morag where it came." It only took a moment for Harry to reconnect to the security cameras on the Kyln and stream it to the hotel room TV.
Harry first had an image of the external cameras and it showed the utter wreckage of the Dark Aster from that one blast. It was clear that Ronan would rather destroy his ship than allow others to use it. The screen changed back to a camera overlooking the docks where Ronan was clearly admiring his work as the Elite Kree assembled around him. Ronan stated, "Thanos offered to destroy Xandar if I gave him the Orb. But now that I know it contained an Infinity Stone, I no longer need the Mad Titan. I will unfurl 1,000 years of Kree justice on Xandar, and burn it to its core! Then, I'll come for Thanos."
Nebula approached and asked, "After Xandar, you're going to kill my father?"
Ronan asked, "You dare to oppose me?"
A maniacal look could clearly be seen from Nebula as she answered, "You see what he has turned me into. If you kill him, I will help you destroy a thousand planets."
Ronan nodded, obviously thinking he was so strong, it did not matter if she followed him or betrayed him later. He ordered his men to take the ships in the hangar and head to Xandar.
Ronan was the last to leave. Before stepping onto a ship, he looked over the hangar and said, "This place will be cleansed." He smashed the hammer containing the Infinity Stone into the ground before jumping onto the ship and taking off. The strike glowed purple and cracked, extending from it through the hangar and into the reaches of the prison. The crack glowed bright purple and as the Ronan's ship left the hangar, the floor shook and exploded. The feed was lost.
Harry swiped a few times, but each screen he swiped to only showed static. He sighed. He figured turning the occupants into toys would prevent Ronan from massacring them. They'd turn back in a day. But Ronan didn't care if the prison was empty. It was still a Xandar Prison made of Xandar metal and stone.
Harry sighed and said, "If he smashed that thing into Xandar, the same thing will happen here."
Peter looked the most horrified. He had been the one to go back and take the orb, preventing them from leaving without him.
Drax was stunned from having his chest nearly caved in but he was never unconscious, so he saw everything as well.
Peter did the only thing that made any sense. He turned to Harry and said, "You gotta help us stop him!"
Harry shrugged and said, "Nope, this Hotel room is only paid for until midday and I gotta go. I don't do Infinity Stones. You broke it. You fix it." And with that, Harry made another portal, clearly to a planet that was not Xandar and entered it before closing it behind him without a word.
Once back on Earth, he teleported back to his house and sat on the couch to watch TV with his girls.
*Ping*
[Quest Complete: Guardians of the Galaxy.
Reward: Multiverse Coordinate Generator.]
Harry chuckled. He'd definitely have fun with that. For now though, he still had to work.
The Quest to assemble the Guardians of the Galaxy had a couple of points that looked like they required a large amount of people to die. Harry didn't need the Time Stone anymore to look into the future as long as he wasn't looking at anyone stronger than he was so he basically ran dozens of simulations for the best way to do it.
The Quest required Peter using the Power Stone in public to kill Ronan and that alone was a pain in the butt to arrange. Ronan had to get the stone and go to Xandar to use it, but that would result in hundreds or thousands of lives lost.
Eventually Harry just figured he could take the Dark Aster out of the equation by getting Ronan to destroy it himself. Making him think they were hijacking it after he got the stone was enough to take out the thousands of Chitauri that otherwise would have eventually dive bombed on Xandar. A small jinx on the Orb to make sure it would fall out when Peter took it and a compulsion to make Ronan desire to open it made the rest relatively straightforward.
Ronan would use the stolen crafts to head to Xandar and Peter would call the Ravagers and the Nova Corps for help. They'd use a blockade to force him to land in a safe zone but since Peter was not completely believed, they didn't send a bunch of Xandarian crafts and Ronan used the stone to smash through the blockade and crash into the heart of the city. Peter and the rest followed him and stalled him long enough for Rocket to destroy Ronan's hammer and for Peter to grab the stone before Ronan did.
The energy of the stone should have killed Peter, but he survives thanks to the power of Friendship and Love. Yondu later comes to take the stone, but is tricked with a swap and the stone is given to the Nova Corps to guard.
All of this happens in plain sight of hundreds of people. So everyone will know that Peter could handle the power of an Infinity Stone and everyone knows that the Nova Corps has the stone.
Of course, Time Viewing really isn't perfect. He hadn't seen that Ronan would still destroy the Prison when he thought it empty. The only reason Harry didn't go back to Xandar to confirm everything would go as planned was that he'd already gotten the Quest Confirmation.
It wasn't as risky as he made it out to be. He lied to Peter and the rest when he said Xandar would be destroyed if Ronan smashed the stone into Xandar. At best he'd destroy a dozen or so city blocks. Sure, if a Celestial used the Power Stone like that, it would burn the planet, but that was a rather poor example since Celestials were perfectly capable of destroying planets without an Infinity Stone as well.
The Power Stone was in fact the weakest of the Infinity Stones. It did not grant unlimited power, it amplified existing power. The Prison was about the size of a mall and close to the upper limit of what the Stone could destroy in Ronan's hands. Ronan was a level 280 Warrior with strength close to than of Thor's and the stone's amplification of that strength gave him enough power to destroy that Prison, but larger targets would not be smashed so easily. With the stone he was only about two or three times stronger than Thor was with his hammer and he'd probably lose to Hulk.
The main use of the Power Stone was not the amplification of personal strength or weapons, but the amplification of the power of other Infinity Stones.
As for the Stone, Harry already had a plan. Next week he'd go back to Xandar to inform them he had a way to mass produce Nova Crystals using the Power Stone. He'd need access to it for a moment to put it into his machine and he'd switch it out for a fake at that time. The fact that the Machine would work after the swap would make people think the Stone inside was the real deal powering it. Harry was quite confident the Nova Corps would love to have access to Nova Force again.
However all of that was for later. After his small break he'd still have to go back to Xandar and crash the Internet a little. It probably wasn't necessary, but since he couldn't ensure looking at the future of an Infinity Stone was 100% accurate, he'd make sure the information that there was an Infinity Stone out in the open would be suppressed for the week before he went to get it.
Harry opened up the list of Multiverse Coordinates. He decided after he had the Power Stone Safely tucked away in his Inventory, he'd have some fun. Looking at the names of the Universes he could visit, one in particular stood out and made Harry smile with glee.
-Two Weeks Later-
Standing on top of a stone stage, a blond announcer with slick back hair wearing black glasses and a black suit shouted to the excited crowd around him, "Ladies And Gentlemen! Are you ready for the 25th Annual World Martial Arts Tournament!?"
*Author's Note*
To prevent myself from getting burnt out, I'm going to have a bit of fun. No, he can't bring the balls with him and due to his physiology they can't affect him either.
Here is the Marvel TimeLine that I still have to go through.
2014 Aug 1st. Peter Gets the Orb off Morag. ✔
2014 Oct 19th Peter's Father Tries to eat the Universe.
2015 May 9th Thanos attacks the Dwarves
2015 Sept 13th Kaecilius leaves kamar-Taj
2015 Oct 13th Kaecilius Steals book of Cagliastro
2016 Feb 2nd Dr Strange has the Accident
2016 May 4th Dr. Strange comes to Kamar-Taj
2017 Jan 19th Strange Comes to Bargain
So I still have to go through all that before ending the last Volume and since that isn't much, I need 3 years of filler, which I shall fill with Dimension hopping shenanigans with Harry, his wives, and occasionally the other Avengers. Some Dimensions will be from Content Harry knows of, like DBZ and One Piece, and HP. I'll also send him a few places that he does not know of so he can have some surprises, like maybe DC or something.
Feel free to give ideas! I read them all!
