CLASH ON TITAN

Part I

By Anthony Crute

Meeting your father for the first time is not something most beings in the universe remember. In the majority of sentient species (and so most of the individuals within them) the birth of a child is something which is often celebrated. Fathers are there to see their children before the child even knows what is happening in the universe. There are however obvious exceptions…mine is a little less obvious.

Genis-Vell and Mar-Vell had been flying through space for the better part of five days now. The Earth was little more than a twinkling star behind them. It hadn’t exactly been the father and son bonding trip that Genis had always imagined he would have if he ever met his dear old dad.

They had made a quick stop over on the Blue Area of the Moon on day one of their flight, but it had only been for an hour or two and they basically covered the plan for reaching Hala.

The two were as emotionally closed off as each other, which meant not a great deal of heart to heart. Mar-Vell was a soldier and Genis was a warrior, so slipping into plans and stratagems was where both found some comfort in the difficult situation.

I knew my Dad…kind of, which just makes all of this worse. While I was being artificially aged, my mother fed my growing mind a normal childhood surrounded by her, my grandfather Mentor and my Uncle Eros. My father Mar-Vell was also present. He helped raise me…or his personality engrams did anyway. He’s the one who taught me to ride a hover bike, he’s the one who taught me to fly and when I came out of the machine which created this illusion…he was the only one who wasn’t real, he was the one I missed. Now it seems like he’s resurrected right before me with absolutely no memory of who I am or all the times we shared together.

They shared occasional smiles and gestures to show that they were both okay or when one or the other needed to stop and hover for a little break. The times that this happened, however, were few and far between. Genis could draw energy directly from the universe and the stars around him so he rarely needed to rest or eat unless he wanted too. Mar-Vell could do a similar thing but not to such a degree, and yet he didn’t seem to tire much on this journey either.

Genis just put it down to willpower. He had never seen his father in action up until a week or so ago. The simulacrum who had raised him was a peace-loving man but he had heard many stories about Mar-Vell. His will was supposedly insurmountable.

The two were making good time for an unaided flight through space. If they’d had a Eternal-level space ship they’d have been halfway to Hala by now. This was something they were hoping they could soon remedy. They would soon be passing Mars, and Genis could open up a jump portal that he and his uncle Eros had put in place just for situations such as this.

They’d be no more than ten minutes away from Titan then and could take a cruiser off into Kree territory where both he and most certainly his father were hoping to get answers about his seemingly miraculous resurrection…or who or what he was in the least.

They matched each other’s body posture as they both whizzed towards the red planet. They could both feel the gravity from the moon of pulling them closer and so were strafing away from its pull.

They moved in unison almost as if it had been choreographed or if it was natural to them both. Anyone watching would swear that the two were related. In truth it had been Mar-Vell who taught Genis how to fly. It was not unusual that their styles would be similar.

Mar-Vell began to pull away from Genis, not purposefully but just because he was faster, seemingly much so after his resurrection. Genis let off a little flash of light to alert his father that he was doing it again.

Mar-Vell mouthed an apology and fell back into formation. He had done it several times over the past few days almost like he himself didn’t know his own speed. Genis continued to send out flashes of light.

It was a system similar to Morse code taught in the Kree Military academies. It was something Genis had been taught by his “father.” It wasn’t ideal for any conversations of real depth but good enough for giving orders or commands.

Genis flashed the angles which Mar-Vell should fly at and then fired a beam along the same trajectory. It struck something which flashed with energy.

Mar-Vell smiled. It was not something that he would have noticed without Genis. It was like an obsidian mirror about 50 feet in height reflecting the blackness of space. It flashed with energy and then began to pulse with a glowing white light.

Genis surged forward and vanished into the white light. Mar-Vell followed a second later leaving behind the darkness of space for the brilliant white light.

It only seemed to take a second for the light to fade and be replaced by a sight which was all too familiar to him. Even with his memory playing up the way it had been since he found himself crouched naked in the streets of New York following his resurrection, this was a place he recognised.

Titan lay there below him. He turned his head slightly to look at the massive planet Saturn and its rings. Titan was the largest moon of the planet and as only moon in the whole solar system with an atmosphere similar to Earth’s, it made it the perfect home for the Eternals.

They were an offshoot of humanity created by the Celestials millennia ago. Many of them still remained on Earth, but an offshoot had moved to the stars long ago and set up home on Titan. It was from this fertile soil that his son, good friends like Mentor and Eros, and indeed bitter enemies like the mad Titan Thanos had grown.

Mar-Vell looked down through the swirling gas clouds of the moon at what he could see to be the rough outline of the city he knew well and began to move towards it. A flash of light to his side drew his attention.

Genis hung in the low atmosphere about 20 feet away from him. “First…Come…Now.” He flashed the signals and began to drift away from the city. Once he saw Mar-Vell was following him he branched into normal flight.

They circled through the upper atmosphere and began to dive down towards the planet after a few minutes. Mar-Vell thought he would lose his son in the thick clouds, but a constant flash of lights kept him on the correct track.

They cleared the cloud cover a couple of minutes later and moved down into a clearing. Mar-Vell could see markers set up around the perimeter of some wide open space.

Genis landed first and turned to greet his father. “I just wanted to have a few words with you…and show you something before we go any further.”

“Atmosphere.” Mar-Vell took a long deep breath. He didn’t so much need to breathe when he was powered up but he did like to. He smiled at his son. He had been rolling the idea around in his head throughout their flight and he quite liked the idea of having a son like Genis. He was a good man, a hero and an Avenger, even if the circumstances were a little strange. “It seems an odd place to have it. We’re away from the city by several Quibits right?”

“They wanted somewhere quiet, my Mom and Mentor. Somewhere peaceful,” Genis looked sheepish as he spoke to Mar-Vell.

“It certainly is quiet and peaceful, deathly silent in fact.” He was used to the silence by now, having spent days in a vacuum, but he didn’t expect it to be silent on the surface of this storm lashed moon.

Genis sighed and pointed a little ways behind him. Mar-Vell tilted his head as Genis moved and looked at the small plinth which stood there. He moved closer towards it. It was a few feet high and atop it stood a small statue of the great planet which dwarfed where they now stood. It was a Titan custom much like the crucifix graves were to Christians. He read the writing silently.

“My grave?” he asked almost to himself. “This is by far the oddest thing yet.”

“Odder than meeting a time travelling version of yourself?” asked Genis.

Mar-Vell managed to raise a slight smile. “That’s not as uncommon as you think. You have no idea how many time travellers, clones, shape shifters and such you run into…well maybe you can.”

“Robots, don’t forget the robots,” added Genis with a nod.

“Oh I love smashing robots,” Mar-Vell smiled. Genis was taken back a little, his father, the one who had raised him constantly smiled and laughed. It was that laugh, that smile but from what he gathered the real Mar-vell was a much more stoic individual. Genis had always put it down to ‘aging’ (as his psionic patterns had along with Genis) or a minor alteration his mother had made to the computer program.

“This is somewhat strange though, standing over what might be my grave thinking that I could be…well obviously I’m not,” Mar-Vell turned smiling back to Genis. The younger Captain Marvel looked worried.

“My father is still in his grave.” He nodded sadly. “Now that I’m closer I can sense him. He’s still in there in his coffin perfectly sealed.”

“So I’m not him?” Mar-Vell’s voice hovered somewhere between upset and confused.

“Maybe you are and maybe you’re not,” Genis said as comfortingly as he could. “We already know that some version of you is out there whizzing around through time. Perhaps you haven’t died yet or you come back in the future and get sent back.”

“Or perhaps I’m some kind of fraud,” Mar-Vell added making sure not to get his son’s hopes up too much. Genis nodded in agreement.

“Whoever you are you had better turn around slowly,” came a familiar voice. Mar-Vell and Genis both turned to see Elysius. She was the Titan who had stolen Mar-Vell’s heart, even if he couldn’t exactly remember it at the moment and would later create and give life to Genis using their shared DNA. She was the one who raised their son into the man he was today.

She had a temporal distortion weapon trained on them which would freeze them like statues should she pull the trigger. “Mother?” Genis asked. He knew his mother to be a careful one, but levelling a gun at them was a bit much even for her.

“Don’t worry, Genis, I won’t hurt you. I’m just concerned about whoever it is you’re with. You tend to have a blind spot when it comes to your father. It’s the perfect disguise to let someone slip right in close to you undetected and the way to hurt you the most. Only a complete idiot would greet him like a long lost friend.”

“MAR-VELL!” The yell came followed by a streak of a substance. Mar-Vell found himself hoisted into the air by the unseen assailant. He was being hugged quite vigorously.

“You old son of a gun! It took you long enough to get out of death’s grasp, didn’t it?” He was being vigorously kissed all over the face between each word. He managed to summon up enough force to push the being off of him and they both tumbled to the floor.

“It’s good to see you too, Eros, my friend.” Mar-vell grinned at the red haired Eternal. His grin beamed at him from across the surface of the moon. Genis stood behind his uncle sharing a similar grin. “I rest my case,” sighed Elysius. She didn’t really think Eros a buffoon no matter how much he tried to portray that image. Many others did, but none that truly knew him. He was a keen warrior who had lived for over a thousand years and had been involved in adventure after adventure across the length and breadth of the galaxy not least helping to combat his twin brother Thanos who was quite possibly the biggest threat to existence the universe had ever known and a time serving with the Avengers on Earth.

He may have come across as an idiot at times but more often than not that was people misreading his joy for life and all things as naivety. He was a good and solid friend who would see the best in everyone, even his brother.

”And my nephew!” Eros leapt into flight from his seated position and caught Genis in a headlock and began to wrestle with him. Genis knew exactly what he was going to do through his cosmic awareness but allowed his uncle to do so. “I swear you’ve grown Genny it seems only a few years ago you were a baby in my arms.”

“It was only a few years ago…rapidly aged, remember?” Genis laughed and freed himself only to be caught in a massive hug.

”Of course I remember…believe it or not, other than your mother no one replaced their computer simulacrum more than I did.” Genis nodded in acceptance.

“Not that I want to interrupt this little reunion, but I do think we should really be getting this man into a science suite and run some tests,” Elysius motioned to Mar-Vell and then made a signal for him to start moving towards the city.

“Oh, but I have arranged such a celebration for their return!” Eros pulled a face like a petulant child at Elysius.

“You knew you were coming?” Mar-Vell asked with a look to Genis.

“Well no, it was just a party before…now it’s a celebration!” Eros threw his hands in the air and cheered a little.

“Science Suite!” repeated the dark-haired Titan to hammer home the point.

“She is always so serious.” Eros rolled his eyes. “I really don’t know what you ever saw in her…I could have introduced you to some real fun loving Titan girls.” He caught eye contact with the woman in question. “…or I could stand over here quietly as we go to a Science Suite…Remind me to introduce Genis to the girls though.”

Elysius kept her weapon trained on Mar-Vell and moved towards him. “We need to get to the bottom of who exactly you are…if I find out that you’re playing my son for a fool, you will find out Thanos is not the only Titan Eternal to be feared.”

“Elysius,” Mar-Vell smiled at the woman. “I’ve missed you.”

Elysius’ face betrayed no measure of emotion in her face. “You don’t mean that…do not try and play with my emotions for the one man in my entire long life I have ever loved.”

Mar-Vell wavered for a second. “I’m sorry,” he nodded. “I have memories of us together, good and happy memories, but nowhere near the level of time I understand we were together. Not the love we apparently shared.”

“Honesty is a good start,” Elysius nodded. Again she showed no emotion. “Now move!”

Titan Science Suite C

Mar-Vell was suspended in a massive device which was somewhere between a CAT Scan, Cement mixer and the Large Hadron Collider, which was scanning him in every way imaginable to Titan and the results were being analysed and compiled in real time by the massive computer brain of ISAAC who ran every system on the moon from it’s main operating system in the core.

Elysius, ever serious, was sitting poring over the data which ISAAC was spitting out to her, creating a fully functioning hologram and a list of readings which she was making sense of.

Genis and Eros were sitting at one of the tables in the room watching, one with less interest than the other. He blew a noise maker into his nephew’s face, the unravelling paper tube coming dangerously close to his face. It was the third or fourth time that Eros had done it to Genis.

“What are you doing?” Genis finally broke down and asked.

“Trying to get you in the mood for a party,” he said through gritted teeth, not letting the noise maker move from his mouth. “It’s very annoying…why do you have a noise maker?” Genis seemed to be channelling his mother.

“This,” Eros pulled it from his mouth and held it up in the air. “This is one of the finest inventions ever to come out of this Solar System. Everything else on Earth when I was there was practically antique! Outdated systems that we Eternals discarded of almost the instant we were created…this however.” Eros smiled massively and blew into it. “This is something only a human mind could create. Something so annoying that its entire purpose is for enjoyment and show people how much of a good time you’re having! Utter genius!”

“Why do you have one on Titan then?”

“I bought 200,000 of these things last time I was on Earth,” Eros smiled and tapped his head to show he had thought this through to a great detail.

“Why would you possibly need 200,000 noise makers?” Genis sighed. He already regretted asking the questions.

“Humans, whilst genius at times, have a horrible habit of forgetting things. Think of all the things they’ve forgotten in my short life span. I cannot run the risk of them forgetting these next time there is a little cultural revolution and having to suffer on for the rest of eternity without them.”

Mar-Vell laughed loudly. He had remained stoically quiet throughout the entire series of scans and tests. These were important to him. Anything which got him closer to the knowledge about who he really was important plus he wanted to try and stay in Elysius’ good books. Eros’ latest burst of information however made him laugh aloud. It was not something he had done in a long time…not something he ever used to do often. Now he had been given a second chance and he was hoping he would do it more often.

“Will you please refrain from that?” Elysius warned. She twinged a little on the inside. That was definitely his laugh. It wasn’t often heard by others, but she had committed it to memory all those years ago. She had spent weeks tweaking the programs so that the fake Mar-Vell she created would be as close to the real one as possible. She daren’t hope though that this was really him.

“Okay, you’re done now,” she informed him, and with a click of a button she watched as the machinery began to lower him out of the machine. Once he was free of its cylinder he leapt free of the bed which he lay on and flew down towards her and the computer which held the results.

“So?”

Elysius looked at all of the results again. Her advanced brain working overtime to make sure she had not made a mistake….she hadn’t. “Inconclusive,” she said with a sigh.

“Meaning?” asked Eros.

“Meaning we don’t know anything…” She paused. “The tests seem to indicate you are Mar-Vell…brain patterns are scrambled to be sure but it says you’re him. You, however, seem to be many times stronger and faster than previous estimates of his uppermost limits. The energy which permeates you is also different…it’s not something we’ve ever seen before.”

“I’m going to run it through ISAAC again and see what he can give us.” She hit the command key.

Sirens began to blare and the lights flashed red in the room in an instant. The automated gun turrets in the room swung out and began to fire at the amassed heroes as a familiar deep and booming laugh filled the room.

Mar-Vell leapt into the path of a blast to cover Elysius and then swung with a blast of his own. Genis had already gotten there first, however.

The three male heroes in the room began to fire blasts at the automated weapons. “It’s really true what Carol says,” growled Genis as he fired off several blasts. “Give any computer too much intelligence and it’ll try and kill you.”

“Who’s Carol?” asked his mother. She too was now firing shots at the machinery in the room.

The laughter which sounded uncomfortably like Thanos boomed in all of their ears.

“Dad’s ex. She’s an Avenger.”

The laughter increased as images of ISAAC appeared on the screens around the room. His chin however was different, altered somehow. He spoke through the laughter.

“Subroutine T-63726 engaged! All those who aide Captain Mar-Vell will be destroyed by command of Thanos!”

To Be Continued…