The containment vault deep within the Dreadnought Sovereign was unlike any other chamber aboard the ship. Its walls were forged from obsidian-titanium alloy, layered with anti-spatial fields and dimensional dampeners. Normally, the vault held the most dangerous weapons in Vilgax's arsenal—prototype warheads, experimental reactors, unstable dark matter shards—but today, all of those were overshadowed.
At the center of the room, suspended by twelve gravity clamps, floated the relic.
A shard of crystallized light, no larger than a fist.
Yet every living being aboard the ship could feel it.
Its energy whispered across the hull, sending faint vibrations through the metal. It radiated no heat, no light, no sound—yet its presence bent reality around it in subtle waves, like ripples in an invisible sea. The artifact pulsed with a rhythm, not mechanical, but alive, as if it were breathing.
Vilgax entered the chamber alone.
The security doors sealed behind him, shutting out even his highest-ranking generals. Only he was permitted to interact with the relic. Even a minor miscalculation could tear a hole through the ship—or distort the dimension they existed in.
As he approached, the gravity clamps hummed, adjusting to the relic's fluctuations. His volcanic-red eyes narrowed with intense focus.
"Pre-Celestialsapien resonance confirmed," he murmured. "But this frequency… it is fragmented. Incomplete."
He activated his wrist module.
A swarm of microscopic drones emerged from hidden compartments in the walls, floating like metallic dust around the relic. They projected lines of data across the chamber, measuring energy output, dimensional pressure, temporal distortion, and over forty other theoretical parameters.
Vilgax processed the data quickly.
Not stable… not complete… not a weapon… a fragment.
A piece of something larger.
Something that had once existed before entire galaxies formed.
He reached toward the relic.
The gravity clamps flared, warning him, but he ignored them. With a gesture, he overrode safety restrictions. The clamps weakened. The relic dipped slightly.
A strange force brushed against his skin—a flicker of weightlessness, then crushing pressure, then nothing. A trillion-year-old echo passed through him, like the memory of a cosmic scream.
And then—
A voice.
Not a sound. A presence.
Something ancient. Something vast.
—Observer…—
Vilgax stiffened.
—Deviation… anomaly… foreign consciousness detected…
His eyes widened. "You can sense me?"
—Presence not aligned with original timeline. Probability error: 99.7%.—
The relic was talking to him.
No—evaluating him.
Its energy flared, strings of light spiraling outward before collapsing back in a pulse.
—Origin of consciousness unknown. You are not Vilgax of this reality.—
Vilgax forced his breathing to remain steady. "Correct. I am something different. Something superior."
Silence.
Then—
—Potential acknowledged.—
The chamber trembled as waves of energy rippled outward, warping the air.
Vilgax's mind raced. This relic was not a simple artifact. It had awareness—a primitive, fragmented intelligence. Perhaps it was a broken piece of a greater whole. Perhaps it remembered the age before dimensions were stable, before time flowed in one direction. Whatever it was, it recognized what even Azmuth had only suspected—
He was not the original Vilgax.
And it did not reject him.
Vilgax stepped closer. "I require your power."
The relic pulsed.
—Incompatible. Physical integration will result in disintegration.—
"I am not asking to absorb you physically," Vilgax said calmly. "I seek understanding. Knowledge of your nature."
A long silence.
Then the relic pulsed again, projecting streams of glowing symbols into the air. They spiraled around Vilgax like ancient constellations.
His enhanced mind absorbed them rapidly.
Equations. Patterns. Concepts. Laws of dimensional compression. Principles of multiversal tension. Fragments of hyperdimensional logic that only higher beings—Archons, Celestialsapiens, Chrono-Titans—could fully wield.
Slowly, the truth formed in his mind.
"This fragment contains a blueprint," Vilgax whispered.
A blueprint for…
• Dimensional anchors
• Reality-binding matrices
• Stabilizers for paradox-safe structures
• Energy fields capable of resisting timeline collapse
And more.
Knowledge that no being below cosmic level should access.
But he could.
And he would.
He clenched his fist. "With this knowledge, I can reshape the balance of power. Even the Omnitrix will be forced to obey my calculations."
The relic spoke again.
—Warning: interference with destiny may trigger intervention.—
"By the Celestialsapiens?" Vilgax asked.
Silence.
Then—
—… Probability high.—
Vilgax smiled.
Not a grin of triumph.
A cold, calculating smile.
"If they interfere," he whispered, "then I will prepare for them as well."
He deactivated the drones, sealing the relic in its containment field. As he turned to leave, something else caught his attention—a chime from his wrist console.
He activated the display.
A projection of Earth filled the screen.
An alert flashed above it.
OMNITRIX SIGNAL DETECTED — IMPACT IN 72 HOURS
Vilgax's eyes narrowed.
"So… it begins."
He analyzed the trajectory.
Max Tennyson's RV had begun its fateful road trip. Ben and Gwen were already arguing over snacks. The Omnitrix pod had emerged from hyperspace, adjusting its descent path toward Earth.
Just as in canon.
"You have two days left," he murmured to himself. "But this time… you will not escape me, Ben Tennyson."
A soft knocking sound echoed behind him.
General Skarn entered, saluting deeply. "My lord, the fleet is ready to receive further orders."
Vilgax turned away from the relic and walked past him.
"Prepare the hyperdrive," he commanded. "Clear all engineering decks. And activate classified project 'Nemesis Protocol.'"
The general stiffened. "Th-That project…! My lord, if we activate it this early—"
"Do it."
General Skarn bowed immediately. "At once."
As Vilgax reached the lift, he touched his wrist console again.
A schematic appeared—an enormous battle platform, designed not for war, but for capture.
A tool specifically designed to catch a falling pod from space.
The Omnitrix was coming.
Ben Tennyson had seventy-two hours left as a normal boy.
After that—
He would either face a smarter, stronger, unstoppable Vilgax…
Or never awaken as a hero at all