Aryan led the group—Tony, T'Challa, Namor, Wanda, Sharon, and Pietro—into a private office that felt more like a sovereign war room.
"Sit," Aryan said, "Before we step out onto the world stage and declare the birth of the Illuminati Council, we need a moment of absolute clarity. We are no longer just heroes or kings of hidden nations. We are the Illuminati Council. And as of today, our 'neighborhood' just got a lot bigger."
As everyone settled in, Aryan tapped the surface of the table. A massive map of the cosmos ignited in the center of the room. At the very center was a blue marble—Earth.
"Most people think we're alone," Aryan began. "S.H.I.E.L.D. spent decades convincing the public that anything falling from the sky was a 'weather balloon' or a freak atmospheric event. The truth is, Earth—or as the older civilizations call it, Midgard—is the crown jewel of a much larger structure."
The hologram shifted, showing Earth as one of nine glowing orbs connected by translucent branches of light that looked like neural pathways in a giant brain.
"This is the Yggdrasil System, the World Tree," Aryan explained. "We aren't just a planet drifting in a vacuum. We are part of a cosmic ecosystem. For thousands of years, Earth has been under the jurisdiction of Asgard."
He pointed to the golden orb at the top of the tree, glowing with a divine light. "The Asgardians are a Tier-1 civilization. To our ancestors, they were gods. In reality, they are an exceptionally long-lived, hyper-advanced species whose technology is indistinguishable from magic. Their king, Odin All-Father, has maintained a protectorate over Midgard for millennia."
"I've heard the legends," T'Challa noted, "The Panther Cult has records of 'Sky Gods' who fought back the frost giants in the frozen north."
"Those weren't just legends, T'Challa," Aryan said. "Asgard is the only reason Earth wasn't enslaved by the Jotuns or the Dark Elves centuries ago. We exist in a state of 'Independent Sovereignty' because of ancient treaties, but make no mistake: we are under the Aegis of the Aesir. If a planet-killing fleet arrived tomorrow, the Bifrost bridge would open, and Asgardian warriors would be the first on the front lines. They are our elder brothers, but they are distant. They allow us to struggle because they believe conflict breeds growth."
"So we're the little brothers in the attic," Tony quipped, though his eyes were glued to the data streams. "Good to know we have a bouncer, but I don't like relying on a guy with a magic hammer to save my skin."
"Exactly," Aryan agreed. "Our goal is to reach a point where Asgard views us as equals, not pets. But Asgard isn't our problem right now. It's the empires that don't care about Odin's rules."
Aryan swiped his hand, and the map zoomed out to a far-off galaxy dominated by a blue light. A symbol of a stylized sun with a vertical sword appeared.
The Kree Empire," Aryan said. "They are a blue-skinned, militaristic species from the planet Hala. Their entire culture is built on the 'Science of War.' They are a Darwinian civilization—they believe only the strong deserve to exist. They are governed by a bio-organic supercomputer called the Supreme Intelligence."
"They've been here before," Sharon added, drawing on her deep-access SHIELD knowledge. "The 1990s incident. Peggy Carter's files mentioned a 'Starforce' team."
"Correct," Aryan said, "The Kree didn't show up here because they had some grand plan to plant a flag on Earth. They came because of the Skrulls and because of Carol Danvers. When she was taken after that accident, they rebuilt her into a weapon for their own machine. Her memories were wiped, her power was leased back to her, and Earth only became a blip on their radar because she eventually found her way home."
He paused, letting the weight of that settle before continuing. "That war? The one that almost leveled our cities? It wasn't about us. We were just the collateral damage—a convenient backyard for a fight that had been going on for eons."
He leaned forward slightly, his gaze steady and unblinking. "The Kree are an empire of 'Accusers' and Sentries. They think they're the universe's hand-picked judges of who gets to evolve and who doesn't. When they looked at Earth back then, they didn't see a prize worth taking. They saw a primitive backwater that wasn't worth the fuel it took to get here."
His voice grew softer, more deliberate. "But that's going to change."
"If the Kree ever realize that Earth is starting to produce its own 'accelerated evolutions'—that we're breaking through our genetic ceilings without their permission—they aren't going to come here to be our neighbors. They'll see us as a threat to their monopoly on power. A 'destabilizing variable' that needs to be solved."
He looked around the room, the implication clear. "At that point, being ignored will be a luxury we don't have. They'll come here to contain us, control us, or just harvest what they want—and they'll call it 'maintaining galactic order' while they do it."
"How do we fight something that has an AI running its entire government?" Pietro asked, looking skeptical.
Tony stayed silent for a few beats. He leaned back, steepling his fingers, his eyes losing their usual spark of mischief and turning into something much sharper—the look of a man who was already three moves ahead.
"Look, you don't pick a head-on fight with an empire like the Kree," he said, his voice dropping into a serious tone. "That's not bravery; it's a suicide pact. The way you beat them is by making sure they never find a reason to bother with us in the first place."
He glanced around the table, making sure everyone was locked in.
"First, we go invisible. And I'm not talking about putting a cloaking device on the planet. I'm talking about an informational blackout. We control the data. We mask the evolutionary spikes and dampen the energy signatures. If the Supreme Intelligence is scanning this sector, we make sure its reports say this planet is exactly as primitive as it was a thousand years ago. We don't let them see how fast we're actually moving.
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