"FKU, William Devonshire! If you've got the guts, come to my ship and catch me yourself! I'll be waiting!"
Talos stormed back and forth in the ship's control room, his frustration boiling over. Once upon a time, the Skrulls were one of the three great empires of the universe.
At their peak, the Kree were nothing more than their subordinates—only able to rise to their current strength because of the technology they stole from the Skrulls.
And back then, Earth was nothing more than a primitive backwater. Wiping out humanity wouldn't have even required ground forces—just one large ship dropping a few bombs would have done the trick.
But now? Not only had their homeworld been annihilated by the Kree, but even humans—who weren't even on the level of their former subordinates—dared to threaten them with an ultimatum?
Five minutes to surrender, or face an attack?
Even talking about putting Skrulls on trial under Earth's laws?
But no matter how much Talos raged or reminisced about past glories, nothing mattered more at this moment than the twelve surviving Skrulls aboard the ship.
And after witnessing William's teleportation abilities with his combat robots, Talos had little confidence in winning this fight.
He wanted to take off and escape, to avoid an even greater loss. But in front of his entire crew, abandoning the twelve captured Skrulls—along with the body of the one who had died—
would mean giving up any hope of ever leading them again.
And that wasn't even the worst part. The Skrull race was already fractured—held together only by their shared desire for vengeance.
If they lost that unity, Talos had no idea what future, if any, awaited their species.
But surrender outright? Skrull pride made that impossible.
Unless faced with total annihilation, they were the kind of race that would rather see their homeworld obliterated than capitulate.
With no clear options, Talos turned to Nick Fury.
Fury, having just been labeled a criminal by William, was secretly hoping Talos would take him back to Earth.
As long as he could get back to the U.S., no matter how powerful William was, there was no way he could drag him to England for trial.
Glancing at the surrounding Skrulls, Fury—keen to avoid being labeled a coward—leaned in and whispered to Talos,
"Our only option now is to head to Earth and find allies."
Talos's eyes lit up. There were already many Skrulls secretly infiltrating Earth. They could use human forces to pressure William.
Realizing this, Talos turned to the ship's pilot and commanded, "Start the ship. We're heading to Earth."
"Sir?"
Hearing this order, not only the pilot but everyone in the control room looked at Talos in confusion.
"You idiots. What good does staying here do us? Even if we destroy those combat robots, they're just machines.
It makes more sense to go to London and capture William Devonshire, or, as Nick suggested, head to the U.S. and seek assistance—force him to release our people."
That reasoning quickly dawned on the other Skrulls. They understood that "cooperating with the U.S." was just a polite way of saying it.
They already had many Skrulls embedded within the U.S. government. Using official pressure to force William's hand—and England's—shouldn't be difficult.
And if push came to shove, they could even trade some technology for U.S. support.
Given Nick Fury's obsession with acquiring alien tech over the years, they were certain that with the right incentives, the Americans would go all in.
But just as the ship left Mars's thin atmosphere—
Golden portals suddenly appeared inside the control room.
"Enemy attack! Enemy attack!"
The moment the ten portals opened, combat robots marched through in perfect formation.
The battle turned chaotic in an instant. But strangely, no matter how many robots the Skrulls shot down,
they just kept coming—one after another—without immediately retaliating.
Before long, the Skrulls couldn't fire fast enough to keep up with the ever-increasing number of robots.
One by one, they were taken down in close combat and subdued.
As the robots closed in, surrounding them completely, Talos and Fury had no choice but to lower their weapons.
They realized that William intended to take them alive. Otherwise, with just a dozen Skrulls in the control room, they wouldn't have lasted three rounds before being wiped out.
Leaving forty intact combat robots in the control room, William shut the portals there and began opening new ones throughout the ship.
Systematically hunting down every Skrull that had been tagged by his spider drones.
With three portals opening simultaneously around them, few Skrulls could withstand an assault from three robots at once.
And even those who managed to destroy three? No problem. Three more portals would open, adding another three robots to the fight.
Within seconds, six robots would be surrounding them.
If six weren't enough? Then ten.
Within moments, dozens of combat robots would swarm the target. And the reinforcements never stopped.
William had ordered Sunday to prepare a full 1,000 next-generation combat robots for this operation—entirely cost-free, produced autonomously on X-17.
And if that still wasn't enough?
There were thousands more older-model combat robots waiting in storage, ready to be deployed.
Not even Thor himself could withstand being bogged down by sheer numbers like this.
And William was counting on the Skrulls destroying as many robots as possible.
The more losses he suffered, the heavier the charges for "destruction of public property" would be—extending their prison sentences even further.
As for the cost?
Easily justifiable. A single robot could be "priced" at over ten million dollars each.
Which meant that Talos and Fury alone, having destroyed more than twenty robots, were already looking at $200 million in damages—enough to lock them up for decades.
As more and more portals opened, William's understanding of fixed-point teleportation deepened.
He even began experimenting—opening portals just half a meter behind certain Skrulls.
The moment they realized what was happening, a combat robot would grab them by the collar and drag them through—straight into a storage facility filled with even more robots.
Some, realizing resistance was futile, surrendered immediately.
Those were promptly disarmed and sent back through portals to be detained on the ship.
And all of this played out in real-time on the control room's monitors—unrestricted for Talos and Fury to watch in full detail.
Fury sighed deeply, turning to Talos and advising,
"Surrender, buddy. No one can withstand an invasion like this.
We've already lost twice in a row. Do you really think William Devonshire is so generous that he'd go out of his way to capture every Skrull alive without having a bigger plan?"
"This—?"
Talos immediately realized there was something suspicious about the situation.
He didn't know exactly what William was after, but he now understood that dragging things out would achieve nothing.
Faced with this relentless unstoppable mechanical army, Talos thought to himself—
Even the gods of Skrull mythology would be crushed under such endless waves of troops.
A profound sense of powerlessness washed over him.
And then, another thought struck him—
The Asgardians had the Bifrost.
But if William could master fixed-point teleportation on this level—and had the strength to resist those who coveted such power—
Then it wouldn't be long before the universe had a new overlord.
(End of Chapter)
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