"Wait!" The Highbreed's voice cracked with sudden urgency.
He raised his arm—the one that had withered in the desert. The limb had regenerated, but it bore the most obvious signs of the Swampfire genetic integration. The skin looked almost plant-like, with a bluish-green texture that seemed to photosynthesize in Wakanda's artificial lighting.
"I agree to take you to see our elders," he said.
Ben raised an eyebrow, genuinely surprised. "Had a change of heart? That was quick."
"Since you're going to forcibly alter our genetics regardless of consent," the Highbreed said, his tone carrying resignation rather than defiance, "why not let you meet with the Council first?"
He shifted his weight, the movement revealing how uncomfortable he'd become in his own modified body.
"Besides... after arriving in this universe, we underwent certain evolutionary enhancements with the Kree Empire's scientific assistance. Although it didn't resolve our fundamental genetic degradation, one elder did theorize that exposure to the failed Cosmic Cube made us marginally more perfect."
His luminous eyes met Ben's directly.
"You now possess a complete, functional Cube. And I have personally experienced how it provides solutions to seemingly impossible problems. Perhaps the elders will find their own answers in that artifact."
"So your base of operations is located within Kree space?" Ben asked.
The Highbreed stood, rising to his full height. At nearly three meters tall, his head brushed against Wakanda's high laboratory ceiling. He looked down at the assembled humans with an expression that might have been superiority in another context, but now seemed almost apologetic.
"That's correct," he confirmed.
"Several years ago our people somehow appeared in this universe. We don't fully understand the mechanism of our arrival. One moment we existed in our home dimension, the next we were here."
He paused, as if the memory itself was disorienting.
"We encountered the Kree Empire almost immediately. They were facing their own evolutionary crisis."
"After an initial conflict we negotiated a tenuous peace. Our goals aligned sufficiently to make cooperation preferable to mutual destruction."
As he spoke, his gaze fixed on Ben with something approaching respect.
"When the organization calling itself the Plumbers appeared in this universe, when we first detected your operations, I believed you were Galvan in origin."
"The intelligence level of the Galvans is... acceptable to our standards," he admitted, the words clearly difficult for him to speak.
"Those diminutive beings possess cognitive capabilities comparable to, or occasionally exceeding, our own species."
"But intelligence alone doesn't constitute evolutionary perfection in our philosophy."
His voice took on a lecturing quality, as if reciting doctrine learned in childhood.
"We consider ourselves perfect because our intelligence rivals the Galvans. Our physical strength surpasses species like the Appoplexians. We can manipulate energy fields. We possess natural flight capabilities. Our sensory systems operate across multiple spectrums simultaneously."
Pride crept into his tone despite his earlier shame.
"We can accomplish almost anything a theoretically perfect organism should be capable of. We are, in your terminology, warriors with no significant weaknesses."
He paused.
"Aside from heat vulnerability, obviously."
"You can call me Reinrassic Sirius XII," the Highbreed added, the name carrying formal weight. "Twelve generations removed from our species' founding bloodline."
Ben filed the information away. Naming conventions that tracked generational descent suggested a culture deeply invested in heritage and lineage.
"In summary," Sirius XII continued, "to defend against threats from the Incurseans, the Skrull and the Sakaar Empire, the Kree sought our cooperation. They launched a project called the Cosmic Cube Initiative—an attempt to achieve controlled evolutionary advancement and create perfect super-soldiers."
His expression turned rueful.
"The project failed catastrophically, as you've already deduced."
"Even the failed, fragmentary Cube granted our people comprehensive enhancements," he said, his tone mixing regret with grudging satisfaction. "Physical capabilities increased across all metrics. If it came to direct combat now, I'm confident I could defeat any of your alien champions."
"Is that so?" Ben's tone was completely neutral, neither confirming nor denying the claim.
Internally, he was already running combat simulations. Sirius XII seemed unaware that Ben currently had access to forms like Celestial Gravattack, Celestial Way Big, and the Atlas template based on Thanos himself.
The Highbreed's confidence was dangerously misplaced.
Sirius XII didn't notice Ben's carefully controlled reaction. His species' inherent arrogance made him interpret the silence as intimidated acknowledgment.
"We leveraged the Cube's enhancement to infiltrate Kree power structures," he continued. "Within two years, we'd achieved de facto control of their entire empire. The Kree Supreme Intelligence itself became our puppet—we fed it carefully curated data that led it to conclusions we desired."
His voice took on a darker quality.
"We then used the upcoming Galactic Conference as cover to deploy climate manipulation towers across inhabited systems. The towers would gradually transform planetary environments to subfreezing temperatures while our forces cultivated orc-class bio-weapons and systematically eliminated intelligent species."
The casual way he described genocide made the temperature in the room seem to drop.
Everyone present processed the revelation with mounting horror.
"Why?!" Peter Parker's voice cracked with genuine incomprehension.
He stepped forward, his hands clenched into fists at his sides—not in threat, but from the sheer emotional intensity of not understanding.
"Why would you do this? It doesn't benefit you! It doesn't accomplish anything constructive!"
Peter's mind raced through the villains he'd encountered, trying to find a framework for comprehension.
"I don't approve of people like Thanos or even some of the more extreme Hydra factions, but at least I can understand their motivations. Thanos believed he was preventing universal resource collapse. Hydra Steve genuinely thought he was creating a safer world."
His voice rose.
"But what are you trying to achieve? What's the goal? What's the point of any of this?!"
"There is no point," Sirius XII said quietly.
He lowered his head, shame and sorrow warring across his alien features. At that moment, Steve Rogers—the younger version from Ben's universe, who'd been recovering in an adjacent room—emerged leaning against the wall for support.
When Sirius XII saw his face, the emotion in his expression intensified dramatically. Shame became almost physical, bowing his massive frame.
"You're saying..." Peter repeated slowly, trying to force the logic to make sense, "that you're going to invest decades, possibly centuries of effort... and you're not getting anything in return? No benefit? No goal?"
"People are most persistent and energetic when they're doing bad things," Ben said quietly, placing a hand on Peter's shoulder.
The statement hung in the air like an indictment of conscious beings everywhere.
"You're absolutely right," Sirius XII admitted, his voice hollow.
"I must acknowledge the truth: this is pure evil. There's no other honest way to describe our species' plan."
He straightened slightly, as if confession required dignity.
"Our race has reached its evolutionary terminus. We are dying as a species—not from external threat, but from internal genetic collapse. And watching other species continue to thrive, to evolve, to have futures..."
His voice hardened with remembered rage.
"We envy them! We envy beings we've always considered inferior, beneath acknowledgment! They possess something we've lost—the opportunity to continue developing, to see what their descendants might become!"
"This is not fair!" The words burst from him with desperate intensity.
"We are—we were—the most superior and excellent species in our home universe! Yet we alone face extinction while lesser beings persist!"
"We couldn't accept that fate. Jealousy and despair twisted our collective consciousness. The majority of our Reinrassic Council made a decision: if we must face oblivion, then all life should pay for our deaths!"
The confession echoed through the laboratory.
Everyone who heard it felt a chill that had nothing to do with temperature.
"What kind of antisocial..." Pietro Maximoff started, then corrected himself. "No, anti-cosmic personality disorder produces this kind of thinking?"
He stared at Sirius XII with something approaching horrified fascination.
"You're not just terrifying in appearance. Your entire species is psychologically monstrous."
Steve spoke up quietly. "You said 'the majority' made this decision. Does that mean some of your people disagreed?"
"Yes." Sirius XII nodded, his expression shifting to something that might have been respect for his counterargument faction.
"A small minority—perhaps one in fifty of our remaining population—believed we should maintain our dignity. That we should face extinction with grace rather than spite, accepting our fate as part of the universe's natural selection."
"And you?" Steve looked at this being who could barely be called a friend, couldn't help but ask.
The question was simple but profound: Are you in the majority or the minority?
Steve's mind flashed back to their time together inside the Cosmic Cube's pocket dimension. The old man, the sick child, and the white creature fighting side by side against impossible odds.
"Inside the Cube, you saved me," Steve said softly. "Without your help, neither of us could have fought off those creatures and enemies. We survived because you helped us."
Sirius XII met his gaze directly.
"I was in the majority," he said simply. "I supported the genocidal plan. I volunteered for the infiltration mission to Earth."
He didn't offer excuses or justifications.
Steve nodded slowly and said nothing more. What was there to say?
"That's the complete situation," Sirius XII continued, addressing Ben now. "You want to use that device to alter my species' genetics. I'd like the opportunity to present your offer to our elders before you proceed."
"And then what?" Ben countered immediately.
"I don't believe that beings as arrogant as your people—arrogance you yourself admit to—would voluntarily accept genetic material from 'inferior' species to stabilize your genome. And what happens when they refuse? What's your plan if they all reject the cure?"
Sirius XII's eyes flickered with hesitation. The internal conflict was visible—decades of cultural conditioning warring against recent experiences that had shattered his worldview.
Then his expression became absolutely resolute.
"If they all refuse the cure..." He took a breath. "Then please eradicate the Atasian species completely."
The statement hit like a physical blow.
Complete silence filled the laboratory for several heartbeats.
"You're asking us to commit genocide," Felicia said quietly. "Against your own people."
"I used to think exactly as they do," Sirius XII said, his voice carrying the weight of profound personal transformation. "That other species were inferior, unworthy of consideration. That our genetic purity was sacred, inviolable."
He looked down at his modified body, the green-spotted skin that marked his contamination.
"You changed my perspective. The Cosmic Cube forced me to confront truths I'd spent my entire life denying."
"The Atasians are no more inherently noble than any other species. On the contrary—it's precisely because of our arrogance that we've become the universe's most foolish existence."
His voice gained strength, conviction replacing shame.
"Perhaps this is the universe's natural selection at work. Whether through your intervention or the Cube's design, evolution has already offered us a path forward. A way to survive, to continue, to have a future."
"It wasn't that we lacked opportunities."
"It's that we chose the path to our own destruction."
He straightened to his full height, looking down at Ben with an expression that mixed hope and resignation.
"So I'm asking you: give us one chance to choose survival over pride. But if they refuse..." His jaw set. "Then let our extinction be complete and final. Better to be destroyed entirely than to spread our poison throughout the cosmos for centuries to come."