The victory in Sector 12 should have felt reassuring.
It didn't.
The ride back to the Spectacular Heroes Academy was quiet. Too quiet.
The broken highways looked like scars on the Earth. Burned-out Crawnk machines were everywhere their metal shells half-buried in rubble and ash. Sometimes their green cores still glowed weakly like dying fireflies.
Quantum Edge sat near the back of the transport his katana resting on his lap.
For once he wasn't thinking about trajectories.
He wasn't calculating probabilities.
He wasn't predicting outcomes.
He was just thinking.
That bothered him.
Tempo Echo leaned against the wall watching his own fading images disappear one by one.
The battle had changed something.
Not just the city.
Not just the Academy.
Them.
Red Chakuka sat down in his seat chewing bubblegum and trying to spin his neon nunchucks around one finger.
He failed.
Three times.
The fourth try hit him in the forehead.
"OW!"
Tempo laughed.
Quantum almost smiled.
Almost.
Sour Grape Man sat in the drivers seat even though he wasn't driving.
The actual driver sat in the passenger seat wondering how that happened.
Nobody knew.
Not even Sour Grape Man.
He wore sunglasses, a fake mustache and a shirt that read:
**"Totally A Licensed Bus Driver."**
He honked the horn over and over.
"HONK HONK! IMPORTANT HERO BUSINESS!"
"Please stop touching things " the driver begged.
"I legally can't."
"You absolutely can."
"I literally can't. My hands are contractually obligated to cause problems."
The bus drifted sideways.
Nobody questioned it.
At the Academy that was normal.
The moment they returned alarms started blaring.
Every hero froze.
Red emergency lights flashed across the campus.
The sky above the Academy darkened.
Not naturally.
Artificially.
Something was blocking the stars.
Thousands of students rushed into the courtyards.
Teachers appeared from every building.
Members of the League of Vengeance arrived seconds later.
GreatMan descended first.
His cape billowed behind him as crimson cosmic light lit up the crowd.
MechaStar landed beside him cracking the concrete.
ScoutGirl arrived in a burst of glowing energy.
Noir Knight simply appeared.
One second he was absent.
The next he was standing silently on a rooftop.
Violett Mage floated above everyone her eyes glowing violet.
Even Micro-Man materialized on GreatMans shoulder before returning to size.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
The giant holographic display above the Academy flickered to life.
The image that appeared froze the crowd.
It was a Crawnk.
Not inside a mech.
Not inside armor.
Just a Crawnk.
Tiny.
Green.
Bean-shaped.
Its glowing eyes stared directly into the camera.
Then it smiled.
Behind it...
A huge machine moved.
The crowd collectively stopped breathing.
The "machine" wasn't a planet.
It was a machine.
A machine so large that continents could fit on armor plates.
Cities could fit inside its weapon systems.
Entire mountain ranges looked tiny compared to it.
The Crawnk spoke.
Its squeaky voice echoed across the campus.
"Analysis complete."
"Humanity has resistance."
"Probability of conquest increased."
"Escalation approved."
The image shifted.
Suddenly thousands of Crawnks appeared behind it.
Millions.
Billions.
Entire civilizations.
Entire fleets.
Entire armies.
The tiny aliens weren't scouts.
They were part of something larger.
The Crawnks had an empire.
Earth had just gotten its attention.
The transmission ended.
Silence followed.
A horrible silence.
Then Sour Grape Man raised his hand.
"Question."
Nobody answered.
He continued anyway.
"How is a species shaped like a jellybean this threatening?"
Nobody laughed.
He slowly lowered his hand.
"Fair enough."
that evening the Academy held an emergency assembly.
Hundreds of heroes filled the Grand Hall.
Students.
Veterans.
Teachers.
Survivors.
The atmosphere felt heavier than it had since RECQUIEMs attack.
GreatMan stood at the center platform.
"We confirmed the existence of a Crawnk Empire."
The room remained silent.
"They are not raiders."
"They are not scavengers."
"They are conquerors."
A massive holographic map appeared.
Red markers covered sectors of space.
Thousands of them.
"The scouts we defeated represented than one percent of a single expeditionary force."
Murmurs spread through the crowd.
One percent.
The Sector 12 battle had nearly destroyed a district.
One percent.
GreatMan continued.
"We estimate millions of warships."
"Billions of soldiers."
"Unknown technological capabilities."
"Unknown leadership structure."
"Unknown objectives beyond acquisition."
The room became colder.
Even Sour Grape Man wasn't joking.
Yet.
Then a student raised her hand.
Lunaria.
"What do we do?"
GreatMan looked around the room.
At every hero.
Every student.
Every frightened face.
"We prepare."
Preparation became the Academys purpose.
Training intensified immediately.
Quantum Edge found himself sparring against opponents at once.
The old version of himself would have focused on efficiency.
Now he adapted.
Now he listened.
Now he worked with others.
Tempo Echo noticed first.
"You hesitated less."
Quantum blocked three attacks.
Countered four.
Parried a fifth.
"I trusted you to cover my side."
Tempo smiled.
"There it is."
"There what is?"
"The part."
Quantum rolled his eyes.
He didn't disagree.
Elsewhere Red Chakuka trained with ScoutGirl.
Which mostly meant ScoutGirl tried to teach discipline while Red Chakuka invented ridiculous attacks.
"What are you doing?"
ScoutGirl stared.
Red Chakuka stood atop three stacked chairs.
Balancing on one foot.
Wearing sunglasses.
Holding his nunchucks.
"Training."
"No."
"It is."
"No."
"It absolutely is."
"You are standing on furniture."
"It increases tension."
One chair collapsed.
Then another.
Then another.
Red Chakuka crashed through a table.
ScoutGirl sighed.
"You're impossible."
Red Chakuka emerged from the wreckage.
"Impossible is just possible wearing sunglasses."
Meanwhile Sour Grape Man was banned from five training rooms.
Then seven.
Then eleven.
The official report stated:
**Incident #44: Created sentient burrito army.**
**Incident #45: Replaced simulation enemies with dancing potatoes.**
**Incident #46: Accidentally transformed gymnasium into bathtub.**
**Incident #47: Not accidental.**
Violett Mage stared at the report.
"You are a threat to civilization."
Sour Grape Man pointed proudly.
"Exactly."
"That wasn't a compliment."
"It is today."
Several days passed.
Then the disappearances began.
First one city.
Then another.
Entire populations vanished overnight.
No destruction.
No debris.
No warning.
Just gone.
The League of Vengeance mobilized immediately.
Investigation teams spread across the globe.
Quantum Edge, Tempo Echo, Red Chakuka and Sour Grape Man were among those deployed.
What they discovered everyone.
The missing civilians hadn't been killed.
They'd been taken.
Collected.
Cataloged.
Studied.
Just like the humans in Sector 12.
The Crawnks were gathering data.
Preparing.
Learning.
Waiting.
Somewhere beyond the stars...
Something was organizing them.
Something intelligent.
Something powerful.
The breakthrough came three nights later.
Micro-Man emerged from a meeting looking paler than anyone had ever seen him.
That scared people.
Micro-Man wasn't afraid of anything.
He immediately requested every available hero gather inside the Academys command center.
Within minutes the room filled.
The League.
The students.
The instructors.
Everyone.
Micro-Man activated a hologram.
A single image appeared.
A silhouette.
Massive.
Mechanical.
Ancient.
Its body resembled a living fortress.
Its eyes burned with light.
Standing atop its head...
Was a Crawnk.
A single Crawnk.
Tiny.
Insignificant looking.
Yet somehow terrifying.
Micro-Man spoke quietly.
"We found their leader."
Nobody moved.
Nobody spoke.
The image remained.
Watching.
Waiting.
Then the file updated.
A name appeared beneath it.
**THE OVERMIND, OF CRAWNK PRIME**
The room became silent.
Micro-Man swallowed.
"We intercepted transmissions."
He looked around.
Then continued.
"They're not invading Earth."
The room relaxed slightly.
Then Micro-Man finished.
"They are getting Earth ready."
The feeling of relief went away instantly.
Quantum Edge looked serious.
"Getting it ready for what?"
Micro-Man did not say anything.
Instead he changed the image on the screen.
What appeared next made all the heroes stop.
Even Sour Grape Man was surprised.
The screen showed familiar faces.
* GreatMan
* ScoutGirl
* Tempo Echo
* Quantum Edge
* Red Chakuka
* Violett Mage
* Noir Knight
* Even Sour Grape Man
Every hero was there.
Every student.
Every teacher.
Each person had a file.
Each person had notes.
* Power analysis
* Weaknesses
* Combat records
* Psychological profiles
The Crawnks had been studying all of them.
For months.
The last note appeared under Sour Grape Mans profile.
** THREAT**
**SOURCE OF UNSTABLE REALITY**
**MOST IMPORTANT TO ELIMINATE**
For the first time that day...
Sour Grape Man was really happy.
He was smiling for real.
Not in a way.
Not as a joke.
Not like he was pretending.
The kind of smile that reminded everyone why powerful people in space were afraid of him.
Why RECQUIEM had trouble with him.
Why whole realities changed around him.
He slowly got up.
Cracked his fingers.
Then fixed his cape.
"Well."
Everyone, in the room looked at him.
He smiled again.
"They know about me."
A purple light flickered behind his eyes.
The lights above flickered.
Reality itself seemed to shake a little.
Somewhere far away...
The Crawnks were already moving.
The next war was coming.
This time...
Earth would not be fighting just scouts.