Reaching the Worldship of Galactus wasn’t hard when you have a contact living on it. I flipped up a Portal, took a step, and I was on board.

Galactus didn’t necessarily hide His location from others, as there was little reason for Him to do so. Capable of teleporting across the universe as He desired, He could be anywhere in basically no time at all, so where He was at any specific moment was basically transient. Once He learned how to Interdict the area so thieves couldn’t teleport on board His vessels, there was basically little reason to hide at all.

“Dyna!” Ben Parker greeted me, he and May flying over to meet me as I came on board. We shook hands.

“A pleasure to hear from you, dear. I understand you have big plans in the works!” May smiled at me, exchanging hugs.

“Yeah, yeah, running willy-nilly all over the universe prepping for a trans-dimensional invasion of sorts. Gonna need your help, and the old fart’s.” Galactus was over on His monitoring equipment, ceaselessly studying the universe for signs of more Celestial Seeds.

“He has a measure of goodwill for us, and is in our debt, but you have to be careful with what you request of Him, Dyna,” Ben admonished me carefully.

“I know. But I think you will be surprised by something. The Old Fart cannot let His conscience interfere with His duty, but if He can let it out to play, well...” I smiled slightly. “Let us see what the last son of Taa will say, shall we?”

---

“Dynamo of Terra,” the World-Devourer of Terra acknowledged me. “You Wield the Power of the Underweb, and have a Core that rivals that of the Power Cosmic. You are worthy to be acknowledged by Galactus. Speak!” He told me, turning from His instrumentation. As He spoke, my smaller form was forced away, and I hovered before Him in my full Golden Child form, little whorls of cosmic energy reacting to His presence.

As always, He looked the same, yet different from before, owing to both my increased perceptions and His subtle changes after consuming more Seeds, as the energy that He was actually made of changed with each of His meals.

After all, He ate the raw materials Celestials were made of...

Part of my head promptly started looking at His tech, which operated on manifold principles as it attempted to overcome the various levels of concealment the Celestials wove about their Seeds.

“Great Galactus, I seek Permission from you, and some time, but no expense of your energy!” I bowed to Him.

“Permission.” He seemed to find that novel as His square pupils, gently burning with the power to consume stars, regarded me. “What would you need to seek permission from Galactus for?”

“I seek the use of the production facilities of Taa II, and your Guidance!”

He couldn’t actually blink, but He did stare at me for a long moment. “Elaborate, Dynamo of Terra,” He finally responded, His tone definitely curious.

“The Negative Zone is coming, a wave of annihilation that is going to sweep across several galaxies. Even now they make worlds designed to kill or capture cosmic beings, with the goal being to be able to harness Your own power for their benefit.” I sent the memories at Him, and He digested them instantly on all the levels.

“Worlds and species are going to die during this war, but the main reason they will is a question of scale. Simply put, it is the militaries of three galaxies being sent up against the population of a universe. We need an edge.

“The battleworlds they are shaping up are designed to counter use of the Power Cosmic, meaning direct intervention by cosmic beings will be dangerous and far less effective than it should be.

“I would like to use the production facilities of Taa II to build two fleets: one for evacuation of planetary populations, and one for war!”

He considered me silently, going over what I’d found out with my Cosmic Awareness and Divinations during my trips to the Negative Zone. Even now, were He to enter the Negative Zone Himself, He would be putting Himself in great danger, let alone lesser beings like the Celestials.

“You believe Galactus has need of a fleet?” He asked, almost amused.

I simply swept my hand around me. “You ride in Your Worldship for a reason, Mighty Galactus. If Your Power Cosmic will be repressed, well then... You are very old, and you are not a fool. Do they think they are the only beings who can build weapons of war, and mighty engines that can shake the cosmos?”

He already had Taa II, and while it was not a warship, there were few to no grander artificial constructions in all the universe!

His expression was thoughtful as He considered the possibilities. “It will cost Me nothing of My personal energy, and scant amounts of My attention, especially were others to oversee the construction.” Hinting that if I wanted to build a fleet, I’d better have the designs and plans to do so.

“Furthermore, I would ask that the first iterations of the evacuation fleets be made available to those species and worlds who do not have access to starflight, that they may be evacuated from their worlds and need not be Consumed by Galactus!”

Now I had His attention. He stared at me for a long and thoughtful moment, going over the pros and cons of that. “A Fleet of Ships to evacuate those worlds that Galactus needs Consume, without expending My own power...” He seemed to find the idea intriguing. “To where would such populations be evacuated to?”

“For this, I would request the Guidance of Galactus.” I turned and swept my hands at Ben Parker. “With the assistance of the Molecule Man, I would request the Devourer of Worlds help him create Ringworlds that those populations could be settled upon, and their ecologies transported and recreated to.

“One Ringworld can house the inhabitants of tens of thousands of worlds. Furthermore, there is no reason to build a massive Fleet if one but knows the destination. If the inhabitants can be removed via teleportation, one only needs build a ship capable of pulling off the feat without expending Your own power, and the task is done.”

He regarded me silently for a long moment once again. “Why,” He asked after that pause, “should Galactus agree to this?”

“Because You already have,” I said kindly, and He almost flinched. “You have the capabilities to do all of this on Taa II, You simply have never done so because the demands on Your time and energy were far too great, especially on a continuing basis, and You are Galactus, there is no one for You to go to for help with this plan.

“The Duty of Galactus is clear, and mercy cannot be allowed to interfere with it. But if Mercy does not interfere with it, and there is no demand on Your time and energy, then You may finally implement this plan, and the Ringworlds of Taa III, IV, and however many more are required, will begin to dot the cosmos.

“The Devourer of Worlds may become the Savior of Worlds, as well.”

Ben and May looked very impressed from where they were looking on. It went without saying that Ben would help pull this off, not being bound to Devour as was Galactus. He didn’t know how to do it all quite yet, and would need the Guidance of Galactus...

“Who would oversee such places?” He asked, and I knew I had Him.

“I plan to ask the Watchers to observe, and measure if any primitive races are ready for the next step. Furthermore, I would like to ask the Watchful Order of the Guardian Eye to oversee and protect the Ringworlds from those who would exploit the populations or use them as a resource for slaves and the like. Lastly, Eon would surely agree to dispatch teachers to them when the time is right.

“It will be simplicity itself to divide them from one another until they are sufficiently advanced to deal with their neighbors, and keep their respective ecologies separated.

“All that is needed to set things in motion is the Guidance of Galactus.” I paused for a moment, and then continued, “I also have a question of Galactus.”

“Speak.”

“On any or all of the many worlds that Galactus has consumed, is it possible that some of the populations were whisked away, perhaps through time, before the worlds were destroyed?”

His eyes actually narrowed at my question. “Interesting...” His all-consuming gaze shifted away. “Galactus... has many, many samples from the worlds He has Devoured, including great numbers of their populations.”

I sighed, and smiled despite myself. “Then perhaps it is time to implement a dream of Galactus’, as well?”

His square pupils turned to Ben Parker. “Will you aid Galactus in this endeavor, Benjamin Parker?”

Ben just laughed, swelling up to equal size as Him, and extended his hand. “Galactus, it would be my honor and my pleasure to make this come true!”

A gauntlet in maroon clasped his hand, and the two great powers shook. And if, for the first time in eons, there was a slight smile on the face of Galactus, that was something only those present needed to know.

------

“You... received Galactus’ permission to use the production facilities on Taa II, his system-ship?!” Tony Stark’s eyes were almost popping out.

“Barb and Wrench are already out there inputting the ship designs for the battle fleets and evacuation vessels. Furthermore, we’ve access to His records of worlds He has devoured in the past, and we’re going to use them to make Ringworlds and the ships themselves.” I could see the fervent light in his eyes. “No, Stark. None of what you are thinking and hoping and scheming is going to happen. Tell me why.”

His mouth worked, and then he grimaced as he began to form arguments to his own desires, countering and re-countering them.

“It all comes down to not pissing off Galactus, and it’s not Our Stuff,” Stark finally admitted, sighing heavily, slumping in his chair. “Damn! Such an opportunity...”

“We may look and watch and attempt to understand, but we can leave with nothing material. That is not our fleet, it is the fleet of Galactus. The Ringworlds are not for those with worlds of their own, but those with nothing. We are aiding Him in realizing His dream, and it just so happens to dovetail with protecting all of Reality. There’s going to be a huge change in the reputation of Galactus soon as a result of all this, I would think.”

“And Ben Parker is going to learn how to create a viable Ringworld,” Stark mused, nodding slightly. “Population problems are not going to be such in the future, I would think?”

“Very good, although Ringworlds are primarily for non-extractive economies, given their nature. So, very much based on agriculture and the like, with centers for service industries. There will be nothing to mine, as such will be used up in creation of the Ringworld. All such mineral assets will basically have to come from beyond the Ringworld.”

“Which isn’t an issue for most civilizations, and you could even place those down in sufficient quantities to help a primitive society advance.” Stark shook his head at the implications. “How many is the old world-eater planning on making?”

“At least ten thousand of them.”

Stark’s jaw dropped despite himself, and he clasped his hands to push it back up, despite himself. “Uh, wow.” He blinked despite himself. “He, wow...”

“Seven billion years of eating worlds, Stark. He’s got a lot of guilt backed up.”

“And he’s just throwing a Sanctuary Ringworld in there because He can.” Stark shook his head again. “Cosmic, right. If I hadn’t seen Taa II myself, I would never have believed this was possible.”

“I expect you to be in constant contact with Barb and Wrench looking at Stuff. They’re already backing up reams and reams of data on the assembly operations and technology. Take what you can and use it. Knowledge is the only thing Terra gets out of this for ourselves, but that’s likely the most important thing, right?”

He glanced at those files in his head, and I saw him quiver. The need to go dumpster-diving in there was almost all-consuming, but Barb was very good at indexing that stuff...