2108 Reassurance, the Eve of Battle
Just because there were the same number of carriers didn’t mean that they were equal in strength.
For a truly professional fleet to unleash the combat abilities of a battleship would require at least ten years of training and operation.
The technology on galactic battleships was more developed, but it was also more complicated to operate them.
The reason why Luke had chosen a ‘once-and-for-all takedown’ was because Earth’s allied forces didn’t have the ability to fight Thanos’s army in a proper galactic war.
He had no other options.
Thankfully, this was still within Luke’s worst expectations, and wouldn’t affect his plan to kill Thanos.
When Luke let the core members know, nobody was scared, not even Dr. Banner, who had been beaten up by Thanos.
That was because the trump cards which Luke had uncovered in the last few days were truly unimaginable.
Skye and D.A. Jennifer, in particular, completely shocked many superheroes.
They weren’t idiots. Looking at how the women interacted with Knight, they knew that they were definitely very familiar with each other.
Who knew how long Knight had been hiding such super powerful heroes.
Almost everyone recalled the in-joke: You’ll never know how many tricks Knight has up his sleeve; just wait for the criminals to jump out and die.
Though strictly speaking, Thanos was more than a simple criminal.
Skye and Jennifer weren’t nervous at all.
Both of them were wearing nanosuits and had changed their appearances. Even Jennifer’s Hulk transformation had been disguised with normal skin color.
After this battle, it would only be ‘Heavenly Crippling Hands’ and ‘Divine Heroine’ who would become famous, not Skye and Jennifer.
Because of that, Jennifer didn’t tell her dear cousin anything.
After this, she could get along with Dr. Banner as an ordinary family member. She didn’t need to be a superhero.
Jennifer was well aware of how miserable her cousin was.
But if superhumans who were far inferior to the Hulk were turned into test subjects by secret organizations, they would only suffer countless times worse than Dr. Banner.
As a senior executive of the Justice League, Jennifer couldn’t finish reading all the files even if she wanted to.
So, she didn’t want to reveal her identity at all.
Hence, she was very grateful to Luke for protecting her identity from the very beginning.
That was why she hadn’t hesitated when she received the order to participate in the battle.
Jennifer knew very well that if the Justice League lost this battle, it would be very hard for her and Dustin to live comfortably.
She had some understanding of the infighting among the Avengers, who were also allies, and of the moles and undercover agents caught repeatedly in New SHIELD.
It was only the Justice League that could be described as serious but lively, meticulous but relaxed.
That was because it had a leader whom no one doubted and who had remarkable abilities, who was both the strongest deterrent and the best mediator who kept the allied forces united.
When the Big Dipper clone officially appeared in front of the superheroes, this sense of security immediately increased.
Whether Knight or Big Dipper was stronger had always been a matter of private contemplation, and had even been discussed many times.
But nobody could give a convincing answer, because these two had never sparred before.
The aloof Knight wouldn’t answer such a boring question, including when Tony gossiped with him.
On the other hand, the more talkative Big Dipper occasionally said that it was impossible to determine a victor between the two of them.
These words couldn’t satisfy everyone’s curiosity at all — they were discussing who was stronger to begin with. Who would want a boring answer like “equally strong”?
Now, everybody liked this answer.
Being equally strong meant that Earth had two ‘undefeated’ superheroes, which was even more reassuring than Skye’s super Vibration ability.
That was because both of them could suddenly explode in extreme adversity and turn things around.
Big Dipper’s public appearance was also very important.
A large number of these superheroes were staunch Knight fans, while some were absolutely Big Dipper fans.
It was necessary for these two most important figures to personally appear and interact with everyone on the eve of the battle.
The night Big Dipper showed up, Wanda called him out for a walk.
The two of them walked through the grassland. The trees in the distance were lush, there were stars above their heads, and insects chirped nonstop; it was a peaceful midsummer’s night.
Wanda looked up at the starry sky as she slowly walked along.
After a long silence, she suddenly said, “Will you return to the lawless planet after the battle?”
Luke thought for a moment, then shook his head. “The situation there is basically stable. Let V take charge for a while.”
Wanda lowered her head, and there seemed to be stars in her eyes. “Are you giving yourself a break?”
Luke nodded. “Of course. Otherwise, I would be letting Thanos down.”
Wanda was stunned. “Huh?”
Luke said, “Shouldn’t we take a long break to celebrate killing a galactic tyrant?”
Wanda chuckled. “That’s true.”
After that, she fell silent again. Pumping herself up, she asked her real question. “Can I be part of that break?”
Luke paused and turned to look at her.
Although he couldn’t sense her mental fluctuations, he could still hear her uneasy breathing and her suddenly racing heart.
Pondering for a few seconds, he nodded slowly. “Okay.”
Wanda took a deep breath and stretched out her hand. “Deal?”
Luke patted her hand. “Deal.”
Looking at the witch, whose footsteps suddenly became lighter and more lively, Luke sighed inwardly. Some things had to be made clear sooner or later, but it was better to wait until after the battle.
At the very least, there wouldn’t be any melodramatic deaths.
After a few busy days, it was 3 July 2018. Shuri, who was basically camping out in Wakanda’s central control room, sent out an alert. “Battleships have been detected entering the solar system… Sensors show an 87.3% match to Thanos’s fleet… ETA is under three hours.”
With this warning, Earth’s allied forces automatically entered war mode.
The mid- and lower-level combatants were busy, but the core superheroes were very calm. After all, it wasn’t the first time that most of them had saved Earth.
Em~ except for Ursa Minor.
In their separate chat channel, voice messages and memes started to flood the screen. “My credit points, they’re finally here. Thank you, God.”
“Aliens don’t believe in God, so Hell welcomes you, alien fiends.”
“Wait, isn’t it Arbor Day today?”
“That’s right, that’s right. I specially bought a box of purple potato cakes yesterday.”
“How did they taste?”
“Hm, the same as the aliens coming — like sh*t.”
“It’s fine. The aliens we can take down for credit points are all good sh*t.”
“That makes sense. Isn’t a gift bag of credit points great? My cannon muzzles are already hungry!”
“Let me remind you that if you disobey battle orders, you won’t be reimbursed for damage to your ship.”
Seeing that things were getting out of control, big sister Mindy poured cold water on them.
The younger team members, led by the little turtles, were greedy for credit points, but they could only settle down at that moment.