Excerpt: Holo-Data Files of MiB HQ: Part Four
MiB HQ: Conference Room Alpha-Prime, 1800 hrs
Mission Briefing: Operation Black Oil (Class Omega), Final Report
[Following parts one, two, and three.]
[Agent Zed:] So you’re saying we can’t wipe out the Black Oil for good. We can get it off our Earth, maybe a few others too, if we’re lucky. But its ultimate point of origin isn’t just outside our jurisdiction, it’s outside our entire realm of existence.
[Agent B:] Yes, sir. It’s theoretically possible we could quarantine it to its own universe, which would be a major accomplishment in itself. But unless we can figure out a way around this, we won’t be able to take any final action against the Black Oil in its own dimension without the help of other parties.
[Agent K:] Parties who aren’t themselves fictional in that dimension.
[Agent B:] Correct. And we’d have to get to the right planet. Every chemical analysis we’ve made suggests the Black Oil could not have originated on Earth. But we still wouldn’t know the Black Oil’s actual point of origin if we hadn’t picked up a name during our surveillance of two Oil-possessed operatives. Apparently, the Black Oil is native to the planet ‘Altair IV.’
[Agent T:] But there aren’t any planets around Alpha Aquilae--.
[Agent B:] In that dimension, there are. But don’t ask me how we’re going to get to Altair IV from Earth if all our tech is nonfunctional on arrival.
[Agent Zed:] Hold on. If what you’re saying is right, then the Black Oil only just got here. First it appeared in this TV program on several alternate Earths, and then it somehow broke through to our Earth. But that doesn’t match the evidence we have of Black Oil on this planet going back thirty years--.
[B: (takes a deep breath)] Uh, well, that’s the other thing we figured out, Chief. It turns out things here are even worse than we thought. Much, much worse.
When the Black Oil broke through into our dimension, that breach broke the rules of time and space. So the time-space continuum rewrote history to resolve the contradiction.
[Agent Z:] You mean--?
[Agent B:] Yes, sir. As soon as it got here, history changed. Everything was retconned. The Black Oil didn’t just get here. It’s always been here.
[Agent K:] Are you saying we just suddenly had a centuries-old alien conspiracy appear right out of nowhere and graft itself directly into our Earth’s history?
[Agent B:] Exactly.
[Agent Zed:] To put it plainly, gents: We’re fucked.
[Agent N: (voice suddenly different)] EVEN MORE THAN YOU KNOW.
[ALARMS SOUND: “CODE ONE-OH-ONE, LOCKDOWN. CODE ONE-OH-ONE, LOCKDOWN.”]
[SHOTS FIRE. MASS CONFUSION.]
[RECORDING BREAKS.]
[And then comes this]