Thanos Quest

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Thanos Quest is a two-issue comic book limited series in the Marvel universe and is written by Jim Starlin. In it, Thanos schemes to steal the Infinity Gems from the Elders of the Universe and other cosmic entities in order to be able to carry out Death's command that half the population in the universe is to be killed.

The Thanos Quest is continued in The Infinity Gauntlet limited series.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

[edit] Book One: "Schemes and Dreams"

Gazing into the depths of Death's Infinity Well, Thanos comes to realize how to achieve his goal of pleasing Death - by capturing the six Infinity Gems and using them in their proper manner. Using a special chair for travel, he first succeeds in breaking out the In-Betweener from his prison (who was being punished by Lord Chaos and Master Order). As a token of "thanks," the In-Betweener attempts to use his vast and immeasurable powers to destroy Thanos......only to find that his jailers set the conditions of his punishment so his powers only work inside the prison; the prison which Thanos had just destroyed. Thanos points out to the In-Betweener that the In-Betweener's current location in the Universe is at a point in between everything...and as such, it is the one place in all realities where the In-Betweener's powers don't function. Thanos also takes this time to reveal that he is, for reasons currently unknown, one of a select few creatures that are outside the realm of both Chaos and Order (an "ability" similar to that of Adam Warlock) and as such, is "invisible" to them....but that Lord Chaos and Master Order are on their way to punish the In-Betweener for "his" prison break.

Thanos claims the Soul Gem as a result from the powerless In-Betweener and teleports away just in time before the two Cosmic Powers arrive on the scene to punish the In-Betweener for attempting to escape his prison against the wishes of his masters.

Next, Thanos transports to the planet Tamarata where Champion is -said Eldre of the Universe testing his might and martial skills against the combined armies of the entire planet -and, goading him to near-mindless rage by taking a cheap shot at him and then hiding behind his strongest force-fields, gets Champion of the Universe to subconsciously access the limitless energies of the Power Gem on his brow to strike a hammerblow that inadvertently destroys the planet he was on, stranding himself in space. Once Thanos pointed out that the planet in question was so distant from the known space lanes that the Champion could reasonably never expect help to come his way by chance, the Champion is willing to give up anything in exchange for being transported to another inhabited location (where he could pass the time by fighting once more); Thanos then transports him to another planet in exchange for Champion's Power Gem (though, true to Thanos' form, he drops Champion from sub-space, having not agreed on a 'soft landing').

Thanos then travels to The Gardener, and succeeds in using his new Power gem to overpower Gardener's Time Gem and forcing Gardener to die by having Gardener's plants grow uncontrollably and invade him (or so Thanos believed; there was no evidence that Thanos knew of the Elders' previously sucessful machinations to make themselves completely immortal by manipulating Death into rejecting them for all time. The Gardener has since reappeared in the Marvel Universe).

[edit] Book Two: "Games and Prizes"

In book two, Thanos first contacts the Collector, who has control of the Reality Gem and offers an exchange for something the Collector will want. After waiting and ascertaining that the Collector doesn't know how to properly use his Reality Gem, Thanos finds The Runner who is in possession of the Space Gem. Having (partially) been informed by the Grandmaster of Thanos's plans -the Grandmaster had himself been monitoring Thanos for some time at this point -the Runner proceeds to display his already awesome speeds (subconsciously bolstered further by the Space Gem which he now always wore) by destroying Thanos' throne chair and threatening to beat Thanos himself to death at super-speed, but Thanos has no need for it now. Thanos then uses the previously acquired Time Gem to instantly age the Runner by millions of years; even with the help of the Infinity Gem, the Runner was an extremely enfeebled old man, and could not even think fast enough in his adavanced state to try to escape. (The Runner subconsciously used the Space Gem to make himself go so fast that he would often arrive at a distant destination '...even before I knew where I was going;' unfortunately for him, like the Gardener and the Champion of the Universe before him, he was unaware of the Gem's true power.)

After taking the Space Gem for himself , he turns the Runner into a baby and transports himself and the baby Runner to the Collector, in exchange for the Reality Gem (another Elder of the Universe being the ultimate collector's item in his view). The Collector, believing the Reality Gem to be just a piece of glass, happily makes the exchange - but Thanos is quick to show Collector how to use the Reality Gem. As Thanos transports out, he takes the opportuniy to show off his twisted sense of humor yet again and informs the Collector in passing that the spell of infancy that he placed on the Runner was only temporary. The scene fades out as the Runner, suddenly reverted to "Adulthood" and apparently completely aware of events around him even as a baby, starts to beat the Collector at super-speed.

Finally, Thanos transports to the Grandmaster, who forces Thanos to play a game for possession of the Mind Gem (as mentioned previously, the Grandmaster somehow caught wind of Thanos' actions in collecting the Gems and knew that the Gems were more powerful than even he had ever imagined). The game involves a sort of hyper-virtual reality, where both Thanos and Grandmaster wear suits and use explosive blasts -death in the "game" would mean death in the Real World as well -and furthermore the Grandmaster had set the final Gem so that the force field around it would be deactivated for the winner of the contest, or transported to a random when and where in the Megaverse if Thanos attempted to breach the force field by force. When Thanos has Grandmaster cornered in the "game,", Thanos's game body, and consequently his body in the real world as well, is suddenly surrounded by a fungus which completely invades his body -the Grandmaster had determined that such a prize as the collected Infinity Gems constituted such a high-stakes prize that he decided in advance (and completely out of character) to cheat at the game with Thanos. However, Thanos gets the better of Grandmaster, as he sent a robot to play against Grandmaster; ironically enough, the Grandmaster could have used the Mind Gem in his posession to determine that he was facing off against a Thanos construct instead of the real thing. Thanos then smashes the board, causing Grandmaster to slip into a coma of sorts, and walks off with the Mind Gem.

Thanos is now the supreme being in the Marvel Universe and now hopes that his love (Death) will be pleased with him and treat him as an equal. However, with the Infinity Gauntlet, Thanos has become so much more powerful than Death that he is now her superior in every way and they can't be equals. Thanos wants her love, not her blind subservience, and thus considers becoming omnipotent to be a hollow victory.