Ravens of Eternity

475 Redemption

Darkness swept across the entire galaxy, and shadow overtook every particle that existed, everywhere. No stone was left unturned, and no corner was left untouched.

The void had completely taken over everything.

In one moment, everything was nothing.

And in the next, everything was back in place.

Azrael’s eyes were firmly shut tight after experiencing such absolute pain. But it had somehow passed, and she once again felt Kali’s beating heart next to hers. The wild thumping struck her chest hard, and told her that they were, in fact, alive.

She reluctantly opened her eyes and saw that the athletic hall was still around them. Whichever soldiers were there at the end were still there as well, along with all their equipment, everything.

Hell, the emergency notification was still going, though it felt like it was telling falsehoods at that point. A few moments later, it stopped.

The two slowly unwrapped themselves from each other as they looked around quizzically.

“Is this…?” Azrael stammered. “Are we…?”

.....

Whatever sentences she wanted to say simply refused to come out.

“If this is some kinda afterlife, I’d say it doesn’t feel much different from normal life,” Kali muttered. “It feels a bit like… Getting woken up in a new body after the old one died though.”

Both of them fully expected for things to completely stop, completely end. For all things to be dead and gone, their lives turned to nothing. For the shadow to be their only existence going forward.

They figured that was the only future they had, especially after experiencing such intense pain. It seemed to them that every cell in their bodies was literally on fire, and had been burned away.

And in fact, if it wasn’t for the lingering pain still in their bodies, they would have easily concluded that this was all some fever dream or pain-induced hallucination.

But the pain ebbed and their bodies remained.

Azrael quickly pulled out her medgun and checked Kali’s vitals. She did both a quick scan and full genetic prognosis – everything was as it should be.

Kali was Kali, as she had been for countless years. More importantly, she was definitely alive.

She then turned her medgun towards herself and confirmed that she was also unharmed and alive. Her eyes went wide as did the grin on her face – they had survived, somehow!

Azrael grabbed Kali’s hand, afraid that it was all a dream, then ran out of the athletic hall at great speed. She passed the same groups going out as she did going in, except now all of them looked bewildered and in pain, yet also deeply relieved.

And she even scanned a few with her medgun just to make sure. Like Kali and herself, they checked out just fine.

But they didn’t stop for long and ran back towards the Council Chambers, where whoever was left were muttering and talking excitedly at what was happening to them.

Raijin was still floating in the air, but with a much more relieved look on her face.

More importantly, the galactic map in the center was restored. Every planet and system and celestial body was back where they belonged, at least as far as anyone could tell.

“What in the hells is going on?” someone yelled out.

“I am unsure,” Raijin replied. “However, Yggdrasil’s galactic connections have been restored. All parts are back in their place. Every satellite and station and ship and planet is visible to me once again. The galaxy is… it is alive.”

“What about Godeater?!” Azrael cried out. “What’s Dendrus look like?”

There was a murmur of agreement, and many in the chamber moved closer to the map to see. As they did, Raijin zoomed in on the nanite projection map until Dendrus IV was its sole focus.

It was still surrounded by countless mirror satellites, of course. But more importantly, the planet’s surface was no longer black as ink. Dendrus had been completely restored to what it had been more than 100 years ago – a wholly war-torn planet.

Its vast cities were crumbled and bombed out and blasted to pieces. Countless craters of all sizes marred its surface, some of which were still smoldering. The remains of various machines and devices of war from a century ago were scattered all around the planet as well.

There were large sections where the crashed remains of the Einherjar’s Storm Discs and mirror satellites had piled up.

And despite the damage that war had caused on it, there were still swaths of land that had all kinds of flora and fauna barely struggling to survive. There were half-burnt forests and half-emptied oceans present on its surface, along with whatever little animal life that survived in them.

Most critically however, it was completely devoid of all humanity. All that was left of them were the countless corpses littered practically everywhere.

It was almost as though the war that raged on it had finally come to a stop moments ago. In a way, it did.

“Look! All those Imperial and de Jardin warships are back, too!” someone cried out.

Raijin zoomed out slightly and revealed the numerous shipwrecks scattered high above Dendrus. They were still in that swirling storm formation, but unmoving and lifeless. However, floating among the dead were the remnants of whatever navies had been swallowed up by Godeater’s initial attack.

Every navy from that fight was seemingly present, from the Sol Federation to the de Jardin to the Discordians to the Imperials. Even a few Einherjar casualties were present.

All of their hulls were marred and scarred by all kinds of weapons fire, some so badly that they were on the verge of destruction.

“Quick! Everyone issue a ceasefire to your fleets!” Halbrecht cried out. “Stop them from firing on each other, just in case!”

“Give them coordinates to Yggdrasil Station where they can parley and repair their ships,” Raijin added. “With the condition of absolute nonaggression, of course.”

Groups from the old galactic nations around them quickly got to work – they opened up comms to whatever ships were out there as fast as they could. They did their best to appraise them of the current situation, as illogical as it appeared, and ultimately informed them of their mutual cessation of hostilities.

As they did so, a high-priority comms request came into the Council Chamber. It was accompanied by Anali de Jardin’s holographic face. It looked pained and confused and out of sorts all at the same time.

“Yggdrasil, do you read?” she asked. “What the hell just happened?”

Cheers erupted from the Einherjar still in the Chamber as they quickly accepted the comms request and completed the line. All manner of weepy welcomes and explanations flooded their comms soon thereafter.

They filled in the High Admiral as best they could, though it looked as though she couldn’t understand what was going on. It was quite a lot for her to hear. For all of them, really.

“Look, the central station is back as well,” said High Templar Sin. “If Anali’s back, then maybe so is the Matriarch? We gotta open up comms there, too!”

A number of de Jardin commanders quickly did as much, and opened up communications lines to the Matriarch. She quickly answered, along with the Grand Parliamentarian beside her.

They too looked bewildered and confused and in deep amounts of pain. But also some degree of relief at being alive.

Even more cheers erupted in the Council Chambers as more and more of them opened up communications lines across the galaxy.

They reached out to every corner they could think of, not just to the powers-that-be, but to their loved ones, friends, families, partners, everyone. It didn’t take long until many in the Chamber were absorbed in excited chatter.

All were filled with great relief that their fates weren’t as bleak as they originally thought. On top of that, everyone had their own theories as to why they were still alive, which they couldn’t help but share with each other.

They ranged the gamut, such as being inducted into some strange heaven or hell or even purgatory. Or it was all a dream and nothing was real. Most agreed that they were alive, though.

Whatever dread and pain that was in their bodies drained away as they all engaged with each other, and quickly replaced with a sense of lightness of being. Slivers of hope slipped in where the darkness receded, and grew at time ticked by.

As the positive energy in the Chamber rose higher and higher, and as everyone opened up communication lines across the galaxy, Raijin adjusted the galactic map in the center.

She pulled back on the map and zoomed out to various parts of the galaxy itself. First she refocused on the Sol system, and found Gaea back in place. Just as critically, the vast tri-ringed dyson sphere that was Helios was also back, along with all of its people.

It didn’t take her long to locate Redstar and Kayt and Kayt’s crazy uncle. Jionna Laertidus and her entire farm was back in place on Venus, alive and well. She reviewed everyone she had ever come across in the Federation, well, anyone she and Freya had gotten along with anyhow. There, she found that they were all equally confused, but relieved.

It was the same with Taloren Prime in the Drogar Empire. Lacroseth City was back, and everyone she knew was alive and doing well. Szereth and Alevos and Severas and Doleth – all seemed fine, if a bit disconcerted.

Foundation in the Hegemony had also been restored, along with everyone in the floating cities. Although many had fallen down to the surface, none had been severely damaged. They were embedded into the ground at odd angles, almost as though they had been there the entire time.

She found Max somewhere in one of those cities – although he was out of sorts, he was doing his best to help those around him.

Mathilde de Jardin was also in a similar situation, and was doing her best to help out whatever disconcerted de Jardins were on Montsoll.

Raijin felt a wave of relief spread through all her systems and circuits at seeing everything – or at least most of everything – back in place. Many were still dead, such as High Admiral Sara Chase, whose had committed suicide before she was converted.

In fact, far too many had chosen a similar path, so when they were restored, they were restored as corpses. Such as those who died in the vast galactic war prior to Godeater’s takeover. All those soldiers and mercenaries – still dead.

She also confirmed that a few malignant people such as That Idiot and Eris were dead.

But Raijin didn’t offer any sympathy for any of them. Some people deserved to remain corpses, especially in a galaxy freshly reborn. There was no need for them to ruin things for them again – they were perhaps too corrupt and beyond saving anyway.

“What about Freya?” Azrael asked quietly. “If everyone’s back, she oughta be too, right?”

Raijin zoomed back to Dendrus on the map, and centered its view on Thanatos. It floated out there quietly and serenely, just outside of Dendrus’ orbital pull.

Seeing it there caused a wave of electricity to pulse through Raijin, and she quickly reopened her connection to her Remote Shard. There, she swept through the devastator’s systems and brought them out of idle.

And quickly reformed her nanite body on its bridge.

The smile on her face melted away quickly when she saw that the bridge was empty and void of life. There was nothing left of Freya, not even a trace.

She turned towards Azrael, back on Yggdrasil, and shook her head solemnly.

“Freya is gone,” she said. “I-I can only theorize that perhaps she actually succeeded in what she aimed to do. She convinced Godeater to withdraw. That is perhaps why we are still alive. For all we know, she might have taken over Godeater herself.

“In any case, it must have cost her everything to achieve.”

“Sounds like something Freya would do, huh?” Azrael replied. “She always was a bit dominant, you know? A little too headstrong and unyielding. If anyone could beat Godeater, she definitely was that person. I guess in the end, her going to meet it really was the right call.”

The two of them chuckled lightly.

“I am sure we will never know what truly happened between them,” Raijin said after a moment. “But it does not matter. We are all alive, and the threat of Godeater is gone. At least, for now. I can detect no trace of its presence anywhere in the galaxy, as far as I can tell.

“We have survived the worst thing to happen to us in our entire history, to every history that exists. And perhaps, we should make the most of this chance.

“Something tells me it could be the only one we have ever again.”