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Chapter 18 - Mortality

Repairs on the Valkyrie were proceeding slowly, with both engines offline all of the resistance fleet had jumped out of Pegasus Drive to protect them as they made repairs before proceeding on to their final destination... Terra.

The fleet was surprisingly small, with only four other carrier vessels which were all designed as large flat vessels with two huge pylons that stuck out each side of the main hull almost resembling the wings of an angel. Squadrons of small fighters weaved in and out of the vessels remaining ever vigilant of attack.

On board the Valkyrie, the engineering deck was crammed with people making repairs to the engines so that they could get underway again. Hy had been promoted to chief engineer in the absence of that slot and was co-coordinating with Oriyn to get the ship back underway again.

"Are we ready to restart the core?" asked Hy, shouting down at Oriyn who was hanging over where the swirling vortex of the core would have been if the engines were re-powered.

"I think so, the drive is a little worse for wear, that;s the best that we can do!" shouted up Oriyn who was a little worried that the cable would break while he was conducting repairs.

Meanwhile in the dark, dank room at the bottom of the ship. Odin was being kept imprisoned within the seal that Eclypse had set up. She cursed her foolishness, she should have listened to Bragi when he told her that they should not have bothered to remake Eclypse. Somehow he kept proving hard to control.

Colin stood before her, smiling at her with all the culminated hatred that he had felt since the beginning of this war against the Asgard. He admitted to himself that it was nice for a while to see an all-powerful "god" confined and helpless.

"I will tell you nothing mortal... You are wasting your time" smiled Odin, confident that even if she was confined by this seal, there was nothing that could hurt her due to her inter-dimensional nature. Blunt objects would pass straight through her. "You have no means of coercing me."

Colin looked confident which kept Odin with a small sense of doubt. "A-ha... so you think that your invincible?" he said crossing his arms and smiling at her confused face. "Well... we have something for you."

At that moment, Blackfire walked into the light carrying an interesting looking gun-shaped device. It was whirling and beeping in an almost rhythmic pattern, he pointed the gun at Odin and fired a purple like energy beam.

The sensation of pain was not something that Odin was used to, it felt like she was being burned alive as the purple beam washed over her, she let out a harrowing scream. The pain was almost too much to bear for Odin, she hung her head down as her white wings shot out of her back and a fire embraced them. The feathers from the wings all began to burn as her body rippled as if she was a reflection in a pond. The seal immediately broke as she collapsed to the floor, her armour melting away to perfect skin.

She looked up a Colin from the floor after the purple energy had finished washing over her. "What have you done!?"

"Done!?" shouted Colin. "Done to you what most other people have to endure... forced you out of that comfortable inter-dimensional state that you were in and made you mortal! Now you will answer my questions!"

"I.. will NOT!" shouted Odin, her voice still showing signs that she was in pain. At that moment two large vines shot out from the darkness and pinned her down to the floor, wrapping around her neck.

"Oh you remember Ultraviolet right?" smiled Colin. "She will help you cooperate..."

"W..w..why?" muttered Odin, sounding completely defeated. "Why make me like this...? YOU DON'T KNOW HOW MUCH YOU PUNISH ME!?"

"PUNISH YOU!?" shouted Colin, loosing his temper, walking over to her and stamping his heavy boot onto her back making her grunt in pain. "What about the millions you enslaved... don't you think you've punished them enough!?"

"You cannot possibly understand..." muttered Odin, almost like she was in a trance. Her voice unusually mellow and soft.

"Understand... what!?" exclaimed Eclypse as he walked into the room. He opened the huge bulked and stepped over a few pipes. "How you have enslaved millions and used so many of us in your little games!? Like me... but what you cannot understand is the way that you manipulate people has not changed in 1000 years and you can never crush the spirit of people."

"So that is why we failed to control you" Odin coughed from the vines lightly choking her as she struggled helplessly. It finally made sense to her, all the problems they had had with controlling Eclypse... they gave him a soul, a spirit and the will to make his own decisions. Such a fatal mistake.

"But why!?" asked Blackfire in his confusion, scales shining in the light. "Why come and interfere with us... you are powerful inter-dimensional beings, even "Gods" as some might say... why interfere with us?"

Ultraviolet loosened the grip on the tentacles to allow Odin a chance to speak but was ready to snap her neck at the slightest resistance. "It was not by choice..."

Colin pushed his boot harder down on her naked back. "And what is that supposed to mean!?"

Odin grunted but complied completely, urging Colin to release his boot from her back which he did after Ultraviolet motioned him to.

"My race... we exist to protect the world tree Yggdrasil..."

"The connection to all the dimensional planes and galaxies!?" shouted Colin.

"You know of it? But no mortal is supposed too...?" looking up at Ultraviolet. "Oh I see... she has told you more then you need to know already."

"Her attitude is getting my nerves" jeered Blackfire. "Can't we just kill her?"

Colin ignored Blackfire's comment and continued. "Go on.." he said urging her to speak.

"Alright... well it is the Asgard's sacred duty to protect existance since the destruction of our world long ago by forces that would crumble Terra into dust..." Colin kicked her in the ribs making her cough.

"Enough with the violence Captain!" shouted Ultraviolet. "She won't be much used to us if she's dead."

Colin looked back at Ultraviolet in rage and then sighed moving back. He had lost both his wife and three of his children to the Asgard's Aesir when he joined the resistance. They executed them in public, through crucifixion, the most painful form of death ever conceived.

"Anyway..." continued Odin. She sat up a little a flicked her long blonde hair back from her face. "We fled that situation, a population of millions reduced to just one ship... the Asgard , our capital command ship. We managed to contain the threat but we were reduced to not even one hundred. We created the Aesir in order to help us in our militant conditions, They are all rejects from our program to reproduce which we lost when we learned how to transcend our mortal coil."

"What does that have to do with us, this universe or this galaxy!?" asked Colin after stepping back for a second. Odin simply stared at him and said... "The existence of humanity has been disrupted... it should not be this way."

"What!?" asked Blackfire as he stepped in, his hand still wrapped tightly around the weapon that had stripped Odin of her immortality.

"You cannot understand what your pathetic existence has done to our race, our universe! It is no matter... you'll be dead soon..."

Colin lost his temper, grabbing his pistol sharply he shot two bullets from the barrel of his gun before Ultraviolet could stop him, straight through Odin's legs. Odin felt the pain encompass her whole body, not feeling it for a long time, she screamed out in agony as she clutched her legs on the floor.

"Why did you invade this universe... if you had so many others.. WHY!?" he shouted watching her in pain on the floor.

Odin clutched her bloody leg and then looked back at Colin, watching his fur slowly stand on end. "Because..." she started, remaining incredibly calm and clear during the pain. "Terra will destroy us... I have seen visions and here you are... proving your point. Anthropomoria, that is the name of your people, the people that inhabit this universe. I am blessed with visions of the future and eventually... you will destroy us. There is only one option..."

The whole room stared at Odin with distrust and contempt.

"Destroy you first... Terra and Silmeria were easy to capture due to the underdeveloped state that we manipulated. You see... Terra was once a power empire that spread across the stars however they challenged the natural order that we laid out for them and meddled in knowledge that they did not understand or have the wisdom to use properly. You see... " said Odin rising to her feet, using the wall to grip herself up. "Anthromorphia have neither the advanced brains or wisdom needed to perceive the true nature of the universe.

"However a scientist, Leviticus..." continued Odin while staring at everyone in the room. "created a clone from the DNA of a sealed Asgard called Galladia... Now, we went to great lengths to seal Galladia away after she nearly wiped out our species and left her on Terra thousands of years ago. He, not understanding anything released Galladia from her prision and we had to mop up his mess. However this clone grew up to have a normal life, she was a commander in Terra's expansive empire, however she unlocked her powers and began to challenge us. Details... Details..."

Colin and Ultraviolet both stared at each other with confused looks on their faces.

"Not to bore you with endless details but a war erupted with your people wanting to exceed more then they were ready for. However they lost, swiftly after we had thousands of years to develop a fleet impervious to mortal weaponry. The clone was lost to us over the final battle of Terra when her ship exploded and in punishment, we restored Terra to pre-space age, dismantled their fleet and our finest achievement... wiped the entire planets memory of their past glory..."

Odin smiled a victorious grin at Colin as she leant up against the wall.

"What right did you have to play god!" shouted Ultraviolet, increasing the grips on the vines around Odin's neck. "To interfere in the natural development of another race!?"

"Being protectors of Yggdrasil gives us that right to protect it against all that lack the wisdom to understand." reassured Odin, her breath getting slightly less from the vines.

"SELF-APPOINTED!" shouted Ultraviolet. She threw Odin to the floor in a heap and turned to face the other way and walk out the door. Tears formed around her face, she could hear the crying of nature, the way that Asgard walked all over life that they considered inferior.

Colin was not sure what to do with her now. He was completely confused over the past that Terra and the Asgard shared. She seemed to be a valuable asset but was probably not going to be cooperative. There was nothing left but to fight the Asgard, to drive them off Terra and save the planet. He was encompassed with rage and a sense of justice for all the lives that had been ruined by the Asgard.

He took a few seconds to think...

"Chuck her out the airlock" he said turning as Blackfire and Eclypse grabbed her to take her out the door.

"No... You can't do this... No!" shouted Odin as Colin turned to walk away from her. "Please... Don't do this..."

"This is justice" thought Colin over and over in his mind as she was taken out of the room screaming for Colin to hear her.

Colin kept walking.

"This is justice"