218 The Patriarch Falls, Pt Mia paced back and forth on her bridge. Her face was etched with annoyance, impatience, and irritation. The screens all around her and her officers showed live feeds of the area all around them, particularly at the settlement base 5 kilometers below them.

Everything was in great working condition there. Hallowed in power armor and heavy drones patrolled all over. Many teams scoured the area inside the base, while others combed the flatlands beyond it, for dozens of kilometers.

But there was nothing out there, not even a hint of Freya and her team.

Darius appeared on one of the comms displays, and saluted the Crusader. His fleet was a hundred or so kilometers away, and was performing a sweep of the area as well. His frigate, though nowhere near as armed or armored as Mia’s, was still formidable. Over a dozen mecha swarmed around it protectively.

“Crusader Mia,” he said. “No sign of anything out here except animals and their excrement. Just like the last base.”

“Dammit,” cursed Mia. “It’s like those blasted scum outright disappeared.”

Darius nodded in agreement, but his face was more stoic than puzzled.

“You did damage them pretty well, right?” he said. “I mean, your report said it all. You nearly tore their ships apart, so they probably just ran away. They’re afraid of you, sister. You should be happy about that.”

Mia only grimaced in response. She had embellished her damage reports quite a bit – there was no way she could report having done little actual damage to Freya’s forces.

.....

She glanced over at her officers, who avoided eye contact at all costs.

Then she grit her teeth as she tried to figure out what was going on, why Freya and her team avoided attacking them. And not just them, they avoided attacking any of the coordinates they had left.

From her calculations, they still had two or three settlements left in their list of coordinates.

“Even if they ran off,” said Mia, “it’s still our duty to hunt them down. Father’s orders. In my opinion, though? I think they’re playing some sort of mindgame with us. Maybe testing our vigilance.”

“Hah! A pity they don’t understand how much we Prophets can endure,” said Darius.

He couldn’t help but laugh, and Mia couldn’t help but flinch at his bravado. She used to think the same way he did, but she now knew better.

Some part of her knew that Freya understood their limitations better than they knew themselves. This idea burrowed itself into her, and bothered her greatly. It seemed an itch she could never scratch.

The Chief Datacoder suddenly came on the comms displays as well, and she looked visibly panicked. Her eyes were bloodshot, and she looked paler than usual.

“Pardon the interruption Crusader,” she said. “But I’ve discovered something that you need to know.”

“What is it?” snapped Mia.

“You’d better be sitting down if you aren’t already.”

“Just spill it already!”

The Chief Datacoder inhaled deeply and centered herself. Her heart thumped heavily in her chest as she prepared herself for a vicious lashing.

“The ship’s SecInt was hacked,” she said. “Freya’s team has all of our coordinates, all of our data. I’m sure of it.”

Mia’s eyes immediately flared wide as she realized all of the failures she committed. Her mind raced as she thought of every coordinate they had, and realized where Freya had gone.

Rather, she realized that Freya didn’t stop attacking at all, and instead went straight for the heart.

“All vessels begin port procedures!” she ordered. “Set coordinates for home – Father’s in danger!”

~

Freya leapt out of the open maintenance hatch with her blade split in two, and charged at the dozen Prophets within the Primary Security room. Many sat at their terminals, while a few others stood in conversation.

She dashed at the first few with blinding speed and cut them to pieces, even before they realized she was there. Her blades cut through the necks of two Prophets at the same time, and lopped their heads off in a flash.

A third was cut cleanly in half at the waist, while the fourth was stabbed straight through his heart and out his back. Both fell to the floor in utter shock as they died.

And in those few seconds, the rest of the Prophets realized they were under attack. A few jumped up in surprise and fumbled around for their weapons. The more experienced ones were already aiming down sights at her.

Freya spun into an evasive dance while Max and T-Rex hopped out of the maintenance tunnels and joined in the fray. The both of them posted up behind cover and fired bursts at the Prophets furthest from Freya.

All their rifles reported were muffled THAK THAK sounds, despite the size of the round they fired.

Their bullets tore in the Prophets as their suppressors began to glow red from the friction.

And just outside of the Primary Security room, a half dozen Prophets walked on by in casual conversation. They were all blissfully unaware of the chaos inside.

A bloodied hand shook as it reached towards a security terminal. Its owner was clearly in pain, but he still reached out towards his controls. His fingers were mere centimeters from hitting the alarm.

But he felt a gust of wind while a blur of metal flashed across his eyes. Only a moment later, his forearm split off from his elbow and fell to the ground. Blood spurted out from his wound in copious amounts.

And he would have screamed in agonizing pain, had his head not been cut off as well.

Freya leaned up on one of the terminals and panted as her stamina recovered. All around her were dead Prophets cut up or shot to pieces. Their blood dripped down and pooled where they lay.

“Gimme a few to catch my breath,” said Freya. “Don’t know what we’re gonna find in Central Command, and I wanna be in top shape.”

And to her surprise, her stamina filled up much quicker than normal. She looked inward momentarily, and saw Azrael’s concoction in her system. It was a cocktail of multiple biocatalysts that helped increase her output overall, assisted by a small swarm of genetically-coded nanites.

“No worries,” said Max. “Gives me time to do a little fancy footwork myself.”

He pushed over one of the dead Prophets and took his seat. Then, he cracked his knuckles before he dove into the terminal in front of him. Though he wasn’t as fast as Raijin, he certainly knew his way around the system easily.

He adjusted a number of settings as a mischievous grin spread across his face. It was as though he was having the time of his life.

“The hells are you even doing, man?” asked T-Rex. “You’re gonna get us discovered.”

“Calm down,” replied Max. “Life’s gonna be a lot easier for all of us if I do this. Now that we’re in Primary Security, we’ve got access to all the security protocols.”

“Alright, so you’re gonna shut it all down?”

“What? Naw, that would get us discovered fast. I’m just muting all the alarms. Even if they trigger it, nothing’s gonna happen. At least, no-one in Central is gonna know.”

Freya walked over behind Max and watched as he worked. She was a little impressed.

“How’d you even learn how to do this?” she asked.

“I took Advanced Sabotage during officer training,” he replied. “Was my favorite class, to be honest.”

He finished lowering a number of sliders all the way to the bottom, then backed out of every menu he dove into.

“Alright, let’s get outta here,” he said.

Freya nodded, then walked over to the security room’s main door and slid it open. She peeked out to the wide circular hallway and found a number of Prophets. Some milled about, while others chatted to each other.

Many walked up and down the hall, clearly busy with their normal lives.

“You two ready for round two?” she asked, to which the both nodded gravely.

She adjusted the grip on her blades, took a deep breath, then launched herself out into the hallway. There, she repeated her performance and dashed straight towards the three closest Prophets.

All three were cut to pieces by a flurry of slashes, and fell to the ground in utter shock and pain.

Freya then spun into a dance and cut down the next group, even as the first ones bled out and died. At the same time, Max and T-Rex had also begun their rampage, and their hail of suppressed bullets tore through all the other nearby Prophets.

Although a handful were able to yell out in surprise, it only took moments for them to be silenced forever. One of them even died with his hand still on his pistol’s grip.

Every Prophet in the hallway was cut down in literal seconds, and littered the area with their bodies.

Freya, Max, and T-Rex quickly ducked into a large hallway and ran down its marble floors. At the very end was a grand set of double doors, with two heavily-armed and armored Prophets guarding it.

But both were quickly perforated by Max and T-Rex’s suppressed rifle fire. Their bodies slammed up against the wall, and slid down to the ground. Blood streaked down in their wake.

Freya recombined her blade into one, then she wrenched the door open with a powerful front kick. The right side of the door tore itself off its hinges and fell to the ground with a WHAM.

The other caved inwards with a CRACK, and swung open feebly.

The three of them walked unimpeded into Central Command, where Father sat behind his obsidian desk in the middle. Seated in front of him was Callie, version 2.3, who jumped out of her chair and spun in their direction.

A frown was etched on his face, while utter surprise was etched on hers.

“Callie, so good to see you,” said Freya. “And you must be the ever-elusive Father, huh?”

“Father! That’s Freya!” cried Callie. “We need to kill her! Quickly!”

Father’s demeanor changed instantly from a frown to that of intrigue. Something within him stirred at the sight of Freya, and he instantly knew he had to have her.

In that moment, he felt it was destiny that brought her to him, and he welcomed it. He stood up, walked around his table, and put a hand on Callie’s shoulder.

“Calm down, child,” he said. “What we have here is an opportunity.”

“Opportunity?” she protested. “Please, no, Father.”

She was rebuffed by Father’s chuckling.

“You’re not going against my wishes again are you?” he chided.

historical

Callie immediately paled, then fell quiet. She stepped back and lowered her head in shame.

Father turned away from her, and looked straight at Freya as she approached. There was a hint of admiration in his gaze, and everyone easily saw it.

“Freya,” he began. “You’ve killed my children, desecrated my work, and made your way into my stronghold without me noticing. You’ve certainly earned your place to be here.”

His eyes wandered up and down her body, and admired her curves openly. His grin became more lascivious as the moments went on.

“And if you willingly join the Family, you can help guide it at my side,” he continued. “Your wilfulness, and your strength, and your dedication... your very presence would brighten all our lives.”

Both Freya and Callie paled at his words. Freya particularly felt as though she had been bathed by some disgusting viscous liquid, and a desire to scrub her skin burned through her.

.....

“I’m not even remotely interested in anything you have to offer,” she said.

Callie paled even further. Not only did the shock of Father’s words course through her mind, but also because Freya rebuffed him so easily and so casually. As though Father was worth nothing, meant nothing. Anger bubbled up in her and overwhelmed her momentarily.

“How dare you treat Father’s offering like it was meaningless,” she yelled.

“Pipe down, junior,” said Freya. “Your dear old Dad and I are having a heart-to-heart. And hey, remember what I told you to tell him? Well, you’re about to watch it happen.”

Father’s eyebrow raised in interest.

“You were supposed to pass a message along?” he asked. “Why didn’t you?”

“I... I don’t remember,” Callie lied.

“Mhm.”

Father’s dubious expression quickly faded and turned to that of deep disappointment. Then he turned his body and faced Freya squarely.

“Since you’re so quick to refuse me,” he said, “I’ve no choice but to make you mine, by force. But don’t worry – you’ll enjoy life here. In time.”

Freya felt energy sweep out from out of him, then shock as she realized that he focused it in a similar way she focused her own. She sensed heaps of it as it flooded through him, and coursed through every fiber of his being.

“Adaptability. Resilience. Persistence,” he began. “They’re the most fundamental powers embedded within every human being. It’s been that way since the beginning, and will be that way until the very end.”

Father’s wiry old body swelled as his muscles grew considerably. The wrinkles on his face smoothed out as his skin became taut and tough. Within moments, he looked decades younger, and more virile.

“And I’ve perfected them all within myself,” he continued. “This is what it means to be a part of my Family, to be at the head of it.”

Callie’s mouth gaped wide as she watched Father empower himself. She felt his strength far overshadow her own to the point where she felt like cowering. And something within her wondered why he hadn’t given it to her.

Why he hadn’t given it to any of them.

Why he freely offered it to Freya.

But she shook the questions away quickly, and instead grabbed her war hammer, which was leaning up on Father’s obsidian desk.

Frustration and anger bit deep into her as her hands tightened around her hammer’s grip.

“Callie,” said Father. “Mark today as a truly special occasion. It’s when our family will finally be complete.”