ALL NOVEL Chapter 268: Cold and Alone.
"Stop, let's head back," General Flint sat in his chair again and sighed resting his hand on the handle of his chair and then sighing again with a string of inaudible curses lined from one end of the ship to the other. "That fucker is playing with us."
"Sir, what about the Godslayer?" The head pilot turned in his seat and glanced at the general curiously.
"We won't find him unless he wants to be found, the same way he disappeared with his entire Collective inside of the Khalla-Nova Collective, he's able to take whatever he wants and vanish without a trace whenever he pleases, he said it before and I simply ignored it because it has never been done before; he will confront us when he wishes, I'm coming to accept that there's nothing I can do about that; senselessly chasing and waring our resources down is just playing into his hand," He admitted and then looked to another section of the dash where several people were staring at him, ready for an order.
"Report to the Emporium, Sol Vestic has disappeared without a trace again, this time taking the Yör Galaxy with him, I'm requesting assistance to deal with this monster, we need a general in every sector that can respond immediately-"
"Sir!"
"What now!?" The man snapped and smashed another part of his dashboard, causing sparks to fly around as the cockpit shook from his rage surfacing like a tidal wave across the closed space. "What is it!?" He roared.
"Sir, he appeared again, he's at the 2000th outpost... Eighty-thousand Pins away from where Yör was!" The woman stared at those numbers and did a double-take after saying them.
Note: "Pin" is the unit of measurement from one universe to another (made my own because NASA doesn't have such measurements)
"That's physically impossible, nothing travels faster than light without teleportation, the amount of energy needed to make a leap like that is..." Viktor slowed his speech until he stopped speaking and looked at the screen when the woman sent it to the main dash for everyone to see... "Send an emergency broadcast to the emporium immediately, Sol Vestic has to be hunted and killed immediately,"
"What's happening?" The woman started tapping away at her keys.
"He is utilizing an entire collective's worth of energy at will, request that he be made a maximum level threat, issue a kill on sight order, have his face be put on every screen across the Grand Emporium, request a bypass of all the coalition laws and the use of section 669-B on the Khalla-Nova Collective, effective immediately.
"Sir it has never been done-"
"Cecelia I didn't ask for your opinion, stay silent and sit down," Viktor glared at her; askance of his previous agitation the man was calm as he spoke.
"Outpost 2000 was just destroyed, there is no estimation, everyone including the 2000th general is dead..."
"Send the requests immediately," Viktor stood stiffly as a trickle of sweat rolled down his cheek. "Request the assistance of the 99 as well," He ordered, and everyone nearly gasped at his words; the man hated the 99 generals that outranked him, but Sol had forced him into a position where he wasn't even complaining as he urgently requested their aid.
"Hey... What's Section 669-B?" A guard of the cockpit asked the other guard standing opposite of himself. "I think I slept through the sections, I don't remember that-"
"Keep your voice down," His fellow guard snapped in a whisper.
"Section 669-B is martial law, but on the scale of an entire collective, he's requesting the full aid of the Emporium and all of its resources, every general, every noble, he's going to lock down the collective and start a purge from one side to the next, they're gonna sweep this collective inch by inch, meaning any resistance they find will be eradicated without a second thought." Experience tales at m v|l e'm,p| y- r
"Damn, that Sol Vestic has really done it this time, ey?" The first guard asked with a chuckle but his counterpart seemed more worried than anything else.
"Are you stupid?"
"What?"
"Have you ever seen what happens when a Godslayer is cornered, kid?
Sol Vestic is the most powerful Godslayer they have ever encountered, there's no doubt he's the most powerful enemy in the history of the Emporium post-war, if they manage to corner a monster like that the casualties are going to surpass human reason, he just wiped out an entire outpost in seconds for crying out loud; as far as I'm concerned the general is sentencing us all to death, you don't corner a healthy dragon and expect to walk away alive, this is suicide."
"Hey... Why are you a guard again?" The first asked finding the older man far too informative to be a simple guard.
"I failed the physical test, I was incompatible with the suits," The man answered without hesitation. "I was posted here on the 100th because I had full scores across the board everywhere else.
"Wow..."
"I don't think I'll be sticking around much longer, I don't want to become a casualty of a war that has nothing to do with me, y'know," The older guard sighed.
"Careful, you could be killed for saying such things-"
"As opposed to what, getting turned into space dust because we foolishly tried cornering the harbinger of death?" The man snapped again.
"This is madness, the war ended billions of years ago, why are we still hunting these godly beings like they're livestock, did you know that across the Grand Collective over a trillion Emporium soldiers die every dozen years, do you have any idea how high that number is?"
"It comes with the job-"
"More than half of that number is directly caused by hunting Godslayer and Vatui beings, they're hiding and they rarely ever instigate a fight but we've attacked and kept attacking them relentlessly for aeons, I don't want to be a part of someone's estimate chart, I want to live to see my grandkids again!"
"Is that so?" Viktor stood before the man and the entire cockpit went quiet. "Are you thinking of abandoning your post as a guard of the 100th fleet's general?" He asked and the man stood at attention and saluted nervously.
"I can't say I don't understand, Sol Vestic alone is trouble beyond anything we've seen in the longest while, but there's apparently an army of Vatui warriors of the Celestial Order and higher that are willing to die for him, that's without even mentioning Ikaris; his wife," the general rubbed his forehead and chuckled, I may be walking into a massacre..."
"General-"
"Take an escape pod and leave before 669-B is initiated, make haste, once the order is in effect any escape pod headed in the opposite direction of the Khalla-Nova Collective will be shot down, you have my permission to leave, Stanley, go back to your family, send me regards to your wife too."
"Sir..." The man sucked in a breath of shock and saluted the general again as his eyes watered, running off immediately. "Thank you!"
"As soon as the coward is clear of the ship, send him to hell." Viktor turned around and huffed.
"There's no room for weakness on my ship, if you're afraid of the Godslayer utilize that fear and turn it into a weapon, there's no room in the 100th for cowardice, we are an order of power feared throughout the cosmos on a grand scale, a deserter is an enemy sympathiser, regardless of your rank or your personal relationship with anyone inside or out of this ship, you will be killed upon discovery."
"How cruel..." Cecelia thought, staring at the general as he returned to his cockpit.
"I always knew I made the wrong decision when I surrendered, but I had to find some way to keep them safe, these days I can't even contact them," She stared out through the large screen at the vast emptiness before them with a sad and longing gaze, highlighted by the spectrum of colours around her as her crimson eyes glistened casting the image of an angel that had lost her wings.
"My Godslayer, my clan, husband, I hope you've all been well; I promise I'll find some way to escape this devil, and when I do, I'll come running into your arms again, I swear it."
***
"General Flint has requested the execution of section 669-B, Master," Alpha quietly stood at Sol's side while he sat on a piece of floating debris staring at what was once a galaxy, reduced to a cloud of destruction rapidly spreading through the void. "Your plan to get them all in one place is coming to fruit."
"Yeah," Sol sat hunched with his eyes tracking the debris before him, his gaze was distant, and his voice was tamed and several octaves deeper than it usually was as all the humour, all the life seemed to have been sucked from his personality at Ikaris's mistrust in him, he could feel the link between them wane, tethered by a single string, she was still very attached, but at the same time, it was weaker than Dina and Arla's.
"Do you wish to return to Milady? I am capable of overseeing everything here for a while-"
"No," Sol sighed lowering his head and rubbing his arms, before him was an image of Ikaris's shocked face and in his head her voice asking him for forgiveness, it felt like blades were scraping across his heart and stomach, his chest had the sensation of thousands of pins sticking into him, and his back had an unusual chill, for the first time he couldn't feel the same kind of affection he had grown used to, out in the void he felt cold and alone...
afraid of his own power.
"Just leave me alone and let me think for a while."