Gril’Die Khuda’Mundi sat in awe at the article that had just appeared on the newswave. Reading, his hand never left his lips as it attempted to shut away some of the horror. After finishing the article, he quickly picked up his personal wireless and entered the parameters to reach his contact outside Skogr, who then patched him through to Feriadd Khuda’Salongriell on a secure connection.

“This is the High Councilor speaking,” Feriadd said over the wireless. Gril’Die would never get used to the way voices sounded over a hypenet connection. It was like listening to someone inside a metal canister with water up to their knees.

“It’s me,” Gril’Die said, keeping his voice slightly hushed out of sheer paranoia, though no one was watching him. He was, after all, the one who made sure everyone was being watched properly. The person who was supposed to watch him very conveniently no longer existed. Nonetheless, the paranoia remained.

“Mi’Olnr!” Feriadd exclaimed, and Gril’Die imagined his hands being flung up into the air in welcome despite the form of communication. Quickly, however, he was back to business. “What is it? Why are you contacting me over the wireless? That’s not like you.” The suspicion in Feriadd’s voice was evident. Still, Gril’Die had very much contacted him for a reason.

“Have you read the latest newswave?” Gril’Die’s hushed voice met itself with a slightly morbid tone, and Feriadd grunted slightly as he made note of the tone.

“No, I haven’t,” he admitted. “I’ve been swamped with paperwork for days. Is there something I need to see?” A note of concern arose in his voice.

Gril’Die nodded somberly before remembering that he hadn’t opened a visual channel. “Yes,” he said. “If you can, open up today’s article 2389.” He waited a few moments for Feriadd to push aside some of his papers to find his newsfeed viewer.

“Alright, I’ve got it,” Feriadd said over the wireless. About a milliday later, he said, “Great One help them.”

Gril’Die took this as his cue to go on to explain further why he had called. “Councilor, if this had anything to do with the Ginnung, I need to know now.”

“Of course it didn’t, Mi’Olnr,” Feriadd went on. “If it had anything to do with us, we’d definitely have kept you in the loop about it when it was still being planned. I don’t think anyone in the Ginnung had anything to do with it. We’re much more precise than that.”

Despite the assurance, Gril’Die didn’t feel too much better about the whole thing. Even without the Ginnung being involved, they’d likely be blamed for it. Furious at that thought, Gril’Die slammed his fist into his desk. How was he supposed to keep this situation clean?

“Mi’Olnr, you don’t have to do anything for us over this,” Feriadd said in appreciation, but Gril’Die couldn’t believe that. He’d been on the other side of the news for altogether too long. He’d stood idly by for too long, working his way to the position he held now.

Still, he had never seen anything quite like this. This went to a whole new level of horrible that he had never witnessed before. “I want to, though, Councilor,” he said, sitting up a bit straighter in his seat. “The Monarch has caused me to do so many terrible things over all these cycles that I’ve been in the Armada. You know, I was an avid patriot before I went to the Academy.”

“Really?” Feriadd asked, quite intrigued. “And how, my friend, did you wind up on the other side of that coin? This is pretty far from patriotism for the Monarchy, all things considered, Mi’Olnr. You don’t exactly fit in entirely here, either, though, do you?” The question was innocent enough and not at all meant for harm. Still, it was true.

“No, I suppose I really don’t,” Gril’Die replied. “But I can at least speak my mind on the affairs of the Monarch when I go around town in Skogr,” He said, thinking back to a particularly nice evening in that city, though he still had trouble remembering all the different boroughs, so he couldn’t have told anyone where in town he had been.

“Very true,” the High Councilor agreed. “That’s not really something everyone can do around the system, is it? I remember getting into all sorts of trouble for speaking poorly of the Monarch when I was a child. I can almost recognize why someone might do this for that exact reason, too.” Gril’Die heard Feriadd’s chair lean back as he adjusted his seat.

“I can’t say I feel the same, Councilor.” Again, Gril’Die was offering a
voice of reason into the argument, but it wasn’t really a valid comment. His feelings about the subject were clearer than the glass panes that were missing outside so many of the stores in Skogr City. He had no way of reconciling what was being reported with anything that could be remotely good in any way, shape, or form. He couldn’t support what had been done, and the fact that it had been done so poorly just made it worse.

“I know, Gril’Die,” Feriadd said over the wireless, using his actual name instead of his title for the first time in the conversation. It was a mark of respect toward his attitude as a man that he didn’t call him by his job title during a time like this. Beside him, the newsfeed lay open to the article Gril’Die had brought up. It was only half-finished, still, but Feriadd didn’t need to continue reading to know what else was written. The story was pretty much told in the headline for the article.

“Well, I think it’s about time for me to go,” Gril Die said, setting down his own newsfeed. “I’ll call in again if there are any developments, but I doubt it.” Before finishing the conversation and putting away the wireless, Gril’Die took one last look at the headline across the top of the article.

Terrorists’ Attempt to Assassinate Monarch Is Met With Failure.

Prisoner 83109 awoke to a loud ringing in his ears. When he opened his eyes, he found himself only able to see a very bright light that seemed to come from every direction, so he closed them again. Realizing that he was seated, he tried to stand. His movement was immediately halted by the rattling of chains and an intensely searing sensation on one shoulder. He tried to feel his way about himself but found himself unable to do so. That was odd.

Then he tried turning his head. He realized at once that his neck was incredibly stiff and sore, which was a sensation entirely unfamiliar to him. He quickly let out a reflexive gasp of pain and heard the squealing of a hatch opening and the clang of the same hatch closing, followed by the tapping of footsteps.

“There’s no point trying to use your powers, 83109.” The voice was female. Pushing through his overwhelming headache, he found his most recent conscious memory. He remembered his ship being shot down, jumping after the same ship, the ship disappearing, and getting into a fight with a Valkyrie who somehow managed to defeat him, though the details were extremely hazy. He did remember something about his arm. That might explain the pain in his arm.

“What do you mean,” he asked. “Why wouldn’t I be able to use my powers?” Just to test the comment, he did, in fact, try to use his powers. First, he tried to crush the woman speaking to him, but he realized that he couldn’t feel where she was. The same problem kept him from entering her mind. Then, he tried to increase his own strength and break his chains. That was one of the simplest powers he possessed, yet even this evaded him. He couldn’t gain a drop of strength. He remembered the woman’s voice having been in his head and feeling weaker before passing out. “What did you do?”

The woman walked around behind him, a fact of which he was only aware due to the sound of her boots on the deck. She continued walking until she had completed a full circle around him. “Oh, I didn’t do much. I just locked away your powers with a bit of my own.” Her voice didn’t expose the satisfaction he was sure she should be feeling at this accomplishment. For a mere Valkyrie to be able to overwhelm a Sheii’Cronell was unprecedented. Yet, instead of satisfaction, he thought he heard the slightest tinge of guilt, as if she felt bad for what she had done. But he wasn’t fooled.

“You’re lying. You’ve done something else to trick me into thinking I can’t use my powers. Valkyries don’t have the ability to do what you’re describing. You can’t just lock away my powers.” He was indignant, and his voice spat the hatred he had accumulated through his years alone, fending for himself. He had fought Valkyries before. They were certainly stronger than the average person, but they weren’t anywhere near as powerful as he was.

“I told you before,” she replied. “I’m not really a Valkyrie.” Her pacing around him ceased, and there was a clicking sound near his face. The reddish orange that shone through his eyelids turned to black. He opened them to a prison visor. He should have recognized the feel of it on his skin and the light that shone into his eyes from every angle, but it wouldn’t really have made a difference, so he pushed it aside.

Through the visor, he was able to look upon the face of the woman who had beaten him. Looking about quickly, he also noticed that each corner of the small room held another Valkyrie, guarding him in still and total silence. He was actually amazed at the silence of their breathing. Even now, he couldn’t hear it. Then, he realized they were simply breathing in perfect time with him. It was quite an effective method, and it was an ingenious technique.

Looking back to the woman, he saw what seemed at first to be just another Valkyrie, a blue-haired woman with lightly freckled skin and green eyes. Wait. Her eyes weren’t green. They were the same seafoam color as her hair. The glow from her eyes was that same Valkyrie green, but the eyes themselves were not, a fact revealed only by his incredible vision, a common trait among Sheii’Cronells that wasn’t actually attributed to any power. It was just a fact of their existence that happened to coincide.

Now looking for more differences, he noticed that the skin tone of this woman was slightly redder than most Valkyries, who tended not to burn but to ever so lightly tan instead. He also noticed the silver in her hair. It was not the silver of a person who has accumulated it over years of age, though the wrinkles on her face bespoke the fact that she was quite old, as Valkyries did not even begin to wrinkle until they reached about two hundred cycles of age. The silver was simply there, as if it were the same color it had always been. It had a lustrousness to it not shared by the hair of the elderly. It was the tint of the blue in her hair that most intrigued him. It had too much green in it, just as her eyes didn’t have quite enough. Most would be fooled, and had she not pointed it out, he never would have taken the time to notice, but she certainly wasn’t a normal Valkyrie.

“Who are you?” 83109 managed out only these three words, and she immediately turned away, continuing her pacing. He looked at her as she walked, her eyes set in a thoughtful sort of way, as if she wasn’t exactly sure how to answer the question. When she reached the point behind him where she crossed to the other side, however, he let out another gasp. His arm was gone. He hadn’t realized in the fight that he had lost his arm, such was the extent of his furious rage at her attack. It was in this fact that he realized she was telling the truth about locking away his powers. Even if it had only been a few hours, his arm should have grown back by now.

“I am the person who can give you purpose in life, 83109. I am the one who can either save your life and let you live normally for the first time or let you find your way back to the authorities, who would be more than happy to proceed in processing you into the Nivlahim facility until your dying days whether you have your powers or not.”

He wasn’t sure where she was going with this. “Yeah? And how do you intend to manage giving me a normal life? I’m a criminal and a rather high-profile criminal at that. You’re a Valkyrie, or something of the sort at least. I’m not really sure exactly what you are, but your people aren’t exactly known for dealing kindly with criminals.”

What she said next were the words he came to remember for the rest of his life. “Right now, you’re in a city full of extremely high-profile criminals, none of whom want to come into contact with authorities any more than you do. If you agree to what I ask, you’ll be given a home here. All you have to do is agree to my conditions, and you will be assigned a house and a job, and you can live out a life free from any sort of judgement. People will just assume you lost your arm in the rebellion and got your prison tattoos before being rescued by the Ginnung. After all, if you agree to my terms, that won’t be too far from the truth. You’ll be as close to a free man as you’ve ever been in your life. No one will know you as prisoner 83109 or even as a Sheii’Cronell. People here will only know you by the name no one has called you in twenty cycles… Qzcivden.”

Hearing his name, given to him after the city in which he had been conceived, gave him shivers. He had almost forgotten his name, it had been so long since anyone had said it. Without realizing they had started, Qzcivden blinked the tears out of his eyes and choked out four words that changed his life and that he would never come to regret. “What do I do?”

The TAS Deathbringer was a peculiar ship, even when compared to its colleagues. It was the last of its line, and its shape reflected a time that had passed in spacefaring. Lacking a TMDS, the Deathbringer was not rounded, as was necessary for the functional use of a TMDS without tearing a ship apart. Instead, it used an older, fusion-powered positron drive system, which meant that its back was considerably wider than its front, which was brought to a point at the foremost part of the ship. The overall shape resembled an arrowhead aimed outward at space.

The Deathbringer did not have hypenet access, again due to the lack of a TMDS, which meant that its hull had to be heavily shielded from particles that would collide with it as it traveled at high speeds. The mass of all this shielding meant that the drive system had to be immensely powerful in order to push the hunk of metal through space. That also meant that the Deathbringer could not land planetside. The weight of the ship would be so imbalanced that it would be unable to take off from the surface of a planet.

The ship also had its hangar in the forward section of the ship instead of the aft section, as ultracarriers did. This meant that in order to deploy or land fighters, the ship had to slow down. It also meant that the upper array of guns that was present on an ultracarrier simply wasn’t present. The entire hangar had to be lifted from the main section of the ship due to the sleek design of the ship. If it were held above the main portion of the ship, it would be torn apart from colliding particles as the ship traveled at ultra-high velocities.

The bridge of the ship could not be in an exposed part of the ship for the same reason. Like the hangar, it could be lifted up at lower velocities, but this was rarely done. Instead, the bridge was kept docked with the main section of the ship, where it was completely shielded from outside damage. Such was the style of what Armadians called a Blockade Buster, so named because it was specifically designed to provide overwhelming offensive power against the ships holding the Ginnung Gap while simultaneously being well-shielded enough to withstand the beating dealt by the Blockade’s smaller fighter swarms.

All of this resulted in a rather peculiar wedge shape with arched sides that allowed for a slight increase in speeds. This was a stark contrast to the pill-shaped ships around it in the fleet, so shaped for their TMD Systems. The Deathbringer was a ship designed to fight a war in a way that had become obsolete. Even at its maximum speeds, its average velocity couldn’t come close to matching that of a ship that hyped to distant destinations, even when cooldowns were necessary. It couldn’t carry as many troops as an ultracarrier, and it couldn’t hold as many guns, either. Its drive system required massive amounts of fuel, and the TMDS required almost none. The bridge couldn’t maintain a constant eye on a battlefield, and the hangar couldn’t always launch fighters.

That was why today, Gril’Die Khuda’Mundi stood on the bridge of the Deathbringer as it was taken to its final destination, a museum dedicated to the Ginnung Wars. Thinking back to recent events, Gril’Die found it amusing that most people considered the Ginnung Wars to be over. Indeed, the museum declared that the wars had ended many cycles ago, even though the Treaty of Nivlahim only brought about an armistice on the Ginnung planets. Even so, the Ginnung waged the war onward to greater heights every day, even on its own worlds, where the Armada still held a moderate occupational force.

It was natural for people to resist occupations of any sort, whether their own government had agreed to it or not. In addition, some of the people on outer worlds such as Valhal and Nivlahim did not subscribe to the Thorlinthian state religion, Jalihu’dai. This made some tensions so great that guerilla warfare and outright intimidation attacks were utilized to keep the Armada back from those territories, where the people continued to practice as they saw fit freely despite the laws against the practice of other religions. The Monarch had decided to tolerate this practice in specific areas in order to prevent unnecessary Thorlinthian casualties, so instead of attacking them, he simply issued a mandated boycott on anything from those areas, preventing what he called, “the spread of the infection.”

As the Deathbringer approached the planet, Lok’hi, Gril’Die was reminded of a time long ago that he had stood in this bridge, observing charts and sensor readings while leading the attack on the same planet. He had been invited to participate in the ship’s retirement for that very reason. Of course, he had arranged for his own invitation, but that was alright. The important part was that he had been invited to do it instead of simply ignoring the retirement of such a significant ship as the Deathbringer.

The Deathbringer was the last surviving ship of its kind. Every other Armadian ship was driven by a TMDS. Every other ship was sleeker and rounded, while the Deathbringer was hard and sharp in shape. Its edges, Gril’Die thought, were its most attractive features. It gave the Deathbringer an intimidating look that the bulbous new ships just lacked. The Deathbringer was black and blended with the dark of space. The new ships were a very light gray, almost white, and stood out like sore thumbs wherever they were.

Nonetheless, the new ships had serious advances in technology and comfort that had never been seen in a military ship in Thorlinthian history. Despite their awkward-looking shape and size, the TMDS ships were capable of high-speed maneuvering within an atmosphere, and the largest of these ships were even capable of external hyping, wherein the ship hyped another object without hyping itself. The TMDS ships had more room for guns and less wasted space from heavy shielding and bulky drives. They utilized high-energy, cold plasma shields for protecting against colliding debris in space. This had been a nearly impossible concept before the aliens had come. The
TMDS wasn’t the only system that had been taken from them.

Gril’Die watched as the sensors began to indicate approach toward the gravitational point of no return as the ship descended toward Lok’hi. He barked orders just as he had cycles ago on this very bridge when it was cutting-edge technology. He remembered the casualties taken over the cycles during which he had held command of the ship. Finally, the ship was met mid-descent by a group of small ships that acted similar to tugboats at sea. At touchdown, the ship groaned loudly, unable ever to take off again without blasting away a quarter of the planet’s life with its powerful drives.

As he stepped out of the ship to a crowd of applauding civilians and saluting Armadians, Gril’Die smiled at them all and waved. When the time came for the decommissioning speech, he made his way through his notes as if someone else had written them. When he stepped down from the stage and looked at that ship again, now covered in battlescars and dented where smaller ships had collided with the Deathbringer, he spoke three words which had never sounded so profound to him before. “I’m getting old.”

The day was at its brightest. Even now, however, the warmth of Linthia was not enough to keep away the cold, even here on the surface. At least, it wasn’t enough this far out into the eternal depths of space. As if that weren’t enough to keep away any signs of life, the limited atmosphere was incredibly toxic and a low enough pressure that the typical man would get altitude sickness at sea level. That was why, here on Nivlahim, civilization was several miles beneath the ice, its power provided by the surging currents of the ocean under the ice and the heat of the planet’s core. It was there, in extensive tunnel systems stretching entire continents, that the people of the planet had built one of the most unique and dreaded technologies ever conceived by the minds of men.

Here, beneath rosts of snow, ice, and sea, the people of Nivlahim had created the most terrible prison ever created. Prisoners were not kept in a secure facility with walls that held them in while they corrupted and rallied against each other. Here, in the prison known only as the Nivlahim facility, the greatest war criminals and mass murderers were suspended in the waters and kept alive through limited life support systems that were operated from systems half a world away. It was here, where prisoner 83109 was meant to be transferred, that he was least likely to come.

And that, of course, was why the Matriarch was standing on the surface, looking across the sky, looking for him. It was here, where he would never come in a million cycles, that she knew he would come. Surely enough, after standing totally still in the freezing winds so long that it covered her shoulders, she blinked at the flicker of movement she now caught in the corner of her eye. She looked toward the flicker, and it was more easily seen the second time through the wispy clouds above in the cold, green sky. Careful not to move, she adjusted her view to more adequately see the ship in which the escaped Sheii’Cronell was now flying.

The ship quickly came into the focus of the high-amplification camera of Valkyr Zero, the Matriarch’s personal ship which predated any Thorlinthian ship in the skies and which had been built long before any ship was fitted with the new Temporal Manipulation Drive System. In fact, Valkyr Zero was more accurately known as VA1L-KZ0 and predated most of the ancient ruins that were the basis for so much Thorlinthian technology. Even now, it was the most advanced piece of purely artificial technology in Thorlinthia. It was made with technologies that were decreed unlawful shortly after its construction. Its very existence was a secret even from the Monarch, and the Matriarch intended to keep it that way.

The ship started setting down. The Matriarch knew she wouldn’t get a better shot than now. Quickly, she sent out a mental command to her ship’s weapons systems, which fired on 83109’s ship with such precision and damage, one would have thought it was fired at point-blank range rather than from over twenty rosts away. As she expected, the forward viewport of the ship blasted open only moments before the round impacted, and 83109 lept out of the ship just in time to avoid the damage caused by the destruction of the ship’s TMDS. That, she thought quietly, was part of why such technologies had been forbidden.

As she predicted, the Sheii’Cronell barely set foot on the ground before a massive shockwave was sent out from his position as he jumped toward her ship. Not wanting to risk its damage, she quickly sent it into the spacetime dimensional matrix to which the Thorlinthians referred as the hypenet. Her ship, however, was not operated under the same parameters as a TMDS-driven ship. There was no shock or implosion as it disappeared. It simply vanished as it slipped out of the standard spacetime dimensional matrix.

Less than a milliday later, the sonic wave following 83109 reached the Matriarch’s location, and the snow that had built up around her was blasted away, even as she stood still as a pillar rooted to the planet like the lifetree. 83109 noticed her figure as he passed, and there was another shockwave as he clapped the air ahead of him, transferring his remaining kinetic energy to the air before him and dropping straight down to the ground. When he landed, the cracking could be heard in the ice, but it was rosts thick. Even a nuclear blast wouldn’t penetrate the ice deeply enough to expose the liquid waters beneath.

“You’re a Valkyrie, aren’t you?” 83109 projected his voice using their wireless systems, but every menacing drop of venom was still felt by the Matriarch as she turned her head to him coolly. He began charging toward her, much of his energy expended for now from his leap across the precisely calculated distance at which the Matriarch had placed her ship. When he reached her, his fist burned through the air so quickly that it seemed to be made of lightning, but the Matriarch was no longer in its path when it reached the intended point of impact.

83109 stumbled forward a bit as he felt for the first time the loss of balance from a missed punch with bad footing. He quickly saw the error of his ways, though, as the Matriarch caught his hand and pulled it forward to bring him off-balance even more, blending with the motion of his attack and turning him, twisting his arm back upon him, snapping his shoulder out of its place. 83109’s gasp of shock could be heard over the wireless as his dislocated arm was brought around behind him into a lock, and the Matriarch said back to him, “Not exactly.”

She placed her right foot on his back quickly, before he could recover from the shock of the event, and kicked his body away, his arm detaching entirely as she held it in place. He careened forward, falling to the ground for only a moment before his powers began kicking in fully. It had been so long since he had actually used it that the advanced healing factor innate in his body had been rendered ine
rt. Now, it reactivated, quickly sealing the wound where his arm had just been. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the time to grow back the whole arm as the Matriarch was suddenly upon him, and he brought his other hand forward to block the blow he expected.

Instead, however, the Matriarch slid around him, grabbing him across the front with one arm and tossing him to the side like a rag doll. As she feared, however, the powers in him were growing to be more of a problem. He hadn’t even reached arm’s distance from where he had been thrown before he blasted himself to his feet with a pulse of air that he expanded in his path. Again, however, the Matriarch had predicted this. The reactions of 83109 were instinctual and animalistic, lacking forethought and rationality. He lunged forward again, screaming in rage and pain. As he approached her, the Matriarch jumped into a forward flip, spinning around and grabbing 83109 from behind.

This time, she did not let go as she recited the ancient words she had long ago committed to memory in order to protect her son from the dark fate of instinct to which all Sheii’Cronells fell at an early age. She reached into the deepest recesses of his mind, beginning to form the blocks. It wouldn’t lock away the rage or the fear that had built up in his mind as a boy, but it would secure his powers, rendering them useless. Only the most highly trained Supreme would be able to recognize the power inside him with a Level Five block, and as far as she knew, there were no more Supremes. The Guardians were gone now, too.

As she sealed the last of the blocks and released 83109, who dropped to the ground in sudden weakness, she wept for the galaxy only she remembered. She wept for her son, who had died long ago. She wept for the girl who had once accepted her son and who had died alongside him. She wept for the Kuli, who had nearly died out entirely in the war. She wept for the worlds that had been destroyed and the races that had been killed. She would never stop mourning the past that only she and the Monarch remembered, but neither would she regret a single action she took.

Casting aside her tears, she brought Valkyr Zero back from the hypenet and engaged its communications array. “I have him,” she said over the wireless. “We can begin interrogations as soon as I return.” She picked up 83109 as she headed back to her ship. She wondered how many times she could keep coming out of stasis like this. Even now, she could feel the toll time was taking on her body despite the processes that were now held as the deepest secrets of the Valkries.

Looking to the sky before entering her ship, she whispered out to the endless black that resided beyond the bright sky, “I’m waiting for you.” Stepping into her ship, she began preparing for the flight back to Valhal.

“I’m going to need you to run that one by me again,” Feriadd said, as Gril’Die finished speaking to him. Almost a full cycle had passed since that eventful day in the Council Room. It seemed so much longer to Feriadd now. With all the planning and operative placements along with the operation of the Ginnung as a whole, Feriadd’s hands were fuller now than they’d ever been. Despite that, there was no man in the Ginnung busier than its recently appointed Chief Strategist, Gril’Die Khuda Mundi.

Now, the two were in Feriadd’s office in Lower Skogr City, so named for its location under the water above’s surface. The Council Room was a part of Upper Skogr City, and most of the Councilors preferred to quarter above the surface, but Feriadd felt that this location better suited his job. He wanted to remind himself at all times that he was not in the position he was in by anyone’s will but that of the Ginnung themselves. He wanted to remember that they all had family, friends, and loved ones here in hiding and out on other worlds that they all wanted to keep safe.

Feriadd’s office was carved out of what was called a retree, a tree which had grown to full size again inside the city. Of course, that meant that he was inside a tree inside another tree inside the sea, which he rather enjoyed saying. Today, however, was not a day for jokes such as that. In fact, it wasn’t a day for jokes at all. Intelligence had just come in of the escape of prisoner 83109 from his newest containment facility, and Gril’Die was proposing they use that as an opportunity to communicate with him.

“Think about it, Feriadd,” Gril’Die implored, leaning in toward Feriadd’s desk. “When they catch him again, they’re guaranteed to move him to the Nivlahim facility. This could be our only chance to talk to him and get him to join our side.”

“You say that, but how do we know we can even get him to talk to us if we find him? What’s going to keep him from killing whomever we send after him? The man’s a mass murderer at this point. He hasn’t learned anything about emotional suppression in prison. If anything, he’s even more dangerous every day he spends locked up. Now, he’s gotten both powerful and aggressive enough that they need to move him to Nivlahim!  Do you know what the Nivlahim facility does to its inmates, Mi’Olnr?”

Feriadd brought forward a number of legitimate concerns. For one thing, anyone they sent after him would have to be able to match him in a fight, which would be almost impossible. For another thing, that same person somehow able to match a Sheii’Cronell in a fight would have to be able to track him down in the first place. Lastly, it required a great show of aggression to be sent to Nivlahim.

The Nivlahim facility was the prison designed only for the most hardened of criminals who couldn’t be contained or controlled anywhere else. Currently, the Nivlahim facility had one prisoner. The prisoner already there was named Geri’Aldr Barednt, and he had killed over two thousand people with his bare hands before getting caught and doing the same thing in prison.

Nivlahim was Thorlinthia’s coldest planet, locked in a permanent winter, its summers still filled with snow even when the planet was nearest the equivalent of Antarctica on the equator, such were the lengths between Linthia, the system’s artificial dwarf star, and Nivlahim. Most of its surface was completely covered in ice even in the summer. As a water planet, this meant that Nivlahim’s oceans were sub-freezing temperature at all times, held in liquid form by the pressure of the ice pressing back down on the water.

The Nivlahim was known never to have had an escape, but that didn’t mean the prison was inescapable. If anyone could figure it out, it would be a Sheii’Cronell. However, prisoners didn’t have much time to think in the Nivlahim facility. They were kept alive via feeding tubes and breathers, all the while keeping the prisoner tethered on a very long chain attached to the bottom of the ocean. This kept their bodies from experiencing time while doing nothing but think in their freezing, naked little bodies.

“Look, I realize the plan isn’t fantastic. Still, it’s the only chance we’ve got, and I don’t want to blow it. If we can find him, there’s a likely chance it will be the only time we have with him between our finding him and the prison system finding him.” Gril’Die almost struck the High Councilor’s desk, stopping just shy with his hand not even a finger’s width above the wood of the tasks.

Feriadd eyed the counter consciously as he contemplated the strength and discipline that came with a strike that powerful packed into such a small packet as Gril’Die’s fist. “What we need, Mi’Olnr,” said Feriadd, “is someone who can actually hold their own against a Sheii’Cronell. That’s priority number one.”

“Well, it looks like we’ll actually need a tracker, too, since we don’t know where he is or where he’ll be when we actually manage to send our guy out.” Gril’Die snapped his fingers, frustrated. “If only we had one of those.”

“Yes, that would be excellent,” Feriadd said, “but the problem is that no one can hold their own against this man. He’s a Sheii’Cronell.” They both crossed their arms in an effort to think a bit harder on any possible operations candidates.

“Well,” a familiar female voice called out gently from the shadows, “it looks like you two are in need of me again.” The Matriarch stepped from the shadowy corner of the room. Her black uniform was again fully decorated in the traditional ribbons and medals of the Armada. The belt wrapped loosely around her hips held various devices that she used in operations, and every holster in her uniform was filled. Her hips swayed, creating a clacking sound as she moved toward the desk. “I can’t send one of my girls after him because he’d tear them apart, but I can deal with an undisciplined Sheii’Cronell who hasn’t had any formal training. I’ll do it.”

At first, there were the usual few moments of shock as everyone got over the fact that she was in the room. After that, Feriadd stood and shook her hand. “I’d love to have your help, Matriarch.” They nodded, and the Matriarch sat down to discuss what would be done afterward with the two.

The following exchange was recorded between prisoners 83109 and 80113 at the Hel facility on Lokh. Most of the video captured during the exchange has been heavily corrupted and is unavailable for display. Audio is uncorrupted and will now be played.



There is a distinct patter of bare feet on cold stone. From the sound, it seems to be two men, one with a limp and significantly smaller than the second. A hard thud is heard along with the cracking of several bones. It is likely that one of the men has just been struck in the side, breaking multiple ribs.

A voice is heard. “Who do you think you are, coming into my home and telling my own men that they shouldn’t be taking orders from me?” The voice is a throaty bass, likely the larger of the men. Several more thuds and cracks are heard. The smaller man seems to be suffering a great deal of bodily damage.

Another voice is heard. “Look, I just meant that they are their own men, and they should look to the Great One for guidance here, not another man. We’re all equals here.” This voice is a soft tenor, likely the smaller man. More cracking is heard along with shouts of pain.

The first voice speaks again. “The Great One?! You think the Great One gives two flying hrags about men like us? No, we’ve got to fend for ourselves.” There is again the sound of cracking, and the shouts become screams this time. “I protect these men from the gangs! I teach them how to fight!” The screams drown out the sound of the first man’s voice again. “People like you teach them nothing but weakness.” The sound of a body falling to the floor can be heard.

The second voice laughs. “You think I’m weak? Do you even know why I’m here? I know why you’re here, 80113.” Hands can be heard sliding across the stone floor as the man on the ground tries to get up.

“Shut your mouth,” says the first voice. “You don’t know the first thing about me.” There can be heard now the sound of a blade being drawn while another slides across the stone floor. There’s a scuffling as the man on the floor tries to get up, but the sound of a blade cutting through the air interrupts it, meeting shortly thereafter a clang as the blades meet one another.

“Loriard Khuda’Feliiah, a former cargo ship offloader, was captured by the Armada yesterday for attempted assault over a dispute about a pet hrag. After resisting his capture and attempting to flee the Armadian Security Forces–” There is another clang, this one much louder. The second voice continues his recitation of the news broadcast. “His sentence was extended to four cycles in the Hel facility with no chance of parole. It is suspected he will die in the prison, where usually only the most hardened criminals are sent.” The second voice stops speaking, and for a few moments, the only sounds that can be heard are labored breathing and the sound of feet sliding across a bloody floor.

“Of course,” the second voice continued, “we both know that’s not what really happened. In reality, you were the only survivor of the ship that got hit by that pod from the alien ship that came from the other side of the Bifrost. That’s why you’re here. You’re here because you were so busy counting the guns you were supposed to be shipping to the underground Ginnung that you didn’t know the ship was coming, so when it smashed a big hole in your ship, you were still in a sealed compartment. The Armadians came through to investigate, and you were sent here.”

There is the sound of a man being picked up and thrown across the room into a wall, and there is a loud grunting as the man who was thrown has all the breath knocked out of his lungs. “It doesn’t matter anymore,” the first voice says. “I’m king here, now. I’m in charge, not you.”

There is a loud series of unpleasant-sounding snaps, cracks, and pops, and the man who had been thrown seems to be standing up slowly against the wall. “Do you want to know why I’m here, Loriard? I’ll tell you why.”



Video corruption ends here. Video will now be displayed.



A large man is propped against the wall, blood staining his ragged clothes, his breath weary and drawn out. Across the room, standing straight, is a short man with what seems to be a large, metal cuff on one leg, stopping just short of the top of the foot. He begins to speak. “It’s because they found out I was a Sheii’Cronell, and there’s already another one bidding candidacy to the Monarchy. There’s only allowed to be one Sheii’Cronell at a time, you see.”

In a single frame, the smaller man moves across the length of the room, thrusting his knife into the larger man’s sternum. The man falls back against the wall, his face blank as he begins to slide back down the wall to
the floor.

“I can’t be king out there,” the small man says, “but there’s no way I’m letting a weakling traitor like you stay king here.” He places his fingers over the larger man’s face, closing his dead eyes. He then takes the belt the larger man had been wearing and throws it over his shoulder. “At least I can be king here.” He walks away as guards and medical personnel are seen rushing into the room.



This concludes the recording of the exchange. No further data is found on prisoner 80113 other than a certification of death three centidays later. Prisoner 83109 is known to have been the first person to be removed from the Hel facility due to the risk of endangerment to other prisoners. Records indicate that he was transferred to Nivlahim for unknown reasons. Further records for prisoner 83109 cannot be found on the general access archives. All further information regarding 83109 is classified.

When the lift opened, Gril’Die let out a light gasp as he looked upon one of the most marvelous things he’d ever seen.

Skogr City was far larger than he had ever imagined. It earned its name as a city not only in population but in sheer vastness. The wooden, domed wall that came around and over most of the city was, after all, living tree. In response to the inner light of the city, the tree wall had sprawled out into the city with branches, providing a very odd view of a tree that seemed to have been flipped inside-out. The bark was multicolored and multitextured, a result of the fact that it was, in fact, thousands of different trees pressed together naturally rather than one giant tree or cut-up wood boarded together, a practiced still used on some planets that embraced a lower-tech life.

This, however, was a highly advanced city. Pulse-cars zipped by and even a few shuttles were passing through the city’s limited airspace. The walkways were lit with a gentle light that simulated evening over the whole city right now, moving across the dome as a holographic representation of Linthia, the system’s only star. Looking about the dome some more, Gril’Die found the dim lights of the other planets and the large chunk of old Valr that Valhal had picked up and pulled into orbit after the Ragn’Rouk. Chunks of old planets like Valr served as a constant reminder to the Thorlinthian people of the Ragn’Rouk, and the light of the Bifrost in the skies served to remind them that they were, essentially, alone.

Thinking back to what had gotten him promoted to Mi’Olnr in the first place, Gril’Die frowned at the mentality of Thorlinthia. It was that victim mindset that caused the people to rally behind the destruction of an entire race of innocent people. It was the information behind that attack that Gril’Die planned to bring to the table today.

“Sir, please follow me,” said the guard beside him. Gril’Die acquiesced, allowing the guard to lead the way, knowing the guard was fully utilizing the full-angle capabilities of the helmet to keep an ever-watchful eye on Gril’Die as they walked along.

Gril’Die almost walked into the guard, stopping just in time to avoid the occasion. The guard spoke again, gesturing to the pulse-car before them. “Please get in. The people at Headquarters want to talk to you.”

Gril’Die stepped into the pulse-car, scooting along the seat as the guard followed. The inside of the vehicle was well-lit, but there were no view ports, indicating that this was a robotic pulse-car. The guard ensured that Gril’Die was seated properly before closing the door.

Once the door had closed, the pulse-car began to make the sound that earned its name as it rose up slightly, pulses of highly pressurized air pushing it into the air and forward. The pulses faded into background as the vehicle moved along, the occasional pulses of air being blown out of the sides to turn the vehicle along the streets as it moved toward an undisclosed part of the city.

Based on the number of turns, Gril’Die was fairly certain the pulse-car was following a route meant to confuse him. As it moved along, the pulses of the vehicle continued to be the only source of sound in the vehicle, a rather quiet sound at that. Gril’Die looked to the guard, who was merely looking forward, probably playing a game or taking notes with the helmet. Gril’Die’s own helmet was lowered in courtesy to show that he wasn’t presently communicating with anyone outside the city.

Finally, after several agonizingly slow centidays, the pulse car puttered to a stop, setting itself on the wooden ground. The door nearer Gril’Die opened before the guard’s door, and two more guards were waiting outside it. One reached in to help Gril’Die with getting out while the other kept a repeater trained calmly on Gril’Die, a caution Gril’Die could understand, given the location. The first guard finally stepped out of the pulse-car and said, “Come with us, sir,” before leading the way into the discrete building before them.

The building was very plain, looking similar to the buildings surrounding it, if a bit larger due to the pillar reaching up into the dome above, a rather common sight across the city. In fact, without knowing where it was ahead of time, it would probably be just about impossible to find. Well, that was probably the point, Gril’Die reminded himself before walking toward the building, the two new guards following him with their weapons trained on the back of his head.

The first guard opened the door and walked in as Gril’Die followed, leading him into a plain hallway much like the entrance to the city, though this one was wooden instead of being stonework. When they reached the end of the hallway, they all walked into another lift, which rose much more rapidly than the first one Gril’Die had taken.

When the lift opened, Gril’Die was surprised to see that they were on the surface, above the level of Skogr Lake. The lift must have been even faster than Gril’Die had suspected. As he walked out to the room awaiting him, however, the guards did not follow. As he left the lift, its door closed behind him, leaving him in the room with a handful of unarmored men who looked to be hunters or fishermen.

Just as Gril’Die began to suspect that this had been a ploy, however, one of the men spoke. “Good evening, Mi’Olnr. My name is Feriadd Khuda’Salongriell, and I am the elected leader of the Ginnung. What can I do for the Armada’s highest-ranking officer today?” Feriadd smiled at Gril’Die openly, and Gril’Die was made certain that he was hearing the truth.

“Actually,” Gril’Die said, “I’d like to do something for you.” At this, Feriadd raised an eyebrow, passing his hand over a small control panel.

The windows closed, and the light in the room dimmed, a large table and seats rising from the floor. The men in the room all began seating themselves at various spots, and Feriadd gestured for Gril’Die to sit, too. Once everyone else was seated and looking at Gril’Die, Feriadd sat and gestured with both hands to Gril’Die again. “We’re listening.”

Fog framed the trees of the Valhallan Skogr Forest, the cold winter haze filling the gaps between the ancient trees as rain poured down over the mountainous forest. The waters from the summer-long rains over the past several hundred thousand years had filled the mountain range with waters so deep that the range had come to be known by another name: Lake Skogr. The trees in the range had gradually grown taller to keep their greenery out of the water, and many now reached higher than the icy mountain peaks surrounding the forest and holding in the lake which poured out between the freezing passes, keeping the freshwater lake from rising any higher.

The wildlife in the area was entirely arboreal or aquatic.There were even some amphibious creatures that had adapted to climb down the trees into the deeper parts of the water to hunt and retreat to the branches of the forest to eat their prey. The dark of the forest was so immense that most of the wildlife in it was blind or almost blind, eyes being useless except for about three centidays every day, when Linthia peeked beneath the canopy but above the lake’s outlets, which were the only areas that sunlight reached through the thick umbrella of the forest.

Now, the trees in the forest had mostly been carved hollow and the forest had been converted into the Capital city of the Ginnung, the main force of resistance and rebellion against the Monarchy. The unique nature of Lake Skogr was crucial in its role as a secret city.

Over the millennia, the bases of the trees had grown together into a single piece, and the roots had turned upward into the lake itself. That meant the Ginnung were able in the beginning of the rebellion to build a secret city, utilizing the pre-Ragn’Rouk tunnels under the mountains to dig up and into the trees, utilizing orbital imagery and positioning equipment, the Ginnung had been able to hollow out the trees from the bottom, leaving only sparse entrances and exits on the surface of the water to give the appearance of an exiled and rural society.

Inside the trees, the city was a vast and urban society, though all of its buildings were single, solid wood structures carved out of the trees in which they laid, which meant that regular maintenance on the city required the wood to be scraped away as it grew back. The waste was then used to produce all the city’s paper products and furnishings. All food for the city was supplied by the Skogr’s flora and fauna. Those that lived on the surface hunted and farmed for the city. All crops were grown on the edge of the lake, where the soil was rich and moist.

The Capital of the Ginnung Domain was officially on Nivlahim, but the Ginnung had long expected the Armada to find some way to raid the capital, so they had secretly carved Skogr City out of the forest. They had been right to do so, too. By the time Nivlahim had been raided by the Valkyries, the government was entirely local, the Ginnung leadership holing up on Valhalla in Skogr City. Valhalla had quickly surrendered to Armadian occupation with no resistance to mask the presence of Skogr City.

The ploy had worked. When Armadian forces had moved past Valhalla, a minimal force had been left behind to police the Valhallan Capital, Fjor’Qzcir. After only a few years, even that force had been pulled out, Valhalla intentionally presenting good behavior to hide the fact that Ginnung leadership was hidden under Thorlinthia’s largest body of freshwater.

Despite all the secrecy, though, most Ginnung agents knew about Skogr City and had even been there more than once. For Gril’Die, this meant he had only needed to break one of his many prisoners to find out what he needed to know to find them. Now, his footsteps echoed through the large stone tunnel that ran underneath the Skogr Forest. He marveled at the architectural engineering involved in such a structure as this one. Even after the Ragn’Rouk, the tunnel had managed to maintain most of its functionality, and it had been one of Valhalla’s greatest keys to readvancement after the Age of the Black, when electrical systems couldn’t operate due to the massive amounts of electromagnetic interference that had been caused by the Ragn’Rouk.

He looked down at his feet, where he could see faint displays still visible beneath the ages of dust that had accumulated in the tunnel. He stopped for a moment and crouched down, digging down to the displays with his hands. By the time he reached the display beneath him, he was reminded how much he had grown accustomed to the dim light in the tunnel when the bright light shone through the flesh of his hand, even going so far as to warm his skin slightly.

He smiled at the red light that now filled the area of the tunnel surrounding him. It was still a mystery how the ancient Linthians had managed to create displays that projected colored light instead of shining white light through a colored filter. It gave a vibrance that was unseen anywhere but in Linthian structures, where their displays still projected their light as strongly as the day they were built. Most of those locations were now considered sacred, though, so no one had been allowed to take apart most Linthian technologies.

Gril’Die stood again, walking back out into the dark of the tunnel. He remembered the description of the entrance to Skogr City that his informant had given him, and he walked confidently toward the place now, his armor clearly visible as that of the Mi’Olnr. He was hoping that his status so high in the Armada and as a personal counsel to the Monarch might give the Ginnung some hesitance before killing him, which he imagined he probably would if someone other than Ginnung entered the city unannounced.

He softened his eyes as he walked along, listening to the scrape of the dirt beneath his boots as they hit the ground. As the dark became deeper, he started once again to fear slightly for his life. Silently, he gave one more quick praise to the Great One before stepping up to a part of the tunnel wall and holding his hands out against the surface. As he had hoped, one of his hands passed through the wall before he withdrew his hands back to his sides. Sidestepping to adjust for his miscalculation in the location of the entrance, he deactivated his helmet and put his hands up against the top of his head as he walked through the dark hologram, another Linthian secret that had been stumbled upon in this tunnel long ago.

As he stepped into the brightly lit hallway, he looked to the end with his eyes slightly scrunched in reaction to the sudden increase in light. There were two guards looking directly at him with repeaters calmly trained on him. “Who are you, how did you find this place, and what are you doing here?” The guard on the right had spoken, the interrogation coming out with a cool fluidity that convinced Gril’Die this was standard procedure and not a moment of panic.

“My name is Gril’Die Khuda’Mundi,” he said. “I am the Mi’Olnr of Thorlinthia, I learned of this place from a prisoner of war I freed long ago, and I’m here to sign up. Any more questions?”

The guard leaned his side to the side slightly, a common reflex when people spoke into their helmet wireless. The ears wanted to get closer to the speakers, so the head tended to tilt in the direction with poorer hearing slightly. After a few moments, both guards lifted their repeaters, and the guard on the left spoke this time. “Come with me, sir.”

As he spoke, the door they were guarding opened, and another guard walked out to replace Gril’Die’s escort before Gril’Die had even reached the door. Gril’Die lowered his hands and stepped into the lift. “Thanks for not shooting me.” The guard just looked forward as Gril’Die stepped next to him, and the door closed.