With Altopereh looming over them like a metal reaper, Anemone and Maximilian finally understood that the real battle had only just begun. Their power reserves were draining fast. The strain was pushing both their bodies and their Orbitons to the brink. They had been fighting at breakneck speed for more than thirty minutes, and for all their efforts, there was not a single meaningful scratch on Altopereh's armor. The Vanisher moved with an impossible fluidity, slipping through every attack like a ghost and punishing them with brutal counterstrikes.
Realizing that their pride would only get them killed, the two of them finally swallowed it and opened a channel to Mikhail. Before the deployment, Mikhail had gathered them for a briefing and told them about something neither had ever heard of: a prototype weapon called the Millennial Claw, a spear-like projectile capable of melting through a planet's crust all the way down to its core. At the time, neither of them had cared. Their confidence had been absolute, and they had believed their own strength would be more than enough. Now they knew it was not.
"Hey, General," Maximilian said, his voice strained and rough. "I think it's time we tested that new toy of yours. What do you say?"
"We'd never hit him," Mikhail said. "You've seen how fast he is."
Maximilian smirked despite the sweat running down his face. "We can pin him to the ground for a moment. Long enough. You just have to fire on time."
"It will take a full minute for the Claw to reach the surface from orbit. Can you hold him that long?"
"Who do you think you're talking to, General? We're gods."
Mikhail did not waste another second. "Then hold on. I'll signal you when it's ready."
Behind Antia's twin moons, Leonora received the update, and the moment she heard the words Millennial Claw, her voice exploded through the comms. "General, what do you think you're doing? Do you realize that weapon could destroy the whole planet?"
"Calm yourself, General," Mikhail said firmly. "You've seen how this battle is going. If you have another way to stop that monster, I'm listening."
"That weapon has never even been tested! Do you understand the collateral damage? The casualties?"
Mikhail let out a long, hard breath. "Our options are limited, and failure is not on the table. I will do whatever is necessary. I made a promise to my Emperor." And he cut the call, fully committed to an order he knew might damn them all.
On the surface, the Tartarusios was slowly making her way toward the fighting. What remained of the Basin of Trass had become a scarred wasteland of craters, shattered ridges and trenches burned into the stone by plasma. The God Orbitons were moving far too fast for ordinary eyes to follow. All the crew could see were bursts of light, flashes of steel, shockwaves tearing through the air. Then Perciosa's silhouette shot past the ship with her wings as sharp as monofilament, aiming to slice the Tartarusios clean in half. Altopereh dropped out of the sky, caught her wing in the middle of the slash and flung her backward like a rag doll.
Anemone recovered instantly, grinning with wicked delight. "Oh? Your friends came back for you. I guess the plan worked."
Altopereh hovered between Perciosa and the ship. Oscar's voice crackled over the channel. "Youri, we need an opening to escape. The Empire has sealed off the orbit!"
"I know," Youri said, calm even in the middle of the chaos. "I can shoot them down, but I have to deal with these two first. Don't worry. I won't let my ship die here."
The relief in Oscar's voice was obvious. "Alright, buddy. The Titans are deployed and they'll back you up. I'm patching them in now."
As Altopereh launched itself forward again, Youri spoke to the Titans. "Listen to me. If you want to live, never take your eyes off your radar. And don't ever attack first. I'll tell you when to strike."
"Copy that!"
Anemone's eyes went wide with excitement. "Hey, Max, we've got new prey. I'm feeling hungry."
"Don't get sloppy," Maximilian warned. "Take them one at a time."
The words were hardly out of his mouth before Anemone flung Perciosa at Alex's Titan, and her claws clamped around his Orbiton like the jaws of a wolf. She raised her arm to tear him in two — and a burst of plasma slammed into her and broke her grip open. Alex tore free, rolled in midair, fired a burst of high-velocity rounds and fell back into formation. Anemone trembled with rage. An ordinary Titan had hit her. She let out an unhinged, primal shriek and unleashed a flurry of plasma slashes that set off explosions all across the battlefield and sent the Titans scrambling in every direction.
"Did everyone survive?" Youri demanded.
"I… think so," Alex groaned.
"All limbs intact," Preston reported. "Somehow."
"Systems still online," Marek said. "I can fight."
"I've never been hit that hard in my life!" Tom complained.
"Thank God you're all alive," said Sergio.
"Good," Youri said. "Now scatter. Surround them from the sky, switch to laser rounds, and wait for my signal."
The Titans took to the sky. Then Youri went on the offensive. Altopereh streaked forward, seized Perciosa by the wing and hurled her bodily at Sirius. Maximilian had no choice but to catch her — which gave Youri the opening he wanted. Altopereh fired two plasma blasts, and both of them hit dead center. "Now!" Youri shouted. All five Titans fired at once, five converging beams of red light burning down out of the sky, and the two God Orbitons vanished inside an explosion that lit up the whole horizon.
Dust billowed. Silence followed.
"Did we get them?" Preston asked.
"Maybe they ran out of power," Alex said.
"Don't drop your guard!" Youri barked — but it was too late. Perciosa burst out of the haze behind Tom with her claws raised for the kill. Altopereh threw itself in the way and took the full blow. The impact drove the Vanisher into the ground so hard that the whole basin shook.
Maximilian's voice erupted in Mikhail's ear. "Fire the Claw! Now!" He launched Sirius upward and fired a containment beam straight down, pinning Altopereh to the ground. The blinding white beam cracked the earth around it like fragile glass.
Far above the clouds, the Millennial Claw detached from its ship, a spear of absolute destruction tearing down through the atmosphere with a tail of molten fire behind it, and it struck the ground only meters from Altopereh.
The world detonated. A shockwave wiped the landscape away and flung Orbitons and debris for miles. The Tartarusios lurched violently and nearly crashed into the collapsing terrain. In less than a minute, the entire western region of Antia had disintegrated. The Basin of Trass was gone, and in its place lay an endless crater of molten ruin.
Out of the wreckage, two figures rose, battered but alive. "Gods," Anemone wheezed, clutching at her neck. "I never want to take a hit like that again."
"I second that," Maximilian groaned.
The Titans lay scattered across the shattered wasteland, some half buried, some sparking, and some hanging together by nothing but exposed power cables. And at the very center of the impact, deep beneath the collapsed earth, Altopereh lay half buried, its armor cracked, its limbs damaged, its core systems flickering. A red light pulsed across Youri's unconscious face inside the cockpit.
In his mind, he was floating again in the dark, water-like void he had been to so many times before, with bubbles drifting up around him, and something enormous was stirring in the deep. A colossal figure came toward him, a hideous fusion of molten bark, ancient stone and living shadow, its skin rippling with jagged textures like volcanic obsidian threaded with twisted roots. Its skull-like face burned with twin ember eyes beneath horned ridges that curled like a demon's crown, and tendrils of smoke writhed behind it like limbs made of pure void. It raised one dripping claw, black ichor falling from it like tar. Its voice rolled out like a thousand buried volcanoes.
"So. You're finally letting me out. Don't worry. I'll give them a show."
Back in the real world, a hand burst out of the rubble. Then came a violent explosion, and after it a deafening roar. Altopereh rose out of the devastation in its true form — the form that had once terrified entire worlds.
This time, the Vanisher was fully awake.