Beyond The Impossible

Atlantis, 2.5 million light-years from Earth

Even in the throne room, the sounds of the battle raging on the other side of the artificial planet is loud and clear… and fast approaching.

Poseidon doesn’t seem to care, stoically sitting on his throne, although a keen eye might see that his grip on his golden trident is getting tighter.

On the other hand, his wife Amphitrite is shifting her position on her throne, is so nervous that the other vassals present in the room notice.

<Father, perhaps it is best if Mother leaves for a secure location? The battle is approaching.> Triton suggests, as the fish-tailed god addresses the ruler of Atlantis.

<I will never leave my husband’s side!> Amphitrite protests.

<He is right. I don’t need you.> Poseidon concurs, and instead of looking at his wife he addresses his daughter:

<Despoina, bring her to Calypso’s planet.>

<But my lord, my place…> Amphitrite protests.

<But Father, the fight…> the daughter tries to argue at the same time.

<A war is no place for a goddess. You have your orders.> Poseidon insists, and with a gesture of his hand he conjures up a portal inside a small whirlpool.

Both Amphitrite and Despoina know there is no point arguing with the supreme ruler of a galaxy, and they both reluctantly leave his court.

The only other vassal present, taking the shape of a carp, moves closer to the throne to comment:

<yOu kNow THey haVe tWo waR goDDessEs, rIghT?> Proteus asks, changing into a coral.

<Zeus is a sentimental fool for relying on them. Father will defeat them, easily.> Triton proclaims.

<No. Under no circumstances are you to fight the invaders. Stay ready at my side for when I will truly need you, and do nothing else.>

<BuT wHy?> Proteus asks, scratching his head with a tentacle after becoming an octopus.

<Do not question me, shapeshifter. Do as you are told.> Poseidon decrees, with his voice being drowned by the explosion of the gate leading into the throne room.

<POSEIDON! The days of the living are over and I shall feast on your bones!!!> Anubis shouts, his cybernetic body glowing with power. Without the gate, a river of the blood he spilled to get here rushes inside.

<We shall respect your desire to fight alone, Father.> Triton concedes.

<gLaDly!> Proteus concurs, becoming a goldfish to swim behind the throne.

<I accept your challenge, Egyptian. Do your best: I promise it won’t matter.> Poseidon taunts him, standing up from the throne and making a “come over here” gesture.

The bloodlusted jackal god doesn’t hesitate: death is the only thing in his mind right now. He rushes forward, surprising Poseidon with his speed; even in this underwater environment, he’s quick enough to avoid being pierced by the trident.

Anubis literally goes straight to the jugular, biting Poseidon’s neck with enough sheer strength to pulverize diamond. His fangs pierce the Greek’s skin and even spill some blood, which immediately flows back into Poseidon’s veins as he heals in a second.

<You Egyptians are so pathetic, more animals than gods.> Poseidon says, pulling Anubis away by grabbing the fur on the jackal’s head. His other hand grabs his tail, and without struggling too much he literally rips him in half.

Anubis howls in pain as Poseidon throws his legs across the throne room, then takes his trident to stab his torso, pinning him to the ground.

<Is this what you call a fight?>

<I call it a strategy. Don’t you know I am the god of scavengers?> Anubis asks, slithering away: part of his torso dissolves into a mass of nanites that allow him to escape the trident, and when Poseidon tries to gather the strength to stop him he finds himself in a dizzy spell.

<What dirty trick is this?> Poseidon wonders, struggling to keep his balance.

Anubis laughs like a hyena as his body rapidly reassembles itself, with increased energy flowing through his circuitry, after which he explains.

<Necrobots. Your blood is filling up with them, sapping your power and flowing it back to me. You could fight back the infection, of course… if we let you time to heal.>

<You coward! This is no way to fight a war!> Triton yells, ready to attack Anubis.

<Stay where you are, Triton. Follow my plan.> Poseidon insists, even if he has to lean on his trident, using it like an old man’s cane.

<You call that a plan? You never were the brightest god in the Pantheon.> Athena insults him, walking into the throne room. Surrounded by an air bubble, she doesn’t have a single drop of blood on her armor.

The two other goddesses of this expedition swim next to her, joining Anubis’s side.

<Do we fight now?> Amaterasu asks.

<Give him everything you have! WAR CRY!!!> Enyo yells, with the scream unleashed by her lungs transcending sound and releasing more power than Atlantis has ever seen.

If this were a regular planet, her scream would have fractured the tectonic plates and flattered mountains. Here the effects are much worse: sound travels faster in water than air, and Atlantis is both filled with and completely surrounded by water.

The entire artificial planet breaks, with the individual rings that compose it separating and fracturing once the shockwave propagates.

And that’s only the first part of the attack. With Enyo focusing her hypersonic onslaught on Poseidon himself, Amaterasu is not as hit as hard and is able to contribute.

A beam of concentrated solar energy leaves her hands, carrying in a single blast the same amount of energy that the Sun produces in a single year.

Athena watches her plan proceed smoothly. Poseidon is currently busy defending himself on four separate fronts: Enyo’s war cry and Amaterasu’s solar attack hit when the necrobots are sapping his power, and the best part is Anubis doubling down by blasting the energy he absorbed back at him.

Her only regret is that she won’t need to fight herself to win. Her favorite type of war.

<That’s enough. Time to end this.> she tells her allies.

The other gods interrupt their assault. All the water in Atlantis has now evaporated, and given the shockwaves and the radiation unleashed it’s unlikely that any mortal is still alive, even those few who survived Anubis’s onslaught.

With Poseidon still leaning on his trident, standing on top of his throne molten into slag, it’s safe enough for Athena to snap her fingers and open up a portal.

Poseidon is hit by a lightning bolt, a fireball and several Blood daggers once the Vanguard exit the portal. As he grimaces from the pain multiplied by the necrobots, he has eyes only for one of the mortals who just arrived.

A girl with silver eyes, shining like two miniature suns crackling with electricity that is building up across her body.

<Eternal..> Noriko Null raises her voice, kicking her Nexus into overdrive.

<Finally!> Poiseidon smiles, with a green gleam in his eyes.

<ERASER!!!>

Null unleashes an astronomical amount of raw information, replicating the powered-up version of the Final Abyss that she developed in her fight with Ulysses.

Poseidon immediately notices this is a much more polished version of the technique and is sure of two things. The first is that this can kill him.

The second is that he planned for this.

Without hesitation he moves faster than light, grabbing both Triton and Proteus… the latter currently taking the form of an elderly human… and puts them directly in the path of the attack.

The Eternal Eraser hits them both, causing more pain that they could possibly imagine: not only their minds are overwhelmed by a ludicrous amount of sheer random information, but every pain they have ever caused to others in the past millennia is pushed back into their souls… multiplied a billionfold.

Both gods scream in agony so brutal that even Anubis winces at that horrific sound, and in just a few seconds their minds are annihilated. And without a mind to give form to their divinity, both Triton and Proteus fade into nothingness.

<My Gaea.> Vesta says.

<Holy φουcκ!> Kari exclaims.

<This is bad.> Torn understands.

<Hit him again!!!> Quantum tells Noriko, but she doesn’t respond. She can feel the electricity tingling in her nerves: the Nexus has sufficiently upgraded her nervous system to withstand the enormous strain of the Eternal Eraser, so she doesn’t have to faint like she used to after every use of the Final Abyss… but she knows it will take time before she can fire another one.

<She can’t. Just as planned.> Poseidon gloats, spitting out a black mass of nanites. Immediately after he does this, he stands up straight and he even seems to get slightly more muscular.

<The necrobots failed. They only infected you because you allowed them to.> Anubis realizes.

<I knew the Slayer was too cowardly to face me directly and she could carry out her blasphemous spell only once, so I faked my weakness. Don’t you realize it by now? This is my realm! Here, I am SUPREME!!!>

Poseidon strikes the ground with his trident, reminding everyone why he is also the god of earthquakes.

Atlantis had already been shattered before this, but at least it maintained some appearance of having been a planet. The quake reduces its remnants to an asteroid field surrounded by a cloud of ionized vapor, generated when its oceans were boiled and irradiated in the first attack.

Even Noriko’s forcefield, protecting her and Kari, as well as Torn’s Blood aura, barely survive for a couple of seconds: if it wasn’t for Anubis coming to their rescue and protecting them with his energy shield, the vibrations alone would have pulverized their bones.

Quantum is the only mortal that doesn’t need rescue: the vibrations pass harmlessly through him once he turns into neutrinos, and he takes advantage of the environment. Changing into a powerful magnetic field he attracts all the neutrons from the surrounding ion cloud towards Poseidon, then changes into a cloud of antimatter.

<Keep up the pressure!> Athena incites her allies, finally engaging Poseidon in direct combat.

His trident clashes with her spear, as the war goddess prioritizes preventing Poseidon from using his weapon against the others by focusing on her.

Enyo, Vesta and Amaterasu keep a continuous supply of raw sonic, heat and solar energies, and all their expertise is necessary to hit Poseidon as much as it is to avoid hurting Athena.

The only god abstaining from the battle is Anubis, and not only because he’s the only factor allowing the mortals to witness such a cataclysmic battle.

<It is pointless. Poseidon’s defenses are beyond anything at our disposal: we simply lack the ability to harm him.> he has to admit.

<I am not giving up, Anubis. And neither are you!> Noriko admonishes the jackal god, but she’s worried. Poseidon is proving every bit as invincible as Class-1 gods have been described to her.

<Only one last shot. Torn, be ready to get us to safety at my command.> she instructs, opening up a link to her base in the Null Zone.

<So you are giving up after all?> Anubis asks.

<Only after giving Poseidon the mother of all middle fingers. I’m about to deliver the full Yggdrasil arsenal right on his position before we leave.> she says.

<Wait, isn’t that like a thousand black holes at once!?> Quantum asks, having just reformed into flesh and blood to catch his breath.

<A lot more than a thousand, but yes. Given what Hades survived I’m not sure if even THAT is going to be enough, but that’s literally all I have left.> she admits.

<I will do my best to retrieve Vesta with us.> Torn tries to reassure them.

<It’s too bad: from what I can see from here, only Athena has a decent fighting style… if only all of them could fight like me, we’d kick his ass.> Kari comments.

Noriko suddenly stops working on the calculations on how to precisely target Poseidon, stares at Kari for a couple of seconds, and her silver eyes shine.

<I need full access to all of your Soul Relays, a s##tload of luck and a few milligrams of necrobots!> she says, turning towards Anubis to demand the most crucial component.

<What? What did I say?> Kari wonders.

<If we manage to stay alive the couple of minutes I’ll need to pull this off, we’re winning this. Come now, those necrobots?> she insists, snapping her fingers twice right under Anubis’s nose.

<You mean you are going to kill Poseidon?> Torn asks.

<Not exactly.> Noriko answers, as Anubis places his hand on her shoulders.

The necrobots penetrate her skin, making the veins in her neck glow beneath them and disseminating through her head.

<“We”. We’re killing Poseidon.> she clarifies, her voice taking the same robotic tone of Anubis.