It was a week later; after Excalibur had fully recovered, and the DMA had started building an underground lab, down in the 'Grounded' vault, for Doctor Disaster; when the call finally came in; Apollo wanted to meet.
The logistics would be fairly straightforward; while Apollo didn't want to meet on American soil, he was perfectly fine meeting up at one of the various international facilities involved in the space program; and so, Arakiel ended up on a long flight to Noordwijk; where he would be meeting Apollo, and, surprisingly, Hephaestus as well; with director Thomes ordering the full Swords team to go, just in case.
On the one hand, it was likely simply paranoia. On the other, all of the Olympians had physical capabilities of a vastly superhuman sort, and the DMA had been given very direct evidence of what sort of game-changer precognition was in a fight; even more importantly, supposedly Apollo was going to turn on them and start killing Titans at some point.
Even as the plane touched down at the airstrip outside the launch facility, another delivery vehicle was being assembled; every week, another craft launched, taking crew, colonists, and equipment up to the various platforms. At present, the population of humans in space was in the low thousands; mostly doing mining work or assembly on one of the various space stations; but the skeletal forms of combat spacecraft in orbit would be filling out rapidly over the coming months and years, and even without the colony ships, tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands would need to be moved up as the timetable advanced.
At present, the only colonists going up were those that could be helpful in finishing the spacecraft; but soon enough the rest would be added to the lists; both ships needed to be gone long before the Jotun arrived in the area, to ensure they couldn't be followed if worst came to worst.
Everyone was geared up for a fight just in case; with Excalibur wearing a much lighter, but still fairly dense, armored suit that looked closer to what a scifi image of powered armor would than the tank with legs he usually looked like; as they descended the stairs; Arakiel inhaling deeply as he enjoyed the brisk, clean air, looking around at the facility; where dozens of partially-complete craft were scattered around, mostly vague metal cone shapes. Usually only descent capsules ended up coming down, with most of the vessel remaining in orbit, so very little of this material would ever see earth again.
The group stood out on the tarmac; Terminal not present, but otherwise the full team there; as three people emerged from one of the craft; an almost perfect, silver sphere resting nearby; the first being a statuesque woman wearing a long white flowing robe; then a short, childlike figure wearing a breastplate over his own robes; and finally, Hephaestus, wearing his massive armored suit.
No-one was quite certain what that suit was capable of; only that it was probably the most advanced piece of technology on the planet, built by a genius who had tens of thousands of years to perfect his craft, and undoubtedly loaded out with a variety of magical gimmicks and technological marvels. Arakiel might have been there to meet Apollo; but it was difficult not to stare at the imposing figure of the god of the forge.
When the two groups stopped; with Arakiel stepping out to meet Apollo; the slim figure nodded. "You asked to see me. Considering the sort of damage we could cause if we came into conflict in this, and of considering how much power our respective organizations wield, I felt it best to do so. What do you know?"
Arakiel sighed. "I know that this should be kept relatively quiet so as not to scare people. Can we take this somewhere private?"
A deep voice emerged from the towering silver figure. "While the recording device in your suit is still functioning. no-one outside this circle can hear you. I can limit it to just the two of you, should I need to?"
"I... No, that'd be fine. Everyone in this circle knows I can see the future already. Alright. Obviously, things will change now. But before we arranged this meeting, I knew how we would die. We'll see how that changes, later."
He took a deep breath. "The two of us were among the few survivors of humanity. We were in a facility on an island... somewhere the Minoans used to be, though I didn't know who they were until I had the vision. We had lost the war against the Jotun, and were waiting for 'The Emperor' to show up before destroying an old relic and wiping out both ourselves and him. You had managed to kill all of the Titans... including a new one we had created... only to discover it was useless; whatever means the Jotun had for seizing control of a single powerful individual, no matter how shielded they were, was able to instead be turned to control hundreds, or thousands, of unshielded people. The spot where the island was had been lethally irradiated. If we hadn't used the relic, I would have died of radiation poisoning soon. They had been able to launch nukes, deploy bio-weapons... and apparently essentially won the war before even landing."
Apollo slowly nodded. "That... unfortunately tracks with my own visions, now. Until you came around, I hadn't seen just what caused the problem, since it would have killed me as well; apparently, if left alone, you would have interrupted Lightning's path of destruction, killing him in DC; but only after he'd killed all the other titans, and millions of others besides. Once I saw that, and knew Lightning was the source of the problem... we researched. Learned of a Jotun mind-control device... or person... or both, really.. called the Chains of Eternity. The ultimate Jotun weapon against the Emperor, still not ready yet, but being field-tested. I didn't know it could be used to control a whole mob of people, though. It.... changes things."
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Arakiel shrugged. "We need to either get the Titans off earth, and make sure all the nukes, bio-weapons, everything, are disabled from control by anyone but shielded, secured invididuals... or destroy the device before it gets here. Frankly, the best approach I can think of would be to have the Titans waiting within sensor range but nearby, so they can hop in to help.... after the Chains have already been used."
Apollo sighed. "It isn't just a mind control device. It's an information-gathering tool as well; able to assess millions of minds scattered across the globe, start reading their surface thoughts, and determine who the best candidate to control is. If we enacted such a plan, they would know the Titans were out there... and possibly just wait for them to arrive before activating."
"...As if it matters? The sun and moon twins could eradicate the entire Jotun fleet virtually instantly. So could Spike, though there might be some unfortunate side effects. So long as we get one of them into position, they could intercept the fleet, wipe it out... and then we use your little orb thing on the Emperor by predicting the direction he's coming and using it at the right time. If they manage to get control of one of them before they strike, then yes, it will suck, and we might have to kill them... but then they'll lose control as soon as soon as the second one destroys the fleet, and the Chains with it."
"...A workable plan. Honestly, we already plan on deploying a series of mines to wipe out the bombardment section of the Jotun fleet on the way in. We need to be very careful; too many mines and they'll detect them, avoid them; but I can't take out both all of the bombardment fleet, and the chains. With this method, we simply take out the bombardment fleet with some titan support... and we could target the Chains with the mines. Let it die before arriving."
Arakiel chuckled. "I know you guys have been unwilling to talk to us since world war 2. And I can understand why. Not only were Hiroshima and Nagasaki horrible war crimes... but our conduct after hasn't been the best either. Your willingness.." He glanced at Hephaestus.. "To help with the space program is truly benevolent of you. But considering the matter of discussion, would you be willing to establish a line of communications between us, to avoid this sort of entanglement going forward; strictly for purposes of preparing for the Jotun war and avoiding damaging each other's plans?"
Apollo studied him thoughtfully for a few seconds. "Unsurprisingly, I figured you would ask that." Both men gave a short laugh. Apollo reached a hand up; looking for a moment like a child trying to grab his father's hand for a walk; and Hephaestus placed a small black box in it. "This is a secure comm-unit." He extended it out to Arakiel; who examined it for a few moments, and then slid it into a pouch at his hip. "It will listen to anything said nearby, and if you say 'Call Apollo', it'll contact me. So don't keep it in your pocket all the time."
The boy studied the silver armor suit for a few seconds. "One other thing. Be cautious using your power. I only know one other person who ever had it, though undoubtedly its sprung up before. She killed herself. As much of a pain as it is figuring out visions with you around with things changing all the time, if someone else with the power hadn't sprung up, we would've gone into the Jotun war knowing we would lose. Once this whole Jotun situation is resolved, we should sit and speak more... in-depth."
Arakiel couldn't shake that feeling that something was wrong as the group split off; the entire encounter had left him with a subtle level of anxiety. Whatever Hephaestus had in his armor, if he pointed any weapon vaguely in his direction, the world would go dark before he could pull the trigger. If he'd aimed at Apollo, he could hit him, maybe even kill him, before it all went dark; but Hephaestus? He wouldn't even get a shot off.
He watched the god of the forge walking away, and turned to his companions. "Well. We've got a few days off, and the jet's gonna wait for us. Ya'll want to go check out Amsterdam, let the flight crew take a few days off here as well? This is actually my first time in europe"
Cascade tilted her head, glancing at Imperious; who nodded. "I've been here a fair number of times, I can show you a few fun spots.We should change first, though. There's actually a small enclave with a few dozen of my people there, I can introduce you."
***
Arakiel had very little idea of what happened during the next several hours. He had vague visions of a bar, a few drinks that didn't hit as hard as they should, some flavors he'd never experienced; and a fun evening with at least two women involved.
It was a bit strange, waking up without a hangover; he always remembered having hangovers after nights like that; and it had been a while since he'd awoken with a warm body against his side. He didn't recognize where he awoke, of course. It was a hotel room, clearly; a large, comfortable bed, a stereotypical layout with some generic TV, bland wall patterns... At first, that didn't seem like too big a deal; after all, he'd almost certainly either hooked up with some random girl in a bar, or possibly even a prostitute, and taken them to the nearest hotel; not like he'd run into any troubles for it unless he'd hurt someone, and he didn't think anything like that had happened; what little memory he had of it all seemed pleasant; he was half surprised, from those odd memories, to only find one body in the bed with him.
When he glanced down in the pre-dawn light and saw a pool of golden curls against his chest, and a feathered wing over the blanket, that lack of concern vanished. It wasn't exactly an unwelcome situation.... but good lord could this make things complicated.