Chapter 335: Prison Break

16th May 2013, Klyn Maximum Security Prison, Nova Empire

(Jasmine Sayre POV)

The feeling of being inside a Jump Point was unlike anything I had ever experienced. It was like being in the heart of a star, surrounded by some kind of pulsing energy that threatened to swallow us whole. I could feel the g-forces pushing against me as the ship hurtled through the wormhole, and I had no idea how a normal spaceship could hold up against something like this.

The feeling kept repeating again and again, through one portal after another, until we came out of the last one. The ship then flew towards our destination. We were probably half a galaxy away from Earth and I had never felt more alive.

When we finally stopped, we were met with a massive spherical structure floating in space. I asked the computer what it was telepathically and was immediately met with a hologram showing the details of this structure.

It was known as Klyn, one of the largest and most secure prisons in the Nova Empire. It had a reputation of being inescapable. Hela was reading the text from behind my shoulder and asked, "Now, what?"

I grinned at her, "Now, we plan a prison break, my dear."

"I don't like this," Hela complained.

She wasn't exactly wrong. We were both wearing orange jumpsuits, having infiltrated one of the prisoner shipments. I decided against being obvious while breaking into the prison in case it bit me in the ass later on. There's no need to cause a war between Asgard and the Nova Empire, or even worse, Earth and the Nova Empire. I chose to infiltrate the prison as a convict and not a guard because I needed Quill to trust me, and that was easier as a fellow convict.

I used my technopathy to alter the prisoner logs to include two fake identities, for both Hela and me and altered the guards' and prisoners' memories as if we were always there. All things considered, for all Klyn is the pride of the Nova Empire's prisons, and it was disturbingly easy to break into it.

I shrugged at my new student, "I know that you don't like the fact that we're technically imprisoned considering your history, but it's only for a little while, until we grab Quill and leave."

The Goddess of Death shook her head, "It's not that. It's just humiliating to even pretend that these things could hold me."

She pulled up her shackles, which seemed to be made of standard steel.

"You know that if I had said that we were enhanced in our files, they would have chosen better cuffs," I answered dryly.

"Still, there's a principle involved!" she protested.

I raised an eyebrow, "Are you telling me that you want to be restrained with better cuffs?"

Hela looked down and muttered, "You don't get it."

I simply shrugged because she wasn't wrong. I didn't get why that woman would ever want to have better restraints. It must be an Asgardian thing, something to do with honor, I guessed.

The guards had strip searched us before giving us our prison uniforms. I decided to just hypnotize them and let me and Hela through normally. I was all for playing the part of a criminal, but I had my dignity. It didn't take long for us to finally be led to our cells.

I will admit that if someone didn't have powers, escaping this prison would be slightly challenging. Sure, there were gaps in security, and the guards weren't the brightest bunch, but the flying artillery going everywhere was somewhat effective in preventing a prisoner uprising.

The system was technically very secure, but like most secure systems, the main weakness had to be the one operating the system. And damn, those guards were glaring vulnerabilities.

Honestly, breaking out of this prison wouldn't be a big deal. But I wasn't here for a trip and mostly came here to find Peter Quill.

As for our prison tour, the guards kept telling us the basic rules, where to get food, where to shower, and practically everything we needed to live in this place. The good thing was the fact that the guards didn't involve themselves too much in the inmate's daily lives, the guards were practically only involved in case something drastic happened, or a prisoner tried to escape. Practically everything the inmate needed was automated, and the robots involved in intimidating the inmates into submission.

Unfortunately, they didn't give a shit about the actual lives of the prisoners. Deaths were fairly common in Klyn, especially at the hands of other inmates. From the sound of it, the prison was practically a small society of prisoners with social classes, probably depending on their physical strength.

Finally, we were left to the common room where the other inmates stayed, and the guards left us to the inmate initiation.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

The moment the guards left the room, a hulking alien with blue skin walked up to me and Hela, "Check out the new meat, and pretty ones too. I'm gonna slather you up in Gunavian jelly, and go to town..."

I just raised an eyebrow and motioned Hela to shut the bastard up. The savage that she is, kicked the alien in the balls and punched him in the face. I then grabbed the kneeling groaning alien's face and stared at him in the eyes, "Let me make something clear, if anyone so much as touches me and the woman with me, I will rip out their balls and feed it to them. And that's me being merciful. Do we have an understanding, worm?"

I didn't even raise my voice, and yet the alien's blue skin started getting paler and paler the more I talked until it was barely blue at all. The man nodded fervently as if his life depended on it, and it wasn't really wrong. I kept holding his face until I felt satisfied that I intimidated enough people around me so that they wouldn't even try to mess with me. Not that it would matter, really, but it would be troublesome to deal with horny prisoners all day.

I let the man go and he fell to the ground, passed out in fear. I heard one of the prisoners yell out, "Who are you?"

"I only tell my name to dead men. With that said, are you sure you want to know?" I answered with a monotone voice.

I heard a collective gulp from the inmates, and I nodded to myself, turned, and walked away.

"I didn't know you were this terrifying," Hela spoke up with an admiring tone.

I shrugged, "You just got this, even after I kicked your ass so many times?"

The Goddess of Death grumbled and looked down at her feet. I have to say that I didn't expect Hela to act like this anytime soon. Oh, she still had her little temper tantrums and was a bit of a psychopath, but once she got used to me, she started acting slightly less formal. She had a wicked tongue but was also very prideful. Poking at her pride was an easy way to get a rise out of her. But she learnt better than trying to do something like that with me.

Hela Odinsdottir was a damaged girl that lived in complete isolation for thousands of years after being betrayed by her father, and I was happy to see her getting better.

Having embarrassed Hela slightly, I found a small empty corner in the courtyard and motioned my new student to come with me there. As we sat down, Hela asked, "So, which one of them is your target? I have to say that I didn't expect whoever you're looking for to be in a place like this."

I shrugged, "There are traces of cosmic energy everywhere, but it's an ambient thing. Quill must have not unlocked his cosmic powers just yet, meaning that our search is a lot less dangerous than it could have been."

"That's good to hear but are you seriously going to recruit a criminal? He could be a mass murderer or something worse."

I raised an eyebrow, "You personally massacred the entire forces of the Valkyries and still want to judge someone for being a mass murderer?"

Hela blushed and tried to justify herself, but I interrupted her, "Look, Hela, I know I don't look it, but I'm in a very hard place right now. If he's some scum, I will leave him be. But as long as he's not a complete monster, I can keep an eye on him and set him straight. I've always known that this was shot in the dark in the first place. I just needed a break and took this small mission to change my environment so to speak."

The Goddess of Death sighed in exasperation, "Well, where are we going to find our young degenerate?"

"Well, we have to be smart about it. We can't tell anyone of our purpose. I'll scan the inmates' minds to find out what he looks like, and who he hangs out with. We'll then observe him to see if he's a monster before doing a deep mind dive to see his memories. After that, after he's passed our tests, we'll make our proposal."

For some reason, while I was talking, Hela seemed to start snickering. I gave her a confused look and she pointed behind me. Inside, was a man in his late twenties with brown hair and a somewhat strong build. He was looking at me with a small smirk on his face, "Well, hello there, good looking. My name's Peter Quill, but I am mostly known as Star Lord."

Or the dude could just come up to me to flirt. I gave him an unimpressed look, "And my name is none of your business."

"Oh, come on, don't be so cold. In this place, you'll need all the friends you could have. And honestly, you two are two of the most attractive women in this prison and no matter how strong you are, you can't fight all the prisoners here. Even Gamora can't and she's very good. She's very lucky Drax wants to use her as bait against Ronin."

Hela tilted her head, "Ronin?"

I shrugged, "He's some Kree warlord that tried to come to Earth a few decades ago. Carol Danvers, a good friend of mine, destroyed his fleet in minutes and he ended up running away. Not that interesting of a guy, to be honest."

Hela nodded, disappointed. However, I had Quill's attention, "Wait, Earth? You're from Terra?"

I shrugged, "Yeah, I'm from London, but I live in New York right now."

"Seriously? I haven't been there in ages, ever since I was a kid really. I'm from Missouri, by the way. When did Terra start having space capabilities?"

"They still don't, not really. Oh, they could make something. I could see Tony Stark, or Reed Richards building a space fleet, but the planet's too divided for it to remain peaceful. Although, the general populace does know that aliens are real, especially after the Chitauri invasion about a year ago."

Peter was pale in shock, "Thanos invaded Terra?"

I shook my head, "No, he was repelled. I was actually part of the team that repelled the Chitauri. Neither Thanos nor his children were part of the battle, and it was mainly confined to a single city, so there weren't that many casualties."

"And how did you end up space travelling, by the way?"

"A psychopathic alien came to Earth with his ship and tried to destroy the world or something. I ended up killing him and took the ship for myself. So, I decided to travel the galaxy for a bit."

The half Celestial burst into laughter, "Well, as a Ravager, I do approve. But how did you end up in here?"

"The Nova Corps are assholes, that's all I'm saying."

From the loud laughter that Quill released, I knew that I said the right thing. Things were going well. Quill didn't seem to be a psychopath in hiding, just some wannabe rogue that fancies himself to be a captain.

Once I get to know him a little better, I was going to recruit him.

My thoughts were interrupted by a loud voice, "Quill, what're you laughing at?"

I turned towards the noise to find a small walking raccoon next to what appeared to be a man-tree hybrid of sorts. Hela looked at me, confused and spoke up, "I never met a talking rodent before."

Well, shit. And everything was going so well. It's my fault for jinxing it.

----------------------------------------

As usual, I generally post four chapters a week, on Sundays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. (The month is over, so I'm going back to the usual schedule)

If you want to support me, check out my Patreon. I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.

Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.