The Adeptus Deorum exited hyperspace into a seemingly random former Angelus Holy Union system. Appearing roughly in mid orbit above the now ravaged planet, the aftermath of ‘Operation: Fallen Down’ was clearly visible. Ash, dust and radioactive fallout swirled around like a smothering blanket inside the planet’s atmosphere, while some small glow from massive infernos could barely be seen underneath the veil of choking debris. This planet and its populace were lucky; unlike Heaven Prime, it had only been hit with three nuke-filled asteroids, which made it among the majority.

Of the roughly one hundred and fifty planets that fell before Arcadia’s wrath, the vast majority were struck first by a sustained orbital bombardment and then by between two to three asteroids. Heaven Prime was a great exception to the norm and was the only planet to have faced such a vengeful and hate-filled execution. At most, a planet would be hit with between five or seven asteroids, and even then, they were usually not nearly as big as the ones dropped on the Angels’ Homeworld.

Arcadia’s bitter and seething rage against those that would destroy it had been the impetus that led to ‘Operation: Fallen Down’ to even be considered. Arkhan had serious misgivings about the use of such weapons, but had been unable to devise a better, more efficient and more immediate method of dealing with the resistance posed by the AHU’s atmospheric and ground-based defenses and forces.

Surveying the nuclear hell from his private quarters, Arkhan looked out at the world that was slowly succumbing to an atomic winter from the deep recesses of his flagship. Who needed the structural weaknesses that were windows when cameras and view-screens did the same thing but with less possibility of taking direct fire? Either way, Arkhan got the same displeasure from viewing his nation’s handiwork regardless of whether he was staring at it from a direct or indirect method.

“I truly wish there had been another way. As much as I hated you all to no end, this is all simply too cruel.” Arkhan could almost hear the pain and misery from the planets’ populace rising and falling like an orchestra of suffering. Some small part of him wondered if this was the same feeling that Newtypes would experience, and he dreaded experiencing the full effects of being an empathic space psychic. “This is nauseating enough now; depressing enough now. I can’t imagine how things will feel later on. Now I understand on a personal level why Newtypes shouldn’t be used for war; this is bad enough for me to experience even with my currently minimal levels of Newtype Space Fuckery…”

Arkhan left his room and walked down the corridors leading to the mess hall. Some of the scant few organic crew members would meet him there for this ‘breakfast’. Although, could it even be called breakfast when they were in a different star system with different timetables?

“Well, it’s five ‘o clock somewhere….”

As Arkhan approached the mess hall the usually vibrant atmosphere was nowhere to be seen. Those living souls who were Arcadian citizens had also begun to develop Newtype abilities, and as Arkhan surveyed the room he noticed how no one seemed to have the appetite needed to even eat a single spoonful of cereal. The atmosphere was far more morose than what it had been not even a few hours ago, but in all honesty even those with the weakest Newtype abilities had quickly felt ‘wrong’ after ‘Operation: Fallen Down’ had begun.

When they entered the system, they had dropped in just close enough that they were hit with enough of an empathic blitz to make everyone feel unwell. In fact, the reason Arkhan was up at all was due to him being shocked awake by the nightmares he had experienced. No one was in a mood to talk, and no one could sleep a wink. And worst of all, the myriad Mobile Suit Golems and Mobile Armor Golems seemed as chipper as ever, if not more so.

Arkhan’s creations congratulated him on his ‘exceptional use of force’ while his Newtype Empathic bullshit only made him feel worse than ever. With the MSGs on board acting as jovial as they were, it somehow only worsened the feelings of guilt that the organic crew faced. They all put on a good face when Arkhan walked in, hoping to make it seem like they weren’t harboring treasonous thought or having sympathy for such a terrible enemy, but they slowly realized that their ruler had the same feelings as themselves.

Arkhan did not want to stay in this place any longer than they had too and ordered the armada’s sublight propulsion to be engaged. The sooner that they were far enough away for the sounds of psionic suffering to not affect them, the better.

…

“You don’t look too good.”

This was the first line out of Asharia’s mouth once she and Arkhan were alone together. Having reunited back in the capital and having dismissed the ambassadors and news crews from the United Galactic Nations, Arkhan was looking forward to getting some time to hopefully let the weight of the prior events leave his shoulders. He was not able to get the psychic screams out of his mind, even when the armada had gotten back into the Solaris System, and instead began to wonder if he would ever manage to stop the nightmares from happening. He was convinced that something about this time was different, as it had not occurred either to him or his people before. Maybe the slow awakening into Newtypes had indeed been slow, only to show up like usual for UC Gundam series at critical times.

“Of course I’m not feeling good, Ash. I have new empathic abilities and I just passed through dozens of systems filled with dying and dead people who were suffering and had been suffering immensely. I have to deal with the aftershocks of events so destructive that they left a psychic imprint on the general area around them. There is no way those will subside fast enough for the finished terraforming to be immediately capitalized on.”

Asharia sighed and motioned to a star map. Her finger traced over the worlds claimed from the aftermath of the AHU’s glassing of UGN worlds.

“You aren’t the only one suffering.”

“No shit. The living crewmembers from every ship in the armada has had the same experience.”

Asharia pointed to the planets she had traced on the map.

“I had a feeling that was the case. We had to evacuate the organic inhabitants of the worlds we claimed and even evacuate the systems themselves. The glassing of those worlds had the same effect as dropping those asteroids; they are most assuredly not suitable for habitation for our people, despite the clean atmosphere and verdant landscapes until we manage to erase those empathic hellzones.”

Arkhan groaned as he strained to think through the reverberating feelings of pain and fear that stuck with him for far longer than he had anticipated. The Angels were giving him trouble even after they had gone to meet their maker…

“Any ideas? I kinda need this dealt with as soon as possible, even if for the sake of my own sanity over anything else…”

Asharia did not look happy, but also did not look unhappy. Rather a mix of disappointment and annoyance filled her face, directed not at Arkhan but instead off towards the realm that once was claimed by the AHU.

“Aside from abandoning your fleshy bodies and becoming machines? There is one option that would be an immediate solution, but that would involve making everyone an emotionless husk, which isn’t ideal. No, the only viable option that would take a ‘brief’ bit of time and would deal with the rapidly spreading epidemic of depression is, unfortunately, to let me flex my power.”

Arkhan did not care at this point.

“Do it. I don’t care what you do, just make it quick… please….”

Asharia looked down at Arkhan and simply said one sentence.

“Be careful what you wish for; you just might get it.”

Like a devil who had just signed a Faustian bargain, Asharia popped out of the room in a puff of sulfurous smoke. Arkhan could feel the empathic weight lift and then vanish, only to be replaced with a severe feeling of unease as Asharia popped back into the room.

“What did you do?”

At Arkhan’s question, Asharia simply smiled innocently.

“Time heals all wounds. Even if those wounds would take tens of thousands of years to heal or more. The worlds are fine, as if nothing changed, but they are all technically several tens or hundreds of thousands of years from the future. You would be surprised what a mix of various temporal magics can do.”

Arkhan once again realized just how dangerous it would be to get on his wife’s bad side as she casually rambled off the ways that things could have gone horribly wrong, of which included ripping apart the whole of reality and creating a massive, universe ending paradox. In fact, the way she described these possible catastrophes made it seem like she had experienced them herself….

“Ash, did the universe end multiple times as you mucked about with space-time?”

Asharia said nothing but merely gave a smile that said, “You don’t really want to know the answer to that question, do you?”