Arkhan had aged visibly since the extragalactic invaders had arrived. Sure, on paper he was but a few months away from the age of 27, but looked the part of around the age of 35. The burden of leadership and the stress that the invaders caused him was getting to him, and he was having trouble sleeping at night, the thoughts of what could be in the future for him and his people causing him no small amount of discomfort and anxiety. He was hoping beyond hope that he would, like every major time of crisis before this one, pull something out of his ass and manage to save the day.

However, he was beginning to feel that every time he did so it would only set the stage for another, even greater foe which would inevitably force him to find some other Deus ex Machina which would cause the cycle to repeat itself again, and again, and again. He was tired of the idiots in the remaining bits and pieces of the UGN and their terrorist allies in the Free Galaxy Resistance. He was also fed up with the endless repetition of building a massive force and then roflstomping his foes with superior firepower and numbers and he was sick of having to churn out innumerable creations with his own power, an act that was causing his own mind to slowly but surely be subsumed by the massive gestalt that he had created.

Of all the stresses in his current life, one of the worst was the fact that his entire nation (save for Asharia, of course) looked at him as an infallible god, one who could never lead the nation astray and could bring only endless prosperity and an eternal golden age. The fact that this brainwashing-like effect had seeped into every aspect of society, from the youngest to the oldest of people, made Arkhan want to just go somewhere far, far away. He wanted desperately to just teleport to a place where people would not see him either as a perfect and flawless god or as a twisted and evil tyrant, but just as himself, a person with flaws and limits, but knew that he would likely never escape the world he found himself in.

As he sighed and reclined in the big cushy chair that was in his private office, he sorted through the voices and sensory information flooding through the gestalt, sent of course by the innumerable Mobile Suit Golems and Mobile Armor Golems. Occasionally he felt himself slipping into this gestalt consciousness and almost losing his own connection to his body in the process. There were too many minds, and worst of all he could not simply get rid of any of them. Even after ‘death’ their will would linger on and add to the ever-growing tempest of voices in his head.

“I can never have a moment of quiet, now can I? It didn’t bother me before, but now…”

Arkhan massaged his temples with his index fingers as he tried to sort the voices into different groups. Perhaps if he managed to do that then they would be easier for him to deal with and hopefully make it harder for him to get lost in.

“Group number one is comprised of these ones… Group number two is made of these guys… God, this is hard…”

As Arkhan shifted the mix of various consciousnesses around, he began to feel something tugging at his mind. It was unnervingly irritating, as it seemed that this force was coming from practically all directions at once.

“Please, don’t let this be some kind of extragalactic infiltrator…” Arkhan moaned as he felt the tugging get stronger.

The tugging grew in intensity and by the five-minute mark Arkhan was straining to keep himself together. The feeling he felt wasn’t painful, just very irritating, like a phantom sensation in his head that created an itch he could not scratch. Then, at the passing of the tenth minute, he… felt.

It was the weirdest feeling he had ever experienced. He could feel people all over the galaxy, and not in the sexual way. He could understand them, and that felt altogether quite alien to him. Yes, technically he could feel those closest to him, as he had indeed long since become a Newtype, but this awakening was like nothing that the books, manga, movies, tv shows, light novels and more had described. Perhaps it was simply that the mortal languages couldn’t describe this kind of enlightenment or the sensation was vastly different for each person, but either way, the feeling of just knowing everyone on such an instinctual level felt… bizarre.

“I know now how Haman Karn felt when Judau connected with her in ZZ Gundam… This power is… horribly invasive and absurdly Orwellian when you think about it…”

But there was one thing he couldn’t understand about all of this ‘feeling’ business, and that was that he could not empathically ‘feel’ the invaders at all. Something about them was so alien that even Newtype Space Magic Fuckery couldn’t fully connect to them aside from the occasional psychic screams from the organic monstrosities. Maybe he just needed to…

“AAARGH!” Arkhan screamed in pain as he opened a small channel with the invaders. It was only for a moment, but the bottomless feeling of hunger, anger and insanity made him curse the fact that he had even tried attempting to connect with the invaders. “Bad idea! Very, very bad!”

As the aftershock of his experience faded away, Arkhan noticed that blood was dripping from both nostrils and his vision had partially blurred, not to mention the fact that his ears were ringing like nobody’s business and that he felt like he had just gotten off a ‘Spinning Teacups’ ride where the teacups had been spun by a madman. He blinked multiple times in short succession to try and clear his vision, but he soon realized that the only way he could fix his current impairments would be to hit the reset button.

“Damn it…”

Arkhan pressed a button on his desk and the air in his office vented into the void outside the station he was in, replaced with said void in mere moments. After a few seconds, Arkhan’s body shimmered and was replaced with a Nemo II, which looked around before flipping a switch and pressing the button again. The atmosphere in the office returned bit by bit, and only once it was fully livable did the door to the office open up and allow Arkhan to walk back in, now as fit as a fiddle.

“Creator, please stop doing that.” the Nemo II begged.

“I don’t do that very often.” Arkhan said with a shrug. “This makes the fifth time I had to use that ability in my entire life if I am not mistaken.”

“But there is still the cooldown you have to worry about.” the Nemo II retorted.

Arkhan nodded with a lackadaisical motion and took his seat once again. He turned to the Nemo II and smiled.

“At least we didn’t have to sacrifice you. You don’t breathe, after all.”

“Yes, but…”

Arkhan wasn’t paying attention and was instead looking at something else. A smile spread across his face as he looked over his list of abilities after the notification hit him mere moments ago. He turned to the Nemo II and with a look that was equal parts devious and jubilant, he asked a single question both to the Nemo II and all of his creations in general.

“Ready for an upgrade?”