Part 3 - Devil's Dawn
Chapter 57 - Devourer of Worlds
The sight out of the view screen horrified everyone who saw it.
"We have to go down there. Our children are still in the village." Said Astrid, clearly panicking.
"Agreed. Transfer room, transfer us down to Berk from the bridge."
The village seemed intact except for one massive difference: cracks seemed to have formed in the fabric of reality itself. Where some met, black holes had formed. Peter touched one but nothing happened, almost as of it weren't there. Hiccup and Astrid began to shout for people to get out of their homes and be ready to leave. Peter and Edward stared into the sky at the cause of all of this.
"Melbourne to Valour, send a request for relief ships. We need them here on the double."
"Yes sir."
Peter ignored the short conversation, wondering how this could have happened. Alduin had grown to hundreds of times his usual size, seeming to hover in the sky. However, after looking for a few seconds, it was clear the World Eater's wings were beating slowly. The beast's body seemed to be filled with fire, perhaps the material already absorbed from this dimension.
"He really is the Devourer of Worlds, isn't he?" Breathed Peter.
"In all my years of service with Sol, I have never seen anything like this."
"I wish we never made the final move on Helltreader. Miles would still be alive, Alduin would still be locked away."
"We have to live with our regrets. They're the one thing we all take to our grave."
"Any ideas how we'll beat him now?"
"Nothing."
They watched Alduin for nearly another minute before Hiccup ran back to them.
"You have to help us. He'll destroy everything."
"I've already sent a request for aid. A ship will be here soon to get everyone to a safer dimension."
"Will they be OK without these?" The chief asked, raising his wrist to indicate the dimensional watch he was wearing.
Even the dragons had been fitted with small anklets to keep them from glitching and falling out the sky.
"They will. Ships with temporal capabilities are shielded from the effects of glitching. They only need to worry if they're stepping outside."
"Thank you."
The next thing that grabbed people's attention was an enormous Sol Galactic Command ship that burst from temporal warp of the coast between the village and Alduin. Peter was blown away by the size of the vessel: over a kilometre long and half as wide. It looked more like a streamlined space station than a ship.
"I thought Valour was the biggest?"
"Valour is the largest warship. Red Cross Class ships have next to no armament, merely shields and some point defence lasers. Now help me sort this out; most of these people haven't been on a space ship."
Small craft descended from the ship, the SRS Haven, and touched down in the middle of the village. Scared and confused, people piled into them. A few fights broke out over who was first in line, but were broken up quickly by Sol personnel, Peter or Hiccup and Astrid.
Nearly an hour passed; still the evacuation continued. Peter was taking a break, this was far more exhausting than any fight he had been in. It upset him to see so many good people scared to the point where they would turn on their neighbour. He looked over at the sound of Venom snarling at someone and watched the people back away in fear. The entrance to the craft closed and the vehicle lifted into the air, turned and zoomed overhead up to the Haven. The symbiote stormed over to the spider, disappearing back into Edward who let out a low growl.
"It's time we tried something. The evacuation is going slower than a dead snail."
"What did you have in mind?"
"If we can get Hiccup close enough to use Dragonrend, I can bring the entire resistance fleet in to blast this Dovah bastard to oblivion."
"I'm pretty sure Oblivion is an actual afterlife."
"Good. Cos that's where that thing is going."
Hiccup and Astrid approached, each carrying a young child, perhaps three or four years old.
"You wanted to see us?"
Edward nodded, still staring out at the World Eater.
"We need to try something. My idea is for you to ride Toothless and get close and personal with Alduin, then hit him with Dragonrend, then the fleet will do the rest."
"Anything's worth a shot."
Edward paced back and forth across the bridge of the Valour. The entire resistance fleet was ready, a total of over thirteen thousand ships. Down on the ground, Peter gave Hiccup a good luck pat on the back. Hiccup patted Toothless comfortingly, and clambered on. The Nightfury spread its wings and soared off the cliff edge, skimming the water then climbing quickly past the Valour and the amassing resistance fleet. Nearly five minutes later, the dragon and dragonborn were within range. Hiccup took a deep breath and shouted as loud and as powerful as he could:
"Joor zah frul!"
The deep blue shockwave certainly struck the World Eater; it was fired at point-blank range. Toothless dived down as the fleet opened fire, unleashing everything from missiles to enormous balls of energy from battleship-like cannons. Peter watched in awe; there was no way Alduin could survive this.
"More!" Edward yelled, desperate to save this dimension and so many more from destruction.
His ops officer sighed as the Valour continued to shake under the force of its enormous cannons unleashing their broadside. Suddenly, it stopped.
"Artillery dark energy reserves depleted. Thermal beam array down to thirty percent. Missile reserves down to three percent." Tactical reported.
"The rest of the fleet is reporting low ammunition." Added ops.
"Acknowledged. Cease fire. If that didn't kill the brute, nothing will."
The smoke cleared slowly, revealing the fleet's handiwork. Peter and Astrid groaned. The fleet's handiwork was nothing. As far as they could tell, not even a scale had been chipped. Toothless glided in and landed with Hiccup.
"It didn't work."
"Clearly." Peter mumbled.
Suddenly, a magenta ring of fire appeared. Gwen walked through followed by Teresa. She looked around at the cracks in the sky, then at Hiccup.
"So, did you try something or were you just about to?" She asked.
"We just tried Dragonrend and a fleet barrage. Nothing happened. It's like Alduin didn't even notice it." Astrid replied.
Teresa's keen eye saw the Viking's knuckles tighten around the handle of her axe. Gwen rolled her eyes.
"Probably because he really didn't notice it. The World Eater is eating this world. In my digging before I ran away with the plate, I learnt the story of Alduin. He is the first-born of Akatosh, one of the Divines back in Nira. His sole purpose was to destroy worlds to make way for the next. But he wanted more; Alduin wanted dominion and power, but he couldn't have both at once. He gave up his true power, this, to rule over mortals. Now that he has relinquished control of Sovngarde, he is free to travel the multiverse and devour anywhere he wants. It also means he is no longer a Dovah, which is why Dragonrend did nothing. And since Dragonrend did nothing, it was impossible to hurt him."
"There has to be something we can do." Said Hiccup, clearly getting desperate to save his home as he paced up and down the cliff.
Toothless watched with sad eyes.
"Since you're a Viking, your knowledge of temporal workings is limited. Do you really think that defeating Alduin here and now will magically fix this world? It won't. These holes, these cracks, will remain here until something or someone finishes the job. They aren't just in Berk, they are in space, on other planets, in other galaxies."
Teresa kicked a stone off the cliff. It fell into one of the holes and disappeared. She frowned, since she could put her hand through them and it would come out the other side unscathed. But that was insignificant to the next thing she saw. She looked up and noticed Alduin's jaw had opened and flames were gurgling in his throat.
"Teresa to Melbourne. Get every ship out of here now. Gwen, portal. Now."
The group looked at Alduin and saw the same thing. Gwen clenched her fist and pushed it forward, opening her hand as she did to create another magenta gateway as flames began to shoot from the World Eater's mouth. They swept over the few ships left, blasting them apart, and continued on towards Berk. Gwen shut the portal as Peter leapt through just in time. They were standing in the middle of a city. A large group of people had stopped and were staring.
"Welcome to Stockholm, 9633. Edward will have taken the fleet back to his home in 9559. Deliver this to him." Said Gwen, pressing a sticky note into Peter's hand.
"You aren't coming?"
"I'll freak everyone out. Go."
She opened another gateway and let the others through. Teresa stopped in front of her.
"You'll be alright, right?"
"Maybe. Maybe not. Foresight is not one of my abilities. Come and get me when you're doing something. I'll be here by this...fountain."
Crossovers in this Chapter
- How to Train Your Dragon
- Skyrim
Well the word 'Dovah' didn't account for twenty percent of this chapter's length so it was probably better reading.