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After a moment, she looked up at Azrael, who was smiling kindly at her. She quickly reached in and gave her a tight hug, which they held for a few seconds.

“Thank you,” Freya said as she let go. “I really needed the rescue. I felt… I felt like I was trapped in an endless pit, down at the bottom. I-I tried to climb out at first, but everything kept crumbling under my fingers.”

Freya looked at her hands, her palms, and curled them slightly. As if to check they still worked.

“I can’t even imagine what you’ve been through,” Azrael replied. “But I can relate a bit. Feel like I’ve kinda been through something like that before, you know? Maybe not all at once like you, but bits here, bits there.

“And I’m glad we got you back, for better or worse. The Republic isn’t the same without you, you know that right? You being back would make things right again.”

“I-I’m not the same person I was back then,” Freya muttered. “It still won’t be the same even if I go back.”

Azrael gave her an acknowledging nod and a smile. The two shared a bittersweet note at the same time. Of course there was no going back to the way things were before.

.....

“That’s okay,” she told Freya. “You’re the one who keeps saying that change is constant, right? We just have to live with that change and adapt, like we always have.

“And besides, the Republic needs you. There are things you can do that no-one else in the Republic can. Just like there are things everyone else in the Republic can do that you can’t. We’re all one, as we’ve always been.”

“That’s all well and good,” Freya replied. “But you’ve seen what I’ve done… what I’ve chosen to do for so long now… I-I burned up so many planets, laid waste to so many people. Everyone in the Republic is a victim of some genocidal maniac somewhere.

“How could I possibly join back now? Especially since I’m one of those maniacs? I… it’s who I am now. And not only that, but I’ve gotta face the consequences of my crimes. Going back just isn’t that easy…”

Azrael pursed her lips as Freya lamented.

She certainly couldn’t discount what Freya was saying. She had long since been declared a war criminal by the Imperium. Of course their own actions in the war were equally as problematic and so their claims were dubious at best. At least, from a galactic stage.

But none of that seemed to matter to Azrael.

“Alright yeah, you definitely did some truly terrible things,” she said. “But you don’t have to keep doing them. You can stop, and you can help fix the problems you’ve made. Even if you had burned down half of the galaxy, you could still go back and, I dunno, rebuild.

“Like, with your own two hands. Literally putting houses and lives back together. I’m not saying people won’t remember you for what you’ve done. They’ll probably remember, for a really long time. And your name won’t be seen well at all. Lots will probably hate you, and maybe even want you dead.

“But so what, you know? If you’re seriously and truly sorry, and if you help rebuild everything you tore down, at the very least, then, you know, at least you won’t only be remembered as some kind of brutal, unforgiving murderer forever.”

Freya exhaled at length, as though she was expunging the last of whatever demons were deep inside.

“Even if that’s something I can do, and even if I go back to the Republic, I wouldn’t know where to start,” she began. “The war’s still going on. Just because I stop firing doesn’t mean everyone else stops along with me.

“And on top of that there’s this massive navy all around us, all waiting to continue burning and razing. I can’t just tell them to go home. I… I don’t know.”

“Well, no matter what, I think the first thing you oughta do is start apologizing,” said Azrael. “At least let everyone know where you’re at. We can all figure it out from there.”

Freya glanced over at the babbling figure that used to be Konleth. She had forced a kind of atonement on him, to make him feel sorry for what he had done, and how he helped engineer the war. And over time, she slowly broke him.

The same with Gravoss.

But in the end, even though she put them through literal hell, neither actually ever apologized. Not even accidentally through any of their incoherent babbling. She didn’t know if that was because they weren’t sorry at all, or if they purposely held it back from her. Forcing someone to feel sorry never seemed to work the way people wanted it to.

She figured her actions probably bred more resentment than anything, which caused them to shut out the possibility forever.

Freya came to the realization that atonement was only powerful if it was voluntary. It only worked if guilt actually wracked the person seeking it. Otherwise, it was as impotent as a rock.

Now was she sorry for what she had done? Absolutely, yes. She wasn’t sure if she was going to get forgiveness for it, or how long it would take otherwise. But as Azrael said, that shouldn’t stop her from atoning at all.

After a few more deep breaths, she picked herself up off the ground, steadied herself, then helped Azrael up as well.

Thin ink-black circuit lines etched themselves on Freya’s face as she telepathically connected to Thanatos once again. She took the ship out of idle and increased power to the life support system. There were a few more aboard the ship than normal, after all.

As an added bonus, she activated the bridge’s lights, which brought some much-needed, long-desired visibility.

Then, she sent out a comms request across every fleet all around her. Not just the Einherjar, but to Orsethii’s fleet, and to the Corvus Republic as well. The request came in across every comms display available, not just the various bridges and military comms stations.

Engineers and pilots and gunners and coders and medics and civilians readily accepted the request all over every fleet.

“Everyone, please, lower your arms,” said Freya. “Deactivate your guns, and instead open up all comms publicly, just between us all here and now. I’ve something to say, and I hope that you listen.

“Many of you know me. You’ve fought by my side, or even against my side for… way too long at this point. We’ve all done things that weren’t right or just. Myself most of all. I’ve definitely done wrong to the drogar, and killed many. Far too many.

“I’ve caused mountains of suffering, and worse I’ve made some of you cause suffering yourselves. Many of you followed me here, down this path, and we… we reveled in the pain we caused.

“Many of us will likely pay the price for the blood we’ve shed. I don’t even mean just from some kind of galactic justice tribunal or whatever, which I’m sure will come for all or most of us.

“But more importantly it cost us all something inside, right?

“We’re all gonna look back at this point in our lives and ask ourselves if any of it was worth it. If we accomplished anything with what we did? And maybe it’ll go back and forth ‘yes we did, no we didn’t’ for the rest of our lives.

“Point is that it’s never gonna go away. We let ourselves believe that setting fire to the galaxy was righteous and just. But all we did was destroy lives simply because our own got destroyed first. Nothing we did was righteous or just.

“It was cruel and needless.”

Freya’s voice wavered as she spoke. Tears welled up in her eyes, though she choked them back as much as she could. The last thing she needed was to break down in front of everyone.

“And that’s on me,” she continued. “I led us all here. My own stupidity and callousness brought us this mess. And I’m deeply, truly sorry for having done so.

“I don’t know if there’s any redemption for any of us, but I want to at least find it, seek it out. I don’t think I could go on otherwise. Maybe some of you might agree with that. Maybe some of you won’t.

“Either way, to the Einherjar – all my brave warriors… If you want to find your own path for redemption, then you may go. You’re free to leave this hell I’ve made.

“For those of you who wish to stay, then stay. Help me find this path to redemption. Help me resuscitate what’s left of the galaxy. Help me undo all that damage I’ve caused, please. I’m hoping that in doing so, we’ll find what we need.”

Freya then bent down to one knee and bowed her head. The shame felt heavy on her shoulders.

“To the Corvus Republic,” she continued. “I need to apologize to all of you the most. I abandoned you while under the immutable oath of protecting you. I threw away those promises so easily, and trivialized your voices and your votes in the process.

“All because I was too absorbed in my own pain to see clearly. And as a result, everything else including all of you became meaningless to me. All of you deserve better.

“I understand that some of you want me back in the republic. Although, honestly, I don’t understand why. I don’t believe I deserve it, after everything I’ve done and become.”

“Of course we want you back!” said someone in the Republic. He was joined by a chorus of agreement. And a few dissents, but they were in the minority.

All their faces appeared all around Freya, all along the wraparound screen. The citizens of the Republic surrounded her, mostly with welcoming arms. A few gave their opinions, which others easily agreed with.

“You helped make the Republic!”

“We made it with our blood, sweat, and tears!”

“You’re family – you belong here!”

Freya also noted the numerous drogar who were in their ranks, none of which were at all happy with her. For obvious reasons. They certainly joined the dissenting voices.

“How could we have a known murderer with us?”

“This person killed my family, and we want her here?”

“War criminals like you don’t belong here.”

Freya grimaced further as she heard those who were deeply unhappy with her. She had inflicted her own pain onto them. No doubt many were also deeply traumatized by what she had done.

The images of her obliterating drogar cities flashed in her mind, and again she fought hard to keep the tears back.

“For those of you who I’ve hurt,” she began. Her voice trembled as she spoke, and she seemed to struggle to push out the rest of the words.

“I want you to know that I’ve done you the most harm. There’s no apology I can give you that’ll ever undo that or make things right. Instead, I want you to know that I pledge to spend the rest of my life making it up to you.

“Although I’ll never again be a First Feather, I instead pledge to forever be the fleet’s Dark Feather.

“I’ll be a living testament of what to never become. And I vow to truly protect the fleet with every fiber of my being, to rebuild everything I’ve torn down, even if the act of it would completely obliterate me. In fact, that’d be the least I could do for any and all of you, now and forever.”