Volume 50 - The End

== Chapter 589 - The End 1 ==
Andromeda and Atlas circled each other for a moment, walking through the remains of the tallest mountain in the Solar System.
"I'm glad you could make it, Anne." Atlas says mockingly. "Soon, we shall see who is fit to rule the u-"
Before he could even finish his sentence, he was punched in the face by her, and sent flying across the landscape. As he rights himself and holds his face in pain, he notices her floating over him, just looking down at him in silent contempt.
"I see...then I suppose there is no need for talk." Atlas remarks with a smile, before his entire body suddenly shatters like glass.
Andromeda realizes what just happened, and is quick to dodge a slash from behind, where her brother had teleported. Atlas swings his sword again, Andromeda leaping over it, the shockwave bifurcating Phobos, before she kicks him in the chest to send him tumbling once again.
Atlas, groaning in pain, dodges her next punch, and slashes at her stomach, but she leaps back from that slash, glaring at him still.
"Have you finally gotten yourself under control?" Atlas taunts, swinging his sword at her again. This time, she catches it in her hand, the shockwave from the sword shattering the surface of the planet!
Andromeda's hand was bleeding somewhat, but she kept her grip despite the pain as she punched Atlas in the face again, and again, and again, continuing a few more times. Atlas attempts to dislocate her arm the same way he did to Dione's, but she leaps back from the grab, before the sandstorm created from their attacks began to rage across all of Mars.
She closes her eyes, and senses Atlas slashing at her through the dust, ducking beneath that slash and kicking him into the air. Right as he righted himself, he saw her grab him by the throat and kick him back down into the storm.
She began to lower down towards the storm, looking for Atlas, as he appeared behind her and slashed at her neck. She whirls around to clasp the sword between both her hands, gritting her teeth a bit before she uses the sword as leverage to fling Atlas into the ground, creating a crater almost halfway across Mars' surface as the dust storm was blasted away.
As the former Socqreath began to get back up, Andromeda tackled him back down to the ground, and punched him in the face once more. Rather than take another barrage, he teleports above her, and slashes down...which she blocks with a Psychic Weapon.
== Chapter 590 - The End 2 ==
"So you didn't trade away your powers for raw strength, after all..." Atlas remarks, Andromeda not verbally responding as he slashed at her again and again. She blocked each slash, the clashes causing quakes throughout Mars, before slashing at Atlas' chest. He parries that slash and attempts a riposte, but she leaps back before she can be stabbed in the face.
As Atlas opened his mouth to speak again, Andromeda sliced apart the ground he was standing on, making it cave in. He was briefly swallowed up, but blasted out of it and flew above her, unleashing a blinding light from his eyes.
Andromeda covered her own eyes, and shielded herself with her Psychic Weapons, which turned out to be wise, as the blast had turned half of Mars into lava. She pulls herself into the air before she can be burned, and then to the side to dodge a stab from Atlas, the former Socqreath righting himself before he could plummet into the molten rock, not that it would have mattered if he did, no doubt.
Atlas turned around to point his sword at Andromeda, charging a blast that moved along the blade before reaching the tip, and firing as a colossal beam. She crossed her arms and Psychic Weapons to block, but was still sent flying nonetheless.
"Hrgh..." She grunted, before noticing Atlas grabbing Deimos and kicking it at her.
She slices it in half, and blocks another slash from him, as he teleports between her and the Psychic Weapon to slash again, cutting her across the arm and abdomen before she managed to leap back and punch him across the molten landscape.
She held her wounds in pain, but then sent another Psychic Weapon at him, focusing as much as she could. He blocks that Psychic Weapon with a dark smile, and unleashes another blast from his eyes to briefly blind her. While she was blinded, he grabs her by the face and slams her directly into the lava!
"ARGH!!!!!" She roars, punching him off her with her normal hand before slashing him back with her Psychic Weapons, which he of course blocked, though the explosions from these Psychic Weapons sent him flying further backwards, his wounds already beginning to heal.
"What tenacity..." Atlas remarks. "...unfortunately, tenacity alone doesn't win a battle, and it doesn't win a war."
Andromeda said nothing in response, instead placing Psychic Weapons on her wounds to begin healing them, just like Candice was able to do. Atlas didn't seem to notice at first, instead just readying another attack.
== Chapter 591 - The End 3 ==
As he ran in to slash her numerous times a second, she used large Psychic Weapons to block the slashes, seeing him begin to teleport again and trying to grab him before she could. He seemed to just phase through her as he vanished, though, and she whirled around to see where he was, not noticing that he was behind her, grabbing her by the leg and throwing her down at the lava below.
She slams a Psychic Weapon into the lava to force herself up, and dodges another of Atlas' slashes, this one bifurcating the surface and shaking the entire world. She bats him into a melting mountain with another Psychic Weapon, breathing a bit heavily for a moment.
Atlas blasts out of the mountain, and teleports behind Andromeda again to slash her in the back. She yelps from the sudden pain and is sent flying forward, but places a Psychic Weapon on her spine to heal it as well, then managing to turn around and clap two Psychic Weapons onto the former Socqreath, who had once again teleported out of the attack, unleashing an eye blast at her from below and behind. She roared in agony from the back of her body being burned, and tried to heal it as quickly as she could, Atlas kicking her in the back of the head to send her tumbling into the lava again.
After a moment, she blasts out of the lava, sighing heavily as she once more began to heal her own wounds, Atlas preparing to rush at her again before more Psychic Weapons slam at him. He dodges and blocks them for a while, but one of them lands true, sending him almost into space before he reoriented himself and blasted at her again from his sword.
She dodges that blast, letting it go straight through Mars, and slashes at Atlas again, Atlas blocking that slash before ducking beneath another, smiling as he did so.
"You really think you can stop me, Anne?" He asks in a mocking manner. "You can't, not now that I am approaching infinity."
He rushes at her once more, but she blocks all of these slashes, grabbing a chunk of molten rock with one of her Psychic Weapons to slam at him. He blasts through it, but is immediately punched across the lava by another Psychic Weapon, Andromeda summoning a few more and readying them to strike as her wounds had almost fully healed.
Atlas, pulling himself out of the lava, gritted his teeth in pain, and rose up again to unleash yet another eye blast, which she deflected out into space before sending a few more Psychic Weapons at him, the former Socqreath readying to block them all.
== Chapter 592 - The End 4 ==
Jack woke up to see two familiar faces, the face of Henrietta, his mother, and of Fred, his father. Fred...who was wearing the Supersoldier's suit.
"...M...Mom...? ...D...Dad...?" Jack asks weakly, barely able to speak, before they both hug him gently.
Friedrich, holding his arm in pain, looked up in what he thought was the general direction of Mars, as did Falqo.
"What do you reckon is happening up there?" Freidrich asks.
"I don't...wanna know..." Falqo manages, being healed by Candice.
Kiyomasu was resting against the wall of a house, looking at what was left of his cane, while Dione sat nearby.
"You think the plan'll work?" She asks, trying to relocate her arm, as they both look up at the sky.
"It has to..." Kiyomasu responds. "...Andromeda may be the only one capable of pushing that thing to finish its mission. And then...hopefully...that will be the end of Atlas."
"Should we evacuate Earth too?" Kasper chimes in, looking extremely worried.
"If Atlas wins..." Kiyomasu replies. "...there will be nowhere safe to run."
Kasper gulps, and looks up at the sky as well, hoping, desperately, that Andromeda was going to emerge the victor of whatever cosmic challenge Atlas really thought all of this was.
== Chapter 593 - The End 5 ==
Andromeda was dodging and blocking more of Atlas' slashes, trying to keep herself healed at the same time as the force of each slash cracked all her bones. Atlas was grinning maniacally at this point, and slashing more erratically, as he teleports in front of her to palm her to the other side of Mars, where what was essentially a hurricane of Martian sand was raging.
She managed to pull herself up, but was almost immediately kicked right back down by the former Socqreath, and then kicked across the landscape with enough force to pulverize it, turning Mars' entire solid surface into sand.
"This is how it ends, Andromeda!" Atlas roars, assuming a divine pose as he put his legs together and spread his arms out wide, his wings glowing brightly. "BURNED TO ASHES ALONG WITH THIS PLANET!!!!!"
Andromeda tried to ready herself for the attack, as the attack came. His wings unleashed a truly enormous amount of energy, reducing the sandstorm to plasma in an instant as it rushed at her!
Andromeda screamed in agony from the energy hitting her, as it began to burn off her very flesh. She closed her eyes, and tried once again to focus, focus on Caelum, focus on what he could do...
...and then, Caelum's shield surrounded her, bending Atlas' Quasar-like blast around herself. As Atlas ceased the attack, he grinned maniacally at what he thought was certain victory, until the light faded, and Andromeda, still severely burned all across her body, stood there, surrounded by a forcefield.
"What?!" Atlas demands. "Candice's power AND Caelum's?!"
"...And yours." Andromeda replies coldly, finally speaking in words as she points her hand at Atlas, and unleashes a beam of electromagnetic radiation at him. He slices it in half, but Andromeda is immediately upon him, slashing him across the torso and limbs numerous times, even cutting off his own left arm and slicing through his kneecaps, blasting him back with a wave of gravity.
Atlas, breathing heavily, was barely standing, as he looked up to glare viciously at Andromeda, gritting his teeth as he did so. She had healed most of her wounds by now, parts of her bandages and clothing now fused with her skin, as she just stared back, looking tired.
"...Your power..." Atlas starts. "...is to copy other Socqreath's powers..."
Andromeda only responds by beginning to crush Atlas' throat by imploding it, Atlas wheezing for air as the Infinity Machine began to glow brightly once more. He screamed in agony and fury, before suddenly going completely limp, Andromeda looking on in confusion.
And then, both his eyes and the Infinity Machine looked directly at her.
== Chapter 594 - The End 6 ==
Atlas' screams of horror and pain made Andromeda wince a small bit, but what made her flinch back was the former Socqreath's body twitching and convulsing. Red metal appendages replaced his organic ones, his sword fused to his right arm, his hair falling out, as his flesh began to split in half. His shrieks made her blood curdle, his bones jutting out from beneath his muscles and turning into more red metal as armor, the same happening to his skull as his former face dangled on either side, his eyes now resembling the Infinity Machine perfectly, down to the purple color.
That was not where it ended. His old wings shattered and disintegrated, as tendrils erupted from his head and back, forming new hair and new wings, which quickly grew sets of spinning serrated jaws that loosely resembled mouths, and eye-covered wing membranes, each of those eyes also perfectly resembling the Infinity Machine. Circuitry ran throughout his entire body, seemingly completely replacing his nervous system, as all his blood spilled out where it could, boiling and evaporating. More tendrils jutted out of his lower back, acting as tails with spade-like blades on the end of each.
As Andromeda tried to keep herself from throwing up, Atlas fell to his knees, and fell completely, dead silent. Then, he slowly began to rise to his feet, brandishing the blade that used to be his right forearm, and snarling like the most wicked beast imaginable.
She tried to keep her composure, but could feel herself trembling, as every last one of Atlas' dozens of eyes was staring directly into her own, making her feel a fear she had not felt since her last encounter with Cygnus.
"It would seem the Infinity Machine has decreed I win this challenge..." Atlas, if he could even still be called Atlas Abraxas, growled. "...AND SO I SHALL!!!!!"
One of the eight wings began to spin its mouth, creating a purple blast of energy that resembled a miniature star, before Atlas tossed it directly at Andromeda, who put up every defense she possibly could, before it hit them.
The explosion engulfed the entirety of Mars, reducing everything it touched to elementry particles. In only a few short moments, Mars, the Red Planet, one of the first worlds humankind had ever colonized, the newest Capital of the Human Star Realm...was simply gone. Erased, as if it had never existed to begin with.
The light from the explosion could be seen from Earth, as everyone there looked on, consumed by terror.
"...it's over..." Reuben breathes. "...it's all over..."
== Chapter 595 - The End 7 ==
Andromeda, having managed to save a pocket of air for herself, was breathing heavily, tears floating from her eyes as her arms were charred to the bone. Even all the defenses had not been enough to fully protect her from that blast.
"I see you were able to survive my attack..." Atlas remarks, as she looks, and sees him floating there, the sun behind him and thus casting him into shadow, only his glowing eyes and sword being fully visible. "...however, both your arms are no longer usable."
And at that, he points his sword at her again, and fires yet another blast at her from it.
Andromeda didn't even try to block it, she just dodged it as fast as she possibly could, and looked on in horror as the beam hit Jupiter, and obliterated half of it within a couple of seconds.
As she had been distracted with such a terrifying sight, she was grabbed by the throat, and tossed through Saturn's rings with such force as to dissipate said rings after only a moment.
She tried to right herself, seeing Atlas charging up another blast from his sword, and as he fired it, she tried to reflect it back at him. The beam hit his sword, and was split in half by it as it narrowly missed the Sun.
She didn't even want to think about what might have happened if the beam had hit the star.
Atlas then slashed at Andromeda again, Andromeda once again dodging as the slash near-instantly bifurcated the rest of the Jovian Planets. She tried to punch him with a Psychic Weapon, but he bat it aside with just his arm.
"I'm no longer bound by the laws of the universe." Atlas rumbles. "As such, I can touch Psychic Weapons without taking any damage from them whatsoever."
Andromeda had nothing to respond with, just trying to fly away, lead Atlas away from Earth, but he was immediately in front of her, kicking her towards Venus. She rights herself before she could hit the planet, as Atlas tackled her to try and send her into it anyway. Andromeda, groaning in pain, manages to flip Atlas over Earth's Twin, and blast him away from it.
Atlas held up his hand to create a blade of energy, and tosses it at her, which she tries to block to keep it from hitting any other world. While she was occupied with blocking it, Atlas claws her in the face to send her flying once more.
== Chapter 596 - The End 8 ==
Andromeda was trying to figure out which way had just been up, but quickly gave up trying. They were in space, there'd be no way to tell. She then noticed Atlas rushing at her, and tried to create a massive nuclear explosion between them.
He rushes through the explosion, and slashes at her again, which she barely blocks using another shield. Atlas kicked the shield to shatter it, Andromeda briefly seeing this in terror before pulling herself back from his next slash. One of Atlas' wings creates another miniature sun to send at her, which she dodges, hoping desperately that it wouldn't hit any world.
Atlas whirls around to unleash beams at her from his eyes, which she tried to dodge and block. The beams seemed to start burning through her Psychic Weapons, so she resorted to just dodging and creating a barrage of mountain-sized missiles to send at the former Socqreath Prince.
Atlas sliced each and every last missile apart, and went to slash at Andromeda herself, Andromeda creating a gigantic sword-shaped Psychic Weapon to block the slash, as that Psychic Weapon broke in half upon contact with Atlas' blade. She flew over him, creating brackets around his limbs to try and hold him in place, before creating hundreds of meteors.
Atlas moved despite the brackets, even breaking some of them, and saw the meteors rushing at him, before he starts rapidfiring blasts from his wing mouths at them to annihilate them all. From the dust, Andromeda swings a massive club at Atlas, sending him flying into what remained of Neptune.
Before Atlas could get back up, Andromeda started bombarding the planet with missiles and meteors, then seeing the monstrosity blast his way out of of the Ice Giant and rush at her again. She created Psychic Weapons in the shape of whips and chains around his sword arm, and used that leverage to fling him throughout the Ort Cloud.
As Andromeda tried to keep track of where Atlas was, he appeared directly in front of her, and threw Mercury at her, which caused her and it to crash into Pluto. As she screamed from the pain of the explosion, Atlas rushed through it to grab her by the throat and start stabbing her repeatedly.
She manages to focus enough to force him back, and then starts blasting wave after wave of nuclear, electric and gravitational attacks at him. While he is sent back further, parts of his armor even broken off, he seemed mostly unfazed, while she herself was struggling to heal from that explosion just now.
== Chapter 597 - The End 9 ==
"I would tell you to give up, but that's not in our culture." Atlas mocks. "This is a fight to the death, only the strongest sibling may survive and rule!"
Andromeda glared in response, wincing in pain as she began to create something behind the former Socqreath. He turns around, and sees an enormous spiked orb rushing at him. While he prepares to send a blast at it, the club from before strikes him in the back, as he is hit by both attacks, Andromeda then having them explode just for good measure while she flew back and tried to let her wounds keep healing, watching the smoke clear.
Though a bit more damaged, Atlas was still mostly fine, and unleashed a blinding flash of energy at her from all his eyes at once. As she closed and covered her eyes, trying to block, she felt such extreme heat that she wasn't sure even the Sun would be so intense.
Atlas grabs her by the face and chucks her into Uranus before she could react, then firing a beam at the planet from his sword to obliterate it completely.
Andromeda had narrowly dodged the actual beam, and shielded herself from the explosion, mostly healed by now as she paid close attention to whatever his next attack would be.
Atlas began to form another attack in his hand, which Andromeda noticed, waiting until it was finished, and he was about to throw it, before having it explode in his hand. Atlas roars in pain, and as he is distracted, she throws a Moon's worth of explosive material at him. Atlas was blasted back by this, regenerating somewhat, as he begins to charge an attack from his sword again.
She takes note, and wraps more Psychic Weapons around his sword arm to force it to point outside the Solar System, forming another attack. Atlas growls and stops charging his own, using his arm to block a massive spinning blade from Andromeda.
While Atlas was busy with that, Andromeda tackled him towards the Sun, and sent more Psychic Weapons at him. Landing on the surface of the Sun, Atlas deflected most of the Psychic Weapons, but one grabbed him, slammed into the sun, and then pulled him back towards Andromeda, who swiftly slashed him across the chest with a smaller Psychic Weapon in the shape of her normal sword.
"ARGH!!!!!" Atlas roars, before stabbing Andromeda in the stomach with his sword arm, grabbing her by the face, and slamming her into the Moon hard enough to crack its surface, almost enough to shatter it.
== Chapter 598 - The End 10 ==
When Andromeda got up, she noticed she was staring directly at Earth, and then slowly, surely, turned around to see Atlas charging attack from all his mouths.
"This is the planet that humankind originated from..." Atlas remarks. "...in that case, you will die, and so will that world. AND THEN, SO WILL THEIR ENTIRE INSIGNIFICANT SPECIES!!!!!!"
Andromeda's eyes widened in horror from his words, as he raised his sword up to make the blast begin to grow larger and larger, soon eclipsing the Moon as its mere presence seemed to shake spacetime itself.
"Don't worry, Anne." Atlas sneers, or snarls, she couldn't tell which. "I'LL TAKE GOOD CARE OF MY UNIVERSE ONCE YOU'RE GONE!!!!!!!!!!"
As an immense storm of lightning and radiation was emitted from the ball of energy, all of Atlas' many eyes glowed brightly. Everyone on Earth was looking up at the charging blast with terror beyond what any of them had ever felt, though none of them even considered whether they would feel such fear again.
None of them thought they were going to survive.
"Come on, Andromeda..." Kiyomasu growls, as Candice fell to her knees, tearing up.
Reuben had tried to speak, but no words would leave his mouth. No words even formed in his mind, as he looked on at their impending extinction.
"Now...THIS IS OVER!!!!!!!!" Atlas screams, throwing the ball of energy, now the size of the Earth, at Andromeda. She summoned every single thing she possibly could to try and stop its descent, but she could feel herself being rapidly pushed towards the Blue Planet, as the Moon was very quickly reduced to nothing.
Atlas' laughs resembled nothing of the man she had encountered on Mars not so long ago, or perhaps he really was this insane beneath that facade of class he put up. She felt her body burning away, crying as she remembered every single person she had ever met up to this point.
And then...she remembered Orion, she remembered what he said.
She remembered what Rosenstock and Kiyomasu had said.
Despite the truly immense pain she was in, the stress, the fear beyond anything else she had ever felt, she closed her eyes, gritted her teeth, and tried her absolute best to focus, concentrate, on the universe itself, concentrate on the Ether around her.
If this didn't work, then this would be the end of the Human Star Realm, and potentially, of the entire universe as a whole, if this psychopath really, truly, did want to rule it in this crazed state of his.
She felt herself connect, and that only intensified the pain a thousandfold, but she knew this was the only way.
Atlas watched for a moment, before noticing the ball stopping...and then, turning right back on him. "WHAT?!" He shrieks. "NO! NO!!!!!!"
The ball hits him and, rapidly rushing away from Earth, explodes violently, outshining the Sun by such an amount that no named number existed to describe it.
== Chapter 599 - The End 11 ==
Everyone down below had watched the explosion in a mix of relief and confusion, while Atlas emerged from the smoke, severely burned and wounded, but alive and regenerating. He turns towards where Andromeda was, and saw her, his eyes widening in shock.
She was glowing brightly, and connected to what seemed like billions upon billions of strings of light. The expression she gave him was one of determination and resentment, as she began to form a massive blade of Light in her hand.
"I will not stand for this..." Atlas snarls. "I WILL NOT STAND FOR THIS!!!"
And then, as she slashed down, he tackled her, creating yet another enormous explosion.
== Chapter 600 - The End 12 ==
Andromeda and Atlas plummeted to the ground below, Atlas having lost his enhancements as his old body weakly regenerated all that it could, prioritizing his face. Kiyomasu pointed his cane at Andromeda to catch her in a special net, while Atlas just hit the ground, making a small crater where he landed.
"Anne!" Jack shouts, as he and Candice run over to Andromeda, helping her down as Jack held her gently.
"Jack..." She manages to whisper, unable to move.
"It's going to be okay, Anne..." Jack replies. "It's going to be okay..."
Then, they all hear laughing, and turn to see Atlas stumbling back to his feet.
"I've done it!" Atlas roars. "I am on the cusp of victory! And once she is dead, once I have evolved again, I shall take my rightful place, AS RULER OF THE UNIVERSE! AND BEYOND!!!!!!!!!!"
They all look on in horror, as the Infinity Machine glows brightly, seemingly about to once again evolve Atlas into an even more powerful form than the one he was just in.
All of them looked on in horror...except for Kiyomasu, Dione and Falqo, who seemed to just be waiting for something to happen.
"AHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!" Atlas shrieks. "IT'S OVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
"...Yes." Kiyomasu replies, smiling. "It's over, indeed."
And then...the glowing stopped, and the Infinity Machine shut down completely.
"...Wh...wh...what..." Atlas breathed.
"The Infinity Machine was a device that the Ancients knew was too powerful to fall into the wrong hands." Kiyomasu explains. "They programmed a deep-seated rule into it, that when it finished its calculations, it would immediately shut down, and fry its own circuitry to become unusable. My nanomachines, Andromeda's attacks, and your own 'evolutions'...have helped it finish its job."
"...Damn...you..." Atlas growls, as he felt the Necrosis spreading throughout his body, and collapsed, glaring up at Andromeda, who only looked back weakly as Jack continued to hold her.
"...You've won." Atlas manages after a moment. "You won the royal challenge, and now...now the universe is yours...for the taking."
He smiled darkly.
"My plan...was for the Abraxas family...to rule the universe...I would have preferred it been me...but at least you...are a part of the Abraxas family."
"...Your plan failed." Andromeda finally replies. "I don't want to rule the universe, and I never did."
"...What...?" Atlas snarls.
"Unlike you, I'm not a power-hungry lunatic." Andromeda retorts. "And if even if I wanted to rule...I shouldn't, I can't. I caused...so much pain...so much heartbreak...I don't have any idea how to lead anything...let alone be Queen."
She turned towards Candice.
"The Socqreath deserve a Queen who is kind and compassionate, and the humans deserve that peace of mind. The entire galaxy deserves it." Andromeda says. "As for me...once I've healed...I'm going into exile, on an uninhabited planet."
"...Wh...what...?" Jack breathes.
"No..." Atlas growls. "...we deserve to rule...we are destined...for greatness!"
"Honestly..." Andromeda responds. "...even after hearing about the Angel of Time, I still don't believe in destiny."
She gave him a slightly-smug smirk.
"And I'm done following people's plans." She finishes.
Atlas seemed as though he wanted to say something else, but he could no longer manage it. His entire body had just then died from the Necrosis, and was starting to flake off as dust in the wind.
Kiyomasu walked over to the Infinity Machine, and carefully picked it up, examining it.
"Where's that gonna go?" Bertram asks, as Kiyomasu sighs, and creates a portal to intergalactic space, letting the supercomputer be sucked in before the portal closed.
"...Anne...no..." Jack whispers.
"We forgive you." Candice near-whimpers, tearing up. "We forgive you..."
"I've done too much harm to roam freely..." She replies weakly. "...if I'm needed, you'll all know where to find me."
"I'm not losing you again..." Jack says tearfully. "...not after everything we've been through..."
"I'll be fine, Jack..." Andromeda replied, wiping the tears from his eyes and putting that hand on his cheek with all her current strength. "...your friends and family need you here."
Jack looked over at Reuben, who's arms were crossed.
"I fully support her decision." Reuben states after a moment. "You can visit her whenever you want, but if she's finally ready to own up to her actions, then I'm not going to stop her."
A few moments of relative silence passed, before Jack closed his eyes and nodded. He continued to hold Andromeda close, as she leaned into him.
The next day, Andromeda was standing in front of a GDF spacecraft, soldiers flanking her on either side. Many of the people who had been there to witness Atlas' death were standing before her now, some with expressions of relief, others of a deep sadness.
"You'll always be in our hearts." Candice said weakly.
"We'll send you gifts, whenever we can." Kasper adds, smiling a small bit.
"We're going to miss you, all of us." Shunsuke continues, as Jack walked up to her.
He looked as though he was going to say something, but a moment after opening his mouth, he closed it again.
A moment later, he and Andromeda hugged, kissing each other goodbye.
Andromeda walked into the spacecraft, looking back at everyone one last time and tearing up. She smiled softly, and then walked in, the spaceship closing up a moment later, and a minute after that, it was off, flying into space towards the planet Thiri 9E3.
Kiyomasu began to walk away, which they noticed.
"Kiyomasu?" Jack asks.
"I think we'd best be back off to Weepmire." Kiyomasu explains. "There's a lot of rebuilding to be done, and I've neglected my orphanage for way too long."
Jack nodded, and waved goodbye to Candice, Kasper and Shunsuke, who all waved back, along with a few other people.
And then, he, Fred, Henrietta, Kiyomasu and Dione all began to walk towards a ship to Weepmire.
== Epilogue ==
Sixteen Years Later...
Kasper had awoken to Candice laying on top of him, as his face turned red as a tomato. She giggled and rolled off, as the sun was barely visible through the window.
The two walked out of their bedroom after a few minutes to see a half-dozen of their children in the Living Room. Two were playing Kasper's game, Dragonpiece II, while three were drawing and painting, and the eldest in the room was on her phone. Only half of them actually physically resembled Socqreath, courtesy of gene editing recently discovered by a student of Demetrius', and they all had eyes that were various mixes of blue and green, quite similar to Jack's
"Make sure to clean that up when you're done!" Candice calls. "Lilly's in charge until we're back!"
"Okay, Mom!" One of the kids calls back, before going back to drawing.
As Candice and Kasper walked out of the mansion, they looked on at Farfair, better than ever before, and began to walk down the path towards the train. Walking was a bit unnecessary in this day and age, but they enjoyed the scenic route, and liked seeing the city from above to fully take in its beauty.
They got off the train a few minutes later, and began to walk through the city, which only seemed more vibrant and more technologically advanced, people now flying in personal drones rather than magnetic cars, goods carried by automated drones rather than magnetic trucks. The roads still gave them directions, but now largely just served as as an aesthetic choice. Parks, backyards and plant boxes gave this city a very home-y feel despite it being an advanced city, though it was no longer the Capital of the Human Star Realm, that instead having been Earth since the day Andromeda left.
Candice and Kasper continued to walk, until they entered the massive graveyard that held all those who had died in the apocalypse that took place on this world, connected by portal to the graveyard on Earth, paying memory to all those who died when Mars was destroyed. Numerous people, many of them families, were in this graveyard, as was Shunsuke, who stood at the grave of his Bisabuelo, having passed away a few years ago.
"Thanks for coming, you two." Shunsuke says, smiling.
"Of course." Candice replies, as she and Kasper stand beside him.
"Hearing he was so proud of me...I still wish I had been there with him." Shunsuke remarks, wiping a tear from his eye. "We saved the universe, I know he's proud of us all for that."
"I hope...I hope Principal Kooji's proud as well..." Kasper responds after a moment, as Candice held him close and Shunsuke put a hand on his shoulder.
"I'm sure he is, Kasper." Shunsuke reassures him. "He wanted us to be heroes more than maybe anyone else, and that's what we became."
"He and Rosenstock both." Candice adds, as Kasper smiles and nods.
"We at Maibaum Engineering always look to improve people's lives!" Friedreich says on television, as Jack watched. "After ten years of rebuilding, we are proud to say that the Socqreath's homeworld, Zulevis, has finally had most of its infrastructure restored!"
People cheered for him as he grinned and held up a hand to wave at them all, and at the camera, while Jack smiled a bit and walked out of the house.
Weepmire hadn't had rain in a long time, after the weather control systems were fixed, and it had grown from a small village into a large town. Kiyomasu's orphanage had been fixed up, and people were now happily chatting everywhere he looked. He knew his dad had become the new Head of Military, while Dione went off to keep training.
He sighed for a moment and looked up at the sky, while on Thiri 9E3, a lush jungle world, Andromeda did the same.