"Who does this impostor think she is? Some self proclaimed deity? Utterly ridiculous!"
He declared defiantly, looking around the room for reassurance. His advisors nodded fervently, parroting his disbelief, desperate to cling to a familiar reality.
"She's bluffing,"
One general insisted.
"No, one being could claim responsibility for humanity this is an elaborate hoax to destabilize us further."
But as the speech continued to echo through the bunker, Caldwell's fists slowly unclenched.
"Still,"
He muttered bitterly.
"Two million seats... If there's even a chance..."
"Sir, we can't give in to these delusions..."
A junior official began, but Caldwell silenced him with a single raised hand, his expression now bleakly pragmatic.
"Prepare to reach out. Denial won't save us now."
The Northern Bloc's deep seated skepticism clashed sharply with the rising tide of terror in their fortified mountain complex.
Commander Erik Larsson sneered openly at the monitors broadcasting Invicta's speech.
"G*d? Humanity's creator? What insanity is this?"
He scoffed loudly.
"Our situation is dire enough without indulging these absurd fantasies."
Yet his harsh laughter died quickly, replaced by a troubling silence as the gravity of their helplessness settled heavily upon them.
"Even if she's not a g*d,"
Larsson admitted quietly, voice strained.
"She holds our survival in her hands. Prepare to make our case... but do it discreetly."
In the Southern Bloc, initial laughter quickly devolved into frantic shouting matches within crowded, dimly lit shelters.
"She claims to be a g*d? Ridiculous!"
Shouted an agitated civilian, standing atop a rusted crate to address the tense crowd around him. "Don't buy into this absurdity!"
Yet, a woman clutching her child retorted sharply, tears streaming down her soot covered face. "And what if she's not lying? Do we risk our only chance because of pride?"
Arguments erupted fiercely, desperate fear battling stubborn disbelief. Eventually, a quiet, terrified whisper cut through the chaos.
"But two million… If it's real, how do we make sure we're chosen?"
Across the devastated globe, in private bunkers, crumbling metros, and fetid sewers, humanity, wounded, shattered, and hopeless, heard Invicta's voice.
And for many, logic and skepticism ceased to matter. They didn't care if she was truly a g*d or just another tyrant with power. They only wanted to live.
Deep beneath the ruins of what was once P*ris, a makeshift shelter in a metro tunnel echoed with the desperate whispers of survivors.
A young mother clutched her child tightly against her chest, her eyes wide with fearful desperation.
"Did you hear that?"
She gasped, shaking her husband's shoulder urgently.
"Two million people. Only two million! Maybe… maybe we still have a chance!"
He stared blankly into the darkness, lips cracked and bleeding from dehydration. He wanted to scoff, to say how absurd it sounded, but instead his head dipped slowly, his voice cracked with raw need.
"Yes,"
He whispered hoarsely, hope dripping painfully from every word.
"Yes, maybe… we have to try."
In the suffocating darkness of a collapsed basement in T*kyo, a family of five huddled together beneath blankets crusted with soot and radioactive dust.
Their small, battery powered radio crackled weakly. The father leaned closer, his heart racing, pulse hammering in his ears.
"This… this woman, she says she's our creator…"
He murmured shakily. His teenage daughter pressed closer, tears streaking clean lines down her dirty cheeks.
"She… she can take us away from this hellhole, papa?"
Her voice broke with a desperate sob, her small hands trembling violently.
The father hesitated only a moment before pulling her into his embrace. He didn't care about logic anymore.
"Yes, my love. Yes… She'll save us. She has to. She's our only hope now."
Somewhere in the charred rubble of M*mbai, a dying man lay broken and alone, his body slowly failing from radiation sickness.
Blood trickled from cracked lips, pooling beneath him onto the concrete. Beside him, a partially functioning phone replayed Invicta's words in loops, her mocking, confident voice filtering weakly through shattered speakers.
He reached out with a shaking hand, trembling fingers brushing the screen like he could physically touch the hope it represented. His vision blurred, and he whispered in agony.
"Please… g*d, g*ddess, whatever you are, just save me. I don't want to die like this. Please…"
His fingers finally failed, the phone slipping away to shatter quietly beside him. Even then, with his last fading consciousness, he kept pleading silently to the indifferent heavens.
In M*scow's labyrinthine sewers, a teenage girl stumbled through stagnant water, clutching an old tablet streaming the miraculous broadcast. Rats scurried past, oblivious to humanity's final drama.
"Mama, listen!"
She sobbed, shaking her feverish, semi conscious mother, who lay limp against a pipe.
"She says she'll take two million… She has to take us. We're good people… Mama, wake up, please!"
Her voice echoed hauntingly through the tunnels, her pleas fading into the oppressive silence. The girl clutched her mother's hand, tears streaming uncontrollably down her dirt streaked face. "Please… whoever you are, take my mama. I'll do anything. Just save her. Save us…"
Aboard a sinking fishing vessel off what remained of S*dney's coast, a grizzled old sailor leaned against a railing, staring at his battered radio in disbelief.
The hull groaned beneath him, taking on water as radioactive ash fell gently from the skies like poisoned snowflakes.
"I ain't no good man,"
He murmured hoarsely, his voice rough with salt and radiation sickness.
"I done too much wrong, but damn it, if yer really a g*d, please… please forgive me. Just let me live. Let me fix what I broke."
He sank to his knees as waves crashed around him, raising pleading eyes to the burning horizon.
"Just one more chance… please, g*ddess, if ya really hear us, just one more chance."
Under the ruins of a bombed out hospital in J*hannesb*rg, nurses and doctors, faces drawn with fatigue and horror, crowded around a shattered television set.
Images of Invicta looking like literal g*dess Incarnate sitting casually in her chair flickered intermittently on screen.
"This is madness,"
Whispered an exhausted surgeon, staring blankly at the impossible scene. Yet beside him, a nurse fell to her knees, sobbing openly, pressing blood stained hands together in desperate prayer.
"She has to hear us. We've saved lives, we've done good. Please, let her hear us."
Others began sinking slowly to their knees, their logic overcome by exhaustion and grief.
"Yes, please…"
A technician echoed softly, tears slipping down his weary face.
"Take us with you. Give us another chance. Anything. We'll do anything you ask."
On every continent, from the shattered skyscrapers of L*ndon to the smoldering deserts of North A*rica, humanity grasped at the promise offered by this strange, arrogant being.
Pride, skepticism, and disbelief burned away in the nuclear firestorm, leaving behind only raw desperation, a desperate plea whispered from thousands of trembling lips, each voice praying to be heard, to be counted among those chosen.
No longer did they care if Invicta was truly d*vine, a machine, or something else entirely. Their world had ended, their leaders had failed, and their hope lay crushed in radioactive ruins.
Now all they cared about, all they clung to was her voice, her impossible offer, the thin, frail thread of salvation she held just beyond their reach.
They pleaded, begged, cried, screamed prayers to this self- proclaimed g*ddess, no longer caring if she was real. She was their only remaining chance at life, at redemption, at escaping a dying world.
And so humanity's final prayers rose toward the hovering black ship, echoing across a devastated globe as thousands of desperate souls begged their newfound g*ddess for mercy, salvation, and hope.
...
The cavernous hangar bays of the colossal ship were alive with movement.
Black armored soldiers cloned humans, bred and trained for loyalty, endurance, and precision marched in tight, disciplined formations.
Their boots hit the deck in perfect rhythm, the sound like distant thunder echoing through the steel cathedral of war.
Each man and woman was clad head to toe in matte black tactical gear modular plates over space uniforms, helmets with sleek, reflective visors hiding grim faces beneath.
No markings. No individuality. Only the Insignias of their units, and the mission burned into their bones.
In the center of the hangar, dozens of dropships stood ready.
They were brutish and elegant at the same time wide, heavy framed like airborne tanks, but built to skim low and fast.
Each dropship, shaped like a deadly black arrowhead, had twin engines mounted high and wide and two secondary at the tail, humming with a deep, throaty growl of restrained power.
The side hangar walls towering metal barriers thicker than castle gates groaned and split open.
Section by section, the massive doors peeled away, revealing the roiling, toxic skies of the dead E*rth beyond.
Blue energy screens snapped into place immediately, vast shimmering walls of light that held back the radioactive storm outside.