Valkyrie Smash

Chapter 145 Replacement.

"Alice…"

In the cold silence of the obsidian castle's throne room, one voice spoke the girl's name. However it wasn't Sam's.

Hela, the Nephilim queen, walked in slow steps, her bare feet making a distinct sound each time they made contact with the spotless floor. The terrifying aura she always emitted was gone making her appear like a different person. The red halo above her head slowed down and the symbols making it became visible, each one flickering as if they were about to disappear.

Seeing a blue hand touch the glass container shook Sam out of his stupor like state. He still couldn't believe what was in front of him, the contents of his stomach rising up to his throat. He fought the urge to vomit and turned to look at the other Alice, the one who's been with him through the past twenty years.

The white haired commander was speechless, motionless. Her legs must've given in at some point as she was sat down on the floor, looking up at the scene in front of her with lifeless eyes.

"Alice… I've finally found you…"

Hela's voice came out as kind and warm, completely contrasting what everyone came to expect from her. Closing her eyes, she leaned in and pressed her foreforehead against the transparent pod, tears beginning to stream down her cheeks, her deep blue lips forming a gentle curve.

The ruthless monster was gone. What Sam saw in that moment was just another young girl crying tears of happiness as she reunited with someone so dear to her heart she is willing to destroy entire worlds just to get her back.

Looking up once more, Sam took in the sight of his childhood friend. His mind began playing visions of the past. The day they first met, when he fell for her the moment their eyes met. She was very shy back then, hiding behind her father all the time. Funny enough the one who broke her out of her shell was Sam, even though she turned out to be even more of an extrovert later on. The two spent most of their time together, his feelings for her growing with each passing day.

Remembering the radiant smile she always had, the scene in front of him became blurry as he began tearing ups well. Seeing that, Alice pressed a hand against her chest, the fear and confusion she felt making place for a terrible pain in her heart.

"Loki…" after a long silence, the Nephilim queen took a step back, speaking with her eyes still on the white haired child. "My sister… why is she in this state?"

Loki, the woman once known as Kurokami Shizuru, closed her eyes and wiped the fake smile off her face, lowering her head as her expression twisted to anger then sadness. A couple of seconds passed before she faced the Nephilim queen again, her gaze shifting to the young Alice before she spoke.

"As you already know, as long as she's awake new consciousnesses will keep forming without a stop." Pausing for a moment, the Asian girl pursed her lips as she struggled to continue. "Odin made the choice of keeping her in a comatose state most of the time. It doesn't stop the process completely, however it slows it down enough for her brain to remain safe for a while."

"Then…"

Hela glanced at the container then turned to the other Alice. The first time she saw her the young queen immediately understood that she's supposed to be an adult version if her sister, however something about the woman felt wrong, as if she was a completely different person.

The question she had on her mind was shared by everyone else present and Loki didn't need to hear it before providing her answer.

"She is a copy of the original Alice. Odin created her when he arrived to this world." She said. "At first he planned to keep her asleep until he finds a way to solve the problem, however as time passed he couldn't bear the loneliness and decided to create her."

"... what?" Hela muttered in a dry voice.

"The consciousnesses born from the original Alice don't multiply. The same goes for neural pattern copies like me." Loki explained. "Until a solution to the main problem is found, Odin chose to let a copy take her place. The memories it gathers can then be implanted into the real Alice making it seem as if she had lived a normal life all along."

"Hey…" Sam's voice cut in. "Why are you talking as if she isn't a person…"

Sam found his emotions boiling as he listened to Loki refer to Alice, the adult Alice, as nothing but a copy, a lifeless object that exists to serve a single purpose.

"As I thought…" Loki said, shaking her head left and right with closed eyes. "Sam, you understand that the Alice you know never existed, right?"

"Spare me the philosophical bullshit." Sam replied. "Whether she's a copy or not, the Alice I know is a person of her own, not just a recording device."

Though he was still confused, Sam forced himself to calm down, whipping the tears flowing from his eyes. He needed to gather his thoughts and assess the situation carefully.

Even if she's a copy, the Alice he knew his whole life existed. She is her own person, has her own experiences and goals, and the right to live her own life. Saying she only exists to gather memories for the original is an insult to her very existence.

"That might be true. After all you've never met the original, which makes them two different individuals as far as you're concerned." Pausing for a moment, Loki then asked him another question. "Have you ever wondered why you were allowed to remain close to the second Alice, even though Odin was always so overprotective of her?"

Sam didn't understand the question. After all Wolf wasn't that accepting of him, always keeping his guard up and making sure no one approached his daughter with malicious intent. One might argue that Sam received some special treatment, but that's only because they were neighbors and knew each other from very early on.

"Let me ask you another question." As Loki spoke, her eyes turned to the blue skinned queen. "Alice had a younger sister she always used to play with; do you remember anyone ever mentioning her?"

Alice looked up, her tearful eyes going wide. She was as pale as a frozen corpse, her reddish lips quivering as she tried to speak. Hela was in shock as well. At first she didn't care much about her sister's copy, if anything she felt infuriated by her existence, however hearing Loki's question made her think: if the white haired woman really is Alice's copy, how come she never recognized her this entire time?

It's true that the two of them looked quite different now, with Hela having modified her body to look older and changed her skin color to stand out among the rest of the Nephilim, however she had recognized that white haired woman is supposed to be an adult version of Alice so how come her sister failed to recognize her?

"You don't have to think too much about it." Loki, having received no answer to her question, decided to reveal the truth. "Her memories have been manipulated to erase your presence, dear sister." Shifting back to Sam she added. "And you were her replacement."