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    All of us Valkyrie snapped up our nano-lattice, and Arina put a hemispherical shield between us and the transport beam, leaving a hole in it where Artemis was now aiming an arrow toward.  I could feel the warping of the air around us toward the artificial micro point singularity on the energy string of her bow.  There was a hum in the air from her jump pack as it fed power to the bow.
    Then the beam was gone and my eyesight returned to normal. I started gathering energy in my right hand in preparation for a strike with the power of Thor if this were an attack instead of a parley.  But then let the energy dissipate when instead of a Jotunn warrior decked out in battle armor like we had expected, there was instead a shapely, eight foot tall woman in a flowing white dress that resembled a toga.  Her ebony hair was pulled up in a sophisticated bun, with tendrils escaping that trailed down her elegant neck and went all the way down to her waist.
    She had the same bright purplish aura of the Frost Giants, her blue and red mixing freely, indicating to me that she held no distinction between right and wrong, good and evil.  This disturbed me on multiple levels.
    She shot an almost endearing smile at us and tilted her head as if she were appraising us.  Her red eyes went dark as she saw Artemis still aiming her drawn arrow at her, my Verr calculated the projected trajectory.  She was aiming directly at the pupil in Rhea's left eye.
    A smile replaced the dark look.  It was easy to tell it was forced.  It startled me when instead of her guttural clicking and a tinny voice from Jotunn translator circuitry.  She spoke in a smooth melodic feminine voice, in Olympian, well Greek I suppose.  I had no problems with it since all in Asgard had learned Artemis' language within a day or two of her arrival in Valhalla, thanks to our nanites.
    She said, “I know you.  The little archer.  You scratched my armor with one of your fascinating arrows upon my withdrawal from our first meeting.  I've meant to find out how that was possible.” Artemis pulled back a little further on the energy string and narrowed her eyes in focus in answer.
    The Titan regarded her for a moment longer. Rhea then turned to us Valkyrie and smiled more sweetly as she strode casually toward us, in an almost predatory manner, only to collide with Arina's shield ten feet away.  It flared as light warped across the surface then it faded to invisibility again.
    She smiled in curiosity as she touched the shield with one hand as I saw lights hitting her eyes from somewhere.  I had seen this before with Ymir, information was streaming into her, some sort of virtual heads-up display.  Then she looked between us all and back to Arina. Then she raised her left arm and typed something on some kind of clear plastic wrist console.
    She beamed her smile past me to Arina and said, “You must tell me of this wonderfully confusing energy you are using.  My scans cannot identify it nor its source.  It is fascinating.”
    Then she turned to me and said, “We have been observing you visually for a while now and are familiar with some of your customs.  Though I must admit that your shielding perplexes us, we couldn't get any scans.”  My Verr were warning me of low-level energy coming from orbit.  I hid a smirk, she had her vessel scan us as we spoke from the quantum entanglement tunnel.  She paused a second then said absently as I saw lights flashing in her eyes, “Intriguing.”
    Then she held her forearm down and out to me in greeting.  “I believe this is how you greet each other?  I am Rhea, queen of the Titans.”
    I took one last moment to appraise her.  I heard Kat's voice inside my head, across our nanite link as she felt me make a decision, “Be careful love.”  I sent loving feelings back to her as I stepped forward and reached my arm up, passing it through Arina's shield and bumping forearms with the pale blue woman towering over me.  I said,