The couple drew attention as soon as they entered the restaurant: both tall and blond, expensively dressed, and while young they behaved in an impeccably traditional manner, the gentleman pulling the lady's chair out as she sat at the table in the far corner. They spoke in hushed tones.
"It's a pleasure to see you outside of work, Alfred," she said, her voice clipped and aristocratic.
His own voice showed his working-class background, though he spoke carefully. "It's my pleasure, Jacqueline." He chuckled, "I still tend to think of you as Lady Farnsworth in my head."
She smiled, "I hope you can see past that. I know that by aging normally for a time I suffered none of the disorientation you felt when you came to the present day from the days of the War, but since my regeneration after the second blood transfusion from Captain Kerosene, there aren't many ... old minds in young bodies ... to whom I can confide. It's good to have a friend."
He relaxed a bit more, and returned the smile. "If you'd told me back then that I'd be having lunch with the famous Hurricane of the Invaders, I'd have thought you were joking." His grin broadened, "A lot of the boys had copies of your pinup on their lockers."
"Well, I should hope so," she replied, "It was for the war effort, after all."
The conversation continued on as they exchanged stories of their pasts. He told her about his days in Kristiana guarding the border to Sweden, continually stymied by incompetent officers, and his apparent death while saving Sweden from an invading army. She talked about her background as part of a multigenerational family of masked adventurers, her sudden acquisition of power and its slow loss as her body aged.
After the meal, they departed to the city streets, enjoying the brisk wind. A sudden gust displaced the hat she was wearing, and she gave a playful laugh as she allowed it to fall.
Alf Raven tsk'ed, running the article of clothing down, and returning it to her with a chivalric flourish. "Thank you," she said with a broad smile. She moved to place it on her head, and then paused, furrowing her brow. "Hold on, this isn't my hat."
They felt another gust of wind, and looked up ... a whirlwind of hats traversed the sky.
The girl on the roof who'd been surveying the city was caught by surprise as the structure crumbled beneath her like an avalanche. She screamed, too disoriented by its suddenness to catch her fall.
An arm, lean but surprisingly strong, caught her mid-air, and she found herself hurtling towards another building. The man who'd caught her managed to grab hold of the wall with deft fingers, grinning at her as he clambered upwards to resettle them in safety.
She sighed, relieved. "Thanks, elf. I shouldn't have let them catch me by surprise like that."
He bowed, kissing her hand with a dramatic flourish. "Think nothing of it." Soberer then, he peered down once more at the giant snails, the aftermath of their rampage blanketing the entire city. "Are your powers affecting them at all?"
"I can slow them down, but that's about it." She palmed her forehead at the irony behind what she'd said.
"I've been working crowd control," he said. "The roads are blocked by the fleeing populace. It was just luck that I was passing by when you fell."
She nodded, "Most of mutant's luck, seems like." She chewed her lip thoughtfully. "I think you and I have been going about this entirely the wrong way. I've been avoiding the salt bombs because they negatively affect my own powers, but maybe I could try to construct structures to ease the flow of people ... though that's a lot more ambitious than I usually am ... but I could try anyway. And you while airborne could help coordinate airstrikes."
He thought it over. "It's worth a try. Just watch yourself, Kari."
She kissed his cheek, and then the mutant known as Frostbite generated an ice bridge to transport her across the city, while the masked swashbuckler known as Cyklon took to the air, his costume's glider wings bearing him aloft.
The woman, whom the public knew under the name Valkyrie, descended from the skies astride her winged horse Aragorn. "Abominations," she cried out.
In the days since the giant snails and the rains of hats, the dead had begun to walk. Her role as a chooser of the slain had made her acutely aware of the dividing line between life and death, and their very presence was near to a physical pain for her.
One arm bearing a spear, the other wielding her unbreakable sword Dragonfang, she tore through the zombies that walked down the city streets. The city was far from evacuated and she wove through the shellshocked populace, the shambling monstrosities disintegrating at the strike of her mystically enchanted weaponry.
Her attuned warrior's senses heard the onrush of air behind her, but she barely had time to react when Aragorn reared mid-air, whinnying in surprise and pain. She guided Aragorn around, and saw another horse, as white as her own but sans wings, likewise suspended in the air. The horse flew forward, hooves attempting to strike at its former target.
She angled her spear towards the attacking animal defensively even as she attempted to calm her startled mount. She was startled to see two more animals, a white dog and an orange cat, likewise soar through the air. She slashed at them with Dragonfang, but they evaded with surprising speed, and the cat managed to land a swipe against her bare leg, drawing blood. She batted it away, but hissed in surprise. "What madness is this?" she muttered, before the flying monkey hurtled screaming through the air in her direction.
She cringed, almost panicked, when a glowing force shield appeared in the air before her, directing the monkey's wrath. She turned her head to see Kaptein Storbritannia hovering in the air beside her, Star Sceptre emitting its protective aura. "Kaptein," she breathed, "thy timing is as good as ever."
"I don't think my force shield will hold them off forever, whatever those beasts are, they're incredibly powerful." He focused more energy into the protective bubble surrounding them. "We have to get back to the Lighthouse." Without another word, the pair disappeared into thin air.
The visage of the Earth hung heavy over the surface of the moon, as full of life as the lunar sphere was desolate, though with his enhanced perceptions Kaptein Storbritannia could sense the sickness which pervaded the seemingly placid surface.
He turned away from the window and entered the central meeting room of the Lighthouse, the headquarter which the Knights of Jormungandr had constructed on the surface of the moon. Cyklon, Frostbite, Hurricane, and Valkyrie met his gaze, their own expressions matching his anxiety. Sven, the young man who piloted their craft the Black Phoenix, sat with Frostbite, though his eyes remained fixed on the portal. "It's dying," Kaptein Storbritannia said.
"What's causing it," Cyklon asks. "Pollution, some alien menace, maybe some plot by our old foe the Invisible Mist and his mad progeny, or one of the other criminal masterminds we've encountered in the past?"
"This isn't a normal death," Kaptein Storbritannia replies. "Reality itself seems to be breaking down. So far the effect hasn't extended to the moon, but we've all witnessed events which seem almost hallucinatory."
"Valkyrie," Frostbite turns to her teammate, "you've told us you can sense a man's death on him ... can you extend it to a planet?"
"I don't need to," she sighed. "I know what it is. It is the end of the world, as foretold in our legends."
"You're talking about Ragnarok?" Kaptein Storbritannia furrowed his brow. "Ragnarok for the Aesir has already occurred ... we both know the truth of that, first hand."
"I speak not of the death of the gods ... since the beginning of time, the dragon Nidhogg the Corpse-Tearer has gnawed at the base of Yggdrasil, the World Tree; it had also survived the final battle of which thou doth speak. The dragon has now reached the heart of the tree, and the results are plain."
Hurricane's eyes return to the visage of the planet. "I can't believe after all this time, all we've fought for ... there must be something we can do."
"Some of us have fought dragons before and defeated them; can we just travel to wherever this Nidhogg is and defeat him?"
Mixed emotions flashed across Valkyrie's features. "He is a different order of beast ... and ... there could be ... consequences ... "
"Worse consequences than the death of the world?" Kaptein Storbritannia said. "We have no choice. Can you take us there?"
"I can," the tall woman replied, rising to her feet.
Sven grumbled, "It looks like I'm going to be left behind again, ain't I?"
Frostbite took his hand in hers. "Sven, your mutant piloting ability has saved all of our lives more than once ... but I don't think we're going anyplace the Black Phoenix can take us. I couldn't bear it if anything happened to you."
"I've heard it all before," Sven said, releasing her hand. He looked over at Valkyrie, "Go ahead. Just bring them all back safely."
Valkyrie began to whirl her spear in a roundabout, and the ends of the weapon discharged a glowing circle of energy which grew to encompass the Knights of Jormungandr, and they found themselves elsewhere.
They stood on a winding path in an airless space of white. Abstract patterns seemed to fluctuate and drift across the sky. Above them, ten spheres of overwhelming enormity ascended into dizzying heights, and below them the ledge on the sides of the path vanished into unimaginable depths. At their feet they saw billions of human tableaux rendered flatly in two dimensions. Her teammates collapsed at Valkyrie's feet, minds unable to cope with the enormity of the visions before them, their eyes burning like fire.
"Brunnhilde," Kaptein Storbritannia found the strength to say, "Where ... "
Valkyrie looked down at the others, her brow furrowed in confusion. "Ah," she said after a moment, and repeated the gesture with the spear, forming another circle to encompass herself and the fallen.
This time, the team found themselves in an underground tunnel. Primitive torches chained to the walls provided illumination. One by one they found their breath, their minds attempting to re-order themselves from the terrifying visions.
"Where ... where was that," Kaptein Storbritannia finally found the strength to say.
"I forgot with whom I traveled," Valkyrie said. "I took thee to the base of the World Tree the way the gods see it. I have created a circle of translation; thy senses will now perceive thy surroundings in terms understandable to mortals."
"The dragon we're supposed to defeat," Frostbite said, "It lives there? It lives in that space we saw? That's its home?"
Valkyrie nodded.
Cyklon cursed under his breath. "We all knew this was suicide, but I thought of it in human terms, not ... "
"I've heard claimed there are no atheists in the trenches," Hurricane said. "I've fought along plenty of brave men and boys who had to face God soon enough."
"We can do no less." Kaptein Storbritannia rose to his feet, extending a hand to the others. "Let's go."
As their minds began to clear, they wandered through the tunnels, the smell of which began to increasingly resemble a charnel house. They came across a trio of charred skeletons whose garb seemed dissimilar to the others they encountered: the first's skull ornamented with a golden winged helm, blue cape around its shoulders, sword in hand; the second clad in a red tunic, a gold belt around his waist; the third in dark shades of red and green, its face concealed behind a mask and goggled lenses. Hurricane paused. "These look familiar ... I think I know those uniforms ... one of them at least resembles a man I'd known during the war."
Valkyrie said, "One had taken the name of the Phantom Viking, the other Thunderbolt Jaxon. It appears they had journeyed here ahead of us, in an attempt to defeat Nidhogg."
Cyklon looked pityingly on them. "Rest in peace, good men."
Frostbite nodded, "I wish they'd contacted us."
Kaptein Storbritannia kneeled down, slipping off the helm which resembled his own. Peering into the rim, he spied an inscription in an archaic tongue. "Valkyrie, can you read this?"
She took the helm from him, angling it so the interior was illuminated by torchlight. "Only Larsen the Liberator and his descendants shall have the power of this helmet, the secret of great strength and flight."
"My mother's maiden name was Larsen." Kaptein Storbritannia tilted his head curiously, "Give it back here. I already have great strength and flight, but I suppose every little bit can help." He removed his own headgear, and moved the helm in place.
Hurricane shifted uneasily, and then saw Valkyrie's face in the flickering light. The other woman's face was intent on the Kaptein's, her lips parted, her expression suffused with anticipation and desire. Hurricane took a deep breath, "Alfred, don't ... !"
As he slipped the helmet on, his body burst forth with lightning and began to expand in size. Blinding energy crackled around him, and he stared at the illuminated Star Sceptre in his hands as it began to change shape, one end bulging out even as the rest of it contracted, becoming a short-handled hammer. "Hear me, Knights of Jormungandr," the figure announced, "No longer am I the man you knew. I am thunder, and lightning incarnate. Now and forever, I am Thorr!"
As he spoke the final words the lightning exploded throughout the hallway, knocking his mortal teammates off their feet. Valkyrie shouted "Yes!" and raised her sword in a fierce joy. As the light contracted, it revealed an immense man clad in blue and cloaked in red, his face covered with a bristling red beard. Valkyrie walked towards him and kneeled. "My lord," she said.
Thorr smiled at her, "Rise, my sweet Brunnhilde," he said. "Thanks be to thee, who endeavored to reunite my soul."
Hurricane glared at Valkyrie. "You planned this, you bitch! Where is Alf Raven?"
Thorr looked over at her. "The mortal was naught but a shade, and always intended by my sons to keep safe a part of my soul, towards the end that I would be reborn this day." He reached down, tearing the belt from Jaxon's corpse which crumbled at his touch, and buckled it around his own waist. "Even my belt of power megingjörd has been returned to me. I am restored sufficiently to face the battle before us. Rise Cyklon, Frostbite, and Hurricane: thou art called upon to extinguish a dragon's flame!"
He whirled his hammer in the air and then flung it forward, through the underground tunnel, the inertia of the hammer carrying his body through it. As Valkyrie mounted her winged horse Aragorn to follow him, the others shared a helpless glance. "The costs are too high to calculate if we fail," Hurricane said quietly, "but there will be a price to pay for this." She sped down the tunnel at a furious speed, and Frostbite followed on her ice track. Cyklon glanced down uneasily at the corpses of the man who had once been Olaf Larsen, picked up the sword which had lain in his hand, and then followed close behind.
As they passed through the hallways, they witnessed more corpses, and the charnel stench grew stronger. Eventually they entered what seemed to be an immense anteroom, and in it they beheld the roots of a great tree. A dragon several stories high with green-gold scales squatted beneath it, the space around the dragon's feet littered with innumerable corpses.
Thorr's voice was audible even over Nidhogg's roar. "By Valhalla!" he shouted as he sent lightning bolt after lightning bolt down on the beast. Valkyrie circled on her winged steed, spear and sword slashing at the dragon's scaly hide even as she tried to evade its claws. Frostbite attempted to impede its limbs by repeatedly binding it with ice, and Hurricane used her speed to harass it as best she could.
"My God," muttered Cyklon. His detective and gymnastic skills had made him a primary member of the Knights of Jormungandr, but this degree of magical threat was out of his experience. Impulsively, he slipped off his mask, revealing the face of Kurt Berg. He felt like a mortal witnessing a battle of the gods, though intellectually he knew that Kari Pryde and Jacqueline Farnsworth were as mortal as he; even the Valkyrie shared her body with the mortal woman Barbara Norris. He said a quick prayer, extended the glider wings on his uniform, and took to the air.
He rode the draft of the conflict, settling on the underside of the cavern as he looked for an opening to strike. The midnight blue of his costume rendered him all but invisible. He saw Frostbite's ice bridge shatter under a claw strike, though the girl managed to erect a ramp to slow her fall in time, Hurricane racing to catch her. Valkyrie fought with a savagery he'd never seen from her before. Over and above all of them was the constant storm, the flash of lightning and crash of thunder from the entity who called himself Thorr.
Cyklon eyed the flat sword he'd acquired. Not his preferred style, but still a marvelously crafted weapon, razor sharp and perfectly balanced. He wondered how the Phantom Viking had become alerted to the menace of Nidhogg, and how he'd transported himself here. He considered a strike to the underside of Nidhogg's throat, but questioned whether the blade would pierce the scales there; the presence of the corpse in the tunnel suggested not.
He wondered how a mythological dragon would react to an attempted frontal lobotomy. Reptiles lacked frontal lobes, though from legend he recalled that Nidhogg was apparently sentient. His decision was made for him when he saw Thorr seized by a crushing grip. My friend Alf Raven is in there somewhere, he said to himself, and I mean to get him back.
He rode the remaining air currents, angling closer to the dragon. He saw the creature glance to the side, distracted by Valkyrie's sword slashing at its belly, and chose his moment. He landed on its head, striking the sword through the eye and angling it upwards and to the center, slicing through as much of its internal soft tissue as he could.
Nidhogg screamed, a chillingly human noise. Its hands clutched at its face but Cyklon was already gone. Thorr, released, laughed bitterly and landed on the back of Nidhogg's skull, his hammer striking repeatedly at its target, jolts of lightning surging through the dragon's body with each blow.
Finally, the creature fell. Thorr, Valkyrie, and Cyklon descended groundwards as Frostbite descended down another ice ramp and Hurricane slowed to a more human pace.
"By the Beard of Odin," Thorr said, "That was a battle worthy of song. Thou art warriors worthy to stand with the greatest at Valhalla."
"We killed the dragon, so we saved the world, right?" Frostbite asked. "Everything will be like it was before?"
"I ... I do not know," Valkyrie said. "The threat to the world is gone, yes, and we are saved. But Niddhhog's gnawing and Yggdrasil's healing have been the natural order since before the birth of the gods ... and now that has changed. We may yet see effects of this battle we had not anticipated."
It was a meeting of Europe's rich and powerful, with members from the United States providing a provincial gloss. He walked through the room easily, joining one group and then departing to attach himself to another, assessing his fellow conversationalists for weaknesses and strengths, who would be a useful ally and who an enemy, who ought to be salvaged and who tossed to the wolves. He expected the same from them, of course.
He saw a waiter walk past carrying a tray, and half-consciously plucked a fluted glass off from it. He took a sip, and scowled. White. He only liked the red.
The universe adjusted itself accordingly, and the drink in his hand darkened. Jim Jaspers smiled a crooked smile.
AUTHORIAL NOTE:
Kaptein Storbritannia trademark and copyright Michael Norwitz
Hurricane, Valkyrie, and Kitty Pryde trademark and copyright Marvel Comics, Inc.
Cyklon / Cyklon Kid trademark and copyright Dew Irian
Sven trademark and copyright Fawcett Publications, Inc. (DC Comics or public domain now).
Frostbite / Kari Nansen trademark and copyright DC Comics.