Hey everyone, a new MCU fic! I'm not sure if its going to be in the same continuity as Rebel Columbia, but we'll see :) For now, enjoy something a little different.
As always, a prologue, for a bit of context...
Prologue
↢ᛞ↣
Malekith could not be stopped.
A Dark Elf, he predated the universe itself. He'd seen the beginning, and he would bring about the end. With the Aether, the first singularity from which he was born, contained in a single stone, he would bring about the death of the Gods.
Ragnarok.
He walked through the lands of his home world, Svartalfheim. Once a realm of life, light, and beauty, it was nothing more than an ashen wasteland. The Aether had done this. It had swallowed the Light that Malekith so despised.
Nothing lived here. Nothing except what remained of his army, who subsisted on their vengeance alone. Revenge was a powerful thing. It could keep a creature breathing long after it should have died. It was what kept Malekith alive for so long, ages after his soul had left him.
He would do this to the rest of the universe. Starting with Asgard and their golden city.
But only one thing stood in his way.
Ten arrows, rendered from beams of sunlight, soared over the battlefield. Fired from one of Odin's prized weapons. Malekith knew it instantly. Ichaival. The bow could fire multiple arrows in one draw.
Absolutely deadly in battle. Each arrow landed, striking a separate garrison. They didn't so much explode as they did as fracture, rays of light cutting away at each soldier, felling as many as a hundred in a single instance.
It was an announcement, an arrival. A bit bold, but since when were the Aesir otherwise? He saw it before it happened.
A flash of light, bright and piercing. Malekith shielded his eyes, feeling the ground shake as the god landed. The dust cleared, and Malekith lowered his hand.
There, crouched before him, the one prophesied to defeat Malekith. With the weapon forged from the heart of a dying star in one hand, and a bow crafted from the rays of the sun slung around his shoulder, stood the Prince of Light.
Baldur.
The God Who Could Not Die.
They shared not a word. The only challenge that passed between them was a steely glare. Neither would back down. Neither would surrender.
A battle to the death. A battle for honor. A battle for victory.
Baldur, so brash, attacked first.
He first drew Ichaival. Knocked an arrow before Malekith could even summon a blade from the shadows. Fired five that landed at his feet. But Malekith was already gone. Slipped away, sucked in by the Aether.
He appeared in the air behind Baldur, dropping out of a hole in the sky. As he fell, he readied his blade on the unsuspecting warrior — but Baldur swung out of the way, and Malekith's blade sank into the sand, sending up a wave of dust in every direction.
Now Baldur wielded Mjolnir. He had only set it down for a second, knowing no one else could lift the weapon but he. Mjolnir — Crusher, as it was called in the ancient Aesir tongue, a formidable weapon that not even Malekith would risk being harmed by.
He ducked. Thunder ripped through the air as the hammer flew over Malekith's head. His head rung with the noise, leaving him momentarily disoriented.
In battle, Baldur was a beacon, every inch of him shining. Beautiful, awe-inspiring, and terrible, all at once. The Dark Elves, with their eyes suited to the endless darkness of the void, went utterly blind if they looked at him directly. Only Malekith, in his cloak of darkness, could stare at the brilliance head on, and see the face beneath.
Compared to the aging, bearded face of Odin Borson, Baldur was a mere boy. An open face, with only the faintest traces of a beard that the experienced Aesir warriors cultivated with pride. Less than a thousand years old, he had not seen the true horrors of war as Malekith had. He had not suffered and sacrificed as Malekith had. He could not conceive the power of the Aether, Malekith's own creation. The weapon he would use to destroy every last shred of Light left in this universe.
He summoned the Aether, writhing black and red tendrils consuming him from foot to head. Then, raising his arms, he sent it towards Baldur. The Aether tasted the light, devoured every last bit. It would make a meal out of the young god.
Only it never reached him.
Baldur's ever-present luminescence annihilated the outstretched Aether. Malekith stumbled back, alarmed. Nothing had ever defeated the Aether before.
Malekith knew he was doomed, but fought nonetheless. Baldur was undefeated. No blade could pierce his skin. No magic could make him bleed. Not even the Aether could consume Baldur's radiance. Even the Allfather Odin deferred to him in war.
Malekith had fought Odin's father, Bor, many millennia ago. That war he had lost. His pride kept him going, even though he knew he would lose this one, too.
He would not bring about Ragnarok. Malekith knew that now. Baldur was to be the first of the gods to die — but how could he die, if he was impervious to everything in the Nine Realms?
Not even the Aether could destroy him. The Aether, Darkness personified, could not destroy this Light.
Hammer fell, crashing into the black smoke. Lightning burst out, crackling through the air, striking Malekith in the chest. Right through him.
The Aether fell from his hands. Expunged from his body, writhing in pain. He reached out, begging for its numbing void, but it shrunk away, abandoning him.
Foul thing. Malekith could feel his lungs failing. He gasped helplessly, and turned away from the Aether. The Aesir would take it, hide it again, but Malekith would find it. He would always find it.
Standing over him, Baldur gazed down at him, no sympathy in those dark eyes. How strange, Malekith thought to himself. That the Prince of Light would have eyes so dark. Wouldn't it be more fitting if they were the blue of the sky surrounding the sun?
These were the thoughts of a dying man. Malekith struggled to maintain his grip on reality, but without the Aether, little made sense anymore. The world was too bright now. Baldur's light burned away his eyes, until he saw nothing but a blank emptiness.
"Your reign has come to an end, Malekith," Baldur's voice echoed somewhere above him, like a distant star, a scourge to his mind. "Your armies have all but been defeated. But if you destroy the Aether, my King may see fit to give you mercy, and let you live."
Life? Ha. As if Malekith could live after this. This was it. This was his failure. Malekith had seen it, but in his arrogance refused to believe it to be true.
Still, he would not let the god have the last word.
"Is this how it will come about, little Aesir?" He taunted Baldur, grinning even though it hurt. His body was on fire. His limbs, although dying, still twitched with the electricity running through his veins. "You defeat me, and take your place beside the throne? Await the day when Odin dies, and you take his place as Allfather?"
"Odin's reign will last a thousand years and a thousand more," Baldur snapped, not appreciating the sly threat. "He will not die so long as I am here to fight for him."
"Oh, do not play me for a fool." Malekith drawled, tired of this grandstanding. In a croaking voice, he asked, "I may be blind, but I can see into your heart. Your greatest desire. You wish to be the King of the Gods. But Asgard will never be yours."
"You lie," Baldur said, his snarl only a thin veil to the fear beneath. "My greatest honor is to serve Odin, and no one else."
Malekith laughed, blood falling from his lips. "Am I? You are the Beloved, are you not? Odin's favored. He has no sons, correct? He needs an heir. But you will never take the throne. You will die before it ever happens."
"Nothing can kill me," Baldur said with a confidence of a man too sure of himself, and Malekith felt the heat of an arrow pressing into his chest. He was almost disappointed. He'd rather be obliterated by the crushing power of Mjolnir. "Not even your abomination can touch me."
"True," Malekith smiled ruefully. If only it were not so. "But one day you will fall, Baldur. Mjolnir will choose another, someone more worthy than you shall ever be. Your ambition will destroy you, and I will rise again. And there will be no one to stop me from destroying Asgard. I will tear down every brick, each stone, I will slaughter every last Aesir! The rivers will run the red and the sky will be black, but I'll save your precious King for last. I won't kill him, until he has watched all the light of the universe die, until he is as blind as I am, and then," he choked, recovered, and crowed: "And then I will kill him! And Asgard will fall!"
"Never!"
The arrow pierced his heart. Malekith died, cackling.
He died, knowing that, soon, Baldur would be no more. He died, knowing that only Baldur's light could destroy him.
Malekith would live again. And who would be left to stop him and the Aether?