Hello again!
I'm having fun with these guys, and I don't think their story's done quite yet, so please, remain seated, and keep your hands and feet in the cart at all times. Thank you, and enjoy the ride!
All recognizable characters belong to Marvel and Loki's children are based off of the Norse Myths of the same name, I only own Erik and Erika.
Also, I'd like to make a note that I haven't been keeping very good concistancy with Loki's children and their age. Sleipnir is the oldest but acts like and is treated like their little brother. Narfi and Vali would have been next, then Fenrir, then Jormungand, and then Hela.
When Erika first began visiting her siblings, she only felt close to Sleipnir, talking to him about things that upset her in the waking world. She mistrusted Jormungand, and she was afraid of Hela and Fenrir. She didn't start confiding in Jormungand and Hela until Tony almost died from Palladium poisoning.
All that showmanship to look Big and Scary, and they were just big softies all along.
Fenrir was . . . . . not so soft. He was just as mean as he looked. Yeah, he was a lot nicer now, but Erika still had a hard time connecting with him.
That being said, she really, really tried connecting with him when she got back from the weird parallel universe the Yggdrasil staff had sent her to (and it had nothing to do with the fact that she had felt sorry for the other Fenrir, who had been a slave to his nightmare of a brother's commands. Nope, definitely not).
Surprisingly, it was Fenrir who offered a way for her to spend more time with him—sword training.
"Your footwork and stance were atrocious," he'd told her. "I'm surprised you even managed to hold yourself upright."
So, here she was, down in the training room with a wooden sword, following Fenrir's instructions.
"Keep your feet slightly wider than shoulder width apart."
"Okay."
"Now, take a good step forward with your left foot."
Erika placed her left foot forward.
"Make sure to keep yourself evenly balanced between both feet, and stay on the balls of your feet for better mobility. Turn your right foot at a 45 degree angle, and keep your chest upright and bent at an angle, also 45 degrees."
She turned her foot and leaned back slightly.
"Make sure to keep your left foot straight."
"Kay."
"There are at least six different footwork techniques, but we'll only be focusing on one of them right now—advance and retreat." He mirrored her stance. "The advance part is simple—you drag your back foot forward, never crossing your front heel, and then you move your front foot forward, so you're back in the stance. Think of it as your back foot nudging your right foot forward." He demonstrated, and then motioned for her to mirror his actions. "Keep your back foot at 45 degrees," he reminded.
Erika looked down at her feet, sliding her right foot forward, then sliding her left foot forward.
"The retreat part is the same, just in the opposite order." He reversed his motions, and then so did she. "Good, now use it—come at me."
Erika brought her back foot forward, and then her left foot, aiming at Fenrir with her sword. He blocked it easily and moved to attack her. Instinct kicked in and her feet moved of their own accord, hopping back almost immediately the way he'd shown her.
"Hmm."
"Hmm? What does 'hmm' mean?" she asked.
"'Hmm' means don't look at your feet when you're moving—keep your eyes on your opponent."
Erika bit her lower lip and nodded. "Eyes on you—got it."
They did that for a while, moving back and forth. Fenrir blocked all of Erika's moves and hit her with his sword every turn.
"Owww," Erika whined when his sword hit her in the side for what felt like the hundredth time. "Why can't we use foam sword, or something?"
"Wood is heavier—if you practice with foam, and then hold a metal sword, you'll be off balance," said Fenrir. "Do you need to stop, or can you keep going?"
Erika shifter her weight. "I'd like to stop for a minute, please."
He rolled his eyes and snorted. "Of course you would. Fine, what's the expression? 'Take Five.'"
"Thank you."
Erika sat on a bench and alternated between holding her side and her bad leg, and after a moment Fenrir came and sat down beside her. "You're learning faster than Jormungand," he admitted.
"Really?"
He nodded. "He's an adequate fighter, but he was always off balance during his lessons. I think that's why he opted to spend his time with our Father's spell books instead—it was easier for him."
Erika had heard stories of Jormungand's childhood in Asgard, and none of them were pleasant. He'd always been small by Asgardian standards—tall, but too skinny, which was ridiculous, because Jor was pretty damn buff. Normal Aesir had a lot more muscle on them, though, so she could kind of see why they'd deemed him not good enough.
"How come you never learned magic?" Erika asked.
Fenrir snorted. "Is that what he told you? That I'm some big, blundering oaf who couldn't cast a spell to save my life?"
Erika blushed and muttered something under her breath that sounded suspiciously like, 'something like that.'
He rolled his eyes. "I'm not as gifted with magic as he and Hela are—that doesn't mean I can't do it. Head-on attacks are quicker and more efficient, though, so I stuck with sword training and hand-to hand."
"Fat lot of good it did you—they still managed to chain you up."
"In my defense, they tricked me," he countered. "I was still a pup, and they called it a game, claiming no harm was meant each time I broke their chains. They went to the Dwarves, then, and came back with the weakest looking chains I'd ever seen."
"Didn't you bite someone's hand off when they chained you up?" she asked.
That made Fenrir chuckle. "Yeah, some dunderhead named Tyr put his hand in my mouth as a sign of good faith—he was a lying bastard, and it served him right when I bit it off." He paused. "They stuck the sword down my throat, after that."
Erika scuffed her foot against the floor. "Was this before or after Odin Banished Jor and Hela?"
"After," said Fenrir. "Hela had been gone for a long time, and Jormungand had just been banished." He looked down at his lap. "If you tell them this, I'll deny it, but. . . . . . I've always felt like I could have done something to save them. Aside from Sleipnir, I was the big brother, and I just stood by and let people mistreat them." He swallowed. "A group of boys threw rocks at Hela once. I was older than them, and they were afraid of me—they would have listened to me if I had told them to stop."
"But you didn't," she guessed.
"They all hated Jormungand and Hela so much, and I though . . . I thought if I let them have their fun, then they wouldn't hate me." He let out a huff of air. "It didn't matter, in the end—I was just another Monster, growing too fast, and the village children were told to behave, or I'd eat them."
Erika looked at him, then. "But weren't you just a kid yourself?"
"That hardly mattered—even as a pup, my wolf form was as big as a horse." He growled, then, low and guttural. "I should have slaughtered them, starting with the prick that almost killed Jormungand. I should have swallowed him whole and spat out his bones."
Erika was silent for a few moments. Then, she asked, "Have you actually ever killed someone?"
". . . No."
"Good, because living with that on your conscience sucks," she said quietly.
Fenrir looked at her questioningly.
She looked away. "I've been having nightmares after . . . . after killing Jormungand—the other Jormungand," she clarified. "Whenever I fall asleep, I'm back there, and I keep seeing him. It alternates, sometimes, and he turns into our Jor right after the sword goes through. I have to watch Jormungand—our Jor— turn to ash, and he just looks so betrayed, and . . . . and I know, I know killing that evil douchebag was the right move, but I just . . .I just . . . ." she trailed off, her voice cracking, and she covered her mouth with one hand and hugged herself with the other arm. She took deep breaths through the nose, and Fenrir noticed that she was shaking slightly.
Fenrir had never been one to offer comfort, but he hesitantly put an arm around her shaking shoulders and pulled her closer to him, not looking at her when she went still and looked at him out of the corner of her eyes. He let go after a few moments, scooting away slightly and clearing his throat.
When he'd looked away from his double in that other world, just for a moment, he had seen his brother's doppelganger burn to ash, and he'd been unsettled.
If he'd been in Erika's position, he didn't know if he would have been able to run him through with that sword.
"Enough of this heart-to-heart nonsense," he growled, "Back to training."
Erika gave a short huff of laughter, wiping her eyes. "Alright, 'chick flick' moment officially over," she sighed, getting back to her feet.
A/N: I really need to write more about Fenrir, Sleipnir and Hela. I really need to stop focusing on Jor so much, I've kind of singled him out as my favorite. Oops.
I'll probably think of a good title when I'm halfway done with it.