Author's Note: Yes I know I have many other stories I should be working on, but fear not! I am currently working on a new chapter for Undertow in the Sea of Simulation as well as Solace. Now that college is out for the summer I can focus more on my stories. Anyways went to see Thor the other day and totally fell in love with it and have had this little story slowly simmering into a boil for a good week...couldn't not write it anymore. Damn you plot bunnies! Anyways this takes place right after the movie but before the little tidbit after the credits. Hope you all enjoy! Rating will most likely go up later on...
The coolness of the evening finally broke through the sweltering heat of the day as an old rusted conversion van squeaked to an exhausted halt. Jane let out a huff and fanned herself eagerly with a pile of maps, wiping the sweat from her brow.
"You know with all the fancy gadgets S.H.I. likes to brag about you'd think they could at least offer us a working air conditioner." Darcy whined reaching for the maps and snatching them out of Jane's hands.
"With the windows rolled down it's not too bad..." she relied with a sheepish smile.
"Yeah but the windows don't roll down anymore in the back, poor Ofelia is probably suffering from a mild case of heatstroke."
A frizzled head looked up as both women turned in their seats and looked back into the crowed back of the van to see Jane's apprentice huddled in the back; maps strewn across her lap.
"No, no, no I'm fine just a little toasty that's all." she relied somewhat flustered, wiping her brow and adjusting her glasses.
"Ofelia...your glasses are fogging up." Darcy relied matter-of-factly.
At this the apprentice scientist went crossed eyed before gingerly pulling off the lens and squinting at them in the low light.
"Hmmm...So they are." she replied and gently rubbed the glass on the dust covered hem of her once white shirt.
"You're going to scratch them that way." Jane scolded as she opened the door and slipped out.
"Well if S.H.I.E.L.D would stop intercepting my mail I would have my contacts by now..." Ofelia muttered under her breath as she shifted in her cramped quarters as she heard her boss open up the back of the van.
"Oh you'd be surprised, those contacts, could be a matter of national security." Darcy said in a sarcastic tone as she proceed to crawl around her seat and scoot in beside Ofelia, who was now trying to uncover their equipment which was buried under maps, readouts and schematics from the bumpy off road ride.
After a half hour of awkward shuffling and clumsy moving about the equipment was relatively set up and the three women sat tiredly upon their rolled up sleeping bags, in the waning light of the New Mexico desert.
"Ugh...I don't even have the energy to open my bag...Jane will you set up my sleeping bag?" Darcy asked beleaguered.
"No I'm sure you're perfectly capable of doing that yourself." she replied with a breathy laugh.
Darcy groaned and began to roll out her sleeping bag, with dramatic grunts and scuffling about.
"So this is just a normal display tonight, right?" she asked followed by an 'omph!' when she landed harder than expected on her bed roll.
"Yes, yes, just what the readouts indicated." Jane said.
If either of the two women noticed her wistful look to the heavens above neither of them said anything.
"Yes but it should be spectacular! The show of the season, which is odd since auroras of this magnitude are usually not documented this time of year." Ofelia said, adjusting her glasses and gazing up at the evening sky.
"You both must have been the life of the party back in school." Darcy chuckled as she looked through her ipod which S.H.I.E.L.D had so graciously returned.
"Hard work pays off!" Jane replied glaring at the other woman.
Ofelia merely chuckled and began rolling out her sleeping bag, feeling somewhat out of place.
Jane and Darcy...they had history together, living through an event, most if not all could only dream about or read in books.
She had come to them soon after the whole ordeal as a scientist recruited by S.H.I.E.L.D; fresh out of college and eager to put her degree in Astronomy to good use. She had been swept up in a whirlwind, graduating college and in her current position in under 4 months.
She had only been introduced to the small ragtag group at the New Mexico outpost a few weeks ago...maybe a month, and for a time she had felt like a stranger among family...she still did. But Jane Foster had insisted that she make herself right at home, and Ofelia was stunned to find out that she had been handpicked by Jane herself out of a dozen other applicants that the government agency had been monitoring...
"Ofelia...Ofelia!"
She snapped out of her revelry with a jump that nearly sent her glasses flying off the bridge of her nose and looked around in surprise.
"Sorry, sorry! Just daydreaming a bit." she relied with a sheepish smile when she spotted Jane looking over to her, a concerned look crossing her features.
"I was just asking if there has been any increased particle activity in the electromagnetic field." Jane repeated and other woman realized that the scanner was beside her sleeping bag.
Carefully she picked up the monitor mentally cringing as she got sweaty, oily finger prints on the screen.
"Nothing yet." she called over her shoulder, and quickly double check before grabbing at a worn piece of paper hanging from her duffle-bag. "This doesn't seem right...we should be getting at least some sort of readings by now..." she said scanning the night sky, only to be met by the twinkling stars and no sign of the fantastic light display charted in.
"It's late..." Jane said slowly before looking through her notebook.
"So it's a little late, you guys don't need to have a joint conniption." Darcy muttered from her sleeping bag, already settling in for the night.
Jane sighed and looked back to her notes.
"I guess we'll just play the waiting game." she said looking over to Ofelia with a smile.
"Cat and mouse?" Ofelia continued, returning the smile shyly.
"Cosmic cat and mouse." the astrophysicist corrected, and the two women laughed in good spirits, which the third groaned at their enthusiasm.
And so they waited; eleven o'clock came and went with no sign of the cosmic lights that were now depriving them of sleep; soon twelve o'clock did as well.
Every hour, every half hour, every few minutes both Jane and Ofelia glanced down at their wrist watches, with each passing minute leaving both of them more and more deterred in their current endeavor.
"Maybe the readouts were wrong...a fluke." Ofelia said slowly, looking over to Jane who looked as though she beginning to fall asleep; Darcy had fallen asleep some time ago.
"They can't, I double and triple-Everything indicated-" Jane's sentence fell short with a huff of displeasure as she wormed her way further down into her sleeping bag and away from the cold chill of the night air.
Ofelia gave her a weak smile, knowing that feeling well, that feeling that all your hard work has been waste; culminating into one fantastic flop of disappointment.
"I'm...I'm just going to rest my eyes for a moment..." Jane said, voice tired and put-off by the whole turn of events.
"Yeah, okay...I'll be up for a little bit longer." the astronomer replied, reaching into her and pulling out a star atlas.
"Wake me up if anything happens..."Jane muttered, already sounding as if she was well on her way to dreamland.
"Sure thing." Ofelia said with a small smile before turning back to her worn atlas.
With a flash light in one hand and her book in the other Ofelia began to map out the stars as she had done so many times before. Finding her favourite constellations and stars, and searching for the invisible galaxies located between the far off twinkling spheres. And though she most likely knew her local cluster of stars and their ever changing seasons like the back of her hand, she mapped them again and again out of reverence.
An hour later she felt as though she would fall asleep sitting up if she didn't put her book away and settle into her sleeping bag. Sluggishly she packed her things somewhat haphazardly before laying down with a tired sigh.
Curling up she ducked her head tucking her cold nose under the blanket and briefly looked out across the barren desert. She hummed and huddled into the warmth of her makeshift bed about submerge her head completely into the confines of her sleeping bag when flicker in the sky caught her attention.
She blinked, unsure for a moment if she was just on the cusp of her REM sleep cycle; she slowly sat up and rubbed her eyes and blinked again before clumsily reaching for her glasses on top of her duffle-bag. In and uncoordinated motion she managed to push her glasses onto her face without gauging her eye out and looked up into the sky.
"...Oh my God..." she breathed, in awe at the show being played out before her.
She had seen many auroras, both in documentaries and first hand; hell in university it was imperative she saw them and documented the phenomenon in detail. But never had she seen one in such resplendent vivacity.
She was dumbstruck, mouth agape and glasses askew, she knew the image was most likely quite comical. But she did nothing to change it... at the moment she didn't care if she looked absurd, gawking up at the sky like a turkey in a rainstorm.
After a few more moments a sudden and forceful gust of wind brought her back to her senses and a loud high pitched squeal to her right caused her to jump in surprise. Quickly glancing over she spotted one of the monitors and the display on the screen left her feeling an unsettled yet completely elated sense in her stomach.
"That's not possible." she said as she gripped the screen, nearly smashing her face into it as she scanned through the data being relayed.
Another gust of wind, this one stronger than the last.
"Jane, Jane! You really need to see this...oh my god, this can't be can it?" she called out shakily face still pressed to the monitor. She had read Jane's notes but reading is different from experiencing first hand and it made her skin tingle and the hair on the back of her neck stand on end.
Jane groggily began to stir, eyes fluttering, looking dazed.
By now Ofelia had discarded the monitor and had picked up the thermal-imaging camera and was around the side of the van trying to locate the spike in the magnetic field.
In a matter of moments Jane was up, tripping over her sleeping bag in her eagerness and shouting to Darcy to wake up.
"Jane! the highest energy spike is coming from this way! To the west!" the astronomer called out from around the van. "This-this is impossible, unprecedented-no, no, no that's incorrect; Jane it looks as though an vortex of...of energy is forming about ten kilometers away-It's off the charts!" by now she was shouting over the sudden wind that turned from sporadic gusts to a complete onslaught.
Jane dragged a half conscious Darcy to her feet and hastily grabbed at the must-have equipment before racing over to the van and ripping open the back and shoving it in unceremoniously.
"...Holy shit..." Darcy said as she came to, the vivid light show catching her full attention.
"Yes, yes! Get in the van Darcy! Ofelia!" Jane shouted out and Ofelia quickly jumped into the back before the astrophysicist slammed the doors shut.
The two other women scrambled into the driver's and passenger's seat doors slamming in unison.
Jane looked about wildly as the two women waited in anticipation; Ofelia gripping the camera with more force than needed.
"Keys, KEYS! where are the keys!" Jane shouted utterly flustered, arms flailing about "Darcy!"
"I don't know!" she shouted back now looking around as well, and Ofelia joined in the frantic search.
"Ignition!" the astronomer shouted out and pointed at the charmed chain hanging in its usual spot.
Jane muttered obscenities to herself as she quickly turned the key, threw the vehicle into gear, pressed her foot to the floor, and threw her weight into the steering wheel.
"It's going to stall!" Darcy screamed over the engine, holding on to the dashboard fearing for her well being.
"No it's not!" Jane called back. as the van jolted forward. A shower of maps and notes covered the three women.
"You're going to kill us!" Darcy rebuked
"No I'm not!" Jane relied. "Ofelia what's our distance?" the ecstatic determination evident in her voice.
"Nine kilometers and closing!" came the reply and the rustling of papers as the woman gingerly tried to push the maps out her lap and the note filled boxes off her back. "...eight!"
They hit a bump and for a moment and it felt as though the van was air born before slammed back to the earth, jostling everyone and knocking the equipment around.
"I see it!" Darcy shouted, pointing through the windshield.
Ahead, just beyond a rock knoll and across a flat expanse of desert, a large dark vortex rose up the sky.
"Holy...shit..."Ofelia murmured, not even bothering to censor herself.
"I know." Darcy said back.
For a moment the team's view was obscured as the van rolled into the trough of the knoll; and then slowly it began to climb the swell, finding little traction on the loose rocks.
"Come on!" Jane shouted at the steering wheel, letting off on the gas slightly.
"Jane it's ascending-it's dissipating." Ofelia said sounding flustered and frustrated at the decreasing energy readouts.
"It doesn't matter...he'll be there-he HAS to be there...there no other explanation." Jane thought to herself, finding reassurance in her reasonings and inner confidence.
Slowly the van rumbled to the top of the hill, just as the last of the vortex was swallowed back up into the night sky.
Jane allowed the vehicle to coast down the hill, a wave of uncertainty suddenly washed through her.
"He'll be there right?" she heard Ofelia murmur to Darcy.
"He should be, this is the only reason why an occurrence like this should happen." she answered before the younger woman could even open her mouth.
Coming to a halt a few meters away from the site where the vortex touched down, a residual dust cloud rose up into the sky, making it almost impossible to see what was beyond the sandy curtain.
As Darcy and Jane scrambled out of the van, not bothering to close the doors behind them Ofelia cast a quick glance down to the camera, to see a blank, black screen staring back up at her.
She cast it aside, opting to find out why it died later and clumsily pushed herself out of the back, through the gap between the driver and passenger seats and nearly felt out of vehicle in her mad dash to catch up to her team.
By the time she had made it to the vortex site the dust cloud was dispersing and she quickly spotted Jane and Darcy standing in the center of what looked like at first glance an intricate celtic knot. As she entered the circle she noticed the astrophysicists slumped shoulders and the ex-interns uneasy shifting from one foot to the other.
"I don't understand..." Jane murmured, sounding shocked.
"...Maybe he started walking towards town." Darcy offered; both she and the astronomer looking around the barren landscape. But saw no one stumbling through the night towards the flickering lights on the horizon, marking the small town in the distance.
And at that moment realization kicked in and Ofelia immediately understood the reason behind the sudden change in the astrophysicists demeanor. They were alone, no one had come through the portal...