disclaimer: I do not own the products and services related to MARVEL; including thor – and this is merely an exercise in creativity

author's note: this is a follow up from "all the little children", focusing on Darcy and Hel.

Summary: yeah, yeah – I'll sleep when I'm dead/on making friends and making your own reservations/helxdarcy


(heimdall has never quite gotten over it, even with all of the eons at his post)

The human girl, Darcy, had walked up to him with a bag slung over one shoulder and a large ceramic jar in the other. A poorly knitted scarf was wrapped around her neck but her jacket was undone and her shoes looked worn.

"Hey," she greeted. "I need a lift to see Hel."


The little girl was waiting anxiously at the entrance of the bifrost, the path that only two others had taken before. The strange mortal Darcy had promised to visit this day and Hel was waiting. At her back, two of her guards waited patiently with. In a small part of herself that she did not like to acknowledge, the Hell-Keeper did not think that the promise was true.

But the path lit up like a thousand stars and the older girl stood blinking. Then she smiled and started walking up the path to meet the bouncing child-goddess.

"It's a sweet wine," Darcy explained as she handed over the bottle. "From Canada. After the grapes have frozen, the wine is super sweet and fantastic." Hel opened the bottle and sniffed it curiously. Then Darcy wrapped her scarf around the smaller girl's neck and frowned for a moment.

"Is it for me?" Hel asked. Darcy nodded.

"I figured that it'd be cold down here. I'm not very good at knitting, so don't mind all the huge gaps in it," she rooted around in her bag some more and pulled out a smaller bag and a book. "Here's that book I was talking about – and I bought some really awesome colours yesterday."

(darcy had gone out of her way and found yellows and green, peaches and bright plums, scarlets and indigos – the colours she knew would not be found in the depths of Hel's realm.)

(it had cost an arm and a leg, but the look of wonder on the girls face was worth it)

They spent the day drinking the strange wine, Darcy slurring the words of the story of TinTin and her careful applications of clear varnish to protect the bone of her skeletal hand. Her eyes wore deep shadows and there was a furrow to her brow that wasn't there before their last meeting. Hel traced it curiously, the warm flesh smooth to her touch. Darcy's jaw cracked under a large yawn.

"You must be careful," Hel admonished. "You are working too hard." The older girl shrugged.

"There's a lot to do," she replied ruefully. "None of it pleasant."

"Please," Hel asked. "Please take care of yourself." Darcy grinned.

"It'll be fine," she promised. "I can sleep when I'm dead."

Hel rolled her eyes.

"What? Was I being politically incorrect?"


(you are doing too much, they told her – yeah, yeah, she replied, I can sleep when I'm dead)

(really though, that's a lie, she has no intention of sleeping then either; there is too much to do and it has to be better than this)


Hel waited anxiously, fingering her scarf.

Darcy blinked her eyes, owlish and curious, her hair slipping over her shoulders and her coat is still not done up.

"What, do I have something on my face?" she asks. Hel exhales, relieved; not all newly-dead translate well to their new state of being. (But, she reflects, how else would her friend react to such a dramatic change but with sarcasm?)

"Welcome," Hel says and stretches her skeletal hands to reach for Darcy's translucent one. "to Hel."

Darcy beams.

"I call shot gun." The ghost-girl declares and Hel laughs.