A/N -The facts are also these: Loki's storyline picks up post Thor; The Dark World and The Pushing Daisies storyline picks up post S2E6 (after Chuck "talked" to Lily through Olive roleplaying for her, Ned met his twin brothers, and Dwight Dixon found Charlotte's grave empty).
Though keeping up with the story would be easier for those who have watched the show up to that episode, everything will be explained in future parts, because Loki is just as new to the gang as you might be :)
Watch "Pushing Daisies" for free here: www. cwseed shows /pushing-daisies/. You won't regret it!
Charlotte Charles was 17 years, 3 weeks, 29 days and 9 hours old when her Aunts Lily and Vivian Charles handed her the automobile keys for her first driving lesson. So eager was she to please that she shifted the gear to reverse rather than drive.
With her first toe's first touch on the accelerator, she became the instigator to break down her aunts' walls.
Thus dear Charlotte Charles never collected her bearings to try again. With her bees and honey she helped pay off the repairs to their home, but Aunt Lily, unbeknownst to young Chuck, handed the money to conspiring neighbors, who in turn continued to buy Chuck's honey.
Nonetheless, Charlotte Charles had a nagging sensation that her first times for anything would end in misfortune.
She was not wrong.
It is 10 years, 26 weeks, 19 days, and 15 hours later, heretofore known as now, that the young Chuck who grew up has forgotten that unfortunate fact.
In the twilight streets of the Pie Maker's city and her own new home flew a Mercedes as dark as the skies above. Trunk filled with last minute groceries and front passenger seats with two souls, it swallowed the ground underneath without another care in the world, but one passenger would rather it stop.
"Ned, hush your pretty mouth before I break through this plastic divider and scoop your voice out with my nails."
"No, no, no, speed limit's 30 and you're going 37... Right wheels are an inch and a half over the next lane and don't attack my vocal chords I need them to talk you out of your breakdowns."
"Ned, I swear—"
"I gave you too much power too soon and you're going insane with it. Chuck I'm so sorry for pummeling you so fast with so much responsibility. Just pull over I'll drive us home nice and safe."
"Keep nagging and I'll be doing the pummeling."
"Unless 33 MPH beats us to the punch."
"NED—"
"Chuck."
"I will not—"
"RightnowRightnowRightnow... I can't have you killing anyone because I let you eat way too much ice cream with your triple berry."
"Since when is ice cream a DUI cause?"
"Since I stopped using Splenda—CHUCK TREE!"
"See? All your nagging's distracting me. Would you just stop freaking out. Look, I'm now driving straight on my lane at 34. Is that better?"
"NO."
"It's not like I can't see. Just trust me."
"We're driving at night; we're all blind at night. Blind as bats and bats at night. Did I mention bats are blind at night?"
"You are an insufferable killjoy. The first time you let me drive you make me pull over after four minutes."
"You drove 1.7 miles which is at least six minutes. Chuck, over, now."
"No. I wanna drive 0.3 more. Shush or I'm moving in with Olive again."
While Ned the Pie Maker continued to argue with his childhood sweetheart, Charlotte Charles floored the gas. She savored every last drop of the fermented taste of freedom of a new kind as Ned's car reached 40 miles per hour, then higher. Chuck's heart capsized with joy while Ned's combusted in a litany of panic attacks.
"Chuck, human!"
She tuned out his incessant demands moments before, but by the time she decided to reconsider his panic and saw her misfortune nearing with her own eyes, it was too late. She slammed the breaks and joined in Ned's screaming, but still a shadowy figure that appeared from the belly of mystery acquainted itself with the metal arms of the Pie Maker's car.
Chuck and Ned did not wait to catch their breaths. Both scrambled out to find a man who was not moving.
"Oh my goodness. I didn't even see him!"
"Yes, because you were driving 60 miles per hour."
"Oh...oh...please don't be dead. Ned, help me roll him over."
The Pie Maker reluctantly stooped next to the corpse-like being.
"Wait, check for a pulse first."
"Just help. If he's dead then I need to say sorry anyways."
"Okay, okay."
Yet as Ned's fingers touched the clammy neck of the man, no sparks left him.
"He's not dead."
"How fast is the heartbeat?"
"Anything but fast."
"We should go to the hospital."
"We can't."
"What, why?"
"Because there's at least a hundred people who could recognize you."
"But I could—"
"No, you can't wear sunglasses and a shawl. Security precautions."
"We can't just let him sit here."
"He's not sitting, he's sleeping. He'll be fine."
"Sleeping with the intended purpose of entering comatose. Here, let's get him in the car."
"No, absolutely not. I am not being framed as a murderer for the third time in my life."
"Sock it, or I'll sock it for you."
"That was violent."
"No, you idiot! Sock the side of his neck, as in wrap the darn cut oozing with his blood. It's on your side."
"...Oh..."
And so Charlotte Charles and Ned the Pie Maker stuffed their wounded fellow citizen in the backseat en route to their makeshift emergency room: The Pie Hole. As her panicking lover carried the still unconscious soul though the back entrance, Chuck concluded that indeed her first times always led to disaster, but at least second times held no such fate.
That she hoped.
#
"Uh, okay. Okay. I think you can stop biting your nails off. He's stopped bleeding."
"Internally too?"
"Well, he's not...purple."
"But he's blue."
"Ugg, I hate blue."
As the Pie Maker handed Chuck the wet rag in his hand, and she rushed to flood it with ice cold water again, Olive Snook the Pie Waitress bolted into the room.
"What was that all about? If we keep closing early then what's the point of a—holy moly! Did you kill someone?"
"NO. I...ran him over by accident."
"So...yes."
"Keyword: accident."
"Is he still breathing?"
"Damn."
"What is it, Ned?"
"Damn, he's waking up. That is not normal he's still too blue."
The three huddled together closer than the Three Musketeers, with Olive snatching a rolling pin and Ned the nearest spatula.
The fallen superhuman swam through the nauseating sensation of death until he fell into some consciousness. Chuck was the first to venture from safety. She tip-toed to the man's side and peered down at him, up close in the light for the first time.
"Is he a fighter?"
In all intended purposes, she wanted to say yes to Snook's question, but the stranger she ran over looked like much more than a fighter. He looked like he had faced death in the eyes and won many times.
"No, he's a king."
She was not wrong.
The facts are these:
Loki Odinson was 1210 years, 32 weeks, 197 days and 19 hours old when he returned from Svartalfheim with a glamor of an Einherjar on after his Frost Giant blood froze the deadly wound he'd been given in exchange for saving his older brother, Thor. He'd entered his father's (not-father's) destroyed throne room to "deliver the news" of his death.
With a snap of his fingers his glamor receded, and a one-sided argument flooded between the hallowed walls with offenses and slights galore. Odin, his not-father (father), seeing the state of his half perished son and overwhelmed by the melodrama that was his life collapsed into Odinsleep.
Loki stole the fallen king's staff called Gungnir and tucked his not-father (father) in a timey-wimmey shadow of Asgard. The magic of the ancient king's companion staff and tool healed his wound, but having never been taught to wield Gungnir accordingly and having been driven half mad by the unexpected development after being half mad already, the younger found himself sucked into a void created by residual energy of the weapon the 7th day, 146th hour, 10th minute and 56th second his five right fingers touched the staff, thumb first.
Fall into it, he did, without any ounce of grace, where he saw monsters and monstrosities beyond comprehension between the stretch marks and scars of the timeless universe.
This was his second time falling into one. Reduced to insanity at the repeated nightmare, he shielded himself from claws of all colors until the last of his magic was spent. It was all fortune that a rift of neon blues and dark greys stole him from the bosom of horrors.
He plummeted to asphalted ground, where the Pie Maker's car driven by Charlotte Charles welcomed him with such a grand gesture that it knocked the King into kingdom come.
Now, at seeing Charlotte while still compressed to the tip of his head with mental madness, the fallen princeling scrambled to his noodle-like feet and stumbled backwards until his shoulders slammed into the wall. Ned, Olive, and Chuck all screamed in his place, with the former taking two steps before his friends with the spatula aimed at the stranger.
"You should know that I wanted to be a Jedi. Anything is my lightsaber if I say so."
Yet as the three friends took in the sight of the stranger slumping to the floor with trembling shoulders, Ned felt a warm wad of emotions churn in his throat until he thought he would choke. Evidently he was not alone, for Chuck stole baby steps towards the stranger and Olive Snook stepped from behind her own prince's protection.
"Hi. I'm so sorry if we scared you, but I was the one driving the car that hit you... I'm so sorry about that, really, it was all my fault." It was strange to Chuck: the surging feeling of fire rising from her belly button and above, yet more ominous was the stranger's silent weeping. She recounted weeping as such when Ned confessed his accidental role in the early demise of her father.
"Hey, don't cry. You're safe." However, that was far from what their stranger believed, for when her tender hand touched his knee where he sobbed behind the shelter of, he bucked her backwards and jolted like a wild stallion towards the nearest door, which was the Pie Hole's dead fruit storage.
Ned jumped to the side and watched in horror as the love of his frail life flew towards the sink. Olive Snook caught her before her knees could crash land from the god-like force. Meanwhile, a million and one types of anger erupted from the gentle Pie Maker's soul.
"Ne-d, no! Do-n't hurt hi-m."
"But he hurt you!"
"Ju-st win-ded. P-ut the spa-tula down... Wow, he sure packed a punch."
"Actually it was more like a kick."
"Thanks Olive."
The three found him pulling at the roots of his hair, breathing as if he were drowning. In truth, he was, for he'd survived his second tumble into what no living soul was supposed to tumble into.
"Hi again," said Chuck, "I'm not mad at you for doing that because I, I kind of deserved it. I just want to tell you that we're your friends. My name is Chuck, or Charlotte...that's Ned, my boyfriend, and that's Olive, our best friend."
As the stranger's gaze met hers, she understood just how lost he was. In an effort to help, she snatched the morning paper, for if he was amnesiac from the accident then she assumed it would help him reorient.
The stranger from the sky took it with trembling spider fingers. And so the fire burned brighter in Chuck, because she watched the terror still engraved in his face soften into understanding, then blossom into quietness; an unquieting quietness. She thought the blazing fire was what a parent felt for their child.
A block or two away, Emerson Cod agreed. As he took in the wonder of his newly finished pop-up book "Lil' Gum Shoe," he concocted a melting pot filled to the brim with different types of scenarios that would land a copy in his lost daughter's little hands, one of which was so:
"When it becomes a bestseller you bett'a ask Santa to give it to you for Christmas. Whack him to death with it too for ignorin' your poppa's letters."
Speaking of letters, he set aside the darling book to revise a dozen query ones to child fiction literary agents.
His phone rang at 11:47 PM on a Thursday.
"Hello, you have reached Emerson Cod Cod Agency, please leave your name and number and call again when normal humans call. ...Have yourself a splendid evenin'."
But he relished two seconds and seventy nanoseconds of silence before the ringing returned.
"What don't you understand about my office being closed?"
"Mr. Emerson I gravely apologize for the late night call. I realize you must have dozens of cases on your list, but I need your assistance. My sister was...murdered, and I have two days to prove it."
"I would be pleased to assist, Miss, uh—"
"Sylvia Christmas."
"Right, Miss Christmas, but you understand this late night call and expedited services will cost you extra."
"I am prepared to pay whatever you charge."
"Thank you for understanding. What can you tell me about your sister?"
"She worked at Metropolitan City Metropolitan Mall."
"Uh-huh..."
"Her name was Santa Claus..."
#
If Ned could smell danger, he smelled danger. Their stranger had not moved since the night before the morning dew, to which Chuck decided she wished to spend it by his side.
Which in turn decided that Ned needed to stay.
Which in turn caused Olive to stay as well.
The Pie Maker wished Oscar Vebunious would come, perhaps to smell the stranger and warn him of possible poisoning attempts. After all, he felt those azure eyes of his was the label of a man who would strangle with hugs after luring you in with the weeping wails of a precious runt kitten.
"Why is it always a kitten? Why can't it be a puppy, or a dove? They can't claw your eyes out."
"Wut?"
To which Ned realized he'd spoken his thoughts aloud. "Oh, just thinking about kittens. How was...the floor?"
"Cold and hard... But I bet you could fix that."
"FIY - fix it yourself. I'm not a fixer, I'm a breaker... Would you go get some coffee ready? And don't let anyone pass the counters. I'll uh, I'll cook up some Cup Pies."
Olive Snook stared through his soul. "Wh-What, no pies?"
"I'm lazy."
As she exited with a dramatic sigh, Ned stole enough moments to stretch his crooked back just as much as his sour soul.
"Maybe I should buy a rug."
"A rug? For—" a yawn "—for what?"
Despite the anger and worry rotting down to the very root of the Pie Maker's veins, he turned to meet his childhood sweetheart stretching as well with a smile as bright as the sun.
"Nothing, it's just my think out loud day."
"Well as long as you don't plan on buying a bearskin one I wouldn't mind... What's with the running around?"
"I'm in my baking zone."
"You mean your about-to-stress-bake zone?"
"I'm not, I'm fine. As fine as aged wine. White aged wine is fine, fine, fine."
"I think the strawberry you just retouched would complain you're not fine enough."
The Pie Maker slumped. He wanted to express his frustration of her running over a stranger with his Mercedes, then confess just how agitated he was with her because she'd insisted on taking in the stranger who was so much stronger than he looked. However, one smile from her even while the words bottlenecked around his throat melted it all down. He crushed his inner storm like the strawberry between his fingers.
"Why do you have to be so perfect?"
"Are you jealous?"
If the Pie Maker could have a smile as wide as the Sahara Desert, then he had it now. "No. I'm just so proud of you for being so unapologetic and loving everyone so unapologetically that it makes me hope one day I'll be as perfect as you.
"If we had to relive last night, adrenaline rush, screaming and bullet sweats and all, then I'd still let you drive just to see that reckless love of yours destroy my safety bubble. Before you I hated surprises so much but now I find that I hate them even more because you make me love them and it feels so wrong but so right because you make wrong feel right. It...it is just an honor to be yours, Chuck."
"You adorkable Pie Maker. I...I think all I can say to that is nothing."
Their lips met between a sheet of plastic wrap. However, their emotions were not the only ones stirring. The stranger named Loki was being subjugated.
"My pies!"
"Oh hush, you can stress bake more. Hey–hey, Scar, this way."
"Did you just call him 'Scar?'"
"You aren't deaf are you?"
"Then who's Mufasa?"
"If you stop talking and start helping, then you!"
Though reluctant, the Pie Maker did wish to claim the title. The greatest lion of Pride Rock was his greatest hero.
#
At the Londonborough school for boys, Ned often found himself detained in what the professors called "The Silent Room". Whether the reason of his detainment was because he was caught baking pies again in memory of the mother he lost or found sneaking into the rooms while the twilight was still young, young Ned found the brick and mortar room with a single television and a broken cassette player to be his new home.
He did not mind the solitude, for silence was a better friend than the other boys would ever be. It would not judge the boy who had powers he never asked for that he could not control.
Though he had a broken life, he did not will to see other broken things, which was why he picked up the project of repairing the broken cassette player.
Days passed. His so-called punishment hours lowered.
Then on hour 45 while completing the 10th five hour session in his new home, the cassette player came to life. He winded back the tape that had been inside, and pushed it in the machine his dainty fingers had brought back to life by his choice.
Thus, the young Pie Maker completed his last five hours in his new home watching The Lion King. He wished his own father would have been like Mufasa the Great, but he had chosen to be Scar the Traitor.
Ned's father played a more appalling trick than murder, however. He disappeared in all a magician's gusto after leaving his son a note that he would come back for him.
He lied.
#
"Coming!"
"Stopping!"
"Going!"
"Waiting! ...Why did you have to bring him here?"
"In our room now. Hey Digby! And because I felt that as a good friend I couldn't impose his care on Olive, since she wasn't the one who ran him over and all."
"En route to kitchen!"
"Following! Come on Mr. Fluff."
"But see here, I do not agree with Stranger sleeping in our home. What if he sets the curtains on fire? Or...or hurts Digby? Hey buddy."
"Crossing behind you. Should I laugh or cringe because you worry more about your curtains than Digby?"
"Digby can defend himself. Don't change the subject. How is he supposed to sleep anyways? Those couches are as old as me; horrible to sleep on."
"Well..."
At the sound of his childhood sweetheart's voice rising an octave and some, the Pie Maker dropped the coffee bag in his hands.
"Don't you—turning!—dare tell me he's sleeping in our room."
"Well—"
"No."
"I—"
"No."
"But—"
"No, Chuck. You and I need good night sleep. We won't get that if a stranger as off his rockers as he is stays with us."
"Hehe, did you just quote me?"
"What?"
"You said 'off his rockers'."
"It – it sounds cuter when you say it."
"Aww, your smile makes your cheeks so pinch-able."
"Mmm... No, stop changing the subject! You know I'm right."
"Where else is he supposed to recover if you won't take him to the hospital? Here, let me make the coffee. Was it decaf or regular?"
"Thanks. Regular of course. And anywhere...but here. Anywhere but here. I heard the fire escape has a nice sunny spot. Walking."
"Following. Don't you even think about it. He's staying in here until he feels better. Whether you like him borrowing my bed or not doesn't matter to me."
"Chuck—"
"I did—stopping!—this, I want to fix it. Can you please let me fix something by myself without trying to be my knight in shining armor? I mean, I like that you love me so much but you still have too many strings on me. I need you to trust me, Ned."
"I...trust you."
"Your eye just twitched."
"I do. I really do."
"Then let me take care of him."
"...Chuck..."
"See, that's what I was talking about. You don't and it hurts."
"Okay, let's look at this objectively."
"Uh, Emerson."
"No, we can't tell Emerson. He'll blow up on me before I could strike the match."
"No, Emerson's coming!"
"Oh shoot! Quick, hide him."
"Running!"
"Getting the—Emerson, hey. How's...how's life?"
"...Boy, you have a phone?"
"Uh...yes?"
"You know what phones are meant to be?"
"Walkie Talkies?"
"No, they supposed to be answered!"
(Whack!)
"Owww! How do you roll those newspapers? It feels like you hit me with a bat each time."
"Uh-uh, don't go changin' the subject. You mind telling me why your little Pie Hole's closed, cause last time I checked small businesses ain't got time for irregular hours."
"Uh... it's President's Day. You know, respect your leaders... My eye's twitching again isn't it?"
"Huh, maybe you do have a brain up in there. Go get me some tea. We have a new case."
"But I'm - I'm kind of busy today."
"...Hear that?"
"Hear what?"
"That's the sound of me carin'."
"Asdfghjk..."
"Was that a grumble I heard from a grown ass man?"
"No, not at all. Feel free, take a seat. I'll get your tea and we can talk. It's not like I'm—in the kitchen!—plotting how to get rid of a stranger Chuck ran over or anything."
"Grey Earl please."
"Do I look British to you?"
"Yeah, you got the dark hair and blue eyes. Hurry up."
"...Asdfghjk."
"Joining! ...Hey Emmy, what's the sitch this time?"
"One, do not ever call me that again. Two, it ain't your concern, dead girl."
"Cooooome ooooon, I wanna help."
"I don't got time for you and your 'any last thoughts or requests' mumbo jumbo. Thanks to Pie Boy here not answerin' his phone like they're meant to be, I'm set back nine hours too many."
"Sugar, milk?"
"One splash of milk."
"Why are the nine hours significant?"
"Because I've got 2 days to solve it before Lady Claus' life insurance stamps her death out as a work related accident. So far I haven't got much but her working hours. That damn mall's so packed ain't nobody got the courtesy to answer questions."
"Which is why you need me, I see. Here's your tea. Just give me two minutes to change. Chuck, you hang around and, uh, read some books. Maybe invite Olive over for some extra support, you know, just in case you need help choosing a book or the bookshelves topple or something."
"I got the message loud and clear, sweetie."
"...Hey love birds, pick up your eyes and place them in your sockets again. I—"
"Don't got time for this," (completed both).
As the Pie Maker and his childhood sweetheart burst into giggles at that and a plethora of unspoken inside jokes, someone else burst with very different emotions.
#
"Vivian, I don't understand why you think I'm out to ruin your happiness. Can't you see I'm trying to protect you? I explained this when Beaver Boy and that metrosexual detective he works with set us up."
"Just because you explained doesn't mean I agree. I have been 'protected' by you and this house for too many years. I can take care of myself, Lily."
"No you—Hey, where are you going?"
"Swimming!"
Aunt Vivian stormed out of the room, but all Aunt Lily could think of was all the times she locked her little sister with a weak heart away from the world. Though she always thought it would hurt her, she allowed herself to dig up the truth she had buried 27 years ago: she was the one that had done the hurting to her all her life.
She snorted when the agitating tickle of salt water met her lips in droplets.
"Ugh, I need a drink."
And as she drank not minding the salt of olives and tears that stung her tongue, she concluded that she had to help Vivian some other way. She had to weave together machinations to prove to her little sister just how dangerous her supposed lover, Dwight Dixon, was.
"Where's my blond-haired big mouth?"
#
"'She was a blond-haired big mouth?' How does that even work with her name?"
"I'm quotin' from her sister's description," said the Coroner with as much emotion as a groundhog on Groundhog's Day.
"I can already see a billion motives."
"Yeah, well I can see a billion dolla's, Mr. Cod."
"Really? Cause I can't see that happenin' in your sweetest dreams."
"I heard this case of yours gotta be done quickety quack. You and Elf Boy wanna see woman Claus, you have'ta pay her makeup artist."
"Um, I'm not an—"
"Elves are shifty sons 'a bitches."
"Did you just..."
"..."
"..."
"Mhhm."
"Oh for pie's sake, just give him more money. I have things to take care of."
"You just lucky this time, Sassy Pants."
"Uh-hu."
The Pie Maker and private investigator Emerson Cod left the Coroner behind to enjoy his newest fan of Franklins. They joined the cold shoulders of Lady Claus.
"Right, so her name's Caroline Christmas, also known as Santa Claus."
"Both fit considering she looks like a golden snowflake."
"Your commentary ain't gonna solve this case. Let's get this show on the road."
"Okay..." The Pie Maker pressed on the timer on his wristwatch. Her eyes fluttered open at his single touch of life. "Hi, Miss Christmas. In case you can't tell from your frozen body, you're dead. Sorry. But we're here to help catch your killer. Is there anything you can tell us that would help us find him or her? You have less than 60 seconds."
"I...was working overtime."
"At Metropolitan City Metropolitan Mall?"
"Yes. I was restocking the Fiery Fiona perfume section. Had me the sandwich my friend Clarissa brought me; tasted interesting. She owed me five bucks anyways, wasn't expecting a gourmet BLT."
"So your real name isn't Santa Claus?"
"Haha! Oh no, sonny. It was the nickname I got at the pageant."
"Pageant..."
"Yeah, training pageant, where all who sign up compete to be the next model for the mall's holiday magazines. Being on that front cover means you made it big."
"But what does that nickname have to do with it?"
"I've forfeited the same pageant six years in a row so my fellow disadvantaged sisters on camera could get a better shot. Earned me that name I suppose, but I quite like it."
"Ten seconds. Can you remember anything else about that night?"
"I remember smelling chlorine when I blacked out. In fact, still do."
"What about the freezer?"
"It's in the back of Olfactory Delights, used to store special perfume glasses and other pigmented fragrances. I don't remember being put in there if that's what you're asking."
"Any-last-thoughts-or-requests?"
Emerson Cod scowled at the Chuck-sized chip on Ned's shoulder.
"Please tell Sylvia to stay away from Cory. I don't trust that introverted screwball."
"Hold up, who's—" With the minute a second to expiration, The Pie Maker touched her again, which took her borrowed time away. He covered her dead-again shoulders. "...Cory. You had to ask about her last requests didn't you?"
"It's only the nice thing to do."
"Yeah? You tell me when bein' nice solves a murder and I'll give you a buck."
"Only a buck?"
"You just think you clever, Elf Boy."
"I don't understand why you two keep—"
"She didn't remember gettin' stuffed in the freezer, which means it happened postmortem."
"Maybe the killer wanted to hide her body, or put her in there to make sure she died."
"Could be something between the two. We've gotta find out who Cory is. Doesn't sound like Christmas and they were close."
"What about her friend Clarissa?"
"We'll get there. What I wanna know is why her insurance company sees bein' stuffed like a skinned turkey into a freezer would be considered a work related accident."
"So, where to first?"
"I'm thinkin' lil' sis knows more than she let on."
#
"I'm so sorry for the delay, Mr. Cod. And you are?"
"Ned, his assistant."
"Pleasure to meet you, Ned, but not too pleasing circumstances I'm afraid."
"Yes, truly difficult. We're so sorry for your loss."
"It is a bit easier to get through because you two will be leading her ghost to peace. Please, come, take a seat. Be careful of the wreaths. I'll get some coffee... Oh, and do forgive the chaos of the kitchen. There's two platters from each friend, it seems, but I haven't an appetite for them."
Emerson Cod and Ned took their seats in the living room bean chairs, but the former chose to stand rather than sink into the seat. Sylvia joined them again.
"Any milk or sugar? If any of the food catches your eyes, too, please feel free to ask."
"A little milk, three spoons—"
"We'll both take black, Miss Christmas, and thank you for your offered goods. They look scrumptious, however we runnin' out of time, you see, and I feel like we haven't gotten your sister's full story."
"Oh, yes, of course, forgive me for throwing you in so blind. I will be as comprehensive as I can. What would you like to know?"
"Caroline worked full-time at Olfactory Delights, correct?"
"Yes."
"Is that all?"
"...On paper, yes, but my sister had a knack for going above and beyond in whatever she did. She was basically the store manager."
"Who is the store manager she stepped up for?"
"Bassem Nagi, who took Clarissa Clary's position."
The Pie Maker and the Private Investigator exchanged knowing glances.
"Uh...do you know anything about the two?"
"Let me think a moment... I know Bassem is an Arabian exchange student. His devotion to the arts of perfumery bumped him up over Caroline to become the true manager. My sister talked a lot about him after he joined the crew. Here's your coffee by the way, dear."
"In place of Clarissa? And thank you."
"Yes. She was promoted to the marketing section. She has a lot of strings to tug at with her social media experience. It only made sense I suppose."
"...And your sister was friends with both of them?"
"Not too much Bassem. He has been in training, I believe, but it wouldn't be too far to say they were good acquaintances. Caroline was just a reckless people-person. But Clarissa, yes. They were conjoined at the hips. Made me quite jealous at how well they'd get along at times. Though their first meeting at the pageant was anything but conventional, they clicked nonetheless. You've never seen better friends than them."
Never before had the Pie Maker tasted sweet drops of energy become bitter beans of anxiety in his mouth. He believed Chuck running over Stranger was anything but a conventional first meeting. "Uh, sorry...about the backwash. Great coffee, it's just...some acid reflux. Do you—ehem—know if Clarissa still visits the store?"
"Almost certain. She can't skip her workload anymore."
"I have one more question."
"Go right ahead, Mr. Cod."
"The crime scene investigators retrieved a sticky note from your sister's daily planner. It just had 'Cory' written on it. Does that name ring a bell?"
"Ah, Cory. Complicated story..." there was a ring on her door, "Well, she can explain it herself. Let me let her in."
"Great,we'll be right here... Please tell me this punctual timeliness feels creepy to you too."
"Everythin' feels creepy. Never seen so much damn white in a house before."
"Agreed. Was the sticky note an actual thing?"
"I'm improvisin'. Better than you citing an 'anonymous source that wishes to remain anonymous.'"
"Improvising is not how I roll."
"Yeah? Well dead girl's still not dead. You've been improvisin' each minute she's been alive. I don't see you whinin' about it."
"Let me revise my statement to: 'I don't look forward to improvising.' Better?"
"Focus on the case, Pie Boy."
"Gladly..."
"Cory, please meet Emerson and Ned. They're here investigating on behalf of Caroline."
"Hey."
"Hey," said the Pie Maker.
"You got time for a question, Cory?"
"Sure."
Emerson Cod's question dangled from the edge of his tongue, however, one look at Cory's name tag blossomed another sentence in its place. "Tell me about your insurance. I've been lookin' for a better replacement."
#
"Somethin's fishy. I don't like it."
"What, the part about the managers not having motive or Cory working at the same suspicious insurance company that ignored the pretty obvious signs of Caroline's death being murder, not accident?"
"...No, either your Grey Earl expired one hour ago or you mixed sea salt instead'a sugar into it."
"...Oh..."
"Make another, and taste the white crystals before you stir them in, would you? But yes, somethin's sketchy about this case. Somethin' about them two managers irks me."
"So you don't feel queezy about Cory?"
"I'm feelin' queezy about plenty, but my gut ain't gonna be solvin' the case. What if we—" The sound of lamps crashing into wood ricocheted from across Ned's apartment. "What was that?"
The Pie Maker swallowed crushing dread in his throat, darting for an escape from the situation. He reached for it.
"Uh, what?! Sorry, I've butterfingers today!"
"Stop slammin' your damn pots together and tell me what you've been hidin'."
"Hiding? Why would I be hiding anything?" The noise picked up again, so followed the Pie Maker. "Like I said, butterfingers!"
"Your eye is twitchin'."
"Completely coincidental."
"..."
"Damn it..."
Without another moment to lose, Emerson Cod marched towards the source of the sound, which came from Ned and Chuck's bedroom. His eyes fell upon a stranger and Chuck and Olive trying to calm him in his distress.
"Someone better tell me what the hell happened here."
"Ned! You were supposed to stay out longer."
"I...Sorry, he wanted tea. Again. Coffee shops don't have good enough tea apparently."
"Did anybody hear what I just said? ... Boy, you better not tell me you touched someone and kept them alive too long again."
"Wut?"
"Metaphor, Olive. And no, I didn't do anything."
"He's right, Emerson. It's my fault. I ran him over last night."
"You let de—crazy girl—drive!"
"I'm taking responsibility, okay? I'm trying to fix this. I don't need Ned to fix everything for me so if you want to yap about what a bad mistake I made then yap at me."
"You damn right you fixin' it, because Ned and I will be digging deeper into our little case while you and Itty-Bitty check him out of town."
"But—"
"No."
"He's—"
"No."
"—lost and scared—"
"No, woman. You lead the unstable man to the hospital or away from here. You have five seconds to agree. 5...4...3..."
"Okay, okay! Geez. Olive, would you help me walk him?"
"That's right. Ned, meet me out back; tea in thermos. We leavin' after them."
"Yes boss... Chuck, don't give me that look. You know full well I agree with him."
"But look at him. He hasn't even been sleeping right from nightmares. I can't just kick him out. Please?"
"You heard Emerson. Like I said, I agree with him. You and Olive can drop him off at the hospital if your conscience weighs you so much. Isn't that right, Olive?"
"...I dunno, he's pretty crazy. All he's been saying is 'Asgard'."
"What, the Asgard of myth?"
"Yup."
"See, you hit him harder than we guessed."
"Ned!"
"No, Chuck. That's final. Hurry before Emerson comes back."
Thus, Olive Snook and Charlotte Charles somehow managed to take the stranger outside, to which he remembered he had feet and started his own trek by himself. While the women broke into sprints to keep up with him, the P.I. and his assistant, both satisfied that the stranger left of his own accord, started their own towards the Metropolitan City Metropolitan Mall.
The women chased their stranger's shadow towards the location where Chuck remembered hitting the man, yet he had a different reason for being there. He gazed up at the sky as if it could tell him the answer to his deepest question.
It did. Asgard was not searching.
With his focus being attracting the restored gatekeeper's notice, he gathered the elements into his closing fists. To Chuck and Olive, swirls of reflective smoke circled their stranger, but it was more than that: it was magic. It whirled and boiled from the pads of his grimy fingers around him until it erupted with a toss towards the sky in a pillar of blinding burned orange. For 5.3 seconds, the fallen majesty let it send his message for him, but when it failed to win notice, he reached for all the replenished magic in his veins to amplify it.
"Heimdall," he hollered into the midst of it so that it carried as if he had a microphone connected to the whole world.
Chuck and Olive fell behind the protection of a fallen tree, watching from between dried twigs still clinging to browning leaves. They watched in horror as the pillar of light grew wider just like the space between his reaching arms. Chuck covered her friend when a shockwave broke free from what had morphed into a twister bending to the hands of their stranger. The women clawed onto the solid ground with all their strength as the twister grew fiercer, yet did not affect its creator.
Out of the rubble and dust, between the torrent sounds of angry elements, they watched with twisted hearts as he poured his soul out through his voice one final time.
"HEIIIIIIIIIIMDAAAAAAAAAAALLLL!"
Asgard did not answer. Loki Odinson collapsed to his knees. Magic millions of miles unlike the Pie Maker's evaporated into the atmosphere.
Charlotte Charles and Olive Snook rose from the resulting mess. Step by step they neared the God of Mischief's trembling shoulders. Inch by inch Chuck's hand reached to console him. Second by second the god felt further away from home. But the two still-beating hearts ended up resting next to the one that struggled to pulse.
Both dizzy with the rush of sympathy and trickles of fear, they took each others hands. It was the exchange that signaled both winded women had reached a silent agreement.
Across town, the Pie Maker and Emerson Cod stumbled upon a little less chaos, keywords being "a little less."
"What is it with all these people? They ain't even havin' a sale."
"They say the second most common desire that humans have in common is that they like smelling nice, behind looking pleasing. Olfactory Delights is the best brand of perfume and cologne in the market. The crowd makes sense to me."
"That so?"
"Very so."
"Huh... I also heard each human has their own scent. I fail to see why I should want to burn $200 on a three-ounce bottle so I could smell like Emmy Davato."
"Special gift wrap?"
"Don't be fallin' for it. Where is that manager—"
"Welcome to Olfactory Delights, gentlemen!"
"Woah!" (hollered both with a jolt backwards).
"Did you know that smell is the most sensitive of the senses? People can remember smells with 65% accuracy after a year, while visual recall is about 50% after three months. I am Bassem, here to help you find your most complementary and memorable scent. Is there any type you'd prefer? Say, Mon Chéri Musk, which has a strong but sweet red-cherry-wood-in-StaffFlag-snow scent, or Feeling Peachy Cologne by Pace McBride, which smells like autumn chill and warm peach cobbler."
"You got a cologne that smells like chloroform Mr. New Manager?"
"...Oh, you gentlemen are here about Caroline Christmas aren't you?"
"You ain't lookin' too thrilled all the sudden. Got somethin' you need'a unpack?"
"Follow me."
"Why we rushin'?"
"I wish to get this whole business out of the way. Bad energy has this place around its neck since the incident... Welcome. Please take a seat."
"Is this your office?"
"Yes, as of recent."
"So you completed your training I take it."
"Yes, Mr?..."
"Ned, just Ned. This is my boss Emerson."
"That's Mr. Cod of Cod Agency. You was talkin'."
"Yes, Mr. Cod. Caroline, bless her spirit, worked overtime the night she left us. She wished my first shift to be as organized as possible."
"Uh-hu, and what was she organizin'?"
"The usual, like invoices, payroll, compounding ingredients. She restocked a few sections as well."
"She sure had lots of responsibility.
"Yes, it was strange considering her title, but I appreciated every moment of her guidance."
"Who was it that trained you then?"
"Mostly HR agents, which varied, but the constant was Clarissa Clary."
"Is she here today?"
"She will be soon, in fact with a photoshoot posse for some social media pictures. If you'd like to be in a picture please feel free to stick around."
"We might just do that. Have you heard anything or know about anyone named Cory?"
"No, doesn't ring a bell."
"Wonderful. Thank you for your time and welcome to America."
"Agreed."
"Thank you Mr. Cod; Ned. Is that it?"
"Sure. Go right on."
Once the manager walked them out and wend on his way, the Pie Maker stopped Emerson from walking on too.
"Wait. Bassem and Caroline said this place compounds some of their products."
"Yeah, and?"
"What if we find where their compounding room is? If we find the chloroform then we might find fingerprints."
"...Good idea but it ain't busy enough."
"Then – then you stay here. I'll find a white coat or whatever they wear."
"Get movin' long legs."
The Pie Maker snuck into the back of Olfactory Delights, where he stumbled upon Caroline's first casket. He followed it deeper until his fingers touched a particularly unfrozen crack along the metal wall. He pulled it open to find the well-hidden compounding room, which made him wonder why it was so well-hidden. Yet what hit him hardest was the pungent smell of a sweet ether.
"That doesn't feel right..."
While waiting, Emerson Cod trekked through the overwhelmed store. It was once he considered the candle shop across the hall and the women's store not too much further, both being sunken in red-ink accounting, that he wondered if perhaps there was more to the success formula of Olfactory Delights than his eyes could see and Clarissa's web could spin.
It was when he picked up his sixth bottle that another horde wound him deeper into the craze. The webmaster herself was at its head.
"Gentlemen, take as many pictures as possible. Keep it minimalistic but festive. I wanna see those VSCO skills in full use."
"...Festive. Huh."
At that precise moment while Emerson flashed over the facts of the case and avid customers broke into a rush to be included in the pictures with their fragrant palms filled with assortments of perfumes alongside the vivacious social media master, the Pie Maker rejoined his side.
"We need to talk. Again."
"That's what I was about to say."
"But first Clarissa?"
"I think she's tellin' us more from the distance. Caroline was a part of a pageant for a holiday magazine cover photo shoot."
"Is your gut telling you the cover's what Clarissa wanted too?"
"It's tellin' me I need'a get out of this store, but yeah, that too. Let's get some coffee. Whisper while you walk."
"K... So, Sylvia said Clarissa can pull strings. What if Cory was that string? Maybe the unknowing string."
"What if Cory was the unknowing mask Clarissa used? Don't you be making conclusions."
"Fine, but I found chloroform in their compounding room."
"Bingo. And?"
"It's the chlorine they mix inside their summer scents."
"Chloroform is a byproduct of—"
"Listen, boss. I took a sniff – I know stupid idea – but it's the after smell for their Rosetta Roses line."
"...What the hell?!"
"Maybe we should keep walking? Looks less suspicious."
"There's chloroform in their products?"
"SHHH. Keep walking and whispering."
"Hhh... Chloroform ain't lethal. A soaked rag isn't gonna kill a person unless they breathe it in for minutes straight. It makes you all loopy in low doses, like having too much ice cream in the summer, and an anesthetic in higher ones."
"Unless her killer made her unconscious and put her in the freezer to die."
"Yeah, maybe. I'll think about it all tonight. We'll visit Cory if I don't get a convenient epiphany. You payin'. Double shot, one pump sugar."
"I guess I'll get the same. We have a lot to untangle..."
Indeed they did. Added to their winding case was the fallen prince of Asgard, who slept upon Ned's couch in a tangle of Charlotte Charles' blankets.
#
"Chuck. Charles."
"Just let me explain and then you both can growl at me all you want."
"Woman, the only thing you'd better explain is why you brought him back when he ran away voluntarily."
"Hush. I just got him to fall asleep."
"I ain't hushin' for anyone. You even know his name?"
"It's Scar."
"His name isn't Scar, you just call him that."
"That doesn't change the fact that I ran him over and I will take care of him."
"Uggh. Chuck, we had this conversa—why are you crying?"
"Because you didn't see what me and Olive saw and you don't trust me."
"I trust you. I swear. I'd never lie to you about that."
"Then if I tell you what happened you'll believe me?"
"On with it already, dead girl. And stop sniveling. Stranger ain't your husband."
"Huh?!"
"Let the woman talk Jealous Johnson."
"Okay...Did you hear someone yelling an hour ago?"
"Ever'body who could hear heard it. What about it?"
"That was him."
"Come again?"
"That ain't human."
"Me and Olive followed him after you two took off. He ran back to where I hit him. He...he has magic kind of like you, Ned, and he used it to call out to someone. He created this whole twister around him—"
"Woah, woah, wait. Did he hurt you again?"
"No, I'm fine. Olive's fine. I just sent her to the pharmacy to get some melatonin for him."
"Who was he callin' for in the sky?"
"Heimdall."
"Ack. Ack, ack, ack!"
"Stop squakin' in my ear."
"Sorry. 40.5% of my brain just melted."
"Well scoop the damn gunk together and talk."
"I – I think Stranger isn't human. Heimdall is the anglicized equivalent of Heimdallr, which in Norse mythology is the gatekeeper of Asgard. They have this whole magic bridge they use to teleport between worlds and super powerful magic and Thor with a crazy strong hammer that shoots out lighting."
"I don't know which part is weirder: you knowing Norse myth or dead girl runnin' a Norse myth maniac over."
"Wait, you believe me?"
"Of course I do."
"Not hard to considering what the bastard's wearin'."
"Aye..."
"Hey Olive. Did you get it?"
"Yeah, and some sandwiches from that one place. Hi Ned; Emerson!"
"Hi Olive."
"...Olive."
"There was a sale at Dicker's so I got Scar some, well, less metal-ly clothes. And a PJ."
"Oo, I love them. Ned won't be the only one wearing monochromatic now."
"See that? See you two a-talkin'? You might'a run the fool over but that don't mean he's staying."
"What Emerson said."
"Well, I suppose we'll just have to wait and see what he decides. My soup's still cooking. Any of you gentlemen want to share a sub?"
Ned the Pie Maker, Charlotte Charles, Emerson Cod, and Olive Snook sat around the dinner table while a prince named Loki slept in the other room. And as Emerson the private investigator chewed his first bite of the sandwich Olive had brought home alongside their Stranger's new wardrobe (if he accepted of course), he frowned.
"What did you put in this thing?"
"Swiss cheese, turkey, romaine lettuce, spinach, peperone—"
"Peperone. What the hell is that?"
"It's an Italian pepper, sort of spicy and sweet at the same time. Real good with Mayonnaise..."
Then it hit him.
"Her sandwich!"
"Wut?"
"I ain't talkin' to you. It was the sandwich, Ned."
"The sandwich?"
"Haha. Hello convenient epiphany."
"Huh... How domestic."
The facts were these:
Clarissa Clary, being angered by her best friend's generosity towards the disadvantaged and her ignorance towards her deepest wishes for the whole of their decade-long friendship plotted a way to kill the Claus. Knowing Cory the insurance agent would likely be the next beneficiary in the pageant because her left leg was shorter than her right, she plotted a way for Caroline to die, but came up with no one that would leave her suspicion free. When her best friend told her she didn't trust Cory after all and saw for herself that Cory did not much like Caroline, Clarissa took it as her blessing and picked up her plots again.
She poisoned the pre-made sandwich she bought for $5 with hemlock leaves she cleaned with crisp, cold water alongside romaine lettuce, baby spinach, frisée, and arugula until they looked fresh from the stem. And so, while Caroline worked overtime to prepare Bassem while believing her best friend was out shopping for their eleventh photoshoot only one of them kept winning, Caroline devoured her sandwich.
Half an hour later, while she restocked the Fiery Fiona section with half-closed eyes and a grumbling belly, Clarissa attacked from behind, holding a drenched cloth with chloroform and chlorine to Caroline's nose until she lost consciousness. The media guru dragged Caroline into the freezer.
Knowing full well the hemlock would take her life in a matter of minutes, she tossed a few ingredients from the freezer shelves to make it look like the woman had stumbled and hit her head. She set the scene up with spilled chlorine bottles and splashed her unconscious friend with it for good measure, all done with garb and gloves. Then she placed the key where Caroline usually left it, locked the door between them, and moved on.
When agents from Cory's insurance arrived, the cause of death could not be determined. With the corpse being frozen atop rivers of spilled chlorine, some of which had created the ether smell of chloroform, it was determined that she had tripped inside, hit her head too hard, and spilled the contents she had in her arms despite her reputation of never being a clumsy worker. Because the door had been locked and Caroline's keys had been on her counter, authorities nonetheless assumed her exhaustion had led her to be a little less careful.
Clarissa Clary was set to win the photoshoot either by Olfactory Delights' bribing the contest or by smiling just right for the camera. No one else would have a chance. But there was one person Clarissa overlooked, which was Sylvia and her loving devotion to her big sister. After inspecting the scene for herself, she was convinced enough that Caroline's untimely death was more than just an accident.
Thus, Caroline Christmas' case was solved with 24 hours still on the clock, but our heroes decided parts of it was not.
Emerson reached out to health services to investigate why chloroform was passing as a "secret ingredient" in perfumes at Olfactory Delights while Ned the Pie Maker reached out to Chuck.
#
"Hi."
"Hey! What do you think? Will it be monochromatic enough for him? He'll walk around like a gothic hero with these, so I figured I'd add more colors to the bed. He seems to love green."
"I'm sure he'll more than love this all."
"Well I'm just grateful he's sleeping. Sure, it's because he cried his guts out, but we can all sew them in again. I don't mind the oozing blood or the iron-tinged stains."
"That sure was a graphic metaphor."
"That's what I felt, though. After you told me you accidentally killed my dad."
"But I sowed your insides back together?"
"Mhm, it just took time."
"Mhm..."
"Mhm..."
"So, I decided something."
"I like decided-and-smiling-Ned."
"I'm not going to be the jealous boyfriend who feels I should be entitled to your big heart. I'm going to try to flow with this whole you being reckless with someone other than me because I...I don't own you. It's not fair to try to lock down that love. I shouldn't even be trying if it's yours to give away anyways since you feel confident it's going to the right person. But I do have one condition."
"Ooh?"
"Can you not call him Scar?"
"Haha! Why not? It suits him so well."
"No reason in particular, I just...have that name reserved to no one of any importance at all."
"You mean your dad?"
"I said 'no one of any importance'. He would fall under the category of 'such-a-vicious-monster-that-he-does-not-ever-deserve-any-mention-at-all-much-less-a-nickname'."
"You need to plan another date with your brothers. You've gone all cynical again."
"I'm sorry you expected over two decades of poison to be gone with a snap of 'oh-hey-meet-your-half-brothers-who-your-dad-left-behind-too-sorry'."
"Well if you ask me, I'd say you created a very specific category for Poppa Ned."
"Please, Chuck."
"Fiiiine... I guess I could call him Tom, just until he tells us his name."
"Tom. I think it'll work."
"Thomas would too, if he wears the clothes Olive got him."
As the Pie Maker looked at her smiling, he could not help but smile too. He felt his heart grow inside his ribcage yet again.
"Thank you."
"No, thank you. You're trusting me and letting me fix this. You'll never know how good it feels to know you mean it."
"I love you."
"I love you more."
Across the universe, at that same moment, shaking five fingers curled around Gungnir. With his one eye staring into the realms from the high seat called Hlidskjalf, Odin All-Father found his son.