Daddy's Little Girl
All the Avengers looked at Loki, head bowed and silent because of the muzzle. Thor looked unhappy as he stared at his brother.
"Well, that's over," Tony Stark remarked. His comment caused his teammates to roll their eyes.
All of a sudden the temperature in the Helicarrier dropped several degrees. A sense of foreboding surrounded all of them. Loki's head snapped up as he stared at the shadows behind the Avengers. They all turned to stare. It looked like there was nothing there until the shadows moved.
Out of the shadows stepped a lithe figure. Dressed in a black gown covered with what looked like different coloured glowing stars was in Tony's opinion one of the weirdest looking person he'd ever seen. And that was saying a lot. One side of her was beautiful. She looked young, maybe late teens, long ebony hair, blood-red, voluminous, lips, porcelain skin and thick eyelashes. The other half of her body was a nightmare. Wispy, thin gray hair, corpse-like pallor that was rotting and in some places, bone was showing. Skin sunken so you could see the contours of her skull and bones. But her eyes were the same on both sides, an entrancing emerald green, the same colour as the supervillain currently gagged in the cage behind them.
They all had their various weapons-except Bruce who just looked wary and Thor who looked too shocked- on her in a second. "Who are you?" demanded Nick Fury.
She just smiled. It was a disconcerting sight considering it was slightly lopsided because of her corpse side, "I am Hela, Queen of Niflheim, Ruler of the Dead, and Daughter of the Liesmith."
They all looked at Loki who was still staring at Hela. His eyes, identical to Hela's, were sparkling and Tony was sure he was smiling at her behind the muzzle.
"Wait, you're his daughter?" Tony blurted out. That was just too weird. Reindeer Games spawned?
Hela just raised an eyebrow at him. Then she turned to Thor. "Nice to see you Uncle," she said mockingly, "You never visited me after I was exiled!" She had snarled the last word.
"Exiled? Why were you exiled?" Steve, the paragon of politeness, asked. "And if you were exiled how did you get here?"
She snorted, "I was born. Odin Allfather decided that I was no doubt a monster so should be shown no kindness or mercy and banished me to Niflheim! I am exceedingly fortunate that I inherited my father's talent in magic. Otherwise I would not have been able to become queen. As for how I am here, my father freed me and enabled me to leave Niflheim with the Tesseract."
Bruce frowned, "I thought Niflheim was the realm of the dead. Isn't banishing you there sort of the same as killing you?" Tony frowned. Niflheim? Realm of the dead? He really needed to brush up on his Norse mythology.
"Not to him. Now if you excuse me I would like to talk to my father," she made to brush past them towards the cage, where Loki was still staring at her with pride in his eyes.
"Not on my watch," Clint darted forward and grabbed her wrist. She spun around with burning eyes as she switched his grip so she was the one holding his wrist and suddenly it was like a documentary of a plant, with its life passing by in fast forward. Clint's hair started to pale and his skin began gaining wrinkles, as his knees gave out and he was kneeling in front of her. As the Avengers watched in horror, as Clint's body, now looking about eighty years old began to decompose as if he was dead.
"Stop! Stop!" Natasha yelled. She fired her gun but the bullet just went straight through Hela. She held on a moment longer before letting go. The moment she did Clint returned to his original state as if he hadn't just been decomposing a second ago.
She regarded him disdainfully, "How quickly does life pass by, while age saps the strength from your limbs. Do not fear. I will not release him. I have not seen my father for millennia as he was not able to visit me in Niflheim as he could visit my siblings Fenris, Jörmungandr, Sleipnir, Vali and Nari."
"Wait, you have siblings?" he couldn't help himself. The idea that Loki of all people actually had Hela was ridiculous, but the fact that he had a brood of them was just crazy.
She rolled her eyes at him. She made her way towards the cage but this time they all were baffled on how to stop her. None of them dared to try and touch her after Clint. She walked right through the walls as if she was a ghost, which she kind of was.
All of the Avengers immediately drew closer to the cage to monitor what was happening. Hela bent down and with green sparks flying from her fingertips she removed the muzzle but to their surprise she didn't remove the bonds. She then leaned forward to give her father-weird- a hug. Loki opened his mouth to say something to her but Hela waved her hand so that none of the Avengers could here. They seemed to be having a conversation, both of them smiling. It would've been considered a sweet father daughter moment if not for the fact that one of them was a criminal and had just tried to destroy New York. They shared one last hug before Hela walked out of the cage and walked right through-literally through- the Avengers.
Thor stopped her by asking, "Why did you not release him?"
She turned, "Because Uncle, he would be forced to leave and I'd never see him again. This was the first time in centuries that I embraced my father, the first time in centuries that I heard his voice. I do not enjoy taking lives. I knew my father would be forced to kill you to escape."
Tony snorted, "That didn't stop him from killing loads of innocents during his attack. He threw me out a window!"
She shook her head, "You wouldn't understand. No one would. I am not here to justify his actions. You want to know why he decided to launch an attack on Midgard? Why do you not just ask the Thunderer."
"In what way is it my fault that my brother ended up committing this destruction?" Thor demanded incensed.
"Brother? You still call him 'brother'? You have no right!" Hela shouted at him.
"I have every right! He is my kinsman! I love him and I will protect him as I always have!" Thor yelled brandishing Mjölnir.
Hela let out a short laugh, "Love him? Protect him? What were you doing when he was picked on and teased for using magic instead of fists when he was younger? What were you doing as your own friends belittled and bullied him for being different? You alongside them! What were you doing as the Dwarves sewed his mouth shut? Oh right, you were the one holding him down!"
The other Avengers exchanged glances as the warily watched Thor and Hela, well aware that either of them could cause a lot of damage and hurt them all. As they paid attention to the words they realised that there was more to the story than they realised. Loki was watching from his bonds a wide manic grin on his face as he watched his daughter scream at his brother.
"And what about my brothers and I? What have you ever done for your niece and nephews? What were you doing as Fenris was imprisoned on Jötunheim as father screamed for his return? What were you doing as father cried for Odin Allfather to return Jörmungandr to him after he cast him into the oceans of Midgard? As I was exiled into Niflheim? As Sigyn and Vali suffered after Nari's death? What did you do? Oh yes, nothing!" Hela shouted. Thor looked positively shell-shocked.
She drew herself up as she composed her face, "You were alongside father as each action against him drove him further into the man he is today. You did not help him. You added onto the cracks in his sanity. You did not protect him and you cannot truly say you have loved him. If you truly had, this would have never happened. You have no right to calling my father, I or any of my siblings family." She turned and walked into the shadows and disappeared.
"I...that cannot be...I never... it is not..." Thor stuttered staring after her. He turned to face Loki as if he could tell Thor it simply wasn't true but Loki avoided his eyes and closed his lips.
None of the Avengers knew what to think. Loki's actions against Earth were terrible and inexcusable. But now there was a but. No wonder Loki was crazy if that was all true. How could anyone be sane after suffering all that?
Don't really like the ending but oh well. Hela, Fenris etc... are all based on the people from Norse mythology not the comics. I never liked the idea of a pure evil Loki. Sure he tried to take over the world and that's not good but after everything that's happened to him I can see why. Just so you know I though I did a pretty good job on this fic considering I've never seen any of the movies.
Oct. 20, 2012
I wrote another fic involving Hela if you're interested. It has no relation to this fic though.
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