He was dead.

He was quite sure of it. But as he felt a cool wind blow over him, Tony began to lose faith in that particular hypothesis. He inhaled sharply as his eyes opened blearily. The light was so bright. He stretched and found he was able to use his right hand to block the harsh sunlight from his eyes as he adjusted to it. He blinked rapidly and his vision slowly became more clear. What had happened? He remembered being trapped in the dark of the void, sure he was going to die. Then he was — well then he was just... here. He coughed once, twice, and then used his hands to help push himself up. There was blurry figure in front of him. As his vision clarified, he was able to make out a young man, older than Tony, surely, but still, he didn't look as if he could be anywhere past 15. His hair was such a dark shade of black, that it reminded Tony of obsidian, of the void he'd been trapped in underwater. He wore plain green swim trunks. He was close enough — only a few feet away from Tony and sitting cross-legged, staring at him — that Tony was able to easily make out his eye color— a shining sea green. He was skinny, almost too skinny really, as if malnourished. His skin was dark and honestly a bit otherworldly. It was a burnished bronze tone, but there were parts of it that seemed to have an almost criss-crossed pattern to it — like scales. The sections of his skin were, well, not glowing exactly, more of a slight luster or sheen of green or blue or even purple in one spot. Who was he? Had he rescued Tony? He wasn't sure, but he definitely wanted to know the answer.

Tony looked around and found that he, along with the other teen, were alone on a relatively small (at least in terms of surface area above the water) boulder that jutted out of the water. It had to maybe 15 feet in diameter, at most. Distantly, he spotted the beach next to the resort he and his father were staying at. It was so far away that the few people on it looked to Tony the size to be the size of ants. He glanced up at the sun, to find its position. Assuming it was the same day, it couldn't be any later than mid-afternoon.

All of a sudden, the teen across from him tilted his head at Tony, smiled, and said "Hi, I'm Jor. Who are you?"

His words brought Tony back to the present. And for the first time, Tony noticed that Jor, whoever he was, was completely dry, like fully. Tony, who had presumably been laying in the hot sun for a little while, had dry skin, but his swim trunks were still at least partly wet, and his hair was certainly still soaked. It plastered to his forehead and Tony pushed it to one side with his left hand, but it didn't distract him from the question at hand. If Tony was still wet, and Jor must have been the one who'd pulled him out of the water, then how was it that Jor was entirely dry? Even his curly black hair was frustratingly dry. It made no logical sense. Of course, that only made Tony more curious.

"Um, yeah uh hi, I'm Tony," well, eloquence never has been his strong point. "You're… Jor, you said? Were— were you the one who saved me?" Because of course someone must have, there's no way that he'd somehow washed up here on his own, impossible really, someone must have saved him. This almost frail looking teen didn't look as if he could even swim through the rocky waves surrounding the boulder they were on with just him, much less tow another person through them. But as the saying went, once you've eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.

Jor blinked and said, "Yeah, I did, didn't I?," as if only just now realizing it himself.

Um, okay? He probably should have said something else, but again, he had no eloquence, like, at all. Tony just said "I— what— why— how?"

Jor bit his lip and frowned in contemplation as if he didn't fully understand what Tony was asking. He paused for a second in thought before speaking, "I saw you get swept under, and so I— I helped you."

"Well, okay yeah, I get that, and I do appreciate it, I do, but-" but Tony was still confused on how this kid, not much older than him, had pulled him out of the water. Tony must have been at least six feet under — literally — by the time he'd fallen unconscious, not accounting for how deep he'd sunk after he was unconscious. To have swam down and even just found him in the dark and cold water is incredible, but to have grabbed him and brought him to the surface, and swam with him to the closest bit of land? It didn't seem humanly possible for Jor to have done all that. " —but how exactly did you save me? There's no way you could have done it, no offense to you but — I mean — it's just not humanly possible!"

"Oh, yes, I probably should have said," he seemed almost sheepish for some reason, "I'm not human."

"I'm sorry — what?"

Jor nodded, "I'm not human." He said this as if they were having a completely normal discussion about the weather.

"So, what, you expect me to believe you're some sort of ali- Omigod are you an alien?"

Jor frowned in contemplation, "I guess? I've… never actually thought of it that way but I was not born on this world, Earth, so that term is technically correct, I suppose."

Oh, this is... this is... Well, he doesn't even know what this is, fuck. He knew it was physically impossible for a human to have actually done this, especially one of Jor's physique, but... is he like, actually for real? He must have been, he had to be. That was literally the only possibility, Jor was an alien... Oh my god...

Tony Stark was a geek, he knew this and would proudly admit to such. He'd seen both Star Wars movies more times than he could count and was eagerly awaiting the next movie in the trilogy. He was a huge fan of Star Trek and pretty much anything else that involved either space or aliens. He was known to devour media at light speed. Of all people, Tony knew better than most how improbable aliens were, he knew the statistics of earth-like exoplanets being able to sustain life. But being who he was, he also knew that aliens weren't exactly impossible either. It was a big universe out there, he'd honestly be more surprised if there wasn't life out there rather than the other way around. Jor being an alien? Okay, so that that was a bit unbelievable, but if Jor could prove it, then this might just be the most incredible thing that had ever happened to him. So, of course, he had a about a million questions.

"Is Jor your real name? Can you prove to me that you're an alien? What planet are you from then? Are you from Mars? Why do you look so human? Is that your real form? How long have you been on Earth? How old are you? Are— agh sorry," this time Tony was the one who felt sheepish. Jor looked pretty overwhelmed at his myriad of questions.

"Okay," Tony said, "let's just start with uh, can you prove that you're an alien?"

"I— well," Jor still looked pretty uncertain but he seemed to be doing his best to answer Tony's questions, and honestly Tony did appreciate that, he did, he knew better than most what a motormouth he could be.

Jor started again, "Yes. That is the simple answer. If you saw my true form, there would be no doubt that I am not human. Perhaps you'll recognize my full name, Jormungandr?"

Okay then... "Jormungandr" huh. Tony was pretty certain he did in fact recognize it. It sounded like one of those weird unpronounceable names from Norse mythology. He scrunched his eyebrows in concentration, doing his best to remember.

"Wasn't that, like, one of the children of Loki in Norse mythology? But— those are just myths, and besides, that's still Earthen..."

Jor, or Jormungandr he supposed, simply raised his eyebrows.

"But... no... you're not telling me... ?" Tony sent Jor a questioning glance but he only kept his eyebrows raised. "Are— are you saying that the Norse myths are real? But that's not possible..," Norse mythology was full of gods, and Tony wasn't exactly comfortable with that. He was perfectly fine being atheist. It was one of the few things he and his father agreed on. Someone saying that there were actual gods? How many cultures did that invalidate then? Were—

Before he could continue his thoughts, Jor interrupted him with a hand and said, "I don't really know how godly exactly we are. We live and we die, just as Midgardians, or humans, do."

Huh, "You know, Arthur C. Clarke said that 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,'" Tony mentioned. If they did have advanced technology or just access to resources that people hundreds of years ago couldn't imagine, maybe had a longer lifespan, too, it did make sense that the ancient vikings had called them gods.

Jor smiled, "Yeah? Hmm, I do like that quote, actually," and Tony knew that he had the right idea.

"Okay, but, hold on. In the myths, wasn't Jormungandr a giant snake? Why do you look so human?"

Jor leaned back and stared at the sky, "I've found that many races in the realms have similar appearances to humans. Me? Not really, but I inherited shapeshifting from my father, so I can blend in pretty much anywhere." He looked at his hands, "I can get basically anywhere if it's connected to the ocean, and if I transform then I can be as indistinguishable as I choose to be."

Tony thought back to the first few things he had noticed about Jormungandr. How dry he was, the patches of skin that looked like scales. Everything made a lot more sense. Tony smiled and asked some more questions. He'd had few friends in his 12 years of life, but right now Jor seemed like he could be, well, Tony wasn't sure exactly, but something.

There was something about Jor (and yes, he does remember that he's talking about an alien, but it's something else), something that told Tony that this was only the beginning. Of what exactly though? Tony had no idea.


a/n: thank you all for your support, sadly the next chapter may not be for another week because I'll be going to a camp that will take up considerable time, but I'll do my best!

~nocturnalis