Author's note: the letter ð (eth) is pronounced like the "th" in the word "them"
It took Ada a moment to realize she was no longer being hurled through space and was instead standing on solid ground. She cracked one eyelid and was met with the warm, shining golden walls of the observatory at the end of the Bifrost. She opened her eyes fully and looked around in awe, mouth hanging open. As her gaze faced front again, she was met with Loki's piercing green-blue eyes. Ada suddenly became aware of her arms, which were wrapped around his surprisingly slim waist. She immediately flung her arms straight out and away from him, causing his leather coat to flap at his sides. Loki gave Ada a smirk, almost too brief to catch, as he smoothed out his coat once more.
Thor looked at Ada angrily and opened his mouth to chastise her for apparently stowing away, but she threw up her hands and shook her head in innocence, still too much in shock to say anything. "I should've known better…" He sighed and turned to Loki, giving him a few choice words in Proto-Norse.
Ada caught Jane's eye, and they both grinned like lunatics. Jane detached herself from Thor's side and tiptoed to her friend. "I cannot believe that just happened!" she squealed, clutching Ada's hand. "How long do you think we were in transit? My estimate is about 45 seconds, give or take. If I knew our speed, I could calculate the relative length of the Einstein-Rosen Bridge, and that would give us a rough idea of-"
"My Lord!" A powerful voice boomed behind them. The girls both spun to see the imposing figure of Heimdall standing on his observation platform, sword in hand, golden armor brilliant in the Asgardian sunlight. Ada nearly started hyperventilating. "What is the meaning of all these… visitors?"
"Heimdall! I apologize old friend, but I have no time to explain!" Thor said, already halfway out the door with Loki in tow. "As I know you saw, a fire jotun threatened us on earth. I believe she means to try to destroy Yggdrasil. I will go to the All-Father's side, and we will assess the situation." He made eye contact briefly with Jane. "I shall send a ship to bring you to the palace. It is the safest place in Asgard."
Thor began to spin Mjolnir in his hand but had a second thought and again turned to Heimdall. "Oh, and make sure the Valkyries don't cause any trouble!" With that, Thor grabbed a very unwilling-looking Loki, hurled his hammer, and took off in the direction of the palace. Their shape quickly faded into the distance.
Heimdall eyed the Valkyries, who were in a heap on the floor. They were both stirring and moaning, but didn't seem to be in any mood for a fight. He stepped down off of his platform, his sword arm relaxed but ready, in case he needed to discourage any aggression.
Ada approached him tentatively, hands clasped in front of her, eyes shining. "You're… you're my favorite," she said, barely audible.
Heimdall looked at her strangely and Jane rolled her eyes.
"I can't believe I'm actually meeting you!" Ada inched closer as Heimdall observed her somewhat suspiciously. "You've always been my favorite god since I was little! Mostly, I think, because you had gold teeth. Do you really have gold teeth?" As she peered into Heimdall's confused face, she realized she might be acting slightly creepy. She took a step back. "Ah, haha, sorry, that's kind of personal I guess!" Ada laughed nervously. "I mean, I like you for more than your teeth! Not that your teeth aren't cool, even if they aren't gold…"
Ada was rescued from her floundering and one-sided conversation by Jane tugging her away. "Ada, don't freak out the huge alien… god… guy with the sword!" She hissed.
Ada gave Heimdall one last furtive glance over Jane's shoulder, then cast her eyes down and sighed in defeat.
Smiling, Jane shook her head in a knowing way. She quickly became more serious and asked, "What the hell happened back there, anyway? One second Thor was saying what I assume was the Asgardian version of "Beam me up, Scotty", and the next second you're stuck to Loki like he's some sort of electromagnet! I didn't even see you run over!"
Ada furrowed her brow, remembering the strange incident. "Well, "run" isn't the verb I would use… it was more of a pull, and I'm not sure-"
"Ladies," Heimdall rumbled. He nodded to the door. "I believe your transportation has arrived."
What resembled a Viking longboat with wings zoomed into view at the entrance of Heimdall's observatory, coming to rest gracefully on the Bifrost. Two einherjar disembarked from the ship and entered the observatory. When they saw Heimdall, they came to attention and tapped the bases of their spears on the floor in greeting.
"Heimdall, Guardian of the Bifrost!" One einherjar stepped forward slightly. "We have come on orders from Prince Thor to collect two Midgardians and take them to the palace."
Now it was Jane's turn to be overly enthusiastic. She rushed past the surprised einherjar and began to examine the ship's two engines, located on the bases of its "wings". She grinned and beckoned manically to Ada.
Ada followed Jane's path, but stopped momentarily to smile at the einherjar. They looked down their noses at her in thinly veiled disgust. The smile melted off her face, and she hurried to Jane's side.
Jane immediately began to babble about "advanced propulsion technology" and "silent pulse detonation engines", but the attitude of the einherjar had slightly put Ada off her initial enthusiasm about the ship. She mentally stuck her tongue out at them and forced herself to stop thinking about how cool their armor was. One thing in particular bothered her, though… why didn't they speak Proto-Norse to Heimdall? What was the trigger that caused them, and Thor and Loki and the jotun for that matter, to switch to English? Why were they speaking English in the first place?
When Jane stopped for breath after a particularly long run-on sentence about the theoretical effects of mechanical fatigue on repeated detonations, Ada took advantage of the break in the waterfall of science jargon. "Were you able to understand Thor, when you met him the first time?" she asked, squinting in concentration.
Jane emerged from her science haze long enough to answer, somewhat incredulously, "Yeah, of course!" She promptly returned to verbally dissecting what made the flying ships fly.
Ada looked back at the doorway of the observatory to see the two einherjar approaching the ship, looking quite displeased. As the einherjar who had spoken to Heimdall boarded the ship, the other motioned to the ship's short ladder with his spear and avoided looking at the girls directly. Jane was far too excited about everything to notice, but Ada frowned.
The second einherjar boarded behind the girls, and the ship's engines whizzed to life. They made a pleasant, rhythmic sound, much softer than that of a jet engine. Jane listened to them thoughtfully and smiled. She was obviously getting more out of this than Ada, who thought they sounded rather like malfunctioning hair dryers.
As the ship lifted off, Ada threw one more glance in the direction of Heimdall, who had returned to his observation platform to watch their departure. She smiled at him ruefully, and to her great surprise, his expression changed ever so slightly in response. While his golden eyes remained intense and his brow furrowed, the corners of his lips had been drawn upwards in a subtle smile. Ada grinned more confidently in return, and turned to face forward, the glittering palace of Asgard large on the horizon.
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Jane nearly danced into the halls of the palace, while Ada moved at a slow but determined pace, keeping her eye out for inscriptions on the walls. When they and the einherjar had walked through the main palace gates, Ada had noticed some lettering, but she was rushed past it by the guards before she could read it. She did gather, however, that the caption was written in was runic, though she was unsure which runic alphabet it was.*
The heavy steps of the einherjars' boots echoed in the surprisingly empty halls. One einherjar walked ahead of the girls and one behind, leading them on a winding path through the palace, up grand staircases and through less elegant corridors, everything illuminated splendidly by the light streaming in through tall windows. Even those remaining star stickers on Jane's dress seemed to shine proudly in such light. They caught Ada's eye as Jane practically floated back toward her.
"Can you believe this?" Jane exclaimed. "Not only are we probably the first humans ever to visit an alien planet, but we're walking around their capitol! I can't believe you're not grilling the guards to death about words or something!"
The lead einherjar looked back with a start at the phrase "grilling the guards to death", but quickly faced front again.
Ada made a face at the einherjar's reaction, but smiled at Jane. "I dunno, they don't seem like the… friendliest guys…"
Jane nodded in agreement. "Yeah, they completely ignored my questions the whole way here! Maybe Asgardian propulsion systems are a state secret or something. I'll ask Thor about it later."
The group ascended yet another staircase, this one more broad and splendid than any of the others before it. At the top, Ada looked out one of the windows and gasped, "Jane! Look how high we are!"
The girls moved closer to the window, from which they could see the city stretching out before them. It shone silver and gold in the now-setting sun, like no city on earth could. The buildings were of all shapes and sizes, some unimaginably slender and graceful, reaching toward the darkening sky, and others squat, but somehow still giving off an aura of grandeur. Some buildings even appeared to have floating architectural elements! Sprinkled throughout them were patches and avenues of green, apparently park areas, which, instead of interrupting the flow of the city, seemed to compliment it and give it a feeling of organic splendor. Two moons, or planets, Ada wasn't sure, were beginning to appear over the scene, solidifying its otherworldly beauty.
Jane pulled out her cellphone and snapped a picture. She slowly turned to Ada, childlike wonder radiating from her face. "There are planets on the horizon", she said aloud, apparently trying to reassure herself that her eyes weren't deceiving her. Ada nodded in confirmation, still taking in the view.
The einherjar behind them struck his staff on the marble floor, making the girls jump. "Keep moving, mortals," he grumbled.
Ada nodded and walked quickly after the lead einherjar, Jane following closely. They were now in a huge chamber and surrounded by outrageously tall columns, and Ada suddenly felt very small and frightened, her heart still pounding from the einherjar's outburst. She took a few deep breaths to calm herself down, and tried to ignore how overwhelmed she was suddenly feeling at her situation.
Suddenly a huge explosion sounded to their right, so powerful it shook the floor under their feet. It was quickly followed by a blast of hot air, and the shout of a male voice.
"Thor…" Jane whispered, then shouted, "THOR!" and ran in the direction of the commotion.
The einherjar were unprepared for this development. One shouted something to the other in Proto-Norse, and they ran after her, their capes flapping behind them.
Ada was hot on their heels. As she followed them around a column, a tall doorway came into view, bordered with intricate golden swirls. The huge wooden doors, themselves embellished in gold, were thrown wide open, and the sounds of battle poured out of them.
As Ada passed through the doors, she found herself in another, smaller pillared space. The tall windows of this room had been shattered, and squads of einherjar poured in from a side entrance. They were all running toward the source of the disturbance, which was a large hole in the wall at the end of the room. The dust was still settling from the explosion that had apparently caused it. A bottleneck seemed to have occurred there, and groups of einherjar pushed and shoved to try and get through, some stumbling over the rubble. Jane stood to the side of the hole, standing on her tiptoes and frantically trying to see over the shoulders of the jostling soldiers.
A second blast went off, blowing the legions of einherjar backwards, followed by another rush of intensely hot air. Ada watched as Jane, who was shielded from the blast from the remains of the wall, darted through the hole and disappeared inside. Ada was far enough away from the explosion that she only had to shield her face from the hot air, and dashed after Jane, jumping over the fallen einherjar, who were having a difficult time getting up due to their unwieldy dress armor.
The room on the other side of the hole lacked the large windows present everywhere else in the palace, and had relatively little ambient light, save for a few torches. The real light source was a gigantic tree, stretching up to an invisible ceiling. It gave off a peaceful blue and white glow that sharply contrasted with the chaos going on at its roots. Ada, awestruck, followed the tree with her eyes from its trunk to its branches where, in addition to leaves, it also seemed to be bearing large fruit in the form of nine galaxies. "Yggdrasil…" Ada whispered.
Now that she fully understood her surroundings, Ada took in the battle raging below the world tree. Three fire jotuns, one of which Ada recognized as Gerðr, stood with their backs to the tree, while hoards of Valkyrie viciously attacked the einherjar trying to reach them. Every once in a while a fire jotun would lob a flaming orb into a group of particularly tenacious einherjar, which would explode and take the whole lot out of commission.
Ada flattened herself against the back wall of the room, not wanting to be noticed or become involved in any way. She looked around anxiously for Jane, Thor, or even Loki. However, while their familiar faces were nowhere to be seen, she did pick out a figure she thought she recognized from mythology: his face was wrinkled but sharp, with a bushy white beard and only one eye.
Odin hoisted his staff, Gungir, which began to glow with an almost painfully bright light. He then pointed it in front of him, and with a sweeping motion, brought down at least a dozen Valkyries with the beam of energy it produced.
This caught Gerðr's attention, and she held a hand up for the Valkyries to stop fighting. The remaining Valkyries backed towards Yggdrasil, effectively surrounding it.
The ranks of einherjar parted to allow Odin to pass through, Thor appearing at his side from out of the crowd. Behind them, Ada caught sight of Jane, pressed to the wall in a similar fashion to herself.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Odin shouted as he came to the wall of Valkyries. One squawked at him and he glared at it so hard with his one eye that it shrunk back. "Asgard has no quarrel with Muspelheim, although your actions may cause one! Release the Valkyries from your spell and return the Norns of Yggdrasil immediately, and the lives of you and your people may yet be spared! However, your status as norns will be revoked immediately and you will spend eternity in our dungeons!"
Gerðr and her sisters laughed sincerely at Odin's demands. Through her laughter, Gerðr choked out, "Although your offer is ever so tempting, I think we'll have to turn you down old man!"
Odin fumed and Thor stepped forward. "Hold your tongue you vile creature! You will show the Allfather the respect he deserves!"
"Oh dear, where are my manners?" Gerðr said, voice dripping with sarcasm. "We haven't even introduced ourselves! I am Gerðr, these are my sisters Greip," she nodded to the tallest jotun, "and Gjalp," she nodded to the other jotun, who was slightly shorter. "We're here to take Yggdrasil off your hands! We'll also be taking that mortal over there." She looked at Jane, who flinched under her gaze.
A Valkyrie took to the sky in response to Gerðr's indirect command, but was immediately grounded by a well-placed toss of Mjolnir. "Not while I still draw breath," Thor growled as his hammer returned to his hand. He began to spin it to hurl at Gerðr, but stopped when Odin thrust Gungir in front of him.
"Yggdrasil will not suffer weapons to pass beneath its branches", Odin explained. "The fire jotuns have chosen their position based on this fact."
"Very observant, old man! I should give you more credit," Gerðr grinned toothily. She narrowed her eyes at Jane. "Perhaps I shall let you keep your pet a little longer."
"Will they ever shut up, this is terribly dull," a mellifluous voice purred next to Ada. She whirled to the source of the comment in surprise, finding Loki leaning casually against the wall next to her. He wore a disinterested expression, but his green eyes were sparkling as he regarded her.
"Why the fuck did you bring me here?!" Ada hissed at him, placing her back to the wall again. She watched as Thor took another step forward, brandishing Mjolnir and shouting. She didn't absorb anything he said; she was far too concerned about the presence of the god of mischief lounging to her left.
"Why?" Loki appeared to become lost in thought. He then smirked and refocused his gaze on Ada. "Why not? Things can get a bit boring around the palace. Also, I admire your taste in headgear." He produced Ada's long forgotten horned headband, seemingly out of thin air.
Ada looked from the headband in Loki's hand to his face in disbelief. She frowned and tentatively took it from him, half expecting him to withdraw his hand. The clang of sword on armor brought her back to reality, and she turned so see Thor holding a Valkyrie by the neck. Its feet dangled helplessly above the ground.
"Ooo, this may get more interesting after all!" Loki settled back, still grinning.
"Enough of this posturing!" Gerðr's voice boomed, echoing across the room.
The einherjar shifted uncomfortably, their armor clinking in the silence that followed the announcement.
Gerðr joined hands with her sisters, and they backed even closer to Yggdrasil. As the flames given off by the fire jotuns' bodies licked the trunk of the tree, its light flickered almost imperceptibly. Ada got the strange feeling that it was almost as nervous as the einherjar.
"Prepare for your end, Asgardians," Gerðr said, voice hardly rising above a growl. "Yggdrasil and its Norns are now the property of Muspelheim. You can look forward to Ragnarok being brought upon you by one of your own!"
The Valkyrie army began to shimmer and disappear, beginning with those Valkyries closest to Odin and Thor. The speed of the disappearances picked up as it continued, and finally the fire jotuns and even Yggdrasil began to sparkle unnaturally. Ignoring his father's words, Thor roared and hurled his hammer at the forms of the jotuns, but by the time it reached its target, there was nothing left to impact.
Yggdrasil was gone; in its place was a gaping hole in the floor, into which vestiges of soil crumbled. Odin's sigh was audible in the strained silence.
*There are three! In order of age: the Elder Futhark, the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc, and the Younger Futhark