Far from the party and festivities up on the surface realm, Tyr and Ganglat had managed to escape Zeus' thunderous fury all the way back into another cave system. They had barely made it with their hair intact. From that very brief episode of running for their lives, they formed a short comradery that only lasted until they had caught their breath.
Ganglat laid flat on her face in the dirt, her hair and furry tail was singed and fluffed out with static. "Why? Why am I always this unlucky?" She whined and peeled her face from the dirt to glare at Tyr who was slumped against a stalagmite. "And why did you run off and do something so stupid like impersonate Tyr!?"
Tyr pried one blacked eye open and glared at the Mare. "For your information, I never impersonated anyone. I am Tyr." Now that he wasn't running to avoid being struck down with lightning bolts, he can finally get around to questioning this demon. Right after everything stopped aching.
"Right." Ganglat rolled her eyes. "And I'm just an imaginary unicorn friend of a princess." She pushed herself up to her hooves and glared at the god.
"Then I guess you are an imaginary unicorn friend of a princess. And a rather bad one too!"
Ganglat slapped her forehead and grumbled, "You do this every time Ganglatti! You take a form, you get their memories, and then you forget you're a doppleganger!"
Tyr finally rose to his feet, towering over Ganglat, "If I'm a doppleganger how do you explain my ability to teleport, and to summon weapons?" He held out his hand and a sword appeared right into his hand. "Huh!?"
Ganglat blinked, looking nonplussed, "You also get his abilities. And if you could teleport, why didn't you just teleport us out of there instead of running for our lives?" She crossed her arms over her chest, a smile curling onto her face.
"Uh. I uh." Tyr could not come up with an explanation. Why didn't he just teleport out of there?
"Exactly."
"No listen here! I am Tyr, because I can tell you things about him you wouldn't know otherwise! Like the fact I was raised by Ice giants!"
"Pfft! Everyone knows that! And everyone knows he was adopted and also turned his back on them and joined the Aesir!"
Tyr blinked, remembering the tabloids once that got out, but it was quickly brushed aside for he was recognized as Odin's son in the following years. "Oh. Right."
"Tell me what you had for breakfast two weeks ago!"
"That's insane! Nobody ever remembers what they ate two weeks before!"
"I do!"
"Then what did you eat?" Tyr asked hoping to catch the demon at her own game.
"Dreams. Duh."
"Oh. Right." Tyr fell silent, but his thoughts were trying to recall every inane detail of his life. The big main events, people heard of and shared in their tales of Tyr the fearless god of war. But nothing else stood out in his mind. Did he ever do anything else? Did he really have any other hobby? How was he to know if he really was Tyr? What if his memories were false, and even his abilities were a gross mockery? The war god had never had to ponder the validity of his existence till now and the creeping terror on his face was plain for Ganglat to see.
"Alright Ganglatti, Let's just go rendezvous with the boss and then you can figure out how to be back to your old self."
"Ganglatti?"
"That's your name. Jeeze. I swear, boss may call me slow, but you're the slower one." She led him further into the cave system. One of the underground springs was bound to head to at least one of the cities.
This was not Asgard. This was not Asgard at all. Hel winced at the influx of light from her cramped spot under a long table. The constant nudging of eventually to be undead heroes knees into her ribs did not bother her as much as the Ymir awful foot stench. If she was not in Asgard then where was she? Her red eyes squinted from the bright light and the different women walking around it carrying drinks. Those had to be Valkyries. Their long shirts however would suit her for cover. She waited till one approached the table and slipped underneath her feet, compressing her body as small and flat as she could.
"Can you get me another glass? This mead tastes a bit… Sour." One of the men asked the bored Valkyrie.
"Sure thing." She said raising her eyebrow at the horn of mead. The Valkyrie turned to take the drink but stopped, feeling her shoe stick to the floor. Her eyes closed as she breathed through her nose. Of course she stepped in some food on the floor. It was all going to be alright, she will just make sure all of their valiant deaths were as painful and brutal as possible. She limped her way towards a fellow Valkyrie to hand her the soured drink. "Here take this, I'm going to go clean off my shoe." This exchange happened long enough for Hel to slip under the next Valkyrie.
"Sorry but I'm on my way to take this plate to the Gods table. The Greek ones tend to get fussy."
The first valkerie sighed and marched off but stopped. Her shoe felt different. She lifted up her foot to inspect the sole that now had holes rotted out from it.
Balder emptied the trash as quickly and properly as he could but it wasn't long before his arm was grabbed, "There you are! We can't have a feast without you babe!" Balder whirled around to see Hermod's blue face. "Oh! Hermod! I- I was just helping out! I have some other thing to do-"
"Don't be shy buddy; We got to celebrate your first victory in a long time."
Balder frowned and looked to the side. "Well, I just don't feel right about that one time."
"This time is different, come on." Balder could not resist being dragged off by the small blue messenger.
He found himself sitting at the same table next to his mother.
"I'm so proud of you Balder!" Frigga exclaimed and threw her deep green arms around Balder. "Hermod, if you could, find Tyr. He needs to be here as well."
Hermod disappeared as soon after to find Balder's brother.
Balder looked up from his food and then up across from him, where Herc, his parents sat across. His eyes widened. What was he doing here when he could be saving hid friend from killing his other friends!?
Hercules caught Balder's terrified look and that seemed to solidify his assumptions that balder had avoided talking to his parents about his brother. Balder waved to Herc nervously as his eyes darted around. He caught sight of something bumping the table of gifts that sat right behind Herc. He stared over Herc's shoulder watching an apple on the table roll on its side revealing a rotten spot.
Herc began to look over his shoulder prompting balder to pipe up. "Have you enjoyed the festival so far?"
"You mean the festival that I was enjoying until very recently had to fight a bunch of draugers to stop them from coming to the surface and wreaking havoc?"
"Uh… Yeah." Balder twiddled his thumbs and then sheepishly asked, "Having fun?"
"Sure." Herc said, deadpan. It was crystal clear that Balder had yet to talk to his parents about the events after he was told to speak to him. Perhaps Balder truly had a long way to go before becoming the God of Heroes.
"So where's your brother?" Herc asked motioning to the empty seat next to Balder.
"Oh! I haven't seen him… Since we had an argument."
"An argument?" Frigga spoke up glancing to Balder, "Again? What is it about this time? Is he eating the apples?" Her voice dipped with motherly concern.
"Oh no! He- I just didn't get to give him his apple yet, Idun told me to give it to him."
"Where is your brother? He should be here..," Frigga asked Balder.
"Which one? Tyr?"
"Tyr's in the Underworld." Odin answered before turning to Zeus, "So how's your bridge game? Up for a round after-"
"What is he doing in the underworld!?" Frigga restrained herself from yelling but her voice cut through the noisy festival of food. The hall fell to a nervous silence and then resumed once again as patrons quickly asked each other about their wives and kids or even the weather.
"I thought the underworld was a no-go zone?" Hera asked brushing back her hair.
Frigga's face turned to Odin looking non-plussed.
Odin sighed, his shoulders sagging a bit, "It is. Tyr's in there, finding himself, He'll be fine dear."
"But what is this about the no-go zone?" Herc asked staring right ahead at Balder looking very disappointed at him.
Balder flashed a sheepish shrug. His eyes landed back into the background spotting something move behind the banner sitting behind the Greek visitors. Balder's jaw dropped, which prompted the hero to look behind him. Balder had to think fast, his attention tuned to the arguing adults and the words "Why does Tyr get to go? I thought it was too dangerous for me to go-"
Odin feeling the change of subject of would better suit him and his pantheon, he answered back, "Yet you dip in and out anyways."
"Wait- You know about that?"
Frigga's jaw took its turn to drop, "Why are two of my sons going to the underworld!?"
"Well- I just-" Balder's eyes flickered back to Herc and then back up to the roof. There he spotted Hel crawling her way up the support beam and positioning herself above Odin and Frigga. He knew when she was getting ready to pounce and he didn't need to see her reach for her knife to know it. "Don't!" He yelled, all eyes fell on him. Even Hel's eyes fell onto him. He almost blew her cover. Now that she was in the open and vulnerable, she knew she couldn't stay there and expect to not get caught. She crawled towards the beam closest to Balder.
"I don't want Hodor to get himself in trouble." Balder was suddenly the center of attention and he was nearly standing from his seat. "I-" He began nervously, his hands shaking. He sat back down. He had to hold their attention and persuade his friend to not kill everyone she could and eventually get into trouble. "Please don't get Mad but- I've been going in and out of the underworld- Hodor keeps going down there and causing problems and I know it's bad but he's just trying to prove that he's capable of being recognized."
He felt someone across from him glaring at him. He looked up to see the guest Zeus look at him darkly. Little did he know about the thunder god across from him was still recovering from bad blood between him and his brother. Balder fell into anxious silence that was only exacerbated by the sound of claws on wood right behind him.
"Listen." He pointed at Balder, "You are not responsible for your brother's failings! You can't keep giving him a pass and covering for him when he keeps messing things up for others!"
"Honey…" Hera warned her husband.
Herc looked through all the deities present and had a feeling this could not end well for anyone.
"Father, you have a point, but can we just hear him out?"
"Just whose side are you on anyways?"
"Dear, he's just trying to mediate before-"
"Well, sometimes people do wrong things for reasons, or because they're hurt or scared and making it worse isn't going to make it better." Balder insisted.
"Balder, don't interrupt our guests." Odin looked sternly upon his son.
"Oh- Right, I'm sorry sir." Balder looked down and turning pink with embarrassment and pushed the food on his plate around. He could feel a chill creep over his shoulder.
He heard a being whispering into his ear, Balder stayed still keeping his eyes on his food and listened. "What's the big deal? You could have blown my cover!" It was Hel, who had managed to creep down the beam positioned behind him and slinked her way to his back unnoticed.
"This kind of behavior just keeps getting worse," Zeus continued pointing towards Balder, "Hades was always up to trouble! From sending the river Styx through the city of Athens to throwing a pool party and erasing everyone's memory! And I may have thrown a few thunderbolts a him every now and then but I still covered for him!" The thunder god's voice began to raise.
"Whaaaaat?" Balder heard by his ear again, "How do you run a river through an overworld city?" Oh that was just great. Just the thing he needed was for her to get any more ideas. He frowned and mumbled, "Stop it." It was just inaudible. He had learned to keep his voice very low from spending his time with his troublesome friend's realm.
The king of the gods continued his voice getting more thunderous, "And what did I get in the end? He started a coup recruiting titans to attack Olympus and imprison every god there! The rest of the world was on fire and in ruins! If it wasn't for Hercules- He looked down onto his son who was now glancing sideways feeling a little embarrassed. His father sure knew how to escalate things and to be honest this wasn't how he hoped things would end up.
"Father- I think we are getting off track-" Hercules looked across to Balder and his downward glance, interpreting it as a defeated look. He looked to his mother for assistance.
"Dear- That was years ago! It's old news, things are better now." She interjected and casted an apologetic look to Frigga who was still lividly staring a hole into the side of Odin's head.
Balder's blue eyes darted between Hera and Hercules; his mind focusing on Hera's words that things got better. He was doing his best to ignore Hel's hissing laughter in his ear. "This Hades guy sound like a complete badass. Smashing the system, overthrowing the tyrants, and just causing all sorts of hilarious crimes! This guy is great!" Balder waved his hand behind him, trying to swipe at her to stop.
"But things got better!" Balder insisted, his voice carrying hope. "Something changed; something had to happen to make it get better,"
"That change was consequences. Change only happened after we applied consequences!" Zues argued.
At this point, Hercules had just decided, that along with every one of his bull headed father's arguments and tantrums, to stay out of it and just be there in case things got too out of control. This food was nice. Sausages and cabbage in vinegar. Who would have thought? He really wished he could have sat with the other mortals, at least a conversation with Phil and Icarus would have been much nicer.
"Or how he got what he wanted!" Hel hissed angrily.
"No, that's not right." Balder looked down, meaning his words to reach his friend.
"Excuse me?" Zeus said, his fists clenching.
"Balder." Odin sounded very stern, while doing his best to pretend that because Frigga was on the side of his blind eye, he could not see her glaring daggers at him. "Are you saying it's not right to apply consequences to your brother for causing so much trouble?"
"No- I mean- I'm not advocating for him to do whatever he wants- But maybe if we just helped Hodor out, and made him feel like he mattered here, he would stop." He had to remain on topic otherwise they would be found out.
"Balder, we've been through this. Your brother is blind; he is completely defenseless and would be a danger to himself! We can't let him have a purpose or he will end up getting hurt!" Frigga finally cut into the conversation. "And letting him run wild in the underworld is utterly irresponsible of you! And-" She turned her head to her husband, "None of my sons should be running around there ever. At all!"
"Yeah Balder, you should tell your lousy brother to stay out of my way and go make people miserable up here instead!"
Hel's input was not helping him in the slightest. He momentarily lost his calm and mumbled down to her, "Shut up."
"Excuuuse me young man?" His mom heard that. All moms had the power to hear the potential back sass of their children and Frigga was like a super mom.
"Nothing! I wasn't. I didn't mean!" Balder stammered out, his face going pink his day could not get any worse for him.
"Alright teenage rebellion!" Hel really knew how to egg things on, and also make things worse for herself.
At that point all of the adults were very upset with him. "He gets this from you, you know!" Frigga shot back at Odin.
"Dear! This has gone far enough. You're embarrassing all of us. This was not supposed to go this way. We were supposed to have a nice weekend, not pick a fight with our friend's son!" Hera also glared u at her husband.
Things were quickly brewing into a fight and this is not want Balder ever wanted. Fights and arguments always made him anxious. This wasn't supposed to be this way. The young god pushed his plate of food away from him and crossed his arms over his chest.
"If you won't eat it, I will. This is getting pretty entertaining." His friend was beginning to get on his last nerve.
"Will you just go home?" He hissed, looking over his shoulder to the direction of his friend.
"Well I would, but somebody's parents went made sure I couldn't." Hel grumbled reminding him just whose fault all of this truly was.
He had to find a way to at least distract her or make her want to go back into the underworld. Anything to get them both out of this mess, but she was not easy to reason with. "What do you want?"
"To slaughter your entire family or…" She had to think of something else that was impossible for him to agree to. "To hear you cuss." Balder was too good of a guy to even cuss. She even believed it might be physically impossible for him to do it.
"Fine." She might not have been easy to reason with but was easy to distract and aim at something else.
The response caught Hel completely off guard. There was no way he would… Could he? The image of his cute face scrunching up as he tried to cuss was too much to pass up. She could always murder his entire family some other time, but hearing him cuss was not to be passed up! "Then cuss already! What will your first cuss even be?" She mumbled on.
"Go home!" Balder mumbled maybe a little louder, enough so that the others could kind of hear him.
"Ugh fine… But remember you owe me a cuss." Hel mumbled rather grumpily and crawled back up the beam with the same amount of stealth she used before. She wouldn't be taking out any vengeance tonight. Stupid, no-good goody two-shoes friend. She condensed herself and crawled back up the
"Excuse me?" His mother heard that one of course. She was at her wits end with Balder who was normally so well mannered.
"I said I was going home. I'm sorry that I caused such a scene and I am especially sorry for insulting our guests and causing so much trouble. I'm sorry for everything. " Balder stood up, his cheeks with embarrassment and head down. He hoped everyone would buy it. Sometimes he wondered why he was still friends with someone that wanted to kill his entire family, or continued to have hope that one day she will change. And maybe that day was not today but it could be one day.
"I'm glad that you apologized for your actions today Balder." Frigga began sternly, taking control of the situation since Odin seemed far too lenient. "But you need to face consequences." She nodded to her guests.
"When you see your brother, you tell him that the two of you are grounded for the next fifty years. There will be no unapproved visits anywhere outside of Asgard, after training an chores, you'll both go straight to your rooms, and furthermore, you'll be helping Eir, Freyr and Freya fix all the damage you two have been causing. Honestly, I expected more out of you Balder, you're supposed to be the god of heroes and light and you can't behave like this."
Balder's shoulders slumped and he stared at his fingers that dug in to the table Now what was he going to do? How was he even to stop his brother or let alone Hel? He very well could not break the rules. "Yes ma'am." He mumbled and looked up to his guess. From behind him, he could see Hel slither down from the support beams onto the table. She stopped from sneaking away to pick up more food and stuff it into her pockets. There was concern that she was going to get caught. She only stopped when she looked up and saw a Valkyrie beginning to return. She had to hide quick and the nearest hiding place was some golden jar decorated with a lid decorated with leaves and fruit. Any hiding spot is a good hiding spot if you're desperate enough. Her body squeezed into it. Balder witnessed all of this but could not say anything. He knew that jar was meant as a gift to Hercules but what could he do?
Maybe, this can be a good thing. She can be in a different environment with someone else, he trusted to be a good, and compassionate person to keep her out of trouble. Maybe this could be a good experience for her, and she could have the opportunities often denied to her. He chose to remain silent. Balder disappeared with a gentle beam of light to head into his room.
"With that said, Hercules," Odin began I want to thank you, for everything you have done here, and I know it doesn't seem much, but you also stopped Ragnarok from happening and we never got a chance to thank you for that." Odin waved to the Valkyrie behind them who took it as her cue to grab the jar on the table. "So we would like to give you a small token of thanks, something that Freya thought up." The Valkyrie presented the jar to Hercules.
"It's a jar of bounty, although this gift is small in terms of what you have done for us, we figured you will put this to the best use." Odin's single eye fell onto the jar almost as if he could stare right into it. Sometimes there were blind spots in his vision, but maybe if h stared at all the things around the blind spots, he could get an idea of what was happening around them. "This jar, will provide an endless bounty of food, both grown and cooked, although depending on whether you enjoy our native dishes could be something entirely. You only need to reach into it-" He paused.
"Oh, Brunhilde, the jar is missing its seal. We wouldn't want it to fall over in our guests room and flood him in food now would we?" Odin pointed out with a very, very small hint of a smile. Brunhilde was quick to conjure up some clasps to hold down the lid before handing it to Hercules.
"Oh, thank you very much." The demi-god was quick to put down his food that minutes ago were much more interesting than the awkward argument that had broken out between the deities. "I, don't know what to say other than that." Or even what to do with this gift. Meg's food was perfectly fine for him, but maybe if there ever was some sort of famine in Thebes, gods forbid, he could help out his community. "Actually, I think I know just what to do with this. And thank you for this wonderful opportunity to meet your family and enjoy this festival."
"Speaking of which-" Hera had cut in, "We meant no harm in interrupting this dinner and starting a debate with your son-" She shot a look at her husband.
"Oh no, it's something that needed to be addressed," Frigga insisted, her blood pressure finally settling down. "I'm just sorry that you had to be a part of it. Well anyways, would any of you like desert? I have prepared apple strudel!"
And then events continued on merrily into the night as it should have. Once Herc was able to regroup with his friends in the guest rooms, he explained the situation
"And so the entire time, Balder was trying to cover for his brother, and I can see why he would do it, but I think the kid really needs help in how to be a better hero about it." Herc sat on the edge of his bed.
"Don't look at me kid, I'm retired. I went and achieved my 'that's Phil's boy dream', and I am happy with that." Phil mumbled grumpily while lying down on his bed across the room. He had hoped at least one of the women would go home with him but for some reason a lot of people tried to speak Finnish at him and it just got extremely frustrating for him.
"That's not what I meant…"
"So, what, do you want to mentor him or something?" Phil rolled over in his bed pulling the blankets over his head. Once the kid got worrying about something, nothing ever seemed to stop him. He knew he was going to have to deal with this for the entire weekend.
"Well, no but- I don't know. Maybe that would be good for him. Come to think of it, there's a lot of kids that want to be heroes now, and this kid in particular is apparently destined to be the god of heroes and he doesn't quite know what he's doing."
"He's gonna have to figure it out himself. It's what I did."
"But wasn't that hard? Doesn't it cause some issues with figuring out how to train people into being the best heroes?"
"No! Because I am the best-" The old satyr sat up in his bed and pointed at Herc accusingly, "And don't you forget it!"
"Oh! Oh oh oh oh oh!" Icarus spoke up, turning from his current project of working on the broken device that Ivaldi gave him. "What if you created a school, for heroes! Like an academy!"
"Ha! Yeah like that would happen!" Phil laughed and waved the brain-fried-by-the-sun human off, but that got his gears turning. He stroked his beard, "Well actually now that you mention it, I did want to start some kind of standards based on my regiment... Actually that's not a bad idea. Phil's Academy for Heroes!"
"The name could use a bit of work." Hercules chuckled, but now they were getting somewhere. A way for him to retire from the hero business but still make continue to make a contribution to the world. "We could even include students from all over the world."
"That's right! Now you're thinking kid!" Phil leapt from his bed and pushed Icarus out of his desk, even shoving the clock aside. His mind was churning out ideas, He could get funding. He could get paid in… Tuition! And even supply the materials, for a small price of course. The three of them continued to brainstorm into the night, and even every now and then during the weekend as they continued to enjoy the festival. Over all it was the most productive Guy's Weekend any of them have ever experienced and none of them could wait to get home and begin their plans.
The jar that they had completely forgotten about sat with their stuff and every now and then would give a little shake but ultimately got nowhere.
Okay, I'm so sorry for the long period in between this chapter. I had a hard time writing this because it I very dialogue heavy and I had to juggle a lot of characters in the scene. Over all it was learning experience that I will continue to improve. I am currently working on a few projects such as a youtube channel of me making art and so that may contribute to some slow chapters, but I will not go on a hiatus any time soon.
Shout out to Angel of Hunky-Doryness for the very kind shoutout she gave me for my fanfiction. That was really kind of you and am glad that you enjoy my fic that much. It really encourages me to see that kind of support.
There are absolutely a lot of secrets in the Norse Pantheon, and I hope that Ican weave them well into the story as well as the entire world of the Norse underworld. I am having a lot of fun doing some world building here for when they return, you know…. After the shenaniganza that will happen in Greece.