THE LAST MIDGARDIAN
QUESTIONS
Yggdrasil's Day was celebrated once every two hundred or so years. Asgard hosted representatives of each of the Nine and a month was spent displaying the unique contributions of each realm. For the last thousand years, Midgard remained in happy ignorance of the other realms and thus the only representatives invited were those who accidentally fell through cracks in-between the branches of Yggdrasil and ended up scattered among the other realms.
Now, with open communications, an Asgardian embassy, trade alliances, and a ratified treaty, Midgard was formally invited to display all their grandeur in Asgard for the first time in "modern" history. The peoples of Midgard were told to share about what they most prided in their nations and an Asgardian committee would choose which would grace the streets of the Eternal City during the sacred festival days.
Preparations for the event began years before the first organizers and vendors arrived by Bifrost to begin setting up their displays. By this time, Jane had only spent five years or so in Yggdrasil's Crown. With wide-eyed anticipation, she watched from the Bifrost observatory as contingent after contingent of dwarves and elves and fire giants arrived. When the commencement of the opening day approached, she was nearly bursting in excitement.
As a resident Midgardian, Jane was asked to join the Midgardian delegation in the fifth quadrant of the festival complex.
"Of course! I'd love to," she had told Lord What's-His-Name of the festival committee. "What do I need to do?"
"It will be fantastic! A never-before-seen experience of life on Midgard! The inhabitants of the other realms have been barred from Midgard for so many millennia that they cannot even begin to contain their curiosity. The guests will flock to see all that Midgard has to offer. All you need to do is stay at the Midgardian Village, answer any questions that patrons address you with, and act natural. They wish to see life on Midgard as it really is," the man told her, his rosy-cheeked face glowing with his own contagious exuberance.
Tall walls and magical screens kept any curious onlookers out of the fairgrounds until construction was complete. When these were removed and the various performers, vendors, and facilitators were allowed entrance, Jane sprinted to the front gates in rapt delight.
Two statues of Valkyrie carved of stone guarded each side of the massive entry gate. Their uru swords gleamed in the sun with an almost blinding intensity. Once inside the gate, a fantastically decorated gilded palace and portico welcomed visitors from all the Nine Realms and beyond.
It didn't fail to cross Jane's notice how much larger, grander, and more physically imposing the Asgardian display was or how everything about how it was built was created to remind guests of which place each realm belonged along the planes of Yggdrasil or that they, and only they, were the Crown.
It took Jane four days to explore each street and temperature-controlled quadrant. Stables carved of gems and inlaid wood housed the best and most beautiful of Alfheim's winged horses. Towering ice sculptures from Jotunheim glistened in the midday sun and refracted rainbows of light onto the Jotnar fur tapestries. The Muspel fire art moved and danced to create ever-shifting, ever-changing images. Vendors and craftsmen from Nidavellir set up their weapons, armor, jewelry, and magic-endowed tools for sale under purple and gold awnings.
In the farthest quadrant, on the smallest plot of land, the Midgardian Village began to fill up with representatives. It was a sight to behold and it stirred up nostalgia in Jane's heart like a spoon of sugar in lemonade. It was a little taste of home.
The entry way to the Midgardian Village was an exact representation of the Arc de Triomphe. Within, a cobbled street ran through the heart of the Village and on each side, homages to the greatest architecture and art in Midgard were displayed in all their glory. On one side, St. Peter's Basilica, St. Basil's Cathedral, the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, and the Akshardham Temple lined the street. On the other side, the Statue of Liberty, the Eiffel Tour, Big Ben, and Christ the Redeemer were scattered between gardens bursting with the flora and fauna of the Blue Planet. In the far corners, an Egyptian pyramid, the Taj Majal, the Potala Palace, and Angor Wat cast shadows over where vendors' stalls and performance stages sat ready for opening day.
In the eastern side of the quadrant, imitations of Midgardian habitations had been created. Jane snorted when she saw what appeared to be a traditional Japanese house, but with tame wallabies roaming freely through the yard. Nearby, a wooden izba was being settled by a recently arrived group of Senegalese merchants. These set out carved statues of giraffes and elephants and colorful fabric for sale. Cambodian dancers practiced their performance on a stage built like an ancient Greek amphitheater.
Overall, it was a riot of colors and sounds and smells that warred for attention…not unlike Midgard itself. While each of the other quadrants exemplified a much more homogeneous artistic cohesiveness, it was only Midgard that dissolved into a beautiful cacophony of chaos. The Midgardian Village was also the only quadrant which had live exhibitions of daily life of inhabitants of the realm. No elves or dwarves paraded around faux huts and displayed how "their people" lived.
Jane was told to settle herself in a nearby yurt. She was given a brightly colored and embroidered hanbok and told to "act natural" and "make herself at home." A Maori and a Yoruba shared the yurt with her, and were just as baffled how to wear their hanboks.
The Midgardian Village was, as predicted, a resounding success. When opening day came, hundreds of thousands of inter-realm guests flocked to the Eternal City. For weeks upon weeks, curious onlookers came to see and to shop, to vacation and visit. Jane and her companions answered query after query about life on the long-isolated realm. They were proud to represent Midgard like this and experience a taste of the rest of the Nine.
oooooo
Jane gave a final heave and the last stitch finally gave way. She nearly stumbled and had to steady herself on the table behind her.
"There it goes!" she said.
Blue blood poured from the torn incisions and dribbled onto the floor. The strange knife, now bent and twisted from its hours of toil, clattered onto the tabletop. She sighed in relief.
Sagittarius gasped. He opened and closed his mouth in a way that reminded her so much of the Tin Man that she wished she had Dorothy's oil can on hand to loosen his rust. His tentative stretching and testing of his mouth disturbed the open wounds and more blood poured over his punctured lips.
Jane grabbed the discarded towel from the table and handed it to him. He tossed it aside and instead rummaged through some of the crates until they produced a bag of clear liquid. He tore it open with his teeth and began to drink. Four bags lay empty at his feet before he attacked the stockpile of food.
Empty jars and boxes and cartons littered the table and floor by the time he finished. With a satisfied sigh, he gave Jane a real smile, his cheeks raising like a theater curtain to reveal each sharp tooth gleaming beneath.
"You look better," she said. The bleeding had stopped and tiny scabs of darker blue now plugged each wound around his lips.
He tried to vocalize a response but the grunted sounds his throat produced made him grimace. He placed his hands over his throat and shook his head.
"It's ok," she said. "We'll figure out some way to communicate. Or you'll get to hear me talking to myself a lot. I do that sometimes."
He gave her a curious stare but there was no spark of understanding in it. He went to another box. From within, a pulled out a knife and a laser gun of some kind. He showed her where the trigger button was on the top, thrust both weapons into her hands, and pushed for her to stand in the doorway. He was asleep on a bunk before she could even turn around.
She gawked at where he lay, blanket thrust on the floor, his massive frame curled into a ball on the narrow bed. She had assumed his species didn't require sleep. In the museum, it was hard to tell if anyone really slept or if they were all merely in a drug-induced lethargy. After so much time spent in flight without seeing him sleep once, she felt it was a logical assumption.
He must have needed it because he slept for a very, very long time.
She studied the weapons in her hands before straining her eyes to see into the meadow and beyond. It unsettled her to be appointed to guard their little bunker with a weapon. What were the threats she should look out for? Was it merely a precaution or did he know of something that would wish to harm them? What if something, or someone, came out of that cave - would she be able to differentiate between a friend or foe?
If she let her mind dwell on "what if's," then she was going to make herself paranoid. So, instead she took the opportunity to bask in the lukewarm sun bathing the meadow. She could not see the source but the available rays warmed her through and through, soul and body. A light breeze sent ripples through the tall grasses. Orange and purple flowers littered the meadow with splashes of color. The dark mouth of the cave was curtained with bright red vines.
She stared transfixed at every new flower and plant she could see. How long had it been since she last saw something that was alive and not sustained by artificial methods within a glass box? It was mesmerizing to see a wilted leaf and an imperfect, asymmetrical flower petal. She could smell the sweet, messy soil that gave it all life and sustained it a in a living, breathing biome.
She thought she could just make out the sound of water coming from somewhere...if it really were water and not something else. She didn't know what else could make that sound, but maybe alien planets had chocolate rivers or lava brooks or creeks made out of burbling vinegar or something.
She rather hoped it was water.
The shadows cast by the bunker and nearby rocks never moved. Not an inch. The yellow sky above stayed bright and warm and she could discern no evidence of the passing of time. Jane quickly realized she did not know if this planet would have a "night" at all. After the interminable night in the museum, constant daylight was a welcome change, but she wished she knew more of what to expect.
She didn't know much of anything now.
Was this Sagittarius' home? He certainly was familiar with the planet and knew his way around, but it didn't seem likely that a being adapted for the cold would naturally dwell in such a warm, humid climate. What place was this and who did the bunker belong to?
Her questions simmered and boiled within her and she sighed inwardly. She knew wouldn't be able to ask them and they would continue to bother her like an itch she couldn't scratch.
oooo
When her companion finally woke, he ate again. Then he took her weapon from her, directed her to sleep, and he disappeared into the tunnel. Exhausted, she complied.
When she woke next, a mountain of supplies littered the floor of the bunker and the meadow beyond. She recognized much of it as originating within the spacecraft. Blankets, food, tools, and materials were being organized into different piles and stored in crates in the bunker. Across the cave mouth, bright lights flashed from a welding torch as Sagittarius erected a barrier.
Curiously, Jane yawned and lugged herself out of the bunk. She walked over to where he was working to watch and her heart stopped when she recognized what he was using. It was the metal plating of the spacecraft. He had torn the spacecraft into pieces and was now using it to make a wall. They would not be leaving this place anytime soon, then - at least not using that spacecraft. It was possible they would not be leaving at all.
When he was satisfied, he collapsed back into a bunk, created a curtain of ice around himself, and went back to sleep.
oooo
They continued this pattern of eating, sleeping, and sorting for a few dozen cycles. Sagittarius' eyes grew brighter and his motions more animated with his physical needs replenished. He tried again and again to rid himself of the bracelets, but the metal cylinders stubbornly remained.
It was a strange thing to be in such close proximity with someone she could not verbally communicate with. She remembered the year she spent in France during her undergrad, but Google Translate and Rosetta Stone came to her rescue there. Here, she relied entirely on facial expressions and motions and posture to communicate...and she was not sure they translated their kinesics properly.
After so much time in isolation, it was a relief to have someone to communicate with at all and she was glad she was not alone. Hearing another being breathe and walk through the bunker was a comfort, even if he was a towering blue man with swirls and ridges all over his body.
In one of the crates, he discovered a collection of identical black jumpsuits. Each had a logo of a green circle embroidered on the chest and they were made of a soft, but strong material.
Sagittarius tried to wear one. It lasted for a total of five minutes before he threw it off with a disgusted exclamation. He spent the next five minutes scratching at the designs in his skin. Then he took a knife to the jumpsuit and cut it into pieces. The end result was a pair of shorts falling to about the middle of his thigh. This seemed to please him.
Jane wondered if, like her toga, he had been dressed in clothes unfamiliar to him which left him feeling exposed. Actually, he behaved as though his entire body was unfamiliar to him, as if he were wearing a dragon skin coat he wished he could shed.
Jane did a little happy dance when she found her own black jumpsuit in one of the crates. It was a little big and she had to roll up the ankles and wrists, but it was not that blasted toga. She took that sheer scrap of white fabric that had clothed her for so long and tore it into pieces with a vehement delight.
Sagittarius gave her a breathy, guttural laugh as he watched her. He added his leather skirt from the museum to her pile of scraps. Then he gathered some dry grasses, a blow torch, and a bit of some kind of combustible liquid. The pair watched their clothes burn into ashes with wry smiles on their faces. Jane spit on the coals after, just for good measure.
Then Jane decided it was time to cut her hair. She found a mirror in one of the boxes under a bed. She hung it from a bunk bed and used a knife to cut off some of her unruly, long untended hair. She busily sliced away the dead hair but stopped when she caught his reaction in the mirror behind her.
He had been passing through the room when he caught a glimpse of his face in the mirror. He froze, momentarily transfixed. One hand rose and hovered over his cheek, as if seeing the reflection of a ghost. He hissed and glared at the face staring back at him. Then he turned and fled the bunker.
Jane found him hiding away in a crop of trees and covered by bushes. He was huddled in on himself in a small ball and the ground was covered with tiny white pebbles. The pebbles were melting. As she caught the shuddering of his shoulders, she realized he was weeping hail. With a gasp, he noticed his frozen tears and picked one up to look at it. He caught another as it fell. Then he threw it against the tree trunk with an expression of fierce rage on his face.
She placed a tentative hand on his shoulder, but cried out at how cold he was. He swung around in a panic and bolted away from her, hiding himself deeper in the shadows. She let him be, but she wished she could have asked him why the mirror had upset him so.
She couldn't.
oooo
