Lawrence Street
Loki was walking purposefully twelve miles east.
Just then, Loki heard a car horn. He turned to the open door.
Across the street, Kurisuta called to him from the Focus.
"You still want a lift?" Kurisuta said.
Lawrence Library
It was story time in the library, as a librarian read a book -"The Secret History of Giants" - to a group of kids.
"And though they're large, giants can be quiet. You have to listen carefully for the sound of their footsteps - because they may be closer than you think." The librarian said.
Nearby, Selvig sat at a computer terminal, finishing up his e-mail. Beside him, a kid flipped through a book with interest. The Librarian stopped mid-story and calls to the kid pleasantly.
"Joshua, come sit down. It's story time." The librarian said.
The kid closes his book and joins the others. Selvig looked over, noticed the title of the book the Kid was reading -"Myths and Legends from around the World."
He picked it up, flips through it, stopped at the section on Scandinavian Mythology. It was a picture of a rainbow bridge coming down from Asgard to earth. Asgardians walked upon it, among them Odin, Loki, and Thor, who wielded Mjolnir. On the ground below them, a group of Vikings kneeled reverently.
He eyed the illustration, pondering.
Cornfields
Kurisuta's Focus cut off the road, headed through the cornfields. Storm clouds roll in over the sky.
Kurisuta drove, pumped with adrenaline, nervous and excited, as Loki sat beside her, smirking ever so slightly.
"We're going to stick it to them!" Kurisuta said. "I never get to get real justice. Too much personal gain crap mucking it up."
Loki looked amused. "Personal Gain? As in the Wiccan Rede?"
"You know it?" Kurisuta asked.
"It is one of the things that I remember," Loki said.
"They stole from my father," Kurisuta said. "I have to get back his research."
"You really care for that man, don't you?" Loki said.
"Yes I do," Kurisuta said. "I'm sure you have a family too. Someone out there looking for you."
She looked at him, saw him staring at her. She was lost in his gaze, distracted, when the Focus lurched. She quickly turned her eyes forward, regained control of the car.
"Sorry." Kurisuta said.
She glanced back at him. He's confident, determined.
"Who are you? Really?" Kurisuta said.
"You'll see soon enough." Loki said.
"You promised me answers." Kurisuta said.
Loki looked at her, charmed by her persistence.
"What your father seeks - it's a bridge." Loki said.
"A bridge? Like an Einstein-Rosen Bridge?" Kurisuta asked.
"More like a rainbow bridge." Loki said. "And that is all that I remember."
Shield Base Over Lone Star Lake
Now set up around the crater - vehicles, trailers, barricades. Armed guards manned a gate in the razor wire fence that ran fifty yards from the crater's edge, enclosing the complex.
Clear, plastic access tubes with junction boxes lead to a translucent cube structure erected in the middle of the frozen lake.
Through the glass walls of the base's command trailer, Coulson was directing technicians, busy at work.
Within the cube structure itself, a team of SHIELD scientists worked with high-tech machinery, analyzing the object at the center of it all - Mjolnir.
Kurisuta and Loki crawled to the edge of the ridge, looked through binoculars, saw the impressive SHIELD base.
"That isn't a satellite crash. They would have hauled the wreckage away, not built a city around it." Kurisuta said.
Loki shrugged out of his jacket and handed it to her.
"You're going to need this." Loki said.
"Why?-" Kurisuta asked.
The big fluffy white clouds turned dark and it began to snow in June. She stared at him intently and took his jacket.
"Stay here. Once I have Excalibur, I will return what they stole from your father." Loki said.
"You wish!" Kurisuta said. "I brought you this far. I'm coming with you."
Xxx
A needle spiked on a handheld sensor device. The technician holding it looked over at the sword at the bottom of the lake. Excalibur began to give off a subtle glow. The snow falling turned to ice and began swirling around the center of the lake.
A younger SHIELD agent, a techie in a headset, monitored security. Agent Sitwell, humorless, just this side of junior, looks on, none-too-pleased.
The Techie hiked a thumb at another monitor, squelching with static.
"Tech's barely working as it is, with all the interference that thing's giving off." The Techie said.
He gestured towards the sword. He checked a computer.
"Hey, we've got a commercial aircraft coming in right over us, Southwest Airlines Flight 5434." The Techie said.
"Reroute it, like all the others." Sitwell said.
"Right. Can I get the passengers some free drinks for the trouble?" The techie said.
Sitwell glared at him.
"It'd be a nice gesture." The Techie said.
The Techie typed into the computer, when he noticed something on another screen, held up a hand.
"Hold a sec... we got something outside the fence, west side..." The techie said.
He pointed at the screen. Through the haze, it showed a thermal image huddled beside the fence.
"DeLancey, Jackson - check it out." Sitwell said.
A pair of SHIELD agents took off in a jeep to investigate.
Sitwell looked out the window, something strange caught his attention. In the window's reflection a glow was coming from the sword containment area.
The jeep pulled up as the Agents scanned the fence with a flashlight, saw nothing unusual.
"Looks like we're good here. Must have been another coyote." Jackson said.
Just then, the Agents notice a section of the fence had been burned and melted, leaving a gap.
Before they could call it in, they saw a man and woman standing outside Jackson's side of the jeep. DeLancey looked over, noticed.
"Jackson?" DeLancey said.
The Agents reached for their weapons. Kurisuta touched both men on the chest and they fell to the ground, unconscious
Sitwell talked into his radio, starting to look worried.
"DeLancey, Jackson - report." Sitwell said.
Loki and Kurisuta, now wearing SHIELD rain slickers, made their way across the base.
Another SHIELD agent approached the jeep, spotted the unconscious DeLancey and Jackson. He quickly called into his radio.
"Agents down! We've got a perimeter breach!" The agent said.
Xxx
The security monitors squelched with static and interference.
Sitwell holds his PDA - even it was on the fritz. Sitwell and the Techie watched the monitors warily.
On the monitor showing the sword containment area, Excalibur starts to glow with energy beneath the frozen lake.
"Get Coulson." Sitwell said to the Techie.
Sitwell punched an alarm.
As Loki made his way towards the crater, an alarm sounded and security lights exploded to life.
Xxx
Coulson emerged from the SHIELD command trailer and marched across the mud, radio to his ear. He looked out across the lit up site uneasily.
Xxx
A SHIELD guard moves through the base, rifle in hand. From the shadows behind a trailer, a figure looked out at him.
As the Guard raised his radio to check in, Kurisuta quickly rushes towards him and tapped him on the chest. He fell to the ground.
Loki noticed the AR-15 rifle lying on the ground beside the fallen Guard. He stared down at the weapon quizzically. As more guards approached, Loki grabbed Kurisuta by the waist and took cover in the shadows of the trailer. The Guards passed by.
Loki and Kurisuta peered around the corner, saw the well-guarded main entrance tube to the center of the lake.
A bright light suddenly illuminates their faces. He looked to saw an ATV moving across the site, shining its spotlight right on him.
Loki and Kurisuta saw that the ATV driver had spotted them. The driver raised his radio to report. Kurisuta knocked him out in the same way as the others.
The ATV roared out of control past the Guards near the tube entrance. The Guards noticed and chase after it.
Loki and Kurisuta emerged from the shadows, watched the Guards abandoning the site entrance.
The vehicle careened over the edge of the lake and headed straight for one of the plastic tunnels. The Technicians inside scatter as the ATV crashed into it, tearing into the tunnel, sending sparks everywhere.
The ATV finally came to a stop, the tunnel collapsing around it and the Driver. SHIELD agents rushed in behind to help.
Coulson climbs to the edge of the lake as the sleet began to get worse. He eyed the damage of the ATV crash.
He was not pleased. The sleet blew into a snowstorm.
As SHIELD Agents pull the ATV driver from the wreckage, Loki and Kurisuta raced towards the unguarded entrance to the tunnels and headed inside.
Loki and Kurisuta raced up the entrance ramp. Before them, two guards round the corner.
Kurisuta knocked out the first Guard, then the second. They hurried around the corner, when more guards come up a ladder ahead. Kurisuta knocked out the closest Guard, sending him tumbling backwards, toppling the others on the ladder behind him.
Loki took off running, Kurisuta behind him, as the Guards regrouped and gave chase. Loki spotted the glow of Excalibur in the central cube, through the translucent walls of the tunnels. They hurried through to tunnels to find a way towards it.
Coulson stood on the edge of the lake, barking out orders, as the Guards in the tunnel rush to cut off Loki and Kurisuta.
Coulson activated his radio. "I want eyes up high. With a gun. Now!"
A sniper, dressed in black tactical gear and high-tech nightvision equipment, picked up a rifle, slung it over his shoulder and headed out.
His name was Clint Barton
Ice spread around the camp.
Barton approached a crane bucket. He leapt in, and the bucket lifts into the air.
Through the translucent plastic, Loki and Kurisuta raced through the tubing.
As Loki and Kurisuta raced through the tunnel, a guard ran right at Kurisuta,
on a collision course. Kurisuta took him out, then turned to see more agents coming towards her.
Loki picked up the fallen Guard, then threw him into the approaching Agents, scattering them.
Loki turned around, ran back the way he came. The Agents gave chase.
Coulson watched the commotion in the tunnel complex. He headed off for the command trailer to enter the tunnels.
The crane basket ascended into the high winds as Barton readied his sniper rifle.
Loki and Kurisuta were inside the complex, heading down a ladder from a junction box, with other figures converging on them.
Coulson entered the tunnels through the command trailer. He called on his radio.
"Barton. Talk to me." Coulson said.
The crane holding Barton arced out over the structure. Barton took aim.
"Two shots, two kills, sir. Just give the word." Barton said.
Overlooking the complex. It was a clear field of vision, nowhere to hide. A digital read-out gave information on the distance to the target. He locked in on Loki and Kurisuta, who were inside the plastic tubing, emerging from the junction box and heading towards the cube structure.
"Hello, handsome." Barton said.
Loki raced through the tunnel, came across a wall of agents. Kurisuta knocked them all out—
whatever it took to keep moving.
As Kurisuta took down the last Agent, Loki saw the last junction box and the entrance to the cube structure up ahead.
He raced towards it. He could actually see Excalibur at the bottom of the lake, when BAM!
Kurisuta threw a fireball in the center of the lake, peeling off her jacket and down to her tank top and shorts. She dove into the ice cold lake, and swam to the bottom, before Loki could stop her. She gripped the sword, and instantly, blue and black frostbite skittered up her arm.
She gasped her breath, choking on icy water and trying to swim up but the sword pulled her down.
Loki caught his breath, terrified of this woman's death, knowing who she was to him, knowing he could not let her die. Loki removed the SHIELD rain slicker and the shirt she had loaned him, unsure if ice would damage his mortal form. Then—he dove in.
As Loki dove in after Kurisuta, Excalibur started to glow brighter, green magic skittering across the scabbard and hilt. The green magic seemed to reach out to him. Coulson noticed, his interest piqued.
Above the open ceiling of the structure, Barton's crane bucket came into view.
Wind and rain whipped around Barton as he stared into his rifle site, locked on the back of Loki's head - his finger on the trigger.
Loki swam down and found Kurisuta. He gently freed her blue knuckled grasp from the hilt and reached out to take the sword from her.
Coulson watched from above. An armed agent approached behind him. He motioned for them to hold their positions, then radioed Barton.
"Barton..." Coulson said.
Barton stood ready to take Loki down. His finger started to squeeze the trigger.
"...hold your fire." Coulson said.
Barton released the trigger, pulled up.
Coulson watched Loki with anticipation as Loki wrapped his hand around the sword's hilt. He lifted the sword, his other arm around Kurisuta's waist as he brought her to the surface. Her body was very pale, shaking and much too cold.
Loki dropped Excalibur next to them as he began CPR on her still cold body. As he proceeded, the sword began to glow with green magic, and the magic spread to Loki. The magic then poured into Kurisuta, her body warming and jerking slightly and then she sat up.
Coulson looked on, excited.
SHIELD agents moved in, guns trained on Kurisuta and Loki, surrounding him. Coulson activates his radio.
"Ground units, move in. Show's over." Coulson said.
Kurisuta moved to shimmer them out of there. Loki put a hand on her shoulder.
"Don't," Loki said. "I want to see what these men are about.
Guards approached Loki and Kurisuta, capturing them.
Heimdall's Observatory
Heimdall stood at his post, watching the scene. He brightened, proud of Loki's decision.