Nick had arrived at Blackpaw manor, and he had brought the dagger that was found in their apartment.
"So, that's basically why I'm here. I don't know what this thing is exactly or why Olaf was scared of it." Nick said as he handed the shard like dagger.
"And it's a good thing you did... this is a Black Mirror Dagger." Anna said as she looked over it.
"And that is?" Nick asked.
"Very dangerous." Josephus said directly into Nick's ear. "It can nullify light magic... the same kind your little Spirit Guardian is made of." He said ominously. "In fact, Ms. Blackpaw keeps a dagger just like this one specifically for dealing with rogue Spirit Guardians."
"It's not just that... this IS my dagger!" Anna said as she showed a tag on the hilt. Indicating that it belonged to her and the address to return it to. "But I what I don't understand is how anyone could have gotten it. Look I'll show you." She said as accessed a live feed on her smart phone.
"And this is?" Nick asked, looking at the display that the camera was showing.
"This is the vault where I keep specialized magical weapons. Nothing on par with the Mask of Loki but it never hurts to keep an eye on things. Specifically that's the Black Mirror Dagger that I'm holding in my hand." Anna explained.
"Hmm... I smell chicanery. VERY esoteric chicanery." Nick said with curiosity.
"Sorry, that's actually me. I haven't bothered in apply my anti-rot cologne all month." Josephus said as he inhaled his wing pit. "Oh that is some good rotting flesh!"
"Regardless, there's the BMD, and there's the vault being broken into by brigands-" Anna noted as indeed, large wolf like creatures entered the vault along with a fox like creature. "Nick, come with us." Anna commanded.
Eventually they arrived at the vault in question, and encountered the intruding mammals. "What the?! Those are those Pali'peli thingy's!" Nick said, recognizing the wolf/boar/bat hybrids.
"WE ARE NOT THINGS!" One of the Pali'peli's roared as she and her fellow hybrids fired there laser rifles on Nick, Anna and Josephus.
"Okay, these are obviously not the same ones we encountered during the Battle of Zootopia." Anna said.
"REALLY?! There using future weapons and can talk! Hey guys! That sound at all different from feral savage monsters jacked up on Nighthowlers?!" Nick said sarcastically.
"What the?" The fox like being said. "HOLD YOUR FIRE! MY DAD IS IN THERE!"
"Wait... did one of them say 'my dad'?" Nick said as the firing stopped.
"Don't look at me. I never even looked at a girl before my undeath." Josephus said offended.
"Oh no..." Nick said as he leapt out of cover... and saw Pandora from the future taking the Black Mirror Dagger. "Pancake! What do you think you're doing?!"
"What I have to do daddy... Olaf wasn't from MY original timeline. And if an earlier talk I had with Aunt Anna is any indication. THIS bad boy is the only thing that can return my timeline to normal." Pandora said as she opened up a pair of wormholes. "Alright troops! Back into the you-know-where!" Pandora said as she hopped into a wormhole and the Pali'peli troops into another.
"What... what the heck is that girl doing?" Nick said as he fell to his knees in shock.
"Is Olaf still alive?" Anna asked.
"What? Yes he is but-"
"Then it means that Pandora had a change of heart about killing him. Why else would she have left this in the wall and not in Olaf?" Anna said reassuringly.
"Yeah... but what is she even doing?" Nick asked. "Why does she have Pali'peli? Not even that but TALKING ones? Why was she so bent on getting that dagger and killing her broth...er..." Nick said as something dawned on him. "Wait... Anna, was our Honeymoon in Forest-Vale your idea?"
"No, it was actually Clancy who suggested that, what really convinced me was the mention that your sister and grandparents lived there." Nick gave Anna a disbelieving look. "What? I'm a sucker for mending broken families! I didn't even know Loki was living there before you and Judy told me!"
"So... in the timeline that the Pandora we've known. We never spent our Honeymoon in Forest-Vale... we never met Loki there, and he never gave us Olaf's egg... and come to think of it." Nick surmised. "Clancy called us on that magic smart phone that Loki gave us in the first place. And suggested the name in the first place!"
"Hmm... methinks that the house of Pandora is divided. Clancy keeping Pandora in the dark regarding any changes HE personally makes. But for what reason would he have to lie to his master?" Josephus asked, then a wormhole opened, and out hopped Clancy.
"Because I am trying to keep Pandora from making a monumental mistake!" The AI integrated into a watch like time machine with spider legs said.
"Okay... I assume you two aren't on speaking terms?" Nick said.
"She made a whole new TSDD, and has been using THAT instead of me. So you figure out you dumb fox." Clancy said angrily.
"Yikes! What got into your circuitry?" Nick said, surprised the usually calm AI.
"I'm sorry... but ever since she found the Timeless Void and those alternate universe Pandora's. She just became more and more obsessed with not only her revenge. But remaking the world in her own image! And I've been trying my hardest to avert all of this without her noticing! But when I tried getting Olaf into the equation, she took umbrage at..." Clancy then noticed the confused looks on everyone's faces. "I should start from the beginning, shouldn't I?"
"Well duh." Nick said.
"Of course, please start." Anna said.
"MY MIND IS AN OPEN PASTURE OF NON-SEQUITORS AND DUMB SILLINES. WOULD YOU CARE FOR SOME BLOOD SPIDER TIME-MACHINE?" Josephus wailed.
"Uh... no thank you." Clancy said.
XXXX
Thor and Mimir arrived at Uror, the ancient homeland of the Norns deep within the roots of the World Tree. From here the Norns spun the fates of gods and mortal alike.
"Norns! Mimir of Mimisbrunnr commands an audience with you!" Thor announced as he held up Mimir's head.
"Lad, I'm a font of wisdom and knowledge. Not a trophy to hold aloft!" Mimir said in annoyance. A hooded figure then arose from the Well of Fate. "Ah... where are your sisters?"
"Urd... Verdandi... they were butchered by the minions of the Changer of Wars in the False Ragnarok... I, Skuld. Am all who remains." Skuld said.
"I am sorry I could not do more." Thor said.
"Your worlds ring hallow Ulricson! But you... what brings the wise Mimir to the well of Uror?" Skuld said.
"Well to make a long story short. I have a vision I need you to decipher." Mimir said as he beamed golden beams from his eyes into Skuld. "It was from a mortal bunny... and what little sense I've been able to make of it has left me troubled.
Skuld then fell to her knee's. "This... this is no mere vision... this is a warning. A warning from across time and space! This... this should not be within mortal capabilities!" Skuld said in a panicked voice.
"Calm yourself Norn! What is it a warning of?" Thor commanded.
"I see... a child. The mortal known as Pandora Wilde-Hopps, meeting with a camel I do not know. I see them working on creatures in the shape of mammals. But wrought of refined oil, thunder and Therrum. I see her heart and dreams callously stepped by the treacherous camel... and there lies the seeds that frightened you oh Mimir." Skuld said ominously.
"Okay, but how does that lead to a raging fire monster?" Mimir asked.
"Be silent and I will answer. Pandora's grief... turned to anger, and that anger drove her to make an item that would allow her to travel between today and tomorrow. At first, she merely used it to study what was forgotten by mortal reckoning... but eventually. She turned her attention to bettering her families lots. Saving her uncle from life as a cripple, and serving a vital role in the Battle of Zootopia, allowing the city to quickly avenge the aggression of Titan-Ear and Long-Fang." Skuld rambled.
"Yes we know this, who in Middengard doesn't know about the Battle of Zootopia?" Thor said.
"You've improved marvelously as a story teller by the way. You even made that part in Swift-Hoof's office sound interesting then it should have." Mimir said.
"But she came across the research of the mule, Yorrick Titan-Ear whom mortals called Dr. Mulerson... his techniques of merging blood's, and sought to learn to use it for her own ends. That was when... she stumbled on a place that should not be. A place where neither time nor space holds dominion... and she met others like her." Skuld said.
"What does that even mean?" Thor asked impatiently.
"Either more rabbit/fox hybrids like herself, or people from alternate universes." Mimir said.
"Yes... she found other Pandora's from universes I know not. But all had been struck by the same betrayer... I think. It's rather confusing at this point. But basically ever other Pandora had suffered some manner of betrayal at the hooves of an Elijah Camelski in one form or another. They agreed to a truce. They all would work together to exact a terrible revenge on their universe's Camelski's. And so they turned to making a place where they could properly learn the arts they needed to learn in order to better themselves." Skuld said.
"Then it is a matter of revenge, what care I for the grudge of a mortal?" Thor asked arrogantly.
"Lad... this girl is using time travel, AND is going out of her way to a place even your father and the Norns never even conceived to exist. In short your highness, shut up and leave any questions to me." Mimir said.
"Yes... but this quest for revenge has brought the concern of her companion. Clancy, an intelligence made by mammals to command the devices great power. To prevent her from creating accidental changes to the flow of time... but he, along with every other variant of Clancy sought to keep their masters from drowning in their own vengeance. But they caught on, and we're exiled for their troubles." Skuld said.
"And then what? How does this go?" Mimir asked.
"The Pandora of this reality... Pandora Prime as she is referred to by her compatriots in the Timeless Void. Eventually succeeded, breaking Camelski's empire of coin and Androids, she took back what was hers. And left Camelski dead in the snow... and through her great knowledge. Brought terrible and inglorious war to Earth itself... and would crown herself the Eternal Empress of Mammalkind." Skuld said.
"Then please... tell us how we may keep such a tainted goal from coming to pass." Thor said in a commanding tone.
"That is beyond us... only the mortals already at the center of this affair can solve what is will have hopefully will not have ever happened... BLAST THIS TIME TRAVEL NONSENSE! FATE WAS NOT MEANT FOR MORTALS TO TAMPER! MUCH LESS TO FURTHER COMPLICATE!" Skuld roared in anger as she dove into the Well of Fate.
XXXX
"So you want me, and Judy to go to this 'Timeless Void'. And stop the Pandora's from turning into despotic tyrants?" Nick asked.
"Yes, it's the only way to save Pandora from her own insanity." Clancy said.
"But Judy is-"
"-asleep, yes I know. I can get us to a time when she won't be tired." Clancy said, cutting off Nick.
"Right... how silly of me to forget that you can not only travel through time. But that you can also see pretty much any alternate timeline." Nick said.
"And other universes. Don't forget that... I technically exist everywhere and nowhere at once." Clancy said as he made his way up to Nick wrist.
"But first... got to make a few calls, need to let everyone know that I won't be available for a few days." Nick said.
XXXX
Eventually, Nick and Clancy were back in there apartment. "It's about time!" Davies said in irritation. "I kept forgetting when you'd be back and..." Davies then gave Nick a hug. "Don't EVER try that again."
"Right... is Judy up?" Nick asked as his question was quickly answered by Judy screaming. "Oh please tell me I don't have to raid Middengard for Mimir's head... AGAIN!" Nick said in frustration as Judy left there bedroom.
"No Nick... no." Judy said as she breathed heavily. "It was of when I was assimilated and turned into a robot by MULERSON... it felt like it was happening again!"
"Oh... well I got some good news, and some bad news. The good news is I now know the who, what, when, where, and why. Of that dagger." Nick said anxiously.
"And the bad news?" Judy asked as she got a glass of water.
"The bad news... is better explained after you've had some breakfast I believe." Clancy said. "I'm not trying to dodge the subject... I just think that after what you personally have been through. You need a little time."
"That's nice of you to say Clancy... Nick why is Clancy with you?" Judy asked.
"Food in our faces first! Explanations after!" Nick said anxiously.