Lukas and Steve went ahead to break a path in the new snow, and Natasha hated both of them with a burning passion because neither of them noticed the temperature. She glared daggers into their backs and tightened her hood, reminding herself she was born in Russia, she was a graduate of the Red Room, and she should be tougher than some 90-year-old from Brooklyn.
Steve laughed at something Lukas said, and she pondered which one she should strangle first. She could leave the bodies here and probably no one would find them for years. It would be a reverse of the comic book story of Captain America finding the Ice Demon in the ice of Arendelle.
She was glad they were friends, and it was good that Steve had kept Lukas company in his insomnia last night. After that, they'd all had a pleasant start to their day. But, hours on, they were far too cheerful as they hiked around in the snow, following Lukas' will-o-wisp feelings about maybe there was something sort of magical thataway.
"Are we getting closer?" she interrupted, not masking her annoyance.
Lukas glanced back over his shoulder, smirking, and mocked, "You mean, are we there yet?" Then he laughed as if that was the funniest thing he'd heard all day.
She was definitely taking him out first. She indulged herself in a fantasy of a quick attack and wrapping her legs and a garrote around his neck. Not that a fight would end up that way, but it was a fun thing to imagine for a little while as they trekked through deeper snow and toward a stand of pines. "Why did I have to come on this make-work mission?"
He was still amused. "You are here to keep us out of trouble, I believe."
"No trouble out here in this white hell," she muttered.
She could not have been more wrong, as trouble found them.
There was no warning, only an angry roar, as the snow itself seemed to rear up and hurl itself at her. Ice pelted her, and she staggered back, reaching for her sidearm in her coat pocket.
More roaring and something massive swatted her so hard she went flying, crashing into a snowbank. Scrambling up, she had her first view of … the thing. It was giant-sized, three meters tall, vaguely human shaped but seemingly made of snow or ice, with big black eyes and a cavernous mouth.
Steve hurled his shield, striking the creature in the head. It didn't seem hurt by the blow, only angered. It roared again, and a huge hand slammed down. Steve threw himself out of the way, and the snow beast followed, digging through the snow for him, as Steve leaped away again.
"So there's no creature?" she called to Lukas. "Just stories about you? Or polar bears? Because I have news for you!"
"All right, I was wrong!" he yelled back, ducking an icy hand that slammed next to him.
Careful of her line of fire, in case the beast wasn't as solid as it looked, she fired her sidearm at it. It staggered, and she saw a hole briefly before it was gone. But the shot drew its attention and she backed away, useless weapon steady in her hands. Drop it and go for her wire, that might work better. If one of the other could distract it, she could get the line around its neck. But if it didn't breathe, that wasn't going to be effective, and she doubted she was strong enough to decapitate it. But Steve or Lukas might be. She let the gun fall and grabbed for her line, waiting for her moment as she retreated again.
"Hey!" Lukas called, and hurled a dagger at its back. It whirled around to go after him. Lukas straightened, holding out his hands. "Halt!" he called in command. His fingertips were aglow with a greenish fire and the creature stopped, held in place by whatever he was doing.
She was about to leap onto its back, when she heard Lukas whisper, "Elsa?" His tone was so different, she halted her motion and circled enough to see that he was looking up at it, his hands up, with wonder and recognition in his face.
The creature's head whipped down, two coal-black eyes fixing on him but now without the earlier rage.
"Destroy it!" Steve cried, but Lukas ignored him, staring up at the creature.
"I feel her power in you. You're Elsa's, you must be," Lukas said, his voice soft. He lowered his hands and moved closer to the creature. She prayed this wasn't going to end badly, as Lukas eased closer. "It's been so long since she went away. You must have been so alone..."
The giant ice monster whimpered, and Natasha realized it understood him, at least at some level.
Lukas extended one empty hand, reaching for the creature. "I didn't know you were here. I would have come," he promised. "I... I am so sorry you've been alone all this time."
It seemed to be working, as the creature looked down at him, but then he howled and a giant icy fist slammed Lukas into a pine tree. The impact echoed and the trunk cracked, as Lukas fell to the ground beneath it. All the snow that had been on the tree branches, fell with a whoosh and buried him.
The monster turned and loped through the trees, tearing off branches as it passed.
Steve was closer to Lukas and rushed over, as a hand emerged from the snow pile. Steve bent to help clear some of the snow, before grabbing Lukas' wrist and bodily pulling him out. "Lukas! You okay?"
On his feet, Lukas shook the snow from his hair. "Fine. You?"
"We're good, but come on, we have to go after it."
Steve started to turn, but Lukas grabbed his shoulder to keep him still. "No. We let it go."
Steve stared at him, brow knitted in confusion. "But why?"
Lukas turned from him, to look in the direction the ice monster had gone. "My daughter created it. It's all I have left of her."
It was plain Steve had no idea what to say; Natasha doubted that he knew the story. "Oh. I'm sorry. Your daughter?"
"Elsa. The Snow Queen of Arendelle," he answered distantly. "Officially I am her ancestor, but she was my daughter. She died in 1823."
Natasha, who'd heard enough to put it together before that, still was struck by hearing it aloud. A historical figure – a fantastical figure of legend, really, "the Snow Queen of Arendelle" – was his daughter, the one he'd nearly cried over at Randolph's house when he'd seen the book. She remembered the images the trolls had shown her of Queen Elsa's funeral and Lukas kneeling at her bier, crumpled in grief.
After a moment's silence, he forced a brief laugh. "It must sound ridiculous to mourn someone dead almost two hundred years."
"No," Steve replied, voice soft with sympathy, and he set a hand on his shoulder. "It doesn't." Then he gave a pained smile. "I'm not exactly in a position to throw stones here, y'know."
Posture relaxing, Lukas glanced at Steve. "I suppose not."
Natasha brushed off the snow caked on her trouser legs with her gloves and stomped closer. "Which leaves the problem of what to do with that... creature. It's still dangerous."
"I... don't know," Lukas answered. "It's alone and feral." His pale eyes sought the more distant mountain peak. "I was not so different once. But I don't know how to help it. I don't have the power to make a companion for it; Elsa was able to create it because of the tesseract. I could take it elsewhere, maybe to Jotunheim where it would have winter permanently, but this is its home. If I did that, I might as well kill it."
The sad hopelessness of his voice touched her. "Perhaps some sort of park?" she asked. "I think this is already protected wilderness, so they could make more of an effort to keep people away for their own safety."
"Its safety, too," Steve said. "I feel like it would be like a modern King Kong, if the public found out." Lukas frowned at him, and Steve abruptly grinned, "Seriously? Do I know a reference you don't?"
"King Kong is a story about a giant ape found on a hidden island and toured around as an attraction," Natasha explained. "But Steve's right; if people find out about the creature, someone might be able to capture it."
"And put it on display," Lukas said, in disgust.
Natasha hesitated before saying, "Or worse. Humans aren't always kind to what's different and magical."
His skin went ashen. "Experiment on it, you mean." She nodded and touched his arm, but he shrugged her off and took a few steps away, looking toward the clouds that hid the higher peaks.
"Go to Arendelle," he abruptly commanded. "I will find you."
"Lukas, no- Wait!" She grabbed for his arm, but it was touching smoke. She felt nothing. She heard snow cracking as if from a footstep and lunged in that direction, but a bright green glow washed across the white field and she knew he was gone.
Swearing in Russian, she turned to meet Steve's gaze.
"Maybe he needs time alone," Steve suggested.
She agreed with a sigh, though she thought his true intent was something else. Lukas would either send the creature away or destroy it to save it from the same thing he'd suffered. She just didn't want him to face that choice alone.
With heavy heart, she turned her feet toward the quinjet. "Come on, Rogers. There's nothing more we can do here."
She set the quinjet down at the military base, almost exactly where it had landed before. She walked out on the tarmac, remembering Sitwell meeting her so they could investigate 'the anomaly' which had turned out to be the Ice Demon. She wondered how much Lukas regretted not killing Ward when he'd had the chance at their first encounter. But at least she'd done her job and kept Lukas from turning against all of SHIELD, despite considerable provocation.
She borrowed a driver to take them into town and returned to the small hotel she'd stayed in previously. When the clerk recognized her, surprised she wasn't on her way back to Russia as she'd claimed, Natasha only had to look at Steve as her 'explanation'. Requesting three separate rooms didn't change the clerk's knowing look and smile as she handed over the keycards.
Later, she and Steve ate dinner down the street from the hotel and were finishing with coffee and whiskey, when the front door opened with the sound of cheerful bells.
Lukas stood in the archway, surveyed the common room and found them in the corner table. He sauntered to them, not a care in the world, dressed only in a green jumper and slacks as if coats were for other people, but his eyes seemed dark and his lips made only a faint attempt at a smile.
"You okay?" Steve asked, after Lukas plopped down in the third chair.
"Fine," he answered with a deliberate shrug.
"How did you get here so soon?" she asked. "You couldn't have walked all that way? Or was it… that other weird path?"
He huffed a chuckle. "No. I ended up not far from a village and I took the train in."
"Oh." She felt oddly deflated that he'd done something so normal. "Well, that's good." Letting the silence hang didn't spur him to volunteer the news, so she prompted, "And the creature?"
"I unmade it," he answered flatly. But his hand trembled as he reached for the last piece of bread still lingering from their dinner.
"No!" Steve gasped. "Why? I thought you wanted to save it."
"I did." Lukas helped himself to her coffee and she let him, figuring he needed it more than she did. "But I can't. No one can. So I made sure it will be no one's entertainment or experiment," he snarled the last word, and she nodded to herself.
"But the park idea-" Baleful eyes met Steve's, and Steve fell silent.
"It was mine to do and I did it," Lukas declared.
There wasn't much they could say to that. Steve didn't approve, that was obvious, but he kept any further objection to himself. She decided she didn't want to appear to disapprove also, so she murmured, "I know. But I wish I could've done it for you."
Steve looked at her sharply, but she ignored him. It was true enough, that she would've done it to spare Lukas from having to do it himself. She'd done worse, for worse reasons.
Lukas shook his head once. "You wouldn't know how. But it was simply a matter of… pulling a thread to let it unravel. It was a magical construct, and Earth is safer without it." He said the words firmly, to convince himself, and only the tremor in his fingers and the shadow in his eyes said otherwise.
Natasha signaled the hostess over, and Lukas ordered brandy instead. When it came he held it under his nose, seeming more interested in the aroma than drinking it.
"So are we finished here?" she asked. "Should we stay in town tomorrow, or go back to New York?"
"Stay," Lukas answered. "I have something to do. And-" His effort to perk up was almost painful to watch as he tried to smile. "I can show Steven the sights."
She worried that it would be too much for him, but since he was volunteering, she agreed. Perhaps now that they were back, he could find some peace.
tbc...