Thank you SO much for the few steady reviewers here. It means the world to me! I've put so much into this that it's nice to see people enjoying it:)
discordchick Like i said, things are about to get hairy!
Ms. HawkeyeSo many things are yet to come! who's to say what will happen?
Fury-Natalia Here you go!
I Can Hear the Drums
Chapter 18
Clint threw himself to the floor as the spear pierced through the front glass and lodged in the next room. The outer forcefield for the ship kicked in the minute it felt the breach, and an invisible wrap sealed across the perimeter. At least Clint wouldn't be repeating his near spacewalk he enjoyed on the Gateway only a few months prior. He clambered to his feet, and kicked the ship into a sideways roll before popping on the overhead communications.
"Everyone get up, we're under attack!" He roared.
In the middle of its roll, the Milano took a hard thrust that dropped her through the red haze of space dust. She'd pulled out of hyperspace, and now they were faced with the looming mass of a coming moon. Clint grabbed at the controls to try and stop their breaching the atmosphere, but a second massive hit sent her reeling aft-first into a spin. As they rotated, the strange newcomer came in and out of view. Each passing moment, he edged closer.
He held a hammer like Thor's, only twelve times the size of it. In a flash of reflected light, he held it to his side. In another moment, he had it raised. In the final spin, Clint watched the hammer drop through the expanse of space and fall against the right wing of the Milano. The ship began to topple wing-over-wing. He could hear the sheer of metal ripping away from metal. An atmosphere alarm erupted from the overhead console, but Clint couldn't reach it.
"Barton!" Loki shouted. He'd sailed through the door of their shared stateroom and, seeing the spear bisecting the war room in half, he grabbed it as a handhold.
"I think it's the herald!" Clint replied, bracing himself between one of the jump seats and the floor. "I can't get to the stabilizers!"
Using the spear, Loki followed along its length to grab the doors and hold himself up. He had to shove one foot against the door jamb on one side, and his back against the other, to keep from being tossed right over.
Rocket appeared from the staircase below. "Who's screwing with my ship?!" he demanded.
"Ask the big and ugly outside," Clint replied. From his position he couldn't see the front screen, but Loki could. He watched as the Frost Giant's face turned white, and he began to scramble away from the corridor. He hit the floor opposite of Barton, grabbed a seat belt strap in one hand and braced for impact. Taking his recommendation, Clint hit the deck. Rocket just managed to cross the threshold when he saw it too.
The ship's nose crushed under the impact of a hammer swing. Clint's body slammed back into the jump seat. Rocket, thrown off balance, went sailing for the forward view screen until Clint managed to lean over and threw out a hand to grab his leg.
"Don't lemme go! Don't lemme go!" the raccoon exclaimed.
"Try and reach the stabilizers!"
"What stabilizers?"
The ship tumbled toward the abandoned moon they had stopped beside. The massive creature followed them the entire way down. The left wing tore, metal screamed, and the minute it finally disconnected, the entire cabin lunged left as the ship spun. Clint, Loki, and Rocket ended up on the ceiling, all scrambling to buckle themselves down to whatever they could and, at the same time, try and keep the ship from landing top-first into the ever closing-in ground.
"Hit the side thrusters!" Clint ordered, trying to reach the front panels. By clam shelling them open, he might get a chance to slow them down, even if that left their aft-end open to another attack.
"We don't have those, either!" Rocket said.
"What in Odin's name do you have?!" Loki roared.
Rocket found a switch, threw back its plastic sheet protector, and jammed his heel down to flatten the button out. The ship screeched and bucked forward. The three sailed downward all at once as the nose dropped. In a pig-pile, they braced against the splintering forward glass.
"What did you just do?" Clint whispered. He froze in place, terrified that moving too much in one way or another might cause the glass to drop right out from under them. He gauged they had another ten kilometers before they hit the ground. Much too far for him to survive, despite his ability to seemingly live through the impossible.
"Parachute." Rocket whispered.
"Is that seriously the best this heap can accomplish?" Loki growled.
"Hey, we're slowing down." Rocket replied with a shrug.
Something above them groaned. All eyes turned upward as Groot's head appeared in the corridor. He seemed concerned as he asked, "I aaam Groot?"
"Never happier to see a talking twig! Hey, stretch down here and get us off this thing! Don't just stand there spreading roots!" Rocket told him.
Groot smiled, then his attention changed to the long spear which stuck out of the far wall. His bark-surrounded eyes creaked as he squinted at the peculiar new object. One finger reached out and trepidatiously touched it. The metal pole dislodged, and dropped half an inch down toward the three beings below clustered on the glass.
"Do not touch that! Do you wish to murder us?!" Loki screamed.
"Don't shout, you'll scare him! Groot, you leave that thing alone before I smack you with it!" Rocket admonished the Frost Giant, but didn't lower his own voice.
"Oh my God, I'm in Jurassic Park," Clint whispered to himself, shaking his head. This wasn't going to end well. He had to get off the glass. It continued to splinter. The center hole expanded out as the invisible field peeled away under the massive damage to the ship's hull. Beside him, Rocket felt the Avenger start to move away and, not to be left behind, climbed over Barton for the safety of the shelves around them. Loki, too, began to move.
The glass splintered in half. Smaller spider fractures connected the large ones, and the first few pieces began to fall. Not to be deterred, Groot grabbed the end of spear, yanked it completely free, and displayed his prize to the horrified cries of the men below him.
"NO!" Rocket yelled. "Bad! Bad Groot! Leave it!"
The tree-man's face curled downward as he glanced at the weapon in his hands. Taking their direction, he lifted it up and tossed it across the room and far from dropping to the glass below. Now he smiled, accepting the praise for his good work.
Though not out of the woods by any means, Clint did relax briefly. Until, that is, the herald appeared again. His hammer dropped against the stern. The battered Milano dropped down another forty feet. Groot lost his grip on the corridor and, in a heap, he tumbled downward. All at once, the view glass shattered.
:(:):(:):
Standing in the bridge of an Alfheimr ship, was much different than the constructions of Asgard, Xandar, and Midgard combined. Whereas, on the Gateway, the hints of the Light Elves work existed in the subtle sweeps and curves of every glistening control panel, an Alfheimr ship held no reservations whatsoever. It was like stepping into a glinting throne room in Lakeheed.
Tony's scientific mind exploded.
Natasha stood to the side, watching him spin around the room as if he might go into a seizure. Not many other beings walked onto those Alfheimr vessels. Rinon preferred to keep them in his race's hands, which prevented the deepest secrets of their propulsion from being revealed. Tony considered sneaking onto one, but decided against it after Rinon invited him onto his personal flagship, the Vioya Rose. From the outside looking in, the ship was one of the most technologically advanced creations the galaxy ever witnessed. Its stardust and golden hull, covered in the images of the four running wolves and the opening jaw of Rinon's Faralir, struck fear in anyone hoping to cross it. From the inside, however, Tony met the truth of it all.
"How many elves does it take to move this thing?" He asked.
"Four." Rinon told him. He was sitting in the captain's chair, which was much more of a throne than an actual command post. He reclined against its vertical cushion, and watched with a swell of pride while the two Avengers took in the peculiar sights around them.
"How do you move this thing?" Tony asked, turning toward the throne.
"The three I have employed are Yuh, Awirrae, and Vuehalie. They are metallurgists from the Blanklands. They ask, the ship moves. They think, it is directed. We have others to man the guns if necessary, but thus far it has not been."
"How many are on the ship right now?"
"A crew of fifty elves. An unnecessary amount, but this is our largest ship." Rinon replied.
Natasha perched on the edge of a chair to Rinon's right. Some part of her analyzed the Elf sitting proudly between his two loyal followers. The Sarhorn's words echoed in the privacy of her mind, of the way she might save Clint but only if she could assure his assistance.
The entire bridge was virtually empty. No glittering panels. No control systems. No technicians managing screens of endless information. Nothing.
Rinon had achieved something no being in the galaxy had yet managed to complete. He created a fleet that relatively manned itself. For every one piloted fighter, there were two un-piloted ones. A single Elf had the ability to control all three with such absolute precision that, having two extra pilots, was unnecessary.
The same reality occurred on the Voiya Rose. Rinon himself, as a former king of Alfheimr, could control everything his hand touched, but he deferred his will power to commanding instead, and left the minor ship's piloting to the others from the Blanklands. He knew he didn't have the man power to overwhelm native forces, but what the Elves did have, was a boundless ingenuity. They overcame their weaknesses with the strength of their minds.
"Only an Elf can command a ship. We are not a plentiful race. In fact, we have one of the fewest populations in all the Nine Realms. But these metals are Elven metals, forged by Elven hands. The wood is Elven wood, grown in our own forests. Where the Kree might have hoped to overcome our force, it will not, especially not in Svartalfheim. There is nothing left of that place for them to take advantage of. The rest of my fleet is there already."
A greater shock couldn't have slapped Tony in the face. He stood, stunned, trying to absorb exactly what Rinon meant, but, in the end, failed. "The rest of your fleet? You have half a million ships swarming over Vanaheim now. You sent another thousand on the carriers that Linnor and Logan are on. What do you mean by the rest of your fleet?"
Rinon's face remained impassive. He would make one hell of a poker player if he ever decided to become one. "There are another one million ships currently at the base I formed on Svartalfheim after the destruction of Malekith and the Dark Elves."
If Tony thought nothing more could affect him, he was wrong. That realm was an abandoned waste land. A place so far removed from normal society, that the Nine Realms treated it like a scourge, a black death. None traveled there. Ghost stories spread of the dangers lurking beneath its surface. There was nothing left of consequence to be gleaned in its hills of reddened dirt and shattered cityscapes. When Malekith reawakened from his dark sleep to wreak havoc on Asgard, even he wasn't on the planet at the time. To all the known worlds, it was utterly uninhabitable.
Rinon made a slight motion with his hand for his most loyal companion, Reylano, to step forward. With a gentle nod and sign, he instructed the Elf to explain for him, which he did.
"Despite being the land of exiles, it is still in Elven hands. It was our king - " Reylano paused to correct himself. Rinon may have been king when the orders came down, but he was that Elf no longer. He often struggled under the new title. "Le'lareme decided, in the last year of his reign, to convert its soil to something of use again. A great struggle presented in that time. What to do with the Eyani', the Southlings, that their leader Ge'elaphi raised. Our land struggled under the weight of what must be done. None wished to forever sever them from our lands, as it was the whole right of us to do. Le'lareme did not believe that all of them were beyond saving, not in the same manner of the Dark Elves. Hyalthaley Bygrove made the current agreement between our people and theirs, and took over their governship personally."
Natasha cut a glance toward Tony to see whether her own emotions about the revelation matched his. She'd never been involved in the happenings of Alfheimr beyond what Barton, Tony, and Rogers told her. She'd seen the aftermath of the fight between the two polar halves of Alfheimr in their bruised and scarred bodies.
Many lives, good lives, were destroyed in that fight. For Rinon to choose mercy instead of completely destroying the insurrection, surprised her from a human stand point. Practicality, though, also won out. The Avengers men spoke very little of what they actually saw in that place. She knew the name Bygrove, that it was Haladarrel Bywater's kin's surname, and that the Elf preferred to be known as Doodle. He was somewhat of a hermit, since his reign as regent in the times of the Dark Elves seven thousand years in the past. He'd been the one to order their exile, and lived under that heavy regret since. To understand better what the depth of Rinon's decision meant, she'd have to see what Tony thought.
"That was very cunning of you." Stark said. He'd dropped his own mask of calm, like retreating into his armor, though, currently, he wore none. Suddenly, he fell into a role Natasha knew very well.
He straightened and moved around the room again, as If to admire it. What he really did, was size up that Elf he suddenly felt like he knew nothing at all about. She'd seen him do this a hundred times before. The first of which was on the Heli-carrier when he meant to discover the depths of Director Fury's need to form the Avengers. Only this time, there was no technician playing Galaga. She wouldn't be at all surprised to find him placing a voice transmitter in the room.
Tony made a sweeping hand motion into the air, taking in the expanse of the space. "So what did you offer them? A chance at redemption if they built you this? A chance to live out some life on a dead planet with the promise that one day, maybe, they could return to the home they knew. You speak an awful lot about redemption. Oh wait, you don't really speak at all."
Reylano took a sudden step back at the surprise hostility, and unconsciously swept his hand toward his sword's hilt. Rinon, though, patiently placed his over the pommel.
"What? Don't like what I'm saying? Someone's got to question you, and it looks like there aren't many in the position to do that anymore. This is all buttoned up pretty tight, and I'm not someone who likes secrets. Anyone can tell you that. And it seems to me like you have more secrets than Hitler's diary."
He stopped a few feet in front of Rinon's throne, and gazed down at the Elf. He wanted desperately to see something flicker beneath that alabaster stone. For good or for evil, he had to know whom he could still trust in this universe, and whom he needed to take care of before that looming ball dropped.
"You've got your ships and your men. A base no one knows about. You started this fleet back when it was all happiness and peace. You never left that little green planet when Galactus came first, or Thanos threatened our doorstep. So why now? What changed? Why are you revealing your hand?"
Reylano cut a glance toward his leader. Rinon smoothly stood, removed his hand from Reylano's sword, and faced Stark. He wasn't angry, impressed, or even insulted. He was sad.
"Iron Man, the reason you are here now is because you must see, in order to trust. The Sarhorn knew that of you too. I am not ignorant of those things the World Council thinks of me. I am nearing fourteen hundred years old. If their comments phased me in the least, I should never be allowed charge of the fleet I have."
"Why are you here?" Tony asked once more.
"Because if I did not come, you would not be ready, and all we know would burn to ash." Rinon's face flushed pink when the words exited his mouth. For the first time, real, raw emotion leaked into his voice. Those desperate lavender eyes cut through Tony's distrust with their sincerity. "And everything I love would burn with it. Can you not hear the drums beating in your ears? The hounds of war are snarling at the end of their master's leash. You may think, believe even, that we have six Midgardian years yet to fight that monster that comes. I am here to tell you that you are very, very wrong."
Reylano reached forward and grabbed his leader's shoulder. He squeezed, telling Rinon he'd gone too far and said too much. Rinon knew it too, the moment the emotion entered his voice and he spewed the very fears that forced him to send his ships after Bruce Banner to begin with. He appreciated the man as a scientist, to be sure, though not enough to risk his greatest ships to recover him when only a few direct from Svartalfheim might do.
"What do you mean we don't have six years?" Tony demanded. He stiffened like an Elf might. Natasha slowly got to her feet beside him, sensing the seriousness of what was coming. Their entire lives were defined by that intricate timeline, the walls of clocks, waiting on the Gateway. Everyone in five galaxies was looking to Midgard now, and waiting for the ball to drop. Not having that time, losing even a second, hour, day of it, might destroy many of their plans before they began.
"We must be prepared for everything that comes to us." Reylano said, drawing his leader back. Rinon conceded to his advice, and turned away from the two Avengers. He didn't stop by the throne again. Instead, he headed for the door, waited for it to open, and slipped out before he could be persuaded to reveal more.
"So, is that all the answer we're getting?" Tony asked Reylano, "He drops something like that, and leaves? You know, I'm not just losing Clint in six years to a horrible death I'm working really hard to not let happen, Galactus is coming too."
Tony stepped toward the six and a half foot Elf. It was like staring up at Thor. He'd known Reylano for as long as he'd known Rinon. The two were an inseparable pair. "Look, you know what we're trying to do here, and you aren't deaf. You know that just showing up out of the blue with an armada this big, is going to turn heads. You've weaponized Svartalfheim, fine. It's strategic, and no one will dispute that it's Elven lands. But do you realize what everyone's going to say when the word gets out?"
"Le'lareme knows what it is he hopes to do." Reylano said, willing the measure of conviction into his voice. Tony could sense the hint of doubt, though, sliding beneath the surface. "We must trust him. It is all anyone can do."
What a bone-chilling discovery! What does he know? Can Rinon be trusted? Will Clint and the others go SPLAT before they can be saved? Stay tuned!
Next time: I AM GROOT, Ronin returns, and bleeding spleens
oh please, oh please, can some reviews I get...?