Three days later
Morning was breaking over New York again with no hint of its inhabitants breaking from their routines. Cars roared through the streets as people bustled to and from work and the sidewalks, though not filled to bursting, were far from empty. To an outside observer, the scene taken by itself would have been normal, but it was the weather that was most puzzling of all. Lightning streaked through the sky on occasion with no visible storm clouds, but New York's inhabitants paid it no mind with the knowledge that they had in residency six super-human heroes. One could not, after all, discount the tendencies of a resident thunder god within the city.
In Stark Tower-better known to most as the Avengers Tower-four of the six super hero inhabitants were just beginning to stir. Tony and Bruce, who had worked through the night on a new idea for Tony's suit were still running on the fumes of caffeine when they joined Steve for the breakfast that Sigyn was just finishing making for them. Clint and Natasha were curled up on the couch with their sandwhiches and mugs of coffee, watching the news report on the strange weather.
Thor sat at the table, a little bleary eyed and face still imprinted with the image of his pillow, with his own coffee. He stared blankly at Bruce when the scientist tried to draw him into a conversation and responded with one syllable answers until Sigyn dropped a very large plate of food before him and smiled when he dug in.
Pepper and Jane were engaged in a technical discussion of some sort that looked to be geared towards Thor and Tony by the sidelong glances they were shooting their men and how Tony kept edging away from them. Sigyn almost smiled when he circled around the counter to retrieve yet another cup of coffee. She snagged the handle of the cup from his hand and dumped its contents into the sink when she turned to pick up a fresh knife.
"You've had a full pot of coffee in the last three hours," she said. "Any more and I might assume you're trying to induce a heart attack."
He looked a little affronted, "Hey, I live off this stuff. Its no more dangerous than drinking thirty liters of mountain dew in fifteen minutes."
"For Thor, perhaps, but that is a lot of caffeinated soda for a human of your size and weight to consume in such a short amount of time. My guess would be that you would end up in the hospital getting your stomach pumped," she replied, tipping the sliced meat into a pan to cook. Glancing up, she grinned at the baffled look Tony was giving her and added, "Jarvis has been very helpful in teaching me about your culture and explaining some of the more bizarre phrases that you and yours use to explain things."
Pepper cleared her throat and Tony looked sidelong at his fiancé. "You haven't slept in the last two days, Tony. I'm going to have to agree with her. Eat something and then go to bed or I'll have Jarvis deactivate everything electronic in the Tower until you do."
Clint and Natasha were glaring at him, a subtle warning of what would happen if his habits interrupted their own schedules-specifically their news seeking habits. Steve, however, glanced up at the ceiling and asked, "That wouldn't include light, would it?"
Sigyn burst out laughing at that. "I do believe that Ms. Potts and Jarvis would be so kind as to leave the lights on for us to make our way through the hallways, good Captain," she said without looking up from the pan.
Pepper glanced at Sigyn and the women shared an amused glance. "Only if he sleeps," Pepper said conversationally.
"Well, I suppose if all else fails, I could lace his food with a sedative," Sigyn replied and Thor suddenly took to inspecting his food. Her lips twitched into a real smile as she watched her brother. "No, Thor, I haven't done anything of the sort. The only spell I cast anywhere near food is to detect for poisons." The room went silent at that and every eye turned towards her. She stirred the food in the pan thoughtfully, glancing up at the sudden quiet. Sighing, she explained, "Amora likes to get at her targets using mundane efforts that makes fighting them…simple or unnecessary all together. Fresh food is always the best for consuming because it reduces the number of hands it has passed through and thereby reduces the chances of being poisoned." Clint set aside his coffee and eyed it mistrustfully. Natasha picked it up and switched it for her empty mug.
Darcy looked up from the dishes that she was washing and eyed the sorceress with interest. "You run across anything poisoned, yet?"
"Not yet, but the restaurant that Jarvis ordered food from two weeks ago has been since closed due to…a string of deaths that can be traced back to it," she said, glancing at each of them in turn. A shiver ran through the room.
Tony glanced at Bruce. "Meet you in the lab in three hours?" When the other scientist nodded, he turned to his fiancé and said, "You're the most easily accessible, Pepper. Take one of us with you whenever you leave the Tower, at least until we confront this Amora."
"I can take Natasha with me. If we reinstate her as Natalie Rushman so it won't raise too many questions," Pepper said, pursing her lips and studying the two assassins. "Natasha, Clint, would you be willing to accompany me?"
"As long as there's food," Clint said, half joking.
Natasha punched his shoulder and he only grinned at her sidelong as she sighed and said, "Of course we'll go with you. The 'Natalie Rushman' identity would allow me to stay close to you while Clint does covert surveillance."
Steve looked like he wanted to volunteer, but he knew that his image was too public. Instead, he settled for asking Sigyn, "Is there nothing we can do until she reveals herself?"
She shook her head and transferred the food from the pan to a plate. "If Loki were here, I could coordinate with him and try to track her using the echoes of the spells that she's cast since arriving, but I don't understand that form of magic as well as my husband so I'm in the dark there."
Tony restrained himself from asking the twenty-three questions that popped into his head as he chose his breakfast from the selection before him. "I'll sleep for three hours, no more, then I need to try to work out that detector," he said, eyeing their resident caster.
"No," she said automatically, handing the pan over to Darcy. "We've had this discussion before. I will not give you the means by which to disable a spell caster, no matter how convenient it would be if it came to battle with Amora."
"Be that as it may, it would be-" he began slowly, ordering his argument.
"No," she repeated, swiveling her body to face him. "Would you give me a weapon which I could calibrate specifically to Pepper and trap her in a realm of her worst nightmares made flesh? Knowing that I am married to Loki and that he holds my loyalty first, before all others?"
There was a long silence that stretched between them as Tony tried to think of an argument that he could use to bring her around to his way of thinking, but he always circled back to "No, I wouldn't endanger Pepper like that." For all the weapons and mechanics and wires and electricity he could buy and build, he wouldn't give anyone something that could be used to hurt her in any way. He would, in fact, go out of his way to destroy such an object if it existed…as he had done before.
"No," he said at length. "I wouldn't."
"Then if you, yourself, would not do it: Do not ask it of me," she said, snarling the last few words.
Even Thor was silent after that as the easy atmosphere of their morning evaporated with her show of temper. She turned from them all and picked up the dishes that Darcy was setting into the empty sink to be rinsed. Between the two of them, they had nearly finished the pots and pans when the others began handing over their plates and utensils and filing away to their own days. Pepper lingered at the counter, willing Sigyn to glance at her.
The smaller woman sighed and looked at Tony's fiancé. The scientist had long since departed, his food mostly untouched and probably headed down to the lab. "He doesn't always know when to stop pushing," Pepper said quietly. "So don't hold it against him, is all I ask."
After a pause, Sigyn said, "I'll ask Jarvis to remind Bruce about eating and food in an hour." It was as close to a peace offering as she was willing to get, but Pepper nodded and left with Clint and Natasha.
From the living room, she heard Thor ask Jane, "What is this 'Lion King' you wish to watch?"
Darcy shot an amused glance at Sigyn and chuckled. "She's been dying to introduce Thor to Disney since she met him. I call it childhood on crack and steroids coated with dreams and sugar, but she goes all nostalgic when she sees them."
Sigyn studied Darcy for a long moment before she smiled and said, "I know not what this Disney is, but Jarvis has taken to introducing me to the literature of this planet. I have noticed a lack of credible books on sorcery and spells. Most of the tomes that humanity seems to possess are gibberish to me. Is this another form of childhood on 'crack and steroids?'"
At that, Darcy cheerfully launched into an explanation about modern occult and her opinion about humanity's current affinity for the "supernatural" that had exploded in popularity since the thwarted invasion. The number of cultural references that the younger woman made had Sigyn's head spinning, but she could at least grasp the underlying explanation that Darcy was trying to impress on her. As she was winding down on the explanation and the last of the dishes were finally put away, Sigyn glanced out the window and tilted her head.
From her place in the kitchen, Sigyn had a clear view of the sky when it rapidly darkened and lightning cracked across the sky. Frowning at the flagrant display of power, she crossed the room to stand before the . Lightning cracked again and spiraled around itself. It was a display very much like the times when Thor would practice with Mjolnir, but he was in the same room with her.
Who then?
That was about when Jarvis switched all lights over to red and began sounding a general call to combat readiness, directing them to the roof and appraising them of four intruders. On every screen available, Jarvis gave them a visual of what to expect.
In the background, she heard Jane's exclamation and Darcy's muttered curse. Thor's startled oath had Sigyn turning to look at the T.V. their movie had been playing on. She was met with the sight of three familiar figures. Their armor was bloody, torn, and Hogun was carrying an unconscious Sif while Fandral looked to be barely keeping himself standing.
The blood drained slowly from her face as she said, "Jarvis, they are companions and comrades of Thor and I."
"Until sir has altered my orders, I am to treat all uninvited, external individuals as intruders and follow a specific set of instructions," Jarvis answered, almost unheard over the noise of the alarms. "Sir has already suited up to confront them. Might I suggest that you make for the roof now before he engages them?" She had already torn from the room with Darcy barely turning to look at her as Jarvis' warnings penetrated the sound around them. Thor hesitated over Jane and she had barreled by him and whipped around the corner before he registered that she was gone. On the stairs, she passed Bruce at a sprint as Jarvis said, "Sir is in the vicinity of the intruders."
"Tell him to wait, tell him to wait! He's going to get himself killed! Jarvis, get him out of there!" she shrieked.
"Sir is choosing to ignore my advice at the moment," he replied and she doubled her pace.
The stairs fell away beneath her feet as she flew up them and slammed her shoulder against the door to the roof and burst through. Steve was there, his shield up and poised in defense. Hogun had one arm around Sif, three of his throwing knives poised in his free hand, and his eyes fixed on the Iron Man suit hovering not ten feet from him with the left gauntlet repulsor raised and charging to fire.
"No, no, no! Hogun, stop! Tony, wait!" she screamed, still running, but it was too late.
The knives were released, the repulsor fired, and she knew that no magic she knew could be cast fast enough. She leapt off the edge of the building into the open sky. Behind her, she was dimly aware of Thor's bellowed warning, the Captain's response, and then she caught her goal, body slamming against hard, cold metal an instant before she felt the sting of pain slicing through her flesh. The impact of the knives against her back had had gasping and seeing white pockets of light.
A grunt, an oath, and a slight drop in altitude were the immediate results of her actions. Then, Tony's arms were around her, supporting her as blood dripped down her back. "Are you crazy?!" he hissed at her and she felt his hand sliding to touch one of the blades. "They're-"
"-friends," she gasped, willing herself not to look down. A fall from this height would kill even a near-immortal like herself. Pain throbbed in time with her racing heart, but its sting was faint compared to what had almost happened. "Allies. Long time comrades." She knew she was babbling, but she couldn't stop. "Fellow troublemakers and blame takers. Followers into danger and shield companions. Family where blood fails and-"
"I get it, princess," Tony said, voice unusually thick even distorted as it was through the mask. She felt the world tilt sideways and realized that Tony had landed and that he was gingerly laying her out on her stomach. "Knife thrower, tell me they weren't poisoned?"
There was a moment of silence and then she heard Hogun say, "They were not poisoned with anything that will cripple or kill her."
She just grunted at them. "Just remove them and I can mend the wounds," she told Tony. "Yank them out and the pain will be more bearable in a mom-" she cut herself off with a yelp when Tony did as she had told him and swiftly pulled the third from her shoulder before she could say anything else.
Eyeing the daggers with a keen eye and casting an expressionless look upon Hogun, Tony straightened and said, "I'm confiscating these. You can have them back in a day or so, when we know you aren't trying to kill us."
"It is a poor joke to slaughter those in a realm where we seek shelter," Hogun said and Fandral eyed him.
"Sometimes I wonder about you," the other warrior muttered, looking more ashen than when they had arrived. He turned his gaze to Thor and said, "In light of recent events, Heimdall thought it best to send us to you. As you may have seen, it was a very hasty sending that he had to do and not at all kind to our wounds."
"What has happened?" Thor asked, glancing discreetly at Sigyn, who had shifted herself into a sitting position to cast her spell.
Fandral grimaced. "The Vanir attacked, demanding Fenrir."
Everyone looked at her. Steve had edged and still held his shield at the ready. Bruce, who had since joined them without Hulking out, gave her a searching glance. Tony watched her features harden and twist with disgust and Thor took three steps back.
She barely restrained her temper to a verbal outburst, recognizing that lashing out at her allies would only hurt her. "Those hypocritical, scheming, lying bastards!"she burst out. "First they denounce my son and now they declare war for him. Their parasitic, bitch of a ruler never gave a flying bilgesnipe about him and now she tries to claim him."
Hogun had shifted Sif back into his arms and was still eyeing Sigyn dubiously. "They call him their heir," he said and then flinched back when power sparked around her.
"Perhaps we should move this inside," Tony suggested.
She looked at him, at the expressionless mask that he wore, and felt the anger drain away, leaving her feeling drained. He offered her a hand and she grasped it, starkly reminded that she was not the only one to have suffered in a millennia. The back of her neck heated as she realized how childish her outburst, no matter how justified, must have looked to them. For the moment, she had to put the situation from her mind and allowed Tony to haul her to her feet. "Will you cancel the alarms?"
"Already done," he answered and then his gaze shifted to the three newest Asgardians that Thor was talking quietly and earnestly to. "If you're sure of them, I will incorporate them into the…ah…guest list." There was another pause in which he looked at her before he added, "I seem to have acquired a penchant for collecting odd guests since your arrival." Then, the repulsors fired and he was lifting off into the air before she could form a reply.
She turned to Fandral and slipped her arm under his shoulder and he leaned gratefully against her. Her spell was already weaving itself around him and sinking its healing properties into his very bones by the time that they were inside the stairway and away from the slanting sunlight that covered the roof. Though she knew he was following her, Hogun's steps were silent. Thor's gait, however, was perfectly audiable, as was his one sided conversation with the smaller warrior.