A soldier: his world, changed forever by a Valkyrie who came to him but spared his life, one destined to someday collide with Captain America! Iron Man! Mighty Thor! She Hulk! Hawkeye!
STAN LEE WOULD PRESENTs IF HE COULD: The mighty Avengerz ! (From the Roger Stern days)

"Heart of the Mountain"

THIS Sherpa IS VERY NERVOUS.
When Ruali took this job, he was pretty sure this man known as Creel was a hardened criminal---but the money was good enough, and the implied threat made refusal seem a flirtation with disaster.

When the Frenchman and the savage whose accent was vaguely North American joined the party, Ruali was very sorry indeed that word had spread of his discovery, amidst the ancient rocks, of a relatively new disturbance, an idol as yet unseen, before a temple that seemed both ancient and ominously, immediately clawed from the bowels of the mountain.

When the strange Irish-voiced man with the fierce dark features and his brawling companion came into sight and began to taunt the members of Ruali’s party, with the rising, shrill call of flight in his stomach, Ruali understandably began to fumble through his memory for half-forgotten childhood prayers.
When the Juggernaut and Black Tom come to call, there is little else, and no mercy.

Pg.2
Juggernaut: What do you think those guys are doin’ snoopin’ around this site?
Tom: Alas, it cahn’t be no coincidence, Cain! There’s loot to be had from those strange creatures that holed up here sometime back: a hidden race, they say...

Juggernaut: Deviants, I heard’em called! I can’t say any of it’s crazy, after what I seen...
Tom: Speakin’ of seeing, we may as well not have any competitors...nor witnesses. I’ll channel muh mutant energy through muh sheileigh...

Juggernaut: You’re not just gonna shoot’em in the back are ya?
Tom: Ah! ‘Tis hardly sporting, true enough. It’s on you, then.
Juggernaut: At least give’em a few last seconds to ... (shouting) TURN AROUND!

Creel: Me first!
Juggernaut: Prepare to meet your maker!
(Tom’s blast rings out to consume its target...who stands charged red with its energy.)
Absorbing Man: Surprise, jerkfaces!

ZZAARRKK!

Tom: Faith b’gorrah, Marko, ‘tis the Absorbing Man!
Juggernaut: Hit ain’t gotta last but another minnit! I got something buddy boy kin absorb right here!
(next panel)
Blast away, nothing can save you now!

(One of the figures sheds his coat to reveal a grey hand of stone, which he then presses to his face, transforming his body to appear granite in mass and texture.)
Grey Gargoyle: Mon ami, I have often wondered...

(he touches the Juggernaut, who begins to turn partially to stone)
...how the touch of the Grey Gargoyle might fair against the power of the Juggernaut, for such you surely are...
Juggernaut: Hell did you do to my legs? I can still...!

(the other figure stands revealed as the feral marauder Sabretooth, who quickly shoots up under the Juggernaut’s guard and tips him back off the ledge)
Sabretooth: Why don’t you take a load off over here?

(Juggernaut falls down the side of the mountain, bellowing, as Sabretooth leans over and says for his own benefit:)
All that stress is gonna lead to a crack up, believe me!

Black Tom: Cain! Saints, I cannae reach ye!

Absorbing Man: Lemme give ya a little push-off there, Irish... (zaps Tom’s hold with the absorbed mutant energy)
Hahahaha!

Grey Gargoyle: Hoist by their own petard, it seems.

Sabretooth: Snort! Whatever! But we can yuck it up after we ransack the goodies we came for! Those two are a sure sign the word is out!

Absorbing Man: Believe me, when it comes to this Asgardian stuff, it’s got powers beyond imagining!

Grey Gargoyle: Pity they disposed of our guide.

Sabretooth: Sniff* there’s a passage with wet clay, an opening beyond that boulder. I can hear the wind catching a note off its mouth.

Absorbing Man: Nice work, wolf man! There’s some kinda weird cave paintings inside. My ex-partner Titania disappeared looking for something they whisper is the Ultimate Destroyer, and the last goons to hijack it abandoned this place sometime after that big robot popped up in San Francisco!

Grey Gargoyle: It appears to be some kind of place of worship!

Sabretooth: I dunno what kind of god or demon we’re desecrating, but I don’t smell any watch dogs and I’m ready to ransack this crypt and move on!

Absorbing Man: Keep yer pants on, Creed! I don’t recognize those other markings, but I seen THAT sign in Asgard! We’re just a little palm sweat away from our meal ticket!

viewtopic.php?f=29&t=57911, Calinferno, is where the subplot in this story begins. This story spins out of viewtopic.php?f=29&t=69590&p=1845003#p1845003, the third part of That story. It's still a fun read without it.

If you want to read the rest without waiting, http://ceaseill.blogspot.com/2010/05/ir ... -feat.html has it, art and all, and the blog contains the rest of "Heart." Happy Reading, Lue






P.S. feel free to share, if you enjoy any part of it.

haha!!

Very colorful dialog, man.

(this section's in prose: I wonder if it's simpler to follow?)



Sgt. Steve Holt, now discharged from the National Guard, is camping out in Joshua Tree National Park, as part of his loner tour of the country. At the time, it seemed a way to find himself after the bizarre events he recalls (See Defenders/ TRANZ, “Calinferno” & “Remus Regret..!”) where he and others fought a massive fire in the middle of a super-powered holocaust. Never has he forgotten the Valkyrie, who saved his life the very moment they met, and after the battle, in which he borrowed his tank to fight beside her and return the favor, or at least ram something big and ugly. He’s dreamed of her often since, to the dismaying effect that he feels he will never find anyone to make him forget her. So where is she? Is that why he’s returned to Southern California, where they met? With one foot over into her world, he is uncertain where he should fit it now to an everyday life which seems clearly more strange and illogical!

Speaking of which, the tall, imposing blond dude that rolls up to the campfire on a very nice motorcycle has a brief, friendly chat.

"Beautiful here in Joshua Tree."
"Love camping, sir. Nature’s where I belong."
BLONDE MAN: You’re in the service?
HOLT: Was. Seems we had a few disagreements about some life style issues.

The Blonde Man starts taking off his top. "Things will change, friend. I’m sorry to hear that! Courage and sacrifice are the capacities that make a good soldier. Many other things in one’s civilian life should make no difference."

HOLT: Actually, I was---, um, yeah.
BLONDE MAN: (in silhouette) Well, listen...
(He changes into his Captain America uniform and throws Holt the keys to the motorcycle.)

CAPTAIN AMERICA : Use it to clear out of here, and warn anyone coming this way, there are incredibly dangerous criminals on the loose in this area. The Avengers are containing the situation now. Contact your local authorities for news. Take care.

Meanwhile, the guide Ruali , with his shaggy blond main and tattered mountain gear, tells the crew of villains he is sure this time he has found the entrance to the lair. In truth, Ruali by his thoughts reveals he is more than meets the eye. He knows exactly what was left buried from Asgard: the Destroyer, the All-Father’s robot built to fend off the Celestials. During their last visit, peace was achieved with the powerful star-farers, who are like unto gods themselves, appearing on Earth as thousand foot tall mechanical golems. During the initial, cautious response to their 1000 year return, they repulsed attacks, including that of the Destroyer, who was left “melted into a pool, in a form useless to further mischief...or so we believed, though the ways and wisdom of Omnipotent Odin elude those who watch for but a moment in time! “

“Better be right this time,” threatens Sabretooth. Ruali nods, and crawls into a natural aperture to a cave, keeping in his mind his own counsel.

“The Absorbing Man’s quest is apparently, for his missing love, Titania, who we have learned came to thieve from the wellsprings of the departed Deviant race! If those terrible ones, Sabretooth and Grey Gargoyle, by his side should find the Destroyer ‘ere the Avengers, murder and mayhem should follow! But what of the dread Destroyer itself? By Mjolnir I speed to know these circumstances!”

Below, Holt speeds up the winding road.
(singing to self) “our shadows longer than our souls...”

His mind abandons Captain America’s warning, for it makes no difference; even the danger compels him, as though he must leap empty-handed across some great fear to reconcile his life.


Deep within the twists of the mountain stronghold, Creel laughs and brags about rounding up his own “gang of Avengerz!” as he, mysterious, deadly Creed, and criminal chemist Paul Pierre DuVal, muttering about limestone deposits and “minerals I’ve never seen”, shift through a dusty, dismally-lit shaft, guarded by doors left a shambles and painted with bizarre images. Creel splinters one door with his prison ball and chain, before stomping straight across a crumbling sandstone floor. Creed---Sabretooth---leaps forward in the lead, wishing to regain his sense of physical primacy, his unspoken natural reversion to dominance behaviors.

But several feet in, the floor begins to crumble apart to reveal a shifting bog of quicksand.
Twins follow the criminals’ path, stopping short in the antechamber as they hear hoarse screams. “Well,” says the largest brother, who smells of the sea, “we know one direction to avoid now.” His brother grins, before kneeling in filthy brown khakis and examining the manner of the ritualistic depictions upon the broken doors, while the other grimly notes the strength and freshness of the deformities in the wall. “What can you decipher?”

“Well, aside from never having seen this language until two days ago, I assure you we will find a shaft about seventy-five meters over there to the left.”

“That’s why I handle the sailing, and you handle the spelling!”

“Don’t kid yourself! But shut up, they’ve finally stopped bellowing in there.”

Trapped still in quicksand, the Absorbing Man has thought of changing himself into the same quicksand that surrounds him to avoid suffocating, only to laugh at his ruthless peers thrashing. Sabretooth snarls they must have stillness; at that point the Grey Gargoyle decides to try changing the entire pool of quicksand into granite with the touch of his palm. “Not me, too, ya idiot!” yells Absorbing Man; “lemme shift back ta human!”

“What happened to our guide?” asks Grey Gargoyle.

“That guy never had a chance,” says Sabretooth.

“Might as well keep going,” says Absorbing Man.
Sabretooth climbs out of the now-rubble coughing and sniffing, when he stumbles into an invisible barrier. “More trickery!” he snarls. Absorbing Man, in human form, slams the air in front of them with his ball, which rebounds ineffectually. “Nothing to turn to stone!” says Grey Gargoyle, passing his open palm over the flexible, impermeable “wall” of resistance.

“Perhaps you require a very different sleight of hand!” remarks the suddenly materializing form of Amora, the Enchantress, an Asgardian sorceress of great power, dressed in metallic bands of green braided across a full body stocking and tunic, all green but with subtle variations and black designs. With her long blond hair tucked back from her face by a matching head band, she cuts a slender, ferocious figure, matching the malevolence of Creel and his crew, but with occult knowledge gleaned over a nigh-immortal life span. She explains the simplicity of the ward set before them: it is an invisible tunnel, which can only be found and entered from its end, while they frustrate against its side. The tunnel will transport them all to the other side of the world. “There lies the Deviant hoard you seek,” she says, “but I am skeptical of your realization of the godly mysteries before you!”

“Stop messing with us, Enchantress!” Absorbing Man threatens.

“Concerned, Absorbing Man? Oh, I know your secret rescue mission. In short order, then; pass that way in darkness, where you will find your opening, the key to your heart’s desire, unvoiced to your colleagues. To them shall fall each a stone of surpassing power, stolen and stolen again from a land beyond the walls of Vahalla (*she means the Norn Stones---C). “
“Why would you help anyone?” asks Sabretooth.

“Because such sport suits me. In answer to your mistrust, I offer you another weapon towards your success. By Fafnir’s jaw, I reach into the psychic remnants of oblivion and there find among the sleepless assassins a pawn from those with no present use of their misbegotten lives!” She passes over the Winter Soldier (held in stasis by the Soviet Union after World War II) and Jaw the Pirate (also seen in an unexplained cryogenic chamber) to find the master martial artist named Midnight, a man black of skin and moreso of garb.

“His neck is broken,” remarks Amora, “but I can fix it for a price!” She restores the body of Midnight, “with inspiration from a future form, the Midnight Sun---I predict I shall not be the last to oversee his resurrection!” thus garbing him with a hat, over coat, and gravity-defying disks. She answers they will need a mindless pawn to redeem the prize that waits within; in the meantime, she sends Midnight Sun now to spy outside, “for I sense Thor and his mortal meddlers will be upon us soon, and the prizes within are nonpareil!”

“Why are you doing all this?” asks Sabretooth. “You celebratin’ your birthday? ‘Cause I have some ideas...”
“Time to fight, my filthy warrior,” she says, levitating Sabretooth right out of the cave.

Outside, Holt’s ride on Captain America’s motorcycle screeches to a halt. Dust drifts into the face of the Avenger known as Hawkeye the Marksman.
HAWKEYE: I was dropped off too far away to be ground support, and I would like to take the motorcycle up because it’s an emergency.
HOLT: Captain America told me to use the bike to vacate the area.
“Really?” says Hawkeye. “I think you need to check your compass, buddy. Safety’s that way. Just as well, though; now you can give it to me. Look, (he flips a coin into Holt’s hands) I’ll flip ya for it.”
“Why not.”

“I call it, you flip, that’s fair? Okay...heads!” Sure enough, the quarter lies on heads on Holt’s arm. Hawkeye hops onto the motorcycle and says, “For the record, beat it! Hike elsewhere! Only you can prevent forest fires!”

This last reference particularly grates on Holt’s nerves. But that is nothing compared to his realization that Hawkeye gave him a two headed coin. By now he is too ticked to do anything but to continue stubbornly climbing the mountain, which he realizes consumes his every instinct.


Thor flies over head. Thor’s arc takes him in convergence with Captain America in the middle of Joshua Tree; grey clouds roil in reflection of the wary god’s wake, for he is, of course, Thor, God of Thunder. In those same skies, a co-pilot discusses the warning message to evade the general area cautiously and safely on the continued flight to Charles Lindbergh Field in San Diego.

Inside, a stewardess begins offering beverages in coach class; when she notices, out of the corner of her eye, the little black elderly man has a stump right arm amputated below the elbow. “She’ll get you, okay?” she tells him, nodding to the back, presumably referring to the other stewardess. She tries not to think of how she simply wanted to avoid dealing with the man. At any rate, he smiles and looks out from across his aisle seat on the two-thirds full flight to stare out the window, where the mountains loom beneath the hurtling vessel.

Below, Thor stands amidst recently rising storms, when he decides to calm them. “I must not bring my power over the storm to bear,” he says to himself, “I have created turbulence for an aircraft I sense being touched by their fury. Indeed, a gift of rain ‘twould be a blessing ‘ere this threat has passed. I must prepare myself to enter this stronghold, with the strength of my arm as my sole ally. Perhaps by cunning I may fall upon my foes before they reach the chamber.”

Within, the Absorbing Man, Sabretooth and Grey Gargoyle have been released from the red metallic cylinder crackling with trans-temporal energies.
“That’s some more conveyor belt!” says Absorbing Man.

“It’s impossible to sort my senses,” complains Sabretooth. “I don’t like disorientation, you can’t detect a set-up!”

“Quit gripin’!”

Aboard an Avengers Hover Cycle, Jennifer Walters, a.k.a. the sensational She-Hulk, pops her knuckles, watching the beacons on the first three Avengers to converge, waiting to see if Iron Man has detected the location of the expected villains. “It’s too bad we couldn’t have caught them around the world where they started,” remarks She Hulk.

“If we could’ve gotten everyone there as quickly as Thor signaled” says Iron Man, “we barely had a team able to use Thor’s information to head them off at the pass, as they said when this west was wild!”

“I lived in L.A. too long not to know Hollywood when I hear it,” she returns, “ but he came up with a good way to keep them climbing around guessing. They just happened to have eliminated most of the possibilities by the time he got word to them of a sherpa to guide them to the spot.”

“Glad it worked long enough for us to get here----wait, I’m picking up an impact that’s either a landslide in the making,” says Iron Man,” or Thor’s moved in on them.”

“Iron Man! I’m closing in on the scrap from the northern side in half a minute!” says Captain America over his communicator.

“Looks like you’re round a tenth of a mile from the spot, Hawkeye,” says Iron Man. “See anything?”

“Been riding this hog hell bent for leather,” says Hawkeye, “hardly time to---“

“Bogie, overhead!!” shouts Iron Man, whose radar has spotted Midnight Sun.

Hawkeye is finishing his mumbled sentence: “ look over my shou---whooaa!”

From his gauntlet, Iron Man's repulsor nearly tracks the lithe form, twisting out of reach atop his flying discs. While Iron Man doesn't recognize Midnight Sun as a former pawn of Fu Manchu, he finds the physical skill a nuisance to his plan to quickly knock him out before he can draw another bead on Hawkeye. With the two of them to fill the air with peril, however, Midnight Sun can't attack either of them, and so he speeds into a crevice, almost vanishing before the naked eye, as Hawkeye's last arrow travels in a near-perfect arc to pulverise the stones beside the speeding criminal, who is showered by loose dirt and stones. He plunges within the mountain with Iron Man in hot pursuit.

Sabretooth roars, right in the face of the She Hulk, whose eyebrows arch as though disappointed. She then roars back, and says, "happy?" He sniffs the air, says, "no sweat." She connects much of a powerful punch to his face, saying, "Probably."
He's tantalized by her colossal power. "I've never killed a green babe before," he snarls, smiling.
"Put up or shut up," she says, advancing on him, "you're not stopping me from going into this cave. You don't look the type to surrender."
"But it might be a good idea," says Hawkeye, drawin his arrow. "Just sayin'."

Sabretooth turns and lopes away, full bore, for the crevice that received Midnight Sun.
"Can always finish you off in the dark," he says, darting in. But an arrow flies towards him, with a shaft full of gas that imparts to his steps a drunken lethargy.

"Of course," She Hulk says, "that's the direction we're going, too."
"Es nada, Shulkie," quips Hawkeye; "We'll have this sky-bike you safely parked going before you can say, 'two in the hole!'"
"Think I can withstand the gas cannister," retorts She Hulk, "how bout I use some of that marksman ship you showed me and just pitch you into the cave?"

"That's an X-Men cliche, this is the Avengers," says Hawkeye. "but I'm flattered you'd like to thrust me into..."
"There's a fine line between jokes and sexual harassment, Robin Hood," says She Hulk, righting the Avengers Sky Jet. "if this thing's in running condition, grab a seat on the back, we've got to catch up!"
"CaN i HOLD on?" he asks.
"No."

"Iron Man, this is Captain America; do you read my position?"
"Fixed, Captain. Zooming after this character into a sightless catacomb! I'm not picking up any navigational technology on him, yet he's instinctively cutting a swift path to the heart of the mountain!"
"That's where the strength for an ambush lies. But they don't know I'm almost right on top of them!"
"You ringing a doorbell to get in?"
"I've got a Norse god of thunder with the biggest doorknocker in the business converging with me on this hillside!"
And inside...

Absorbing Man! That android...posed to strike!
He's froze up, sure as you touched him yourself, Gargoyle!
Who is that woman?
TITANIA! Baby, izzat YOU?

She and this machine are at the moment of transfer---of her mind into its body!
Enchantress!!! What's the game, woman?

So you DO care for this girl! I recognize Doom's catspaw from the Beyonder's world...Take her out of the way, at the moment I bring forth a substitute of my choosing, and she is yours.
Holt (thinking) Is this what's drawn me into this place? What can I do against a group of world-beater supervillains? What is the purpose of havi---those crystals! The size of a phone booth...there's someone inside! It's---it's HER!!!The Valkyrie! I can't leave her there---I've got to book it over to her, even all I can do is wish really hard to free her!
(whispering from shadows): Look! Our dad's going for it!
Kinda hope he’s not in the middle of this scrap, ‘less he has powers like Dad where we grew up!”
“This’ll be a different version of Dad, anyway."
"C'mon, dude, we've got to distract the stony grey guy! He's walking up on the huge stones with the lady inside!"
"Is that Mom?"

Absorbing Man:
Waitaminnit, Enchantress! How cum you've already got a patsy on hand for yer switcheroo? I ain't dumb enough to wonder why you have a plan!

I'm doing you a favor, Creel! If you want the wench, remove her from the Destroyer's reach while I bring forth the Norn Stones!

Holt (thinking) Keep talking, I've almost reached you, Blondie...
Shadowed figures (whisper): Dad doesn't see him!
Grey guy! Let's move on him! While the others are talking!!!
Hey! We've got the stones to stop him, right here!
Say what?
Let's rock these boulders onto him!

Gargoyle: Wha?!?

(from shadows) We're not interested in your version of freeze tag, Frenchie!

Enchantress: Something's happening beside my Norn Stones!
Absorbing Man: Somebody rattlin' yer Asgardian jewels? Why don't I step up and touch this robot myself---we'll find out whatever properties it's got when I absorb its...
THOOOM! THOOOOM! THOOOOOM!

Sabretooth: The whole cave is shaking!
Grey Gargoyle: One thing in the universe makes that noise! Quickly, fool, take her before...

And inside...

Absorbing Man! That android...posed to strike!
He's froze up, sure as you touched him yourself, Gargoyle!
Who is that woman?
TITANIA! Baby, izzat YOU?


“She and this machine are at the moment of transfer---of her mind into its body!”

“Enchantress!!! What's the game, woman? “ shouts the Absorbing Man.

So you DO care for this girl! I recognize Doom's catspaw from the Beyonder's world...Take her out of the way, at the moment I bring forth a substitute of my choosing, and she is yours.

Holt (thinking) Is this what's drawn me into this place? What can I do against a group of world-beater supervillains? What is the purpose of havi---those crystals! The size of a phone booth...there's someone inside! It's---it's HER!!!The Valkyrie! I can't leave her there---I've got to book it over to her, even if all I can do is wish really hard to free her!

(whispering from shadows): “ Look! Our dad's going for it!”
“Kinda hope he’s not in the middle of this scrap, ‘less he has powers like Dad where we grew up!”

“This’ll be a different version of Dad, anyway."

"C'mon, dude, we've got to distract the stony grey guy! He's walking up on the huge stones with the lady inside!"

"Is that Mom?"

Absorbing Man:
Waitaminnit, Enchantress! How cum you've already got a patsy on hand for yer switcheroo? I ain't dumb enough to wonder why you have a plan!

I'm doing you a favor, Creel! If you want the wench, remove her from the Destroyer's reach while I bring forth the Norn Stones!

Holt (thinking) Keep talking, I've almost reached you, Blondie...

Shadowed figures (whisper): Dad doesn't see him!
Grey guy! Let's move on him! While the others are talking!!!
Hey! We've got the stones to stop him, right here!
Say what?
Let's rock these boulders onto him!

Gargoyle: Wha?!?

(from shadows) We're not interested in your version of freeze tag, Frenchie!

Enchantress: Something's happening beside my Norn Stones!
Absorbing Man: Somebody rattlin' yer Asgardian jewels? Why don't I step up and touch this robot myself---we'll find out whatever properties it's got when I absorb its...
THOOOM! THOOOOM! THOOOOOM!

Sabretooth: The whole cave is shaking!
Grey Gargoyle: One thing in the universe makes that noise! Quickly, fool, take her before...

Gargoyle: I know you're up there...whoever's dumping these pathetic rocks will soon find themselves a statue of unliving stone!

Holt: Got you, babe! I wish I could just carry you out of ...what the hey? The crystal's shrinking! It's palm-sized!

Enchantress: You grey buffoon, someone's taking the Norn Stones!
Absorbing Man: Don't worry, Titania, 'bout being frozen beside some idol! The Absorbing Man's got the touch!!!

KRAA-KA-DOOOOOM!!
Thor:
Enchantress!! Absorbing Man! Be still!!! Heed the words of Thor, Son of Odin, villanous ones!!!

Iron Man(flying in): Can't top the man's entrance without a few showgirls---but how bout some fire works?

Grey Gargoyle: The mountain side!!!It's ripping open! After all these years, the power of the Thunder God...

Absorbing Man:
At least now I got enough light to split open their heads, with the power in this ro---
Enchantress: NOOO!!!

Captain America: Iron Man! Thor! AVENGERS ASSEMBLE!!!!
Grey Gargoyle: Just one touch, and I’ll...

Cap: Catching my shield is a matter of practice, Gargoyle! (flings shield into Gargoyle’s head) Something tells me you’re not trying out for the Mets.

Thor: The Absorbing Man must NOT come within an arm’s length of yon Destroyer! As God of Thunder do I call the winds to sweep away this doom!

Absorbing Man: Suddenly this whole place is cracking up and flying away! Blast it, Enchantress! He’s picking me up off the ground with a hurricane force!

Iron Man: My force field will keep us both from being swept away, Cap!

Captain America: I don’t know what the Enchantress is doing here, but as soon as we’re clear, she’s got to be stopped next! She’s powerful---unpredictable! And most likely behind this plot!

Iron Man: Hawkeye, She-Hulk! I detect you flying into the antechamber now! Thor’s cooked up

She Hulk: We’re getting long-hair’s summer breeze back here in the cave, Shell head!

Hawkeye: But I think we’ve picked up a hairy hitch-hiker on the way in! I’ll try not to crash this sky-cycle, and we’ll be right there!

Holt: I’m about to be sucked into the storm! They don’t even know I’m here...which is all that’s kept me alive, so far!

Suddenly, as Iron Man deactivates his force field, Midnight Sun glides in on his aero-discs and kicks him into the wall, skimming past. Captain America charges the Enchantress, too quickly for her to put her plan into motion. Titania still stands beside the Destroyer, imprisoned in an eerie glow.

Enchantress: By the dark trolls, Avenger! I’ll have your mortal life for this.

Grey Gargoyle: Our forces cannot be divided thus! Absorbing Man!

Leaping into the air, Gargoyle reaches out for the wind-swept villain. With a touch he turns him to stone, so he falls back to the ground near the frozen Destroyer.

Grey Gargoyle: The nature of his power should allow him to take the stone touch and still remain mobile. Were such a brilliant chemist as I, Paul Duval, to have such ability to absorb energies and substances, I’d be truly unstoppable!

Absorbing Man, changed now to stone on the surface and too heavy to been blown out of the ripped open cavern, struggles quickly to reach the Destroyer, while Sabretooth lands directly onto Iron Man. In the moment it takes for Iron Man to wrest free, Absorbing Man reaches the immobile Destroyer. Desperately, Thor hurls his war hammer Mjolnir into the robot, smashing it over...but not quite far enough out of reach!
As his hammer magically speeds back to the hand of its thrower, Thor cries out to Iron Man:
Quickly! Render yourself and all Avengers invisible!

Iron Man complies, as Midnight Sun comes barreling at Captain America on his aero-discs once more, to deliver a brutal kick. To his chagrin, Hawkeye fires an arrow with a bola tip that engages and swings around Sun’s left leg; the resultant imbalance slams him into the wall, and then the ground, where another arrow hits his right aero disc, releasing a corrosive that causes it to fall off the dazed assassin. The Enchantress sees Creel touch the Destroyer, and as the mind-transfer into the robot occurs, she disappears, saying:

The first thing the Destroyer sees upon its awakening, it will attempt to destroy, without rest! It can’t see meeeee...(fwash!)

Three phantom forms appear before the Destroyer at that instant: one of them declares, “Quickly! We are intangible...let us distract this behemoth!” Sure enough, his initial blast goes straight through their vanishing forms.

Titania is also unfrozen at this moment; dazed she tries to gain her bearings. Grey Gargoyle tells her: “Woman, the Avengers want those stones atop ---there!” he says, pointing. She looks down at her feet and sees: “Crusher? Baby, you came for me! That must mean these other guys are fighting the Avengers!!”
She walks up to the precipice on which the Norn Stones rests and slams into it; “well, anything I can do as a non-favor to those smug hero creeps!” In the resulting pieces slide the twins.

“Dave! This whole thing’s crumbling!”

“I kinda noticed, Nick!”

“Look! Dad’s levitating! He’s gonna make it!”

“It’s that stone he’s holding!”

“Yeah...apparently he believes it’s happening, too.”

Steve Holt, frantically wishing not to be caught in the rock slide, instead finds himself drifting out of their reach. His face bears utter amazement; it is the Norn Stones reacting to his mental command not to slide into the rubble.

Iron Man and She Hulk, with a beam generating cold and a cold blow, knock the disoriented Titania out of commission momentarily.

Iron Man, visible once more, is checking his computers, onboard. “I detected three other life forms in this area for a moment! But whatever technology they’re using is giving off energy configurations like nothing I’ve seen on Earth! Are they a part of this strange chamber? It seems filled with markings and ...wall art?---from some fantastic hidden race...”

Thor’s hammer engages the villains; Sabretooth decides, as Grey Gargoyle falls upon the shattered cavern floor, that a Thunder God is above his pay grade. Instead, he rakes his claws across Captain America’s shield. A quick kick to the villain’s solar plexus backs him off long enough for Captain America to charge him shield-first. As Hawkeye rushes over to check Midnight Sun, the Grey Gargoyle freezes him with his hour-long stone touch.

The Destroyer remains frozen; it has no way to detect the foes it believes it was awakened to destroy!

Thor wonders aloud if the robot will retain the Absorbing Man’s powers, as well. At that moment, however, the Enchantress reappears.

Twins bypass the scene of battle to continue the search, adjusting for space warped by the teleportation tunnel. Should they leave clue, in case Dad is active in this realm? Never leaves Mom’s side in the one where we grew up!

"Kinda hope he’s not in the middle of this scrap, ‘less he has powers like Dad where we grew up!”

“This’ll be a different version of Dad, anyway. Sides, what if we are just as lost?
I’m beginning to suspect we are.

NOW:
When the Enchantress returns to the chamber, she levitates the body of the Absorbing Man close beside the Destroyer. As soon as they are at arms’ length, the mind becomes active again in the criminal, leaving the brutal destruction engine standing, inert.

“My intentions were to use the captured Valkyrie as the means of bringing Destroyer to life! Though I am loathe to leave my nigh-immortal, graceful frame...”

Suddenly, she merges her mind with the Destroyer, who raises its fists in defiance of all life present!

“Beware, Avengers!” shouts Thor. “Yon construct was created by Odin himself to stand as defense against the Celestials! Brute force will not be enough to stop it!”

“I have a plan!” shouts Cap. “But we have to get Gargoyle and the Destroyer lined up in position.”
With a concussive blast from its fingers the Destroyer crushes Thor into the wall; with its other hand, it begins to use magnetism to begin spinning Iron Man beyond his own control.

Captain America leaps to Iron Man’s aid, to steady him, his shield now strapped to his back to free his hands. Just as Iron Man’s gyros begin to orient him, he begins blasting with his boot jets, crunching his fingers down into the ground. The Grey Gargoyle grabs the stone form of Hawkeye and hurls it at the star-spangled Avenger, who rolls forward tucked in a tight ball, springing out at full length to perform a hand stand and kick Sabretooth’s jaw.

Iron Man’s pulse bolts increase with kinetic force as they rush towards the Destroyer; still, the robot advances, haltingly. “Thor? Can you engage the Destroyer for a few seconds? I’m going to try generating an electromagnetic impulse...”

Grimly, Thor takes a blast from the Destroyer, then raises Mjolnir to batter the impossible foe. Captain America asks: “isn’t this creature powerless without the spirit of another within it? If we find the person’s body...”

“It’s the Enchantress, here,” says She Hulk, “but I can’t reach her body! There’s some sort of ward set over it.”

“Then let’s deal with this in a more nuts-and-bolts approach!” declares Iron Man. “EMP active in three...two...” A strange sound emits from his armor, which then collapses. However, the Destroyer continues to advance, unaffected. “That...that should’ve shut down its circuits!” says a frustrated Iron Man. “Reminds me...I really HATE magic!”


Cap evades the Absorbing Man’s ball and chain, thrown like a hammer. His own throw connects with Creel, but unfortunately gives him the properties of Cap’s indestructible shield! This provides him protection when the Destroyer’s pulsing bolts blast away a huge chunk of the cavern. She-Hulk hammers away at him, but he remains unharmed. He then decides to try absorbing some of She-Hulk’s strength, as Titania rises again and crushes a boulder into the back of She-Hulk’s head.
Treacherously, the Grey Gargoyle speedily touches the shield while Cap’s back remains turned. The stone-heavy shield throws off his balance, but Cap delivers a round house kick to Gargoyle’s bread basket.


She Hulk runs up behind Grey Gargoyle, subduing both his arms with a full nelson hold, as a shieldless Captain America narrowly evades more crumbling stone. Thor collides with the Destroyer, battering it with his hammer. At that moment, the small black man with one hand, from the airplane earlier, strides into the chamber, smiling with determination in his eyes.



“Too bad I couldn’t get my hands back on the shield!“ says Absorbing Man, “The energies from that blasted robot are getting to me!” He advances on Iron Man, as eldritch energies crackling from the Destroyer run riot throughout the chamber. The Destroyer trains its power upon Thor, then turns to bat Iron Man. Absorbing Man closes the gap now. “Guess I’ll have to settle for the armored Avenger!”
Absorbing Man touches Iron Man’s armor, and begins to take on its appearance. “Be a pleasure, clobbering ya with your own armor’s power!” His face becomes metallic, with circuitry appearing all over his skin.


Cap assesses the positions of the villains and shouts:

“She Hulk! Throw Grey Gargoyle at Sabretooth, NOW!”

“Have a nice trip, you bad-tempered garden gnome!” she says, as she launches him like an inhuman missile towards Sabretooth. The feral villain snarls and drops on his belly, out of the way. However, to his dismay, the Gargoyle’s touch freezes the Destroyer, stone cold, in its tracks!

“Take care, my friends,” says Thor, “I know not how long this ploy will keep the Destroyer at bay!”

“Who are you?” Iron Man asks the small black man. “In this melee, you could be totaled!” His armor has begun working again after the electromagnetic impulse; he lurches to his feet.

“They call me Nido,” he replies, without glancing backwards. “Just one thing I need to take care of here!”

Punches through his powerful exo-skeleton fail to free Iron Man. Then he stops to think. He gives a cybernetic command as he gestures with open hand over his head and begins to emit sound waves.

When Absorbing Man takes on their properties, he begins to vanish, transmuted into pure sound!
“Noo!” cries out Titania. “What have you done with Crusher?”

His angry scream is the last sign of his presence.

Enchantress knows the immobile Destroyer is of little use. “This grotesque form can be resumed easily enough; yet I draw now into my eternally beauteous body” she thinks, transferring back into the body she’s brought back to within an arm’s length, with but a pass of her hand. Before the Enchantress touches the ground, she levitates, fully possessed of her own consciousness, outside the stone-frozen Destroyer. “How much this pleases me,” she coos, “to have you all now beside me, free of that loathsomely obsessed form!” There is no defensiveness in her posture, effortlessly displaying her most charming self as the remaining Thor, Iron Man, and Captain America approach her from thirty or so yards away.

Having a kick-butt time reading along? 4 parts to go.

“This mus be ThursdaY

She Hulk digs into the stones fallen beside the dazed Grey Gargoyle, who takes several of these to the head. This must be Thursday. I never could get the hang of Thursdays,” she thinks. Determined to reach the person on the other side, she quickly excavates Sgt. Holt out of rubble. She also takes a formidable boulder and throws it at sputtering Midnight Sun, whose damaged aero discs, he assesses, serve little further purpose indeed after Hawkeye’s attack.

In fact, Iron Man still ponders the effectiveness of the cobalt ray treatment in restoring the avenging bowman, when he turns his immediate attention to the gaze of the lithe, unguarded, soft-eyed
Enchantress: What now have you to give me? A girl on her special day?
Thor: What designs have ye on the Destroyer?
Enchantress: I’m quite happy to be free now in my own body. I’m so much more comfortable this way!

Captain America closes his eyes, shrugs and says: Remember what she’s...capable of!!!
“I’ve no special reason to harm you, brave Captain,” she replies, as snake arms of ectoplasmic substance venture into the cavern, seeping like vapors through the dusty aperture that lies beyond Thor’s arched back, flowing past his crimson cape to seek passage where none seems possible.

“You warriors would do well to partake of the wine with me! Even a goddess may some day celebrate, for such is the blessing to one who would enjoy long life, that we may connect the years out of mind with memory.”

“Drinking on the job wouldn’t be too much smarter than fighting the Destroyer!” quips Iron Man.
“I drink of many things, armored hero,” she replies, walking towards him as his boot jets bring him steadily to the ground. “We self-made wizards know like no other the thrill of our plans acting out in time and fortune! Yet is it any wonder we seek release from the brilliance of invention in an equal genius for...animal pleasures?”

The drifting hands reach the other side of the fallen rock pile which shifts, disheveled, before She Hulk’s tremendous strength and speed. Each takes hold of the two Norn Stones

“This is not the conversation I flew in here to have, Enchantress,” replies Iron Man, relaxing to a degree that distresses the alert Steve Rogers.

“Iron Man, you’re not asking enough questions!”

“Truly, there is much about which we might converse!” she says with a playful laugh. “Can you feel me surrender with such a fierce spirit in my presence? The time for helmets and shields is done, fair one. Let slip the cogs of war.”

“There’s...a lot I’d like to let slip,” replies Iron Man, perilously close to removing his helmet.

“As your fellow Avenger, I bid you beware,” mumbles Thor.

“Old friend, there’s no need for anyone here to feel jealous. I see everything this day I want, sitting precious in my hands!”

The man clutching the Norn Stones clings for dear life, dragged across the cave floor.

“How darling, you should hold the hands of my mind,” she says to him, beckoning for effect with her repetitively curling finger. “Never let it be said, Amora has not love enough for all she deems worthy!”

Her eyebrows arch; her cheeks squeeze high and tightly; her eyes dazzle with the essence of desire.

”There’s really no further need for violence, guys,” says Iron Man, positively entranced. The features of the Enchantress soothe, even arouse, those assembled before her. “I propose a very different engagement,” she says coyly, “wherein I conjure sylphs and nature-perfumed wood nymphs---and a broad-shouldered, handsome and fair warrior for you, green one, if you wish to let bygones go by. This is our...special time, no longer burdened by the schemes of the wretches you’ve laid low!” She actually gets her arms around Iron Man’s neck, speaking as she dangles behind him. “Your armored friend ascertains the very different time we might share, and let this violent tableau burn away in the fires of our passions.”


"There's...so much good you could do...with your powers, Enchantress," says Captain America, earnestly.

"If ye wish our friendship," declares Thor, "thou needest turn thy restorative power upon yon fallen archer, for behold! His statue-like being hath born the ravages of battle as serious fractures!"

"Ah, geez, Hawkeye..." says She Hulk, let down at the sight of the seriously damaged stone iteration of the marksman of marvel.

"Tis a simple measure," replies Enchantress, who re-assembles Hawkeye's stone form. While her vaporous hands seek out the Norn Stones, she restores the Avenger, who begins to take on color, flushed of cheek. His uniform, however, remains humbly, yet greatly, shredded. The entire tone of the room turns in Amora's favor---as if it had never left.

The Grey Gargoyle stands, swaying from She Hulk’s attack,
calculating some moment when he might reach an advantage...
and attain the secrets of immortality that have drawn him into conflict
all the days since the accidental discovery of his transforming stone touch.

Only the coughing, ragged man gripping the magically summoned Norn Stones
breaks the strangely tantalizing mood...while Sabretooth, dazed, crouches, scenting another figure,
the man from the plane. He steps carefully into the shadows, laughing to himself.


Before the Norn Stones draw into the flesh and blood hands of the Enchantress, mighty Thor shakes off the ambient hypnosis of the cooing sorceress and takes one in hand.

“There is---life within the stone!”

“N-no kidding,” says the battered and weary Steve Holt, who clutches the other Norn Stone to his chest.

“I guess...if you’re gonna take these, kill me, lady. Least maybe I’ll die a warrior’s death...and this beautiful thing held inside will take me somewhere better.”

“There’s nothing there, my weary friend,” she answers, “save for some heart’s desire therein you see!”

Holt looks the impossibly beautiful woman in the eye, and realizes even HE must glance away to retain resolve. “Maybe...heart’s desires are too crystal perfect for this crummy world...refracted from other worlds we imagine inside us.” He holds the stone up to eye level. “But here’s a flash for ya. I’ve got the stones to do something about it, so too bad for you!”

She stiffens momentarily, but she engages, mystically and conversationally, her inexorable pull. “You know...I have understandings to unlock those desires of which you speak. I will be your passionate tutor...if you’ll only share now what’s coming to me.”

Then the warrior woman---the one who saved him on the most exciting day of his life, and the one of whom he’s dreamed in the bewildering nights since---Valkyrie emerges from the stones. “That he will, wicked one...that he will!!” Adorned in white and blue, regal in her bearing, her golden tresses hide one of her angry, peering, determined eyes, as she draws her sword Dragonfang and affixes the stone to its hilt on one side, and plucks the other from Thor’s hand to repeat on the other.

“My thanks for your concept of me; perhaps the Eye of Odin lies not, and some past life together did we thread; and you,”
she says, turning towards Holt as
the Enchantress begins to gesture with malevolent sparks at her fingertips,
“thank you also, whatever our connection...for the piece of me you have brought forth, as well.”


She turns to the Enchantress, and as everyone snaps out of the mesmerizing tone of the room, she brandishes her blade. “You betrayed me long ago, Amora, and from the shadows of some scheme in recent years did you cast a spell to capture me once more, as you did with the soul crystal of a thousand years past---when you made me your plaything, your disguise, even merging me with the body of lost Barbara Norriss * (Defenders #4, 1973) !”


Now strides the Grey Gargoyle towards the Destroyer, only to be bashed aside by the wary Captain America. “No you don’t, Stoney Face!”

From the shadows, the twins Dave and Nick grab Holt (their father?) and drag him out of the fray, as the Norn-enhanced blade of Valkyrie crashes down upon Amora the Enchantress’ phosphorescently manifested spells. The She Hulk comes quickly to her senses, and says, “Waaiit a minute! May I humbly present for the court a proposition: I owe somebody one SERIOUS birthday spanking!”

“Stand at ready,” says Thor, barring her way slowly, firmly. “This be a matter---by our watchful gaze-- which Brunnhilde herself, methinks, must resolve!”

“At some point,” begins the Valkyrie, “did you bewitch me, during one of my adventures beside and beyond what most call reality. Only of late have I been drawn into the Norn Stones, a situation I ascertained was a trap. Was I there for my own safety, or imprisoned? But patience quickly prevailed once found, and my nothingness became a prism for my consciousness.”


Then did I realize, Amora. ‘Twas YOU who did play me as before, containing my essence without help in a crystal for passage-less eternity. Yet as you know, I have since the day you merged me with Barbara’s body, to make from her lost mind a champion, diminished when opposed to her fellow woman, yet, forever prepared to test her equality with any man living. Yet did her life before seek to smother me with questions, commands and kisses unbidden, born of passions belonging to the mortal woman with whom I became merged. Now, free of her body, returned into my own, I find some enchantment from that life remaining...still able to draw me to you again.”

“Long have we known one another, yes,” replies Amora. “As your friend and master, I bid you---peace now.”

Valkyrie shakes her head, with melancholy, and then glares with firm resolve.

“Of the many things you have been, you must find a new role yet,” she says. Her sword strikes ball lightning sparks that roll throughout the walls and earth of the ripped open heart of the mountain, clashing with shield made visible, force bolts turning aside, friction, scattered gravity and force physically reflect the mesons and anti-matter substances disturbed---redistributed---the bending of reality’s binding ingredients in the creation of their battle.

“Inside the stones did I realize:
This!... Hold on me is not as complete. She relies on a spell she cast, a trap she set, when I was in fact a very different person! So was the body different and so, the body has been free to BE free!

Yet did I bide my time. I will separate our paths in this form, Amora. I have waited to see what notorious thoughts and resolves did require myself as your pawn. When the conception of me was drawn then would I materialize---perhaps by you yourself, when your plans came to fruition. Your will: that my mind play the hand to carry your deadliest toys. Have you ever seen me for myself, even so much as this wounded warrior who did reach for my imprisoned self? See you any, save yourself, for all your vaunted years and charms?

“Stay-Stay back!!!”

The power of the Norn Stones, which of late were her jail, unite with the will that yet remained free...for she has come to know her immortal self, who it is her nature to be...
And by that intention, does she break free.

Now, the Enchantress, her hand over her pained face, wounded that none raise a hand to her aid in all the universe, sounds refreshed in the bite of a moment, as she disappears from the realm of sounds, smells, and the wide realms of touch.
“I sever ties to you, though never would I want to do
So but I must let you go
It’s with pain, constraint, and necessity, you know.
For our own good, sorry to be misunderstood
The energy level all wrong to let things keep moving along
In such an unhealthy way you’ll drain me dry if we stay
So we give the energy to our arts, free to live our stolen hearts.”

With those words inspired by the ghost walk with Marc Kane into the place wherein the hidden Enchantress had set this game into play, assembling her as a piece, now does the pawn claim her own stakes and decisions, removed from this weakness for the magic of this one she’d called friend, in the bitter days first when Valkyries no longer chose the human slain.

The Celestials of the Third Host, all thousand feet high manifestations of unfathomable superhumans, had bargained to remove the gods from the matters of men, a thousand years before; the Destroyer intended as her next prison had been made to face the danger of their return. So have events turned now, the assertion of her being---in a world greater, mysterious outer mechanisms forever change.

And with these words does the energy to destroy all herein described begin a new life in the foundation of the cavern.

The trees...the moss...the light from the opened heart of the mountain...years of tender care, it seems, brings a small garden...and from that, now comes a semi-circle of trees.


Twins have safely come to take their Dad out of the fight once he was now out of fight himself. In the shadows of the Deviant catacombs, the hieroglyphs and hidden machines hinting at marvels by the greatly mutated line of Man created by the Celestials’ machination upon the visit of the Second Host. Now do green shrubs and the flora awaiting its entrance now into Nature and its fauna.

Stones affixed to the hilt of Dragonfang now become the Valkyrie’s to bear away to Asgard, as befits the life beyond circulation in the lives of earth’s super-heroes, its champion now returned to a place of impossibilities that would seem madness outside the daydreams of humanity.


Grey Gargoyle seeks to acquire its secret of immortality; that guides him to the only proven totem of immeasurable power available, the Destroyer figure. But She Hulk has now figured out how useful a projectile might be in disadvantaging the Grey Gargoyle. She takes the stone form of Cap’s shield and hurls it with vigor into the villain. Cheerfully, Cap catches it on the rebound, fruitfully transmutated back to its reliable, one-of-a-kind allow form. “You trying out for these stars and stripes?” chuckles Cap to She Hulk. “Your head wings’ll never go with this cut! Besides, you want people to think I’m just a female knock-off of some well-known male super hero?“

“Nice shot!” cheers Hawkeye, complete with ripped up costume.

“Nice suit!” she quips.

“What are you doing?” growls Sabretooth to the quite normal seeming older gentleman with one hand, strolling up to the Destroyer. He disregards the mutant. With the arm that now no longer seems to have a hand attached does he reach to the cosmic goliath, and without touching, the air seems to part like a liquid before the construct, which in fewer blinks of the eye than it took to read this, the Destroyer is now a formless pool lying at his feet: a pond of indescribable substance, and indestructible matter.

Captain America stands before this enormously powerful, yet subtly contained, personage, his face filled with wonder. His heart sets aside fear...but no question comes to mind.

“Nido,” says the man. “That’s me.”
“You...reached out...”

“Ah, with my old stump, without the hand I lost in a tow truck winch, at the end of my younger days. I was free to be a hoodlum all I could, since there was not much else waiting in life those times. Right now, all I really want’s to catch up with my plane to San Diego! Nice this time of year...”
As Thor takes note: Sabretooth abandons the fight. “For what wait thou, beastlike man?”

“Thought I might see something I like,” he replies, casually turning his back now. “See I’m mostly busy with saving my own SKIN! Breaking fangs on wrist of a thunder god has NOTHING to add to survival!”
By the time Sabretooth clears the crevice into which he leaps, Thor’s hammer hurtles close behind, to end in dusty shatterings of plans.

“Yet do men not realize, I seek not to take lives of mortal men,” says Thor, as Mjolnir flies back to its thrower’s hand. “Though in battle times oft have I seen one so insanely unafraid of senseless savagery yet respect the sheer presence of authorial force! Still should I plunge within the darkness...and...nothing! I hover, having plunged into the shattered ground, yet to no avail, while still are matters else unresolved!”
Sunday morning

As Thor turns back, Sabretooth holds his breath deep in shadows. Here, however, he turns towards a pair of red eyes, and a metallic, tall figure with a presence even Creed would call sinister.


“I have need of one such as you,” says the figure. “Hold still a moment...I collect you for my marauding band of cloned creations...and such as you shall serve well...glad am I to have continued to parallel the path of the Enchantress in emergent scheming with the extra-dimensional prime movers...” He holds Sabretooth in stasis, surrounded by crackling crimson. The light absorbing darks dotting the aura announce the coming of absconding oblivion.


“Triplets”: that is the rhythmic word attracting the attention of the twins to a place in the air otherwise unfilled, they touch an experience with their minds amidst the corridors of secrets from the offshoot civilization. “Brown...and on either, side, white, then black,” says Dave.

“I see it too,” replies Nick. “Those layers of sound bending, then falling in cadence, place something like communication straight into our... wait, we know you! But you’re so young!”

“Then a great team has reunited, in a way,” say the voices; which one exactly speaks, it is from one perceived auditorium of the pictured mental self, a mystery zone.


“We actually just got an energy boost from elsewhere in time and space that got us this close; we were attracted to the magic of the Valkyrie. We are travelling backwards in time, before she thus became imprisoned..travelling back to the time when the spell connected, from an era containing plots of yet another dimension. *”

(*See “Free of This Fallen World!” and “Calinferno!” and “Remus Sharptooth Regrets, or Spell of the Wolf”, the Defenders/ Tranz trilogy on these blogs..not to mention the giant-sized Fantastic Four story. It chronologically falls in between those sagas and this one! Yes, really!)

“Sense Stones,” thinks Iron Man.

Read outs consistent; quantum parameters heuristically recorded; pattern unknown.
Triplets sense Iron Man. But he tries, in addition to his many computations, to find some kind of non-algorithmic, original thought...seeking in sensation he knows as an arbitrary induction, to unite with the unknown, some other way...and so stands in the presence of enigmas, aware simply they yet remain beyond his rationales.


So long as you don’t loot or disturb the Deviant tech...IF you’re not just some side-effect of one of those hidden machines...I just want to remain here a minute longer....even if I can’t understand, I’m just...so curious.
“Nido!” they exclaim, when the humble dark skinned man’s twinkling eye belies instant knowledge of themselves profoundly beneath their own understandings.


“Dangard stands witness,” he says warmly. Then he turns to Steve Holt.
“A moment, my friend.”

Triplets, given energy by Sun Strike, realize this version of the father of the twins is not the one native to the reality where they forged their bond with differently named twin sons. However, their pathway back in time towards their parents, thanks to the spell attempting to bind Valkyrie, glows brightly, twinkling in a type of void beyond hyperspace, connecting subtly with their one connection to the mysterious time travelers who, with their mother, gave them birth.

“We’ve been trying to regroup with Mom and Dad,” explains Nick; “Dave and I got separated, too, but we found our way to this reality inside some transport device in this mountain!”

Valkyrie holds the Norn Stones forth to them... a legacy from her capitivity, the jewels won by the bravery of their father-in-this-reality. “Twins: a knowing is mine, I must share. Take these stones; they are from another reality stolen. Take them with you, and when the feeling directs, when the knowledge comes, you will return them to the Norn Queen. From Karnilla’s magical presence, you will find yourself thereafter back in the world upon which your parents are incarnated three hundred years away...and from there lies the path to the children that began this journey, from a different turn in Mysti Hazel’s Garden...perhaps a ride on an Iwangosowhers, asking directions from I Don’t Know...”


“Are you...Mom?”

“No,” but we are of the same spirit, born of the continuing spell that make us each to ride the skies of Asgard, the same purpose that made us to gather fallen heroes. Perhaps now may we stand by their side, and poise our strength against sadness and helplessness, to prolong the lives of heroes.”


“Follow your own journeys into mystery. Return to your childhood. Connect with your Source. You will find the means of contacting her again. Return to where she sent you to play.” They pass down a hallway in gratitude...and then does their adventure graduate some new level as yet known in the clues yet shared widely...


And now her gaze meets his. And finally he understands. Profoundly. He is alone, after all. Yet one need not take it that way...he watches her as they walk into the forest conjured in the aftermath of her victory, expending the immediate wishes upon which the Norn Stones played.


She is, after all, a creature of Asgard. So then does her walk take her into the same woods...yet her part in his path becomes a feeling held secret and dear...and her reality again reaches across the cosmos, to dwell beyond faith.

Thor’s rain shower is gentle this time, cleansing, cooling the laser-riven earth. His thoughts turn to stories of a Wanderer, told before his own birth...the greatest magician, truly, for he hung the nine days to gain the runes, and even gave an eye to Wisdom. Though his guises were many, Thor feels certain: the hand of his All Father has again intervened.

Holt awakens, gathering his pack, walking the path from nowhere to the highway.

You will find her, the man had said, extending an arm without a hand as though to shake his own. With that, he vanished as one may have never been.

And who can say what months pass...


Until one day...


He again beholds one he might wish to love in every way.


In her he sees more magic than he ever dared to hold. He watches her hair, unbidden, her smile, and scrutinizes her serious looks in between, her nervousness here in the same grocery store he labors to make his bills, to share a suite with friends and get together a life to replace the lonely roads.

He watches her bend over. He knows he’s staring. And yet her smile from the start has shaken him in a way only the greatest dangers have.

He continues bagging the accumulated line of groceries.
“Now that’s what I would call a nice end.”

Battle with the Destroyer!!

Do I detect a little similarity to Ryza Dawn here?

You do; she's the MK ' 10 (for 'Marc Kane') in the pic. Good eye, Ross!