Chapter 1: Fair Game
Midgard (Earth) Home of The Avengers
"Ladies and gentlemen my name is Maria Hill and I am Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Now that we've gotten the niceties out of the way let me cut right to the chase. Three men were found nailed to the wall outside our headquarters just a couple of days ago in what can only be described as a crucifixion. Those three men were known as Dr. Elliot Franklin, Henry Camp and Brian Calusky otherwise known as Thunderball, Bulldozer and Piledriver of the Wrecking Crew." The man responsible for these atrocities claims to be a god and is a part of what you know as the Avengers a group that has deceived us by claiming to protect the world when really it was harboring monsters like him.
Well I say enough is enough if this man wants to decide who lives and who dies then so can we and earth's mightiest heroes won't tell us which is why I am sending this message out to every corner of earth bring me Thor, the God of Thunder dead or alive!"
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Asgard, Home of Thor
Asgard will fall, those were the three words the woman dressed in a brown cloak recited to herself as she pulled her hood down over her head trying desperately to conceal her long dark hair and to remain unseen. She moved cautiously through the crowds as she made her way towards her seat in the local Asgardian bar. The last thing she wanted was to make a scene. But like most things in Asgard, things are far from quiet.
"a drink my lady?" the bartender rhetorically asked as he began to pour out some of Asgard's finest ale, the woman could tell by his crooked smile he was trying his best to ignore the blood spattered on her face.
The woman simply nodded as she glanced down at the scar on her hand and her mind drifted back towards Odin's throne room, she was a warrior but she had never witnessed anything like this.
KRRRSHHH
The woman snapped out of her daze to notice a familiar man with a yellow goatee bent over broken shards of glass as a brute casually glazed his axe down down the back of him. The man with the goatee seemed to be smirking for whatever delusional reason as he raised his arms glancing back at the two others. One a bulky man with a red frizzy beard and a golden helmet that sat impolitely on his crown and the other a small man with a viking helmet who remained silent with a mace placed at his side.
The brute of a man known as Skurge the Executioner slowly droned out the names of the three men as his feet stomped across the wooden floor.
"Fandral...Volstagg and..."
"ah ba ba my good man allow me" the man in the goatee interrupted as he placed his hand on his chest
"I AM..."
The Executioner gripped his axe as he began to fluster in anger as the naive man in the goatee known as Fandral continued.
"This lovable little fellow is..."
The crowd began to gather and cheer around the execution with one or two chuckles emerging as Fandral announced the last man "and finally Ladies ang Gentlemen we have..."
"ahem... grim" Fandral smirked back to Hogun's dismay.
Skurge smashed the counter sending a ripple through the room as he roared "ENOUGH, You three are charged with the robberies of Asgard's most sacred objects such as, and not limited to Bodn, Gjoll...
"Yes as I..." Fandral attempted only to find Skurge continue to rumble
"Gelgja, Elfen Beam and as the man of Jotunheim says...eating the King of the frost giants dinner."
Volstagg let out a reluctant giggle as Skurge took a deep breath after the long list of charges.
"How do you plead?" the brute asked bemused by the men's calmness.
Fandral stood up and grabbed a glass of wine on the counter "Not guilty, y'see it was sort of an exaggeration."
Skurge's eyes jolted as he enquired "an exaggeration?"
Fandral swerved his wine as he explained "Yes we kind've... don't have no clue where any of those artifacts are and honestly Volstagg....may have eaten the King of Frost Giants dinner."
Hogun chimed in "The point is executioner we are innocent and there are no witnesses to these charges because it never happened."
Skurge let out a whaling laugh "no witnesses? you told my cousin!"
Fandral placed his wine down on the counter and turned his glance towards Skurge's cousin who was wearing an alluring blue dress "Yes...well that was kind of just to get r...n...b...d"
"What?" Skurge asked unable to decipher Fandral's mutters
Fandral scratched his head trying to decide what to say next as the next few words could mean the difference between life and death "Welll, how I would put this nicely? to, uhhh... get her in bed?"
Skurge's cheerful mockery quickly turned into a deadpan fury as his veins began to erupt up along his forehead and his teeth started to scratch and jeer.
"How dare you? you three clearly have no respect for anything or anyone but yourselves. I hereby sentence you to execution, may you rot in the fiery pits of Hel and...what's this?"
Skurge turned his attention to the sword placed sitting on top of his neck as the woman with black hair stood on guard.
"That's enough Skurge" the woman proclaimed only inches from Skurge's jugular.
The whole room fell silent as Skurge placed his axe against her throat in return, neither of them moved as the two exchanged words with no emotion and no depth as a lie would shift their necks onto the weapons placed in front of them nothing other than truth was allowed stick out in their minds.
"You dare threaten me?" Skurge mockingly remarked as he kissed the blade clung to him.
"It's not a threat, I only wish for you to release these three men" the woman said clasping her blade
ENOUGH BOTH OF YOU
The two warriors looked up to find both their blade and axe scattered in the air and a blonde woman strutting towards the dark haired woman.
"Dearest Sif" the blonde woman smiled.
"Dearest Amora or should I call you Enchantress?" the black haired Sif retorted.
A silent chuckle emerged from Amora "All this fighting is getting us nowhere, so I will grant you your three friends but in return you must answer me three questions for each understood? question number one WHERE IS THOR?"
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"2 hours...that's how long it took me to find you" a man's deep voice emerged as Thor lay still on the ground.
"15 minutes, that's how long it took me to beat you" the man continued with each sentence seemingly more cheerful than the last.
"and now I'm gonna wreck you by smashin' that Asgardian head of yours with my crowbar and after that once you've realized all hope is lost... just like you did to my three brothers then I'm goin' to kill ya 'cause I'm the Wrecker baby"
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Sif's eyes dwindled as she showed her first hint of emotion "he...is cut off, no one knows where he is in all of the nine worlds, not even the Norse God of Vigilance Heimdall"
Enchantress hunched over her stool with a melodic tune in her voice "how sad...okay QUESTION NUMBER 2! now on to something you do know about, that scar where did it come from? and please, don't spare any details I want to know everything."
Sif glanced down at the scar scraped across her hand she hadn't seen for thousands of years, she was surprised she could still remember the name of it. Sif inhaled to try and calm herself as her heart began to race from the thought of recounting her memories.
"Very well Amora"
It flew like a shooting star and its light covered the night sky, it was beautiful but as she watched closer the light erupted into what felt like a million exploding suns as it dazzled and blinded her vision.
She couldn't see and all she could hear was the blistering explosion that could only only be drowned out by the sound of the children's screams.
The blast had shook the ground beneath her feet and its force could be felt all through Asgard.
Hordes of people ran and stumbled towards the illuminating light that had crashed into the ground and everyone gathered around to see what had happened.
Sif began to fall every two steps as she was still dazed from the light and she could barely see anything other than irregular shapes of men but she dashed with sword in hand towards the crowd that had gathered around the blast.
All she could hear was whispers and murmuring amongst the group as she made her way through.
"IT'S A STORM!", "IT'S AN ATTACK" all of these words had worried her but none of them struck the fear into her heart as much as when she could see quite clearly that it was none of these things...it was a GODDESS!
The Goddess lay still like an angel bathed in a pool of blood with her helmet crushed into miniscule pieces and the only thing left was a chunk lodged into her chin as the blood trickled from her head down along her armor. Sif looked down towards her hand, there was a note. She couldn't quite make it out because the blood had faded the writing, but as she looked closer and tried her best to wipe away the blood it was clear what it had said, "Fair Game."
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Thor's eyes awakened to see a trail of blood rubbed across the pavement as the man known as The Wrecker dragged him out on to the street.
"is this...my blood" Thor whispered only to find the Wrecker casually waving his crowbar at the civilians ha
"Ahhh...you're awake" Wrecker smiled as he picked up Thor's golden hair "Good, because I wouldn't want ya to miss the grand finale."
"My head...it's not moving" Thor attempted to creak his neck, then his legs, then his arms but there was nothing.
"Of course not, it's a lesson I learned from good Ol' Pa...if you hit the right nerves you can paralyze just about anyone, God's included." Wrecker attempted to wipe his irreversible smile "Until an hour after of course which, according to my watch is right abooouuuut now!"
GAAAAAAAACCK
"HAHAHAHA c'mon Thor buddy don't die on me yet we've so much to do in so little time"
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Enchantress fell silent as did the rest of room as there was no comment to be made and she wasn't quite sure what to make of it "which goddess was it?"
Sif stared down at the floorboard underneath her boots
"I SAID WHICH GODDESS WAS IT?" Amora screeched
"Eir" Sif replied as she rubbed her arm.
Amora peered her eyes in disgust "you're lying, what you're saying can never happen, Ragnarok forbids it."
Sif eased in "I only speak truth Amora, we must remain vigilant, all of us. For the death of Eir the Goddess of Healing can only mean one thing and it is as true as the scar on my hand, we are no longer invulnerable and if we shed blood we may very well die, forever"
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♫ One nine inch nail on a Thor, one nine inch nail on a Thor,
You taken one down shift it around now we've got 92 more nine inch nails left for Thor ♫
Wrecker hummed cheerfully to himself as he began to "crucify" Thor as he did to his brothers.
Thor began to feint in and out as the pain became unbearable "Wrecker...please don't do this. I am not responsible for the deaths of your friends but I promise you I will find the person who did."
LIAR! Wrecker yelled as he plunged the nail into Thor's kneecap
Thor bit his lip, there was no use in screaming now...the man was lost and so was he.
"Now where were we? ahh 92 nails left to g..." Wrecker fell silent as he grabbed the packet of nails and smashed them on the ground.
The clinging sound sent an ache through Thor's ears. Thor glanced back to see an emptiness in Wrecker's eyes it was as if he had left and what was left was but an empty shell "Wrecker?"
"No" Wrecker replied "I am not he"
"Then who are you?" Thor bellowed
"I have many names, many encounters but I prefer God killer." The mysterious man hollowed closer to Thor as he forced a note into his right hand he hissed the words "My blood.. is your blood"
"What do you?" Thor attempted only to find the answer screaming right in front of his face.
Wrecker's body levitated into the air with his arms and legs extended. His body splashed onto the pavement leaving trinklets of blood spattered everywhere as the litres of blood ran Wrecker dry after a repeated pounding against the ground. Thor's eyes fell into a daze of horrifying confusion and as his head hung down he couldn't speak because there was nothing to be said nor could he hear because there was nothing to be heard.
"IT'S THE POLICE DON'T MOVE!" The roars fell silent for the Asgardian despite having a gun to his head with an ounce of blood dripping from his ribs every second. Thor looked up at his hand nailed to the wood to see for the first time in his hands what he hadn't seen in him for thousands of years. He was was weak, vulnerable and godless.
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"Very well Sif, I may despise you but I know one thing, you're noble and I shall believe you for now, at least until I get to talk to Balder or Odin himself."
"Good" Sif stated.
Enchantress rolled her tongue in glee at what she was about to say "but I still have one final question left. do you still love him?"
The words cut deep into Sif's heart as a sudden flash of him appeared.
Sif stared firmly back as she mulled "No... come warrior's we have work to do."
As the four left the bar Skurge sat down beside Amora as she smiled with a menacing look.
"Now...that Skurge my friend was a lie".
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Thor's heels clipped and clopped as he dragged his clinging chains down the halls of S.H.I.E.L.D's maximum security prison made specifically for super-villains otherwise known as The Vault.
"Don't worry goldie, I think you'll fit right in" a S.H.I.E.L.D officer remarked
"Besides...we've got you a roomie that you know very very well"
The doors widened to reveal a man Thor knew all too well.
"Hello brother"
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A/N: Well that was longer than I had anticipated, hope you enjoyed it if you made it this far.
NEXT WEEK PREVIEW:
Sif and The Warrior's Three go on the search for the "God Killer"
PLUS
What does Enchantress want with Thor's father and king of Asgard Odin?
ALSO:
For more Thor adventures check out Pyrogram's "Thor:The Might Avenger" (coming soon)
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