Thor: The Dark World

by Marvel Press

  Darcy and the police looked at each other as the giant beam of light disappeared. They were all speechless.

  With a mighty flash of light, cinder blocks, parking meters, and car hoods emerged from the Bifrost, causing a nonplussed Heimdall to move out of the way to avoid being hit from the debris that was accidentally sucked into the wormhole. With another flash, Thor and Jane landed in the observatory. Upon seeing them, Heimdall removed his sword from the controls, causing the observatory to stop spinning and the Bifrost to close.

  Jane staggered to her feet as Thor reached out to steady her and make sure that she was all right. Jane looked up at him and grinned like a giddy schoolgirl. “We have to do that again!” she said with a smile.

  Across the cosmos, Malekith strode through Svartalfheim, seething with rage. He could not wait to make the Asgardians pay for their injustice to him, his world, and his people. As the Dark Elf leader neared the Ark spaceship Algrim approached, struggling to keep up. When the two were out of earshot of the rest of the elves, Malekith began to speak. He instructed Algrim to take on a top secret plan that only he could accomplish. The second in command slowly nodded his acceptance. Malekith placed a reassuring, thankful hand on Algrim’s shoulder, then turned and looked out upon his awaiting army. They were falling into formation outside the large Ark. The war with Asgard was about to begin anew.

  CHAPTER NINE

  THOR STOOD BY, waiting and worried, as Eir, goddess of healing, examined Jane inside the palace’s healing room. As Jane was from another realm, Thor wanted her to get a thorough scanning from Eir, just to make sure the trip to Agsard would not affect her. Rather than lie still, Jane reached out to touch all of the new technology around her and asked questions about any new device she saw. This caused Eir to get a bit frustrated with Jane. Thor reached out and held Jane’s hand to distract her long enough for Eir to continue her examination.

  Eir moved a Soul Forge—a small crystalline device—over Jane’s body. The device projected an image of Jane’s insides overhead, as if it were a holographic X-ray of some sort. Just as Jane was about to ask a question about the strange device, Odin burst into the room, flanked by two Einherjar.

  Holding Gungnir, which was both his battle spear and royal scepter, Odin glared at Thor, barely able to contain his rage. “Are my words mere noises to you, that you ignore them completely?” the Allfather yelled.

  “She is ill,” Thor began, before Odin cut him off.

  “She is mortal! Illness is their defining trait. She no more belongs in Asgard than a goat at a table,” Odin said. This got Jane’s attention.

  “Excuse me, who are you?” she asked, weak but still strong enough to put up a fight.

  “I am Odin, King of Asgard and protector of the Nine Realms,” he stated. Jane began to introduce herself, but he cut her off, too. “I know who you are,” Odin said, clearly unhappy with them both.

  “Father, I think something has happened to her,” Thor said. “Something I cannot explain.”

  “Her world has its healers. They can deal with it,” Odin said. Then he turned to the two Einherjar. “Return her to Midgard,” he instructed. But as one guard reached out for her, Eir intervened.

  The healer pointed to the hologram. The Asgardian sensed something was not right with the earthling’s biological readings.

  Odin looked from Eir to Jane, then moved Gungnir over Jane’s body. He stepped back and sighed. Instantly, the Allfather knew that Thor was right: Jane would be safer on Asgard than Midgard. She wasn’t going anywhere.

  Thor and Jane followed Odin through the palace to the Hall of Science. Jane looked around, awestruck. In the center of the room was Yggdrasil, the tree of life. Asgardians circled the tree, passing their hands through holographic pillars of light that showed images and gave information. Jane’s curiosity got the best of her, and she reached into the light, the rays falling over her fingers like water. Suddenly, there was a loud BONG! It was a sound unlike anything Jane had ever heard before, and it rang throughout the Hall of Science. Everyone within the hall stopped and turned to stare at the earthling. Lowering her head to hide her embarrassment, Jane quickly realized that the sound meant Don’t touch. She quietly folded her hands behind her back and walked with Thor.

  “Some believe that before the universe, there was nothing,” the Allfather said as they entered the palace library. “They are wrong.” Odin lifted a huge tome from the wall and brought it down in front of them. “Before the universe there was darkness, and woe betide the warrior that almost mistakes darkness for nothing.”

  Thor nodded to his father, an acknowledgement of the Allfather’s unspoken apology.

  “The Nine Realms are not eternal,” Odin continued. “They have a dawn just as they have a dusk. Before the dawn, the Dark Elves reigned unchallenged,” Odin said as he leafed through the book. “But then came the birth of light. The darkness faded, revealing the Nine Realms as we know them.” As Odin spoke, the book shone brightly, mirroring what the Allfather was explaining.

  Jane caught on quickly, and related the events to Earth science. “You’re talking about the Big Bang, aren’t you?” she asked.

  “I am reading to you from the sacred, all-knowing record of our existence,” Odin said, his tone growing more annoyed as he spoke. “Do you have something to add?”

  Thor shot Jane another look, then spoke up. “You’ll find Jane knows of what you speak…and often speaks of what she knows.” Jane understood Thor’s unspoken warning, and spoke up to explain.

  “We have a theory on Earth,” Jane started. “Fourteen billion years ago, a high-energy density led to a rapid expansion of particles. A massive explosion occurred, then cooled into what we now call the universe.” She gave Odin an apology in the form of a smile. “The Big Bang,” she said.

  Odin continued. “The birth of light changed the very nature of the universe. The Dark Elves resisted. Their leader, Malekith, built a weapon out of the darkness and waged war against the Nine Realms.” Odin turned the page and the book showed Malekith leading an army of Dark Elves. “After years of bloodshed, my father, Bor, finally triumphed. He offered the Dark Elves a truce. But Malekith would not live in a universe he could not rule.”

  Jane looked at Thor, nervous, then back to Odin. It was going to be a long night.…

  At dawn the next morning, Heimdall opened the Bifrost to let Lady Sif, Fandral, and Volstagg reenter Asgard. They were with a battalion of Einherjar, and they had with them another group of chained alien prisoners. “When, exactly, did we become the prison of the Nine Realms?” Sif asked upon her return.

  “At times of chaos, it is best to keep your enemies close at hand,” Heimdall said as he deactivated the controls. As the observatory stopped spinning, Volstagg and Fandral escorted the prisoners toward the dungeons beneath the palace. Volstagg couldn’t help but agree with Sif.

  “Acting as caretaker to these scoundrels is beneath us,” he said.

  “If they were beneath you, they’d be dead!” Fandral joked.

  Meanwhile, across the realm, inside her own chambers within the palace, stood Jane. She was amazed. The architecture was traditional and ornate, but also modern and futuristic, and in the center of the room was a fire pit in which multicolored flames danced. Jane was suitably impressed.

  “Thor wanted you to have the best room in the palace,” Eir said as she showed Jane inside. “Your continued health is of the utmost importance to him.” Jane continued to look around the room and noticed an assortment of elegant gowns and dresses.

  “And the dresses?” Jane asked as Eir walked toward the door. “Do they have some kind of medical value?”

  “They don’t hurt,” Eir said as she closed the door. Jane looked around the room. Even her dreams weren’t this good. Maybe things were finally looking up.

  Far below Jane’s chambers, inside the dungeon, a Marauder slammed his fist against his cell’s energy barrier. The impact shocked him, and threw him across his cell. There was no escape. Th
is was true for every prisoner in the dungeon. But once Malekith’s plan unfolded, all of that would change.…

  Aboveground, on one of Asgard’s many splendid plazas, stood Thor. He was searching for Jane, who finally arrived. She was dressed in a stunning Asgardian gown, and she looked beautiful. In her hand was a golden sphere. As she approached Thor, she threw the sphere into the air. It burst into a dozen parts, hovered for a second, then reformed into a perfect sphere. Jane was awestruck. “This is amazing. The magnetic propulsion alone would advance Earth’s by decades,” she said with excitement. “If I could get this to a lab, I could determine—” But Thor cut her off. Then he pointed to a group of children staring at her from the other side of the plaza.

  “You have their ball,” he said as he nodded toward the kids. Embarrassed, Jane handed the ball to the children, who were now laughing at the situation. Jane quietly made her way to Thor.

  “The gown suits you,” he said upon her return.

  “I feel like I’m going to the prom,” she said. “Though hopefully this time, I won’t come back from the bathroom and find my date making out with Heather Abramowitz.”

  Thor was confused. “Should this Heather Abramowitz appear, she shall answer to me,” he said.

  Jane smiled at him and the two began to stroll through the plaza, unaware that danger lurked beneath their feet.

  “My father would’ve given anything to see this,” Jane told Thor as she thought about her dad.

  “He was a scientist too?” Thor wondered.

  “Yes, at Cambridge. He was British; my mom was American. They were from different worlds. Relatively speaking,” she said, painfully aware how she and Thor were literally from different worlds.

  As they continued on, Jane began to question him about why Heimdall couldn’t see her for a period of time. Thor believed that Jane might not have been entirely on Earth when the dark energy swirled around her in London. Jane didn’t see how this was possible, so Thor began to explain the Convergence to her.

  “The Nine Realms travel within Yggdrasil, orbiting Midgard, much like the way our planets orbit the sun,” he began. “Every five thousand years, the realms align. This is called the Convergence. During that time, the borders between the realms become soft. It is possible you found one of these points,” he said. “We are lucky it remained open. Once the realms are out of alignment, no science can reopen the door.”

  “You never know,” Jane said to him, smiling. “Science could surprise you.”

  Thor lifted her hand and kissed it.

  “I will find a way to make sure it does,” he said.

  “Your father said there wasn’t one,” Jane replied, referring to Odin’s feelings on science.

  “My father does not know everything,” Thor said, but just as he did, he heard a different voice call out to him from behind them.

  “Don’t let him hear you say that,” the voice said. Thor froze, then turned to see Queen Frigga staring at them, a sly smile on her face.

  “Mother!” Thor said with surprise.

  Jane shot him a look—she wasn’t prepared to meet his mother! She quickly pulled her hand away.

  “I was just out shopping for dinner,” Frigga said, but her ruse did not work on Thor.

  “You have more than two hundred chefs,” he said. This time, Frigga shot Thor a stern look. Thor sighed and realized he was outmatched.

  “Jane Foster, this is my mother, Frigga, Queen of Asgard,” Thor said. “Mother…this is Jane.”

  Frigga approached and took Jane’s hand in hers. “We have so much to talk about,” Frigga said as she led Jane away.

  Thor didn’t like the looks of this.…

  Back in the dungeon, it was time for Malekith’s plan of destruction to be put into action. As dozens of hopeless Marauders sat in their cells, a blinding explosion rang out from one end of the dungeon. Debris and brick flew everywhere, and when the dust settled, a huge monster known as Kurse stood on top of the fallen dungeon wall. He snarled and roared and clenched his fists. Kurse looked around at the Marauders, who now stood at the end of their cells, just waiting to be freed so they could seek revenge on Asgard for locking them away. A smirk came across the beast’s dark face as hope fell across the Marauders’. Kurse stepped to the first invisible energy barrier that housed a dozen of the prisoners. He pulled back his giant fist and unleashed a devastating blow, shutting down the force field. It flickered out, and the Marauders were free! Then Kurse began breaking and punching open cell after cell as waves of dangerous, and soon to be armed, prisoners raced up the stairs to confront Asgard.

  As Kurse entered the dungeon’s hallway, alarms began to sound. Hearing the commotion, two Einherjar rushed over to investigate. But Kurse was faster and stronger. Since he had already started to deactivate other cells, by the time the Einherjar arrived on the scene, it was already too late. Prisoners were running wild.

  Kurse continued through the dungeon, freeing prisoners and lifting the weapons of defeated Einherjar who first came to the rescue. As Kurse walked through the dungeon, he suddenly felt a cold shimmer run down his spine. He stopped at one cell and peered in. Loki stared back. “The east stairs lead to the barracks. You’ll find them mostly unguarded,” Loki said. Kurse nodded, then continued on, glad for the inside information. Loki wanted revenge against Thor and Odin—he just hoped that he wasn’t getting more than he hoped for. The fascination of Kurse stayed with Loki for a moment or two, then he returned to his books—which he was now reading.

  Meanwhile, aboveground, Frigga and Jane walked and talked, while Thor trailed behind them, unaware of the horrors that were occurring several stories below his feet.

  “I can’t remember the last time Thor brought a friend home to meet us,” Frigga said to Jane. “When a young man brings a young woman home to meet his parents…” Frigga began, implying a possible marriage between Thor and Jane.

  “Technically, I think we have only known each other for three days,” Jane said, surprised to be having this conversation so soon.

  “And if it were three million, would that change how you feel?” Frigga asked.

  Jane thought on this. It wouldn’t change one thing.

  Jane was about to respond when a horn blasted out in the distance. Thor and Frigga froze in their tracks as the horn blasted again.

  “The prisoners—” Frigga gasped.

  “Loki,” Thor said with anger in his voice. The horns signaled a problem in the dungeons, and Thor feared that it was an escape attempt by his trickster brother, but he couldn’t just leave Jane in the middle of Asgard unattended. Frigga realized this, too.

  “Go. I will look after her,” Frigga said, before both she and Jane added, “Be careful!” The two women looked at each other, worried about Thor.

  Inside the dungeon, Volstagg and Fandral were battling against the escaped prisoners, trying valiantly to keep them within the confines of the dungeon. “It’s as if they resent being imprisoned,” Fandral cracked. A Marauder slammed into Fandral, knocking him down; then Volstagg did the same to the Marauder.

  “There is no pleasing some creatures,” Volstagg said with a smile, as he swung his battle-ax through the air, coming down on Marauder after Marauder. But his smile soon disappeared as a mob of escaped prisoners got the upper hand and surrounded the two warriors. Voltsagg and Fandral stood back-to-back, clearly outnumbered. Until…

  THOOM! The Mighty Thor landed in front of his friends, Mjolnir down at his side. “Lay down your arms and return to your cells,” Thor said. “You have my word, no harm will come to you.”

  A huge, menacing Marauder approached Thor, as if to surrender, then punched the Asgardian with a powerful blow, sending Thor back about an inch. Thor looked up, spit blood from his mouth, and gripped Mjolnir. “Very well. You do not have my word,” he said, and in the blink of an eye, Thor raised his hammer and smashed the Marauder in the face, slamming him against a stone wall and knocking him out cold. Then with a roar, the prisoners charged Thor, Fandr
al, and Volstagg. The battle for Asgard had begun.

  Across the realm, in Heimdall’s observatory, the sentry turned his gaze toward the palace as the horns continued to blast. Heimdall grabbed his sword and began to run toward the palace to help, but something else caught his attention: it was the sound of wrenching metal and the churning of an engine, and it was coming from directly above him. Heimdall looked up to see the clouds warp in the sky. There was something hiding within them—something cloaked and unseen to all of Asgard. Unseen to all, except Heimdall. The mighty sentry quickly jumped onto the observatory’s suspension cables and ran up the observatory, alongside the distortion in the sky. With all of his strength, Heimdall leaped into the air and landed on the invisible object. He then plunged his sword into it, causing the distortion to spark and, finally, reveal its true form: a Dark Elf Harrow ship. Heimdall raised his sword again and began slashing at the ship over and over, each strike more powerful and damaging than the last.

  Heimdall’s attack exposed the ship’s gravity drive, and with another strike from his sword directly into the drive itself, the drive exploded, causing the ship to fall from the sky. Heimdall jumped to the safety of the observatory just as the ship crashed into the water. The sentry allowed himself a moment of satisfaction as the ship sunk into the sea, but it was short-lived. Terror washed over Heimdall’s face as the massive Ark ship and two more Harrows de-cloaked above the observatory and sped off toward the palace.

  Inside the palace, Odin was strapping on his battle armor and preparing for war. He strode down a corridor and barked orders at Sif and a squad of elite Einherjar who followed behind. “Send a squadron to the weapons vault!” he ordered. “Defend it at all costs. Secure the dungeon!”

  Just then, Frigga and Jane emerged from an adjoining corridor, and Odin immediately ordered his men to protect their queen. Sif eyed Jane suspiciously as Frigga looked at Odin with concern on her face.