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A few days ago. The New Mexico desert.
"I want the Rainbow Bridge," Hermione said, her voice a quiet, simple statement of fact.
Loki, who had been in the middle of a charming, manipulative smile, froze. His expression went blank with disbelief. "Impossible," he finally said, a short, sharp laugh escaping his lips. "You ask for the very foundation of Asgard's power? For its greatest weapon and its most sacred treasure? You are mad."
"Am I?" she asked, her eyes glinting with a cold, ancient light that did not belong in a child's face. "You want to be king, Loki. But a king needs to protect his people. I am offering you a way to eliminate a threat to Asgard before it even begins."
She reached into her bag and pulled out the crystal ball, placing it on the desert sand between them. "Before you refuse," she said, "perhaps you should take a look at the future I have foreseen."
She drew a silvery, shimmering thread of memory from her temple and placed it in the ball. The crystal flared with a sudden, brilliant light, and an image appeared within. It was a vision of fire and death. A massive, dark, and terrifyingly alien warship hanging in the star-dusted void above a golden city. Asgard. It showed a tall, purple-skinned tyrant in golden armor, his face a mask of grim satisfaction. It showed Loki himself, his people slaughtered, kneeling before this titan. And it showed Loki, his neck held in a brutal, crushing grip, his life being extinguished with a final, pathetic snap.
Loki stared, his face pale, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps. "What… what is that?"
"That is Thanos," Hermione said, her voice a low, grim whisper. "And that is the future you are blindly walking toward. A future where your petty squabbles over the throne leave Asgard vulnerable and ripe for conquest. The Frost Giants are your sworn enemies, a constant threat. In that future, Thanos will use them, and the Casket of Ancient Winters, to cripple your defenses before he takes what he truly wants from your father's vault. But," she said, her voice dropping, full of a tempting, serpentine logic, "if Jotunheim were to be… removed from the equation… then Thanos's future weapon would be gone. And the man who had the strength and the vision to remove it, to commit an act of genocide for the protection of his people… he would be no mere king. He would be a savior. A hero worthy of Odin's throne."
She was not offering him a partnership. She was offering him a justification, a grand, cosmic excuse to unleash his darkest impulses and call it heroism.
The Present. The Rainbow Bridge, Asgard.
The Bifrost was a roaring, uncontrollable vortex of pure, cosmic energy. A brilliant, multi-colored beam of pure destruction shot out from the observatory, lancing across the void of space, aimed at the heart of Jotunheim.
"NOOOO!" Thor roared, a cry of pure, agonized despair. He had finally broken free from Hermione's restraining spell, and he charged, not at her, but at his brother.
Loki, his face a mask of manic, desperate resolve, met his charge. Gungnir, the spear of the All-Father, crashed against Mjolnir, the hammer of the God of Thunder. The impact sent a deafening peal of thunder and a shockwave of golden and electric-blue energy ripping across the crystalline bridge.
It was a battle of gods, a clash of brothers. Thor fought with a desperate, righteous fury, pleading with his brother to see reason. Loki fought with the cold, bitter determination of a man convinced that this terrible, monstrous act was his only path to redemption.
Hermione, meanwhile, stood at the control console, her small hands resting on the ancient, golden device. She was the one fueling this fire. Her own immense magical reserves were being poured into the Bifrost, pushing it far beyond its normal limits, turning it from a gateway into a doomsday weapon. She could feel the souls of the Frost Giants, light-years away, beginning to flicker and die as their world burned, and a cold, predatory smile touched her lips.
This was her plan from the very beginning. The ultimate harvest. A weapon of mass destruction, infused with her own magic, allowing her to reap the souls of an entire race from across the universe.
"Boom!" Loki was no match for Thor's raw, righteous fury. A final, devastating blow from Mjolnir sent the God of Mischief flying, his spear clattering across the bridge. Thor pinned him to the ground, the weight of his hammer on Loki's chest.
Useless, Hermione thought with a flash of annoyance.
"Hermione!" Thor roared, his voice full of a pain that went beyond the physical. "Stop this! This is madness! You call yourself a partner of justice!"
Do I look like a cartoon superhero to you? she thought. She ignored him, her focus absolute as she continued to pour her energy into the Bifrost.
With a final, agonizing roar of determination, Thor called Mjolnir back to his hand. He looked at the roaring beam of light that was annihilating a world. He looked at the path back to Midgard, back to Jane. And he made a choice.
"Forgive me, Jane," he whispered.
He raised his hammer high, and with a cry that was a mixture of grief, love, and terrible resolve, he brought it down upon the Rainbow Bridge.
EIGHTY! EIGHTY! His war cry was a litany of blows. The crystalline bridge, said to be indestructible, groaned. Cracks began to spiderweb across its surface.
You fool, Hermione thought, watching him with a cold, detached pity. You sentimental, noble, idiotic fool. He was destroying his kingdom's greatest weapon, its ultimate deterrent, severing its connection to the other realms and leaving Asgard isolated and vulnerable, all for the sake of an enemy he had been at war with for a thousand years. It was the single most strategically stupid and heroically beautiful act she had ever witnessed.
With a final, cataclysmic BOOM, the Rainbow Bridge shattered. A massive explosion of cosmic energy erupted, throwing all three of them from their feet. The roaring beam of light cut off, and a vast, empty chasm now separated the observatory from the city of Asgard.
It was too late. The damage was done. And in the silent, echoing aftermath, as Hermione lay on the broken edge of the universe, a quiet, satisfying hum resonated through her very soul.
Dark Harvest
[Current Soul Energy: 105,927]
She had done it. She had committed genocide by proxy, and the reward was a level of power she had never even dreamed of.