Loki, who had been monitoring the Earth battlefield from Asgard, went pale. The thing he'd feared most had come to pass.
He couldn't fathom why the World Serpent would abandon Earth and strike Asgard instead. But the why didn't matter. The fight was coming to his doorstep.
Cunning and deceit were his trademarks, yet Loki was still an Asgardian. The courage ran in the blood. That pride kept him from calling Daisy for help. Thought after thought churned through his mind, and in the end, he didn't notify Thor either.
He struck the butt of Gungnir against the floor. The sound, amplified by the spear's power, rang through every corridor and courtyard of the realm.
"Warriors of Asgard! Take up your swords! Don your armor! To battle!"
In Asgardian eyes, Loki was the current God-King. No one hesitated. Fathers kissed their children goodbye and buckled on their breastplates. Husbands left their wives and took shield and blade to the field.
The full defensive grid came online. Dozens of laser cannons rose from concealed emplacements and locked onto the sky. Flying longships capable of faster-than-light travel launched one after another. Rank upon rank of warriors assembled in lockstep: shields in front, spears behind, formations packed tight on both flanks of the royal palace.
Loki stood at the center in full battle armor, Gungnir gleaming in his hand with an intensity that lent him genuine authority. How much of the spear's power he could actually wield was a question only he could answer.
The World Serpent had forced his way through the dimensional barrier with a body stretching several kilometers. In his current depleted state, breaching this realm would take time.
All of Asgard watched the horizon. At the far edge of the sky, a bank of dense black cloud churned upward, shot through with lightning. Something enormous was squeezing its way in.
Most of the warriors didn't know what they were facing, but it didn't matter. This was home. They would fight to the death.
Frigga, mother of Thor and Loki, knew exactly what was coming. She donned her own armor, took up a longsword, and stationed herself outside Odin's bedchamber. The last line of defense.
After the World Serpent vanished, the Earth heroes searched everywhere and found nothing. Eager for any news about where the creature had gone, they rushed back to the Helicarrier, burst through the door, and found a certain someone gnawing on a pig trotter.
Daisy sat there, face smeared with grease, color considerably improved. She waved them over with the cheerful nonchalance of someone inviting friends to dinner.
"You're alive! Thank Oshtur!" Storm didn't care about the grease on Daisy's hands or mouth. She pulled her into a fierce hug.
Storm was truly a good friend. Not a shred of resentment for the scare. Only joy.
"Where did the enemy go?" The question came from everyone at once.
Daisy said nothing. She looked at Thor. Between Loki cutting off their communication earlier and the Serpent's well-documented hatred for Asgard, the answer wasn't hard to guess.
Thor was still drifting, lost in philosophical contemplation over whether a warrior who died and then came back to life still counted as a warrior. Sif was quicker on the uptake. Her face went white. "You mean he went to Asgard? We have to go back immediately!"
The gears finally turned. Thor jolted to his feet, realization crashing over him, and in a blur of motion was standing on the flight deck.
"We need to return to Asgard at once! Heimdall!"
The Helicarrier was still in flight. Not everyone had the constitution to stand on an open deck at altitude. To the Earth heroes watching from inside, a pillar of shimmering, multicolored light descended onto the carrier's surface.
So that's the Bifrost, Daisy mused, mentally cataloging the transmission mechanism for anything she could adapt.
The five Asgardians needed to leave now. As battle companions, the Earth contingent had opinions on whether to follow.
Cyclops and Black Widow raised the diplomatic angle: Earth and Asgard had no formal ties. Under what authority would they be fighting? The subtext was clear: sort out the politics first.
Iron Man disagreed. Abandoning people you'd bled alongside, even after knowing them for half a day, wasn't his style.
The argument had barely started when Daisy shut it down.
She'd waged a quiet internal debate of her own. Strictly speaking, this was no longer her problem. But she stepped forward anyway. Not for Asgard. Not for Earth. For Skadi. She would avenge Skadi.
A thousand years of grief, transmitted through the gene completion, had become partly her own. Having inherited a portion of Skadi's genes, she felt an obligation.
She had her flaws. She'd be the first to admit it. When she lacked the strength, her moral floor could sink a little. But ignoring a debt when she had the power to repay it went against everything she was.
"Listen up," she said, cutting across Stark and Storm. "This has nothing to do with Earth or Asgard. Nobody needs to follow. This is personal."
She gave Hill a look that said she knew what she was doing. It might be personal, but she carried enough weight to represent Earth's goodwill all the same.
"There should be plenty of the Serpent's leftover soldiers scattered in the ocean. Handle cleanup. I'm going to Asgard with them."
The framing was elegant. It let Earth's heroes stay home without losing face and gave her a reason to go that nobody could argue with. Even Cyclops and Stark nodded.
She'd recovered maybe thirty percent of her strength. It would have to be enough. She fell in step with the Asgardians and walked into the light.
The Bifrost didn't rely on speed. At true superluminal velocity, everyone except Thor would have been vaporized. The bridge operated through spatial displacement.
The transit was eerily smooth, like riding an elevator. A few discrete jumps later, the weightless limbo gave way to solid ground beneath her feet.
They stood on a bridge. Calling it a bridge was technically correct, but this one was woven from prismatic light, without supports, without railings. Thor landed on its surface and walked forward. Daisy tested it with one cautious step. The surface was as solid as asphalt.
In the distance, a round structure stood at the bridge's far end. A figure in golden helm and armor drew a sword and watched them approach.
Daisy's embryonic super-vision let her lock eyes with Heimdall across the gap. He was tall, stoic, and resplendent in that gleaming armor. Every inch the elite warrior.
Too bad she knew the truth. This was a man whose combat record included getting cut down by Hela's skeleton grunts.
Thor, consumed with worry, gave Heimdall a brief nod and took off immediately, swinging Mjolnir skyward.
Daisy tested the local gravity, found it close enough to Earth's, and launched herself after him.
As for the four Asgardian extras, they'd have to run.