Capítulo 1523: 22
Chapter 22Summary:
Where's Jane?
Darcy, what did you do?
Yes, Midgard is bright, especially after Sakaar.
Chapter Text
November 3rd 2005
Jane foster opened her eyes and frowned. That ceiling didn't look like the ceiling of Erik's flat in Edinburgh.
"Erik?" She called but even after nearly a minute there was no answer.
"Darcy?" There was no answer this time, either. "That's odd… Darcy never leaves me to wake in new places, not for the first time." She pulled herself upright until she could reach the bag on the end of the bed and dug around in it until she pulled out a cell-phone. The cell her hand emerged with was her phone, but it wasn't in the battered, bumped and abused condition that she remembered. In fact, it looked brand new.
'Did Darcy get my cell refurbished and not tell me?' She wondered.
With another frown, she pressed speed-dial two and waited for Darcy to answer.
~~~
November 3rd 2005
In Brooklyn, Darcy was putting the finishing touches to a batch of muffins, when her cell started to buzz and dance across the kitchen bench. She hastily shoved the muffins into the oven and reached for the cell, absently checking the caller ID as she lifted the cell to her ear.
She froze as she recognised that number.
"Hell-hello?" She whispered, after pressing to accept the call.
"Darcy, where am I?" Jane asked, without hesitation.
"Uh…?"
"Aren't we supposed to be at Erik's? Th-this doesn't look like Erik's, Darcy."
"Hold on a second, Janey." Darcy took a shuddering breath and covered the cell's mic. "JARVIS? Can you trace this call, please?" She lifted her hand from the cell and spoke. "I got someone tracing you, gimme a minute, here. Are you hurt? Injured, at all?"
"No, Darcy. Just confused. Did Erik move and no-one told me?"
"Ms Darcy? I've traced the call to just east of Westerly, Rhode Island." JARVIS said quietly.
"Rhode Island? Huh. That'd be the Drew Observatory, then." Darcy muttered.
"Darcy? Drew Observatory is in the US… We're in England… aren't we?" Jane asked. "Or did I miss a trip?"
"Not exactly…" Darcy grimaced.
"Darcy! What happened?" Jane demanded.
"Um… We got time travelled, Janey…" Darcy sighed.
"We got what!?" Jane screeched.
"We got time travelled." Darcy said again. "But… we didn't get sent to the same point in time."
"Darcy…?" Janey whispered.
"I got dropped in July 1999."
"Oh, God…" Jane gasped, she knew what had happened in July 1999.
"Yeah… Remember how Brucey-bear was telling us about his part in the time heist?"
"Uh… he went to Stephen Strange's teacher, didn't he?" Jane replied.
"He did. And she told him about…?"
"Time and… and time streams!" Jane exclaimed.
"Yeah, so… I was dropped in 1999, in the house where Templeton found me, but he hadn't got there, yet. So…? I changed things for the local version of me."
"Isn't changing your own timeline a bad thing?" Jane asked.
"It is, if you're in the same time stream. If it's not your native time stream, the changes you make won't affect you, they'll only affect the local version of you. Your alternate self." Darcy replied.
"But… does that mean that there's another Jane Foster running around with my research?" Jane demanded.
"No. I don't think so." Darcy answered. "Look, Tony Stark put it this way. There's two types of time travel. Insertion of consciousness or complete physical insertion. From what we've worked out, most of us are insertion of consciousness. You wake up, in your younger body and you remember everything, up to whatever point you were removed from. Okay? That wasn't me. Or JARVIS. Or Tony's Iron Man suit. We seem to be physical insertions. Everyone else, so far, are consciousness insertions."
"Oh." Jane huffed in understanding.
"Yeah. JARVIS traced you to Westerly and you're about a mile from the Drew Observatory. There's a crappy little no-tell-motel there and I think that's where you are. He's organising someone to come and get you and I'll work out what needs to happen as far as grants and shit is concerned."
"Um…? What's the date?" Jane asked.
"Uh… November 3rd 2005." Darcy said after checking on the screen that JARVIS had positioned against an overhead cupboard, off to Darcy's left.
"No grants in November 2005." Jane answered. "I had two applications in but neither had been accepted, at that point, and neither of them were accepted, later. In February 2006, I lodged an application with Culver and while they weren't all that enthusiastic, they coughed up the money. They renewed that, in November 2009, after my atmospheric readings caught their meteorologist's interest."
"Well, you don't have to worry about that, Tony's already approved money for any research you want to do. But…" Darcy grinned. "I had my necklace with me, when I appeared…"
"The one that Thor got Stark to make?" Jane asked eagerly.
"The one that I'd just updated all you research onto, yes." Darcy.
"Oh, my God, Darcy, thank you." Jane sighed in relief. "You have no idea of how much I wasn't looking forward going through all of that, again."
"Hey, there's always the really easy option." Darcy laughed.
"And that is?"
"Calling for Heimdall. He's always on watch, isn't he?"
"Oh, I never thought of that." Jane huffed.
"That's because you're all about the science and I'm only interested in bringing your science into the real world." Darcy teased.
"That's your job, intern." Jane teased back.
"Oh, no, not an intern, anymore." Darcy huffed. "R&D Lab manager, these days."
"Huh. You might be coming up in the world, Miss Lab Manager but you'll always be my intern." Jane said.
"And you'll always be my boss-lady. Oh." Darcy read JARVIS' message and cut off whatever she'd been about to say.
"Oh?" Jane asked.
"Sorry, I was just reading a message from JARVIS." Darcy said.
"And?"
"And, you'd better check your wallet for cash and pack your stuff. You're about five miles from Westerly Airport, so I really hope you've got enough cash to catch a cab, there. We'll have a plane meet you there, for pickup. There's no kids at home today, so I can be part of your pickup. The Twins are at school, or at least Happy should be dropping them off any minute now. And the other pair are at creche for the morning."
"Kids?" Jane spluttered.
"Well, yeah." Darcy grinned. "You don't think I was going to let my husband get away without giving me kids, do you?"
"Oh, God, Darcy…!" Jane groaned before gasping. "Husband?"
"Uh, Jane…? What's the last date you remember?"
"May 12th 2018."
"Ah, that might be a problem…" Darcy grimaced.
"Why?"
"I married Bucky Barnes in 2024, a week before the one-year anniversary of the second snap." Darcy said. "A month later we went to visit Brunnhilde and Lorelei cursed me."
"She what?!" Jane screeched.
"She cursed me." Darcy said. "Cool down, Janey, it's not as bad as it sounds. She cursed me because she thought I was the mortal that Thor was in love with. Now, we both know that wasn't the case, but she didn't. Her curse tied me to my soulmate, my heart beats with his, if his stops, mine stops. Brunnhilde sent us to the Norns and they said that Bucky was my soulmate and that I share a part of his super-soldier serum. Just the rapid healing and slow aging, nothing else."
"Bucky Barnes? Darcy!" Jane groaned.
"Oh, lay off, Janey. Even the Norns approved, you can keep your whinging to yourself. I never whinged about you and Thor, did I?" Darcy chided.
"No, Darcy." Jane answered quietly. "So, you married Bucky Barnes and now you've got kids?"
"Pretty much." Darcy agreed. "The twins were born April 1st 2001."
"Oh, God."
"Oh, it gets worse." Darcy said, cheerfully. "We named them after Bucky's mother and mine."
"Georgiana and… what?"
"Winnifred."
"Born on April Fool's Day, named Georgiana and Winnifred… George and Fred." Jane groaned. "Oh, my God, the Weasley twins."
"Yep, and so far, they're living up to their namesakes."
"Oh, God…"
"Fleur was next, she was born in '03, August '03 and Alastor is six months old. We decided to stick with the Potter theme, but neither of us wanted to name a poor kid, Harry."
"Hell, Darce, how many more are you going to have?"
"We agreed on four pregnancies, so we've got one more to go." Darcy laughed. "Oops, my ride's here. Oohhh… hel-lo, Soldier." Darcy directed the last to Bucky, who'd stuck his head in the door.
"Hey, doll, you ready to go?"
"Er… No, not really. I got muffins in the oven. Can I have another twenty minutes? Janey will want one."
"What sort?" Both Jane and Bucky asked.
"White chocolate, cranberry and coconut."
"Ooh…. Please, Bucky?" Janey said loudly. "I haven't had a Darcy special for months."
Bucky looked at the cell-phone and grinned. "As long as you share." He said in a slightly louder voice, obviously directed at Jane.
"Thank you!" Jane called. While all this was going on she had been packing her bags and checking what she had with her. "I'm packed and ready. I've also got cash, a couple hundred and some change."
"Excellent." Darcy crowed. "Give us… two hours?" She directed the question to Bucky.
"Two hours is fine." Bucky said. "It's only an hour flying time from Newark to Westerly, apparently."
"And it takes a half hour to get to Newark airport." Darcy agreed.
"Yep. And you want time for our muffins to cook, so two hours is fine." Bucky grinned.
Two hours and thirty-five minutes later, Jane unhooked her seatbelt and lunged across the plane's cabin at Darcy.
"Tell me." She demanded. "Tell me… everything. Absolutely everything."
"Sure, Janey." Darcy laughed. "So, The Snap. Yes, Jane, it's capitalised and no, I'm not responsible for that, the media coined it. After The Snap took you and Erik, I needed something to occupy myself with. Thor suggested that I go back to school and finish up my Poli-Sci degree, so I did, but I was still not coping so, I started pestering Ian, he suggested that I try for a computer science degree. After that it was Astrophysics, because I spent so much time looking at the stars, thinking about you and Erik, I figured that knowing what you meant in all those little videos I'd taken, would make them mean more. Then Sam Wilson and James Rhodes came knocking, they needed a hacker something to do with stolen stuff, I never figured it out but it introduced me to Bucky and well…? That? Was a good thing. We hit it off, mostly physically, at first, but it quickly became more. We married in 2024, the day after his pardon came through…" She paused and turned to the cockpit. "Hey, Buck?" She called.
"Yeah, doll?"
"Did you ever tell Raynor that we got married?"
Bucky's head tilted and he blinked a few times. "No, I don't think I did."
"Ooh…" Darcy winced.
"Darcy." Jane remined her that the other woman was there.
"Oh, right." Darcy nodded. "So, we got married and had a nice honeymoon in Wakanda, courtesy of Okoye. Then Bruce asked us to drop in and check on New Asgard, as he hadn't heard anything from Brunnhilde for a few weeks. Turns out she was having issues with Lorelei, who was blocking their communications. She cursed me, Bucky punched her and Brunnhilde managed to get the magic suppression collar, that was made for Wanda, on her. Brunnhilde called Thor and the two of them packed us off to the Norns for them to study me. They laughed and we came home. A week later Bucky and Sam took off to deal with the Flag Smashers and when they got back, we had a big cook-out on the dock in Louisiana and ate a lot more than we should have."
"A lot more…" Bucky agreed, from the cockpit.
"We went to sleep in Sarah's living room and woke up in two different times." Darcy had barely paused as Bucky had cut in.
"Who's Sarah?" Jane asked.
"Sam's sister." Darcy replied.
"What did you mean by two different times?"
"Buck woke in December 1991, the morning of the day the Winter Soldier killed Howard and Maria Stark."
"Tony Stark's parents?"
"That's them." Darcy nodded. "He met up with Tony and…" Darcy kept talking, explaining to Jane what had happened in the time since, who had remembered, who they'd told and what they were doing to avoid The Snap happening again.
"I think calling Heimdall is a good idea." Jane said. "He can put us in contact with Odin and Frigga."
"And the Norns." Darcy agreed.
"And Valkyrie." Bucky added.
~~~
Heimdall, the guardian of the Bifrost, frowned. He'd heard that conversation and he wasn't sure what to do about it. And that in itself alarmed him, confusion was not something he was accustomed to feeling.
"Heimdall." A soft feminine voice came from behind him.
"My Queen." He turned and bowed to Frigga, the Allmother of Asgard. "Of what service may I be?"
"You are not the only one to watch, Gatekeeper." Frigga said. "I have seen a future that will no longer come to be." Heimdall's eyes widened. "And I am not the only one to know what that future would have wrought upon us."
"My Lady?"
"The fate of the entire universe lies on the shoulders of but a few." Frigga ignored Heimdall's question. "And of those few that faced the end that will no longer be, all but five dwell upon Midgard. I have need of speech with them. "
Heimdall caught his breath. "You would go to Midgard?"
"I would." Frigga nodded, causing Heimdall to frown. "I shall only stay there for a few minutes, Gatekeeper, an hour at most. And The Valkyrie will be at my side for all that time."
"My sister?" He looked out over the seemingly empty reaches of space and saw Brunnhilde looking back at him, bags at her feet. "If my sister fell, why would you still name her a Valkyrie, your majesty?"
"I do not." Frigga shook her head. "I name her, The Valkyrie. The epitome of what a Valkyrie should ever be." She gave him a sad smile. "Her destiny lies outside of Asgard, Gatekeeper." Her smile grew sly. "Watch and you will see." The smile fell away. "Send the Bifrost to her." She ordered, every inch a queen.
Heimdall nodded and pushed his sword into the lock that would direct the Bifrost where he wanted it to go. Lightening crackled and the dome's spire spun before tilting down and releasing the rainbow bridge from it's shackles. Bare seconds later and a familiar figure emerged from the shadowy glare.
"Brunnhilde." Frigga nodded to the woman.
"Queen of Asgard." Brunnhilde nodded back, before turning to Heimdall. "Brother."
"Sister." Heimdall knew not what to say.
"I would have you send me to Midgard, brother." Brunnhilde ordered.
"Have you, your DragonFang with you, Valkyrie?" Frigga asked.
"Always." Brunnhilde said, touching a holster at her hip.
"Excellent." Frigga smiled. "Heimdall, when you open the Bifrost to Midgard, ensure that it's done with discretion, please. It would be of little benefit to us or our allies, to have our enemies alerted of our actions."
"As you say, My Queen." He twisted the sword and the light of the Bifrost faded into nothing but a hum. "Where would you have me direct the Bifrost?"
"Mark this place." Frigga used her rarely seen magic to guide his hand upon his sword to direct the Bifrost. "I will either return to it when I wish to return to Asgard, or I shall call upon you, directly."
"As you will, your majesty." The Bifrost opened and the two women began to cross it. "Fare thee well, sister." He whispered.
~~~
The shimmer the Bifrost left, faded and Frigga and Valkyrie blinked in the bright sunlight.
"I despise the sun." Valkyrie muttered.
"Now, dear…" Frigga gave the other woman a quick look. "You should be used to Midgard's brightness, by now."
"Oh, no. New Asgard was far to the north, we saw little of this glare. Even when the sun never set, we didn't have this… glare…" Valkyrie sneered.
"No. I dare say you didn't." The voice came from behind them and both women spun to face it. "Hello, Valkyrie." Bucky sighed. "Let me guess… Thanos…" It wasn't a question.
"Of course, Thanos." Valkyrie spat the name out before pausing. "Wait. You… you know who I am? You know who Thanos is?"
"Oh, yeah. You'd better come on in, meet the team and see what we've done." He started towards the next building. "Bring your friend, too."
"She's not my friend, she Frigga, Queen of Asgard."
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