Chapter 127: The Bridge Burns
Loki raised Gungnir, the golden tip flaring with lethal energy.
"Yes," Loki said. "It does."
He fired.
Thor swung Mjolnir upward, catching the blast perfectly on the flat of the Uru head. The impact exploded outward, shaking the crystalline bridge beneath their feet.
While Thor engaged Loki, Ethan opened the Plumber analyzer case. The screen flared, confirming the readings. Removing Gungnir had not cancelled its final command. The Bifrost remained locked onto Jotunheim and continued drawing power without the spear inside the mechanism.
Ethan carried the analyzer toward the control dais. Thor could handle Loki; the active Bifrost was the greater threat.
Sif and the Warriors Three drew their weapons and started after Thor, but another violent tremor passed through the observatory before they reached the bridge. A damaged support split near the receiving ring, sending pieces of golden metal crashing toward Heimdall.
Volstagg and Hogun rushed beneath the falling section and caught it across their shoulders. Fandral dragged Heimdall clear while Sif cut through a twisted strip of metal pinning the gatekeeper's leg.
Ethan glanced back from the control dais. "Thor can handle Loki. Keep Heimdall alive and stop this chamber from collapsing around us."
Sif looked toward the bridge, where Thor was already driving Loki away from the controls. She clearly wanted to join him, but Heimdall's blood was spreading across the floor beneath her.
She turned back and drove her sword beneath the trapped section. "Volstagg, lift."
Thor drove Loki backward, their weapons clashing in a shower of sparks.
"Why are you doing this?" Thor demanded. "Why send the Destroyer? Why annihilate Jotunheim?"
Loki spun Gungnir, deflecting a heavy blow. "I am finishing the war you started! You invaded their realm, Thor! You endangered Asgard and nearly pushed our father into a realm-wide conflict. I am cleaning up your failure."
"This is not protection," Thor yelled, swinging the hammer hard enough to dent the crystalline floor. "It is slaughter! Destroying every Frost Giant will not make you a better king!"
Loki knocked Mjolnir aside and staggered back, his control finally breaking.
"Because I am not his son!" he shouted. "I am Laufey's. Odin took me from Jotunheim and raised me beneath a name that was never mine."
Thor stared at him, Mjolnir lowering slightly.
"You were always meant to inherit Asgard," Loki continued. "Even after your arrogance nearly caused a war, everyone waited for you to return. I was the Frost Giant hidden inside Odin's house, useful only while I could pretend not to be one."
Gungnir flared in his hands as he pointed toward the destruction consuming Jotunheim.
"When that realm is gone, no one will ever question where my loyalty lies."
Thor's shock did not become disgust. The man he had been before Midgard might have recoiled from the truth, but that man was gone.
"Our father's secrecy does not justify murdering an entire realm," Thor said.
Near the observatory controls, Sif briefly stopped moving. She remembered Ethan calling Thor Odin's only son during the battle on Midgard. She looked toward Ethan, realizing the sorcerer had known exactly what Loki was before the truth had ever been spoken. Ethan was entirely focused on the Bifrost controls and did not acknowledge the look.
Ethan reached the main mechanism. The bridge was pushing an enormous, continuous stream of destructive energy directly into Jotunheim.
He used the Plumber analyzer and his own magic to examine the active route. He could destroy the mechanism, but cutting it apart here at the central control dais would release the massive amount of stored energy directly into Heimdall's chamber, instantly annihilating the observatory and everyone inside it.
He began wrapping the active mechanism in layered spatial containment. This did not shut down the Bifrost, but it prevented the growing instability from tearing through the observatory while he looked for the safest place to sever the route.
Loki realized Ethan was working on the mechanism. He slammed the butt of Gungnir into the bridge, instantly creating several illusionary duplicates of himself across the crystalline span.
The illusions rushed Thor, forcing the prince to strike through false bodies while the real Loki attacked from another angle.
Thor adapted rather than repeatedly falling for the same trick. He used lightning through the bridge surface, forcing the illusions to violently flicker and revealing the real Loki through his shadow and his physical contact with the crystal.
Loki sent one duplicate racing toward Ethan while the real Loki shifted to the opposite side of the bridge. Ethan erased the illusion with a sweep of golden magic, then folded the space in front of Gungnir's next blast and sent it harmlessly into the void.
Loki glared across the shaking chamber. "This is Asgard's affair, sorcerer."
Ethan continued tightening the containment around the Bifrost mechanism. "You sent the Destroyer to Midgard. You made it mine."
Thor surged forward before Loki could answer, batting Gungnir aside and driving his shoulder into his brother's chest.
"Stop the attack!" Thor demanded.
Loki laughed. "The command no longer needs me. The Bifrost will continue until Jotunheim breaks apart, or until this bridge itself is destroyed."
Thor looked toward Ethan. "Can you stop it?"
Ethan pulled the golden containment tighter around the shaking mechanism. "I can keep the chamber from tearing itself apart, but the beam will continue as long as the bridge carries power to Jotunheim."
Thor looked along the crystalline span stretching into the void. "If I destroy the bridge?"
"The beam ends with it."
Thor's gaze remained on the bridge. Destroying it would save Jotunheim, but it would also destroy the only known road back to Jane.
Ethan left the choice there. Thor already understood its cost.
Jane was waiting on the other side of that connection, and there was no promise that another route to Midgard could be built soon.
Loki saw the hesitation and stepped closer. "Midgard has weakened you. The Thor I knew would never destroy Asgard's greatest weapon for Frost Giants and one mortal woman."
Thor stared at Jotunheim for another moment. He had already proven willing to surrender his life for others. Now he was being asked to surrender the future he wanted.
He turned away from Loki and raised Mjolnir over the crystalline span.
"Protect the observatory," Thor said.
Ethan tightened the containment around the control dais. "I will."
Thor brought Mjolnir down, striking the crystalline bridge with earth-shattering force.
The first blow sent massive, jagged fractures spreading across the surface. But the structure was built to carry realm-crossing power and did not break easily.
Loki realized what Thor intended and fired at his exposed back.
Gungnir's blast struck a wide golden shield and broke across its surface before it could reach Thor. Loki abandoned the ranged attack and hurled himself against his brother, trying to drag him away from the spreading fracture.
Thor drove an armored elbow into Loki's chest, threw him aside and brought Mjolnir down a second time.
Ethan's containment around the observatory strained violently as each impact pushed more unstable energy toward the control chamber. Sif and the Warriors Three helped Heimdall remain clear of the breaking mechanism while heavy pieces of the observatory ceiling began crashing down around them.
Thor raised Mjolnir and struck a third time.
The deep fracture reached the active Bifrost channel.
The beam tearing into Jotunheim collapsed immediately. On the viewing field, the destructive light vanished from the frozen realm.
But the released energy tore through the crystalline bridge directly beneath Thor and Loki.
Ethan threw his hands forward, folding the worst of the explosive backlash away from the observatory, preventing the entire structure from exploding. The outer span of the bridge shattered completely, breaking apart and dropping into the endless void.
The released force threw Thor and Loki over the jagged edge.
Thor caught the broken bridge with one hand while Loki hung beneath him, gripping Gungnir as Thor held the opposite end of the spear.
Ethan reached toward them, but the space surrounding the shattered Bifrost was folding and tearing with the collapsing route. A golden portal began forming beneath Loki and immediately broke apart into sparks.
Before Ethan could switch to another spell, a wave of immense golden power crossed the ruined observatory. Odin reached the edge and caught Thor's arm just as the crystal beneath his fingers gave way.
Loki looked up at his adoptive father.
"I could have done it, Father!" Loki cried. "I could have destroyed our enemy and proven myself worthy of you. I did it for Asgard. I did it for you!"
Loki searched Odin's face for the approval he had expected to find there.
Odin looked down at him with grief rather than pride.
"This was never what I wanted for you," he said.
Whatever answer Loki had hoped to hear was absent from Odin's face.
Thor tightened his grip on Gungnir, desperately trying to keep his brother from falling. "Loki, no..."
Loki looked from Odin to Thor. His frantic anger slowly faded, giving way to an exhausted, hollow resignation.
He released his grip on the spear.
"No!" Thor shouted.
Loki fell backward, tumbling endlessly into the dark void before anyone could reach him.
Ethan reached the broken edge and activated the Multiversal Tracker. A faint trail flashed across its display, twisting through the dying energy of the shattered Bifrost. He almost secured the route before the surrounding void tore it apart and scattered the signal beyond anything he could follow.
The trail vanished.
Ethan stared at the empty display for another second. Loki had survived the fall in the original future, but that knowledge could not tell him where the altered route had carried him now.
"Do not assume Loki is dead," Ethan said.
Thor turned toward him immediately. Odin raised his head as well, while Sif and the Warriors Three stopped helping Heimdall away from the damaged mechanism.
"You found him?" Thor asked.
"For less than a second. Something carried him beyond the bridge, but I lost the path before I could identify where it led."
"Then he lives."
"He may," Ethan cautioned. "I cannot promise more than that."
The possibility changed the silence inside the observatory. Thor released a breath he had been holding since Loki disappeared. His brother's actions had not been forgiven, but the terrible finality of watching him fall loosened its grip on Thor's face.
Sif lowered her sword. Some of the tension left Fandral and Volstagg, while Hogun gave a small, quiet nod. Odin said nothing, yet the grief in his expression eased as he looked toward the void where his younger son had vanished.
Thor stared into the darkness for another moment. "Then I will find him."
Odin placed one hand on Thor's shoulder. The simple gesture carried more comfort than anything he could have said in front of the others.
Only then did the All-Father turn toward the unfamiliar man standing inside the remains of Asgard's greatest structure.
Odin's single eye moved over Ethan's robes, the Plumber analyzer and the faint golden tether still wrapped around his wrist. His expression hardened as he recognized the style of magic surrounding him.
"You carry the teachings of Kamar-Taj."
Ethan closed the tracker and met Odin's gaze without lowering his own.
"I do."
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