You know how, in the stories, when the hero needs this weapon to slay that monster, it's never finished or there before he fights the monster? Either it comes for him earlier than he expected, or he sets on his journey and forgets the weapon, or loses it, or it breaks.

Luckily, it didn't seem like I would need my bladed cross for the next mission. ARC would have preferred being able to make their own holy weapons, but the world's various Churches had a monopoly on that, and anyone who knew how to make what I'd asked pops to forge was already in the clergy. So, outsourcing is only fine by necessity, though it makes them grind their teeth.

At least Constantin was known and respected, even as an outsider. Fifty years of service and protection freely given will do that, even if it will also make your brothers in faith question why you are so tolerant of the pagans and the unbelievers.

Not to mention the monsters, in appearance if not essence.

'The Sognefjord,' Marcus' translucent finger hovered over the map of Norway, so that it seemed to actually be touching the King of Fjords. 'We are...surprised, the Aesir are only making their move now.'

'Permission to speak freely, sir?' Rivka Peretz's fangs made her sound like she was always holding in a growl. That, and her permanent shark grin, clashed with the long, dark braids and watery grey eyes, which did little to make her look friendlier.

But you could have worse problems, as a ghoul.

Rivka's family had come to Romania after the Revolution, when we were still politely debating whether the Party should be replaced with a democracy, a meritocracy, or if we should just go 'fuck it' and throw ourselves at the mercy of the nicest supernaturals.

And, as Romanians are wont to do in the rare occasions we don't have a yoke around our collective neck, we tried all three and managed none. The Meritocratic Mage Party was still getting hyped up these days, as far as I could tell whenever I hated myself enough to watch politics. Let the most skilled, competent and powerful rise to power, and maybe if they're nice too, we won't end up in a magical oligarchy.

The fact most of them looked human probably didn't hurt, either. Maybe I should run for President sometime in the future, to balance this anthropocentrism.

The Peretz family had traveled to Romania because the patriarch had been a pretty big fanboy of Benjamin Fondane-Barbu Fundoianu, if you'll forgive me for not using the Frenchsona-and his wife hadn't trusted him to watch himself out of Israel, however short his stay was. But one thing turned into another, then they had a girl, and by then, they really weren't in a hurry to go back home.

I didn't know how Rivka had become a ghoul. I wasn't sure what the process in general was, or if there even was one, and it would have been rude to try and guess.

I had once barred my swollen, veiny neck to her, to show I wasn't shy about the way I'd died, but she'd just told me some undead liked to keep their former lives to themselves.

'Well,' I had said. 'At least you're not the shapeshifting desert demon version, then. What do those turn into again? Hyenas?'

'Think I'd turn into an animal for you, Silva?' she'd laughed, and-

'Yes?' Marcus cut into my microsecond-long musing.

'Are we really supposed to believe the Norse gods, being the Norse gods, have been sitting all quiet and nice for three years without their favourite talking head?' She took Marcus' frown as an encouragement to go on. 'I know agents are like mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed sh-'

'Yes, beautiful analogy, agent Peretz.' The Legionary held up a warning hand at her widening grin. 'This might surprise you, but one of the Aesir's two best planners is a paranoid, shapeshifting consummate liar, and the other is Loki. They're not all screaming morons, jumping headfirst into impossible fights.' "All the time" went unspoken. 'If you believe ARC has been fighting a shadow war without your knowledge because we do not value your opinion, I am happy to let you down. When we don't tell you about shadow wars, it's for completely different reasons.' Marc smirked as the other Crypt agents in the meeting room-all ghosts-muttered in agreement about compartmentalisation and need to know bases. 'You might have noticed we have been advertising our presence, in every country, like the worst cheap movie billboard these last three years? To let the pantheons know the Earth is held by men, for men, and they can't just waltz in and walk all over us.'

Marc was putting on a brave face for us, acting all impartial, because he had to give an example. He had confessed to me that he feared being denied entry to Pluto's realm for not aiding him or his family.

'ARC is calling all hands not dealing with the chaos caused by Chernobog's manifestation.' This was new to me, at least, and I stood up straighter in my chair. 'When it's not his worshippers showing their devotion through chaos, it's people fighting against them, or using him as an excuse for doing whatever they like. The Black God walks the world! This was never foretold! The end of days is coming!' The ghost didn't roll his eyes, but only just. 'Perhaps I am poor at reading, but my goat entrails have been showing no apocalypse any time soon. Anyway...we have been lending a hand to most national supernatural law enforcement agencies-FREAKSHOW, Strannyy Okhrannik, Dingdan Baoliu, O Circulo Bizarro-who have been doing likewise to us, and their smaller counterparts.'

I was about to call Marc out for showing off his "multilingualism" (he'd never been the same since possessing that dictionary) when he tapped an unseen button with his left hand, and a section of the whiteboard behind him projected a life-sized, holographic rendition of the events at Sognefjord.

Oh, gods.

***

I had nothing to gear up with, a thought that had me bitterly swearing at the lack of a cross in case we bumped into some Unseelie Fae on the way to Norway, but my colleagues did. To have a way to truly interact with the world, the ghosts possessed the safesuits ARC had received from Yamada Inc, as a favour for us cleaning up Mars for mankind, but really because Kenji wanted to see his inventions tested by lab rats whose injuries and/or deaths he wouldn't have to answer for.

Each safesuit was simultaneously tougher than a mountain and more flexible than silk. Painted black with white trimming, with non-reflective black visors, each safesuit could take the punch I'd used to first pulverise that mountain golem in Siberia with only a cracked visor, and that was their weakest point. The fact they were this durable meant the ghost could move them as hard and fast as they wanted, giving us thousand of fighters physically on par with me.

Rivka put on a safesuit too, because, as a ghoul, she was the squishiest member of our impromptu regiment. She could slap rounds back at a railgun, take tank shells with a bruise and break a speeding train with a tackle, but none of that was worth squat when dealing with even einherjar, let alone Thor and his sons. The safesuit's toughness, backed up by her ghoulish ferocity and knack for violence, would still make her a valuable asset on the field.

We left Omu base with Marc leading us in a safesuit customised to make him look like a centurion ("Because I always wanted to be one", but also because its appearance would help us distinguish him if his voice was drowned out in a hypothetical fight). Rivka tried to hoof it first, running down the mountain fast enough to melt the stone, but one of the ghosts, Albert, picked her up as he realised her plan. Yes, she was more than fast enough to run on water and leave steam in her wake, but we didn't need to charbroil everything between us and Sognefjord, and only she seemed to want to.

The ghoul had grumbled and invented several curses by the time we had reached Norway, with Albert stolidly taking everything in stride.

'Look,' she told him after stopping to think up new words, and not because she needed to breathe; an ability all ghouls agreed was wonderful when swallowing, and even when eating. 'I'm not-I'm really grateful I flew with Albert Airlines for free, but this is demeaning. Can't we...'

'I might have an alternative,' I suggested after she trailed off. Rivka turned to me, and I could see her curious expression through glass that would have been opaque to humans. 'Leap of faith?'

Shrugging-even if she fell, from orbit, she'd heal- she muttered to Albert to let her go, and her boots hit nothing but air...which became solid when shaped by my will. I didn't solidify all the air I could perceive-that would have been both excessive and dangerous to the environment in ways I wasn't qualified to analyse-only the sections she needed to run on. With a whoop and a thumbs up, she started running on the invisible bridge, so fast a sphere of flames formed around her.

It was like this that we made our way to Sognefjord.

***

Heimdall, as Thor patiently explained to us, grinning cheerfully like we were all out for a beer, couldn't find Mimir's head with his farseeing gaze. As neither Odin's runes, nor his ravens, could find the head, either, the Allfather had ordered his greatest son and warriors to scour the Earth until they found the head, or never return.

With a world-shaking laugh at this newest challenge, Thor had called upon his own sons, Magni and Modi, and servants, Pjalfi and Roskva. They had mounted his chariot, drawn by Tanngrisnir and Tanngnjostr, at the head of ten thousand einherjar.

Yes, I can into Wikipedia. I can even write down long Norse names. Everything, for a lollipop.

As Marcus tried to argue that Aesir presence on Earth was distruptive, riling up both their worshippers and the rest of the world, the Thunderer just smiled and nodded along, like my math teachers whenever I was called to the board.

We could all tell how likely he was to agree by the end.

'We share your concern!' Marcus said, holding out a hand. 'The weft of fate should not have been able to be severed, let alone like this. We will help you find Mimir's head and set things right, but I beg of you...return to Asgard. The world is already chafing under the presence of the Black God. It cannot take more-'

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Thor cracked his back and neck, sighing into his long, wild red beard. Rolling his broad shoulders, the god gestured at himself. 'Unarmed. Beltless. No gauntlets. I come in peace, revenants.' Funny. I didn't know Sif went by "peace". 'You,' he told Rivka, winking. 'Are the first woman to see me not gripping my hammer.' His stormy grey eyes then turned serious. 'But if you seek to turn us from our course, and bar us from taking back what is rightfully ours...you shall die again, and truly. So swears Thor.'

And the clear sky flashed with lightning, before the frozen fjord cracked open from the teeth-rattling thunder.

Because, when gods speak, the world listens.

As I stepped forward, to say my piece, I could only think this hadn't been how I'd expected to spend my November.

The einherjar, who had ditched their Iron Age armour for golden, rune-covered plate that left nothing uncovered, stiffened at my approach. One of them, leaning against a round boulder six meters tall and three wide, lightly struck the stone with one elbow, turning it to dust. His way of getting his fellows' attention, which worked better than expected.

Magni and Modi, standing at their father's sides, stepped out of the chariot to intercept me. The former had his mother's golden hair and father's long beard, the latter Thor's shoulder-length red hair, though he was clean-shaven. They were both so tall I only came up to the base of their bull-like necks, and their arms were thicker around than my thighs. I help up my hands to show I wasn't going to do anything stupid, but they stood their ground.

That was when Hex made himself known.

The second most powerful member of ARC's Salem division, the watchers over magic, Hex had been in the Thule Society in his youth, and had then become one of ARC's founders. He didn't hold a candle to his superior, or so the rumours went, but he had still been skilled enough to conceal himself from my strigoi senses.

The black mass that streamed out of his white long coat, from under his slouch hat, made me want to gag in a way even meeting Fixer for the first time hadn't. It grinned as it shaped itself into weapons, the infinitely-sharp blades cutting rents into reality that were sealed shut by Hex's power.

'They have told you to leave. The ghost has begged. That is unworthy of him, and unworthy of ARC.' The old mage didn't move his stitched lips, and my ears registered no sound, but we all heard his voice in our minds. 'We will not ask again.'

'Making threats, sorcerer?' moody Modi sneered, drawing a two-headed axe, covered in runes of destruction, from thin air.

'Only promises,' was the last thing Hex said before he was sent flying.

The Einherjar who had snuck in behind him, impossibly fast and quiet, had produced a mallet, then slammed it between the mage's legs, sending him out of even my sight.

His armour scattered like old toys thrown by a disappointed child as he flexed, revealing a long-haired, muscled redhead. I only had time to frown like a moron at his mischievous grin, then he was suddenly in front of me, scarred hand on my throat.

And then, I saw stars.

***

Loki smiled as he let the glamour fall away, being sure to pet the goats for bearing his presence for so long. Looking like their master hadn't helped. If anything, it had made things worse, more confusing, and the poor things already had tooth problems.

They still bleated in relief when he hopped out of the chariot to stand on water. Bastards.

'The first undead to reach Alpha Centauri without a spaceship...' the Trickster mused, twinkling eyes easily tracking the Christian strigoi-sounded like a paradox he would devise-far longer than this drab's universe's laws should have allowed. 'And that patchwork dabbler is gone, too. I didn't like his parasite much, either.'

'Not as much as you still love your voice, obviously,' Thor scoffed, shaping lighting into a cage to hold ARC's members. Neither their armours nor undead natures would save them if they attempted to cross, but he didn't want to kill them if he didn't have to. Yet. They were all protectors of man, dammit. 'Me wearing foot soldier's armour was the only worthwhile idea you had today.'

'Well, if you didn't want to cross-dress again...' Loki shrugged, smiling.

'It didn't have to end like this.,' the ghosts' headman, wearing Rome's history like a king's rags, called. Then, he reached for an unseen device on the armour, and all Hel broke loose.

When ARC evicted the reptilians from Mars, the aliens didn't ask for recompense for their dead. After all, they were all genetically-engineered and modified, and could build an infinity of reptilians if they wanted.

Instead, they had been thankful for being stopped before relations between the Collective and mankind could deteriorate beyond mending.

The loss of their quantum experiment at Liam Lloyd's hands had stung, but only spurred their scientists on. And their remaining star experiment-the extreme labour/combat unit designated "Unscarred" for its extreme physical endurance- had been improved as a result.

Drained of lifeforce, the mindless albino was now moved solely by yoctomachines, controlled by the gestalt consciousness that would have been known as the Shaper, if it had ever deigned to name itself to mankind.

And now, as the Collective looked to rebuild their image in the eyes of the surface world, its master cried havoc, and let slip the dog of war.

The Unscarred teleported right atop Loki, landing a lazy backhand on the Jotunn that smashed him through the water, and then the fjord's bottom. He did not stop there. The Trickster would later be found in China, nursing a numb nose in a mountain-sized, steaming crater.

Magni and Modi were the next it struck. The gods raised their weapons so fast light and space bent around them, and Norway was rocked by the explosion that vapourised Sognefjord and blinded people as far as Denmark.

But they were not fast enough. When Heimdall looked for them, he was surprised to learn you could swear in the sun's core, if you were angry enough.

The einherjar cracked their armour and broke their feet and fists, shattered their mountain-splitting blades and island-sinking bludgeons, on its pale, scaled hide. The Unscarred walked through them, turning them to red mist and chunks of golden plate.

Thor grinned.

'A worthy opponent! Our battle will be lege-' he braced himself with one hand as he landed on the moon, pulverising a crater the size of Russia. The reptilian teleported above him an instant later. 'What are you, DreamWorks' lawyer-?'

Thor did not feel its next punch either, laughing in the vacuum as the moon shattered like an egg under him. Mani would have a cow over this later, as would the other moon gods, but...oh, well. Even the god of fertility couldn't please everyone.

Thor leaned aside from a red-glowing punch as he closed his left hand around its tail. Black spikes sparked against Jarngreipr when he stopped the tail whip.

'Aberrant!' a rasping voice screamed, and the Thunderer laughed as the incongruence between its thinness and the lizard's body. Then, he realised it wasn't coming from its trunk-like throat or barrel chest. 'You recklessly damage this system's astrography and assault its foremost law enforcement agents-'

Ah. Its master, speaking through its toys? Thor could see the infinitesimal machines with his godly sight-little puppets, moving a bigger one. All at a coward's fingertips.

'If you spent half as much time helping us as you did yapping,' he growled. 'Everything would be fine now!'

A gauntleted backhand smashed the albino through Mars, splitting it in half harder than Ares' spine did when confronted by a real enemy. The Unscarred jumped out of the exposed core, shattering half of the red planet into fist-sized chunks.

That was when Thor began worrying.

This construct wasn't evil, nor was its master. But they were stupid and blind, for all their skill in craftsmanship. They couldn't see they were ruining things even further than that moron from the Emerald Isle had.

As such, he had no reason to kill it. Furthermore, he was defender of mankind, and, it seemed, so was it.

So, Thor pulled Mjolnir free of Meginjord, creating a hurricane between the humans' world and the destroyed celestial bodies. Wind screamed into the cold void around the moon and Mars, holding them in place, preventing meteors while he thought of other possible dangers.

The big bastard's scales sported only a tiny hairline crack after he broke Mars in half with its face. These reptilians built well. Maybe he could have them meet the dwarves, and teach them not to be so damn stolid? A little ale never hurt...

As the Unscarred hammered his face with punches that would have shattered planets and kicks that would have shaken stars, Thor sought a way to end this pointless, if entertaining, distraction of a brawl.

Then, he saw where they were.

'Stupid drake! You've given THOR the greatest storm under the sun!'

Hoping to his ancestors that Odin would find a way to fix this-lately, he'd only been worried about getting head from that beheaded old man, despite being married, but he was still the greatest runecaster he knew-Thor tapped into his power, and wrapped Jupiter around Mjolnir, condensing it until it was barely larger than its head.

And then, he brought the hammer down.

The Unscarred flew faster than most spaceships, turning Saturn into a thin cloud. Uranus and Neptune were barely even visible after it passed through them. As for Pluto...well, no one would be thinking about that as-

The Unscarred's head sported the most gorgeous goose egg Thor had ever beheld, white scales split open to reveal bruised, leathery skin. Its eyes-placid pink at the start of the fight-were now red as blood, and its muzzle was set in a -ha!- thunderous scowl.

It didn't compare to the coterie of angry gods floating behind it, though. Zeus, Poseidon, Hades-and not beating each other bloody, progress!-, Artemis, Mani...and more moon gods than he knew, or could count.

That wasn't the worst part, though.

'Thor,' Odin's brow was so furrowed, it was threatening to turn into a trench. "What in Surtr's flaming bowels are you even doing?!'