No More Olympus

Epilogue

"... come from the land of the ice and snow.
From the midnight sun where the hot springs flow..." Adolpha mumbled under her breath, singing along with the faint music over the elevator's loudspeaker as it went further and further beneath the earth, "...fight the horde, sing and cry, Valhalla, I am coming..."
Burrows loudly cleared his throat, reminding her that she was not alone in the small metal box.
"I'm sorry," she said abruptly, smoothing out her suit jacket, "That was unprofessional."
Burrows made no comment.
The two were currently several hundred feet underground in the middle of an empty field of land down in Vermont.
"Are you sure you made it deep enough?" Burrows asked as he checked his watch.
"The deeper it is, the harder it is to detect," Adolpha explained, "And the easier it is to bury should anything try to leave against our wishes."
"Bury?" Burrows questioned, "Why would you want to bury your headquarters?"
"Our headquarters are up in Manhattan," Adolpha corrected.
"Then what's this place?" He asked.
The door opened with the sound of a bell.
"A prison," she explained.
The bunker wasn't particularly large at all. It couldn't have been wider than a football field or taller than your average house.
Inside there were dozens of people walking around about half that many cells, each made of a variety of unique materials and configurations.
"This bunker was designed to contain things that we wanted to keep secret from the public eye," Adolpha explained as they walked deeper into the bunker, "A place intended to keep things inside for the rest of the foreseeable future with no method of escape, we call it 'Limbo.'"
The two quickly approached a collection of cells.
"Allow me to introduce you to some of our guests," Adolpha continued, motioning to the most basic-looking of the cells.
Inside was a being technically of human shape, but barely, its limbs were twisted in random directions, and one of its arms was just missing completely, its muscles were twisted randomly like a careless back of yarn and across its pale skin were a number of black marks in the shape of large veins.
"This one came in a little under an hour ago," She explained, "General, I'm sure you've met Wallace King."
"That's Wallace King?" Burrows asked in disbelief, "As in top of his field, friends with the president Wallace King?"
"The very one," Adolpha nodded.
"What happened to him?" He asked.
"He tried using a power that was not his own. It was too much for his body to handle," she explained, "We believe he's the one that summoned the creature that attacked Athens this morning. Anyway, let's move on,"
Opened-mouthed, Burrows slowly followed Adolpha down the row of cells.
"Right here we have Ginger the Leprechaun," she introduced,
"That's not my name," the stout little man in tattered green cloth spat.
"Shut up," Adolpha ordered, "Notice the reinforced plastic cell? His kind has a way of manipulating earthly metals, but when it comes to plastic, he's completely worthless, which makes for perfect containment. Now legend says when you catch one, you get a wish."
"What did you guys wish for?" Burrows said, almost afraid to ask.
"That the Americans would get themselves involved in World War Two," Adolpha admitted, "And it worked."
"Why the hell would you want that?" Burrows asked.
"Over here," Adolpha said, dodging the question, "In the lovely silver cell, we have a Mr. Stanley Schmitt."
Burrows peered through the thick metal bars to see an old naked man shivering in the corner with burns all over his arms.
"What is he?" Burrows asked.
"He's a lycanthrope," She answered.
Burrows gave her a quizzical look.
"A werewolf," Adolpha explained, "He may not look it, but when we get ourselves a full moon, he becomes rather... explosive."
"...please sir..." a weak voice called out, "...they won't let me leave..."
Burrows turned his head in horror to see a weeping little red-headed girl kneeling behind a glass cell wall, dressed in something that resembled some sort of prison nightshirt. He then noticed a large chain locked around her ankle.
"And here she is," Adolpha presented, pressing her palm against the glass.
"What security measures do you have for this one?" Burrows asked.
"See that chain?" Adolpha asked, "They found it on her when they caught her, as we understand it. If she wasn't wearing that, she could rip apart this whole bunker."
"Please, sir..." the child begged, "She's lying. I want my mommy."
"She tries this with everyone who comes in here," Adolpha explained, "Luckily, no one's believed her for longer than a minute."
The child continued to weep, and then as if turning a switch off, she stopped.
"Don't press your luck bitch," the child sneered.
Adolpha flipped off the child as Burrows looked to the back of the room.
He saw a metal dome covered in yellow and black caution markings surrounded by several scientists using high-tech and very expensive-looking equipment, including computers, robotic arms mounted to the floor, and a pair of Tesla coils coming out of the walls.
"Who's under that?" Burrows asked.
"Not who," Adolpha corrected, "What."
She began to lead the way toward the dome.
"All right, eggheads," she called out to the team, "We have a guest of honour here. Let's give him a show."
Motors began to run as a large metal cover lifted off of a platform.
The moment the dome lifted less than an inch above the ground, every single hair on Burrows's arms began to stand on end.
After a few minutes, what was finally hidden under the dome was revealed.
It was a hammer, with a head about the size of a cinder block and a handle no longer than Burrows's own thigh.
"We found this after World War Two, or more specifically after the D-Day operation, in a secret Nazi lab," Adolpha explained, "We believed that they were trying to weaponize it to use against us. So after we found it, we took it into our custody and brought it here, this is why we wanted to enter the war, to get this."
"What is it?" Burrows asked, fascinated by the weapon.
"In this business, it's unwise to assume you know what you have," she explained, waltzing around the platform where it was sitting, "But given that the runes carved into it are Scandinavian in origin, we have a few ideas as to what it is."
"Were you able to translate any of them?" Burrows asked.
"Most of them are in an alphabet lost to history," Adolpha explained, "The ones we can, we can't make heads or tails of, that is, except for one word, carved into the handle."
"That word being?" Burrows asked.
"Mjolnir," she answered.

To Be Continued...