Caffeine Rush (Avengers Fanfic)

Chapter 34: Signs of Ragnarok

Sorry I didn't say goodbye. Those were the first words Tony read from the hastily scrawled note left by Rush. Those words hit hard. He never got to say goodbye to any of the loved ones that he'd lost and Jes was no exception, other than hers had been voluntary. That had probably been what had hurt the most.

There's something I need to do. Nobody wanted to talk about it. How she went crazy after their conversation about the rifts and left. At first, she had been erratic, moving in short bursts of speed without direction. Then after she'd tossed Thor through their hanger and several aircraft, it had become more purposeful, and then she'd made a beeline for the coast, building speed as soon as she hit the water until her tracking signature had dropped out completely.

I don't know how long I'll be gone. She'd been gone for long enough that the press had started questioning her absence and they had been arguing with the brass about what to tell them. In that time, the rifts that had caused her sudden and unexplained departure had grown increasingly more frequent, to the point that Gandalf had cautioned their ability to continue guarding against them. They could continue to close the rifts all they liked but one of these days, the sanctums that were shielding their planet from the influence of outside dimensions and multiversal energy would fail and whatever happened after wouldn't be preventable.

Take care of yourselves until I get back. Everyone missed her presence, no exception. Even Fury seemed to miss her humor. Natasha had taken over her coffee station but by her own admission, she just wasn't as good as their speedster barista. Everyone still followed the same routine, as if expecting her to waltz through the door one day and pick up right where they left off. Steve had confessed to Bucky and Sam privately about his feelings of guilt on how he had treated Jesse during that meeting. Tony had pulled Bruce into a science project to keep their minds off of her absence, ignoring the emotional problem instead of dealing with it. Clint often found himself in front of Quicksilver's plaque in the Hall of Heroes, enough that he'd grown familiar with Bucky's routine visits to the Archangel's plaque. Wanda seemed to be pretended that everything was fine, that nothing had changed, and Thor was the only one who seemed to truly think so, as gullible as ever, believing the words written in her note to be as sacred as an oath carved in stone. As for Loki, no one saw much of him at all aside from the rare streak of black fur or the glowing green eyes illuminating a dark corner.

I'm serious, don't die without me. She probably had meant that part flippantly but it was beginning to become an increasing concern. The rifts were a huge problem, one that had locations they couldn't predict forming all across the globe, often needing local heroes and emergency response to take action before they could get there resulting in a list of casualties that were piling up. And the rifts weren't getting easier to handle either, each dimension it opened into was unique, presenting its own dangers that took time and effort to identify, and without Rush, they had to manually search the location while fighting off enemies until they found the rift for a sorcerer to close. That errand had better well be worth all this. They needed her back, and fast, before things got any worse.

Love, Rush (:

***

My father was more than just my father, he woke up early every morning to make pancakes, he was there to advise me through my education, a shoulder to cry on, his hugs an open invitation, a smile always playing on his lips, a certain light in his eyes every time I did something noteworthy, even if it was stumbling down the stairs on my first day of the semester. But more than that, he was my mentor. He had been there to laugh at my first wipeout, I had tripped over my own feet and that road rash was not pretty. He had taught me all the basic rules of being a speedster, the best running techniques, and the importance of control over speed.

When I had proven myself to be among the fastest speedsters, my father and I had taken an entire year to jump through different universes in the multiverse. At the time I had thought it a wonderful vacation, a reward of sorts, now I knew that he was teaching me about all the differences in the multiverse and introducing me to its rules. At the end of our journey, he had taken me to the world serpent, a sleeping giant amidst universe sized leaves, told me the prophecy of the end of days and our role to play in it. It was there that he gave me the first rule of being a world serpent guardian; if the eyes are white, all is right, if the eyes are red, run or you're dead.

It wasn't like the basic rules for being a speedster, such as never wearing lace-up shoes, it was a rule that had outside responsibility attached to it. To check on the world serpent and observe any indicators that he might be waking. Each speedster had responsibilities of their own back in their own universe or those they'd chosen to frequent, but this was one we shared. Each of us checked often by multiversal standards, once every few years for each of us, usually five to eight years. I'd gone early the last time; it had been one of my first stops directly following the day that I'd left my universe. The snake had been asleep, its eyes a milky white color streaked through with silver veins.

The only time I'd seen his eyes even a shade different was in the astral form he'd projected when Hela had tried to wake him during her invasion. They were pink then, a light rosy pink, so pale I might not have even known the difference had his scales not been the exact same shade of white as his eyes.

I caught my breath as a tremor made its way through my body. It had taken so long to get here, almost a full month of straight running as fast as my legs could sustain me. Coming so far across the multiverse took a lot out of me, Yggdrasil was an unfathomably large tree and the energy it produced—the same kind that was drawn by the sorcerers—could sustain me throughout my multiversal travels so I didn't need to stop in different universes for food. But the tremor had nothing to do with that. I had gotten as close as I needed to get to find my answer, almost a full week's run from where the snake actually rested, a giant so large that even from this great distance, its eye looked to be the size and shape of the moon in the sky.

It should have been just as white too, but I remembered before when his eyes had turned pink, his astral form barring his fangs against the heroes of my world.

His eyes were pink now.