It’s a beautiful, sunny day in New York City. The clear skies and welcoming warmth – something of a rarity at this time of year – have drawn the people of Manhattan out of their apartments and their offices. The streets of Fifth Avenue and Broadway are filled with shoppers and diners, and families flock to Central Park. It is a city buzzing with life, a hub of activity and a beacon of humanity. For many, this makes New York a prime target.
The bright sun was obscured by some passing cloud. In Central Park, some couples lying out on the grass together let out a sigh of disappointment, the sudden chill detracting from a romantic moment. But few were worried, as they assumed the cloud would soon move on, and the sun would return.
There is an ancient, incredibly powerful being named Seth. Amongst cultures long since vanished from our world, he was known as the Serpent God of Death. But though his presence has diminished in the millennia that have past, his power and his malicious intent have not. Seth is a being obsessed with bringing order to what he deems the chaos of life, an order that can only be achieved through dominion and death. His obsession with order brought Seth into conflict with Odin, King of Asgard, in a battle that resulted in the loss of Seth’s hand. This is a defeat Seth has never forgotten, one he has spent centuries upon centuries plotting revenge for. Revenge he has now come close to finally achieving, striking at Odin through his favorite son.
In Times Square, busy, rushing pedestrians are now stopping, and looking up at the sky. Those clouds have not moved on. Instead, the clouds have gathered into a thick, grey mass, looming ominously overhead, and turning what was a bright afternoon mere minutes before into a dark, heavy gloom.
“Looks like a storm’s comin’,” one elderly man says to no one in particular.
With his son in his clutches, Seth expected Odin to descend from his throne in Asgard, and engage him in battle on Earth once more. But Odin did nothing. Seth could have done what he originally intended – sever the son’s hand as his own hand had been severed, and then kill him. But he realized there were more enduring ways to hurt Odin. And so with the hypnotic power of his icy stare, Seth took control of the mind of Odin’s weakened son. And now the one Odin loves most will be used as a weapon against those Odin has sworn to protect. If Odin would not intervene to save his son, would he intervene to stop him?
Many across Manhattan let out a gasp of surprise as a crack of lightning lights up the darkened sky, not in the distance, but circuiting across right over their heads. Then the thunder comes, rumbling low, then building up in a steady crescendo to a deafening boom. Now people begin to be frightened. This is most unusual to them, most unnatural. It had been a bright, sunny day in New York City. Now they were in the eye of a storm.
The rain begins to pour in torrents, hitting hard and heavy, accompanied by stinging winds. Then, just as the hordes of New Yorkers begin their frenzied rush back to the shelter of the indoors, the clouds part, and a figure descends. Many onlookers would describe the figure as a hulking man close to 7 feet in height, but this is no man. They would also remark that he is dressed like a Viking, when the more accurate assessment would be that the Vikings dressed like him. Clad in chainmail armor and a regal winged helmet, he looks like a warrior prepared for battle, or perhaps even a massacre.
His red cape billows in the wind, but that aside the warrior seems untouched by the storm around him. And it is very much around him, the rain seeming to swirl in circles around his descending form, and crackles of lightning fizzing from the short-handled metal hammer gripped in his hand. This hammer is called Mjolnir, and it is a weapon more devastating than any known to man.
It might as well be night. The skies above are black, and the sunny afternoon is already a distant memory. Despite the rain beating them down, some onlookers remain outside, staring stupidly at the storm bringer as he hovers mere feet above the ground. Some film the event with their camera phones. The warrior looks around, expression blank and eyes dead, assessing his surroundings. He has landed in Times Square. He points Mjolnir upward, in the direction of one of the massive video screens overhead. Suddenly, a bolt of lightning shoots down out of the sky, and connects squarely with the screen, which explodes in a shower of falling glass and metal.
Now the screaming begins. Now people begin to run, blinded as much by panic as the rain whipping into their eyes. Drawing his trunk-like arm back, the warrior grips onto the strap at the end of Mjolnir, and swings the hammer, faster and faster. Then he throws it at a building, one of the many large, multi-floor megastores in this area. The stone wall is pulverized, and as the hammer returns to his hand, more debris plummets into the street below.
This is Seth’s weapon. This is the son of Odin.
This is the mighty Thor.
