Doom of the Gods

Scarlet Witch says to the Collector:

"While it is to be understood that you would not wish to leave your museum unattended, perhaps there are some things here you could loan us that would help save the Universe--and thus preserve the rest of your collection?"

The Collector seems intent on the Pogo Plane, and does not give any sign that he has heard.

Hmm. Storm does not free the bat-winged optopod humanoid at this time.

To Thor, she says, "I am eager to do what I can to help maintain order and protect the universe. I will
come."

INVISIBLE GIRL

Sue becomes visible, and says, "Hello, Thor! You remember the many times you dueled the Thing. And the time Reed lost his powers and was replaced by a parallel time version of himself that looked like the Thing? And you remember that time the version of Reed from the Counter Earth of High Evolution known as the BRUTE attacked the Avengers? Well, Reed is feeling a little under the weather right now, but this is a dangerous job that needs to be done, so I'd like to come along."

She turns to Ant Man and says "Can you get your ants to pilot Reed's absurdly expensive one of a kind spaceship back down to a landing pad on top of a Manhattan skyscraper without causing any burn marks on the neighbor's buildings? Because I am going with Thor and we need someone to put the Pogo-Plane away."

ANT MAN

Ant Man will turn to Invisible Girl, "Good question! No .... no ... no!"

Ant Man then turns to Thor, and says, "Good question! Yes!"

Scarlet Witch, says, with lingering, sibilant consonants, "Perhaps there is an automatic pilot setting?"

"Oh," says the Collector, "I can see to restoring the rocket to its proper place. One of a kind, you say
... hm, slight yellowing from cosmic rays ... original paintwork ... still, one of a kind."

SPIDER MAN

Spider man will add more webbing to the Serpent Crown to make it look the size and shape of a football.

Then he will say, "Sure, Thor! I'll help! Everyone needs a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man!"

And then he will think to himself sarcastically, "Yes, little old me, the teen hero barely able to hold
his own against the Three Enforcers, clearly will be a great help against a power mad Titan who is only rivaled by Asgardians! Maybe we should get Daredevil and the Night Thrasher to help too!"

He cradles the webby football casually in his arm.

"Let's roll! Let's swing! Let's rock! Let's, uh, jazz! Let's use another lame musical metaphor for
beginning the adventure!"

There is a clap of thunder which smites the ears and stuns the senses! It's Thor, shouting.

"SO BE IT! Gainst which Asgard, the fabled Realm Eternal, threatens, shall Toothgnasher and Toothgrinder, the perpetually-angry star goats whom mine own Goat Chariot pull, convey us!"

A full-blown thunderstorm rages in the Collector's harbor, while the Collector runs about using gestures of pure force to catch flying debris and put it back safely.

Out of the heart of a lightning flash leap two colossal star goats, dripping foam from their maddened
jaws and glaring murder from their reddened eyes. They are hitched to a chariot, which swings and weaves wildly behind them, as they are fighting each other.

Thor fondly clouts one of the goats on the jaw, while pinning the other one's head under his arm and
knuckling its horns.

"Ho, Toothgnasher! Ho, Toothgrinder! Your master has need of thee this day!"

Machine Man points out, "I'm not made of meat," to the slavering goats.

The Vision fearlessly floats into the goat-cart. Everyone else follows, barring a last-minute rush of
prudence.

"Oh, Scarlet Witch," says the Collector, "take this. It may aid you in preserving my storage area."

"You mean the universe?"

"Yes, that."

The item is a cone of reddish chrome ridged metal, topped with a hemisphere about the size of a
basketball. The hemisphere's forward surface is capped by a pair of clamshell doors.

"The Evil Eye," says the Collector. "Scourge of civilization since the dawn of Atlantis. That ought to do the trick!"

With a crash of thunder, the goat cart leaps free of the Collector's ship and gallops clatteringly into the stars!

"Exactly where are we going?" says the Vision, believing this to be a 'moment of calm' in which fundamental questions may be asked without risk of irrelevancy.

"Asgard lies beyond the fields e'en you, wise Vision, have seen!" says Thor. "Farther than the stars, yet nearer than thy touch! For the home of the doughty Aesir forms the spire triumphant of this material cosmos, rising from the firm foundations of space and time to surmount the heavens empyrean themselves, and look down at once on all places, all times, all manner of men and gods!"

"So once there, we can travel to any point," says the Vision.

"Aye, e'en so!"

"And once there, Thanos can travel to any point."

"Aye, verily, but thou dost not reckon with the mighty Heimdall, seer of all things, nor the Warriors Three, dashing Fandral, grim Hogun, and voluminous Volstagg! Nor the Lady Sif, patroness of shield-maidens, nor the legion of Valkyries who choose the virtuous dead from the battlefields of a hundred worlds, nor those selfsame legions of eternally-youthful Einherijar to whom the lightest whim of All-Father Odin is the law of gravitation itself ..."

"... nor, if all these stalwarts and more beside should fall before the conqueror, dost thou reckon with the hard-won wisdom beyond Death itself of that selfsame patriarch of the heavens men call Odin The Lord of Valhalla!"

With a rainbow kaleidoscope effect, the goat cart breaches the walls of space and bypasses the cold light-centuries with but a single hoofbeat!

There, below, glows golden Asgard, primordial home of the gods since time was new.

It glows quite a lot, in fact, owing to the huge cracks in the green fields and brooding hills, through which boiling lava, flames, and skeletons armed with axes are pouring, smoke-stained, to darken the streets of the Realm Eternal with blood!

"The Fire Giants!" Thor exclaims! "One-fourth of the scourges prophesied to sack glorious Asgard at the end of time! Well, they have never come in such numbers before, but we have beaten their fire into ashes many and many a time, and shall do so anew ..."

Indeed, warriors in complicated headdresses and armor, no two even slightly alike, are leaping, stabbing, wielding mighty spells, invoking earth spirits, or just plowing forward crushing every fire giant in their path. Though death and destruction flare on every hand, still it appears the gods have this invasion well on the way to grim defeat.

But that is not why Thor trails off. No, the Thunder God has been struck mute by the shimmering adventition of three writhing trails of blue-green lightning, forming into cones like unto hurricanes of electric force.

And through the eye of those space-storms, now pour three armies, one of Ice, one of Beasts, and one of the Risen Dead!

"Were we expecting the end of time?" says the Vision.

"All things now perish in battle!" Thor exclaims in answer. "Tis now the time of the burning of the halls of the Gods. It is an ice-age, an axe-age, a storm-age. Henceforth no man shall know peace until he lies in his gore, nor woman know safety lest it be in the homely grave! RAGNAROK, the Last Day, has begun -- and none shall live to see the dawn!"

The ICE GIANTS head for the hall VALHALLA, home of the excellent dead and of Odin in his role as Master of the Slain. Valkyries, riding winged horses, rush to oppose them.

The FELL BEASTS comprise three colossal, Godzilla-sized monsters, a wolf with bloody jaws, a bear with claws of fire, and an endless snake whose body keeps unreeling from some hidden depth beyond the storm-portal. The beasts are accompanied by thousands of lesser beasts, mansized or slightly larger, who orbit them like flies around a crocodile. They stream directly toward the shores of a Crystal Lake, where several larger-than-life gods leap skyward to confront them.

The RISEN DEAD don't attack anybody. They spread across the picnic grounds, hauling on rusty chains, straining their bones to pull something very large, very heavy, through the portal into Asgard. There are quite a lot of them.

And the FIRE GIANTS, seeing their opening, surround two gods, one black with an iron hand, one golden with an ivory bow, and swamp them. The heaving masses of fire giants throw up showers of dead, torn bodies, but more fill the holes before the entrapped gods can escape.

The floating cylindrical golden tower, orbited by two golden hemispheres in perpetual harmony, is yet untouched.

THOR leaps to fight the Fire Giants.

"Ho, Tyr! Ho, Uller! You shall die this day -- but not yet! Not while THOR, the master of Mjolnir, has yet one unbroken bone! HAVE AT THEE!"

MACHINE MAN's head revolves 360 degrees to take in all the carnage.

"I'm suddenly glad I don't have a stomach," he says.

The VISION looks around.

"What would Thanos be doing during this battle," he asks, "and where would he need to be in order to do it?

But Thor's gone, into the scrum.

The Vision hopes someone else will answer. He's literally the least experienced hero present.