Wow! I am on a role! Mind you, this chapter is kinda on the short side, and a good chunk the beginning was already written, so it isn't that great of an achievement, but still!

Disclaimer: I do not own any Marvel characters

Chapter 8: The Morning After

Erica felt safe. So very, very safe, as though she knew that a thousand warriors were prepared to fight to the death to protect her. She also felt loved, as though her family entire family was near. She was comfortable in some kind of silk gown and sleeping in a giant, gold cradle. Her surroundings were magnificent, an enormous golden room with decorated with carvings and tapestries alluding to legends and bedtime stories. Erica would have been perfectly fine with staying in this moment forever.

Suddenly, the door at the other side of the room flew open. A giant warrior clad in battle armor and a red cape ran to Erica and picked her up like she weighed nothing. The warrior then carried her out of the room and down an enormous hallway.

Erica began to squirm in the warrior's arms. Although she felt as though being carried by him was nothing new (in fact, she felt that his arms inspired memories of comfort), she did not like that fact that he was running with her.

The warrior looked down on her lovingly and said, "Do not worry, my child. Thou art simply spending a few days on Midgard, thy mother's homeland. When the battle is won, I shall return to collect thee and thy mother as well." The warrior then shifted Erica such that she could look over his shoulder. Erica was granted a marvelous view of a great golden city as they ran farther away from it.

When the warrior reached the edge of the city, and handed Erica to a beautiful woman clad in royal silks and precious jewelry. Erica recognized the woman as her mother, and relaxed into her comforting arms.

The warrior leaned down and gave Erica a kiss on her brow, then kissed her mother on the lips. He then turned his back to the city and cried in a loud voice, "Brother! I have brought them, as you instructed. Now tell me, how do you mean to get them out of Asgard?"

A space of air next to the warrior shimmered, and out of it stepped—

"Erica! ERICA!"

Erica opened her eyes to see Lily shaking her. Erica groggily sat up. "What is it? You better have a damn good reason for waking me up."

"7:00" Lily stated simply.

Erica bolted out of bed. "How the hell did I sleep 30 minutes past my alarm?" she shouted while pulling on the first things her hands touched.

Lily held up Erica's old alarm clock, completely dead. "I think you broke it yesterday. You sure do go through alarm clocks really fast."

At the mention of yesterday, thousands of emotions flooded Erica. Trying to make sense of it all, she asked, "Did it all really happen?"

"Did all what happen?"

"You know, yesterday. SHIELD. Tim. Ana. Phil. James." Erica had a hard time forcing out her next words. "Mom's experiment."

Lily looked down at her hands. "I'm afraid so."

Erica's eyesight grew blurred with tears. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

Lily looked surprised. "What do you have to be sorry for?"

"I was useless. I always act confident and ready for anything, but that is all it is. An act. When things really got tense, I froze up."Erica choked on her words. "I couldn't save my own mother when it counted." Erica left her closet, fully clothed, and walked to her dresser to do her hair. "You were amazing, doing exactly what was needed. I just froze up."

"Don't beat yourself up. Nothing that happened was your fault. If it had been anybody else, they probably would have freaked out as well."

"You didn't."

"Honestly, I don't know why." Lily frowned. "I was scared out of my wits the entire time. For some reason, I just felt like I had been situations at least as bad."

Erica turned to her best friend, surprised. "Are you starting to remember? You know anything before you were 5?"

Lily shook her head. "Not really, it's more of a feeling than a memory." She sighed. "Anyway, stop beating yourself up about it. You need to be the cheerful, spunky, crazy Erica that I know, not this self-loathing girl I've never met. Especially since we are going to meet the SHIELD consultant today."

"That's right!" Erica pulled her hair up into a ponytail and turned to her friend. "It's decided. I'll become an agent of SHIELD and train so if something like that happens again, I'll be ready."

Lily smiled. "Now that's the Erica I know."

Erica walked downstairs to make a quick breakfast before school. "By the way, do you know what happened with that guy you tazed?" she asked.

"I don't. Uncle Selvig lleft with him after dropping us off. He kept muttering something about a hospital disaster."

"I wonder what that was about." Erica muttered, vaguely remembering the trip home afterwards. Suddenly, another memory entered her mind and she jolted.

"What is it, Erica?" Lily asked.

"What? Oh, nothing." But it wasn't nothing. Erica had remembered her dream. Not only had it extended even more last night, but it had some unnerving details.

For one thing, the way the warrior had kissed her mother made Erica think that they were exceptionally close. Could he be some relative, possible Erica's father? Another thing, the warrior had mentioned a battle and sending Erica to Midgard. Erica knew from Norse Mythology that Midgard was the name of the realm humans lived in. In other words, Earth. What was this battle about, and why did he want to get Erica to Earth? Also, the warrior had spoken with his "brother" about having Erica and her mother leave Asgard. Asgard was the legendary home of the Norse gods, the kingdom ruled by Odin Allfather. What were Erica and her mom doing there, and why would they have to leave?

However, none of these facts held a candle to the most disturbing detail. When the warrior carried Erica, she got a good image of the golden city she had been in previously. And Erica was confident that she had seen that city before, quite recently. It was the same city she had gotten a glimpse of in the hole in the sky that had taken her mother.

Erica shivered. It was just a dream, of course her subconscious would have wanted to bring up events from that day.

It was just a dream, right?

OK! Probably didn't tell you all that you wanted to know, but still brought up some important stuff to keep you hooked. Bwah ha ha ha!

Seriously though, when I see my number of views, follows, favorites, or reviews go up, I get so happy! Especially for reviews. Please read & review!