Chapter 14
Thor sees Sif go flying into a nearby dumpster - the Destroyer seems hellbent on killing her for some reason - and slides to his knees next to her while saying "My friends, you have done all you can."
Sif grips Thor's wrist and brings his hand to her neck, shaking her head and saying "No, I will die a Warrior's death, stories will be told..."
Thor moves his hand to her shoulder, saying "Live, Sif, and tell those stories yourself." He's expecting the Destroyer to simply vaporize him when he offers himself up to stop the destruction, regardless of whether or not he believes Sif's claims of Loki having sent it…he's not expecting the giant thing to backhand him, sending him flying.
Jane's suddenly kneeling next to him, saying "No! Thor, c'mon, you need to get up! You- why would you-"
Thor wheezes out "Allfather's command…banished until…I got my powers back…"
Jane's expression turns to shock, and she incredulously asks "You're telling me you just let yourself get this injured…because your dad told you to?!" She just heard something break in his chest when that thing hit him, she swears it!
Thor shakes his head, saying "It obeys…Odin's orders…" He's about eighty percent certain the Destroyer is here because his friends came to bring him back before he proved himself worthy, not because Loki sent it after them or to kill him.
And then Erik's pulling Jane away, earning some panicked protests from her as she struggles to get out of his grip…and Mjolnir flies into Thor's hand moments after she's out of reach.
Hela breathes a sigh of relief, shoulders relaxing as Thor regains his powers - she was ready to have Odin's head, Patricide or no, Regicide or no, if Thor died because of the old man's mind-blowing arrogance and refusal to learn from his mistakes.
Between the two of them, they take the Destroyer apart piece by piece - and, if Hela gathers up the metal pieces to make a toy for Fenrir and Cerberus, well, that's their business. It's not like even this metal is gonna break their teeth, after all - and the two of them are bored, what with guarding the entrance to the Underworld. Tracking down the bits of Riddle's soul was the most exciting thing either of them got to do in Stars-know-how-long.
And then Jane's tackling Thor in a relieved hug, all but babbling about how insane that was, she thought he was dead, don't ever scare her like that again.
And then Sif pulls Jane off him with a scowl, which quickly turns to confusion when he pulls her back and hugs her as well.
After a moment spent being grateful only a few dozen people got caught in the Destroyer's path, Hela asks "How did you lot even get here, anyway?" She doubts Heimdall would leave the Bifrost's key just lying around, and him opening it up when Amora told her it was closed until further notice on her way to another room to ward is even less likely.
Sif shifts nervously from foot to foot, then says "None of your concern."
Hela raises an eyebrow, asking "Then, how do you plan on getting back? Because I'm not summoning the Bifrost's powers to take you." Even if she wanted to, she's got a job to do since people died in this mess. And, incidentally, she doesn't want to.
Volstagg clears his throat, a grin on his face that doesn't quite reach his eyes, and says "Well, Thor has his powers back now, so Heimdall can open it up to bring him home!"
Hela facepalms, muttering about stupidity and being glad she doesn't live full-time on Asgard. A little louder, she says "The Bifrost is closed until the situation with Jotunheim is resolved. Exactly nobody is going to be picking the five of you up. I'm off to do my job. Thor, have Amora fill me in when you get back, whenever that is." And then she stalks off, heading into the still-smoking rubble to, presumably, collect the souls of the dead.
Hogun waits until Hela's gone, then says "Perhaps we're stranded until she's found."
Thor frowns in confusion at once, asking "What now? Until who's found?" Hela would've said if someone had gone missing, he thinks. Especially if they were important enough to have the entire palace on lockdown until they're found.
Fandral rubs the back of his head, saying "Don't know what happened, but Loki sent all the guards into search parties throughout the entire palace. We may have used the chaos to slip away to the Bifrost to get here…" Sif managed to somehow steal the sword from Heimdall in the excitement, they met up at the Bifrost, and activated it to send them to Midgard. Pretty straightforward, really. He shrugs, and adds "Wasn't there when whatever set him off, so I don't know the reason why."
Luna frowns at them, eyes no longer looking clouded whatsoever as she pins Sif with a furious look. "There's only two reasons why Loki would send the guards to search the entire palace. Either Amora is missing, or Frigga. And the only reason he wouldn't go himself is because he can't sense their magic. So, Sif Mandifarisdotter, what did you do?"
Sif looks panicked for a moment, not pasting a sneer onto her face quite fast enough for Thor not to catch it, and says "Don't presume to know of what you talk about, mortal."
Luna snaps "I'm a Seer, don't presume to be able to hide anything from me! I know you've been dreaming of marrying Thor and becoming the next queen of Asgard, I know you plan to Banish Loki and have Amora thrown in a dungeon simply because she doesn't care that you're the Goddess of War, no matter how much Asgard as a whole applauds you, and I know you dream of a blood-stained Thor proposing to you on a battlefield somewhere." Amora and Loki may have filled in the context, but Sif is such a battle-lusting gold-digger she was featured in several visions over the course of the past few years. And, Luna's dreams have always been about important things - Hari dying and freeing Hela, meeting Loki, the two of them being Soulmates, for instance. Tom Riddle being pieced together by Osiris. Thanos and the end of half of everything. The Infinity Stones being swallowed by two snakes.
Luna leans back, shaking her head...and then she wordlessly ties a very shocked Sif up with a flick of her wand.
Thor stares at Sif in shock, unable to even ask if what this Luna said is true - from the look on her face, it was. But he can't imagine why in all the Realms...she's his shield-sister, just like with the Warriors Three, he's completely incapable of seeing her like that! Especially after Fandral tried to flirt with her and she beat him unconscious.
The Warriors Three seem to be in various states of shock as well, all of them staring at her with almost impossibly wide eyes as if they can't believe what they're hearing as well.
Rolf claps his hands over his ears when Luna places her wand to her throat…and they quickly realize why a moment later, as she booms out louder than Thor's ever been "HEIMDALL! SHE KNOWS WHERE AMORA IS! GET HER UP THERE BEFORE LOKI GOES ON A RAMPAGE TRYING TO FIND HER AND TAKES THE PALACE APART BRICK BY BRICK!!"
Everyone holds their heads, bar Sif, and Thor recovers first…only to breathe out "What did you do, Sif?"
Sif, of course, can't answer because she's gagged.
The absolute outrage written all over her face when Jane kisses Thor, though, is unmistakable. Thor and Jane both glancing at their left forearms simultaneously goes unnoticed by everyone else, though, because she's apparently throwing a tantrum, thrashing and screeching from behind the gag and almost certainly swearing and cursing, potentially with some kind of threat involved if the crazed look on her face is anything to go by.
Consciousness crashes into Amora like an Oppungo'd bag of Asgardian bones - denser than bricks by far - and lets out a small whine as she starts registering just how awful she feels.
Most of her body is alarmingly-numb, bar her side which feels like a Dwarf from Nidavellir injected molten metal into it, but the worst bit is that she can't feel her magic at all.
Oh, yes, and one shoulder is aching despite the numbness and fire in the rest of her body.
Then she manages to turn her concrete-filled head in the right direction, she sees she's chained to a wall by some kind of cuff - right, Sif put that on her. The cuff, she decides, must somehow block her magic - how Sif managed that is beyond her, the woman hates anything and everything to do with even the mere thought of magic. She can't unlock the cuff, can't focus enough to break through whatever binding is on the thing since Sif poisoned her, but…that doesn't mean she's completely helpless.
Reaching up with her other - shaking, stupidly shaking, she can't even feel it why is it shaking so bad - hand, Amora eventually manages to pull out one of the sharp fangs of the snake on her bound hand. Hela thought of everything when she made these snakes, made the fangs detachable and everything. And she always keeps them filled with a small amount of Basilisk venom for emergencies - in case she ever needed to poison someone, or if she ever needed to melt something.
It takes her a solid five minutes for Amora to successfully release the Basilisk venom from the metal fang onto the cuff, but the instant it melts through the thing her magic finishes it off rather explosively - like letting air out of a small hole in a balloon once it's blown up, the amount of magic that forces its way out of the cuff blows it to pieces instantly.
Mustering up the last of her strength through sheer force of will - or just plain stubbornness, as Hermione would call it - Amora focuses on the newly-returned sense of Loki's magic and Apparates to him. And, thank the Stars, she's still on Asgard, else the Splinch she just gave herself would've left her in literal pieces rather than just taking a chunk out of her thigh.