Luke

“We’re about to be overrun.” Luke swung his axe into the head of the beast that was trying to get through the circle of men who were protecting the women and children from the monsters.

“What are they?” The clan leaders eyes were wide with fear, as he had never seen creatures like this before. They were like a nightmare, like something out of the old stories.

“I don’t know. Your guess is as good as mine.” Luke pulled the axe out of the creatures head as it crumpled to the floor, immediately swinging for the one that stepped over the body of its fallen brethren to get to the humans. His eyes widened when this time, he was unable to pull the axe free, he grimaced and put his foot onto the creatures head, trying to get leverage to get his axe back, as he couldn’t be defenceless against the attacking hoard. While he was bent over, he heard the monster as it swung at him, trying to take his head off, so he dropped to the ground and rolled out of the way. “We’re going to need a miracle to get out of this one.” As he rolled to his feet, he glanced across and saw that one of the elders was on his knees with his arms spread, shouting at the sky.

“Freya, Goddess of love, life and War. Please help our village in our time of extreme need.”

Luke couldn’t help himself, and he glanced up at the sky, hoping for the miracle they so desperately needed. But the sky remained dark, and one of the creatures lunged towards him as he still struggled to free his axe.

He could feel the heat of the creature and knew his time on the Earth was over, so he closed his eyes and waited for the inevitable. When the killing blow didn’t come, he opened his eyes to see what had happened, and his jaw dropped open as his mother was standing in front of him, swinging a frying pan with deadly accuracy. Each blow led to another creature dropping to the floor.

“Mother, what are you doing?” Luke struggled to free his axe as he spoke, grimacing when it suddenly slid free from the creatures head with a horrible sucking sound.

“Well, that old idiot.” She gestured across at the old man, who was still on his knees, holding his hands out to the sky rather than fighting. “Called for me, so here I am.” In the short time she spoke, she had dispatched several more of the monsters. “And I was coming anyway, as I was hardly going to leave you alone to face the creatures your father sent.” She swung the frying pan so fast it was a blur. “He’s trying to flush us out. I told you not to do it, but you never listen to your mother. I warned that you could only push your father so far before he would no longer tolerate you and would try and end your life.”

Luke looked at his mother in confusion, glancing away to swing his axe at the creature who had got too close.

“My father is dead.” His words were punctuated by the sound of his axe hitting flesh.

“Well, that is… well that is far too hard to explain at the moment.” She pulled a necklace out from under her shirt, the pendant glowed blue. She crushed it between the fingers of one hand, all the while swinging the frying pan with the other arm.

He watched in awe as blue smoke was released from the crushed pendent, streamed into the air and swirled across towards him. He tried to avoid it, but the mist enveloped his face and absorbed through his skin.

He blinked slowly as his mind cleared, and he remembered what his mother Freya had done to protect him from his father. He tilted his head slightly and grinned at the creatures in front of him, as this was going to be a lot of fun.

“Mother, you may want to step back as this is going to get messy.”

Freya rolled her eyes at her son. “Loki, when you have finished playing with your father’s creatures, we need to leave.”

With a final manic grin, Loki dashed into the heaving mass of creatures.