Fallen Máni: Hail

Dagr loomed over Midgard.

Eternal day was accomplished.

The humans, though cowering for now, would soon embrace endless light.

The sun was gone, no other light but his.

Yet, he could sense that the Moon had not died yet.

This frustrated him immensely.

Had the wolves truly failed?

He turned his sight across the tree, searching far and wide across the cosmos, until his sight set on Fensalir.

Most curious....

***

"Things don't have to be this way" Manuel pleaded, "Look around you! Everything isn't how Ragnarök is supposed to be."

To say Hati scowled was an understatement. He gave only silence, and a glare that could burn titanium.

"He does speak the truth, bro" Sköll said, "This is more trouble than it is worth, even if their guts should splatter the ground...."

"SILENCE!" Hati barked and sneered at his brother.

"This is useless" said Thor, "There is no reasoning with a giant."

"Your mother is a jötunn" Sif said.

"Yes b-buh she's momma!"

"Enough of THIS!" Hati growled, "Kill me if you're going to pantomime, oh worthless Æsir!"

"No" Manuel insisted, "This may be foolish, but I can see how much you're hurting. Let this be, now."

"I know you believe this to be noble, but you cannot reason with hatred himself" Bil said.

She raised herself on her raft and touch Manuel's foot, as if trying to pull him down.

No such luck.

"No" he insisted, "I'll be stubborn about this. Look at him, this is clearly eating him from the inside."

"I wish not for your pity" Hati growled.

"I'm not pitying you, any more than you love me. I want to understand."

"Understand this, then: it is my fate to kill you. That is all."

"But why when everything else that was supposed to happen has happened differently? Fate, therefore, isn't that set in stone, or necessary."

Hati scowled once again, but less hatefully. Truly, even his other reason, the mockery of other jötnar, was fairly flimsy when so many laid down their arms for loving homes.

Yet he stood firm.

"Why?" Manuel asked.

And three times he asked, grabbing the eyes of all gods each time.

The first time, Hati scowled less.

The second time, Hati was stone-faced, devoid of hatred.

The third time, Hati said:

"There truly is no reason."

I'll give you one then!

A light so strong as to endanger existence flared above Fensalir. All ice was melted, even with the gift of Hel, falling like raindrops unto the muddy waters. Manuel averted his eyes and fell into the water.

Another splash accompanied his.

And in the water, each with the face half-submerged, Máni and Hati stared at one another.