The Berserker Tribe

Stoick, Hiccup, Gobber, Mirabel and a small entourage of other Asgardians all gathered at the harbor as their visitor arrived.

A storm swallowed the horizon as thundering grey clouds above and an ominous, breakneck bog floated over the ocean. This was not a storm of rain and thunder that the Aesir was used to. This was the weather of a world that wasn't conducive to life. This was the weather of Hel, the Realm of Dishonored Dead.

Cutting through the fog like bone from a corpse was a longship. While an Asgardian longship would have been colorfully painted and managed, this ship was grey with wood that had rotted away with age.

The ship docked and Mirabel could see that while some of the crew of a Godly sort, the others were undead draugr, shambling with leathery skin that made them look as though they were mummified. One of the gods on the ship walked up the plank.

"Introducing the Heir of Hel, Future-Ruler of the Dishonored Dead, Smiter of Blasphemers, Warlord of the Nine Realms..." Stoick traded a cocked eyebrow with Gobber, who then passed it along to Hiccup and then to Mirabel. "Dagur, God of the Deranged!"

Walking up the plank was a god.

All gods had a certain aura about them, something that Mirabel noticed when she had started traveling. Everyone in the Aesir, Hiccup and Stoick included, had an aura that denoted electricity. Electricity associated with the crackling ozone of lightning, of the first light-bulb illuminating a dark world, and other interesting parallels.

Dagur's aura had electricity too, but this electricity made her think of electric chairs or electro-shock therapy; a prolonged, cruel doom that tasted like metal.

Mirabel's bad feeling of this god would be confirmed to be true when Dagur pulled out a knife and threw it at Hiccup, her boyfriend managing to evade its blade by ducking. While Hiccup tried to swallow his fear, Mirabel and Toothless gave him a sneer.

"Dagur, I was expecting your father," said Stoick placidly.

"My father is... busy at the moment," answered Dagur. "And he sent us to do it for him."

"Our father sends his apologies for not being here in person and wishes you well."

Walking up the gangplank was a woman. Hiccup and Mirabel's age, her black hair tied back. Her body was dressed in a mix of leather and spiked metal armor that was polished to a reflective sheen.

"Stoick, you remember Heather."

"Introducing Heather, Goddess of Vengeance and Mercy," called out the announcer.

Everyone looked at the announcer, who gave a sheepish look for introducing Heather later than he should have. Dagur kicked the gangplank an inch to the left, causing the announcer to lose his balance and fall into the water.

Dagur's gaze snapped from the god flailing in the water to Hiccup.

"Hiccup!" Suddenly Hiccup found himself in a headlock, his bones making a dislocated, popping sound as he struggled to breath in his grip. "So glad you're here. I have a lot of questions that only you can answer."

Hiccup flopped to the ground when Dagur let him go. Dagur brandished his axe lovingly as he gave Toothless a devious smirk.

"Dragon stuff."

Dagur's eyes gleamed with bloody-****, but he instead walked back to Stoick, burying whatever desire to kill the Night Fury to the wayside.

Hiccup stood up, coughing his lungs out as he felt too hands on his shoulder blades; one from Mirabel and the other from Heather.

"I'm sorry about him. You know how he gets."

"Oh, sure, no problem," wheezed Hiccup.

Stoick looked like he wanted to spank Dagur like the petulant brat that he was, but he said nothing as he escorted his guest. His cthonian crew marched (or shambled in the case of its undead members) well behind.

Once upon a time, there was only one god who dwelled in the realm of unhonored dead. Her name was Hel, illegitimate daughter of Loki and Queen of her Realm, given to her by Odin Allfather in an effort to stave off the Twilight of the Gods. When Loki engineered the **** of one of their own -- Baldr the Blessed, God of Light -- his **** did not allow him passage into the Hall of Valhalla, but the miserable wastes of Hel's realm. Their parents failed to get him out and thus he remained there till Ragnarok.

What the sagas didn't tell you was why Hel wasn't so quick to part with the Prince: she had a massive crush on him. Everyone did, Baldr was always very popular, but he was the only guy the usually stoic Queen of the Dead had any interest in. No one was sure if he reciprocated her advances, but either way she bore him godly children of their own.

After Ragnarok, her children and their descendants picked up the pieces of their ruined world and ran it at their own pantheon; the Berserker Tribe.

While being the blood of Loki had put a bad taste in Asgard's collective mouths for eons now, being the blood of Baldr technically made them family. When Stoick started to reach out to other pantheons, he started with the Berserkers. While Hel's King Oswald wasn't receptive at first, he eventually mellowed out and agreed, Stoick eventually moving on to the rest of Yggdrasil and worlds beyond.

Now they had to deal with Oswald's lunatic kid.