They kept the party going for three consecutive days. At the end, Drax lay in some corner, Mantis on top of him. Quill and Gamora had left for their quarters to "sleep." Kraglin slept on the sofa, and the only one up and going was Rocket. His metabolism was truly astonishing. While he didn't drink nearly as much as Drax, he drank more than all the others and still operated a holo pad, like nothing was going on.
Tenno sat next to him in his spectral form, watching him as he continued to browse through the Materials he had written down.
"These compositions are truly spectacular, Tenno, that I have to say. "Hick". But at least half of them are not feasible with our current technological standard. We don't even have the energy reserves to technically talk about creating such a thing, not even thinking about the specifics on how to make them."
He lulled drunkenly as he closed the pad and turned to me.
"Will you one day explain where you got all that data from? Maybe even how I could get there?" He asked with puppy eyes.
"When the Time comes, I will take you there, but believe me, it's not a good place to be. I would actually prefer it if you wouldn't follow me there, but the way I know you, that won't be an option." A snicker followed, as Rocket just nodded while curling up into a ball.
"You go and have your little adventure on that backwater planet. I will stay here with my pals and research your new Materials while gathering the stuff that already exists. And also take care of your pets, like the last months. But it's ok, Groot loves them after all, and they seem to love him as well"
He said before turning away, while snuggling against a blanket.
After he told them a bit more about his plans, they quickly lost interest when they realized that Earth wasn't even a starfaring civilization. Especially Quill somehow didn't want to return to the planet he was born on, he probably had his reasons, and Tenno wouldn't pry any further.
"But call us once you find the railjack, I really want to see that thing."
Rocket whispered finally, before falling into a dreamless sleep, forcing a smile on Tennos' face.
"Sure, I will," he said as he returned into Rhino while baby Groot hopped against his leg and cuddled him one final time.
Mantis saw him leave, stood up, and also hugged Rhino one last time before she tumbled to the sofa and lay down next to Rocket, tried to cuddle him, got a foot in her stomach and turned around, as he left and headed to the Liset.
In the end, everyone secretly watched through the feed as his ship used the jump point. Baby Groot even stood at a bullseye, still waving, long after he was gone.
Rockets' pad blinked for a second, signaling a received message from Tenno, a list of possible abilities Groot might develop, and what they should look out for while training him, as he knew what a Hivemind's powers were through live experience.
On board the Liset, Ordis set the path to Earth on his own, as Tenno disconnected from his Warframe with every jump they took, till he finally decided to stay in the orbiter for a while and meditate.
After some time, he opened his eyes and reconnected with Rhino, as his inner clock told him that they should have arrived at the outermost jump point of the solar system.
He looked outside, and for the first time in a while, he saw the sun from space again.
Truly not his own sun, but the resemblance was incredible, making him feel like he'd come home, even though he knew he didn't.
Then he began the procedure he learned from the Nova Corps archives for approaching this system, before it became part of the Nova Empire.
"Heimdall, the all-seeing and gatekeeper of Asgard, I, Tenno Voidborn, request passage to one of the nine realms. I do not harbor any ill intent, as I am only looking for something lost, which could bring chaos to the nine realms."
And then he waited. As per protocol, the Bifröst should open up at any moment now, transporting him to the transit port of Asgard, but nothing has happened.
"That's strange, does Asgard not reign over the nine realms in this reality? That seems highly unlikely," he thought. "Ordis, use the next jump point to Earth. I have to find out for myself what's going on here." He ordered as he sat down in a meditative pose, waiting for the jump to Connect.
A short while later, the big blue ball appeared before his eyes, and he smiled inwardly. The sight was beautiful, no matter how many times he had seen Earth from this Perspective.
He ordered Ordis to fly to the moon's Orbit, and as he settled there, Tenno went to the console and threw out a ping. The Orokin developed the ping during the Old War, a method for finding allied ships in hiding without revealing their positions.
In itself, it was theoretically the perfect tool for stealth operations, at least until the sentients got their hands on one of the receivers and, from then on, could not only target the transmitters and receivers with pinpoint accuracy but also began using it as their primary means of communication. At the same time, the Orokin, till the end of the war, still couldn't do the same.
Another excellent example of the Orokins' arrogance turning against them was the thought of others figuring something out that they couldn't figure out themselves.
But in this universe, there were no sentients, at least none he knew of, and so he used that method to search for the railjack in the Earth's orbit and its vicinity. It still was not faster than light, so way farther than that was neither helpful nor accurate in any sense.
But it seemed his idea was not the right one to begin with, because even half an hour later, nothing returned.
"Maybe the receiver is damaged, or something worse happened, because of which they can't answer Operator, the Orbiter, for example, would neither be able to receive nor ping by herself," Ordis argued.
He wasn't wrong, for this problem to clear itself up so quickly was something he never really believed in to begin with,
But like always, hope died last.
"I had a feeling it wouldn't be so easy.
Ok, Ordis, set me down at a mountain peak near Kathmandu, as Asgard is unavailable at the moment. I have to get my stay approved by another authority."
He ordered as Ordis started the engines, next target Mount Everest.
As Liset flew through Earth's atmosphere, he once again admired Earth's beauty. As they finally reached the peak, the underside of the Liset turned, and out of the magnetic locks fell Rhino.
He twisted while airborne and landed gracefully on his feet, before sinking in knee deep into the snow.
"That was anticlimactic," he thought as he turned, catching a glimpse of the Liset already leaving for orbit in the night sky.
He wanders around a bit and scans the snowy peaks in awe, switching between feeds, admiring the Himalaya in the whole color spectrum, before settling down on a cliff, his legs hanging over the abyss.
After some more time of silence, orange light came from behind him for a second, before another person sat down next to him.
"I always admired the Himalayas. They seemed so ancient and were always there, listening to all the worries I had." The woman next to Tenno spoke as he turned his head and observed her.
She was clothed in a yellow Master's robe and wore sandals, even though the temperature was clearly shown on Rhino's interface as -40 degrees. Her facial features were those of someone who had seen pretty much everything there was to see and more, leading to something resembling boredom or inner peace, depending on perspective. A white Nepalese woman with a bald head, striking green eyes, and a slight smirk on her lips.
"It's hard to find things that last between the rubble, Humans leave behind once they lose interest in something," Tenno retorts, and the Woman nods.
"They truly think themselves the king of this world, while they are, after all, still only visitors in an uncaring cosmos." She retorts, which makes him chuckle.
Tenno turns towards the mountains again. "When the rivers are all dried up, and the trees cut down, man will realize that he will not be able to eat… Money," he says, which in turn makes her laugh.
"Enough philosophizing and joking around, Tenno, why are you here?" she finally asks while turning his way.
"You are just as Strange has described you. It's an honor to meet you, ancient one," Tenno says as he bows, touching his fist to his open hand and kneeling before her.
She chuckled again and repeated the greeting as she stood up, signaling Tenno to do the same.
"I came here first and foremost for your approval to visit Earth and research some things at Kamar Taj," he said as he fell in place next to her, wandering down the peak.
"The first thing I can't give you, as earth is not under my jurisdiction, but Kamar Tajs' doors are open for your research at any time," she replied.
"How can that be? Asgard is not reachable or contactable, isn't Kamar Taj the next instance of authority of the Æsir?" he responded, confused.
"Not that I know of, and that Asguard is not reachable is something I can't give you an answer to, but it is also none of my concern. Kamar Taj and its sorcerers exist solely to protect the world from extra-dimensional threats, the other affairs were always left to the Humans."
"Interesting, but the nine realms still exist?"
"They do, but we are pretty much free in what we want to do, in their eyes we are probably still their vassal, but that's up for debate."
She responded as she stopped in her tracks and turned towards him.
"I actually find it quite rude for you to speak to me so informally through that puppet of yours, won't you show yourself finally? I don't fancy myself a danger to foreign diplomats," she says as she tips on Rhino's forehead.
"Of course, my apologies," Tenno said as he suddenly appeared floating next to Rhino, and he slumped down into a kneeling position.
"I never intended any kind of ill intent," he apologized.
"It's ok, but good to know that you are also a fellow Master of the Mystic arts. That makes your entrance to Kamar Taj even easier," she says as she came over to take his hand, clearly recognizing his master robe, but she just passed through him.
"You're still not here in person. What is the meaning of this?" she asked, suddenly agitated.
"I thought you knew. The reason I came here was to find a way out of the place where I'm currently trapped. This is just my mental projection," he said, clearly confused by her lack of knowledge in that subject.
Her face instantly cleared and changed from anger to something resembling pity.
"It's ok, the way your powers work just cancels out any form of sensing, I was just taken aback, that's all."
I nod and fly next to her as we continue our path forward, leaving the rhino behind.
"So you are trapped in a place even a Master of the mystic arts can't escape from, but can project a Mental projection out of while controlling that puppet over there. I'm sorry, but there is no such place that comes to mind. Would you be so kind as to enlighten me?" she asked while jumping down a cliff way too high for a normal human.
"Actually, there is no such thing as a puppet, it's pretty insulting, I might say, to say something like that about him, taking his past into account. It would be more accurate to classify them as once proud, but now broken Warriors, whom I now am allowed to pilot in their stead, after I took vengeance for them on the ones that did this to them," Tenno said, now himself quite agitated.
She looked back at where Rhino supposedly was and whispered some apologetic words his way. "Again, I didn't know, I apologize to you in his stead if that's ok," she then spoke to Tenno, who in turn just nodded and let the matter go.
"But might I ask, who would be these beings cruel enough to do something like that to a conscious being?" she said, clearly still not getting over the fact she was wrong two times in a row.
"Humans, of course," Tenno said, making her again chuckle a bit at his response.
"But as to the place I am stuck in at the moment, it's something called the Void, ever heard of it?"
Tenno said as he continued his descent.
"The Void, No, I'm sorry, that I truly have never heard of, but I could help you research in the old archives, even though I haven't read them all. "
"Thank you, that would be appreciated," Tenno said, realizing the dead end he had found himself in again. Wanda and Strange also never really studied the Void before the corpus came, so why would this universe's Kamar Taj have something that would just pull him and his ship out of there?
"But I might know who could help me in the subject, could you maybe introduce me to this universe's Dr. Steven Strange and Wanda Maximoff?"
"I'm sorry, Dr. Steven Strange hasn't started his journey of becoming a Sorcerer yet, and this person called Wanda Maximov isn't a name I recall." She says apologetically, looking intrigued at the end, at the mention of Wanda.
"Wanda Maximov, going by the code name of the Scarlet Witch, never heard of her?" Tenno asked as a sudden motion of understanding flashed over her face.
"So you did know her? I thought we were honest here," He asked while looking at her, confused.
"Don't misinterpret my realization as a sign of my words being untrue. I was just not aware of the Scarlet Witch's Identity, that's all. Wanda Maximov, truly, if you should search and find her, I would love to have a word with her. Could you arrange that?"
"I will give it my best," Tenno said as they finally reached a cliff from where they could overlook the whole mountain range.
She turned his way, smiling, as a portal to a room he recognized as inside the Kamar Taj opened behind them.
"Do you mind stepping inside? It's getting quite chilly, don't you think?" She jokingly asked at Tenno, floating in front of her as a mind projection.
"How could I say no, tea and cookies?" he said as he floated inside, eying the table filled with little pleasures he could only lay his eyes on.
"Ok, now to the other thing I came here for. I have lost something and want to find it as quickly as possible. It's a weapon of mass destruction, so in the wrong hands it would be quite bad," Tenno said as he floated downwards, seemingly settling on a cushion on the floor in front of a knee-high table.
"Of course, we will also help you in finding these weapons. It's in our best interest to help a fellow Master get his tools together. Such artifacts tend to land in the wrong hands after all," she said as she sat down in front of him.
"Can your friend consume food or drink? I don't wish to torture you like this," she said as she pointed into the corner with her arm. As Tenno turned his head, he found Rhino beeping next to a fireplace, the snow on his body already melting.
"Sadly, not, I'm afraid, but don't hold back, I don't mind," he said, as he turned around to her, already sipping on a cup.