Saga of the Stranger

Posted on Mon Feb 16th, 2026 @ 8:39pm by Jean Grey-Summers & Alaric Thane & Skjoldr Jórundsson (Hrimstrand) & Moira MacTaggert

4,733 words; about a 24 minute read

Mission: Episode 7: Pathogens and Contagions
Location: Mutant Research Center - Muir Island
Timeline: March 7, 1992

“Oh thank you, Alaric.” Jean said as she watched one of his portals open and the lobby to Mutant Research Center on Muir appeared on the other side. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to fly ever again, especially commercial.” She said before glancing back behind her at the welcoming committee that had been assembled to accompany her. Alaric and Desmond stood waiting to follow her as they traveled together to meet a possible new resident of Xavier’s. The duo were a fine representation of what the school could offer and based on the information Moira had provided, the man that washed up on Muir’s shore could definitely use a safe harbor to reside in.

“Remeber, go slow with this one, a lot of this is new to him and he didn’t have an X-Men as a mother to tell him stories about us.” Jean smiled at Alaric before she took a step through the portal and entered the Research Center.

Just outside of their view, Moira was waiting for their arrival with a smile on her face. The Legacy Virus had taken its toll on her and the first plume of grey hair had appeared at her temple. “Jeannie, hen, it’s grand tae see ye.” She reached out and hugged Jean, her arms lingering for a beat longer than necessary as she held on to the young woman who had endured so much these past few months. As Moira let go and looked at the rest of the team that followed she offered another smile and a nod of the head in greeting, “Ah’m glad ye brought some pals wi’ ye — the lad could dae wi’ a friend or two.”

Leading the group from the lobby, they walked past a few offices and curtained exam rooms before entering the common area reserved for long term patients of the Research Center. A small TV framed by firm green couches took up the space while the island’s grey sunlight provided enough light to make the room comfortable. Sitting on the couch and looking very out of place was a large man in an outfit from another time.

“Skjoldr, these are ma pals Ah was tellin’ ye about.” Moira said as they entered, announcing their presence to the wanderer. “This here’s Headmistress Jean Grey — she runs the school an’ boardin’ place Ah mentioned.”

“Hello, Skjoldr.” Jean approached him with a few easy steps, her heels clicking on the title floor as she moved. Her red hair caught in the light and it ignited like fire as she reached out to shake his hand. “Thank you for meeting with us.” She offered him a smile that was easy and genuine while her lively energy filled the room, Jean was confident but not overbearing.

“These are one of my students and another resident of Xavier’s. I was hoping you could meet with us and we could talk for a bit.” Jean gestured to each as she introduced them. “Alaric, Desmond.”

Skjoldr rose when they entered, the plates of Hrímjárn whispering against quilted leather. The room’s heat pressed gentle on his skin with no fire burning—a strangeness that he kept off his face by will alone. The soft green benches gave under him the way drifted snow gives and then holds; he had been testing that, warily, when they arrived. Across from him the little moving-picture box threw light and voices without a storyteller or a flame. Sorcery in a wooden frame.

The woman with the red hair led, bright as a beacon—Jean. She stepped to him and held out her hand in a way that made no sense. Skjoldr’s eyes flicked to Moira for a beat; Moira’s chin dipped. He reached, closed awkward fingers around Jean’s, and shook once, firm, measuring. Not a challenge, then. A greeting. He released, a half-bow following to cover the misstep.

“Skjoldr Jórundsson,” he said, voice low, careful with her name. “I thank you for the welcome… and the warmth indoors.” His gaze climbed to the vents, as if the wall itself breathed heat.

The man at Jean’s shoulder felt like a place where the world is thin—no flash or thunder, just a quiet draft through a closed door. Skjoldr hadn’t seen him arrive, yet some part of him marked a seam in the air and the prickle that follows it. Dark, slightly wavy hair, brown eyes that could be welcome or warning, and a roguish cut to his smile. The black leather coat caught Skjoldr’s eye—good hide, finely worked, but stitched in a strange patterning he’d never seen on his people’s gear; the red vest and rings glinted like trader finery, and the wide-collared shirt sat oddly formal beneath it all. He dipped a small, respectful nod. “Alaric,” he said, testing the name. A beat of dry humour: “Your leathers are honest, but your maker has ideas I don’t know. And you… carry a road in your shadow.”

Then his eyes found the other.

Skjoldr had seen trees that lived long enough to learn the wind, and he had felled timber that fought the axe as if it remembered storms and would rather keep them. He had never seen a man whose bones read like oak and whose presence filled the space like a grove. For a heartbeat the old instinct rose—hand to hammer haft, weight set, the lift in the chest that means Varðbjörn is already waking. The great white Vardr pushed at the edge of him, a cold breath across the back of his neck, the promise of a sheltering pelt.

He breathed. Let it pass. Open hands.

He turned to the towering figure—six foot nine, broad as a door—and forgot himself for a breath. The man’s body was wood made flesh: smooth bark-like skin in mottled grey-green-brown, musculature carved straight from the grain. Where moles might have been, knots rested; where eyes should startle, there were amber lenses—true resin, with tiny air-bubble swirls forming intricate irises that watched.

“Desmond,” Skjoldr repeated, tasting the name. His eyes widened, then a crooked smile found him. “By our stories I thought Yggdrasil kept its children rooted. Did a jötnar carve you from oak and set you walking?” He dipped his chin, plain and respectful. “You are… strong-grown indeed. I’ve not seen your like—if a woodsman asks me the way, I’ll send him to you.”

A smile, tight but true, flickered and was gone. Skjoldr looked back to Jean, to Moira, to the others. He let his hands rest on the bracers so they did not look like fists.

“This place is… many new things,” he said. He glanced at the television, where a man laughed without company and colour shifted like fish in a net. “Soft benches. Fireless heat. A box that holds a window and sings. Where I come from, we have light when we make it and warmth when we cut and carry. Here the walls do the work.”

He caught himself and squared. “But I am grateful for it.” A beat. “And for being met.”

The name of his guardian stirred behind his teeth. He gave it, because these people asked for truths, not riddles. “My Vardr is Varðbjörn,” he said, the old letter soft as breath. “Short—Varð. He is near when I call. If I startle, it is his way to shelter first.” He tapped the Northstar rune over his breast with two fingers—an oath, not a threat. “I will try to keep him quiet in your hall.”

He looked at Jean again—calm, bright, steady. Leadership sat on her like a cloak she wore easily. “You wish to speak,” he said. “I will speak. I can tell you what I remember. I can learn what your school asks of those who live under its roof. I am… not quick with new things, but I am sure once I set my feet.” A faint ripple of dry humour: “If your soft benches forgive me.”

His gaze returned to Desmond, then Alaric, then the red-haired headmistress. He lifted his chin, a small, old-world formal gesture. “Ask, and I will answer as I can. And if there is work to be done before words—lifting, mending, hauling—I am better at doing than telling.”

In the corner of the room, the television changed scenes. Skjoldr did not flinch that time. The inside warmth held constant; the storm beyond the walls hissed and worried at the glass. He stood like a man who would rather plant his boots and be useful, but could learn to sit on a too-kind bench if that is what the moment required.

The air beside Skjoldr tightened and cooled; light gathered like hoarfrost knitting itself and then took weight. Varðbjörn stepped out of that cold shimmer fully solid—paw-pads thudding soft against tile, a great pale shoulder coming up even with Skjoldr’s chest. Frost-mist steamed from his muzzle as he pressed close to Skjoldr’s flank, then eased one step forward.

He inspected them without hurry: first Jean—head low, a polite lean and a slow breath like a bellows, the kind of scenting that says friend, if friend. Then Alaric, a faint lift of the bear’s ears at the tang of ozone; and finally Desmond, where Varo lingered, drawing a deeper breath as if tasting bark and rain. The room’s warmth met a skin-prickle chill around the bear, not painful—just the clean bite of winter air under stars.

“Easy,” Skjoldr murmured, palm on the Northstar rune; Varo’s weight shifted, but he held his ground, a living bulwark at Skjoldr’s side, watchful and present rather than threatening. A last considering sniff, and the bear’s breath gentled, as if the strangers had been catalogued and accepted—on probation, perhaps, but inside the circle of the fire.

Desmond kept quiet as the big man spoke. And even from Desmond's lofty vantage, the norseman looked big. Shoulders, thick neck, big hands. It all radiated that solid mass Desmond recognised on a more instinctual level. When Skjoldr introduced himself, Desmond just kept the closest approximation of a stoic expression on his face. He wasn't sure what this yggrdy-something was, or why some jot'm would have carved him. But from Jean's body language he could also surmises it wasn't really the time to ask.

“Oh hello,” Jean said in a soft tone as the bear approached her and she dared to touch the animal. She felt the psychic energy that had been summoned to create and manifest the creature. A sharp, cool focus of Skjoldr’s telepathic and telekinetic energy to create something real and tangible.

She eased up on her own mental barriers and allowed Skjoldr and Varðbjörn to feel her telepathic presence, a feeling of spring, of warmth, of life renewed immendated from the redhead in a brief, silent introduction of her abilities to his own.

When the bear appeared Desmond's eyes grew bigger. That was just cool. A huge polar bear ghost just stepping out of nowhere. "Duuuudeeee..." Desmond said in a loud whisper as he nudged Alaric, as if his friend hadn't seen it right away. "He has a magic bear. Can you do that too?"

Alaric saw the ghostly creature appear and shook his head at Desmond's question. "No, I don't summon creatures like that. Mine are from the waking dreams of your nightmares," he said with a smirk.

His gaze met that of the bear's and he slowly dipped his head in a nod of respect to the massive beast. He then turned to Skjoldr. The mountain of a man appeared to be a warrior, at least when the need arose. So that's how Alaric approached him, with a couple of confident, but not aggressive, steps. He held out his right arm for a warrior's greeting, intending to grasp Skjoldr's arm just below the elbow.

"Welcome," he said with a nod. "And my thanks. There are many tales woven into the stitching and patterns. Your armor, finely crafted, as if forged in starlight," he said, returning the compliment. A faint smile touched his lips. "You’re perceptive. I carry many things in my shadow."

Skjoldr stayed on his feet as they approached, the fireless warmth of the room still an odd, gentle pressure on bare arms. When Alaric offered a forearm, Skjoldr met it below the elbow—firm, brief, soldier to soldier. “Well met,” he said, releasing without turning it into a test.

Varðbjörn stood at his flank, pale bulk easy but immovable. Desmond’s awed whisper drew a slow swivel of the bear’s head and a deep, assessing breath. Varð padded one step forward—cold lifting gooseflesh—and scented each newcomer in turn: Jean’s clean heat, Alaric’s leather with the faint draft of elsewhere, Desmond’s resin-bright amber and greenwood beneath smooth, bark-like skin.

“Seen,” Varð said at last, voice like stones shifting under ice.

Skjoldr cut him a sidelong look, dry amusement there. “He usually saves his words.” Varð settled with a deliberate thump between them and the door.

Skjoldr let his shoulders ease a fraction. “These are new things to me,” he said, meeting each gaze. “But I can learn them. Ask what you need; I’ll answer plain. If there’s work before words—lifting, mending, hauling—I’m better at doing than telling.”

“Come on, let’s sit down.” Jean gestured to the couches as the trio stood and sized one another up, it reminded her of the early days when Warren, Scott, and Hank were getting to know one another. She sat on the end of one the couches and waited for Alaric to join her, leaving Desmond and Skjoldr to each have their own love seat.

Once they had all settled into their seats, Moria excused herself and mentioned bringing tea to them. Jean’s attention turned to Skjoldr once more. “Moria, Dr. McTaggart, she told me a little about you but I thought it would be best to hear from you directly. What happened that caused to arrive at Muir?”

Skjoldr eyed the soft thing Jean indicated the way a man eyes new ice. He lowered himself anyway—careful with the Hrímjárn plates—then immediately shifted, and shifted again. The love seat took him, hips sinking, knees higher than he liked. He tried one angle, then another, jaw tight, until he settled into the least-worst slouch a warrior can manage on a trap meant for sleeping.

“Doctor…” He glanced after Moira, testing the name like a new tool. “Mc—Taggart. Moira.” A small nod of respect for the woman who’d met him on the storm’s edge.

He looked back to Jean. “Right. What happened.”

He set his forearms along his bracers, fingers interlaced to keep from fidgeting against the upholstery. “I went out with the hunt. Weather on the turn, meat low. The gale came down like a curtain and took our lines one by one. I dug into a drift and waited it out.” A beat. “When I came back… there were no bodies. Halls in order. Fires drowned cold. A rune cut into our stone—Bound Elsewhere. I searched the island until I had the map of every drift in my head. Kept the beacon burning until the pitch was gone. Spoke names into the wind.” His mouth thinned. “No answer.”

Beside him, Varðbjörn made a low sound—agreement more than comfort. “Wind lied,” the bear said, voice like rocks under ice.

“I took what I could carry and pushed off,” Skjoldr went on. “Meant to follow the coast and learn things as I went. The weather decided otherwise. It built dark on the horizon and came on in a wall. I reefed early. Spare mast went. Then the main. The boat rolled.”

“Sea left breath,” Varðbjörn said, matter-of-fact.

“We did under-ice training: went long, kept the mouth shut, let him pull. I found rock, then shingle. Saw a light up a building here. That’s how I reached Muir.”

He shifted again, dissatisfied with the soft seat, but his shoulders had eased. “That’s the lot. I’m here because one man can’t keep a village’s life by himself, and because someone on this island might know what makes people vanish without a trail.” He glanced towards the door Moira had used. “And because your doctor opened the door and didn’t waste words.”

Then glanced to Desmond. “I didn’t expect someone like you,” he said, honest rather than unkind. “You’re the first I’ve met who doesn’t look human on the outside. Where I’m from, everyone has a Vardr—you just don’t see it until we call. Here…” his eyes moved over Jean and Alaric, then back to Desmond, “…why does no one else have one? Are your gifts different, or do your people not carry spirit-companions at all?”

Varðbjörn lifted his head, drew in the warm air and the first drift of tea from the corridor, and gave a short grunt that passed for approval. Skjoldr’s mouth ticked. “If there’s a stool with legs instead of a cushion that swallows you, I’d trade. If not—this will do.”

"Wait, don't your people have random mutations like us?" Desmond asked, his stoic expression broken by his absolute disbelief. "I know families can have similar mutations. Like Mister Summers and his brother have some kind of energy projection power, even if they're not identical. And Joey said his kin all have a bit of the animal in them, right?" He looked at Jean questioningly. "But a whole island of the same type of powers can't be though."

“It’s probably due to their remote location,” Jean said as she considered where Skjoldr had come from and what had happened. “Generations of passing down the same mutation until it’s the only variation to the x-gene, it’s called a genetic bottleneck.” It was an interesting situation and one that probably had never been discovered or discussed before.

“We can try and help find your missing village, the fact that everyone went missing all at once is concerning for a multitude of reasons.” Jean didn’t want to raise red flags just yet but the idea of a whole village of identical mutants suddenly being abducted felt like something Sinister would do. “But in order for us to do that, you would need to come with us back to our home in New York... which is very far away from here and even farther away from your village.”

Skjoldr shifted on the too-soft seat and looked to Desmond first. “Where I’m from, everyone has a Vardr when we come of age,” he said. “Not the same one—all kinds. Wolf, seal, hawk, fox… mine is a bear. It fits the person. It’s a look into who you are.” He shook his head slightly. “I don’t know this word mutation, or x-gene. We call it a gift. We’ve had it as long as our elders’ elders tell it—since our ancestors spoke with the gods more often and found the sky-stone we smelt into Hrímjárn.”

He turned to Jean. “The village isn’t missing,” he said, taking her words literally. “It’s where it sits on the map. It’s the people who are gone.” Her talk of genes and bottlenecks earned a small, respectful nod. “You’ve a head for big words. Sounds like a wise woman’s trade.”

“Wise,” Varðbjörn rumbled—brief, approving—and went quiet again.

Skjoldr’s mouth tugged at one corner. “You said New York. What became of Old York?” A beat; then he got back to it. “I’ve no way home. The boat’s at the bottom, and Varð can swim—but he’s no ferry.”

“Not a ferry,” the bear agreed.

Skjoldr nodded once. “If going with you is the way to find what happened to my people, that’s the road I’ll take.”

“Where we live is a school, a boarding house, and a hospital for the sick.” Jean decided to leave out the struggles of the Legacy Virus for the time being, she didn’t want to overwhelm the newcomer. “We are a sanctuary for mutants in need.”

How did you prepare someone like Skjoldr for the world? The conflict and strife that made things so complicated and cruel, to tell this man that he was about to walk into a world that feared and hated him simply for who he was.

“I just want us to prepare you for what life is like.” She glanced at Desmond and Alaric, silently requesting them to provide their background and experience at Xavier’s to help Skjoldr understand what he was actually agreeing to.

"This realm can take a while to learn," he began. "I grew up in a place far from this one. A place called Limbo. It is a harsh realm, full of monsters and magic. You learn to fight, to think fast, to survive, and to never take peace for granted. It wasn’t the best situation, but it made me who I am."

"Coming to this world... it’s been strange. But it’s worth it. It just takes time to translate things into understanding. But you don't have to do it all at once or by yourself. None of us do. That's why Xavier's is here. It's a place for us to learn from and help others like us."

Skjoldr took that in—the school, the boarding house, the sickroom—and nodded once. “A place to learn and a place to be useful suits me. I can watch doors, haul, mend, stand a post. If there’s fear of folk like us, I can handle it while I learn the rest.” He glanced between them. “You won’t have to dress it up. Tell me the rules, the work, where I sleep, and I’ll find my feet.”

He listened to Alaric’s talk of Limbo and gave a small, understanding look. “Harsh places teach fast. I know a little of that. If your way is to take time and share the load, I’ll keep pace. I’ll have questions—many—but I can learn letters, maps, whatever your school uses. If I get things wrong at first, I’ll fix it and try again.”

At his side, Varðbjörn rumbled, brief and gravelly. “Keep sanctuary. We help.” Skjoldr’s mouth tugged. “He’s right. If I come with you, I’ll pull my weight and mind your house. When you’re ready, tell me when we leave and what to bring.”

"I didn't always look like this." Desmond gestured to his own face, his fingers unconsciously tracing the line of bark under his left eye. "Just a few years ago I looked like a regular human. But in a few days my skin turned wooden, and then my insides changed too. We call that a mutation, fancy word for changing or adapting. I'm a mutant, like Mrs Summers and Alaric. And a bunch of the people here."

Desmond fell silent for a moment. He didn't like talking about the time he was locked away at home, with just his family. But Mrs Summers had explained how talking helped, and he asked to come on this trip. It was to share his perspective. "I spent a lot of time at home when after this change. When I went outside people stared, were mean and cruel even. Eventually I got snatched by some criminals and smuggled to a far away island." He looked at Jean for reassurance, and continued. "That's when the X-Men rescued us, the people on that island. I stayed with them, at their school. And eventually joined them. To help people, to save people."

Skjoldr listened without looking away, the bark line under Desmond’s eye drawing his gaze and holding it. “That’s a hard road,” he said at last, simple and steady. “To change in a handful of days and have folk you’ve never wronged turn their faces from you. Where I come from, we all carry a Vardr—no one stares. I’ve little practice with that kind of cruelty. But I know what it is to be taken by weather and left to find your feet again.”

He shifted on the too-soft seat, palms resting on his bracers. “You stayed. You learnt your shape. You put it to use. That’s good work.” A beat. “If stares and worse come at you while I’m there, they’ll have to come through me first.”

“A noble offer.” Jean commended Skjoldr for his immediate loyalty but she was a little worried about the man. He was so quick to trust them and eager to pitch in, traveling to the mansion was a simple request as soon as it was offered. She worried that Skjoldr was naive and at risk of being exploited with his trusting demeanor. “But first, let’s get you settled and accustomed to New York City.”

She stood with that comment, a natural conclusion and the decision made that Skjoldr would come back to the mansion with them and they would use their resources and assets to help him find his missing people. “We’ll have to take you shopping, I don’t think we have much that will fit you. Thankfully Desmond knows where to shop… there are still a few open rooms on the second floor, I’m sure the south facing one would be best…” Jean trailed off for a moment and they all watched as she was obviously creating a to-do list in her mind for getting her latest addition to Xavier’s moved in but she quickly snapped out of it when she noticed all three of them were looking at her. “Right, shall we go?”

Alaric nodded, "Indeed." He took a few steps back from the group and opened a Shadow Gate portal. On the other side was the main entryway inside the Mansion. "Delivery in thirty seconds or less," he said, imitating the commercials he'd seen from pizza restaurants.

Skjoldr rose, giving Moira a parting nod before his attention fixed on the tear of dark air Alaric opened. The room changed around it—pressure easing, a faint draft where there was no door. He didn’t step at once. He watched the threshold like a hunter studies new ice, weight set, measuring. “Is it safe to walk?” he asked, not fearful—practical.

Varðbjörn leaned in, drawing a slow breath at the Gate. “Door-without-walls,” the bear rumbled, verdict neutral. He planted himself at Skjoldr’s flank, ready to match the first step.

Skjoldr looked to Jean, then Desmond, then Alaric. “I’ll come,” he said. “You have paths I don’t, and my answers are likely on the far side of yours.” A beat, steadier, honest without being soft. “I’m grateful for the help.” With that, he squared his shoulders, kept one hand relaxed near the bracer out of habit, and moved for the portal with Varðbjörn at his left—cautious, eyes open, but committed to the road he’d chosen.

“It’s safe.” Jean said with a smile as she noticed a large ruddy colored wolf watching them from the other side of the portal, it was about to climb a flight of stairs when the portal had opened and caught her attention. But the impressive animal was soon shooed off by a young woman with golden blonde hair as a few more children followed behind her. The children stopped and waved, unphased by the glowing portal and the team standing on the other side. The blonde smiled at them briefly but soon turned and corralled the rest of the students, whisking them off and up the stairs all together.

“Welcome to Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters." Jean said while stepping through Alaric’s portal and into the wood finished foyer. “We’re happy to have you."

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