Wednesday narrates the Vikings landing on an island, finding themselves unwelcome. One man down. The gods did not know yet a word for miserable, but it was time to make one and to leave this world. They didn't even have the wind to set back into the water. Sacrifices made no difference.

Their god was a war god, so obviously they needed to make war against each other to find their way home. The wind picked up and they left without a word. A hundred years later when Leif the son of Erik landed he found his god waiting, alone, along with war.

In prison, despite nearing release time, feels an ax hanging over his head. He calls his wife. Something feels weird. The weather, something. There are only five more days left to wait.

Shadow plays with a coin as a storm rages outside. He dreams of his wife, of walking through a forest padded with skeletons, trees with branches reaching out to grab him. The hangman's noose is waiting for him.

In the morning, he's called to the Warden's office. His wife died.

He needs to get to Eagle point, but the airport will not honor his ticket for two days from now without an original death certificate. He turns around and sees his friend from prison, who had words for him. Do not piss off the bitches at the airport. Shadow kindly asks her how much for a ticket tomorrow and waits in the airport until then.

A man is at the counter, struggling with his ticket purchase. He bought a first-class ticket but blah blah. The same woman who wouldn't let Shadow fly a day early gets the man into first class for no charge. As luck would have it, when Shadow gets on the plane, his seat is double booked.

The stewardess points him to a first class seat next to the man, who is completely normal, drinking a cocktail and asking for one to be poured for Shadow.

Shadow and Mr. Wednesday strike up a conversation in which Mr. Wednesday knows a bit more about Shadow than expected, but not nearly as much or as discomforting as in the book.

Mr. Wednesday offers to Shadow a job, assuring him he doesn't have one waiting as he believes and Shadow falls asleep, dreaming again of the forest and a buffalo with flaming eyes. He is woken when the plane makes an unexpected landing and he takes a rental to Eagle point, stopping at the sites along the way to let out a primal scream.

A man meets Bilquis on a dating application, he's unbelievably happy his kids forced him onto the thing because she's amazing. She takes him home to bed. He wants to see her again, maybe they should wait. They fuck. She wants him to worship her. He does as asked. She swallows him whole.

At a restaurant, Shadow orders food and in the bathroom runs into Wednesday. He's getting annoyed. What's Robbie's condition? What the fuck does he know about Robbie? Wednesday take the book.

When Mr. Wednesday goes to the bathroom, Mad Sweeney the leprechaun drops by. Wednesday returns with a round of drinks, mead for Shadow to seal the deal Shadow doesn't think they have.

Sweeney and Shadow fight over coin tricks, Laura and for the hell of it.

Shadow and Wednesday arrive in Shadow Point, where Shadow learns Laura died with Robbie's dick in her mouth. Laura's best friend Audrey wants to screw Shadow to get over the betrayal, but she's drunk and Shadow helps her. The gold coin that Shadow flips onto Laura's grave is sucked inside of it.

Shadow finds a mechanical box on the way home from the cemetery. It turns into a virtual limousine

Shadow wants it to drop him off at the motel. The dude inside tells Shadow to stop fucking with him, while Shadow sits next to two faceless dot made beings. The kid wants to know what Wednesday wants. But Shadow knows nothing.

Technical Boy is pissed at Shadow's attitude. He decides his boys will not just kill him, but delete him. Undeleting is not an option. Despite an ugly "death" by hanging, being sliced in half vertically and seeing his guts spread across a park, Shadow is not dead.