“He’s dying!” Ada exclaimed, doing her best to try and heal Jack whose body was beginning to seize.
“Hold him still! Hold him!” Mi'shka ordered, using his blood control to try and stem the flow of Jack's blood while Ada and Sahaqiel continued to apply healing magic.
"Damn gurilla keeps breaking my arms!" Selfia hissed, her multitude of prosthetic limbs failing to pin down the convulsing man.
“Sarah, Sarah what do we do?!” Ada asked as Jack's body refused to heal thanks to the corruption turning his flesh necrotic.
Behind them, Selfia's troops and what awakened Lilith had managed to pull into the space were converging on Micheal and Adam, the soldiers paying with blood to delay the enemy hellbent on taking his prize.
“I-,” Sahaqiel began before Lilith manifested, showing herself to the group trying to keep Jack alive.
“Bring him to the sphere! I've got a plan!” Lilith spat as Micheal cut down Jin and made his move to reach the Infinity Machine.
“Go!” Sahaqiel shouted, turning to get ready to intercept the Black King.
"Sahaqiel, take this," Selfia said, drawing out Excalibur and handing it to the angel who took it and moved to attack the archangel.
****
“Jack… Jack. Jack, wake up. Jack? I know you're -”
Jack's eyes shot open, he sat up, taking in his surroundings that were of his old barren apartment of New Eden.
“What?” Jack muttered, moving his body that was devoid of tattoos, scars, and the usual hum of mana he felt pulsating beneath his skin.
An illusion? A dream? No… too real to be a dream.
Jack removed the paper thin blankets draped over his body to plant his feet upon the ground as he scanned his surroundings.
Lilith? Ruby?
Nothing.
He roused his mana, attempting to break free from this illusion yet all Jack felt was…
Nothing.
Jack stood up and walked across his apartment, standing beside the window that overlooked the city untouched by demonspawn.
Untouched by his act of vengeance.
“Jack.”
At the call of his name Jack spun, swinging his fist at a woman that caught it.
“Eleanor?”
“Hi Jack,” Eleanor said, the red-eyed blonde woman wrapped in the imperial officer uniform flashing a smile.
Immediately Jack was on the offensive, throwing a flying knee kick that was blocked followed by several jabs parried and blocked by the red-eyed woman who retreated across the room.
“You've become quite the fighter,” Eleanor said, smiling at Jack who raised his palm, willing energy to attack the woman yet nothing came of it.
“What is this? Is this another ploy?” Jack hissed.
One moment he was dying and the next he was trapped in this… illusion?
“No. Not a ploy," The Imperial Mage replied, her expression softening, "You're dead.”
Two words that made Jack momentarily pause.
“This isn't exactly what I imagined my afterlife would be like,” Jack said, his eyes scanning his surroundings.
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Dead? He couldn't be dead. Not when there was so much to do, so much at stake. No, something else was happening.
“No, it wasn't what I pictured either.”
There were many things Jack wanted to say to the woman, but he kept quiet, unsure if this was a ruse.
“Lilith sent me,” Eleanor said, a small smile on her face as she calmly walked towards Jack and stood before him. She looked him up and down, taking in the full image of the man Jack had become from the teenager she once knew.
Jack's brow furrowed, distrust clear on his face.
Micheal didn't know about Lilith. Most didn't. It was a well kept secret that was his triumph card against the Black King.
Was this a ruse? A lie? Maybe a spell where his mind was probed for information and Lilith had been spotted?
Jack didn't know, but he wasn't taking chances.
“How do I know you're telling the truth?” Jack asked.
“You don't,” Eleanor replied, raising her hand to touch Jack's face only to stop as he flinched. “But time is of the essence. You. Are. Dying…”
“Yeah. I know,” Jack replied deadpan, turning to the window. “So what's her plan then?”
Eleanor sighed, staring at her palms.
“To win.”
“How?” Jack said, snapping his head towards the woman beside him.
“She’s working on something to give you an opportunity to disable Adam… but you aren't going to like it.”
Jack blinked, “And where is Lilith, why isn't she telling me this?”
“Because she's busy managing that and keeping the Black King at bay,” Eleanor said, handing Jack an intellipad that displayed Micheal clashing with Adam while attempting to gain access to the Infinity Machine.
Jack's mouth opened as he spotted Selfia beside the Infinity Machine, the woman yelling indiscernible words while Ada and Mi’shka dragged his body to the sphere.
“What is Ada doing here?!”
“Buying time. Your angel friend can't manage looking after you and dealing with the Black King and Adam,” Eleanor reported, her eyes crinkling at the sight of Mi'shka helping to move Jack's blood into his body and circulate it.
They were a small team. Mi'shka, Jin, Leona, Ada, Selfia, and Lita, all of them trying to keep Jack alive while imperial soldiers began entering the space. Paladins and Imperials throwing themselves at the enemy archangel who swatted them away.
“What does Lilith need from me?” Jack asked as he looked at the former mage whose focus was on the heterochromic white-haired man.
Genuine love and longing.
Whatever doubts Jack had was dispelled as the woman raised her head and blinked away the tears in her eyes.
“She needs your consent.”
“Consent?”
“Yes,” Eleanor said with a frown, her eyes wondering to the sleeping girl curled up on the floor. “Because what your friends are about to do is going to hurt. A lot. And there's no guarantee of survival.”
"When does it not hurt?" Jack sighed before locking eyes with his former friend. "Whatever it is, I'm ready."
****
Jack gasped, his eyes snapping open to the sound of gunfire, explosions, and his final gasps of life.
“Tanji!”
““Jack!””
A multitude of voices, people calling his name as he lay bleeding out over a machine with tiny tendrils picking corruptive flesh from his wound.
Suddenly Jack spun, pushing away a frantic Ada to call out to the angel doing her best to keep Adam and the Black King.
“SAHAQIEL! COME TO ME!” Jack roared through the blood gushing from his mouth.
At his command, the angel spun, racing towards Jack with her bronze lightning bolt in hand and impaling him through the chest and into the Infinity Machine.
Stunned, Mi’shka and Selfia stood wide-eyed at the sight of Sahaqiel killing Jack.
“TANJI!” Ada shrieked before swiping at the angel only to go flying as a sudden eruption of light blinded all those gathered.
A scream sounded, a unified voice of Jack and Sahaqiel crying in pain as intense voltages sparked wildly around the room.
Immediately Adam disengaged from the Black King, moving on the source of light with fist raised only for a hand to leave the light and catch the First Awakened by the throat.
As the light faded, Sahaqiel was gone. In her stead stood Jack, his eye patch falling away to reveal two burning orbs of gold that glared angrily at the world. Upon his back, six wings. Four of pristine white and two of shadowed black while on his arms were shackles connected to obsidian chains.
“T-Tanji?” Ada let out as the being known as Adam suddenly dissipated into ash.
Jack stepped forward, lightning coursing around his glowing body that pulsed from the runic tattoos that covered him from head to toe.
This… feels better. Jack sent as he flexed his hand.
“I couldn't agree more,” Sahaqiel replied, manifesting her spiritual form to hug him from behind.
Much like their first meeting, Jack and Sahaqiel had merged. However, unlike their first encounter, the conjoining of bodies were that of an Archangel and an angel.
Two beings ahead of the fake awakened and humans.
He raised a hand, pointing at the Black King while his other manifested a large obsidian shield.
“Micheal. I'm going to fuck you up,” Jack growled as a portal opened, and chains appeared, snatching Ada and the coalition forces away.
“I see,” Micheal chuckled, adjusting his white suit and picking up his fedora. He straightened the creases on his torn suit, gold eyes narrowing as he realized that Jack in fact had more tricks to show him. “Come on then, I gainsay you're in need of an attitude adjustment.”