"I'm trying, I'm trying to sleep.
I'm trying, I'm trying to sleep.
But I can't, but I can't, when you all have
guns for hands."
-"Guns for Hands", Twenty One Pilots
It's well below freezing. The wind is sharp with a biting cold that tears through the air. Jack is standing on a frozen lake so large that he can't see where it ends. The sun is nearly set, and the sky is clouded and darkening with every passing minute. He hears a scream behind him and whirls around.
A girl, barely on the cusp on adulthood, is kneeling on the ice. She is wearing puffy clothes and a hat. In front of her, gaping and dark, is a fissure in the lake where the ice has broken. Her arm is plunged into the water, soaking her entire right side. She sees Jack, screams again, and yells at him in a different language, one that is harsh and sly, with so many more consonants than what Jack is used to hearing. To Jack's surprise, he can understand her perfectly. It's as if she is speaking English.
"Help me! Please help me! I can't hold on!"
Jack moves towards her and without a moment's hesitation, plunges his arm into the ice. Her frozen hand is just barely gripping the sleeve of another person. Jack grabs onto it tightly and pulls. Together they drag another figure from the frozen water, facedown and blue. As soon as they drag the body to a safe patch of ice, Jack flips it over. It's a boy, no more than twelve, with black hair and skin so blue he doesn't even look human. Every inch of his winter clothes are drenched in ice cold water. He's not breathing.
The girl is crying hot tears and places her hands on the boy's face, shaking him roughly. Jack puts a hand to the boy's neck. Barely a pulse. This was the prayer he had chosen, the cry for help from an innocent soul.
Without speaking, he touches the boy's temple and reaches into himself for the well of power coursing through his veins. He feels the heat of it travel through him, out through his fingertips. His eyes glow. With a gasp the boy sits up, coughing up a fountain of ice water. His skin is rapidly changing before their eyes, from light blue to white, and then to pink. He looks around wildly and falls back as the girl, gasping from shock and relief, wraps her arms around him. Jack stands up. He is soaking wet and the cold physically hurts. He blinks and he is dry again.
"Wait," says the girl. Jack doesn't turn back to her, but stops in his tracks with his back facing them. "Who are you?" she asks.
Although he knew someone would ask, the question is still impossible for Jack to answer. He opens his mouth and then closes it again. The wind is howling.
"I'm here to help," he says. His own words come out in the same sharp tongue as the girl.
Then he blinks, and he is gone.
The bunker comes to life around him. Without Castiel and the Winchesters, it's a lonely shell of a bygone home. Jack sinks onto his bed, holding his head in his hands. It felt good to help someone. It felt good to be good. Why then does he feel so disturbed?
The stream of prayers which he has been tuning out catches his attention again. Saving one person from an untimely death wasn't so bad, right? What was one more? It dawns on him that there are millions of prayers, millions of moments of evil. How will he choose?
With a frustrated growl, he chooses another prayer and disappears. When he reappears, he is at a crossroads at night with a single street light illuminating the road. A barn lies off in the distance, with a corn field nearly blocking it from view. It smells like America again.
There are two figures at the crossroads: a woman dressed in a black dress and a man in a baseball cap and corduroy. The man is on his knees, and he is begging.
"Please," he whispers, "I didn't know…I didn't understand."
"You knew," says the woman. "You knew the deal when it was made. Now it's time to pay."
"I didn't! You tricked me—!" he cries.
"Hey!" says Jack forcefully.
The two figures turn to him, their eyes adjusting to the darkness. Jack steps into the light as the man crawls to his feet. He might have been in his sixties, with graying beard and torn pant legs. The woman is sneering. Her red-stained lips turn up at the sight of Jack. For a moment, her eyes are all black.
"Come to join the party?" she says silkily.
Jack faces her head on. "This is no party," he says.
"Relax, kid," she says. "Give me a moment to finish this deal, and I'll handle you next."
She snaps her fingers and directly behind her appear two ferocious dogs, snarling and bloody at the mouth—Hellhounds. The man gives a strangled cry and falls to his knees, his eyes on the feral creatures.
"Stop," says Jack.
"Cool it, kid," says the demon. She turns to the Hellhounds and beckons them forward. They take a step towards the man who has begun begging without restraint.
"Please! I'll do anything! Please!" he cries.
"A deal's a deal," says the woman. She steps back as the Hellhounds begin their attack.
"I said STOP!" yells Jack.
He holds out his hands and the world freezes.
The Hellhounds hover in midstride. With a wave of Jack's hand, they disintegrate into the air. Jack makes his way to the demon who is in mid-cackle, and puts his hand on her shoulder. Instantly, she unfreezes. Her laugh slides off her face when she sees the frozen form of the man.
"What the—" she stammers. "Where are my Hellhounds?"
"Gone," says Jack. He lets go of her shoulder.
"But…how?" she asks. She looks Jack up and down. "You?"
"You'll see them soon enough," he says. "Or maybe not. The Empty is a strange place."
The woman tries to take a step back from him, but Jack has her frozen in place again. The first flicker of fear crosses her face. "Who are you?" she spits.
"My name is Jack."
"That's it? Jack?" Her eyes dart back and forth, trying to figure him out. "Jack who?"
"Jack Winchester."
A startled look of recognition crosses her face. And then real, unfiltered fear.
"Look, I'm just doing my job—"
"Enough," says Jack.
He places his hand on her forehead, and with an ear-splitting scream, a rupture of black smoke pours from her mouth. The smoke swirls around her head and tries to dart away into the night, but Jack doesn't let it. As the woman's body crumples to the ground, he raises his hands into the air. His eyes glow gold. And then the black smoke burns—a tendril of black fire, like ash—until there is nothing left.
Jack stoops down to help the woman up. She is dazed. Human again.
"It's alright," says Jack. "Go home and don't tell anyone about this. You're safe now."
And before he can hear her response, he disappears and reappears back in the bunker.
Jack sinks onto his mattress a second time, breathing hard. That wasn't right. Crossroads demons weren't supposed to be making deals. He'd have to have a talk with Rowena.
He closes his eyes and rubs the palms of his hands into them, using his elbows to prop them up on his knees. Gradually, he lets the prayers in again. Even in a slow stream, it's like a tidal wave. Pain, suffering, injustice. He can feel it. It's like a billion billion souls all echoing in his mind, crying for help. He can hardly breathe for the pain of them. How many can he do?
It's one after the other: healing a blind man in Jerusalem, preventing a back-alley murder in Chicago, stopping a flood in Manila, killing a demon in Singapore. On a on. He loses track of the people he saves, loses all sense of time and place.
But he always end up back at the bunker with millions of voices crying out to him. Desperate. How does he choose? The voices don't let him rest, for as long as he can hear them, he knows that he has a job to do. He curls into himself on the bed, puts his head between his knees, takes deep breaths of air. He is God, he is God, he is God—
And then, because he can't take it anymore, he shuts them all out. The silence is deafening.
"Castiel," he whispers.
A rustle of fabric.
"Jack? Are you alright?"
He feels a weight on the bed next to him, a hand on his back, but he doesn't move.
"Jack," says Castiel, his voice thick with concern.
"I can't do it," says Jack. His voice is tired and rough. The burning sensation behind his eyes feels shameful. He sits up, but he can't look at the angel sitting next to him. "There's too much."
"Too much?"
"Too much pain. Too much suffering." He blinks wetness out of his eyes frustratedly. "There is an order to things—I sense that. A balance that is necessary for life. Good and bad. Light and darkness. But I can hear them. I can hear the pain. Am I just supposed to let it go?"
He feels Castiel relax beside him, followed by a heavy sigh. "Oh, Jack. I should have seen this coming. You have to do what you think is right—"
"But I don't know what's right," he says forcefully. "I…I saved many people. So many people need my help, Cass, and I tried, but they're not…out of everyone who needs my help…it's not enough." Finally, Jack summons the courage to look at Castiel. "I could end it. I could snap my fingers and end the pain. No more monsters, no more death. Just paradise on Earth. But…"
"But what?"
"It's not that simple. I understand now that there must be bad in order for there to be good. There must be pain in order for there to be joy."
"Balance," says Castiel.
"Yes, but balance for what? At what cost? Why can't there be only good?" He doesn't have any control over it, and he finds himself raising his voice. "If I have the power to stop it, and I don't then…I'm just a guilty as if I had done it! I have a responsibility, Cass! I have to—"
But he doesn't get the words out because an overwhelming darkness floods his mind. Castiel disappears, and so does the bunker, and all of sudden he is surrounded by darkness. And then a voice—not like last time, just a single, solitary voice—speaks out and Jack feels every fiber of his being vibrating with the words.
COME TO ME.
He doesn't have a body or a mind, and all he can do is exist with the voice coursing through him. And it's not just any voice—it is his voice.
I HAVE WHAT YOU DESIRE. FREEDOM—
All of a sudden, he is lurched back to reality. This time, he isn't still on the bed. He's collapsed to the floor. Castiel is hovering over him, looking more worried that he's ever seen him.
"Jack!" he cries.
Blinking hard, Jack pushes himself up. He puts a hand to his head which is pounding painfully.
"Cass—" he begins, but stops when he sees the room spinning. He takes deep, steadying breaths before continuing. "It happened again—the voices. Only this time it was…"
"It was what?" urges Castiel.
"It was…me. I was the one speaking," says Jack.
Castiel helps Jack onto the bed. "Jack, we have to figure out what's going on. This isn't like before? When—"
"When my own body was trying to kill me?" he snaps. "No, it's different. It feels like a…a calling. Something is calling out to me."
"I don't like this," warns Castiel. "We have to tell Sam and Dean—"
"And have them do what?" says Jack sharply. "Research? They can't help me, Cass. I can't even help me. We'll just worry them."
"They care about you," says Castiel gently. "It's not about whether they can help. They'd want to know."
"I care about them too," says Jack. "Too much. That's why I can't tell them. But you…you can help me."
"I will help you," says Castiel determinedly. "With everything I have, I will help you."
The pounding in his head begins to lessen. Jack leans against Castiel lightly, feeling more grateful than ever to have him for company. Sometimes, he feels like a child—a real, actual child. Sometimes, it dawns on him the immensity of his power, of his responsibility, and the weight of it is nearly crippling. Sometimes, he just needs a friend.
The bunker is quiet. The solidity of the walls make the bunker feel like a fortress. Jack is glad to be here.
"I spoke to the angels," says Castiel quietly.
Jack nods, grateful to take his mind off the present problems. "Tell me," he says. "What do the angels need?"
Thanks for sticking around this long! I have a lot of great adventures for Jack and Castiel to get up to in the next chapters, and I'll get Sam and Dean in there too. Team Free Will 2.0! Leave a review if you can!