Soooo, long wait for this. I apologize, I am currently working two jobs to save up for school, and what little time I have left over after that is spent trying to be a good mom. Hopefully, this makes up for some of it. Thanks for being patient reader's! Please note the added warnings, mmkay?

Recommended listening for this chapter:

8) The Hollow Wasteland: Imagine Dragon's - Radioactive

"...there ain't no journey what don't change you some."
― David Mitchell

For a second as he left the Bastion, the world seemed to stretch and bend around Jack like a Dali painting. Then, like an elastic band stretched to the limit, Jack's fifth step forward pulled the world taut and with a nearly-audible snap the world resolved around him into the next challenge. Looking around with a gimlet eye, Jack silently observed the entirety of the decimated cityscape. All around Jack tall steel spires stretched their barren fingers towards a clouded, blackened sky; the burnt-out and brutalized husks of empty skyscrapers spreading in all directions toward the horizon. The ground was littered with rubble, the buildings only long-shattered husks of rebar and concrete. Nothing appeared to grow within this new landscape; there was no green, only a thousand dull shades of grey from gunmetal to fresh ashes. The city was empty, as still and quiet as ground zero of a nuclear blast, and Jack couldn't help but wonder, as he carefully, cautiously proceeded forward, if perhaps this was what it was meant to resemble; some dark, post-apocalyptic vision painted in whispers of death and destruction. The sky was as greyscale as the ground, and the lingering ash and dust in the air had the effect of making the distant horizon blend together in such a way that it resembled a large, charcoal smudge in the distance. There was not enough light to even cast proper shadows, as the sun that filtered through the great thunderous clouds above was a weak, hazy light at best, and Jack every time Jack stops staring diligently at his feet, he finds himself stumbling occasionally over obstacles that he'd missed. It was slow going with shards of glass, chunks of concrete and bits of metal threatening to shred his bare feet as he walked. Although his soles had toughened considerably over the course of his travels, they weren't yet strong enough to be impermeable to sharp, pointy objects, as he'd discovered earlier. Wincing a bit as he managed to drive a pointy bit of something into the tender arch of his left foot, Jack resolved that when this was all over he'd seriously start to rethink his stance on shoes. Maybe those weird ones with the individual toes would be comfortable enough to tolerate?

Shaking his head, Jack returns his attention to walking, making sure to keep his head up and to stay alert to any possible threats, stopping only occasionally to roll his shoulder against the continued ache along his spine. To either side of him, Jack eyed the storefronts and facades, which were all tarnished and pockmarked with windows smashed in and doors blown clear off hinges, although what lurked inside was lost to the shadows and darkness. Jack shivered, almost able to imagine the streets looking the way they should, with the signs painted bright and new, the sunlight gleaming off of a hundred thousand intact panes of glass, and a heavy, bustling noontime crowd laughing and talking and shopping and walking as cars and trucks and taxi cabs flit their way down the streets between stoplights like bees in a hive. As empty and broken as this city is it makes Jack's skin crawl; as if the voices of a million lost souls were whispering right into his ears, their ghostly breath cool against the back of his neck. Shivering slightly with the imagined chill, Jack found himself missing his old sweater for its hood. Nothing for it though, he'd just have to ignore the unsettling feeling crawling up his spine and focus on staying alive. As he continued to carefully pick his way through the asphalt ruins, Jack found himself wishing for perhaps the thousandth time that he still had his staff at his side. Although the dagger could be handy in a fight, Jack was mostly untrained with a bladed weapon, unless you counted the extremely rudimentary basics of 'sharp edge needs to go into the other guy.' Sure, he'd handled a hunting knife as a human in a lifelong past, but skinning the day's kill and actually defending oneself from an enemy were two very different things, and as Jack had learned so far there were always enemies on the Road; and often little to no warning before they emerged, hungry and violent. As for the crystal, well whatever use it had if in fact it had a use beyond 'paperweight' or possibly 'crude instrument of blunt force trauma,' he hadn't discovered it just as of yet. At the very least, Jack thought wryly, he'd been reliably informed that he had pointy knees and elbows that he could just start flailing about, should the situation call for it.

Coming to a T-shaped intersection, Jack looked left and right and then cursed colourfully; down each pathway, one of the towering structures had collapsed into the street before him and the remnants were completing blocking the way forward. The left looked marginally worse at a second glance, so Jack decided to hazard the right hand road. Creeping carefully amidst the rubble, Jack examined the blockade from a closer standpoint. It was over thirty feet tall for sure; a twisted and crumbled mess of brickwork and steel directly in his path. Groaning, Jack crept forward, examining the pile of refuse from up close. He took his time walking along the length of it, cautiously testing handholds until he found a section that looked safe enough to climb. Well, for a given value of safe at least. Grumbling under his breath about how much easier this would be with his staff; Jack commenced his careful scaling of the blockade. It was slow going, each new step or reach being performed with the utmost of attention, Jack definitely wanting to avoid taking a tumble down the side of what was essential a giant pile of jagged chunks and sharp edges. Cresting the top, Jack took a moment to just breathe deeply, hunched over with his hands on his knees, lungs heaving from the exertion and the poor air quality. Jack had heard stories of miners suffering from blacklung before, and he wondered idly what damage he was doing to his just by sucking down the thick, polluted atmosphere of this world. Straitening up once he'd caught his breath, Jack looked around, using the new vantage point to survey the way forward. The skeletal building and blocked streets had turned this once-bustling town into a veritable labyrinth of a wasteland. Jack could see down the street in front of him in a straight line, but couldn't see around the corners for any hidden dangers or alternate paths. At least it looked like the way forward was clear, so Jack might as well proceed.

Jack was halfway back to the ground when the hunk of concrete under his left foot suddenly gave way. Jack gasped in shock, fingers scrabbling frantically for purchase, but his handholds too crumbled away under the unexpected increase in weight and pressure. For a second, Jack felt himself freefall, his right hand clenching unconsciously around his absent staff; a knee-jerk reaction to control his descent. With no staff though there was no wind, and therefore no control to be found. A split second later Jack collided hard with the sloping side of the embankment, his left shoulder exploding into bright fireworks of pain and wrenching a sharp, high noise of agony from his lips. He tumbled then, head over heels down the last ten feet to the ground where he found himself laid out; stunned and battered on the cold, unfeeling ground. Jack lost time for a few moments, the pain stretching them out into a long, murky haze as the adrenaline faded. Eventually Jack shifted, gritted his teeth as his shoulder flared again, and gravel dug into his skin at the motion. It took some doing, but Jack was soon able to shuffle himself upright into a sitting position, back propped against a large slab of concrete, cold and smooth behind him. He worked his shoulder carefully, hissing in pain at the motion, but a cursory inspection revealed no blood and not enough swelling for a break. It was badly bruised then, but far from the worst case scenario. He had some abrasions on his palms, and a gash on one calf, but it was all simple surface damage, and nothing that he couldn't heal in a few hours, a day for two for the shoulder. Jack had gotten very, very lucky this time around, for sure. Checking to ensure that the stone and the knife were still with him, Jack slowly pushed himself to his feet, unwilling to remain a stationary target any longer.

He'd only just made it upright when he felt it; the distinctive feel of a pair of eyes sliding over him, assessing, calculating. The very air around him shifted; became oppressive and heavy, like the air suddenly had weight to it, pressing down into his skin. Jack cursed and whipped around, hand fumbling to brandish the dagger and a cold sweat breaking out across his skin. Turning in a slow circle, Jack's penetrating stare flowed over his surrounding, looking for any sign of a threat, or something out of place. He kept his back to the blockade with enough room that he could dodge without being pinned, but that an attack from behind would be unlikely. From the corner of his eye a shadow passed quickly along the ground and Jack jerked his head up, catching only the briefest glimpse of a slim, dark figure as it shot above him. Well hell, seemed this enemy could fly, which meant Jack was so incredibly screwed. Hands trembling faintly with renewed adrenaline and the beginnings of deep foreboding, Jack took off at top speed, ignoring the tiny pinpricks of pain in his feet from the rubble as he ran. Since his enemy could fly, Jack needed to take cover, preferably indoors where a flying hostile would lose the advantage in close quarters. Ahead of him, there was a shop front with the double doors blown open but still mostly attached and the large main window spider-webbed with cracks but miraculously intact. Perfect. Jack ducked through, yanked the doors shut behind him. They groaned on their damaged hinges, and one caught on a piece of metal and wouldn't budge, but the gap was only a few inches and Jack hoped it would be enough to at least slow his enemy. The cracked glass was too compromised to stop a direct assault, but hopefully whatever it was would be injured by coming straight through. If not, well, there was nothing subtle about destroying an 8 foot by ten foot piece of glass, was there? Jack cast his eye about, immediately determining the far corner as the most defensible position in the room, protected as it was by a large reception desk. Using the desk as cover, Jack crouched, waiting, weapon at the ready, his breathing heavy and laboured with the pounding of his heart. Long seconds stretched into minutes, then into half an hour, but still nothing came. The doors stayed mostly shut as he'd left them, the already damaged window remained further unscathed. Slowly, Jack's heart calmed, and his breathing slowed. His skin was tacky with fear sweat, and his thighs and calves ached from crouching, tensed as he was, for so long. Quietly as he could, Jack straitened up; eyes still glued to the two points of entry, and hand clenched so tight on the handle of the knife that his knuckles were bloodless and aching. With exaggerated care, Jack came back around the desk, slinking along the wall toward the front of the ruined store, until his back was pressed into the front corner, where wall became the window. Outside nothing moved, the world the same grey as before, the light filtering into the darkened store the same ugly, grainy quality as always. Jack squinted a bit, trying to stay as out of sight as possible, sticking just his head out, nose almost to the cracked glass as he peered up and down the road and the visible skyline, looking for anything that moved; anything that reeked of the nameless, faceless entity that had taunted him earlier.

As narrowly focussed as he was, it took Jack a moment to realize something was wrong. A sudden motion directly in front of his face had him yelping and jumping back, bringing the dagger up in what he hoped was a threatening gesture. In the window in front of him, Jack's reflection did the same, except that the reflection was instead wielding a far-too familiar staff in its hand in place of the knife. Jack blinked in surprise, and when he met his own gaze again the smile on his reflection's face was ugly, the eyes black as the holes between the stars, his grin was a wide mockery with teeth like tiny knives, the horror of the moment extended by the cracked surface that turned one ghoulish face into a thousand grinning maws and hellish dark eyes. Shocked, Jack froze, allowed the creature a moment to laugh, just once; a high, howling noise like the sound of spiders singing that drew gooseflesh along Jack's arms and the back of his neck. Then, the monster lunged, and Jack was face to face with himself, in all his wrathful, terrible glory.

There was a split second pause then, like the world was holding its breath in anticipation of the violence to come. Eyes locked with the horror in from of him, Jack could feel his heart rate, having only just begun to settle, soar back into overdrive. The blood thrummed in his veins, fluttering at his pulse points, hammering at his eardrums. Adrenaline overload, shock, dismay, outright panic, and then the window shattered inward. The universe resumed motion in a spray of broken glass, and although Jack's closed eyes and hastily thrown up arms protected his face, he knows he's sustained more than a few gouges from the angry shards. He was still reeling from what felt like a hundred papercuts when something lithe but remarkably solid slammed into him, sending him flat to his back. His spine immediately lit up in agony from both the debris gouging him and the lingering unexplained ache from earlier. The sensation is one that would usually have his gasping aloud but the air has been forced from his lungs and he just chokes instead, eyes wide and frantic. The Doppelganger shifts, crouched above him heedless of the broken glass that must be digging into the shins that were planted on either side of Jack's thighs. The Doppelganger is still grinning like a loon; too many white teeth in a great black grin, Jack thinks dizzily. The creature has Jack pinned with his weight, the facsimile of Jack's old staff made of a dark tar-black wood pressed tight to his throat, cutting off all chance at air. Jack didn't need to breathe per se, at least not back home where the support of his believers was enough to sustain him long past mortal tolerances, but here in this dim, grey wasteland he was as relatively fragile in comparison, and oxygen was definitely more of an essential.

Jack's mouth gaped wide, struggling to draw breath where there was none to be had, fingers scrabbling helplessly at the hands that held the staff against his throat. He tried digging blunt nails in to the scant flesh on the back of the bony appendages, but that only brought another mad, barking laugh from his mirror-image. Already, black spots were dancing at the corners of his vision, his struggles weakening, the sick laughter of the Doppelganger growing louder, higher. Jack remembered the knife suddenly, letting one hand fall to scrabble uselessly in the dirt by his hip, but he's dropped it MiM-knows-where and with his head pinned, vision fading and coordination flagging there's next to no hope of finding it, let alone having enough strength left to use it with any sort of effectiveness. Jack is terrified, more so now then he'd been when facing down the fire spirit. He was alone, without hope of rescue, and the weight of the Doppelganger hovering above him suddenly feels like the weight of winter water on his chest had; cold and vicious and unforgiving. The seconds drag on, and Jack's thoughts dim further, becoming as sluggish as his now weakly grasping hands. Five, ten, fifteen more and his struggles stop, hands slipping to rest in the dust and broken glass, scratched and bloody and still. The Doppelganger grins even wider, lips unnaturally wide, eyes shot pure black and giggles still coming in heady, high-pitched waves. Jack's face is slack, his eyes unfocused and vacant, chest not moving. Slowly, the Doppelganger eases off, using the black staff to push himself back to its feet. The dark wood has left a smudge of ash on the raw, pale skin of Jack's slender neck, the skin already blooming into bruises that will never fully form now that his blood isn't flowing. The ash staff is made partly of the remnants of Jack's old staff, the Doppelganger birthed of the pain and blood and fear of those few, heart-wrenching moments when Jack had died burning, moulded and shaped by the magic of the Road and the malice lurking in the corners of this long dead place. It snickers again, pleased with its great trick. No Jack, not anymore; just it, and its anger, and hatred, and lust for pain. It leans closer, snuffling into the side of Jack's neck, long forked snake-tongue flicking out to taste where Jack's pulse should be, but won't be, because it won, and Jack-be-damned-Frost is gonegonegone...

The pulse is weak, but steady beneath its tongue, and it frowns and draws back snarling, catching a glimpse of impossible motion out of the corner of its eye. The Doppelganger turns it head sharply to catch the motion...

...And catches the obsidian knife straight into his throat, instead. The ugly, guttural howl comes clean up from its toes, and should be obstructed by bubbling blood and shredded vocal cords, but the creature only leaks a black, tarlike substance over Jack's hand and down his outstretched arm like a car losing oil and the sound bursts free to echo harshly in the empty space around them. It thrashes, one hand grasping at the one that holds the knife, and the other flails, trying to thump Jack a good one, but the staff is too long and the abomination's angle is bad, wrenched to the side and slightly backwards as it is by Jack's hand still holding the knife, which has apparently hit with such force that it imbedding into what passes for a spinal column in a dark construct; the lethally sharp blade turning more and more of the Doppelganger's neck to gore with its desperate writhing as it tries to escape, to fight back. Jack grunts and gasps, sucking heavy wet breaths in through his abused throat, lungs still burning and body still aching from the oxygen deprivation, but desperate to stay strong, to hold his ground. He hadn't quite expected the possum ploy to work, but it turns out that even evil twins got overconfident when they thought they'd won. Jack wouldn't make the same mistake though, and gritting his teeth against the throbbing his skull, and continued ache in his back, he jerk his arm sideways and down with all the strength he can muster. The knife is ludicrously sharp and follows his motion well, tearing through flesh and sinew and scraping along bone, travelling from pulpy throat over collarbone and out the side of the creature's ribcage. The Doppelganger shrieks, back arching in agony, a heavy black spray of ichors showering onto Jack's face and chest as the creature's own chest blooms open like a wet, gaping flower. Funeral lily for a dead thing, Jack thinks hysterically as he arches his back, thrusting his pelvis up hard, counting on the creature's pained thrashing to help dislodge it. It works, and with an angry cry the creature flips sideways, landing heavily onto one shoulder, staff pinned awkwardly beneath it by its own weight. Grunting, Jack follows the motion, ignoring the protests of his aching body, heaving himself over to flop onto the creature, reversing their roles with little grace. The creature hisses, struggling uselessly, but it's split open from chin to sternum and leaking everywhere, the snarling face already taking on a wet, mushy look; melting and dripping like ice cream in the sun.

Jack snarls, feeling suddenly feral and wild with his success; his left hand going down to pin the black staff to the ground, his right hefting the knife up once more. The Doppelganger bares its teeth, mouth wide like a livid slash on its face, and Jack brings the knife down right into it in a surge of ice-cold rage. The blade bursts an eyeball, gouging into the socket, likely puncturing brain since the only thing that stopped its motion was the side of Jack's fist clenched against the handle. The creatures makes a sound like the wounded, dying thing it is; something Jack doesn't have words to describe but raises the hair on the back of his neck regardless. In a sick parody of just moments earlier, the thing's empty hand scrabbles madly, blindly, fingers catching and smearing black sludge against Jack's shoulder and collar as the dying thing grasped uselessly at his throat in one last, desperate attempt at violence. The lightest brush of fingers to still-tender flesh had Jack letting out on more panicked, frantic noise and suddenly the creature's head tips back as its spine arches dramatically, high enough that daylight could shine between the dying body and the ground. The creature arches and bucks once, then twice more, sending Jack heaving along, his teeth gritted and his filthy fist twisting the knife into the mauled eye socket, feeling the blade scrape sickeningly against bone. Finally, with one last shudder, the creature falls still, silent, body slowing melting beneath Jack until he's left sprawled on his knees over nothing but a puddle of ichors spread out like black ink in only the vague shape of a body. The staff too crumbled away, dispersing into nothing but ash in a growing puddle of blackness. Jack blinked once slowly, feeling stunned and sluggish with the adrenaline quickly fading out. He looked down, realizing suddenly that his hand was still clenched so tightly around the handle of the knife that his knuckles were blanched white and bloodless. Shock must be setting in, he thought detachedly, using his left thumb to dig into the pressure point on the underside of his wrist until his right hand relinquished the knife; the muscles having cramped into place during his furious struggle for survival. The knife is tucked haltingly into Jack's waistband, because who knew what else was yet to come, and even an idiot wouldn't throw away his only weapon, despite how much he wanted the stained blade to be gone. Bracing his shaking hands onto the ground before him, Jack gagged a little at the feeling of the black muck slurping up over his hands to the wrists. It took three tries, but he finally managed to shove himself up to his feet, legs trembling so forcefully that he nearly collapsed again. Groaning with the effort, Jack took half a dozen stumbling steps away from the carnage until, three steps from what was left of the store window and tumbling back down to his knees, his stomach empty but heaving regardless, shock and horror and pain leaving him retching and wailing into the dirt.

Jack does not partake in the dressing of Aster's body, after his death. He was empty, numb and nearly blind with grief, and had instead been steered gently into one of the private baths North had at his disposal. Jack had only fuzzy memories of undressing, running the shower, and scrubbing the dried rust-coloured flakes that had once been Aster's lifeblood from his hands and legs. He'd been kneeling beside him in the mud and blood, and now the filth was ground into his skin, painting him like a masterpiece of battlefield gore. Suddenly assaulted with the memory, Jack had gagged and heaved, vomiting Christmas cookies and bile into the bottom of the shower, heartsick and sobbing unreservedly. He'd stayed so long under the spray that the lukewarm water he preferred had run ice cold, and Tooth had come to fetch him, drawing him carefully out of the shower and coaxing him to towel off and dress in a spare set of clothes. Jack had complied woodenly, eyes still raw and red, although the tears had long dried up. Even clothed again, he still looked no better than Tooth herself did, and they'd clung to each other then in mutual mourning, Tooth crooning comforting nothings into his hair while Jack gripped her tight enough to probably hurt, but she hadn't pulled away. Despite Tooth's comforting hold however, Jack still couldn't quite shake the lingering feeling of being soaked in Bunny's blood.

Jack lost track of the time he'd spent on his knees, but by the time he rose again his eyes were dry and his legs were numb, but steady. He limped along for a bit, grunting a bit in discomfort at the pins-and-needles sensation in his limbs. He was determined to ignore both physical and psychological discomforts until such a time that he forgot about them, or they became insignificant enough so as not to bother him further. What did it matter that some horrible thing, some terrible creature was dead because of Jack? It had been self defense and nothing more, even if he still felt nauseous and ugly inside at the remembered sensation of driving the knife into the doppelganger's eye. Gamely, he trudged on; ignoring the tacky mess that glued his pants to his legs, and that covered his hands and a good portion of his torso. He was a mess, but there weren't any of North's giant showers out here, so he'd just have to suck it up and carry on, now wouldn't he? Everyone was still depending on Jack to succeed. Eyes dry and gritty from both crying and the dust in the air narrowed a bit as Jack rounded the next corner. Was it just him, or was the air shimmering slightly about halfway down the block, like a mirage just out of reach? The closer he came, the more the illusions seemed to in fact be a disturbance in reality. Pausing at the very edge of the weirdness, Jack tilted his head in curiosity, squinting a bit as he studied the anomaly, which seemed to resemble something like a tear in the fabric of reality. Quite literally, the frayed edges of the world hung gaping open like a wound, with a glimpse of something beyond. Something dark shimmered just past the large rend in reality, sounding like the rustle of wet leaves and smelling like rain on forests. With a grim tilt to his smile, Jack stuck out a hand, feeling a slight tugging sensation the closer it got to the hole in the world. Taking a deep breath, Jack stepped forward and let the strange gravity take hold, whirling in a spinning flash of colour once more into the unknown.

"That which does not kill me had better run pretty damn fast."

- Unknown