➣ [ MICHAEL'S BASE ] ➣
— ➣ —
THE NEXT MORNING Arya woke to Mary gently shaking her, saying that it was time to leave. It took her a few minutes to fully register what was going on. She was not a morning person in any sense.
In those few minutes, she realized that she was now facing the pole that stood in the middle of the tent with her head resting on Jack's shoulder and right arm curled to her chest. Meanwhile, one of Jack's hands intertwined with hers on his chest with the other wrapped around her shoulders.
It took another fifteen minutes to wake him up due to every time she tried to shake him or speak his reply was either "just five more minutes" or just pulling her closer. By the time Arya and Jack had their things together and the tent put away, everyone in the group was packed and ready to go. They picked up their journey within the hour.
"We should get there in a few hours," Jakob had said.
Arya walked hand-in-hand with Jack for the first two hours. They talked about random things, similar to how they would back at the bunker, ranging from a place in the world you want to visit their favorite book or movie series.
"The Jedi have lightsabers and they can use the force. Wizards only have sticks!"
"First of all, wizards don't always have to use wands. Secondly, correction, Jedi have overgrown laser glow sticks and can use weird-ass telekinesis."
Jack rolled his eyes. "Jedi are still better."
"Are not! Tell me more than ten Jedi that actually lived a long, happy and healthy life." Arya countered.
"Why would that matter?" Jack asked, a laugh escaping his lips.
"It totally does. Wizards beat Jedi and you can't convince me otherwise."
Arya saw Jack roll his eyes again as they debated which was better, Jedi from Star Wars or wizards from Harry Potter. The argument had stemmed from them asking who their favorite characters were in their favorite movie or book series. Of course, it was only a playful argument but that didn't mean neither wanted to make their case.
"Whatever you say, Ari," Jack kissed her cheek, finally giving in to the girl. Pink painted her cheeks and she grinned at him as their intertwined hands swung back and forth gently.
"What are you lovebirds talking about?"
Arya glanced over to see Mary and Joseph making their way toward the two and her smile broadened.
"Just proving a point." Arya glanced over at Jack who shook his head with a small smile.
"You two are so sweet I think I'll get cavities." Joseph teased the two, poking Arya's shoulder while Mary went to Jack's side.
"Oh shut it." Arya stuck her tongue out at him.
"So childish. I'm disappointed." Joseph shook his head, placing his left hand over his gun strap. Arya shoved him lightly and they both laughed.
"Anyways," Mary cut off their banter. "I'd like to talk to Jack before we get there if you don't mind."
Arya and Jack exchanged glances and the girl shrugged.
"I'll keep her company, you two go ahead," Joseph offered.
Arya nodded in agreement and looked over to Jack who opened his mouth then closed it before nodding as well. She gave him a grin then let go of his hand, allowing Mary to lead him further towards the front of their group where they could talk in private.
For a few minutes, the two walked in silence with only the crunch of fallen leaves and rocks under their boots to accompany it. Arya thought back to the previous night where she and Jack had spent the time huddled close to each other. A small smile graced her lips as she recalled how comforting Jack's embrace had been.
"What's the dorky smile for?" Joseph poked her cheek, bringing her back to reality.
"Don't worry about it." Arya swatted at his hand as he chuckled.
"Oh?" He raised a brow, grinning. "You sure it's not because you and your lover boy shared a tent?"
Her cheeks flared with heat and she punched his shoulder harder than she intended. "Get your mind out of the gutter asshole!"
"Ow!" He rubbed his arm, laughing now. "I was just kidding!"
"Yeah right!" She punched him again.
"That was unnecessary! I didn't even do anything!"
"You were thinking about it!" A broad smile now stretched across her features.
"Was not!"
It made her laugh at how similar this was to the stupid banter she would often have with Dean (mostly over his eating habits) that usually ended with them laughing and Dean ruffling her hair which she would complain about with a glare directed at the older Winchester. She missed the Winchesters dearly. They were the closest thing to family she had besides Castiel.
Arya and Joseph continued laughing even as they felt their party's eyes staring at them before realizing that their banter may bring in monsters so they quickly quieted down to bright smiles.
"So," the brunette started, "what have you been up to?"
Joseph shrugged, tucking his left hand into his pockets while the other still rested in his gun strap. "Mainly just patrols and unloading supplies. Pretty boring compared to you and lover boy."
"Loverboy? Really?" He shrugged again and Arya rolled her eyes. "I really wish we didn't have to."
Joseph hummed in agreement. "Hopefully this'll be over soon and neither of us will."
"Hopefully."
And so they returned to silence and crunching.
Arya looked ahead at Jack and Mary to see them still talking with one another and she wondered what exactly the older woman wanted to talk about. Jack's hands made odd movements that Mary nodded at then waved her hand for him to continue talking. She assumed they were going over Jack's latest mission again.
Bringing her eyes away from the two, not wanting to seem like she was staring she glanced at Joseph. For the first time since she had met him, she really looked at his features. He had deep blue eyes with black hair to match, giving him the bad-boy-on-the-outside-soft-on-the-inside look. Her eyes then caught a flash of silver around his neck and her head tilted slightly in confusion.
"Do you have a necklace on?" The question seemed to startle him, but he smiled a little and nodded pulling out the chain from under his shirt. It was a long silver beaded necklace with four dog tags on it.
"Dog tags?" Her head tilted further as she tried to look at them.
"Yeah, my twin brother and I were in the navy together." He gave her a small smile.
"It must've been nice to have your brother with you," the brunette returned the smile.
"It was for a while. Kinda annoying, but it felt good for a while to go in knowing you'd have someone who had your back." He slipped them back into his shirt. She noticed then that there were four instead of the usual one or two.
"It must've been," Arya decided not to push the subject more.
They walked a few more minutes in comfortable silence. She liked Joseph. He was a good guy who she had a gut feeling would do the right thing when it came down to it.
"Hey," Jack's voice brought her from her thoughts, his hand intertwining with hers.
"Hey," Arya smiled at him. "Everything okay?"
Jack hummed and glanced over at Joseph, "How have you been?"
"As good as I can be. You?" Joseph put his hands in his pockets.
"Same here."
Joseph soon dismissed himself after giving the girl a pat on the shoulder, winking. She had chuckled and waved him off with her free hand before returning her attention to Jack.
"Are you sure you're okay? You seem really tense."
"I'm sure," he gave her a reassuring smile, squeezing her hand.
➣
Arya made the very quick assumption that she never wanted to be in this place again.
"I hate this place," Mary said, putting away her gun.
Arya nodded her head, eyes shifting around the room.
They had stormed in guns ready only to be met exactly with what Jack had said: no one. Arya had taken care of most of the guards on the perimeter, but inside there was nothing but a table with a map and toy soldiers.
"Well those are Michael's armies," Mary said, pointing to the pieces around the table.
"Why are they all over there?"
He was right, the pieces were much more towards the south than what their group had anticipated and Arya suddenly got a bad feeling in her gut.
Mary sighed, "I don't know."
"I think —"
"Look who we found in the dungeon," Jakob cut Arya off, pulling on a boy's hair to lift his face up. "The prophet, Kevin Tran."
The men forced Kevin to his knees where he looked as though he would break at any moment.
"He's a traitor!" Jakob pointed an accusing finger at him.
"I'm — I'm a prophet of the lord!" The boy tried to defend himself. "I was serving God —"
"You serve Michael. The prophet here turned his back on his own kind!"
By now, the entire group had circled around Kevin. The men (including Joseph) that had brought him in had guns to his back while Arya, Mary, and Jack all stood in front of him.
"I didn't have a choice! I..." Kevin was desperately trying to justify Jakob's accusations. "You don't understand I..." he was now on his feet. "I never used to believe in anything!"
Kevin went on to talk about how he had lost everything and that he didn't understand why God had chosen him as a prophet. He said that when he couldn't perfect a spell, Michael got mad and threw him in the dungeon.
Arya felt sorry for the boy. He was so torn between his moral compass and what he was told he was born to do but angels no less. To top it off, he had no emotional support that any human should have in this world that Michael had ruined.
"Kevin," Mary stopped the boy, speaking in a motherly tone. "What spell? What's Michael planning?"
"There's a place in the south where the walls between worlds are thin," Kevin said. "Michael's gonna use a spell from the angel tablet to open up the rift, and then he's gonna..."
"He'll invade our world," Jack finished his sentence for him.
There was a moment of tense silence as the group digested what had been said. They all looked between themselves, trying to figure out what to do.
"Kevin?" Arya spoke in a soft voice as to not startle him.
The boy looked up, eyes as wide as saucers.
"Do you want some water?" She asked, slowly reaching into her pack and pulling out a bottle of water.
Kevin hesitated, looking at the bottle before looking back up at her. They stood there awkwardly for a good few seconds until Arya smiled at him and offered it to him again.
"There's no catch. If you're thirsty, drink."
Kevin nodded slowly and took the bottle from her. "Thank you," he said.
She nodded and guided him over to sit on one of the benches toward a window to allow him to rest for a while.
Once the group had settled, they had circled around the table with the map trying to figure out if what it saying was true or a trap. In Arya's opinion, it could easily be both. Michael really could have his army where the map showed them to be and it could be a trap, but either way, he was much too clever to leave this out
"No, I can go, right now," Jack interrupted the two men bickering. "If I can surprise Michael, I can kill him."
Arya turned to him sharply, looking at him as if he was crazy. He couldn't take Michael alone, yes he has had some experience fighting, but she doubted it would be enough against a damn archangel. Maybe with her help, they would have a chance, but since he still had the Dreamroot she wouldn't be able to get close.
"Jack, no." Mary gave him a similar look.
"No, we can't let him cross over." Jack insisted.
"I know this, but —"
"We know where he is."
"Do we? Michael could've left this map as bait," Mary countered. "Bobby's only a day out. We should wait."
"I'm with Mary on this one, Jack." Arya pressed her hands against the table as the boy looked over to her, somewhat hurt. "None of us can singlehandedly take down Michael on our own without casualties."
The two held eye contact after she finished. She could tell Jack was getting too confident with all of his victories lately, and there was no mistaking that he was strong, but strength just wasn't enough to win a fight sometimes. She just hoped that he would realize that before it cost him.
"They're right," Kevin spoke up, gaining everyone's attention. "Michael, he...never does anything without a reason."
"I say we let the archangel go," Jakob said. "Let Michael be some other world's problem for a change."
"Excuse me?" Arya looked over to him, flabbergasted. "You better not be serious."
"What if I am?" He shot back, glaring at the girl.
"You'd seriously let all those people suffer and die the way you all have? Have you really gone that low?"
"Don't act like you have any idea what we've been through."
"I never said I did. I asked whether you were willing to let billions of people die," Arya scowled at the man, pushing off the table to turn to him fully.
"Hey, that's enough from the both of you," Joseph spoke from between the two, putting his hands on either of their shoudlers to stop them from getting any closer to each other. "We're not here to bicker."
Arya clenched her jaw and sent the man one last heated glare that he ignored before turning back to the pieces. She felt Joseph pat her shoulder as if telling her to leave it be (she really didn't want to do it, but elected it was for everyone's best interest that she didn't start a fight that she knew she'd win physically or vocally).
"Arya's right," Mary spoke up. "That's seven billion innocent people that we'd be sentencing to hell on earth if we let that happen."
Jakob didn't respond that time.
Mary scoffed then turned to Jack. "Jack, listen to me. This is Michael we're talking about. He's killed everyone that ever stood against him. We have to think this through. I'm asking for a day." She paused, "please."
Jack only looked back at the table, brows furrowed together in serious thought.
In the end, he agreed and the group went to their own separate parts of the room. Arya decided to just sit and try to relax.
She doubted that Jack wouldn't try to go out sometime soon, but she also knew that if she didn't calm down it would only turn into an argument. She guessed she felt so uptight was because Michael tortured her and almost gave her a death sentence just a few meters away. Maybe that was why she picked that fight with Jakob.
"You okay?" Joseph's voice interrupted her thoughts.
"Hm? Oh yeah, I'm fine."
"Well, you don't look fine," he said taking a seat next to her. "Spill."
Arya ran a hand through her hair, "Just bad memories."
"I'm here if you need to talk," he said squeezing her shoulder reassuringly.
Arya only nodded as Joseph left to give her some space. She sighed again, putting her head in her hands, blocking out as much of the thunder and voices that she could. She got a few more minutes of time to breathe before it was interrupted again.
"Arya?" Jack's voice appeared at her side.
She looked up at him.
"Can we talk?"
"Sure." She let him lead her to a corner of the church. "You're leaving aren't you?"
"Yes, but —"
"You can't, Jack," Arya said. "It's too dangerous."
"I can beat him. I know I can, please don't fight me on this."
"How can I not?" She looked at him desperately. "You're getting cocky and you're not thinking this through."
"That's exactly what Mary said," he sighed.
"And she's right!" Arya grasped Jack's hands in her own. "You can't win this without either dying or sacrificing something, Jack. It just isn't worth it."
Jack pursed his lips and looked down at their hands.
"He was able to kill Arya Baker, someone who had more experience fighting him than the both of us combined. Just wait one more day."
Jack sighed, pulling her into a hug, cradling her head and shoulders while her arms hung loosely around his torso.
"I'm sorry, but I have to," he said, holding her close. "I have to do it for everyone here and to make sure he can never hurt you again."
"No," Kevin's sudden voice made them break away from each other.
"Kevin?" Mary came to stand next to the two followed by the rest of the group lining up beside them.
"You can't go," he said ripping apart his shirt to reveal an angel mark carved into his chest.
Next to her, she heard Joseph cock his handgun and Arya shot him a look and shook her head 'no' as Mary also stopped Jakob.
"Michael...he told me to wait for Bobby, for all of you to be together but I can't," Kevin shook his head. "He wanted you to see."
"Whatever Michael said, he was lying," Mary told the boy.
"No! Michael says that when I get to Heaven when he lets me into Heaven I'll get to see my mom again." He said his voice breaking.
"I've been to Heaven and what's there, it's just memories," Mary said. "Nothing's real."
"I don't care!" Kevin shouted. "You don't understand I...you don't know the things that I've done."
"Kevin," Arya called out to him but he ignored her, continuing and she realized that she didn't know what to do. He was desperate and in pain. She knew in a way what that felt like but she couldn't figure out how to make him slow down besides forcing him to.
"I just want this to be over," he said.
"Your spell won't kill Arya and me," Jack said.
"Michael doesn't want to kill you," Kevin said, his dead eyes staring straight at Jack. "He wants to break you. He said for me to tell you that, "Even if you win, you still lose"."
Arya's mind was still trying to digest what he said so when she finally registered what was happening it was too late.
"Kevin, no!" She shouted.
"I'm sorry," he said, crying.
"Don't!" Mary called to him just as he slammed his hand on his chest.
Arya reached for the person closest to her just as Jack pulled both her and Mary underneath his wings. She pulled the person close to her and threw her own wing around them as she huddled as close as she could to Jack.
"I'm so sorry!" Kevin's last words were barely heard over the high-pitched noise that accompanied the white light.
➣
When Arya opened her eyes, everything in the room was toppled over, and when she saw that the person she grabbed was Joseph, she was thankful. Jack's arm was still wrapped tightly around Arya and her hand never left his as they sat there processing.
Both Mary and Joseph were out cold and with Joseph's weight pressing on to her she gently pushed him off, lying his head on the floor.
She refused to look at the bodies and instead pressed her free hand onto Mary's forehead.
"She'll be okay," Arya told Jack softly, rubbing circles on his hand.
He didn't respond, looking around the room, absolutely devastated.
Arya grit her teeth and continued rubbing circles on Jack's hand as she tried to focus on the fact that she still had Jack, Mary, and Joseph with her.
They sat there for a while until Jack stood, kissing Arya's head and walking over to a corner of the room where he could turn to either see nothing or everything. She guessed that's where he was at right now: going between forcing himself to look at the chaos or trying to turn away from it.
Arya was lost and she was scared. She was so scared. Just last night she felt so at peace and now half their party was dead and she knew Jack was blaming himself just like she was. She looked down at Joseph and Mary. They were both fine, but she couldn't help but keep checking until they woke up. She refused to let anything else happen to them.
Joseph was the first to wake with Mary not too soon after. Arya checked the both of them one more time before Mary thanked her and going over to talk to Jack.
"What happened?" Joseph asked as his eyes landed on the scorched bodies of their dead comrades.
"Michael used Kevin's fragile mind to set a trap for us," Arya said, pulling her knees to her chest. "Jack and I weren't fast enough."
"Don't say that," Joseph scolded. "You saved who you could."
Arya nodded.
"Thank you," Joseph tried to smile at her.
She nodded again, honestly afraid she would cry.
"There was nothing —"
"Arya," Jack interrupted Joseph. They both looked up at him as he extended a hand to the girl. She took it and he pulled her up.
"What is it?"
"I just..." He looked over at Joseph who nodded and waved them off.
Without another word to the man, Jack led them over to the only standing bench and pulled her to sit next to him. He held her hand in his tightly, closing his eyes, and leaned his head on her shoulder.
"I just want to hold on to you for a little while," Jack whispered. "Please."
Arya sighed and rested her other hand on top of the one Jack held in his.
"We can stay here for as long as you need," she said. "We'll be okay."
— ➣ —
Hi everyone. I hope you're having a great day/night! Kinda haven't been active so thank you to everyone who's still here. I'm not sure if I'm dreaming or not but we made it to 50K views and 1.3K votes. That's honestly insane to me. Your votes, comments, and even just reading this make my day so much better. Thank you all so much for everything.
Until next time, please do make sure to take care of yourselves and others.