⚡️THUNDERFANG S3 #34

⚡️THUNDERFANG S3 #33: Make The World A Better Place

Locke and his crew arrive on Avam and immediately face off against Jack and his army of Risen.

GXYZTavon Gatling

Conspiracy Awaits

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Jane dropped Jack’s heart just as his body slumped onto the cold lifeless ground, blood trickling from his mouth. It landed with a horrible squish—and yet, despite the eternal night on Avam, I couldn’t look away, eyes focused on something I never thought I’d see with my own eyes. It pumped once, twice, three times…and stopped.

Silence descended on us. 

I had to be dreaming…right? Or maybe it was yet another terrifying vision of the future, showing me what would happen if I didn’t act fast enough. I was sure of it. This had to be something unreal: Jack’s face was twisted in fear, the only emotion I’d ever seen from him. There was no way that any of this was true.

And yet…Jillian let out a shrill scream and the unfortunate realization of what had happened finally settled in.

“JANE! WHAT DID YOU DO!”

I kicked up dust as I ran towards her, instinct driving my actions despite the numbing weight in my mind. “JANE, PLEASE! STOP!”

How did I miss the signs? Had I not been paying attention?

In hindsight, she’d always told me she wasn’t a hero, and yet I kept trying to force her to be one. When Ira called me a hero, I damned near killed myself to live up to the expectations that title came with. I was okay with that, though. I wanted to be a hero. I wore the title with pride.

And yet…

I was an idiot. Selfish, even. We literally just got through letting Siege know that John was no longer going to be addressed by a name he didn’t identify as, and I refused to be called a Plague by the Moriartys.

Why had I insisted on Jane accepting a title she didn’t want?

I was a hero because I wanted to be. It was clear now that Jane did not feel the same.

Jillian sliced her blade through the air as Jane approached, but all it did was pass through her harmlessly. I threw myself between the two, arms stretched wide and chest heaving heavily, my back to Jillian and her sharp blade—a testament to how dire the situation was. 

“We do not kill!”

“Did you think I was joking, Locke?” Jane’s words were laced with fury, her gaze looking through me to her target. “I was serious when I said I would do whatever it took to make this world a better place. It can only be better without Jack in it—and her, and the rest of her rotten family.”

“They don’t deserve to die!” I fought back tears and anger as my words echoed over the dead landscape, the pain of our reality consuming me. “They deserved to be punished! That’s it!”

“Move out of my way.” Her voice was cold and sharp.

“No.”

“I swear, if you don’t—”

 I stomped forward, closing the gap between us so quickly that she stumbled back, caught off guard at my advance. John and Ira rushed to us but I raised a hand to stop them before they got too close.

If she was as serious as she claimed, she would have to rip my heart out, too.

“You are so much better than this.” I regretted it the moment I said it. That was how we’d ended up in this situation in the first place: thinking someone was something they were not.

“They were going to use me as a weapon, Locke!” she screamed, regaining her footing. “Probably use me to infiltrate the other sectors, or assassinate anyone that opposed them! They were going to use me and everyone else here as a weapon in this stupid ass war!” She addressed the other Branded in a startling mimicry of me. “He needed to die! She needs to die! Their whole fucking family deserves to die!”

Perhaps I’d taught her too well.

Sobs behind me gave me the perfect opportunity to not look at Jane any longer. Instead, I raised my hands to my chest and approached Jillian, very, very slowly. “I’m…so sorry. That wasn’t supposed to happen like that, I promise. I was never going to kill your brother.”

Jillian’s eyes shot open. John gasped behind me. Ira yelled out and, instinctively, I spun around to place a well deserved fist. Jane could pass through it, but maybe, just maybe… My fist hit soft flesh and I felt a little better. Jane had pissed me off and, while I couldn’t rip her heart out, having her know what some pain felt like for once—

Jane had never moved from her spot. Her eyes were widened in horror just like everyone else.

I looked down at my fist, slowly, trying to understand what was happening. John and Ira were still off to the side. No one else was nearby. So who did I punch?

The victim of my assault groaned loudly, and twisted his head all the way around to look at me with lifeless eyes.

Jack. 

The Risen.

He lunged, hands reaching out to strangle me. I instinctively dislocated his head with one forceful movement. It rolled about ten feet away as his body collapsed to a heap on the ground. 

Again.

“That…that’s what I saw…at the vault.” Jillian’s voice was barely a whisper. She dropped to her knees, an unsteady hand reaching out to her twin brother’s lifeless body. “They…they didn’t believe me. Father—”

She turned her head, the words caught in her throat. I followed her gaze, though I failed to see what she had spotted, her eyes wide with more sadness and terror. Nothing was off in the distance, save for an imprint in the dirt of the ship the Moriartys had been on.

Oh.

“FATHER!?” Jillian shot to her feet and sprinted in the direction where the ship used to be. “No!”

Where the hell had they gone? I looked around but Avam’s dark and dreary horizon showed no signs of the Moriartys or Dr. Hendrix.

“Where are they!?” Jane stomped towards Jillian, bloodied hand readied at her side.

“I-I—” Jillian stumbled and fell, scrambling back on her hands and feet to avoid the deranged Ghostbranded. I stepped in their path once more. Jane halted the moment our eyes locked. 

Before she could threaten me, I let a bit of my electricity flare up over my skin. “Don’t make me, Jane. We are only here to stop the war and Malice.”

She huffed and rolled her eyes with a shake of her head, then walked off towards the freed Branded. I turned around slowly to reach a hand out to Jillian to help her up, though she looked at my hand with anger and fear. When it was clear she wouldn’t take it, I returned it to my side and did my best to swallow my frustration with the entire situation. Jane had royally fucked our entire plan. There was no way the war could be stopped now. They’d be out for blood. Ours specifically.

“Jillian…Please, we need you to take us to your father and bro—” She flinched. “Dr. Hendrix. I still need to stop this war.”

Ira and John joined me. My fiancé held a length of rope that seemed to be made from thin twigs turned into twine. He didn’t have to say anything. His face conveyed the emotions I was feeling. There was no way we would leave her behind, but we couldn’t simply travel with her, either. She would be just as unpredictable as Jane.

Ira approached her slowly and she flinched again. “Stay back!”

“We can’t just leave you here,” Ira said, holding out the rope. “But we don’t exactly trust you yet, either.”

“You can’t trust me?!” Her disgust was palpable. “You all are the ones who ripped my brother’s heart out!”

Ira exhaled slowly, then tossed the rope onto her. Before she could scramble away, he gestured with his fingers and the rope wrapped around her, forcing her to fall flat on the ground. She tried to wriggle free but the bindings and Ira’s Branding was too much for her. When she eventually stopped squirming, he adjusted it so it was primarily around her wrist, tying her hands together in the front.

John stepped forward as Ira stepped back, and she finally allowed someone to help her to her feet. She stared blankly down at the ground, the fight in her gone. John patted her down and removed any weapons he could find, and then softly whispered to her, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

Jillian reluctantly led us to where she believed her father had headed. As we walked, I made contact with Lestrade and Irēn. I was pleased to discover that Jack’s death hadn’t immediately had an impact on the Forge. I could barely hear anything else they said, though, my mind still clouded with emotions.

I shook my head after ending the call. This was entirely my fault. I wished I could have known it was going to happen—

“Tick!” I yelled out. He made his way over to me, crossing paths and struggling to keep up with my pace as we walked. “Did you know? About Jane and Jack?”

He shook his head furiously. “No. And that still, still scares me, Locke. Why didn’t I go back? Should I go back now, now?” His head drooped. “I feel useless. I want to go back, stop Jane from killing him, but…what if I make, make things worse? What if Jane gets both of them? What if something else goes wrong—what if we lose Jane instead? I’ve never been this scared to loop before, Locke. I normally feel fine risking a glitch, but this seems…it feels so important.”

I shook my head. “It’s fine, Tick. I…I just wish I could have prevented this.” I wasn’t angry with him, but my tone didn’t convey that properly. He backed away, shrinking in on himself as he mixed with the crowd.

The rest of our walk carried on in silence, Jillian walking with bounded arms a few feet ahead of me. Ira occasionally placed a comforting hand on my back, but nothing helped.

“Well, that’s new.” John stopped and pointed.

A large platform, about as high as my shoulders, jutted out from the ground up ahead. Just like on Saffron, two control panels flanked a large Iron Gate. Generators surrounded the platform, pulling in power from the large ship and pumping power to the electronics.

And surrounding that, a sea of risen.

A figure on the platform turned to face us. He motioned to who I presumed was Dr. Hendrix. She raised something to her mouth and the sea of risen parted, revealing the steps that led to the top of the platform.

“Don’t you dare,” Ira said as I parted my lips. Damn, he knew me too well.

“You think he’s gonna fight his way through all of them?” Siege asked from behind.

“No.” Ira sighed. “He’s going to talk to them.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s fuckin’ stupid.”

I pulled Ira in close, our foreheads pressed together, and took in the sight of his eyes. I did my best to commit the love and support—and hint of annoyance at my actions—in them to memory. This was likely it. The finale. Either I’d convince them to back down, or…No. The alternatives were not something I wanted to think about. It was entirely possible that we could beat them in terms of power. But that wouldn’t stop them forever. If I wanted a future free from the threat of them, I needed to reach their hearts.

I involuntarily thought of Jack’s heart plopping on the ground, forcing my eyes shut as I pushed the thought away. I inhaled sharply, lips so close to Ira’s.

“But, if anyone can convince them, it’s you,” he said, kissing me softly before pulling away. He pulled a small bracelet made of vines from his pocket and tied it around my wrist. “Just in case.”

I nodded and gave him as much of a smile as I could muster.

I took Jillian by the arm and signaled for Watt to come with us as we walked through the Risen. The smell of them made me gag, though Jillian was too numb to notice. As we got closer to the steps, her eyes raised, catching sight of her father at the top. Taking a gamble, and hoping the pros outweighed the cons, I removed the binding around her wrists and gestured for her to go. She took off running into her father’s arms.

I methodically ascended the few steps, stopping at the top to take in the sight. The Iron Gate here was larger than the one we’d entered—I did my best to suppress the worrying thoughts that began to creep in. Dr. Hendrix stood behind one of the control panels, attention bouncing from one James Moriarty to the other, awaiting orders.

Jillian’s father released his embrace on his daughter and held her close. For some reason, I was shocked to find the love in his eyes as real as Ira’s. Was he not as evil as I’d thought?

And then his eyes locked on mine.

If all that I’d been taught was true, I had to applaud Malice’s work. The pure hatred I saw in the father’s eyes made me take a step back, completely caught off guard by the shift in his demeanor. But, more than that, I was amazed to still see the love in his eyes. He wasn’t evil for the sake of being evil. He’d been manipulated all his life to think that I—the Detective—was going to bring about ruin and destruction, and he’d believed it.

In a way, I’d proven it.

“Father,” Jillian sobbed, wiping away a tear and some of her makeup, “Jack—”

“I know, little one,” he said, love in his voice but fury in his eyes. “It seems as if the Plague has struck our family once again.”

Movement behind the father made my breath hitch. The man I’d seen as a meat suit for Malice stepped forward, arms crossed and a smirk on his face. “I told him facing the Detective alone would be trouble. Pft. And you were dumb enough to think that helping him would be a good idea.”

The sadness evaporated from Jillian in an instant, immediately replaced with anger. “At least we tried to stop him! You’ve just been hiding away while we did all the work!”

“If you had simply waited like I suggested—”

“Do you see him!?” She raised an arm in my direction. “He’s gotten so much stronger! I’ve seen it! I was trying to stop him before it got to the point that I was in chains and our brother was killed!” The words caught in Jillian’s throat as she choked backed tears.

“Children!” The father raised his hands in a silencing motion.

“No!” Jillian snapped. “The 44^th never did anything, yet he was going to end up taking all the credit. Jack and I did everything! We’ve always done everything!” She turned her gaze to her older brother. “Your name has always been the most important thing to you but you don’t do anything to deserve it. I had to earn mine.”

“Earn?” The laugh tumbled out of the older brother. “You think you earned your name? All you did was change it, Jamie.”

She scoffed. “I forsook that name a long time ago, and I will not—”

“That is enough!” The father stood with clenched fists, eyes darting between his remaining children and me. “There is more than enough misery here without you two bickering and adding to it. Forty-four, what have I told you about names?”

“There is power in a name,” he said with a roll of his eyes.

“Do not strip your sister of that power.”

Dr. Hendrix cleared her throat, drawing everyone’s attention. “Everything is ready.”

Fuck. “Why do you want to wage war so badly? Leave these people out of it.” I let the words tumble out of my mouth, eager to delay them as much as I could. I shifted my sights to the son. “James, please—”

“You are not allowed to call me that,” he spat—literally. “Didn’t you hear what I just said? You do not have the right to call me that. You are a nobody—a nuisance at best. And those nameless beasts behind you? None of you stand a chance against greatness that has existed for generations.” He took a dramatic step forward, hands in the air showingly. “Do not think for a single second that killing my younger brother has deterred any plans I have.

“I’ll even let you in on a little secret,” he said conspiratorially, eyeing his sister. “I don’t actually care that he died. He was more of the left hand—a little useless, but he had his special areas. Jamie—”he said with a playful smirk, “Jillian here on the other hand is more of my right hand.” He winked in her direction. Her brows furrowed and she tightened her grip on the handle of her sword.

“In any case,” he said, returning his voice to its full volume, “I am the 44^th—address me as such. You would be better off remembering that while you’re still alive. And it would make things easier to remember your place. A nameless beast of the field. Say it with me now: a nameless beast.”

He taunted me and repeated it slowly, eyes never once leaving mine, a devilish grin plastered on his face. His condescending tone made my blood boil. I did my best to keep my lighting at bay. I would not repeat our previous mistakes.

“Seems he’s too dumb to learn. No matter.” The 44^th snapped his fingers in Dr. Hendrix’s direction, not bothering to grace her with a look. “Activate the Veil.”

Next week on ⚡️THUNDERFANG:

Locke vs Jane vs the Moriartys and Dr. Hendrix.

Who will win?