<span style="font-style: italic">Its strange really......</span><br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">Whats that?</span></span></span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">Just....The way some things work out...Love, hopes for the future...It all feels like a dream...like any moment I'll just wake up, back home in Ireland, and the dying <br/>and rebirth..all of it will just have been a bad dream...</span><br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">You still don't get it do you?</span></span></span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">What is there to get?! I got killed by a bunch of fuckin' ignorant bastards who decided that me an' mine weren't fit to live.</span><br/><br/><span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">Have you ever stopped to consider that your part of something bigger than yourself? That maybe theres a greater reason that your here?</span></span></span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">Well what the fuck is that shit huh?! I didn't ask for any of this! I was happy, I had a wife, I had a beautiful piece of land and I was gonna be a fuckin daddy...God, I <br/>can't remember anything but a few weeks before before I died, my family, my life, its all a goddamn blur. I lost my life, in more ways than one, and now I'm some <br/>sick fucked up joke of a person, stuck in a sick fucked up joke of a world, and you wanna tell me that some sick fucked up cosmic force is responsible for all this? Huh?! <br/>Tell me, if the little picture looks like a great big fuck up, what exactly can the big picture be?!? Fuck you, fuck your predestination bull crap, fuck your karma, and fuck <br/>this whole fucked up world! I'm done with all this shit, I'm tired of playing the straight and narrow and getting shit on for it!</span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">PREACH IT TO ME BROTHER!</span></span><br/><br/>Jack hit the ground with a thud, staring up at the woman he once called his love, for whom he would have done anything for. The woman he had<span style="font-style: italic">died</span>for.<br/>Looking up into her eyes, he relived moments of passion and pleasure, darting through woods, running, laughing, playing...Tears scorched his eyes and set his<br/>cheeks ablaze as they cascaded down his face. Lurching up, his lips embraced her own for a brief moment before he jerked his wrists free and twisted his body,<br/>entering a push-up stance before rolling from underneath Shey and standing to face both her and the Demon.<br/><br/>"Who woulda seen this coming eh? This whole fucked up world is a real trip, like Disney World, only the deranged angry monsters aren't just carnies this time, but<br/>actual deranged angry monsters. I am sick of this shit storm that is my life. Or my second life." At that he began to laugh uncontrollably.<br/><br/>"Jesus....Jesus only had to deal with hell for the three days till he got brought back. Me...The hell<span style="font-style: italic">was being</span>brought back." His face turned from laughter to<br/>grim seriousness in the blink of an instant, his face a mask of pain and anger.<br/><br/>"If I had the power....I would burn this world and not look back."<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000"><span style="font-weight: bold">WHAT IF YOU DID?</span></span></span><br/><br/>Jack stopped mid-step, his muscles locked and frozen in the moment. His depleted mana suddenly began filling, his body drawing strength from some unknown<br/>source. He could feel it coursing through his veins, magic, power,<span style="font-style: italic">life</span>. He clenched his fists and let a wicked smile don over his face. It was invigorating,<br/>empowering, it was fucking<span style="font-style: italic">incandescent</span>. Power was the surest path to freedom and now<br/>Jack realized this with more mana than he had ever felt before running<br/>through his body like a river. With this power he could do<span style="font-style: italic">anything</span>. But then, something clicked. So minute, he wasn't even sure it was a sound but he felt<br/>it and then the mana, the power began rushing faster and faster.<br/><br/>It was overwhelming, like trying to hold the world on a straw, the onrushing magic was too much. His gnosis was sky-rocketing past anything he had ever<br/>experienced. The world became an insignificant play thing in a cosmos of giants, and he was an inconsequential observer. Only now, he wasn't. There was a piercing<br/>shriek, something he had heard before in his past life, a sound of pain and sorrow, a crying mother, weeping for herself and her children. The sound rose in accord<br/>with the mana, overwhelming his senses. His body couldn't contain the sheer level of mana that was being forced into it, the magical tattoos and markings on his body<br/>flared brightly and lines of mana criss-crossed his body, shining through clothing with a faint ethereal glow.<br/><br/>Long blue wisps trailed off of his body, dancing in the air before fading away.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">THERE....ALL THE POWER YOU COULD EVER NEED....USE IT....NOW...KILL THE WOMAN....DESTROY THE DEMON....JUST WILL IT AND IT WILL BE DONE<br/></span></span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">Don't forget who you are...what you stand for...Who've you fought for....who have fought for you....Don't let your inner-</span></span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">QUIET FOOL! KILLDESTROYMURDEREVISCERATEDESICRATEDECIMATERAPEKILLDEVOURCONSUMEEFFACEDESTROYKILLTHEBITCHKILLTHEWORLDKILLTHEMALLKILLTHEMALLKILLTHEMALL<br/>KILLTHEMALL</span></span><br/><br/>The screaming in his head reached a fever-pitch with the shrieking and his senses collapsed. The magic whirled around him like a hurricane. He had to do something before<br/>he burnt out from the sheer force contained within him.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">HERE....ALLOW...ME</span></span>His hand lifted of its own accord, pointing in the general direction of Shey and the Demon, his mouth forming rote he<br/>had never heard in a voice that wasn't his own.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">NOOO, YOU CAN'T! JACK, STOP, ITS NOT TOO LATE!</span></span>The mana was concentrating in his arm, he could see it now, releasing it all in one,<br/>destructive blast. They would die immediately, torn apart by the explosive release of the raw mana.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">OR...HOW ABOUT THISSS?</span></span>Jack felt himself moving, directing the deathly flow of magic towards New Hope.<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">Jack...Your stronger than this...I know you are...You just have to have faith...</span></span>Tears cascaded down his face as he struggled in vain to try<br/>to avert the death of countless innocents. The power was too much, he couldn't stop. He was too weak to save them...Just like he had been too weak to save<br/>himself...to save his unborn child...<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">It wasn't your fault...You can't keep blaming yourself Jack...Your a good man who died before his time...Your strong enough to end this... </span></span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO STOP IT? THIS WORLD HAS BROUGHT YOU NOTHING BUT GRIEF AND PAIN....RETURN IT....DESTROY IT........YOU CAN <br/>DO ANYTHING WITH THIS POWER...</span></span>Jack sagged against the wall behind him.<br/><br/>"I can't.....Its too much..." He whispered quietly under his breath. The mana swelled, his arm<br/>stood rigid, spelling the death of New Hope. With a cry of agony and<br/>despair, Jack felt the mana swelling, readying for the cataclysmic release. He saw images of mothers, fathers, children, all hiding from the chaos outside, feeling<br/>safe...he saw a man he knew meant something to him, but could not recall who it was...He<br/>screamed...The mana was spreading through his hand. Tears seeped out<br/>of his eyes.<br/><br/>"I'm so sorry...."<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">HA HA HA HA</span></span>His fingers began to crackle with murderous energy and the ominous thrumming of mana about to discharge filled the air.<br/><br/>"NOOO!!" As the deathly emerge from his outthrusted palm, Jack wrenched his shoulder skyward, the energies carving a swathe through the steel and titanium walls before<br/>increasing in strength and tearing through the ceiling, bisecting the sky, a shining beacon of destruction rushing straight upward, higher than the sky-scrapers of old,<br/>slashing at the heavens. The solid mass of mana grew in size as Jack emptied all of his abundant energies into it, feeding his pain, sorrow and rage into the blast, feeling it<br/>as it tickled the upper-layers of the atmosphere before finally stemming, slowly at first then quickly until it dissipated into nothing.<br/><br/>Jack sagged to his knees, his mind and body utterly shut down by the exertion. Jack felt himself edging towards unconsciousness but he fought it, fending off the darkness<br/>for as long as he could before he felt his body topple to the ground. As he slipped into the loving embrace of exhaustion, he thought he could almost feel...content?<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #0000FF">There is hope yet.</span></span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic"><span style="color: #BF0000">HMM...WE SHALL SEE....WE SHALL SEE...</span></span>