"Before the beginning" for the writing meme :D
Thank you for the ask @argylepiratewd! It was helpful to get this scene written out for reference purposes. This part happens before the beginning of the story. I had another scene in mind, but realized it didn’t really happen prior to the start. So here’s this instead. It was a little hard to write -- poor Jack. :(
Jack was trapped in a dark place. He tried day after day to call upon his Nephilim powers to force the bars of the cage to open. But he was left frustrated and more afraid as the hours, the days went by. Lucifer, his father only in blood, had managed to beat him. Jack hated that he was confined to this place, unable to get his powers to work.
He wondered if the cage he was in was suppressing his powers as he did not have handcuffs on him. And Jack knew that those “angel cuffs” could dampen angelic powers. So it just had to be something in the Cage -- maybe the spell work nullifying his powers was on the cage’s metal bars? That had to be the most likely explanation.
Yet Jack wasn’t deterred. He had to return to his family. With Lucifer on the loose, Jack dreaded to find out what he would do. He worried especially about Sam since he had suffered great trauma thanks to Lucifer. The thought of Sam -- who was more of a father to him than Lucifer ever was -- confronting Lucifer made Jack very anxious.
As he thought of Sam facing off against Lucifer -- of Cas and Dean fighting by his side, Jack fought harder to free himself. They needed him. He focused, and demanded his powers to surface -- to overcome this obstacle. He was supposed to be more powerful than an Archangel.
He could do this. Jack would not accept defeat. Especially not now.