Stranger In A Strange Land [14.01]
AO3
Maybe he wasn’t as human as he thought. It feels different without his Grace. Pain is more vivid longer, sharp and burns. It’s difficult. How did Sam and Dean live through these constant echoes of thousands of emotions?
It is overwhelming.
Most of all, he feels so helpless. Dean's gone. Michael is out preparing for the next apocalypse, hurting people, in his family's body; while Jack sits in the Bunker, useless and a dead weight. Weak.
He was no better with his powers—why should this feel any different? (at least now, no one can get hurt, at least now, no one can die by his hands). Though Sam and Castiel paid more attention to him when he had his powers, now, they overlook him; don't pay as much attention. He’s nothing now, has nothing at all (and god, it hurts).
He spends his time in the gym with Bobby, training, training and training— it hurts, it’s tiring, but there’s a fire pit in his stomach that makes him rise again and again.
It’s been a week or so, and still, Jack hasn't made any progress. He can barely throw a punch. He finds stumbling under pain as he tries to push and move forward. Power does not come as easy. Castiel tells him, it’s okay, you will get better in time but— when? Time is slipping. There’s not enough of it.
Lucifer might be dead, but Michael’s still on the loose (wearing his father’s body). He was their only hope against him. In the first place, this whole problem started with him, why Dean said yes in the first place—if he only listened first and killed the devil and crushed those little curiosities in his head about Lucifer and didn’t let the situation get to this.
He’s coughing blood again, knows something is wrong; this burning pain inside of him is not going away. He feels like he's dying.
But he can’t manage to say anything.
He has to be fine (even when nothing is).
