Jessica

Acceptance Part Five

"You think I'm a demon... you'll discover that I'm quite the opposite."

In just a few seconds everything fell from riches to rags and then it kept crashing down until their chances dug through the dirt and hit the bedrock. Kitty kept telling herself that it could have always been worse but even if the enemy wasn't what he hoped to be or the titan that they fought months ago, he was still oozing so much power that it made their heads ache.

He looked daggers at them and his heartbeat alone made them feel an unbearable pressure. While they were stuck in place staring at him, he took just one step and then he vanished into a blue and red blur.

Only a couple of them were just fast enough to see him run towards them at inhuman speeds that didn't match his size. Jessica kicked her foot on the floor on instinct and propelled herself towards Kitty, standing relatively still by her side, and managed to push her out of the way in the blink of time.

She imagined her blood covering her clothes. She didn't care about her intangibility, how much stronger she was or how many times she told her she could take care of herself. Her priority always was and will be keeping her safe.

After Jessica and the Ultimate Mutant exchanged just one casual look, he kept flying past her but enough time was given for Cloak to finally react and teleport Dagger and himself out of the way so that he would crash into a wall.

As soon as Apocalypse turned around, the room was lit up by the crimson light of his optic blast. Spider-Man promptly grabbed Bombshell and ducked, she then hit the villain with a continuous explosive wave.

While he was being locked in place by the light orange jet, as if he was stuck under a waterfall, Kitty and Jimmy looked at each other. Jimmy tilted his head towards the monster while still looking at Kitty; she pointed at him then at herself. Once Lana's attack stopped they charged at him and Jimmy unsheathed his claws.

A little blood came out of his knuckles as always but it was worth it to draw a much bigger amount out of the opponent's chest with a single swing. The girl in the white uniform promptly punched him across the face, only stunning him for a while.

They kept doing that for some time, trying their best to hurt him by either stabbing him or brute forcing their way into his skin but it was all just a mild annoyance to him. She wasn't strong enough to cause any lasting dent and the wounds made by the blond healed in no time.

The same could not be said about the absolutely disgusting mess he made out of the boy when he threw an impossibly quick punch, piercing through his guts just like butter. Kitty watched the boy she loved drop to the floor while his blood splattered on Apocalypse's disproportionate hand.

After a moment of disbelief, she screamed the way she did only a couple of times in her life and hit the monster's jaw so unexpectedly hard that it shook him.

"...you two have the power to oppose me?" he realised as Kitty kept tormenting him with a relentless barrage of fury and he tried his best to mitigate the pain. She remembered the way he once controlled her actions but she was no longer the same girl. Her willpower had grown too much the past two years to still fall under his commands.

Jess dragged Jimmy away from the fight. He may have been close to losing consciousness but he was still alive, he just needed to pick himself back together... piece by piece. He was the spitting image of his dad, after all.

Perhaps that was the reason Kitty had fallen prey to such an animalistic rage that prioritised senseless attack over strategy. Her trauma distracted her to the point that instead of making herself intangible she let him swat her away like a fly.

Dagger's projectiles bypassed Apocalypse's durability and pierced his feet to the floor, giving the two spider people on the team enough time to look away from their injured friends and trap him in a web cocoon. It didn't matter how much stronger it was than steel, he still slowly broke free, one strand at a time but in the time he needed Cloak engulfed the whole room in darkness and the team disappeared from his line of sight.

They reappeared far away from the temple but still in the middle of a desert. Kitty slowly stood back up and saw Jimmy by her side while his wound finally closed. Feeling guilty, she touched the sash on her left arm. The others were catching their breaths, in some cases hyperventilating. Miles was one of them but he still managed to ask: "Tyrone... where the hell did you take us, man...?"

"Wyoming..." he replied, stil wiping the sweat off his brow, "... remember? Plan 5."

"Damn right—!" said Jessica, "This guy wants the Ultimates... I'll give him the Ultimates...!" she said as she tinkered with the weird watch on her wrist.

Right after she said that, a cloud of golden smoke appeared not too far away from them and the creature they had left on the other side of the planet walked out of it as if they didn't move a single metre.

"I am the most powerful mutant that ever lived. You're dust in the wind." he said using his impossibly powerful voice.

"Enough gloating, fish lips. I called back up." said Jessica, causing Kitty to look at her confused.

"You, too?" she asked, instilling disbelief in the other girl's mind as they looked each other in the eyes.

Apocalypse watched patiently as the kids were joined by everyone who survived the experience, accompanied by all that deserved to be called mighty. After what felt like a lifetime, the Ultimate Universe was once again united against a common threat, ready to show off its true colours underneath its unwelcoming exterior.

Fury placed his hand on Jessica's shoulder. He and Monica were wearing S.H.I.E.L.D.'s official Hulkbuster equipment. Reassuring words came out of his lips: "Everyone's here. Everyone."

"Of course. I deserve nothing less than this whole forsaken world but don't fool yourself: even all assembled, you're not enough."

After saying that he started blinking in a curious manner and with his hand he reached for his face. In the meantime the Invisible Woman's eyes glowed with the same azure of her uniform.

"I blinded him. Get him."

"On it!" shouted Iron Man, wearing his 'Phantom' armour repainted with the Future Foundation's royal colours. As he flew towards him at Mach speeds, he charged up a fist that seemingly shined yellow and crashed straight in his chest.

A man shaped flame flew towards Jessica and through the fire she saw a smile. "I love the new look, baby!" said Johnny, just as tiresome as usual, "Now, if you'll excuse me, I want to discover this guy's melting point!"

And so the Human Torch hit him with the power of a star while thunderbolts fell out of the sky under Storm's command. She didn't utter a word, too focused on destroying the threat as soon as possible, unlike the cocky Iceman.

"You're getting Giant Sized Jumped, dude!" he yelled as he froze his head inside a solid and clear ice block.

In the meantime the most recently formed team was approached by two individuals. One was Sam Wilson and in his arms he carried one of the oldest members of the first team.

"You did good, Jess!" said Hawkeye, carrying heavy artillery on his back, "But we have to do this together, now! You kids have to follow the plan."

They looked behind them as an enormous fleet of Helicarriers was starting to gather up in the sky. After assigning the leading role of their subgroup to Jessica, Barton left with the whole of the so-called Avengers following him.

Colossus gently shoved Rogue out of the way and ran towards Apocalypse as he screamed: "Let me at him!" He threw a fist so powerful that it shattered the ice and made him lose balance. "Demon! This is what happens when you hurt my sister!"

The metal man pummelled him to the floor but he ended up making the same mistake Kitty made earlier and overlooked his guard. His enemy eventually caught his arms and reversed their positions.

Right as he was about to switch to the offensive, he felt a confusing energy blast hit him in the back. Turning around he saw Rogue, one half made of ice and the other engulfed in fire. She hit him again with a bright beam that promptly encased him in an ice cage so cold that it burned and Storm made it explode with a rain of lightning.

He obviously didn't answer too kindly to that but rather with a powerful wave that the others tried to push back with no avail. All their attempts ended with them too exhausted to stand. Sue saw the red light approaching her brother and the others and put up a shield that held the beam back while the others evacuated the area.

She held the attack back just barely enough for the others to get out of the way but the wall was starting to crack and the blood exiting her nose was the sign of the stress she was going through becoming too much. Thankfully for her she had someone strong to rely on who ran head first into the danger, as his skin made contact with that wall of energy it turned from flesh to purple energy.

Once he reached Apocalypse by the other side, he was more than ready to square up and announced his intentions with a single fantastic war cry: "It's clobberin' time!"

And clobber he did while everyone else offered artillery support, relatively weak compared to the punches Ben was landing which made his enemy flinch each time. Unlike the others he never left himself open for attacks but he still stopped inexplicably after a decisive left hook.

Apocalypse looked in the same direction the man was looking and saw that a woman engulfed in flames that he knew very well was floating behind him. Using her echoing voice, she said: "Surrender now or I'll destroy you like I did last time."

However he didn't show any sign of fear, only genuine anger. "Do you think I'm a fool?!" he screamed in her direction, extinguishing the flames and revealing the redhead beneath them, "I know you're no longer Phoenix! Your mind tricks are useless!"

Jean rolled on the floor but promptly got back up and began to stare right into the monster's eyes as her own glowed pink, she shouted: "I may not be Phoenix... But I'm still Jean Grey! Your mind... is mine!"

Her target held his head and gritted his teeth. He was so busy fighting a battle of the minds that he wasn't able to defend himself from all the varied physical attacks.

"Keep at it kids!" said Iron Man as he shot his repulsor rays from afar, "Keep him busy until Six arrives!"

The less powerful members of the shooting squad fired at the enemy under Hawkeye's command. They dealt a small amount of damage but it was damage nevertheless and in such a fight even they made a difference.

Immediately after they stopped shooting, Apocalypse was hit in the head by a massively thick stone pillar, swung around by Captain Britain. "This isn't exactly Excalibur..." he said, "...but it gets the job done!"

The Captain's attack gave Jessica's team enough of an opening to incapacitate the adversary their own way. Spider-Man and his mentor locked his giant feet to the ground with their webs and Cloak held his arms above his head with the extensions of his cape.

With him wide open, everyone got to take a hit on him in progressively more brutal ways, starting with Kitty's immensely dense punches and ending with the deep cuts caused by James' blades. While Lana was subjecting the captive monster to several explosions, Tandy climbed on his back to reach his head and stick her daggers into his eyes.

Every one of those attacks caused him unimaginable pain and the fight on both the astral and physical plane was hard fought but he was slowly and surely healing while Jean instead started giving in to exhaustion. If they kept at it any longer, he would have evolved again to overpower them while Jean would fall on the floor devoid of any energy.

But something entered the atmosphere from outer space and finally they could let go. Not only they could, they had to. Because Iron Man Six's artillery made no distinction between friend and foe.

As everyone ran away under Stark's orders, Apocalypse looked up into Six's single red eye. Out of that same giant eye, the satellite shot out a continuous beam of colourful fire that completely engulfed its target until he was no longer visible.

The red light got so bright that, with Iron Man's exception, everyone had to look away. The proton cannon fired relentlessly for around a minute and destroyed all the earth beneath it until a huge crater remained.

After such a long time of unbearable noise and strong winds, silence ensued and everyone stood up. Jess looked around the field, looking for the others but right after she started admiring Kitty she heard a sharp beep immediately followed up by an explosion. Six had been pierced by a sudden little beam and fell to pieces as if it were nothing.

Apocalypse walked out of the crater, beaten up but he promptly regained his posture and his body turned back to the way it was. The same couldn't be said about his mind. He was so enraged by this affront to his life that he gave into a primal roar that cursed the souls of all that could hear it. With a burst of energy he caused what could only be described as an earthquake to the most extreme potential and a rise in pressure that knocked out the ones in the surrounding area.

Most of them, anyway. Some barely managed to stay conscious, though walking on a fine line. Of all the ones that could still open their eyes, the living calamity walked towards Jessica Drew. He looked at her intrigued while she struggled to get back up. Once she saw him staring, she wondered why it had to be her.

She had a good thing going on. She had planned for all this to be simple and straight to the point. Not this, whatever this was. How could she have been prepared for this?

"I told you, you're dust in the wind. There was no hope of you ever beating me." he said, holding his hands together.

She didn't answer him, she just thought about the past few months, all the things she accomplished and the friends she gained. The experiences that Peter never made. She thought that was good enough. Could the others forgive her for not being able to surpass this wall, knowing she already did the impossible? She may have lost but at least when she did, she was Jessica Drew.

"Do you know what I see when I look at this world? An empty shell of a planet devoid of true wonder and gods. In another world, Celestials could have watched over Earth and made sure that it went the right direction. But they never came here... they left this Earth alone, to humans' devices and this is what we end up with.

Broken people, heroes turning evil and those that remain are anything but mighty. I can fix this, child. I can be this world's saviour, make it right this time and turn it into what it was supposed to be. Simple, streamlined and welcoming...

You must understand, there's no place for you in this world. Certainly not in the state that you are now... to put it bluntly, you're too bizarre... you may be part of the new world but only in name.

I have to kill you... I'm just their avatar... but killing isn't enough. The dead become legends, they write and dream about them. They're never forgotten. I must delete any trace of you. No one will remember your Ultimates."

He seemed almost regretful while saying this. She wasn't quite sure if it was genuine or if it was a facade. She only knew that what he described deeply frightened her. Not just dying but being entirely deleted and forgotten, never to be mentioned again... it seemed that this would have been her fate.