*BOOM*

*BOOM*

*BOOM*

David and the other Jumpers were blasted away when a grenade was suddenly tossed in the midst of their abrupt gathering.

The grenade had jamming properties that scrambled spatial coordinates to stop Jumpers from Jumping.

The blue energy of the grenade shocked the Jumpers, luckily, David had trained his fellow Jumpers to resist the effects by anchoring themselves somewhere else.

Oftentimes, David had his Jumpers anchor themselves to their wives or children to steady their minds, and by extension their abilities.

By now, many of the children and women were already in the bunkers below.

Should the city fall, the generators within the bunkers would Jump all families halfway across the Herme's Dimension.

Nobody knew how far that was since David was the only person to actually witness the location, and he never leaked any information to anyone.

David quickly fought the effects of the grenade blast, grabbed two nearby Jumpers (one of which was Jan), and Jumped them to a nearby roof.

Jan could not be allowed to die before preparations were made to deal with the Artificial Black Hole growing within the city.

Once there, David watched as Jumpers, along with soldiers started appearing on the streets of the city.

This was an all-out assault… a final battle…

It would have been hard to tell friend from foe had David not personally known all his fighters - humans and Jumpers alike.

Still, there were probably new Jumpers who just came to help out and would end up as casualties of the conflict.

"I guess a decision has to be made," David said, Jan only nodding slightly behind him.

"Them or us, huh?" David asked, not expecting a reply since he already made up his mind "I choose them,"

The words barely made it past his lips since he desperately tried to bite his own tongue, but Jan heard it and Jumped away to make the necessary preparations for what was to come.

With that said, David Jumped to the armory of the palace.

The armory was filled with guns, grenades, Pulse Cannons, ion-shifters, and whatever else had been scavenged from this Dimension.

David picked up the Energy Sword on his right and nodded his head as if reaffirming his resolve.

David placed his hands on the wall of the armory and Jumped outside the flickering blue barrier. There, he saw dozens of soldiers blasting the barrier with all kinds of weapons and machinery.

JUMP!

David Jumped once more, this time bringing the armory directly in front of the blasting weapons, and Jumped back into the city.

*BBBBOOOOOOOOMMMM*

Everybody felt a shockwave wash over their bodies as the blue barrier protecting Traveller's City finally collapsed.

The Ion-Shifters did their jobs because soon Jumpers started showing up inside the City with heads or arms missing.

The Ion-Shifter scrambled spatial coordinates so anyone attempting to Jump into the city would materialize with missing limbs or organs.

JUMP!

David appeared next to an invading soldier, his energy sword beheading the soldier who had no idea what was happening.

JUMP!

David appeared above the head of an unsuspecting Jumper, stabbing his sword downwards through the brain of the Jumper and directly into his throat.

Jump!

David swung his sword over his shoulder, the Jumper's body still attached to his weapon. Luckily, the Jumper's body shielded David from the many bullets shot in his direction.

Jump!

David appeared between two buildings with his sword in the motion of an early swing, already penetrating the neck of an unsuspecting human soldier.

Jump!

David Jumped and appeared Mid-swing with his sword already penetrating the neck of another human soldier.

Jump!

With a final Jump, David appeared late-swing with his sword piercing the neck of the third human soldier.

Jump!

With one swing of his energy sword, David had beheaded three different human soldiers but such a technique was the limit his physical body could perform.

David rolled onto the roof of a building with his body soaked in sweat that was quickly evaporating.

He began breathing exercises to calm his rapidly beating heart. Jumping so heavily could kill Jumpers within the Herme's Dimension since the dimension had its own rules.

Jumping was not as unlimited as it was on Earth, the spatial Laws of the Herme's Dimension was much stronger.

Jump!

David instantly Jumped away from the roof, a faint line of blood appearing on his cheek.

Someone had come close to catching him off-guard, a dagger was mere millimeters away from slicing through his jaw.

David reappeared on the neighboring roof, and he knew his attacker would not be far behind.

David slapped both his hands onto the roof of the building he was currently on, and gritted his teeth and his eyes turned bloodshot.

Jump!

The entire stone roof disappeared the moment another Jumper was attempting to land on the roof.

David and the roof appeared above the Jumper, and what followed was the sound of squashed flesh and David Jumping away to avoid the collapse of the entire building.

David rolled onto the street amidst the raging battle, and what he saw tore away at his remaining humanity.

Jumpers and humans killing each other, smiling while plunging daggers into the hearts of their fellow brethren.

A child, possibly one who had slid through the cracks, was bawling her eyes out as two men were holding her down, moments away from either killing her or doing something worse.

Watching the scene in front of him, David had a thought, a random thought that sounded like something Zeel would say.

'Did humanity deserve to survive?' David thought, his eyes flashing for a moment before regaining their clarity.

After his eyes regained clarity, David gazed upon the battle once more and saw something completely different.

He saw the desperation on the faces of the fighting men, and fear on the faces of all Jumpers. They were not fighting for joy; they were fighting because they had no choice.

Who didn't have families they wanted to protect? Who didn't have a story hidden behind the pain in their eyes?

There were no cruel men in the battle David was witnessing, there were only men who had no choice.

It was crazy what a mere shift of perspective could reveal to a darkened mind.

David placed both his hands on the ground and closed his eyes in focus. Three Jumpers appeared next to David's body as guards to hinder any attempt to disrupt him.

"[Jumping Touch]!" David yelled, chunks of the Earth disappearing from the ground and reappearing hundreds of feet above the city.

This was David's only technique that allowed him to send objects to certain locations in space without having to physically Jump there himself.

Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump!...

David didn't know how many times he Jumped, but somehow he managed to Jump 30+ of his remaining allies (including the child) to the palace before rubble started falling from the skies like meteorites.

"AAARRRRGGGGHHHHHH!!!!" David yelled, finally feeling the effects of conducting so many Jumps in close succession.

He collapsed onto the cold, glistening, floor of the palace. Everyone surrounding him with tears in their eyes.

They had seen the effects of stressful Jumping and knew that David would probably not survive the side-effects.

Green veins bulged to the surface of David's skin, blood spouting like endless rivers from his orifices, and the cracking of bones that had been strained from too many Jumps without proper dispersal of the momentum.

David's vision went red from the capillaries in his eyes bursting, but he still didn't regret his actions one bit.

Opening the Herme's Dimension to everyone was the right choice, fighting to keep humans within the Herme's Dimension was also the right choice.

The right choices were always the hardest to make and he needed to be a man his daughter could respect even to his last breath.

"I… have been… a good… father!" David said strongly through his bloodied coughs like there was nothing more worthy in the world than being a good father.

Millie Jumped next to David at that instant.

"Good fathers don't die!" Millie yelled, holding some sort of tech in her hands.

Millie quickly strapped the contraption to David's chest and color slowly returned to his face, veins receded into his skin, and bones stopped creaking under the pressure of undispersed momentum.

Within a couple of minutes, David was once again on his feet, staring at the contraption Millie had attached to his chest.

"Isolation Module?" David asked surprised.

Isolation Modules were built by Zeel so Jumpers could disperse their momentum while fighting, but the modules could not be replicated.

"I kept one for a rainy day," Millie admitted, not averting her eyes from David's.

The Isolation Module could have probably saved a lot of Jumpers over the years, but Millie only had one husband and she couldn't risk it being broken like the others when her husband needed it most.

"Millicent?" David asked, not minding the secrets he knew his wife kept.

After all, it was his righteousness that made it difficult for his wife to share the darker sides of herself.

"Sleeping," Millie replied, placing her forehead against David's own as tears trickled down her face.

There was no need for words, the tears already telling David that Millie was just as prepared as he was to fight for their home.

Had it been the past, he would have insisted she be a mother first and wife second, but he had come to acknowledge that she was both, and a strong woman should never be limited by her own husband.

Jan appeared next to David holding a small box in her hand.

"The Artificial Black Hole is expanding at a faster rate," she whispered reluctantly.

"How long?" David asked, rising to his feet with Millie in his arms.

"Now!" Jan replied with a loud voice causing all the remaining fighters to stand to their feet once more.

Jump!

The next moment everyone was gone from the palace, reappearing as a circle around the black sphere that had grown increasingly larger.

Their hands joined as their bodies started to overlap, all the momentum centering around David's and Millie's bodies.

The air shook, the ground quaked, and reality warped under the pressure of the combined Jumpers attempting to transport an Artificial Black Hole.

Within the blink of an eye, David and all the other Jumpers disappeared from Traveller's City.