"I'm sorry," she said, her voice breaking as she held back tears that threatened to spill over. But David, although deeply angry with how she had kept such a huge secret from him, just reached out and held her hand tightly in his.
He had asked her parents to watch over Sarah for the night, so he stayed with Elena the whole night in that sterile hospital room… and he did the best thing he knew to deal with such overwhelming emotions and pain… he wrote music.
"Hands, put your empty hands in mine
And Scars, show me all of the scars you hide
And hey, if your wings are broken, please take mine so yours can open too
'Cause I'm gonna stand by you…"
The sound of the song went on to play in the background of the memory, showing how David was constantly with her during this time, trying his absolute best to get the money needed for her expensive treatment and condition… and all of this effort had an unexpected and wrong side effect. Elena, who had been mentally ready to die and accept her fate, found herself suddenly not wanting to leave the perfect life she had built.
She went from trying to have everything ready and organized for her death, preparing David and Sarah for life without her, to desperately wanting to hold on to the life she had with every fiber of her being.
She tried her best to spend quality time with her family, recording every last moment on camera, and making every second count like it might be her last… but the more she experienced, the more memories she made, the more she realized just how much she would be missing out on if she died now.
David, seeing this change in her and the pain it caused, hardened his heart and went on to do the last thing he ever thought he would do in his entire life… he took to the road and went somewhere. He lied to his wife about where he was going, he lied to everyone around him, and he headed directly towards Los Angeles with determination.
"D-Dad… how was Mom cured!" Sarah asked, her voice shaky and uncertain as she saw how the song that had been playing in the background was growing louder and more intense, reflecting David's eyes in the present, which were widening in horror as the suppressed memory came flooding back to him.
"Dad!" Sarah grabbed David's shoulders desperately, her voice being completely overwhelmed by the song filling the theater. His eyes were fixed on the sight before him on the screen, watching his past self pull up to a nightclub.
"I'm going to stand by you, even if we can't find heaven…" David said softly to himself, the words barely audible. After taking a deep breath to steady himself, looking at the nightclub one more time, David stepped inside the building, and went to see the devil himself.
"A soul from another world, how interesting. What can I do for you?" A handsome blonde-haired man asked while welcoming David to come sit with him at his private table.
He was truly handsome in an almost unnatural way, as if the gods themselves had taken extra time and care to ensure he was absolutely perfect in every detail. He even dressed right, wearing a clean, sharp suit that fit him perfectly.
"What?" David asked in confusion, thrown off by the comment about being from another world, to which the man who called himself the devil just laughed easily and changed the subject without explaining.
"So, what brings you here tonight? What can the devil do for you?" he asked with a charming smile, making David take a deep breath as this entire situation felt wrong on every level. He understood that he might be bringing himself serious trouble in the future, but for his wife, for his family… well, they were priceless compared to him. He would happily die a hundred times over for them.
"Can you save my wife?" David asked softly, his voice barely carrying across the table. Meanwhile, David, who was watching this memory play out, shot to his feet in the theater, a look of pure horror spreading across his face… he didn't remember this happening… but seeing this scene now, the buried memory came flooding back with terrible clarity.
"Of course I can, but everything comes at a price in this world. I can remove that illness from her body completely, and in return, you owe me a favor." Lucifer said with a scheming smile that didn't reach his cold eyes.
"How did you know about her illness… What do you want from me?" David asked, suspicion rising, to which Lucifer simply shrugged casually.
"Nothing for now, but go on and return home, your wife will be perfectly okay by morning… just remember, you must pay me back when I call. You're not allowed to die until that debt is paid. Otherwise, what's most dear to you in all the world would be taken as payment instead. Even if they have, for example, already died." At this ominous statement, Lucifer turned to look directly through the screen of the movie theater, breaking the fourth wall, and stared right at David in the present, before slowly looking behind him at Sarah standing there.
Instantly, David's entire world went blank, all sound cutting out. He had completely forgotten this deal… for his wife, he had sold his very soul to the devil himself, something that had crushed him when he returned home and found she had left behind divorce papers, ending their marriage. David felt lightheaded and unsteady; he felt like he was about to throw up.
"... I can't die." He said weakly, the realization hitting him. How could he die? He had failed her once, and now, even after death, how could he cause her more suffering by breaking the agreement?
"Nooo!" David suddenly left his mind space, his consciousness violently returning and taking control of his body in the real world. His eyes were bloodshot and wild. He ignored the blood covering his entire body and the sea of deep scars that covered him from the endless battle. In the next moment, his body exploded with an overwhelming willpower, much greater and more intense than anything he had ever shown before in any fight.
David was no longer fighting for Earth… fuck Earth and everyone on it. For his daughter? He would give it his everything, pushing beyond his limits, and go on infinitely higher without stopping.
For the person he loved most in this entire universe, what wouldn't he do? That was his baby girl, the most beautiful thing to have ever come into his life, the person who had foolishly died to save his useless life.
David's love took physical shape, fusing seamlessly with his curse energy. But it didn't stop there, the power continuing to build. Whether it was Will, Fear, Hatred, Greed, Love, Hope, and Compassion—at this moment, David had tapped into all of them simultaneously, fusing them all together to form curse energy… well, it couldn't be called curse energy anymore, for it had transformed into a pure white energy that glowed brilliantly.
David had tapped into the full emotional spectrum in its entirety. He floated there in space like a god who had descended into the mortal world to pass judgment… but his power kept skyrocketing higher and higher without stopping. His physical body broke down completely, becoming a body made of pure and raw power instead of flesh.
He reached out and grabbed Zeus, who happened to be the closest to him, and before the world's shocked eyes watching through the stream, Zeus's body was ripped apart like paper, with his inner organs spilling out into the void of space.
David grabbed Zeus's spine as it separated from the body, and as if it were a weapon or club, he disappeared in a flash, ripping through all of the assembled gods and every powerful figure present like they were nothing more than insects.
With a flash of white light, David disappeared from that space, shooting directly into the sphere of the gods where their true forms resided. The live stream tried desperately to follow him, the cameras struggling to keep up, but all they managed to capture was the sight of David looking back at the vast multiverse spread before him. With a bloodied grin on his face, he pointed back at them, at Earth and everyone watching.
"The rest is up to you!" David said with a grin, his voice carrying across space, before turning around and clashing with the true form of Darkseid in an explosion of power. The live stream went completely white from the intensity of the clash… and for the first time in weeks, the live stream, which had been running continuously for weeks without stopping, finally ended in static…