It was all a case of being in the wrong place at the right time, and in the end, Lucy supposed it had saved her life. She remembered the first time she'd seen the young man with the bright green hair, on a windy but sunny day, though she hadn't realised the significance of either the bridge or the man then, and she didn't think he'd noticed her either. She'd kept her head low as he passed the opposite way so he wouldn't think she was staring, but plenty of others were. A young man carrying a rifle who wasn't wearing the red or yellow uniform of the Krimson Guard was a rare occurrence. Was it even legal at all?
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Jak had noticed the first time, only because she looked like she was trying not to stare too much. As he'd passed he'd secretly turned back to look, partly out of natural male curiosity. She was a fairly attractive young woman with red hair, but her green skirt, white long-sleeved top and brown bodice were pretty ordinary, and besides the day was bright and he was on his way for a picnic in the gardens with Keira so he didn't remember he'd seen her until much later, when he saw her again.
When he did see her again, it was in most unusual and disturbing circumstances, though she was on that same bridge over the water in the port of Haven City. The sky was dark, raging with one of the worst storms Haven had ever seen, and Jak was in a bit of trouble with the law. He had come out as far as this to try and escape their attentions, figuring no foot soldier would chase him out over the islands in the driving rain with near zero visibility, and any traffic from the water would be turned back by the churning sea beneath the bridge.
The citizens of Haven weren't stupid either- there were nearly none of them out walking around here in this foul weather. Apart from one.
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Lucy stood at the edge of the highest point of the bridge, all her confidence for what she'd planned to do lost, now she gazed down into the raging waters. In the rain she looked like a drowned rat, her clothes plastered to her and her hair whipping wildly in the same wind that was trying to sweep her off her feet. Lucy shivered, frozen and numb, but she couldn't take her eyes off the water. It seemed to invite her. Jump, you know you want to, a small voice in her head said. You've got nothing to lose. A conflicting voice chimed in, telling her to wait, don't do it. It sounded different somehow, more like it was howled over the wind instead of coming from inside her head. It confused her. She turned around to make sure she wasn't going mad, and that's when she saw the green-haired man with the rifle again. He was advancing slowly up the ramp to her, what was he doing out here?
She got her answer when she saw a Krimson Guard sneak up behind him, then before she could shout back, slam the trigger on his own gun and surround the man with deadly tendrils of electricity. In her haste to throw herself from the bridge she hadn't even heard the alarms ringing across the city, and now she wasn't sure she wanted to throw herself off or find out what happened.
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Jak swore as he went down on one knee. He'd been so concerned with what the woman was doing, he hadn't even seen the KG. The shock if the shot tingled through his body, making him good and mad. From his position he lashed out and heard a grunt from the guard who'd shocked him. Fighting an urge from his muscles to simply lay prone on the floor and allow himself to be arrested, Jak struggled to his feet to face his attacker, another faceless KG in red. He took out the scattergun and blasted it, knocking the KG unconscious as it threw him backwards. Jak quickly scanned the area and was dismayed to see more closing in, too close for him to consider running.
As every nerve in his body twitched, trying to recover from the electricity, he looked around for the woman, who was alternating between looking back and considering the dark waters below. Jak didn't have time to go to her though, instead switching to hand-to-hand combat to knock down the next lot of KG that were on his ass. He parried every blow until an elite unit arrived in a Hellcat and all hell really did break loose. Jak tried to run, to gain some cover behind the tower on the island, but one of the elite guards got close enough to shock him again with one of their guns, and this sent Jak over the edge.
He felt the familiar creeping of the dark eco and went cold with dread, but he was too far along now to stop the transformation, no matter how hard he fought it. He dropped the scattergun and fell to the floor again, clutching the earth as if he might fall off it, and risked another look up at the woman, wishing he could gain control of his tongue and shout for her to run.
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Lucy watched in horror as strands of purple electricity this time started to fly around the man, almost as if it were coming from him instead of the guns. She was transfixed with his face, which took on a weathered look and his eyes flickered with something dangerous. She realised in horror that the electricity was coming from him, and it was changing him physically into something grotesque, angry and almost certainly deadly.
His hair was white by now and he slammed a clawed fist into the ground. Oh Gods, Lucy thought. I wish I'd stayed away from here today. Now I really am going to die.
The man, or now monster just a little way from her shook his body side to side, almost as if something inside him was trying to fight the transformation. As the man leaped up into the air, she automatically took a step back to get away and teetered on the edge of the bridge, letting out a small scream as she wobbled. As the man landed hard into the ground, a wave of the purple stuff shot out in a circle from his body, vaporising the guards closest to him and throwing the others back. Lucy could back up no more, there was no ground to give, and suddenly there was only fresh air beneath her feet, and she was falling backwards, not knowing if the screams she heard were her own or just in her head as she blacked out .
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