I do not own Prototype or Infamous.

Things still not quite moving along this chapter but it's getting there. Things will speed up after Alex talks to Cole.


Light in the Dark

Making it to the Neon was easy, I'd done it several times already after all. I was a bit irritated to find that Cole may well have been little more than a quick jump or so away from me each time I'd entered the district directly from the Historic side. The building where he shared an apartment with Zeke was basically right next to the bridge as far as I was concerned.

I checked there first and found no one. It looked like they'd left maybe half an hour earlier at most. I picked up two distinct scents on the roof and followed them as best I could, given the condition of the city and how much trash and rot was piling up I was surprised I could find a viable trail at all.

Found myself at Archer Square, site of a recent supply drop at the time. Didn't have a picture or anything and I wasn't about to start asking if anyone had seen "The Terrorist". When I paused to examine a few unconscious Reapers who'd been left lying on the sidewalk a man, carrying an armload of canned food, noticed and shook his head.

"Strangest thing I ever saw, I swear." He said.

"They were electrocuted. Mild shock at worst and a few first degree burns. A little blunt force trauma but other than that no other injuries. What's so strange about that?" I asked. After all, they could have just been hit with a taser several times and beaten a little.

"Yeah, they were electrocuted. You'll never believe how though." He paused and I raised an eyebrow. "You seen the TV broadcast, that Voice of Survival guy? The terrorist that blew up the Historic District was here. He took the Reapers down and I'm serious here, he was throwing lighting right outta his hands like some kinda comic book character or something."

That got my attention in a big way. Given what I'd learned from the First Sons about Conduits it sounded to me like Cole was one. I asked the man if he'd seen which way Cole went and he pointed me in the general direction of Stampton Bridge, I figured Cole was likely trying to get out of the city.

I ran as fast as I could as soon as that thought occurred to me, cloaking mid-step. Cole was my best bet at the time of finding a good lead on what was going on, short of hunting down Kessler himself. I'd seen the barricades that had been set up on the bridge, about halfway across they'd set up a solid wall of reinforced steel and heavy machine gun mounts; a Hunter would have been torn apart by the virtual wall of bullets those guns could throw out per second.

When I got there things had already started dying down. I stayed cloaked and moved closer to investigate. Swat officers unconscious or groaning on the ground with signs of electrical damage confirmed that, if what I'd heard in Archer Square was true, Cole had been through there.

I got as close as I felt I could risk and surveyed the area. They'd killed dozens of civilians. I could understand the quarantine if there was a biological threat, even if I wouldn't be happy about it, but I knew for a fact that the plague wasn't something that could be contained like this.

I wanted to tear the wall down and throw it all into the river. Instead I examined the bodies scattered about. I didn't see Cole, or anyone matching Amy's descriptions of Trish or Zeke, which was a bit of a relief. I figured that if they'd been there they had managed to escape back into the city. So I headed back too.

Spent an hour wandering around listening for any rumors of a man shooting lightning out of his hands. Plenty of those but most were just gossip about what had happened in Archer Square. Eventually I heard people saying they'd seen him climbing buildings and jumping from one rooftop to another or running along power lines.

I searched areas people claimed to have seen him and found signs he'd been there, electrocuted Reapers came in quite handy as a marker of Cole's passage. Still took far longer than it should have to actually find him though.

My own fault, I was trying to corroborate Amy's assessment of his character from what other people had seen him do, unfortunately few stories matched up beyond the agreement that he could shoot lightning out of his hands. The tv jacker even reported on it, which immediately made me suspicious of him when put together with other bits of information he seemed to have.

While I was questioning a man who claimed Cole had saved him from a mugging attempt the power went out. The whole district went dark, given the heavily overcast sky most humans would have had trouble really seeing without the lights of the city to help them. I abandoned the discussion I was in and jumped to the rooftops.

Scanning the skyline of New York would have been difficult, but Empire was much smaller and had fewer exceptionally tall buildings. I made two more high jumps before I caught a flash of light at ground level. On the way I found over a dozen incapacitated Reapers. At the end of the trail I found a wrecked power station.

Cole's scent, mostly ozone really, was mixed in with the Reapers smell of drugs, blood and tar. I followed it easy enough and it lead me to a manhole into the sewer. I cloaked and went down to investigate. Nearly ran into Cole on his way out. I decided against actually meeting him just then and followed him back to the surface.

A substantial portion of the district had power back, not all of it but it was probably better than nothing. Cole got a call after that, Moya. I listened in and she sent him to meet an EMT in the area who needed help. I watched Cole fight the Reapers to restore the clinic, then I watched him heal several people injured during the fight. Wasn't sure then how he did that but it was interesting.

I followed him after that to see if I could get an idea what sort of person he was. Not that I didn't think Amy knew what she was talking about, she seemed pretty certain Cole was a good person. But giving a human power like mine, or Cole's, I figured would change them. I wanted to know if his powers were changing him, and if it was for better or worse.

Cole did a good job of proving Amy right as he made his way back to him and Zeke's place. He stopped to heal people a dozen times along the way and didn't even stay long enough for them to really thank him. He ambushed Reapers and freed prisoners. Stopped muggings, even took the time to disable monitoring equipment Reapers had installed on an apartment building.

I clung to the wall, invisible, and listened to him and Zeke chat about the situation, and a dozen less important things. I learned Zeke was a paranoid conspiracy theorist, and that Moya was FBI and an agent for DARPA. They knew about the Ray Sphere and Moya wanted Cole to get it for her, and extract her supposed husband John.

That set off warning bells for me, I almost interrupted them but Cole seemed to believe Moya was using his phone to listen in on him whenever she felt like it. Revealing my presence then, even if I didn't tell them I was Blacklight, felt like it would be just asking for it to get back to Blackwatch.

I went over everything I knew, wandering the streets for a while and eliminating a small group of Reapers. I came to the conclusion that the agent I'd seen tailing Cole the day of the blast was John. I couldn't be sure then but I doubted he was any relation to Moya. And given what the Ray Sphere could do I was inclined to agree with Zeke, to a point.

I had no intention of letting the government get the Ray Sphere, no matter what Cole might want. The possibility of it finding it's way into Blackwatch hands made me shudder. Since I didn't have enough information to really form any sort of plan I decided to keep trailing Cole, hoping to pick up more details before contacting him.


Since I forgot to do this at the end of the Prologue, I will be noting new powers Alex gains, Conduit and otherwise. I will also note new powers Cole gains/develops due to Alex's presence but I will not bother noting his canon powers as he picks them up.

Alex: Conduit Powers

Cloaking: Optical Camouflage. Hides from human sight and Cole's Radar Pulse.