Jae didn't know how long he had been lying in his cell. The light never changed, and he was strapped down so he couldn't even walk around. All he could do was stare at the same panel over his head the entire time. He had been dumped there as soon as he reached the factory. The pain from the explosion had slowly been receding, but as he felt better he got angrier and angrier. He was angry at so much. He was angry at Jak for giving him the mission, he was angry at the KG kill-bots for finding him first, and he was angry at the Azure Guards for not finding him first. Jae didn't know where all of his anger was coming from. He rarely got angry, or felt any emotion other than determination to finish his mission. He knew he should only be angry at the kill-bots, but he couldn't calm down. His anger seemed to come from an outside source, one he could not identify. Most of his pain had vanished, but he didn't know if it was because he was getting better, or if he was just so mad that he couldn't feel it any more. He was almost at his breaking point when the door opened and a monster stepped into his field of sight.
Jae had never seen him up close while the monster was alive, but he had been present the night it had died. He had watched as it had been beaten by Jak in a hover race, and then it rammed into a delivery of Eco. Jae had also been at the Naughty Ottsle when it had made its first communication since that night. But now, despite everything that had happened to it, there it stood with its horrible mix of pale, human skin and its bright, reflective metal. The enigmatic leader of the KG kill-bots was the famous racer Errol.
"Hello, Jae." Errol's voice was extremely distorted, more like the robot he was than the human he had been. "I hope you are well rested. You will need to be to start paying for that convoy you blew up." Two ball bots rolled into Jae's cell and started unstrapping him. One freed his right hand and painfully jerked his arm up. Jae's rage exploded out, and it changed him.
He yanked his arm down, then struck the kill-bot at the neck joint. That ripped its head off and into the air. He also ripped the strap of his left arm, grabbed the other kill-bot, and tossed it at the other one. He ripped the remaining straps off, and launched himself at Errol. Jae rammed into an Eco barrier that separated them. Jae pounded his fist into the shield, but it just bounced his fist back. He punched it again, and again, and again, all to no effect. Jae roared at the barrier, and turned to vent his rage at the kill-bots that were in his range, but something made him pause. The head he had knocked off was almost to the floor, and the two kill-bots had just collided, and were just hitting the wall of the cell. Sparks that were trailing from the severed head seemed to be moving in slow-motion. Jae turned back around and saw to his amazement that ripples were just starting to spread out from where he had punched the barrier. As he watched, the ripples slowly spread from the center. Since his anger was receding, Jae was able think better. He realized that either everything was moving extremely slowly, or he was moving extremely fast.
