Chapter 3
Disclaimer: Again, I do not own Star Wars or Infamous.
Cole awoke early the next morning, but the temple was already bustling with activity. As he made his way to where the Jedi were supposed to bring him, he saw that the vehicle they would take had no wings.
"Well, considering how nothing here seems to have wings, I'll go out on a limb and say things are way more advanced than back on Earth," he thought. Touching the vehicle a Jedi had called a 'speeder', he noticed it didn't explode upon contact like the cars back on Earth did after he unwittingly activated the Ray Sphere. Pleased at this sign of progress, he climbed in and sat down in the back, facing two empty seats. A few minutes two Jedi climbed in the back across from him, one looking around twenty and the other appearing thirty or so. The driver, a mechanical humanoid another Jedi had explained as being a 'droid', soon lifted the speeder off the ground and flew off.
"So who exactly are you?" the younger Jedi said, fiddling with a strand of his ponytail. Cole noticed the elder Jedi did not have his hair that way: most likely a sign of rank.
"My name is Cole MacGrath," he said, leaning back in the ever-so-enjoyable non-exploding seat. "Who exactly are you two?"
The elder Jedi spoke up. "My name is Obi-wan Kenobi, and this here is my Padawan, Anakin Skywalker. So it would seem you have been assigned with us to guard the senator?" he asked, a bemused look etching his features.
"Yes," Cole replied, watching the skyline as speeders flew past. The younger Jedi, Anakin, looked up at his master, a hint of annoyance etching his features.
"I still don't understand why we need his help. What can he do that we can't?" The elder Jedi groaned at Skywalker's rudeness.
"You'll have to excuse my young Padawan; he's a bit brash and, well, undisciplined." Cole shrugged his shoulders at Kenobi's apology: he saw quite a bit of himself in the youth.
"Tell me, Anakin, exactly what can Jedi do?" he asked, wanting further information on the people he had been partnered with.
"Using the Force, we can move objects with our minds, enhance our reflexes to unbelievable levels, heal ourselves at an accelerated rate and read the thought of others, among other things," Anakin replied, looking somewhat smug. "What can you do?"
Cole shrugged his shoulders. "To be perfectly honest, I'm still finding that out for myself." He let the lightning in him dance across his fingertips, giving the Jedi something to stare at. "I cannot be immersed I water. So far, no fall from any height can harm me. It seems the weapons of your world, 'blasters' as I was told, do little to me, if anything. I can rapidly recover from any wound."
He looked down at his hands. "I can tell if someone is an enemy or not. I can follow the 'echoes' of someone's electronic signature. I can pull information from a source; living or mechanical, dead or alive. I can heal people almost instantaneously." He looked back up at the Jedi.
"In short, I can manipulate and generate electricity. I can call down lightning from the sky and cause a lightning-filled tornado. I can glide for short distance, electrically grind on wires and can climb nearly any surface, especially metallic in nature. I can throw electrical grenades and fire off electrical rockets: I can throw out a leash of lightning and either pull myself towards something or pull something my way. I can lift objects with my powers and throw them great distances." He leaned back, waiting for a response from the awed Jedi.
"So," Kenobi spoke up, still trying to find the right words. "Why exactly were you assigned to us?" Cole shrugged.
"I have no idea. I was told I resemble something you call a 'Sith'. Yoda told me this would be something of a test, to prove I am as good as you Jedi." Cole looked up as the speeder came to a stop.
Kenobi spoke up. "Well, it looks like we're here." As they exited the speeder, Cole couldn't help but feel a little inspired by these Jedi. Here were Conduit-like beings that formed an order to protect and serve the public: what was not to like?
"That's not a bad idea," Cole thought as he followed them into a tall building. If there was an order of Jedi, maybe there could be an order of Conduits as well...
"Not likely," he thought as they entered what appeared to be an elevator. "There probably aren't any Conduits in this galaxy."
A few hours later...
Cole had finished his sweep of the upstairs, the sheer openness of the building giving him a sense of unease. Making his way back down to where Obi-Wan and Anakin were, he reported his findings, or lack thereof, to Obi-Wan.
"Well, at least that's some good news," Kenobi said, sitting down on a chair. Cole remained sanding, pacing the room. Anakin was leaning against a wall, his expression dour and his posture tense.
"Why would they want to kill her?" he asked with a hint of anger and worry in his voice. Cole looked up from his thoughts.
"I have no idea: what are politics like these days for you people?" Kenobi shook his head.
"Massive corruption, inflated bureaucracy, and isolation from the people they represent," Kenobi said, rattling them off as he counted his fingers. "It's been that way for a very long time."
Cole shrugged his shoulders: didn't sound too much different from things back home. He kept thinking while Kenobi and Anakin got into an argument, something about a chancellor or something. If the assassin wasn't going to come from the roof or the lower levels, then just how were they going to get in?
A few minutes later, Cole felt something was wrong. Sending out a radar pulse, he saw there were two things in the senator's bedroom that didn't belong there. The Jedi must have sensed it too, for they quickly rushed into the room in front of Cole. Anakin leaped through the air and sliced the two worm-things with his a beam of light emanating from his metallic cylinder.
"Cool," Cole thought. He turned just in time to see Kenobi jump through the window and latch onto the droid that seemed to have delivered the deadly cargo. Anakin rushed past him, shouting something about 'get to the speeder'. Cole hurried off after him, giving a backwards glance at the startled senator.
Both Anakin and Cole jumped into a yellow speeder on the landing deck and zoomed off after Obi-Wan. Cole felt himself holding on more than he would have: the boy was driving like a maniac. Quite understandable; his master could fall at any moment to a very protracted but still painful death.
Zeroing in on the dangling Jedi Master, Cole saw a distant figure blast the droid into pieces, causing Kenobi to fall. Anakin dived after him in the speeder, causing Cole to flip over and tumble into the back seat. Seconds later, they caught Kenobi and continued the chase after the obvious fleeing assassin.
They were speeding by buildings so fast, Cole didn't notice the change in scenery until they flew through some smoke. Blinking his eyes free from the tears, he saw they were in an industrial sector of the city. As they flew towards two posts, the assassin leaned out the window and shot the posts, causing electricity to spark and flow between them.
Anakin just drove through them, earning an angry shout from his master about 'power couplings'. Cole, still a bit disgruntled by the fact he had nearly fallen out, barely felt himself become charged. He did notice, however, a change occur inside of him. He suddenly felt light as a feather, and he had no idea why.
Anakin turned in the wrong direction and stopped to hover over the city, looking around. "Great," Cole thought. "The kid lost that assassin." Kenobi seemed to be sharing his silent sentiment, going into a ramble of 'not thinking' and 'paying attention'. He was surprised when Anakin jumped out of the speeder and landed on the assassin's many yards below. Kenobi let out what Cole could only assume was a swear-word and took over the wheel. As they followed the speeder, a passing ship nearly collided with them, forcing Kenobi to take evasive maneuvers.
Cole had not expected this and tumbled out of the speeder, unnoticed by Kenobi. Free-falling, Cole tried his Static Thrusters again: nothing. He felt the new power struggling to escape, so he let it loose.
Suddenly, he found he had stopped falling: he seemed to be floating in mid-air. Testing an idea, he leaned forward and, to his amazement, he shot forward as if he was propelled by jets.
"Cool!" he shouted, punching his fists into the air. "Now I can finally fly!" With that, he found the disappearing speck of Kenobi's speeder and sped off, absolutely zooming through the air. Within no time, he was flying along the speeder, almost causing Kenobi to lose control of the speeder.
"How in the Force are you doing that?" he shouted. Cole just shrugged in response, too giddy with excitement to explain himself. All that time he had been jealous of Kuo and Nix and their flying abilities: well now he could do it too.
As they zeroed in on the assassin, Cole saw Anakin mess with the pilot area and soon enough, the ship started to go down. He saw the young man's shiny cylinder fly out of his hand, but Kenobi caught it from behind him in a bored manner suggesting he had done this many times before. A minute later, Cole landed next to a burning hulk of twisted metal, looking for the assassin.
Cole looked back to see Anakin and Kenobi approach him. "The assassin went into that bar," Anakin said, pointing one out. "I think it's a shape shifter."
Cole nodded. "I'll cover the back door." With that, they each rushed to their points of contact, with Cole waiting out back by a dumpster. A minute later, Kenobi and Anakin emerged with what appeared to be the assassin, with one notable difference: she was missing an arm.
"Weird," Cole thought as they interrogated her. Before she could finish, a toxic dart struck her in the neck: she died quickly. Quickly turning around, Cole saw a figure fly off into a ship and take off, quickly disappearing from view.
"Damn," he thought, "I'll never be able to catch him." He looked back at the now-dead shape shifter, an idea forming in his head. "There goes that lead: but what about her?" Leaning over the dead alien, he placed his hands on her forehead and concentrated. A blur of images and sounds entered his mind, making it difficult to find what he was looking for.
A few seconds later, he stepped back and looked at the expectant faces of the Jedi. "Well?" Kenobi asked. "What was that all about?"
"Her name was Zam Wessell. She was employed by a bounty hunter with strange looking armor. Why, I don't know," Cole explained. Anakin nodded his head.
"We'll have to report this to the council." Obi-wan nodded.
"I'll report back to them: you two get back to the senator. We have no way of knowing if they'll try to silence her again."
As they flew off for the senator's quarters, Cole couldn't help but think: "This place is getting more interesting all the time."