Of Lightning, Flesh, and Swords

Chapter 13

The Holy City of Rabona Arc part 8

Disclaimer: I don't own inFamous, Prototype, and Claymore

FINALLY Apoclyptian Scribe

Sheesh where have you been

A/N: Sorry for taking so long to update

But basically I was trying to write out a new story called What the Sith! It's a self-insert story that's set in the SWTOR universe and the story seems to be turning out well. Please help support it :D

BTW: I also closed down the Zerglings Come in Pairs story because, well, it was an impossible sceneario to write. Though I am planning something else and you can actually see the cover page I'm drawing up for the story on my deviant art. Check out the link in my profile.

As for this story. I was kinda sad that you guys didn't really try to guess what would happen with the "Test".

Oh well. Let's get it started

Several tense hours passed as the Cole and Alex managed to get her up into Father Vincent's study. The priest and Alex both managed to bandage the Claymore's wounds while Cole paced outside the study with Denra. Denra watched the Conduit's expression as uneasiness swept over the man's face. This worried the little priest.

"Mr. Cole?" Denra questioned. Cole flinched and looked back at Denra as though he had been in a trance.

"Uh, yea . . . Denra?"

He looked at Cole worried, "Are you ok? What happened in the Cathedral?"

Cole shook his head and gave a yawn, "*Ahhhh* It's nothing Denra. Just . . . go t*ahhhhhhh* sleep,"

"Um, I just woke up. It's five in the morning."

"Oh, . . . ok." Cole said as he looked off in the distance. His mind was anywhere but there. Thoughts flowed through his head in a flood of madness. The appearance of the Vermaak 88 ice head had been crazy enough, but for the operative to be the beast . . .

'No,' he thought, 'John White's supposed to be dead. Every conduit on Earth was supposed to die. Kuo, Nix, and I felt it—'

He stopped. The RFI was supposed to kill him, but it didn't so . . . it could work?

'Wait,' Cole thought as he stopped himself, 'Alex didn't get transported by the RFI . . . No. It still doesn't mean anything. For all I know, Kuo could still be alive.'

But some things didn't add up. Why had John gone through the trouble to contact him? How did John get Vermaak 88 on his side? What did he mean by "his world?" Why did he need to test him? How was the Beast a part of Vermaak 88?

Nothing made sense and there were far too many variables.

I'm the secret that you want Cole Macgrath

He shuddered. What did the Beast even mean by that?

'Fuck, so much shit to think about,' he thought as he violently scratched his head. He kind of missed New Marais, heck, even Empire City at this point. At least back then, there was always something to keep his mind off of the confusing crap that had been going on. Hero business always helped did help him feel better. . . and then he started to get back to Trish.

'Don't blame myself,' he pondered scoffing, "Sorry Trish, maybe you didn't see the real me."

"Trish didn't see what?"

Cole stepped back from the Virus, not realizing what he had inadvertently said out loud. "Crap, sorry. I'm just . . . just a bit down."

Alex shook his head, "Well stop that crap, you're the damn hero out of the both of us. I'm the only one allowed to sulk around here."

He nodded, "Yea, yea, I know." Alex frowned. Cole wasn't fighting back at all.

"Look," Alex firmly stated, "if you're gonna sulk do it later, we got a test to take."

Cole gave another little nod and headed inside the study. Alex looked at the Conduit in disbelief, stunned that the once lively and ass-kicking Cole had fallen to such a state.

'But then again, the bigger they are the harder they fall.'

Alex didn't know what to do. He could talk to Cole and try to help get him out of his rut, but Alex wasn't that type of guy. The virus gritted his teeth, cursing whatever gods that were watching him. These reversed roles were going to get the best of him.

'Fuck it,' Alex finally conceded, 'I'm no good at this crap,'

As they walked in, the old bald priest Father Vincent turned showing his worn down eyes. When Father Vincent looked at the two men, he noticed Cole's tired expression. While Alex's biology eliminated his need for sleep, Cole worked a little differently. Cole's powers usually put a lot of stress on the already volatile physical make-up and sleeping would help heal over the damage. Cole had not been sleeping for a while and even Father Vincent had been sleeping before he treated Claire.

"Um, Cole was it?" Father Vincent asked, the conduit looked back with the contemplation.

"Hmm?"

"Yes, um do you require sleep?"

"He shook his head, no . . . no need, *Yawwwn* I'm good."

Alex moved in stopping the priest, "Just let him go, besides we gotta a city to save."

"Y-yes," the Father said, "I guess so,"

"Alright, first order of business," Cole grunted out, "we gotta get everyone outta the city."

"and how are we gonna do that," said Alex as Cole turned to Father Vincent.

"Well . . . I'm just hoping that Father Vincent could get us to . . *yaaaawn* t-the . . guys in the top you know."

"Um . . . yes," The Father said as he moved his gaze away from the drowsy conduit "I think he speaks of the church heads. They have general control of the city."

Alex nodded, "K' you think you can get . . . me," he started to whisper as he noticed Cole started to doze, "a meeting with them?"

"Yes," he whispered in response, "but we will wait till after the morning service. That is when the clergy gathers into the meeting room."

"Good, then let's get to it," Alex said as the two left the room. Off in the corner, Cole had dozed off with a blanket, courtesy from Denra.

After a number of hours later, the clergy finished their morning service and proceeded into the meeting room. The halls of stone seemed exceptionally chilly that morning as they moved through, but it was mostly negligible compared to the real problem that had been haunting the priests. The previous night's guards had all been taken out by two men. The first was described to have frozen a multitude of men and shot out strange lights from his hands. The second man completely over powered the guards with super human strength.

"First mysterious deaths and now witches," said one Father Pario, "What is our holy city coming to now,"

Father Serene, an older bald priest, looked at Father Pario with skepticism. "Perhaps, they have stretched their accounts."

"From what my friend? I can't see anyone being able to stretch freezing people in place as well as strange lights. Its witchcraft I tell you."

"Calm down Father Pario," said a firm voice. The two men turned to face another priest, this one older than the both of them.

"Ah, Father Rodo," the bald priest exclaimed.

"Fathere Serene, Father Pario." He replied, "So you've heard of the rumors?"

The two men looked at each other, "Yes?" Father Pario said suspiciously.

"Keep them in mind when we go into our meeting."

The two nodded as they when through the final corridor that led to the room. Once inside the priests found themselves surrounded on all sides by guards. The sight was a bit nerve wracking but understandable.

"This must be because of last night's incident," Father Serene commented.

"I still don't see how this would help though. Didn't they say that two of them took out almost thirty of them?"

Father Serene shrugged, "I suppose it's just in case."

Quickly the two made it toward the large table and thus they sat. The table was a large, intricately designed wooden piece of furniture that extended out to accommodate the rest of the priests. As soon as they sat the other priests followed as well with the head Bishop of the church situated on the end of the seats.

The room was quiet for a second as Bishop Kamuri led them into prayer to unease the many men. Then, their meeting began.

"My brothers, we come together in a time of great confusion and sadness. Last night, one of our sisters died within our very halls yet again."

The other priests whispered to each other, many speaking of the two strangers that made themselves known, "Yes, we have all heard the rumors of the two men and I am somewhat alarmed to say that these rumors are, in fact, true."

More whispers echoed through the room as the old bishop struggled to keep the priests quiet, "There is no need to be alarmed. We are now taking the precau—"

Just then a loud *thud* rumbled through the hall as shouting came from the other room.

"STOP, What are you do— Ahhgg"

"Hold, yield, anyone Stop hi— Rawaaa"

With another crash the priests all stood to face the man at the door. The hood obscured his eyes from priests but they could already tell he had the look of a predator.

"Hello," Alex said with a smirk

"Y-y-yoma!" said one priest freaking the others out of their stupor and their seats.

"Um, no" but before he could explain further, the ten guards in the room lashed out with their spears impaling him. To their shock, the man just gave an annoyed look and moved forward into the shaft of the spear.

"Move or I'll stab in the face . . . now."

The men backed off, trying to avoid the now full-of-spears human weapon. The clergy shook in fear as the virus walked up to the old priests and rolled his eyes.

"Now then, we got some business to take care of here."

"Business?" said another priest,

The virus smirked, "Yea, I got something I gotta do for a friend. Hey Father Vincent, you can vouch for me."

The others turned to the old man, "You've consorted with this monster!"

"Brothers, listen," he said as he tried to calm the clergy, "I originally . . . gained their help along with the help of a Claymore to get rid of the suspected Yoma that had been attacking our church members, but the situation has become far worse than what we have thought."

The other members whispered, wondering what he was talking about. Many spoke of how he had consorted with witches, but one voice stood out, out of all of them

"Father Vincent," said the Bishop. The men stared at the old wizened bishop and even forced Alex to focus on him, "I have watched you ever since you started to work together with our brothers and sisters in these holy halls. Do you believe that we are in danger, that we do require the aid of this man?"

He nodded, "Yes, and from their accounts as well as the wounds that the Claymore sustained, the entire city may be in danger."

The priest stroke his beard and gave a faint smile, "Then we shall let this being in front of us speak"

Alex looked at the bishop impressed, "Well damn, I thought this would have been a bit harder than this." He shrugged, "Ah well, let's get to it."

Alex moved himself closer to table as the clergy found their seats again. The virus moved around the table as if he stalked his prey and his voice startled some of the members as he began, "About twelve hours ago, I and my two other associates had attempted to get into the church to search for the suspected Yoma. What we instead found . . . was something else."

He paused, letting the information sink in, "What we found was a soldier from faction known as Vermaak 88 and they apparently planned on my appearance in the city as well as my friend's. He deliberately set up a scenario that imitated a Yoma attack in this city to draw us out."

"But why would he do that?" said the Father Serene clearly intrigued.

"He wanted to give us a test or something. I don't know what's his problem and his deal with Cole, but, in all seriousness, he basically told us that if we failed or didn't do the test, our test would kill everyone in the city."

The words chilled them to the bone and only the Bishop could hope to speak up, "So what do you suggest we do then?"

Alex shrugged, "Well, we both thought at first the best thing would be to evacuate the city, but that would take way too much time and resources. Not to mention the fact that there could be Yoma traveling around your city in search of prey. What I thought up of, was a bit more reasonable. I need you guys to do a total city wide lockdown and have EVERYONE stay inside a building."

The clergy murmured in agreement, a lockdown was quite easy anyways. "Yes, if also said that the Yoma were going to commence in a large scale assault that could easily drive people inside."

"So are we good then?"

"Perhaps," the bishop said he thought to himself, "what happened to your friend then and the Claymore,"

"The Claymore is currently recovering from her wounds and Cole is sleeping, he's gonna need it."

He nodded, "Once you have finished your task, do you promise to leave our city and take the Claymore out as well?"

"I don't see why not?" he said shrugging, "We're not really motivated to stay here anyways."

"Good then, let's get Captain Ganasu. We have a City to defend."

Sorry for the really short chapter

I think with whats happening now, I am going to put this story on hiatus until December 1st.

What I'm trying to do is start up my webcomic "Squad Seven Chronicles."

I'll post a link once I get the story started, sorry for the wait.