Chapter 35: Electrical Currents

Jedite stood in utter surprise as Jupiter Knight walked closer to him. The Knight's coat waved in the wind as he approached. The Knight's green eyes were the only thing visible from under the bill of the hat. The General saw that they had grown wide with anger and hatred as he stared at him. His voice wavered as he knew who was approaching, "J-Jupiter Knight?" a smirk started to form across his face as he realized who it was that had become the knight, "Well, it seems you weren't just some stupid human after all. No wonder I had trouble killing you."

Jupiter Knight's voice was gruff and filled with scorn as he growled at the ethereal general, "Before the night is out, I'm delivering you to hell personally."

"By all means," he chuckled, "you go ahead; I'll meet you there," Jedite threw out his hand toward the Knight as he ordered his demons out, "Take him!"

There were 35 demons left. They all surrounded the man in green as they prepared to blast him. The Knight raised his chain link-gloved hands up and proceeded to crack his knuckles as he stood at the horde before him and spoke, "Okay, who wants their ass kicked first?" A demon behind the Knight lept toward him. He heard the beast coming toward him and with twitch reflexes spun on his heels and punched the demon in the chest so hard, his fist went through it. Sticking his other hand into the chest he literally ripped the demon in half as he screamed in rage. The sheer strength of the Knight was on full display as his arms were coated with the remnant clay of the demon he destroyed. The Sailor Scouts and the Ghostbusters were absolutely shocked. He turned to the other demons, "Next!"

Ray, Peter, and Winston watched on as their youngest member fought the demons, his appearance changed before them. Winston was the most surprised as he watched the Knight bash demons before his eyes, "H-He's one of them! Of all the weird things I've seen on this job, this tops it!" Peter looked to Egon who was struggling to pull loose of his bonds, "Egon, you kidder! You knew all along, didn't you?" Egon stopped a moment and sighed in guilt, "I didn't know until this morning what it was Dan was. I didn't want to say anything because I didn't want you to lose trust in him. I had my reasons."

A pack of demons lash out. Jupiter Knight reached behind him and pulled a silver samurai-like sword with small emeralds embedded in its handle from the back-scabbard of the longcoat. The demons surrounded and one by one thrashed at the man. The Knight moved at lightning speed, hacking his way through multiple charging demons at a time. A demon performed a leap landing behind the Knight making him spin again, cutting the demon clean in half.

While the Knight was distracted two demons slammed into each other, their clay bodies liquifying to form a demon like the one at the park; large and strong. As he was cutting the last demon down it rose up behind him quickly, forcing the Knight to swing his sword downward and cut off the demon's right hand at the elbow as it tried to wrap its arm around him. The severed limb falls to the floor, but it doesn't slow the hulking creature down. It slammed into him and sent him flying backwards thirty feet. He tumbled across the floor and eventually slammed into the control room wall so hard that a large crack formed in the concrete.

The Knight suddenly finds himself wrestling with a nine-foot-something nightmare, it leaping at him and grabbing him by the front of his long coat. After lifting him up the demon rears back its head, mandibles stretching wide. Knight forces an elbow against its throat trying to keep it at bay. With his other hand he reaches into his coat and pulls out his pistol, the device unaffected by his transformation. He shoves the barrel of the gun into the demon's larynx and pulls the trigger. It destabilizes back into its base clay. The smell left behind by the demon and the pistol discharge became a very disgusting one, "Damn, that's rank!"

The Sailor Scouts were in awe of what was before them. They watched as Jupiter Knight - by way of blunt force trauma from his punches as well as his sword - mowed down several of the demons. Sailor Mars looked on in sheer amazement, "I can't believe this! He's really powerful!" "I can confirm," she looked at Sailor Mercury and saw that her visor was still active when the demons restrained her. She could still clearly see what was happening with Jupiter Knight, "He has somewhere close to double the energy output Sailor Jupiter has…" she stopped a second and closed her eyes in shame as she realized what she said, "I mean, had." "That's not power he would normally have," both Sailor Mars and Sailor Mercury looked over to Peter as he stated that, "That's the power of a man who has nothing left to lose." Sailor Mars knew exactly what the psychologist was saying and it hurt her to hear it. She felt the energy coming off of Dan when he was distraught about Sailor Jupiter. In his current form it was even more intense and it felt like a fire was enveloping the man; he was a man covered in electrical currents.

Sailor Mars felt a great urgency and started pulling on her bonds, "Can anyone pull free?" Everyone tried and confirmed that they couldn't. Egon felt his body and noticed parts of his torso were exposed outside the clay bonds. He shook himself to get a vantage point to his side to confirm that a certain device was still at his side. He looked beside him and saw how close a proximity he was to Sailor Mercury. Her hand to his immediate side was only lightly coated in the same clay that made her bonds. Taking into account her enhanced strength in her transformed state, "I got an idea! Sailor Mercury, on my belt is a holster. It still has my destabilizer pistol in it. Can you try to break your restraints and reach it?"

Sailor Mercury looked down and saw the pistol. Looking at her bonds on her left hand she saw through her visor that the clay was barely holding that hand back. She looked back at Egon, "I'll try!"
Another group of demons moved at incredible speeds to try and match Jupiter Knight's. He sensed them approaching at high velocity and ran to the other end of the open space between the control room and the base of the array. When the demons thought they had him cornered he ran up the wall and flipped over the demons' heads. When he landed behind them he pulled out the sword and with a number of quick swipes, he wiped out all of the demons pursuing him.

Very few stray demons were left. A demon pulled a copper pipe out of a nearby wall with water spewing out of the hole. The demon sped towards the Knight whipping the pipe back and forth. He blocked multiple blows with his sword. He went into a low kick and swept the demon's legs from underneath it. Once it was on the ground he took the pipe the demon had and stabbed it in the head. He sent a charge of electrical energy through the pipe and inducted it into the demon's head, solidifying and exploding into a cloud of dust.
Three demons that were lined up behind each other, approached him. Jupiter Knight took the pipe and slammed it into the first demon's chest. He plants one foot as he then performs a breaching kick into the end of the pipe, sending it through the first demon, and through the other two. They convulse and liquify.
A demon begins shooting multiple energy bolts at him. He took a defensive stance and started reflecting the bolts off the sword into other directions, some striking other demons caught in the crossfire. The demon stops a beat allowing the Knight to make a move. He flung the sword, sending it spinning end over end. It becomes embedded into the demon's head, the force of impact throwing the demon into the wall behind it. It becomes pinned against the wall, its body decaying into the same clay as the others. The Knight held up his open hand before his face and as he slowly closed his hand lightning started attracting to the sword, intensifying the more closed his hand became. Clinching his hand closed, the energy attracted to the sword discharged into the demon's body. It exploded violently into a dust cloud.
Another stray demon began leaping toward the Knight. Jupiter Knight ran toward a corner, kicked off the wall while jumping and turning around, and while airborne wrapped one of his legs around the demon's neck. As he hit the ground, his body weight compressed his leg down onto the demon's neck until it snapped.

Jedite watched as Jupiter Knight single handedly wiped out all of his demons. The energy influx was distracting him like a drunken stupor as Sailor Mercury took the opportunity to pull at her bonds. She finally became free as she started reaching for the pistol on Egon's equipment belt. The tips of her fingers were barely touching the pistol's grip, "I can… almost… reach it!" Sailor Moon kept encouraging her fellow Scout, "Come on, Amy! Keep trying!" Among the captives watching, Peter was about the only one that had a thought cross his mind, "Wait, uh… Spengs? What are you gonna do with the pistol?" "Sailor Mercury is going to use it to shoot and destabilize one of my bonds. Hopefully, the settings on the pistol will allow me to get free and free the rest of us."

Sailor Venus knew where Peter was going with his line of question, especially after hearing Egon's explanation, "Isn't that dangerous? What if she misses?"

"Total atomic destabilization." Egon's answer was lost on some of the Scouts prompting Winston to translate, "In other words: All of your atoms take separate vacations." Sailor Mercury blanched a moment as the other Scouts looked to her wide eyed. There was a massive pressure on her, but she spoke in what confidence she could, "I won't miss."

A demon fights with Jupiter Knight in hand to hand combat. He blocks each blow from the demon, the demon also doing so in kind. The both of them locked fists with each other allowing the demon to force him backward into a wall. Another demon came from one side and started rushing toward him as he was pinned by the other. Looking to the side he sees his sword, still stuck in the wall with ecto-charged clay caked on the blade. He reached out and the sword started to vibrate. The sword unstuck itself and flew in the rushing demon's path, slicing the beast in half before the hilt of the sword fell into its owner's hand. The demon holding the Knight had its throat slit by the sword making it release the man in its grasp.

The straggling demons began to mount a charge. Taking notice of the final demons around him he put the sword back in the sheath strapped in the center of his back. Like Sailor Jupiter's tiara, the sword acted like an antenna for the electrical powers the Knight wielded, the lightning gathering in the sky above him as he began to call the power, "I call upon the planet Jupiter; I summon my power…" The lightning pulsed and flashed in the sky as it came down and struck the sword's hilt, "Jupiter…"

Sailor Mercury was still attempting to reach for Egon's pistol when she was interrupted when her visor flashed new data. It was a massive energy spike. She looked toward Jupiter Knight and saw the electrical current hitting him and started to charge him.

"Thunder…"

A warning message started to flash on her visor's display, "Uh, oh! Everyone, close your eyes!"

The electricity enveloped Jupiter Knight as he clinched his fish and reached back, screaming the final word of his power move's activation, "PULSE!" He threw his fist to the ground and punched the floor. A sphere of electrical arcs surrounded him as it then spread outward. The pulse of energy slammed into all the remaining demons on the roof and blew them over the sides of the building. The demons closest to the epicenter of the sphere froze up and burst into plumes of dust. The Scouts and Ghostbusters finally heeded Sailor Mercury's warning and squeezed their eyes shut from the intense light that emanated from both the lightning and the attack. The pulse also slammed into Jedite. He was able to brace himself, but he felt the pressure through his ectoplasmic form and it told him that the power the Knight welded had the ability to hurt him, no different than Sailor Jupiter.

After a moment, the smoke cleared. He fell to one of his knees and attempted to catch his breath. Standing back up straight he looked around and saw the amount of damage that was done to the demons. The electrical power he just let loose knocked out the lights surrounding the periphery of the roof and the antenna spires, "Whoa! I did all this?" He peered around again and saw Jedite had disappeared, "Where are you, you dirty mother…"

Sailor Mars had opened her eyes and started looking toward Jupiter Knight again she sensed something and it was moving fast. She screamed, "Dan! Look out behind you!"

Too late. Two glowing, detached hands came down and slammed the Knight right into the shoulder blades before disappearing, making him seize up in pain and drop to his knees. The hands reappeared interlocked together and hit him in the side of the head so hard it sent him tumbling and skipping across the floor until he slid into another wall. After a moment Jupiter Knight groaned and pushed himself up, "I said it before and I'll say it again: This was not in the job description."

Bracing against the wall he attempted to stand up. He was breathing heavily as he pushed himself upright, looking around the roof again, "Alright, you piece of shit," he reached back behind him and pulled the sword from the sheath, "where in the fuck did you go?"

"I can see you, Jupiter Knight," Jedite's voice reverberated around the man, a mocking tone clear in the words spoken, "Can you see me?" "Stop being a pussy and fight me!" "Can you fight what you can't see? Can you fight me without your machines?" Jupiter Knight heard him laugh. He had to think fast. Why did Darien say Jupiter Knight and Sailor Jupiter were their only hope?

"Dan! I can track him!" Sailor Mercury yelled out, "I still have my visor active! I'll be able to…" a hand appeared already at speed, smacking her across the face forcefully removing the visor from her eyes shortly before disappearing. She yelped in pain as Jedite's voice echoed around them, "Ah, ah, ah! No cheating!"

Jupiter Knight witnessed that and started walking his way toward them, "You fucking dirtbag!"

"Wait, Dan," Sailor Mars calling to him made him stop as she explained, "he's not here! H-he's nearby, but he's not near us." "Daniel," Egon called out clearly, "the PKE meter works by generating a small EM field and samples the muons colliding with it. Do you understand? You can generate the field yourself!" It was an odd statement from the physicist. After a moment of milling it over…

"I'm growing tired of this," Jedite's voice echoed, "Time to die, human."

Jupiter Knight spread arms out and started to concentrate. The distinctive odor of ozone started to fill the space. The green glowing smoke started to part around him as everyone started to feel their hair start to stand on end like holding a Tesla coil. The field started to react by showing a shimmering form walking toward the Knight from behind. He again spun on his heels just as a vague form of an arm swung at him. He grabbed the arm and performed a large electrical discharge into the form, lighting it up like a bright light in the form of a man. Jedite suddenly materialized as he was being electrocuted, screaming in pain as Jupiter Knight screamed at him, "Let's get one thing straight, jerkoff: The name's Shannon! Learn it!"

The Knight wound up and smashed the hilt of the sword into Jedite's face. The Knight let him go allowing the general to stumble back. A clear rip was seen into his form as green ectoplasm trickled down his face. Egon was taken by surprise at the physical contact the Knight was able to perform after electrocuting the Negaverse General, "Fascinating. The sheer electrical energy Dan is able to call temporarily made Jedite prone to physical attack." Sailor Mercury was also impressed with the spectacle before her, "That would explain how Sailor Jupiter hurt him with her attack last night!"

The physical contact left Jedite stunned, but after dabbing the ectoplasm from his forehead and looking at it on his fingers he saw his vulnerability. He clinched his hand in anger, "You'll pay for that, you wretch!"

"I'll pay?" the Knight growled, then screamed, "I'll pay?! After what you did tonight, I owe you?!" An aura started to surround him as he started to step forward, electrical crackling being heard as the arcs flew off his body. Jedite started to see the wrath he invoked and began to back away from the very aggravated man. Jupiter Knight took steps toward his target as he continued to rant, "You've dragged me here; you put me through hell; you killed her. HER! And I'M going to pay?!" The glow returned to his eyes as he readied the sword, "The only thing I owe you is an ass-kicking!" The Knight got into a fighting stance as he gritted his teeth and spoke in a low threatening tone, "If you have a God, you better start praying to him."