Static Sparks (Good Karma)

Day 21...

Twilight awoke to the sight of Cole's back. He had broken from their embrace and rolled over, but she had held onto him. She nuzzled up against him and sighed happily. She loved the man in her grasp dearly.

The movement seemed to have woken Cole, because he shifted and rolled over to look at Twilight. He smiled at her happy face and gave her a good morning kiss. After laying together for several moments, he sat up to stretch.

Twilight got up and stretched as well. She looked over to Cole and asked, "You ready to find that friend of Trish's?"

"Yeah, we should head over there, but how should we get over there?" he asked.

"I can teleport us back where we were," she suggested.

"Are you sure? Yesterday that nearly toppled you over," he said. He was hesitant to let her to put that kind of strain on herself.

"I had used quite a bit of magic before then, so my magic wasn't what it normally is. Not to mention that was an instant long distance teleportation which is why it took the toll it did. If I had spent time to charge my magic it wouldn't have left me so exhausted," Twilight explained. "I would still have been slightly tired of course, but I wouldn't have nearly collapsed like yesterday."

Cole hesitates, having a rather hard time believing that she would be okay, but he doesn't know how big her magical reserves were and knew nothing about spell-casting, so he couldn't really say whether or not she was just trying to come up with something so she could get them the fast way. Reluctantly, he agrees, "Fine, we can teleport, but I don't want you running out of magic while we are fighting, so if you look like you are too tired you're coming back here, okay?"

"Okay," she accepts. Grabbing Cole's hand, she started to charge the spell. Once she gathered the necessary magic she cast it. The two disappeared in a magenta flash.

The couple appeared a short distance from their objective. As soon as they got there, Cole checked to make sure Twilight was okay. She stood straight, taking deep breathes to recollect herself. Other than her breathing, she seemed fine.

When she was done, he said, "All right, you look okay. Let's find Roger." But before he could head out, Twilight kept a hold of his hand. Looking back at her, he asked, "Twilight? Are you okay?"

She shook her head, "Not really. What we saw in the sewer yesterday. That was the most brutal thing I've ever seen. It was just as bad, if not worse than what happened on the bridge." She started to slightly shake again. She looked up at Cole, "Do you think that was the same Conduit?"

He thought about it for a minute, then answered, "More than likely. I mean that was the only Wind Reaper that we have encountered. He probably got out of my restraints the same way he disappeared yesterday."

"So does that mean that those Dust Men died because we didn't do anything more permanent to him?" she asked, guiltily.

Cole was surprised to hear her ask such a thing. After shaking off the shock, he shook his head, "Of course not Twilight. We couldn't have known that he would have escaped. I promised that I would do my best to limit the amount of deaths you see and while you have seen some death it isn't as much as if I wasn't watching what I was doing."

A small smile appeared at the reminder of his promise. "Thank you for doing your best to keep that promise." Her smile quickly turned into a frown, "But like I asked you after you made that promise, to keep people safe from him the next time we face him it needs to be the last."

"You're right Twilight. We aren't going to able to contain him, so next time we take him on, I'll end him," Cole swore.

Twilight nodded solemnly. After coming to an agreement about the rampant Reaper, they continued to where Roger should be. When they reached the roof of the building near his location, they saw him on his knees with his hands behind his head and surrounded by four Dust Men.

"That's not good." Cole contacted Trish. "We found Roger, but he must have pissed the Dust Men off somehow. They are all over him."

"There's a rumor that the transients are kidnapping engineers and mechanics. They are using them as slave labor and the worst part is that they publicly execute anyone who refuses to work," Trish told them. "If they have Roger then you're going to have to take them out at the same time or else they will kill him."

"Don't worry Trish, we'll get him out of here," he promised, ending the call. He looked at Twilight, "We are going to have to each take two of them out, okay?"

She nodded and aimed at two of the Dust Men and readied her magic. Cole checked who she was aiming at and readied his precision to take the other two out. "Alright when I say now." He steadied his aim and, when he had it aligned, he used his precision and said, "Now!" He shot the Dust Man he was aiming at. The bolt hit him directly in the head and he went down. The others reacted instantly, but two of the others went down from magenta beams. Cole quickly aimed at the other Dust Man and shot a bolt at him, the bolt missed it's mark, but knocked him back. Reacting quickly Cole aimed at the Dust Man's head and fired. This time the bolt hit home and he went down.

The two climbed down the building and walked over to the man as he slowly got up. Looking over to them he asked, "You're those people with the powers, aren't you?"

"Yeah, we are... listen Trish Dailey sent us, she was hoping that you could fix the Stone Canal Drawbridge," Cole asked.

"Trish is stuck in the quarntine too?" Roger asked.

"Unfortunately," Cole replied. They started heading toward the bridge.

"Hell. I used go camping with her and her family, you know. Kind of fell out of touch with her old man when he got transferred up state. What about Amy? Did she make it out of here?" he asked.

Cole and Twilight glanced at each other. Cole said, "Uh... Yeah, she made it out."

"That's good. Hate for both of them to be stuck in here."

They soon reached the drawbridge. When they reached it Roger when to work on it. "Damn it. This thing is messed up nine ways from Sunday. Watch out for Dust Men, this is going to take some time to fix."

"Twilight before they come, will you enhance my shock grenade?"

"Alright," Twilight said and began enhancing Cole's power.

When she was finished, Cole and Twilight walked out to the street and went to different sides of the street. Soon several Dust Men came running from each side and the two quickly engaged them.

Cole ran down the left side of the street where several kamikaze Dust Men charged at him. Cole quickly took them out. Unfortunately there were several bystanders on the sidewalk. They were greatly injured from the blast, but they had been far enough to survive. Cole immediately ran to heal them. When he reached them however, more Dust Men rounded the corner. Not wanting the civilians to get hurt more or worse, he quickly moved away from them and confronted the Dust Men. He ran towards them and charged his gigawatt blades. He dodged there gun fire as he ran and when he reached them he drove his blades into one of them and sent them flying. Turning to the Dust Man next to him, Cole punched him in the face and quickly followed with a kick to his chest. He quickly restrained the fallen shooter and aimed at the last one. He pushed the last Dust Man back with a shockwave. As he flew through the air Cole quickly shot him with four bolts. When the Dust Man fell he was knocked out. After taking care of the Dust Men, Cole went back to the injured civilians and healed them. After thanking him they left, so they wouldn't be in his way, in case more enemies showed up.

As Cole was taking care of the Dust Men on one side, Twilight took care of the one's on the other side. The three of them started firing at her. She quickly teleported behind them and kicked one in the back of the head, sending him flying. She quickly dashed toward the next and, as he turned around, punched him in the chest with a magic charged punch. Facing the last Dust Man, Twilight shot him with a freezing spell. After he was frozen, she heard a strange whirring sound. Turning toward it she saw another Dust Man with a huge gun. Twilight quickly brought up a shield around herself. Just as the shield finished surrounding her, he opened fire on her. Twilight instantly felt the pressure from the nonstop onslaught of gunfire. As he fired, the Dust Man slowly moved closer to her. Suddenly, a bolt of electricity hit the gunner, stopping his barrage of bullets. Not wasting the opportunity, Twilight fired a heat spell at the gun, melting it. The heat caused the gun to explode, knocking the Dust Man back. After making sure he wouldn't get up and that there weren't any other Dust Men, she walked back over to Cole.

When she reached him, Twilight gave him a quick kiss and said, "Thanks."

"Anytime," he said. Walking back to the engineer, he asked, "Have you fixed it?"

"Just about... done," Roger announced. As he finished, the bridge started to lower. However, just before it lowered completely it stopped. "You cannot be serious! *sigh* The hydraulics aren't engaging on the other side."

"Can't you fix them?" Cole asked.

"Not from here. It has to be done from that side. But, I know someone that might be able to help," he said. Roger started to call someone. "Hey Lou, it's Roger. The #4 hydraulic on the south side of the Stone Canal isn't engaging. We need it back online, where are you?"

A voice, Lou, came from the radio, "I'm in Memorial Park. I'm not going anywhere, however unless you have a gun. Reapers are swarming all over the place."

"Yeah well, what I'm sending is better than a gun. I'll see you in a minute," Roger said.

"Alright, I'll head over there and get him out of there," Cole said. Looking over to Twilight, he said, "You guard Roger and make sure no other Dust Men try and take him out."

"Okay," she said. Stepping close to him, she gave him a quick peck on the cheek, "Be careful."

"I will," he promised.

Separating from her, Cole started climbing the rails on the edge of the bridge. Once he reached the top of the bridge, he jumped to the other side and slid down to the street. He immediately headed to Memorial Park. As he headed to the park Cole stopped several times to heal any injured people he came across.

Cole soon arrived at the park. He soon found Lou near the parks archway. There were a couple of Reapers guarding him. He walked on the archway until he was above one of the Reapers. Cole waited until the Reaper was underneath the archway and quickly threw a shock grenade at the other Reaper. The grenade stuck to him and he started to panic. It soon exploded taking him out. The other Reaper noticed and ran out from under the archway. As soon as he did, Cole pounced onto him. Landing on him, he quickly restrained the Reaper. Getting up, Cole walked over to the engineer.

"They do anything to you?" Cole asked.

"Damn, that was intense. No, I'm fine. Did Roger send you?"

"That's right. Let's get over there," Cole said. As they headed to the bridge, he asked, "What did the Reapers want you for?"

"They had heard that the transients are looking for engineers to work on their tower. They figured they would get a reward for trading me to them or something," Lou explained.

"That's a lot of pointless work for a monument to garbage."

"Working on that thing is a death sentence. They work you til you drop and then shoot you in the head," the engineer said.

They soon reached the Stone Canal bridge. As Lou went to work on it, he said, "I need you to keep an eye out for any Reapers. There are a lot roaming around."

Cole stood behind the engineer, watching for Reapers. He soon heard the clanging of steps on metal. Looking up he saw several Reapers on the railway. Noticing they were standing where the trains ran through, Cole rushed forward and started to climb one of the pillars holding the railway up. Once on the tracks, the Reapers backed up to put some distance between them and Cole. Taking advantage of them moving away from the engineer Cole quickly hit them with a shockwave, knocking them off of the tracks and onto the ground below. Just after being knocked off the tracks, a train went by. When the train passed, Cole walked over to see what happened to the Reapers. They were alive, but unable to move from the fall.

"There's more coming!" Lou shouted.

Cole quickly jumped back to the street. He saw the Reapers coming and started to engage them.

As Cole fought the Reapers on the other side of the bridge, Twilight was dealing with the Dust Men. She had placed a shield around Roger and the console he was working on. Four Dust Men were rushing towards them. Twilight shot beams at two of them, freezing one and knocking the other out. She quickly teleported next to the remaining two. Twilight punched one of them with a magic filled fist then pushed him back with a blast of magic. He was slammed into the wall of the prison that was across from the bridge. Turning around she saw that the last Dust Man had kept charging at Roger. Rushing toward the Dust Man, Twilight quickly kicked him in the back, knocking him to the ground. She then shot him with a beam to keep him from getting up.

Twilight walked back over to Roger to make sure no one got passed her. Looking over to the tunnel, she saw two Dust Men with RPGs and one with a minigun. Knowing the RPGs take time to reload and that the minigun can't start shooting right away, Twilight waited until they started to attack. When the RPGs were fired she immediately teleported behind them. Flying up slightly, she kicked both of the RPG wielding Dust Men and brought both of her hands down onto the minigunner. All three Dust Men were knocked out from the magic powered attacks.

Twilight teleported back to Roger and waited for Cole to finish up on his side.

Kicking the Reaper in front of him Cole quickly restrained the gunner. After taking care of the Reapers he walked back to Lou.

As he was heading back he heard the engineer curse. "Dammit, everything checks out, but the power grid is..." he paused, then, turning to Cole, asked, "Can you?"

Cole nodded and told him, "Yeah, I can. Stand back." Lou walked away from the console and placed his hand on the control panel. He started channeling his electricity into the panel until it was green across the board. When it was charged he looked back at Lou.

"I'd love to stay and chat, but I need to find somewhere safe, away from the Reapers and those transients. I'll see you around," the engineer left to find someplace safe.

As Cole started to climb the bridge to check on Twilight and Roger. When he reached the top, he sighed in relief to see Twilight wasn't injured and Roger was fine. After he slid down the bridge he walked up to the console and charged the control panel.

When it was charged, the bridge started to lower. Roger said, "And I would have missed this had I taken an early retirement. I think I need to have my head examined."

"Thank you for the help with the bridge Roger," Cole said.

"Yes, hopefully we will get people over there some help," Twilight added.

"Yeah, your welcome. Tell Trish I said hello," Roger said. He then went on his way.

As he left, Cole tried contacting Trish. Instead of getting her however, he got the voice mail. "Hi, you've reached Trish Dailey's voice mail. Please leave a message."

"Hey Trish, I just wanted to let you know we managed to get the drawbridge lowered. I'll call you later, to see how things are going," Cole said. He ended the call and looked over to Twilight. "Alright I'm going to go look for Dwight. Do you feel up to coming or should Spike come?" he asked.

"I'm feeling pretty tired. I think I'll take a rest and Spike can help you with Zeke's 'problem'," Twilight said, with air quotes, rolling her eyes.

Cole chuckled at her attitude toward Zeke's reason for trying to find Dwight. Cole called Zeke, "Hey Zeke. Me and Twilight are heading back so that she can take a break. Is Spike there?"

"Yeah I'm here," Spike called out.

"Will you go with Cole?" Twilight asked.

"Sure, I'll go with him."

"You're going to find Dwight now right?" Zeke inquired.

Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Cole said, "Yeah we are going to go look for him. See you two in a minute." He ended the call and the couple started heading home.