For Your Photoreceptors Only/Chapter 10

For Your Photoreceptors Only

Chapter 10

In the large warehouse, the mutants were frantically fighting the QUAD droids. Blaster bolts flew everywhere, ion blasts destroyed much of the interior of the warehouse, sparks seemed to sputter out of a few of the QUADs, and chunks of flesh, blood, and some twisted metal hit the floor. It was a war zone in the building.

But as the battle raged inside, the other MI5 operatives were chasing down Noah and his friends. Across the street from the warehouse, Noah's team was climbing into a landspeeder. Clowe and Perkins were firing blaster bolts back at MI5 while Klay was starting the engines. Gruu and Acura used their lightsabers to deflect the bolts as they ran.

"Damn it," Pandolfo commented. "They're too far away. We'll never catch 'em."

While Acura continued to deflect blaster fire ahead of the group, Gruu channeled the Force. He concentrated and Force-jumped ahead, crossing a great distance and an even greater speed.

"Whoa," Europa said between breaths as she ran.

Gruu deflected some incoming fire as he descended on the speeder. Just as the speeder began to pull away, Gruu landed and sliced his lightsaber through the right wing, separating the turbine engine from the body of the vehicle. The speeder continued to move forward, but without one of it's turbines, it was extremely difficult to control. Klay tried to maneuver it but couldn't. The speeder tipped slightly to the left and crashed head-on into the corner of a building.

Gruu and the rest of MI5 was rapidly approaching the downed speeder.

Noah said, "Lose them and meet at the rendezvous we discussed earlier." They all climbed out of the speeder and scattered into the city.

"Sithspit!" Shasta exclaimed. "They're heading in different directions. We've gotta split up."

Turning back toward Acura, Gruu said, "We-sa can get a better vantage point from up higher." He Force-jumped to a ledge of the second story of a shorter building.

"Coming, Master," Acura acknowledged, leaping up after him.

Bont, Shasta and Europa all ran into the city streets. Pandolfo was picking up the rear. He was huffing and puffing. He was shorter than the others. His legs could only move so fast. Over his comlink, he heard Europa say, "Pandolfo, Urma Boont ducked into that diner."

Pandolfo stopped for a moment to catch his breath. He hadn't been doing all this running around in the field all that often anymore. Since he became such a whiz in the technical aspect of MI5, he had apparently become out-of-shape. Bent over, leaning on his knees and hanging his head, he looked up to see the diner just up ahead on the left. The sign above the door simply read "Flo's".

He holstered his blaster and walked inside. It seemed to be quite an evening. The diner was packed full of patrons. He quickly looked around for a Bothan but saw none. Wait! There. Behind the counter, in the kitchen area. He could have sworn he caught a glimpse of a Bothan.

As the patrons of Flo's Diner ate, oblivious as to what was happening, Pandolfo managed to slip past one of the servers and through the swinging doors into the kitchen. Where were all the cooks? Maybe he was on the right track. They may have all fled when they saw a Bothan enter with a blaster. Pandolfo ducked down behind a stove when he saw movement. He glanced around hoping to see her in one of the many reflective surfaces in the kitchen. Sure enough, there she was, hidden near the door to the meat locker.

Thankfully the noises from all the running machinery covered the sounds of his footsteps. He made his way to the spot just around the corner from where she was. He then leaped out toward her and opened his mouth wide. The greenish phosphorescent light emitted from his mouth, known unofficially as the "Nosaurian flash", temporarily blinding Ms. Boont. Pandolfo then used that moment to tackle her and take the blaster from her.

Pandolfo held her own blaster to her head as he pulled out his stun cuffs. "And back to prison you go."

Urma Boont remained silent.

- - - - - - - - - -

Only a block away, Gruu and Acura had tracked Clowe to a busy street. They were on the lower rooftops looking down at him. "He-sa is tryin' to blend in wit' da crowds." It was pretty obvious Clowe was hiding weapons under his clothing. There were bulges here and there.

"Shall we confront him?" Acura asked.

"We-sa don't want any innocent bystanders harmed. We-sa will follow him-sa and wait till da time is right."

- - - - - - - - - -

Europa was following behind Klay a few streets over. Klay, too, was trying to blend in with the crowds of beings on the street. Europa was questioning whether she should just take him now. Klay was an arms dealer and probably knew lots of beings in lots of places. He might even be able to slip away into the "criminal underworld" and never be found. Damn. She should probably just take him now.

She started jogging, and when she caught up to him, she stuck her blaster in his ribs. "Don't go anywhere."

Klay immediately threw up his arms. "I surrender!"

Europa was stunned. She hadn't expected it to be that easy.

I guess that's why Klay wasn't the muscle on Noah's team, she thought to herself. Okay. She spun him around and slapped some stun cuffs on him. The beings on the street watched in awe as MI5 made an arrest.

- - - - - - - - - -

Not far away, Shasta had tracked Perkins down an alley and into a marketplace. Thankfully it was night and the shops in the market were all closed up. The area was deserted. Shasta drew her blaster and carefully made her way into the marketplace. "This isn't gonna end well," she said aloud so Perkins could hear her. He was hiding someplace, probably waiting to snipe her or something.

Shasta was looking around, scanning the area to find the best hiding spots. There wasn't many. Some niches between the individual shops, stacks of crates... The best place was probably the balcony up overhead. It was a half-circle roughly 10 feet in diameter. Shasta lifted her blaster and took aim.

Sure enough, Perkins peeked his head over the edge to see where she was and, BLAM!, Shasta took her shot, catching Perkins squarely between the eyes. And that's just another perfect example of why she was the best marksman in the agency.

- - - - - - - - - -

Gruu's padawan Acura had made the decision to confront Clowe. They dropped down from the ledge above, using the Force to soften their landing, and activated their lightsabers. Gruu was behind him and Acura was in front. Without saying a word, Clowe pulled two rather large blasters from his coat and extended his arms, pointing a blaster at each of them. He immediately started firing and the Jedi began deflecting shots.

The few bystanders that were in the area ran away from all the blaster fire.

Gruu leaped over Clowe and landed next to Acura. Continuing to deflect, Gruu managed to deflect one shot back at the blaster from which it came. The blaster bolt fried the weapon and singed Clowe's left hand. In the split-second he took to drop the damaged weapon, he hesitated firing the other. Acura then used that brief moment to Force-push him backward.

Clowe flew back and slammed into a taxi that was hovering along the edge of the street.

"Perfect timing, Pad'wan," Gruu said to her, congratulating her on a job well done. The Jedi slowly inched toward Clowe's motionless body. Gruu reached down to feel for a pulse. There was one.

Gruu looked up at Acura. "He-sa is still alive but knocked unconscious. He-sa musta hit his head on da speeder."

"Hey!" a voice yelled. "What's goin' on here?"

Gruu turned to see the Twi'lek taxi driver. "Dis is MI5 business. We-sa apprehended a crim'nal. Sorry for da disturb'nce."

- - - - - - - - - -

Bont was chasing Noah down a street with very little activity. The few pedestrians there were scared off by the two men carrying blasters. Noah took a sharp turn around a corner and Bont followed, his feet skidding on the pavement. Noah now found himself in an alley and a dead-end up ahead.

Bont aimed his blaster. "There's nowhere to go. It's over."

Out of breath, Noah slowly turned around to look at Bont. The Doctor was holding a blue lightsaber.

"Well," Bont said, "now we know why you had an operation on Ilum." He waited, but Noah said nothing, just held the lightsaber. "Do you even know anything about wielding that thing? Unless you trained at the Jedi Temple, that weapon will be useless to you."

He was right. Noah had not had any training. He hadn't developed that part of his master plan yet. This may be the last shot he had at executing that plan. He thought he would take a chance. "Try me," Noah instigated.

Bont fired one shot and caught Noah in the left shoulder. He dropped the lightsaber and fell to his knees in pain.

Jace Bont just stood there for a moment watching Noah, waiting for some other crazy surprise.

"It was a perfect plan," Noah muttered. "How could it have gone so wrong?"

"You weren't expecting our droid to multiply itself, were you," Bont inquired, stepping closer to Noah.

"How is that possible?" Noah saw Bont inching closer and knew it was over. Noah pulled the blaster from his pocket and dropping it on the ground. "I'm a scientist, an inventor. I'm a super genius. Why can't I understand how that happened?"

Noah willingly let Bont put stun cuffs on him. Bont said, "Well, I guess MI5's super genius is smarter." And it seemed to be true. Without even trying, Q'u had outsmarted the evil super genius Dr. Noah. Q'u not only created QUAD, but also the time-travel technology that allowed the droid to build an army of itself. Q'u gets the win this mission.

Chapters: Prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | Epilogue