Heh. Sorry it took so long to get this up-I've been really busy lately getting my Christmas presents together. But now I'm on break, so expect some chapters coming up soon. And for this one, I actually have most of the plot points worked out. Still, I might work on like, a oneshot or something sometime while I work out the kinks in it.
Jak's Patience is Tried (again)
"Turn around. Slowly," the woman commanded. Jak complied, frowning deeply. The first thing he saw was the barrel of a gun, pointing directly at him. He glanced past it. Yep, it was that girl all right. What the hell kind of city was this, where crazed teenage fans suddenly turned into law enforcement?
"And to who do we owe the honor? Officer..." Daxter trailed off, gesturing for her to finish the phrase.
"None of your business."
"What kind of city arrests people for no reason?" Jak asked bitterly, scowling. Blast it, how many cities were going to try and arrest him?
"This one, I guess," Daxter answered. "And by the way, you just lost loads of money towards your vacationing industry, Officer None of Your Business, 'cuz we are not comin' back!"
"You won't even be leaving when we're done with you, and trust me, I'm not losing any sleep over it. And it's ma'am to you, idiot."
"What exactly is the reason why we're being arrested...Ma'am?" Jak asked. "Last time I checked, we didn't do anything wrong."
"Shut up!" the officer barked at him. "Don't play dumb, you know exactly why you're going downtown."
"No, I don't," Jak replied, rolling his eyes. "Why do you think I'm asking?"
"Smartass!"
Jak tapped his foot impatiently on the concrete ground. He was going to be late for something if he didn't get off the hook soon, and he did not want to be late for where he was going. He watched the sun dip a little lower in the sky, skimming the top of the alley wall, and grimaced. Why did every single bothersome problem in the world have to target him? Maybe he had no luck?
He sighed. "...No, seriously. I want to hear a reason."
"Jak Mar and friend Daxter, wanted for connections to gang lord Rayn and deceased father, Krew, for possession of illegal weapons, and for the murder of one G.T. Blitz," the woman recited, almost as if from a cue-card.
Moron, Jak thought. Get your facts straight.
"Look, you've got it all wrong," he said. "I didn't know that Rayn was working for her father until about six days ago. I haven't had connections with her since. G.T. Blitz is not G.T Blitz, either, he's Mizo, the crime boss."
"Yeah, really!" Daxter cut in. "You should know, it was broadcasted world-wide on the T.V. Get with the times, why don'cha?"
"I don't watch television," the woman replied.
"Then that's your problem, not mine," Jak retorted. "But really, you should be thanking me instead of pointing a gun at my head-I saved you a lot of effort by killing Mizo."
"...There's still the problem of possession of illegal weapons," the woman started weakly.
"Have fun arresting every one else in the city." Jak's patience was wearing thin, and his obnoxious sarcasm was starting to show it. Jak promised himself that, if this kept up much longer, he'd just go Dark Jak and impale her with his claws. Horrible thoughts, yes, but it truly was getting that bad.
"What about you racing for Krew's team? You just don't do that for no reason. You must've known what he had done the past and had connections with him," pressed the officer.
"I did know what he did in the past," Jak replied. "He was a fat bastard who manipulated, lied, cheated, and stole. And you're right, people don't work for Krew for no reason. I didn't. I was poisoned, and forced to race or die. Simple as that."
"A likely story." A very cliched phrase; Jak was almost surprised he heard it.
"No, not really. And besides, there's witnesses to the poisoning. AND," he said, before she could intercept his remark, " this is not my city of residence. You have no authority to arrest me."
That's right, I'm not some common idiot. I know how your laws work, Jak thought bitterly.
"Yeah, that's Ashelin's job!" Daxter added.
"Yeah. Thanks Dax," Jak said flatly. Everything I just said, the fancy law crap, you just ruined it.
"...So, you're the one who killed Mizo?"
This conversation, Jak decided, was going nowhere. A very stupid, pointless question was asked, and
There was a long, silent pause.
Enough, dammit! DarkJak screamed inside his head. He was starting to lose his temper, which wasn't good. Suddenly, without any real control over what he was doing, Jak ducked beneath the aim of her gun and tackled the woman to the ground. His sudden movement shocked her into firing, and a bullet whizzed over Daxter's head, just barely missing the tips of his ears. Jak tried wrestling the gun out of the officer's hands, and it fired shots off in almost every direction. Screeching in protest, Daxter dove towards the ground to avoid another spray of bullets. Finally, Jak mangaed to get a hold of the weapon, and he threw it; it clattered to the ground and slid a ways before coming to a stop.
She kicked out, and a metal-tipped boot made contact with Jak's stomach, knocking him backwards and leaving a sizable gash in his stomach. Cursing loudly, he clutched his stomach. When he looked at his hands again, the palms were completely covered in red, and sticky. Covered in his own blood. Inwardly, he groaned. Great, just great.
"JAK!" Daxter screeched.
The woman was standing up, trying to get her hands on her weapon again. Ignoring the fact that he was now bleeding profusely, Jak lunged again and tackled her. The two rolled a couple of times, coming to a stop when Jak collided with the alley wall. With a painful throbbing in his head adding to the pain in his stomach, Jak simply grabbed the woman by her shoulders, then performed a headbutt that successfully managed to knock her out. He pushed her off of him in disgust and leaned back, sitting on his knees. Though his hands were covered with his own blood, he rubbed his temples; he now had a pounding headache, to top it all off. He had been irritated, gotten into trouble with the law, then attacked. And now he had a headache.
Really, he had gotten thisclose toundergoing the full transformation into Dark Jak If that would've happened, he knew the woman would be more than unconscious at the moment...
"You okay, Jak?" Daxter asked tentatively.
"Yea-"
"Incoming message."
The alert was coming from the officer's car, and before Jak could react, a holographic head popped up above the dashboard of the car. The head of Rayn. Jak cringed. Fortunately, it was only a one-way message, and Rayn couldn't see him.
"Mira!" she said urgently. "If you've captured Jak, I need a message back as soon as you can send one. And try to get as much information on what he's been doing as you possibly can. And if you haven't apprehended Jak by now, remember not to kill him, no matter what. It's crucial that he lives long enough to-"
There was a pause in the holographic feedback, and a beep. Jak anxiously waited for the message to resume...
"Ugh, I have another message coming through. I'll get back to you later. Goodbye." The image of Rayn's holographic head fizzled and clicked off, and the car's automated voice notified them that the message was ended.
"No!" Jak shouted. "Lives long enough to what?" He punched the side of the vehicle, leaving a sizable dent. "Damn!"
"Jak, that's not all we have to worry about!" Daxter shouted back. "Did you notice how that police officer is working for Rayn?!"
"We don't even know if she is a police officer, Dax. At first, I thought she was a deranged fan, and I was wrong about that. Seems like something's up," Jak thought aloud. "We might have stumbled into something we might not want to be involved with. I wonder if-"
Suddenly, an obnoxious synthetic ring sang out, interrupting his statement. Jak hastily pulled a communicator-phone device from his pocket and flipped open the lid. There was a message for him, reading simply, 'Where are you?'
Remembering how late it was getting, Jak cursed. He dragged the woman, Mira, into the seat of her car, grunting from the effort, then ran out of the alley to his car. As soon as Daxter jumped in with him, he quickly flipped a few switches on his dashboard and hit the ignition button with the side of his fist. The engine roared to life, and they sped off, car tires screeching.
Jak was halfway to his destination before he realized he was covered in blood. Cursing yet again, he slammed on the brakes, slid, and turned the car around.
"Uh...Jak?" Daxter seemed a bit confused. Maybe he was just used to Jak being covered in blood, after all the nasty, gory things they'd been through together.
"Gotta make a quick stop," he replied. "Clean up a little, you know?"
Jak wasn't even sure if his car completely stopped, but he jumped out anyways and sprinted into his temporary residence, an apartment near the water. Unlike Haven City, residential parts of the city weren't sterotypically sectioned off as rich or poor, they were just sort of grouped together, sort of like a collage.
After fiddling with his keys after what seemed an eternity, Jak entered his apartment and made a beeline for the bathroom. He hastily tore his clothes off and jumped in the shower, not waiting for the water to heat up. He emerged three minutes later, shivering, but clean. With a towel around his waist, he rummaged through his bathroom cabinets searching for bandages. Jak wrapped them around his middle, and rushed so much as to make them too tight. He didn't care.
However, there was one good thing about his bleeding all over his jacket: he would've surely forgotten to change otherwise and showed up to where he was going in casual dress (which would have been, considering the circumstances, embarrassing). Around ten minutes later, he was dressed (somewhat) formally, and ready to leave.
"What, you're just going to leave me here?" Daxter complained.
"Yep," Jak replied, with a quick wave as he went out the door.
Driving down the road, he was well aware of the fact that he was past the legal speeding limit by about 96 miles per hour. But hey, he was late, and he didn't care. And after all, it paid off, for he arrived shortly in the parking lot of one of the city's most popular fine restaurants. He practically threw his keys at a valet, who scrambled to catch them. The poor man looked so flustered as it was glancing at Jak's screaming metal deathtrap of a car, when he accidentally ran into another vehicle catching Jak's keys and set the alarm off, Jak almost felt sorry for him. Almost: he didn't quite have time to feel sorry for people.
Then there were the troubles with the 'greeter'. Jak had entered the restaurant in a huff, and hastily rushed up to a dark-haired woman with a clipboard and gave his name.
"Jak, Jak...Jak...Oh, there!" she said, moving her finger down the list of names on her clipboard and stopping when she reached his name. "Your party has already arrived, but...You know, sir, we require formal dress at this restaurant," the greeter told him.
"This is a dinner jacket. It's formal," Jak pointed out, grabbing the sleeve and showing her.
"There are dinner jackets, and then there are dinner jackets, sir."
There was a short pause, as Jak simply glared at the woman.
"Are you making fun of me?"
"No, I'm simply stating that this is a top-notch place, and we don't allow people inside in casual dress." It seemed she was at least making attempts to be polite to him. But then again, that was her job, so Jak wasn't giving her any points for that.
"Well, what do you want me to do about it? Go out and buy a tie?" Jak snapped. "Seriously, I am having a bad day and I'm not one to pis-aggravate right now." Jak figured swearing wouldn't help his situation much.
"Sir, I'm sorry, but-"
Jak interrupted her by pulling out his wallet and thrusting a few money bills in her direction. A last resort. He raised his eyebrows at her.
"...I'll see what I can do."
Yeah, I'll bet you will, Jak thought. Of all the qualities in people that he hated, greediness was at least in the top five; it bugged him how it seemed like people would do anything just to get their hands on a bit of extra cash. Really though, it'd always been that way, even back in Sandover Village. There was always the villagers who wouldn't part with their power cells unless given ninety precursor orbs, even when they didn't really need them.
Sighing, he pulled up a chair at his table and sat. An angry woman sat across from him, tapping her fingers impatiently against the white tablecloth.
"You're late, Jak."
Yep, there it is. Expect another chapter within a week or less.
Morgan
