Disclaimer: My name is not Naughty Dog, so I do not own anything but the OCs and their contributions.

Chapter the Third: The Sailing and Changing

The following week went by much in the same way, only now that Charlie was in the group, I had regained some hope. Samos taught us about the Precursors and the different kinds of eco, after finding that we couldn't read the language, he taught us that as well. He taught us all kinds of things that any ordinary gamer would never learn. Of course, his lessons were filled with warnings about Misty Island and the Lurkers and such.

We searched Sentinel Beach and the less dangerous areas of the jungle, but found nothing that hinted of Rose or Daniel. A large snake startled me at one point, and Jak scared it off, but not before it dropped a flat, rectangular object. I examined it, and found it to be the envelope with the pictures I was going to burn. I decided to hang on to it and get rid of the more...demeaning pictures only. If we never went back, it would be nice to have memories.

Charlie, Jak and I were running out of places to look, there was only so much we could do here. But there was one area we hadn't touched yet.

"Misty Island."

"Excuse me?" I didn't expect Charlie to suggest going there.

"It's the only place we haven't looked, maybe they ended up there."

"Ooh no. We can't go there! What if the Lurkers catch us? And Samos would kill us if he found out."

"We'll just have to be really sneaky is all. Ardus is trying to get fish in the jungle since the Lurker Sharks ruined his fishing boat, so we can use his speed boat to get there."

Jak sent him a look that said 'This is a bad idea, but it looks like we have no choice.' During the time we've been here I've halfway learned to decipher Jak's voiceless language. I don't usually understand the entire message, and sometimes I didn't have a clue, but the basic understanding seemed to be enough.

I chewed my lower lip in nervousness. I knew something bad was going to happen when we got there. A very odd thing, I knew I had played the games, so I should know what was going to happen, but for some reason the precise events eluded me. I was clueless as to what would happen! I explained this to Charlie a few days before when he asked me what happened in the game.

We managed to act like nothing was going on for the rest of the day. I told Samos I was going for a walk that evening, but he said nothing. He must have been meditating or something, so I don't know if he heard me. I hurried down to the dock where the boys were waiting. Daxter was there too, apparently Jak saw this as an opportunity to teach Daxter not to be scared of everything. The boat wasn't big enough to hold all four of us, so Charlie opted to stay behind in case the fisherman came back.

Upon reaching the island, Daxter instantly began to show signs of being scared. I'm pretty sure I was shaking too. The piles of bones were insanely large, it must have taken something great to kill a creature that big. I fervently hoped that there weren't any still alive. Daxter was the first to break the eerie silence.

"Uh, guys? Old green stuff told us not to be here y'know."

Jak ignored him and kept walking. We followed him, and the silence came again. I was too afraid to speak, it was all so dark and gloomy, and I couldn't shake the feeling that one of the skeletons would come alive and eat us. We scaled one of the calcium statues and crouched behind a boulder overlooking a large gathering of Lurkers. I shivered and Daxter slipped and fell behind us, somehow managing not to shout. Jak and I shushed him anyway.

Three dark clouds appeared and revealed the same number of beings. Two of them were floating in the air and the third was standing on the ground. They all looked familiar, but one more than the others. One of the floating ones spoke.

"Continue searching for artifacts and eco. The villagers have some items, you know what to do."

His voice was incredibly raspy, and had a slightly hollow sound to it. The other had a more normal sounding tone.

"Deal harshly with anyone who leaves the village. We will attack in due time."

The third said nothing, but he was frowning, unlike the other two. Maybe he was there against his will?

Me and the boys exchanged glances and left, not noticing that we had been spotted.

We climbed onto a small platform and looked around for some sign that my friends were here.

"Do we have to be here much longer?" Daxter complained, "This place gives me the creeps."

Daxter was so busy shifting his eyes he wasn't looking where his feet were.

"Dax watch-" He fell with a small cry after tripping over an artifact. "-out."

Daxter picked himself up and looked at what he had tripped over. "Oh, stupid Precursor junk." He said as he dusted it off. "The sage always yaps about how the Precursors built everything." He flattened his ears, trying to mock him as he proceeded to imitate his voice. "Where did they go? Why did they build this crap?" he shifted back to normal and tossed the artifact to Jak, continuing to rant about how stupid Samos was.

I was about to smack him just so he would be quiet when the artifact in Jak's hands lit up.

"-real losers...whoa! How did you do that?" Daxter asked, now thoroughly amazed. I was about to examine further when a Lurker armored in bones attacked us. Me and Daxter dove behind Jak.

"Jak, we're in trouble." I needlessly pointed out. Jak shot me a look that translated to 'No duh.' He looked at the artifact in his hands, ran forward and threw it at the Lurker. The Lurker exploded, and the shockwaves threw Jak backwards knocking me onto my back, and Daxter into a pool of dark eco that we somehow failed to notice. Jak and I scrambled to our feet and I called down into the vat.

"Daxter! Daxter are you there?"

My reply was something small and fuzzy popping back out and landing on its face. We stared for a moment before the orange fuzz ball sat up and started ranting as in walked toward us.

"I told you we shouldn't have come here, and if you listened..." he finally noticed our staring. "What?" He turned to look at his hand that had been pointing at us and moved it experimentally.

An extremely loud scream came from his tiny lungs that forced me and Jak to cover our ears. The new Daxter seemed to have recovered.

"I'm fine...I'm fine." He looked behind him and saw a tail.

He screamed again.