Chapter 10: Battle for the City Pt 1

Date: October 30, 3657 - midnight

Location: Outside Haven City

Jak and Daxter hadn't been asleep for any longer than two hours when their comm. units went off. "N-Nah…" Daxter groaned as he felt around the bed for the offending object and finally Daxter touched something and squeezed it. It was soft, not hard and that caused him to lift his hand away from the soft object, just as heard a moan come off from his sleeping friend and retch over her and grabbed the device. "What?" he groaned as he suddenly saw Torn's ugly mug. Ugh! It's too early to see this ugly bastard's face.

"Get your lazy asses up, NOW!" he yelled which caused Jak to suddenly sit straight up in bed.

"What's going on?" came her groggy question.

"We have a double invasion that's occurring." Torn growled

"Shoot that fucker!" came Jinx's distinctive voice in the background.

Both Jak and Daxter looked at each other before quickly grabbing their clothes. "We'll be at the base in ten." Daxter told the underground commander.

"Be faster!" came Tess' panicked voice.

"We've gotta get the kid to safety!" came a gruff voice in the background that neither Jak nor Daxter recognized.

"Look just get here," Torn said as he cut the link.

Daxter yawned. "Wonder who's attacking?" he said as he pulled his shirt on, which was followed by his boots.

"Daxter, where's my bra?" Jak asked which caused Daxter to cackle as he spotted the offending garment by the couch.

Picking it up, he threw it at her face. Jak caught it in mid-air and quickly put it and her blue tunic back on.

After racing to dress the two grabbed their weapons and ran out of their door only to come face to face with a combat stealthed metal head which Jak quickly took care of and beheaded the creature, at the same time Daxter switched his gun to blaster mode and began to shoot the stingers that were attacking the people left and right.

"M-Metal heads!?" Daxter yelled as he questioned what he was seeing with his very eyes. "Where's Sig when ya need him?"

"Dax!" Jak called out as a grunt went to just from a roof onto the red haired youth, when suddenly her dark self took over. The metal head was quickly disemboweled by the dark creatures long and deadly claws. Daxter turned towards his girl just in time to see her get splattered by the metal heads blood.

"Adriana, now's not time to play." He said as he watched her stalk towards him. The creature seemed to shake itself from its thoughts of molesting him and jumped about eight feet into the air and landed in front of Daxter in time to land onto another stealthed combat metal head. Upon killing it she gave him and nod and the two went of running through the streets of Haven City to the Underground base.

Commander Erol sneered at the Wastelander woman as she came at him with her sword and gave a double blast from his pistol to her face; the first one cracked her mask that she wore and the second one went through her skull and killed her instantly. To his right another Wastelander was struggling with a few grunts and saw a juice goon sneak up behind the fellow, but did nothing even as he heard the splatter of guts as the man was torn to pieces. "The palace is under attack!" he yelled into his comm. unit. "All patrols protect the Palace and the Baron."

"Delay that order!" came a feminine voice over all soldiers' comm. units. "Protect the city, get the defense systems up! That's an order soldiers!"

Erol snarled as his orders were ignored by the bitch Ashelin Praxis, the Baron's daughter had once again become his enemy and at this moment that was the wrong thing to be. So as he raced over to a KG zoomer bike he type in Ashelin's comm. unit and got a display on where she was located. Damn the repercussions on what he was about to do, but Ashelin Praxis had to die.

Damas had broken off from his men as they began to attack the KG and KG Elite forces enemas and headed directly to the Palace. Once inside the city he made his way through the farming district and made a beeline for the industrial sector that was near the Stadium. Once there he found one of the Palace support beams and was thankful that the elevator was still hooked up to the B zone side of eco grid. Once on the top of the support beam he had to cross the mile and a half of cables. Even with his channeling powers that would be a feat in and of itself. No time like the present. He thought as he began to make his way across the cables that supported the floating Palace of his ancestors.

The wind howled, and threatened to blow him off his rather precarious position. Not helping was the fact that the person who had designed these things had obviously never heard of a handy little device called handrails, meaning that at any moment, a wrong step would send him plummeting a good nine or so hundred feet to the ground where the battle for this city and its soul waged on. Still, the former King of Haven City pressed onward, making his way towards his goal, entertaining visions of Praxis' lifeblood staining his hands within his mind. His revenge was so close, finally Lidia's death would be avenged and his son's possible death would be avenged when he had Count Vegar and Councilman Kaedon's heads at his feet.

Jak, who'd regained control a few moments ago, and Daxter had arrived at the Underground base just in time to see two blue and gold uniformed soldiers kill off six metal heads by throwing a channeled yellow eco blast at the group. Channeler? She silently wondered.

"Blondie!" one of the two yelled. "What the fuck took ya so long?"

"Jinx?" she questions and if she could've seen the pyromaniacs look on his face at finally surprising the dark warrior, she'd probably would've hit him in the gut or something that was akin to that.

"Hehe…" he chuckled. "Surprised?"

The two newcomers looked at him with a looked that demanded him to explain,, but just as he was about to do just that Torn's voice came from the second armored man. "Bring the kid up." He ordered whoever he was talking to over the comm. unit that was built into his armor. Seconds later Tess came out, armored from head to toe in the same type of armor as the two men were in. "Take them to the Port and go to the metal head nest, Keira and the two Samos' will meet you there." Torn said as the green haired little boy ran up to Jak, who picked the little boy up. "And Jak," Torn said as he lifted the visor on his helmet. "Ensure his safety at all costs."

Jak looked down at the little boy, who looked up at her. "I will." She assured the commander of the Underground as she and Daxter took off in a sprint.

Torn sighed as he turned back towards the base, when suddenly he heard Ashelin's voice over his comm. system. "Can anybody hear me?" her usual calm and collected voice sounded panicked.

"Ashelin, this is Torn; what's going on?" he asked as he and his two companions waited for her reply.

Her answered was full of static which worried Torn. "…Erol's…..me….need hel-…at contructi….site." Torn cursed. "I…-peat…-ed….-elp" after that Torn couldn't life her on her device.

"Did she say construction site?" Tess asked as she began to think of where there was a construction operation going on.

"There are two sites." Jinx said. "One in the Stadium sector and the other is in the-"

"Industrial." Torn said as he looked at the other two. "You two head over to the one in the Stadium, I'll head to the Industrial sector near the Port." With that the group split up, their weapons ready for both Wastelander and Metal Heads.

Though you wouldn't be able to tell by looking at him, Damas was greatly relieved when he got off the cable, and just about every fiber of his being prayed that he would have an alternate route available once he had taken care of business, because he really had no desire to backtrack across that Precursor accursed thing again.

As quickly as he could, he slunk through the darkness, and upon touching a small device on his hip he vanished into the shadows as well as any professional assassin could. The former King had been preparing himself for this task for years, and knew the palace better than anybody in this city. As far as he had been able to reason, at this time of day Praxis would logically be in the throne room overseeing the battle plans and hoping to keep this city alive and he'd be alone.

It would hardly be a challenge.

Thus, imagine his amazement when he happened to wander by one of the large skylights that looked down upon the throne room, and beheld two, very, familiar figures standing inside.

As it turn out Count Vegar was also in the throne room giving his invaluable advice to Baron Praxis. "You need to protect the palace better." The count said. "There are catacombs below the palace that lead to the oldest Precursorean artifacts that we have yet to even gain access to." He paced back and forth. "You also need to send more soldiers-"

"ENOUGH!" Praxis yelled at the count which made the tiny man jump a few feet into the air in surprise. Praxis was always known for his temper, but yelling at him; a councilman, was a bit beyond what he had done so far. "I was a general before I was the Baron, or have you forgotten Counselor."

"Oh I remember just fine." Vegar sneered. "Just remember who put you in power."

The two men glared at each other and were about to say something else to each other when suddenly there was a cracking sound and then glass from above fell onto them. When both raised their heads they were surprised to see the former King Damas adorned in ancient Precursorean armor and in a blink of an eye Vegar's life ended abruptly as the former king of Haven City pulled out his sword and slashed the traitor's throat with a single swipe of his blade. He turned away from the count just as the wound splattered and sprayed blood onto the back of his cloak.

Praxis looked upon the Wasteland hardened man that was once his best friend and former king. "I've been waiting for you Damas." He muttered as he drew his green eco blade.

"You made the mistake of not killing me that night all those years ago." Damas growled. "However your biggest mistake was killing my wife and child." Damas threw his staff weapon to the side as Praxis threw his pistol to the side. The two men starred at each other for a moment and it was as if an invisible bell rang as they charged each other their blades clanging together.

Keira sprayed the advancing metal heads with her Vulcan mod on her pea-shooter and in minutes the submachine gun of the Vulcan began turning the flesh of the advancing metal heads into swiss cheese. Holes peppered even the largest of metal heads armor. She was running out of ammo though and her father and his younger self were only half way to the Lurker balloon with the Rift Rider. She'd been happy when her father told her that they were finally going to use the rider she'd built and because of Jinx and Vin she'd been able to find both the Heart of Mar and Time Map, both of which Jinx told her to never ask where he'd gotten them, because it may cost her, her life. So she didn't. She still couldn't believe how fast she'd gotten those two devices, after all it was only just this afternoon she'd told Jak she needed them.

Suddenly there was a click sound which caused Keira to look downwards and just as her father looked towards her to ask what the problem was she looked up at him in fear, before she threw down the weapon and snagged her heavy and large wrench that she carried in her pack and began smashing in stinger heads and killing the tiny metal head pups into bloody pulps, the grunts however were a bigger problem; even if there were only a few of them she wouldn't be able to kill them with her wrench.

That was when their saving grace came through the entrance of the Stadium in the form of two blue and gold armored people. A blast of channeled yellow eco came from the one with a grey slash across his chest, which killed two of the six grunts, when suddenly a half dozen metal head wasps began to swoop down towards her and her fathers. The second soldier threw a bright blue bolt of electricity through the air and like a chain reaction, when the bolt hit one; because of how close it was to its companions, the bolt went from one to the other and before the group of wasps could even form an attack they were burnt to a crisp and fell to the ground harmlessly.

Keira watched as the two armored people approached them, the one a bit girly in her run. "Keira!" came the recognizable voice of her friend Tess.

"Tess?" the mechanic questioned as she walked the gold visor lift and reveal the blonde underneath it. "You're a channeler?"

Tess giggled. "No, it's the suit; it channels the eco like a natural channeler would do." She explained and immediately Keira wanted to get her hands on the equipment and learn how it worked and how she could possibly make it even better.

"We have no time for this," Keira heard her father say as he and the younger Samos got onto the balloon. "You two get on the balloon with us, we may need the protection." Tess and Jinx gave a nod and as Keira got onto the balloon and was lifted in the air she got a shocking look at what was happening to Haven City.

If one was to look down upon the scene that was playing out in Haven City one would see both civilian and soldier alike fighting against their enemies; whether that enemy was a metal head or wastelander; it didn't matter. For once the city wasn't tearing itself apart in bloody battles, but helping one another in a fact for their lives against two different enemies.

As an underground soldier took out a metal head that was advancing her, behind her a yellow armored Elite soldier took a blast to the chest from a Wastelanders staff weapon, and as the soldier fell from the blast the underground agent attacked the desert dweller by throwing her body on top of his and began to crush the Wastelanders skull in with her only weapon, her empty gun. In the end both city and wasteland Elf began fighting each other, killing one another in an attempt to do what they thought they were supposed to do. No spoils of war would be left by daybreak, but still they'd fight for something they thought was worth the embrace of death.

It was in the middle of these battles that a single blue and golden armored man raced through the city to save the one he loved. Not wanting another death to a friend to be lost because of Praxis. Torn rushed down the quickest routes to the construction site that was in the industrial sector. As he passed the security gates to the site he heard another gunshot, but this one was from within the site. Lowering himself to the ground he stayed low and waited for either Ashelin or her enemy to reveal where they were.

Another shot, this one gave off a familiar double bucked shot that Ashelin's pistol gave off when it was close to being out of ammo. Cursing Torn dashed across the site, all the while staying as low to the ground as he could. It was when he saw Ashelin behind a spool of cable, she grabbing her right shoulder with her left hand and her right hand was holding a bleeding wound on her right outer thigh, but that wasn't what had his attention; it was the gun aimed right at her face by Commander Erol.

Torn could've cursed right there and then, but his training as a soldier had taught him to wait for the perfect moment. Lifting his rifle he sighted Erol in the crosshairs and saw his lips moving as he spoke to Ashelin. Torn was too far away to hear what he was saying; but he could see unshed tears about to fall from Ashelin's eyes. Just as he saw Erol's finger on the trigger twitch he let released the bullet from his sniper rifle and watched as Erol's body slumped to the ground, a hole in the side of his head the size of Torn's trigger finger, was the reason for the Commanders death.

Torn ran over to Ashelin and pulled out a green eco pack and began to rub it over her wounds. "Torn." She breathed as she recognized the armor he was wearing to be the Mar Empirical Soldier armor that he had worn in the days that King Damas Mar ruled the city.

"Everything's going to be okay Ash." He said as he finished cleaning up her wounds and watched as the green eco began to make the wounds smaller, until they'd vanish altogether.

Suddenly Ashelin grabbed his helmet and pulled his face to hers and kissed him. It'd been a long time since they'd done this, but she knew that with enemies everywhere now was not the time for a little rendezvous. "Let's go help our friends." She said after she broke the kiss. The look on Torn's face was definitely worth it. He had a half smile across his face, a bit of redness from a blush and his ears were tipped, one downwards and the other up halfway. Shaking his head he grabbed his helmet and followed Ashelin out of the construction site and left Erol's body behind.

Finally, Damas broke the blade lock with Praxis, and quickly ducked underneath his opponent's strike as it whooshed overhead. At the same time, he took advantage of the slowness that Praxis was finally letting show. The Tyrants armor was well made, and it held up to the assault as Damas channeled red eco and began to punch Praxis in the stomach, and with only a couple of grooves to show for his efforts, the armor was much thicker that Damas had originally thought. However, he was prepared for such an event, and quickly back flipped as Praxis' massive blade came back in, sailing neatly over it, while firing off another round from his hand as he channeler yellow eco. As before, it did little, if any, damage to the massive Tyrants armor, aside from making him all the more enraged.

Once more, Praxis leapt, cocking his massive weapon behind his head, before bringing it down with enough force that it probably would have hacked through the armor of an assault tank. However, with a roll, Damas was out of harm's way.

He charged back into the fray as Praxis readied his blade, bringing his own blade in from the side to strike against the ribcage of his foe. The weapon bounced off with little success, and he was forced to duck a vicious backhand that would have likely crushed his skull had it connected with the metal gauntlet. As it was, it gave him the perfect opportunity to draw first blood. He quickly jabbed upward with his blade, and smirked once more as it nailed Praxis in the armpit, drawing blood and tearing through flesh and began to spurt blood onto the red flooring that'd already been ruined by Vegar's cut throat.

Deciding that the time had come to further humiliate his foe, Damas jumped backward, before reaching down to his pack and acquiring some blue eco. Instantly, his movements speed increased, and he spent the next few seconds literally running circles around Praxis, laughing out loud as the tired Tyrant tried in vain to keep up with him. A blow came in, aimed at the back of the other elf's neck. The armor wasn't as thick at that point, thus, the blade was able to tear through and make an easy, tiny gash along the back of Praxis' neck.

Gripping his colossal blade as tightly as he could, Praxis' angry roar followed as he once again began to spin around, hoping that with the nearly ten total foot reach that he had with it that his foe might find himself within that range, and be taken care of. What he got instead was the ringing sensation of a few more slugs bouncing off of his heavy armor as Damas wisely retreated back out of range.

However, Damas had reached a decision, and thought that it was a good time to stop toying with his enemy and finish the job. As Praxis once again charged him, he assimilated a large amount of yellow eco, that caused his entire body to give off a steady illuminating glow and with a wicked, ear to ear grin, pointed his left hand at Praxis, who was too late as he realized what was about to happen. So as the energy beam caught him squarely in the chest, General Baron Praxis' life came to an abrupt end as he was sent ailing through the room and landed unceremoniously on the throne chair dead.

The stench of burnt flesh was heavy in the air as Damas strode over to where his enemy lay. Damas approached the dead body of his long ago friend and a small distant part mourned that something like this had to occur in order for him to free his people from this Tyrant's daily attacks and tortures.

So as King Damas turned on his heal he suddenly heard a rustling from the dead body and turned once again and saw that Praxis wasn't as dead as he thought. "I made the grandest weapon to kill the metal head leader…" he coughed up blood, "but even the smartest of men….know when you…build a weapon…" he gasped as his hand pressed a tiny red button of a device in his hand. "You always…make two." He said as his dying breath left his body.

Damas' eyes widened as he realized what this meant. Praxis had just armed a bomb and he didn't know where this bomb was or how big.

Jak held onto the little boy tightly, she had one hand around his waist that kept him held tightly to her body and a second hand around his head keeping him from seeing the blood and gore that was occurring. In front of her was Daxter; his blaster ready for anything that would come out and try and kill them. The only thing they've had to worry about were the metal heads, all the wastelanders and soldiers were fighting each other, so that kept them busy.

It was as they rounded a corner that a familiar wastelander spotted them. Sig saw the duo and was about to ignore them and go on with killing another KG soldier when he spotted the green haired little boy in Jak's arms, around the child's neck was a black cord and he'd bet everything he'd earned by working for Krew that attached to that cord was an amulet with the family of Mar symbol on it. Thus he blasted his last enemy and took off after the demon girl and her friend.

Jak never saw Sig, thus wasn't looking out for the wastelander as he trailed them to the Port. Once to the air train Jak sat the little boy down on the bench inside and closed the door, as she did so she spotted Sig; but didn't stop the door from shutting. If the brute of a wastelander wanted in to the transport, he would have to find another way in.

Daxter on the other hand pointed his gun at the soldier waiting in the air train and forced the pilot to gas the vehicle and drive it to the metal head leader's home in the Wasteland. Daxter kept his gun point at the pilot's head for the entire thirty minute ride, while Jak was resting and getting ready for a battle through the nest.

M-Angel: So instead of Kor killing Praxis or Jak doing it I had big Daddy do it in a revenge killing. So what did you guys think of that?

xoxoangii: Let us know your thoughts! See you guys in the Reviews :) and the next chapter!