Setting: Haven City slums

"Someone stop this crazy driver!" Sparx yelled as the cruiser sped through the slum section of the city. The three newcomers were literally hanging on for dear life as Jak kept swerving the cruiser left, right, up and down, narrowly avoiding colliding with traffic numerous times. Suddenly, a traffic jam of four zoomers appeared ahead which blocked their advance.

"Uh Jak," Spyro stuttered, "perhaps we should slow down instead of pulling another crazy move." He talked loudly as the flap of his cloak in the wind drowned out his voice.

Jak still heard him but gave a smirk, "Come on you guys, where's your sense of adventure?"

"We've had our fill of adventures back home thank you very much!" Cynder yelled as her cloak wipped in the wind as well. They were just about to run head on into the zoomer blockade in front of them, causing all of them to scream.

"JAAAKKK!" was heard from everyone in the car, including Daxter. Jak wasn't worried one bit and lurched the zoomer up, and rode along the walls before doing a loop which brought them back into the clear, leaving the traffic jam behind them and a clear shot to Dead Town.

Spyro was the first to pull his head up, and he immediately glared at Jak asking, "Do you drive all newbies across town like this?"

"You're actually the first," Jak said.

"Gee…there's a shock," groaned Sparx, who was clingling onto Spyro's tail for dear life. Cynder recollected herself as well before throwing her own argument, "After this is over, I'm walking on the ground, I'd rather take my chances flying myself and risk fighting the Krimzon guard, than flying around in one of these crazy machines with you at the controls!"

"Sheesh, you guys are worse than Daxter," Jak said.

"Yeah well I'm used to high speeds, newbs what can you do?," Daxter stated.

Jak just smirked and turned his attention toward a huge dome structure coming up the street. He instinctively picked up speed heading right for it. "Uhh…Jak…what are you?" Daxter asked nervously as they kept getting closer.

"Oh no, not again," whined Sparx.

"Jak, please not again," Spyro begged. Jak just shook his head and pulled off another move as he lurched upward again. Daxter yelled at the top of his lungs, "AAAAAHHHH!"

Jak flew over the structure and into an alley where he finally slowed the cruiser down and began landing right near a hole that was embedded near the city wall. Everyone breathed a side of relief now that the horror ride was over. Daxter immediately shot out, "Are you crazy?! Do you have to keep making reckless and dangerous maneuvers that are highly unnecessary?!"

Jak just grinned at his companion thinking, whose the newb now?

Upon settling on solid ground, Spyro asked, "Please refrain from doing that again, for all our sakes." Cynder and Sparx nodded their heads in agreement.

Jak just rolled his eyes and said, "Fine, since you're all new here I'll cut you a break, just don't expect everyone else too."

With that said he walked over to the hole and jumped down, followed by the dragons and dragonfly. In front of them was a large metal gate that was locked with some sort of gear mechanism. Cynder asked, "Is this the way to Dead Town?"

Jak replied, "Yes, these security locks keep everything from the outside locked out, but allow others to travel outside whenever necessary."

"Oh yeah that makes perfect sense, who would want to stay in the comfort of this metal dumpster, and instead travel outside where it's even more dangerous?" asked Sparx sarcastically.

"Ya got me," answered Daxter shrugging.

Jak and the dragons shook their heads at the duos complaining, and as they approached the gate, the gears started turning themselves preparing to open. The large metal gear lock slid up the crevice carved into the door, and with one 180 degree turn and a clank, the door opened and all five of them stepped inside. They stood in a small circular room made of metal waiting for the second door in front of them to open, until

BANG!

A loud noise sounded followed by a tremor, which made all five of them twitch uneasily, Daxter yelled, "What the heck was that?!"

"I don't know," Spyro answered, "Any thoughts Jak?"

"I'm afraid I'm at a loss," he replied to the sudden earthquake. Though while they were questioning what happened, the door finally opened and a bright light blinded them through the crack. "Hey, I thought it was nighttime," said Cynder.

"It was," replied Jak.

The light died down after a few moments and their surroundings became clear. The group looked out at a gloomy ruined section of Haven City, filled with ruined paths, broken pipes and destroyed buildings. Scars of wreckage littered the ground everyone, a solemn reminder of the battle that had wiped out this section.

"Dead town, the name surely fits," said Spyro.

"Yep" answered Jak.

"I bet it was beautiful before the fight," said Cynder.

"I doubt that," said Jak, "I hardly see anything in this city worth admiring." Cynder's face bore one of sympathy, his harsh comment made her wonder if there was anything positive about this world, if there was anything worth protecting, because according to Jak, it sure didn't sound like it.

"If you look clearly enough, I'm sure you can find one thing about this city that's worth protecting, because I still am," she said trying to boost his spirits. Jak just mumbled under his breath and kept walking straight down a ruined walkway, the dragons then noticed the entire place was swamped, water had risen in many places ruining many structures. They turned their heads, looking in every direction for any suspicious creatures, these 'metalheads' as the inhabitants called them.

"Everything looks clear," said Spyro.

"Looks can be misleading," said Jak. "I've learned that from dealing with these monsters."

Jak wasn't wrong, because at that very moment something suddenly appeared to surface from the ground, flying dirt everywhere. Something then erupted from below ground, a small, repulsive scorpion-like creature, with nine others soon following him, making a total of ten. Each of them had golden gems on their foreheads, and evil stares that sent a shiver down the heroes spines.

"Yikes!" cried Sparx.

"What are these things?" Cynder asked.

"Metalheads! Nail them!" Jak yelled as he immediately pulled out his blaster gun and started shooting. He fired two shots and two of the metalhead creatures immediately fell back. Spyro noticed that the golden gems attached to their foreheads popped out as they died. The others began moving toward them to attack, while Spyro lashed out with his tail knocking one away, and prepared to unleash a fire breath at them…but as he exhaled…nothing came out!

"I'm out of breath!" he cried in realization.

Cynder tried to throw a shadow breath, but the same results happened, all that came was a little mist, "me too! I don't get it!"

Spyro soon realized he and Cynder were both out of power, unable to use their elemental powers, but that wouldn't stop him, "We'll have to fight them the old fashioned way!"

He charged at them full force with his horns, knocking two metalheads into the murky water, drowning them. Jak kept firing his blaster, unfortunately he kept missing targets due to Spyro and Cynder constantly in his line of sight forcing him to shift his fire. Cynder lashed at a metalhead with her tail, causing it to shriek terribly as her tail blade cut off its scorpion stinger. She then jumped and drove the metalhead into the ground with all four feet, popping its gem out of place indicating it was dead. Spyro began to back up as three metalheads started to gang up on him. Suddenly, Jak jumped in front of Spyro and yelled, "Cover your ears!"

Spyro was confused, but did what he said. Jak transformed his gun from blaster to scatter gun, then pulled the trigger. A loud BOOM erupted as three gems fell to the ground and three metalheads were blown into the water. Spyro watched in astonishment at the firepower he just witnessed, Jak turned and said, "Scatter gun…takes out more than one."

"Uh…boys" they both heard Cynder say. The two of them turned to see Cynder surrounded by the final two. Jak immediately reequipped his blaster, and with two shots, they were dead.

"Thanks," said Cynder taking a breath.

"No problem," replied Jak, though he was confused about something, "What happened, why didn't you guys torch them or something like you did to the guard?"

"I'm afraid we're out of energy," Spyro explained, "our elemental breaths depend on a certain amount of our energy to use, and now I'm afraid were too weak now to use them."

Daxter asked, "But why now? You could do it before in jail."

"I'm not sure," Cynder said, "Perhaps going through the rift did something to us, and was slowly draining our energy away, we need a crystal to revitalize ourselves."

"Crystals? You mean eco crystals?" asked Jak.

"No, green mana crystals, they empower me and Spyro with magic so we can use our elemental breaths."

"Are you telling me until you guys get a recharge you can't fight?"

"We can fight hand to hand, we've handled problems without our elements before, we can do it again," said Spyro.

Jak pondered this for a moment and said, "I'd rather not take any chances, leave this to me, you guys stay here until I give the all clear." He took off down the path heading for a huge stone walkway sticking out of the water. Cynder and Spyro watched him move away, until Spyro broke the silence, "Sparx, you can come out now."

Sparx flew up from behind a rock and toward Spyro, "Well glad that's over, so these are metalheads huh?" he said eyeing the dead creatures. "Guess we're lucky they aren't as tough as they are ugly." Spyro didn't acknowledge his joke, and instead started heading towards Jak's direction.

Cynder asked, "Spyro, what are doing?"

"I'm going to help him."

"Spyro, come on man, relax," said Sparx, "he's a tough guy, he can take care of himself."

Spyro turned around with a serious look, "I don't care if I can't use my abilities, I'm going, I said I would repay him, and I will!"

He ripped open two holes in his cloak to expand his wings and took off after Jak in the air. Cynder watched him fly away, feeling concerned she decided to do the same, "Spyro, wait up! Your not going alone!"

Ripping two open holes in her cloak, she flew to follow him leaving Sparx alone, "Oh, why do I have to be stuck with the heroes who never rest?"

Jak was jumping from rock to rock across the contaminated lake and finally came to rest on a big land mass that was covered with dozens of scorpion metalheads. They started scurrying towards him ready to attack. Daxter yelled, "Blow em away Jak!"

Jak pulled out his gun and equipped it to the new Vulcan fury Torn had given him and let loose a barrage of machine gun shots which wiped out every one of the metalheads. Gems landed everywhere from the ammunition shower, indicating the job was done. Jak was picking them up until two grunt metalheads jumped down from a ledge connected to the land and immediately started running toward him. Before Jak could equip his gun to strike back, the two metalheads were knocked down by two flying streaks. The streaks turned out to be two dragons who had headbutted them right into the wall. The metalhead grunts growled at Spyro and Cynder, and got back on their feet and leaped into the air to pounce. Both dragons rolled out of the way to avoid their attack, leaving the two monsters to grab nothing. As soon as they landed, they swatted the metalheads away with their tails, stunning them. Then both of them leapt into the air and dove headfirst into them with a horn dive to finish them. Their gems popped out upon impact, showing they were dead. Spyro and Cynder smiled at each other with a nod of reassurance, then turned to Jak. He was actually quite impressed they had handled themselves so well hand to hand with the beasts. Sparx soon caught up and saw everything as well, but shrugged it off because it wasn't anything he hadn't already seen.

"So that's how dragons fight," said Daxter, "Sweet."

"Not bad huh?" replied Spyro.

"You guys can definitely fight," said Jak, "but though you seem to turn a blind eye when it comes to taking orders."

"Hey blue-boy," Cynder called Jak by his new nickname, "Just because we can't use our elements doesn't mean we're helpless, you would do well to remember that"

She finished her statement with a serious glare at Jak. He finally gave in and said, "Okay then, I'm done arguing with you guys."

He walked over to the ledge and climbed up, with the dragons and Sparx following. They walked along the path which led to the interior of a ruined building. Spyro noticed to the right a large base of stone standing in ruins, with vultures circling high above, almost like a symbol of death.

Cynder said, "This place is both creepy and dangerous."

Jak answered, "Well, it's really no different then the rest of the city. Save for the metalheads, Dead Town is just as sinister as any other part of the city."

Sparx entered the discussion, "After what we've experienced already, I can't argue with you."

They soon reached the ruins entrance, but before they could proceed any further, an group of grunts leaped down from above and screeched. As all five landed, they growled at the intruders with hungry glares, which Jak returned with a scowl before bringing his blaster back out ready to fight. Spyro noticed another new metalhead in the middle called a slinger, it was tall, with an ugly face which reminded him of the orcs from the Dark Army. It was also bipedal, standing on two legs and had long slender arms with long claws that appeared to be emitting some sort of dark magic. Spyro looked at the other four grunt metalheads clearly and thought they resembled the carvings he saw on the arch in the graveyard.

"What kind of metalhead is that?" Spyro asked Jak about the tall one.

Jak answered, "I'm not sure, I've never seen one like that, metalheads come in different sizes, shapes, and breeds."

"Whatever breed it is its going down like the rest!" Cynder shouted.

With an eerie screech, the slinger beckoned for the grunts to strike, which they responded by pouncing with claws drawn. Jak dove out of the way and knocked them away with the butt of his gun, trying to get some room to fire. Daxter was clinging to his partners shoulder as he fought. Spyro and Cynder engaged their attackers with their tails and claws and numerous melee attacks. Sparx was watching the whole battle while shaking from a safe place in the rafters. The fighters were fending pretty well, until the slinger screeched terribly, it's sound rattling Spyro and Cynder a bit. Spyro shook his head trying to clear it up and noticed the slinger was curling his arm back, and then let loose a dark energy bomb from his hand toward the two dragons. "Look out!" yelled Jak.

The bomb exploded right near them, sending out a shockwave which drove them right into a ruined wall, covering them with debris and ash as they were knocked unconscious. Jak cried, "NO!" as three metalheads approached to finish them off.

Sparx then swallowed his fear and flew to wreckage Spyro was buried under. "Come on man, wake up, I can't lose you now!"

Jak saw his friends in trouble, but he couldn't help, he was locked hand to hand with a grunt, while the slinger metalhead seemed to watch the struggle with delight. Jak thought he saw him smirk, and he felt nothing but rage and anger toward the vile beast. Daxter was clinging onto his bandanna, but then soon noticed Jak's muscles were tightening, his body was starting to shake, and his breathing was sounding much heavier.

"Huhh…huhh…Ahhhh….AHHHHH!"

Daxter jumped off him and headed for a protected spot and watched as his partner's skin changed from normal hue to a dark purple hue, his eyes turned black, and his nails grew longer and sharper. The grunt metalhead screamed as Jak tore his arms with his claws, leaving many ugly bleeding cuts. Daxter watched the transformation with horror, and Sparx noticed as well. Needless to say, both of them were completely stunned and afraid of what just happened. All the metalheads now turned their attention to their companion, who was now at the mercy of Dark Jak.

ninth chapter edited, and for first time readers, duh...duh...duuhhhh! Dark Jak makes his first appearance, how will Spyro and Cynder react to this? Keep reading!