I don't own Jak. Sorries.

Vacation or War- Return
Chapter Twenty- Gotta, Wanna

Heat. An electrical snap in the air that made it tough to sit still. Music pounding at her ears, making her body desperate to move with the pulse.

A crowded dance floor. Flashing lights and the smell of people. Jumping with the beat, shaking her head and letting her hair fall over bear shoulders, a scandalously short skirt giving her freedom; shame and fear nonexistent.

Who cared if they saw? Would they be tempted? She hoped so.

Louder. The music kept getting louder. Who was she dancing with? Hands on her hips, sliding on her stomach, following the pulse, bumping lips against her ear and making her heart direct the music with urgency.

So many people, but who was this? Man or woman? Big hands, it had to be a man.

The smell changed. She'd zeroed in on him.

A daring hand on her skirt; he didn't have to reach far for it.

It was too hot. Too loud. She had to get away from the dance. The lights made her dizzy.

His other hand had slid up as the first sat firmly over the thigh, picking at the hem of the skirt. His touch made her more vulnerable to the heat. She was swooning, leaning on him, as the music continued to play her like a puppet on strings.

The other people might as well have vanished, present but forgotten. Fingers on both hands brushed near the forbidden, temptation making her whimper.

The sparks in the air, crackling like short bursts of lighting as she softly murmured her want, tilting her head back and questing for a kiss. Surely he'd be willing?

Another nibble to her ear, further along the upper ridge. A coy chuckle that asked her to speak her wishes more clearly; describe her lust with greater fidelity. Fingertips on her thigh traced the very boundary of the taboo.

Too much noise to think. Too much heat to speak properly.

She was reduced to begging.

"Please..."

Loor awoke to the realization that she'd fallen asleep with her head next to one of the speakers she'd gotten for her computer. After the movie she'd switched the media center to play all of her music on shuffle and loop; some techy beat that would have been easily ignorable at a distance getting pumped into her ear. Attempting to lift up and away gave her another realization on the morning.

Jak had fallen asleep on the bed with her. How exactly her head had ended up on the desk, she hadn't a clue, but he was holding her around the middle with his chin hooked over her shoulder, effectively keeping her still when she attempted any sort of movement.

His hands, though placed most innocently on her stomach, brought back the dream she'd been having in great detail.

The heat she'd felt in the fantasy, the snap of electrical sparks, were too familiar to be mistaken. Lyra... what did I tell you about messing around up there?

And since when have I ever cared for your rules? The animal was giggling, and Loor could practically see her grinning from ear to fuzzy ear. You're practically defenseless when you're sleeping, I'd be a fool not to take advantage.

Do you even know how this feels? Loor growled slightly as she made another attempt at moving, wrenching free of Jak's body after several efforts and sitting up to look back at him. Moving made the odd effects of the dream all the more obvious; she felt a hot knot in her stomach that beat with her heart, making her want to either curl up to hide or nurse it like a toothache.

It only hurts because you're trying to ignore it.

She sighed, her eyes only now registering that Jak was still serenely asleep. He'd laid out on his side, likely with her in arms, at some late point in the night. How long it had been was anyone's guess, but it was lucky that she'd woken up before anyone came to check on her. He was in plain view; too easily seen if anyone had just walked into her room.

And her parents were due back that afternoon; Ann was sure to check in and make sure she was awake for Mom and Dad's arrival back home to help them get all their things inside.

With all these pending things, she'd reached out a hand to shake him. He needed to wake up and move to a better hiding place; the sooner he did the less she would have to worry. All she had to do was wake him up and tell him to move; he'd playfully argue a little, but he understood how much trouble she'd get in for having a guy in her room.

Sighing slightly, she instead tucked a strand of blond-green hair behind his ear, watching quietly. It was interesting to see him like this; no disasters, no world about to meet it's doom. Just a few pillows and possibly a dream. He was completely relaxed, a hint of a smile on his face. She wanted to lean down and leave a kiss on his forehead before settling in next to him again, but she only got through the first part of the motion before she was reminded she had to move him.

She wished she was as old as she looked. She wished she were actually an adult, instead of a kid in big-girl clothes. She felt so small next to him, and not just physically. Oh, he was bigger than her in pretty much every muscular dimension, and had a few inches up on her height-wise, but he was also pretty mature. He'd made the decision to come after her. He didn't even need all the facts before he'd decided that. What had she decided? To hide under a rock until it was safe. Back in Haven she'd done nothing but clung to him, too unsure to do anything else.

She was only confident when she had all the information. Was that really confidence?

She blinked, first noting that she was still playing with his hair, and second that all this negativity sounded a lot like moping, and Daxter would have never stood for that. Shaking her head she figured if she was going to give herself a lecture for being indecisive, she might as well do something instead of sitting up in bed playing with Jak's mop.

She moved, and the heavy and hot stone in her stomach throbbed a reminder; her body was literally begging for attention. This distracted her from whatever plan of action she'd been thinking of, but she wouldn't let it stop her. Instead she rolled over to get to the edge of the bed and stand up, looking up at her digital stereo clock.

Five in the morning. She'd slept all of two hours, maybe three. You suck.

If you'd listen to me, we wouldn't be having these difficulties.

Listen to you? It was her turn to laugh, though it was little more than an irritated and unbelieving snort as she moved for her door; she had an idea. If I listened to you, God only knows how much trouble I'd be in.

Trouble... but that's the fun kind of trouble. Admit it, you were enjoying that little flight of fancy I gave you.

Lyra's voice let off into a purr that led Loor's mind into another sensory bath; in a moment she felt something invasive and intimate, and just as quickly it was gone, leaving her surprised and pining. What was the animal doing to her? Toying with her senses... This isn't fair...

Fair? Hm... I suppose not, but since when do I care? A full laugh came now, and Loor noticed she'd stopped in her doorway when her mind had been so rudely taken. Moving quickly she stepped through the door and shut it behind her, taking a quick turn to her right to face another door.

The door to her sister's room. She knocked first, and then opened it when there was no answer.

Ann, of course, was fast asleep at this ungodly hour. She was nearly face-down in her lime green pillows, matching bedspread messy but effectively wrapped around her person. The floor of the room was pretty clean but there was a desk near the door with a chair overflowing with odds and ends. The shelves were occupied with two things; dragon statuettes and books, and there was a great many of both. Picking her way into the room, Loor clambered onto her sister's bed and gave Ann a light shake to the shoulder.

She reacted with a light groan, but woke up quickly. At first dull blue eyes went searching for the clock, but the answer to that unspoken question led her to look up at her younger sister with a frown on her face. "...What?"

"I have a friend who wants to come over, and I wanted to know if it was okay." Lauren did her best to look pleading; this was actually not that uncommon. She had a lot of friends with a lot of family issues, and her house generally played safe haven to those who needed it. Usually it was incredibly late instead of incredibly early, but sudden requests for a friend to stay at the house was not out of the ordinary.

Ann only took a moment to think about it before nodding a little. "Should be alright... tell Mom and Dad when they call... anyone I know?"

"Not really; kinda a new friend."

"Kinda... right... well just keep it down... I need sleep."

"No worries." She nodded with a smile on her face, ready to hop off of her sister's bed and move on to something else with a renewed happy energy.

"Hey." Ann's voice caused a hiccup in that feeling.

"Hm?" She looked back to her big sister, eyebrows raised while staying placid.

"I... saw you put all your Jak stuff in storage. I didn't mean to snoop, but your walls were blank and I just kinda... the box was right there..." Ann actually moved to sit the rest of the way up, stretching her arms up over her head for a moment before grabbing her little sister and pulling her into a gentle hug. "Are you sure you're okay? I mean... it's just kinda strange for you to suddenly abandon something you loved so much."

Lauren nodded slightly, not struggling against her sister's hold. Instead she sat there, even leaning back a bit when she spoke. "It all... just seemed a bit childish to me all of the sudden. I'm sure I'll come back to it soon enough, but with all that's been going on... all that stuff seemed pretty stupid."

"Sometimes it's the stupid stuff that lets us vent all the stress we get from the real stuff." Ann suggested. "You... don't have to grow up all of the sudden. You're still a kid."

Lauren blinked, and then let a laugh out. Not one of her rueful snorts; instead the short bark of a laugh that indicated that she'd been thinking some similar things of late. "I don't feel like a kid anymore... but at the same time I do. Like... when I know what's going on, I feel like an adult, but when I don't I feel like a toddler... and I don't like feeling that way. I want to feel big and sure of myself and worry less about whether or not I'm doing the right thing. I just wanna do stuff and know it's right, even if I don't have all the facts."

"You're always gonna worry." Ann's tone sounded like a warning of disappointment. "As you get older, you never worry less. I thought it would get easier as I got older too, but it didn't... And I had to grow up all at once, taking care of you and Paul."

Loor felt a pang of guilt; Ann was right. She'd been forced to make that maturity jump when they were all kids; for the first ten years of her own life their dad had always been working, so Ann was forced to be Mom's counterpart. It was rare that all three siblings felt on the same level, but Ann had always been the most put-upon.

It wasn't the same as physically skipping three years and spending a month in a war-zone, but Lauren suddenly felt she had no reason to complain about how messy her own mental state was at the moment.

"Be a kid while you got the chance." Ann advised, giving her sister one more squeeze before releasing her. "You don't get to come back after that. Things just keep piling up, and before you know it you've got the whole world on your shoulders."

Loor sat still a moment more, not moving off the bed just yet even though Ann was sending all the signals that she was ready for their conversation to be over. She'd never thought that someone in her family might be able to relate to how she currently felt, even in the most remote way. The very concept that her sister knew at least a little of what she was going through led her to ask a question.

"What if you need to grow up? What if you got a good reason, even if no one else can understand it?"

"You got something worse than two kid-siblings and an only-home-on-the-weekends dad?" There was a challenge in Ann's voice. "I got to help out while you were still in the terrible-twos stage."

Some serious consideration might have gone into Loor's answer, but she decided it better not to engage her sister in a 'who had it worse' fight for fear of letting slip just how much shit she'd gone through. "Not worse. Just important. To me."

"Sounds kinda like you're already past the point of no return..."

"Yeah... it's been feeling like that."

"In that case..." Ann sighed, as if that's what she'd been fearing. "Don't fight it. You'll just make it worse for yourself. Understand what you gotta do, and do it. Then, whenever you got a second to breathe, do what you want, and don't waste any time about it. Losing time and looking back, having the regret that you didn't use the time when you had it, it's shitty."

Lauren had to blink and look back at her sister; Ann tried not to swear around her. Something about her being the baby of the family or something, but she always tried to watch her mouth around her.

The two made eye-contact, and Lauren felt it; Ann still saw her as the baby sister, but not necessarily as a child.

"I don't know what happened to you." Ann admitted. "But you've caught up... just whatever you're doing, lose the contacts. As cool as they are, they don't make you look any older. You just look like some crazy anime fan."

Again Lauren blinked, but this was for the fact that she wasn't wearing contacts. Her sister thought her natural color was artificial; and what else should she have thought? It was a psychological blind-spot; people didn't have eyes like what she'd gotten with the dark eco treatments.

Ann snickered, smiling as her sister was momentarily dumbfounded. "I saw the case in the bathroom. You thought I wouldn't notice? I'm sure Mom and Dad have seen 'em by now too. Where'd you get the money for them? Are the comfortable?"

"Comfortable enough." She finally got back with it, cracking a smile. "Early birthday gift from Damian, though I don't know where he got them. Anyway, I should call my friend back and let him know he can come over."

"He?" Ann got a sly smile. "And it's not Damian? I didn't know you associated with guys besides him."

"A few." She shrugged, scooting to the end of the bed and standing up. "Sleep well."

"Oh yeah..." Ann nodded, flopping back to her pillows. "Sleep. Almost forgot."

Lauren let out a long sigh when she got out of her sister's room and shut the door, leaning on the wall between the rooms. She hadn't expected Ann to be so full of ready advice, but the fact still stood.

Do what you gotta, then what you wanna... and don't wait.

So what do you wanna do?

Me? Lauren turned to her own room, a slight bounce in her step. You'll see.

The Author's Corner

It has been two months since I've updated... and there is no excuse. None. I won't make any. Here's the new chapter; let's get on with it, eh?

I love you all for sticking with this story despite my shameless delays.

-Loor