Miss.Ecofreak: zzzzzzz... oh, back already? Well I'll better give you a new (hopefullybetter than chapter 8) chapter then

Answer to Thee Slushee: Yeah. I really hope it doesn't take that long to update again... er... whatever. Reading the reviews I almost got confused thought since everyone comes asking for chapter 9 and while under the reviewers name it says chapter 9, since the intro was uploaded as a chapter of its own but that's how the story goes:) I gotta tell you I didn't like the way chapter 8 turned out either so you're not alone, the jokes was an emergency case which tends to appear when I get writers block (most of these jokes are deleted though, but this time I got sick of waiting so I let some stay)

Zakura: enough talking. Let's get back to the flut-flutranch!

Miss.Ecofreak: right. You guys remember the flut-flut-ranch from Growing up? Well as almost everything else in GRowing Up the flut-fluts were created as characters for this story (at least the birds Spot, Phoenix and Tiny Blue. Spike was created a bit later) But I am also intruducing a new character.

I have this hobby of sketching Jak and Daxter-characters as animals, since they are a lot easier to sketch than elves. I sketched Jak as an ottsel and a pretty cool dragon, and my own character Cornelius I often sketched as a wolf dog (as in Brother Dork)
I really liked his wolf dog form though, so I created it as an own character, changed it into female and put it in this story as Kura the wolf dog, she has the same colors in her fur as Cornelius' hair but that doesn't mean they're related!

CHAPTER 9

RETURN TO THE FLUT-FLUT-RANCH

Daxter

It felt a bit funny to wake up to almost pitch black darkness instead of daylight, at first when I woke up I didn't really remember where I was.

But then I remembered why I was out here in the desert, and I remembered the dream I had in my sleep.

Just then I got a coconut in my head.

I looked up to see Tetra smirking at me.
"Are you awake?" she asked.

"I was awake! No need to throw things at me" I snarled.

I turned around to see Shara sitting by a fire; she had obviously been awake for some time.

"Want some breakfast?" she asked. "I have roasted coconuts and water. You don't have to eat it thought" she added as she saw the look on my face. "I know someone who lives nearby so we can probably get some real breakfast at their house".

"Who in their right mind would live in the middle of the desert?" Jak asked drowsily, he didn't exactly look like he had gotten a moment sleep; then again this is what he usually looks in the morning ever since our adventures in Haven started.

"Well… he has this certain hobby which isn't really easy to work with in the city" Shara said as she threw water over the bonfire. "The city is too small for him".

I noticed she wasn't looking at Jak; she was probably still a bit shaken by what happened earlier.

We packed up quite quickly since we didn't have a lot to pack.

And then we headed out to the desert by the light of a flashlight Tetra had brought.

For once, Tanya didn't act so cocky.

"What was that?" she said at almost every time we heard a small sound, usually it was lizards, or even the sound of our own footsteps, one time she flew of from Shara's shoulder and got startled by the sound of her own wings.

I wanted to throw a cutting remark, but Jak held his hand in front of my mouth before I got to say something.

"Leave her alone, she's upset enough as it is" he said.

"Oh, so now she's upset huh?" I said. "She didn't exactly offer me a lot of compassion when I was looking for you",

"Fine, go ahead" Jak said rolling his eyes.

But just as I was about to open my mouth again, Shara shouted "There it is!"

I was hardly able to see what she meant in the darkness, but then I saw some torches scattered around a large enclosure, in the middle of it was a couple of houses, and close to those houses I noticed some animals.

"Woah" Jak said. "Daxter? Do you see what that is?"

"No, how am I supposed to see anything in this darkness?" I asked.

Then I heard a loud screech from the animals down at the farm.

I had heard that sound before, and it was not easily forgotten.

"Oh my. Flut-fluts" I said.

"That's right. My friend raises flut-fluts" Shara said. "They need a lot of space, so he couldn't build his farm in the city."

"Are you sure it's alright to come by this late at night?" I asked.

"Of course. As long as the birds are still outside it's a sign the elves living there are awake too" Shara said. "They rarely go to sleep until like 3.00 am anyway".

She quickly started running down the hill, obviously she couldn't get to the birds quick enough, Tanya and Tetra followed.

"Maybe this isn't such a good idea" I said.

"Aw come on Dax, not all flut-fluts are as annoying as Chici" Jak said.

Chici was a flut-flut I knew back in Sandover, a crazy chick who of some reason thought I was an adult flut. (It's the same you see in Jak and Daxter. I just needed a name for her)

"I don't feel like taking any chances" I muttered. "Who knows? Maybe they're aggressive?"

"You're such a chicken (ironic choice of words)" Jak said.

I glared at him for a moment.

"Is that Dark Jak talking now or is it okay to bite your ear?" I asked.

"That's my real opinion, but my dark side agrees so please let go of my left ear" Jak said.

He had become quite good at separating his own thoughts from Dark Jak's over the night, the only annoying thing was that this gave him the chance at saying all the jokes he wanted to say to me before he learned to talk.

So we went down to the flut-flut farm where Shara was waiting by the stables.

"What took you so long?" she asked, as if she had been waiting for hours.

"Don't mind her. She always gets inpatient when she's by the flut-fluts" Tanya said.

Shara didn't hear her; she just opened the door to the stable.

"Charles? It's me, Shara, are you ho...? Oh hi"

At first I thought she had found the guy she was shouting for but as she backed out from the stable door, what came out was a small light blue flut-flut.

"Is it just me or did has the flut-fluts grown smaller over the past two hundred years?" I asked.

"Of course not. This is Tiny Blue; he's a miniature flut-flut, the smallest flut in the world" Shara said. "Say hi to Jak and Daxter Tiny".

Every thought about Tiny Blue being as annoying as Chici disappeared when he shrieked and ran inside.

"What's gotten into him?" Tetra asked. "Usually he can't leave strangers alone. Don't worry ottsel-boy, he's a nice flut"

"Gee, that's great" I muttered.

"Shara! I thought I hear your voice"

I turned around and saw a man walking towards us carrying a large bag of flut-flut-pellets and closely followed by a wolf dog (yup. Wolf dog. I really love wolves so I decided to make this one a hybrid, besides; there are already a lot of hybrids in the Jak and Daxter-world)

Jak wasn't slow on putting on Crocket's lead as he saw this dog.

"Hi Charles, long time no see" Shara said.

"It sure is. I haven't seen you in months. Hard times in the underground?" the man asked.

"Yeah. I'm just glad that's over" Shara said. "By the way, I brought some new friends over, this is Jak and Daxter".

"Well what do you know? Celebrities on my ranch, what an honor" Charles said. "My name is Charles Elfin, and this little puppy here is Kura" (Zakura: last four letters of my name!)

"Is that a puppy?" I asked.

The dog was a bit higher than Crocket, and I knew (although Tess often called him pup) he was an adult.

"She's only six months old. Although she probably won't be as tall as her father who's a wild wolf I'm sure she'll grow bigger than this" Charles explained.

"Hey wait a minute" Jak said. "You said your last name was Elfin, like…"
"Yes. Errol Elfin is unfortunately my nephew. But he's sort of the black sheep of the family" Charles said. "He had a rough childhood".

"I can't really picture Errol as a child anyway" I muttered. "I feel sorry for his family".

"Ehm, maybe we should go inside? We've been walking a lot today and haven't eaten yet" Shara said.

"It's always nice to have guests" Charles said. "Just go inside, I'll go feed the birds and then I'll come with you".

"Do you think Shara changed the subject for a reason?" I whispered to Jak as we walked towards the house.

"I don't know. You're the conversations-expert" Jak said. "But she did seem a bit upset when you mentioned Errol's family. I wonder why?"

Miss.Ecofreak: yeah, wonder why.

Zakura: maybe its because his brother was her best friend?

Miss.Ecofreak: yup. And hey! I found the best of news today!

Zakura: what? You're going to get a chinchilla?

Miss.Ecofreak: no. I looked around on the internet as I figured out a new Ratchet and Clank game was coming, not that I'm very interested in R&C since I unfortunately hasn't played it yet but out of pure curiousity I checked out new playstation games in general and guess what I found?

Zakura: Naruto?

Miss.Ecofreak: no... well I've seen that too, but frankly they don't sound to interesting. What I found was a game titled JakX combat driving! They're coming back! And there's a new game for Daxter coming on PSP as well, reason enough in itself to get myself a PSP

Zakura: sure, buy a PSP only because of one game... But back on topic. please review or this story will end here.

Miss.Ecofreak: No it won't! But review anyway.