A/N: I got my system down straight and now you should see a chapter in this fan fiction at least once a week because I'm working hard on it in my study hall everyday. I don't own anything from Jak2. The only thing I own is Roxie and Merlander. Please R&R.
WRTD: Yes. Merlander will be in this fic a lot for now on. I'm not sure about romance, though. And I'm making it so that Roxie does not go out with Erol. She goes out with another guy later on in the fic. But thanks for the idea and for reviewing.
Chapter 11
Before Merlander had a chance to tell Erol why he was avoiding him so much, Daxter placed his foot wrong on the vine he was holding onto and fell. He grabbed another vine before he hit the ground and clung onto it like his life depended on it. The two guys looked up when they heard some noise and saw leaves fall and Roxie held her breath. She had to do something!
Roxie clinched her teeth together and straightened the hat on her head as her mind made up what to do. She got up slowly and started to climb a vine. It was slow moving because she did not want Erol or Merlander to see or hear her.
Daxter swore under his breath and started to slide down the vine to where Morph had turned into a red flower of some kind in a dangerous game of hid-and-go-seek. Daxter saw that the two were not looking his way and he let go of the vine with his hands, but still had a grip with his feet.
Roxie saw that Daxter was fine from where she was a few feet above the ground. She was out of earshot with the two guys, but she was not caring about them now. She had her eyes set on the bird above her head.
Daxter hung upside down and reached out with his hand for Morph. He grabbed the little shape shifter and quickly flew back up the vine with Morph firmly in his hands. He got back down to where Roxie and him had first been and Daxter soon realized Roxie was doing the thing he mostly told her not to do.
Roxie was doing something stupid.
"Don't tell me you're part of the Underground," Erol said to Merlander.
"What do you got against them?" Merlander asked with a hint of annoyance to his voice.
"They are like the big enemy to Baron Praxis!" Erol said while a fire of anger flew up in his eyes. "What do you have against the Baron?"
"Nothing!" Merlander shouted. "I just look at it on both sides. The Underground just wants a better Baron. Praxis is not stupid, but he is not fighting the Metal Heads very well right now."
There was a long silence between the two. Merlander kept his eyes down while Erol burned with anger. These two used to be friends. Was some simple war breaking the two apart? Was this war really that small? Were the two way too deep to get out?"
"So you are part of the Underground," Erol said with disgust and he spat the word "Underground" out like it was some gross bug in his mouth.
Merlander looked up with surprise and said, "No! I'm just confused now, that is all. I don't know what side to pick."
"If the Baron wasn't your uncle it would be easy to pick a side," Erol retorted.
"This is not about him!" Merlander yelled. "This is only about what I believe. Leave my uncle out of it!"
Daxter was not paying one ounce of attention to the two on the ground fighting. He had his eyes on Roxie way above his head inches away from getting her prize. Morph changed back to his real form and looked up with Daxter to Roxie and the bird.
Roxie blocked out the world around her. The only thing going around in her head was catching the bird. She was the little 8-year-old in her head and was not thinking like the teen she looked like.
She reached out her hand as slowly as she could and her tongue stoke out of her mouth in determination. A slight wind blew up and Roxie held on tight as it went past her. She did not want to fall this high up.
Roxie knew it was now or never. She snapped her hand out like a frog's tongue catching a fly, and she grabbed hold of the bird. Her quick move broke the branch she was on, and with a short scream of surprise she fell to the ground right in front of Erol and Merlander.
Daxter winced as he saw Roxie sitting on her butt with her eyes wide with surprise. The bird was still in her hands putting up a squawking fit over the whole thing. Daxter went into action and ran out of the vines he was behind and scooped up the wooden cage at Merlander's feet. He grabbed the bird from Roxie's hands and shoved it into the cage with a yell of triumph.
"That's the girl I was talking about!" Merlander said with a touch of glee to his voice. Maybe now Erol would believe him about the story he told him about a teen turning into the little girl they were after.
Erol stared at Roxie with his jaw dropped to the floor of the swamp. A ton of questions zipped through his head. Now that he saw her he could swear he saw her before.
"Wait!" Erol said. "You're the girl from the day before when your pet bit me!"
"Oh...gosh darn it!" Roxie said with a load of sarcasm to her voice. "I guess I'm busted." Daxter chuckled and set the cage on the floor to lend Roxie a hand. She stood up and wrinkled her nose at seeing her pants with a big mud stain.
"She turned into that girl we are after," Merlander said while pointing to Roxie and looking at Erol.
"It is rude to point, you know?" Roxie said while dusting herself off and whipping away the mud on her face with a rag from her pack on her belt. She stopped when she realized it was the same rag that Daxter cleaned himself off when he got covered with Metal Head blood.
"So now you're lying to me," Erol said to his friend while looking back and forth from Roxie to Merlander.
"No! I'm serious!" Merlander pleaded. "I saw her change into a little form that looked just like the girl we are after. And she still has that annoying talking pet from then too."
This got Erol's attention. All eyes flew over to Daxter and Erol finally realized who this girl really was.
"I thought I killed you!" Erol yelled over to her with anger burning in his eyes. He did not like it when his dead came back to life. And he was mad that he had never seen it when he was flirting with her. That whole time he could have just captured her and get it over with. The Baron was not going to be happy with him.
Roxie gave them a big smile and took off the pirate hat on her head as she did a deep bow.
"Roxie and Daxter, the two invincible friends ready to kick butt," Roxie introduced herself after her bow and gave them a wicked smile. She winked down to Daxter and the small bit of fear in him left. Roxie knew what she was doing. All he had to do was play along with her.
"How shall we kick your butts today?" Daxter asked and gave the two the same wicked smile as Roxie had on. "Should we throw fruit at you, or should we fake a death only someone as stupid as Erol can believe?"
"Or should I sick Daxter on you?" Roxie asked. "He packs a pretty good bite." She put her hands on her hips and waited for an answer.
Merlander frowned at the unpleasant memory of the day before when Daxter bit him. That little fur ball had a lot of spunk. Merlander glanced over to Erol to see his friend boiling with anger now. Merlander knew Erol had a short temper and a big ego problem. Right now he was about to explode.
"Get them," Erol ordered Merlander through clenched teeth. Merlander glanced over to Erol a bit too hesitant and Erol yelled, "Get them NOW!"
That was when Roxie moved. She picked up the cage with the bird and threw it to Daxter. Merlander ran up to her, and she ducked just in time as he jumped into the air in a flying kick.
Erol took off after Daxter and Daxter had no idea of how to defend himself. But Morph did. The little shape shifter turned himself into a fist and slammed into Erol's stomach and knocked the air out of him. He bent over gasping for air.
"Yeah!" Daxter cheered and gave the flying hand a high-five. "Maybe you are handy after all. No pun attended." Morph giggled then flew into a loop.
Merlander sprung off of a tree after missing Roxie and came back at her with a tight fist. Roxie crossed her arms in front of her face to defend herself and Merlander hit her arms instead of her face. The force threw Roxie to her butt and she quickly rammed her toe up into Merlander's chin.
Merlander backed off while rubbing his chin. Roxie got to her feet in a flash and came at Merlander now and was not playing defense anymore. Merlander planted his feet apart and crouched down then sprung up and grabbed a vine right as Roxie came at him. Roxie had to stop fast when she saw Merlander jump out of her way, and she almost lost her balance.
Merlander was now somewhere above her. Erol, Daxter, and Morph were now all gone. It was only her and Merlander and it looked like he was winning.
Suddenly a hand grabbed Roxie from behind and a vine went over her mouth so she could not scream. Roxie kicked all around but did not hit the person behind her. The person dragged her to a stone house that was in the middle of the swamp and was breaking down.
"Calm down," Merlander told her as he kept his grip on her firm. "I will not hurt you."
He let her go and she was knocked off balance and landed on her butt again and facing him. The look on her face told him that she was not scared but extremely mad. She looked up at him all flustered, and he gave her a weak smile.
"What do you want?" she asked while trying to get up. Merlander offered her a hand, but she turned it down with a cold glare.
"I'm in a group that is called 'Black Water'," Merlander said. "We are for the Baron and for the Underground. My only mission is to protect you from the Baron."
"So a bunch of tree huggers got together to form a team finally?" Roxie stated while putting her hands on her hips and looking at him with hard eyes. "Sorry, but I'm a true Underground person and I'm not switching over!" With that said, she tipped her hat to him and started to walk off.
"Wait!" Merlander called after her and ran to catch up. "We don't care where you stand. I don't care where you or anyone else stands. But my mission is to keep you out of harms way, from Erol, or any other Krimson Guard."
"Stop!" Roxie ordered while putting her arm out and stopped walking. Merlander had to quickly slam on the breaks to keep from ramming into her. "Listen," she said to him and he tried to hear something, but there was nothing to be heard.
"Those were the few silent seconds where I was caring about what you said," Roxie said with a nod of fake seriousness. "But now," she added while putting a hand on his shoulder, "I'm over it." She patted him on the shoulder then said, "Now you're getting on my nerves, tree hugger, so leave."
Merlander gave a heavy sigh and said, "I'm not going to leave. I'll just stick around and you will not know that I'm here."
"You know what?" Roxie asked while stepping out of the broken down house and into the swamp.
"What?"
"You're like a fly," Roxie answered with annoyance to her voice. Merlander chuckled and followed her. "I just want to catch you in my hands and...and..." she was now getting ahead of herself. She curled her hand into a ball and started to pound it with her other hand. "Squish you!"
"I beat it would be very refreshing for you," Merlander said calmly with a faint smile on his face. He followed her till they got to a batch of green peach-like fruit on a bush.
"I wonder where Daxter and Erol are," Roxie said while picking a fruit and giving it to Merlander. She picked up one herself. Suddenly there was a loud yell that echoed around the swamp. Roxie dropped her fruit in surprise and her and Merlander took off after the noise.
"Oh yeah!" Roxie could hear Daxter cheer. She came up and saw that Erol had his back to her and Merlander and was stuck in quicksand. Daxter had led him into it. He was doing a victory dance on the other side of the sand with Morph doing loops in the air. The cage with the bird was next to them.
"Get me out of here, rat!" Erol shouted.
"Talk to the left," Daxter said while putting his left paw/hand up to Erol, "Because you ain't right!" He smiled to Morph and they both gave each other a high-five again. "How cool was that one?" he asked Morph with a nod and Morph returned it with an over dramatic one. Erol had not seen the two behind him yet. Roxie looked up at Merlander to see that he was trying to hold down a chuckle.
"Okay, I got another one for you," Daxter said with a giant smile. Erol narrowed his eyes at him and growled. "Talk to the palm because you ain't the bomb!" Daxter said then spotted Roxie. "Got to go," he said then stopped and added, "And do take some anger management classes because you really need 'em." He then ran off to join Roxie.
"Guess you need to get your friend out of the there," Roxie said with a sticky smile and ran off with Daxter and the bird. Morph zipped up to Merlander and looked into his eyes with a chirp of glee.
Before Merlander could react to the flying creature in his face, Daxter came back and grabbed him while scolding, "Get over here you flying pink Jell-O, or I just might think about eating you for dinner because I'm real hungry."
Merlander could hear Roxie shout to him, "Stop thinking about your stomach, Dax! We got to take the bird back to Mod and return Morph. Get your butt over here!" Daxter quickly ran away to make the girl happy. Merlander now knew where to find them. Mod's place.
Merlander shook his head and turned toward Erol. He would have to put his mission to protect Roxie aside and help Erol. Even though the two were not good friends anymore Merlander could not just let Erol die.
Merlander came up to Erol with a small hint of a smile on his lips. Erol looked up at him and frowned. He was not in a happy mood.
"Well?" he asked.
"Well...what?" Merlander said in response.
"Get me out of here!" Erol yelled.
"What's the magic word?" Merlander asked with the smile on his face widening.
"Shut up!" Erol said with anger, "Before I..."
"What are you going to do?" Merlander asked. "Hit me? You're stuck, waist deep, in quicksand. Could it hurt to say please?"
"Fine!" Erol yelled. He looked away and crossed his arms while muttering, "Please get me out."
"Can't hear you!" Merlander said with a laugh. For years Erol had always been better at everything and Merlander was just the run-of-the-mill kind of guy. He could not help himself to have just a little bit of payback.
"Please get me out!" Erol shouted.
"Okay," Merlander said with a shrug. In two seconds he got Erol out. It was easier with Erol than Daxter because Erol was not that deep down in it and he was not sinking so fast.
"Where is the girl?" Erol asked the second Merlander got him free.
"She ran away," Merlander said with a bit of fake anger. "Here is some fruit," he said while giving the fruit he picked earlier to Erol. He wasn't hungry enough to eat it.
Erol looked at it and asked, "Where did you get this?"
"When I was running after Roxie I gave up because she was so far ahead of me and found it on a bush on my way back here," Merlander said with a shrug.
"Okay then," Erol said. "Thanks." He crunched into the fruit and swallowed the sweet taste. They both walked silently to the muddy land. Erol started to sway a bit like he was drunk and Merlander caught him before he hit the ground.
"Stars!" Erol exclaimed faintly while pointing weakly to the air in front of him and Merlander gave him a strange glance.
"Are you okay?" Merlander asked him. Then Erol's eyes rolled back and he passed out in Merlander's arms. Merlander struggled under the weight of his friend. "Oh, crap!" he muttered to himself while dragging Erol across the mud to the metal door. It opened for him and Merlander stepped in.
"Wake up," Merlander ordered to Erol with a heavy sigh. Erol did nothing and Merlander looked to the fruit he held in his hands and shook his head. "Knock-out fruit, should have know if it was coming from an Underground."
Merlander dragged Erol out into the slums and put him next to a building. He got out his communicator and called for someone to pick Erol up. "Now on to Mod's," Merlander said to himself with a slight sly smile on his face. He put his helmet on and ran up to a zoomer. He turned the keys and flew off on his way to where Roxie and Daxter were heading.
A/N: Long chapter! Love them! Sorry if I miss a review. I only had time to do one. I had a long day so I want to go to sleep. Please give a review!