Wow... it's been a year and a half since I posted the last chapter. Heh. Forgive me, I get sidetracked by college and life and other such things. Anyway, seeing as Jak 3 is now out and all, this is very Alternate Universe. Heck, it was to begin with. Anyway, on with the show!
I've obviously slept through all the greetings, 'cause no one's fawning over Jak's overwhelming alive-ness. In fact, if anything, most of the group seems rather... cold. Sig and Tess are chattin' it up while she mixes drinks, but everyone else stays remarkably quiet. Guess they're still pissed off...
Especially Keira. She's not even looking at Jak, and he doesn't seem to know what to make of it. Finally, after who-knows-HOW-many years she's changed her clothes, showin' even more skin than before. While I can certainly appreciate the view - that girl's got some dangerous curves, baby! - it worries me at the same time... She's even started tattooing her ears! Jeez! What, has she started her teenage rebellion late or somethin'!
"Now that everyone's CONCIOUS," Samos barks, "let's begin."
"Okay." Jak takes a deep breath. "Here goes."
---
"That place is where the Metal Heads have been congregating," our guide said sourly. "The Wasteland's nearly empty, 'cause they're all flocking HERE." He turned to Jak and I. "Now, my payment?"
Jak handed him the three orbs. "We should be able to reach there by nightfall, right?"
"Not with those Metal Heads swarmin' around. You're stocked up on ammo?"
"Of course."
"What a waste. You're just gonna die anyway." The guy sighed. "Well, it was nice knowin' ya. Thanks for your help, and may the Precursors have mercy on you."
"Well, isn't HE the optimistic one," I sneered as he abandoned us for the relative safety of the camp. "Psshaww. He don't know our track record! We're unbeatable!"
The broken terrain leadin' up to the Precursor Palace made us wish sorely for our zoomer, which had croaked not too long before. We made do with the hoverboard, though- in fact, Jak had a heck of a good time catchin' air off random boulders further on. Still, we approached with as much caution as we could muster. The Wastelanders had been absolutely TERRIFED of this place, and it would have to be something major to scare those nutjobs.
By the time twilight fell, we'd reached the palace without encountering a single Metal Head. Now, of course, in tense situations like this I have to keep my cool, 'cause Jak? Pshaw! The guy dissolves under pressure!
"I can feel them watching me!" I hissed. Jak jumped at the sound - I stand VERY close to his ear, after all - and I hadta grab his hair to stay on my perch. He shot me a dirty look, then turned back to his examination of the palace doors.
The place reminded me most of the Forbidden Jungle temple, wayyy back from our Sandover days, only... bigger, shinier, grander in every way possible. It loomed hundreds of feet into the air, towering over the Wasteland peaks that surrounded it, reflecting the last few rays of the setting sun. It had surprised the heck outta us, 'cause when we were first approaching we'd thought it WAS a mountatin. Precursor metal, after all, is practically the color of dirt, and the shimmering heat of the deep Wasteland had completely disguised the place. It wasn't visible at night, either - unlike previous Precursor crap we'd seen, it had no exterior lighting. I'd be willing to bet the Naughty Ottsel that we were the first ones to stand before its dark and gloomy gate in centuries. The silence was eerie. Cliched, I know, but true. It felt like we were standing before a tomb.
Then again, in a way, we were.
EXTRA CORN POINTS!
"We need blue eco to open this door," Jak said, quite suddenly, and this time I jumped.
"JEEZ! A little warning next time!" I huffed, scanning the landscape for any sign of Metal Head-ness. "Y'know, this is downright creepy! Where're all those monsters the guide was talkin' about!"
"I don't know... But I don't think they're inside the palace. This seems to be the only way in, and it's still locked." Jak furrowed his brow. "I wonder if Metal Heads could channel eco... Well, in any case, there's no sense in stopping for the night now. We've got one heck of a shelter here, so we might as well use it."
"So we look for some blue eco?"
"Yeah." Jak laughed. "Just like the good ol' days."
The eco vent was easy to spot in the moonlight, and I suppose that put us at ease. Just me an' Jak, findin' eco and opening Precursor doors, not a Metal Head in sight. It was the first time we'd actually SEEN any color of eco but dark since Sandover- heck, it was the first time we'd seen an eco vent in almost three years!
By the time we raced inside the palace, Jak crackling with blue energy, we'd all but forgotten our guide's warnings of imminent death. How could anyone blame us? It was like we were kids again! We'd been tired and ready to call it a night, but now there was no way we could sleep. We traversed floating Precursor platforms, leapt over bottomless pits, carefully timed swims across electrified moats...
And then, quite suddenly, we were there.
The passageway opened up into a circular hall, lined with pillars, the ceiling fading into darkness overhead. The shadows were broken only by a small, softly glowing pool in the centre. The pool itself was bubbling gently, shimmering with a pearlescent light...
White eco.
"It's beautiful," Jak breathed, taking a single, reverent, cautious step forward. His words echoed throughout the sanctum.
"HOLY MOTHER OF MAR, WE ACTUALLY FOUND IT!" I shrieked- err, rather, yelled - bouncing on Jak's shoulder like a sugar-high schoolgirl - uhh, I MEANT, like the STUDLY BEAST I AM.
Jak took another step foward. The eco flared up in response, its light bouncing and refracting off the Precursor metal adorning the hall, eventually illuminating various carvings and hieroglyphs etched into the walls.
"C'mon, Jak! Get out the spy fly! If THIS ain't worth draining the batteries, then I don't know WHAT is!" I raced out to the edge of the pool and struck a pose. "HURRY UP, JAK!"
He laughed and reached into his pack. We'd been saving the spy fly for either grand events or dire emergencies, 'cause the rusted piece o' scrap had seen better times. "Yeah, I think this is definately worthy." He pushed a button and tossed the thing into the air. It came to life with a grinding whirr, sand choking the gears, and began to circle us.
"HEY! YO! WHO'S THERE!" I yelled.
"Ehhh... What? Daxter? Jak? Where ARE you?" A sleepy Keira happened to be standing watch over the transmission equipment.
"Remeber that light we told you about, sweetcakes?" I grinned while Jak rolled his eyes, "that white light?"
"Well, yeah. What, did you guys find the source?"
"Sort of! TURN ON THE VIDEO FEED!" A small, sputtering LED came to life on the fly, but it was Keira's gasp that REALLY let us know the video'd been activated.
"That's - you - you actually FOUND white eco, and in pure form! You didn't have to meld anything!"
"Nope! The 'Daxter Goes Live' TV special is about to start! Gather your friends AND relatives, ladies and gentlement, for this truly MOMENTOUS occassion! And don't forget to stop by the Naughty Ottsel for the party afterwards! Warning: I'm not wearing any pants! Buy war bonds!" I smirked, saluted, then turned to the pool, crouching, pouncing -
"WAIT, DAX!"
I froze at Keira's urgency, teetered on the edge, and almost fell uncerimoniously into the vat before Jak grabbed my tail. He looked up at the spy fly, annoyed and confused. "What?"
"Let me get my father... eco THAT concentrated could be fatal!"
"If dark eco didn't kill him, then why the heck would WHITE?"
"Ahhh, don't worry 'bout it, Jak," I drawled, absently buffing the leather of my gloves. "I do love an audience!"
"Give me a second, I'll go wake up Daddy..."
Jak sighed.
---
Keira suddenly stands up, knocking her drink over, looking anywhere but at Jak as she interupts his recap. "I just remembered, I didn't turn off the gas to my welder! I need to go turn it off before someone lights a match! Sorry!" She backs up a few steps as she talks, then turns tail and jogs straight out the door.
Jak looks to me, utterly bewildered, raising both eyebrows and scrunching up his left eye while his mouth twitches ever so slightly - "What the hell was that?" in Mute!Jakspeak.
DAMMIT, KEIRA, you're the OBVIOUS LOVE INTREST! You're not SUPPOSED to do things like this! Blondie's alive, all is well, you're supposed to be clingin' to him like a freakin' barnacle! Ughhh... guess Dax has to save the day. I do that a lot, y'know.
"Jak, you keep on yappin' an' I'll go fetch yer eye candy!" I wink. Everyone groans in exasperation whilst I resolutely follow Keira out the door.
---
The spy fly gently touched down on a block near the pool, powering down to save what was left of its batteries. Jak and I took turns skipping rocks over the eco (which, by the way, really didn't work too well). We discovered that, if you stare at it long enough, white eco's bright enough to burn into your cornea and leave you seein' neon-colored spots. We'd begun to nod off (due to the the excitement of counting random pebbles on the floor, no doubt) when the fly sputtered back to life.
"Jak? Daxter?"
Our heads snapped towards the fly. "What?"
"...Daddy says he has no idea." We groaned in unison before she continued. "He says to go ahead anyway-"
"-because Daxter can't possibly get any WORSE!" Samos finished with a growl.
I twitched. "You're just jealous that I'm gonna be taller than you again, gramps!"
"Daxter..."
I turned to Jak, alarmed by the urgency of his whisper. He was looking up. I followed suit.
Hundreds of Metal Heads were crawling down the walls. Hundreds of 'em. Oh yeah... I suppose that White Eco stream would have had to pop out of the temple somewhere. Great. By the time Jak grabbed his gun, they had us surrounded. Pinchers clicking, antennae waiving, mouths salivating... They began to close in like some kind of dark shadow, pressing and heavy, forcing us to back away. Jak's eyebrows forrowed together as his eyes darted madly around the room, searching for something, ANYTHING that could help us - but Metal Heads coated every available surface. There was nothing save a pebble or two left at our feet. His breathing grew ragged as he fully realized just how much trouble we were in. We didn't have enough ammo left for even half of them, and that was if every bullet yielded a kill shot. The panic spread slowly but surely across Jak's face, and the sick yellow glow from the advancing creeps' skull gems did the same.
"Jak..." Keira's voice whispered from the fly.
He slipped on the edge of the vat, forgetting about the pit behind us, and the Metal Heads pressed forward eagerly at this sign of weakness. He gained footing almost immediately and began to empty rounds into the mass of enemies, piercing our ears with both their death screeches and the shots of the gun. The eager ones backed off again, but only to prepare for a running leap... One slipped on a lucky pebble and tumbled straight past us into the vat, slipping underneath the pearly surface with hardly a ripple.
It didn't come back out.
Jak fired madly into the swarm as blobs of Dark Eco seeped into his body. Several of the lesser creatures sprang upon him- startled at their courage he dropped the gun, grabbing blindly- and one tried to latch onto his face. He pried that one off, taking in ragged, panicked breaths, and when he saw the Metal Heads drawing ever closer his eyes flashed black. With a primal roar, he became the monster the Baron had always meant him to be- savagely powerful and frighteningly sane.
"Hold on," Dark Jak grunted. I barely had time to react before he leapt into the air and crashed the palm of his hand to the ground. Waves of cold purple energy followed cracks that rippled from the site, almost in slow motion, but they didn't spread nearly far enough. A few of the Metal Heads shoving their way forward had makeshift weapons of their own. They tossed aside the underlings blasted back into the crowd like so many rag dolls, took careful aim, and fired nearly in unison upon Dark Jak.
The explosion of yellow Metal Head energy knocked me clean off Jak's shoulder. I arced into the air, my mind racing - grab something, break your fall, hold onto Jak- but a split second later my tiny Ottsel body glanced off a cracked chunk of Precursor tile. I landed on the floor with a not-so-soft thud just in time to watch Dark Jak fall backwards, arms trailing limp at his sides, into the White Eco pool. He, too, made only the tiniest of ripples as he slipped beneath the liquid.
"Jak! JAK!" I quickly righted myself, only to be tossed aside as a floor tile flipped up underneath the weight of a Metal Head's claws. They clustered around the pool, making strange noises and acting as though even the light of the Eco was painful. They obviously wanted to make certain Jak was dead.
Seconds ticked by... nothing happened. The heavy breathing of the Metal Heads masked my own, but they seemed too wary to close in any further. The surface of the pool remained calm, cool; my heart beat faster as the Metal Heads grew more impatient. I'd been thrown some distance so I slowly, surely crawled my way back through the monsters' legs to the edge of the vat. Unfourtunately, although none of them noticed me, I noticed too late that my tail was dragging across some Metal Head toes. They twitched, they twitched again, and then out of reflex kicked out -
- and tossed me straight over the pool. My vision filled with glaring, brilliant white as I neared the Eco- will I turn human? Will they murder me as soon as I do? Will I ever get to snuggle in Tess's cleavage again!
Before I could react, two shining white arms reached out and caught me.
Light Jak burst out of the pool just before I hit the surface, splashing the nearest Metal Heads with White Eco. Their shrieks of pain quickly gave way to the roar of air as I realized that we hadn't only jumped, we were flying. Jak held me tightly to his chest as beat his strange, tendril-wings faster, picking up speed, leaving the horrors of the Palace behind.
We burst out the top of the highest tower, and as I looked below I realized a small stream of Eco had followed us. It too burst from the opening and pierced the sky with light, and in a daze I thought so that's how it happened.
I looked back to Light Jak. He was slowing down, tiring, flying back towards the Wastelander camp. His breathing sped up as his wingbeats grew more laboured. Jak was nearly translucent - I swore I could see the moon through his body - and he was beautiful, glowing with the unearthly light of the White Eco. That glow began to wane as he tired, and Light Jak started to descend from the incredible height we'd reached.
Suddenly his light left completely; it shattered into a thousand, fading pearls, and we fell.
---
"Keira! Gadget-girl! What's the deal? Wait up!"
By the time I catch up to her, tears are streaming down Keira's face. She quickly wipes them away before glancing back at me. "Leave me alone, Daxter."
"To HECK with that!" I leap on her shoulder totally unannounced, but to my surprise she doesn't flick me away. "I mean, I'm sure us showin' up is a shock and all, but aren't you the least bit happy we're back? Alive? Kickin'? Or, rather, aren't you glad Jak's back?"
"I..." She looks at the ground. "Of course I am..."
I frown. "Then why the CRAP are you running away?"
"It's..." For a second, she seems to be ready to spill the beans. But then she glances at me, and her eyes turn to steel. Sigh, I can never get anything outta her when she's like this... "Listen, Daxter, I've got to go turn off that gas tank. I won't be long, my garage isn't far."
She gives me a light push, and grudgingly I leap off her shoulder. "Fine! You wanna play it that way! Well, I'M not going to tell you about any of OUR adventures in the Wastelands! SO THERE!" I mean, can you believe the nerve of this girl! Yeesh. I righteously snort, turn around, and start walking back to my bar.
I saunter in just as Jak is finishing up the tale - how the Wastelanders saw the light in the sky and, expecting a meteorite or some crap, found Jak and I instead. Jak was more than half dead, and I was hardly better. Falling from the sky like a sack of bricks will do that to ya. I'm still not quite sure why the Wastelanders bothered to nurse us back to health. They'd warned us. We went anyway and had suffered the consequences, and in their opinion anything that could no longer earn its keep was to be tossed into the desert and forgotten.
I suspect the ladies couldn't bear the thought of a world without Daxter!
"So," Jak concludes, "as soon as I was able to walk we packed up and came back."
Samos strokes his beard thoughtfully. "Interesting..."
"That doesn't make any sense. We killed their leader. They have no unity. All the Metal Heads around here are dying off from the in-fighting," Torn growls.
"And, uhm, why would they be after that Light Eco?" Tess frowns, scrunching up one eye as she does, her voluptuous chest lightly rising and falling with her bre-
"OW!" I glare at Jak, who'd smacked me when he noticed my eyes dipping down ever further.
"I don't know," the big guy says, ignoring me completely. "They seemed to want it, very very badly. They're just too stupid to know how to get it. When we showed up they didn't jump us right away. They were probably waiting to see if we could do anything with it..."
Torn scowls. It's his default expression, though, so take it as you will. "What do you expect us to do about it?"
"Well..." Jak leans back on his bar stool, tilting his head to the ceiling. "I was thinking we should get that eco out of there, before they do."
"I don't think that's possible right now, Jak." Samos's little bird cocks its head, and the geezer taps his fingers the gnarled wood staff he always carries around. "You see, our forces are spread rather... thin."
My sidekick lifts an eyebrow.
"There's an army of lurkers approaching from the north," Sig grunts, nearly spilling his drink as he gestures wildly. "Nothin's been able to hold them back so far, and they should reach Haven City within the week."
Jak and I stare at him disbelievingly. "Lurkers? You guys are having trouble with LURKERS? Yeesh! We were taking out those things when we were kids, and the ones around THESE days seem to have developed an extra "love love hug" gene!" I pat Jak reassuringly on the head. "Well, aren't you glad we're back, then. This'll be like taking candy from a Hiphog."
"You don't understand, Daxter." Ashelin's eyes pierce me like a knife, and I shrink back. She lifts up her right hand. I hadn't previously noticed that it was covered in bandages. She begins to unravel them and my mind wanders, thinking it would be much nicer if she'd be peeling off certain other pieces of clothing...
Jak's gasp snaps me back to reality. Ashelin's arm is covered in painful-looking purplish burns, which only reminds me of-
"Dark Eco?" Jak says, bewildered. "Was that caused by..."
She silently wraps her arm back up. "I went north to check out the rumors myself. They're... they're not really Lurkers anymore. They're mutated, twisted..." Ashelin shook her head as if trying to clear her thoughts. "I ran into one at our northern waystation. The place had already been destroyed, I'd found what was left of our guards there. This Lurker was injured, apparently left behind to die by the rest of the group. It surprised me and managed to grab my arm before I got a shot off. Didn't hold me for long, though," she says darkly, and I wonder how much was left of that poor creature when she was done with it.
Then, suddenly, it clicks.
Haven City is in Big Trouble. Coincidentally, its saviour has returned.
My precious White Eco is stuck the opposite end of the map, surrounded by thousands of Metal Heads and hundreds of miles of wasteland.
I'm not getting changed back anytime soon.