THEMAKEROFLIGHT: weel hello again dear readers, I see you still havn't been reviewing, now in this I am going to finally tell you what that thing in the jungle is, and I assure you that these things are entirely my idea, although I have submitted some ideas for enemys and allies in jak5 to my friend in Naughty Dog, so if you see these creatures in any future Jak games, you can know that I thought of them first.

CHAPTER EIGHT: THE DEMON OF THE JUNGLE

The four adventurers met up some way to the north as the creatures footsteps receded to the south, they made their way back to the clearing they had been in when the thing attacked. And found Kleiver's body lying twisted and mangled on the ground, his face scarred and crisped by the dark eco on the beast's body, clearly dead. Keira didn't even try to revive him, the wounds of dark eco could not be healed by her gift, maybe the old gangster would have teken heart in the fact that at least one tear was shed for him, in whatever hell he woke up in.

They made their way further north, not speaking to each other, the memory of his corpse stuck in all their heads, Jak had witnessed death aplenty his whole life, he was sure he saw more people killed by the guards in the prison than he had by the metal-heads, but he still had never seen anything as horrifying as that. They came to a crossing, another island waiting for them just over the water, Jak went in first, looked around for anything that might fancy some hero stew, and called that it wa safe, Keira was hoisted onto his shoulder,and Maealan presumed to do the same to Karena, who hopped across the stream without even touching the water, smiling wryly at him from the opposite side. The young eagle captain stepped tentatively to the water, and was halfway across before he noticed a dark patch on the floor of the river, curiosity in his nature, he lowered hid head into the water to take a look, and jolted back up in surprise, his head quickly followed by a huge shark like creature with tentacles for fins. It leapt upon the man and strapped itself to his face, its suckers on the inside injecting something into him, dark eco.

Jak attempted to take aim with his blaster, but Maealan thrashed around in pain, the thing seemed to be growing larger with every second, Jak gave it up and jumped into the water, ripping the beast off the screaming mans face and dissapearing into the murky dapths, Karena crwled cautiosly towards Maealan and dragged him to shore. Keira just stared at the surface, waiting for her hero to emerege, a small bubble brock the stillness, then nothing.

Keira screamed, and tryied to jump in, she was sure she could still fell his life force, positive, but the other two pulled her out.

"There's nothing you can do Keira, he's gone." Said Maealan.

Keira looked bewildered, she was too distressed to talk, they didn't understand, she could feel him still alive down there, he needed help. The thre were too budy scuffling to notice him rising out of the water with the thignin his hand.

"Hey!" He shouted, making them all turn and stare. "D'you mind getting your hands off my wife and helping me out of here?"

The young future-queen laughed and practically jumped at him, making him sink back down a couple of feet. "OK you're making me sink here, you really need to go on a diet." He spluttered, and received a hearty slap for it.

four hours later

They had been walking for what seemed like days, and still hadn't found anything, Jak had had a short run in with another of the things that had attacked the transport in Shassa, but it was dealt with easily, and Keira healed his wounds. They were approaching a clearing, obscured by trees they couldn't see what was in it. They emerged from the shrubbery in awe, a massive facility stood in front of them, old precursor metal looking back at them. Each one cried in delight and Keira rushed in first, crying out for anyone who was in the vicinity to come out, and stopped in her tracks, bones cracked under her feet, skeletons hung off the wall on spikes, dark patches dotted all ovr them, each one bent back, mouths open in a never ending scream, there was something written on the wall in blood. It read, the demon creature has come, they are using the altar to awaken the dark two once again, we cannot get out, cannot, get, ou... Tears ran down her face, if she had been here she could have saved all these people, but they had all died the same death as Kleiver.

Jak sidled up beside her and put his arm around his young love, her form breaking down in his arms, he led her out of the room to the clearing, telling the others what had happened, they all despaired.

"Can we make it back to the transport, if we can get to Haven we can send troops in, there's obviously a large concentration of eco in the area, we need to take this land." Pointed out Maealan.

"No, this place is death to all who come here, I saw the Mamoron sign on the wall in there, if that country, in all its military and strategic power couldn't bring that thing down, then I doubt a city thats only just getting back on its feet can." Answered Jak.

"But we still may have to fight it to get to the ship, my dark poweres can take us some way, but after I don't have the strength to fly anymore, we're on the road walking again." Said Karena.

While the group debated on what to do two pairs of eyes were watching them from the trees, hidden from the explorers by more than shade.

"Well my sister, it seems we have found this hero sooner than expected, maybe we should just kill him now and be done with it." Said Gol.

"Well that would be practical,but we don't want to reveal ourselves just yet, and we havn't yet fully recovered from our long imprisonment, and besides, I see a beter way to get at him. The young girl, Samos's daughter isn't she, he cares for her obviously, I beleive we can make that work to our advantage, but we may as well send the demon creature to get them, just to test his power, and the other one, she claims to be the dark eco sage, a claim taken only by you my brother, we could send a tortured creature after her, do you think? said Maia.

"Very well then, but be quick about it, they have almost come to an agreement."

The arguement had finally been decided, Jak was to take keira and use light flight to get back to the ship, and Karena would use her dark flight to get there, while Maealan had already summoned his ragle, and would be using him to make it back.

Jak fired up his wings and watched as dark tendrils bagan to sread across Karena's, the tendrils grew in sizt to cover her spine entirely, then tey branched out and skin grew between them, forming the basis for the wings, and then it expandd to become over four eight feet from wingtip to wingtip, she turned around to catch Maealan looking at her in a rather sensous way, he quickly coughed and looked in the other direction. She smiled mischeviously, and made a mental note to be as teasing to him as possible.

Jak put his ear to the ground and listened, he could hear a melodic thumping, far off now, but coming closer every second, it was getting faster, he looked over to Maealan who was still waiting for his ragle to arrive, it wouldn't get there in time.

"NEVER MIND THE DAMN BIRD, KARENA, JUST TAKE HIM, WE GOTTA GO NOW!"

He grabbed Keira by the waist and hoisted her into his arms, not even letting her look down at what came out of the trees, Karena and Maealan only just got off the ground before a massive creature with foot long horns growing out of its head, claws glistening with dark eco, and long spikes growing out of it's spine took a swipe at where they had been, the entire earth shook with the strength of its roar, it grabbed a tree, uprooted it and hurled it at the flying people, it clipped Karena, making her drop Maealan, hie body fell through the trees and landed in front of a man, wreathed in shadow, but eyes shining bright blue in the faint light.

"Come with me, and the light shall guide you home." He siad, and Maealan did so, this was the kind of person you could trust, his body shone with a brilliance that the young man had never seen before whenever he passed into the light, Maealan had no doubt that this man was one of the creatures he had seen, excapt instead of being created from dark eco, he was forged from light, he was one of the beings from Dei Dailan Ok Eco, the land of eco.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: you all thought I was going to kill him didn't you, but I've already had my two compulsory deaths ( Kun and Kleiver ), so I wasn't going to do another only one chapter after the last, and for a full list of all the creatures I invented, check out my profile.