A/N: I love my pet pyjak :D

Sara had been dreaming, of that she was sure. Dreaming what, though, she could not say. As the fog of sleep cleared her dreamscape faded, disappearing like smoke, and was instead replaced by an increasing panic as she felt a heavy weight pressing down on her chest. She gasped and her eyes snapped open, elbows shoving herself half upright as she came fully awake and stared at the wildly screeching pyjak that had launched itself from her chest and scampered away across her quarters in a similar state of panic. It perched on the back of her sofa chattering angrily at her.

Sara took a deep breath, huffed it out as she let herself flop backwards among her pillows. "Jak... You scared the crap out of me," she muttered, rubbing her palm over her face and waiting for her racing heart rate to settle down.

Jak gave an indignant squawk from the sofa.

"I'm sorry I scared you too, buddy," Sara replied as though the noises made sense to her. And they kind of did in a way.

Jak had escaped her cage within days of arriving aboard Tempest. Sara had discovered this by walking into Jaal's chosen quarters in the tech lab and finding the angara seated at his workbench staring quietly at the pyjak, who was crouched on the bench staring back as though in silent conversation with each other. It had been a bizarre sight to say the least. Jak had been roaming free ever since, but seemed to have decided Sara was her owner and would seek her out for food amongst other things.

Sara lifted her head enough to look at the pyjak and found her looking almost expectantly at her. "You're hungry, aren't you?" She asked. Jak merely blinked her huge black eyes in reply. Sara sighed and kicked the covers off herself, rolling out of bed with a wide yawn. She stretched her arms above her head, then let them fall back to her sides, padding across the room on bare feet to her desk chair where she had laid out her clothes the night before.

She wriggled into white cargos, long-sleeved initiative shirt and her well-worn hoody, stuffed her feet into boots and brushed and tied back her hair, then turned to Jak, who had been waiting patiently on the back of the sofa for her. Sara gave a fond smile. "Come on then, girl," she said, holding out her arm.

Jak gave an excited squawk and jumped off the sofa, scampered across the floor and threw herself up at Sara, climbing her arm to her shoulders where she settled down with one hand in Sara's raven hair, her long tail curled around the Pathfinder's neck like a scarf. Almost as soon as she had escaped her cage Jak had decided this perch was her favourite way to traverse the ship. Sara had been alarmed at first, initially believing she was under attack, but quickly decided she liked it too. It made her feel like a pirate.

They left her quarters and began heading towards the cargo bay, where Jak's cage was still stored, along with her food and water bottle. The ship felt empty and quiet and she realized Jak had woken her earlier than usual; everyone else was still asleep. "Thanks for that, Jak," she muttered. Jak wisely chose to remain quiet.

It wasn't entirely true though, she realized. Suvi or Kallo or both would be on the bridge and Cora, who didn't believe in sleeping even one minute longer than strictly necessary to maintain a healthy level of alertness, would probably be poking at her plants in the lab. But the others, the sensible members of her crew, would all be snuggled up in bed, blissfully unaware of the needs of screechy space monkeys.

As she neared the cargo bay Sara could hear muffled thudding and rattling, interspersed with occasional gruff grunts of exertion. It took her still-sleepy brain a moment to piece the noises together, as she realized Gil hadn't decided to work through his issues with Andromeda by whaling on the Nomad and it was, in fact, actually just someone working out on the punching bag.

"Sounds like you're gonna have company for breakfast," she told Jak, who merely twitched her tail in response.

She strode out onto the walkway above the cargo bay, heading towards the elevator platform that moved between the two decks. The Nomad took up most of the space in the middle of the bay, hulking white metal plates gleaming under the bright lights, and huge all-terrain tyres locked to the floor. Crates of equipment and supplies were strapped to the walls of the bay not leaving much space in between. She could see the punching bag rigged up outside Liam's chosen quarters, shuddering as Liam himself landed punch after punch against its surface. He had been there a while judging by the sheen of sweat that laced his bare torso.

Sara gave a low whistle as she descended on the elevator. "Now that's a much better wake-up call!" She teased.

Liam halted mid punch, placing both palms against the punch bag as it swung back towards him, and glanced her way, giving a wide grin in response. "Hey, Ryder!" He called. "Did Jak jump on you again?" He asked sympathetically, eyeing up the pyjak perched behind her head.

"Something like that," Sara inclined her head, making her way over towards Jak's cage as the pyjak squawked in apparent greeting at Liam. The cage was tucked away in a corner amongst their cargo, bolted to the floor and wall to keep it stationary while the Tempest travelled. The door was wired open so Jak could come and go as she pleased, much to the chagrin of Cora and Kallo, the former having once found Jak making a home amongst her precious plants, the latter simply being wary of an insatiably curious pyjak roaming free about his ship.

Liam chuckled, grabbing the towel he had dumped on the floor before starting his workout and drying himself off as Sara set about getting Jak's food ready.

"What're you doing up so early?" Sara asked him curiously, checking the water bottle wired to the door of Jak's cage. Seeing it almost full she moved on to the empty food bowl instead.

"You have to get up crazy early if you want to get in a workout before Cora," Liam said. He dropped the towel again, snatched up his T-shirt and pulled it on. "She hogs the equipment." He crossed the bay towards the Pathfinder and her pyjak.

Sara wrinkled her nose as Liam halted beside her. "You stink," she grumbled.

"Thank you, Ryder," Liam replied with a laugh. "I can always count on you to make me feel appreciated."

Sara flashed him an angelic smile, then crouched to set down a fresh dish of food on the floor. Jak dropped down from her shoulder to happily eat her breakfast.

"Mmmm, tasty freeze-dried bugs," Sara commented wryly. "Do you think she'd be happier if they were alive so she could hunt them?" She looked up at Liam worriedly.

Liam slowly raised one eyebrow. "I think she might like that, but do you really want to be chasing crickets around the ship?"

Sara grinned at him, rising up to her full height and looking back down at the feasting pyjak. "I guess not."

"Besides, she seems happy enough," Liam continued, gesturing to Jak. "She was bred in a cage, but you let her run around almost free. She's a science experiment but you don't treat her that way."

Sara laughed. "That's something Cora and Kallo regret me doing."

"They'll come around," Liam said, dropping to a crouch in front of Jak. "How could anyone resist that little face?" He scratched behind one of Jak's ears. Jak lifted her head to look at Liam briefly, long pointed tongue flicking out before she turned back to his food. Liam smiled and climbed back to his feet. His expression fell when he caught Sara giving him an odd look. "What?"

Sara reached out with one hand, patting his cheek affectionately, jabbing one finger of her other hand into his chest. "Don't ever change, Kosta. That's an order," she gave him a playful grin.

Liam laughed and pushed her away. "Yes, ma'am!"

The playfulness melted away to something akin to seriousness on Sara's face. "Really though," she said, leaning back against the crates behind herself. "The stuff we're facing every day is enough to harden the gentlest person. We need warm hearts like yours to keep us human."

Liam crossed his arms over his chest and leaned one shoulder against the crate beside Sara, watching her with an earnest expression on his face. Then the corners of his mouth twitched up in amusement. He fought the smile until he saw a smirk play across Sara's lips in response to his own.

"Too early for talk like that?" She asked.

"Yeah, something like that," he replied.

Sara gave a half laugh and pushed off from the crate, gesturing down at Jak. "Play with the space monkey, I'm getting coffee," she announced, already walking away.

"Yes, ma'am!" Liam called after her, chuckling to himself as he sat cross legged on the floor in front of Jak. He watched her go, then looked down at the pyjak. "Your mama's crazy," he whispered. Jak gave a soft chirrup which Liam took to be a sound of agreement.