Darker by the Day
By JakandTornSweetheart
Disclaimer: Oh how I wish….
Author's Note: For those of you who read the last few chapters and still don't exactly have a feel for where Keira lived, (and I can't believe I didn't explain this before; shame on me!) here's a description to help you out. I roughly mapped out Dead Town in my head, so the house is an actual place in the game. The building that they lived in can be seen from the beginning of Jak II but can't really be explored until the Titan Suit missions start. If I'm not mistaken, the building that you first barge into with the Titan Suit is their house, which means that it's to the left of the Dead Town entrance. I assumed that the area was not as flooded two years before and you could walk to that island. So can everyone picture it now? Hope so. Sorry for not explaining before. :D
Extra special thanks to Red Mage 04 and Silver-WindScar for helping me out. You guys are great.
Chapter 6
The New Recruit
TWO YEARS LATER…
Keira sat in her usual bunk in the Underground hideout, flipping through a briefing of her next undercover mission as the Stadium garage mechanic.
Torn stood over his own array of maps, blueprints, and mission objectives spread across the conference table in the center of the room. Only he was looking at Keira instead of going over his schematics.
If he looked close, he could still see remnants of the innocent and scared girl he had rescued two years ago. She looked and acted so much different now. Even though he had grown accustomed to the new Keira, he still awed at the transformation.
Her hair, all one length and so long that it brushed past her shoulders, appeared darker due to subtle black highlights. Both her ears had three silver loops in them, and her face was nearly the same, save for an angled scar down her left cheek. She wore her same white tank, but now added the short black army-style jacket that Torn had given her the day they started the Underground. Her midsection was bare, displaying a length of muscles that were more toned that most women's due to excessive use. Her long legs were crossed at the ankles. Her black pants hugged every curve and sported criss-crossing slashes to show off her smooth, muscled legs. Her boots made her feet sink into the mattress from their weight, but heavy boots were necessary for the wear and tear she put on them.
She also had the Underground symbol tattooed over her right shoulder blade. Another tattoo with markings that ying-yanged into the House of Mar symbol was on her lower back. There was one tattoo, one she wouldn't show to anyone, covered by a black arm band that both hid her tattoo and served as a symbol of remembrance for those who were slain in the attack on Dead Town.
Torn turned his attention to the papers before him. He tried to concentrate on mapping out an attack on the ammo dump in the KG fortress, but his mind just wouldn't stay focused. It had been two years since he and his men had started the Underground movement, and yet they weren't really any closer to taking down the Baron.
Sure, they had small victories like successfully defending parts of Haven against Metal Head attacks, and cleverly-place spies seemed to be their strongest weapon at the moment. But when it all added up, it wasn't much. Information gathering was either inaccurate or arrived too late to use. They kept losing men and gaining nothing from it. They seriously needed to catch a break. They needed a miracle.
This was one uphill battle that Torn wasn't sure would succeed. But for his parents, for everyone else that had died, he would fight it to the death.
At least he could try to protect Keira…
He couldn't bear to lose her.
In one swift movement, Keira lifted the tattered cloth that veiled her bunk and stood. Torn glanced at her and mentally prepared himself… because she looked none too happy.
With a grunt, she threw the briefing on the table. "What the hell is that Torn?"
Here we go…
"That's your mission briefing. Is there a problem?"
"Hell yes there's a problem! You're taking me out of the field! You know I don't mind doing undercover work, but this pansy-ass garage job is long term. Everything's coming to a peak, and you know it, but you're sticking me in a hole so I'm not involved at all." She placed both her hands flat on the table, mimicking his own posture. "I'm not doing it."
Torn tread carefully with his words. It would probably not be a good idea to piss her off more. "Keira, I'm not giving you this garage job to take you out of the loop. You were a mechanic before you were a soldier. This job requires you to be both."
He hesitated. He didn't dare tell her that he really was giving her his mission so he could protect her. The Slums hadn't had water for over a week, the Baron was overworking Vin at the Strip Mine to get more eco, and Ashelin was beginning to think that something big was about to go down. Things were building up, and he needed Keira to get out of the middle before she got hurt.
Instead, he said, "Besides, you're the best spy we've got, and Erol may be a bigger part of this than we originally thought. We need information out of him. You're our best option."
"He'll recognize me."
Torn smirked. "He won't. You look nothing the same as you did two years ago. There's no chance that he'll even give you a second look."
She stood, hands on hips, and narrowed her eyes at him. "You're being overprotective. I'm not a scared little girl anymore."
In a sudden outburst, he slammed his fist against the table. "I don't care if you're Wonder Woman, you're taking this mission!"
Her head was beginning to hurt from her frustration. She decided that her usual route of argument wasn't worth it if he was going to get that mad. She decided she was going to have to prove on her own time that she was worth her salt.
And as enticing as the idea of getting to use her mechanical expertise sounded, she felt too deep into the Underground cause to be so distant from the action at such a crucial point.
"You're taking the mission," he affirmed.
"On one condition."
"Keira…"
"Let me work regular missions on the night patrol. I'll be fine."
He hesitated, letting her think that he was actually considering such an insane request.
"I'll… be… fine. Torn, I joined the resistance for the same reasons you did. I need to be a part of this. I don't deserve to just sit back and watch it all happen."
Damn it. She was using that pitifully sad tone in her voice and her eyes glistened with forced tears. He knew it was a ploy. But it was a damn good one, because it worked. It always did.
"I'll try to find you something to do. But don't brush off this mission so easily. Get information out of Erol any way you can. Tess will take your place with the weapons and cargo. You can pick up where she leaves off at night. No buts. Now go!"
With a displeased grunt, she turned and left.
He let out a deep breath. Finally, he could get back to his plans.
Then a voice came over his earpiece communicator. "Torn, where are you?"
Damn it… It was Kor.
He touched the receiver in his ear to respond. "I'm at the Hideout. Why?"
"I've sent a young man your way. He wants to join our operation. I think you'll find him very… interesting."
Keira came down the stairs of the Hideout with smudges on her face and a greasy rag in her back pocket. She looked like a mechanic again.
She saw Torn smirk as he pretended not to notice her entrance.
She glared at him. "Don't say a damn word. I'm grabbing a shower before I go to South Town to work on the weapons." Her hand hovered over the hidden door in the wall before her shoulders slumped in defeat. "Shit… I was so tired I forgot we don't have water. Now I have to go all the way back to…"
"It's okay. The water's back on," he interrupted.
"What? How? Wait… don't even tell me. I'm too tired to think right now. I'll be back in ten minutes. You can tell me all about today then."
Fifteen minutes later, the hidden door slid open to reveal Keira towel-drying her hair. She carried her jacket and boots. The last inches of her pants legs bunched and dragged along in the dirt on the floor.
She tossed her clothes toward her bunk and leaned against the table next to him, her back to the scatter of papers he was looking at. "So… tell me how you managed to get the water back on."
Keeping his eyes on the map of the KG fortress, he replied, "We got a new recruit today. He's the one that caused all that commotion in Dead Town."
"I heard something like that. What happened?"
"The tower in the square… it… sorta collapsed."
Comprehension rang within her mind and towel nearly fell from her hands. "You sent him to get the banner, didn't you?"
He half shrugged. "I wanted to see what he could do. He looked promising. On my way to check on him, I got information from Ashelin about how to turn on the Slum's water, so I sent him to do that too."
"And?" she asked, not concerned with the water at all.
"I think he'll be an asset to the cause. He's… good. He took out the Metal Heads at the Pumping Station like they were nothing. If he lives through tomorrow, we'll have to get him one of your Morph Guns." As soon as he mentioned the Morph Gun, he wished he could stuff the words back in his mouth.
Kiera stiffened. "He's been here less than a day and you're already thinking about giving him a gun! It took me months to refine the gun prototype and all its artillery. I didn't make it so you could just hand them out to rookies when…" She stopped when she noticed his fierce glare and absentmindedly went back to drying her hair.
Her anger couldn't be helped. She had slaved for months over ways to manipulate the trace amounts of eco into usable artillery, and then a gun that was flexible enough to use them all. She was proud of her knowledge of the ancient motion, force, and fire ecos and worked night and day to make weapons on the chance that they would give the Underground an upper hand.
She considered it her greatest accomplishment and yet she had received littler more than a thanks and a pat on the back. Worse than that, Torn hardly gave her enough opportunities to use it, even though she held the records on all the gun courses.
It was just like Sandover. She would create the means and stand back while other people got to use them. There had to be something she could do that would make them all see. She was tired of standing back and watching.
When her hair was nearly dry, she tossed the towel toward her bunk. Her mind turned to something else.
"Whatddya mean if he lives through tomorrow?" she asked.
"He's good, Keira. Real good. Maybe too good. I don't trust him yet. Someone who knows how to fight like that might be a spy from the Baron, so I'm thinking about giving him the ammo dump mission." Torn studied the map of the KG Fortress.
"But I heard word that he killed a whole squad of Krimzon Guards."
"Killing a few guards is nothing to the Baron. You know that. The ammo is too valuable to the Baron for one of his spies to destroy. If he pulls this off, then I might let him take our payment to Krew. If he starts to give us information that's not bogus, then I won't have to kill him. Until then, I'll only give him the need-to-know info."
"You're really being careful, aren't you?"
"I can't risk a repeat of last time. New faces make me too nervous now."
Torn looked at Keira. She had a thoughtful expression on her face as she stared at the wall. She lightly chewed on her lower lip as she always did while she was thinking. Her hair was still damp and wavy with curls from being towel dried. That weird feeling started to seep into him again. Over these past two years, he had come to realize just how special Keira was. They had found out that she was from the distant past, that she probably invented zoomers, and that she was connected to the grand scheme of things somehow. She wasn't just any ordinary girl.
He had changed as well… or rather, something within him had. He didn't know where or how, but sometime down the line he had manifested feelings for Keira that were far from brotherly. He now felt for Keira what he used to feel for Ashelin. It confused him, and he ignored it as much as possible. He was devoted to Ashelin, and he got the feeling that she belonged to someone else, though he couldn't imagine who.
These feelings, he had decided, were just plain stupid and were not worth heeding. It was probably just stress anyway.
"He wants to meet the Shadow," Torn said.
Keira almost jumped at the sound of his voice. "Who? Oh… the new recruit. Why does he want to meet Samos?"
"Because he doesn't know his place, that's why. Really, I don't know. But he's adamant about it."
"I see…"
After a few moments in silence, he noticed her expression became more serious. She turned her face to his and, in a quiet voice, asked, "Are you coming with me tomorrow night?"
Ah yes… tomorrow would be two years to the day. No wonder she had been quieter than usual tonight.
In an equally quiet voice, he answered, "Yeah, sure. We'll go after you get back from the garage. You can afford to take an hour or two off before you start on the weapon upgrades. You can take the night off if you want."
"No… I need to work to get my mind off things after all that," she said. He half-smirked. Those words came from the Keira he knew. She stood, slipped on her boots and jacket, and grabbed the bag from under her bunk to leave.
"Keira."
"Yeah?"
"If Krew doesn't kill the new guy, he'll be contacting you for night missions. How's that for a new assignment?"
She smirked at him over her shoulder. "That'll do just fine. Thanks for caving in."
He smirked back. "Don't I always?"
To be continued…
Just a side note – when I describe Keira's short, black army jacket, think Mirai Trunk's (DBZ) jacket, only black and without the CC logo. That make sense?
Alright people! That's it for another chapter. I don't start my summer semester until May 30, so expect more updates until then. I don't know why I focused on Torn and Keira again for this chapter, but I promise there will be more from Jak's perspective from now on. I meant to include him in this chapter as well, but things don't always go as planned when I write.
Sorry for the wait in the update, but you know how busy I get with these college classes, and this last semester I had to take more hours. Sorry 'bout that! I'm back for a while, and only taking two classes, so I might be able to update throughout the summer. Here's hoping! Review please! - JATS
Special thanks to my reviewers!
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