Chapter 15: Save the Environment!
Music: Zero Percent by My Chemical Romance
'I don't like being alone
Burn up these streets
Turn up the stereo
Synthetic animals like me never have a home
I'm not the one you will be walking through'
Mood: Elated!
Disclaimer: Writers lie, just like your parents!
"Finally, we get to see the Shadow!" Daxter said as we pulled into the alleyway that the hideout was in. "What do you got to do around here to get noticed?"
Katie and Torn were waiting inside the door, standing shoulder to shoulder, arms crossed, blocking off whatever was behind them. "The Shadow has decided it's time to meet you." Torn said, eyeing us both up and down. "Don't know why."
Katie smacked his shoulder, smiling, "Shut up, Torn, they deserve it!"
"Why is that place in the old ruins so important to you?" Jak asked, getting in Torn's face a little.
"There's a powerful energy force at the old house. The Metal Heads are drawn to it." Power source, huh? Well, I guess 'Ol Samos was a Sage. That's got to leave some sort of Power Residue. I thought to myself.
Daxter stood up on his tip-toes on Jak's shoulder, trying to see in between Torn and Katie to see what was behind them.
"No kidding? We used to know the guy that lived there." Jak trailed off. I wound my arm around his waist in comfort.
"So, you're the new recruits who keep getting into trouble." A man with white hair, a moustache and a moss covered log on top of his head said. Was that…?
"Oh no, not you!" Daxter said, grabbing his face in distress.
"Welcome to our humble Underground movement." Samos said warmly. "I am known as the Shadow, but you may call me Samos. And you are?"
"Sheesh Jak, we went through all that to meet his holiness, ol' log on the head, grandpa green?"
"Samos?" I questioned, walking forward slowly.
"Don't you know who we are?" Jak asked, putting his hand on his chest slowly. I could see the pained confusion in his eyes. I wound our hands together, sqeezing.
"Sorry kids... never seen you before... and I never forget a face... especially one that ugly." He said, pointing at Daxter. "Or hair that pointy," He pointed at me. "Or someone who looked that angry." He turned to Jak.
"So it begins..." Daxter said with a heavy, irritated sigh.
"Man," I complained loudly, running my hand through my hair. "Why is everybody pointing out my hair lately? It's not that spiky." I heard Katie giggle and Torn growl in irritation.
"It kind of is," Daxter said, jumping on my shoulder and warily pressing his paw down on my hair.
"How is this possible?" Jak asked, not getting distracted by my hair problems. "We came through the rift with you..." He paused, "into the future... right?"
"Yeah!" Daxter agreed. "You used to look older than dirt and uglier than a knotted stump." I smacked hi head because Torn was glaring at us. "What gives? Did you get a little nip and tuck while we were gone?"
"Listen," Samos snapped." I don't know what kind of twigs you've been chewing on, but I don't have time for this. We've got a Baron to overthrow, two children to protect, an invasion of Metal Heads to stop, and a city to save. I'd say the schedule's pretty full!" He stopped before saying reasonably. "Besides, I haven't gone through any rifts. I hate teleporting!"
"That's not what you used to say, 'ol green stuff." I grumbled under my breath. Torn growled at me quietly.
"Sure sounds like the ol' Samos." Daxter griped.
"Right now I need you to go to Haven Forest and root out a few Metal Heads." Samos said, ignoring the comments and jumping up on a table to stare at the news articles on the wall. "That forest is my source of power, but I can't protect it much longer. Chase down and destroy all the Metal Head scouts you find there. Good luck... and welcome to the fight!" He finished jovially. I sighed before walking out after Jak.
Haven Forest was through the Mountain Temple, so we had to cut through the Bazaar to get there. The huge metal gate opened when we stepped up, revealing two JET boards leaning against the wall inside.
I immediately grabbed the dark red one, yelling, "Dibs."
"Whoa!" Daxter exclaimed. "We get to keep 'em! I call shotgun!"
I laughed, "Dax you always get the same spot. You don't get a choice for shotgun." He ignored my comment, bouncing excitedly on Jak's shoulder.
I hopped on the JET board, skating it around the small room before getting off and putting it in my pack. I looked over to see Jak and Dax fist bumping, grinning. I shook my head at their childishness.
On the ledge across from the temple entrance was a floating platform that I assumed would take us to the Haven Forest. It look about the size of one person, though, so I jumped on Jak's back, kissing his cheek and yelling, "Carry me!" While wrapping my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist, Daxter jumped, getting dislodged from his usual spot by my arms. He huffed before jumping on my shoulder.
I didn't know why, maybe it was the mountain air, not so much Eco Pollution, but I felt good. Like, not angry, I could focus on something other than just getting revenge on Praxis. The boys seemed to be sharing my feeling of elation, grinning as the platform took us through the middle of a mountain, stopping on the other end.
We got off, Jak and my hands connected, arms swinging. I felt really carefree. I hadn't felt that way in a long time… years, really.
Jak and I pulled apart, though, to try out the JET boards. They were totally badass.
We took our separate boards down a rocky ledge that dropped a good 10 yards, down to the middle of the forest. The JET boards hovered on water, so we went up the river, rather than down, which cut through another mountain.
The first Metal Head – a flying dragon-type thing – was just at the bass of the river, right by a water fall. Jak took off in chase of it, and I turned and went the other direction looking for another one.
I weaved the JET board through trees, flipped it over the river, and even passed Jak once, who was still chasing his, before I found the next Metal Head.
It glided over the ground smoothly as I took off after it. It went up a few hills, trying to throw me off, and I was suddenly reminded of a past life, chasing Lurkers to get their Power Cells. Now I was chasing Metal Heads to get their skulls. Yeesh, what a difference.
I did a flip over the top of the Metal Head when I got close enough, and it ran directly into me. I got it, and its skull, and went off in search of another one. The map showed me that there was another one just through a small rocky passageway, so I went through it.
There was three left, so I assumed Jak got his. The map showed me that he was on the opposite side of me, coming into the big clearing through the tunnel at the end of the river.
I found the next Metal Head on a ledge across a few stone pillars that I had to flip over. It took off when it saw me, and I chased after it. The dragon led me across a few rock slides that I had to flip over, and a fallen tree that I had to grind on, taking a big circle and going back to where I first found it. It only took two more revolutions until I caught it, just beyond the fallen tree.
I opened my map again to see that the last Metal Head was flying on the lake, but also the little blue J and the teeny tiny D were already chasing it, so I took my time to explore around the forest a little. The area I was in seemed to be some sort of meadow, with flowers and butterfly and everything. No matter how good of a mood I was in, I couldn't help but snipe the butterflies and Eco Birds with my arrows.
I took the JET board around, grinding on a few of the structures just because I could. There was what looked like it might have been a big wooden building just up on a hill. I wanted to go explore it, but just then, I heard the Transmitter crackle and Jak's voice say, "Maddy?"
"Yeah, I'm here." I responded.
"I got the last Metal Head, meet me by the river wh-" I heard him get cut off, then Daxters voice in the background, and then what may have been Daxter smacking the transmitter.
"Hi, Dax." I said.
"Hey spikes." He said. I heard Jak mumbling in the background.
"Okay stop it with the spiky hair jokes or I'm going to shut this off." I warned.
"But there so long and pointy." He said drawing out the word long. "You know what else it long an-" I pressed the button to end the transmission, laughing and jumping on the JET board to go meet Jak.
xMx
"Excellent work!" The Shadow enthused. "Come on back to the hideout. I have another task for you three." Samos said when I met up with Jak. How he knew when we got back together was beyond me.
So we made our way back to the city, but Krew contacted us on the transmitter before we could get back to the hideout, telling us of the KGs listening devices on the water that we had to get rid of with the JET boards.
"Doesn't that fat man have any other slaves to do his work but us?" I complained, jumping onto my JET board on the water.
"Probably," Jak said. "But were the best he's got. The rest probably blew themselves up or something."
"Or he ate them…" Daxter said.
"Who wants to bet this is timed?" I asked with a grin, pulling out the mini map. Indeed, there was a timer up at the top. I programmed the timer into my watch, and took off after Jak, who had already taken out two of the devices while I was distracted.
I went in the other direction, getting the ones, and only hitting a few bombs. I avoided the explosions, though. I reached the opposite end of the water port, and turned around before I heard a bomb go off. Jak must have triggered one of the bigger ones.
I laughed as I arrived at the scene, seeing two singed boys, floating in the water. Jak got back on his JET board when I pulled up. "You know this is timed right. We don't have time for your silly explosions." I mocked, taking off towards the devices on the left as Jak went to the right.
The rest of them were easy, and I met up with Jak and Daxter over near the Hip Hop. Daxter was still looking especially tattered, his orange hair black and poofy. Jak had lowered his goggles around his neck and was running a hand through his dirty blonde hair. I laughed at their disheveled appearances, wiping off the black smudge on Jak's cheek.
"Don't." Jak said, holding his hand up to cover my open mouth. I almost fell over in laughter.
On our way back to the underground, we cut through the Bazaar, after seeing the ridiculous amount of red dots gathered there, and a rather suspicious red-orange looking A.
And, just like we thought, in the middle of the main court, stood Ashelin and quite a few KGs. I glared at them. They just cocked their guns when they noticed me. I felt my hand twitch towards my bow.
"How's it riding in the hood, red?" Daxter said, jumping off the front of my hover board, where he had been sitting, walking up to Ashelin. A guard poked me in the chest with his gun when I tried to grab the rat, making me stumble back into Jak. I flexed my hand. I was just itching to get an arrow in that thing's head.
"Get out of the area." Ashelin said, almost worringly, pushing both of us back with her hands. "This is Krimzon Guard business!" She smacked the Guard's gun that had been pointing at me. "One of Vin's Eco Tankers is coming in from the wasteland, but the clearance transmission sounded fishy. The driver was scared. We're going to check it out. Just in case." She turned to walk away.
"How can we help?" Jak asked, loading his gun.
"I've got it handled." She said without turning around, staring up above the buildings in the Bazaar.
Just then, an Eco Tanker broke into the Bazaar and blew up, taking out all the guards in the area. I had to back flip and spin away to avoid getting hit by a stray bit of metal. I already had my bow out and loaded at the door of the Tanker.
"Ahhh! A Metal Head sneak attack!" Daxter said, as if we hadn't known by the way there were Metal Heads pouring out of the open hatch. I started shooting.
"Damn! It's just us! Help me take out all the Metal Heads!" Ashelin said, pulling out a mini gun and a knife from the holster around her thigh.
So we did. I started shooting from my new Vulcan bow, which allowed me to shoot arrows that split into four arrows, all trailing behind one another or to the sides of one another if I chose.
It wasn't a serious attack, easily dealt with in less than five minutes, but it was the fact that the Metal Heads could get in at all that worried me.
"Damn it," I cursed, kicking a barrel.
"We got 'em all! The Metal Heads are getting bolder every day. It's almost like they're testing our defenses," She rubbed her hand along her pistol, "like probing attacks. I've got a bad feeling about this." She finished, walking away without another word.
"Yeah... you're welcome." Jak said, almost in a 'What the fuck?' kind of manner.
She didn't respond.
A/N: Yayyyyyy! Thank you for the reviews! You make me happy :3 I should ask for reviews more often. Ask and you shall receive? Hahah well, thank you all for reviewing, you made my dayy :D You also all kind of boosted my ego a little but still… Now you should all review on every chapter and I'll be a happy monster.
Anyway, I hope you like the chapter. I really hate the defending people missions. And gahh the one on the water always takes me forever to do.
Oh, BTW, a message to all you artsy people: Anyone want to make a banner slash cover for this story? That would be wicked. Message me, or just send it to me if you want to. Since I'm not really arty at all, im depending on you guys. If not it's going to stay a picture of Mikey Way, which I don't really mind actually because MikeyFuckinWay is rad as hell, but he has nothing to do with this story :0
So do as you please.
P.S. Mikey Way is the bassist for My Chemical Romance if you didn't know.
xahappyMonster
Now come on, write the review, see that little tiny box? Write something nice, it'll only take a couple of seconds. Please? For me? :3