Anyone asks, this is supposed to be chapter 2.

Teral: And ac works on this when extremely pissed off.

Laret: albino chocobo owns Teral, nothing more

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I wake up and slowly scan the area. I'm still where I fell asleep the night before: on the supporting beams of a walkway. My guess is that this is the water slums; rickety houses on stilts, wooden walkways, murky water—yep, this is it.

I don't really know why I came here. Maia couldn't swim, and I don't want to know if I can that badly. Yet I came to the only place that the sidewalks have to be supported above the vile liquid. What. The. Hell.

The sun is just starting to rise, giving the sky a combination of sickly yellow and pink appearance. There's a small mist just above the water, and no one's up yet. I was slightly surprised to see those flying machines, but I'm over that now. Maia was dead for a good long time, and in a way still is.

I pick myself up, and my body groans in protest. I need to sleep a little more, but I'm not going to risk being in the sun this soon. That means I have to find an at least somewhat abandoned house, kick out whoever's in there, and climb into a trunk or something and sleep. If I'm lucky, though, I won't have to do that since it'll call the attention of the KG, and I really don't feel like fighting them all day.

I climb up to the walkway and peek over the edge just to make sure it's clear. After giving a great heave on my arms' part, I'm soon stalking down the makeshift bridge. I silently pad right up to the side of a "house" and press my ear to its wall. The sound of steady breathing—damnit, this one's taken.

For the next hour or so I repeated this cycle; walk up, listen, walk away. Who would've thought so many of these huts are inhabited? The sun's right about to send its banishing light, I'm almost out of time.

I press my ear to the wall of another hut, expecting to hear the same signs of life inside. All I can hear is this low humming sound. There's no one sleeping in here!

I quickly trot my way around the hut, looking for the door—no, make that doorway. There's no fuckin door! How the hell is this supposed to help?! I sigh irritably. Beggars can't be choosers, it'll have to do.

Ears straining for any sounds other than that constant hum, I carefully peek into the hut. There are candles on the floor, on the wall—pretty much everyplace you could stick one. They made a small walkway straight into where the back of the house would've been. Instead, there's some giant, bug eyed statue with a trumpet for a mouth. Wow, artists really have fallen.

There's something itching in the back of my mind. Some long forgotten memory, probably of Maia's, trying to resurface. Pushing it aside, I slowly saunter into the room. It doesn't seem anyone's here, except for that huge—

"Greetings, Dark One."

I whip my head back to the doorway, fangs bared and muscles tensing, ready to rip apart whatever snuck up on me, only to find it completely empty. I desperately look around the place, searching for the owner of the booming voice. There's nothing else here except for—

"I am known as the Oracle, an ancient piece of Precursor technology."

Oh, that's right. It's called an Oracle. And here I thought none survived to the present day. At least now I know what that memory Maia had was.

"I have a proposition for you. You, who is not blinded by rage, wish to walk freely among the Havenites and plot against the Baron."

As observant as ever.

"If you kill my enemies, the Hora Quan, and bring back their skull gems, I will grant your wish."

Kill stuff, be able to kill more stuff—sounds good to me. But there's one tiny problem: I can't kill anything with how weak I currently am.

So I open my mouth, exhale and start forming the words, but all that comes out is a gurgling noise. What the hell happened to my voice? Since Oracles don't speak gurgle, I decide to shut my mouth and glower at it instead.

"However, you don't seem to be at full power at the moment. Allow me to give you a place to rest."

Almost during it said that, three odd looking boards slid underneath the statue, revealing a small crawl space. It looked pitch black inside, despite the sun's warnings of light from outside.

"You may rest here until nightfall, when you are able to move about freely. The closest concentration of the Hora Quan is just down the path, in the area known as Dead Town. Head there to begin your hunt."

Pushing aside my own curiosity for how it knew so much, I walked into the crawlspace. The Oracle then replaced the boards, blocking out any light that would seep through the cracks, while I felt sleep overtake me. The last thing I heard was the Oracle's booming voice:

"Sleep well, Dark One."

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It took awhile to figure out what to make the Oracle say.

Teral: No, people, this won't be an OCxJak fic, you pervs.

Jak won't even be in here for a long time.

Teral: What's up with the no name thing?

Laret: Please read and review!

Teral: Answer me damnit!