A/N: Hello, everybody! Thanks for reviews and suchlike. Also, JKA, Marn & I have both subscribed to you on YouTube...and commented on your profile. Thing. Just letting you know ^_^ Anyway, read, review or no Chapter 17. :D ~ Mika

"You!" Erol hissed, drawing out his own standard service weapon, although both gun-wielding men knew which was the more powerful. "So you were involved with taking my girlfriend after all!"

"Not at first, but it was a pretty nice bonus," the blonde hissed. "Besides, I believe you stole her from me. She was my girlfriend way before she was yours." He lowered the 'Maker, holding the Commander's gaze with a degree of intensity reserved especially for those he held in the lowest regard. "Seven years, she was my girlfriend. All without taking a hand to her in anger as I've heard you've done..."

Erol's eyes narrowed. "She was a whore!"

"Bullshit!" Jak bit back, feeling the Eco in his veins rise. "She is not that kind of woman! You are just a twisted son of a bitch who gets hard over other people's suffering, especially by your hands." He sent a reassuring gaze over to Keira as she looked at him, worried. It's okay...I can handle this. He turned his attention back to the Commander, eyes narrowing. "More than that, Erol...you're a coward. You're nothing but a spineless coward,"

"How dare you!"

Jak chuckled. "You ain't got a good comeback because deep down, Erol, you know it's true. How else would you explain taking your shit out on a woman?" He switched to the Vulcan Fury, Eco pushing at his skin. "You are a coward, Erol, born and bred spineless..."

"Jak, stop!" a female voice exclaimed, weakened with tears.

Both men turned and looked at Keira, who had tears pouring down her face. She looked between the two men frantically, pleading silently with them both; two men whom she knew wouldn't listen.

Sure enough, Erol was the first to react, raising his gun and slamming the butt into Jak's stomach without warning. Reacting quicker than even he anticipated, Jak fired off a shot in the general direction of the Commander, whose quick reflexes unfortunately saved him from gaining a new body hole. Sliding across the floor, he kicked Jak's feet from under him, sending him crashing to the ground. Before he hit the floor completely, he stretched his hands out to stop himself crashing completely, metal shrapnel and little screws and bolts slicing his hands open as he did. Wincing in pain from the embedded shrapnel, he got up, ducking from a punch from Erol and landed one of his own straight in the weasel's stomach. He doubled over long enough for the damaged man to deliver a hard kick to the face – luckily, or unluckily, depending on one's point of view, he had his Krimzon Guard mask down almost from the second he'd kicked Jak's legs out from under him.

The younger man sprung back onto his feet, fists clenched, body hunched defensively, growls hissing from his throat. "Want more, Commander?"

I know when I've lost, the named Guard thought, straightening himself up, dusting off his uniform absentmindedly and attempting bravado. "Well, Jak. I must say, you fought better today than you did two years ago. And all for that whore's hand!" He spat at a terrified, curled up Keira's feet as she pressed herself up against her destroyed Zoomer. "Well, seeing as you fought so hard for her, you may as well know who the father of her bastard son is. I certainly don't know. That bitch never told me,"

Jak's temper flared. "Don't you dare talk about Keira that way, or her son!"

Erol cocked his head, face growing its own half-smile. Picking up his service gun, he slid it back into his holster and strode out of the garage. "I'll see you later, Jak. You..." He whirled back around to face. "I hope the next time I see you, you're roadkill. Otherwise, I will make you so."

Without another word, the evil Commander left the garage, metal crunching under his boots. The only sounds he left behind in the ruined garage was the sound of heavy breathing from both Jak and Keira, and not the kind of heavy breathing they'd been doing this morning.

"Keir, you okay?" the blonde asked, walking over and squatting down to assist his girlfriend.

You may as well know –

She inhaled and winced sharply. "My ribs...I th-think they're broken." She curled up against Jak and he held her tightly for several long minutes.

– who the father of –

The young mechanic had a question in her throat.

"How did you know when to come in?"

"I finished doing what it was Torn asked me to and I just happened to be passing the Stadium," he explained, stroking her teal hair. "Lucky I did, huh?"

– her bastard son is.

"Wh-where's Daxter?"

"Right here, baby. Ya miss me?" Daxter leapt onto Jak's shoulder, appearing into Keira's eyeline.

"Yeah, where did you go?"

"Hey, buddy, I wasn't exactly gonna stick around for the explosions!" the ottsel interjected. His best friend simply raised his eyebrows, shaking his head with a smile.

Keira chuckled, wincing again as the action moved her damaged ribs. "Ow..."

"Okay, let's get you back," the blonde said. "You alright to stand?"

"Yeah..."

"C'mon, I'll help you."

As the young mother stood up, she was holding her breath in hope that Jak wouldn't ask her about what Erol had said. Normally, he wasn't the type to ask questions until hours or days later, often whenever it had been brought up.

As the trio walked/ struggled out into the white clouded day, however, Keira's hopes were dashed.

"Erol said something about Daniel's real father..."

Her heart fell and she looked at Daxter, who shrugged. You tell him, I ain't breaking the news to him.

"I never...told him," she gasped, slackening her grip around Jak's waist with subtlety. "I never...told him who Danny's real father was. I told Danny...he knows..."

...I certainly don't know.

Jak fell silent, a lump forming in his throat. He wasn't sure whether he liked where this was going, which is why the next four words changed everything.

"Jak, you're his father,"

The bitch never told me.

For a moment, he wasn't sure if he heard her properly. He shook his head and squinted at her as if his eyesight had suddenly deteriorated in the last four words.

"What?"

She took a deep, ragged breath and began again. "When you...ah...when you disappeared...the day you...disappeared I took a test after I missed my third period. It was positive..." She winced, inhaling sharply. "I was going to tell you...when you came home...but you never did...you never returned..." She held in tears; she did not want to cry in front of Jak again. "I had Danny six months later, a few months after...after I properly moved in with Erol. I knew all...along that you...were his father, but...something told me...not to tell Erol. S-survival, I guess. Lucky me." She coughed, her whole body shaking.

She never told me.

Jak's mouth was dry.

"I'm...Danny's dad?"

"Oh, c'mon buddy, could ya not tell?" Daxter interjected. "The kid's the spittin' image of ya, right down to the whole mute thing,"

He can't speak.

Jak was rendered speechless as he helped Keira onto the Zoomer, climbing on and starting the engines. Her arms around his waist, he set off back to the Bunker, on complete autopilot as he cruised through the city after what he'd just been told.

I'm...I'm a father?

"La fortuna ti sorride quando non sta guardando; sacvi quel buco profondo."