Chapter 32: Spargus City

Date: April 20, 3658
Location: Spargus City

Damas looked at the almost translucent being before him. If it wasn't for her armor that accentuated her elfian form, Annalina would've been thought to be a completely different species than what she was claiming of being. He knew that once more people learned of the Precursor City being within Spargus' harbor that the waste city's safety would become compromised. The Precursor warrior promised nothing more than to help keep his city safe, but still...

Turning towards Sig, he shared a look with the wise warrior. "Listen here Cherry," the dark-skinned man began. "This city is our king's number one priority; the people and its citizens must be kept safe from any outsiders; yourself included. You prove to be a danger and Precursor or not, and you'll be mincemeat." His mechanical eye sized her up once. The cybernetic components telling him the strong points in her armor along with the few weak points it could spot. "Now the AI in that city fortress chose to bring that city here for a reason and that's to somehow to keep us safe when your dark ones decide to attack."

Annalina looked at the dark-skinned elf, quite shocked that he was talking to her with such vehemence in his voice, almost like an older sibling correcting the younger one. It brought a smile upon her face. "I have assured your king that I would do nothing to harm the inhabitants here. What must I do to make you believe so?" she inquired from him.

Crossing his arms over his chest, Sig was about to say something when someone spoke before him. "Absolutely nothing, old one," the raspy voice behind him caused Sig to turn to see one of the monks from the ancient temple walk forward. He almost groaned as he realized it was Seem, the head priestess of the monk sect. Her face was painted mainly white with a red stripe going down the middle of her forehead, one across her eyes and yellow marks under each eye.

"Seem," Damas greeted her, causing the woman priestess to bow at the king.

"I was told a great city had appeared over Spargus harbor, I came to see it myself," she stated in a deadpan voice. "Did you come from the city of the ancients?"

Annalina looked at the young elf, the device that was over her left eye was scanning the priestess on a cellular level and found the elf to be one of the rare channelers, but only a carrier of the gene, not a user. Sons or daughters produced by her would have the ability but she, herself would never use the substance. 'Too bad,' was Annalina's only thought. "No. I was found by his daughter and her mate elsewhere," she said, causing Damas and Sig to raise their eyebrows at the word mate. "It is not a city but one of our fortresses that was built during the last war. The AI aboard has kept it in working order until now." She looked at the king once more. "I wish to use the fortress to create a barrier over this city, to protect the inhabitants. This will force the fortress to land within the harbor because the reactors will have to focus operations upon the barrier. I also want to take every abled body, fit them with proper armor and weapons, give them a chance at fighting Errol and his minions."

"And those who cannot fight? What of them?" Damas asked, his eyes narrowing at the woman.

"There is a section of the fortress that's made for stasis. They'd be placed there for safe keeping," she answered him. It was clearly not the answer he was expecting.

"No Spartan will willingly go into stasis," Sig told her with a definite look of annoyance on his face.

"The children will," Seem said with certainty. "They will obey their parents or guardians."

Damas' grip on his staff weapon tightened as he went into deep thought about this. "I will not be the king to lose Spargus to an outsider let alone a planetary invasion." He looked at Sig and Seem. "You two are to get the youngest generation to the fortress after it has erected the defense shield up and over the entire city." As the monk and seasoned warrior left, he turned his attention back to the Precursor. "Now, I want to know your plan when this Errol arrives."

"At the end of the last war Mar, myself and three others stayed behind as most of our species escaped through slipspace to another part of this galaxy in an attempt to restart," she began, her mind going back to those olden days. Shaking her head, the web dreadlocks of hair shook, bringing her mind back to the present. "We did keep thousands of fetuses in case we could bring our species back, but the thought died as we realized that your kind was the future of this world; not ours. We changed our appearances with help from some very powerful devices. Some of us married into your kind, thus creating super warriors amongst your kind."

"Channelers," Damas said causing her to smile.

"Yes!" she said excitedly. "Then the scourge occurred. Horra Quan or metal heads, as your kind called them." She sighed sadly. "We never thought Errol and his kind would create those monsters to hunt for us and subsequently your kind as well." She then smiled at him proudly. "But then your daughter, a dark channeler, and Mar's descendant killed their champion and stopped the spread of his kind. This of course meant Errol would return."

"Why?" he inquired.

"To destroy your kind the rest of the way because if you have the ability to destroy their genetically mutated monster, Kor, then you must have the technology to kill him and his dark ones too." She shook her head. "He's not the smartest tool in the shed, but he is a deadly warrior."

"What's the plan?" he asked once more, getting annoyed she hadn't answered it yet.

"Technically?" she asked. "We don't have one," she admitted causing him to look at her with wide shocked eyes. "Survival is our only thought, but how? We don't know yet." She sat down upon the ground near the steps that led to the throne. "Mar has a plan, but I haven't made contact with him yet. My plan is to watch over your daughter during the battles and ensure she lives long enough to kill Errol once and for all. Then, I plan to give her my gift; which will kill me, but ensures she lives."

"Why do that?" he asked, not quite sure what to say in learning that a once long ago god wanted to give her life to his daughter.

"Because I can see she has lived through hell in order to be what she is now," she told him with a sincere look in her icy blue eyes. "She deserves to have happiness in her life."

Curiosity getting the best of him, Damas had to know. "What is your gift?" he inquired with a slight confused frown.

She smiled brightly at him. "Life," she said causing the light eco in her body to explode in a flash of light. When the light vanished the once sandy floor of the throne room was covered in green grass with beautiful flowers sprouting from in between the rocks. Chuckling she stood up to leave. "I should go speak to Ze'dura and see about getting into contact with Mar and the others. I'll activate the shields when I get to the fortress." She bowed before leaving.

Feeling suddenly exhausted, Damas sat down upon the now green steps. 'This is getting more complicated by the day,' he thought as he pulled out his comm. unit and wondered where Jak had disappeared off to this time. 'They're putting a lot of trust in one person. Why?' he wondered. 'She's just one person. How can she stop somebody that they could stop hundreds of years ago?' frowning he wondered. 'What makes Jak so much more different than anyone else?' Then again, he had seen her do some impossible things and couldn't wait to see what else his child could do.

In the airlock at Far Drop, Jak had a sudden shiver go down her spine as Daxter double checked his ammunition for his staff weapon. Shaking her head, she readied herself for whatever she was about to step into.

M-Angel: Sorry for not updating sooner. Been sick since Thursday afternoon and didn't get this out to xoxoangii until Monday evening. Will hopefully get more chapters out this month. I hope everybody is enjoying this story. I thought we would check in with Spargus here because the last several chapters have just been in the Brink.
xoxoangii: I also would have posted this sooner but my daughter was sick this week, so she has been cuddled up with me all week. For all the FF mamas out there: ever heard of Fifth Disease? Luckily now she is getting better, so I was able to get on here and post. Stay healthy everyone!