A two-part piece to avoid a super long post, jumping ahead to how Damas and Phobos got their suspicions about the boys confirmed (part two is Damas confronting Jak over it)
The net thumped against the supports of the dock as Phobos hauled it upward. The catch was small for the evening; normally she wouldn't have even considered bringing it in so early. But the scanners had picked up a storm blowing in, and the last thing she wanted was for her net to get dragged out over the reef -- or for the Scylla to get any ideas about free snacks if she decided to shelter in the lagoon. Small though the catch may have been, it would just have to suffice until the weather was more favorable. Phobos supposed she could always take another overnight trip for larger fish later in the week. Maybe Jak would agree to let Mar tag along.
Phobos's hands stilled over the net of wriggling greenbellies. She stared out at the water without really seeing it as her thoughts drifted to the two boys who had drifted into their lives. Or, drifted back into their lives.
She knew her son when she saw him. He could have been five or eight or twenty-five and she would have known him. Denial at this point was foolish. But what she couldn't understand was Jak.
Phobos knew the child she'd borne. Knew every curl on his head, every dimple and birthmark. But to her knowledge, she'd only given birth once. And Jak...
Jak looked at her with Mar's eyes. He smiled with Mar's left-cheek dimple. And according to Damas, beneath the scarf he never took off, Jak had Mar's portwine stain on the back of his neck.
Phobos didn't need the blood results from the monks to know who Jak was. What she didn't understand was why.
Why had the Precursors given their lost son back, in two different bodies? Why did the older Mar call himself Jak? How had he come to be? And did he even know the impossibility of his own existence?
The wind began to pick up, sending a spray of salt into Phobos's face. She sputtered and spat. Served her right for getting distracted. Grumbling to herself, the angler slung the net over a pole and balanced it across her shoulders. It was getting to be time to take shelter, and her dawdling meant she might not make it to the tower before the sands picked up.
As she trudged through the West Market, shops closed their shutters and people nailed down tarps over stands. The walls and cliffs would protect most of Spargus from the winds, but the West Quarter was open to the sea. Things sometimes got a little dicey on the coast.
"Captain!" Someone called across the street, and Phobos spotted one of the summer semester teachers for the little ones.
The younger Spargan shook her head with a worried frown. "Not yet! I've got Seek with me -- the new boy? Seek? -- he refuses to go home! Says he needs you."
Phobos dropped the net immediately.
"Clean the net and those are yours," she said hastily to the startled shopkeeper beside her. Then she raced across the street.
Sand was beginning to carry along the wind, stinging her face as she caught up to Korah.
"Where is-" She caught herself quickly before saying Mar. "Where is he?"
The teacher gestured with the stump of her right arm. "I convinced him to wait in the Chime Sisters' place so I could look for you. I'm sorry, Captain. I know you're busy. The little guy's really taken a shine to you, though."
She ducked into a half alley between shops, looking for some relief from the wind.
"Don't know if he's showed you any of his classwork or not, but he picked you for his presentation on important roles in the community."
Despite her worry, a warmth filled Phobos's chest. "I uh. I know," she answered, just a little bashful. "It's taped up in my boat cabin."
So much had changed. Mar didn't suck his thumb anymore. He didn't respond to old nicknames. He didn't snuggle anymore, or want to be carried. He didn't call her Mommy -- that one hurt most -- but something, something was still there. Perhaps it was instinct. Or perhaps she'd rebuilt it with her own two hands by simply being present.
Phobos followed Korah to the two story building that held the Chime sisters' shop and apartment. Just as the teacher had said, Mar sat just inside, huddled next to the door with his knees drawn to his chest. He looked sullen. Like he couldn't decide between anger and sadness. Immediately, Phobos knelt in front of him with a worried frown.
"It's about to storm, minnow," she said, "Why aren't you home? Where's Jak, he usually picks you up by now, doesn't he?"
Apparently this was the wrong thing to say. Mar's brows fell into a fierce scowl.
"Jak left me!" he answered in short, terse signs.
That didn't make any sense. Jak was devoted to his little brother! Phobos glanced at the women sheltering around her and then back at Mar.
"I'll take him up to Damas’s," she said. "We'll get this straightened out after the storm blows over."
Nadia Chime clucked her tongue and nodded. "You get that little sprout out of this weather, cap'n!'
Phobos held her hands out to Mar. "Come on, you. Let's go see Damas, eh? Bet you he kept Jak late for training again."
Mar shook his head angrily. This time, tears beaded up in his eyes. But he reached out and grabbed Phobos's hands anyway, using them as leverage to propel himself into her arms.
She shoved down the beginnings of anxiety fluttering in her stomach. The sooner she got to the tower, the sooner she could regroup with Damas.
"We need to move fast if we don't want to get sandburn. Can I carry you, minnow?"
Silently, Mar nodded into her chest. Phobos took a breath, scooped up her little boy, and made a dash for the residential sector.
Something's wrong with Jak. He's hurt, or he's sick, he must be. He wouldn't leave Mar. He wouldn't!
By the time she'd made it to the bridge tunnel that led to the tower door, the storm was beginning to sweep across the eastern part of the city. Wind howled down streets an alleys like a dune-wolf looking for prey, and kangarats scurried for cover while Leapers bedded down and covered their heads with their vestigial wings, as they did in the wild. Phobos hefted Mar higher in her arms and made for the door marked with the great spiral wyrm.
"Almost inside, Mar," she said, trying to comfort him.
Just as he had every time she'd slipped his name into conversation before, the child failed to correct her.
The walls of the tower were thick, almost erasing the wind entirely. Phobos stepped into the elevator and sat down as it rose. She set Mar down on her lap and took advantage of the silence to ask, "What did you mean "Jak left"? Is he on a mission?"
Mar still looked angry, but tears stained his dusty cheeks. "He left!" Stupid Haven's stupid governor whined about all the trouble happening -- but it's only happening because they tried to kill us, so stupid Jak left to keep them away from Spargus because they're all so STUPID!"
Phobos felt a knot forming in her stomach.
"Haven?! Why the- why in the world would Jak listen to them? And why would he try to keep them away from the city by himself?"
And with that, the dam burst. The silent trickles of tears turned into sobs that shook Mar's little body as he signed, "Because of me. I'm a bad brother."
"What?! No, nonono you are not a bad brother!" Phobos wiped tears from round cheeks and rocked her son back and forth. "Why would you think that?!"
"Cause it's my fault he left!" Mar hiccuped, and his signs shook. "The Council guys in Haven are looking for me, cos I go where Jak goes. And he- he- he-"
"He left so the council would look for you somewhere else," Phobos guessed grimly.
A fresh flood of tears soaked the front of her tunic as Mar cried. He clung to her the way he used to as a toddler, wailing into her chest. The elevator locked into place and Damas was already running towards them, having heard the cries, before Phobos even had a chance to stand up.
It's a little follow-up to Mistaken Identity au, as per the poll results!
The first week "home" had been...stifling. The man purporting to be Jak's father wouldn't leave him alone, always checking in on him, making sure he wasn't pulling at the IV, asking him questions he just didn't have the answers to. The one upside was that Damas had finally brought Daxter to see him. Of course, it had been right in the middle of Jak's fourth escape attempt, which may have been calculated. But considering Jak was pretty sure he was going to lose his mind without Daxter, he'd decided to let it go for now.
For the first hour, neither of them had even spoken. They'd just clung to each other in silence, taking solace in the knowledge that they were both alive, and here. Damas had stood to the side, watching, like he always did. He really hadn't given up on this "I think you're my kid" business. And without blurting out everything he knew about time-travel, Jak couldn't exactly prove him wrong. Frankly, even if he did tell Damas exactly why he was wrong -- namely, that Jak had technically only been born five-ish years ago -- Jak didn't think even that would convince him. He'd probably think it was some near-death hallucination Jak had in the desert.
Daxter wanted Jak to play along; let this new city think they were long lost children returning home. Anything was better than rejection and exile! But Jak just...couldn't. First of all, he was a terrible liar. Tess often told him he couldn't bluff his way out of a paper bag. But even more pressing, it just didn't feel right, repaying an act of kindness with one of deception. Besides, what would they do when they found out it was all a mistake? Better not to get comfortable at the outset.
It was, all in all, a difficult position to be in.
"So tell me why your friend there looks like a river-cat, but has human blood," Damas finally interrupted after close to two hours of watching them sign to each other.
"He has wha-"
"I HAVE WHAT?!"
Daxter bristled and leaped down onto the cot. "Whaddya mean my blood is still human?! How did you even figure that out?!"
Damas was entirely too cheerful when he answered, "Oh, nobody knew what you were when we found you, so we did a blood test. Using the wrong medicine could've killed you, after all. The vet called it a day and went home with a migraine once she figured out all your internal organs are identical to a human's. That's probably why you can talk, I suppose."
Sputtered explanations of Daxter's plight -- talking over each other and around each other, one blaming himself and the other refusing to accept it -- took up the next seven minutes while Damas just listened with a stupid grin. Maybe because it was the most Jak had willingly spoken to him since regaining consciousness.
On the bright side, after learning that Daxter was medically still human, Phobos had brought a pair of pants for him. Maybe they were an infant's button-snap trousers, but the buttons made room for his tail and both boys were grateful for it.
After four days of tortuous boredom and the hated IV, they finally let Jak out. No one had returned his clothes -- it figured, couldn't let him have gear that would help him escape -- so he'd had to shuffle out after Phobos in slightly undersized sandals that pinched his toes. Even with Daxter's enthusiastic and highly colorful commentary on the world outside the clinic, Jak hadn't been prepared for the size of the city around them.
He'd expected something like the Slums of Haven. Ramshackle buildings of sheet metal and broken roads surrounding a few locations of importance. The market district outside of the clinic alone could have fit all of Dead Town quite comfortably, and according to Daxter that was only a quarter of Spargus's true size! Asymmetrical sandstone houses and apartments lined city walls and a network of well-kept walking paths in a variety of levels, many with baskets of colorful fruits, or racks of laundry drying on landings high above the street.
Jak had immediately wandered away from Damas and Phobos, just trying to take it all in. The air was clear -- hot, but clean and free of smog -- and tasted of salt. A child collided with him, bounced off, and continued running as other children gave chase with shrieks of laughter. Jak had never seen kids playing in the street before. Where were the guards? The soldiers? Everyone outside walked with heads held high, calling out greetings, haggling over prices. The marketplace thrummed with life and color and sound, almost overwhelming in its intensity. Haven seemed like a ghost town by comparison!
Jak strayed between vendors' stalls, trailing his fingers along split-rail counters and sturdy awning poles. Daxter leaned eagerly over his shoulder, pointing out all the ammunition and daggers and armor being made. There were piles of metal gems being weighed on scales, traded back and forth, even being set into weapons! City of the hunter indeed. It looked like everyone had gems of their own to pay with. Daxter even swore up and down he'd seen an eight year old with a handful of metalbug gems buying a satchel of seeds!
"Oye! Don't wander off like that, kid!"
Phobos caught him two streets over, peering at a rack of creepy gas masks. She sounded more amused the annoyed, at least.
"See something you like?"
"This place is so crowded." Jak shaded his eyes and tried to guess how many of the people around him were warriors.
Phobos snorted and jostled his arm with a friendly elbow. "This is nothing. You should see the Arena!"
Arena? Like a stadium? The possibility of racing piqued Jak's interest, and he and Daxter exchanged eager glances.
"What's the Arena?" Daxter asked.
It was fairly hard to miss, as it turned out. Phobos pointed them towards a structure built into what looked like a caldera, just north of the market.
"There, that's the Arena: gathering place, courtroom, race track, stage and morgue, all in one!"
Daxter blanched. "What was that about a morgue?!"
Phobos shrugged. "It's built over lava, kid. Citizen candidates have to prove they can survive volcanic activity -- and Marauders, and- well, most desert life, really -- before we let them leave the city. If they don't take it seriously enough: whoosh! Crematorium."
"....ah." Daxter cringed and slid down Jak's back until only his ears were visible over Jak's shoulder. "Hence the age restrictions."
"Hence the age restrictions," Phobos agreed. She gave Jak a little shove. "Hey, if you want to get a look at it, one of our veteran hunters managed to trap a couple metaljackets recently. The Warriors' Guild is giving a demonstration for civ candidates and younger rookies this afternoon. Kind of a "here's what you can be if you don't slack off" thing."
"Ugh. Metaljackets." Jak rolled his eyes. "Not as annoying as Stingerheads, but they're up there."
He paused.
"Do you even have Stingerheads out here? Those stupid things drive me crazy."
"Well..." with a slightly chagrined look, Phobos tiptoed to wave down a slightly dismayed looking Damas, who was apparently questioning some baffled shopkeepers as to their whereabouts.
"I mean. We used to. But then we found out that Leapers really will eat anything they can fit in their mouth. We don't have a Stingerhead problem anymore."
Phobos shooed Jak over to the now relieved Damas. "Go on, I've got work to do. You guys, I dunno, bond or something. Take Jak to see the metaljacket exhibition."
Of course, in the clarity of hindsight, she would regret the suggestion.
There were still a few hours before the event was scheduled to take place, but there were already some people camped out to get front row seats. Damas didn't seem to think that this was a particularly wise strategy, commenting as he led the boys past the stands that the campers would likely run through most of the water they had on-hand while waiting. He paused when he noticed that one of the "campers" was an old man, stretched out on the benches and snoring softly.
"Well. Peat excluded. That guy just kind of does what he wants and manages to survive anyway." Damas tugged at his lip. "Honestly, nobody's really sure how. I mean, the man ate a cobra once because he said if it bites you, biting it back cancels out the venom."
"Does it?" asked Jak.
Damas’s head whipped around to fix wide eyes on Jak. "No! No, absolutely not! He was in the healing ward for days! But he managed not to need the foot amputated and ate the rest of the snake anyway."
Daxter gagged and Jak laughed. "I wanna meet that guy."
Rightly, Damas had a bad feeling about that.
When the exhibition did begin, Jak was a little disappointed. Sure, the long gunstaffs used to keep the metalheads back were cool, but he couldn't see the weapons' details well from the box where Damas usually sat. He leaned over the rail, squinting as one woman used her staff to vault into the air and slash a metaljacket back down to the ground. Daxter, long since grown bored, was scanning the rest of the stadium. Abruptly, he sat up and smacked Jak's arm.
"Hey lookit! It's a Precursor orb!" He pointed to a familiar shape lying on an awning halfway down the Arena walls. "Somebody must've dropped it! I bet we could get that later, huh Jak?"
Daxter looked around.
"...Jak?"
All Jak had heard was "Precursor orb" and the old childhood habits came flooding back. Without a second thought, he slipped over the railing the moment Damas’s back was turned. The metal was almost blisteringly hot, but he ignored it as he climbed down footholds that should have been too small for a human. Getting the orb without falling into the Arena would be tricky, but not impossible. He just had to watch his balance.
Up in the observation balcony, Damas was a little more focused on catching up on some paperwork than on the exhibition below. He tuned out the ottsel-boy muttering in alarm about...something...in order to review a new infrastructure proposal. The faster he got this done, the more time he would have to get to know Jak.
He heard some cries of alarm down below, but ignored them. The rookies would realize soon enough that the Guild had everything under control.
"Hey boss?"
"What, Kleiver?" Damas didn't even spare a glance at his talk-box.
"Er...ain't that your brat, climbing into the Arena?"
"What are you talking about? Jak's right-"
Damas finally looked up.
"...here?"
He dropped the datapad and leapt to his feet. "Oh don't tell me-"
A quick scan of the ring confirmed his suspicions and before he could stop himself he burst out, "JAK! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"
Jak paused and looked up at him from where he was leaning over the awning, orb in hand. He looked down at the orb, frowned, and looked back up at Damas.
"Is...that a trick question?"
"Get back up here before you fall and break your neck!" Damas yelled, gripping the balcony edge with white knuckles.
Behind him, Daxter sighed and shook his head. "Welcome to my world, Spikes," he said sympathetically, "welcome to my world."
Actually quite long (about 42 pages in my tiny notepad), because it's a full one-shot rather than part of a multi-chapter idea. Although that's not to say I won't add pieces later
The distress beacon had been Sig’s, but the shape lying limply in the dust was most assuredly not Sig. The gathered Wastelanders looked at each other with grim expressions: this felt like a trap.
"Circle around," Damas signed to the driver of the second car, "Check for an ambush. I'll see if it's one of ours."
"Be careful," the woman signed back. A dimple between her brows suggested that under her heavy scarf she was frowning.
"I'm always careful."
Even so, Damas took extra care in approaching the crumpled form, gesturing for Kleiver to follow him in case of attack. He'd assumed that the person -- or corpse, hard to tell at this distance -- would be larger up close. But as he drew near, the figure remained small, and slight. They were dressed like a Havenite from the Slums, wearing stained, threadbare layers of clothing. A filthy scarf and dismally battered goggles half covered matted green hair; they didn't seem to have any more protection from the sun than that. Foolish Havenite.
Two small animals lay beside the stranger, breathing shallowly. Pets? That seemed an unusual step for Haven, letting an exile take anything important to them.
Damas glanced at the stranger, but kept his attention focused on the ground, looking for Sig’s beacon. It didn't take long to find, considering it lay beside the stranger's hand. Damas picked up the beacon and turned it over in his hand. There were no obvious signs of tampering. No blood or scorching or anything else to indicate that the beacon had been taken by force.
"How did you get this?" Damas murmured, not really expecting an answer. Whoever this was, they were barely alive.
"Er...lordship?"
It was not like Kleiver to sound hesitant.
"Do you...know this kid?"
An odd question. Damas looked up with a quizzical expression and found the big Wastelander peering down at the face of the figure. Kid?
The king pivoted on his heels to get a better look at their find.
Sunken cheeks. Dark circles under large eyes. A pitiful patch of stubble that might’ve been a first attempt at a beard on an otherwise startlingly smooth face. Precursors, he was a kid, wasn't he? He could've been anywhere from sixteen to nineteen -- in his state, it was hard to tell.
"Scrawny thing, isn't he?" Damas remarked. He took hold of an iron ring strapped to the boy's chest and tried to shake off a nagging sense of familiarity in the boy's features. "A channeler, maybe? We could use one of those. Honestly, I'm impressed that he's still breathing."
He glanced up. "What makes you think I'd know who the whelp is?"
Kleiver looked back at him with an unusually uncomfortable expression. He gestured awkwardly to the boy's face.
"Well he's...I mean- well look at 'im! 'S just weird, is all."
"What's weird?" Damas scoffed and hoisted the boy up by the iron ring.
The boy's head fell back and for just a moment, something around his neck glittered in the fading sunlight. With a curse, Damas dropped him as if he'd been burned. He scrambled to his feet and stumbled back a step, swearing under his breath.
"What fresh hell is this?" he demanded.
That was where Phobos found him after completing her perimeter check: staring in horror down at a much younger version of his own face.
Phobos crossed the space between their vehicles to touch his shoulder.
"Damas?"
"I...who is this?"
"Damas." Phobos shook him gently. "Hey. Hey. Are you just going to leave him lying there?"
The king blinked and inhaled sharply as he seemed to come to. "Right," he muttered, "...right. Pho, take my staff."
"What? Oop-!" Phobos hastily grabbed at the staff Damas all but dropped. "What the-!"
In a daze, Damas knelt and slipped an arm under the boy’s shoulders.
"Gods. He really is scrawny."
He shook his head and hoisted the boy up.
"Kleiver, get the car started. And someone grab those animals!"
Phobos's eyes flicked from Damas to the half-dead castaway, and narrowed.
"Damas...who is that?"
Her husband turned to face her, a disturbed shock stamped clearly on his face.
"I don't know," he said grimly, "but he's wearing a Maridius amulet."
■■■■■■■■■■
The Rift Rider idled, ready to take Samos and the child back in time. Ready to begin the cycle of pain all over again. Jak bit his lip and folded his younger self's fingers back over the proffered amulet.
"No, buddy, you keep it," he said gently. "Try...try to remember something about your family this time. Maybe remember me."
The tiny boy pouted, then threw his arms around Jak’s neck. "Za?" He whispered in Jak’s ear, the closest he'd ever come to saying his name.
Jak closed his eyes and hugged the kid tightly. Precursors knew he wouldn't get a lot of hugs in Sandover. "No, buddy. Za can't go with you this time. You have to be really brave for me, okay? There's...there's a kid on the other side of that gate who really really needs a friend. Can you look out for him for me?"
Sniffling, the little boy let go and nodded. "Brave like you," he signed. Then, rubbing his eyes, he sat back down in the craft.
Jak took a slow breath, then looked to the younger Samos. Doubtless this version of the sage was going to withhold just as much information as the older one. Jak didn't trust him to warn Mar about Errol. And he'd be blasted if he let that swine get his hands on the amulet in any timeline.
"You know, I didn't have the amulet when I got back to the present," he said casually. "I think you locked it up for safekeeping right before we fixed the Rift Gate, but I never saw where in the house you put it."
Samos took the bait too easily. "Oof! Yes, I suppose it would be bad for the kid to meet the Baron with that thing on. Thanks for the heads-up."
All too soon, they were gone. And not long after, so was Jak, headed for Dead Town. It had been a selfish ploy, a bid to give himself some semblance of a connection to his past. He couldn't remember having the amulet yet -- but he'd had trouble remembering a lot of his early years ever since the experiments began. "Traumatic amnesia", Daxter called it.
But if the amulet was there, if his ploy had worked, then maybe he'd get something back.
It took him an hour to sift through all the debris in the old hut, even with Daxter's help. The ravages of time hadn't left many places for treasure to remain undiscovered in. But just when Jak was beginning to fear that someone had found it decades before, his hand brushed over a brick in the old planter circles that lacked the same grout as the others.
Leave it to Samos to hide such an important artifact under a giant, vicious, carnivorous plant. Had he fed it to the thing?! The amulet was down where the roots had once been!
Still, Jak could admit to a sense of relief that washed over him once the amulet was in his hand. Clearly he'd changed the past at least enough to have an emotional connection to the pendant. He tucked it into his tunic, resolving to put it on a chain the first chance he got. He wasn't going to let anyone take it from him again.
■■■■■■■■■■
The last thing Jak remembered was collapsing beside a boulder, desperately trying to stay conscious only to fail seconds later. He could hear a voice -- not Daxter or Pecker -- nearby, and as he focused on that, other sensations began to filter in.
Softness beneath him.
The smell of eco med-gel.
An itch in the crook of his elbow.
A sticky dryness in his mouth, like cotton.
And something off about his skin. He couldn't put his finger on it, but his skin felt different somehow. Cleaner? No, that didn't make any sense. Why would it be clean?
It took a monumental effort to open his eyes, and he regretted it immediately. Light stabbed into his retinas pitilessly, and Jak let out an involuntary grunt of discomfort. In response, a shadow fell over his face, shielding him from the unforgiving glare. First a blur, then a shape, a face slowly swam into focus.
"Ah, you're back with us! Thank the Precursors, that was a close one, eh?"
Jak blinked up in confusion as his brain slowly processed the presence of one of the most beautiful women he could ever remember seeing. Not that he could remember seeing that many women in his life. Her skintone was so deep that the light framing her glanced off her cheekbones in little flashes of garnet and amethyst. Coils of hair spread out behind her head in an artful halo, providing most of the blessed shade across Jak's face. He squinted up at her for a long moment, trying to determine whether he was hallucinating in the desert.
"....'m I dead?" Jak croaked, then winced at the dry soreness in his throat.
The angelic stranger laughed in surprise. "Dead? No, quite the opposite, kid. Although you got pretty close."
"Where am I?" Jak tried to sit up, and something tugged at his elbow.
Instantly, he froze. He knew the shape of a needle.
Bile crawled up his throat, and his heart thundered in his ears as he forced himself to turn his head and look.
A bag of clear fluid hung from a stand beside a cot he'd been laid on. Descending from the bag, a long tube fed the fluid through a needle secured to his arm with bandages. A high whine escaped him, and the room seemed to spin.
"Whoa whoa whoa- kid, kiddo, look at me."
The mysterious woman suddenly took his face in her hands -- rough hands. A warrior's hands.
"Saline. It's a...kinda like a saltwater solution you give to people suffering dehydration."
One of the calloused hands cupped the back of his head, rubbing a thumb comfortingly over stubble.
Stubble?
Jak's breathing quickened and the room spun faster.
"What-!" he gasped, and his breaths began to squeak. "What did you do to me?!"
"Hey now, breathe. Breathe." The woman began to sway back and forth where she sat, dragging him along with the rocking motion.
"Inhale with me, yeah? In and out, in and out. I've got you."
"M- my h- my h- hair-!" Jak squeaked.
The woman clicked her tongue. "Oh, ohhh, you can feel that, huh? Yeah, you were overheated. The mats in your hair were just doing damage to you, longterm. The doctors didn't have any time to waste, so they shaved it out to cool you off."
She continued to cradle his face with her other hand, offering him a full, apologetic smile.
"I'm sorry we couldn't get your okay, chico. But...I mean, you wouldn't wake up! Not even your orange friend could get a response. He gave us the go-ahead."
For the first time since waking, Jak felt something like relief. "D- Daxter?"
"Mm. The mouthy one? Yes."
"Where-?"
The woman pulled back and turned away for a moment. Jak wondered why he felt minutely disappointed by that. He wasn't that touch-starved, was he? When she turned back, she held a cup and pitcher in her hands. The sight of the water trickling from one container to the other made Jak's throat ache all the fiercer.
"Here. Slow sips now, little bird. Don't make yourself sick like your friend did." The woman settled back into her seat at the edge of the cot. She made a vague gesture with the hand not holding the pitcher.
"At least he made a quick recovery. My husband took him back up to our place. When you're cleared by the doctors, we'll take you to him."
Jak gulped down the water, ignoring his visitor's protests. It was cool, although not cold, but even that was like heaven on his irritated throat. Droplets leaked from the corner of his mouth, and the IV tugged painfully as he reached up to catch them. He didn't think he could afford to waste even one drop.
"Hey hey!" The woman reached for the cup, and Jak jerked back out of reach.
"Not so fast, chico, you'll make yourself sick!"
Jak growled softly behind the rim of the cup and hitched up his shoulders. If this lady wanted to take the water away, she'd be in for a fight.
"Whoa!" The woman raised her brows. "Calm down. The water isn't going anywhere, I promise."
"I don't know you," Jak retorted, "How do I know you keep promises?"
Now the woman began to look a little annoyed.
"Fair enough," she begrudgingly allowed. "Considering the state we found you in, am I to assume that if I take that cup you'll bite me or something?"
"I might," answered Jak coolly.
Something bittersweet passed over the woman's face and lingered there at the corners of her mouth as she forced a smile.
"Well that wouldn't be very nice of you, but I can't say it wouldn't fit with every other kid in Spargus."
Jak lowered the cup slowly. "Spargus?" he asked, tilting his head, "What's that?"
"It's home," she answered. "The city of the forgotten and the betrayed -- and the hunter."
Jak raised the cup again and muttered darkly, "Well that's ironically appropriate."
"Let's start over, huh?"
The woman leaned back and carded a hand through her teased-out coils.
"My name is Phobos. I was with the convoy that found you and your friends in the Strider Range."
"...oh."
Jak grimaced. This woman had rescued him, hadn't she?
"I'm, um. I'm Jak."
Embarrassed, he gestured to the cup, the IV, and looked away. "What do I owe you? I don't...I don't have any money."
Phobos shook her head. "It's fine, chico- er, Jak. When people come to Spargus, those who have life debts pay it back by contributing to the overall survival of their new home and neighbors, depending on how old they are when they arrive."
"How old they are?" Jak fiddled with his now empty cup awkwardly. "What does that have to do with anything?"
Phobos gave him an amused glance. "Uh...kids are kids? This isn't Haven, hey? We don't even let people take the citizen applicant training course until we know they're eighteen or older."
She scooted closer and held up the pitcher. "Cup."
"Huh? Oh-"
Jak tilted the cup toward her but didn't let go. He watched her refill it and puzzled over the idea of a city in good enough shape that kids didn't have to work. Maybe there weren't metalheads out here.
"So...do you people normally pick up half-dead people and bring them home?"
"As long as they aren't half dead because they tried to kill us, yeah," Phobos said with a careless shrug. "Strength and survival: it's the two things Wastelanders respect the most. So when we find somebody in the badlands who isn't a dried out corpse, we know we've got the makings of a tough little survivor."
Surviving was, by necessity, Jak’s best skill. But considering the kind of jobs he got when people knew that, and how it had turned out last time, Jak decided not to advertise that fact. It already nagged at him that someone had seen his scars, and the bruises from the arrest, and every other injury he'd gained in the name of helping a city that hated him. Spargus wouldn't get the same freebies.
Eventually, Phobos stood up and put the pitcher back on a low counter that extended out of sight behind a curtain. She dusted off her yellow tunic and stretched her back with a soft grunt.
"Alright. I guess somebody ought to tell Damas you're awake and talking," she said, more to herself than to Jak.
Before Jak could ask who Damas was supposed to be, something careful and calculated slipped into Phobos's voice.
"So...just you and the critters, huh? Your parents know where you are?"
Hands tightened into claws around the wooden cup.
"I never had parents," Jak growled.
One more thing to "thank" Haven for, apparently.
"Ah." Phobos's eyes widened in an oddly dismayed expression. "Sorry, I..."
"Why?"
Jak's eyes narrowed at her.
"Literally no one has ever asked if I even had parents before you. You're fishing for something. What do you want?"
Then it hit him: if the woman had seen his scars, she had seen his amulet as well. Was that what she was getting at? Probing to see if any other ill-fated Heirs of Mar existed?
"Uh..." Phobos puffed out her cheeks and blew the air out. "It's...complicated. I'm gonna let Damas take this one."
"Who's Damas?" Jak demanded.
Phobos made another odd grimace and lifted a radio from the countertop.
"Hey, Damas, the kid's awake," she said, ignoring Jak's question.
A raspy voice crackled through the speaker.
"He is? Has he said anything yet?"
"Well, he threatened to bite me," Phobos joked before growing serious. "Take it easy when you come down, he's pretty worked up. Bring the orange guy if you can."
"Understood. Anything else I should know?"
"Yeah," Phobos sighed. "He doesn't know who we are, where we are, or how he got here. I don't think you're going to get any answers out of him."
"......oh."
The guy she called Damas sounded strangely...emotional.
"Er...alright. I'll...I'll see what I can do when I get there."
Jak glowered at Phobos's back. He hated when people talked about him like he wasn't there.
Out of habit, he reached for his collar to run his fingers over his amulet. That always helped him slow down when his thoughts were racing too fast. His fingers brushed against loose linen; the tunic he was wearing were not the one he'd had on the last time he was awake. Jak's stomach felt like it was plummeting from a precipice as he finally looked down at his body. Someone had dressed him in loose, lightweight clothing. There was no sign of his own clothing.
Or his amulet.
Fighting down feelings of violation and revulsion, Jak gripped the thin sheets in hands like claws.
"Where are my clothes?" he snarled, "What did you do?"
Phobos didn't look overly concerned, which only agitated Jak more.
"They're being checked for trackers or other bugs," she said with a shrug. "Haven's been trying to find our city for years. Can't be too careful. Look on the bright side: it's probably the first time they've ever been washed."
She leaned over the cot, and Jak jerked away.
"Don't touch me!"
There wasn't much room to retreat on the small bed, but Jak tried anyway.
"Who stole my amulet?"
"Hey, calm down," Phobos raised a placating hand, but dropped it quickly when Jak flinched. "Nobody stole it."
"Don't lie to me!"
Jak was over the verge of panic now. He was alone, powerless, right back to being poked and prodded like a doll. Like a lab rat.
"What do you want?!"
Grimacing, Phobos stepped back and grabbed her radio again.
"Hey Damas? Hurry it up, will ya?"
"I'm en route."
"Good. Because he just noticed the absence of a Certain Something and he is losing it right now."
"Rot. Okay, just- rot! Try to keep him calm, I'm bringing it, okay?"
The man's voice rose and fell oddly. It almost sounded like he was running.
Phobos ran a hand through her hair and puffed out her cheeks. This was not going as well as they'd hoped. Could've been worse, she acknowledged, but this kid's reactions were giving her a bad feeling. The scars, the reaction to the IV and having been given new clothing without his knowledge, it all painted a pretty grim picture.
"Damas is bringing your amulet down," she said in what she hoped was a soothing tone. (How did one talk to agitated teenagers?! Why weren't they as easy to calm as toddlers?) "He'll explain everything, chico, I promise. Just...stay here a minute, okay?"
Jak warily watched the woman walk through the curtain, listening and counting her footsteps. By the sound of it, he was in the back of a narrow building. There was someone else up there, wherever Phobos had gone, but they rustled around opening drawers instead of speaking. If there were guards, Jak couldn't hear them. He hoped there were none. In his current state, he doubted he'd be able to fight them off.
A door slid open with the sound of a chime, and Jak stiffened as a heavier tread entered the building.
"About time!" he heard Phobos greet the person, "He's all yours."
"Allegedly," the voice from the radio answered.
"Mmhm. You're cute when you're in denial. Better get back there before the poor kid has a heart attack."
When the curtains parted, Jak was in the act of climbing off the cot to look for something -- anything -- to defend himself with. He froze, locking eyes with a weathered Wastelander covered in scars and armor. He looked like the kind of guy Sig would run with. Jak stared at the man and wondered if this was the guy who allegedly had his amulet. Were those piercings on his skull?! Despite himself, Jak wondered how the man slept without ripping whatever he used for a pillow.
"Easy, young one," the man murmured, holding out his hands as if approaching a skittish animal. "Easy. You're in no danger."
"Usually when people tell me that, they're lying," Jak retorted. He backed up, silently cursing his shaky legs, until his back touched the wall and the IV tugged painfully at his arm. "Where's Daxter? What do you people want with us?"
The armored man lowered himself to sit on the end of the cot and folded his hands in front of him. "Your friend is perfectly safe," he soothed, "Well, unless he tries to use the water wheel as a carnival ride, I suppose. But he doesn't really seem the type to do that kind of thing."
"You didn't answer my other question," Jak said pointedly. "What do you want?"
"Answers," the man -- Damas, probably -- replied steadily, "Just answers."
"Like what?" Jak edged closer to the IV, trying to relieve the horrific sensation of the needle.
Then his visitor reached into a cloth pouch at his belt and drew out a familiar shape.
"What can you tell me about this?" he asked, holding up the amulet.
Forgetting the needle, Jak lunged for the pendant. Pain lanced through his elbow for an instant, hot and dull, and he pulled up short. He'd learned long ago not to rip needles out. There would just be more if he did.
"Whoa!" Damas dropped the amulet on the sheets and reached out as if to steady Jak. "Slow down, boy, you're going to hurt yourself! You shouldn't even be standing right now!"
Jak, unfortunately, agreed. But he locked his knees and kept his eyes on Phobos's friend, just as he had on Phobos.
"Give it back," he rasped, holding out a demanding hand.
Damas frowned thoughtfully. He picked up the chain and considered it for a few seconds before dropping it into Jak's outstretched hand.
"Where did you get this?" he asked.
With time-travel being too unbelievable an explanation even to those closest to Jak, he settled for the most open-ended version of the truth he could manage.
"Ancient ruins," he muttered.
The chain slipped down around his neck, and he visibly relaxed once the familiar weight rested against his collarbone.
Damas made an interested sound and folded his arms. "Ruins, eh? How did you find it?"
Evasively, Jak shrugged. "I just...knew where to look."
"And does this happen to you often? "Knowing" things?"
Hm. He might’ve been a little too open-ended there. Jak braced his back against the wall and begrudgingly clarified.
"I'm not a seer. It's just with eco stuff."
Damas nodded. "Ah! I understand. So what made you decide to keep such an odd little trinket?"
He wasn't being very subtle. Jak could do blunt too.
"It's mine. That's it. And I know what you're trying to do."
A hint of tension lined Damas’s neck and shoulders as he tried to play casual.
"Oh? And what am I trying to do, young one?"
Jak curled his lip at the man. "You're trying to get me to say I'm an Heir of Mar, probably so you can get some of his artifacts. What, do you want the Precursor Stone too? Well you're too late."
Any semblance of relaxation dropped from Damas like a cloak. He straightened, and the air filled with an undercurrent of warning. It was almost like eco -- enough that Jak wondered if the man could channel.
"Explain that, please."
It didn't sound like a request.
"What, exactly, do you know about the Precursor Stone?"
Jak gripped his amulet for calm.
"Not a myth," he said shortly, "Not meant to be used as a weapon, and not a rock."
He lifted his chin and met Damas’s hard eyes.
"I opened it. It can't be used anymore."
"Opened?!" Damas recoiled slightly. "You've touched the Stone?"
Suspicion colored his voice, but strangely he didn't seem to be getting hostile.
"Where did you find it?"
Agitated, Jak snapped, "In a tomb designed by some sadistic obstacle-course lover obsessed with "manhood", guarded by a bunch of loudmouth Oracles. Be glad you missed it."
He wondered if he was just setting himself up for problems later. If the Wastelanders knew he could speak to Oracles and traverse ruins, they'd probably make him pay off the medical care by finding artifacts for them. Story of his life.
But Damas looked shaken by the statement, not shrewd. He seemed almost to pale, and drew a hand over his face to rest over his mouth. His eyes bored into Jak's with an unsettling intensity.
"The amulet truly belongs to you, then," he finally acknowledged, in little more than a croak. His fingers pressed into his jaw hard enough that Jak wondered if the man would have fingerprints there later.
"How...how old are you, boy?"
What did that have to do with anything? Annoyed, Jak shrugged.
"Like I know? Fifteen, sixteen, what's it matter?"
"You don't...you don't know?" Damas looked even more shaken. "No one told you your own birthdate?"
Jak didn't want to talk about this. He finally slumped to sit at the head of the cot and crossed his arms sullenly.
"Y'know what, that's none of your business. Where's Daxter? I'm not saying anything else until I see him."
"I can arrange that."
Damas stood and absentmindedly picked up the wooden cup.
"You should er...try to sleep some. Heat exhaustion will leave you weak for a good several days-"
"Are you Damas?" Jak interrupted suddenly, as Phobos's attempted reassurances came to mind.
Damas turned. "Yes?"
He looked like he almost expected something else to follow.
Jak pulled his knees to his chest and rested folded arms on top of them. "The lady who was in here said you'd explain what you people wanted from me. And why you took my amulet."
The Wastelander looked, Jak thought, rather like he had just swallowed a bee. He made a few awkward hand motions -- some of it almost looked like signs -- and tugged on a tuft of hair at his chin.
"Ah...that is..."
He picked up the pitcher and splashed water into the cup clumsily. He was unsettled.
"The crest of Mar has...connotations. Doubtless you've learned by now, but when people see it they form...expectations."
Damas cleared his throat and handed the cup over to Jak.
"I removed it from you before the monks could see it and develop those expectations. I...wanted you to be able to focus on healing without the distraction of history zealots."
Well, that was marginally better than Jak had been imagining. He didn't exactly trust that the man was telling the truth, but at least he hadn't tried to sell it or something. Jak acknowledged his visitor's words with a curt nod and sipped at the water slowly. Idly, he wondered if his general age fit this city's "too young for serious work" bracket or not. After Haven, he honestly didn't know whether he hoped so or not.
Damas was staring at him. It was subtle, but intense, and Jak could feel his eyes. It made his brain itch, and he felt the urge to squirm uncomfortably.
"Are you in any pain?" Damas asked suddenly, apparently in response to the squirming.
"I don't like being stared at," Jak answered gruffly.
"...ah." Damas cringed and looked away. "Apologies. You just...look very familiar. I was trying to place whether I might have met you or someone you were related to in the past."
"Not unless you were in Haven before Praxis took over," Jak grumbled bitterly, "Or you took a tour of his prison labs in the last two years."
You're talking too much, Jak. Wait for Daxter. Why are you volunteering this information?
Well. He knew. He was scared and disoriented and angry, and he wanted to shock someone. Anyone. It was the dark eco talking.
"The labs?!" Damas dropped the pitcher with a crash. A terrible look flooded his face. "Did...was your whole family there?"
"Rot! Why are you guys so obsessed with information about my parents?" Jak was getting tired of repeating himself. "You know as much as I do! Even the freakin Oracles wouldn't tell me what the amulet meant until I got to the Tomb!"
From the front of the building, the third person finally called out.
"My lord, if you keep getting him worked up, I'm tossing you out. He's supposed to be resting!"
"I'm working on it, Petros!" Damas retorted sharply.
He closed his eyes and made a visible attempt to calm himself before turning back to Jak.
"Sorry. I know this is confusing. I am...having a difficult time finding the right words to ask the right questions." He made a helpless gesture. "Finding you, practically on my doorstep, with that amulet has upended my understanding of the world and my place in it."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Jak demanded.
Damas gingerly took a seat at the end of the cot again and, sighing deeply, reached into his pouch again.
"The last time I was in Haven for an extended period of time was about fifteen years ago, at the end of the last major campaign against the metalheads."
He opened his hand, revealing a second amulet of Mar in his palm.
"After Praxis betrayed me- after the hardships our city has faced over the last few years-"
He shook his head with furrowed brow.
"I- I thought I was the only one left. And now here you are, and I have more questions than answers."
Jak blinked, then blinked again.
"Well," he said in a strangled voice, "That makes two of us."
Splinter Cell au today! Last Splinter Cell was father-son bonding time, so today Jak gets to spend time with his mom
Phobos was a light sleeper even in the best of times. Here in this rebel base, during the second week of her and Damas rotating between Haven and Spargus with their children, even the slightest noise was enough to wake her. She sat up in her cot and let her eyes adjust to the half-light of the Babak settlement's barracks. What had roused her?
She let her eyes roam the long wooden hut, taking stock of each of her fellow Spargans and the members of Brutter's tribe. Leave it to a son of Damas to reforge the alliance between the Babak and the House of Mar by accident. Damas had been insufferable for an entire day when he found out. But Phobos found she couldn't be too irritated at him; the way Jak and his fluffy friend brightened when they heard him bragging about them was enough to make that stupid little smirk bearable. They walked a little taller any time she or Damas complimented them, Phobos had noticed. It was nice to see Jak opening up.
Thoughts of her newfound son drew her gaze to his cot, two beds over. With how restless he'd proven to be, Phobos half expected the cot to be empty. But it wasn't.
Jak sat hunched in the center of the cot with his knees pulled to his chest. Even in the gloom, it was apparent that something wasn't right. The fingers that gripped his knees were tipped with curved, black, talons. His skin had faded from bronze to an almost reflective pearl.
Oh.
Phobos had heard the reports of Jak's "Hunter" shape before, but she had never witnessed it in person. She took in the curved horns rising from his curls, and it struck her that the boy resembled nothing so much as the dragonowls that nested in the cacti in Strider Range. All he was missing were the feathers at this point. Even the flickers of violet sparks dancing across Jak's horns didn't diminish the fact that, in the context of desert life, the Hunter form was a little endearing.
Rising from her cot, Phobos shook out her tunic and made a show of stretching. From what she'd heard, startling Jak when he was in a battle-shift didn't end well. Stark black eyes zeroed in on her in an instant, tracking her movement. Phobos smiled at him and approached his bed slowly.
"Hey, little owl" she whispered, "What's got you up so late?"
His ears flicked up, then back -- a warning that he did not want to be touched, Phobos guessed. She settled on the very end of the cot and kept her hands where he could see them. Had he had a nightmare? From the things Tess mentioned now and then, Phobos knew the boy had more reasons for nightmares than most people twice his age. They may have been just acquaintances so far, but it rankled to know a young boy had suffered so horribly with no one to stand up for him.
"Are you alright, owlet?" Phobos frowned gently and tilted her head. "Has something disturbed you?"
Surprise softened Jak’s face. He cocked his head and mirrored Phobos's frown.
"You're not afraid?" asked clawed hands.
Phobos clicked her tongue, almost scoldingly.
"Why should I be? I am as dangerous as you are, owlet. And neither of us are as dangerous as the sea."
Jak furrowed his brow and drew his knees in closer.
"...doesn't feel good," he finally admitted. "Too much dark eco, can't let it out right now."
"Ah." Phobos sighed and shifted a little closer. "You're oversaturated? Yeah? I saw that happen to your father once when an ammunition crate broke."
It was getting easier to call Damas this boy's father. Easier to think of Jak as her own.
"It was a different kind of eco, sure, but it looked like it sucked either way."
If he had been Mar -- a strange statement, considering he had been Mar in another world, another life -- Phobos would have rubbed his back and hummed him to sleep again. But Mar was a toddler, still dependent on his adults for comfort. And Jak was just a few years shy of being old enough for the Arena trials! Most teenagers his age found such coddling embarrassing; Phobos could admit that she had been one such teenager once upon a time, cringing at her own mother's public affection.
But would Jak be the same?
He was so much older than their Mar, and yet sometimes she could see her little boy peering out from behind those bright eyes. He was starved for affection, but conditioned to distrust most touch. Unbearably lonely, but afraid of rejection.
Phobos bit her lip, then held out her hand. "Come on, Jak. Let's go outside. We'll get that eco spent so you can go back to sleep, alright?"
Jak winced and looked up. Fangs dug into his lip as he frowned.
"Can't. Might need it for battle."
"There will be more eco in battle," Phobos said. She stood and kept her hand extended.
"Come on, baby. I got you. I'll watch your back, okay?"
It took another five seconds of gentle cajoling before Jak uncurled himself and slid off the cot. He didn't take her hand -- he usually didn't -- but when Phobos looked back, he had the end of her sash in one hand, twisting it around his claws like he was afraid he'd get lost if he let go. He let himself be shepherded along the catwalks connecting the Babak village to the mine shafts. The humming of the elevator seemed to vibrate in his bones, through his horns, unbearably loud.
It was better to wake up in the stifling heat of the caverns, better to be surrounded by snoring, than to find himself in the harsh cold of the Baron’s laboratories. Better to be soaked with sweat on a creaky cot than to shiver while listening to the screams of other test subjects. But even here, even from the grave, Errol still held sway over his nightmares. That was what had gathered the eco into battle-readiness in his body, looking for threats that did not exist. Jak was a haunted man.
The cool night air washed over them both, and Jak shivered. It ended in a sneeze, and the woman beside him smiled softly.
She nodded to the cliffs above the cave network.
"Sig said he saw you scale a building in this shape, fast as a lizard. I bet you're even faster with real handholds."
She stepped back and squinted as if searching for something.
"I'll bet," she said slowly, "I'll bet you there's a couple hotfoot lizards up there, actually. You can eat those, you know. They don't taste that great, but they help your body regulate heat better for a while."
She shrugged.
"Why don't you see if you can catch a few, and I'll show you how to cook them in the morning."
Jak's sharklike eyes studied the cliffs, absorbing even the smallest pinprick of light. He grinned slowly.
"Eat them raw?"
Phobos made a face. "Blegh! You can, but you might regret it later."
"I might not."
"Oy!" Phobos shook her head and laughed quietly. "You sound like Damas when he was young!"
She wasn't sure if the subsequent darker hue of the boy's skin was a blush, or if the observation had made him lose a little dark eco.
Jak bent his knees slightly, and then with a rush of air he leaped; suddenly airborne, six feet directly up. One hand caught the face of the cliff, and soon he was scaling up the rocks at a dizzying rate. Despite herself, Phobos felt her jaw drop. She had never seen anyone but a Lurker make a jump like that unaided! Would Mar be able to do that one day? Or was this an ability only Jak had, learned from the Dark Oracle that favored him?
"Look at you!" She laughed in astonishment and clapped a hand to her forehead. "I oughta put you on the rigging in my fishing boat!"
Jak reappeared after a noisy minute or two with dark spots on one cheek that looked suspiciously like blood.
"Found the lizards," he signed down to her.
Phobos raised an eyebrow. "Did you eat them?"
"No....yes. One." Then he reached back and almost sheepishly raised the battered carcass of a Glub.
"Ohhhh." Phobos squinted up through the darkness. "You want any help up there? Or do you just want to hunt until the eco runs out?"
She knew the answer before Jak had even set the Glub down to sign again.
The moment she'd said "hunt", his eyes had narrowed and his ears flicked up.
Dark eco wasn't just the element of the ocean. It was the element of the hunter, the carnivore, and the tempest. The chase was in its very nature, and right now that nature was rushing through Jak's veins at breakneck speed.
Jak bared his fangs in what was either a show of aggression to Glubs, or a very unsettling smile. Then he dropped out of sight, and Phobos guessed that he was probably shimmying along the ground to look for lizards.
He would probably be up there for a little while. Phobos strolled along the small strip of beach, looking for palm fronds to weave into a basket. She somewhat doubted that Jak would remember to actually bring her any lizards, but she liked working with her hands nonetheless. Without really thinking about it, she hummed quietly, keeping a rhythm with her hands. It was a lively tune, a folk song so old that no one in Spargus really remembered where it had come from. In the language of the people who had once lived in the ruined coastal settlements, the lyrics were something to do with a wily cacomiztli asking a cockatoo to a Fiesta with her. She praised the bird's plumage and grace, and he, flattered, agreed to go. Naturally, the song ended with the cacomiztli having a very nice party meal.
A bit morbid, perhaps, but it had a fine, rollicking melody, and easy to remember rhymes -- even for those who couldn't speak the Coastwatcher dialect. And it reminded children not to trust a flatterer.
A shuffling of feet on the sand paused Phobos's humming, and she glanced up. Jak crouched less than two feet from her, watching with a bemused expression. How was he so quiet?!
His horns had receded considerably, now no more than little nubs poking out of his curls. He'd gotten some color back, too.
"Oye, owlet, did you bring me any lizards?" Phobos asked.
Sheepishly, he held up two lizard tails. Evidently, he had forgotten that the creatures could detach their tails and flee. By the mess on his hands, Phobos guessed he'd spent more time hunting Glubs. She laughed and patted the sand next to her.
"Better luck next time, eh? Here- go get yourself a frond. We're making baskets until you're ready to go back to sleep."
The dark eco continued to fade as Jak struggled to weave with claws. What little hadn't been expended on the small carnivores up the cliff was rapidly being reabsorbed into his bloodstream. When the dark form dropped entirely, Phobos almost didn't notice at first. Jak was as quiet as before, sitting still and watching her weave. She continued to hum until a raspy voice interrupted her.
"Did...Dax...teach you...that?"
Phobos glanced up and noticed Jak wince and massage his throat. She clicked her tongue sympathetically.
"Regretting eating that lizard raw, huh? Too bad we didn't bring our canteens so you could wash that taste out."
"It...was bad." Jak made a face.
With a chuckle, Phobos scooted closer. "Alright owlet, let me see what you've got."
She looked at the sad, lopsided basket, and took hold of Jak's hands to guide him.
"Here: over, under. Over, under. Do that all the way around until you have an alternating pattern on each stem."
Jak furrowed his brows and did his best to follow her movements.
"You didn't answer my question," he croaked.
Ugh. That taste was going to sit in his throat for hours.
"Which one, baby?" Phobos asked, reaching over to flick a coil of hair out of his face.
Baby.
Nobody had ever called him baby before. Well, not sincerely, anyway. Jinx and his guys did sometimes, but they called everyone nicknames like that, because they were weird.
They didn't have the same warmth in their voices, and they definitely didn't apply affectionate nicknames to his dark form!
"The song. Daxter's favorite when we were little. Did he teach you?"
Phobos leaned back. "It's been around that long? Huh! Didn't think the Coastwatcher people went as far as Dead Town."
Jak shrugged. "Daxter's not from Sandover either. He showed up in a boat a year before I did. Said a hurricane washed his village away and he was trapped in the boat."
Jak paused as something occurred to him.
"Wait. How far is your island from Misty Island?"
"Misty Island?"
"Where everyone says the Nest is," Jak clarified.
With how much dark eco had been there when he was a kid, he wasn't surprised that the metalheads had chosen Misty Island to nest.
"About two days on a propeller boat," Phobos said, rubbing her chin, "Closer to two hours by air."
The math lined up surprisingly well, and Jak began to wonder if perhaps his best friend had his origins on the same island he had allegedly been born on. One more thing tying them together; Daxter would be so excited!
"You telling me your buddy in the Titan Suit is a Coastwatcher?" Phobos asked with interest.
"Um...maybe? Have to ask."
Phobos whistled low. "When we go home, we'll have to keep the monks from snatching him. They're obsessed with history and archeological discovery. You tell them a Coastwatcher ancestor is still living and they'll lose their minds."
Jak laughed, almost silently. "He'd probably like that, though. It's rough being the last survivor."
Phobos wrapped an arm around his shoulders and, distracted as he was, Jak simply leaned into her. Phobos stilled, unwilling to jeopardize this moment. She smiled and set her basket aside to brush a hand over her son's hair.
"Well. Neither of you are alone now," she murmured. "And I can promise you, we're not going anywhere."
Was it her imagination, or did Jak lean into her side a little further?
They sat quietly for a moment, watching the waves roll in and out. Then, barely audible over the hiss of the surf, Jak whispered,
Jak always knew when he was being stared at. He'd developed a sense for it out of necessity in the Fortress; knowing when unfriendly eyes were on him was sometimes all that stood between him and another beating. It made his skin prickle, and his heart race. It wasn’t just his imagination: the dozen or so Wastelanders in the vehicle pit were openly gawking at them as they climbed out of the buggy.
It's Mar they're staring at, Jak tried to reassure himself. Not me. They aren't staring at me.
A thin arm slipped around his shoulders, and Jak looked up quickly. Daxter walked beside him, eyes darting back and forth rapidly. To anyone else, the gesture would have seemed protective -- and in part, it was. But Jak knew that Daxter was seeking reassurance as much as he was. They were strangers in a strange city, and lacked the easy confidence with which Tess approached the Wastelanders.
Tess sauntered boldly alongside Sig with the crocadog at her heels, eagerly pointing at one thing then another to ask questions. From the moment she'd spotted a woman wielding a weapon that was part staff, part morph gun, there had been a spark in her eye that only grew brighter.
"What's the rate of fire on it?" Tess asked.
Sig smirked indulgently. "Go ask her yourself, cherry. Each gunstaff is custom."
With an excited squeal, Tess ducked under Sig’s outstretched arm to approach the woman. Her bubbly greeting was received with a guarded and not very friendly response, but this didn't dim her enthusiasm in the slightest. She was more than used to such attitudes in the saloon.
"Oh. My. Blob." Tess hopped like a child with a crush. "Is that blowback breech assist? How'd you work that into such a sleek design?"
Some of the warrior's suspicious demeanor eased. Weapons talk? From a city kid?
She glanced up at Sig and Damas with a raised brow.
"Civvy candidate or temp worker?" she asked bluntly.
"Sponsored candidate," Sig answered. "The kid's got a thing for gunsmithing."
He waved a hand in their direction.
"Tess, this is Zara. Zara, Tess."
"Sponsored, huh?"
With a cocky smile, Zara gestured to Tess with her chin.
"Tell you what, Sunshine, you bring me a battle amulet and I'll show you how to make your own gunstaff."
"Bet on it!" Tess chirped. She waved and all but skipped back to the main group.
"Um...do...do you know how to get a battle amulet? Or where?" Daxter asked her quietly.
Tess shrugged. "Nah, but I'll figure it out. I always do."
"That's true," Daxter mused.
His freckled face darkened to crimson as Tess slipped her hand into his and laced their fingers together. On his other side, Jak shot him a wicked grin. Before, Daxter had never really had to worry about people seeing him blush. The bright orange fur covering his body had camouflaged it, giving him an abnormally good poker face. Now, of course, he was right back to wearing his heart on his sleeve again. And right now, that heart was pounding fit to burst.
He had no idea what Tess saw in him, really. He was just the goofy sidekick, making up exploits for even a crumb of attention. Maybe she liked storytellers or something. She certainly liked his freckles. For a moment, Daxter almost wished Jak's "uncle" could be there so that he could see the "little, annoying, miserably ugly one" walking hand in hand with an absolutely dynamite girl.
The memory sat sour in his stomach, barely tempered by remembering the disgust on Jak’s face when his guardian prattled on with his insults. Jak used to try so hard to make himself speak out loud whenever people would say things like that to Daxter. He would get so angry, and then ever more frustrated when his voice wouldn't obey him and the rebuke stayed lodged in his throat.
That had always made Daxter feel both better and worse, somehow. Knowing that Jak was always ready to stand up for him made everything bearable. But knowing the depths of Jak's frustration, being unable to make the adults stop, and how powerless it made him feel-
Well. Daxter hated seeing Jak upset. He always had.
The thought drew his mind back to the present, and he discreetly checked Jak to gauge his mood. The smaller boy was tense, walking in a state of hypervigilance. He kept his eyes on Damas’s broad back -- and the top of Mar’s curly head by extension -- as they moved from the circular garages to an inner gate into the city. Beyond it, houses lay stacked in piles of sandstone, adobe, and sheet metal in asymmetrical clumps interrupted by dusty streets. Laundry criss-crossed the alleys from upper storey windows like flags -- much of it in earth-tones, ostensibly for desert camouflage, but Daxter could spot more than a few items in lively yellows and blues.
"So uh..." Daxter cleared his throat to rid himself of the awkward squeak -- he couldn't help it after having fought alongside Damas. The man was just plain intimidating!
"Which um, which house is yours?"
Damas juggled Mar a little higher. "Well, Mar? Do you remember the way home?" he asked.
With a wide smile, Mar pointed to the armored tower that loomed over the rest of the city. The one they had taken for just a beacon.
Daxter was pretty sure Jak's eye was twitching.
"That's your house?!" he sputtered.
"Oooooof course it is," Jak sighed. "Nobody in this family is normal, apparently."
"And don't you forget it," Damas answered placidly.
"Normal is for city-slickers, anyway," Sig added, tousling Jak's hair as he strode past.
Crowding into the small elevator at the base of the tower was not an especially enjoyable experience for anyone. Sig was backed against the side rail, Daxter was having doubts about structural integrity, and all Jak could see was a forest of elbows in his face. He suspected that this was how Daxter had been seeing the world for the last two years. It was definitely how Mar saw things when not being carried. But currently Mar was free of the elbow parade, up in Damas’s arms, enviably unsquished. Of course, Jak wasn't going to ask someone to pick him up. He'd just stay with the elbows, thanks.
"There's only one way in and out of the tower?" Tess asked, glancing around. "Isn't that a tactical hazard?"
Sig shrugged, having never really put much thought into it. He didn't live there, after all. Damas, however, acknowledged the observation with a half smile.
"Well," he said, "There's only one way in and out to the public."
Tess raised her eyebrows. "Ah. Fair enough."
When the elevator locked into place at the top of the shaft, everyone under eighteen abruptly lost their senses.
The throne room was filled with water.
Streams, pools, even trickles dropping from the ceiling here and there. Homemade thickets of date palms around the edges of the chamber added to the feeling of an indoor oasis. In the desert, that made for a truly intimidating show of wealth and power.
There was a purpose to the display, however -- as Damas had learned shortly after coming to power. The looming statue of a Precursor Oracle to the right of the dais was hollow: a facade to hold pipes that ran through a filtration system that filled much of the interior of the tower. Water was drawn from the ocean below, passed through several filtration rooms, then sent out of the base of the statue and onto a massive water wheel behind the dais. From there, the well-filtered water was sent back through pipes and into the city. The runoff flowed through the pools and streams of the throne room to power generators under the floor.
Jak stared at the rocks and damp sand coating the floor. So that really had been a memory! He'd been taught to swim here, in another life. An impulse seized him, and he kicked off his oversized boots the second he'd squirmed between the elbows to exit the lift. The stones were pleasantly warm against his bare feet, and the sand was cool and wet. The motion of the water thrummed with unrefined blue eco potential, resonating in Jak’s blood in a way that made it impossible to stand still. How he would have liked to take the jet board over that water wheel!
"This place is awesome!" Daxter gasped behind him.
Damas looked just a little smug. "We've worked hard to make it so."
In his arms, Mar began to squirm restlessly -- no doubt sensing the eco of motion just as Jak did.
"Swim! Go swim, Daddy!"
"After you say hello to your mother," Damas admonished. "She hasn't seen you in a very long time, little one."
"Damas?"
A woman's voice cut through the sound of the water like a bell, and everyone paused.
A pathway of stepping stones cut through the pools, leading to a raised dais framed by the water wheel. Torchlit pillars on either side were emblazoned with the spiral design that Jak would later learn was the symbol of the desert Wastelanders, meant to signify the wind. There was a dark-skinned woman in blue standing beside one of the pillars, with her hand resting against the wind-spiral carving. And judging by the shriek that tore out of Mar, the lady was exactly who Jak thought she was.
"Mm-a!"
Damas set Mar down on the walkway and watched with a soft expression as the tiny boy raced across the stone to fling his arms around the short woman's thick waist. Phobos tried her best to restrain a soft sob, successfully relegating it to a hiccuping gasp. Then she fell to her knees to scoop Mar into her arms, rocking back and forth where she knelt.
"My baby-!" she choked, and buried her face in his hair for a moment before turning to cover his round cheeks in kisses.
Mar giggled and pushed at her lips. "Nooo! Smoochy-monster!"
Behind him, Jak heard Sig numbly mumble, "Precursors. He remembers the Smoochy-monster game?"
"The what?" Daxter whispered to Tess.
Tess shrugged. It seemed straightforward enough to her.
Proudly, Mar leaned back in his mother's arms to point to himself.
"Mommy, I am so big now! I'm big enough to swim all by myself!"
"He isn't," Tess interjected, "Don't let him fool you."
Phobos quickly wiped her eyes -- red and watery though they remained -- and pulled Mar close again. Sitting cross-legged on the stone, she folded herself around her son, either laughing, weeping, or both.
"Baby, I missed you so much! I knew Uncle Sig would find you, I knew it!"
Open-mouthed, Mar looked back at Sig. "How'd you know that?"
Phobos's lips wobbled as she tried to smile around another sob. "Call- call it a mother's intuition. Or call it faith."
Jak startled when a hand fell on his shoulder. Apologetically, Damas let go, but stayed close.
"We never gave up, you know," he said quietly, and somehow Jak knew the words were for him and not his small counterpart. "We never stopped searching for you."
Surrounded by uncomfortable emotions, Jak blurted out the nagging fear that had plagued him from the moment they set foot in the city, "If I'd been sixteen, would you still say that? Would you still look if I wasn't small and...and cute?"
That was not an easy question to answer. And Jak knew it wasn't really fair -- Damas had never seen him in the sixteen-ish year old shape, how was he supposed to answer? But the dark eco in his blood curled around that anxiety and worried at it like a cat, batting it around and howling until the rest of him conceded that there was a problem. Tentatively, Jak looked back at Damas, about to tell him he didn't have to answer that.
He didn’t want to know anyways, he told himself. Damas had been unusually kind to him, and he didn't want to ruin that image.
Damas didn’t answer the question. Instead, he frowned down at Jak and asked, "Why would that change anything? I would still be finding a second son I didn't know I could hope for, regardless of how tall he'd gotten."
Jak turned his head again quickly, hoping to hide his emotions from the man. "But-" he said thickly, barely audible over Phobos's sobs, muffled though they were, "I wasn't....I was a freak. I turned into something...else, whenever I got angry!"
Damas made a thoughtful hum behind him, then sighed heavily. "Forgive me if I sound flippant, but without having witnessed that for myself, I can't help thinking that just sounds like puberty. I wasn't the most lovable individual from fourteen to sixteen either."
Jak felt him tense slightly.
"In fact," the man muttered, suddenly even more awkward, "I recall a...large quantity of traffic incidents caused during that period."
Something about the image of the intimidating warrior accidentally scraping against walls and knocking into other drivers in a zoomer struck Jak as funny. He couldn't picture Damas as a teenager -- in his mind he just saw himself with Damas’s rather unusual hair. It was decidedly bizarre -- Daxter would have called it a "cursed image" -- and despite himself, Jak found himself snorting in amusement.
"How many zoomers have you totaled?" he asked.
Damas moved to crouch beside him with a mischievous smirk. "Accidentally, or deliberately?"
"Yes."
Glancing back at Sig, Tess, and Daxter, all of whom seemed too uncomfortable witnessing the emotional reunion to notice, Damas leaned in and whispered to Jak, "One hundred and fifteen."
Jak blinked. "You're a bad driver," he said without thinking.
Damas flushed slightly as he managed to suppress a laugh into a hissing wheeze.
"Hey!" he gently jostled the boy's arm. "Only some of those were accidents!"
"Then you're a bad driver on purpose."
"And I suppose you have a spotless driving record, little man?"
Jak puffed up indignantly and jostled Damas back. "You had somebody to teach you how to drive. I figured it out all by myself and still won the Memorial Stadium Cup."
"The death race?" Damas wrinkled his nose. "I hope that was when you were...taller."
They gave everyone in Spargus such drab colors except for Jak 😅
I think they should be allowed to have bright colors for festivals and stuff. Yeah, I get needing desert camouflage when your neighbors are Mad Max Adjacent, but when you're inside the walls, why not liven it up a little?
Jak getting adopted in Faulty Info is a good enough reason for fancier clothes 😉
