#there is a DAMAS. LOOSE. in HAVEN!

[radioactivepeasant]

Snippets: Free Day Thursday

Ok, part 2!

Part One Here

(Warning for brief violence)

"Okay!" Daxter snapped, flinging a piece of a lever to the ground in disgust, "That is the last time I ever, ever, touch any more stupid Precursor crap!"

Jak would have responded, but he couldn't tear his eyes away from the strange place they had fallen into. Hard stone covered the ground in even, flat surfaces, like walking paths made of one solid piece. They matched the gray of drab huts built four or five levels high -- fortresses? -- with equally flat tops and windows covered in a thin, reflective material of some kind. Everything smelled like rotting garbage and the exhaust fumes of his zoomer! What kind of dead ruin was this?

A ruin, perhaps, but hardly a dead one.

Zoomers in bright colors and sleek shapes darted back and forth overhead, mesmerizing the small boy. There were more people on them than he'd ever seen in his life! People walked along the streets in crowds! Was this what Uncle called "city"? It was so much bigger than the villages! And if he stood on the tips of his toes, Jak could see more structures that were even taller!

"There he is!" a harsh voice rang out.

A group of -- were they people? They were covered in armor with goggles that reminded Jak of the giant Precursor robot -- marched towards him, carrying strange weapons. The long, thin things reminded him of the Yellow Sage's blunderbuss. Some forgotten instinct told him that these things were deadly, and never to be played with.

Why were they coming towards him? Had he done something wrong?

Oh no! The broken pieces of the Rift vehicle must have hurt someone!

"Move in!"

In mere seconds, the red warriors had completely surrounded them. Part of Jak wanted to fight, but if they were just protecting their city from what probably looked like an attack, maybe it would be better to stay calm. Jak didn't want to find out what those weapons could do at such close range. But as the circle closed around him, Jak looked up into the face of their leader, and his stomach turned.

This wasn't a misunderstanding. These people were looking for trouble. The tattooed man smirking down at him had the same unreasonable gleam in his eye as Gol Acheron. He didn’t want to talk. He was going to hurt them whether or not they gave him a reason.

Jak took a step back without thinking as his pulse began to thunder in his ears.

What does he want? I didn't do anything to him! Why is he looking at us like that?!

"Step away from the animal!" barked a soldier.

Whoever they were, they understood that Jak was more powerful with Daxter supplementing his attacks. But Jak had never seen these people in his life!

Had he?

The boy cast a frantic look down at Daxter as a soldier began to move towards him.

Run! Run, Daxter!

With a shriek, the ottsel dodged the armored hand and dove between the man's legs.

"GO GO GO!" he screeched, darting off down a side street.

But Jak couldn't follow. The men crowded closer, fencing him in as their sneering leader snapped, "Forget the rat! The Baron wants him!"

Me? Why?! What's a Baron?!

A cruel smile twisted the leader's face as he signaled the man beside Jak.

"We've been waiting for you," he cooed.

Something slammed into the side of Jak's head, dropping him like a stone. Lights danced behind his eyes, and he couldn't think past the pain. Why? Why were they doing this? Were they friends of the Acherons? Rough hands grabbed him by the arms and dragged him to his feet, ignoring his soft whimper. He had to escape. Had to find Daxter. Somehow Jak knew that if he let these people take him, he might never see his friends again.

His throat pulsed and spasmed, but he couldn't force the sound past the lock in his mouth, couldn't cry out for help. Someone! Please, please stop them! Precursors! Somebody!

Somebody answered.

There was an awful, wet sound. Claws through cloth, and flesh, and the horrible, high screams that always followed.

Jak knew that sound. When the Lurkers attacked village outskirts and Samos sent him to clean up the mess, he'd learned what it sounded like when someone was being ripped apart.

His head was swimming, but Jak forced himself to look up. Through leaking eyes he caught the blurry figure of a...a someone, covered in armor. Their head -- or maybe a helmet? Hopefully a helmet -- looked like the skull of the monsters that had flown out of the Rift Gate, complete with the shining yellow thing on the forehead. They were attacking the leader man, the one who hadn't been wearing as much armor as the others.

It seemed the leader wasn't accustomed to close quarters fighting.

He screeched again as the newcomer raked long claws down his face, then bodily lifted him. With a grunt that sounded more human than monster, the creature flung its victim into the soldiers surrounding Jak just as they raised their weapons. There were three flashes of light at once, then panicked shouting and more screaming. The eco that shot out of their weapons had hit their leader as he was thrown, by the sounds of the yelling. "Commander Errol" continued to scream like he was dying. He probably was.

Abruptly the two men holding his arms let go. Still disoriented, Jak staggered and fell to his hands and knees. More yellow eco blasts roared over his head, adding to the ringing in his ears, and the stench of blood grew stronger. Maybe he could crawl out of the way, escape down the side street Daxter took. Maybe-

The creature shot out a red hand and caught Jak by the wrist, pulling him to his feet so quickly his head spun and his stomach lurched. He tried to pull free, but the monster's grip tightened.

"Can you run?"

A man's voice. Was it a creature? Or was this more armor?

Jak wobbled and groaned, and the man-thing seemed to take that as an answer. Without another word, he ducked down to sweep Jak's legs off the ground. He bundled him close to his blood-spattered breastplate and began to run. The jarring of boots against stone did nothing to allay the pounding in Jak’s head, radiating from where the red soldier had hit him. What on earth was happening to him?!

"Hold on tight, Jak. Going to get a little tricky here," his rescuer said.

Wait. He knew Jak's name? How did he know Jak's name?! Did he know one of the sages? Maybe the Yellow Sage, since he seemed like some kind of wild man. If he knew the sages, he'd know how to get back to Sandover! Jak struggled to make a sound the man would recognize as a word or question. Grownups never understood signs, why would this one be different?

"Wait, Jak. We're not safe yet," said the man sternly.

Jak stilled. Whoever this was, he didn't sound like the kind of person you ignored.

Streets flew by as the man ran down alleys and around more corners than he could count. Then his steps slowed. There was something metallic and green -- one of those unusual zoomers that had been flying around, wide enough for two people -- sitting unattended. The man made an exclamation of triumph and hurried over to it. He deposited Jak into one of the seats with a surprising gentleness, fastening two strange belts over his chest with a click.

"That commander's access pass will get us into the agricultural sector," his rescuer said, as if that meant anything to him, "then we'll be out of the city and into the forest. Just stay close to me, no matter what, understand?"

Jak stared at his mask with wide eyes and didn't answer. The man sighed, rattling behind the skull.

"I know. I know you don't recognize me, little one."

Strange, he sounded kind of sad.

"I promise, I'll explain what's going on when we're in the forest. Now: hold onto something."

The wide zoomer, it turned out, was a lot faster than his a-grav zoomer back home. It could hover a lot higher, too. If Jak's head didn't still ache, he would have been a lot more interested in the vehicle. But as it stood, he was pretty sure he was going to throw up. Was this how Daxter felt when they were running around?

Nah. Daxter was one of the toughest people Jak knew. He could roundhouse kick a Lurker in the face and flip back onto Jak’s shoulder without even getting dizzy!

Wait! Daxter!

Frantically, Jak waved his hands as the zoomer careened through and around other drivers, scraping paint more than once. Even though he didn't expect an answer, he signed, "Go back! Go back, my friend is back there!"

Predictably, the man did not go back. But to Jak’s surprise, he did answer.

"We're not going back," he grunted, throwing the craft into a climb that left the engine straining. "That plaza will be swarming with guards now."

Then, a little gentler, he added, "Don't worry so much about Daxter. He's a smart boy, he knows how to keep himself safe until someone comes for him."

Not only did this person know who Jak was, he knew Daxter?

A smart boy. He called Daxter a smart boy.

No one had ever said anything that nice about his best friend before. Especially not adults. Jak had never understood why everyone but Ollie and Mrs. Perch seemed to hate Daxter so much, but it had always frightened him. If they hated a kid who never did anything to them, that meant Jak was on a tightrope every day to keep them from deciding to hate him, too.

But the scary man who grabbed him, he knew Daxter's name. He didn't call him a rat or an animal, he called him a boy! He called him smart! Jak’s previous fear began to melt away. Anyone who talked about his best friend like that had to be a nice person, right? And he was a fun driver, too! Too bad Jak's stomach was trying to crawl up his throat at the moment.

After a tense few seconds, the zoomer leveled out and shot past a fancy fountain, over the heads of people in nicer clothes than what Jak had seen before. A few shook their fists and complained as they flew past. Slate gray paths gave way to the first green he'd seen since first getting into the Rift craft. A long, narrow expanse of grass held several plots of unusually large produce. The plots were being tended by exhausted looking people in much dirtier clothes than the people by the fountain. They didn't even glance up when the zoomer sped by.

They pulled to a stop at a high, forbidding wall. The door shaped vaguely like a skull only added to the sense of foreboding around it, as if it was a warning. A quick glance around revealed that the wall extended as far as Jak could see, so high that nothing was visible beyond it. How could these people stand it? It must be like living at the bottom of a silo!

Jak was snapped from his thoughts by the man yanking the strap things off him with a click and pulling him out of the zoomer. It took him a moment to get his feet under him, but at least he didn't feel like he was going to tip over.

"Hurry," said the man tersely. Almost as if he wasn't thinking about it, he reached down and took hold of Jak's hand. He tugged Jak after him and walked swiftly towards the door.

"Not a little kid!" Jak protested with his free hand as best as he could.

Although, he had a feeling his rescuer could argue to the contrary, considering Jak barely stood as high as the man's ribcage.

"Now leaving Haven City," said a woman's voice above their heads as the door rolled shut behind them. Jak looked around for a talk-box, but couldn't tell where the lady was speaking from. "Haven", eh? Didn't seem like much of a Haven to Jak.

A second door opened in front of them, and a weight lifted off of Jak's shoulders.

Trees, ancient and massive, sprawled across hills and around a creek running placidly down to a lake. Nature didn't care about soldiers and cities and people hurting each other. Nature kept growing and being born and dying and being reborn in an eternal cycle of eco. It was a relief to see none of those entombing walls before them. Strange though, Jak didn't see any signs of wildlife. One bird chirruped several trees away, but everything else was eerily quiet.

The armored man lifted an oddly shaped talk-box to his ear and turned away from Jak.

"Satellite One, this is Lighthouse. We're clear."

"Copy that, Lighthouse. Wait, who's "we"?"

"Oh. Jak. The kid Praxis was trying to ambush?"

"Kid?! Wait, you didn't tell me you were going to grab someone's kid!"

"Don't worry about it," the man said casually, "Focus on the mission."

The person calling themselves Satellite One was quiet for a second, then relented. "...right. I'll...I'll bring him home, Damas. I swear it."

"If anyone can, it's you." The man -- Day-maz? Is that what Satellite called him? -- put the talk box away and took in a deep breath through his nose. Then he pivoted to kneel in front of Jak.

"Alright, let's have a look at you."

He unlatched the mask or helmet and slid it off, revealing a human face beneath a hood. He pushed it off and shook his ears free with a grumble.

"Bah. This disguise is a necessary evil but I can't say I'll be sad to see it go."

The clawed gloves followed, and then rough brown fingers lifted Jak's chin carefully, checking for injuries.

"Look up? Good. Pupils...ah, mmhm. Jak, can you tell me if you feel dizzy or nauseous right now?"

"Yes."

Thin, almost invisible eyebrows rose over violet eyes. "Yes you can tell me, or yes you feel dizzy?"

"Yeah, that one." Jak frowned. "There's no birds."

The Day-mas man released Jak's face and clicked his tongue. "Well, you may have a mild concussion, little one."

Jak's ears drooped a few seconds after the words caught up to him. Aw man! But those take forever to go away without eco!

The thought of avoiding running and climbing for a few weeks was torture!

"There's a green eco vent a couple miles into the woods if we keep going northwest. For a slight brain injury you really need a full vent, but I can give you a little now to make walking easier."

The man pulled off more of the scaly armor and searched around a belt full of pouches before coming up with a tube of some kind of paste.

"Hold still."

Eco in paste?! How did he get it into a jelly?! It sat cold on Jak’s skin, numbing the place the guard had slammed his weapon into. Jak shivered as his mind cleared a bit. With the adrenaline beginning to wear off, he was starting to notice the cold. He'd need to find some yellow eco to raise his core temperature. Absentminded, he signed a thanks to the man and looked around.

"Who are you?" he asked, then belatedly remembered to add, "How do you know me and Daxter?"

With a weird, sad, smile, the man sat back on his heels. "My name is Damas," he said quietly, and then spelled it with his hand.

"You sign?!"

Jak thought adults just weren't capable of understanding signs!

"Yes," Damas signed back, "It's very common where I come from. Come, we need to get you more eco. Explanations can wait until you are fully healed."

He stood and held out a hand.

"I'm not a baby!" Jak complained, but he took the offered hand anyway.

Damas chuckled warmly. "No, you're not a baby. But you are quite small, compared to me. I wouldn't want you to get lost out here in the unknown. You never know what you'll run into out here in the woods."

"No birds," Jak commented again, frowning into bushes and trees as he was tugged along.

Entirely too cheerfully, Damas answered, "No, no birds. You're keeping track of your surroundings, good! There are predators nearby that have scared them off."

"Wha?!" Jak yelped, looking around again.

Damas squeezed his hand and began to make his way along the creek. "You don't need to worry about them, alright? I won't let anything hurt you, I promise."

Jak made a skeptical sound, but squeezed back and let himself be guided deeper into the woods, and further away from the world he'd left behind.

[diario-secreto-bjd]

* BJD recursos: Información y Base de Datos: Actualización 2017

* BJD resources: Information and Database: Update 2017

Nuestro Grupo en Facebook -- (Spanish only)

La verdad sobre el cyberbullying en grupos de dolls Argentinos: -- (Spanish only)

If you are new in this hobby – Guía Express para novatos. (Español/Spanish) e (Ingles/English)

Medidas Comunes de BJD: (Guía Explicativa de nombres y escalas) -- (Spanish only)

¿Son ‘Dollfies’ o ‘BJDs’? : Diferencias explicadas para sacarse la duda. -- (spanish only)

Guía Express de siglas u abreviaciones – sus significados en el hobby, medidas y tipos de dolls. (Español/Spanish)

Casas baratas de BJDs: -- las marcas de BJDs mas económicas - (Spanish only)

ResinSoul, a Good Option – Review about RS / Nota sobre la casa ResinSoul (famosa por sus bajos precios en BJDs originales)

List of Companies – General listing of some companies / Lista general de Compañías.

List of companies – By alphabetic order / Lista de Compañías de la A-Z.

Tiendas de Accesorios para Muñecas y BJDs: (Pelucas, Ropa, Ojos, Calzado y otros accesorios) - (Spanish only)

* Argentina Only – Como lidiar con Aduanas (2015) - En español. -- ACTUALIZADO a Agosto 2016.

Info sobre el sistema de compras al exterior [Argentina AFIP 2017]: -- (Spanish only)

Importadores de BJDs y dolls de afuera hacia Argentina: -- (Spanish only)

How to Order a recast from S/L – Express Tutorial. (Ingles/English)

Translations that can help – How to Translate: English/Chinese. (Ingles/English)

Vendedores de Recast en Aliexpress: - nombres, calidad, confiabilidad. -- (Spanish only)

Facups made by recasters – Maquillajes realizados por Recasters

BJD clothing – Some stores on Taobao / Ropa de BJD Tiendas de Taobao.

Castaways Forum – ALL doll friendly / Foro amigable a TODAS las muñecas, incluyendo Recast y Originales.

Recast BJD Haven Forum – ALL doll friendly / / Foro amigable a TODAS las muñecas, incluyendo Recast y Originales.

Recast Sanctuary Forum – ALL doll friendly / / Foro amigable a TODAS las muñecas, incluyendo Recast y Originales.

Recast Masterlist – General info / Lista Maestra de todos los Recast-Copias disponibles y sus vendedores. **NOTE, due to the Haven being temporarily out we have to include a direct link Recast Master List V2 (spreadsheet, viewable in browser)

BJD collectacy – Bjd news / Noticias y Novedades de BJDs.

Movies with dolls – A list of films to remember / Listado de películas con muñecas.

Where Angels Lie – Volks database / Base de datos sobre todo lo que sea de la fabrica VOLKS (“Super Dollfie”).

Dean-of-Angels Wiki – I do hate DoA, they’re bully-elitist-irrational people and it’s horrible place to be as a forum, but the Wiki it’s open for everyone so you might want to check for some extra info. No need to register.

Dean-of-Angels Wiki – Realmente no me cae bien DoA, es un foro lleno de abusivos elitistas irracionales y un horrendo lugar para estar si realmente amas este hobby, pero la Enciclopedia (solo en ingles) esta abierta a TODOS por si quieren verla para sacar info y medidas. No tienes necesidad de registrarte en el foro para verla.

BJD Measurement Comparison Spreadsheet – WIP - Listado de comparación para medidas de diferentes BJDs (formato “Spreadsheet”).

Comparison Heaven – WIP - Listado de comparación para medidas de diferentes BJDs.

- Instructions to use Comparison Heaven – WIP / Instrucciones de como usar el “Comparison Heaven”.

- How to save pics for further reference – WIP / Como guardar a tu PC fotos del “Comparison Heaven”.

* Tumblrs - Noticias:

BJD~Collectasy -- BJD News all the time - Noticias Online sobre BJDs (en ingles) / (english only)

Doll Tutorials – All dolls - Tutorials by request / Guías a pedido.

BJD Memes – Jokes and memes for BJDs / Bromas y memes.

Haru Co. – Resin Casting Service / Servicio de casteo en resina para cuando haces tu propia doll.

Tiny Feet – Online magazine / Revista Online.

BJD Yellow Pages – Beware they are ANTI recast / Cuidado, son Anti Recast, o sea son “anti-copias”.

* Videos: tutorials y mas…

1 Que es un BJD o Dollfie - ‘ExodoY2K‘ – En Español (Spanish)

2 Que es un BJD o Dollfie - ‘Punt.2‘ – En Español (Spanish)

3 Que es un BJD o Dollfie - ‘Isartdolls‘ – En Español (Spanish)

4 Que es un BJD o Dollfie - ‘ExpoManga 2010‘ – En Español (Spanish)

5 Que es un BJD o Dollfie - ‘reManga 2010‘ – En Español (Spanish)

6 Que es un BJD o Dollfie - ‘Dollmanía‘ – En Español (Spanish)

7 Historia de como comenzaron los BJD - ‘Isartdolls‘ – En Español (Spanish)

What is a BJD Doll? (Short Documentary) – Que son los BJDs (Documental Corto). (Ingles/English)

Super Dollfie on ‘Japanorama’ – Que son los SuperDollfie de Volks. (Ingles/English)

BEGIN Japanology - Japanese Dolls 日本人形 – Especial de muñecas Japonesas y su historia/tradiciones. (Ingles/English)

Los precios de los BJDs – En Español (Spanish)

Se puede vivir el hobby con poco presupuesto? – En Español (Spanish)

Desmontar y montar un BJD - (Basico) – En Español (Spanish)

Gluing y Retensado (Restringing) -- (Ingles/English)

Faceup Supplies for Beginners – Elementos para principiantes en maquillajes (Ingles/English)

How to keep a sharp pencil point – Como mantener afilados los lapices para hacer maquillaje (Ingles/English)

How to seal during cold/humid days – Como aplicar spray sellador sin ningun problema en dias frios/humedos (Ingles/English)

BJD Faceup Tutorial - Cute (Basico) – Como pintarle la cara aun BJD #1

BJD Faceup Tutorial - Adult (Basico) – Como pintarle la cara aun BJD #2

BJD Faceup Tutorial - Scar (Basico) – Como pintarle la cara aun BJD #3

Faceup on a HUJOO head – Maquillaje en un cabeza de HUJOO

Hujoo Dana Face up tutorial – Como maquillarle la cara a una HUJOO Dana

Faceup process (time-lapse) – Proceso de Maquillaje (camara rapida)

How to apply eyelashes to a BJD – Como aplicarle las pestañas a un BJD (Ingles/English)

How to attach doll’s eyes – Como colocar los ojos en un BJD (Ingles/English)

How to make BJD Eyes – Como hacer ojos para tu BJD. (Ingles/English)

How to make eyes for a BJD – Como hacer ojos para un BJD (Ingles/English)

DIY: "Faux Resin" eyes for BJD and Dollfie Dream -- ojos tipo anime, como hacerlos - (English only)

How to make doll eyes – Como hacer ojos para dolls (Ruso/Russian)

What wig size will fit my doll? – Que tamaño de peluca le va a mi doll? (Ingles/English)

How to Style Faux Fur Wig for BJD – Como peinar y modificar pelucas de Fur. (Ingles/English)

Wig Making: dyeing alpaca hair – Haciendo pelucas: cambiando el color del pelo a “arcoiris” (en pelucas naturales de piel de Alpaca) (Ingles/English)

How to Straighten dolls Hair – Como hacerle el pelo “lacio” a una doll (Ingles/English)

BJD comparison with big Monster High line – Comparacion entre un BJD y una Monster High de las mas grandes. (Ingles/English)

BJD Video-Tutorial ‘How to Wire Jointed Hands‘ – Como poner alambres en las manos articuladas de los BJDs para que posen mejor en las fotos. (Ingles/English)

BJD Video-Tutorial ‘How to make easy glasses‘ – Como hacer anteojos facilmente para tu BJD. (Ingles/English)

How to make a BJD head (Time Lapse) – Cómo hacer una cabeza de BJD en camara rapida (Español/Spanish)

BJD Video-Tutorial ‘Silicone & Resin casting‘ – Como hacer un molde de silicona (basico) y articulos en resina. (Ingles/English)

BJD Video-Tutorial ‘How To Pierce Ears On A BJD‘ – Como perforar las orejas de un BJD para ponerle joyeria. (Ingles/English)

How to do human ears from Elf ears -- Orejas de Elfo a orejas Humanas. (Ingles/English)

How to make a Book for BJD -- Como hacer un Libro para nuestro BJD. (Ingles/English)

How to make an I-Phone for BJD -- I-Phone para BJD. (Ingles/English)

Band-Aids for BJDs -- "Curitas" para BJDs. (Ingles/English)

Winter accesories for BJD -- Accesorios de Invivierno. (Ingles/English)

How to adjust human clothing to BJD size -- Como pasar moldes de ropa para humanos a escala BJD. (Ingles/English)

Sandals for BJD -- Sandalias / Ojotas para BJD. (Ingles/English)

* Tutorials Generales: guias y cosas para saber…

How to Lighten a Yellowed Resin – Como quitar el amarillo de la resina vieja y volverla a su color original. (Español/Spanish) e (Ingles/English)

Como quitar una mancha difícil de mi muñeca? – (Español/Spanish)

How to make BJD wigs – Como hacer pelucas para tu BJD. (Ingles/English)

BJD Modification: Non-permanent Gouge Piercing – Como ponerle un piercing o “aro” a la oreja de tu BJD. (Ingles/English)

BJD Hands - How to sculpt them – Como esculpir manos de BJD. (Ingles/English)

How to sculpt theeth for a BJD -- Como hacer "dientes" para BJDs. (Ingles/English)

How to open a BJD mouth to insert teeth -- Como abrirle la boca a un BJD para colocar dientes. (Ingles/English)

How to make a baby doll with a loose head – Como hacer un ‘bebe’ con una cabeza suelta de BJD. (Ingles/English)

How does old “yellow” resin looks – Asi se ve la resina amarilleada cuando es vieja y la expones a la luz (fotos de referencia)

MOLDE / PATTERN - (ropa) - BJD Tutorial for big dolls - How to make  sweatshirts (pattern) – Moldes para hacerles ‘sudaderas con capucha’ (ropa) a BJDs grandes. (Ingles/English)

MOLDE / PATTERN - (ropa) - BJD Tutorial - How to make  circular dress – Guia para hacerles ‘vestidos cierculares’ (ropa) a BJDs. (Ingles/English)

MOLDE / PATTERN - (ropa) - "pantimedias” / ”Tights”  - (Ingles/English)

MOLDE / PATTERN - (ropa) - "Vestido de Dama Medieval” / “Medieval Maiden Dress” - (Ingles/English)

MOLDE / PATTERN - (ropa) - "Vestido de fiesta del 1900's RETRO” / “Retro Reboot 1900 Party Dress” - (Ingles/English)

MOLDE / PATTERN - (ropa) - "Vestido de novia Victoriano” / “Victorian Wedding Dress” - (Ingles/English)

MOLDE / PATTERN - (ropa) - "Wa Lolita Yukata” / “Wa Lolita Yukata” - (Ingles/English)

* Datos Extra / Extra Data: Sociales y mas…

* Things you need to know about me: What do I think about Recast – Cosas que tienes que saber de mi: Cual es mi opinion sobre el tema de las copias o Recast. (Español/Spanish) e (Ingles/English)

Nuestro Grupo en Facebook -- (Spanish only)

La verdad sobre el cyberbullying en grupos de dolls Argentinos: -- (Spanish only)

Cosas que tenés que saber sobre las Pullips (para comprar y que no te estafen): -- (Spanish only)

What is a “dollkin”? – Que es un “Dollkin” o persona que se considera un “kin”. (Español/Spanish) e (Ingles/English)

Pediophobia: “miedo a las muñecas”. – Que es?, Existe..? (Español/Spanish) e (Ingles/English)

ResinRose BJD Expo Scandal – Escandalo social contra las copias en USA en la convencion “Resin Rose” / Que fue lo que paso..? (Español/Spanish) e (Ingles/English)

Fabricas legitimas baratas y BJDs considerados “off-topic” - El odio, ¿fué real? -- (Spanish only) 

La muerte de los gigantes - D.O.D. 2003/2016 -- (Spanish only)

El curioso caso del muñeco limitado que volvió a la venta una década después… -- (Spanish only)

-

Si tienes alguna pregunta puedes hacerla aquí: http://diario-secreto-bjd.tumblr.com/ask

If you have any question for me you can use: http://diario-secreto-bjd.tumblr.com/ask

[kichimiangra]

KC Does Jak and Daxter 30 Day Challenge Day 17

Day 17: Dark Jak or Light Jak?

Uuuuugh... That’s a hard choice as they are both GREAT IDEAS but also Somewhat inconsequential to Jak as a Character.  I know they add a nice MECHANIC to the combat of the game but they’re both poorly implemented to Jaks own narrative.  LET’S TALK ABOUT BOTH!

We’ll Start with Dark Jak, or as I call him Dark Bomb.

Because that’s all he’s good for in Jak 2.  I tried to use him and enjoy him for ANYTHING ELSE but he’s a clawed melee fighter with a few extra skills that even invulnerability didn’t make fun.  I used him for only one thing and that’s crowd control using Dark Bomb.  There were a few missions that I NEEDED dark bomb just to pass like guiding Jynx and his buddies through the sewers.

I might just suck at playing Jak 2, and I accept that.  But one thing this 30 day challenge has shown me I don’t suck at, it’s complaining about wasted potential in it’s narrative.

Outside of it’s mechanical uses in the gameplay Dark Jak means almost nothing to Jak as a character or the story as a whole.  He wakes up with this new dark Jeckle and Hyde thing going and has almost no reaction of it until he saves Kor and Lil’Jak leaving it as “Praxis did something to me I can’t control it!” and after that point you can use it whenever you want.  After this it doesn’t mean all that much on the story until the whole Keira “You get mad and change!” thing and the ‘Jak is tainted and can’t birth the precursor egg’ thing.  In Jak 2 Dark Jak is a gun and nothing else.

In Jak 3 he gets some new abilities making him far more fun to play and some new mechanics like turning invisible, but still suffers from wasted potential on the narrative standpoint.  By having been Dark Jak in the second game it’s not hard for Jak to get branded as a monster by Veger and have the civilians you had been harrasing and murdering and stealing cars from vote you off the island and banish you to the desert to hopefully die.  Damas thinks your cool because you could be useful and usefulness is top priority to be a wastelander, and the monk likes to talk shit about you being tainted like the Dark makers.

And then you get Light Jak, or as I like to call him: Health Pickup.

Because that’s pretty much all I used him for.

You get Light Jak from that Precursor temple thing in the desert and Jak gets this cool line about how he feels less angry and stuff so we know Light Jak is balancing out Dark Jak but other than that He serves almost NO narrative purpose to Jaks Character.  There’s no awesome scene where he gets to have Veger eat his ‘Dark eco freak’ words while donning light Jak, no visible proof that he isn’t still unliked by haven cities populace in Jak x onward, basically nothing. I Had actually thought Jak was going to get a cool scene of him saving civillians or something as light Jak!  Something that can be compared to that one song from the Powerpuff girls movie (Sorry to compare JAK to a PPG...)

The town approached it’s darkest hour. The girls were forced to use their powers. Flew back at destruction and mayhem. Those freaky girls (Jak), those monsters-- THOSE MONSTERS SAVED THEM.

can you see where I’m going with this?

I feel both had a great chance to be development for Jaks Character but it’s sadly wasted and pushed to the side as a gameplay mechanic and a loose thread to start the plot of Jak 3.  If I had to pick a favorite I would have to say Dark Jak, as he had the most narrative potential and Darkbomb is still a satisfying way to end a boss or two.

[radioactivepeasant]

Free Day Friday: Trespasser

(From the poll: "In Which the Demolition Duo made it to the Wastelands without being banished because They Are Trespassing)

Damas was not, by and large, a religious man. He didn't worship Precursors -- there were some who insisted that his ousting from Haven was divine punishment for his arrogance -- nor spirits. If spirits could be killed, so could Precursors. That made them oracles, elders to be respected for unique perspectives on time, but not gods in Damas’s opinion.

Which made it an oddity to find him in the temple.

He sat on the shallow steps, staring up at the six carved heads meant to represent Precursors. More insectoid than Oracles, or perhaps just more elaborate. They seemed to wear headdresses over their bizarre masks.

"If you, by action or inaction, let Mar die, then at least have the decency to tell me," he whispered into the empty air.

"You always foretold a future moment of need that my House would answer. Has that need passed unnoticed that you stay silent while my bloodline ends? Or does my son live?"

The masks were silent, of course. Carved stone could neither hear nor speak.

Ungrateful wretches. Damas had a fleeting thought that perhaps they'd allowed -- or even orchestrated -- the abduction of his little son because he wasn't servile and "pious" enough for their tastes.

Damas wondered if spirits could harm Precursors. If perhaps the "Good Grandmother"*, She-Who-Hears-Them-Cry, might take an interest if something in this temple had been directly involved in bringing Mar to harm.

Má took her payment even from the hides of fellow spirits, after all.

"Even if you were capable of bringing him back unharmed, I very much doubt you would," Damas whispered harshly to the open air. His throat bobbed with a painful, bitter anger.

"But if you took him, you owe blood-debt to my House, old ones. So grant closure or sit in your realm knowing that I will seek answers among others as old as you."

Was it wise to threaten the Precursors? Damas neither knew nor cared anymore. Two years he'd barely survived having his heart metaphorically ripped out of his chest.

What more could they do to him? Really, what could they possibly do that could be worse than not knowing?

No answer arrived, not that it surprised him. Damas sighed and braced his elbows against his knees, head in his hands.

Stone grated against stone and metal to his left, and he turned his head swiftly.

There was a door there, one heavily fortified with traps. A hovering Sentinel eye kept watch for movement, designed to activate a spike trap if anyone tried to enter the lower levels without permission. And if someone managed to somehow get past that, the door would still be sealed. Whether by an enterprising ancestor of his or by meddling Precursors, that door could not be opened without an Heir of Mar. Damas was the only one who had ever been beyond it.

It should not have opened even an inch.

And yet Damas was witnessing the two mighty halves forcing themselves apart with a tortured groan born of idleness.

He was on his feet in an instant, ready for a fight. There was no chance that this heralded anything good.

"Whoa!"

That was a hu'men voice.

Damas’s hand hovered over his sidearm, ready to draw the moment he saw a face.

"And I thought this place was huge before!"

It was a young voice. High and a little squeaky.

"It just keeps going, doesn't it?" laughed a second voice, deeper, but just as young.

And then the doors were open wide enough to see the silhouette in between them.

And more importantly, to see the object glowing faintly in his outstretched fist.

Damas’s mouth was dry as he fumbled for the pouch between belt and leather armor where he kept his own amulet of Mar. He knew the shape by heart: twin comets orbiting each other, over stylized hands.

Thief-!

Pure, outraged, fury burned through his veins for a moment. Who had this scrawny figure stolen that amulet from? Heaven forbid it be Mar's amulet, lest Damas murder this boy before his very next step.

"Identify yourself!" Damas shouted, raising his gun.

The figure stepped into view. He was small, so thin his clothes hung loosely on scrawny limbs, but he held himself like a warrior.

"People!"

The animal curled around his shoulders sat upright and spoke.

"Jak! There's real people in here! We're saved!"

Odd reaction to a man pointing a gun at them.

The boy eased a step forward, hands raised as if soothing a frightened animal. He still held the incriminating amulet in his hand.

"Whoa, okay, put the gun down. I don't want to hurt anybody-"

He took a step too far and the sentinel flashed. The spikes shot up out of the floor with a faint shunk!

With a yelp, the boy leapt back -- he was surprisingly light on his feet for someone wearing boots two sizes too big. Then, as if the nearly fatal encounter was no more than a slight inconvenience, he backed up, got a running start, and launched.

He kicked off the wall, seeming to find handholds in the tiniest of crevices as he bypassed the spikes entirely.

Once on the ground again, the boy dusted himself off.

"You okay, Dax?"

"Just peachy, considering you almost dropped me!"

"Did not!" the hu'men boy protested in annoyance.

He really was small.

The general gangly sprawl of his limbs suggested he would gain an impressive height, but for now he just looked..small.

And entirely too excited.

"Who....do you- Where did you come from?" Damas demanded.

The boy pointed back down at the steps and shrugged before scratching his head.

"Exploring?"

Oh that green hair hurt to look at. It was filthy, and matted, like it hadn't been correctly washed in years. He couldn't even determine the age of the trespasser, what with the layers of grime embedded into every crevice of his face. The clothes were just as stained with sweat, dirt, and what looked to be bloodstains. From traps?

"Exploring."

Damas repeated the stranger's explanation incredulously. "How did you even get in here?"

The boy and the orange animal looked at each other for a curiously long moment. They seemed to be having a conversation merely by narrowing and widening their eyes in turn. Then, seeming to come to an agreement, they shrugged and turned back to face Damas.

The boy pointed down a barely visible flight of rough-hewn stone steps, lit by torches.

"We came up through the catacombs."

There were catacombs? He hadn't seen anything like that down there, and Damas liked to think he'd made it pretty far! He examined the stranger more closely, avoiding his eyes -- they're not familiar, you're just projecting your grief -- and avoiding looking at the talking weasel thing. He saw sunken cheeks drawn tightly against sharp cheekbones. A pale, barely visible scar across the bridge of his nose. Deep, deep shadows beneath his eyes. How large was the temple, altogether? Were there more people living below their feet?

"How...long were you down there?" he asked after a few seconds.

"Trust me pal," the weasel-rabbit said, "he smelled like this before we got in that zoomer."

"Hey!"

"What zoomer?!" Damas asked, feeling more confused than before.

"The one we took through the lava tube to the catacombs."

Damas was beginning to wonder if he'd somehow inhaled the monks' incense by accident.

The trespasser cringed as if only just noticing the bewildered and only barely softened hostility on Damas’s face. He shoved his amulet -- not his, it can't be his, there aren't any more of us left!*-- into his pocket and waved his hands placatingly.

Was there another Heir all this time? Is that why I was given no chance to protect Mar? Were my child and I expendable?

"Didn't mean to bother you," the kid apologized, "We'll just uh- huh. Actually, where are we?"

And then he looked to the door rather than Damas.

"Hey Oracle!" he shouted, and Damas was glad no monks were present to hear this and faint at the impertinance.

"Where the rot are we?"

Alright. This was now officially more of a problem than he'd first thought. Not even the monks were supposed to have found that Oracle down there.

One of the past Heirs who never inherited the throne had sealed it up the moment he discovered it long ago. After all, the discovery of light and dark eco being opposite poles of one energy might have thrown society into chaos and they didn't want to deal with the fallout. Even Damas was leery of reintroducing that knowledge outside of the Arena yet. Apparently this trespasser had no such thoughts.

He spoke to Oracles -- or pretended he did.

He held and used an amulet.

The boy was a mystery. And Damas hated not having the answers.

"You," Damas decided, wearing anger like a shield, "are coming with me. You have questions to answer."

The boy balked.

"No!"

He dodged before Damas could seize his arm, stumbling back amidst the columns.

"Uh-uh, I'm not falling for that."

"Falling for what?"

Damas was genuinely confused, and more than a little irritated.

The boy continued to back away.

"No, no I know how this goes. You're gonna take me back to the Haven Council, aren't you!"

*

"Haven?!" Damas sputtered, "Why the bleeding rot would I want to go there?! I'm taking you to my city!"

That didn't reassure the kid, who apparently was not fond of the leaders of Haven City.

Well, that was at least a bare minimum of common ground.

"You ain't takin us to no secondary location!" the orange one declared, pointing a skinny digit at Damas.

"The last time I got transported to a new place, I got kidnapped and experimented on for two years," his friend agreed.

Embleer Frith.

Damas stared at the boy. He squinted, as if that would give him insight into the unsettling response, then shook his head.

"You what?!"

What was he talking about? Experimented on?! That would explain the sudden shift from curiosity to distrust. But why-?

Damas knew. Deep down, he thought he knew.

If the boy was an Heir -- and he didn't even want to entertain the thought, but it had to be acknowledged as a possibility -- then that alone would be motive for someone like Praxis to torture even a young man -- or young boy?

If he was still obsessed with creating the ultimate war-sage, then an unclaimed and unattended Heir of Mar would be invaluable.

But if Praxis had been so focused on an older Heir, then perhaps it at least meant that he'd never gotten his hands on Mar.

That there was a stab of shame to follow that whisper of relief was an unsettling proof that he had not successfully hardened his heart as much as he'd thought.

"You came here from Haven?" he asked.

"Yeah?"

Thoughts of a breach in their defenses sickened him.

"And others will follow in pursuit of you?"

This time both trespassers scoffed.

"Only if they feel like sharpening their reaction time enough for a volcanic subrail," the hu'men said. He almost smiled.

The orange one nodded. "Jak here's the best driver there is! Also the most demolition-happy, but nobody's perfect."

Jak?

Now that was a name his spies had been mentioning a lot in their reports. An alleged juggernaut who had turned the Baron's own secret project against him and -- rumor had it -- even destroyed the metalhead nest.

Damas had been expecting someone a little...older.

* the "Good Grandmother" Damas is referencing is a spirit I made up for the Wasteland called Má Crocadeer. Fairly grisly figure with a crocadeer skull wreathed in flowers for a head, and a crocadeer's legs and tail. Her purpose is to punish those who deliberately cause or inflict harm on children. There's a lot of people in Haven who should avoid the desert for this reason.

[radioactivepeasant]

Snippets: Jak and Daxter

Loosely based on the song "God Games" from Epic: the Musical

It would have been so easy to leave. The subrails were right there. They could just step in, find out how far onto the mainland it went. It should have been so easy.

So why couldn't Jak do it?

"Uh...Jak?"

Daxter waved a hand in front of his face.

"Earth to Jak! What's the holdup, buddy?"

Just step down. That's all you have to do. It's so simple, Jak, why can't you do this one simple thing?

Jak stared at the tunnels for the space of three breaths.

And then he took a step

Backwards.

"Jak?" Concerned, Daxter leaned around to examine his expression. "What's the matter? C'mon, don't you want to get out of here?"

Shame slithered up his throat, but it couldn't stop the confession from slipping out.

"...no."

Dumbfounded, Daxter scurried to Jak’s other shoulder.

"No?! After how long it took to get down here, you wanna go back? We ain't gettin' a warm welcome, you know that, right?"

"I...can't leave. Not like this." Jak took another step back, then another.

"They'll think we're just, just weaklings who ran back to Haven because they couldn't cut it."

"They don't gotta know we went to Haven!"

"Dax, we barely escaped getting kicked out as it is! I- I can't go AWOL right now, what would Damas think of us?"

That was the wrong thing to ask. The ottsel's fur puffed up, and he bared surprisingly sharp teeth.

"He didn't think we could cut it anyway!" Daxter snarled, "Who cares what he thinks?"

But he knew the answer before he'd even finished the question. It was that sickening guilt in Jak’s eyes that drove it home.

I do.

Even after the man turned on them, called Jak "newcomer" like he didn't belong, Jak still wanted his approval? Daxter didn't understand.

But then, he'd never understood why Jak couldn't see right through Samos, either.

"I...I want to talk to him. Before anything else."

Jak prayed for some kind of perfect sentence or phrase to explain to Daxter why he needed to go back, but none were forthcoming.

Jak swallowed and added, "Sig should know about these tunnels anyway."

Daxter grimaced, but relented. "Fine. Fine. But I am not talking to Sandspurs unless he has one heck of an apology waiting."

No one was waiting in the vehicle pit. In fact, no one seemed to notice them come in at all. Jak told himself that was better, that he didn't have to explain himself if there were no witnesses. It didn't keep the whisper out of the back of his mind.

They wouldn't miss you if you left. They'd barely notice.

They were almost all the way past the forges when someone called out to them. Jak almost ignored them. But-

"Hey kid, you okay?"

But that wasn't a question he was usually asked.

Jak turned with a questioning expression to the gunsmith. He looked oddly concerned.

"You didn't show up yesterday. We were startin' to wonder a little. You didn't breathe in any of that gas, did you?"

Jak looked away.

"No."

"Good." The smith shook his head. "Poison gas-! They've never done that before. Sorry kid. Damas wouldn't have sent you out there if he knew."

"What would he have done?"

Jak didn't mean for it to come off aggressive. But he was just...tired. Tired of everything always happening to him. Tired of everyone else always having excuses.

If he heard the anger under the words, the gunsmith didn't let on. He picked up his tongs and shrugged as he got back to work.

"First offense, and you're a cadet- no, wait, two amulets, you're a scout. So scouts on punishment detail get either the 'pede larva cleanup or manual fishing net repair. Cadets have to clean the stables for three days."

Punishments that actually made sense?

Jak needed to talk to Damas. And at the same time, he did not want to talk to Damas.

At the elevator, Jak paused awkwardly.

"Da- Daxter? Can I- um. Can I do this...myself? If- if it goes south, I don't want you in the crossfire."

"If it goes south, you'll need me watching your six," Daxter retorted. But he reluctantly agreed.

Damas wasn't there, and that was somehow worse than finding him on that throne, glaring down at the intrusion. The water wheels creaked and groaned in an otherwise unnaturally silent chamber. Jak almost lost his nerve. What if Damas really didn't believe he belonged in Spargus? What was he going to have to do to prove him wrong?

Jak paced the lowest stair for several minutes, trying to rehearse his question. Trying to plan for every worst case scenario. If Damas got angry and threw him out, did they have a place to go? If Damas just shut him down, did he want to defy him again?

He didn't hear the elevator lowering down the shaft again. He didn't even notice it coming back up until it locked into place loudly.

Jak paused mid-step. His eyes flicked over to the elevator, but he didn't turn.

Damas was staring at him.

He didn't look angry, he looked surprised.

"I...did not expect to see you this soon," said the king in lieu of a greeting.

Jak couldn't quite make himself turn to face him.

"Why?"

"Ah." Damas sounded chagrined. Almost pained. "Because I...did not handle the debacle two days ago very well. I wouldn't have blamed you for wanting to put some distance between us. I put you and Sig in harm's way because I failed to fully read the artifact runners' brief."

Sounded like what the smith had said. Like Damas hadn't known about the poison gas.

"So you...weren't trying to kill me."

Damas’s ears stood almost straight up, and his shoulders stiffened.

"What? No! No, I wasn't trying to kill you!"

Jak nodded, but kept his eyes on the stairs and resumed pacing.

"Had to make sure."

Damas took the long way to the throne, along the outer edges of the pools. He didn't speak, letting the oppressive thickness of the air settle over them again. When he'd almost disappeared behind date palms in ceramic planter pots, Damas stopped to look out the windows, down to the sea.

"Is that why you came?"

"No."

"I see."

Jak thought he imagined a hint of hope in Damas’s voice.

"I don't have any work for you."

Damas glanced back down at him.

"It's not because of the...incident, you understand. You've just come after work has already been assigned for the day."

Jak glanced up. "I know."

courage. You can do this. And even if you can't, you have to.

"Well," the king sighed, "if you're here to lambast me with Sig for taking things too far, you just missed him."

Taking things too far. That was certainly...simplifying things. Jak clenched his fists and forced down acid in his throat. Don't get angry. Don't let him get under your skin. Remember why you're here.

Jak folded his arms across his chest and watched Damas’s face carefully.

"I...needed to- to ask...you. For something."

It was like pulling teeth to get even that out.

Damas turned immediately, eyebrows raised.

"It's not like you to ask for favors. Or help. What happened?"

He couldn't outright say that he'd met with Ashelin Praxis. Damas would probably shoot him on the spot.

"Got a call out there from-" Jak paused. "From a friend still stuck in Haven. It's- there's barely any city left. People I still care about are in danger."

"And?" Damas asked coolly.

Clenched fists and gritted teeth. Jak had to fight to force out the words.

"And I'm a- asking. You. For- for permission to go back."

Any pretense of calm fled Damas in an instant. His eyes darkened, and there was a promise of danger in his stride as he came to the edge of the dais.

"You're what."

"Just until they're safe. Just until I can destroy the new metalhead nest."

Damas flung out an arm as if gesturing to the offending city.

"You're asking me to allow you to leave Spargus, to give aid to our enemies. You want me to deal with Haven again. You want to go back to the people who betrayed you, again."

"If Haven falls, Spargus is next!" Jak argued.

"Spargus is not weak like Haven!" Damas snapped. "I had thought you had been among us long enough to know that by now."

"Apparently not, since I'm just the newcomer who doesn't deserve mercy!" Jak shot back.

He felt a tiny twing of guilt for throwing the words back in Damas’s face when the king lurched back like he'd been struck. But Jak couldn't stop now.

"The metalheads will raze Haven to the ground. Everything Mar built, they'll have access to. Even the subrails to the temple."

"The what?" Damas asked softly, almost threateningly.

"There are catacombs under the temple." Jak gestured sharply. "Daxter and I found them last night. Oracle says they have a subrail that goes right to Haven. How long do you think that's going to stay hidden if the city goes down?"

"We will fortify the temple." Damas turned away to march to his throne.

"You will remain in the city."

As he sat, he leveled a harsh glare at the boy.

"I strongly recommend that you heed instructions this time. I prefer not to revoke your gate pass."

Keira's life was on the line. Tess's life was on the line. And Damas was going to confine him to the city out of spite. Fury rattled in Jak’s lungs and loosened his tongue.

"I almost left," he growled at the king, "I almost went anyway without telling you."

Be grateful I told you anything at all ran unspoken under the statement.

"Then why didn't you?" Damas challenged him.

"You already think I haven't earned a place here yet. Well I'm not going to prove you right."

Jak's anger didn't burn hot enough to evaporate the lump in his throat. He should have known it would be useless.

"Jak-"

"This was a mistake." Jak turned his back on the dais and throne and stormed down the pathway.

"Shouldn't have asked."

He heard Damas stand in a rush, but ignored him. Why did he think this would go in his favor? Stupid. Stupid to hope.

"Stop."

He didn't.

Damas’s voice rose, bouncing off stone and water.

"Put one foot in that elevator and I put this tower on lock down."

He probably thought Jak was going to go to Haven to spite him. Jak weighed his options before pivoting on his heel to glare at Damas.

"What."

Damas was pretty fast for a man in armor. He had one arm outstretched like he'd been about to grab Jak by the collar. He settled a hand on Jak’s channeling ring -- not pulling, not yet. Just keeping him from leaving.

"You. Belong. Here," Damas said sharply.

"Not in Haven. Do you not know a trap when you hear one?"

You belong here.

Don't crack.

Jak cursed the catch in his voice. "You dropped everything to send rescue missions after just four scouts. You can't ask me to leave my friends behind enemy lines after that. Either you're a hypocrite, or I'm just doing what you taught me to do."

If Damas wasn't angry before, he probably would be now. Jak knew he shouldn't have called him a hypocrite point blank. Damas’s face went still, expressionless. His fingers tightened around the channeling ring, but his face was blank.

Jak closed his eyes.

"Sorry," he grunted.

"Convince me."

"What?"

Damas leaned closer.

"If this is that important to you, you'll have to convince me. You find five Wastelanders willing to go with you or support your mission, and I will consider letting you go."

Five?! Jak wasn't sure he could fine one!

"And if I don't?" he asked warily.

"Then you don't leave home, simple as that." Damas released him and stepped back.

"You have one day."

[radioactivepeasant]

Snippets: Free Day Thursday (Second, sillier part to follow Friday)

Poll Results: Trespasser Jak

Picking up from HERE, Jak and Daxter have been taken back to Spargus

The drive back to the city was not quiet. Every couple seconds, the kid with the amulet he shouldn't have had was pointing to something else, talking a mile a minute to the fuzzy orange thing. The red rock bluffs fascinated him. The crocadeer on the clifftops fascinated him. The frith-rotted cactus was interesting to this stranger.

Jak started to lean out of the seat again, trying to take in every speck of the horizon.

"Will you stop that?" Damas asked irritably, "You're going to fall out, and I'm not turning this car around to go get you. What are you so entranced by, huh?"

Jak's enthusiasm wasn't dimmed in the slightest. "After they took us to Haven- I thought there was nothing left out there but wasteland!"

"You're in the Wasteland," Damas reminded him.

"Nah."

Jak stood up despite the driver's protests and clung to the turret gun to watch a flock of birds.

"This place isn't wasted. It's alive."

"And you won't be if you don't sit down right now-!"

Damas’s headache only multiplied -- exponentially. once they had actually returned Spargus.

The stranger gawked at everything, sometimes lagging as many as ten behind to look at the most mundane things. Forges. The communication hub/post office. Leapers. A stray chickalope he tried to pick up-!

Getting him into the Gate District garrison building took five minutes longer than it should've, by which time Damas’s patience was almost completely gone. It was all he could do to keep some modicum of professionalism as he herded the boy and the talking spirit thing into a clean, well-lit room for interrogation. He left them with a stern warning to wait there until someone came to figure out who they were.

Then he left to make a very strong pot of coffee. He wasn't going back in there without it.

He quickly decided that needed another kind of drink when he returned ten minutes later only to find Jak, barefoot, sitting on top of the table like a moody teenaged gargoyle. That ratty blue winter tunic was tied around his waist now, and the loose scarf and oversized undershirt didn't quite cover a surprising amount of scars for someone his age -- or maybe not so surprising if he was an Heir, given the proclivity of Haven to put those through the wringer-

No. No jumping to conclusions.

Old burns on the soles of his feet that looked roughly six to seven years old -- a childhood accident or stubborn adventure, most likely -- were the most benign of them. Damas saw old, healed clawmarks, and strange fractal-like patterns not unlike those struck by lightning, crossing his upper arms, shoulders and chest. Here and there he saw raised lines -- the telltale sutures of do-it-yourself shrapnel removal. Regardless of whose blood flowed in his veins, this kid was a soldier. And it looked like he'd been a soldier for a depressingly long time.

Damas pushed the thoughts from his mind and took a seat in the chair the trespasser had ignored.

"Alright. Let's get this over with as quickly as we can, shall we? I have a lot of work to do today."

"Oh...kay...?" Jak gave him a puzzled, wary look and scooted back across the table to rest his back against the wall. "I mean, I can't answer everything, and half of what I do tell you won't sound believable, but that's honestly not my problem."

Patience, Damas. Inhale, slowly. You're just stressed. You can't kill him if he's related to you.

Damas took an exaggerated breath and folded his hands on the top of the table. "I don't much care about your activities in Haven. My agents deliver news regularly enough. No, I want to know how you opened a locked door with a Seal of Mar on it."

The kid looked surprised, and then intrigued.

"Mar? Wait, really? He made it out here too?" Jak looked almost impressed. "Huh! Guy got around!"

"Answer the question."

The orange one answered in the kid's stead.

"Jak here's got the distinct misfortune of being descended from the guy-"

*Allegedly," Jak interrupted. His voice was distinctly harder than before.

"What "allegedly"? Dragging me into the frickin nightmare tomb wasn't enough for ya?"

"Everything we know about that guy we got from Krew, or Samos," his companion argued, "And most of the Oracles didn't bother to warn us that Samos was lying to us our whole lives. So no, I'm not taking that on faith."

Clearly this was a sore spot for the young man.

It just so happened to also be a very sore spot for Damas.

They were just going to act like they so happened to "conveniently" let slip that this boy was supposed to be related to him? Did they think he was a fool?

"What are you playing at?" he snapped, startling them both. "Do you think I am so easily taken in?"

"What-?"

"Tell me, boy," Damas said, much more quietly, "What makes you either brave enough or stupid enough to try to pull that story with me?"

And Jak blinked at him with eyes that were a little too familiar. Wide. Full of shadows and pain and anger but still clinging to the vestiges of innocence. He narrowed his eyes and tilted his head.

"Um. Who? Are you?"

If this was a con, the kid was a decent actor, Damas had to give him that.

"You're telling me you're a survivor of the House of Mar."

"No? I said other people told me I was related to that guy. People with a vested interest in controlling me."

Jak scoffed bitterly and spread his arms wide.

"Little "abandoned" orphan boy kept isolated to train as a soldier, so he wouldn't know what they planned for him. Wouldn't run. And then magically suddenly he's heir to the worst city on the planet? Give me a break. The guards in Praxis's lab came up with better lies than that."

Damas wanted to agree with the kid. He wanted so much to agree with him. Whatever else he might be, clearly Jak was not the kind of person who bought into delusions of grandeur. In fact, he sounded like he actively resented the thought. Damas could appreciate that. Rot, he could even sympathize with the kid.

But.

He had opened a sealed door.

And the river-weasel had just said something about a Tomb.

He really really didn't want to be right, but if they could give an accurate description of the Tomb at some point, that information would be pretty hard to fake.

"Why did they think they could pass you off as Haven's heir?" Damas asked bluntly.

"Because I can make old Precursor crap work, I guess? And the Oracles like me." Jak folded his arms and shrugged. "They're useless when it comes to actually protecting anyone, but at least they tried to help after the fact. More than most hu'mens did."

Oh. Alright, okay. Maybe he's a sage prodigy and he's never been trained. That would make sense-

"Pal, the Oracle called you a "chosen one". That's gotta mean something."

"Chosen for what? Time looped torture?" Jak's entire posture had become rigid. He was beyond agitated, but Damas couldn't quite pin down if it was anger or fear or something closer to grief.

"....I...sorry." The orange one looked down, clearly ashamed. "That's- fair point. I won't bring it up anymore."

Damas didn't want to hear another word of this. Not one. Without stopping to think lest he talk himself out of it, he drew a knife from the back of his belt. The boy tensed even further, looking like he might snap as he watched Damas pull a sheet of paper haphazardly from the notepad that came standard in all the interrogation rooms. Damas ignored him and placed the tip of the blade to the pad of his thumb, pushing until two large drops of blood dripped onto the paper. The boy's tension eased slightly, but he still looked vaguely alarmed.

Damas wiped the blade and, steeling himself, held it out hilt-first to Jak.

"Your turn."

Jak glared at him.

"Are you nuts?"

Damas remained stonefaced. "You want to prove those people wrong? Blood comparison. Computer will be able to identify if it matches old records or not."

"Then why'd you cut yourself?" Jak challenged.

"Control sample," Damas answered shortly, staring until the boy gave in and set the blade against the tip of his little finger.

He declined to specify whether he meant for or against.

Jak twisted his pinkie between his fingers and let a single drop of blood fall onto the paper. He narrowed his eyes at Damas.

"And this is supposed to take...how long?"

"Two months if they're not busy."

Jak unfolded his legs and slid off the tabletop. "Months?! What good does that do me? They'll probably have found a way to guilt me into going back to Haven by then!"

Hm.

Damas leaned back in his chair and studied the boy with a new perspective.

"You're a runaway. Aren't you?"

Jak scowled and folded his arms.

"I'm not! I'm just...there's something I have to do out here. And I can't go back yet."

Suspicion trickled in cold at the back of Damas’s mind. He folded the edge down over the bloodied paper and tucked it into his belt.

"And what," he asked warily, "is this "something" you intend to do?"

The boy's ears dropped, broadcasting uncertainty despite his belligerent posture.

"I...don't know yet. There's just...something was calling me. And I can't leave until I know what it is."

This boy was going to be a walking migraine trigger, wasn't he? But unfortunately there was a reasonably high probability that he was Damas’s kinsman, which meant that under no circumstances could he just toss the kid back to Haven and say "not my circus, not my moncaws".

Just get through this until the blood tests come back. Who knows, maybe the guy will find a place here in the meantime. Or he might decide to fight the squid and die horribly. One step at a time.

Damas opened the door and beckoned to one of the district guards down the hall. Commander Shui left her subordinates immediately to respond.

"Sir?"

Damas nodded back towards the trespasser.

"Have someone show him to the showers. Once he's cleaned up, see if you can't determine his age."

Shui glanced at Jak, but never lost her stoic expression. "Understood. Is he a candidate for the trials?"

Damas ignored the harsh whispering between the boy and the...okay that was called an ottsel apparently. Didn't have those out in the desert.

"I doubt even he knows. For the moment, we will proceed as though he is a refugee."

He sighed.

"I have matters to attend to. Inform me if he causes any problems."

Jak wasn't sure how to feel about this turn of events. Six days of maddening dreams of eco comets and a broken string of beads. Five days of something pulling on his eco core, or his soul, the way the Precursor Stone had.

He wasn't sorry for leaving Haven in the middle of the night. The Grand Council had been getting more and more vocal with their more...Praxian...views on his right to life and liberty, and Samos just kept telling him to focus on what was "more important", fighting metalheads and new Krimzon Deathbots.

When the Call took him down that ancient eco mine, it had felt like an escape. He'd told himself he'd go back after he found what was at the end of the tunnel. And he'd meant to, if only because he thought he had nowhere else to go. After all, Daxter had built a life in Haven. He had a mentor. A girlfriend. A whole business!

But regardless of all the pretty lies Samos and Onin and Ashelin filled his ears with, Haven was not Jak's home. He would not take responsibility for their evil. And even if he was descended from their founder, they all let Praxis kill whatever blood relatives he might've had! They decided the line of Mar had no say in government, so who was Jak to contradict them?

It was strange -- almost unfathomable -- how his perspective could have changed with a rebalancing of eco. The Oracle down in that desert temple, it had pushed through old scars, given him access to light eco, when he'd thought the substance didn't exist anymore. The constant aches that ruled his every waking moment when it was even slightly cold out, the irritability, the burning in his core, it was gone.

How had he become so accustomed to at least low levels of pain as a daily companion? Jak hadn't realized how bad his condition had been until it was gone. And his mind felt clearer than it had in months. Maybe even years. Home was far behind them now. Sandover was forever lost to them, along with all remains of Jak's innocence. Because of Onin. And because of Samos.

Without his thoughts dulled by pain and lack of sleep, Jak thought of his heartfelt thanks to the manipulative old sage and wanted to be sick.

And now he was on an island, eighty nautical miles from Haven. A wild, living, sanctuary of Wastelanders and open wilderness. They called it "wasteland", but Jak couldn't understand why when it was so beautiful.

That Call still pulled at his heart, told him he wasn't done here yet. And he was relieved, because the longer he spent under clear, blue, sky, the more he hated the thought of returning to that corrupted city.

Just because he'd told Ashelin it was worth saving didn't mean he belonged to it.

Damas -- the angry man he'd startled when they came up out of the catacombs -- left, and a well-built woman about his height entered the interrogation room.

"Holy crap, a lady Sig!" Daxter hissed in his ear.

The Wastelander did have a prosthetic eye -- her left, not her right -- of the same make, but that was really the only similarity. She carried herself like Ashelin -- someone in command, used to cooperation if not obedience -- and that alone put Jak on-edge. He met her searching gaze with a hard stare, determined not to be the first to flinch.

"Hm." The woman clicked her tongue disapprovingly.

"I see what he means. When's the last time you washed?"

"Do pools of water count?" Jak asked. If there was sarcasm in the tone, so what? "Expendables don't get time to wash."

"Eesh." The woman curled her lip. "Well that's not going to fly in my garrison."

She turned to shout down the hall, "Strom! Get the rookie to the showers before the flies move in!"

"Oh rot you!"

[radioactivepeasant]

Snippets: Free Day Friday

Aka "you've ruined a perfectly good Damas is what you did. Look at him, he's got anxiety"

(For context, I gave Damas a backstory of being last in line for Haven's throne, but also Last Man Standing. This had something to do with Praxis hating "the default king". Long post warning, it's a whole one-shot again)

At some point in his life, the Precursors had decided that Damas was their least favorite Maridius. Any time something went well for him, it had to be immediately balanced by something awful.

He found acceptance and camaraderie that he never had from his elder brothers among the Forward Guard in the war.

And then Menelaus and Nicostratus died stupid, pointless deaths trying to seize glory, leaving Damas the sole focus of his parents' hopes.

He found an escape from the pressures in running the numbers, working out which districts needed food more than soldiers, and which districts needed more protection than most.

And then Father died and Mother shut herself in a convent, no longer interested in anything to do with her disappointing youngest son.

He actually had support from people for focusing on them and not the nest-

And his eldest brother's childhood friend literally stabbed him in the back and left him to die in the desert.

For a time, he'd assumed things would never get better. That the Precursors were tired of reeling him in and out like a fish on the line. But the hook pulled once more and he found himself using the skills he'd learned from the guards who raised him, joining a rebellion against a tyrant and defeating him against the odds.

And then the Precursors let him have ten good years. They let him find love, and family. They let him become a father. And then they ripped it all away in the cruelest way possible.

Damas knew it was foolish to hope that Mar was alive. He knew Phobos had been right to move on from him -- from them -- and throw herself into operating the orphan barracks of the Cliffside district. But he couldn't let go yet.

So he'd endured. Two bitter years he'd endured. And when he found that scrap of a boy in the desert, only to watch him outdo warriors twice his age, he'd thought maybe things were getting better.

Jak was...hard to define. The kid had seen more combat than some of his most experienced scouts. He carried scars on par with the surviving child-soldiers of Atys's reign. And while he shared their distrust of authority in general, he had none of their understanding of ranks and rulers. He just...treated everyone like they were his equal.

And after the kinds of things he must have experienced in his short life, Jak probably had every right to consider himself the equal of any senior Wastelander.

And for a moment, Damas had foolishly let himself hope that the Precursors could leave well enough alone. That they'd just...let him have this-!

Annnnd then Jak had to go and break the one rule. The one law Damas had given him.

Do not compromise the Arena.

Six other candidates had been doing their third trial against the Leucas Freebooters in that Arena. Six other candidates whose results had to be thrown out, who had to wait for full citizenship, because Jak refused to fight, and Sig had decided to waltz into a trial without checking to see what the purpose of the trial was!

Damas was either going to lose his mind, or go fully rogue and declare war on the Precursors. He couldn't discount either option yet.

Deep breaths, Damas. Deep breaths.

Jak knew not to mess with the purity of the Arena. He knew that, didn't he? He couldn't have gotten this far without understanding how important it was to keep the trial balanced for all candidates! He had to have known the consequences for not only compromising the others' trials and putting them at risk of the Freebooters getting the upper hand on them, but open mutiny-!

He wanted to shake sense into the boy. Maybe smack him upside the head and hope it jarred his common sense loose. But he wasn't likely to get that chance.

Even if Sig had caused this, he had all three amulets. Jak only had two. Those two protected him from a lot, but not public mutiny. A challenge in private Damas could have handled.

He knew Jak -- he thought he knew Jak -- enough to make him understand whatever instruction or decision he had a problem with. He knew how to phrase things to make it sound like all Jak had done was ask for clarification.

He couldn't cover this one up. Not with this many witnesses.

Damas knew the name of the creature thrashing beneath his ribs. Terror.

It clawed at his lungs, coiled around them until he couldn't breathe. Kicked at his heart until he felt every beat like a hammer.

I can't lose him too. I won't lose him too!

He didn't know when, exactly, things had changed between them. Was it before he'd admitted that he'd never had a father to teach him- well, anything? Was it before his second trial, when Phobos had pointedly compared the boy to her own students? Was it her less than subtle hinting that he find his closure in helping the boy he'd dragged out of the mouth of death?

Did it even matter?

You've taken enough from me! You can't have him, too!

It was depressingly easy to mask fear with anger. He had been doing it all his life.

In hindsight, so had Jak.

Damas wondered later if that was why the boy didn't seem afraid. He glared at Damas the whole time, but in those eyes was a challenge: I see through you. You don't fool me.

Damas hoped no one else saw through him.

"What have you done?" he demanded, slamming the butt of his staff onto the stone with a ringing clang.

"One of those Freebooters could have shot you in the head -- shot your comrades -- because you threw down your gun! You placed yourself and them in danger!"

I stopped the trial because of you! Do you not grasp how serious this is?!

"Freebooters?!" Sig exclaimed in surprise before cutting himself off.

"And you, you're a veteran of the Arena! You have no excuse for this!" Damas snarled.

He knew he was going to have to set a punishment. If he didn't, the legislative council would. And he knew which of the two offenders they would favor.

"I shouldn't have to tell you the penalty for sabotaging citizenship trials!"

Sig risked a glance at Jak, then set his jaw.

"You're right," he said in a voice as artificially calm as Damas’s was artificially angry. "I don't have an excuse. I take full responsibility. Don't put this on Jak. He didn't know I'd be there."

Interesting. Sig was trying to protect Jak.

But in doing so, he was trying to force Damas into an impossible decision. One that would haunt him the rest of his life if he carried out the known sentence. After everything Sig had done for him, exile felt like blasphemy.

Damas clearly wasn't the only Spargan who thought so.

"Sire, think about this!" One of the Arena guards set foot on the pathway as if he intended to join the offenders.

"It can't end this way, it can't! Sig is one of us!"

One of his comrades, emboldened by his courage, joined him.

"He just came home from assignment!"

"Stop," Sig warned them, but was ignored.

"Lord Damas, Sig’s served faithfully as your spy in Haven two years! Surely it's not that surprising that he might forget to check a roster!"

"Char is right!" The first guard cried, "It's the newcomer who deserves no mercy!"

You'd better shut your mouth-

Damas knew they were just standing up for a fellow Spargan. He knew that if Jak had all three amulets, they'd be rallying on his behalf, too. But it rankled to see them turn on the boy so quickly.

"Sire, if anyone must be cast into the desert, it's him!" Rikard pointed a shaking finger at Jak.

The words were out before Damas had time to plan his next move.

"Absolutely not! I'm not letting him off that easy!"

Oh rot. He had to follow that up with something.

Think, Damas! Use your shiny, spiny, head for once and think like Obed taught you!

He thought of the old captain of the Krimzon Guard -- when that had meant something, when only the king’s honor guard wore those tattoos -- the man who had raised him when his own family hadn't been interested in such a weak channeler.

There's always another way, whelp."

Then you tell me, Obed! I don't know what to do!

He reached for that memory desperately.

*Sometimes, you face your enemy head-on. And sometimes, you wait until you see a weakness. A loophole."

"You're talking about my brothers again."

"Now, did I say that? Clean the gunpowder out of your ears, whelp, before you get me in trouble!"

A loophole. I can do that. I can still save them-!

Damas sucked in a calming breath through his teeth.

"You do make a point about Sig’s record of service. I would not be king if I did not try to keep you all alive."

Let this work, please, Obed, if you're still watching over me, let this work.

"This once, I will give you the opportunity to salvage this. In your absence, metalpedes have settled in Turquoise Canyon and begun harassing our artificact carriers."

He leaned on his staff and hoped no one saw the tension in his jaw for what it really was: fear.

"I want you to drive into the heart of the nest and take out anything that moves."

He turned on his heel to send a hard stare Jak's way.

"Unlike Sig, you get a choice right now: stay here and forfeit your second amulet, or go with Sig and repay the damage you did today with something that benefits your community."

He prayed Jak could hear the emptiness of his threat. That he would know what Damas needed him to do.

Jak was not technology-friendly. Anything that required precision or aiming was more likely to be used as a blunt force weapon. But put him on a turret gun and the boy was a prodigy. If he went with Sig, the odds of them both surviving skyrocketed.

Jak's glare melted into something uncertain, even a little fearful. He was weighing his options. Good. That would sell the act more to the guards -- who were, like all watchmen, incurable gossips.

Damas saw the moment the light clicked on for Jak. He knew that glint.

Jak nudged Daxter, almost too quickly to be seen, and Daxter nodded. To anyone else, it would seem he was responding to Jak.

Damas knew that Daxter was answering him on Jak’s behalf.

Message received.

"I'm not gonna let you send Sig in there alone."

Damas almost smiled. Defiant to the last. Never change, Jak. Unless it's to learn some common sense-!

"Then perhaps something good can come of this debacle. But understand this, boy: coming back from destroying that nest does not mean this discussion is over. I expect you to turn over your gate pass when you return. You're off scouting for three weeks."

"You're grounding us?!" Daxter shrieked.

"Keep talking, I'll make it a full month."

That one wasn't an empty threat. If he'd thought it would keep Jak out of harm's way, he'd keep him off missions indefinitely!

"We're going," Sig said quickly, and grabbed Jak by the arm before he could protest.

"I'd say good luck," Damas said dryly, "But then, luck won't help you."

which is why I'm sending Jak.

The second the elevator was out of sight, Damas dropped into his throne with the most long-suffering, exasperated groan he'd ever made.

"Someone tell me this is a dream and I'm actually dying of boredom in a financial meeting right now," he said sarcastically.

When no such reassurance arrived from the guards, he dropped his head into his hands with another irritated sound.

In the silence that followed, even over the water wheel they both heard him mutter,

"What am I going to do with that boy?"

Rikard was...not a bad guard. He did his job, and he stuck by his comrades. But he had a big mouth sometimes.

"You...favor the newcomer then? Is it his age?"

Damas aimed a tired glare at him over his fingers.

"Boy, if I told you some of the things I did at his age...."

He groaned again.

"This is boundary-testing. I've seen worse. Rot, I've been worse!"

Silence enveloped them again as the two guards stared at Damas, and Damas stared back. He hadn't meant it to come out like that. After several seconds of owlish blinking back and forth, he said simply,

"Crap. I think I adopted him."

Char turned her head quickly to hide the fact that she was trying very hard not to laugh at the king’s slightly stunned expression.

"Do you...think this will be an adequate lesson?"

Rikard winced. At least he knew he was questioning Damas’s choices in parenting. Er, ruling.

"The nest? Perhaps. It's the confinement that's going to get him." Damas snorted. "You know how Wastelanders are about adrenaline. You ground a kid like that? End of the world."

Mar was exactly the same. Gods, if he's as stubborn as Jak at that age, I'm done for. Might as well write the epitaph now: "died of a heart-attack from idiot sons doing idiot stunts".

"As long as he doesn't set anything on fire in the Arena, sounds good to me," said Char, raising her hands in mock surrender. "Are we clear to return to our posts?"

"Can't set things on fire if I don't let him get two yards away from me, right?" Damas grumbled, but he waved a hand in dismissal.

Once alone, Damas dragged his fingers down his face and muffled a scream in his palm. He was going to get Sig for this. Babysitting. Indefinitely. Or maybe make him handle Arena trials for a while, let him feel that stress! And Jak? Jak was grounded. So, so very grounded. If he had to make Jak sit through meetings with him in the throne room to get it through his head, then so be it. No stunts, no racing, no "the Precursors made me do it" nonsense.

Briefly, he glanced up at the statue of the Oracle in his throne room. Gaudy thing, but it did house a lot of parts of the water wheel.

Damas flipped it off.

[radioactivepeasant]

Snippet Thursday: Demolition Trio

The winning prompt for this week was "Demolition Trio: Jak's dog chooses violence" as a follow-up to last week's snippet where he got the dog. Don't worry, no animals were harmed in the making of this snippet. Errol got a little traumatized though.

"Here boy! C'mere!"

Jak bent and patted his knees, a wide, silly grin decorating his face.

With a growling, grumbly vocalization, the crocadog bounded out of the transport and leaped into the boy's waiting arms. Rip wriggled and panted happily, perfectly content to be held like a puppy by the unnaturally strong teenager. Jak laughed and stumbled back a step before finding his balance.

"Whoa!" He hefted the pup higher -- if he could outpace the average KG with a twenty pound ottsel on his shoulder, he could handle a hundred pound half-grown crocadog.

A high-pitched squeal caught both sets of ears, and Jak swiveled on one heel expectantly to see Tess standing on the quay with her hands clasped in front of her mouth. She bounced on her toes even as she directed two men with a trolley to carry Krew's newest shipment of alcohol inside the bar.

"Awww!! You didn't tell me you had a puppy!" Tess shouted across the landing platform.

Jak set Rip down and hooked the thin chain lead to his collar. It seemed overly fancy for a place like Haven -- a beautiful, patterned steel that looked like watermarked paper. "Silksteel", Damas called it, an alloy made from metalhead bodies and Precursor metal melted together in a crucible. Jak was pretty sure the dog's leash was legitimately the nicest thing he'd ever owned -- and maybe the only thing that wasn't a hand-me-down besides his gun.

"Hey, Tess!" Jak jogged across the walkway with Rip trotting along beside him. Once they'd stopped in front of Tess, the dog went on alert. Ears pricked, tail stiff, he shouldered between Jak and the girl with a low warning rumble.

"Hey, hey. Easy, Rip. Good boy."

Jak reached out and boldly took Tess’s hand. "Here, let him smell you so he knows you're a friend."

Tess was not wholly unfamiliar with dogs. She tucked her fingers into a loose fist and held them out for the young croc to sniff.

"Hey, bubba," she cooed, "Who's a good boy, huh? Is it you?"

"It is not," Daxter loudly interrupted as he finally caught up to Jak. "Jak, your demon dog befouled the air train! I had to pay extra fare for cleaning!"

Jak snorted. "Oops. My bad, I'll pay you back, Dax."

"Daxter!" Tess threw open her arms to scoop the ottsel into them. "Ooooh-! I missed you!"

If ottsels could have blushed, Daxter would have been the approximate color of a tomango. Seeing Short Master and Shorter Master so relaxed with Nice-Smelling Lady, the dog calmed immediately. He sat back on his haunches and decided after a moment that it wasn't fair that Daxter was getting all the love. Rip whined for attention, sticking his cold nose on Tess’s bare knee. Tess squeaked and jerked away, then burst out laughing.

"Awww aren't you the cutest puppy!"

For some reason, Jak couldn’t help feeling a little pride. He scrubbed his hand across Rip's ears and grinned. "Well, his runt brother is actually the cutest. Rip is pretty great, though."

Tess’s eyes narrowed to a laser focus. She had her suspicions that Jak was referring to the puppy that always followed the tiny Heir around. The Heir that Jak had kidnapped and refused to give up the location of. The Shadow was breathing down her neck to get information out of Jak before they lost their chance to open the Tomb. But she couldn't act on her suspicions here in the open! Even if Krew hadn't been in earshot, Jak would just deny it anyway.

What she needed was for Jak to actually trust her with...whatever it was he was doing. The younger teen seemed to be fighting his own private war solo, only working with the Underground or Krew when he felt like it.

"No dogs allowed!" Krew barked from the doorway of the saloon. "This is a pub, not a kennel, eh?"

"Dog? What dog?" Sig's voice floated past him.

"The brat brought a crocadog from his latest hunting excursion," Krew sniffed. "People don't pay to see normal animals on my wall, you know, even if they are dangerous."

He shook his folding fan at the boys.

"That trophy had better be in mint condition or you can turn right around and stay out until you bring me something better!"

Daxter rolled his eyes from Tess’s arms. "Relax, hoverboy. Mr. MacPooch down there helped us bag a ramhead before he was even house-trained!"

"He is house-trained, though," Jak added hastily.

It couldn't have been more obvious that something had changed about Jak when he widened his eyes and hit Krew with a forlorn, innocent look.

"You don't mind if I put him up in the bar loading bay, right?"

Before Krew could answer, Jak shifted his weight and channeled just the tiniest hint of dark eco into his eyes, enlarging his pupils. He rubbed his arm, mimicking Mar's usual method for getting Damas to agree to something.

"I just don't want him running loose, y'know? The Guard are really bad about hunting civilian pets for kicks, and- and I really didn't want to have to gut a whole squad today."

There was something deeply unsettling about Jak putting on the guise of a vulnerable, worried kid while casually discussing mass carnage. Krew stared at the youngest "employee" on his roster. Well, "intern" was more accurate. He paid the brat in food and gun upgrades -- and the latter was only because Sig insisted and it wasn't wise to overly antagonize one's bodyguard. He'd never been a "dog person", himself.

Before his racing injury, he used to promise his daughter he'd bring her all kinds of pets to make up for his constant absence. Terrakeets, cabbits, dogats- he'd even sent her a jer-boa once. (That had been an unmitigated disaster, leading to his ex-wife calling to scream at him when the fuzzy legged-snake decided to constrict and consume a neighbor's hip-hog.)

Dogs had never once been on the list.

Krew curled his lip. "You're lucky I like you, Jak," he groused. "Get that thing in the back before someone reports us to the health inspector!"

He started to float back to the bar, then turned.

"And don't do that face again! It's upsetting!"

Jak snorted, and in an instant his old demeanor was back. "Sure, sure."

Tess followed Krew in, directing the last of the bottle delivery, and grimaced when she noticed a particular patron waiting at the bar.

Errol.

"Champion Commander Erol Errol", as he always bragged to her.

She suspected his parents had not been especially creative people.

His swaggering bravado and complete failure to understand that someone could willingly cross him made him a decent source of intel, but Tess had hidden in sewers that made her feel less slimy than she did every time she played Cute Barmaid with Errol.

Her personal feelings aside, she knew Errol had done something to Jak. Something bad. The man was allergic to keeping his mouth shut if anyone brought Jak up. He was both sadistic and obsessed - a dangerous combination.

And Jak was about to walk in and see him.

Tess squeezed Daxter in a silent cue to go warn the boy, but it was too late. A low, almost subsonic rumbling began to fill the room, vibrating the floorboards. The dog had clearly picked up on his master's sudden tension. Rip's eyes were fixed on the commander, lips slowly peeling back to reveal dozens of jagged teeth. Beside him, Jak had gone still, eyes cold. He quietly, deliberately, dropped the leash. But this time there was no fear in his reaction.

Daxter patted Tess’s arm. "It's okay, babe," he whispered, "Demon Dog won't let the Tattooed Wonder try anything funny."

Honestly, he was amazed by how much the dog boosted Jak's confidence. Maybe that was why Mar was so terrifyingly fearless?

"Hey Sig, I thought Krew said no dogs allowed!" Jak said loudly.

Tess tensed. Kid, don't-!

"You better let Praxis know his mutt wandered in here."

Outrage wiped the smug look right off of Errol's face. He lurched off the barstool and pasted on a condescending coo.

"Well isn't that sweet. The freak found his long-lost twin."

He took a meaningful step forward, and his fingers brushed against the wicked hunting knife on his belt. "Maybe this one will respond better to obedience tra-"

He didn't get a chance to finish the sentence before Rip was on him.

Tess leaped to the side with a shriek that didn't even come close to matching the shrill sound coming out of the commander. He sounded like a wounded rabmouse-

Probably because his entire head was currently inside the crocadog's mouth.

"Not on my freshly waxed floors, Cherry!" Sig complained, "C'mon!"

Secretly, he hoped the puppy would just bite down. Hard. But Krew was afraid of Errol's influence and Sig knew it. Best to put on a facade.

Jak watched Errol flail and try to pry Rip's mouth open for a few seconds with the kind of detached curiosity generally reserved for particularly strange looking insects. But when he heard the whine of Krew's hoverchair returning, he finally intervened.

"Rip! Drop it!" he commanded.

Rip did not drop it.

"Come on, pal. I told you not to eat garbage! Spit it out!"

Reluctantly, the croc opened his half-shut jaws and delicately spat the commander's head out. He looked sorely put-out by the loss of his prey, and grumbled reproachfully at Jak. Errol thudded to the floor, dripping with thick drool and finally understanding what it meant to have one's life flash before one's eyes. His hand inched toward his knife as he desperately hoped the croc wouldn't notice his movement.

"Rip, heel."

Jak made a hand signal and the huge dog left his prey to take up a guard stance in front of his human. Jak wrapped the end of the lead around his glove and stroked the dog's back.

"Good boy, Rip! Good boy!"

Mollified, Rip let his tail thump happily against Jak’s legs. Well, if Short Master said he was A Good Boy, maybe it was okay that he didn't get to Crunch the sickly smelling Red Thing this time.

Daxter's ears drooped. "Awww, I wanted to see if KG really do run around for a couple seconds after they lose their heads," he joked.

He and Jak both knew he would have been violently ill if this had actually happened.

"Aw where's the fun in that?" Jak retorted, "Just four witnesses? Nah man, it's gotta be the Stadium. We're gonna pulverize him in front of thousands. That'll be way more memorable."

He casually stepped over Errol's prone body, secure for once in the knowledge that the man couldn't hurt him.

Not if he wanted to keep all his body parts.

He paused and crouched next to the wide-eyed man's head.

"Next time, I won't be there to save you, commander," he murmured, "Tread lightly. And try not to run. Crocs love it when you run."

Jak stood and patted his thigh, and Rip bounced over Errol -- one paw landing in the middle of his stomach as he went. "Alright, Rip, let's get you settled. If you're good, I'll bring you some metalhead scraps. Sound good?"

"WURF."

"Yeah, I thought you'd like that."

Errol stayed on the floor, staring at the ceiling, for a full four minutes after that.

It wasn't hard for Tess to convince Krew that he'd consumed more than his share of liquor, or to convince him to eject the man from the bar until he could "pay" his "tab".

She made a face.

"Remind me to keep some chew toys around here," she whispered to Daxter. "I don't want Rippy getting any ideas about my rifles."

[radioactivepeasant]

Part two:

The vehicle bounced over the rocks, kicking up a plume of dust behind it. The occupants grimaced, but it couldn't be helped. Strider Range was one of the harsher places in the Wastelands. It was just a little too far from the Cacomiztli river for any reliable water sources, and only the desperate would risk drinking the acrid fluid collected in the local cactuses. The soil was hard packed, not the loose dunes of the Stygian region that wrapped around the island from the coast to the first six miles inland, and visible dust plumes were inevitable.

"Signal's close," the driver, a large, bald man with a truly impressive mustache, shouted over the growl of the engine. "You reckon the beggar's alive still?"

In the seat beside him, a weatherbeaten man stared down at a scanner with hard eyes.

"The beacon went off two hours ago. They haven't moved towards the Cacomiztli since then, they went northeast."

He shook his head, sending little flares of light bouncing around the jeep where the sun glanced off of five metal spines or horns implanted in his skull.

"We're getting too close to Turquoise Canyon. The odds of the metalheads leaving any leftovers are slim."

A man in the back of the jeep stopped fiddling with his eyepatch for a moment and made a disgusted sound in his throat. "Poor sap," he remarked.

The signal led to a trio of boulders just in sight of the Great Volcano. Poor soul. Whoever had activated the distress beacon, they'd stopped only a mile away from being able to see the Lighthouse.

The three Wastelanders stepped out of the vehicle and moved cautiously forward, weapons at the ready. It was not unheard of for the southern Marauders to kill one of their scouts and steal their beacon to lay an ambush.

The driver spotted the bodies first, and cursed.

"Ah, Volcan's bits! Those ain't Wastelanders, that's Havenite gear!"

All three men recoiled, scanning their surroundings with renewed suspicion. The city-state of Haven was usually wise enough to keep their greedy fingers off of the Wastelands. Finding Havenites in Strider Range was either a sign of exile, or a bad omen.

"This flotsam wouldn't have set the beacon off, right?" the driver muttered to his companions.

"I'm going to take a look."

The horned Wastelander slung a wicked-looking staff off his back and eased closer.

"Wait, sire!" The one-eyed Wastelander hurried after him. "What if it's a trap?"

"Then their fate is on their own heads," the king retorted.

Upon closer inspection, the strangers definitely weren't Krimzon Guard, which probably meant they were exiles. But it was too soon to let down their guard. Two humans and two animals lay propped against the boulders, where they had no doubt relied on the shade of the early morning. Pity it hadn't lasted long. The sun now beat down on a gangly figure with green hair hanging down over their face in limp curls. A second figure, far smaller -- too small -- lay beside them, so covered in red cloth that no distinguishing features could be seen. If not for the gentle rise and fall of their chests, they could easily have been mistaken for corpses.

"Looks like we've got a couple of live ones," the king called over his shoulder. He prodded the taller one's boot and scoffed when it elicited no response. "Well. Barely."

His eyes fell from the tangles of half bleached hair to a beacon in the dust beside the Havenite.

He glared down at the offending device. Beacons of this style were made and produced solely by his city. His people. There was absolutely no good reason for a citizen of Haven to be using one, unless they had killed one of his people.

"Lord Damas, I don't like this," the man with the eyepatch called, edging forward. "Can we just go?"

In one quick movement, the Wastelander king gripped the Havenite by the channeling ring strapped to their chest and heaved them upright.

"Where did you get this beacon?" he demanded, "Who did you steal this from?!"

The stranger's head flopped back weakly, and Damas nearly dropped him in surprise. Without the hair to obscure his view, he was looking at a young man -- just a boy, really. Not even old enough to have more than a patch of peach fuzz on his chin.

"Hell's bells! It's a kid!" The driver took a step back. "Haven's throwin' out kids now?"

Damas scoffed. "It's Praxis. Why does that surprise you?"

He clicked his tongue and shook his head. "The sun blisters on this one are pretty ugly, but not the worst I've seen. Kleiver, get him in the car. See if he'll answer some questions with some fluids in him."

With a mildly disapproving harrumph, Kleiver stumped forward and hoisted the boy up over one shoulder.

"It's your lucky day, punk," he grumbled, and hauled him back to the jeep.

Damas stooped and scooped up the two animals that had been using the boy's shadow for shade. One was an orange, rodent-like thing he'd never seen before. Almost like the endangered swamp rats once found throughout northern Haven, but not nearly as ugly. The other one-

The king scowled. Oh, he knew this creature. It was a seer's familiar. It could hold much knowledge, or great malice. Only time would tell which.

"Drake. Here." Damas passed the animals to the third man. "Try to get them to drink some water."

Drake cringed at the sight of the moncaw.

"That is one ugly-ass bird," he said flatly.

He had a far more favorable reaction to the rodent thing.

"Oh, look at this little fella! Huh. He's soft, too. Hold on, little guy, we'll get you fixed up."

Drake turned back to the vehicle, talking to the unconscious rodent in an embarrassingly babyish voice. Damas smirked and rolled his eyes, then turned to examine the last figure. His wry grin fell as he took in a tiny hand inching out of the cloth wrap.

"Oh. Oh Rot!" he breathed, and dropped to his knees beside the tiny figure.

There was a knot in his gut as he pulled back the material shielding the face, wondering why he was filled with dread.

Oh gods, no-

For just an instant, he was a haunted man.

He saw round, flushed cheeks, vivid blue eyes. Damp curls plastered against a little brown face. Dark green, just starting to bleach at the ends.

Damas squeezed his eyes shut, opened them again.

No.

The face hadn't changed. It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t!

It's not him. He's too old. But his eyes- oh Precursors!

Slowly, agonizingly slowly, the tiny boy raised his hand towards Damas. It faltered and fell weakly against his face. Then, peering up through glazed eyes, the child gathered his strength and formed his hand into a sign.

"Daddy?"

Damas’s heart leapt into his throat.

Who is this child?!

He knew at least one sign of a language invented in his city -- the city-state of Spargus -- but he was left in the Strider Range with a Havenite.

Damas bundled the child into his arms and attempted to calm his racing heart.

Time was of the essence.

"Kleiver, get the engine going!" he shouted, "This one's delirious!"

"Holy-!" Drake scooted over to make room in the back for the second boy. "That's an entire baby! Who exiles a freakin' baby?!"

Ignoring the space provided, Damas slipped into his seat and kept his grip on the half swaddled child.

"Water," he ordered tersely.

Drake handed a flask up as Kleiver gunned the engine. They all knew that getting back to the city quickly was a matter of life and death now. The mystery of a Havenite kid having a Spargan beacon could wait.

Damas glanced between the feverish child in his arms and the limp teenager in the back of the jeep.

"For your sakes," he said, "I hope you have the willpower to survive."

Fic Prompts: Free Day Thursday

We return once more to the Meddling Mar au, in which Jak’s childhood self and the Explorer uncle messed with the time map and got back to Haven after only 5 years had passed. Now we move from the end of Jak 2 to the beginning of Jak 3

Jak didn’t struggle when they came to arrest him.

He didn't fight back when he was handcuffed and dragged into an air train, even though he could have slaughtered every one of them in a second.

He didn't even protest. He was in shock.

Everything he'd been through, everything this city had subjected him to, and now they were throwing him away.

He'd been taken from whatever poor fools brought him into this world, kept under Samos’s thumb as their weapon in training. Handed over to Errol to be tortured into their perfect monster. Sent into battle before he was even physically mature. And now that Kor was dead and the Precursor Stone was beyond their reach, Jak had outlived his usefulness. Even Samos seemed to think so, keeping silent during the sham trial.

Of course, Jak had also wondered if that was retribution for his defiance of the old man.

How long he stood in the hold, glazed over and shell-shocked, he couldn't guess. What finally broke him free of his trance was a flicker of movement in the corner of his eye. Discreetly, Jak shifted his stance to give him a better look. That couldn't have been who he thought he'd seen!

In the very back of the hold, near the hatch to the cockpit, two crates full of emergency supplies were kept locked to the floor. Most air trains had them -- one in case of a water landing, one in case of crashes. A small, round face peeped out from behind the crates, locked eyes with Jak, and ducked down again.

It took every ounce of Jak’s self-control to keep from stiffening.

Mar?!

[[MORE]]

What could have possessed him to stow away?!

Wherever they were going, Jak hoped there would be a place for Mar to escape-

The ramp lowered, and Jak's heart sank.

The sun was rising over a dusty expanse of nothing. This was dry desert, with barely a hint of life outside the perversely vibrant cactus dotting the horizon. Already heat shimmered between uneven towers of rock, like a portal between sweeping dunes and hard scrublands. Jak stared into this gateway to hell and understood then why they'd pulled him from his hammock in the middle of the night. This wasn't actually a banishment. This was an execution.

Ashelin shot him a worried look as he was dragged from the ship into the rising heat, but she said nothing. Jak locked eyes with her, ignoring Count Veger's smug reading of his "sentence".

Please- he tried his hardest to convey without a sound, Don't let him do this.

"This is a death sentence and you know it," Ashelin spat, "At least have the guts to admit to that."

"Your protests were overruled!" Veger looked far too smug. "This dark eco filled...thing is far too dangerous to run free."

He flapped a hand at the guards holding Jak.

"Drop the cargo!"

"Overruled by who?!" Daxter demanded, interrupting what promised to be an overly verbose protest from Pecker. "We want a recount!"

The count turned with a sneer. "Oh? I see you wish to join him?"

Predictably, Pecker immediately backpedaled. Jak tuned out his patronizing suggestion to "drink lots of water" -- did the birdbrain see any water around here?! -- and made urgent eye contact with Daxter.

"Go back to the city, Dax," he said sharply.

Don't die out here with me. I've gotten you into enough trouble. Don't leave Mar alone.

Ashelin wouldn't meet his eyes as she released the handcuffs.

"I'm sorry," she said half-heartedly, "The council is far too powerful. There's nothing I-"

She looked away, clearly embarrassed by her own meager apology.

"I know," Jak answered dully.

Can't overrule an entire city if they all want me dead.

He blinked and looked down as something was pressed into his hand. It was a beacon of some kind, already activated and flashing. What was-?

She's...trying to help me?

"You just stay alive," Ashelin said brusquely, "That's an order. Someone will find you, I promise."

She took a step back, then reluctantly turned back to the shuttle.

"Oh, and don't worry about the poor little Heir you've been dragging around," Veger purred, looking down his short nose at Jak.

"Freed from your deplorable influence, he'll be able to meet his full potential under my tutelage."

Jak tensed.

That's what this was about.

It wasn’t about him!

Well, it was. The other him.

Veger was after Mar.

Mar wouldn't be safe in the city if he went back.

Jak’s eyes flicked from Veger to Ashelin to Mar, and then to Daxter. He saw understanding in his best friend's eyes. Daxter understood the risks too. The ottsel was going to have to be ready to fight the instant they made it back to Haven.

Keeping his hands low, and his movements small, Jak spelled out take the kid to Sig. Stay safe.

The ramp began to rise up as the engines roared to life, and Jak pulled his scarf up to block the plumes of dust raised by the turbines. He heard a cry, then several more shouts; surprise, indignation, or anger, he couldn't tell. A small hand slipped into his own, and then he was being pulled towards the rock turrets.

"Don't look back!" Daxter's voice rang shrilly in his ear as a familiar weight landed on Jak’s shoulder. "Junior jumped out before I could stop him! Run! Run before Velcro turns that ship around!"

"This is madness!" The unwelcome voice of Pecker grated on Jak’s ears. "What are you doing?!"

Relief was overpowered by anger in that moment. That stupid kid! If he'd just kept his head down and stayed hidden, he and Daxter could've had a chance to escape! Now all four of them were going to die if they didn't find water and shelter!

Jak darted through the space between the rocks -- the one he'd thought of as the gateway to hell -- and pulled Mar to the side with him.

Mirages shimmered across an expanse of rocky soil and cactus plants-

"Ay! I told you not to touch that, my love! Look at your finger-"

Jak blinked, and the memory dissipated like smoke. Where had he heard that before? There weren't plants like this in Haven. And while there were plenty of thorny growths in Sandover, the phrasing didn't sound like anyone Jak had known.

Beside him, Mar held up a hand, fingers splayed, and squinted at it as if trying to read it. He tilted his head, then frowned and dropped his hand.

"Can't see the lighthouse," he said with a dejected look.

"Lighthouse? What lighthouse?" Daxter asked.

The little boy shrugged expressively. "Don't know. I know there's a lighthouse in the Wasteland that's supposed to save travelers, but I don’t know where it is."

Well, a lighthouse meant a lighthouse keeper, and that meant shelter. It was better than wandering aimlessly under an unforgiving sun until their legs gave out, anyway.

The boys picked their way between haphazard piles of red rock and scrubby bushes, seeking shade. Now and then, Daxter stopped to try to scrape dew off the leaves, but it was barely enough to wet their tongues.

All the while, the hum of the air train grew louder.

They needed to hide.

Jak scanned the rocks with gritted teeth, silently praying that one would have a cave or recess. There wasn't enough dark eco in his body to transform: if he had to make a hole in the rocks, he'd have to do it under his regular power. But not here. They were too close to the air train.

"Pecker," he said sharply, "Fly up."

"And let them -- raaawk! -- spot me? No thank you!" the moncaw snapped.

Jak picked up the bird hybrid and bodily tossed him into the air.

"Fly. Up." He glared at him. "Look for shelter, or anything that looks like people live there. If the air train is far enough away, we'll run for the next rock tower."

Daxter frowned. "We won't be able to do that for long," he warned. "Remember how tired we got just crossing the magma gorge back in Sandover? I got a feeling this heat is gonna really take it out of us."

Already sweat rolled down their necks, taking precious moisture from their bodies. Jak slipped his goggles down around his neck and unwrapped his scarf. Every fiber of his body told him that he was going to regret this decision, but what choice did he have? When the full length of the cloth had been shaken out -- some two feet in all -- he draped it unceremoniously over Mar's head.

"Cover up. That's about the only shade you're going to get out here."

Mar wound the scarf around his neck and face twice, but the excess still fluttered down over his chest. Just as well. That was more of him to be slightly shielded from the sun. Mar wrinkled his nose and gagged behind the scarf.

"Smells gross," he complained.

Jak ignored him and set about tying his hair up into a makeshift knot on top of his skull. If he could keep it off his neck, his body might be able to cool off a little more efficiently, but he couldn’t guarantee it. When finished, he set his goggles back in place and scanned the horizon with them.

We're on our own, now.