A Matter of Time - Chapter Nine
Title: A Matter of Time
Fandom: Jak and Daxter
Rating: PG13
Summary: When Jak first landed in Haven City, Erol wasn't the one to find him. Now he must face a future he is ill prepared for, and even with help from Sig and Damas, there's no guarantee that he'll survive.
Main characters: Jak, Sig, Damas
Ships: Genfic
Spoilers: Jak 1, Jak 2, and Jak 3
First chapter.
Previous chapter.
Next chapter.
-Chapter Nine-
People in Spargus were not as obvious about how they made their living as the people in Sandover, but Jak didn't have to observe long to know that that guy was a fruit vendor and that woman repairing someone's gun had to be a mechanic of some sort. Every once in a while he spotted a place where stones in a building had been replaced, so there had to be stone masons, and someone had to have constructed the wooden stands that displayed the vendors' wares. In those ways, Spargus was a lot like his home.
But it was the things that weren't familiar that caught his interest the most. No one here rode on zoomers, but a few people in the city had giant lizards that reminded him vaguely of featherless, gray-green flut fluts. He also noticed that people tended to barter with Precursor artifacts and what looked like Metal Head gems, with only the rare Precursor orb tossed in. Maybe they're not as common here, he speculated.
Though he blended in better with his brown clothes, no one here seemed interested in striking up a conversation with a stranger, so for the most part Jak was left alone. That suited him just fine, since all he wanted to do was watch. Watch and listen. As he strolled down the streets, he heard lots of interesting things.
"...kangarats in the granary again..." That was an old woman with a weather-beaten face who looked like she could blend right into the sand.
"...heard Erol's gonna be in the Haven City races again. No surprise there..." This came from a burly man with a gun that was almost as tall as he was.
"...I'll give you ten gems for the lot..." A younger man, maybe a few years older than Jak.
"...heard there was a new batch of Marauders entering the arena, wantin' to become citizens. Think any of 'em will manage it...?" Jak couldn't tell which person in the cluster of Spargans said this, other than the fact that it couldn't be the one woman who was with them. He shrugged and went on. It didn't really matter.
"...damn the man. I'm tellin' ya, he's up to something. Heard he was doing experiments..."
"...bet I can bring in more Metal Head gems than you on our next run! Got a new gun upgrade..."
"...if that leaper lizard craps on my doorstep again, I swear..."
Jak stopped paying attention and just let the sounds of the city wash over him. Half of what he heard he didn't understand anyway, but if he didn't listen too closely, he could get the general feel. Most of it felt so completely and utterly normal that, if he closed his eyes, he could almost pretend that he was home. He didn't do that more than once, though. The wave of homesickness that it brought had made his chest ache in a way that hadn't been pleasant at all.
Searching for something else to think about, Jak realized that he'd come to the end of the street. It wasn't just any street, though. He recognized this street. This was the same street that Sig had led him down when they first entered Spargus, the street he and Damas had taken to go to the desert. That door at the end opened up to a sort of holding area that had been devoid of people, but had a number of odd-looking machines in it. While trying to keep up with his guides, he hadn't had an opportunity to take a closer look, but now...
Jak grinned and kept walking. The door opened for him as soon as he got close to it, and then there they were. He immediately went to the nearest one. He'd never seen anything like it. They've got wheels, so they've gotta be some kind of vehicle. He leaned in and poked at the controls, but nothing happened. I wonder what people use them for.
The next one was a lot larger, and the way its wheels and frame were splayed out made him think of a four-legged spider. There was enough room between it and the ground for Jak to crawl under and take a look at its belly, which he did so after shifting his gun so that it wouldn't catch. Weeiird. I bet Keira would go nuts over this. For that matter, she could probably take one look at all these components and know exactly what it was this machine did, how fast it could go, and how many power cells it needed to make it work.
A loud screech of metal on metal suddenly filled the air, pulling Jak's attention away from the vehicle. Rolling onto his stomach, he scooted forward until he was able to see the main door to Spargus. Sure enough, it was opening, allowing a motley group of men to come in. Some of them were so filthy and unkempt that Jak could smell them from across the holding area. He wrinkled his nose but kept watching.
"All right, poppies, listen up!" bellowed the man at the front. He was huge, reminding Jak of Krew, but unlike the bar owner, this man's weight looked to be just as much muscle as fat. His handlebar moustach almost looked like tusks, giving the man an even more dangerous appearance. "You're 'ere in Spargus for one thing and one thing only, an' that's the arena! You go anywhere else an' I'll gut ya and leave ya for the lizards! Understand?"
Some of the men he addressed sneered at the threat and thumbed the edges of their weapons, but Jak couldn't hear any protests under the mutters of agreement.
"Right, then. Follow me!"
The men shuffled after the leader, passing by the vehicle that Jak had been investigating. Curious about where they were going and what they were doing, the teen pulled himself out from under the machine, intending to trail behind them.
"Oi, you! Get away from me vehicles!" Jak nearly jumped out of his skin as a large hand suddenly came down on his shoulder and spun him around. The big man curled his lip up and growled as he looked Jak up and down. "What did I say about pokin' yer nose where it don't belong, you scrawny little runt? Pull somethin' like that again and I'll wallop you! Now get back in line!" Before Jak could even try to point out that he wasn't with this group, the man shoved him forward so hard that he nearly stumbled into one of the fighters.
"Watch it!" the grubby man snarled, clouting Jak over the head with his fist.
Ow! Jak winced and rubbed his head, then glared at the man. That was completely uncalled for!
"Well? What're you lot waitin' for? Get moving!"
Edging away from the man who had hit him, Jak tried to extricate himself from the press of bodies as they made their way into the city. Somehow, though, he kept getting jostled back into the middle. First it was a man with tattoos on every inch of his skin. The man growled when Jak tried to cut in front of him. After what the last man had done, Jak decided to back off and try a different path. Then it was the man with so much armor that it was impossible to be certain it was a man. This one didn't even growl, just shoved Jak to the side the moment he got too near. Frustrated, the teen tried ducking between two men dressed in brown leather, their hair bleached a sandy color from the sun. One of the men laughed and caught him by the back of his shirt.
"'Ey, Dag, lookit 'ere! Don't 'e look just like you when you was a kid? You shoulda told me you had a brother!"
"Ah, shut it, Jeb," the other man snapped. "That kid ain't my brother. His hair's too green."
"Maybe 'e's got a different father, then," Jeb said slyly.
No. Jak shook his head as he struggled against the first man's grip. He didn't know who his parents were, but he really, really doubted he was related to anyone here.
"Just let the little bastard go," Dag said, irritably reaching out to help pry Jeb's fingers off of Jak's shirt. "Doesn't matter who he is. I'll treat him the same as I'll treat you when we get to the arena." Once he succeeded in freeing Jak, he pushed him none too gently back the way he'd come. "Go on, kid. Scram!"
Once again, Jak was right back where he started. Huffing to himself, he plunged more determinedly through the crowd, avoiding the men who looked the most annoyed and either dodging or enduring the occasional fist or elbow that came his way. Eventually, he made it to the edge.
Unfortunately, the leader was there, looming over him like a thundercloud. "Don't even think about it, nipper," he growled. "I've got me eye on you."
But I'm not- Someone bumped into Jak, staggering him from the force of it. Straightening up, he tried again. He pointed at himself and shook his head vehemently. I'm not supposed to be here!
The leader snorted. "Don't act innocent with me. You think this is me first time leadin' a bunch of you yabbers through this city? I know all the tricks- 'ERE NOW, DON'T THINK I DON'T SEE YOU!" he suddenly bellowed. "YEAH, YOU, THE ONE WITH NO EARS! KEEP IT UP AND YOU WON'T HAVE HANDS EITHER!"
Jak resisted the urge to look and see who the man was yelling at. Whatever they were doing, it wasn't his problem, and he had something more important to focus on. When the leader turned his eyes back on him, Jak lifted his chin, determined to be heard. He pointed at himself, then at the group, and shook his head. He made the motions sharp and distinct. I'm. Not. With. Them.
"Oh, you think you're too good to walk with the others? Too good to speak to the likes of me?" The large man's lip curled into a sneer. "Maybe you're too good for this city, then, eh? 'Ow 'bout I toss you right back out the gate?"
At that moment, Jak would have given almost anything to be able to growl. Being able to vocalize his frustration right then would have been immensely satisfying. That's not what I said! Ears laying back against his head, he lifted his hands to try again.
But someone grabbed his hands before he could begin the first gesture and yanked him forward with the rest of the crowd. For one startled moment, Jak stumbled after him, but then his brain caught up and he twisted in the man's grip, trying to pull free. Hey! Let go!
To no avail. The man's grip was like iron. "Yer slowin' us down, kid," said the tall, stringy fighter with a wicked-looking axe strapped to his back. "Quit tryin' to slip off. If we gotta stop and wait while Kleiver knocks some sense into you, it's only gonna piss the rest of us off. Trust me, runt, you don't want that."
Of course, that didn't stop Jak from trying to break free. He clawed at his captor's fingers, though with the thick leather gloves he was wearing it was doubtful the man felt anything. When that didn't work, he literally dug his heels into the dirt.
But he'd forgotten to take one thing into account. The streets of Spargus weren't covered in dirt, they were covered in sand, which gave way all too easily under his feet. Instead of offering any resistance, Jak found himself being dragged. His captor regarded him with amused indifference.
"You might as well just walk. It's a lot easier for me and a lot more comfortable for you - unless you like gettin' sand up your ass."
Faced with the choice of either following on his feet or getting dragged the rest of the way to wherever they were going, Jak unhappily settled for the former. The man didn't let go and he didn't look at the teen again, so there was no opportunity to try to convince him that there'd been a mistake. Jak grimaced. I'll have to wait until we get where we're going.
They didn't have far to go. Jak had noticed during his exploration that Spargus could be split into two main sections that were connected by one narrow street. There was the area by the ocean and the area by the entrance - they might have had proper names, but nobody had used them within his hearing - and it was on the other side of the second that they came to a wide set of stairs. Rather than going up the stairs, though, the leader - Kleiver? - took them to the side and opened a door.
"These stairs go down to the 'olding area where you're to wait. When the doors open, that's yer cue to pile out and 'ave at it." Kleiver grinned at them then, but it wasn't a nice expression. "Good luck becomin' citizens of Spargus."
Jak's ears flicked up at that, but he barely had time to process the words before the men around him roared with enthusiasm and started shoving their way into the stairwell. Unfortunately, even though the man who had been holding his arm had let go, the crowd swallowed him up and pushed him along, giving him no room to maneuver or escape.
The next few minutes were a jumble of confusion for Jak. Too many people were talking, too many sweaty, unbathed bodies were pressed together in too small a room, and there was too much that the teen didn't understand. He tried to talk to some of the fighters, to explain once again that he shouldn't be here, but they all either ignored him, threatened him, or tried to hit him. Frustrated, Jak found a relatively empty space to sit down and wait.
As he sat, his thoughts went over what had happened in the last few minutes. What had Kleiver meant? What were these men - and Jak, apparently - about to do? And was it really how someone became a citizen of Spargus?
He didn't know how he felt about that. Becoming a citizen was supposed to be his backup plan, something for him to consider if he couldn't find Sandover. It was way too soon to give up just yet. Yeah, sure, he'd been investigating the city with that thought in mind, but that was all he'd been doing: investigating.
Okay, so this isn't exactly what had I planned. Just calm down and look at it this way, he reasoned with himself. If I can't get out of this, then I'll just go with it. I can be part of Spargus until I find Sandover or... or whatever. If I decide to stay, then I'm already a citizen and I don't have to ask. He took a deep breath, then instantly regretted it. Ugh. Just being near these people makes me want to take a bath.
Something caught his ears then, even over the mutters of his erstwhile neighbors. It almost sounded like cheering, but it came from outside the walls of the room, so it was muffled by the wood and stone. Curious, Jak stood up. All around him, the fighters tensed and shut up. Near-silence reigned for just a moment as they all waited for some unknown signal.
Then the wooden doors in front of them opened, and once again Jak was swept up in a moving, roaring tide.
-o-
As Damas took his place on his balcony overlooking the arena, his mind was not on the fight that was about to begin. He had seen its like many times before and would see many more in the future. Only a minimal amount of attention was really needed to weigh the talents and abilities the fighters displayed, and frankly he doubted he would see anything of true interest from this particular group. It was easy to let his thoughts wander while he waited for Kleiver to signal that the men were ready.
As had been happening all too often of late, his thoughts went to the blond teenager that Sig had brought in. The boy showed promise with a gun, though at this point it was too soon to tell how good he would be. He at least had the right attitude about training. Though Damas had driven him hard, and though the boy was obviously unused to the desert's heat, there had been no sign of complaint, only a strong determination to master the task that Damas had set him. Such a trait was not common and was always rewarding to work with. Perhaps that was why Damas had decided to take the boy's training into his own hands. It also allowed him to keep a closer eye on Jak, who admittedly had been allowed into the city without following the proper procedures. No one had checked his background, no one had judged his willingness to stay silent about Spargus, no one knew where his loyalties laid. The more time Damas spent with him, the more sure he could be that Jak was not a liability. It was certainly a good excuse to use with his advisers the next time one of them commented about how much time he was devoting to Jak.
But if he was honest, the truth was that he didn't know why he had agreed to Jak's silent request. It had simply felt right. Perhaps it was. He was the one who had ordered Sig to have the boy brought here. That made him Damas' responsibility.
Deep down, though, he knew it was more complex than that.
Movement on one of the other balconies caught his attention, pulling him out of his thoughts. Kleiver gave him a short wave and a thumbs up, indicating that the would-be Spargans were in the holding room. Damas nodded to indicate that he'd seen the gesture, then stood up. It was time to begin.
"Citizens of Spargus!" he called out, the acoustics of the volcanic chamber picking up his voice and amplifying so that all could hear. The babble of the spectators immediately died down and all eyes turned to him. Once he was certain he had their complete attention, he continued. "Tonight we bear witness to a fight of skill, determination, and survival. The fighters we will see have only one thing in common, and that is their desire to join us as a part of this city. Watch them and judge their worth, for tonight, one of them will be one step closer to being your brother in arms." He paused, then lifted his staff and brought it down with a sharp crack that echoed throughout the arena.
"Now, let the challenge begin!"
The crowd roared its approval and anticipation, and down below, the doors to the holding chamber were opened. Fighters poured out onto the platform that sat in the middle of the lava, as typical a bunch of Marauders as Damas had ever seen. His eyes skimmed over them, taking in their stained and ragged clothes, their hodgepodge of salvaged armor, and their dirty and often rusting weapons. He was about to dismiss the lot of them as not worth the time it took to watch them slaughter each other when one last person slid out of the holding room and stood there, blinking around in confusion. This one had a gun but no armor and his brown clothes and blond hair were relatively clean. He was much shorter and younger than any of the other fighters.
He was also entirely too familiar. Damas' blood ran cold with shock.
It was Jak.
-End Chapter Nine-
Next chapter.
Fandom: Jak and Daxter
Rating: PG13
Summary: When Jak first landed in Haven City, Erol wasn't the one to find him. Now he must face a future he is ill prepared for, and even with help from Sig and Damas, there's no guarantee that he'll survive.
Main characters: Jak, Sig, Damas
Ships: Genfic
Spoilers: Jak 1, Jak 2, and Jak 3
First chapter.
Previous chapter.
Next chapter.
-Chapter Nine-
People in Spargus were not as obvious about how they made their living as the people in Sandover, but Jak didn't have to observe long to know that that guy was a fruit vendor and that woman repairing someone's gun had to be a mechanic of some sort. Every once in a while he spotted a place where stones in a building had been replaced, so there had to be stone masons, and someone had to have constructed the wooden stands that displayed the vendors' wares. In those ways, Spargus was a lot like his home.
But it was the things that weren't familiar that caught his interest the most. No one here rode on zoomers, but a few people in the city had giant lizards that reminded him vaguely of featherless, gray-green flut fluts. He also noticed that people tended to barter with Precursor artifacts and what looked like Metal Head gems, with only the rare Precursor orb tossed in. Maybe they're not as common here, he speculated.
Though he blended in better with his brown clothes, no one here seemed interested in striking up a conversation with a stranger, so for the most part Jak was left alone. That suited him just fine, since all he wanted to do was watch. Watch and listen. As he strolled down the streets, he heard lots of interesting things.
"...kangarats in the granary again..." That was an old woman with a weather-beaten face who looked like she could blend right into the sand.
"...heard Erol's gonna be in the Haven City races again. No surprise there..." This came from a burly man with a gun that was almost as tall as he was.
"...I'll give you ten gems for the lot..." A younger man, maybe a few years older than Jak.
"...heard there was a new batch of Marauders entering the arena, wantin' to become citizens. Think any of 'em will manage it...?" Jak couldn't tell which person in the cluster of Spargans said this, other than the fact that it couldn't be the one woman who was with them. He shrugged and went on. It didn't really matter.
"...damn the man. I'm tellin' ya, he's up to something. Heard he was doing experiments..."
"...bet I can bring in more Metal Head gems than you on our next run! Got a new gun upgrade..."
"...if that leaper lizard craps on my doorstep again, I swear..."
Jak stopped paying attention and just let the sounds of the city wash over him. Half of what he heard he didn't understand anyway, but if he didn't listen too closely, he could get the general feel. Most of it felt so completely and utterly normal that, if he closed his eyes, he could almost pretend that he was home. He didn't do that more than once, though. The wave of homesickness that it brought had made his chest ache in a way that hadn't been pleasant at all.
Searching for something else to think about, Jak realized that he'd come to the end of the street. It wasn't just any street, though. He recognized this street. This was the same street that Sig had led him down when they first entered Spargus, the street he and Damas had taken to go to the desert. That door at the end opened up to a sort of holding area that had been devoid of people, but had a number of odd-looking machines in it. While trying to keep up with his guides, he hadn't had an opportunity to take a closer look, but now...
Jak grinned and kept walking. The door opened for him as soon as he got close to it, and then there they were. He immediately went to the nearest one. He'd never seen anything like it. They've got wheels, so they've gotta be some kind of vehicle. He leaned in and poked at the controls, but nothing happened. I wonder what people use them for.
The next one was a lot larger, and the way its wheels and frame were splayed out made him think of a four-legged spider. There was enough room between it and the ground for Jak to crawl under and take a look at its belly, which he did so after shifting his gun so that it wouldn't catch. Weeiird. I bet Keira would go nuts over this. For that matter, she could probably take one look at all these components and know exactly what it was this machine did, how fast it could go, and how many power cells it needed to make it work.
A loud screech of metal on metal suddenly filled the air, pulling Jak's attention away from the vehicle. Rolling onto his stomach, he scooted forward until he was able to see the main door to Spargus. Sure enough, it was opening, allowing a motley group of men to come in. Some of them were so filthy and unkempt that Jak could smell them from across the holding area. He wrinkled his nose but kept watching.
"All right, poppies, listen up!" bellowed the man at the front. He was huge, reminding Jak of Krew, but unlike the bar owner, this man's weight looked to be just as much muscle as fat. His handlebar moustach almost looked like tusks, giving the man an even more dangerous appearance. "You're 'ere in Spargus for one thing and one thing only, an' that's the arena! You go anywhere else an' I'll gut ya and leave ya for the lizards! Understand?"
Some of the men he addressed sneered at the threat and thumbed the edges of their weapons, but Jak couldn't hear any protests under the mutters of agreement.
"Right, then. Follow me!"
The men shuffled after the leader, passing by the vehicle that Jak had been investigating. Curious about where they were going and what they were doing, the teen pulled himself out from under the machine, intending to trail behind them.
"Oi, you! Get away from me vehicles!" Jak nearly jumped out of his skin as a large hand suddenly came down on his shoulder and spun him around. The big man curled his lip up and growled as he looked Jak up and down. "What did I say about pokin' yer nose where it don't belong, you scrawny little runt? Pull somethin' like that again and I'll wallop you! Now get back in line!" Before Jak could even try to point out that he wasn't with this group, the man shoved him forward so hard that he nearly stumbled into one of the fighters.
"Watch it!" the grubby man snarled, clouting Jak over the head with his fist.
Ow! Jak winced and rubbed his head, then glared at the man. That was completely uncalled for!
"Well? What're you lot waitin' for? Get moving!"
Edging away from the man who had hit him, Jak tried to extricate himself from the press of bodies as they made their way into the city. Somehow, though, he kept getting jostled back into the middle. First it was a man with tattoos on every inch of his skin. The man growled when Jak tried to cut in front of him. After what the last man had done, Jak decided to back off and try a different path. Then it was the man with so much armor that it was impossible to be certain it was a man. This one didn't even growl, just shoved Jak to the side the moment he got too near. Frustrated, the teen tried ducking between two men dressed in brown leather, their hair bleached a sandy color from the sun. One of the men laughed and caught him by the back of his shirt.
"'Ey, Dag, lookit 'ere! Don't 'e look just like you when you was a kid? You shoulda told me you had a brother!"
"Ah, shut it, Jeb," the other man snapped. "That kid ain't my brother. His hair's too green."
"Maybe 'e's got a different father, then," Jeb said slyly.
No. Jak shook his head as he struggled against the first man's grip. He didn't know who his parents were, but he really, really doubted he was related to anyone here.
"Just let the little bastard go," Dag said, irritably reaching out to help pry Jeb's fingers off of Jak's shirt. "Doesn't matter who he is. I'll treat him the same as I'll treat you when we get to the arena." Once he succeeded in freeing Jak, he pushed him none too gently back the way he'd come. "Go on, kid. Scram!"
Once again, Jak was right back where he started. Huffing to himself, he plunged more determinedly through the crowd, avoiding the men who looked the most annoyed and either dodging or enduring the occasional fist or elbow that came his way. Eventually, he made it to the edge.
Unfortunately, the leader was there, looming over him like a thundercloud. "Don't even think about it, nipper," he growled. "I've got me eye on you."
But I'm not- Someone bumped into Jak, staggering him from the force of it. Straightening up, he tried again. He pointed at himself and shook his head vehemently. I'm not supposed to be here!
The leader snorted. "Don't act innocent with me. You think this is me first time leadin' a bunch of you yabbers through this city? I know all the tricks- 'ERE NOW, DON'T THINK I DON'T SEE YOU!" he suddenly bellowed. "YEAH, YOU, THE ONE WITH NO EARS! KEEP IT UP AND YOU WON'T HAVE HANDS EITHER!"
Jak resisted the urge to look and see who the man was yelling at. Whatever they were doing, it wasn't his problem, and he had something more important to focus on. When the leader turned his eyes back on him, Jak lifted his chin, determined to be heard. He pointed at himself, then at the group, and shook his head. He made the motions sharp and distinct. I'm. Not. With. Them.
"Oh, you think you're too good to walk with the others? Too good to speak to the likes of me?" The large man's lip curled into a sneer. "Maybe you're too good for this city, then, eh? 'Ow 'bout I toss you right back out the gate?"
At that moment, Jak would have given almost anything to be able to growl. Being able to vocalize his frustration right then would have been immensely satisfying. That's not what I said! Ears laying back against his head, he lifted his hands to try again.
But someone grabbed his hands before he could begin the first gesture and yanked him forward with the rest of the crowd. For one startled moment, Jak stumbled after him, but then his brain caught up and he twisted in the man's grip, trying to pull free. Hey! Let go!
To no avail. The man's grip was like iron. "Yer slowin' us down, kid," said the tall, stringy fighter with a wicked-looking axe strapped to his back. "Quit tryin' to slip off. If we gotta stop and wait while Kleiver knocks some sense into you, it's only gonna piss the rest of us off. Trust me, runt, you don't want that."
Of course, that didn't stop Jak from trying to break free. He clawed at his captor's fingers, though with the thick leather gloves he was wearing it was doubtful the man felt anything. When that didn't work, he literally dug his heels into the dirt.
But he'd forgotten to take one thing into account. The streets of Spargus weren't covered in dirt, they were covered in sand, which gave way all too easily under his feet. Instead of offering any resistance, Jak found himself being dragged. His captor regarded him with amused indifference.
"You might as well just walk. It's a lot easier for me and a lot more comfortable for you - unless you like gettin' sand up your ass."
Faced with the choice of either following on his feet or getting dragged the rest of the way to wherever they were going, Jak unhappily settled for the former. The man didn't let go and he didn't look at the teen again, so there was no opportunity to try to convince him that there'd been a mistake. Jak grimaced. I'll have to wait until we get where we're going.
They didn't have far to go. Jak had noticed during his exploration that Spargus could be split into two main sections that were connected by one narrow street. There was the area by the ocean and the area by the entrance - they might have had proper names, but nobody had used them within his hearing - and it was on the other side of the second that they came to a wide set of stairs. Rather than going up the stairs, though, the leader - Kleiver? - took them to the side and opened a door.
"These stairs go down to the 'olding area where you're to wait. When the doors open, that's yer cue to pile out and 'ave at it." Kleiver grinned at them then, but it wasn't a nice expression. "Good luck becomin' citizens of Spargus."
Jak's ears flicked up at that, but he barely had time to process the words before the men around him roared with enthusiasm and started shoving their way into the stairwell. Unfortunately, even though the man who had been holding his arm had let go, the crowd swallowed him up and pushed him along, giving him no room to maneuver or escape.
The next few minutes were a jumble of confusion for Jak. Too many people were talking, too many sweaty, unbathed bodies were pressed together in too small a room, and there was too much that the teen didn't understand. He tried to talk to some of the fighters, to explain once again that he shouldn't be here, but they all either ignored him, threatened him, or tried to hit him. Frustrated, Jak found a relatively empty space to sit down and wait.
As he sat, his thoughts went over what had happened in the last few minutes. What had Kleiver meant? What were these men - and Jak, apparently - about to do? And was it really how someone became a citizen of Spargus?
He didn't know how he felt about that. Becoming a citizen was supposed to be his backup plan, something for him to consider if he couldn't find Sandover. It was way too soon to give up just yet. Yeah, sure, he'd been investigating the city with that thought in mind, but that was all he'd been doing: investigating.
Okay, so this isn't exactly what had I planned. Just calm down and look at it this way, he reasoned with himself. If I can't get out of this, then I'll just go with it. I can be part of Spargus until I find Sandover or... or whatever. If I decide to stay, then I'm already a citizen and I don't have to ask. He took a deep breath, then instantly regretted it. Ugh. Just being near these people makes me want to take a bath.
Something caught his ears then, even over the mutters of his erstwhile neighbors. It almost sounded like cheering, but it came from outside the walls of the room, so it was muffled by the wood and stone. Curious, Jak stood up. All around him, the fighters tensed and shut up. Near-silence reigned for just a moment as they all waited for some unknown signal.
Then the wooden doors in front of them opened, and once again Jak was swept up in a moving, roaring tide.
-o-
As Damas took his place on his balcony overlooking the arena, his mind was not on the fight that was about to begin. He had seen its like many times before and would see many more in the future. Only a minimal amount of attention was really needed to weigh the talents and abilities the fighters displayed, and frankly he doubted he would see anything of true interest from this particular group. It was easy to let his thoughts wander while he waited for Kleiver to signal that the men were ready.
As had been happening all too often of late, his thoughts went to the blond teenager that Sig had brought in. The boy showed promise with a gun, though at this point it was too soon to tell how good he would be. He at least had the right attitude about training. Though Damas had driven him hard, and though the boy was obviously unused to the desert's heat, there had been no sign of complaint, only a strong determination to master the task that Damas had set him. Such a trait was not common and was always rewarding to work with. Perhaps that was why Damas had decided to take the boy's training into his own hands. It also allowed him to keep a closer eye on Jak, who admittedly had been allowed into the city without following the proper procedures. No one had checked his background, no one had judged his willingness to stay silent about Spargus, no one knew where his loyalties laid. The more time Damas spent with him, the more sure he could be that Jak was not a liability. It was certainly a good excuse to use with his advisers the next time one of them commented about how much time he was devoting to Jak.
But if he was honest, the truth was that he didn't know why he had agreed to Jak's silent request. It had simply felt right. Perhaps it was. He was the one who had ordered Sig to have the boy brought here. That made him Damas' responsibility.
Deep down, though, he knew it was more complex than that.
Movement on one of the other balconies caught his attention, pulling him out of his thoughts. Kleiver gave him a short wave and a thumbs up, indicating that the would-be Spargans were in the holding room. Damas nodded to indicate that he'd seen the gesture, then stood up. It was time to begin.
"Citizens of Spargus!" he called out, the acoustics of the volcanic chamber picking up his voice and amplifying so that all could hear. The babble of the spectators immediately died down and all eyes turned to him. Once he was certain he had their complete attention, he continued. "Tonight we bear witness to a fight of skill, determination, and survival. The fighters we will see have only one thing in common, and that is their desire to join us as a part of this city. Watch them and judge their worth, for tonight, one of them will be one step closer to being your brother in arms." He paused, then lifted his staff and brought it down with a sharp crack that echoed throughout the arena.
"Now, let the challenge begin!"
The crowd roared its approval and anticipation, and down below, the doors to the holding chamber were opened. Fighters poured out onto the platform that sat in the middle of the lava, as typical a bunch of Marauders as Damas had ever seen. His eyes skimmed over them, taking in their stained and ragged clothes, their hodgepodge of salvaged armor, and their dirty and often rusting weapons. He was about to dismiss the lot of them as not worth the time it took to watch them slaughter each other when one last person slid out of the holding room and stood there, blinking around in confusion. This one had a gun but no armor and his brown clothes and blond hair were relatively clean. He was much shorter and younger than any of the other fighters.
He was also entirely too familiar. Damas' blood ran cold with shock.
It was Jak.
-End Chapter Nine-
Next chapter.