//------------------------------// // Precursor: Misty Island // Story: Jak and Daxter: Children of Eco // by Blackdrag-rose //------------------------------// It didn't take them more than a few minutes to reach Misty Island, once again docking the boat next to the old wooden dock that the island had, though they all knew that they were the only ones who bothered to use it anymore. As Jak and Pinkie climbed out of the boat, with Daxter still on Jak's shoulder and taking the position of a watchdog of some kind, they kept their eyes open for anything that might want to do them harm. They quickly followed the only available path they could take, right in front of them, though once they had climbed up the rocky steps they found a few Lurkers waiting for them, one with the normal red-purple colored fur while another one had blue fur... and was wearing armor that looked like it had been crafted from one of the many bones that had been scattered around the island. A quick jab to the chest was enough to make the bone Lurker's helmet jump into the air and come crashing down on its head, stunning the creature long enough for either Jak or Pinkie to finish him, and his comrade, off before it had time to react. The moment the two Lurkers had been taken care of, and he coast was clear for a few seconds, the trio quickly discovered that they had two directions they could go, though before they could come to a decision Daxter pointed at a glittering green rodent creature that was staring at them. The trio immediately recognized it as the Sculptor's muse, as they had all seen it during their years in the village, though the only problem was catching it. Pinkie let Jak chase the muse for a little bit, where he took care of a few more Lurkers, gathered a few more Precursor Orbs, and even freed one of the seven Scout Flies that had come to the island, before noticing that there was a pattern. The moment that the muse ran passed her, and was followed by Jak, Pinkie joined them, though instead of following her brother she went in the direction he had come from and raced to meet up with him. The muse, essentially trapped by two people in the end, surrendered easily, though the moment Jak held the creature in his hands Daxter ripped it free and shoved it inside Jak's backpack, as if he wanted Jak to himself. "That wasn't very nice Daxter," Pinkie said, not liking how their friend treated the Sculptor's muse, especially considering the man might notice if something hurt her. "We can discuss this some other time," Daxter replied, his eyes looking all over the area, as if he was looking for more enemies that might want to harm any of them, "For now we should move on... this island is giving me the creeps." Both Jak and Pinkie agreed with Daxter, because now that they knew what was on the island they knew the reason why Samos had forbid them from coming here, until they had disobeyed him and gotten Daxter into the mess he was in. Pinkie still found Daxter's ottsel form to be extremely cute, as in a pet sense anyway, but she knew her friend hated it and wanted nothing more than to help him revert back to his original state. They quickly scanned the area they were in and headed to the right of the entrance, though a few seconds later Pinkie snatched a bit of Blue Eco that was floating around and ran towards the edge of the area they were walking on. Jak then watched as his sister safely made it to a Precursor platform, activated it with the Eco she had grabbed, and rode the small platform out to where a Power Cell was waiting for someone to claim it. Once Pinkie was with them again they ended up finding two more Scout Flies hidden to the left of where they were walking, along with some more orbs, though they also discovered some Red Eco clusters floating in the air... and discovered that Red Eco empowered their physical attacks, making the two of them hit harder than before. Now that they were boosted by the Red Eco they were able to take out the Lurkers that were wearing armor in one shot, as well as break through the bones that made up the armor as well. As Jak punched his way through the last Lurker in the area, and he was sure that it was the last one, Pinkie returned to the Blue Eco she had grabbed earlier, to which she raced across the platforms they had jumped across and opened the Precursor Door that Jak had stopped in front of. "Why did you go all the way back there for Blue Eco?" Jak asked, before pointing at the small cloud of Blue Eco that was floating near where he was standing, "We had some at the end the entire time." "Umm... it was more fun to run over all the stone platforms again?" Pinkie offered, because in reality she hadn't seen the cloud that her brother was currently pointing at and relied on what she knew to help them out. Jak shook his head as he and Daxter let out a quick laugh, because no matter how serious a situation was there was always something funny about what Pinkie did, or what she said, that made the two of them laugh... and she never got mad at them about it. The moment the two of them were finished the trio climbed into the area that they had unlocked, which was actually the arena area that was connected to the pit of Dark Eco that Daxter had fallen into the last time they were here. As they walked into the middle of the massive area they spotted a few more metal boxes lining the wall opposite of the large pit, no doubt filled with orbs for them to collect, though after a few steps the door slammed shut behind them and Lurkers started to fill the area. "AH! ITS A LURKER AMBUSH!" Daxter shouted, though at the same time he grabbed onto the shoulder piece that allowed him to ride on Jak's shoulder, intending to hang on for his life. "Thanks Captain Obvious," Jak and Pinkie replied, though this time they didn't stop and chuckle over the fact that they had said the same thing at the same time, as there were enemies for them to fight. Jak and Pinkie started throwing punches and kicks at the Lurkers that weren't wearing armor, as they intended on cutting down the number of enemies they had to fight before focusing on the armored ones, though that thought went out of their minds as they noticed that some of the unarmored enemies were dropping Red Eco for them to use. As they grabbed the Eco that was being dropped they all noticed that there was a cannon firing pouches into the arena, just like the one on the beach they had taken care of. Once they were both empowered by the Eco they changed their tactics and started hitting everything that was coming their way, knocking out Lurkers left and right until their opponents seemed to wise up and stopped throwing more troops at them. The moment the last Lurker was taken out, and they were sure that there weren't anymore to deal with, they noticed that a stairway had risen from the floor, leading them to the Dark Eco pit... which happened to have a Power Cell waiting near it. "That so wasn't there the last time we were here..." Daxter said, just as Jak grabbed the Power Cell and stashed it inside his backpack, "or was it actually here and we were too focused on investigating that blasted pit?" "In the end it doesn't matter," Jak replied, heading towards the other door they could have used to enter the arena, taking note of the cannon that was still raining pouches down on the arena floor, "the Power Cell is ours... which means we can use it to power Keira's zoomer once we've finished checking the rest of the island." On the other side of the second door they discovered three more of the bone armor wearing Lurkers waiting for them, though while Pinkie kept them distracted, by jumping over them and avoiding their clubs, Jak moved forward a little bit to grab the Red Eco that was floating in front of a small pool of mud. With his strikes empowered he returned to his sister's side and beat up the three Lurkers that were trying to hit her, which was followed by the two of them continuing onward. As they jumped over the mud pit, and beat up the Lurker that was on the other side of it, Pinkie spotted something she could jump on and immediately accessed it, causing Jak and Daxter to pause while they waited for her to come down. When she returned to them she handed over another Scout Fly and a couple of orbs that she had grabbed while she was up on the ledge above them, while at the same time telling them about the Lurker Ship that happened to be docked in the water right now. They jumped over a few more pieces of stone, and knocked over another large piece of bone, before they reached a decent sized body of water that the large ship happened to be docked in. They carefully made their way across the bridges that had been constructed between where they had come from, the ship itself, and the opposite side of the body of water. Jak and Pinkie spotted what appeared to be a transport pad on the opposite side of the ship, where the zoomer that Keira happened to be working on was waiting for them. They carefully made their way to the other side of the body of water, collecting the Precursor Orbs and a Scout Fly that were on the ship, before they made their way towards the zoomer. When they reached the device they discovered that there was room for one person to ride at a time, which was the original function of the vehicle according to Keira, so Pinkie decided to let Jak ride it on his own, as she suspected that he was the better rider between the two of them. As he hopped onto the vehicle, and headed out over the water, Pinkie climbed back up onto the ship and worked her way to the top of it, where she found a Power Cell waiting for someone to claim it. She then noticed that there was a bunch of moving logs that were coming down a ramp, some that were just moving down the ramp like normal while a few were jumping in the air and landing before repeating the movement. She jumped down onto the ramp and ran up it, jumping over the logs that weren't jumping and slipping under the ones that were jumping before they could land. As she made her way up the ramp she moved into the small areas on the sides that allowed her to let some of the logs roll down the ramp, though after a few seconds she continued moving until she came to the second area and found another Scout Fly... who happened to have the Power Cell it had recovered before being locked up. With the Power Cell in hand she continued towards the top, dodging the logs in whichever manner was necessary based on how they were moving, before she came to the top of the arena area, where she spotted the cannon that had been firing at them earlier. She rushed at the two Lurkers that were standing around the cannon, one standing guard while the other loosed another explosive pouch, before she knocked them out and acquired another Power Cell for stopping them. She eyed the cannon as she collected the cell, to which she grinned as she took control of it and fired some shots down at the locked boxes that she had seen earlier, releasing the orbs that had been trapped inside them. Once the deed was done Pinkie pulled herself away from the cannon and headed back down the ramp that she had used to get to this area, which was now free of logs for some reason, though as she noticed Jak running down some of the Lurkers that were flying balloons she decided to head into the arena and gather the orbs. It didn't take her long to reach the arena, though once she had the orbs in her possession she turned around and headed back towards the Lurker ship. The moment she arrived she spotted Jak parking the zoomer on its teleport pad and climbed off of it, though judging by the smile on his face he had found a few orbs and Power Cells to make up for the trip. "Can we please leave?" Daxter said, his eyes looking at the shadows around them, expecting a Lurker to jump out and attack them, "I'd like to leave this island before something actually happens to us." "Well, we've picked up everything we can find," Jak replied, while he and his sister made their way back towards the boat they had used to reach the island. The moment they returned to the village, and made sure that the boat was safe, they went to the Mayor's house and listened to him praise them for restoring the village's power, as he had asked of them, and gave them the Power Cell as a reward. That was followed by Jak offering ninety orbs for the other Power Cell that the Mayor had, which was quickly accepted and exchanged, allowing them to walk out with their rewards. They then walked to the Sculptor's house and let the muse go, to which they got the reaction that they had been expecting the entire time after they had rescued the poor creature. "My muse!" the Sculptor happily proclaimed, while the little critter climbed onto the stone slab that was still untouched, "You saved her! You guys really are the best. Here, take this Power Cell as thanks." The trio was happy to accept the Power Cell that was offered to them, along with Daxter being happy to get away from the creature before he did something to it, though the muse stared at them all as they started to make their way out of the small house. "Ah, she likes you guys," the Sculptor commented, his face full of joy as he waved goodbye, "Say, do you think ya might pose with her for a statue when ya get back?" "Sure thing," Pinkie replied, knowing that it would be the perfect thing to celebrate the end of an adventure, once they had restored Daxter to his original form and stopped the Lurkers from whatever they were doing. Once they were done in the village, and had made sure that they hadn't missed anything, they returned to the Precursor Oracle and collected the two Power Cells that it happened to hold. The moment it handed them over the trio made their way to Fire Canyon, where they could finally get underway and get to the Blue Sage's hut... and get them one step closer to wherever Gol Acheron called home.