//------------------------------//
// Renegade: Meeting the Mechanic 
// Story: Jak and Daxter: Heirs of Mar 
// by Blackdrag-rose 
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Instead of heading back to the Hip Hog, to see if Krew needed anything done that might earn them a few more mods for their new weapons, Jak and his sisters collected their two seater zoomers and headed back through the Industrial Section once more, as it was time for them to return to the Underground and give Torn the information they had been able to pull from Krew earlier, if he didn't know it already since there was a chance that their Communicator could have heard it and let their superior know what in the world was going on... and sure enough, when they returned to the hideout, they found him pacing around the table he was usually standing near, even though he stopped when the door opened and the four of them entered the hideout.

"We're back, and we learned something interesting from Krew," Twilight stated, something that caused Torn to raise one of his eyebrows for a moment as he turned towards them, meaning he was interested in what they might have learned in the time they had been gone, even though it did look like he might have discovered something as well, or at least that was what Jak and his siblings thought since he was a hard individual to read at times, "based on what he said, Baron Praxis has made a desperate deal with the Leader of the Metal Heads, giving his own enemy regular shipments of Eco in exchange for his forces to assault Haven City, to justify his continued rule over the city... and, if it weren't for the war, the citizens of this place would no doubt put the true ruler back on the throne."

"I knew the situation was bad, but this just makes matters worse," Torn commented, not that the siblings were at all taken by surprise by that statement or the annoyance that flashed across the man's face for a few seconds, due to the fact that he had worked for the Baron at one point and it seemed like the current Praxis might not be the same one he worked for all those years ago, even if they had no idea how long it had been since he left the Krimzon Guard, before he focused on them once more, "and, to add to the list of bad things happening, one of the Baron's mining operations is under attack by a large force of Metal Heads... the only reason I'm mentioning this is because the foreman just so happens to be one of the Underground's best informants! His name is Vin, and he's just valuable enough to save, so what I need you to do is go back to the Industrial Section and head to the Power Station, as there's a Warp Gate there that will take you to the mining operation, the Strip Mine as we call it, so you can rescue Vin and get him out of there before the Metal Heads figure out where he's hiding."

"Don't worry, we'll find Vin and make sure to pull him out of the Strip Mine before our enemies get to him," Starlight said, though she suspected that there was another reason to saving Vin, other than the fact that he was an informant for Torn and the rest of the Underground, something that Twilight seemed to agree with while Jak and Cozy, plus their Ottsels, just stood there and waited for them to get all of the information before heading out to see what was going on in Vin's area, which seemed to be crawling with Metal Heads.

"Whatever deal the Baron made with the Metal Heads, the city's Eco is almost completely gone, and his time is starting to run out." Torn stated, giving them another piece of information to chew on while they were out in the field, where none of them complained about the missions they were being given since they knew there were more members of the rebellion and all of them had to be working to bring down the Baron, before he sighed for a moment, "If we don't get the kid back on the throne soon, there may not be a city left to defend... plus, if you rescue Vin, he might be able to solve our little Eco problem and buy us some more time to bring the Baron down."

Jak and his sisters nodded their heads for a moment, as while it seemed odd to help someone that was working for Baron Praxis, not to mention giving some information to the Krimzon Guard, Twilight knew that Vin could be trusted and that was more than enough for her to want to help him, not counting everything he had done for her and Starlight since they had landed in the parts of the city they had appeared in, to which they headed out through the hidden door and powered up their zoomers before moving out once more. Once more the four of them found that none of the Krimzon Guards cared about them, confirming that they had to do something that involved breaking the law before such a thing happened, but this allowed Twilight to direct them to where the Power Station was located, allowing Jak and Cozy to find that it was near the border between the Industrial Section and the Port, not to mention rested on the upper level that they had used when delivering Krew's cargo to him. As such it didn't take them long to reach it and park their vehicles near it, though Twilight made sure that no one was around them, as in the guards, before opening the door and discovered that no one was inside the Power Station, which she was fine with since it allowed her to access one of the nearby terminals and make sure the commands for the Warp Gate were set to the Strip Mine, while Starlight made sure to lock the door to give them a barrier in case the guards came to investigate who was using this place. A few moments later, after both of them were sure that things were ready, they nodded and Jak rushed through the Warp Gate that rested near the other side of the room, which was followed by Twilight, Starlight, and Cozy doing the same thing, though it didn't take all that long for them to reappear in the Strip Mine, a rocky area that had a bunch of machinery, a dark cloudy sky that seemed to be due to smoke from the machines, and there was a section of the mine that happened to have some metallic containers that were transporting whatever was inside them to another part of this area, but even as they took in all of that the siblings also noticed that a small pool of Dark Eco resting nearby, with what appeared to be large thick weeds growing out of it, or at least until Simon informed them that they were looking at some eggs.

While they learned that information Jak stared at the Ottsel brothers for a moment, as he was starting to feel that it was a very strange they would know something like that, regardless of whether or not they studied Metal Heads, as Twilight said that was how Alvin and his brothers knew this information and he was starting to believe that there was more to the three Ottsels than what he had seen so far, but for now he was going to focus on helping out the Underground and gathering a few more weapons from Krew. As they moved forward, however, the siblings discovered a new type of Metal Head, which was becoming more frequent the more they headed out to tackle all of the missions they were given, that was roughly a little taller than their ankles and seemed to resemble scorpions, so called Stingers due to their scorpion-like tail, but what they discovered was that a single attack was enough to take their new foe out, as in a single punch knocked it out and let Twilight pick up another Skull Gem as they followed the path that was behind where they found their foe. One thing they discovered was that the pool of Dark Eco wasn't a pool, as there was a thin river attached to it and it seemed to head over to what was resting behind where the first Stinger had been located, including a small pool off to the left of the Warp Gate that had brought them here, though instead of worrying about either of those areas, since they knew not to touch them, the siblings turned to the left after passing where their first foe had been standing and readied their weapons for the rest of the Metal Heads Torn had told them about. That was when they discovered that, in addition to some conveyor belts to move gear around for the workers and cart off any rubble that needed to be moved out of the way, there were a number of enemies coming right for them as they turned around the corner, a large number of Stingers that burst out of the dirt and rushed at them, a fair number of Grunts that were lumbering towards them, and a second new type of Metal Head, a shocker to Jak and his sisters since they weren't expecting to see a second one so soon, which happened to be a wasp-like Metal Head, meaning they would refer to this type as a Wasp, or Wasps since there were a few flying through the air and placed themselves in their way.

As such Jak, Twilight, and Starlight opened fire on the Metal Heads that were in front of them as they moved forward, with the sisters also throwing bolts of magic out as well when an opening revealed itself, though none of them were surprised by the fact that Dark Cozy surged to life once more and assumed control over Cozy's body once more, where she rushed right at the enemies that were in front of them and started to tear into the Metal Heads, carving her way to the center of their foes, who seemed to be shifting and converging on her location. It was in that moment that Jak discovered what Dark Cozy was up to, as he noticed the darkness that was inside the palm of her right hand, and as soon as he noticed it so did both of his sisters take notice of what was going on, to which all three of them stopped what they were doing and a barrier sprung up around them not a few seconds later, just in time to watch Dark Cozy jump into the air and slam down like Jak had done, releasing a violent wave of dark energy that tore apart the Metal Heads with ease and even temporarily sent a shock through the conveyor belt in the process. The siblings just stood there for a moment, as while they knew that Dark Cozy was strong this was far beyond what they were expecting to witness, because while the Precursor Oracle might have given their sister more control over the Dark Eco that was resting inside her body, which had been the whole point of their visits to it's building, giving her this Dark Bomb attack as well, as Twilight was going to call it, might have nullified what they had gone through earlier and might suggest they needed more of the Oracle's power to keep Dark Cozy in check. There was one downside to this, however, and that was the fact that while Dark Jak expanded most of Jak's Dark Eco supply, and reverted him back to normal after the Dark Bomb was done, but from what they could tell Dark Cozy had only lost a chunk of her power, where Twilight suspected that her attack was a mixture of Dark Eco and magic, a terrifying combination to be sure, and this only made her wonder what could have happened if she or Starlight had been injected with that much Dark Eco, or even a portion of it, before deciding that it was best if she didn't think about it as they collected the mass of Skull Gems and moved forward again.

Of course, even though she decided that, her mind still wandered to the fact that she could absorb Dark Eco, a 'gift' from when Dark Cozy had struck her inside the Fortress, and she suspected that there might be a small pool of it inside her, just waiting for something to happen no doubt, before she shook her head and pushed her thoughts of the darkness to the side for a time, as they needed to focus on what was in front of them and not worry about Dark Eco, even though it was easy to see that Dark Cozy was scanning the area for enemies. With the force of enemies dealt with the siblings followed the conveyor belt over to the gap between dirt piles and found a path that seemed to lead over to one of the structures that should bring them over to the lone building, where Vin had to be holed up based on everything they had seen so far, and it didn't take Starlight all that long to find a conveyor belt that was arranged as a ramp for them to use, or two with a platform between them. That allowed them to stop at the top of the building that was across from the lone structure, even though it gave the four of them a chance to see that there were some odd machines scattered around this place and each of them seemed to be pumping Eco out of the ground, Eco Wells no doubt, before they jumped onto the first container that moved in front of them and used it to reach their destination, something that caused Dark Cozy to vanish and allow Cozy to take over again, even though she staggered for a few seconds and Jak helped her out. At the same time there were a few Wasps that came into the area and tried to fire at them from afar, something that prompted Starlight to fire at them while Twilight blocked the incoming blasts with her magic and collected the fallen Skull Gems as well, though it wasn't long before their ride reached the edge of the platform in front of the lone building, where they found that there were no Metal Heads in this area, save for the Wasps that had been taken down, and that there was a Warp Gate nearby, which was a tad bit interesting as they approached the door and pressed the button on the side.

As the siblings opened the door, however, they caught a glimpse of someone inside the small building before a few blasts came their way and they heard someone shout 'stay back' at them, though to be absolutely sure nothing happened both Twilight and Starlight formed a barrier between them and the man in question, meaning none of the blasts would be able to hurt them, even though it did look like the individual was a bad shot and that none of the attacks got close to them, so the magic was pretty much unless, other than giving them a clear window to look at the man, where they found that he was an elderly Human with gray hair and slightly aged skin, though he wore brown overalls, a white shirt, brown mining boots, and some eyewear to protect his eyes, even if he didn't seem like the type to do manual work.

"Vin, it's Twilight, Torn sent us to get you out of here." Twilight stated, because she was hoping that the man remembered the times they conversed with each other via the messaging system in the Power Station, along with everything else they had done before she found Starlight and eventually discovered what happened to Jak and Cozy, while also banking on the fact that mentioning the second in command of the Underground might snap Vin out of wasting the bullets that were in his weapon, even though he needed a lot of work before the weapon could be used effectively, something he likely had no interest in and was only using it because of the Metal Heads.

"Oh, friendlies? Oh, thank goodness!" Vin said, where he came to a stop and layed on the machines that happened to be in front of him, as in his chest was on them and his head was now on their side of the building, before he took notice of how many people were standing near the opening, and the Ottsels as well, before he considered something as he registered the fact that he knew the name 'Twilight' from his conversations with the messaging system, "Um, where are all the Metal Heads? I know there was a force of them attacking this place."

"Gone, reduced to nothing." Cozy stated, even though she made no mention of the fact that it was her that wiped them all out and secured this area for Haven City in a matter of seconds, as she refused to acknowledge that this aided the Baron and was fine with thinking it was for the citizens of the city, but at the very least that seemed to relieve some of the stress that Vin must have been carrying for some time, given everything that had happened to this place, to which she glanced over at the Warp Gate for a few seconds, "Though we had best get out of here before another force of them attack, as I'm sure that an even greater group of Metal Heads might show up after hearing the prevoius group was wiped out..."

She never got to say the rest of her statement, as that was when Vin rushed out of the room he had been stationed in, and he only paused for a second to close and lock the door, before he dived right through the Warp Gate, heading back to the Power Station, to which the siblings shrugged and followed after him, though upon their return to the chamber they made sure to tell Vin part of Torn's reason for saving him, managing the city's Eco supply, while Twilight made sure to send Torn a notice indicating that they had rescued Vin from the Strip Mine. Torn, in his own way, was happy to hear that Vin was no longer in the range of fire and that they might be able to monitor the city's Eco supplies at long last, to make sure they had more than enough time to take down the Baron and secure the true ruler in his place, though he also informed her that he had no missions for her or her siblings at the moment, meaning anything he had must have been given to the others who were allied with the Underground, which informed them that they would have to head back to the Port and visit the Hip Hog again. Jak nodded his head, as it seemed likely that Krew might have something else for them to do, hence the reason they left Vin to his work, even if he didn't thank them for the timely assist, and used their zoomers to leave the Industrial Section again, allowing them to enjoy a short ride for a few minutes, even though it eventually ended when Jak reached the outside of the Hip Hog, to which he and Twilight landed nearby and everyone climbed off their vehicles so they could head inside and see if Sig had returned. Of course it was easy to spot the man in question, as he was sitting at the bar and might be in the middle of drinking something after all of his hard work, and there were a few more trophies on some of the walls of this large room, those being the heads of the five Crab Heads they had helped him take down earlier, though it seemed like Krew was minding his own business right now, floating above the bar area and rested near the ceiling, like he was in the middle of a conversation with someone else, before he stopped talking to whoever happened to be on the other end and shifted his seat for a second, to glance in their direction.

"I have a proposition for you, Jak." Krew stated, speaking the moment he noticed that the siblings had entered the Hip Hog, while at the same time it was easy to see that Sig seemed a little interested in what he might be sharing, even if he stayed silent for the most part, before he gestured to something for a moment, which happened to be a few racing trophies that were resting above the bar, the prizes of his champions no doubt, "Racing is the biggest sport in Haven City, and Erol just so happens to be the undisputed grand champion.... he's crazy and dangerous on the track, which makes him my kind of  guy. Only a fool would dare race against him, eh! And that's where you come in, Jak, as a client of mine is looking for a fast driver for her racing team and contacted me to find her someone to fit the role, and the first person I thought of was you, as while I might not know what sort of skills you have, in terms of racing, you did a good job getting my shipment to me in a timely manner. Here's a Security Pass to get you into the Stadium Section of the city... uh, and your contract with just a few trifles for me, though I took the liberty of signing your name to save time, hmm."

As Krew handed over four Security Passes, all of them being green, Daxter took the contract and started to read it, even if none of them knew why, even though they found that it was designed to give Krew anything and everything Jak earned while working for the person who contacted him, something that even included the rights to games, something that really shocked Daxter in the process, and that he even got the insurance claims if something happened to Jak while he was on the track, be it accidental or anything else, before he sighed and gave the papers to Twilight as Krew informed them that this was also an interview, that Jak had three minutes to get to the Stadium to be considered for the team, before wishing them luck. Due to that information they took a look at the map and found that to get over to the Stadium Section of the city they would have to get through both the Industrial Section and the Slums, before reaching their destination, though Twilight knew that if they had found a few Security Passes for the Bazaar it would have given Jak a better route and that he wouldn't have to go through the rest of the city, but since there was nothing they could do she, Starlight, and Cozy stayed silent as Jak made a mental map of his route, even though he nodded his head a few seconds later and headed outside, as there happened to be a single seater outside for him to use. Once everyone was ready Jak climbed onto the zoomer and rushed off without delay, as the moment he got on it the timer had started, according to Krew anyway, and Twilight made sure that she and her sisters used their vehicles to follow after their brother as he headed into the Industrial Section, flew through the various twists and turns that were in there, passed through the Slums, and made his way over to the border that rested between the Slums and the Stadium Section of the city, the latter being more modern, like a cross between the Slums and the Industrial Section, complete with a waterway in the middle of the area. What really stunned them was what rested right at the end of Jak's flight, the massive stadium that was in the upper left most corner of the city, where racers and citizens came to enjoy themselves while making sure to leave their worries behind, meaning this was a way to take a whole bunch of pressure off of them, before Jak landed near one of the wings of the structure and his sisters followed him not a few seconds later.

In that moment Twilight realized that Jak had gotten here within two and a half minutes, even if it broke nearly every speed rule in the city and that meant Krew must have arranged for the Krimzon Guard to ignore this specific zoomer for a short period of time when he started to use it, before he headed over to an area that seemed like a vehicle garage, since he had the feeling that they might be meeting the Mechanic that had been mentioned a few times since they started taking this fight to the Baron and his forces.

"Uh, hello? Krew said someone was looking for a new driver for their race team?" Jak inquired, speaking the moment they entered the room, as all of them agreed that the person they were looking for had to be in the vehicle garage, and if she wasn't they had the feeling she might be inside part of the Stadium to check out a vehicle upgrade or fix something that might have broken, though his thoughts were interrupted as he found a curtain and the shadow of a figure that was on the other side, appearing to work on something important and only stopped when she, as it was definitely female solely based on the shape of the body, heard him speak.

"I'm a little busy right now... though you must be Krew's new errand runners." the lady, who had to be the Mechanic, said, though at the same time that was when Jak and his sisters paused for a moment when they heard her voice, as Daxter did the same thing as well and left Alvin, Simon, and Theodore wondering what was going on, because they had been looking for this person for some time and now they knew part of what happened to her, something that brought a smile to all of their faces as they understood what was going on right now.

"You can come out, Keira, it's just us, Daxter, and some new Ottsels." Twilight replied, something that caused the lady on the other side of the curtain to stagger for a moment, especially since their voices were nearly identical, though that was followed by the figure rushing to put some items down and moved towards the curtain, where it was pulled to the side for a moment and revealed Keira, in all her glory, looking the same age as Twilight and the rest of her siblings no less, on the other side of the divider, even though they had no idea what she was working on.

"Twilight... Jak... Cozy... Starlight... Daxter..." Keira said, her tone revealing that she was overjoyed to see them again, even though they didn't need to think about that since she seemed on the verge of tearing up, as they hadn't seen each other for a long time, possibly even longer for her due to the fact that none of them knew how many years she had spent in this city and under the Baron's rule, but that was when she rushed forward and threw herself into Jak's arms, even though the opening between the wing and the garage they were in closed, making sure no one saw what was going on, "You're okay... I was so worried about you guys..."

The group spent the next five minutes calming Keira down, before she broke down on them, and then spent nearly thirty more minutes giving each other a shortened version of their stories, as in what happened since each of them left the Rift Tunnel and ended up in Haven City, even if Jak and Cozy kept most of their stories short since they didn't want to worry or terrify Keira, something that prompted her to inform them that she was stronger than she had been the last time they saw her, which lead her to inform them that she had exited the Rift Tunnel six years ago, which made sense due to their ages now being the same. What happened to her was that she ended up landing in the Scrap Yard, part of the city that was, as she later learned, forbidden to most of the city's residents and it had a whole bunch of parts for her to use, creating a new zoomer from what was scattered around her, which was when they discovered that whoever created the previous version of her vehicle had messed up badly and it had taken her quite a while to fix it, even though the codes that were on it had been from a broken Krimzon Guard vehicle, one that allowed her to enter the city and into the Baron's net. From there she could have been thrown in the Fortress for her 'crimes', but the effectiveness of her new and improved zoomer caught the eyes of those around the Baron and prompted him to offer her current position, as the 'Mechanic' as everyone seemed to call her, even though she felt that it made her more like a member of the Underground or something, despite the fact that she had more information on the Baron than anyone else in the city, and that included Krew and the other key leaders she had discovered. Of course she could have chosen to refuse the Baron's offer, but she felt that staying in the shadows and doing all she could to find the siblings was more important than staying in prison for who knew how long, hence why she spent so many years searching for them with all her new connections, but despite all that none of them showed up on her radar, something that Twilight knew was due to Vin, for some odd reason, tampering with the video evidence and hiding all of them from both the Baron and the Krimzon Guards, though Keira wasn't about to complain at this point, since now they had been reunited at last, leaving just her father as the last one that was missing.

In addition to all of that Keira also mentioned that, in addition to making all of the vehicles that were scattered throughout Haven City, hence why Twilight thought they were hers in the first place, she was also in the middle of making a prototype JET-Board on the Baron's orders, something that was supposed to aid them in their jobs, but despite everything he had her doing she hadn't had a chance to actually test it out, something that prompted Jak to offer his services, since he seemed to be her vehicle tester back when they were in Sandover Village and this was a repeat of the past. Keira was overjoyed to hear that statement and unsealed the door not a few seconds later, allowing them to follow her over to the other side of the stadium and discovered that it was definitely a massive structure with a large open area for racing and testing, hence why she remained in this place and had enough room for all five of them to sleep in peace, an offering none of them were going to refuse at this point in time, before she lead them down a ramp and revealed the item in question to Jak and his sisters. The JET-Board was an oval shaped device made of metal and the new technology that had been developed since they left Sandover Village, with two fins on the back and a bumper resting on the front, and it also possessed the ability to expand when in use and shrink when the user wanted to carry it on their back, to which Jak smiled as he activated it and used it to move across the floor, performing a few turns before finding that he was able to actually do flips and spins while he was in the air, as per Keira's instructions, before she opened the way to the training course she had built for this, all to see what sort of problems the board had and what improvements could be made. While they watched Jak test out the new item, which might become important in the future, Cozy asked Keira a few things before anything else happened, like how one was supposed to get into the Palace, which happened to be the seat of power for the ruler of Haven City, and where Baron Praxis happened to be located when he wasn't in the Fortress or enjoying the races of the city, which was followed by Keira revealing that there was an old maintenance elevator at the base of one of the Palace support towers, and that it would need to be powered for someone to use it.

Twilight, Starlight, and Cozy glanced at each other as they heard that, as it appeared that rescuing Vin had a side effect that none of them had considered, he was just the person that would be able to do what Keira had just said and Twilight made sure to learn which tower was the one Keira was talking about, before they focused on what Jak was doing and breaking for the night so they could enjoy their time with their friend, as when tomorrow came they knew that it would be back to helping the Underground and Krew out in their schemes, before eventually heading up to the Palace to spy on the Baron and see if they could get anything that might help them out in the future.