Jak and Daxter: Children of Eco

by Blackdrag-rose

Precursor: The Beginning

Jak, Daxter, and Pinkie settled in for what would be the shortest boat ride of their lives, as Misty Island was about ten minutes away from Sandover Village when using the fisherman's speed boat, or more like thirty if one happened to be using the larger wooden vessel that he occasionally used. Despite the reasons that Daxter gave for wanting to go to Misty Island, to explore the one location he deemed as the most dangerous place in the area around Sandover Village, Pinkie still felt like something was up. She knew that, in years past, when one of them mentioned going to Misty Island one day Daxter would always put a brave face on and declare that he wasn't afraid of the island, but she and Jak knew the truth.

Daxter was actually afraid of Misty Island, not that Pinkie could blame him considering she always felt uneasy whenever she looked in its direction from the safety of Samos' hut.

Samos, roughly six or seven years ago, decided that she and Jak needed to learn to defend themselves and learn to live off the land, which generally meant that they spent a few weeks each year on another island, Geyser Rock, and put up with whatever conditions the island had for them. During the time they weren't on the island, and were relearning the skills Samos told them that they would be needing when they were older, they would run around the village and use the tree branches to help them get wherever they were going, though they occasionally tested how high they could jump with the various cliffs for fun. It was all in the name of them learning the necessary skills they needed, that was what Samos told them every now and then, before he sent them off on either a break or another lesson.

Pinkie's thoughts were interrupted by Daxter falling into the water, to which she and Jak reached into the water and pulled him back up before the lurker shark took a bite out of him.

"Thanks," Daxter said, taking a seat opposite of where Jak was sitting, which was why Pinkie always sat at the front of the boat whenever they used it, "I certainly didn't want to become fish food, not when we haven't even reached our destination."

"Don't mention it," Jak and Pinkie said at the same time, to which Pinkie turned her attention back to the island that they were rapidly approaching, "and don't fall in again, otherwise you might upset that shark."

"You don't have to tell me twice," Daxter replied, shaking himself for a moment to get off as much water as he could, before he turned to Pinkie, "Hey, there's one thing that's been bothering me since I met the two of you; what does the 'P' stand for?"

Daxter was referring to Pinkie's last name, because while she was able to remember her first and middle names with ease, the only thing she could remember about her last name was that it started with a 'P'. Her full name, as Samos had told her so many years ago, was actually Pinkamena Diane P, though she had changed her first name to Pinkie because she thought her actual name sounded too serious and boring. She almost never used her middle name, she never saw the point of it, but her last name had always bothered her, because she had no idea what it was. Even Samos, the person who had raised her, Jak, and Keira, had no idea what her last name was, though eventually she had settled on something that made her happy.

"Pie," Pinkie answered, causing a shocked expression to appear on Daxter's face, though at the same time Jak had to stop himself from laughing when he saw how shocked their friend was, "the 'P' stands for Pie."

"Seriously? Your last name is Pie?" Daxter asked, before letting out a sigh that indicated that he was unsure if she was pulling his leg or if she was being serious, "Forget I even asked..."

Despite the fact that Daxter had some seasickness, which was why he had accidentally fallen overboard because he had been puking, Jak managed to steer them into the small dock that Misty Island had, to which the three of them climbed out of the boat and started their exploration. As they walked along the beach, or what could pass as a beach, they saw that there were a large number of plain grey stones with various large bones sticking out of the stone walls, as if some large animal had died on the island. All of the bones made the place feel grim, dark, and foreboding, which could have been one of the reasons why Samos had told them to stay away from the island, but they continued walking... until they came to a large amphitheater like area.

The trio hid behind a large skull, because in the center of the amphitheater was a large group of beastly creatures that were known as Lurkers, though before any of them could remark on the size of the group in front of them two blue skinned beings appeared from a purple mist and face the Lurkers... though the trio noticed that one was male and one was female.

"Continue your search for artifacts and Eco," the male of the pair said, his voice somehow echoing every word he said, though his voice also sounded a little raspy at the same time, "If the locals possess Precursor items, you know what to do."

"Deal harshly with anyone who strays from the village," the female added, though her voice was much stronger than her partner's, while at the same time the trio noticed that she seemed mad about something, "we will attack it in time. Oh, and if a certain trio cross your path... eradicate them immediately."

Pinkie, Jak, and Daxter shared a look, worried that the female figure was talking about them, though before they were found out they slipped back down the way they came, to which they changed their course and scanned the structure that the Lurkers had been standing in front of. Eventually, after a few minutes of searching, they managed to scale a small cliff on the opposite side of where the group had been located, where they managed to enter the structure and searched the area. As they looked around they approached a deep pit that was filled with purplish-black liquid, which Pinkie was sure was another one of the types of Eco Samos had told her and Jak about in their lessons.

"Can we get out of here now?" Daxter begged, looking around and taking in all of the metal and wood that surrounded the area, while also making sure to keep his eyes away from the pit, "This place is giving me the creeps!"

"Watch out!" Pinkie warned, though that was followed by Daxter taking his eyes off of whatever he was looking at and turning his attention towards her, where he tripped over a circular canister that happened to be covered in Precursor runes.

"A little warning would have been nice," Daxter commented, though as he picked himself up he also collected the artifact, before the three of them looked into the large pit that rested before their eyes, "What is that dark ooze?"

"I think that's Dark Eco," Pinkie replied, staring down into the darkness for a moment, though at the same time she heard the artifact change hands, which meant that Daxter had passed the artifact to Jak, "I've never seen so much Eco in one place."

"Ugh..." Jak said, to which Daxter and Pinkie turned and noticed that he had, somehow, turned the artifact a bright shade of red, to which the three of them stared at it in awe for a moment.

Before anyone could say anything about the artifact suddenly coming to life, or begin to speculate what the Precursors could have used it for, a large blue furred Lurker, wearing some sort of bone armor, jumped down behind them and waved a bone weapon around, indicating that it was about to attack them. Daxter, being the coward that he was, hid himself behind Pinkie, while she raised her fists in case the Lurker decided to attack her first, though before the Lurker could do anything Jak threw the artifact at the creature. The moment the artifact came into contact with the Lurker it exploded, taking the beast out in a single hit, though the force of the blast knocked everyone onto their backs... where Daxter was unfortunate enough to be knocked into the pit of Dark Eco.

Jak and Pinkie looked into the pit, trying to find a way to rescue their friend, though before they could do anything something small was thrown out of the pit... something that stood as high as Jak's knee, had orange and tan colored fur, a short tail, and round ears atop its head. Oddly enough the creature was wearing Daxter's gloves and aviator's cap, which had been shrunk to fit the creature's smaller body, while any other bit of clothing had been completely destroyed.

"Man that stung!" the creature said as it picked itself up, though its voice indicated that that it was actually Daxter, much to the confusion of both Jak and Pinkie.

"Awe, Daxter got turned into an ottsel." Pinkie said, a smile appearing on her face as she looked down at her friend, though at the same time she wondered why the Dark Eco had done such a thing to him.

"A what?" Jak and Daxter asked at the same time, though they were used to such a thing occurring when they were around Pinkie, as there had been several other times where she had said something and the boys had questioned her at the same time.

"An ottsel," Pinkie repeated, though she noticed that both of them were still staring at her, "What? He looks like a cross between an otter and a weasel. What else was I supposed to call him?"

That was followed by Daxter screaming and freaking out, which included him laying on the floor and pounding it with both his hands and his feet as if he was a child throwing a temper tantrum, though Jak had to cover his mouth so the trio could leave the island without drawing more of the Lurkers to their location.

---

"...and that's what happened on Misty Island." Pinkie said, finishing up the story so Samos knew what had happened, though she knew that he was going to be angry at them for disobeying his orders.

"Pinkie, what were the three of you thinking?" Samos asked, throwing a harsh glance at both Jak and Daxter, who were standing by the entrance of his hut, before turning back to her, "Who knows what a Dark Eco bath could have done to you or Jak."

"Look, Jak and his sister are fine," Daxter cut in, stomping his foot on the floor for a moment, all in order to draw attention to his problem again, "Can you change me back?"

"No! I cannot help you," Samos said, though instead of turning on Daxter he moved to the nearby window and pointed out of it, "Only Gol and Maia Acheron, the only people who are actively studying Dark Eco, have a chance at returning you to your previous form, but they live far to the north. I'd let you use the teleporter gates to get there faster, but none of the other sages that maintain the other gates have seen fit to turn their ends on in some time... which means the only way forward is through Fire Canyon."

"Wasn't Keira working on something to get people through the canyon?" Pinkie commented, trying to remember if Samos' daughter was actually working on something or if her mind was messing with her again.

"Actually, I'm still working on it," a voice said, to which Keira walked into the room with a slight grin on her face, "I'm almost finished with the heat shield that I've developed for the Zoomer, but in order to power it we'll need about twenty Power Cells to keep the shield up until you can reach the Blue Sage's lab."

Keira was dressed like most of the other villagers in Sandover, in the sense of the minimalist life style, though her fashion sense told her to dress up in a shirt that had a color that was a cross between white and lavender, which also being cut off at the midriff to show off a little skin, while also wearing purple colored pants. She was also wearing her own pair of goggles, which was currently resting against her next, though she definitely looked like an inventor that was ready to get to work on a big project.

"Hey, don't the other villagers have some Power Cells laying around?" Daxter asked, as he seemed to recall some of them mentioning that they had acquired one or two, depending on who you asked, "Why don't we just ask them for their Power Cells and get moving?"

"I doubt they'll hand them over if we ask," Jak said, causing his friend to glare at him for a moment, "Our best bet is to collect any Precursor Orbs that are scattered around the area and trade them to whoever happens to have a Power Cell... and maybe do some odd jobs here and there for some extra ones."

"Before you go anywhere else, and get in more trouble, I'm sending the three of you back to Geyser Rock to complete your training," Samos told them, beckoning to Jak, Daxter, and Pinkie for a moment before beckoning to the gate behind him, "Once you have completed your final lesson I'll let you start your adventure."

The trio shared a look among themselves as they registered Samos' words, though once they knew that they were on the verge of their first adventure they jumped through the warp gate and traveled to Geyser Rock. The island they traveled to was a fair distance away from the village, which was why Samos had this particular method of transportation available, though when they jumped through the other side they were accompanied by a strange contraption. The device was bright blue colored, had a shape that resembled a box, somehow floated in the air as it moved around Jak and Pinkie, and also had two antenna sticking out of the top, no doubt to receive a signal from Keira.

"Um, what is that?" Daxter asked, though at the same time he had decided to climb up to Jak's shoulder, as if he was a lookout or something along those lines.

"Its a communicator I recently finished working on," Keira said, her voice coming from the device's grill for a moment, "With this device my father and I will be able to give you advice while your in the field."

Jak and Pinkie both declared that such a device was useful, as this device would allow them to tell Keira and Samos anything interesting that they discovered while they could, in turn, receive any instructions from Samos. Once the device had returned to wherever it hid itself while it wasn't in use, likely Jak's pack, they followed the path that was in front of them and found several Precursor Orbs, which were egg shaped objects covered in Precursor runes, laying about. They made sure to collect all of the orbs that were in their way, though it wasn't long before they found their very first Precursor Power Cell, which they discovered was a stone sphere with four segments cut out from it, though those segments were orbiting the sphere at a distance.

The moment they claimed the Power Cell, and Jak stashed it in his pack, Pinkie started an unusual dance, though before she got very far she noticed that neither her brother or their best friend was joining in.

"What?" Pinkie asked, feeling incredibly silly all of a sudden as she stood back up, "I thought we were going to do a goofy dance once we picked up our first Power Cell."

"I wish you had said something before we started looking for them," Daxter replied, a small frown appearing on his face, indicating that he would have loved to do a little dance before things got serious, "It would have been a great stress reliever from losing my body... and my great pants."

"Maybe we can do one when we finish our adventure," Jak commented, to which the three of them continued on their way and collected the other orbs that were in their immediate area.

Eventually they came across a set of strange boxes, where each side had a red square in the middle that was surrounded by a larger blue square, though when Jak broke the first one open he found a device that looked like an oversized fly.

"Hey, that's one of my scout flies!" Keira said as Jak collected the fly, though at the same time Pinkie moved to the other six and started breaking them open as well, "I've sent seven of them to each area to track down Power Cells! The Lurkers must have captured them while they were searching their areas..."

"I found one!" Pinkie exclaimed, smashing open the final box and freeing the Scout Fly that had been trapped inside, as well as freeing the Power Cell that it had found.

It didn't take them long to return to the path that they had been following, where they punched and kicked the dummies that Samos or Keira had left for them to practice on, before they stopped when they found a floating blue cloud of energy.

"That is Blue Eco," Samos said through the communicator, "which contains the energy of motion. Blue Eco allows you to move faster than normal, break boxes without even touching them, and even activate certain Precursor objects. The two of you are unique in your ability to utilize the Eco in your environment, though I am uncertain how either of you are able to do so."

Jak and Daxter shared a look with each other as Pinkie moved up to the Eco cloud and watched as it flowed into her body, which was what happened when she or Jak found any stray clusters like this one. The boys knew that there wasn't an explanation for why Pinkie could absorb the Eco, or for why Jak could do the same thing as well, but they figured that it was one of the mysteries that they would never be able to solve. Jak moved to the area that was to the right of where Pinkie found the Eco, where he found a couple of orbs waiting to be collected, though once he had them he followed Pinkie further along the path that she was running along.

After a minute or two they stopped in front of a large Precursor door, one that had a blue lightning bolt at the top of it, but by the time they stopped the Eco that had been flowing through their bodies had run out... though there happened to be a vent that was pouring out Blue Eco like it was gas.

"This is a Precursor Door, which can only be opened by approaching the door while Blue Eco is flowing through your bodies," Samoa commented, though while he spoke the group moved towards the vent, so he could explain it to them as well without having the communicator leave for a moment, "and this is, as you might have guessed, a Blue Eco vent, which will allow you to use Eco for a longer amount of time than one of the clusters."

Jak and Pinkie stepped into the Eco vent, allowing the Blue Eco to gather in their bodies, before they ran back to the door they had passed, where the Eco flowed out of them and forced the door open.

"Very good you two," Samos spoke up as Jak and Pinkie walked through the open doorway, where they were able to collect a third Power Cell, "maybe there is some hope for you yet."

Daxter growled at the fact that Samos hadn't mentioned him, but at the moment he decided to not bother with retorting to the Sage's words as his friends completed their training. Jak and Pinkie continued through the area, jumping down onto the logs that happened to be behind the door, and floating in a small pool of water, before they jumped up some Precursor items that were scattered around the area. As they collected the orbs around them Samos commented on the small green balls that were floating in the air, identifying them as Green Eco balls that helped restore health.

Eventually the group reached the top of Geyser Rock, where they found the fourth and final Power Cell in the area, which they were certain of considering how small the island was, while at the same time discovering that they only had fifty orbs in their possession. Samos even made a comment about that as they accessed the warp gate and returned to his hut, as if he expected that they would need more orbs than they would find on the island.

"You did good in your training," Samos said, which was as much praise as they were likely to get at the moment, "but I doubt that fifty orbs will be enough to get all of the Power Cells that the villagers have. I suggest that you search both Sentinel Beach and the Forbidden Forest for any additional orbs... and who knows, you might actually get some more Power Cells while your at it. Oh, and while your out 'adventuring' you might as well see to the Green Eco Collectors I left on Sentinel Beach... it seems that they have been clogged again."

"We'll be sure to check them out," Pinkie replied, a smile appearing on her face while Jak grinned as he looked out at the areas that surrounded the village, though it was clear that they were both interested in seeing what the rest of the world had in store for them.

"I can always count on you to do the right thing," Samos said, though that was followed by him clearing his voice, as if there was more he wanted to tell them, "Now, all of you... get out of my house!"

Jak, Daxter, and Pinkie left Samos' hut behind and started the short walk to the village, where they would be able to see what each of the villagers wanted in exchange for their various Power Cells... and where they could begin the greatest adventure of their lives.

Comments

[Sonata Blaze]

Wait, so either Pinkie forgot her last name... or there's something else that the author is hiding from us.

"What?" Pinkie asked, feeling incredibly silly all of a sudden as she stood back up, "I thought we were going to do a goofy dance once we picked up our first Power Cell."

Dang it, it would have been funny to see the three of them dance when they found the Power Cell.

[Aria Blitz]

Pinkie didn't know her last name... I wonder if that means that all is not as it seems.

[Eye of Knowledge]

Such an interesting start to the story... and its good to see that Pinkie is still random or silly at the moment.

[Vigilant of Stendarr]

Hmm... I like where this is going, despite the fact that not many like the story.

[Adagio Shimmer]

what does the 'P' stand for

Oh no... I do hope that's not what I think it is.

Also, Keira is freaking hot... and I'm going to say the same for Pinkie, considering that they likely share clothes.

[Pinkie Glimmer]

Should we be worried that Pinkie doesn't know her own last name and 'came up' with Pie to replace it?

8038858 You think Keira and I are hot?!
Though in seriousness, I would have to agree with you.

[Lord Frieza]

Even reading Daxter falling into the dark eco pit is as hilarious as watching it happen in the game.

[HeartfireFirebrand]

"Pie," Pinkie answered, causing a shocked expression to appear on Daxter's face, though at the same time Jak had to stop himself from laughing when he saw how shocked their friend was, "the 'P' stands for Pie."

"Seriously? Your last name is Pie?" Daxter asked, before letting out a sigh that indicated that he was unsure if she was pulling his leg or if she was being serious, "Forget I even asked..."

I pretty sure she remembers that.

[dvdspires]

which was currently resting against her next

Did you mean neck.