#Mar's personality is a fusion of Daxter and Damas and it expresses itself in eccentric ways

[radioactivepeasant]

Damas Lives fic Part 6

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Jak stared at this second self for a heartbeat or two, then managed to take a breath.

"...Mar?"

Mar leaned back on his heels and pushed him. "Jerk! Way to give me a heart attack!"

He stood up with a grunt and dusted off his faded blue trousers. "Dax told me you were heading up, and then...poof. No Jak! You're supposed to tell us when you're having a Moment, idiot!"

Jak pulled himself up on shaky legs. "I'd like to see you walk away unscathed after changing your own timeline," he grumbled under his breath.

If Mar heard that, he didn't indicate it. He rubbed his face, and Jak noticed the same dark circles under his eyes that surely decorated his own.

"Hey, uh, when did you last sleep?" Jak asked awkwardly.

Mar shrugged. "Don't know. Whenever Loghead was here last I guess."

His shoulders sagged. "Look, don't say it. I know, okay? I just...I don't want to sleep right now. Not until I know he's pulled through."

He?

Please, please please-

The words bumped clumsily against his teeth three times before Jak managed to let them out.

"H- how is he?"

Mar beckoned him to follow and picked his way through Damas's throne room to the infirmary down the hall. "On the outside? No change. On the inside? Who knows. Seem said the healing sleep will take time."

Jak knew the set of Mar's shoulders too well. The barely concealed trembling in his fingertips. He was worried, and impatient, and underneath it all he was scared.

"Waiting is the worst part."

Mar scoffed. "No, seeing Father when you pulled the Slam Dozer off him, that was the worst part. This is just. Irritating."

Curtains stitched to welded frames divided the beds in the infirmary, granting a modicum of privacy. There were a few monks in the other beds, and several Spargans who had taken part in the final battle. But the bed closest to the door seemed to eclipse all the others.

King Damas looked strangely peaceful in sleep. The harsh lines softened, and the muscles relaxed. There was a thick rope of old scar tissue down one side of his chest that Jak didn't remember, and his torso was wrapped in bandages. He was definitely older than the last time Jak saw him. But he was there, and he was breathing.

He's here. He's really here.

Jak had the presence of mind to sit down on the edge of the cot before his legs gave out again. He fumbled to grab one of Damas's hands, marveling at how warm it was.

Mar watched him in silence for several minutes, but there was something unmistakably shrewd in his gaze. He took a seat on the other side of the bed and laced his fingers through Damas's free hand. He watched their father's chest rise and fall evenly, counting the seconds between breaths. Then he looked up.

"You went with the Precursors after all, didn't you?" He sounded both resigned and almost accusatory.

Startled, Jak looked up. "How did-?"

His newfound "twin" gave him a look Jak knew he'd gotten from Damas. "Seriously? It's still my turn with the Armor of Mar and I know for a fact that it's still in my foot locker. Way to cheat, snagging it from another loop."

They had been taking turns with the armor? That sounded annoying. Jak hoped they didn't have to take turns with weapons, too. He didn't like sharing his morph gun.

"Besides." Mar's annoyance faded just a little. "You're looking at Father like...like you thought you'd never see him again."

Had he been that obvious? Or did Mar simply know how to read him as easily as Daxter did?

"I, uh...sorry." Jak found that he couldn't quite meet Mar's eyes.

"You're sorry." Mar scowled. "You ditched us and ran off without backup again. I don't even know how long you were actually gone! Poking around in older time loops just gets us hurt, Jak. You know that."

"Not this time," Jak said softly. "This time, Dam- F- Father lives."

His twin's eyes widened. Then his brows fell again. "No wonder you look like that."

After a short, tense, silence, he added, "You still should've taken backup, though."

An uncomfortable prickle of guilt squirmed in Jak's stomach unexpectedly. "Well," he hedged, "You were here. And Dax is...occupied."

Mar pulled back and made a face. "Do I wanna know?"

"The Precursors turned Tess into an Ottsel."

Mar cackled, then slapped a hand over his mouth. He looked around quickly to see if he'd woken anyone, then lowered his hand.

"Are you serious? She finally pulled it off?"

Jak cracked a smile at last. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure the "Precursors" are the same as Dax and just stole Precursor ships, because I haven't seen them grant any wishes that didn't involve Ottsels and Ottsel accessories."

"I bet Loghead lost his little green mind."

"Oh, big time."

Feeling a surprising lack of self-consciousness, Jak pried his boots off and laid down along the edge of the cot. There was a vague awareness in the back of his mind that he shouldn't have been comfortable doing this, that he didn't trust anyone but Dax to be that close when he slept. But that sense was steadily fading beneath an image in his mind he couldn't shake of sleeping in a pile on Sandover Beach. Himself, Daxter, Keira and Mar all curled around a watchful Damas and trying in vain to stay awake. He yawned and dragged his fingers down his face.

Mar snorted, but followed suit.

"I think we're too big for this," he whispered.

"Shut up." Jak draped his arm over his eyes, but didn't quite hide his grin. "Sig says you need to sleep anyway."

"Well Sig's a snitch," Mar mumbled rebelliously, but closed his eyes nonetheless.

When Damas awoke, in the middle of the night, he found himself trapped in the cot. Mar was pressed up against his right side, Jak against his left, and he could feel Daxter's fur against his head. The combined body heat of all three boys was not the most comfortable thing to awaken to, not that he was coherent enough to really consider that. But, he reflected drowsily, there were worse things than waking from a near death experience surrounded by his sons.

He couldn't move his limbs yet, but he could feel hands clutching his own. Just tightening his fingers felt like a monumental effort, but it was enough.

"I told you," he whispered, to one or to all of them, he wasn't sure. "I told you I would be here when you came home."