Adult-FanFiction.org : Games

Room and Board	By : sillyneko345 Category: +G through L > Jak & Daxter Views: 25355 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 7
Disclaimer: I do not own the game this story is based on (Jak & Daxter) nor do I make any money from writing it.

Chapter List
- 1-Ch. 1
- 2-Ch. 2
- 3-Ch. 3
- 4-Ch. 4
- 5-Ch. 5
- 6-Ch. 6
- 7-Ch. 7
- 8-Ch. 8
- 9-Ch. 9
- 10-Ch. 10
- 11-Ch. 11
- 12-Ch. 12
- 13-Ch. 13
- 14-Ch. 14
- 15-Ch. 15
- 16-Ch. 16
- 17-Ch. 17
- 18-Ch. 18
- 19-Ch. 19
- 20-Ch. 20
- 21-Ch. 21
- 22-Ch. 22
- 23-Ch. 23
- 24-Ch. 24
- 25-Ch. 25
- 26-Ch. 26
- 27-Ch. 27
- 28-Ch. 28
- 29-Ch. 29
- 30-Ch. 30
- 31-Ch. 31
- 32-Ch. 32
- 33-Ch. 33
- 34-Ch. 34
- 35-Ch. 35
- 36-ch. 36
- 37-ch. 37
- 14
- 15
- 16
Characters: Belong to Naughty Dog, Inc.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
“Order up!” Taryn yelled, sliding a pizza across the counter. “That’s table seven ready to go. Deliveries should be up in five!”
“You got it, Tarynator. Let’s just hope Ximon’s back by then.” Daxter deftly grabbed the pizza, careful of the hot pan, and delivered it to table seven with a flourish.
Business had been coming in steadily throughout the evening, a pleasant change from the usual monotony of game nights—monotony that lasted until ten minutes after the game ended and everyone in the stadium made a rush on the local eateries. The change of pace was almost enough to make the redhead forget why he didn’t want to be there.
Almost.
“I’m glad you’re still speaking to me,” Taryn said conversationally as she leaned against the counter, drying her hands on a dish towel.
“Yeah, well. If playoff kickoff had ta be sacrificed for the worthy cause of not losin’ my job, I guess it’s worth it.” Barely. Jak had been crestfallen at the news that his friend wouldn’t be at the game, though he hid it well. “After all,” Dax made a great show of suffering, the back of one hand pressed dramatically to his brow, “it’s not a violation of the Bro Code or anything, leavin’ my best pal all alone at the most important game of the season with no one ta cheer him on. Not at all.”
His manager was unimpressed. “No one but the thousands of adoring fans who worship the quarterback, you mean?”
“Details. BFF-sies have priority.”
Taryn sighed deeply. “Daxter, I am sorry you had to miss the game tonight. I really, truly, deeply, sincerely am. But when we only have four other servers besides yourself and one other cook besides me, it’s really no surprise that no one is ever willing to cover.”
“I know, I know!” Daxter groaned, draping his upper body across the counter like a disgruntled ferret. “Don’t mean it doesn’t still suck.” He glanced up at her imploringly. “Seriously, babe, could you please hire some more help so the place won’t fall apart if I ever need ta take some time off?”
“Welcome to my world,” she muttered, rolling her eyes to the grease-spackled ceiling. “Alright, look. I’ll take it up with Uncle Osmo. I’ve been meaning to broach the topic again anyway.”
“Think he’ll cave this time?” The old business owner, who also happened to be Ximon’s father, hadn’t been exactly pleased with the last slew of hiring.
“Oh, he can be a stubborn old codger, but something tells me he’ll see reason.”
“Threatening ta quit on him again, huh?”
“I could manage any establishment in this town and he knows it.” Taryn contentedly examined her manicure. “Besides. What would you do as a business owner if your manager told you that your business’s entire delivery system depended on Ximon?”
Daxter shuddered. “Have a heart attack, narrowly recover, an’ reexamine my life choices.”
“Well then, there you are. He’ll come around.” She patted his head indulgently. “Now get off my counter and act professional. And while you’re at it… how about you give yourself a two dollar raise. For proving that you’re responsible enough to come in when I need you, even though you’d much rather be somewhere else. How does that sound?”
“… sounds like you might be forgiven for makin’ me come in when I’d much rather be somewhere else.” Maybe he could splurge, casually take Jak out for a steak to celebrate when the team inevitably won the game and advanced in the playoffs.
She swatted the hat off his head. “Smart ass.”
“I try.” As Dax gathered his hat, the unmistakable sound of a backfiring engine arose from outside. “Sounds like our intrepid delivery crusader’s back.”
The bells over the door jangled as Ximon stepped in, shaking crystalline drops off his coat. “Hey, dudes and dudettes! Crazy night out there.”
“What’s up?” the redhead asked eagerly.
Ximon had been listening to the game all evening from the radio in his truck and giving Daxter periodic updates when he came in for more orders. So far the Warriors were behind—the refs were throwing out some pretty shitty calls, if Ximon’s reports could be believed—but Jak, Phoenix, and the rest of the players that hadn’t been injured or suspended after the Razer fiasco were giving the rival Marauders a run for their money. They could turn it around yet.
“Not good, dude,” the blonde reported grimly. “We got ice!” He took off his cap and shook pellets of sleet across the counter.
Taryn shook her head. “I told you the forecast was terrible. I can’t believe they haven’t called the game yet. But, then again, I suppose that’s football. They’ll play in all kinds of ridiculous weather.”
Ximon nodded, warming his hands over the stack of hot boxes she slid his way. “Sounds like it’s been real rough out on the field. Lot of time outs, lot of minor injuries.” He glanced up at Daxter and his ears fell almost guiltily. “And, uh. Jak’s out.”
Daxter stared. “Whadda ya mean, Jak’s out?”
“I dunno, dude. My radio cuts in and out, y’know? I just heard the announcers talking about some sort of multi-player pile up and they pulled the Haven quarterback off the field. But don’t worry, he’s not hurt bad,” he amended hurriedly at Daxter’s panicked expression. “At least I don’t guess he is, since he walked off the field by himself. But the coach put Phoenix in as the quarterback for the rest of the game. That’s the last I heard. The station cut to a commercial break right before I came in.”
Dax could feel his hopes deflating. “Ah, man, that blows! Jak’s gonna be so pissed…” His friend was stubborn enough to keep plowing ahead despite the odds, injuries or no. Saying he would be unhappy about getting benched in the middle of the game that determined advancement in the playoffs was an understatement.
“Well, they may still have a chance,” Taryn said diplomatically. “After all, Phoenix is an excellent player, too—” In the back, a buzzer sounded. “Hang on, those are the deliveries out of the oven. Saddle up, Ximon!”
The blonde groaned loudly. “But Taryn, it’s icy! I’ll wreck! There’ll be pizzas all over the road!”
“You should have thought of that before you failed out of that fancy college in California, shouldn’t you? Just think, you could have been surfing at this very moment…”
Ximon pouted. “That’s cruel, ‘cos. So cruel.”
Daxter rolled his eyes as the two cousins went about boxing the hot orders, bickering all the while. For all the ice and cold, he still wished he could be at the game. Maybe he couldn’t do anything more for Jak if he were there than he could while he was stuck in pizza hell, but it would have at least made him feel better to know that he was near enough to help if it was needed.
He glanced at the pizza-shaped clock and huffed a deep sigh. It was going to be a long evening.
- // - // - // - // -
In the hour and a half he had been staring at them, Jak had become intimately acquainted with the walls and ceiling inside the ambulance.
He would have protested much harder when the paramedics first herded him into it, but for the fact that his vision kept doubling and darkening unexpectedly. That, and the damn dizziness would not go away no matter how hard he shook his aching head. Then he had thrown up on that EMT the moment they got his helmet off, there had been a unanimous declaration of “concussion,” and that had been that. No more game for Jak.
Luckily, he could still hear the announcers loud and clear from the ambulance in the stadium parking lot, so he knew what was happening on the field. Right up until the bitter, brutal, bloody, icy end of the game. It was decidedly not an end in their favor.
So much for winning the title my first season, he thought sourly.
Oh, sure, his brain knew that he, Phoenix, and the other guys had done the best they could. He recognized that the weather had been working against them, that the officials that night had seemed to hate their team from the get-go to the point that Sig was calling foul play—but his pride was having no excuses. It still hurt. An undefeated season leading up to… this.
“No, sir, he doesn’t need to go to the hospital,” the paramedic next to him was saying patiently, a phone held almost a foot from his ear to compensate for Jak’s uncle shouting on the other end of it. “We’re about to release him. He’ll just need supervision for the next few hours, someone who could get him to the ER if something were to change, and he’ll have to take it easy for a few days—”
The shouting on the other end redoubled.
“Let me talk to him,” Jak groaned, grabbing for the phone.
//“Jak? Jak, is that you? Now don’t you worry, my boy, I’ll be there in two shakes of a croc’s tail—”//
“Uncle, if you fly here from Cairo because I bumped my head I will never take you seriously again,” the quarterback deadpanned.
//“Nonsense! A concussion is a serious injury and as your guardian I—”//
“Come on, Uncle, calm down. The licensed, college-educated medical professionals say I’m going to be okay. It’s fine. They just called you to let you know what’s going on. Not to make you fly halfway around the planet. Besides, you probably have sunburn and camel bites that are way worse than this that you’re not taking care of. I know you.”
By the time Jak was able to talk the old man down from an airline website and a major credit card, the pounding in his head had redoubled. All he wanted now was out of his dirty uniform and into his bunk, with a short detour through the shower.
“Can I go now?” he asked tiredly. “The game ended half an hour ago. Everybody’s already gone.” Mostly gone, anyway. The crowds had thinned dramatically, as they usually did when the entertainment stopped. He needed to get back into the locker room to collect his clothes before everything was locked up for the night.
The medics were agreeable. Jak got his feet under him—harder than it should have been—and gratefully accepted a helping hand out of the back of the ambulance from someone standing outside on the icy pavement. He only belatedly realized who that hand belonged to and blinked up at the man dazedly.
“Coach?”
“Hey there, chili pepper.” Sig looked tired, cold, frustrated, anything but happy. But he scraped up a crooked smile. “Came to check on my scratch-and-dent quarterback. How are you feeling?”
“…like I got run over by a shuttle bus,” Jak grinned wryly. “Good news; turns out my shoulder isn’t actually dislocated, it’s just strained. And I have a concussion.”
“So I heard. I’ll be taking you back to your dorm.”
“What?”
“Direct supervision, next twenty-four hours. Paramedics’ orders. I already grabbed your gear.” Sig held up Jak’s coat and gym bag, obviously liberated from his locker with the coach’s master key.
The green-blonde laughed, then wished immediately that he hadn’t when his head, ribs, and shoulder throbbed in counterpoint. “You shouldn’t have to do that. Where’s Phoenix? We room right next to each other. Maybe he’ll babysit me for a while.”
Sig snorted. “He’s holed up in the showers by his lonesome throwin’ the biggest diaper-baby tantrum I’ve ever seen.” The coach’s eyes, though, were understanding. “We’ll leave him alone. He obviously needs to get it out of his system. It’ll be good for him to punch some lockers and swear. Save him takin’ it out on somebody else later.”
“I guess you’re right.” Jak sighed and ran a hand through his hair in frustration. Phoenix had been quarterback for most of the last half of the game. Of course he would consider the loss his own fault. “I’ll have to talk to him when he calms down.”
“Good plan, chili pepper.” Sig looked ready for a customary backslap, then appeared to think better of it. “Alright, let’s get back inside. This snow, ice, sleet shit—whatever it is, it’s ridiculous.”
“What’s the plan?” Jak asked, stifling a yawn. He took his bag from Sig and gingerly hoisted it over his sore shoulder as they headed back toward the stadium.
“I just have one or two minor details to take care of. You can wait in my office for a few minutes and change while I’m out.”
Jak shot him a suspicious look. “Those minor details wouldn’t have anything to do with strangling a ref in the darkest corner of the parking lot, would they?”
“What? No!” Sig balked, almost managing to look properly offended by the suggestion. “What makes you say that?”
“I had double vision when I was walking off the field, not sudden severe hearing loss. Your threats aren’t exactly quiet, Coach.”
Sig wagged a huge finger at him firmly. “You heard nothing, you hear me?”
“Punch him once for me and I will deny everything to the cops.”
“That’s my boy.”
Inside the stadium, they went their separate ways. Jak was none too keen on meeting anyone who might still be hanging around inside. Fans, cheerleaders, his own teammates—he would have to face them sooner or later, along with their concern, their consolations, maybe even their anger. But not right now. Right now he just wasn’t up to it. So he took the long way around through the back halls and came out near the locker rooms, only a few doors down from the coach’s office.
He ran smack into Razer.
They blinked at each other for a moment, Razer’s emerald eyes widening in surprise behind the ring of black and blue bruising.
“Uh, hey,” Jak finally found the sense to say. “I didn’t expect to see you here.” Razer was much more mobile than he had been only three days ago, but he wasn’t completely recovered, either, not by a long shot. Not even enough to be sitting in the cold bleachers for hours, Jak would have thought. “You feeling okay?”
“I could say the same for you,” Razer countered, quickly recovering from his own surprise. “You took a nasty hit out there.”
Jak grinned. “I’m fine. Just a little banged up.”
“And I could say the same of myself,” Razer sassed with the ghost of a smile.
“Good to hear,” the quarterback laughed. He glanced at the locker room door, the other’s obvious destination. “Looking for Phoenix, huh?”
“Indeed. Something tells me the idiot boy might need a dose of reason injected into his foul mood.”
Jak couldn’t help being a bit skeptical. “Good luck with that. Apparently he’s on the war path.” But, really, if anyone had a chance of getting through to Phoenix, it would be his roommate. The two seemed to click, as unlikely a pair of friends as they seemed.
Speaking of friends. He should probably call Daxter.
“Really, though. Good luck. I’ll catch you guys later.” With a last nod to Razer, Jak cut down the hall and into Sig’s office. The beat up old couch in there was calling his name. It would be an excellent place to crash while he waited for his coach to return.
- // - // - // - // -
As expected, the usual rush descended on Pizza Haven right on schedule. Even with the bad weather, there was no shortage of work for Daxter. When his phone went off in his pocket and he saw Jak’s number, though, he dropped what he was doing. Literally. The pile of pizza trays fell into the sink with a clatter.
“Taryn, I’m goin’ on break!” he yelled, grabbing his coat from behind the counter.
“What?” She looked up in a panic from the register, in front of which a sizable line had formed. “No, wait, you can’t go now—!”
Too late. The redhead was already out the door. He slid a bit on the slick sidewalk, but recovered quickly as he hurried around to the alley at the side of the restaurant. There he could huddle up in the lee of the building, mostly out of reach of the biting wind and driving sleet.
“Hello?” he gasped.
//“Hey, Dax.”//
“Jak! Hey, what’s up? Are you okay? Ximon said ya got hurt.”
//“Yeah, I’m okay. Just a bruised shoulder and a minor concussion.”//
“Concussion?!” Dax shrieked before he could stop himself. “Shouldn’t you be in the hospital?”
Jak groaned so loudly Daxter could clearly hear it over the stay gusts of wind whipping past the speaker. //“I just said it’s a minor one. I’m fine.”//
“But concussions are, like, brain damage an’ aneurisms an’—”
//“Daxter, I swear to God, calm down. I already went through this song and dance with my uncle and I’m about to go through it again with Keira, so don’t you even think about freaking out over this. I. Am. Fine.”//
There was a moment of silence as Daxter’s brain tried to organize itself. “… you called me before Keira?”
//“Uh, yeah.”//
“Oh. Okay.” The flutter that information caused was absurd. Focus, Daxter, focus! “Do you, uh, need anything? Do I need ta leave early?” He still had two hours left on the clock. As much as she liked him, Taryn would probably fire him if he walked out now. “Cause if ya need me to I’ll come home, okay?” Screw it. Priorities, man.
//“No, it’s okay. Sig’s going to hang out with me until you get back. Thanks for offering, though.”//
Daxter let out a silent sigh of relief. Sig. Sig was good. He was big enough to manhandle Jak upright if he somehow blacked out, or drive him to the hospital if he started to seize or something. Sig could take care of Jak. “Well, aren’t you just the coach’s pet? Careful, Jakkie-boy. If word of yer illicit relationship gets around it could put the entire football program in jeopardy!”
//“Oh my God. You are sick, you know that?”//
“Hey, I’m not knockin’ yer life choices, I’m just sayin’ you should be careful about it, y’know? Only because I care, Jak.”
//“He reminds me of my DAD, you psycho!”//
“Like I said, no judgment here. If Sig fulfills yer daddy issues then power to ya, big guy.”
//“I am hanging up on you,”// Jak threatened, the mortification obvious in his voice.
Daxter couldn’t wipe the grin off his face as he imagined how red his friend’s ears had to be. Jak was adorable when he got indignant. “Yeah, I need ta get back inside anyway. I left Taryn stranded at the register. If I don’t make it home tonight she killed me an’ threw my body in the dumpster, okay?”
//“I will not call the police. I will not come looking for you. I will give your bed to my ferret.”//
“See ya later, Jak,” Daxter sang cheerfully, and hung up, reassured that everything was going to be alright.
- // - // - // - // -
If Jak had thought it might be awkward to spend time with his coach in a non-athletic situation, those fears were soon put to rest. Sig had a good, if mostly quiet, sense of humor. He also treated his players like people rather than seeing students as lower life forms the way some professors and graduate instructors did.
“I haven’t been in a dorm in years,” Sig mused as they stepped off the elevator on 3W. Fear of recurring dizziness on Jak’s part had kept them off the stairs. “Kind of makes me nostalgic.” They passed a room with a blasting stereo, then one in which a screaming argument was loudly, obviously in progress. “Y’know. Almost.”
“Yeah, it gets pretty old. I’m looking forward to going home for a while next month.” Jak unlocked the door and stepped into his room tiredly. He had managed to fall asleep on the couch in Sig’s office after talking to Keira, but the coach had woken him up as soon as he’d come back. Something about not sleeping after concussions. Which was bound to be a problem sooner than later that night, because right then all the green-blonde wanted was a hot shower and—
“What in the world is this?”
Sig was leaning over the ferret cage.
Shit! He had completely forgotten about trying to hide Killer! “Um… I, uh… I found him out by the dumpsters during move in week, and…” Jak’s ears fell. “Please don’t report my ferret?”
Sig laughed loudly. “Don’t worry, chili pepper, your secret’s safe with me. My roommate had a rabbit when I was a student. Hell, he smuggled it out of the bio lab under his coat one day. Was a real bleeding heart. We kept that little cotton ball hid from sophomore year ‘til graduation.” A pointed nose wedged between the bars and he tapped at it with a chuckle.
“Oh.” Jak was immeasurably relieved. The last thing he needed to cap his bad day was Torn showing up to confiscate his pet. He dropped down on the edge of the bunk and began the arduous process of unlacing his shoes. “Your roommate sounds like a nice guy.”
“Oh, he is. Most neurotic kid I ever met, though, that Vin. Went totally white by the time he got his doctorate. He still teaches here, matter of fact.”
“Professor Vin? In the tech department? Me and Dax have a class with him next semester!”
“Small world, ain’t it? I’ll put in a good word for you two. Maybe he won’t hack your computers with really annoying automatic pop-up reminders to do your homework every night.” Sig chuckled evilly. “They’re impossible to turn off or debug.”
Jak almost expressed his disbelief, but there were enough rumors floating around about Vin being an unrivaled tech wizard that he actually did believe it. It was said that the unassuming professor could run the computer and electronics systems of the entire campus from a single room, while expending most of his concentration on Minecraft.
Sig’s hand fell to the cage latch. “You mind if I take this little fella out for a minute?”
“Yeah, sure, if you don’t mind him pulling your shoelaces. We usually let him run when we’re here.”
In another moment Killer was war dancing circles around Sig, back arched in a perfect hump, chattering like mad.
“Well, isn’t that cute. What’s his name?”
“Killer. Destroyer of cat toys, mauler of rugs, bane of small, unattended possessions everywhere.”
“Don’t that beat all.” Sig sat down in Jak’s desk chair, furry slinky hot on his heels. As soon as he was sitting, Killer grabbed onto his pants and started to scale his leg. “I didn’t realize ferrets were so friendly.”
Jak watched in amusement as his coach was given the once over. “He normally isn’t. It takes him a few tries to get used to people.” At least, that’s how it had been with Phoenix, Razer, and Ximon, the only others who had actually seen him.
Now exploring the coach’s lap, Killer stuck his head up Sig’s sleeve.
“I dunno, maybe he likes how you smell.”
“Old Spice fan, huh?” Sig plucked Killer off his chest, held him up, and looked very seriously at Jak. “Does your coach look like me? Probably not. But he could smell like me, if he used Old Spice body wash instead of whatever soap he found melting in the locker room shower drain. Look down. Now back up. I’m holding a ferret.”
Jak laughed so hard he went dizzy again for a second. “You missed your calling, Coach.”
“Oh, now, don’t say that, I got a lot invested in this coaching gig.” Sig set Killer back on the floor gently. “Some days it hardly seems worth it, but…” He glanced at Jak and smiled. “You did good out there tonight, kiddo. You’ve done good all season and worked your ass off to do it. I’m proud of you.”
Even if Jak wasn’t exceptionally proud of himself at the moment, it was still nice to hear. “Thanks.”
“I told the whole team as much while you were chillin’ in the ambulance, but I’m especially proud of you. And Phoenix. I’ll tell him as soon as I’m sure he won’t bite my head off when I do.”
“He’ll probably feel better in the morning. Let him sleep it off.” Hopefully by then whatever pep talk Razer have given him would have had time to sink in, too.
Jak stood and stretched hard. He was already starting to stiffen up. That didn’t bode well for how sore he would be in the morning. He crossed to the wardrobe on a quest for clean bed clothes, stepping around a ferret dragging a half empty water bottle.
“What’s up?” Sig asked, halting the progression of the water bottle with one foot.
“I think I’m going to shower and head to bed. Thanks for hanging out with me, Coach.”
“Shower, yes. Bed, no.”
Jak looked back over his shoulder, clean shirt in hand. “What?”
“You can’t sleep for at least another hour and a half. Concussion precautions. Technically I have to escort you to the shower, too. If the heat makes you pass out and you hit your head again I’m draggin’ your ass to the ER.”
“I am not going to pass out!” Jak yelled. “What is everybody’s deal?!”
Sig shrugged. “No deal. No big one, anyway. You just shower, do your thing, and I’ll sit on the bench an’ listen for the thud. We can talk about what you’re going to do with yourself now that football’s off the table until training camp next summer.”
The quarterback stifled a groan with his armload of clothes. Nothing could be easy, could it? Glaring at the clock over the top of his sleep pants, he huffed. At least Daxter would be home soon.
- // - // - // - // -
This time, Daxter made sure to get a ride from Ximon when they closed down for the night. Ensuring said ride might have involved cornering a delivery guy and throwing out an “If you don’t wait fer me before ya book it out’a here tonight I swear ta God I will tell Taryn you’ve been eatin’ pepperonis out’a the package again!” but he was sure circumstances warranted such extreme measures.
By the time he got back to the dorm the redhead was on auto-pilot. He dashed through the lobby, ran up the stairs, burst out of the stairwell, and crashed full into Torn.
“Slow it down!” Torn bellowed, cafeteria chicken nuggets bouncing around his feet. There was a smear of ketchup on his shirt. “How many times do I have to tell you little brain-dead bastards, no running in the building?!”
Dax didn’t hesitate to exercise the one finger salute. “Sit on it an’ twirl, Tattooed Wonder!” Before the RA could respond he made a dash for the safety of their room. He had more important things to worry about just then.
At the door to their room, he made himself pause. He sucked in a deep breath to calm the slight pant that running all the way from the sidewalk outside had left him with. Just keep it cool, Daxxie. Keep it cool. Can’t make it obvious you ran up here ta be with him. He ignored the tightening of his chest at the thought of Jak, hurt and maybe needing him, and unlocked the door with forced nonchalance.
“Hey, guys. Hope ya didn’t start the party without me.”
Coach Sig glanced up from where he lounged in Jak’s desk chair. Killer was on his lap, a paw held in each of the man’s big hands. Sig had, apparently, been making him dance. “Hey there, cherry. Glad you made it in alright. Looks like the ice isn’t letting up much.”
“Nah, it’s slicker than snot out there.” Daxter kicked off his shoes, shrugged out of his coat, and looked to the sprawled form on the bottom bunk. “How ya holdin’ up, Jakkie-boy?”
Face down in his pillow, Jak offered no response.
Sig glanced over, then frowned. “He was awake two minutes ago. I swear, can’t take my eyes off that kid.” He sat up straighter and leaned toward the bunks. “Hey! Wake up, you!” he barked sharply.
Jak jumped like Sig had used his coaching whistle, ears flying straight up in shock. “I wasn’t sleeping, I swear!” Bloodshot blue eyes were wide as his hands clenched reflexively in the pillowcase.
Daxter clicked his tongue in sympathy. “How much longer you gotta stay awake?”
Sig glanced at his watch. “Just another twenty, thirty minutes. Realistically, it’s probably fine, but hey. Better safe than sorry.” With one last scratch to the bendy small of Killer’s back, the coach lifted him to the floor and stood. “Here’s where I hit the dusty trail. Daxter, I’m leaving him in your capable hands.”
The redhead twiddled with the coat still in his hands, suddenly nervous. He wasn’t used to being the one in charge. Very rarely was he considered capable in any capacity. People never depended on him for anything. “Uh, what do I do?”
“Let me sleep!” Jak moaned, face back in the pillow.
Sig pointedly ignored him. “Just keep him awake another half hour. That’s all. Don’t let him sleep abnormally long in the morning, either. If he looks confused when he wakes up ask him obvious questions—what day is it, which class he has first on Tuesday, that kind of stuff. If he can’t answer right or he can’t see and walk straight, get him to the health center ASAP. Got it?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I think so.”
“Good. Have a good night, cherries.”
Killer chased Sig to the door, then looked almost forlorn when it was closed in his face.
Dax snickered. “Hey, Jak, I think weasel-face is sweet on yer coach. He didn’t want him ta leave!” No response. “Jak?”
The green-blonde had dozed off again, courting suffocation in his pillow. One arm hung limp over the end of the bunk. His ears flopped to the sides, perfectly lax in his exhaustion.
Daxter sighed. The last thing he wanted to do was wake his friend up. Jak had had a shitty day for the record books and all he really needed was a good night’s sleep. But, as Sig had said, better safe than sorry. “Jak? Come on, pal, ya gotta stay up! Just a little bit longer, okay?” He shook Jak’s shoulder.
The quarterback burrowed deeper with a displeased sounding mutter.
Dax angled his ears back. O-kay. Obviously the nice approach wasn’t going to cut it. “Okay, I think I know what the problem is. You gotta get out’a bed if yer gonna have a prayer of stayin’ awake. Let’s go, big guy. Up, up, up!” He grabbed the wrist that was hanging off the bed, pulled, and—absolutely nothing happened. It was like a Papillion trying to budge a German shepherd. The redhead groaned. “Jak, please, ya gotta work with me, here! Just twenty more minutes. After that I will tuck ya in an’ read ya a bedtime story, I swear!”
There was a slow, rumbling growl, the likes of which usually preceded Godzilla rising out of the boiling sea. Slowly, very slowly, Jak shuffled around until he could swing his legs off the bunk. It took a few seconds, but his upper body followed. He perched precariously on the edge of the mattress, eyes fighting to stay open.
“Yes, upright! Upright is a good start!” Dax cheered.
“You are so lucky I like you,” Jak mumbled, head already nodding.
He really, truly was. It sucked to be woken up or kept from sleeping, as Daxter was reminded each and every weekday morning. That Jak could swat him like a fly and go right back to sleep, but was choosing to listen to him instead, spoke volumes on their friendship.
“Hey, pal, I got an idea.”
“Hn?”
“I gotta grab a quick shower, brush my teeth, all that fun stuff. Come hang out with me while I do. By the time I get through it’ll be time fer you ta catch some zees, alright?”
Jak thought it over, ears perking just a bit from their lifeless droop. “…and then you’ll leave me alone?”
“Cross my heart. Sleep aaaall night an’ no alarm in the morning.”
With a tiny noise of agreement, the quarterback hoisted himself off the bed. It was a momentous effort. “Okay. Let’s do this thing.”
Daxter made quick work of scrambling for his change of clothes and soap basket, but Jak didn’t change his mind. In fact, the walk down the hall seemed to jumpstart his brain back into gear. A low gear, granted, but a gear higher than neutral. By the time they reached the showers he was speaking more than one sentence at a time. By the time Daxter was soaping up, they were laughing together through the shower curtain as Jak regaled him with the story of decorating an EMT’s shoes with puke. And by the time Dax was toweling his hair dry, they were discussing where around the stadium Sig could have potentially hidden the body of a crooked referee.
It was five minutes past the end of Jak’s imposed sleeping ban when they got back to their room.
Unsurprisingly, Jak went straight to his bunk and collapsed like a falling tree. Daxter narrowly resisted the urge to yell “Timber!” as the green-blonde bounced on crappy bunk bed springs. Instead he hung up his damp towel without comment and put his robe back where it belonged. When he turned back to the bunks, Jak already looked asleep.
The redhead stood for a long moment, suddenly twitchy. Then he crept forward.
“Jak?” he whispered, mindful of his promise to leave his friend alone. “Hey, Jak? Jakkie-boy?”
“Hmm.” Not asleep, but heading there fast.
Daxter snuck to the edge of the bed and dropped to his knees on the rug, staring pensively at the flopped out form of the quarterback. “… sorry.”
Jak lifted his head enough to perk an ear. “Huh?”
“I said I’m… sorry.”
That seemed to get Jak’s attention. He turned his head and opened one eye, then seemed surprised to see Daxter so close. “Why’re you sorry?”
A more accurate question would be, why wouldn’t he be sorry? It hurt to see his friend so tired, so sore, so out of it. Jak should have been tired in a good way, after a night of accolades and celebration. Daxter’s ears flagged. “I wasn’t at the game tonight ta cheer you on. I was at stupid work. An’ then you got hurt. An’ you guys lost. An’ I wasn’t there. M’sorry.”
“Dax, none of that’s your fault,” Jak argued quietly. They were less than a foot apart, voices almost whispers. Surely their dear RA who was always telling them to shut the hell up would have had a coronary at the sight.
“Yeah, but…” He bit lightly at his bottom lip, searching for a way to make Jak understand why he felt he had let him down. “You said I was yer good luck charm.”
Jak’s eyes widened. He stared at the redhead for one blink. Two.
Daxter flushed. Okay, that was a really stupid thing to say. That made no sense whatsoever. Why had that made sense in his head? He started to stand up, climb up in his own bed and act like this awkward conversation had never happened—but he couldn’t, because suddenly something was impeding his exit. Jak’s hands shot forward to grip his upper arms, so big they nearly wrapped around his biceps. Then the quarterback yanked.
“Ack!” Daxter yelped in surprise as he tumbled into Jak’s bunk and landed on his back among the blankets, almost doing a full somersault over his friend with the force of Jak’s tug. “Jak, what the hell?!”
“Stay.”
“What?”
“I said, stay,” Jak clarified, but he was already sinking back into prime sleeping position. “I’m cold, I’m tired, I hurt, I feel like shit. If you’re so sorry for something you have no reason to apologize for, you can stay there and keep me company.”
Daxter struggled upright, perched uncertainly between Jak and the wall. “Uh… y’mean, like… sleep here? All night?”
“Mmm.” A flip of long ears. One of which was bruising at the base, blending into the bigger bruise that was forming along Jak’s temple where he had taken the hardest hit.
The redhead swallowed tightly. Oh man. Oh man, oh man, oh man. Should I?
He was well and truly caught. On the one hand, sharing a bed with the guy he was guy-crushing on was a bad idea right off the bat; an unlimited source of potential embarrassment. That should have been more than enough to deter him. But even knowing that, Daxter couldn’t just forget about how nice Jak had been to him last month during what he had christened the Night of the Epic Thunderstorm Fail. It had felt so good to hide in the bunk, tangled up with Jak, knowing that as bad as things seemed, someone had his back. He owed Jak.
Jak’s not used ta bein’ alone, either, he realized dimly. He’s probably always had his uncle ta take care of him when he’s down fer the count. Maybe his Keira girl always cuddled up when he didn’t feel good. What if it’d really make him feel better? Daxter had seen enough nature programs to know that a pack animal taken out of its pack didn’t simply become a lone wolf; it pined for contact.
Well, that thought settled that. Resolutely he squirmed under the blankets and threw an arm around Jak’s ribs. “Never say I don’t care about yer welfare, Jakkie-boy,” he muttered, hoping his nervousness didn’t echo in his voice.
Jak chuckled quietly, a rumble Daxter could feel in his chest where it pressed against Jak’s back. Gah, that was hot. Hot hot hot, why did it have to be so hot, aaaand—he needed to stop thinking about that before that unlimited potential embarrassment became not so potential. Dax closed his eyes tightly and concentrated instead on how the tension that had lingered in Jak’s shoulders evaporated as they settled in, melting into the same warm pocket under the covers.
“Uh, Jak?”
“Hn?”
“The light’s still on.” The lamp on Jak’s desk glowed, the only light in the shadowed room.
“Leave it on,” Jak mumbled, obviously giving a total of zero damns.
“Yer ferret’s still out.”
“Leave him out.”
Daxter sighed, the breath ruffling Jak’s long hair. Maybe the light could stay on without issue, but leaving a marauding weasel loose all night just sounded like a bad idea. Who knew what kind of havoc the little monster would wreck while they were sleeping—
Jak stretched minutely, the bare skin of his back brushing Daxter’s chest through the redhead’s thin tee-shirt and leaving warm, shivery tingles in its wake. The quarterback’s arm shifted just enough to overlap the one Daxter had across his chest.
Okay. So. Getting up wasn’t happening. Daxter offered a silent prayer to whatever deity protected dorm rooms from the jaws of destructive ferrets. Very carefully he stretched out the arm that wasn’t being held hostage and groped through the bunk bed slats until he found the cord of the desk lamp. After a little fumbling he managed to get a hold of the on/off switch, blinking the room into darkness.
“G’night, fake jock.”
Jak offered a mumble that might have been words, but he was already too far gone, the day catching up to him hard and fast.
Daxter lay awake a while longer, staring out at the shadows, listening to the rustles and squeaks of Killer getting up to who knew what. He felt protective curled around Jak, warm and cozy. He could definitely get used to this.
And that thought scared the hell out of him.
- // - // - // - // -
To be continued.
- 14
- 15
- 16
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Room and Board