A/N: I swear, I'm alive, and this story is not dead. Just a short little thing this time, but I feel the chapter after this needs to be separate. The wait for that will not be as long. Really. Thanks to everyone who's reviewed so far. There is no better motivation.

"Where did you leave the welding torch?" Jack's voice bounced around the inside of the ship strangely. Sounded like she was hearing herself say it from somewhere else.

Probably just echoing off the bulkhead, she reasoned, but the sound was nonetheless a bit disorienting.

"It's by the docking ramp," he answered. She could see his boots through the floor grate, but beyond that he was just a murky shape in a chair.

The docking ramp was, naturally, at the other end of the ship. Sighing, Jack rolled over onto her stomach and scooted awkwardly out the way she'd come. It was twenty feet to the access grate where she could crawl back into the cabin. Twenty useless feet, she realized immediately. The acetylene tank wouldn't fit where she needed to go.

"Damn. Do we have anything else I could use to repair that casing?"

He didn't turn away from the console. "Nope."

Jack suppressed her twinge of annoyance and very deliberately did not throw her sparker at the back of his head. "Fine. I'll be back later."

He made one of his Riddick-noises. Not a growl, not a purr, not even an 'mmhmm.' Just some weird noise no one else ever made but him. She took it to mean he didn't care but had listened to what she said. Good enough. With a little noise of her own, Jack levered herself out of the ship's underbelly and opened the hatch.

After only the briefest hesitation she closed it behind her politely. She didn't really want to annoy him. She just... wanted something. A fight ideally. An argument would do. Anything to break the tension they weren't talking about. Lavezoli was late. Riddick was perfectly relaxed, which meant he was waiting for the knife to come at his back. Dave was tense, wondering why the hell Riddick wasn't. Jack was tense, waiting for the stalemate to break. She didn't really care which way it went so long as it did, in fact, go one way.

She kept a fast pace as she walked the corridors. The floors that always curved slightly up had stopped disorienting her after two weeks on the station and she could maintain a good clip. It felt good to put real effort into something. Maybe she'd drag Riddick to the gym later. Or Dave, if Riddick was still being Mr. Inaction. Or maybe she wouldn't bother asking and she'd just start the fight in their quarters. The thought of Riddick's expression as she drop-kicked him in the liver considerably improved her temper. She stopped stomping like she had a grudge against the ground and eased her pace into a brisk stroll.

No sense in wasting a good excuse to get out, she reasoned. Might as well enjoy having something to get done.

She shook her head as she ascended the ladder to the center column. The gravity was simultaneously stronger and weaker this close to it. Gave her terrible vertigo, but it was the only way to change levels without moving the ship. When the opening popped up she jumped through into the zero-g tunnel. Suddenly weightless, she took a moment to savor the sensation. If she closed her eyes, she could half-forget she had a body at all. If she didn't know she had one, and that it was vulnerable when she let herself lose focus, she might be tempted to drift for a while. She might.

But she'd learned her lessons well, and only let herself drift a moment before she opened her eyes again. It wasn't very hard. Not very.

The column was wide enough for two cargo lifts to pass down without strain, so maybe 15 meters across, with bars secured at each level for individual passengers to catch. Jack took hold of the one beside her and used it draw her body in tight to the wall. At this hour, the column was mostly empty, but it was always stupid to be careless. She needed to get to the fifth level. At the moment it was below her, so with a careful hand, she pushed her body down. She moved her hands to change her direction slightly when she drifted a little out from the wall, but her aim was mostly true. She caught the bar for the fifth level and after another minute, slipped through the opening feet first.

She dropped to the ground in the reinstated presence of gravity.

I hate that part. She stood up and felt her bones more keenly, as she always did after experiencing null grav. She imagined having arthritis might feel like this. She was only too happy to move into the outer layers where the sense of pressure lessened even as the gravity increased. She felt much more secure on her own feet as she descended the ladder away from the column.

The first layer held mostly clothing, she knew from experience, and the second was nothing but food and necessities, but the third was the mechanic layer. Somebody would have a smaller acetylene tank, or some kind of laser burner. She didn't have the UDs to buy a laser burner, but she could probably convince somebody to part with it for an hourly fee. If she was very lucky, or someone else was very inattentive, that hourly fee might be zero. That was enough to put a smile on her face and she was tempted to giggle. An urge she suppressed, her eyes passing over the crowd calculatingly. There was no question in her mind it was full of predators. Knowing the threat exists is the first step in beating the fuck out of it, as Riddick would say.

Two guys had been eyeing her as potential mark until they saw her eyeing them. Never go for the hard target when there are easy ones. She came to lean casually against the same wall, her hands in her pockets.

"This layer is spoken for," said the near guy. He was tallish, with dark hair and features. Really nondescript in that cultivated way. Jack decided he was probably the decoy. Lowest possible slot in the gang. He had no real skills, but nobody ever managed to recognize him after the job.

He was also entirely disposable which was the only reason he started talking in the first place.

"I'm not here to compete," she answered. "Just looking for a repair. Passing through."

"Smart," he agreed.

"And the faster I find my laser burner, the faster I can go."

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the decoy whisper something to his partner, who whispered back and nodded. Tall-Dark-and-Forgettable straightened up. "There's a little place thirty meters ahead. One of the apprentice's is the worst to get as your mechanic. Scatter-brained. Name of Brian. Ask for anybody else."

Jack didn't nod, but she did push herself away from the wall and roll her shoulders back. "I'll do that. Pleasure chatting," she said as she merged back into the crowd.