Disclaimer: own nothing, the characters are all from the movie 'Pitch
Black'
"This will be most difficult"
Jack rolled her eyes at Lando's translucent message, which had melted onto her screen. Talk about stating the obvious.
"I know, that's why I need your help" she typed back "blacking out security in slam is complex, impossible sometimes"
"It can be done though, give myself and Leccy time and we can squeeze ourselves through"
"No time, I'm almost there, a few light bumps away from landing"
"Then I will do what I can, may I contact you by Comlink?"
Jack's fingers hovered over the keyboard. If she gave Lando her Com number, there was a chance she could be tagged and traced. She'd have to throw away her precious link to Iman and possibly Riddick. But this was the only way she could come up with for getting Riddick out. She didn't have the skills to take down an entire slam security system. Quickly she tapped in the code. Another code materialised from Lando, his own ComLink number.
"I will place a tag thread on your Com, then I may be able to see where you are at all times through Net Mapping, placing you wherever you are in the universe in front of my eyes" Lando replied "I will activate the security shut down when I sense you getting within their reach, com me at the exact moment you desire the meltdown of everything, good luck Miss Badd"
Grinning, Jack slid out from in front of the computer, paid at the counter and strode out to the ship. She'd stopped at a refuel station a few light bumps from Pixel to contact Lando and buy any essentials. The ship had been refuelled as well as modified, now under the guise of 'Freedom Fighter' since 'The Serenity' was probably blacklisted after her little skiv duel back at Sunscorch. She wondered what the Blues thought when they found the mechanic-bounty hunter with two healthy sized holes in him and blood pooling around him with her ship gone. She hoped they tossed his body in the trash dispenser. She fucking hated bounty hunters.
'Freedom Fighter' lifted off and Jack steered it off towards the small glowing thumbprint that would be Pixel. Her adrenaline was beginning to pump now and goosebumps were rising on her flesh. There would be a lot of killing going on when she and Riddick got cool and loose. Especially now she'd got rid of the flowing girly style she'd been hiding beneath. Her hair was a dark bloody red and chopped back to its normal slick and shining style short nearly to her shoulders. She was back to wearing black too - tight liquidy pants and a matching vest top with her Riddick goggles hung around her neck; forever her talisman. She felt much more comfortable. Catching sight of herself in a mirrored panel, Jack grinned. It was definitely more to her style (her mother would have hated it) and good to be back to kick some ass. That was what she looking forward to most, seeing Farrell's face when she ripped his fucking throat out. She missed hunting with Riddick, watching him work was a thing of beauty to her.
The planet loomed ahead. It was a marvellous glowing orange, speckled with indistinguishable buildings far apart. Jack switched the scanner on so that she could find the slam. Then she could park out of reach of their hailing frequency, she guessed their equipment wouldn't be as efficient as some slams were as it was such a small planet so not lavished with expensive airtight equipment. It gave her less chance of being detected. There was a bleep as the scanner picked up the slam, clearly detailed on-screen in translatable techo-speak letters and numbers. Jack slowed as she approached the planet, her eyes straying to the screen as she took in all the slam dimensions. It was a large (to her eyes) but cramped building where the scrapings of the universe were locked tightly away in the middle of nowhere. And Jack was going in there willingly
"I must be fucking nuts" Jack grimaced
She had to remember it was for Riddick. A man she'd unknowingly loved for a long time, a serial killer and the worst possible person to have these feelings for. Shaking her head at her situation and all she'd done so far to get here, Jack couldn't help smiling. She knew how to pick her men. Carefully, she manoeuvred the craft onto the planet, maintaining a short distance from the slam. She shut down the ship; any electrical pulses might be detected by the slam outposts. She knew her own heart was racing now, it was do or die. Grabbing her canvas backpack, Jack hopped out of the ship and began her stealth journey. She could see no one else; the area was a wasteland really. Slowly the Slam came into view - it was just as forbidding as Riddick had described all slams he'd been thrown into. He'd told her stories when she was younger that had given her horrific nightmares. She would cry and he would remain stony silent, a frozen presence in her open doorway. He showed no sympathy, saying she had to learn to fight the demons in the darkness alone. Then she'd really survive. Tough love, or maybe no love at all. Just a friendship by chance and a grudging willingness to have someone near him who understood his desire better than anyone to always survive no matter what. And she'd learnt; the nightmares had receded. Jack was no longer afraid of the dark.
Jack opened her com and keyed in Lando's number. His face appeared onscreen, smiling expectantly. Jack smiled in response; a relief to know his tagging had worked.
"I was about to initiate the security lock out, I see you are almost there" he offered
"Which way's his cell?" Jack wasted no time on pleasantries.
A spidery outline diagram replaced Lando's smile. Rapidly it rotated to reveal a tiny highlighted room at one side. Jack's eyes did calculations. She'd have to climb to the roof, as it was so near the top and then scale down the short distance to the window. The security wasn't tight, they couldn't afford much but she was sure that there would be enough surrounding Riddick to prove a mild distraction. And since she was number one on the most wanted list, there was more than a chance that she'd be ghosted on sight. She saved the diagram.
"Shut it out until I'm on the roof" she commanded
"It can be done"
"As soon as I'm in range, kill it"
Lando nodded once and signed off. When the security systems broke down, the top priority would be preventing inmates breaking out, not Jack slipping in. Grinning to herself, Jack moved closer. She could see the individual bricks now and hear the low vibrating hum signalling a construction run entirely by machines. Find the weakness and kill it, that was what Riddick said. As she neared, the hum abruptly stopped. This was her chance. Jack ran to the building, it was enormous to her but she knew it was considered one of the smallest slams on one of the smallest planets. She reached the side of the building safely and could hear the howls of the inmates who were delighting in this sudden excuse to act up and cause havoc. This was where precision and everything Riddick had ever taught her came into play; it was like one of the tests he used to give her. Only this wasn't one of his games, this time Jack was saving his ass.
She pulled a compact gun from her bag; a huge length of rope attached to the bolt loaded into it. How it fitted comfortably into her bag was a mystery itself. It was one of her favourite toys. She aimed for the roof, concentrating hard.
"Come on, don't miss, don't miss" she chanted forcefully to herself
Jack could feel the sweat prickling over her skin and her heart pounding loudly. It was this sort of shit she adored, walking the thin incomprehensible line between rescuer and prisoner. The shit that was made for her, a new challenge every day. The bolt took off and imbedded itself deep in the rooftop ledge
"Yes!"
She allowed a small private victory party before attaching the end of the rope to her belt, making sure there was no slack. Then with the press of a belt device button, she shot through the stifling heat towards the rooftop. It was a primitive method but it always worked well. As soon as she came within grabbing distance, she hauled herself over the ledge with a grunt. Unhooking and putting away the equipment, she stopped to catch her breath, huge exhilarated lungfuls of it. She pressed a Com button. Obediently the security system went back online. Give them a few moments of peace before striking again. Jack marvelled at the view; she was looking down at this beautiful barren wasteland and up at the torrid swirling sky through heat you could cut with a knife while stood atop a slam full of deadbeat prisoners and her favourite serial killer. Her life really wasn't what her mother wanted it to be; no nice rich men for her to marry or glamorous stay- at-home job. Just a survivor's skin and a dangerously unstable murderer. Perfect. She could hear the chaos beneath her, guards trying to get the prisoners under control, the prisoners struggling against their captors the brief panic having awakened them and somewhere Farrell wondered at the distant noises and gloated over a scorched and imprisoned Richard B Riddick. She relished it. She was the invisible eye of the storm, controlling it and exhilarating it at her will, just the way Riddick liked it. Mistress of Chaos and bringer of darkness. She pulled the Riddick goggles up from their constant place around her neck to cover her eyes, completing her appearance of night glider. She dialled Lando again
"Start the meltdown"
*
It's a dangerous thing to leave a man with nothing to repent for with his memories for company. Riddick could remember everything and since he was not capable of the sweet fantasies of dreams and could comfortably see now, he passed his time remembering. Since remembering when she was shot at by Farrell, it had all been about Jack. Shaped by her past. He could so clearly now see her being held back by Paris as she screamed for Shaz to stay down and was forced to watch as Shaz was eaten alive by the monstrous beings. There was a child's compassion that coloured her actions but mostly it was that survivor's skin that she'd come to fit into. She knew how to survive since escaping her parents and that potent identity clung to her. He could see looking back that everything on that planet was beginning to pull Jack into the apprentice killer she turned out to be. A beautiful monster of his own creation. And he was proud of her. He hoped he got a chance to get out of here and show her his appreciation in the flesh.
Farrell entered the room and walked straight up to Riddick's darkened corner. Riddick watched with expectant interest as Farrell roughly unchained his prisoner's wrists and dragged him by the arms into the light. Riddick swore loudly, unable to hide his pain at suddenly being exposed to the burning light after several days of darkness. His feet were still attached to the floor and Farrell chained his wrists to another ring. Riddick had instantly shut his eyes, his anger visible bubbling. Someone had pissed Farrell off. Then he realised; the hum that surrounded his cell usually was gone. Someone had gotten access.
Things were being shaken up. Riddick became aware of how he could feel and hear and smell people running around maniacally. There were inmates fucking yelling their throats out and Blues losing their minds. Riddick was loving it, even in the torturous light. It sounded like his own twisted version of heaven. He relished chaos, it was when he could really blend in and take people by surprise. Here though, he couldn't do much. He still couldn't move and his eyes were stingingly blinded by the sun that now drenched him through the window. It was the perfect opportunity he'd take in a normal situation to make the best of it. And he couldn't do anything about it. He had to sit and play chicken as everyone else enjoyed the panic. Except Farrell who now was striding out the cell, his anger momentarily quenched through causing more intentional vicious pain to Riddick.
There was silence for a moment and then, something else happened. There was total electronic silence. Then panic seemed to set in and the chaotic noise was back again and even louder. Inmates were rattling their cages and trying to escape, Blues were trying to control the situation. He wondered what Farrell was doing. Probably fuming, trying to get the situation under control again. Something big was going down and Riddick wasn't part of it. He was stuck in the fucking sunlight and unable to move. Someone was doing what he wanted to do and had wanted to do since he first had been dragged in. Someone else was raising the hell instead of him, just the way he liked it.
Then he knew.
"This will be most difficult"
Jack rolled her eyes at Lando's translucent message, which had melted onto her screen. Talk about stating the obvious.
"I know, that's why I need your help" she typed back "blacking out security in slam is complex, impossible sometimes"
"It can be done though, give myself and Leccy time and we can squeeze ourselves through"
"No time, I'm almost there, a few light bumps away from landing"
"Then I will do what I can, may I contact you by Comlink?"
Jack's fingers hovered over the keyboard. If she gave Lando her Com number, there was a chance she could be tagged and traced. She'd have to throw away her precious link to Iman and possibly Riddick. But this was the only way she could come up with for getting Riddick out. She didn't have the skills to take down an entire slam security system. Quickly she tapped in the code. Another code materialised from Lando, his own ComLink number.
"I will place a tag thread on your Com, then I may be able to see where you are at all times through Net Mapping, placing you wherever you are in the universe in front of my eyes" Lando replied "I will activate the security shut down when I sense you getting within their reach, com me at the exact moment you desire the meltdown of everything, good luck Miss Badd"
Grinning, Jack slid out from in front of the computer, paid at the counter and strode out to the ship. She'd stopped at a refuel station a few light bumps from Pixel to contact Lando and buy any essentials. The ship had been refuelled as well as modified, now under the guise of 'Freedom Fighter' since 'The Serenity' was probably blacklisted after her little skiv duel back at Sunscorch. She wondered what the Blues thought when they found the mechanic-bounty hunter with two healthy sized holes in him and blood pooling around him with her ship gone. She hoped they tossed his body in the trash dispenser. She fucking hated bounty hunters.
'Freedom Fighter' lifted off and Jack steered it off towards the small glowing thumbprint that would be Pixel. Her adrenaline was beginning to pump now and goosebumps were rising on her flesh. There would be a lot of killing going on when she and Riddick got cool and loose. Especially now she'd got rid of the flowing girly style she'd been hiding beneath. Her hair was a dark bloody red and chopped back to its normal slick and shining style short nearly to her shoulders. She was back to wearing black too - tight liquidy pants and a matching vest top with her Riddick goggles hung around her neck; forever her talisman. She felt much more comfortable. Catching sight of herself in a mirrored panel, Jack grinned. It was definitely more to her style (her mother would have hated it) and good to be back to kick some ass. That was what she looking forward to most, seeing Farrell's face when she ripped his fucking throat out. She missed hunting with Riddick, watching him work was a thing of beauty to her.
The planet loomed ahead. It was a marvellous glowing orange, speckled with indistinguishable buildings far apart. Jack switched the scanner on so that she could find the slam. Then she could park out of reach of their hailing frequency, she guessed their equipment wouldn't be as efficient as some slams were as it was such a small planet so not lavished with expensive airtight equipment. It gave her less chance of being detected. There was a bleep as the scanner picked up the slam, clearly detailed on-screen in translatable techo-speak letters and numbers. Jack slowed as she approached the planet, her eyes straying to the screen as she took in all the slam dimensions. It was a large (to her eyes) but cramped building where the scrapings of the universe were locked tightly away in the middle of nowhere. And Jack was going in there willingly
"I must be fucking nuts" Jack grimaced
She had to remember it was for Riddick. A man she'd unknowingly loved for a long time, a serial killer and the worst possible person to have these feelings for. Shaking her head at her situation and all she'd done so far to get here, Jack couldn't help smiling. She knew how to pick her men. Carefully, she manoeuvred the craft onto the planet, maintaining a short distance from the slam. She shut down the ship; any electrical pulses might be detected by the slam outposts. She knew her own heart was racing now, it was do or die. Grabbing her canvas backpack, Jack hopped out of the ship and began her stealth journey. She could see no one else; the area was a wasteland really. Slowly the Slam came into view - it was just as forbidding as Riddick had described all slams he'd been thrown into. He'd told her stories when she was younger that had given her horrific nightmares. She would cry and he would remain stony silent, a frozen presence in her open doorway. He showed no sympathy, saying she had to learn to fight the demons in the darkness alone. Then she'd really survive. Tough love, or maybe no love at all. Just a friendship by chance and a grudging willingness to have someone near him who understood his desire better than anyone to always survive no matter what. And she'd learnt; the nightmares had receded. Jack was no longer afraid of the dark.
Jack opened her com and keyed in Lando's number. His face appeared onscreen, smiling expectantly. Jack smiled in response; a relief to know his tagging had worked.
"I was about to initiate the security lock out, I see you are almost there" he offered
"Which way's his cell?" Jack wasted no time on pleasantries.
A spidery outline diagram replaced Lando's smile. Rapidly it rotated to reveal a tiny highlighted room at one side. Jack's eyes did calculations. She'd have to climb to the roof, as it was so near the top and then scale down the short distance to the window. The security wasn't tight, they couldn't afford much but she was sure that there would be enough surrounding Riddick to prove a mild distraction. And since she was number one on the most wanted list, there was more than a chance that she'd be ghosted on sight. She saved the diagram.
"Shut it out until I'm on the roof" she commanded
"It can be done"
"As soon as I'm in range, kill it"
Lando nodded once and signed off. When the security systems broke down, the top priority would be preventing inmates breaking out, not Jack slipping in. Grinning to herself, Jack moved closer. She could see the individual bricks now and hear the low vibrating hum signalling a construction run entirely by machines. Find the weakness and kill it, that was what Riddick said. As she neared, the hum abruptly stopped. This was her chance. Jack ran to the building, it was enormous to her but she knew it was considered one of the smallest slams on one of the smallest planets. She reached the side of the building safely and could hear the howls of the inmates who were delighting in this sudden excuse to act up and cause havoc. This was where precision and everything Riddick had ever taught her came into play; it was like one of the tests he used to give her. Only this wasn't one of his games, this time Jack was saving his ass.
She pulled a compact gun from her bag; a huge length of rope attached to the bolt loaded into it. How it fitted comfortably into her bag was a mystery itself. It was one of her favourite toys. She aimed for the roof, concentrating hard.
"Come on, don't miss, don't miss" she chanted forcefully to herself
Jack could feel the sweat prickling over her skin and her heart pounding loudly. It was this sort of shit she adored, walking the thin incomprehensible line between rescuer and prisoner. The shit that was made for her, a new challenge every day. The bolt took off and imbedded itself deep in the rooftop ledge
"Yes!"
She allowed a small private victory party before attaching the end of the rope to her belt, making sure there was no slack. Then with the press of a belt device button, she shot through the stifling heat towards the rooftop. It was a primitive method but it always worked well. As soon as she came within grabbing distance, she hauled herself over the ledge with a grunt. Unhooking and putting away the equipment, she stopped to catch her breath, huge exhilarated lungfuls of it. She pressed a Com button. Obediently the security system went back online. Give them a few moments of peace before striking again. Jack marvelled at the view; she was looking down at this beautiful barren wasteland and up at the torrid swirling sky through heat you could cut with a knife while stood atop a slam full of deadbeat prisoners and her favourite serial killer. Her life really wasn't what her mother wanted it to be; no nice rich men for her to marry or glamorous stay- at-home job. Just a survivor's skin and a dangerously unstable murderer. Perfect. She could hear the chaos beneath her, guards trying to get the prisoners under control, the prisoners struggling against their captors the brief panic having awakened them and somewhere Farrell wondered at the distant noises and gloated over a scorched and imprisoned Richard B Riddick. She relished it. She was the invisible eye of the storm, controlling it and exhilarating it at her will, just the way Riddick liked it. Mistress of Chaos and bringer of darkness. She pulled the Riddick goggles up from their constant place around her neck to cover her eyes, completing her appearance of night glider. She dialled Lando again
"Start the meltdown"
*
It's a dangerous thing to leave a man with nothing to repent for with his memories for company. Riddick could remember everything and since he was not capable of the sweet fantasies of dreams and could comfortably see now, he passed his time remembering. Since remembering when she was shot at by Farrell, it had all been about Jack. Shaped by her past. He could so clearly now see her being held back by Paris as she screamed for Shaz to stay down and was forced to watch as Shaz was eaten alive by the monstrous beings. There was a child's compassion that coloured her actions but mostly it was that survivor's skin that she'd come to fit into. She knew how to survive since escaping her parents and that potent identity clung to her. He could see looking back that everything on that planet was beginning to pull Jack into the apprentice killer she turned out to be. A beautiful monster of his own creation. And he was proud of her. He hoped he got a chance to get out of here and show her his appreciation in the flesh.
Farrell entered the room and walked straight up to Riddick's darkened corner. Riddick watched with expectant interest as Farrell roughly unchained his prisoner's wrists and dragged him by the arms into the light. Riddick swore loudly, unable to hide his pain at suddenly being exposed to the burning light after several days of darkness. His feet were still attached to the floor and Farrell chained his wrists to another ring. Riddick had instantly shut his eyes, his anger visible bubbling. Someone had pissed Farrell off. Then he realised; the hum that surrounded his cell usually was gone. Someone had gotten access.
Things were being shaken up. Riddick became aware of how he could feel and hear and smell people running around maniacally. There were inmates fucking yelling their throats out and Blues losing their minds. Riddick was loving it, even in the torturous light. It sounded like his own twisted version of heaven. He relished chaos, it was when he could really blend in and take people by surprise. Here though, he couldn't do much. He still couldn't move and his eyes were stingingly blinded by the sun that now drenched him through the window. It was the perfect opportunity he'd take in a normal situation to make the best of it. And he couldn't do anything about it. He had to sit and play chicken as everyone else enjoyed the panic. Except Farrell who now was striding out the cell, his anger momentarily quenched through causing more intentional vicious pain to Riddick.
There was silence for a moment and then, something else happened. There was total electronic silence. Then panic seemed to set in and the chaotic noise was back again and even louder. Inmates were rattling their cages and trying to escape, Blues were trying to control the situation. He wondered what Farrell was doing. Probably fuming, trying to get the situation under control again. Something big was going down and Riddick wasn't part of it. He was stuck in the fucking sunlight and unable to move. Someone was doing what he wanted to do and had wanted to do since he first had been dragged in. Someone else was raising the hell instead of him, just the way he liked it.
Then he knew.