Author's Note: Wow, I started the rest of this sooner than I expected. Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed, your comments are what encouraged me to continue. Please, keep it up! Also, the lyrics at the beginning are from "In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth" by the band Coheed and Cambria.

Disclaimer: I do not own Riddick, Jack, Imam, or any of the other Pitch Black/COR characters. Any other character is of my own creating, as are the circumstances of this story.

The Waiting Game

Chapter 1

The Navigator.

The Pilot.

Her favorite.

The one they call the vision, he bears the gift.

She didn't feel different. Not at all. Today was her eighteenth birthday, but it felt the same as any other day. Strange, how in twenty-four hours she went from being a child with a guardian to a legal adult, free to make her own decisions. She could buy cigarettes, apply for a hover license, hell, even hire a prostitute if she wanted too. No one had to take care of her now; she could be on her own. She could live alone and let herself become the only person she needed to rely on. Oh sure, she could do that. But she didn't want to. Not anymore.

Glancing at herself in the mirror, she decided that she needed some eyeliner. Black, to match her dress. Now that she was eighteen, she figured she might as well use that particular type of makeup. She never wore it before, because it made her look and feel too old. She hadn't felt old enough to pull of smoky, sultry eyes, just like she had never felt old enough to actually wear the little black dress she'd bought. But things were different now. She was eighteen. So she'd pulled the black dress out, tried it on, and for some reason, it now looked good on her. Really, really good. Just like the eyeliner was going to look, and the black strappy sandals too. And it was all because she was eighteen.

Eighteen. The age had big implications for everyone, and she knew it. But she couldn't help but feel that her eighteenth birthday was a bit more important than the average teenager's. After all, the average teenager didn't survive flesh-eating monsters on a deserted planet. The average teenager didn't live with a Muslim holy man. The average teenager didn't look forward to the return on a convicted mass murder with almost unbearable excitement. So it goes without saying the Jack wasn't the average teenager.

It wasn't as if she expected him to return today. In fact, she didn't expect him to come back for at least another six months. Yet the fact of the matter remained; his note had said he would be back when she was eighteen. And call her crazy, but she'd held onto that written promise with everything she had. As long as she remembered it, as long as she could look at the well-worn paper and see the words written in his spiky hand, then everything was okay. Because then, he hadn't really left her.

She hadn't always felt like this. It had taken her two years for her to forgive Riddick for leaving, and to believe that he had actually done it because he cared. Two years of feeling utterly alone, of lashing out at Imam, of locking herself off from every other human being. The latter had caused her many problems, especially at school. She had been fiercely anti-social, and hadn't a single friend as a result. Everyone had given up on her; teachers and counselors grew tired of her attitude and wrote her off as a hopeless case. Her peers had shunned her, labeling her as the schools resident psycho. There was one girl, Claudia, who had felt compassion for her and tried to get close, but Jack had cruelly pushed her away. She hadn't wanted a friend, all she had wanted to do was go to sleep and never wake-up. But sleep was no escape, not for her. She still had terrible nightmares, and no Riddick to help her through them. For two years, she had been absolutely miserable.

Then one day, for no reason at all, she'd decided to pull out the note he'd left her. She'd only read it once, that morning she'd woken up alone in their bed, and she suddenly felt the urge to look at it again. It was short and to the point, exactly what she would expect of him. Reading it over had been awful, and she'd been on the verge of ripping the paper to shreds, when her eyes found the last two sentences. I'll be back once you've grown up, once you're eighteen. I promise.

After that, no one could believe she was the same girl. She treated Imam with respect and said that she would obey all his house rules. She started doing well in school. She asked Claudia to spend the night, and quickly became best friends with her. She made more friends too, and even started to enjoy shopping. From that day on, she decided to live her life as best she could, but always with the knowledge of his promise in the back of her mind. She never told Imam about the note, and she never spoke to Claudia about Riddick. Maybe it wasn't a mentally healthy thing for her to do, but she didn't care. That promise was her rock, and with it she was able have a fun, normal teenage existence.

The party she was going to was part of that existence. Despite her protests, Claudia and her other friends had arranged a party for her birthday, and seeing as the entire purpose of the party was to celebrate her, she had to attend. It wasn't as if she didn't like parties, but it seemed like every time she went to one, she ended up feeling disenchanted with everyone there. The mass of people, the drinking, the loud noise, the constant hook-ups and break-ups, it all just seemed so insignificant, so average. And nine times out of ten, she'd end up sitting in a secluded corner, nursing a drink and praying that no guy would attempt a conversation with her. Funny, it was during times like that that she had to question Imam's faith in God and the power of prayer. Because no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't escape the teenage boys and their endless pickup lines.

She tried to give them all a chance, she really did. But they just couldn't compare to Riddick. Not one of them. And it was no one's fault but her own. Every time she met a guy, she did the same thing. She'd check out his arms, and find them lacking the right amount of muscle. She'd check out his eyes, and see the absence of a blue glow. She'd listen to his voice, and wonder why his chest didn't rumble when he talked. She did all of this, and in the first five minutes of talking, would decide she wasn't interested. This bothered her more than a little, but what could she do? What could she do when the only guy she wanted to hug was a convict, when the only guy she felt safe with was a murderer, when the only guy she'd want to sleep with was accused of rape? Accused, but never convicted, she told herself. But it didn't matter, the point was easy to make; she was a bit fucked in the head where guys were concerned.

Sighing, Jack did a final once over in the mirror. With her hair upswept and her makeup in place, she had to admit that she didn't look half bad. The dress fit her well, showcasing her small chest and lanky frame to its best advantage. Tonight was going to be fun, she'd make sure of it. After all, she didn't spend hours making herself look like a girl only to waste it by being immersed in thoughts of Riddick the whole time. Hearing a knock on the front door, she grabbed her small purse and looked at the clock. Claudia was a little early, but that wasn't surprising. She probably wanted to get there first and make sure she didn't miss a new potential boyfriend. Jack called to Imam as she walked unsteadily down the stairs (not quite used to wearing heels), and told him that she was leaving and not to wait up. Reaching the door keypad, she punched the code with one hand and smoothed out her dress with the other.

"Hey Claus, I thought the party didn't start till…" Her voice trailed off as she looked up from her dress. A large man was standing in her doorway, blocking out most of the evening light. He had long, thick dark hair down past his shoulders, and an unruly beard to match. He was wearing a stained black tank top and olive-green army pants that looked like they'd seen better days. Dark goggles covered his eyes, and she saw a glint of metal in his right hand. Her breath caught when, with a slow, deliberate motion, he lifted the goggles off his eyes, and sniffed the air.

"Been a long time since I smelled beautiful."