I know there's someone there. I know there's someone watching me. I know I'm being followed. They know who we are. They know why we're here. They know us.
I know it.
Why won't they show themselves? Why the hiding? Come out, damn you! Come into the open! Come out where I can see you! Come face me! She turned around and around, silver eyes wide as she stared into the darkness of the ship, her gaze fierce, hands clenched tight enough to ache. She felt the stares, each time spinning to see who dared to watch her, each time facing nothing.
She wanted to scream, wanted to curse, wanted to do something. She glared and glowered into the empty interior, snarling impotently at the looming darkness.
"Come face me!"
Her voice echoed off the metal walls. It bounced around her, rising into a cacophony of sound, a storm of impotent fury.
Something heavy sounded behind her; the familiar dull striking sound of a body dropping, the soft hiss of a final breath, the sound Riddick had once called the "rattle," although Spook had never understood why.
It wasn't a sound she liked hearing under the best of circumstances, and on the fading tail of her shout, leaving only silence in its wake, it became even more distressing. She felt the stare upon her back. The air felt suddenly both cloying and frigid.
Slowly, hesitantly, she turned.
Her eyes widened in horror. She gasped for air. She could hear only the sound of her heart pounding. She felt a scream trapped in her throat.
He lay on the floor, silver eyes dull, staring. Blood stained his slightly parted lips. It coloured his already dark skin, blossoming over his chest, pooling almost delicately in the rippled stomach. A cream-hued handle stood amidst the crimson, the metal of the blade completely hidden, sunk deep in the broad chest.
Then the scream tore itself free.
She covered her eyes with her clenched hands. Still the wail ripped through her, ricocheting along the corridors of the tiny shuttle. Slowly her hands dropped, and her eyes settled again on the still face.
"who..."
Laughter, cold, low, barely audible. It swelled around the girl, a vicious echo of the sight that she beheld with such chilling fear.
"who are you?"
The laugh faded to a low chuckle.
Something moved in the shadows.
A figure slowly stepped forward, bare feet carefully skirting the gloss of Riddick's blood on the shuttle floor.
Slowly the face moved into the light.
Spook stared deep into a familiar face.
Her silver eyes met her own.
Her scream was cut short as her head struck the low monitors above the control panels.
"Rabbit! Are you all right?" His low rumble surrounded her.