Chapter Four

She was drifting, stuck in a dark place, and there was something in the darkness… waiting… hunting. She felt fear—gut-wrenching, mind-numbing fear—because she knew that it was after her. She turned and ran. Her heart pounded in her throat and hot air made her eyes sting. The muscles in her side began to seize, but she ignored the pain. If she stopped running, the monsters would be on her.

Suddenly, she tripped falling into mud and there were bones all around her. The creatures in the darkness swooped and shrieked—a sound that sent chills through her soul. She rolled under a large bone and one of the hammer-headed beasts was immediately on top of it. The thing pounded with its skull, trying to bust through. This was the end! There was no way for her to stop it! The bone began to crack and she screamed a name, "RIDDICK!"


Jack sat upright, panting. A fine sheen of sweat covered her body and the bedclothes were twisted around her. Slowly, the aftershock of the nightmare dissipated, and she became aware of her surroundings: golden cream stucco walls, dark wood furniture with intricate carvings, French doors open to a small balcony. She was in Imam's house in New Mecca, in her own room. Imam rushed into the room, concern written on his dark features.

"Jack! Are you all right, child?" he asked, grasping her by the shoulders. Jack heaved a shuddering sigh and nodded.

"The dreams again? The same as before?" he inquired, his eyes searching her face. Again she nodded.

"I have them, too, you know," he reminded her and then gently lifted her face to look at him. "Would you like to talk about it?"

Jack inhaled and smiled weakly at him. She took his hand and squeezed it gently. "I'm fine Imam. You go get some sleep, you've got a big day tomorrow."

Imam smiled at that. "You know, child, I did not expect to marry again. But it has been ten years since my wife went to join Allah, and a young girl like you needs a mother. I believe that Lajjun will make an excellent wife and mother."

"Oh, come on, Imam," Jack teased, giving him a genuine grin. "I've seen the way you look at her. Your whole face lights up."

"Ah, well…" he glanced down sheepishly. "She is much younger than me, could have had her choice of many men. I am honored that she has agreed to join her path to mine."

Jack laughed gently, leaned forward and briefly hugged the man. In a low conspiratorial voice, she told him, "You know, I've seen the way she looks at you, too. I don't know much about this whole 'arranged marriage' thing, but I think she's really into you."

At her words, he stood and laughed loudly. "Ah, Jack, you are a balm to the spirit of a romantic old fool."

Jack grinned impishly at Imam and waggled her eyebrows in a suggestive manner. "Not so old that you don't need a good night's rest before your wedding day. After all, you and Lajjun aren't likely to get much sleep tomorrow night."

Imam looked at her again, obviously scandalized by her frank speech. Jack was unable to suppress a snicker at his shocked expression. She knew that a good Crislam girl her age would never have dared to hint at something like sex, even between a married or soon to be married couple. Oh well, she mused silently, I guess I'm just not a good little girl. Imam simply shook his head and walked out, muttering something about Allah giving him strength.


Jack really was fond of Imam, and she realized that he had made major changes to his life to help make a place for her. Almost immediately upon landing, he committed himself to staying in New Mecca. He had begun procedures to be granted official long-term guardianship of Jack, accepted a teaching post at a local seminary and petitioned the head of the Crislam church to assist him with finding a suitable bride. "Someone who can serve as a mother to Jack. Perhaps, a pleasant widow or someone…" he had said. But Lajjun was not a 'pleasant widow,' she was a vibrant, beautiful, young woman only a dozen or so years older than Jack.

It was obvious to Jack that Imam was thoroughly shocked when the Caliph formally presented them to Lajjun and her family. Imam and Lajjun had gone for a very long walk in the church garden. When they returned, both had been smiling brightly. Imam had gently clasped Lajjun's elbow in a most proprietary way, and they announced that they wished to be married as soon as the appropriate preparations could be made.

Jack sensed their connection immediately. When they were making preparations for the wedding, their eyes often drifted to one another. Also, they took lots of walks together and just sat and talked for hours with Lajjun shyly called him Abu- his given name. Imam had asked Jack if she wished to address him as Abu after they'd landed. She had considered it and then asked if she could just continue calling him Imam—Abu just didn't fit him in her opinion. He had laughed and said, "Of course, child! Imam is a term of respect. I would be honored if you called me that."

Jack sat for a little while and then decided that she would never be able to get back to sleep. She stood and dressed quickly in her customary garb: a pair of loose black cargo pants with lots of pockets, a snug tank top and a loose fitting sweater woven from some sort of plant fiber that was native to Helion Prime. At first, Imam had tried to get her to wear the flowing Crislam robes that he called "proper clothing," but she had resisted. Eventually, he had given in and allowed her to choose the loose, comfortable, boyish clothes she preferred.

New Mecca was as diverse a city as one would find in this sector. She knew her clothing didn't look out of place in the community in general, but she also knew that several of the older women in the Imam's church muttered about her behind their hands. Normally, Jack didn't particularly care; tonight, she was particularly grateful. She swung her legs over the balcony railing, shinnied a few feet across a narrow ledge to a strong vine-swaddled trellis and then swiftly climbed down. She glanced back up at the railing, twelve or so feet above her head. Can't do that in robes, she thought as she dusted her hands against the back of her pants.

Jack quietly slipped away from the house. She knew that Imam would scold her thoroughly and shake his head with a look of disappointment if he ever discovered that she was sneaking out. Imam had been given a very nice town home in a quiet, safe part of New Mecca as part of his compensation for his job at the seminary, but he still seemed reluctant to let her wander. Jack realized that he just wanted to protect her, but she had visited large cities all over the galaxy. She felt comfortable in cities, and she needed to wander—to be alone with her thoughts. It wasn't something she felt Imam could readily understand. She knew what the seedy underbelly of a city could look like and she knew how to take care of herself in that sort of place. Of course, the part of New Mecca where they lived was, in Jack's opinion, the most wholesome place she had ever been. Little kids played in the streets, and people smiled and waved to their neighbors and looked out for one another. So, rather than argue the facts with Imam, Jack simply took matters into her own hands. She slipped away whenever she could without him finding out.

Even with the need for secrecy curtailing her explorations, they had only been in New Mecca for a couple of weeks before she was adept at finding her way around the big city. That night, she immediately headed to one of her favorite places to sit and think, a large concrete drainpipe about a mile from their house. The pipe was part of the storm control system in New Mecca during the rainy season. During a storm, it could quickly fill with water and become very dangerous, so it was strictly off limits. That meant it was a place she could be completely alone—a rarity in a metropolis that size.

Jack had managed to find similar places in every city she'd visited, even the ones on deep-space stations. When you were a kid traveling alone, you had to find somewhere that you could get away or you aroused suspicions. If you weren't careful, some Good Samaritan might just call social services. Jack had left more than one place in a hurry after that happened; she'd been determined that the system would not return her to another endless series of group foster homes or, worse, consign her to one of the institutional schools where they tended to stick hard cases like her.


Jack slipped through the fence very cautiously to avoid being seen by anyone. She then made her way down the slight slope and into the pipe opening. This particular cistern was about five feet in diameter at its mouth, but it subdivided into many tributary pipes that led to the street level. Jack slipped into a smaller pipe and snuggled down to think. She stretched into the curve and rested her back against the pipe wall. Because of her lanky height, her legs curved up the side of the cylinder so that her feet were almost at a level with her eyes. She laced her fingers across her stomach and stared at the tips of her thick-soled boots, allowing her mind to drift as she pondered her life.

Jack was going to miss traveling and not having to answer to anyone about her actions. New Mecca was a nice place and she really liked Imam, but she had also really enjoyed seeing the galaxy. She'd had fun on every planet she'd visited to date. With one notable exception, she thought wryly, recalling the planet where the Hunter-Gratzner transport had crashed.

Actually, even that little bit of hell had its nice points, she mused as Riddick's face drifted, unbidden, into her mind. Her thoughts of Riddick were a complex, bittersweet tangle; she genuinely cared for him, probably even loved him, but his leaving so abruptly had hurt her.

When Jack had awakened to find that Riddick was already gone without her, she had railed at him internally. You, son-of-a-bitch! How could you fucking do that? Don't you know that I need you? I thought I meant something to you, that we had a link!

He'd treated her like a younger sibling even while they were on the planet working on repairing the skiff. They'd shared private jokes, often at Paris Ogilvie's expense, and she'd enjoyed helping him work the stiff, wing fabric. The others had frowned and muttered and tried to steer her away from him, but she'd mostly ignored them. And he'd saved her ass, several times. She couldn't forget that. For a few days, she'd actually hoped vainly that he might come back and get her. He hadn't.

"What kind of fucking bastard just runs off without even saying goodbye?" she had demanded of Imam after she finally accepted that Riddick truly was gone from her life. "Did he say anything to you? Did he tell you where he's going?"

"No, child, he did not tell me," Imam had answered. She didn't think he was outright lying to her—his faith would prevent that. However, she suspected (no, KNEW!) that he was only telling part of the truth. Regardless, Imam would not be moved to tell her what he knew.

He's amazingly stubborn for a religious guy, she thought with fond exasperation.

The dreams had started right after she awoke from cryo. She suspected they'd been there even while she was under. There was nothing she could really put her finger on to support this suspicion (she didn't actually recall any details) but she'd come out of the cryochamber with a vague feeling of dread and deep, primitive fear. It was a sensation that she'd never had before in all the time she'd spent in cryosleep, but then she'd never had an experience like the one on the planet. She supposed that could change a person in subtle ways.

Once they reached Helion Prime and New Mecca—once she'd been returned to the land of living, breathing, dreaming people—the dreams had begun in earnest. They came almost every night with varying topics and were so vivid that she had started sleeping with a small desk lamp turned on so that she wouldn't have to wake in the dark.

Mostly, Jack dreamt about the planet and the creatures. Like her dream that night, these dreams mainly focused on the run through the canyon, especially the part where she was trapped beneath the bone with the thing trying to get at her. Those were the ones that often caused her to wake up screaming and sent Imam rushing to her bedside. It had taken Imam a while, but eventually, he extracted details of the dream from her. He had confided that he too had nightmares about the planet. His were different. They often centered on his feelings of helplessness as the three young Crislam pilgrims- "his lambs"- were taken from him, but she knew he understood.

Sometimes, though, she dreamt about Chillingsworth: about how the gun had felt when she fired it, about how Chillingsworth had looked as she collapsed, about Riddick's expression when he realized that Jack, not Imam, had shot the woman. The Chillingsworth dreams, while frightening, were also somewhat exhilarating.

She didn't tell Imam about those dreams. He had been seriously disturbed when she shot the bitch. She knew he would worry about her if he found out how she felt about the Chillingsworth dreams. He just would not understand. However, that didn't stop her from having them or for cherishing them as a tenuous connection to Riddick. She couldn't let him go in her heart.

"Awfully uncivilized thing you just did, Jack," he'd said to her- she could still vividly remember the exact timber of his voice as he'd said it. With that he had stood in spite of his pain, ushered them onto the large shuttle and once again saved them. Then when they were safely away, he had held her as she poured out her grief for all that had taken place.

Jack didn't tend to get close to many people; even as fond as she was of Imam, she didn't feel the sort of deep down resonance she felt for Riddick. Jack clung to the sense of rightness that she had felt in his arms—the sense of connection and belonging, which was unique in her life.

The only other person to whom she had felt even a passing kinship in recent memory was Shazza on the planet. They had shared stories of their travels while Shazza worked on the sand-cat. She suspected that the tough woman had thought she was making most of it up. No one ever believed that a thirteen-year-old kid had seen as much of the universe as Jack had, but Shazza never made fun of her. The woman had even offered to let Jack go along with her on her travels once they left the planet, and Jack had considered taking her up on the offer. The prospector's only major flaw in Jack's mind had been her mother-hen tendency to try to steer Jack away from Riddick.

When the monsters swept Shazza away so suddenly, Jack had felt like she had been kicked in the stomach. However, while Shazza's death had hurt a lot, Riddick's leaving had been even worse. Jack had been so disheartened over the loss of Riddick in the wake of all that had happened on the planet, that Imam had finally confided in her. Her thoughts wandered back to the conversation; turning the holy man's words over in her mind.

"Mr. Riddick is a much more noble man than most people realize," he had said.

"No, shit? You figure that out all by yourself?" she had shot back sarcastically and was immediately sorry because of the hurt look that crossed Imam's face. She'd mumbled an apology and clamped her teeth together to let him have his say without further interruptions.

"Jack," he had explained gently, "I realize that you care a great deal for him, but he has a hard life. I believe that the encounter with the Chillingsworth woman frightened him more than he would admit. I know it certainly frightened me."

Unable to hold her tongue, Jack had interjected bitterly at that point, "I'm glad I did it! It gave me the chance to repay him a little for all he did for us on the planet. Besides, the bitch deserved what she got."

"Perhaps," Imam had said diplomatically, although the haunted look in his eyes told her that he was deeply disturbed by her outburst. "Nevertheless, I believe it made Mr. Riddick realize that no matter how much he might want to start over, the price on his head was such that the bounty hunters and mercenaries would never let him. And he could not bring himself to subject you to the kind of life that he knew he was destined to live… a life on the run and in hiding. He cared a great deal about you, Jack."

"He told you that?" she had asked.

"Not with those exact words, but yes, he did."

"Then, why did he leave before I even came out of cryo? Why, if he cares so damn much about me, did he sneak away like a coward in the night? Why didn't he at least say good-bye?" Jack had demanded fighting back tears.

"Because, child, he knew that if he stayed that long, you would try to go with him, regardless of what either of us said. He anticipated that you would try to stow away with him and he realized just how dangerous that could be... for both of you."

Well, they've got me there, she thought. I probably would've stowed away. I just don't see that it's such a big deal. I care for Riddick; he cares for me- BAM! Everybody happy. And it's not like I haven't spent enough time moving and hiding myself.

Jack suddenly shook herself back to the present. Where did all that shit come from? she wondered. Maybe it's because Imam's getting married. He gets a new life and gets me thinking about mine. Jeez, I'm gettin' sentimental.

"Snap out of it, Jack," she chided herself aloud. Jack turned her attention to the opening of the pipe and noticed that the western sky was beginning to lighten, the energy beacons beaming up from the surface of New Mecca were fading into the brightness of the coming dawn.

Uh-oh, almost morning. Better get back before Imam wakes up or I'm gonna catch some serious hell. She scrambled out of the pipe, quickly made her way back to Imam's house and climbed back to her room. Once there, she waited until she heard the sounds of Imam making breakfast below, then she also descended to join him in preparing for his big day.


A/N:

I just wanted to thank all those who've left me feedback so far. I really appreciate the support. Also, I hope the lack of an active Riddick presence in this part of the story doesn't turn off too many people. Stick with me, he'll be coming back eventually, but as I said in the summary, this is primarily Jack's story (although there's a fair amount of Toombs and Kyra as well... what can I say, they're fun to write).

As you may have noticed, I DO NOT consider Jack and Kyra to be the same person. How exactly Kyra gets where she is in TCoR will be explained in future chapters.

My current plan is to post approximately one chapter each weekday until I run out of written chaps.