By: MataruDoukotsu

Taming the Beast

Chapter Eleven

Disclaimer: I do not own any part of the Riddick universe, no matter how sad it is. One thing is for sure, Riddick is hot. The one man who can pull off buff and bald is Vin Diesel and the character he plays in this series.

Now on to the story.

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He was not pleased. This whole thing was frustrating, if he could, he would damn the Project to hell for the mess ups that had occurred throughout its continuation. Over ten times did they almost totally demolish the Project and one like the Perfect Solider Project was not a project that could just be done with; especially with ten specimens. And out of the ten, four were oblivious and running from the Regime.

Of those four, two just happened to be the most dangerous people in the universe, another happened to be an inventor genius whose main object is to create artillery, and the last is the bridge to them all with ties to all three and the want to become an apprentice to the Beasts.

The Project had first started twenty-two years ago with the one who the Regime wanted to be the dominant over the whole pack. The Regime had thought of the specimens as a wolf pack, but the unexpected happened, four had run; escaped and became…perfect. They came out to be everything that the Regime scientists wanted, but they all went mentally unstable. The two killers went through psychosis and turned into untamable beasts.

The second specimen was perfect. PSPLDS2 was the ideal Perfect Solider; unlike PSPRBR1, she had the ability to change forms. The scientists that were in charge of seeing to the female hosts pregnancy were in total awe as the subject had repeatedly switched from a human form to something that looked much like a kitten. The changing had pained the host throughout her eighth going on ninth month until the subject had just stopped. After the birth, scientists had monitored PSPLDS2, hoping for a display much like the one she had shown within her hosts womb.

It did not.

Regime scientists did find that PSPRBR1 had what looked as if what might have been lapses of consciousness resulting his instincts to kill to fill in. While PSPRBR1 did have what the scientists liked to call the "guideline" instincts-the basic of the basic instincts- PSPLDS2 was a much more complicated web. And the Regime scientists believed that the reason was because of the gender difference and the want to play with her prey-

"Or how Riddick likes to say: Skull-fuck her victims." He said aloud to himself. As the comm. on his desk buzzed to life, he looked up at it. "What?" he asked it irritably

"Ah, General Seagare, it is good to hear your voice." A female spoke.

"What do you want Dr. Winston? I don't have time for your petty conversations unless it has to do with our favorite people." The General growled. He was a rather youthful man in his early thirties, a lean build with kind yet serious ice blue eyes and natural long white hair that was usually seen pulled into a low horsetail. Souvenirs of what the Regime did to me…

"Actually, Kisho…it does."Dr. Winston answered, "You might want to get down here. There's something I want you to see."

"This better be good, Corey." Kisho rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"It is, Sir. I promise." The woman answered.

If this has to do with what kind of sedatives that would be able to bring down LDS2 again. If it is, I'll kill her myself. Kisho thought as he pulled himself out of his comfortable leather chair and continued out of his office to the laboratory. He hated being here, his green uniform standing out amongst all the white lab coats and the atmosphere just brought back old memories that made him growl slightly.

"Thank you, Kisho, for coming down here on such short notice. I know you don't like it here, but you must see this." A young woman looking to be in her late twenties walked over to him, her dark blond hair in a messy bun and her cerulean eyes covered by safety goggles. She pulled the goggles off and led him toward a sampling room. "This might interest you…quite a bit, I must say myself."

They stood looking through the Plexiglas viewing window watching a young scientist making adjustments. The young male looked up at his superiors and Dr. Winston nodded for his continuation. "What am I looking at, Dr. Winston?" The General asked as he watched what he thought were cells that were in a disk on a screen in the work room.

"This, Sir, is a sample of LDS2's DNA. Let me tell you what brought this whole situation on as Marshal gets everything ready. Today I had given Marshal a project to do with this sample of LDS2's DNA. He was to test it in different temperatures, just to understand what kind of environment LDS2 can stand. The lowest temperature is 21°F, while the highest is 128°F. He had called me in to show me the results, at the time I was carrying a tube sample of AIDS. As you know, we have been toying with that virus for a long time, beginning in the 20th century. I had complimented Marshal on his findings and turned…" Her cheeks dusted with pink, yet she did not look away from him. "Ahem…and tripped over the stool legs."

Kisho barked with laughter. Corey Winston was a very stubborn woman who had never been clumsy, but nimble on her feet. She was a woman with great agility, something that the Regime, also, had to do with…so of course Kisho would be laughing his lungs out, holding his aching gut.

"There is nothing funny about it, I could've twisted my ankle," yet this sentence only seemed to fuel his fire. "Kisho, you are making a fool of yourself. Stop laughing this instant. I still have something important to get at."

Wiping his eyes, the General straightened himself out. His face swiftly turned to emotionless. "Go on, Doctor."

"Anyway, I fell and the tube flew out of my hands…only for some of it to land with LDS2's DNA. This is what happened." She pointed to the screen, and Kisho watched as the scientist in the room dropped a bit of the virus in the DNA sample. He watched as the DNA suddenly twisted and reformed, then swiftly moved toward the samples of the virus and began to attack it.

"What is it that I am seeing, Corey?" Kisho asked, awed at the sight of battle between the two samples.

"Well…the only way to say it is, LDS2's DNA is killing off the AIDS virus as if it were just a common cold, yet the strange thing is that the DNA shifted…it-it evolved, Sir. I don't know any other way to put it."

The wheels in his brain began turning at an alarming rate. "LDS2's DNA is basically all of the Cerberus gene, right Doc?"

"The Cerberus gene is purely animalistic, General. It is no specific animal, it's all just instinct and strength from all of the predatorial animals in the universe. Panther, lion, wolf…hellhound… When Dr. Morose made the Cerberus Gene, he took DNA from all sorts of animals. He was trying to make the ultimate solider."

"There's where your wrong, Doc." Kisho shook his head.

"Well then, General, what was he trying to do before he died, Oh-All-Knowing-One?" she asked sarcastically.

The General frowned, and began to walk away. "I don't know doc. I don't know."

But I sure do aim to find out.

XXXXX

"URGH! GODDAMN YOU, YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

Imam jumped up from his bed, awakened by the loud cursing yell. Grabbing his robe on his way out of his room, the Muslim priest rushed to the mess where all the sounds were coming from. He threw the door open and saw a slender, lethal body jump onto the back of the biggest then continued to bite the juncture of the man's throat and shoulder.

"Jack! Riddick! Stop this nonsense, now!" the eldest of the trio living on the ship shouted. He had never seen this before. They had always gotten along fine together.

Riddick reached behind him and yanked the girl from his back, dangling her at arms length away from his person. "She bit me!" he angrily announced to the dark skinned man, pointing to the bleeding wound with his free hand. "She bit me, Holy Man!"

"Mr. Ridd─"

"You should've never of said I was weak to begin with, Dickie." Jack interrupted, before hauling herself up a little ways and biting him on his arm. Riddick promptly let her go before she could draw blood.

Jack scuttled over to the first aid box and took out some gauze and alcohol to disinfect the wound then proceeded to throw the items at the big man. She might have wounded him, but it didn't mean that she didn't still care. He had gotten justly punished for his impertinence when he had called Slade and Damion weak females and telling her that she was just as weak. Jack knew that he had been joking, but no one bruised Slade and Damion's pride when she was around. So she had attacked…

Riddick sat down on one of the benches with the gauze and alcohol and gently touched the tender and now bruised skin. "Damn, Jack, they sure did teach you some dirty tricks, didn't they?"

He smiled mentally as she gave a smile that would almost be considered baring her teeth as she set down a plate loaded with food for him. I knew she was a spitfire, but damn…kinda makes me wonder what the Con-X is like now.

Imam shook his head as he picked up his breakfast plate Jack had made him and sat down. Life with these two sure was interesting for a man in his mid forties, not mention it kept him in shape as well.

"Mr. Riddick, Jack," he started as he sat down opposite of them. They both look up at him, their eyes questioning as their heads were bent down getting ready to accept a fork full of food to their open mouths; they were as still as statues. "I have good news for you."

"Wha?" They both asked absently, wondering what the priest would have to tell them as he seemed to radiate a glow of importance. It must have been extremely imperative if he looked at them with such a stern look…

"You have both been deemed psychotic nuts." He said at last, exasperated before he took a decent fork full of food into his mouth.

Jack looked at Riddick only to see him doing the same; both were shocked, before they snorted.

So he finally figured it out. Riddick thought, before accepting his bite of eggs, before mumbling, "Oh, yeah? By who?"

"Me." The priest answered, looking down at his food as he wiped his mouth with his napkin.

At that, both fugitives laughed. Jack with a more loud and explosive laugh, and Riddick with almost refined chuckles.

"Yer funny, Holy Man, real funny. I'll give you that." The large convict nodded.

This was how they usually started their days, minus the whole fight. Jack would make breakfast, they would sit down and Imam would "diagnosis" them with many different things. For the rest of the eating period they would discuss the reasons Imam came to the conclusion of why they were a certain way. The whole shebang would end in them chortling over their little flaws and why Imam was cursed and destined to look after two wild rebels.

Soon after they would all split up. Imam usually to pray, Jack usually to her room or to exercise, and Riddick to do only Allah knew what.

Riddick watched as Imam walked back to the room they had all deemed the "Place Where Imam Does His Thing", making sure the old man had safely shut the door before he turned to Jack as she was exiting the mess.

"Are you ever gonna tell him, kid?" he asked, curious of her answer, yet needing to know whether he could talk about Damion and Slade in front of the priest.

Jack shrugged, "I don't want the old man having a heart attack any time soon. But I think that if Slade suddenly showed up at our door step, he'll die of heart failure. So I guess I ought to take my chances with the heart attack."

Riddick nodded a hint of a smirk shadowing his lips before walking to their room. Jack walked in behind him, pouncing on the bed with a laptop he had bought for her on their last planet. He searched their drawers for something before turning to the teenager. "Jack, where's my black hoodie?"

"Why? Where you going?" she asked and he heard her open a file and began to read it.

"A job I decided to take." He answered, still digging in their drawers, looking for his favorite article of clothing besides his pants.

"Whose the target, and how much?" she absently asked, knowing full well that Riddick would only take a job for killing and the target had to fit in his categories.

"A powerful mob leader by the name of Conte Derais. The guy who wants him dead said Derais killed his wife and two twin children; girl and boy five years old. 1.5mil if I give him back the finger with the ring and tattoo on it. The ring is a golden eye. It's some kind of ally ring."

"Damn, this guy really wants really your man dead, hn?" the teenager asked. She looked up for a minute to watch the large man continue to tear through their things. "Riddick…it's here, on the bed right beside me."

As said murderer turned, he saw amusement twinkle in those emerald depths. "Not funny Jack."

"Whoever said I was laughing oh-great-one?" She handed the hoodie over and let him snatch it. Jack watched as he pulled it over his bald head and then push his goggles into place. "When will you be back?"

"Don't worry about it, kid. Just do what Imam tells you. I'll be back later tonight." Riddick mentally went over his checklist before walking out of the room and exited the ship via the cargo ramp.

Jack watched him go and turned back to her laptop with a shrug. Let 'im do whatever he wants, just as long as he doesn't get killed.

XXXXX

If he had not been a patient man, Riddick was sure that he would have already killed himself out of pure frustration. It almost seemed as if his guy was never left alone.

Well, it looks as if I'm gonna have to kill thrice. Conte and his two cronies. The fugitive thought with a mental sigh. He sat on top of a building watching as Conte was making some deal in the dark alleys. Riddick blended in perfectly with the darkness of the night as he caressed the right side of his face with the blade of his shiv; his thinking position. Riddick wanted to do this quickly, drop off the proof to his "boss", get his money and leave this planet before anybody noticed that he had been here in the first place. The planet Cortevera was not a place that he wanted to stay for long, for not only was it one of the many places that Jack was wanted, but the place teemed with Mercs since she had left it. Although its sister planet, Nevra, was a great place…Might wanna crash there sometime. Riddick held many fond memories on Nevra, an easy place to get lost in and never be found. Once called Never Land, it was shorted to Nevra.

Riddick's mercury eyes narrowed on his man as Conte punched the other. This just might be an opportunity… He continued to watch as one of the men flanking Conte was shot down. Maybe I won't have to do as much as I thought. Riddick quickly scaled down the low brick wall to sit in the shadows, his shiv held at the ready; ready to strike as quickly as spitting king cobra. Uh-oh, the murderer thought as he watched Conte over power the other group with mere fire power, time to turn this to my fortune.

Looking to his left and right, he picked up a sharp metal piece of pole. Testing it's weight, he aimed at the last of Conte's minion who was standing in front of the other one's last, strangling him, then threw it; accurately killing two birds with one stone. He watched as Conte and the other man with greased back hair glance at the pole.

"What the fuck! Where the fuck did that come from!" the other man yelled at Conte.

I'm surrounded by idiots, I swear. Riddick thought before sauntering from the shadows. "I can never understand how Mob leaders can be so idiotic yet lead a gang. Fucking amusing if you ask me."

I just might be able to have some fun tonight. As the two men's eyes widened in wild fear, his nostrils flared at the scent; the beast laying just underneath in his chest reared its sleek, furred head and let loose a growl that reverberated in the air around them.

Show time.

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A/N: Well...whatever. Review.