AN: Sorry it's been so long, but I've been way busy with my classes. The good news is that round one of mid-terms are over, but round two starts next week. Hopefully the next chapter won't take so long...hopefully...


Jack B. Badd sat on a wall
Jack B. Badd had a great fall
And all the King's horses, and all the King's men
Could never put Jack back together again
Life's a real bitch, and that ain't no lie...

"What is this?" asked another man, one who was standing in the background of the scene from Jack's perspective.

"Looks like just a couple of kids," one of the guards replied, but neither of them showed any signs of lowering their weapons.

"Yeah, just a couple kids," Dom repeated from behind her, his voice airy, perhaps even fear laced as he squeezed her shoulders tight and pulled her back against him. He was slowly inching the two of them away from the two men, back the way they'd came.

Jack's hands were still in the air as she stared with her eyes wide. She knew better than to panic, but it had been a while. Rational thoughts were hard to catch a hold of among the flood of emotions and energy running through her entire body. She was so pumped full of adrenaline she was shaking noticeably. Her expression was a slack jawed one.

"Quit moving!" one of the guards snapped, and almost instantly their backward progress ceased.

"I don't like this," the strange man continued, beginning to inch away himself.

It took the addition of that strange voice, another person in doubt, to clear Jack's mind almost completely of her state of near-paralysis. She began to look around, assess the situation. She had to know what she was dealing with if she and Conte were going to make it out of that alley alive.

Why were these guys here? Had they been stalking her all along, waiting for the right moment to ambush her and Dom? What exactly was going on? Why would three men be standing around in a back alley in the evening hours where no one would see them? They'd been nearly as shocked as she'd been when she flew around the corner unexpectedly, so perhaps they hadn't been waiting for her. They didn't even seem to recognize her...

And why the fuck was there a beautiful classic twentieth century navy blue Ford Mustang in this alley with them? Who the hell in this dump of a neighborhood could afford one of those? Not only that, but who had the kind of money it would take to get the gasoline to fuel it so far out in the sticks of the universe?

It had to be a deal...the car was hot and they were making a deal...they were selling the car to...some guy wearing a suit that was waaay too nice for a local to be wearing. That was what was going down. It had taken Jack all of about ten seconds to get it figured out once she put her mind to it, but the question of how the hell they were going to get out of there in one piece still remained unanswered.

One of the guards turned to address the man they were apparently trying to do business with, trying to convince him not to bail prematurely. "No, don't go, man. It took us a long time to get this exchange set up and we're going to go through with it. There isn't a problem here," he said half pleasantly, if with a little too much enthusiasm. "This is just a misunderstanding."

"Yeah, we were just looking for this guy who said he'd sell us some blow," Conte chipped in suddenly, and picking up on the hint Jack nodded slightly in agreement. Better that they think that the two of them were also up to something illegal, less reason to think that they'd go to the cops that way.

The other guard motioned to the two of them with his palm up, turning to look at their buyer. "You see? Besides, do these two look like undercover cops? Just a couple teenaged coke heads out looking for a score."

She felt Dom shrug as he slowly moved to her right, releasing his hold on her shoulders as he took a few careful steps to the side, turning them from one target into two. He never drew any closer to the gunmen, but yet he never stopped moving, circling around them cautiously, his arms spread wide, palms up, in a non-threatening stance.

"Hey, guys, come on. I can see you're trying to do a little honest business back here where big brother can't see ya. I respect that. Spent more than my share of time in juvy slam, and let me tall ya, whoever 'the man' is, I sure hate the fucker just as much as anyone. So, how bout you just let us be on our way?" he asked, trying to sound reasonable and cool.

The guard closest to him shrugged. "I don't know if we can do that, kid. See, we're sort of on this other job that's really important, and if we get recognized by the cops, our boss will kill us for sure."

Dom shrugged, keeping his hands in plain view. "Yeah, okay, I get that much. Hell, who hasn't been there, right?" He was stalling. Jack could see straight through it; but luckily for both of them the guards at least, couldn't. As their attention followed Conte away from her, Jack slowly began to back away again, hoping to fade back into the shadows enough that she'd have a chance to make a break for it.

And hopefully, when she ran, Dom would have an opportunity to make his own break.

Just when she was about to turn and go, Conte pretended to take a slightly closer look at the car that was the object of the thugs' deal, and let a huge grin spread across his face. "Hey, is that a 1967 Ford?" he asked, sounding more than authentically interested.

Jack froze, too curious to see what he was playing at to do anything intelligent, like running away.

"1969 Ford Mustang," the buyer corrected, fiddling casually with his gold cufflinks. Almost instantly the words 'rich know-it-all' flashed before Jack's eyes as she finally took serious notice of the man.

Conte, however, seemed pleased to have connected with another twentieth century car expert. He smirked at the man, looking at him with his head tilted to the side. "Fuel injected, turbo charged?" he asked, sounding more than a little caught up on what must've been one of his favorite subjects.

Jack would've huffed at how all guys were the same, the whole lot of them were more impressed by some old carbon dioxide spewing combustion engine than they were with keeping themselves alive. But, she was too relieved to see that the guards were finally lowering their handguns, seeming to become more at ease with a guy who was actually interested in what they were selling to care at the moment. In fact, Conte actually seemed to be putting up a fairly decent sales pitch for them...and so just maybe they were no longer in as much danger as she'd feared...

Jack stood with her hands on her hips while the car's future owner went over just about every inch of the vehicle, including looking under the hood, and all the while her companion followed along like a dog on a leash, wanting to know all sorts of details about the make and model and the extras that had been specially loaded in the stupid thing.

While leaning in the driver's side window, being careful not to leave prints on the finish, Dom looked back at her over his shoulder, grinning like a kid on his birthday. "Holy shit, babe! This thing's got a tape deck in it! A freakin' tape deck! I didn't even know they existed anymore!"

"That's great, hun," she ground out, sounding more than a bit peeved. All she wanted to do was get the hell out of there, but if she ran they'd probably shoot the idiot she was with. Hadn't he been the one who'd mentioned something about being the toughest guy in town?

Heh, so much for that theory, Jack thought to herself. Riddick would've definitely had every bad guy standing in that alley very, very dead; and in a fraction of the time.

"All I can say is, that it's one hell of a machine you're buying," Conte finished, still speaking to the man as he slammed the hood of the car shut.

The suit nodded his agreement, smiling like a six year old kid. "It sure is," he agreed before turning to the two guards. "Buff it up and deliver it to my lot tomorrow night at nine. One of my people will meet you there with a check. Deal?"

"Deal," the older of the two men agreed.

The suit nodded to them both, smiling a bit. "Good doing business with you, gentlemen. I would like to stay and chat, but duty calls. You understand," he falsely confided before turning with a great deal of flourish, and walking off down the street. After he'd been walking for half a block or so a car pulled up alongside him and he got in the back, then was driven away out of sight.

"Creepy," Jack intoned.

"Mmhm," Conte agreed readily, having come to stand next to her after reluctantly leaving the side of the vehicle he'd just fallen so madly in love with.

"Come on," he finally said, jerking his head in the direction they'd come, turning to go with Jack following closely in his wake. They got all of three steps in before the two men noticed their attempt to leave.

"Hey, where do you think you're going?" the younger one asked, sounding rather threatening all of a sudden.

Jack froze in her tracks, allowing her eyes to slowly shut as she realized that they weren't going to get away so easily.

"Both of you turn around, slowly," the other guard ordered.

Jack turned one way, Dom turned the other, and as soon as she caught his eye she just knew he was going to try something. She hoped that whatever it was, it wouldn't be something stupid.

She slowly raised her hands in the air again, even though there really was no point. She obviously had nothing to defend herself with against the gun that the man on the right was once again pointing at her.

The guard almost smirked. "Oh come on, you didn't seriously think that you'd get away that easily, did you? Like I said, the boss would kill us if we were recognized by the police. So...better not to leave any loose ends. Bang, bang, no loose ends. Nothing personal..." he added, his grip slowly tightening as he prepared to fire at a fear-paralyzed Jack.

The whole thing was beautiful, really. The slightest shift of attention of the gunman, the tiniest lapse, and Conte had pulled a pair of heavy handguns seemingly from thin air, drawing them so fast that not a man alive could've possibly followed the action with the naked eye. Without pause, without hesitation, and before either of the two men could get a shot off Dom leveled the guard threatening Jack with four, precise, rapid shots.

Before the closer guard could recover himself, Conte again made his guns disappear and then engaged him, charging head on and tackling him before he could raise his own gun to fire. The two of them struggled briefly on the ground before the guard managed to hit Dom in the side of the head with the butt of his gun, knocking the dark featured attacker off of him.

Conte rolled to his feet over his shoulder, sitting back on his haunches to consider his enemy, but prepared to strike as fast as a viper at the first sign of that pistol being raised. He wanted the fucker to try something, he wanted a fight. He was a brawler by nature, and it had been a long time since he'd been in a good scrap that really got his blood flowing. There was no rush, no spike in the galaxy that compared to being the victor in a fight to the death. No knives, no guns, just his wits—and everything else God gave him.

There was an extended pause during which the guard tried to catch his breath, watching his opponent with matched intensity. It was clear that he too was determined to survive.

The instant that he attempted to raise his gun Conte became liquid motion. He was smooth, fluid, and never once paused as he launched himself forward in attack. Jack could merely watch in awe as he tore into the man with moves as quick as lightening, easily disarming him in a single pass and flinging the weapon off into the darkness where it most likely wouldn't be found without the aid of sunlight.

Once again the two paused, having switched positions but still only a mere handful of feet apart, watching each other closely like two dogs fighting over a piece of meat. Jack held her breath, wondering which one was going to make the first move.

Like before, the guard attempted to strike first. He charged Dom, apparently prepared to take him down to the ground. However, he made the terrible mistake of leading with his head, and his onrush was met by Conte's fist landing hard in the middle of his face right before the bigger man sidestepped out of the way, spinning quickly and kicking out the back of the guard's knee before he had a chance to get out of range.

The guard fell to the ground in a heap, crumpling as the shock of having his nose shoved up into his brain finally began to sink in, and his body realized it was dying. Jack was torn from her dull stare at the dying man when Dom grabbed her by the hand, dragging her along behind him as he began to run away from that place at last.

"I...I didn't think you were that fast," she blurted out suddenly, mostly out of breath by the time they stopped over a block away from where Conte had just killed two men right before her eyes. He finally let go of her hand and Jack bent over, grabbing at her knees for support as she tried to keep herself from throwing up. After a few deep breaths, she started to regain her composure and continued to think out loud on the same line of thought. "I mean...you're sort of a big guy, so I assumed that you'd be a little slow. But you're not, you're really fuckin' quick, Conte. Hell, I could hardly follow what you were doing and I've been in a million fights..." she panted.

When he didn't respond she looked up at him, only to see that he hadn't been paying attention to her in the slightest. He seemed lost in his own little trance as he stood at the mouth of the alleyway, staring blankly out at the street. Perhaps because he was blatantly ignoring her, she was almost pissed to see the contented smirk on his face. That, 'I'm too cocky to touch' look that she used to think she liked on him. At that moment, it was just too much.

"What the fuck's up with you?" she asked sharply, barely raising her voice above a whisper in case by some chance someone might overhear her.

Conte shrugged, digging into a pocket on his cargos. "That ain't no way to talk to someone who just saved your ass, Jack."

Mostly because she felt the need to cover up the fact that she'd been so frightened when he so obviously hadn't, Jack glared at him. "Some fucking tough guy you are. What was it you said to me? No one would fuck with you because you were the toughest son of a bitch in town? Well you were obviously on your way to proving it, bud. If you had that fast a draw, why the hell didn't you waste the fuckers the first chance you got? You do realize that whoever the hell was those guys' boss is going to be after the two of us now, and so are the police! So next time, please don't hesitate to take out all the witnesses!" she half-yelled, her temper heating up her entire body, and causing her hands to shake as she clenched them into fists.

Dom began to chuckle, finally pulling a cigar out of his pocket and with steady hands took one end in his mouth and lit up. "There's something you need to learn, Jack, and you're fortunate that I'm here to teach it to you. And that something is that actions always speak louder than words. And some actions, speak louder than other actions. Now quit bitching me out, get down on your fucking knees, and cover your head," he demanded calmly, in no mood to joke with her.

"Why should I?" she asked, angrily placing her fists on her hips, pissed as hell that he was asking for what she thought he was asking for.

He shrugged, looking at his chrono. "You wanna stand for this, suit yourself. You'll probably get a better view anyway," he said, being almost cryptic.

He slowly took a drag on his cigar, almost closing his eyes as a peaceful smile touched his lips. When he slowly exhaled, blowing out the sweet-smelling smoke, Jack almost thought she heard him whisper some word in a foreign language. But she couldn't have been sure, considering at that exact moment she was knocked violently off her feet by fiercest and most sudden force she'd ever been hit by in her life. For a second she thought that hell itself had broken through the crust of the earth and was trying to swallow her whole.

There was an extraordinary amount of heat, and the roar and her ears didn't quit even as the world began to slowly re-balance itself some moments later. It seemed like it was some time before she finally sat up and attempted to compute what exactly had just happened, but from Conte's point of view it was only a half a minute or so.

"What...what the fuck was that?" she asked, her voice a little too loud because of her sudden hearing loss. Her gaze finally fell on him, and she noticed after some time of staring at him that he was still standing. From her perspective, he hadn't moved an inch. The only way that should've been possible was if he'd been expecting what was coming.

Dom shrugged, smirking down at her and taking another hit off of his cigar. "That, Jack, was a thug barbeque. And believe me, I've been waiting a long freakin' time to pull a stunt like that," he laughed, honestly enjoying himself as though he'd just pulled the best prank ever invented.

At last he offered her a hand, and she gratefully took it, allowing him to pull her to her feet. "You blew them up? You blew up the crime scene?" she asked, sagging against him slightly, still stunned by the blast.

He was forced to abort his next shrug as he looped one arm under hers, supporting her weight so she wouldn't sink back to the ground. "Figured they were muscle working for that guy Shella's probably getting the Seka from, and that means we really don't want anyone connecting either of us to the place where they were killed. Seriously, how many other 'top secret' jobs would be going down around here that would be bigger than selling fake stolen cars?" he asked, taking a second to get a better grip around her waist with his right arm as he slowly moved the two of them along. There would be authorities absolutely crawling all over the area within seconds, and he sure as hell didn't want to be hanging around when they got there.

Jack leaned on him heavily, once again resuming a strong two-armed hold around his chest, doing her best to carry her own weight on her legs in the current stunned condition that was clinging to her. "So you blew them up? When did you plant the bomb? How did I not even know you were carrying a bomb?" she asked, feeling stupid and disoriented.

Dom laughed out loud, honestly amused by what he saw as her ever endearing naivety. "Let's just say that when some boys spend too much time traveling alone through space, they tend to get a little too creative in their attempts to pass the time."

"Oh, that makes sense, I guess," Jack said, her eyes and voice still dull from the slight shock she was suffering. "You know, Rick doesn't like cryo sleep either. He never really goes to sleep, I guess. You have that problem too, Dom?"

A laugh rumbled deep in his chest, soothing her in ways that words couldn't. "I wouldn't know. The only tubes that've ever been available to me were the ones that filled up with loc gel. I have aquaphobia, so I've really never tried it. Too afraid of drowning in my sleep," he replied simply, glad to see that his little trick had caught her interest...and diverted her anger...

"Yeah, I think you told me that once..." she agreed. Then continued after a pause, "So tell me one more time how you knew that Mustang was a fake?"

They were making good progress down the street, and were just getting out of the vicinity of the 'accident' as sirens and horns began screaming from the direction of the explosion.

"I knew it was fake because all the labels on individual parts said 'Made in USA' instead of 'Made in China,'" he informed her, snickering at his own joke.

"Serious?" Jack asked, wondering if he was just pulling her leg.

"Dead serious, Jack," he replied, sounding too amused for her to take him seriously at all.

She decided it had been far too long of a day to press the issue, and simply hugged him tighter as they continued down the street under the light of the moon and the stars, slowly making their way back to Riddick's house, together fading away into the calm of darkness.