Vakko had explained to him that it couldn't be anytime, it had to be a certain time. Which he was entirely sure was a bunch of bullshit, but only one of them had been to the underverse, or at least tried, and Riddick wasn't going to fight him on this.

Elnora had been exploring when Riddick returned from the master's chambers. She wasn't fully understanding his position here, but she didn't complain when he pointed her to Dame Vakko's old quarters and told her to have a rest. He hadn't explained to her yet that she wasn't going to make it, not after this was all said and done; that bitter taste of blood on his tongue.

Vakko had explained that the ship needs to be in the right place, that it needed to be facing the right way. He pointed out the coordinates on the palm map, sure of himself, his failing lungs rattling inside his rib cage. After handing Riddick the key to the main pilot bay, Vakko resigned to the bed, muttering about earning a rest. Leaving him be, Riddick headed up to the station, wanting to quickly get this ship back in working condition to move it where it needed to go.

As he stepped onto the landing, looking out over the vast viewing window that stared out over the stars, he couldn't help but feel the creep of the phantom version of Fiona just behind him. Her soft chuckle, her fingers sliding along his neck, he dared not to turn around and see her, her voice in his ear, beckoning him back. His body ached for the touch of her skin, for the warmth she provided, for the rush that she gave him.

He wasn't sure why he was breathing. The thought had rarely crossed him mind in the past, and usually it only came to him when he was in a life or death situation, but this time it was much deeper. He was alive, he could drop this, he could move to an isolated planet, work out the rest of his days, and be peaceful alone. So why?

She was why.

He grunted, flinching away from the tickle on his neck, his brain making it all real. She was more important to him than any other living creature on the planet had ever been, and he had made the decision to walk away from her before she was taken from him. Taken like the rest of the people who interfered and tried to do him right.

He figured he could have fought, when he woke, seeing Fiona beside him in a deep sleep, a frown upon her face. He could have done what he does best and cut his way out of there, with her body on his shoulder, ready to wake when he had her safely on a ship they stole. Like old times, the idea brining a small smile to his lips. It was gone quick though, the reality more prominent. The truth was, Aereon's quick tongue convinced him to step out without Fiona, to take a ship given to him, and coordinated to find Vakko. The last words of Aereon's haunting him, because he wasn't sure if they really were true.

The old Riddick will have no problem finding someone who will die for him, now go, before she wakes.

It only took two days to get there. Vakko kept to the bed most the time, but Riddick had gotten into the routine of bringing him food and drink. He felt like a maid for the most part, Vakko not thanking him, but grunting with appreciation. The man was dying, each breathe a step closer to the end. The rattle in his chest was getting longer, and if he was possible, he was getting paler.

Elnora didn't seem to notice that the ship had moved, nor did she bother him. Her arrival for this moment seemed almost fated, as she was enthralled with Necro culture. He found her on occasion nose deep in a book that had been stashed in Dame Vakko's closet.

They arrived the night before, the milky darkness around them vast. There was no light outside the shit, no star near by to give warmth. The inside of the Armada was cold, the stillness on the inside and outside deafening.

"Are you going to tell her?" Vakko glanced up from the bowl of soup that Riddick had brought him. They were sitting in front of the fireplace now, enjoying the silence of the ship, a fire crackling in the hearth just before them. There wasn't much warmth on a ship that had no power left to it. The strange hum of the underverse resonated throughout the room they were in, as though it knew the time was vastly approaching.

"She'd run."

"Fair point. I suppose she's not as crazy as my wife was." Vakko chuckled to himself, coughing on the warm liquid that moved down his throat. "Devotion is the death of almost all people, as I'm sure you know." They shared in the silence; the phantom of Fiona perched beside the fire now, still in her necromancer dress. Her skin shinned like diamonds, everything about her ethereal. Her eyes had a glow to them even in the dark, and although Riddick tried to wish her away like he had been able to in the past, she wouldn't budge. He assumed, as she followed him everywhere now, that this was the underverse playing tricks on him.

"Just hours away now." Vakko made to put his bowl down, standing slowly, stretching out his arms as he tried to balance his weight. He had the curve of a 90-year-old man to his back, the color to his skin completely gone at this point. "Go and fetch your sacrifice, lets getting started on the preparation."

"Bryan." Fiona's throat was dry. She had finally closed her eyes and let sleep take her for just a moment, and now opening her eyes she wished desperately she had stayed awake earlier. "Why?"

The Armada sat before them, the vast darkness around it bleak. The only reason she could see the surface was due to the lights from their little jumper ship, shining brightly on the main entrance that sat level with the ground when they conquered planets in the past. Her stomach had long since dropped inside her, the swell in her chest making it hard to breathe. She despised this ship, despised everything it stood for, what it had done to her. She set an icy glare on Bryan, wanting more than anything to rip his throat from his body.

"This is the final step Fiona. Aereon says you're not ready, but I don't entirely agree with that." He maneuvered their ship to the entrance of the docking bay, finding the door already open. The vast emptiness of the Armada did not surprise him. The Necromanger's had died out when their Lord Marshall had been killed. The power he had harnessed as the shadow elemental had been the fuel to make this all possible; with his death, and the rebirth of Fiona, everything in here had slowly started to rot.

"So, all of this is just another planned excursion by the fuckin fantastic Aereon. Just another planned part of my life that I have no fucking control over."

"Yes and No." Bryan initiated the attachment of their ship to a docking bay, weary of the ship that sat across the vast hanger from them. Fiona hadn't noticed it, her anger deeply set as she began to shake. As soon as the Armada had fully connected she was out of her seat, opening the doors and moving as far from him as she could. "Fiona, wait!" He followed out of frustration, grabbing her arm and turning her to face him. "This is not Aereon's initial plan, as it's extremely early in her timeline. Trust me, you need to do this to be able to be free."

"Last thing I'm going to do for a long fucking time Bryan, is trust you. Get your hands off me." He released her then, watching as she stalked off into the ship, cursing under her breath. A dark glow about her, a black shift of shadow seemed to grow, the very air around her electric. He shook his head, closing his eyes and stressing a hand through his hair. He could still see the ship from here, his minding going over the repercussions of Riddick being here.

She'd kill him if she found out Riddick was still alive, and that he had known. He knew that.

Fiona found herself marching around the empty Armada, her anger beyond her control. She could feel the radiation of what was inside her spilling out as she let out an exasperated cry. Her own voice came back to her, the silence around them defining. Closing her eyes and slipping down into a sitting position on the steps in front of the throne, Fiona felt tears slip from her eyes. She was tired of all of this. She was tired of being alive and being used and controlled. She felt like a puppet, and the strings seemed to be growing tighter and tighter.

Suicide had been a thought, in the first month of being awake after her deep sleep. She had debated it day and night, not doing much of anything as Bryan sat beside her and coaxed her to eat food. But there had never been the final moment that put her there, the final straw. So she kept going, kept seeing Riddick, kept reliving his death over and over in her head.

Free. He said this was what she needed to do to finally be free.

Shaking her head, Fiona rose and stared at the throne, remembering the ghostly image of Riddick sitting at it. Freedom is what she wanted now, more than anything. She wanted to go back to the days when running was fun, when seeing the universe was a trivial thing; before prophecies were known to her, before she was something special.

Riddick heard the strange cry of frustration deep inside the ship from a voice he didn't recognize as he slit the throat of Elnora. Her eyes, filled with tears and looking up at him in confusion, went dead as her blood spilled from her neck and her body collapsed around his feet. Vakko waved it off, telling him to continue forward, that there was no time to stop now.

Glancing at the doors one last time Riddick nodded, knowing that any intruder wouldn't be able to follow him anyhow. Turning his back to the ship he stepped forward into the purple mist, Elnora's blood on his hands, the phantom chuckle of Fiona all around him.