I totally forgot to do this with the last chapter: I do NOT own Pitch Black, I don't own the totally awesome script, or the really amazing characters. None of it is mine! I claim NOTHING! The only thing I own is my mind. Oh, and the rating changed because I wanted to follow the original script in some places, and it has some 'strong language'.

Again it felt like we were on an endless death march, and my feet dragged slightly as I walked. My body begged for water, and I felt starved of oxygen. There was a slight shimmer on the sand in front of us, and I just waited for the cliche mirage to pop up with an oasis. My breathing was labored, and I shivered as a drop of sweat glided down my neck and onto my back. God this was awful. I looked into the sky and silently willed a cloud to appear and block out at least one of the suns, this was getting ridiculous!

We walked in a scar in the land, it looked to be a skid mark from when the ship crashed. Or at least that was the most logical explanation for the chunks of metal and wires that littered the area. Black smoke would rise out of some of the bigger pieces, and the air smelled like burned rubber and smoke. I kicked a piece of tubing out of my way and Aria picked up a piece of cloth from the ground. We exchanged worried glances before turning back to stare at the bigger part of the wreckage. I waited anxiously for someone to come out of there, but it was hard to see into the distance with the glare of the sun on the sand.

Slowly a black figure faded into sight in the distance, and I picked up my speed with renewed vigor. The black blob got clearer, and it seemed to pick something out of the sand. It threw the object down violently, then stalked off towards a group of what I hoped were people.

Aria saw them too, and I heard her breathe a sigh of relief. We watched as the group moved into the other part of the crashed object. I got nervous for a moment, 'What if these people aren't normal, what if they are psycho murderers who wear your skin as clothing and eat the flesh from your bones so they could carve them into knives?' I shuddered as I thought of my tan skin as someone else's pajama bottoms. I was wary of approaching them, but we really didn't have any choice, these were the only other people we had found, and we would not last long out here by ourselves.

I felt Aria rush past me, and watched as she tripped in the sand. I stifled a giggle as I walked over to her and offered my hand. She took one look at my smirk and turned her head away with a 'hmph', she ignored my awaiting hand and stood up herself.

"I didn't trip," she started, "I simply thought I saw something on the ground!" This time I openly laughed. Her face was scrunched up into a pout, and she turned her head away from me, a slight blush staining her cheeks.

"Of course," I managed to choke out. "Just be careful, or after your next trip, I'll have to see you next fall!" I broke out into a fit of giggles, it was a super lame joke but I couldn't help myself. Elementary students probably found it hilarious, but the pun was as old as the dirt under our feet. I felt like a total dork for saying it, but the moment was perfect for it and I couldn't pass up the chance. It broke the lingering tension in me, and I felt better after I had a good laugh.

I quickly caught up to her, wiping at my eye to get rid of a tear that threatened to escape after I laughed too hard. I walked behind her, and I touched her shoulder to get her attention back. She kept her back to me, displaying her anger at my mirth. I know she doesn't like getting teased, but right now she was just being a big drama queen.

"What?" she growled out, refusing to face me as she continued marching away.

"Remember what I said, we don't know these people, and we don't know where we are," I said, all traces of my joking mood gone from my voice as I said this to her. Aria turned her whole body around to look at me, then she nodded and I continued, "They could be psychos, so try not to anger them, but at the same time don't get too close to anyone. Anything could happen, and now we only have each other to rely on."

Aria nodded and we continued walking, albeit at a slower pace due to Aria's new found skepticism. She never thought of the dangers, she always ran ahead without thinking and it got her into trouble more times than I can count. She was blissfully ignorant to the horrors of the world, and it really worried me. And maybe I was more paranoid than the average person, but I always played it safe, Aria just ran head first into everything. I reached into my bra and felt for the folding knife I always kept there. It wasn't much, but it was better than nothing. As a child, Aria was bullied and pushed around because of her kindness, and so I took it upon myself to always protect her. I had taken self-defense classes at first, then moved to kickboxing, taekwondo, and jujitsu. I excelled at every form of martial arts, and my affinity for weapons made learning weapons handling easy. I worked out daily, and I trained hard for the day that Aria got herself into something way over her head. She just had awful luck like that.

As we got closer to the wreckage, I could faintly hear voices. They were hard to understand, but if I concentrated I could make out what they were saying. It was difficult to separate the voices from the sounds of them rummaging through something, but what I did hear did not sound good.

"Well, what's the point, anyway? If the man's gone, he's gone. Why should he bother us?" a squeaky man's voice questioned. He sounded like he had a British accent, but I couldn't be sure.

"Maybe to take what you got," another male voice responded, but this one was more masculine and had a southern twang to it. "Maybe to work your nerves, and maybe he'll come back, and just skull-fuck you in your sleep." I heard rustling and thumping from inside, so they must have closed something, or hit something, it didn't really matter.

"Sounds like a charmer," a female voice chimed in, she sounded Australian and her remark was undoubtedly sarcastic.

I wondered at that for a moment, was there someone dangerous out here? They wouldn't be saying crap like that about a saint so they must be worried about whoever this person was would be coming back for them. I looked over at Aria to see if she heard them too, but the look on her face was ignorant of what had just happened. I nudged her and mouthed 'be careful' before we entered the 'ship'.

I heard footsteps come near us, and as we rounded a corner Aria ran into someone. "Oh! Sorry love, I didn't see you there," the Australian sounding woman said. She was a tall lady, and she had curly dark brown hair that was pulled behind her at the top. She wore a lot of leather, and she had pretty silver beads around her neck. She had her hands on Aria's shoulders to keep her from falling down, and she looked at her with concern. Aria looked startled, and a little scared, but she managed to regain her balance. "Now who might you two be? I ain't seen you before, and I thought we found all the other survivors."

"We are stowaways!" Aria blurted. I mentally smacked myself in the forehead, of course she had to make it sound suspicious. I noticed though, that as Aria blurted that out, another woman walked up behind the first, and winced at what Aria had said. She looked down for a moment, and even after she picked her head up she didn't look at us for a while. It seemed to me that she was hiding something, you don't avoid eye contact like that unless you are really, painfully shy, or you have a secret.

"Huh, well doesn't matter now! I'm Shazza, and it's nice to meet you," the tall leather clad woman said. Her name was kinda odd to me, but who was I to judge, mine was Chara. Aria shook hands with Shazza and introduced us, she seemed much less skittish now, and actually managed a small smile at the woman. Shazza looked behind her and noticed the blonde woman standing there. "And this is our captain and life saver, Carolyn Fry." She motioned her head at the blonde woman and I took a moment to observe Carolyn. She had short, dirty blonde hair and a nice round face. She was average height, and she seemed nice, but her cloths were strange. She had a tight shirt thing that zipped up in the front, and barely reached past her belly button. Faded grey jeans clung tightly to her legs, and she had a brown belt with some small tools attached to it. She didn't exactly look like a captain, but maybe that was just the lack of a colorful talking bird on her shoulder.

"Just call me Fry," our 'captain' said. She didn't really look us in the eye long before she walked past us and outside. I watched her as she left, she was definitely hiding something.

"C'mon love, you gotta meet the others," Shazza said as she lead us further into ship. There were broken beams everywhere, and these strange neon blue tubes lining the ceiling. It was pretty dark in here, but it felt good to be out of the sun for a while. I had a feeling I would be burned and as red as a lobster by the time whatever this is, is over.

Aria and Shazza chatted as we walked, but I kept my attention on our surroundings. I didn't trust anyone, and Aria was already doing what I told her not to, she was making friends. In any survivor movie ever created, people died, sometimes a lot of people, sometimes only a few. But the point was that Aria was gonna be devastated when people started dropping. She was too kind to everyone, her heart was too big and she got hurt too easily. If this ended as bad as I thought it was going to, then we would be lucky if we survived this.

A noise behind me caught my attention, and I felt someone sneaking up behind me. I continued walking, and waited for their approach. I felt a hot breath on my neck, and a hand reached around me, holding something. I quickly turned around, grabbing whoever it was by the wrist, and yanked their arm behind their back. I heard a clatter as whatever they were holding dropped to the floor and I pulled their arm higher before I heard a yelp of pain.

"Let him go," Aria said behind me, her hands on my shoulders. "He's just a boy, he was only kidding."

I backed off and looked the kid over. He had short brown hair, and wore a grey paperboy hat. He had an ugly brown striped and randomly patterned shirt on and both his shirt and pants were too big. He dressed like a boy, but his face was pretty like a girl's. He had a stunned expression on his face as he rubbed his arm. I suddenly felt really bad. "Look, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you," I apologized, scratching the back of my neck sheepishly.

"Dude, you got skills!" the boy exclaimed. I was definitely surprised. He was practically bouncing up and down with excitement. "I'm Jack, who're you?"

"Chara," I answered, a little unsure with his behavior. I could have broke his arm and yet here he was, all smiles and sunshine. It was a little unnerving. I pointed to Aria when I noticed his attention on her. "And this is my cousin Aria."

He turned back to me and stared at me with sparkles in his eyes and I heard Aria giggle in the background. "Do you think you could teach me some moves?" Jack asked.

I looked at Aria and then Shazza, and they both shrugged their shoulders. "I can't see why not." I watched as he bounded away, clearly happy. I just shook my head and followed Aria and Shazza when they continued on.

Next we met Zeke, Shazza's husband. He was really dark skinned, with a scraggly beard and black hair speckled with grey. He had the same accent as Shazza, and he seemed like a nice, uninteresting man. He had a dark green long sleeve shirt over a white long sleeve shirt. His cloths were big on him, and they made him look poor. Maybe he and Shazza were poor, but her leather outfit didn't look cheap.

After him we met Paris, he was the squeaky voice I heard before. He was tall and lanky, the more studious type. He had small wire glasses that were cracked and a little bent, and short dark hair. His cloths were interesting though, he wore a reddish robe thing, and stripped pants underneath it. He was a mouse of a man, and was carrying a large amount of booze with him. For some reason he irritated me, and I wouldn't be surprised if he complained a lot.

And that was when we met Johns. He was what Shazza called a police officer, and he definitely dressed the part. But there was something off about him, his eyes were hungry, and he walked with an air of superiority. He had curly, light brown or dark blonde hair, and he could have been good looking if he didn't give me the creeps. I didn't like the way he was looking at me or Aria, and if I didn't have any self control I might have just punched him right in the face. Aria didn't seem to get the same feeling though, because she was all blushing and bashful around him. She introduced herself, and she acted all sweet and when he held his hand out to shake it, she didn't seem to mind when he held on a bit longer than necessary.

"So if she is Aria, then you must be Chara. Charming name," he greeted, holding out his hand for me to shake.

I looked at it distastefully before taking it, a fake smile plastered on my face. "I must be," I responded. I noticed a slight tick in his jaw, like he noticed my disliking of him. Yet he still held my hand longer than necessary, just like Aria. When he looked back at Aria I wiped my hand on my pants, trying to get rid of his sweaty palm and sleazy look.

"I hope you two will be careful, we seem to have found ourselves with a criminal on the loose," Johns commented, looking between us.

Aria opened her mouth to speak, but I interrupted her, "Really, Officer, and what do you plan to do about that?"

He glared at me for a second before he too plastered a fake smile on his face. "I am in the midst of tracking him now, Chara," he purred my name, and I did not like it. I really wanted to jab my fingers in his eyes then storm away, dragging Aria behind me. But that would be rude.

"And what has this prisoner done?" Aria butted in. She broke the tension, but I still wanted to kill him somehow. Probably slowly and painfully. Like with a rock or something.

"He has murdered more people than you can count, and has escaped from several maximum security prisons," Johns started, walking around me and Aria slowly, like we were some kind of prey. "He'd kill you without a second thought, and he'd probably enjoy it. But hey, I'll protect you." He had his hand on Aria's shoulder, and he whispered the last part in her ear. If I didn't have the excellent hearing I did, I might have missed it completely. Aria was blushing like an idiot, and I grit my teeth in frustration. Why couldn't she see him for the creep he is?

"No thanks," I said, pulling Aria away from him. "I think we'll be fine."

I grabbed her arm as we walked away, Shazza not far behind us. I felt his eyes glaring into my back, and I was so tempted to flip him the bird while I stalked off. My grip unconsciously tightened on Aria's arm, and she made a small noise of protest. I stopped and turned to her, questions burning in her eyes. I mumbled an apology before letting her go and setting back off to go outside. I heard Aria talking to Shazza as they followed, but at this point I really didn't care anymore. I was once again mumbling, but this time it was curses and hateful words spoken under my breath. I don't know what it is about that guy, but he really ticks me off. Maybe it was the way he looked at us, but it felt like it went deeper than that. There was something off about him, and he almost reminded me of those druggies from Milwaukee. I don't understand how everyone else trusts him so easily, even Shazza didn't do anything about his unwanted attention. Of course, he was acting as a police officer, so maybe that had something to do with everyone's easy won faith. I grumbled some more about this stupid desert, its three suns, and no water. I just wanted a blue icee dammit!

As we got outside, pain once more shot through my eyes as they tried to adjust to the sudden brightness. I felt like I was stuck in a dryer, there was no humidity at all and it really took a lot out of me. The sand reflected the light, and for a moment I was worried it would blind me, but alas I saw some figures a ways away from us and decided I probably couldn't go blind just because something is too bright for comfort. There looked to be about four of them, and it almost looked like they were praying. I turned and looked at Shazza, asking her who they were.

"That's Imam and his boys. Ali, Hassan, and Sulieman, they're Chrislams on their way to New Mecca," Shazza informed me. I nodded my head in thanks, and watched as she walked away. Aria looked between me and her and I smiled at her, giving her approval to follow Shazza. I was worried about these Chrislams, not only did they seem to have a strange name and concept, but they could turn into the religious fanatics that cause the deaths of others. Kinda like in the movie The Mist, when that lady created a cult and tried to sacrifice a child or whatever.

I continued to watch them warily and listen to their Adhan, when footsteps started coming towards me. Jacks voice cut through my thought, "Why are you dressed so funny?"

I looked down at myself, I didn't think I looked strange. I had light blue, bell-bottom jeans on that had holes in the knees with cute bleached circles here and there. For a top I had a simple grey wife-beater and, while I admit, it did have some sweat stains on it, it hugged my body in all the right places. I had a simple onyx pendant on a long silver chain wrapped around my neck, and my hair was up in a messy bun. My nails were painted a metallic grey, and I had one silver ring on my middle finger. My shoes were relatively normal too, they were converse knockoffs with the original black and white coloring. I definitely looked normal.

I looked over at Aria, she didn't look unusual either. She wore dark blue shorts that clung to her legs, but came down to just above her knees. She had a purple graphic tee on with some colorful jelly bracelets. There weren't a ton of them, but a good range of colors that tied in with her shirt. She had actual converse on her feet, but hers were purple. To me she kinda looked like one of those weird swag people with their sideways hats, but she told me before that she just likes the vibrant colors.

"What do you mean?" I questioned, not understanding what Jack was getting at. I sat down in the sand and Jack sat next to me.

"Well, I've never seen a shirt like your friend is wearing, and your pants kinda look funny," he replied. I must have looked offended or something, because Jack just laughed and jabbed me in the side with his elbow. "I ain't saying you look bad! Just, different."

"Hardy, har har. Poke fun of the poor eighteen year old with the funny pants," I said, pretending to be upset. It looked like Jack was about to say something, when something in the distance caught his attention. I turned and looked at where he was staring, and saw Johns standing on the ship. He was looking in a pair of binoculars out into the distance, and he seemed pretty focused on something. "Hey Jack, I was never told what happened, why'd we crash?"

"Fry said we hit somthin' like a rogue comet or meteor shower, and then we crashed on this planet here," Jack looked out into the sky, then got quiet.

"Where were we going?"

"Most of us were going to Helion Prime, but Shazza and Zeke were going somewhere else and Johns was takin' Riddick to some slam," Jack said, slightly puzzled. "How come you don't know where we were goin'?"

"Like I said before, we were stowaways, we just needed to get... uh, off-planet," I answered. This was all so confusing, we were on an unknown planet, on our way to another planet, and there were Chrislams. I've never even heard of Chrislams before! I knew for a fact that there weren't people out living in space, I mean, we barely made it to the moon, and people still say that never happened. There was no way that we crashed a space ship, on a foreign planet. That was Britney Spears crazy, or was the phrase bat-shit? Oh well, means the same thing.

I turned around to see Jack gone, he was over by Shazza and Zeke, who were giving him and Aria something to breathe in. I had a moment of panic, waiting for them to pass out, but when nothing happened I calmed down. I got up and walked over to them.

"Hey Imam, if we're lookin' for water we should leave soon," Fry started. "We should leave before nightfall, when its cooler." Nightfall sounded wonderful right about now. I had had enough of this blasted heat and even just a small, cool breeze would be much appreciated.

Imam called out to the boy, Ali, and they walked away, just as Paris came up. He was out of breath and he leaned heavily on some old scythe weapon-thing. "Excuse me," he called, and everyone turned to look at him. "I think you should see this."

Everyone followed Paris around the ship, and everyone else was shocked. The just noticed the third sun, rising in all of its blue glory as the other two set. Everyone stared at it in disbelief, save for myself and Aria because we already knew this. I just couldn't understand how they hadn't seen it earlier.

Jack was the first to break the silence. "Three suns?" he asked, incredulous. He turned from the blue sun to look at Fry, who gave him no answers

"Bloody hell," Shazza breathed.

"So much for your nightfall," Zeke commented, looking at Fry.

Paris decided to pipe up, "So much for my cocktail hour."

Imam had his arms around Hassan as he walked up to everyone. He smiled and gladly stated, "We take this as a good sign. A path, direction from Allah, blue sun means blue water."

"Ever wonder why I'm and atheist?" Zeke questioned, before turning and walking away.

It was then that Johns climbed down from his perch on top of the ship and approached everyone. "Its a bit of a bad sign, that's Riddick's direction," Johns stated, as he pointed towards the blue sun. His southern accent was suddenly irritating, and on anyone else it might have been charming. I guess he just ruins everything.

"I thought you found his restraints over there," Fry added in. "towards sunset?" It was less of a question, and more of a statement. She looked at Johns, and I hoped with all my heart that the look in her eyes meant she didn't trust him. Even if a little, tiny bit of her mistrusts him, that would be enough for me.

"Right," Johns agreed, nodding his head. "that means he went towards sunrise." Johns walked over to Zeke's retreating figure, and grabbed something behind his back. "Zeke," he called. He pulled a strange looking gun from behind him and pulled back the barrel, letting it snap back into black with a click. "Fully loaded clip, safety is on, fire one shot if you see him," he instructed, handing the gun to Zeke.

"You're going off too?"

"Yeah."

"What happens when Riddick spots us first?" Paris questioned nervously.

Johns let a slow, creepy smile spread across his face before responding, "There will be no shots." He then walked away, leaving everyone to their thoughts.

Aria and I were quiet the entire time, not really having anything to add to the conversation. I thought about the last few things they said, they talked about a man, they did say he, named Riddick. I remembered Jack mentioning something about Johns, Riddick, and a slam, so Riddick must be the murderer and escape artist Johns was talking about earlier. Another odd name.

I looked at Aria, watching as she meant to go with Johns and Fry in search of water. I thought quickly, I didn't want her near Johns longer than necessary, but we still needed to be there when water was found. I sighed, great, we have to split up. "Hey Aria," I called. She turned to look at me questioningly. "I think you should stay here, and rest up awhile. I'll go with them in search for water."

"Okay," she looked at me warily, uncertainty in her voice.

"Don't worry, I'll come back with water, I promise!"

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