A Thousand Shades Of Black

Chapter Five – Can’t Fight the Future

Vaako stepped out into the sunlight and lifted the tools on his shoulder onto the waiting truck. They had finished rebuilding this area and were moving on to the next one. He had made friends here on this world that he had once tried to destroy. His tireless efforts at rebuilding and his calm, steady nature had made him a place amongst these people.

There had been a moment on the bridge of the Basilica, looking into the Threshold, seeing the future he could have, when he had wanted it so much that he had been ready to run off of the ship and fling himself into it. Riddick’s words had stopped him. “Too much to do back there.” Vaako looked around at this world and knew he had been right not to cross over. There really was too much to do and so much to atone for as well.

“Vaako! Hey, come on!” McCauley shouted and he hauled himself onto the truck. It pulled away and he saw again his wife’s face, eyes wide with shock as he stepped back away from the transport. So beautiful, so sensual, so treacherous. Had there ever been such a fool as he was?
She was dead and gone away now and he was a widower. Of course, he was hardly alone on this planet. Everyone here had lost someone and when he said he’d lost his wife and didn’t want to talk about it, everyone here understood.

“Coming, keep your shirt on!” It was a phrase he’d picked up from the other workers and he used it a lot now. There was a whole new way of thinking here, a whole new way of doing things. He was living for the first time in as long as he could remember. He was hopeful for the first time ever.

The other members of his crew grinned and flipped off the short rough-hewn foreman who flipped them off in return with a long-suffering look. Paterson, a tall, well-built young man with a cowlick and a wide cheerful smile handed Vaako a water bulb that he accepted gratefully. Regina, a lanky woman with deep haunted gray eyes favored him with one of her rare smiles. He smiled back and passed the bulb to her after he had taken a swig.

These three people as well as Jacks, Davis, Riley and Tom – the rest of his building crew – they were becoming as much his people as the Necromongers had been, as Freet and the other survivors were, as much as Riddick, Sturm, Lajjun and Ziza were. They were family. He had never had this kind of bond with the other Necros, there was too much competition between them all. He had never known such welcome and such a warm and kind set of people.

He liked it here.

Kyra looked out the hospital window at the bright sunlight. Wind pushed the curtains against her body and she clawed them to one side, impatient to stare at the hot blue sky. Sweat trickled down her neck, something that never happened in the Underverse. There had been no pain there, no sorrow, but also no moments of sheer heart-stopping exhilaration. There was a peaceful joy that someday she might yearn for, need and crave, but for now she took a deep lungful of air and was content.

Imam and Carolyn had been right about her; she wasn’t done here and she had so much left to do and see and be. She breathed in the fresh air and let herself feel safe and cared for. Riddick had risked death again and again to keep her alive, the people of this world welcomed her despite her past and she had a future spreading out before her that seemed bright and hopeful.

Riddick was staying too. The people of this world would never allow the Mercs to come here and take him away for he was their hero. He was safe and without pursuit for the first time in his life and Kyra was getting more time with him than she ever had before. She had family again.

Riddick, Lajjun, Ziza and even the enigmatic Sturm came to visit her every day. It was wonderful to see Riddick. He had become rather overprotective of her since her return from the Underverse, which was annoying, but he was here and that was all that mattered. Lajjun clucked over her and fussed like Kyra was little older than Ziza, which ought to have been maddening but somehow was soothing instead.

Ziza was ecstatic to have another figure from her father’s stories come into her life and acted like Kyra was her big sister. Kyra had been horrified at first, feeling wholly inadequate to the task of role model to a young girl. Riddick’s gleeful expression when he realized what her initial reaction was had made her pause. She started to really think about how he must have felt when she had looked at him the way Ziza now looked at her. It had stopped her initial decision to pull away from the little girl, remembering the pain of rejection she had felt once herself. It had also led to her first real apology to Riddick. He had just given her that feral grin, but she knew it meant something to him to hear it.

As for Sturm, well, she was confusing to Kyra. She followed Riddick around like his shadow but they never touched or kissed. Lajjun had told her that they slept in separate bedrooms and didn’t seem to be together. Yet there was this underlying tension that just radiated off of them that was definitely sexual in nature. Kyra couldn’t imagine Riddick not going after what he wanted and he quite obviously wanted Sturm. What Sturm wanted was never very clear.

Sturm was strangely protective of Kyra as well, watching her doctors narrowly as they cared for her and visiting often, usually randomly and at odd times. Sturm was capable of sitting silently beside her for hours while Kyra poured out her heart or engaging her in lively debates if that was what Kyra wanted. Yet no matter how much you talked to Sturm, you never felt as though you really knew her. There were wells of silence in her that were never sounded. She was a mystery to Kyra and yet she guarded her as though she was close family. It was puzzling.
Riddick had brought her a whetstone and a collection of knives the second day she had been awake and she had made it her task to sharpen them all. Sturm had brought her synth-leather to make straps, customize hilts and craft sheaths for them. Kyra felt better with all the lovely sharp blades about her and the doctors hadn’t said a word.

She had family again; the first in so long a time that it was painful to think about. Riddick had finally accepted her as such and it was a joy like she had never known before. There was nothing in any universe to match what she had in this place.

She liked it here.

Riddick strode through the market with Ziza perched upon his broad shoulders. Alia stalked beside Lajjun who was sandwiched between them, her basket slowly filling with fruit and vegetables, unheeding of the stares her two companions drew. Ziza was chattering non-stop while the two Furyans scanned the crowd.

“And then the teacher said that it was rude to tell the boy that I was going to ghost him and I said that at least I warned him first.”

“Ziza!” Lajjun chided the girl.

“What?” Riddick chuckled at Ziza’s innocent reply and Alia glared at him.

“Better to show respect to your teachers, Ziza,” Alia rebuked her and Ziza sighed and slumped forward against Riddick’s shaved head, arms crossed with her chin resting on them.

“I’ll try but it’s not easy!” she pouted.

Riddick listened with half an ear to the discussion. He was more aware of the ground underfoot, the movements of the crowd and anything that might threaten his charges. Fry had been torn from his arms, he’d almost lost Kyra, Imam was dead, and despite the peace of this world he was not going to be dropping his guard anytime soon.

Still, the market was pleasant. No Mercs were after him here and he was accepted, as he had never been anywhere else.

Alia had agreed to stay here and to help him keep his promise to the Holy Man. They had moved into Lajjun’s house with Vaako and started rebuilding it. Riddick hadn’t lived with other people outside of a prison setting in so long he had forgotten how nice it could be to have someone else do the cooking. He had moved farther along the path Carolyn had set him on. He was rejoining the human race.

Aereon had stayed as well which confused him. He had thought that the destruction of the Necromonger threat would have sent her back home to her own world. Still, he was finding her company less irritating lately. Maybe she was starting to grow on him.

One of his stray Necros looked up as Riddick’s group passed and waved, smiling at him. Riddick nodded back and Ziza waved gleefully from her perch. People were actually glad to see him. How weird was that?

He liked it here.

The ship slipped into a distant orbit of the hot yellow world with its bright green seas. Sensors showed that it had all the things they needed to live and thrive here and that the planet had almost no defenses to speak of. A recent war had devastated the world and left it open and vulnerable. The ship’s inhabitants eyed it with interest and greed.

They liked it there.

Riddick was in the dream again; he knew it but couldn’t fight it. He was in a soft green forest that he knew now was on his race’s home world. He stared about at Furya and watched the light refracting through the trees with a strange hunger in his belly. Home. This was his home. It pulled at him, tugged at his mind and heart as no other place ever had or could.

“Riddick.” Shirah stepped from the shadows of a tree and greeted him with warmth in her voice. She had visited him many times now in visions or dreams or whatever these things were. He wished he knew what she wanted of him.

“Shirah,” he answered her absently, more interested at looking around at this world he couldn’t remember than anything else.

“Your people are scattered and leaderless, your world is empty and echoes only with the cries of the dead.” Shirah drifted closer. She seemed different this time, as though there was some strange new urgency to her.

“What do you expect me to do about it?” he snapped back at her. He had enough trouble dealing with the problems of Helion Prime. Leave that safe haven of a world and it would be back to dodging bounty hunters and cops.

“You are the only one who can gather the lost Furyans back to their home world and lead them,” she told him with a new sternness in her voice that hadn’t been there before. He shot her a dark look.

“What if I don’t give a damn?” he answered her, even though he knew it was a lie. Looking around this home he had never known, he felt a terrible longing for what he had lost.

“Then the race of Furyans will fail in their appointed task and night will eat this universe,” she retorted. “The Elementals know. They know that the Furyans are the fulcrum, the balancing point,” she continued, her draped white robes flowing over the landscape as she walked.

“Why us?” Riddick was irritated by the reference to Aereon’s people. He knew that there was much more going on here than he was being told and he hated that.

“Because we are the only race that can walk the Void. We opened the gates and now we must defend them. If we do not do this, then everything will fall away and be destroyed. You have to find our lost people and bring them home.” Riddick was angry now. No one told him what to do, not even some weird racial avatar of his people.

He jerked awake and felt the cool night air of Helion Prime caress his skin. He threw back the sheets and rose from the bed with a grimace. Standing up, he ran a hand across his stubbly head and went to do what he always did when he couldn’t sleep.

Alia cracked open one eye, knowing full well whose footsteps were tentatively shuffling towards her bed. Not again, she sighed to herself.

“Another nightmare?” she ground out, her voice rough from sleep.

“Yes.” A tiny sound, but quite pathetic really. Alia flung back the covers, letting in the cold night air.

“Well, come on,” she grumbled. A body slipped into the bed beside her and curled up to sleep. Alia dropped the blankets back over Ziza and wondered for the millionth time why the child chose to crawl into bed with her whenever she had a nightmare. Why not her mother or even Riddick? Ziza adored Riddick; Alia knew that but still when it was midnight and the monsters were under her bed, it was to Alia she ran.
Tucking an arm around the little girl and checking that her blade was still in easy reach, Alia drifted back into slumber.

Riddick watched the whole scene play out in the semi-darkness with a bemused expression. His nighttime prowl around the house had been interrupted as Ziza had darted from her bedroom into Alia’s. He doubted the child had even noticed him as he stood in the darkened hallway but he had been startled by her mad dash. It also wasn’t in the direction he had expected.

He hadn’t thought that Alia particularly liked Ziza. She rarely played with the little girl, was sharper towards her than any of the others were and was rather strict. In fact, he was under the impression that Alia didn’t much like children at all. He leaned against the doorjamb with a thoughtful look.

Now that he thought of it though, whether she liked them or not, the children all seemed to like her. Her brusqueness didn’t faze them and her strict no-nonsense attitude seemed to charm them. They watched her with shining eyes and followed her around. Ziza had even begun to imitate Alia’s style and posture. She had expressed a desire to learn knife fighting in such terms as had given her mother palpitations.

He watched the protective way she held the little girl against her side and it made him wonder. What really went on in her head? He trusted her – which constantly surprised him – but he really didn’t know her well, even after all these weeks on Helion Prime living in the same house with her.

His mind returned to the way she had made the energy shift to her hand, how his own body had responded to it, the way a part of him yearned to match that energy to reach out and … what? He didn’t know but it was irreversible, whatever it was. He wasn’t up for that, not by a long stretch – didn’t know if he’d ever be up for that.

There was a sharp humming noise that was growing louder and he went very still as he listened. Something was wrong outside. Alia jerked upright in the bed, woken by the same sound and he saw her drawing a long knife from under the pillow, one arm still around Ziza. Damn but he liked that woman.

“Huh? Whuuzzat?” He heard the sleepy mutterings of the child and then Alia caught sight of him standing in the doorway. She crawled from the bed, dragging Ziza along with her.

“Riddick?” She cocked her head as she came towards him, carrying the little girl with an arm clasped around her waist. Alia wasn’t short but she certainly wasn’t as tall as Riddick and Ziza’s latest growth spurt left her dangling from Alia’s grasp rather comically.

“Give her to me,” he commanded and Alia handed the child over to him. He scooped her up against him with one arm, using the other to draw his shiv. Ziza wrapped her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck, clinging like a baby monkey, with her eyes shut tight and her face buried into his shoulder. She had gone through so much lately that her response to any danger was to go very still and quiet.

The noise grew much louder and began to be accompanied by the sounds of combat and explosions. Doors being slammed open and running feet could be heard now from outside as the already traumatized citizens of New Mecca began to panic.

“Ziza?” Lajjun’s frantic voice cut across their hearing.

“Here,” Riddick replied as the dusky-skinned woman appeared in the hallway, her night wrap clutched around her. She ran to them, coffee eyes wide and Vaako materialized on the landing behind her, barefoot with gun in one hand and sword in the other.

“What is it?” Lajjun’s eyes darted around seeking the source of the sound.

“Ship,” Riddick murmured and turned to look at Alia. She nodded and moved off down the hallway towards the stairs at his unspoken command.

“This better not be another invasion,” Vaako grumbled. “I just finished re-building this damn city.” Riddick shot him a quelling glance; no need to give Lajjun an excuse to panic. The woman was extraordinarily brave and strong for someone with little to no experience with violence, but she could freeze up or lose it when things got too much for her.

The ex-Necromonger ducked his head in embarrassment then fell in beside Lajjun protectively as Riddick edged them downstairs after Alia. The sound of the front door crashing open came from down below but it was out of their sight.

The clatter of gunfire could be heard in the front hallway and then some wet sounds followed by thuds. Riddick moved more quickly, making sure the little girl was turned away from any approaching danger.

“Alia?” he called out, trying to sound unconcerned.

“Amateurs.” Alia’s voice could be heard to contemptuously declaim. He let out a breath in relief – she sounded unharmed.

Riddick stepped over the bodies of small, rather simian-looking aliens, checking to be certain they were all dead. He needn’t have worried for Alia was very thorough. They heard sharp noises from the street then screams and Alia lunged out the front door while the sounds of Armageddon fell again over the streets of the city.

“Alia!” Riddick felt a moment of panic as she vanished. He held his breath and counted to ten before she returned through the door with the children from next door in tow. Her face was grim and in the flickering candlelight he could see that she was covered in blood. The children, both even younger than Ziza, huddled shell-shocked at Alia’s feet as she barred the door.

“Invasion force – any ideas?” She looked at Riddick as she asked and he wanted to protest her assumption that he was in charge, but the words died aborning. She was right, he was Alpha. It was up to him to lead them.

“Fresh out,” he admitted. Looking around at the group, he knew the most vulnerable parties were the kids and Lajjun. Riddick could do nothing until they were stashed somewhere safe. He also had to find Kyra and see to it that she was protected.

“I’ll get them to the catacombs, you figure out what’s going on around here,” Vaako said and reached for Ziza. Riddick looked down at the little girl and then at Vaako. Ziza gave Riddick a look of utter trust and confidence.

“You keep them safe,” he muttered, his voice gruff with menace.

“Done,” Vaako assured him. Riddick set Ziza on her feet and Vaako and Lajjun picked up the other two children. They quickly fetched shoes and robes, swirling them on hastily. Alia pulled on her boots and pulled on a lightly armored jacket.

“Be careful, Mr. Riddick,” Ziza whispered to him as she followed Vaako and her mother. Riddick merely nodded at her in return. They were out the back door and gone in a twinkling.

“He’d die to protect them.” Alia sounded as though she were trying to convince herself.

“Anything happens to them, he will die,” Riddick promised, then he unbarred the door and stepped out into madness. “We need to find Kyra.”

“Why does that sound so familiar?” Alia joked behind him.

The aliens were small but fast, Riddick discovered. They spun like little dervishes as he attacked them. They had elongated arms, slender necks and a wiry strength that was hard to credit from a species so thin and short. They wore red jumpsuits with strange markings all over them but Riddick didn’t bother with an anthropological survey. He was too busy either shooting them or cutting them up.

Beside him, Alia had gone back into the Void. He really needed to learn that someday. Like a reaper machine, she moved forward with dreadful purpose. She looked like she was dancing, floating untouched through the fracas. He danced along next to her, grinning like a fiend, actually enjoying the killing for a change. These little monkey-faced bastards had invaded the wrong damn planet.

“Don’t know who they are fucking with!” Riddick roared as he decapitated another alien.

“They could be figuring it out.” Alia pointed to a small heavy artillery unit being turned towards their position.

“Time to go.” Riddick leapt upwards, grabbing at a balcony and Alia swarmed up the side of the building beside him. The reached the roof and took off running.

“Get to the hospital and get Kyra?” she asked, panting as she ran.

“Yup and kill everything in the way,” he agreed.

“I was fucking sleeping,” she growled and took off across a gap, legs pumping. She landed hard on the other side taking the impact out of her fall with a rolling stop. “That’s just rude,” she grumbled as she got to her feet again.

“Tell them, not me,” he advised, landing easily beside her.

A small ship rose beside them, its guns swiveling and he leapt onto it. He bent down and there was a horrible screeching noise as he ripped the ship’s canopy open with his bare hands. He reached in and grabbed the head of the pilot and snapped his neck with a quick brutal movement. He shoved off hard from the ship, leaping away from it as it began to plummet towards the ground and found himself back on the rooftop where Alia was waiting for him.

“Nice,” she said to him with a wide-eyed stare. He grinned at her, feeling the blood pounding in his veins. It was a rush to be able to impress the normally unflappable Alia. Still, they had things to do and places to go.

“Move,” he commanded and they resumed their run. She kept a pace behind him, her eyes moving over their back trail, letting him blaze a path for them. It was an amazing feeling, having someone he trusted at his back, knowing that she could handle herself and he wouldn’t have to worry about protecting her as well as himself. He gave himself over to the beast, reveling in his strength and speed, in the power to destroy that lay in his hands.

He was furious with the invaders but also elated by the hunt and the coming kill. He was enjoying himself immensely.

Alia raced after Riddick as they threw themselves across the gaps between buildings, headed for the hospital. Next to the medical center, a sleek red and gray craft had settled down which appeared to be the source of the alien invasion. She was both angry and curious about it. What in the name of flaying tools was going on? She had never seen a species like this one or even heard stories of anything similar and why were they launching an unprovoked attack on this world?

The questions bubbled in the back of her mind but most of her attention was on the run and keeping an eye out for more of the alien craft. Her mind was filling up with the red haze of a killing rage and she was controlling it with an effort. She needed to be clear-headed about the coming fight but the memory of her neighbors, lying in pools of their own blood, enraged her.

She was in no mood to be kind to her enemies.

Vaako guided Lajjun and Ziza through the maze-like streets. After spending weeks re-building them, he was intimately familiar with every alley and street but the confusion and noise was still disorienting. He was unused to being on the receiving end of an invasion and it was far more frightening than he had imagined. This was his divine punishment for all the worlds he had killed, he thought grimly. The road ahead had been blocked by falling rubble and he paused, momentarily confused.

“Vaako, which way?” Lajjun was clutching the small girl to her chest, unheeding of the wetness soaking into her shirt. Both children had been covered liberally in blood that Vaako could only assume had come from their parents. His own clothing was soaked through from the boy who clung tightly to him and the iron tang of it filled his nose and coated the back of his throat. He reoriented himself by glancing upwards at the tall spire of one of the solar collectors.

“Left, Lajjun.” He dashed across an open space with her and Ziza right behind him and ducked into another alleyway. He was trying to take back streets and avoid thoroughfares where he could. Frightened people clogged the larger arteries and he was scared they would be separated in the panicked rush.

In the distance, he could hear the sounds of fighting. Somehow the remnants of the armed forces were attempting to fight back against the invasion.

He raced around a corner and right ahead of him was the entrance to the catacombs. He grabbed Ziza’s hand and ran for cover, Lajjun at his heels. They ducked into the cool blackness but he plunged on without pause. He had to get them deeper. They were still far too vulnerable and exposed.

“Vaako!” Lajjun’s scream echoed off the walls and he spun in fear, dropping the little boy into Ziza’s arms. Lajjun was sprawled untidily on the ground, child clutched against her. She was using her own body to shield the tiny girl as one of the aliens leveled a gun at her.

Vaako leapt over her and onto the simian creature, knocking his shot off-target and tackling him. He was too close to use either his sword or gun, so he grabbed the alien by the ears and pounded his skull into the rocky floor. Fueled by his desperation, Vaako felt bone give way under his fingers as the alien’s skull collapsed.

He raised his head and saw the second alien a second too late. He stared down the barrel of his own death. Something hot sizzled by his ear and the second attacker collapsed, his chest exploding as he fell.

Turning back to trace the line of fire he saw Lajjun, sitting on the ground, the first alien’s dropped gun in her trembling hands, the children crouched behind her. Her face was pale, her eyes were wide and the stark horror on her face was heartbreaking to him.

“Lajjun,” he called out softly to her and she tore her eyes from the body of the creature she had killed. “Keep moving.” She nodded and handed him the gun, then leaned down to pick up the little girl. Ziza still carried the boy – the child overburdened her but he needed to keep his hands free to use his weapons in case they were attacked again.

“Lord Vaako!’ Freet and some of the other ex-Necromongers came barreling around a corner. Daikken and Auret had been soldiers for the Cause and came striding forward with weapons at the ready. Freet and Joisa were unarmed and sandwiched between the burly Daikken and the lithe Auret. He had never been happier to see them.

“Lady Freet, would you mind carrying the boy for Miss Ziza?” He gave her a polite little bow, as though they were meeting at some Necromonger social event, and she curtsied back to him equally politely.

“It would be my pleasure, Lord Vaako.” She accepted the bloody child from Ziza without a sign of distress – a useful side effect of having been a Necromonger was a very strong stomach. The men fell into a guard phalanx surrounding the women and children. The two neighbor kids that Sturm had rescued were either shell-shocked or petrified because they didn’t protest being hauled around like baggage by total strangers.

Vaako led the group deeper into the catacombs, hoping to find shelter or at least a defensible position. He spared a thought for Riddick and Sturm and prayed that whatever god watched over Furyans, that he was extra-vigilant today.

Riddick jumped from the building and landed hard on the concrete below. He scrambled to his feet, turned and reached out his arms to catch Alia as she jumped. Her weight barreled into him and he found himself on his back again, with her on top of him, grinning. Her black eyes were inches from his own and realized that there were slight silver flecks in them that he had never noticed before. Having her on top of him was giving him ideas and he frowned at her.

She sprang to her feet and reached out a hand to haul him up. She had to brace herself and it took all her strength to do so but she was still grinning as she pulled.

“You’ve gained weight. Lajjun’s cooking is fattening you up,” she chuckled.

“Just run, woman,” he grumbled back at her and they took off again.

They slid around a corner and the hospital was right ahead of them. Riddick scanned the area in front of it and then they dashed across the open courtyard and through the double doors of the lobby.

Doctors and patients were huddled behind an improvised barrier of couches and desks. Riddick eyed the crude barrier with amusement. It wouldn’t hold up against real firepower but it had a familiar style to it.

“Kyra!” Riddick shouted, having a good idea who had chivvied the civilians into building that wall of furniture.

“Riddick!” came the immediate response and a familiar dark-eyed face rose up from behind the barricade. Relief flowed through him as he realized she was well and safe.

“Get that ass moving! Their ship is only a few blocks over from this building!” His shout galvanized the cowering survivors and they began to pour out from behind the barricade. “Get yourselves to the catacombs!” he ordered them.

Kyra flung herself into his arms for a brief hug while Alia stood motionless watching their back. He wrapped the child up in his arms and hugged her back hard. She was the little sister he’d never had, the only family that he acknowledged. He couldn’t have stood it if, after all he had done to keep her alive, he had failed at this late date.

“How do you always manage to be in the center of every shit storm, girl?” he asked gruffly.

“Just lucky, I guess.” She tossed her head with a saucy grin and then eyed Alia, who stood with weapons still out and poised on the ball of her feet. “We’re going somewhere, I take it?”

“Yeah, we are going to kill those bastards.” Riddick growled. “I was just getting settled in this place and they had to trash it all up again.” Kyra was eyeing him with some emotion he couldn’t read.

“You could always bail, you have a ship.” Her tone was challenging and Riddick wondered how long he would be paying for leaving her with Imam. Good reasons or not, she didn’t seem quite able to let it go.

“You going to let them kill the Holy Man’s kid?’ he asked her grimly. He knew the answer but he wanted to hear her say it.

“No, but you always said heroing wasn’t your gig.” Alia shot a look back over her shoulder, with one eyebrow raised in what he saw was amusement. What was so funny?

“This isn’t heroing, little girl.” He leaned in close to stare Kyra straight in the eye. “They weren’t invited to this party and I mean to bounce them out on their ass.” She tilted her head to study him and then nodded.

“Not heroing. Right.” She pulled a knife from her belt and eyed it. “I’ll need a gun too.”

“Oh no, you are going straight to the catacombs and you are staying there.” He pushed a finger into her chest and frowned. She rolled her eyes at him and batted his finger away.

“I survived in the Slam without you, Riddick, I can handle some monkeys.” She blew out her breath in exasperation and Riddick opened his mouth to argue with her.

“We have no time for this, Riddick, people are dying.” Alia gestured towards the street where fires were burning. “She can handle herself fine, so come on.” Riddick saw the look of gratitude flash across Kyra’s face before her hardened ex-con attitude came back. He grimaced and then turned abruptly and stalked out of the building.

“Fine, but you know the drill,” he barked out angrily.

“Yeah, yeah, there’s only one speed – yours.” Kyra muttered behind him with an irritated sigh. “I know.” He hated teenagers, he really did.