Right Hand

A/N: This chapter is, of necessity, mostly Riddick’s POV. Just for the heck of it, I made it first
person. Hope it’s not too confusing.

9


Don’t got many rules in my life, but the ones I have are set in stone.

First one is: Waste Them Before They Waste You.

Second one? Never Touch What’s Mine.

And Vaako’s mine.

Don’t have a heart - don’t love the man. Don’t know what love is.
All I know, when I think of Vaako, the blood-pumpin’ muscle in my
chest beats a rhythm.

A rhythm that says, Mine, Mine, Mine...

I’m pretty damn sure that Yur is dead.

That makes him one lucky man.

‘Cause if he wasn’t dead, I’d rip out his spleen with my bare hands.

Nobody takes what’s mine.

Tried to get Vaako back, after that damn octopus-wannabe carried him
into the dark. We couldn’t make it through the opening into that cavern
- not me, not the soldiers, not the Hellhounds. Bounced off of open air
like it was made of rubber.

Didn’t want to shoot into it - the bullets might have got through, but we
didn’t know where Vaako was. Didn’t want to shoot him.

Would’ve defeated the purpose, ya know?

I didn’t like it, but we hadda let it go for now. Leave Vaako in there. I
was gonna have to go back to my techs, try to figure out what the hell was
going on here, how to get him back. I left the lensor and five soldiers in the
first cavern, watching the second and ready to report any new action.

Protega was crouched by the entrance looking like she’d lost her best friend.
I guess she had, she’d decided from day one that Vaako was her buddy. I
took Rage and the cub, Jazz, with me but I didn’t try to make her come. I have
a feeling she wouldn’t have left. Anyway, she could help guard.

When I got through the corridor back to the house, the techs were already
setting up some mobile station. Monitors, keyboards, buttons, little flashy lights,
the works. They would have been able to see what happened through the lensor’s
feed. Apparently they knew what I was going to want, and were already starting
their research before I killed one of them to make them move faster.

Smart people. No wonder they were techs.

Stood there watching them, knowing my glare would make them work faster,
harder. Stood there trying to think of anything, anyone, that could help make
sense of this mess.

I wanted him back.

Now.

It was like something burning in my blood - the desire to run back down that
corridor, throw myself through that damn barrier, take back my... whatever
he was.

My possession, my Empath, my Right Hand, my mate...

Didn’t matter. Just *mine.*

I had to stop thinking like that, force my brain to focus on what was going on.
The techs were making worried little noises as they worked, analyzing some of
the wet sand I’d had one soldier bring up. Wet from where those tentacles had
dripped on it, the few times we’d ripped one apart. I could tell they weren’t
figuring anything out yet.

“So what is it? What’s it made of?” I demanded, not patient enough to wait for
one of them to tell me something.

“It... it’s water.” That little girl tech said bravely, trying to keep the quiver out
of her voice.

“Water.” I said the word like it was something nasty, and saw her flinch. I didn’t
care, wasn’t her fault and I wasn’t going to rip her apart. I knew that, but she
didn’t. And I wasn’t going to tell her.

Fear would keep her working hard.

Water. The thing bled water.

And it was made of light.

What did that mean?

How the *hell* should I know? I ain’t no damn scientist!

Let the techs work on it. I was going to see what kind of weapons those transports
had on them.


*


Something wasn’t quite right.

Vaako wasn’t sure what the something was, but it was nagging at the back of his
mind.

He walked down the corridor of the ship, noting the dark blue wall hangings and
decorations and wondering vaguely why they weren’t silver and metallic. Shouldn’t
they have been? Or... Zhylaw’s colors... had been dark reds and browns.

His brain kept trying to puzzle it out while his feet moved him mechanically forward.
He had somewhere to go, but he couldn’t quite remember where it was.

Lucky that his legs seemed to know. They kept walking, walking...

...and stopped outside the Lord Marshall’s chambers. The guards at the doors
nodded and let him in without questions. He stepped into the formal little audience
chamber, and once again the sense of something not quite right prodded at him. He
pushed it aside for now, moving forward to kneel respectfully at the Lord Marshall’s
throne.

“Rise.” A voice said cooly, and he obeyed, lifting his eyes to meet the pale blue
ones gazing hungrily at him. A vague half-memory stirred in his mind, of this man
fighting Lord Zhylaw, of an awesome fight and a glorious victory.

A new Lord Marshall.

He blinked. Well, that explained the wall hangings, didn’t it?

The Lord Marshall stepped down from the throne and Vaako took a respectful
half-step back. The man followed him, circling him like a predator and raking his
eyes over him. Vaako watched with his own eyes half-closed, completely calm
and composed.

Except for that nagging little part of his brain that kept screaming this was
wrong! wrong! wrong!

He tried his best to ignore it.

“Wouldn’t you be more comfortable in something... lighter?” The Lord Marshall’s
voice was closer than it should be. It seemed he was speaking right by his ear even
though the man stood a good three feet away. Very odd.

Vaako glanced down at his rather battered armor and the warm, thick garments
he wore under it. It was rather warm in here, and the armor was heavy. He nodded.

There was a sudden sharp sense of weightlessness, of motion, then he was standing
in the Lord Marshall’s inner chamber, a room he’d been to only twice. Full of sharp,
formal furniture, statuary and tapestries, he’d always silently hated it. So pretentious.

“Much better.” The voice spoke next to him again, trying for a purr but coming out
more of a grumble. How did he know it was trying for a purr? Why was it
*supposed* to purr? And what was better?

He glanced down at himself and saw without surprise that his armor was gone, that
he wore some soft, light clothes of the same shade of blue as the wall hangings, as the
color scheme in this room. Very appropriate.

He was just another decoration, after all.

A big hand landed on his shoulder, pulling his attention back to the Lord Marshall
just in time for the man’s lips to crush against his. He stayed passive, feeling his own
lips bruise and tasting a trace of blood. Felt the big hands slide roughly along his
shoulders and down his ribs to settle on his hips, pulling him hard against the other
man as a tongue slid into his mouth...

...and it was *wrong!*

Wrong taste, wrong feeling - the memory of another taste blasted into his mind, a
cool and faintly metallic taste, overlaid with a deep rich tang. A name whispered
through his head, a face floated in the darkness behind his closed eyelids.

~Riddick.~

He shoved Yur away and bared his teeth at him, nearly hissing. “What is going
on here? Where am I, what is this?!”

Yur stared, then lifted his face to the ceiling.

Or where the ceiling used to be - it was just a yawning black void.

“What is going on here?!” He echoed Vaako’s words. “This isn’t right, he’s
not supposed to know this isn’t real!”

“Quiet!” Another voice, an alien voice he remembered, shot through the rapidly
disintegrating room, then he was floating in darkness once more and that terrible
pressure was back, squeezing around him like it wanted to press the air from his
lungs, the blood from his veins.

“Sleeeeppp...” whispered the voice, soothing him, taking away the pain, and
he relaxed again, even though he didn’t want to...


*


“There’s a call coming from the mother ship, sir.” One of the techs told me when
I came back to the house.

“Put it through.” I didn’t want to deal with it, but you never know where help
might spring from.

And it was a good thing I decided that.

The face on the screen was beautiful, in a Mother-Nature-meets-the-Ice-Queen
sort of way. And it was familiar, too.

“What do you want?” I wasn’t in the mood to be polite.

“To help you.” Aereon replied, her voice as soft and smooth as always.

“I ain’t got time for your mystical mumbo-jumbo.” I growled at her. “I got other
things to worry about.”

“Perhaps you’ll have time for a few facts about the creature you are dealing with?”
She asked sweetly, her young-old eyes lighting up with humor.

I swore.

Tricky bitch.


*


“We have always known the creature was on a planet somewhere in this system.”
The Elemental was strolling back and forth like she was on a nice calm walk at the
beach. I didn’t know how they got her down here so fast and I didn’t care - she
had insisted on talking face-to-face, saying she didn’t trust the vid links not to be
tapped.

Whatever, so long as she could help me get Vaako back.

She didn’t seem surprised that he was gone. I was still waiting to find out why.

“The creature is old. Very old. We have stories about it dating back thousands
of years. But it was thought to be injured, and weak, and no longer a worry. Our
people stopped trying to seek it out and destroy it eons ago.”

“What is it?” I wasn’t in the mood for a fairy tale.

“It is called, I think, the Avenger. A name given to it by the people of this planet,
who were fooled by its false promises. It would have just been waiting to lull them
into security so it could feast upon them. Avenger, indeed. It has an older,
darker name.”

“And that is?”

“The Devourer of Souls.”


*


Vaako waited by the bed, kneeling on the small cushion, as was his usual habit.
He spent his time examining the light silver chains around his wrists, studying them
for imperfections, making sure they were polished to a mirror hue.

His Master didn’t like it when he looked untidy.

Once the chains met with his satisfaction, he turned his attention to his clothes.
Light, gauzy things of a soft shade of grey, cut to reveal as much skin as possible
to the soft light of candles. Arranged just so, so they would entice and allure
without revealing too much, keeping some secrets to be uncovered. Everything
seemed to be perfect about them...

The door opened and he looked up sharply, a practiced smile settling on his face.
The big man who came into the room smiled back, his eyes raking over the slim
form waiting for him.

“You look beautiful this evening, Pet.”

He smiled and lowered his eyes, knowing what was expected of him. He
didn’t reply.

His Master didn’t need to hear his voice.

The man moved slowly around the room, taking off his heavy outer garments,
pouring a glass of wine. The pale eyes never left Vaako, who in turn never
looked up.

But he could feel the eyes watching him. It was so very familiar - those eyes
had always been watching him, ever since he was purchased, just a young
child, from the slave market in the city. Given the name Pet, raised for years
to be the Master’s plaything, until the day he was old enough to share the
man’s bed.

A thought flickered across his mind - if his name was Pet, why did he
remember Vaako? Was that his name before -

“You’re thinking too hard, little Pet.” The thick voice was right in front of
him, a strong hand grasping his chin to lift his face. Hard lips moved against
his, the familiar taste of wine and his Master’s tongue filling his mouth.

~You know this taste.~

The words filled his mind but didn’t sound like his usual thoughts - his eyebrows
drew together even as he allowed his Master to deepen the kiss, totally submissive
to the man’s wishes. Of course he knew the taste, better than he knew the taste
of food...

He got the sudden feeling that something was smugly satisfied.

Master leaned back, licking his lips with some satisfaction of his own. Those
pale eyes roamed his Pet’s body, settling on his hair with a sudden frown.

Vaako tensed. What was wrong? He’d been very careful with his hair, the
elaborate braids had taken well over an hour...

“I don’t like this hairstyle.” Big hands brushed against the shaven sides of
his head, ran blunt fingers through the shorter hair at the top. “I think it
should be all one length.”

The other man trembled as a strange tingling started on his scalp, as darkness
whirled in his vision and then he was opening his eyes again, soft black strands
of hair falling in front of his face. He lifted a hand and touched one, eyes round
with surprise.

Surprise that quickly faded - this had happened before, of course. His Master
liked to make changes, he would have to get used to the new weight of hair that
tumbled over his shoulders to brush his waist. Even the braids were gone...

Hands began searching his body, pushing and pulling at the soft cloth. Vaako
stayed completely still, knowing his Master liked to be rough when he undressed
him, wondering if this outfit was going to share the fate of so many before it...

Riiiiiiiiiiippp.

Certainly seemed so.

He watched as Master threw the shreds of his shirt to the side, the hands rough
against smooth pale skin now, instead of soft grey cloth. Vaako - *Pet* - still
didn’t move, knowing there would be bruises, but weren’t there always bruises?

~Light bruises from strong fingers holding his hips, a tingling at the base of his
neck that was probably a bite. His shirt would cover that... he always knew those
high collars were good for something...~

He gasped and tried to pull away from the hands clutching at his back, from the
mouth that had settled on his collarbone, sucking hard enough to hurt. Pale eyes
shot to his face, taking in the wild confusion in his own hazel eyes. Master’s face
darkened with anger.

“What do you think you’re doing? You’re mine, you know that, you’ve always
been mine!”

~Mine - a gravelly voice whispered the word. Vaako wouldn’t have dreamed
of arguing...~

“No!” He cried forcefully, shoving the man away. Yur growled and grasped
the chains, yanking him to the floor and throwing his heavy body on top of him.

“You’re mine! Not his, not anymore! Mine, and I’m keeping you here!”

“How?!” Vaako shouted back, fury filling him. “How, when you are not even
real?” He threw a punch that went right through Yur’s startled face, the room
wavering and shredding around them and the darkness soothed him again, lulling
him to sleep, away from the pressure, away from the pain...

He still felt the weight of his hair... how strange...

He let the darkness take him, far too sleepy to fight.


*


“You’re trying to tell me it ain’t real? I *saw* the thing carry Vaako away!”

“I’m not saying it isn’t real. I’m saying that it doesn’t have a physical body. It is
made up of light, and of water, and of air. It controls these, in small amounts, to
manipulate the physical world. It is the mental world where it reigns supreme.”

“And that means what, exactly?”

“That it chose Vaako for a reason. Yur was only a means to an end, something
to use against Vaako once it had him.”

“Use against him.” My voice was flat, but she darted a sudden quick look at
me, her eyes widening slightly before she continued her lecture.

“Yes. To cause emotions to flow through him - everything Vaako feels, when
he has no control, is magnified to an intense degree. The Devourer feeds off of
emotions, the ‘soul’ of an individual. With Vaako being an Empath, not only does
it get *his* strong emotions, but through him, it can feed off of anyone within range
- without having to use its own power. It may have seemed strong, but it can only
manage such feats for a short amount of time.”

“But it just fed off a billion people.”

“Yes, but very, very quickly. It would have absorbed very few emotions in the
half-second it took to wipe them out - only enough to give it the strength to take
Vaako and Yur.”

“And how exactly is it using Yur against Vaako?”

“To keep him upset, emotionally. I have heard - whispers - of how Vaako’s
Honor Guard felt toward him. It will put them in different situations, where
Vaako may or may not break free, depending on the strength of his mind. The
longer it has him, the weaker he will become.”

“What kind of ... situations?”

“Use your imagination.”

I had to suppress a growl. Yur was very lucky he was dead. Very, very lucky...
“He *is* dead, right? Yur, I mean?”

“Sort of. His mind is still very much alive, even though his body is gone.”

“So can I kill him?”

She had the gall to look amused. “If you feel you must. What did the Devourer
promise him? Vaako?”

I nodded.

“Then if you take Vaako back, Yur will die.”

“Is this... hurting Vaako? I mean, it’s all in his head, right?”

“Not exactly. It wants to keep Vaako alive for as long as possible, but it will use
pain as a means to get the emotions that it wants. Anything that... well, *happens*
to him, in his mind, will be happening to his physical body, as well. It is the best
way of deceiving the mind. Telling someone they feel pain is much easier if they
actually *do* feel pain. If Yur were to hit Vaako, for example, he would be bruised
in real life as much as he would in the dream.”

Such a dead man. Such a dead alien, too.

Vaako, buddy, fight hard...

“So how do I get him back? And wait - how did you know he was an Empath?!”

“I researched him, of course, as soon as I was told he was your Right Hand. I am
still very interested in your destiny. I wanted to see where he fit in.”

“His homeworld records are gone.”

“Ah, yes, but if you know anything about the system the Necromongers were in
at the time he was listed as Converted, it would be obvious what he was. There
was only one inhabited planet in the area. Or not a planet, exactly - a small group
of sparsely inhabited asteroids.”

“And you know all about them, of course.”

“Of course.” There was no pride in her voice - she was just stating a fact. Irritating
woman. “The area is known as the Xaviatte Cluster, and was once known throughout
the universe for producing Empaths. Their race was nearly wiped out in a plague,
several hundred years ago. I suppose they were only beginning to recover when Lord
Zhylaw destroyed it. Such a shame. At least Vaako is left. You should consider getting
a surrogate mother, and continuing his race. Continuing your own, as well. I don’t
know how many Furyans are left, but there is no need for them to become extinct, and
they will need their Focuses, of course...”

“Hold on, Breezy, you just lost me.”

She glared at me, probably ‘cause of the nickname. So what, it fit. She could get used
to it, if she wanted to hang around and study my ‘destiny.’

“Well, of course you realize that Furyans are powerful. You will not have heard of it,
but there is a thing known as the ‘Rage’ of Furya. Rather a silly name, really, since it
is not only anger, but any intensely felt emotion that can cause the reaction...”

“Breezy!” I cut off her lecture again.

“Oh, yes. Pardon my enthusiasm. Anyway, I’m sure you’ve noticed, a few times in
your life, that when you felt extreme stress, some odd things happened? Bursts of
light, perhaps, when you were fighting an uneven battle? and your enemies would be
severely injured?”

I didn’t answer, but I think my expression may have given me away.

“I thought so. I’m quite sure you’ve tried to use it, and found you couldn’t control
it. That’s what a Focus is for. For very powerful Furyans, the top of the food
chain, if you will. And I’m sure that applies to you.”

“And what’s a Focus?”

“I’ll quote the ‘definition’ to you as I’ve read it in our historical archives. It is
the simplest explanation. ‘The most powerful of the Furyans were those who
had a Focus, someone of strong empathic abilities, who could take in the wildly
scattered Rage and focus it into a single, deadly pulse. This ‘Focus’ was usually,
although not always, a person of the same gender yet of an alien race, most
commonly from the Xaviatte Cluster, and was referred to as ‘the other half of the
soul’. The Furyan kept this Focus with them at all times, and almost always
established them as a permanent mate.’” She paused, looking at me brightly.

Permanent mate. Well, shit.

That was certainly something I’d never thought of.

Never wanted.

Though... if I had to have one...

...then Vaako was...

This was *not* the time to worry about it!

“So how is all this gonna help me get him back?” I demanded, definitely feeling
some stress right now.

“Easily. The Devourer will not know you are a Furyan, or that Vaako is from
Xaviatte. All it knows is that Vaako is delicious, and it probably would enjoy
feeding off of you, as well. You’ll just have to get angry enough to send your
‘Rage’ to Vaako, and let him kill the creature for you.”

“And how’s he supposed to do that? He doesn’t know any more about this
than I do!”

“That doesn’t matter. It’s all instinct.”

“Will it kill him, too? Since he’s in there with it?”

She frowned. “That is the only part of my calculations that I have no answer
to. Such a thing has never been done. I cannot tell if your Focus will live
through this, but it is your only choice. No weapon will kill the Devourer,
only this single intense bolt of pure emotion. Anger is the strongest, and probably
the easiest for you to achieve. They didn’t name your race ‘Furyans’ for nothing,
you realize.” She laughed softly.

I couldn’t help but grin, too.


*


The room was dark, and cold.

He hated being cold.

He shifted against the rough stone floor, feeling the heavy weight of chains on
his wrists, on his ankles. Feeling the belt that wrapped tightly around his waist,
making it difficult to breathe, felt the weight of the chain that was attached to it.
The other end was bolted to the wall. He swallowed, and felt the collar around
his neck, felt the heavy chain on it pulling his head down into a submissive
posture that he did not truly feel.

He didn’t remember why he was here.

Some crime in his long-forgotten youth, he supposed, that kept him chained
in this room, prey for any free person who came along. The punishment on his
planet was the same for every offense.

Slavery for life...

And slaves who caused trouble were put in rooms like this, chained down
with so much weight it was hard to move, their bodies free for the use of
anyone who wanted them.

He hated his life, but he was helpless to change it.

The heavy door creaked open, and he looked up without any real interest,
watching to see who was going to defile him tonight.

A new customer, hmm. Big man, with pale eyes that were already greedy
on him. Why would he look so much like he wanted to eat him; he knew
he was dirty and skinny and covered with bruises and scars from so many
nights with so many different people...

Big hands tangled in his long hair, yanking him to his feet. His muscles
protested the weight of his shackles, but he had no choice. On his feet,
and into a bruising kiss, even as impatient hands began to grasp at his
chest, run roughly across aching ribs, pinching and twisting at nipples that
still hurt from the night before.

He swallowed a moan of pain, determined not to give the man the satisfaction.

A rough shove sent him sprawling to the floor, helpless to stop the man as
he climbed on top of him, shoving at the ragged clothes that barely covered
him, anyway. Teeth bit into his shoulder and he shuddered, wishing he could
push the man away. Why were they always so rough, it wasn’t like he could
stop them? They didn’t have to hurt him so badly. Didn’t have to leave him
bruised and bleeding.

~Always had everything rough...~

True enough, though he didn’t know where the thought had come from. He
wouldn’t know how to react to someone who didn’t hurt him. To hands
that weren’t like the hands that were yanking his thighs apart, pawing at his
backside. More bruises, how nice. Couldn’t a man ever have it be gentle?

~Can’t a man want some things to be sweet?~

Hadn’t there been hands, once, that didn’t hurt? Long fingered, strong hands
that stroked instead of grasping, that petted instead of clawing?

~...silver eyes catching what little light shone in the window, and he leaned
forward, closing his lips around one small, hard nub. Vaako murmured a
soft, incoherent encouragement, his fingers leaving Riddick’s chest and going
to stroke the smoothly shaven head...~

The man was kissing him again, hard, barely what you would call a kiss, more
like his tongue raping his mouth in a foreshadowing of what would soon be
happening to his body. He tried to cast his mind back to that elusive memory,
searching for an escape from this reality.

~...fingers wrapped carefully around him, a thumb flickering across the tip to
tease him mercilessly. He chewed at his lip to keep from moaning, hips bucking
until Riddick lay a strong hand on him, holding...~

A hand slapped across his face, hard enough to rock his head back against
the floor. His attention was dragged back to the furious man above him, the
pale eyes crazed with anger. “You pay attention to me! Don’t try to get
away! You’re mine!”

How had he known...?

Vaako’s eyes focused sharply. He knew this man - this man had no right to
be on top of him, to be grinding against him, trying to force his reluctant body
to show some interest. He moved, felt the weight of chains dragging him
down, and subsided.

The memories had to be false - he’d been here so long, with a shadowy
parade of men who were never gentle, never sweet.

Why couldn’t he remember a single face?

He remembered the silver eyes easily enough, the strong features and the
rather smug smile that even now made him want to roll his eyes.

And the name. Riddick.

“Riddick...” he whispered, and received another blow, from a closed fist
this time and he tasted blood in his mouth, the inside of his cheek sliced
open against his teeth.

“Don’t say his name! Don’t... he doesn’t exist! You’re dreaming of a
phantom!” The words were accentuated by punches that slammed into his
ribs, into his stomach, slaps that rocked his head back and forth. “Don’t,
don’t, don’t, don’t *ever*...”

“Don’t, yourself...” the words tasted thick in his mouth, like he’d never
spoken aloud before, and the man paused, staring at him.

“Do not hit me again.” He found the strength from somewhere, gathering
his tattered, shredded mind back into its proper place. His voice was a
firm order, sitting so oddly on the lips of a slave.

But he wasn’t a slave...

Was he?

“Vaako.”

Well, *that* voice didn’t come from the man above him - his ‘customer’ looked
like he’d seen a ghost, eyes wild and full of fear.

“Vaako, listen to me. I know you can hear me.”

He knew that voice...

“Vaako, fight him. Fight them.”

Them? There was only one man this time, thank the gods...

“Vaako, don’t let them win.”

You try fighting, ghost voice, when there are ten tons of chains holding you
down, and a very big man sitting on top of you...

“Vaako, it ain’t real. Whatever you’re seeing, whatever it’s showing you,
it ain’t real.”

Sure felt real. He hurt so badly...

“I know it hurts.”

The voice was psychic! He’d always known Riddick was psychic, the man
had seemed to know exactly what he was thinking, gotten the most
embarrassing reactions out of him...

Riddick.

Riddick was talking to him.

Riddick was real.

Something in his mind snapped, and the angry man above him howled and
began to vanish, screaming obscenities as he went.

Vaako was back in darkness, with the pressure around him and the pain
coursing through him, worse now because he could feel the bruises Yur had
given him, and he still hurt as if he’d been raped by dozens of men for dozens
of nights. He could still taste the blood in his mouth.

But he knew who he was. Where he was, and why...

The alien voice was trying to soothe him to sleep, the oddest edge of
desperation in it.

“Vaako, don’t sleep. I can hear it too, don’t listen. Don’t rest, it’s lying
to you.”

But he was so tired... he hurt...

“Vaako, I swear, I’ll let you sleep for a year if you want to. C’mon,
work with me here.”

“What do you want?” He didn’t realize he’d spoken aloud until he felt
Riddick’s relief coursing through him.

“Good boy, Vaako. Fight it. Got something for you... just take it,
don’t think about it. You’ll know what to do.”

What on earth was the man going on about - *gods*, what was going
through him?! He’d never felt such anger, such raw, primitive rage,
how *dare* they try to take him away? How dare they hurt him?
Mine, mine, *mine*...

He screamed, and his body convulsed, the tentacles tightening around
him until he thought he would die, and something bright and powerful
flowed through his soul and up through his body and out his throat and
the entire cavern was lit up, showing the alien in all its true horror, a
wiggling mass like a huge pile of glowing slimy worms, squirming and
writhing and trying to hold on to the shadowy people within it...

They were escaping, flowing free from the tentacles and vanishing into
the light, some with relief on their faces and some with anger - he saw
Yur, who looked like he was being ripped in half by fury of his own,
before the shadow-man imploded and was gone.

Vaako hit the floor of the cavern as the tentacles let go, shriveling in the
light of the anger that was still coursing through him, even as his own
mind gave way and began to shut down. Protecting itself, closing off
from the rage that would drive him insane.

He saw the alien as it seemed to melt, tentacles flowing down to the
floor in a weeping river of water, light being swallowed by this stronger
light.

Saw someone at the entrance to the cavern, looking at him, tense and
ready to run forward. Knew who it was...

Felt the rage die down as the creature in the cavern with him screamed
out its death agonies.

Sensed real darkness waiting to swallow him, even as the man ran to him.

Held on long enough to feel a gentle hand touch his face before his
eyes closed...