{"id":994,"date":"2024-12-03T21:33:31","date_gmt":"2024-12-04T02:33:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/?p=994"},"modified":"2025-01-28T23:17:40","modified_gmt":"2025-01-29T04:17:40","slug":"the-changeling-game-chapter-86","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/the-changeling-game-chapter-86\/","title":{"rendered":"The Changeling Game, Chapter 86"},"content":{"rendered":"<style type=\"text\/css\">\ntt {\nfont: .857em menlo, monaco, consolas, monospace;\nmargin: auto;\n}\nh2 {\ntext-align: center;\n}\nh2.chapterhead {\nmargin-bottom: 2em;\ntext-align: center;\n}\n  .nowrap {\n    text-indent: 0;\n    display: inline-block;\n}\n<\/style>\n<p><b>Title:<\/b> The Changeling Game <small>(Formerly <i>Identity Theft<\/i>)<\/small><br \/>\n<b>Author:<\/b> Ardath Rekha<br \/>\n<b>Chapter:<\/b> 86\/?<br \/>\n<b>Fandom:<\/b> <i>Pitch Black<\/i> (2000); <i>The Chronicles of Riddick<\/i> (2004); <i>The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury<\/i> (2004)<br \/>\n<b>Rating:<\/b> X<br \/>\n<b>Warnings:<\/b> Adult themes, controversial subject matter, harsh language<br \/>\n<b>Category:<\/b> Het<br \/>\n<b>Pairing:<\/b> Riddick\/Jack<br \/>\n<b>Summary:<\/b> Reeling from his faux pas with Jack, Riddick focuses on several mysteries he needs to solve, including the mystery of the woman he met, a year earlier, in Crematoria.<br \/>\n<b>Disclaimer:<\/b> The characters and events of <i>Pitch Black,<\/i> <i>The Chronicles of Riddick,<\/i> and <i>The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury<\/i> are not mine, but belong to Universal Studios.  I just <i>wish<\/i> I were in charge of their fates.  No money is being made off of this.  I\u2019m writing strictly for love of the story.<br \/>\n<b>Feedback:<\/b> Absolutely, the more the better!  Shred me, whip me, beat me, make me feel grammatical! I post \u201crough,\u201d so I can always use the help. \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n<input type='hidden' bg_collapse_expand='6aac2e6919a776098617498' value='6aac2e6919a776098617498'><input type='hidden' id='bg-show-more-text-6aac2e6919a776098617498' value='Long post is long. Click to read the story.'><input type='hidden' id='bg-show-less-text-6aac2e6919a776098617498' value='Hide the story again.'><button id='bg-showmore-action-6aac2e6919a776098617498' class='bg-showmore-plg-button bg-green-button  '   style=\" color:#D9ECFB;\">Long post is long. Click to read the story.<\/button><div id='bg-showmore-hidden-6aac2e6919a776098617498' >    <\/p>\n<h2 class=\"chapterhead\">86.<br \/>\n<u>Through an Occluded Mirror<\/u><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>You\u2026 stupid\u2026 fuck.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Riddick kept his walk smooth and calm as he headed for the Chamber of the Quasi-Dead, even as he mentally pummeled himself. It had been a long time since he\u2019d felt like this much of an idiot.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">The look on Jack\u2019s face, the confusion and disbelief in her mind, when he\u2019d told her he wanted to make her Dame Riddick, kept smacking at him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>What the fuck is wrong with you?<\/i> Why the fuck had he phrased it like <i>that?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Could he possibly have made more of a ham-handed job of it?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Worse, he\u2019d practically <i>fled the scene<\/i> of his fuckup, before she could even put together more than a handful of words.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He entered the throne room, aware that he was surrounded by people watching for even the slightest weakness\u2014and, he suddenly realized, he\u2019d walked in without any armor on\u2014and glowered at everyone. Let them <i>try<\/i> something right now. He\u2019d enjoy having someone to punish for his foul mood.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Not that he could actually blame Jack for it. The more he thought about it, the more it struck him how badly he must have thrown her. He\u2019d <i>lived<\/i> her memories. He knew how she\u2019d handled herself for the last few years.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">And, he realized, he knew exactly why he\u2019d thrown her quite so badly.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">On those occasions when a man she\u2019d had a fling with started to get too attached to her, started even hinting at an interest in a longer relationship, one of her ways of getting him to change his mind\u2014and, in many cases, run for the <i>hills<\/i>\u2014had been to start crazy-talking about marriage and children. It wasn\u2019t her only tactic; on several occasions, if the man in question seemed to <i>like<\/i> the idea of instant domestic bliss, Michael had shown up to play the enraged cuckold and <i>really<\/i> scare him off. But it had been her go-to.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>And what did I do? Start talking about children and marriage less than three hours after she rode my dick for the first time\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Granted, it was a proposal he\u2019d been planning on making anyway, although it hadn\u2019t involved kids until <i>she<\/i> brought up the ones that had died on the <i>Santa Clara<\/i>. He\u2019d spent a year trying not to think about what the Necros did to kids\u2014<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>I need to talk to the Moribund about that. Now.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cIs this to be a session of Court, Lord Marshal?\u201d Vaako asked from behind him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Fuck.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cWe got anything pressing on the agenda?\u201d Agendas. Him, dealing with <i>agendas<\/i>. The \u2019verse had gotten knocked on its <i>ass<\/i>, all right.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cRequests from some of the ships in the Armada for permission to conduct raids. Not much else.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cHold off on that,\u201d Riddick told him. \u201cGot a few things to get straightened out about those raids. Those ships might be gettin\u2019 some new instructions.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Vaako gave him a puzzled frown. \u201cMore new instructions?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cGot a problem with the last ones?\u201d It had, he thought, been a bit over half a day since he\u2019d shut down the brothels; most of their prisoners were still in the process of being converted, he figured.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cNo,\u201d Vaako said. \u201cAnd, surprisingly, no one else seems to. Most of the Lords I would have expected to be up in arms about it are treating it as the right move.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cYour god spoke up on the matter, that\u2019s why.\u201d Riddick kept an eye on Vaako\u2019s face as he said that, curious to see whether the warrior would think he was mocking him or not.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI thought so,\u201d Vaako said with a nod. \u201cYou may not be converted, but\u2026 you have been\u2026\u201d He frowned, as if reaching for a word. \u201c\u2026anointed. Your claim to the throne has been blessed. I feel it. I have heard others speaking of feeling it, as well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Interesting.<\/i> \u201cSo maybe you can tell me something else, Lord Vaako. How does a Lord Marshal get married, in your religion?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Vaako blinked. Then comprehension appeared on his face. \u201cThe girl? The one I brought to you?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cYeah. Jack. How do I make it official?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cThere is no ceremony, if that\u2019s what you\u2019re asking,\u201d Vaako said, moving to walk beside him. \u201cWhen a Lord of the Fleet chooses a wife, he has only to present her to you before the assembled Court and declare her his. There have only been a handful of cases where the Lord Marshal has forbidden a Lord from claiming a wife. Only, I think, when he wished to make a claim of his own. For the Lord Marshal himself, he only needs\u2014you only need\u2014to present her to the Court and announce her standing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Riddick nodded. It made sense that it would be that simple. Come to think of it\u2014<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cYou have performed a variation of that already,\u201d Vaako continued, \u201cwhen you gave the girl Margaret to the Purifier on the <i>Lionheart.<\/i> By presenting her to him, you gave permission, and his vow to you, that she would be by his side until Underverse Come, is as close to a marriage vow as anyone says.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cMakes sense.\u201d He\u2019d just been thinking of Margaret, himself. It had been hard to even look at her, especially before the torment the raiders had inflicted upon her had been wiped away. She had, in a twist, borne the closest resemblance to Jack of anyone brought to him before Jack, herself, arrived. Seeing her broken had reawakened his desire to burn down the whole Armada\u2014<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">As if he could have then. As if he needed to now.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cThere is, actually, one Lord who wishes to present a bride to you, but not yet. She is still being converted.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cOh? Who?\u201d If she was only just <i>now<\/i> being converted, she had to have been in that brothel.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cLord Jalman. He wishes to take a woman from the Greensleeves Stew, named Celia, as his wife.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cCelia Wyndham.\u201d Well, that was a twist. \u201cWhat\u2019s <i>she<\/i> think of that?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Vaako gave him a quizzical look, as if wondering why it mattered. \u201cLadies of the Armada are not, generally, asked their opinions of such things. But I do know that Jalman was an infrequent patron of the Stew until her arrival there, when he began to go nightly. He monopolized her time as much as he could. He is likely the reason that she lasted until now, which is considerably past the lifespan of most\u2026 breeders\u2026 kept in the Stews.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cInteresting.\u201d He had his own way of finding out what Celia\u2019s opinion of it was, and he\u2019d be sure to use it.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Fuck. Jack\u2019s still up in my head.<\/i> He\u2019d spent the last year taking care <i>not<\/i> to care what the Necros were doing to each other, not letting himself think about issues like how many of the Lords\u2019 wives might not <i>wish<\/i> to be bound to their husbands, or how many children died each time his raiders went out. But <i>Jack<\/i> cared about those things, intensely, and thanks to his journey through her memories\u2026 <i>Guess if I needed a comeuppance for \u2018violating\u2019 her like that\u2014<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Not that she\u2019d seemed at all upset about him poking around in her head\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>\u2014here it is.<\/i> Her conscience had <i>infected<\/i> him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cThe Necromonger Way still bothers you,\u201d Vaako observed.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cWhen I was still a kid,\u201d he decided to tell the soldier, \u201cI was enslaved for two years before I managed to free myself. Don\u2019t much like seeing that being put on anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Vaako nodded, looking thoughtful. \u201cThe girl, your Jack, she has given her consent to you, then?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He shrugged. \u201cWe\u2019re still workin\u2019 things out. Just wanted to already know the next steps once we do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cMy wife seems to believe she fears you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cDoes she, now?\u201d Interesting. He knew that Jack had been running a Scared Little Girl act when Dame Vaako visited; that was no surprise. The concern that Vaako seemed to be expressing about that, though\u2026 that was what had his attention. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to worry. Never raped a woman in my life. Got no intention of startin\u2019 now.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cAnd she <i>is<\/i> a woman? Not a child?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cHer nineteenth birthday is just under three weeks away.\u201d He\u2019d have to think up a good way to mark that. Nobody seemed to celebrate birthdays in the Armada. But he owed her one, after running out on her before her thirteenth birthday and leaving her to \u201ccelebrate\u201d it alone in a cold and loveless household. \u201cSeems to me that if she\u2019d still been a kid, she\u2019d never have made it here alive.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cAdolescents are frequently converted. They\u2019re just not\u2014 for those with <i>honor,<\/i> they\u2019re not\u2026\u201d Vaako hesitated, as though fearing he would give offense.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI get you. And I agree. How long have <i>you<\/i> been a Necromonger, Vaako?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI was fourteen when the Armada came to the Zon Belt.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cHmm.\u201d He remembered the copious research Jack had done. The Zon System, according to her notes, had fallen eighteen years before. It had been an odd system, dominated by an asteroid belt that took up almost its entire habitable zone and was a source of valuable rare mineral deposits. Most of its industry had been centered on exploiting those deposits, and almost all of the inhabitants had been descendants of influential mining families from old Earth\u2019s South Africa. But Jack had left it off of her presentation; there had been no Black Planets in the system after all of its people disappeared, and the belt itself\u2014massive and lacking in biospheres to destroy\u2014had seemed unaltered aside from five million miners vanishing. Although she had found a candidate for a Level Five Incident in the system, she\u2019d decided that it was all too tenuous to include.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He realized that he was looking forward to filling her in on that.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He got why she\u2019d held back on including it, though. There had been roughly a dozen possible additional entries, but if she\u2019d added all of them in, it would have diluted the power of the list and made it look more like the work of a conspiracy theorist who saw warning messages in cloud patterns. She\u2019d stuck with the indisputable Incidents, and had still been able to assemble enough evidence to predict the Armada\u2019s movements with almost pinpoint accuracy. Until he\u2019d taken over, anyway.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI remember hearing about the Zon Belt\u2019s fall,\u201d he told Vaako. \u201cMostly people whinin\u2019 about where\u2019d they get those minerals now and how much more was tech gonna cost without \u2019em. Nobody seemed to give a fuck where five million human beings had gone.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cDid that surprise you?\u201d Vaako asked.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Riddick shrugged. \u201cI was thirteen. Guess I needed something to get pissed off about, so yeah, I was surprised and angry about it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">For the first time in the year-plus that he\u2019d been on the <i>Basilica,<\/i> he heard Vaako chuckle. \u201cI remember that age well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Jack had been nearly that age when he met her, he reflected. She\u2019d had moments like that, but not as many as he\u2019d had at her age. At times, it was hard to reconcile everything that had changed since then\u2026 and all the things that hadn\u2019t changed at all.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cHow\u2019d you end up married to Dame Vaako?\u201d he asked after a moment.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cShe came to the Basilica eight years ago. I was a Knight of the Legion, and she was the wife of Lord Vath. She was newly converted, taken in battle. Lord Vath was vying for the position of the Lord Marshal\u2019s First. And she\u2026\u201d For a moment, Vaako looked pensive, even uneasy. \u201cShe liked to stir things up. There was more intrigue in the Court, that year, than I had ever seen before. Duels. Assassinations. Seven different men, most of them Lords, died in a short time trying to maneuver against Vath. And I began to hear rumors that <i>she<\/i> was behind it all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cSounds likely.\u201d Riddick wondered what her motive had been. Had she been ensuring that Vath had no competition for being the Lord Marshal\u2019s successor? Or had she been trying to escape her marriage to him the only way that a Lady of the Court apparently could?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI had been serving under one of the Lords, and when he fell, I found myself under Lord Vath\u2019s command. I did my best to keep my distance from his wife. She was beautiful and refused to wear black the way all other Ladies of the Court did, even though she was devout in every other way. Eyes were always drawn to her. Including mine. She was just eighteen years old. It was hard to believe that she could be behind so many manipulations.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cWhen did you figure out she was?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cAfter she manipulated me into killing Lord Vath, taking his place as a Lord of the Fleet, and taking her as my wife,\u201d Vaako admitted. \u201cI did it for love. She still fools me, from time to time, for love. I <i>do<\/i> know what she is, what she does, but part of me refuses to believe. And much of the time, her advice <i>is<\/i> sound and not <i>just<\/i> about scheming.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cLast year?\u201d Riddick raised an eyebrow in Vaako\u2019s direction.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cThat was scheming,\u201d the other man conceded with a sigh.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cAnd now?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Vaako\u2019s uneasy look was back. \u201cJust as we have all begun to <i>know<\/i> that you are our anointed leader, she has come to me with a tale of how this girl, this Jack, is someone you knew and abused as a child, and she is certain you intend to do so again because the girl is terrified.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He <i>knew<\/i> he could count on Dame Vaako to make the day a little worse.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cYou\u2019ll get to meet Jack soon enough and decide for yourself if it\u2019s true,\u201d Riddick said after a moment. \u201cBut I\u2019ll tell you one thing now. Your wife may have met someone who can outplay her today.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Vaako\u2019s eyes widened. \u201cThat\u2026 would be something to <i>see.<\/i>\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cHopefully we\u2019ll even live through it.\u201d Riddick forced himself to relax. Jack was a practical girl\u2014woman. He really needed to dispense with that whole <i>girl<\/i> label, especially if Dame Vaako was selling the story she seemed to be trying to.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Anyway\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">She was practical, and smart, and even if he\u2019d thrown her for a loop with his ham-handed fuckup of a proposal, she\u2019d figure out why it\u2019d be worth doing. He wasn\u2019t going to demand soul-shaking love from her\u2014<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Not that I\u2019d mind that, or anything\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u2014but she needed cover and <i>he<\/i> needed peace of mind, knowing she would stay safe.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cIs there anything you need from me?\u201d Vaako asked. They were almost at the throne. Riddick moved to the side, stepping around it toward the doors into the Chamber of the Quasi-Dead behind, as Vaako stopped next to the throne itself.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cNah. It\u2019ll be another day or two before I\u2019m ready to present Jack to the court.  Just gettin\u2019 everything ready right now. I might possibly have some new instructions for raiding ships in a few hours.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Vaako gave him a weighing look, and then nodded. \u201cI am at your command, should you need me.\u201d He bowed, stepping back, too correct to turn his back on his commander.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">The bit of Jack still in Riddick\u2019s head told him not to turn his back either, out of <i>politeness<\/i> rather than <i>caution.<\/i> He opened the Chamber doors without turning away, stepping inside and closing them while still facing Vaako.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">It was the usual way he entered the room, in truth, but it felt different somehow, with Jack\u2019s motivation guiding it rather than his own.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>What is your will, Lord Marshal?<\/i> the Quasi-Dead asked around him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cGimme a moment,\u201d he said. \u201cGot somethin\u2019 I need to ask your boss, first.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He closed his eyes and focused on the angry being in the bowels of the ship. <i>I have a question for you, Moribund.<\/i>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>If you wish to know whether you succeeded in procreating today, you did not.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Rude. He already knew Jack was protected against that. As was he. <i>Nothing like that. I want to know if the Necros are killing babies and children at your command or if it\u2019s something they came up with on their own.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Silence greeted him. Shocked silence.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>You seriously didn\u2019t know what they were doing?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>It would seem,<\/i><\/b> the Moribund said after another moment, <b><i>that these creatures have truly understood little of what I have asked of them.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Riddick sat down on the dais at the center of the chamber, folding his legs into the \u201clotus\u201d pose that one of the only Trainers from his youth that he <i>didn\u2019t<\/i> want to kill had shown him. <i>So if I forbid them from killing kids anymore, will you allow that change? Maybe even support it?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>Yes.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Have there ever been children in the Armada before?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>It used to be the norm. They converted when they were old enough.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Old enough for what, exactly?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>When they are too young, their neuroplasticity rejects the process.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">That made sense. Pissed him off, but he kept that from bleeding into their channel of communication. <i>So they\u2019d just hang out and wait?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>Possibly. I did not pay much attention. I believe it may have changed with Zhylaw. He seemed to view children as a threat.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Because of me.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>Yes. One of the Demons of the Darkness spoke to him without my knowledge and told him the most probable outcome for his five-shape in this \u2019verse. He sought to resist it.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Well, that fit with what he\u2019d gleaned from the Necros who had been willing to talk to him up \u2019til now. <i>And you let that happen?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>These creatures do my will, but you know what I think of them. I tried to ignore their petty squabbles and games of one-upmanship.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Maybe that was a mistake.<\/i> No maybe about it. But far be it from him to piss off the critter keeping its minions off his back.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>Yes. It was.<\/i><\/b> The Moribund\u2019s voice was simultaneously testy and abashed. <b><i>I have said as much to my sisters. You may tell <u>her<\/u> I admitted this, if you wish.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>You could talk to her yourself, you know. Girl\u2019s surprisingly forgiving about a lot of shit.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He could feel its unease in response.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Word is, she\u2019ll be bringing back the \u201cother larva\u201d sometime soon. Kyra, if you ever paid attention to her name.<\/i>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Now he could feel something like resentment stirring in the Moribund.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>That ain\u2019t gonna be a problem, is it?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><i>Will it be one for <u>you?<\/u><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Fuck. This creature knew everything about him, didn\u2019t it? If the whole deal wasn\u2019t just someone\u2019s pipe dream\u2026 it could be a <i>big<\/i> problem.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He\u2019d known Kyra wasn\u2019t Jack almost as soon as he got to Crematoria. But the strange woman in the shadows had helped him, strangling one of the men running for him in a move that had, eerily, made him think of the way Jack had restrained one of the Shrills on the <i>Kublai Khan<\/i>. Even so, his glimpse of the woman\u2019s face\u2014not to mention her hair, which was dark and thick with curls where Jack\u2019s, before she\u2019d shaved it, had been straight and lighter\u2014had told him she wasn\u2019t the girl he\u2019d come looking for. But maybe she knew where Jack was. In prisons barbaric enough to force women into the spaces controlled by violent men, they tended to stick together, guarding each other\u2019s backs.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Just how she\u2019d gotten behind him, he hadn\u2019t known at the time. Now, he had a pretty good idea. He\u2019d thought he was following her, and then suddenly she had two sharp blades poking into his back. \u201cShould I go for the sweet spot?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">It wasn\u2019t Jack\u2019s voice, but for a moment, he thought he\u2019d awakened <i>Fry\u2019s<\/i> ghost. The voice sounded hauntingly like hers.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cLeft of the spine, fourth lumbar down, the abdominal aorta?\u201d The words were only getting creepier. Only Fry and Jack had heard him say that, and this wasn\u2019t Jack. \u201cWhat a gusher.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Huh. He hadn\u2019t said that part to either of them. Had he met this woman somewhere else? Was there another time\u2014?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cHow do I get eyes like that?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">No, she was definitely referring to his conversation with Fry and Jack. But her knowledge was secondhand and flawed. From bull sessions he\u2019d had with Jack in the skiff, those times he\u2019d managed to get past her cagey evasiveness and gotten her to open up instead of just listening to <i>him<\/i> talk, he\u2019d figured out that the girl had perfect recall. If it had been her peeking over his shoulder at him, she\u2019d have said <i>just to the left of the spine<\/i> and <i>where the hell can I get eyes like that,<\/i> and wouldn\u2019t have mentioned gushers at all. Still\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Whoever this is, she\u2019s talked to Jack. Has to have.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He\u2019d play along and see where it went.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cYou gotta kill a few people,\u201d he said. What would she say in answer?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cDid that,\u201d she told him. \u201cDid a <i>lot<\/i> of that.\u201d He could feel her anger and resentment. She started pressing the sharp object, whatever it was, deeper into his skin.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Fuck this.<\/i> He turned before she could react and grabbed her, catching her wrists in his hand and shoving her against the bars. She could poke her little toy into someone else\u2019s back if she wanted. Not his.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">It was his first chance to get a really good look at her, and the woman in front of him was eerie as <i>fuck.<\/i> Not even one feature looked like Jack\u2019s\u2026 but if someone had brought back Fry and Shazza and combined the two of them, the woman in front of him would have been the result. She had Fry\u2019s general face shape, Shazza\u2019s eyes, hair, and coloring\u2026 and Fry\u2019s voice.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Spooky.<\/i> But this little dance was still the key to finding Jack. \u201cThen you gotta get sent to a slam.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cOne where they tell you you\u2019ll never see daylight again?\u201d she asked him, her expression accusing.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Well, she got that part right.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He opened his mind up, just a crack\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>\u2026The fuck?\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">This woman in front of him <i>believed<\/i> this was <i>their<\/i> dialogue. She had a vision in her head of watching him and Fry having their little standoff\u2026 a vision of the eclipse\u2014<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cOnly there <i>wasn\u2019t<\/i> any doctor here who could shine my eyes, not even for twenty menthol Kools,\u201d she snarled at him, anger and denunciation filling her voice. \u201cWas there <i>anything<\/i> you said that was true?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">And there, tucked in the back\u2026 <i>It\u2019s your fault I lost her!<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">There it was.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>She\u2019s an esper. These ain\u2019t her memories, but maybe she doesn\u2019t know that.<\/i> Jack had had a glimmer of that, herself, as he recalled. Two espers meeting and exchanging memories\u2026?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He could play. He\u2019d pull what he needed to know from her thoughts. He just had to trigger the right ones. He lifted her up higher, just high enough that she wouldn\u2019t be able to use the ground as leverage. Not before he was ready to let her down.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cWhat are you gonna do, huh?\u201d she asked him. \u201cGo for the sweet spot?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Weird question to ask him, given the way he had her pinned. Not like he could reach for it. Unless she meant a different \u201csweet spot\u2026\u201d She was straddling his arm, and for a second he felt her press suggestively against it.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cRemember who you\u2019re talking to,\u201d he told her. <i>Let\u2019s just test this\u2026<\/i> \u201c\u2026Jack.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He expected a vision in her head of the girl, maybe a moment of the two of them together. And for an instant, he <i>did<\/i> catch a glimpse of a girl who looked like his Jack, but with long blonde hair. But he didn\u2019t expect the surge of anger, grief\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u2026and guilt.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">She turned her face away, trying to hide those emotions from him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>His fault she\u2019s gone, his fault his fault his fault he did this to us\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cJack\u2019s dead,\u201d she ground out, her words stabbing him more deeply than she possibly could have with her little toy knives. \u201cShe was weak. She couldn\u2019t cut it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>No,<\/i> he thought. <i>Oh fuck, no\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He was so blindsided by her declaration that he almost missed the kick she aimed at the light beside them, barely felt the sudden slice of a tiny blade along his cheekbone, hardly registered the moment when she <i>vanished from his grasp.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">She was on one of the nearby bridges a moment later. How she\u2019d gotten there hadn\u2019t made sense to him\u2014<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>She isomorphed,<\/i> he thought as he sat among the Quasi-Dead, aware that they were, as always, listening in. They\u2019d seen this moment from <i>her<\/i> perspective already. Soon he would see it as well.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cThe name\u2019s <i>Kyra<\/i> now,\u201d she\u2019d told him, for a moment almost managing to do an imitation of Jack\u2019s boy act as she stared him down, blatantly no boy, blatantly not-Jack, never-was-Jack, and yet he could feel her thoughts beating at him\u2014<i>you left me, you left us, you abandoned us and it\u2019s your fault she-I died<\/i>\u2014and demanding his participation in some strange folie \u00e0 deux. \u201cAnd I\u2019m a new animal.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Whoever she was, she had moves. She\u2019d jumped over the side of the bridge a moment later and vanished.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">His cat-and-mouse with her over the next day, while he waited for the moment to come when he\u2019d cut fence, didn\u2019t enlighten him any more as to how she\u2019d known his Jack so well. Somehow, though, she hadn\u2019t known Jack\u2019s story well <i>enough<\/i> to avoid running afoul of some mercs. Just to see if she\u2019d back off from her claims, to see if her masquerade would crack, he\u2019d pressed that point. Jack would never have trusted a merc, much less signed up with a bunch of them. How would she explain it?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cThere was no one else around,\u201d she\u2019d told him, and he\u2019d caught that echo again\u2014<i>I lost her, it\u2019s your fault I lost her, it\u2019s your fault she-I died<\/i>\u2014that made no sense even as it tantalized him with hidden meaning.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Even as he started to care about her\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u2026to <i>want<\/i> her.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">And he could feel <i>her<\/i> wanting him\u2026 thinking that he was the only man she would ever want, <i>could<\/i> ever want.\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">None of the others in the facility, be they \u201cconvicts\u201d or \u201cinmates,\u201d had ever seen Jack. She\u2019d never been there. Many of them remembered Kyra\u2019s arrival, vividly remembering the brutal deaths that several \u201cinmates\u201d who tried to get a taste of her got instead. One of them had run screaming through the caverns as he bled out, clutching his groin as blood fountained around his hands, claiming that she\u2019d <i>bitten his dick off with her cunt\u2026<\/i>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">It almost startled a laugh out of him now. <i>She isomorphed some rapin\u2019 muthafucka\u2019s dick right off him\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">But she\u2019d been alone. First and last, alone. While there were other women in the place, most of them hidden away and protected if they survived long enough to hook up with one of the Guv\u2019s semi-principled \u201cconvicts,\u201d <i>she<\/i> had never been there. The Holy Man had been wrong. Jack had never gone to Crematoria. The closest she\u2019d ever come were the brittle shards of her memories in Kyra\u2019s head. And Kyra had made her own strange, solitary, bloody way through the caverns of Crematoria on her own. She had no one\u2026 except him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Figuring out what had really happened to Jack became secondary to getting himself\u2014and Kyra\u2014off that rock. He stopped trying to remind her of her supposed past with him, stopped trying to trip her story up, and focused on enjoying her company. She was unbalanced, not even a little sane\u2026 but he didn\u2019t mind. Once he got her alone, maybe he could help her. And maybe once he\u2019d helped her, and she knew she could trust him, knew he wasn\u2019t gonna throw her over, she\u2019d be okay with telling him what had really happened to the kid from the <i>Hunter-Gratzner<\/i> crash\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">But then the Necros took her.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He\u2019d followed, not because he was trying to find Jack but because he was trying to <i>save Kyra,<\/i> and found her in the worst possible straits of all. A convert.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He\u2019d barely heard a word the Lord Fuckin\u2019 Marshal was saying to him, something about choosing the Necromonger Way, his attention focused so completely on her. Her eyes were sad as they met his.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cIt hurts,\u201d she told him as she stood before him, \u201cat first.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Pain is all I\u2019ve ever known\u2026<\/i> her soul whispered to him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cBut after a while, the pain goes away, just as they promise,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>She went away\u2026 they took her from me\u2026 all I had left of her is gone\u2026<\/i> There was grief in that thought, but strangely muted.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cAre you with me, Kyra?\u201d he asked her. She seemed lost inside her own head somehow, her eyes clouded over. Were these even her words coming out of her mouth?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cThere\u2019s a moment when you can almost see the Underverse through his eyes,\u201d she told him instead. \u201cHe makes it sound perfect. A place where anyone can start over.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>I\u2019ve started over so many times\u2026 what\u2019s one more?<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">And there, for just a moment, he caught a glimpse of her embracing a girl, of a height with her, a girl whose face had haunted his dreams for five years. <i>Tell him Jack\u2019s dead. She wasn\u2019t strong enough to cut it in his world\u2026<\/i> in <i>her<\/i> voice. And Kyra\u2019s puzzled hurt that <i>she<\/i> could say such a thing, her cloying fear and regret over their separation\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Fuck\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cAre you <i>with<\/i> me, Kyra?\u201d He pushed at her mind, trying to bring her back to him. <i>Gimme a sign and I\u2019ll get you out of here. Anywhere you wanna go, we\u2019ll go\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">For a moment, she almost swayed toward him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>He is not yours. He never was.<\/i> The voice was <i>in<\/i> her head but not <i>from<\/i> her head, the manifold voice of the Quasi-Dead. Killing rage filled him as she walked past him and away, puppeted by the Lord Marshal\u2019s minions.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He had no intention of letting those voices puppet <i>him.<\/i> He\u2019d rather die than be something\u2019s slave again. But first\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u2026he was going to get as many pounds of flesh as he could. For her.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">The fight was vicious, brutal, and nearly over\u2014he was certain that he was going to actually die, but at least he\u2019d die <i>himself<\/i>\u2014when Kyra, her eyes clear and lucid once more, had stabbed the Lord Marshal in the back and then been flung across the room, striking the spiked pillar. He\u2019d felt the spikes pierce her back, felt her agony, no longer numb, no longer shielded from injuries by whatever the Necros had done to her, now somehow undone. He needed to get up, to rise, to help her.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">She managed to pull herself off of the pillar, collapsing to the dais by the throne. Her eyes met his. <i>I thought we\u2019d have more time\u2026 I thought I\u2019d get to be yours first\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He wanted to burn down the \u2019verse.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">And somehow he could see the Lord Marshal in motion, preparing to flee Vaako\u2019s raised weapon, as if time had slowed to the crawl he\u2019d experienced when he\u2019d been in cryo.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>This is your first step in freeing all of the enslaved,<\/i> the voice from his dreams murmured. Shirah, somehow in his ear\u2026 <i>But it\u2019s going to hurt.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">It wasn\u2019t the death of the Lord Marshal that hurt, even a little. It was holding Kyra as she bled out, knowing there was nothing he could do to stop it.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI thought you were dead,\u201d she whispered, the tiniest thread of sound left to her voice.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>Hold on. Hold on. Don\u2019t die\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>You cannot anchor her,<\/i> Shirah told him, her voice gentle inside his head. <i>Not now.<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He refused to believe it. \u201cAre you with me, Kyra?\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Kyra\u2019s face twisted in pain, in grief. \u201cI was always with you,\u201d she gasped, her expression suddenly pleading.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>It was me,<\/i> he heard her saying even as her voice failed her. <i>It was always me. There by your side in the eclipse, it was me, nobody else, me\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI was\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>\u2026Jack\u2026<\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He saw it, an image in her mind, the two of them side by side, walking through a forest he\u2019d never seen before, him vanquishing foes he knew he\u2019d never met on any field of battle.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\"><i>It was real, I swear it was all real\u2026 it was always <b>me\u2026<\/b><\/i><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Silence fell over her like a shroud had dropped, and she was no longer there. The tears that had been welling in her eyes, that she\u2019d been struggling to hold back, slipped free, and there was only\u2014<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u2026an empty shell\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u2014below him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">Because, he told himself with a shudder, Lucy had pulled out her soul and taken it away. There were questions that he needed to ask about that. Implications that were only just beginning to dawn on him.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">But first\u2026<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">He needed to spend some time with Kyra.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">\u201cI\u2019m ready,\u201d he told the Quasi-Dead. \u201cSkip to <i>after<\/i> that sick fuck was done hurting her. I don\u2019t want to have to feel her feeling that. Let\u2019s see what she did about it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-indent:1em;margin-bottom: 0\">She had, after all, done <i>something<\/i> to merit being sent to Crematoria. He hoped to fuck it was ten times as bloody and brutal as anything that had been done to her.<\/p>\n<p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Title: The Changeling Game (Formerly Identity Theft) Author: Ardath Rekha Chapter: 86\/? Fandom: Pitch Black (2000); The Chronicles of Riddick (2004); The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury (2004) Rat","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"bgseo_title":"\u201cThe Changeling Game\u201d 86: \u201cThrough an Occluded Mirror\u201d","bgseo_description":"Reeling from his faux pas with Jack, Riddick focuses on several mysteries he needs to solve, including the mystery of the woman he met, a year earlier, in Crematoria.","bgseo_robots_index":"index","bgseo_robots_follow":"follow","footnotes":""},"categories":[9,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fan-fiction","category-the-changeling-game"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=994"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1128,"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/994\/revisions\/1128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ardath-rekha.com\/wips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}