Chapter Fifty-four: Cartwright - Finally!

Teresa Cartwright stopped in the doorway of her office and stared at the intruder within. The military lieutenant from the other day was back, pacing up and down the narrow space between her desk and her open case files as if he owned her room. He ignored her, his concentration intent upon his personal comm call.

She closed her door and leaned against it, glaring at him. Her assistant had been forced to reschedule three checkups to accommodate this bastard, who had apparently made it clear that the clinic would be shut down if she didn't, and now he couldn't even break off his conversation--

Despite her anger, she began to listen in, quickly fascinated. If her eavesdropping bothered him he could just screw himself; it was her office.

"No, do not use the medical files stored in the mainframes. I already told you, they're compromised...

"That's right. Have someone at the Special Forces Hospital pull out the hard copies. It's been less than five years so it shouldn't take too long...

"Yeah, that's a good point. Have them pull the mainframe backup from about a week before she arrived at Seti Station. See how the data compares with the information on file after her 'body' was found...

"No, I already know exactly what you're going to find. It's her. She and I had a long conversation, of course I'm sure!"

The lieutenant -- Jarvis, that was his name -- glanced up at her and grimaced. In spite of herself, a wry smile tugged at Cartwright's lips. Yeah, she'd battled with bureaucracy a few times herself... the smile curdled as she remembered the circumstances and outcome of her last battle. She'd never fought back again.

Jarvis's attention had already turned back to his call. "Well, you tell Baldwin that we almost had a bloodbath on our hands today. If she'd died, or if I hadn't let her go when I did and he'd caught up to us, we'd have lost another dozen soldiers and god only knows how many innocent bystanders...

"No, I'm getting some important evidence right now. I'll be back at the ship once I'm done, and the General can swear at me as much as he wants to then."

He looked over at Cartwright again, his expression more focused. The call was being drawn to a close.

"Look, if you want to give him a piece of good news, tell him that what I've found out means the Phase II Operatives can be restored to active duty and Phase III can move forward on schedule. I have to go, Sergeant. Yes. Good-bye."

As Lieutenant Jarvis closed and pocketed his personal comm unit, Dr. Cartwright deliberately stepped past him and took her seat at her desk. He raised an eyebrow and then took one of the chairs before it, letting himself be relegated to the role of patient or supplicant if only for a moment. She knew it wouldn't last long. He had too much power not to wield it without even thinking.

"How can I help you today, Lieutenant?" She kept her voice polite. She really wanted to ask him why he was wasting her time today.

"I need all of the information you can give me about the Tarsins. Both what's in the clinic's files, and what you remember from dealing with them."

Interesting. Fascinating, actually. A cold chill passed down her back abruptly as she realized what it probably meant. "May I ask why?"

"Because Colin Tarsin was, in fact, Richard B. Riddick. And the woman you knew as Rebecca Tarsin was Audrey Jacqueline Kowalczyk, the girl--"

"The girl he's supposed to have murdered?" Cartwright stared at Jarvis in shock. There was no possible way--

He smiled thinly. "Believe me, I know what you're feeling, Doctor. I wouldn't believe it either if I hadn't come face to face with her only a little over an hour ago. She's alive. Or at least, she was when I last saw her." He looked intensely uncomfortable suddenly.

"Then how..."

"He faked her death. The bastard got into secure Interplanetary Data System files and replaced her physiological profile with some Jane Doe's. We still don't know all the details." He stared out into emptiness, his expression frankly admiring. "We still don't know everything he can do."

His eyes focused back on her. "Tell me about his appearance. You said he had brown hair and brown eyes when you saw him?"

"That's right," she replied, wondering why he was interested in that. But then she remembered how quickly he and Aspen had lost interest when she'd described Tarsin's -- Riddick's -- physical appearance. A disguise? It couldn't have been, could it? It had seemed far too natural...

"And the gate guards said he clearly had blue eyes..." Jarvis began to laugh. "I'm going to have to add 'master of disguise' to his resume."

She watched in bemusement as he shook his head, recovering quickly from his bout of mirth.

"I can get you Rebecca's -- I mean Audrey's --"

"Actually, she likes to go by 'Jack,'" he corrected her.

"Okay. I can get you her files if you would like."

"I would. I think there are some people in the Top Brass who might find them very enlightening. But I'm more interested in learning about them. Tell me what you saw, Doctor."

Cartwright sighed, collecting her thoughts. Where to start? There had been so many things that had stuck in her mind about them. She could still see them vividly, the way she'd first seen them... She'd start there.

"Well, I knew they were unusual almost immediately, actually. When I went into their room to begin Rebec-- Jack's treatment, they were sitting next to each other on the edge of the bed, holding hands. He was always so... solicitous to her. I think we both know that's something that hardly ever happens in a place like this."

"I see. Please go on." The expression in his eyes was odd. These weren't just questions to him, she suddenly realized. It was important to him on a more visceral level.

"I think... after I spoke to you the other day, I almost called you back because I realized why Riddick would have killed Pete, assuming Mr. Tarsin was Riddick--"

"Which he was," Jarvis affirmed again.

"During the primary Regen procedure, he stayed with her the whole time." A tiny, sad laugh emerged from her mouth before she could stop it. "He did something I'd never seen before." She described how he'd lain beneath the girl, holding her and comforting her as the procedure dragged on.

The lieutenant frowned. "Why was she in so much pain?"

Now the shame flooded back. Of course. If Riddick had been upset, knowing as he did how life in the underground worked, this man from the clean and sanitary world where legitimate doctors and nurses practiced would be horrified.

"You know how expensive the few painkillers that can be used with Regen work are, don't you? None of the clients who come here ever want to pay for them, or at least, none did until he brought her here. He gave me hell when he found out they existed. He ended up buying her fifteen thousand New Francs worth of analgesics after that, to keep her from feeling any more pain."

Jarvis sat back in his seat. A look of... joy? Awe? What was that in his face?... had appeared. She wasn't sure she caught the next words he whispered correctly.

"You're still in there, Bryan. God, it's good to see you..."

"Sorry?"

"Er... nothing. Please continue, doctor. He held her through the procedure?"

"Yes. And I remember that, at one moment, when the pain got really bad for her, Pete was watching her writhe and enjoying it a little too much--"

Murderous fury appeared in Jarvis's face.

"--and Riddick looked exactly the way you look now. He looked like he wanted to rip Pete apart." Cartwright sighed shakily. "If Pete tried anything else on her, I can see why Riddick would have gone after him."

"Did they ever complain about him? Do anything to prevent him from going into her room?"

Oh god, yes-- the ring!

"Yes he did," she told Jarvis slowly. "About an hour after he cussed me out for not giving the girl painkillers, he reported that a valuable ring was missing -- possibly stolen -- from her room. He insisted that anyone who went into the room when he wasn't there had to be accompanied by a supervisor from then on."

"A ring?" A tiny smile had crept into Jarvis's expression. He knew. She watched as the smile grew and he shook his head.

"It supposedly belonged originally to his great-grandmother--"

For whatever reason, that made Jarvis sputter with laughter. After a moment he recovered. The broad grin he gave her took twenty years off of his face and made her suddenly like him a great deal. "Oh man, you people were set up."

She chuckled a little herself. "You want to know the worst part? The owners were so furious over it that they contacted every fence in town to demand the ring back. And one of them had one that matched the description--"

Jarvis burst out laughing again. She joined him.

"You guys gave them the ring?" He finally managed, pointing at her with an unsteady finger.

She was laughing too hard to manage anything but a nod. She had to wipe at her eyes and hold her stomach for a long moment.

"We had Shannon give it to them, because she'd felt like she'd been personally accused. She'd straightened up the room that day. We told her we'd found it in a vacuum bag, because she was so upset she'd almost quit over it--"

Jarvis sighed. "Bry must have been dying of laughter."

"There never was a ring, was there?" she finally asked, serious once more. "It was a ploy to keep Pete out of her room for the remainder of her stay, so nobody would suspect Riddick when he killed Pete, right?"

Jarvis nodded gravely. "Whatever Malcolm did, he infuriated Riddick badly. The way Pete was killed... he'd done that to corpses before, but never to a live human being. He really loves--"

The lieutenant swallowed and Cartwright felt obligated to glance away from the excess of emotion that crossed his face.

"When did you find out she's still alive?" she asked gently after a moment.

"Today," he whispered. "I found out today. Until now, I thought he'd tortured her to death... I thought Bry didn't exist anymore. Just some..."

He took a deep breath and glanced over at her. "I'm going to tell you something that I'll deny later if you ever bring it up or try to take it public. Do you remember the New Ecuador Ripper? Or The Wolf of Daedalus Station?"

Cartwright nodded, no longer breathing. Both of those men were uncaught, serial rapists who had mutilated and murdered their victims...

"Both of them were the same man. Peter Malcolm. We've now determined that he murdered at least eleven women in New Paris as well, and more than fifty on other planets. That's who this clinic was employing. That's who Riddick killed."

It suddenly felt freezing in the small office. "Why aren't you making this public?"

"Two reasons. First, Pete eluded Interplanetary Law Enforcement and continued his games for ten years over seven planets and two space stations. You can imagine how little they want that made public. And second, they don't want anyone starting to think of Riddick as a hero. The lawmakers in America and particularly New York State would never permit that."

Cartwright nodded, seeing his point. It was a shame, though. From what he'd told her, dozens of families who'd lost a daughter, sister, mother, wife... they'd never know that the man who had tortured their loved one to death had finally been given his just reward.

And to think I thought nobody could possibly deserve what Riddick did to him...

"So now what happens?" she asked after a long moment of silence.

"Well, Riddick's finally really gone. He left Troubadour an hour ago, for real this time, we think. He could be anywhere at this point. I'm not going to look for him now. When he's ready, he'll reappear." An odd look, a mixture of dread and longing, crossed the lieutenant's face. "He said he would. So... now I gather the files on the Tarsins, do a little research on the people he and Jack were masquerading as this time, and then I go back to Earth. And wait for him to come to me."

Cartwright frowned slightly. There was both an ominous tone to his words, and a great longing. "Will he?"

Ineffable sadness was in the man's eyes as he nodded. "He will. When he's ready. I only hope he realizes that I'm--"

He silenced himself and his composure returned. His gaze, when it returned to her, was pure business. "None of this ever happened, doctor. Colin and Rebecca Tarsin are nobody for the clinic to concern itself over. Peter Malcolm was the victim of random foul play. Understood?"

She nodded.

He paused again, considering. Finally he seemed to come to a decision. "I know your past, Dr. Cartwright. I know why you're here instead of practicing proper medicine the way you should be."

A hot spike of anger flashed through her at those words. The son of a bitch--

"Don't."

He glanced up at her, looking genuinely confused. What a consummate con artist! "What?"

"Don't threaten me, Lieutenant. I'm going to give you the records and forget they existed anyway. You don't have to throw your weight around." She stared down at her desk, bitterness throttling her. "And I really doubt you could ruin my reputation any more than it has been, anyway. So just... don't."

Genuine puzzlement filled his voice. "Doctor, I wasn't threatening you. Believe me, if you did try to go public with this, that's not what we'd try to do to you. You'd just disappear."

She glanced up at him, still furious but also deeply chilled. His gaze upon her was frank. They'd really do it, she realized. "Then what do you want?"

The lieutenant took a deep breath. He held it for a moment as if he was debating the wisdom of what he was about to say. Finally he shook his head and exhaled. "You may not thank me for this. It's not much of an improvement, but..."

"But what?"

"Doctor, sixteen years ago you performed an abortion on a young woman who you believed to be named Mallory Chase. The personal ID she showed you indicated that she was of age to abort without parental consent, and the procedure went flawlessly. Do you even remember anything about it?"

Cartwright stared at him in confusion. She'd thought he was about to bring up the sordid little scandal that had cost her her license, but this...? "No, I'm sorry. I don't."

"I can't tell you her real name, but I will tell you that she was underage. That's not your fault; the ID she showed you was first rate. You couldn't possibly have known that you were performing the abortion on the daughter of one of the Tribunal Senators. And you certainly couldn't have known that she was pregnant by her own father."

Cold horror and disgust flooded through her. Understanding followed.

"Yes, Doctor. The scandal that ended your career was orchestrated by the Senator in question. You were entrapped. He was retaliating for something you didn't even know you'd done, and doing so in a way that would prevent the world from knowing what he was doing to his own daughters. Sordid, isn't it?"

She nodded, too appalled to speak. All that shame, years of self-recrimination... arranged?

Jarvis was watching her intently, a mixture of sympathy and some less definable emotion on his face. "The Senator died two years ago. Something he ate..."

Did he look smug? It wasn't possible.

"Doctor, he was the only one with any interest in preventing you from returning to the world of legitimate medicine. He's gone now, but a great deal of his influence remains. I can't get you publicly cleared, but... there is a position that could be opened to you, if you are interested."

She watched him for a long moment. "Tell me more."

"You would be doing prenatal care, initially. There would be approximately three dozen patients for you to attend to. You would have to monitor them intensely; none of them are capable of caring for themselves. The slightest sign of infection -- of any kind -- would need to be reported. Every detail of their children's health would need monitoring as well. Once the children are born... they would become your primary concern. At that point the job description becomes more like that of a GP so I'll understand if you're not interested. But I know you're qualified for the position if you are."

"And the downside to all of this?" She waited. Nothing he'd said explained how uneasy he looked, after all.

"You would be working under the strictest non-disclosure statutes in existence. No matter what you did or saw, you would never be able to publish your findings. You would never even be able to admit to working on the project. Once you go in, you're part of it forever, or at least until your death. It means saying goodbye to the life you have."

The life she had? What life? She'd been living from day to day for a decade and a half, turning ex-whores into breeders for the frontiers. She had half a dozen acquaintances, no close friends, and those few were the only people she'd found herself able to respect who were also able to respect her. Most of the people who didn't find her current line of work offensive were frankly too sleazy for her to enjoy being around...

She couldn't possibly miss this life. Especially not since she'd caught a glimpse of a new world through the Tarsins... through Richard Riddick and Jack Kowalczyk.

Riddick and Kowalczyk's passage through her life had marked her in some way that she couldn't explain or define. A longing that she hadn't felt in ages had been stirred awake. She'd seen something different from the sordid world she'd inhabited for a decade and a half, a glimpse into the world she'd been forced to leave behind or one very much like it, and she wanted in. Badly. She wanted the calluses and scar tissue that had formed over her soul gone.

Idly she wondered why a man who chased a serial killer across the galaxy and back would be involved with prenatal care. Then she realized it didn't matter. She'd be finding out soon enough. He was offering her a step toward the world she wanted, and it was one that would probably never come again.

"You've got yourself a doctor, Lieutenant." She smiled.

He didn't smile back. If anything, his face became more grave. "You do understand that if you take this position you'll be stuck. There's no way out once you go in."

"Lieutenant Jarvis, I've spent the last fifteen years of my life thinking there was no way out of this dive. I'm game."

An odd look flickered through his eyes. "I hope so, Doctor."

He stood. Strange. It suddenly came to her that the way he tilted his head, as he watched her, was almost exactly the same way Riddick had. How well did the two know each other, she wondered. Where'd they both pick up that particular mannerism? Had one learned it from the other?

"If you'll get those files for me and gather your personal effects, we'll be going, Dr. Cartwright. How long do you think it'll take you to pack?"

The thought about Jarvis and Riddick's mannerisms was swept away. In its place was her squalid but tidy apartment. Mentally she picked through her possessions, realizing anew how depressing her life had become. There was almost nothing she'd actually want to take with her.

"Not long at all, Lieutenant." She turned to her files and pulled out the one labeled "Tarsin." Normally she would have turned it over to Records long before now, but she hadn't. She hadn't wanted to let go of it. Every time she looked at it, just glimpsing the name, she'd seen the two of them again, the way they acted toward each other.

Every time she'd looked at it she'd been reminded that love still existed.

She wondered what she'd find in this new world she was about to enter.

The door to her office closed softly behind her as she left it, moments later, for the last time.