Chapter Fifty-five: Cry For Her...

Still and pale, Jack lay on her side in the bed that had once been hers. She didn't move as Riddick began yet another stitch.

He'd set up an IV drip for her, mostly a transfusion of whole synthblood but with a touch of sedative mixed in. He glanced at it periodically. He knew it would be enough to replace the blood she'd lost, but he was still uneasy. It was the last. Until they got to Daedalus, there was no more blood in his med locker. He already knew she couldn't have a transfusion from him; that was one of the things he'd checked on right away when she'd first returned to his life.

Now he concentrated on stitching her wound shut, knotting the newest suture carefully.

She'd been amazingly lucky. The bullet had grazed her in passing and was probably buried in some lawn on the Rue Mercredi. It had sliced her like a knife, though, ripping through her flesh. Another centimeter or so over and...

No. He wouldn't think about that. She was alive and she would be well and that was all that mattered. In another week he'd see to it that her skin was flawless once more, too. This was the last bullet she'd ever take for him, he vowed.

Problem is you just run right at those things, kid, he thought wryly as he prepared the next stitch. Been doing it since I first met you.

She'd volunteered to go in after Zeke, or so he'd been told later. Carolyn had been forced to restrain her from rushing into the coring room after Ali. Paris had had to do much the same when she'd tried to run back for Shazza, and Imam himself had held her back from hurrying to his aid along with Carolyn.

"Gonna have to discuss this heroic impulse control problem of yours," he told her quietly. He couldn't feel anger about it, though. He suspected it was that sort of natural selflessness within her that had enabled him to rediscover his own humanity.

Jack's only response was a low sigh. She was still under, of course. He turned his attention back to her wound and began another stitch. At least he was familiar with treating battle wounds--

Battlefield doctors decide who lives and dies; it's called triage, a voice he knew all too well commented in his head.

Fuck off, Billy. A low growl escaped Riddick's throat. The memories, however, surged forward.

He'd never really despised William Johns until the end, when the man had tried to connive him into killing Jack. After all, he was a realist; he knew that he'd almost single-handedly destroyed the merc's life three years earlier; had very nearly killed him, in fact. But he'd been surprised and increasingly disgusted by the depths to which the former "William the Conqueror" had sunk.

The drugs had made a certain amount of sense, at least. He'd heard, through rumors, that it had taken Johns almost a year to learn how to walk again. At first he'd been grudgingly impressed by how far Billy had managed to come, but not for long.

Walking with him, ahead of the others, he'd understood and even somewhat approved of the plan; sacrifice one life to save five. From a coldly logical standpoint it made perfect sense. Until Johns tipped his hand completely.

"You do the girl, and I'll keep the others off your back."

That was when Riddick knew, for certain, how many games Johns was trying to run at once. He'd expected the man to nominate Carolyn. Those two had been locked in a power-struggle ever since the eclipse had begun, and she had seemed the logical target for Johns to pick. Or, perhaps, the holy man, who had sided with her in the latest round of that struggle. But Billy hadn't. He'd picked Jack.

Yeah, there was some logic to it. She was the one who was bleeding already, the one the creatures were smelling. But...

But.

But it would strike at all of the others like a mortal blow. Carolyn loved the girl, calling her "sweetheart" and promising never to leave her. Imam had taken her under his wing. Suleiman had shown signs, since her true gender had been revealed, of solicitous gallantry toward her. Her death would wound the group severely.

Did Johns even realize that? He had to. The man wasn't stupid, after all. Was he trying to hurt the others because they hadn't automatically turned to him for leadership?

And what of little Jack herself?

For a moment he could actually see it in his head: he'd lead the girl aside, just a little way from the others. Only far enough so they couldn't reach him in time to stop him. She'd go with him willingly, that trusting look in her face -- an ache lanced through his chest at that. He'd reach for his shiv and-- no. He'd need it to be instant. The idea of her feeling a moment's pain, even a split second's awareness of his betrayal, nauseated him. The vision fell apart.

Billy, you sick fuck, he thought to himself. Maybe I should thank you for showing me where my limits are.

Could he stand by and let Johns do it, he wondered, before the final realizations fell into place. Billy wouldn't do it. The motherfucker had a plan behind this.

Have big, evil convict Riddick kill an innocent member of the group and butcher her. Have everyone else hate Riddick for her death, but be unable to act against him. Get everyone to the skiff. Break the deal and put Riddick back in chains for transport back to Nereid. No one would stop him. No one would speak against him. His hands would be bloodless and he would be a hero.

And little Jack, the only one in the whole group who had really liked or trusted Riddick from the beginning, would be dead by his hands.

You insidious son of a bitch. That was why Johns had targeted her and not Fry. That and the fact that he would need a pilot, and the only other one available would soon be back in chains.

"It's not too big a job for you, is it?" came the fucker's voice from behind him. Suddenly Riddick realized that he needed to kill something... or someone.

There's only one person in this group I can kill with impunity, he thought, before he slowly turned around. There was only one person in the group, he realized, that he wanted to kill. This time he would make no mistake.

"I'm just wondering if we don't need a bigger piece of bait," he replied, and watched as slow comprehension came to the other man's eyes.

It was a very good kill.

In the end he let one of the creatures take Johns. But it was still his kill; Johns died by his design if not by his hand. He watched it happen, studying the way the creature moved, the way it attacked. He felt inordinate satisfaction as he watched it feed.

Time, he finally told himself, to go after the others.

Shouldering his lights once more and climbing a slight embankment, he was amused to see that the four remaining survivors had gotten turned in a circle and were running back toward him. He let them come to him.

The moment that burned him inside, however, was when Jack got upset over Johns' death. The man had wanted to throw her to the flying, keening wolves that infested this planet, and she was mourning his loss! He stepped close to her, conflicting emotions passing through him. He wanted to shake her and tell her to open her eyes. He wanted to... what, hug her? Comfort her? What the hell was wrong with him suddenly, anyway?

"Don't you cry for Johns," he finally growled softly. "Don't you dare."

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the holy man stiffen, comprehension on his face. So, he thought. Somebody else knows what almost happened here.

He moved past the girl and headed into the bonefield, seeking out the sled with the precious fuel cells.

Never cry for him, Jack, he thought as he walked. Not one tear.

The last of the stitches was in place. Riddick sat back, surveying his work.

They looked horrible.

Oh, there was nothing wrong with them, other than their mere presence. Each suture was precisely placed, carefully laid so that Jack's skin would heal with minimal scarring. Any that actually occurred would be regened away when they got to Daedalus station, but...

They still looked horrible. Obscene. Jack's body was not meant to be broken.

Riddick's understanding of human anatomy was absolute and had been for a long time. He knew the names and locations of every bone, every organ, every muscle group and nerve center, every blood vessel. He knew exactly where to strike an opponent to paralyze or even kill, but...

Looking at Jack now, he understood the wonder of it, the way that it all came together in grace and beauty, in a totality that went beyond miraculous. He'd been worshipping her body for days, yes, and memorizing every inch of her, but the full power of it only hit him now as he stared at her wound and was outraged by its presence.

Did other people feel this way? He imagined they did. He imagined they must. It came to him, suddenly, what the parents of his chess club friends must have felt as they looked at the broken, butchered remains of their sons. That outrage, and the devastating, soul-extinguishing loss he'd felt when he'd believed Jack to be dead.

He'd spent years trying not to imagine how they had felt. A shudder passed through him and he forced those feelings back once more. That was something that could never be undone, and could never be forgiven, no matter what he did or became now. It had to be left in the past, an ineradicable blot on his newly-rediscovered conscience.

When his psychosis had first come upon him, he hadn't been sure whether it was an exultant dream or a terrifying nightmare. Images and ideas had begun to haunt him; odd hungers and thirsts had plagued his mind and soul. He'd held out for almost five months before he was no longer able to resist the siren's call of the madness within. Pent up for so long, it had exploded out in a terrifying, devastating maelstrom.

He honestly had no recollection of killing his chess club friends, although he knew he'd done it. Sometimes hints of his memories of that evening would surface; he banished them as quickly as he could, not wanting to see the terrified, pleading faces in his mind's eye. They were mixed in with other fragmented memories from those five years of madness -- the moment when he snapped his first cellmate's neck in a prison brawl, the feel of a guard's hot blood sluicing over his hands -- but he tried not to recall any of them.

Because those memories were tainted... with unspeakable pleasure.

Yes, a part of him hungered after that violence, yearning for it still. The animal within was alive and well and knew exactly what it wanted -- blood and death. It hungered for the kill always. With every waking moment, he could feel its restless pacing within him. It had taken him five years to cage it, to become its master.

And still, now and again, it escaped and went on a rampage.

He'd been wrong, he realized. In between the night when Ruth Baker and her toy-boys had tries to poison him and the day of the space battle, there had been one other time the beast had gotten loose. The consequence of that time had gone beyond horrific -- it had been the first genuine tragedy of his adult life.

And it had happened the very same night he'd finally killed William Johns...

As one predator to another he'd understood those creatures all too well. He could feel the frenzied drives that motivated them as they completed their nocturnal revels. Fight. Mate. Hunt. Feed. The primal urges of all living things had been heightened to the screaming point as the creatures emerged for their one long, special night of freedom after twenty-two years of subterranean imprisonment.

Yes, he knew exactly what they were feeling.

On this one night the world above was as hospitable to them as the world below. Predators and prey alike had come out while they could. Riddick and his fellow survivors were really just targets of opportunity for the creatuures during their planet-wide feeding frenzy.

And he could feel that hunger. His own growled in answer. Most of the beasts skirted him, rightly sensing that they'd come up against a deadlier predator than themselves. But a showdown was inevitable.

Riddick couldn't believe his stupidity in sending all of the light ahead with the others. Crabbing backwards up the hill as a particularly huge beast stalked toward him, he could feel its animal hunger clawing at him. His own snarled back, raging at him for his idiocy, for the self-sacrificial behavior that had brought him to this low.

Move it, you stupid fuck!

He rolled over the crest of the hill and sprang to his feet, racing after the others. Around him the sounds of pursuing creatures dogged him. Only a few were really all that interested, he realized as he ran. Most hadn't gotten a taste of human flesh and blood and were only mildly intrigued by the strange beasts moving through their mating and feeding grounds. But a few were dogging him with a voracious hunger. They'd tasted the blood of his kind and wanted more.

Abruptly, he was cut off and had to duck into an alley. He kept moving, his shiv clutched tightly in his right hand. Any moment one of those fuckers would actually catch up to him and the game would end. Turning another corner, he skidded to a halt as one of the beasts glided down, landing just in front of him, its back to him. He made his decision as it began to turn.

Blind spot, he reminded himself. Get close up, step in.

In a second he was nose-to-nose with the great beast. With every bit of strength and grace he possessed he swayed along with the creature, staying in the one area where he was completely invisible to it. Its mouth opened and he could smell the familiar stench of human blood on its breath.

I'm doing it. I'm really doing it!

He could have killed it then. He should have killed it. He should have taken his shiv and opened it up on the spot. But he didn't, too enrapt with the deadly little dance they were swaying in.

Finally the creature moved away.

I did it, I fuckin' did--

Another one landed behind him, crying in triumph. The first whirled back, now spotting him. The dance, he realized, was at an end. He shouldn't have let it go on so long in the first place. Now he was very likely fucked.

As slowly as he could, trying not to draw attention to the movement, he raised his shiv.

Now.

Riddick lunged forward, darting beneath the first creature's arms, the shiv arcing out. Even as blue blood and gore spattered his hands he felt a sharp sting by his ear and knew he'd been clawed. The creature fell back, squealing in mortal agony and he turned to deal with the other--

--and screamed.

Fiery agony lanced through his thigh as the second predator sliced at his left leg. He could smell his own blood now, sharp and, yes, copperish. He'd been felled; he was surrounded. He was going to die...

The scream transmuted into a guttural roar as the animal burst its cage. A new dance began, the Dance of Death. As squeals and hoots echoed through the night, marking the approach of other predators, Riddick's blade flashed out and sliced through the clawed arm of his attacker. Now it screamed, falling back. He pursued, slicing open its belly and grasping at its innards with his free hand. Even as it fell, convulsing, he heard another landing behind him. He whirled, roaring his aggression.

Kill! the animal shouted, exulting. Kill everything! He would go down with the blood of as many of them on his hands and in his mouth as he could manage.

Distantly he thought he heard someone shouting his name. He ignored the call. It had no meaning to him now. Another beast fell before him, its head almost sliced off of its body, and he whirled to face yet another.

He lunged forward but this creature fell back, retreating from him. It fled into the night even as yet another sound came from behind him and he whirled, shiv arcing out toward the pale blur now before him--

Oh fuck, NO!

Pulling the blade back cost him his balance and his momentum carried him crashing into some barrels, but he did not slice Carolyn's throat open. Later he would wonder if she'd even realized that the business end of his shiv had come within a half-inch of her jugular.

Within him, the bestial side raged. Blood was blood, it snarled, and hers would be every bit as good as any of the beasts he'd been killing. His body trembled as he fought the urge to continue his berserker rampage.

Not her, he growled back at it. Not her!

She hurried to his side, oblivious to the war raging within him. He knew she was looking at his wounds and imagining him to be in terrible pain, believing him horribly weakened. True, he was hurting, but not that badly. But all of his energy was going toward reining in the animalistic violence that had been unleashed, and now did not want to stop. It wanted her.

Run, he tried to tell her. Get away from me now! But all that emerged was an agonized, incoherent wheeze.

Her arms slid around him. "Okay, hold onto me," she whispered in his ear as she tugged at him. "Hold onto me."

He didn't dare obey her. The shiv was still clutched deathgrip-tight in his hand. If he raised it the monster within him might turn it on her. He forced his arms to stay limp as she pulled at him.

The hunger stirred again as she tried to drag him to his feet. All of his energy was focused on battling it back; he couldn't help her. He couldn't even tell her how much danger she was in from him at that moment.

"We're gonna get out of here," she hissed, and tried to make him take a step forward.

Let me out, the beast demanded again. Let me feed! Images of what it wanted to do to her spooled out before his eyes and he recoiled in horror.

"Okay, I've got you, come on--"

He staggered and collapsed, too busy restraining the beast within to navigate the world without. It was roaring at him, filling his head with its fury. He could barely hear Carolyn shouting at him over it.

"Come on, Riddick! Get up! Get up! GET UP!" The fury in her voice finally penetrated the red haze swimming around his head and he managed to focus his eyes on her. An ironic smile quirked her lips as he stared.

"I said I'd die for them, not you, now let's move."

Her remark confused him. He managed to stagger almost upright, clinging to her. His shiv was still in his hand, dangerously close to her back. He tilted his wrist to keep it pointed away from her. She began to maneuver him through the alley, slowly turning the two of them around and around. Taking a deep breath, Riddick shoved the beast back further down and managed a few stronger steps of his own.

The end took them both by surprise. Even as his strength began to return and his self-control reasserted itself a shock jarred both of them. He heard Carolyn's abrupt intake of breath and saw her eyes widen and dilate with sudden pain. A new blood-scent entered the air and he knew that she was bleeding now.

For one terrible, heart-stopping moment, he honestly thought his hand had slipped and he'd stabbed her. But no, his wrist was still turned, keeping the shiv away from her. He hadn't done it. Something else had.

He could feel it as the life began to drain out of her, could see it in her face. He'd been here before, after all, many times; he knew very well what it was like to watch someone die. But he'd never, ever in his life felt such a powerful, overwhelming urge to stop it, to roll back the moment. Within him the animal had finally gone silent, stricken as well.

No... he thought in sickened denial. Not her...

But it was too late. Carolyn Fry was dying in his arms. He couldn't do anything to stop it. Their eyes met, for one final moment, and an odd smile appeared on her lips. It would haunt him for years as he wondered what it meant, and what her final words had intended.

Abruptly the moment ended as she was jerked back. He lunged forward, grasping her hand, but it slid out of his grip. As he watched in powerless horror she was pulled back into the night and lost.

He really wasn't injured that badly, but now his legs gave out, completely numb beneath him, and he fell back down to the mud. This wasn't supposed to have happened... she wasn't supposed to die for me!

"Not for me," he rasped, shudders wracking his body. Gaining a little strength, he shouted it again into the pitch black night around him.

As if from a distance he observed himself with ironic detachment as, just as he'd feared he might, he begged the night to give her back. It was the animal itself that cried out in pain and remorse now, for the first time in its savage life.

"She didn't have to die..." Jack's words echoed mournfully through his mind. She'd been talking about Shazza, but it was even more true of Carolyn.

If he'd acted like a man before and gone back for the others without prodding, she would have lived.

If he'd had better control over his inner beast and had carried his own fucking weight, she would have lived.

If she'd had enough sense to cut her "losses" and leave him to the grim fate of his own making, she would have lived.

Carolyn Fry was dead, not by his hand but by his design, a design he'd scribbled in a moment of casual, brutal selfishness. Kneeling in the mud, he found himself wanting to follow her into the darkness--

"Fry? Riddick? Hello?!"

Jack.

He had to get the girl and the Holy Man off this rock.

Grimly, hating himself, he rose, picked up the dropped bottle of glowing larvae, and slowly made his way the final distance to the skiff. Imam and Jack were standing on the ramp, peering into the darkness. Their smile at his limping approach faded as they realized he was alone.

"Where's Fry?" the girl begged. "Is she okay?"

He couldn't do more than shake his head silently. Imam stepped back as he climbed wearily up the ramp. Jack followed him in, a choked, suppressed sob escaping her throat.

Turning to look at the girl, he saw the odd, pained contortions of her face as she tried to hold in her tears, attempting to hide her grief away from him. He put his hand on her shoulder without even thinking.

"It's okay, Jack. You can cry for her."

She sank down onto one of the seats against the skiff's walls, tears now in her eyes.

Cry for her, he thought again as he pulled himself wearily into the pilot's chair. He closed his eyes for a long moment as he reached for his reserves. His eyes were dry, as always. As far as he knew he hadn't shed a single tear since he was seven years old. Cry for her, Jack. Do it for both of us.

Lying beside Jack now, his hand on her still cheek, he wondered if he would have found tears at last if she'd died. Would they have finally come? Or would everything human within him have died with her, and the chance of tears ever coming again along with it?

He wished he could see normal colors again. He thought her color was improving, but he couldn't be sure. Of course it should be, after all the synthblood he'd transfused into her. His thumb gently swept over her lips, caressing them.

Jack stirred, her lips parting. "He's gonna be so upset..." she murmured before going still once more.

Now what did that mean? He wondered if she was referring to her gunshot wound... or to those blasted disks.

He'd put away all of the medical supplies just a few minutes ago. Along the way he'd found the bag of disks she'd been so determined to bring home. He had no idea what was on them, but there was no way it could have been worth the risk to her life.

Still, they were important to her. He had resisted the impulse to throw them away in his anger over what they'd apparently cost her.

Gonna be a long week, he thought to himself. He'd have to be very careful with her. The stitches were in an awkward place, a part of the body that tended to bend and stretch and so even normal movements would likely pull at them. She'd be on the lightest duty he could come up with. Training would be suspended in most areas... and sex would be just plain out of the question for a while.

That would probably have been true even if the injury had been in a less delicate place, he reflected. Physical trauma was rough on the libido, leaving all of a body's nerves raw and on edge. A simple, gentle caress might be intensely uncomfortable to her while she healed. He knew that from experience; a few of his worst wounds had even managed to kill his own sex drive for a time, as he recalled.

But at least, this time, he wouldn't have to hide his thoughts from her. This time he could admit to his feelings, rather than concealing them. If he became to aroused in her presence and had to pull away, at least he could admit to it.

It amazed him, sometimes, how much closer to humanity she'd brought him. Carolyn had made him want to be a better man; Jack had showed him how to become it.

Who knows? he thought as he closed his eyes. Maybe she'll even show me how to cry someday.

At last he slept for a time, knowing Jack was safely in his care once more.