The Games We Play

Ally_Ranger


Chapter Sixteen

Casteel found her man. She let go of Riddick's hand and handed him her pack before she hurtled towards her unsuspecting target. He was six foot five and dressed like a lumber jack, complete with a baseball cap. His clothing left a lot to be desired, but he was the right size so he'd have to do.

She deliberately ran right into him, knocking him to the ground.

"Oh my God! I am so sorry! I just didn't look where I was going! I'm sorry."

He looked up at her and she smiled back sheepishly. Here goes nothing, she thought as she held out her hand and helped him to his feet, "Well, I guess I should introduce myself to the guy I swept of his feet! I'm Stacey."

"Uh, hi. I'm Ian, pleased to meet you Stacey."




Riddick stood a few feet from the Casteel - whom he could only guess from the sudden change in behaviour was busy charming the clothes off the man in front of her. Her face was animated, cheeks flushed and she glowed. It was hard to identify this woman with the one who had cracked his ribs. Rich laughter pealed through the air. Casteel was laughing at something the lumber jack had said. Riddick almost felt sorry for him - he probably thought he had hit the jackpot with 'Stacey'.

He tried to relax as more police cars whizzed by. It didn't look like Casteel was hurrying.

"Anytime today would be good," he mumbled.

He surveyed the road and the sidewalk looking for places to hide in the event that something went wrong and he had to flee. He saw an abundance of alleys and several large buildings with rooves close enough together that he might be able to jump from one to the next. He took a deep breath and regretted it.

Now that he was standing still he could understand why the people on the streets were in such a hurry. The place stank. He could smell sweat mixed with asphalt and God only knew what else. The sooner Casteel got him his change of clothes the better. At Slam, he had to endure all manners of foul smells, but now that he was free - he didn't have to put up with it. And he wasn't going to.

He watched as she showered the lumberjack with 1000-watt smiles and he almost laughed when she shyly dug her toe into the ground and brushed hair out of her face. It was an award worthy performance.

She finally began to lead him towards an alley, her arm linked through his and Riddick followed them taking off his goggles once in the safety of the darkened alley. It was easy for him to blend into the shadows and so he waited as she kissed the man and took off his jacket tossing it into the shadows.

He retrieved it silently and waited for the shirt, which landed neatly in his arms. Soon he had a pair of trousers too.




Casteel stripped Ian of his trousers and stood up. She almost felt sorry for him, almost. Riddick would have creatively suggested holding a knife at this throat or something equally terrifying for the man - just to get his clothes. If Ian had any idea about what was going on he would have to consider himself lucky.

"Close your eyes," she said as she tossed the pants into the shadows. He obliged and she scooped up his hat and motioned Riddick to follow her further into the dark alley system. They melted into the shadows and covered a fair amount of distance in silence before Casteel heard Ian shout for her to bring his clothes back.

"Nice job, thought you were going to devour him right there and then." Riddick said with a straight face.

"Hmm. And he just looked so yummy," she handed him the baseball cap, "and so will you in your brand new second hand lumber jack outfit. Strip."

Riddick looked at her in surprise.

"Well, fair's fair. You saw me naked and now I get to see you. If it makes you feel a little less like a piece of meat, we have to get this done now or you're going to get yourself caught. Think of it as imperative."

He placed his new outfit on the ground and stripped. Casteel had to smile - she didn't consider it too much of a chore to watch Riddick strip down to his boxers, not with a body like that. Maybe it was the only other good thing, apart from still being alive after fighting with him, of course, that had come out of the rotten day. She was going to take what little voyeuristic pleasure she could get. She wasn't going to get any from Len's podgy form and she hadn't seen even a semi-naked man since she'd signed the contract to hunt Len.

Riddick struggled with his shirt and she saw the flesh would she had inflicted with her gauge was hampering him. Stepping forward, she helped him pull the shirt off, "nasty wound. You should get that looked at," her voice was syrupy sweet. She took the new shirt and helped him into it.

"Pants," she added and handed him the jeans that would complete his new ensemble, "you don't want me to help you with those too, do you? I have to draw the line somewhere." Almost a pity…

She picked up her back pack and stuffed Riddick's suit inside, shouldering the pack as Riddick pulled on the jeans.

"Bravo."

"Don't even think of telling me how I look."

Casteel grinned, "no, not a chance of me telling you that you look very manly. Not a chance at all." It was almost too much to see him dressed like that. She decided that they had better move before she had the chance to really look at him. "C'mon. Time to go."




Riddick followed her as they moved further away from Ian. His body itched. He was puzzled. How could anyone wear flannelette? The material scraped against his skin - it was a special kind of torture reserved for people who wore the stuff, he decided.

Casteel stopped in front of him and pointed to her eyes. Up ahead was another street, brighter than the last. Riddick slipped his goggles back on. They were crossing over into a more affluent area -the buildings here looked stable and the vehicles on the street were not like the rusted out bombs of the previous block. The sea of tired faces was the same though.

Depressing fucking planet.

He didn't need to push his way through the throng, he had a firm hold on Casteel's pack and he was content to let her deal with the crowd while he examined her weapons case. When she had locked it earlier, he had made a note to check out the thumb print lock. It was smaller than most, probably custom built like the bag obviously was. Designed to look like a fancy latch - the usually green scanning area was black to match the buckles on her bag. The devices were easy to bypass - usually a severed thumb did the trick - but this one was top of the line. The thumb that opened it needed to be in possession of a pulse. That required of course a live and kicking body.

He moved his attention to the outer pockets of the pack, patting them down lightly. Empty - every single one of them. If things with Casteel went sour, all he had was his shiv. He couldn't get access to her weapons and he hadn't thought to bring any more with him.

Fuck, this was supposed to be easy, his mind howled in anger. Get Jack and drag her back to Iman. But no - he had forgotten all about Murphy's fucking law. He debated the idea of renaming the idea to Riddick's law. 'Anything that can go wrong will.' Very apt.

"I smell bacon at one o'clock" Casteel said as she slowed her pace. Riddick moved to her side and swept a broad glance over the crowd. Five officers were blocking the end of the street with plastic barricades.

"Fuck." He didn't think that he needed to say any more. Casteel shrugged and kept walking.

"We're lucky," she said after a moment, "they decreased the search radius. Peak hour pedestrians may be too much for them."

"Lucky?"

"Yes. We get through that barricade and whiz bang, we're home free. One hundred metres instead of five more blocks."

"And just how do you plan to get us through?"

"I was thinking of improvising, you up for that?"

Improvise. He was beginning to think that he had saddled himself with a drama queen.

Seventy-five metres.

"What ever happens, keep that shiv in your pocket."

Fifty.

"We're going to get through this with no violence, understood?"

Thirty-five.

For the second time in one day, he was going to come face to face with police officers.

Thirty.

He could clearly see Slam in his mind now. And he decided that he would rather die than go back there again and if this little jaunt went wrong...he was going to take as many people to hell with him as he could.



 

Previous    Fiction List    Onwards