by Frank Lauria
In horrified fascination Audrey saw two blades actually sizzle and burn as the light came near. Screeching, the predators recoiled.
Imam placed the illuminated bottle closer to the shield, so the light could fill the gaps left by the predator’s blades. Then he began to pray. But as he placed a protective arm around Audrey, she felt abandoned by God . . .
Riddick fiddled with the flight controls before rolling the skiff to the runway. For some reason he took his time, unable to strap himself in and take off. He kept peering out through the rain-soaked darkness, as if expecting someone.
He sat in the flight chair and checked the computer for the fourth time. All systems were primed for go. Get in the wind, asshole, Riddick urged, but he hesitated.
What if they make it over the hill?
So what? came his answer. First come, first saved.
But for the first time in decades a strange emotion gnawed at his certainty.
Every time you get noble, you get royally fucked, Riddick reminded himself. Still, he couldn’t pull the flight trigger.
His instincts suddenly bristled. He stood up and opened the hatch. Pulling off his goggles Riddick peered through the darkness.
A dull light was bobbing towards the skiff, pursued by a dozen shadowy predators, talon-tipped wings ready to pounce.
Without hesitation Riddick dimmed the interior lights and activated he skiff’s head beams. He pulled down his goggles as the figure ran into the bright light and stopped.
Startled, he realized it was Fry. And she didn’t look happy to see him. She crouched in the head beams like a drenched cheetah ready to spring for his throat.
Riddick stepped outside, on the stairway. Below, Fry remained where she was, in the rain-fogged light beam. “Strong survival instinct,” Riddick drawled. “Admire that in a woman.”
Fry wasn’t amused. “You’re not leaving,” she shouted. “Not until we go back for the others.”
Riddick snorted, and turned away.
“I promised them we’d go back with more light,” she called, moving to the stairs. “And that’s exactly what we are going to do!”
Riddick paused and looked back at her. “Think you’ve mistaken me for somebody that gives a fuck!”
“What, you’re afraid?” Fry jeered. She stood swaying in the rain as if daring him to attack her.
“Confusin’ me with Johns now,” Riddick corrected with a sly smile. “Fear was his monkey. I only deal in life and death. All that stuff in between? Some shade of gray my eyes don’t see.”
“I trusted you, Riddick!” Fry pointed at him, voice barbed with contempt. “Goddamn, I trusted that some part of you wanted to rejoin the human race.”
His face remained impassive, mouth tight beneath the dark goggles. “Truthfully?” he said quietly. “I wouldn’t know how.”
Fry’s hands dropped to her sides. She realized Riddick didn’t play by anybody’s rules. But she knew he had compassion. She had seen it out there. He could have left them stranded. But he led them to safety before he made his run.
“Then wait for me,” she yelled, voice ragged with desperation. “I’ll go back myself. Just give me more light for them.”
That got to him. Face taut, he tossed her the broken light.
Fry threw the light aside. “Just come with me!” she cried, sensing he was wavering.
He resisted the impulse. “Got a better idea. Come with me . . .”
Fry looked at him as if repelled. But Riddick knew she was considering it.
“You’re fuckin’ with me,” she said finally. “I know you are.”
“Course I am,” he admitted. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t leave you here. If you believe anything about me, better be that.”
For a long moment the only sound was the driving rain. Fry’s mind was racing backward . . . to Owens screaming, to that moment she pushed the PURGE button . . . fifty lives to save her own sweet ass, to every steep, treacherous step it took to get her off the trash colony where she was hatched . . . to here.
“No, you see I promised them,” Fry said, stepping back, one foot in shadow. “I have to . . . I have to go and . . .” She paused, rain streaking down her stricken features.
It was clear she was bleeding resolve. Riddick could see it. He could smell it like the predators waiting for her to step back too far. So he kept slashing away at her will.
“Step aboard, Carolyn,” he said calmly.
“I can’t . . . I can’t . . .”
Riddick stepped out into the rain and extended his hand. “Here,” he whispered hoarsely. “Make it easy on you.”
Her eyes locked on his, unblinking in the windswept storm. “Don’t do this to me . . .”
“Just give me your hand,” he said, leaning down the stairway. His streaked goggles were skull-dark sockets above his grim mouth.
Fry started to lift her hand, then dropped it. “But they . . . they could still be . . .”
“No one’s gonna blame you,” he said, in a calm soothing voice, like a priest hearing confession. “C’mon. Take my hand and save yourself, Carolyn.”
Hearing him speak her name convinced Fry. Hesitantly, she lifted her hand and felt his fingers close strong and secure around hers.
With sudden fury Fry yanked—dragging him down the gangway.
Both of them sprawled in the rain-spattered mud, the hovering creatures screeching in anticipation. Fry rolled and wedged a knee against his throat, hard.
“Listen, you asshole, I am the captain of this ship—and I will not give up on them!” She shouted, gasping for breath. “I will not leave anyone on this rock with those things—even if it means . . .”
In a snake-swift blur Riddick’s neck was free and his shiv digging into her throat like a venomous fang. Too exhausted for fear Fry waited for him to slice her jugular and toss her to the predators.
But when their eyes met, his expression was strangely calm. He regarded her with bemused curiosity, his blade gently stroking her neck.
“You would die for them?”
The question hung in the drumming rain.
“I would try for them,” Fry said finally.
Riddick snorted and looked away. “You hardly know them.”
Fry pounded his shoulder angrily and struggled to her feet. “I’m sorry . . . I’m sorry but I do feel fear—theirs, too!” She ranted, eyes half-closed against the rain. She bent down and glared at him. “Godammit, Riddick . . . Yes! I would die for them.”
He didn’t answer, face as blank as his rain-streaked goggles.
I must be totally insane, Fry thought as she slogged through the downpour, aware of the clicking predators swarming around the sickly pale illumination of the glow worms. Back in hell’s toilet by choice.
Goggles off, Riddick marched ahead, leading her back to the canyon. Time and again he would recoil as a predator zoomed past the edge of the light. And every weary step through the storm-drenched darkness was dogged by the relentless clicking.
Once back inside the canyon Fry realized that it would be difficult locating the cave sanctuary amid the hundreds of unfamiliar shadows. Numbly, she trailed Riddick, feeling foolish, as if returning for Audrey and Imam had been a neurotic impulse.
Riddick didn’t seem to think so. Ever since leaving the skiff he’d been focused. One last pass and I’m clean, he told himself, moving steadily through the rain. Then he paused. His night-vision eyes picked up a flurried knot of predators.
Runoff from the deluge had formed a huge pool at the bottom of the hill, and the winged creatures were gathered to drink. Riddick detoured around them and scanned the canyon wall for familiar landmarks.
All he found was flat black rock. But as he moved along the wall, more predators floated down to the watering hole.
A hard scrabbling sound awakened Audrey from her nightmare.
The blades, she thought, pushing back against the wall. She saw Imam crouched near the shield, his spectacles glinting in the bottle’s dim illumination
.
Imam lifted his sword as the shield, rattled—then moved . . .
As the shield fell aside, Imam rose up to meet the attack. He stopped, blade poised in midair.
Fry stepped inside, followed by Riddick.
Audrey stared wide-eyed as if St. Nicholas had just appeared from the fireplace with a sack of presents. “You came for us . . .” she said in disbelief.
Riddick scooped up the second bottle of glow worms. “Yeah, yeah . . . we’re all fuckin’ amazed. Anyone not ready for this?”
Imam managed a smile. Again his prayers had been answered.
However, as they emerged from their sanctuary he wondered how many prayers he had left. Driven by the wind, the rain was slanting down in sheets, and the darkness seethed with predators circling their meager light.
“Tighter, tighter,” Riddick urged, leading the way. His eyes gleamed like black diamonds, searching for the rise. Then he saw it.
“Stop.”
Audrey and Fry piled up awkwardly behind Riddick. Imam held the glowing bottle aloft and they stood silent, listening. There was nothing but the steady rainfall.
“I don’t hear—”
Riddick clapped a hand over Fry’s mouth. His enhanced vision could see the rise ahead. And a predator stood directly in front of them. The creature’s hammerhead was bent, drinking the water pooled at the base of the muddy rise.
“Doesn’t see us,” Riddick’s voice was warm against Fry’s ear. “Wait for it to leave.”
First error. The creature wasn’t leaving. As they waited in the chattering downpour, other predators swooped down to drink at the widening pool. One by one they landed, until the pool became a major gathering place for the winged beasts.
Like blood-glutted gargoyles, fresh from their kills, Riddick thought, looking for a detour. There was none. The survivors behind him started to waver as the dreaded clicking sounds filled the darkness.
“Stay behind me!”
As Riddick spoke the predators shifted places in the pool and a narrow gap appeared. Without hesitation he decided. “Get behind me!” he hissed. “When I go, we go! Full throttle!” He took Fry’s wrist, made sure everyone joined hands, and crouched down, waiting.
The creatures shoved for position as newcomers dropped in their midst.
“Ready, ready . . .” he chanted hoarsely, watching the winged shapes like a surfer studying monstrous waves. He glimpsed a brief parting in the sea of fangs and talons—and went for it.
Good timing. As Riddick dove forward, a pair of creatures broke into a furious squabble. Their wildly flapping wings widened the gap as other predators scuttled out of the way. Just as they reached the pool, the gap became a narrow passage.
Riddick ran headlong into the passage, half-dragging the others, all linked like paper dolls in a howling death-storm. Some of the creatures turned to “stare” blindly at the screaming intruders, their echo beams sensing one long shape.
Legs spraying water, Riddick and the others crashed through, scattering the predators long enough to reach the rise. There, they scrambled desperately over the rain-slicked mud, feet churning to outrun the creatures clawing after them.
Audrey lost her grip and began back-sliding toward the pool. Riddick snatched her by the ankle and yanked her back as a claw lashed out.
In the same motion Riddick muscled the little girl up the rise and heaved her bodily over the crest. Audrey tumbled and slid down the other side.
Only problem was, Audrey had the light.
“You know the way?” Riddick shouted, but Fry and Imam rushed past and disappeared over the crest. Riddick paused to catch his breath and glanced back. Second error.
They were coming in force, spreading over the rise like a writhing black shroud.
Riddick ran, galloping over the crest, and recklessly bounding down the muddy hill to catch up with Imam, Fry, and Audrey. Their glowing bottles bounced wildly in the darkness ahead, as Riddick scrambled to elude the talons raking at his heels.
Fry, Imam, and Audrey headed for the building outlined in the distance. Breathing in tortured gasps they spilled around a corner and saw . . . the lights of the skiff.
Racing behind them, Riddick saw the trio vanish around the corner leaving him . . . in total darkness. At the same time a winged shape floated down directly in front of him.
Riddick froze in his tracks. The creature had its back to him, but it sensed something. Slowly, the predator turned, its blade-crowned skull six inches away from Riddick’s shimmering eyes.
In that instant Riddick made an extreme choice. He stepped close enough to the rapidly clicking creature to smell its rotten breath—and stand in its blind spot.
The razor-tipped skull twitched from side to side in confusion, scenting human prey but unable to locate him with its sensors. Riddick swayed in a snake charmer’s dance, staying nose-to-nose with the creature—keeping himself in the blind spot.
The stench frayed at his nerves and Riddick felt a flicker of uncertainty. To his shuddering relief the creature turned away. But the uncertainty lingered.
A spidery prickle crawled up his neck. Even before he heard the rapid clicking, Riddick knew. Another predator had landed behind him.
As ruthlessly efficient as the demon beasts stalking him, he slashed and spun. The move gutted one predator and the others immediately began snatching bites and chunks of their wounded kin. Without warning it all collapsed on Riddick as he realized that he had an essential part in the gruesome ballet swirling around him. Like the cosmic snake eating its eternal tail, he created and destroyed his own reality.
Perhaps he glimpsed God’s own mirror.
Whatever happened, it blew his soul.
Exhausted and breathless, Imam and Audrey staggered aboard the skiff.
Below them, in the light of the head beams, Fry stood gasping for air, waiting. For Riddick.
Long seconds went by, then minutes, as her eyes swept the dark rain.
“Captain . . .” Imam called out. He wanted her to board the skiff, but knew why she couldn’t. A pang of shame tempered his fear, and he prayed for forgiveness.
Face streaming-wet and hair drenched flat in the wind-driven deluge, Fry stared at the blackness beyond the light. She listened hard but the monotonous drumming of rain washed away the sounds.
Then she heard it. A ragged howl floated over the wind. Without hesitation Fry jumped aboard the skiff, snatched the glow-worm bottle from Audrey’s neck and dashed outside. Feet sliding in mud she plunged through the darkness, guiding by the rising screams.
A shrieking blade flashed past her face. Fry ducked and spotted her attacker.
Riddick. Face spattered blue with predator’s blood, writhing body caked with mud, he knelt beside a freshly gutted kill—his blade slashing wildly at the creatures gathered at the edges of the light.
“It’s me, it’s me, IT’S ME!” Fry shouted. As she secured the bottle around his neck, Fry saw his face clearly in the glow. Riddick had changed. His stony-white features and liquid, black eyes reflected a very human emotion. Naked terror.
Fry grabbed his armpits and lifted, but her feet couldn’t find purchase in the mud.
“C’mon, Riddick,” she rasped in his ear. “I said I’d die for them—not you!”
He managed to get his feet under him and with her help, started walking back to the skiff. Behind them predators dove down to feed on Riddick’s kill in the sudden dark.
A wave of clicking sounds followed Riddick and Fry’s stumbling footsteps toward the skiff’s beacon lights. Fry hadn’t checked Riddick for open wounds so she rotated him as they plowed through the rain—both spinning like dancers in a macabre waltz—hoping to throw the predators off his blood scent.
“Just ten steps,” she muttered, urging him on past the swooping predators. “Keep turning, keep turning . . . that’s right . . . others’re already ’board waitin’ for us right now . . . five steps, c’mon, almost there, Riddick . . . almost there . . . we’re almost . . .”
/>
A hard jolt staggered them both. Suddenly the clicking stopped.
In the drumming silence, Fry and Riddick found each other’s eyes. They knew what had happened. Someone had been slashed from behind—and was bleeding . . .
But who?
Riddick slowly shook his head. “Not for me . . .”
Fry gave him a surprised look. Then vanished. Torn from his arms by a ghastly black cyclone of ravenous fury.
No scream, Riddick thought numbly.
No cry. No final words. Nothing but the rain—and a pitch-black universe.
This is the way the world ends . . . not with a bang but a whimper, Riddick recited prayerlike as he dragged himself through the downpour toward the skiff.
The fabric wings ignited when the skiff reached escape velocity. For a long moment it hung like a burning moth against the immense blackness. Until the wings disintegrated and it disappeared into space.
After a few hours, distant stars blinked into view, like city lights at the edge of a trackless desert. Riddick remained hunched over the control board, toggling through nav-charts with a bloody hand. Just as easy coulda been me, he told himself. But he knew better. Fry had come back for him.
At the rear of the skiff, Imam rolled out a prayer mat and knelt. He smiled at Audrey who was watching him curiously. “With so much prayer to make up for . . . just where I should . . . ?”
“I know where I’d start,” Audrey snapped, curiosity spilling into contempt.
“Of course,” Imam said apologetically. He bowed his head. “Forgive me. Captain Fry gave her life . . .”
“She really died for us?”
The little girl’s question drifted in the sudden silence. Up at the control board Riddick waited for the answer.
“Only Allah knows whether it was for us or herself,” Imam said quietly. “Or even both.” He lowered his head and began to pray.
Restless, Audrey joined Riddick at the control board. “Guess it’s okay for us to talk now,” she said hopefully.
Riddick didn’t answer, his attention on the nav-charts.