He Didn't Come

Well, he was back- but for how long? She opened her mouth to ask, but didn’t speak. She was afraid of the answer. Having him back was more than she could have ever hoped for. She didn’t want to lose him again. If she was going to anyway, then she certainly didn’t want to know about it beforehand.

He interrupted her thoughts by reaching for her arms. She resisted out of long habit, developed during therapy at Chapel Hall, but reminded herself of who he was and forced herself to relax. He examined her arms, but found no new scars. Other than the ones that had needed stitches, most of her old ones had faded.

“Good girl,” he murmured. She flashed him a smile, and he quirked his lips into a grin.

“I’ve been doing all right,” she said with pride. “Like I said, I kept training. It helped a lot. They put me back in therapy for a while, but I bullshitted my way out of that without a problem. You helped me more than anyone else, really.”

Riddick’s grin stretched more widely. “Oh, yeah? How’s that?”

It was Jack’s turn to grin. “The training was a lot of it, but mostly because you were consistent. It was the same zero-tolerance policy combined with kindness every time I fucked up. I needed that.” Her smile turned wistful for a moment, then she laughed out loud. “You were strict as hell, too.”

“Strict?” Riddick frowned. “When was I strict?”

She rolled her eyes. “Don’t you remember making me sleep in the same bed as you, when I refused to stop cutting? It scared the shit out of me at first. After a while, though, it was all right.” The wistful smile was back. “I’ve missed that. You’re the only one I’d trust enough to sleep with.” She caught the double meaning of her words, but it was too late to take them back. Glazing lightly over her verbal slip, hoping he hadn’t noticed, she went on, “At first, though, Chap was hell. Way too many people. I roomed with two bitchy twins and a lesbian that everyone thought I was in love with. Once I started making my own shivs, though, everyone left me alone.”

Riddick looked interested. She handed the blade over wordlessly when he extended his powerful hand, asking for it. The edge was wickedly sharp, so they both handled it carefully. It was made of small rounded lump of metal that she’d picked up from a mine scrap heap a few months before she left Chap. It was fairly light, but weighty enough to prevent it from flying from her hand at a crucial moment. She remembered wedging off the sickle-shaped chunk and honing the resulting curved edge to a violent sharpness. It had been much harder than she had anticipated. Metal didn’t exactly carve well, but the end result was more than satisfactory. The shiv was simple, yet effective. He looked impressed.

“Good size and weight for your hands. Nice,” he concluded as he returned it.

She was embarrassed by his praise. “Thanks. I made it about six months ago.”

He nodded, and the both fell silent. There wasn’t much to say. ‘Hey, glad you’re still alive,’ was all it boiled down to. The tension spread between them like thick ink.

Recognizing this, Jack thought, to hell with it, and threw her arms around her ex-hero. She didn’t want to lose him again. She lost him once before, and he came back for her… eventually. Would he return for her a second time? She didn’t want to find out.

~*~

Taken by surprise, Riddick slowly returned the embrace. They sat like that for close to a whole minute. Being that close to a woman, any woman, after five years in slam would excite any man. His testosterone didn’t care that it was Jack in his arms. Riddick’s inner predator smelled a female, and therefore wanted a female. Soon. Like, yesterday would have been good.

He knew she wanted to ask him something, and waited for her to speak up. She didn’t, however; she just clung to him more tightly. He felt her silent heaving before her first subdued sob.

Tilting her face to meet his, he asked what was wrong. She didn’t answer him at first. He hesitantly stroked her long hair and repeated the question.

“Jack, tell me. What’s the matter?”

She squirmed in his arms, and he released her. Wiping her eyes with the palm of her hand like a child, she started speaking, but abruptly stopped. “You…”

“What, kid?”

Almost angrily, she burst out, “What happens now, Riddick? Where will you go? Are you just going to ditch me again?”

Where had this come from? He sighed. “Jack, I swear I never ditched you! I-“

She cut him off. “I know, I know. You were in slam.”

“Exactly. I was in slam.” He put his hand to her cheek, wiping away a stray tear with his thumb. “And now I’m out of slam. I’m here now, kid. The rest is up to you.”

“What do you mean by that?” she asked slowly.

Riddick began to elaborate, “I mean that I can’t stay here. I can’t stay in one place for too long….” Seeing her face fall, he added, “But that doesn’t mean I’ll ditch you. We can keep in touch, I’ll visit you, or-“

Totally taking him by surprise, she stood with a jerk and stormed over to her punching bad. There was some tape lying on the floor nearby. She snatched it up and angrily began wrapping her hands.

Riddick watched without comment. Something he’d said had royally upset her. If only she’d given him a chance to finish speaking.

As she started in on the punching bag, he said loudly, “What do you want from me, kid?” He had an offer for her, but only if she was willing to listen.

She didn’t answer him. It wasn’t clear if she’d even heard him. Her well-defined form was moving flawlessly. Riddick felt a tug in his groin, but suppressed it. She hated him, he was sure of it. Bad time to want to fuck her. What was wrong with him?

“Jack. Jack!” He stepped up behind her, but her reflexes were much quicker than he remembered them ever being when she was a kid. She whirled around and almost connected with his jaw, but he grabbed her fist and held it firmly. If he’d wanted to, he could have crushed it easily, and the both knew it. In response she slammed her other fist into his powerful abs. He grunted, but stood his ground. With one quick motion he had whipped her around with one arm crossed in front of her body. He brought up his other arm over her left shoulder and placed it around her throat.

“Remember this?” he asked in a challenging voice.

“Fuck you, Riddick,” she gasped.

His voice was stern. “Do you remember this, Jack?”

“Yes, all right? I remember!”

Coldly he said, “Good. Don’t forget who you’re dealing with.” Stepping back, he released her. She hurled herself a few feet away and glared at him violently.

“What do you want from me?” he asked in a much more normal tone of voice. When she didn’t respond he growled, “Well?”

She answered him by walking across the room, purposefully brushing past his shoulder roughly, and sitting on the couch. She placed her head in her hands and mumbled something unintelligible.

Rubbing a hand over his bald head, he sighed. “Speak up, kid.”

Jack raised her head and stared at him defiantly. Her lips were set in a firm line. Slowly and clearly, she said, “Get out.”

Riddick was stunned. “Huh?” There was no way she could mean it.

She nodded, her voice gaining confidence and resolve that cut him to the core as she spoke. “It would be better if you just left.”

Hurt beyond belief, Riddick asked, “What makes you say that?”

In a detached voice laced with feigned nonchalance, she stated, “I have my life. I don’t need you fucking it up any more than you already have.”

When he only stared at her, trying not to comprehend what she was telling him, she went on, “Who do you think you are, anyway? I’m not that screwed up thirteen-year-old girl anymore, Riddick. I survived growing up without you. I got used to not having you around. Then you decide to show up in my life again, expecting me to worship the ground you walk on? Fuck that. Quit showing up in my world and fucking with my life, okay? You don’t have that right.”

Dangerously, Riddick spoke. His eyes flickered with carefully controlled rage and pain. “If I could have been there for you, I would have. Don’t you dare blame me. I came back because I wanted you understand that. I was going to ask if you wanted to come with me, before you went psycho on the punching bag.”

He stood, towering over her. She glared back at him fearlessly. He understood why she was doing it. She’d been hurt so many times in her life that she trusted no one, especially not him. She would do anything to protect herself. What she couldn’t see was that isolation would get her nowhere. Cutting herself off from everyone else would make her whither and die. She would become a cold hard bitch, completely emotionless, much like he had been before she touched his life.

He knew that if he told her any of this she wouldn’t believe him. There was no point in wasting his breath. He waited for Jack to start hurling out more words designed to hurt him, but she kept her mouth shut. He refused to allow her to see how much she was succeeding in the first place.

Without another word, he turned and walked stiffly out the door. As he did so, a hard voice quietly floated after him.

“How does it feel?”

He stopped moving and turned his head, cocking an ear towards her but not looking her in the face.

“How does it feel to be left alone, Riddick? To be rejected?”

The silence stretched out like a resonant note, but so much colder. Finally Riddick offered his parting words, half challenge and half prayer.

“I’m docked at the east end of the closest port. I don’t leave until tomorrow morning. If I don’t see you before then, I’m not coming back.” Refusing to allow himself to hesitate, he walked away, exuding an artificial calm.

Don’t be stupid, kid, he silently pleaded. Don’t to this to me. To either of us.

~*~

Jack lay on her still-made bed, sobbing brokenly. She tried to puzzle out just why she had turned him away. She was slightly bitter and definitely angry, but Riddick was right. There wasn’t much he could have done for her in slam. She knew that she was lucky he had come back at all. And now, because of her stubborn anger, she’d lost him again.

All she had to do was go to his ship. One problem: she didn’t know what it looked like. She had a feeling that she’d figure it out, somehow. He would make it stand out, or maybe she would just know. All she had to do was pack a bag and leave. It was so simple. All she had to do was thrust aside her pigheadedness and walk out the door.

“Don’t do it, Jack,” she warned herself. “Don’t cave. You don’t need him.”

True, she didn’t need him. She’d survive just fine. Bartending would work for a while, until she found something more stable. It wouldn’t be too bad. She would be living her life her way, like she always swore she would. The fact that, besides Riddick, she didn’t have a friend in the world didn’t matter. She was used to being alone. She had a decent-paying job, at least for the time being… it was enough to keep her stomach full and a shitty roof over her head, at any rate. She’d find a better job.

Doing what, though? She had absolutely no formal education. The bastard was right. Sooner or later she’d get shiv-happy on some punk’s ass and lose her job at Nero’s. Bye-bye apartment, bye-bye food, bye-bye life.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she groaned into the blanket before rising. There was a large backpack she had brought with her from Chap. Sadly, she was able to fit all of her clothes inside, as well as a single pair of deadly heels. She slipped on a pair of soft running shoes. Forgoing everything else besides all the creds she’d managed to stash, Jack was soon ready to leave.

The lights had remained on, seeing how Riddick had neglected to enable them for all users before she threw him out on his ass. Looking around in the dim light at her roach-infested “home,” Jack felt a sense of loss. She almost felt as though she were throwing away her independence, something she’d striven so hard for, but ordered herself not to be stupid. Oddly enough, she had a far better shot at a life with an escaped convict than she ever would bartending in a third-tier slum.

“Here we go again,” she muttered as she locked the door behind her.