False Dawn

Chapter 4

There was no possible way the little skiff would be able to reach anywhere. It was slow and old and just way too damn far. Once Riddick had reached the shipping lane he set a course for the nearest inhabited planet. If they ever reached it on their own, they'd all be dead. Little food, less water, and no heat. There was very little hope of being rescued. A tiny ship in and endless expanse of space was as good as invisible. For two days they drifted, speaking little, moving less, slowly growing weaker.

After just over two days another ship entered their field of vision. They all watched it slowly approach over a matter of hours, feeling a relief that couldn’t be expressed, but was evident in the smiles that were impossible to contain. It was a scavenging team running the back shipping lanes, probably honed in on the HG's last broadcasted message. They didn't seem overly impressed with the grubby trio they pulled from the tiny skiff, probably seeing the same scenario of cast off survivors teaming together to survive all the time.

The three of them were taken to the medbay immediately. The rather rough facility showed that their isolation was more for the crew's protection than for any concerns about their injuries. Each of them had small cuts and scrapes that were revealed a little more after a good scrubbing, but otherwise, after the customary blood tests to test for contagions, it was just Riddick they examined.

Jack wouldn’t leave Riddick and watched in silence as the two man medical staff worked over his rather extensive injuries. A portable scanner was brought out and run over his entire body looking for broken bones. She frowned when they set it aside without a word. How could that be right? She KNEW he'd broken at least his ribs, and he had said his arm was broken too.

Over the two days that they had drifted before being rescued, Riddick had kept her from checking on the stitches in his thigh. At the time she had shrugged it off as Riddick just being his self-sufficient self. But as she sat nearby and watched the bandage removed she started to wonder what his intentions had really been in not letting her see the wound.

"Gods, man. It looks like someone tried to take your leg off," the one medic exclaimed. "You got damn lucky this didn't get infected."

The other medic took some sterile wipes from a table nearby, his attention still on the patient before him. "It looks like the stitches held nicely," he said as he worked. "How old is this injury?"

From where she sat she could only see Riddick's face, and his expression, or lack of, never changed, "More than a week."

The medic just nodded absently, while Jack frowned. She wondered why he was lying. It had only been three days, no more. She watched them bring out scissors and begin carefully cutting at the stitches.

"No need for these any more," the man said softly as he leaned over Riddick's leg.

From the angle she was sitting Jack couldn't see the gash, but how could they be taking the stitches out so soon? She slid off the table quietly, not wanting to draw attention to herself, but she noticed that Riddick's head moved towards the slight sound just a bit. When she stepped forward to see what they were doing she quickly brought her hand up to stifle the gasp.

His leg was healed! The skin was still red and puckered from being drawn back together, but without the stitches it would be hard to tell that there had been so serious of an injury. But how? How could a wound that bad heal within days? It wasn't possible, was it?

She turned and left them to their patient, her brain going over and over the facts she knew. It had only been two days, but it was healed completely. That was why Riddick hadn't wanted her to see it. He had known. And now he was lying about it, keeping the meds from knowing how fast he'd healed. She stopped in the doorway to glance back at the three men. The one on the table was looking at her, his bald head lifted a bit so that he could stare directly at her. She couldn't see his eyes, his dark goggles keeping them hidden, but she understood. 'Keep you mouth shut', was what he was telling her. She just nodded slightly and left.

She knew he would never explain it to her. Why would he? She was just a kid to him. But she was already lying to protect him. What was one more lie? It made her shudder to have to call him Johns. She never wanted to think of that man again, much less call one of the two people that she knew by that horrid name. But she did it. She swallowed the bile each time and said it.

Their stay on the Crowther Radd was rather uneventful. They were onboard for a month, and were never allowed to leave the medbay, much to Riddick and Jack's annoyance. Jack was more pissed off for Riddick than for herself. She knew that any confinement, even one supposedly for his own good, was unwanted. He prowled the several rooms constantly, making her feel even more restless.

When they were set down it was on the first planet the ship happened past. Not surprisingly, they took the next available ship off that dump.

It truly was a dump. The universe made a lot of trash. Several planets in different solar systems were designated for refuse. There were small settlements on these planets to run recycling plants, but it wasn't a nice place to be. Most were chosen for such a use because they were nearly uninhabitable otherwise.

Imam went on to New Mecca from there. It was a rather emotional farewell, with promises of keeping in touch that none of them believed would ever be kept. They had been temporarily thrown together, not by choice, but by fate. Each of them knew that it was best to part ways.

Strangely though Riddick and Jack never discussed whether or not they'd continue on together. It just was. Neither had anything or anyone to go to. At least they had each other, was Jack's reasoning, though she wondered what kept Riddick from leaving her somewhere.

Their lack of conversing would seem strange if it would have been any other two people. Pleasantries weren't exchanged when they encountered each other, a simple nod letting the other know that their presence was noted. In their month of confinement on the Crowther Radd they had had only a handful of conversations consisting of more than a dozen or more words.

The first few months together were rough. Accepting each other's presence was one thing, learning how to live with each other was a whole new obstacle. Neither knew how to treat the other, and neither knew just how they wanted to be treated. During the daylight hours they mostly kept to themselves, by unspoken agreement, after several confrontations that had left them both pissed off and seeking the privacy of their bedrooms. Since they both worked during the day it was quite easy to give each other space.

Three days a week they would arrive home from work and go immediately to the exercise room. They had set the extra bedroom up with several different types of equipment, and exercise mats for them to work out. Jack was thrilled that Riddick had wanted to teach her self-defense. She did know some stuff. You didn't live on the streets for years and not learn some ways to protect yourself. Training from Riddick was priceless, and a dream come true for her.

Riddick's lessons were hard and demanding. They would work out for hours. Jack would often just watch him discreetly as he lifted weights. No matter that he saw her as just a kid, she was old enough to admire a beautiful body when she saw one, and Riddick's was perfect. By the time they got around to sparring she was usually dry-mouthed and shaky from watching him.

For weeks he knocked her on her ass until she learned to control herself. Mostly to ignore that she was aching strangely in several intimate parts of her body. And he wanted her to put her hands on him! God! Could a girl get so lucky?

She knew she sucked at fighting him. He taunted her occasionally, showing her that even Riddick had a humorous streak, as he tried to piss her off in an attempt to get her to fight him for real, but it didn't feel right. Though she knew she could never actually hurt him, it felt wrong to even try.

One night she'd gotten in a lucky punch and bloodied his lip. He had just stared at her for a moment, making her cringe while she waited for his reaction. Then he had thrown his head back and laughed. That deep vibrating Riddick laugh that made her insides thrum.

He had thrown his arm around her shoulders, still chuckling. "Kid, there might still be hope for you."

After that she'd given him her all. She just longed to make him laugh for her again. She wanted him to be proud of her, and to see her as more than a little girl, and if she had to keep bloodying his lip to do it, then she would.

From the very beginning when night fell things were always different between them.

Both continued to have repeated bouts of nightmares. Jack's worst nights were being woken by Riddick's cries. She hated those sounds. She hated knowing that even Riddick could be scared of something. When she would go to him, he never spoke of what he dreamt. Occasionally she would share hers, but they both knew of what they were dreaming. Not the details, of course, but that planet would always be with them.

Jack hated the nightmares but she loved waking up to Riddick's urgent words. He would sit with her for a while, not saying much. She loved to hold his hand, which she did whenever he came to her room at night. When she was particularly upset he would hold her. God, how she loved those nights. Having his strong arms wrapped around her, her face pressed to that impossibly wide hard chest. She felt she was seeing the real Riddick during those times. He didn't hide from her like he did during the day, in the light. She loved seeing the glow of his eyes above her as he looked down at her. Sometimes she actually hoped she'd have bad dreams so that he would come to her. It felt wrong to wish for something she hated so much, but couldn't change the way she felt. She just wished it didn't take her cries in the night for him to come to her.

The planet they had chosen to settle on was about as far from Earth as they could get. Urika was an industrial planet. The entire planet was for manufacturing. Anything and everything was made on Urika. Most factories were automated centuries ago, to where no human labor was needed. But humans were still needed to keep those machines running, to push the right button when the time came. They worked six days a week in a factory that made various items from a mixture of steel and titanium. It was boring, monotonous, low-paying work, but it was work, and they could disappear. No one batted an eye when Rich and Jackie Spade showed up for their shifts. No one gave a shit.

Jack watched the news as often as she could. Riddick would just shake his head at her when she'd grab up the Vid remote as soon as they came in from work, but he never said anything.

The reports of the Hunter Gratzner crash landing made very few headlines. No one cared about a ratty old ship falling from the deserted back shipping lanes. But when word got out that Richard B. Riddick had been on that ship, it suddenly became hot news. Jack found it all quite funny.

Three nights a week when they came in from work, when they weren't intending to work out, Riddick would just take a quick shower and then leave. It had bothered her at first. She wasn't an idiot. She knew what he was going out and doing. He would come in hours later smelling of smoke and booze and cheap perfume. She got used to it, and did the only thing she could. She waited up for him. It seemed pathetic, but she couldn't manage to sleep unless she knew he was home. He would just nod at her on his way to his bedroom and she wouldn't see him until morning. Unless one of them dreamt.

Jack had never been more content in her life. She missed what little family she had known, but they were all dead now. A normal life was something she'd given up hoping for years ago, so she was just thrilled to belong somewhere. She belonged with Riddick. This was her home, even if she did long for something more. Not something more ordinary, whatever that was, but more from him. She sometimes felt like they were two strangers living together, acknowledging each other only when necessary. But for now they were safe, and she would be satisfied with that.

So as Jack stood under the hot spray in the shower washing off the sweat and grime of the day and allowing her sore muscles to relax some, she knew it was just a regular day. Riddick had been gone for nearly an hour already, and she didn't expect him back until nearly dawn. It was Saturday, and Saturday was payday. This one night was the traditional night of living it up, and Riddick usually didn't come in until very late, or very early, depending on how you looked at it.

Wearing only a long tee and still toweling her short hair dry she plopped down in front of the Vid to watch the evening news.

She had made a habit of it years ago to watch the news everyday. Richard B. Riddick had always interested her, even as a child, when she'd still been getting in trouble for speaking of the mass murderer. She would watch the news with her parents, secretly watching for any mention of the notorious Big Evil. Now that she was living with him she found it damn near hilarious to continue watching the news for him. The universe was rabid to get any news on the legend of a man, and he was out boozing and whoring.

Suddenly she heard his name and stopped toweling her hair so that she could listen. A gray-haired man in a suit stood before a mass of microphones as people shouted questions at him.

"We have every reason to believe that if Richard B. Riddick was on the Hunter Gratzner that he somehow made it off the planet, yes." Jack frowned as she watched the man lean forward as if listening. He nodded a bit as he straightened again. "Chem Industries found only traces of his DNA on the planet after numerous bio-scans. We have concluded that there is not enough to verify that he died on Tanginier 2. And as you know, we're VERY thorough." There was a collective, if nervous chuckle from the reporters before he continued. "We collected DNA samples to match 38 of the passengers, and the three crew members, leaving only three passengers unaccounted for." Another question that she couldn't hear was asked and the man turned to speak softly with a man standing behind him. Then he stood and face forward again. "Of the three survivors of the HG, only one could be located. After questioning he continues to insist that the only male survivor was the bounty hunter who had had Riddick in custody before the ship crashed."

Jack gasped, the blood rushing through her ears kept her from hearing the next answer. Chem Industries was a pretty name for a very dirty company. No one had ever been able to prove a thing, but it was common knowledge that they were delving into every kind of unthinkable and illegal activity. From human experiments to germ and virus mutations, they had pretty much done it all. If they had questioned Imam, chances were they used some very unpleasant persuasions to try to make him talk.

Her hand covered her mouth, her throat clogging with unshed tears, but she again managed to focus on the Vid. "No, we don't know where the other two survivors are," the man was saying. "When we locate them, they will be questioned, and possibly charged with abetting a known criminal." Another question was shouted and Jack could just barely hear something about a merc. Then the man answered, "We found enough of Bounty Hunter Lawrence Johns' DNA on the planet to verify that he was killed there. Which leads us to the fact that Richard B. Riddick did not die on T2." With that said he turned and left the small podium, the reporters continuing to shout questions at his retreating back.

The anchor guy came on with a stutter. "Well, um, that was Aurick Ndale, the vice-president and spokesperson for Chem Industries. Chem Industries' findings have lead to the file on the escaped mass murderer Richard B. Riddick to be reopened. At this time the reward for his live-capture is at an all-time record high for any criminal. Thirty million universal credits if he is brought in alive." The man frowned down at the paper he was holding for a moment and then smiled at the camera in that false way again. "There is no reward for dead capture."

The woman sitting beside him was brought into view as she spoke. "Can that be right, Craig? Aren't most rewards dead or alive, with a 50% cut for a dead capture?"

Jack could see that the question had been rehearsed. She could see that the woman honestly didn't give a shit. Jack's lip curled unconsciously as they so callously spoke of Riddick's death.

"Normally, that is the case, Jan. But Chem Industries is the corporation putting up the bounty. They can choose the stipulations." He smiled at the pretty blonde beside him. "Though, as you know it is rarely done."

They moved onto other news and Jack mechanically lifted the remote and shut it off. Her mouth was still hanging slightly open, her towel still draped across her dripping hair.

Riddick was back on the wanted list. Thirty million creds. Holy shit! She smiled slightly, thinking of the staggering amount. That was enough money to cause anyone to turn on him. And it would ensure that every merc and lawman in the universe would be keeping an eye open for the winning ticket, so to speak.

She just sat and stared at the blank screen before her, her thoughts running circles. They would have to run again. It wasn't safe to stay here. They'd been in one place for too long already. Riddick was in danger.

That thought flashed across her mind and she gasped and stood suddenly. Was he safe being out at all? Should she go out and try to find him and warn him?

Thirty million creds was enough to cause word to spread quickly. She couldn't allow for him to be out for hours without knowing that the stakes had increased.

Oh, God! She had to go find him!

Just minutes later she dashed out the door, keys and cred card in hand.