Acid and Steel (Riddick / Alien Resurrection)

Notes on this chapter:


Some of you might have noticed that I've used the names of chemical substances / elements as titles for the chapters of this story.

The usage of 'Mercury' for this one might not be obvious (as the word, unlike the other chapter, doesn't appear in this chapter), but if you know that mercury was used in old Chinese medicine as suppressant, you'll know why I used it.




For the first time in his life Riddick found that cooperation was rewarded. Truly rewarded, that was.

In the various slams of the galaxy, reward for cooperation consisted of being less mistreated; be it in not keeping food rations way below human needs (but just slightly below those needs), in not being put into an isolation cell alone (but with someone else, which could be way more annoying) or being tied up in less painful chains.

It had always just been a bit less uncomfortable, but not really rewarding.

No, here, in what he still suspected to be an illegal laboratory, cooperation was truly rewarded.

Food. Not protein waffles, but real, cooked food. Fresh food. Fruits, even; though Riddick didn't even want to know how they got a hold of fruits here. Probably cloned stuff, but didn't taste bad.

Drinks. Not just water, real drinks; juices and even the sparkling stuff - at refreshing temperatures.

Warm water. Soap. Shower. Damn, they even supplied him with a razor; though that one really was good for nothing but shaving hair off.

Clean clothes. He'd put them into a drawer next to the bath cube, and when he'd return from his shower, they'd be cleaned. Riddick thought he'd be damned if he knew how they did that, but it worked.

And, last not least, going out.

Not out of the lab, of course, but being able to walk around in the lab. At least on the level on which the cell was.

There was even a bigger hall, Riddick suspected it to be a mess hall, with an improvised basketball field, irons to pump and other devices to work out.

And all that just because he was playing along with them by teaching that weird freak in the shape of a female human being one or two things.

The privileges were revoked when he didn't play along. In case he didn't play ball with her as long as she wanted, he'd find his clothes not clean. Or less fresh food, occasionally decorated with protein bars.

No real punishments, but also not the full plate of rewards he could have had when cooperating. No one told him what to do; he thought that they might have figured out that he was clever enough to find out all by himself what was 'good' for him and what not.

It was pretty obvious: He was being trained into functioning with her.

A part of Riddick was all for this. Hell, if that was all it took to get those rewards, he'd do that until he'd die of old age.

Another part of him, though, growled constantly against this kind of submission. Occasionally he felt like a goddamn dog.

Then again dogs had fairly good lives if their owners treated them well. The alternative was to become a bandog - and he knew what that was like; and it was something he liked even less.

The privileges - especially the being able to walk around part - gave him the possibility to scan his surroundings. To look out for possibilities to escape. And any attempt to break out would work much better if he was well fed and well trained.

Which was why Riddick just played along. For the moment.

'She' learned fast. Too fast. But Riddick had realized pretty fast that she couldn't be measured against a regular human beings learning curve.

They'd come to take her away often, sometimes up to three times a day, for an hour or two. Whenever she'd return, her eyes would sparkle with knowledge.

Still, she didn't talk much; only if it was really required. If she wanted something, that was. And if she spoke, it was monosyllabic. Single words. Nothing more.

One 'evening' - he still had no idea about day- and nighttime, but it was around the time when they'd get ready to sleep - he decided that it was time to ask her one or two things.

She lay on the floor, in the middle of the round cell, as always. Somehow he never understood why she showed no wall-seeking behavior, especially during sleep; but then again, she wasn't human, no matter how much she looked like one.

"Hey." He said softly from the part of the cell that he had claimed as his 'bed' - with one of the walls in his back, of course.

She just unrolled from the fetal position she always took up when she slept, sat up, arms curled around her knees, and looked at him.

"Listen, you don't happen to have a name, right?" Riddick started chatting. "I mean, we've been sharing a cell for such a long time and you obviously know mine, but I can't remember I ever heard-"

"Ellen. My name is Ellen Ripley." She replied, voice calm and low, still staring at him.

Riddick had to recover from the shock for a moment.

"Wow. Six words in a row. Must be a record." He finally chuckled. "So, Ellen Ripley, what are you?"

She cocked her head questioning.

"Well, yeah, I mean, you'll have noticed that you're a bit... different from me, right?"

Ripley cocked her eyebrows and pointed at her breasts. Riddick couldn't help but laugh out loud.

"That too. But, I mean, you have to know that we're different? Species-wise, I mean?"

She frowned and shook her head.

"Well, you don't smell like me, you learn faster than me, you already have more strength than I have even if you don't carry around as much muscle mass as I do - so...?"

He could see in her eyes that he had touched a subject which was troubling her. Had probably been troubling her for quite some time. And from the way she stared at him, he knew it was about damn time to drop that subject. Immediately. Or no scientist, no energy weapon could save him from being killed by her.

"Uhm," he continued, "I guess you should ask your scientists that. Well, what about - do you know when your birthday is?"

She thought for a long moment. First Riddick thought he had angered her further, but then he could tell from the creases on her brow that she was trying had to remember. Damn, he thought, what kind of fucking clone are you?

"I was... born... in 2092... but I can't remember..." She started hesitating.

Riddick's eyebrows shot upwards.

"2092? You're shitting me. That would make you, like, three hundred years old!" He stuttered.

"Not that old.... I died in 2179." She added even more hesitating than before.

"Which, again, would make you, uhm, dead for over two hundred years and nevertheless looking very much alive, even if you died at the age of... 87? Say, do you happen to have dyscalulia?"

"Cryo sleep" Was the answer she could give. "I spent fifty-seven years in cryo before I died... didn't die of that, though..." Her brow was creasing again. She remembered something

"Shit! That's the longest time of cryo I ever heard of; let alone at the time you claim to have experienced it!" Riddick laughed. His laughter was a bit strained, a bit tensed; but he did what he had to in order of keeping her relaxed, to keep her from thinking about... whatever, to look at him in that way again.

In the back of his head, his thoughts were raging.

A clone with memories of the original? Impossible. Then again, she's not a normal clone. Not human. Something different. But fuck me, to create a clone with memories is just sick. I wonder how much she actually remembers. Wonder if she remembers her own death. She definitely tries. Better not ask about that, it'd probably just make her mad.


Ripley was staring at the floor, then, after some time, she lifted her eyes up to him.

"How did you get here?" She asked.

"Well, they brought me here." Riddick replied.

"And where did you come from?"

Oh, the crucial question. He knew he'd probably scare her with the answer, just as all other people got scared when they got it. Then again he didn't want to lie to her.

"From a triple max slam." He said as calm as possible, watching her just looking at him questioning. "Uhm - prison. Cell. You know, where the convicts go." Riddick added.

To his surprise her face showed nothing resembling fear. Curiosity, yes; but not fear.

"Why?" She finally asked.

"Killed some people. Did that a lot."

"I've killed just two. Do you think they'll put me into... slam for this?" Her eyes showed no regret, no fear, no pride. Just curiosity, and that was what scared Riddick most.

"Why did you kill two people?" He managed to ask without choking on the words.

"First one... cut me open, took my baby from me. Second one... told me they're proud with my progresses. Looked at me as if I was a lab rat. Didn't like that, so I made him stop it." She informed him as if she was telling him about what she had for dinner.

"Yeah, scientist can occasionally be annoying." Riddick laughed.

Again, his thoughts were raging and he came up with a question.

"Say, didn't they sedate you when they cut you open?"

"Of course."

"How the hell did you manage to kill someone then?"

"Their sedatives won't work on me. At least not in the way they probably work on... other people."

Riddick could see that she had started to think hard again with her last sentence.

"What am I, Riddick?" She finally asked with a small voice.

"Told ya, ask your scientists. They'll probably have a brilliant answer." He replied, suddenly feeling pity for her.

"I'm not like you?" She added hesitating.

"No, honestly, I don't think you're even just remotely like me." He smiled, shaking his head.

She just turned around, curled up in that fetal position on the hard iron grid of the floor and seemed to sleep instantly.

Riddick stretched out on the equally hard, yet probably more comfortable bench by the wall and stared at the window above them for a long time after the light up there had been turned off.

He woke up in the middle of the 'night' by a touch to his face. Feather light.

As he opened his eyes he could see her sitting next to him, holding his face in her hands.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing there?" He hissed.

Talking to her was one thing. Playing with her another. Being touched by someone whose sweat was slightly acidic, however, was something else. Something that scared him to no end.

"Just wanted to look at you." She replied, her face and voice without emotion.

"Listen, I don't know how you look at people, but I only need to use my eyes, not my hands for that." He snorted.

"Just remembered... that I once touched someone's face like that... but couldn't remember more. Wanted to see if I could trigger..." She said, hesitating.

Riddick took a deep breath. On one hand he could understand her longing for bringing back memories, even if those memories were those of a woman who died centuries ago. On the other hand she still made him somewhat nervous, being non-human as she was.

"Okay, listen." He started carefully. "Just want you to know that I'm feeling a little bit uncomfortable with what you're doing there."

"Why?" She frowned.

"Why?" Riddick glared at her. "You're really asking me why?"

"Yes. Why?" Ripley replied calm.

"Uhm, maybe because your sweat is slightly acidic? Don't even want to know what your blood or other fluids in your body are like!" He spat.

"Acidic?" She cocked her head.

Riddick groaned out. Damn, why was it so difficult to make her understand? She definitely wasn't dumb - very clever was probably more like it - but unfortunately, she was lacking the experience and education for subjects like this.

"Okay, what happens if you cut yourself?" He said.

"I bleed." She replied frowning. "Everyone bleeds when they're cut."

"Yeah, and did you ever observe what this blood does to surfaces other than your own skin?"

"No, never."

"Well, until you've done that, I suggest you're not touching me any more unless you'd like to share the cell with a molten down puddle of myself." Riddick growled, rolled around, felt her leaving this side and tried to sleep again.

Unsuccessfully.

Some time later he turned around to look if she was sleeping, but Ripley was just sitting on the floor, knees pulled up under her chin, her arms wrapped around her legs, rocking back and forth and stared at the wall.

Good, he thought, she's got some things to think about. With a mental snicker he noticed that he definitely didn't want to be one of the scientists in the following days.

-----------------------------

The aforementioned scientists would probably have panicked if they had seen what took place in the cell on that evening and night.

They'd have killed Riddick and Ripley instantly if they had known that he encouraged her to think, encouraged her to ask things - encouraged her to test her blood against other substances.

But the scientists weren't in the observation room.

They were busy unloading a merc ship called Betty from its illegal load of kidnapped civilians; and a failure in the computer systems later that night destroyed all recorded evidence of the conversations and events in the cell, so they never knew what had happened between Ripley and Riddick.