27.
Jarvis: Disclosure
"For those of you who received your clearance before this mission, a great deal of this information will not be new and may not be interesting. Please bear with us while we go over it for the newcomers in our ranks."
Lieutenant Reginald Jarvis stopped and surveyed his audience. Everyone looked interested. Tactful bunch, or maybe just ambitious. Entrée into the Charybdis Project was a coveted achievement. It signaled the likelihood of a stellar rise through the military ranks and into the innermost circles of the Tribunal. Provided, of course, that one lived long enough.
"There were twenty-four subjects in Phase II. You have files on all of them. As you know, during the Crisis Year eleven of them committed suicide. We were able to stabilize twelve of the survivors and incorporate them into our ranks as Operatives. The final subject, Richard B. Riddick, is the one we are tracking now."
He had been pacing as he spoke. Even thinking about Riddick filled him with angry, restless energy. He turned and faced his audience once more.
"You have had ample opportunity to review the dossiers on the Operatives. You know what they are like, what they have done, what they can do. Riddick tops every single one of them. He is the one who killed Ruth Baker, the most proficient and deadly of the Phase II Operatives. Remember that."
For a moment, Ruth appeared in his mind's eye, her cold beauty and brilliance still vivid to him. She'd been both a frightening and delightful presence. Almost every man involved in the Project had been a little in love with her. Her loss was still felt, almost a decade later. Funny, though, how he hated Riddick more for Jack's death than Ruth's. For most people on the staff, the reverse was true.
He shook his head sadly and glanced over at the calm, heavyset woman in the lab coat standing in the wings. She nodded and smiled slightly, walking onto the stage.
"Dr. Aspen will go over the psychological profile with you now," he informed his listeners. "Please listen to her with utmost care. The man you may find yourself face-to-face with takes great joy in murder and mayhem. What you learn here today could be the only thing that prevents him from taking joy in yours."
Now he had them. Everyone's attention was locked on Dr. Aspen as she stepped up to the podium.
"As near as we can determine, Riddick's current biological age is thirty-three years old. He has spent only two years of his existence, since nativity, in cryo-sleep, a particular oddity when one considers that he has been loose in the Known Systems for eleven years now. This seems to indicate to us that his brain functions are probably very much like those of the other Phase II subjects. None of them succumb to cryo-sleep in terms of brain activity. They continue to experience the cycle of consciousness and dream-states that normal human beings only experience outside of the cryo-chamber.
"In all likelihood, Riddick has avoided, and will continue to avoid, going into cryo-stasis whenever possible. Should he manage to slip past us off-planet, this is something to bear in mind when checking the passenger rosters of outbound ships. If he is forced to go into cryo-sleep and you catch up with him in that state, please be warned: he will be aware of you. Do not assume that he is helpless."
Dr. Aspen opened one of her files, glancing down at it. "Riddick's weapon of choice is a knife. He is extremely skilled with knives, both in their use and their construction. He has been known to fashion deadly weapons out of the most improbable items."
She took out a long, thin blade with a slight curve to it and held it up.
"This, for example, was fashioned out of the metal arch-support in a lady's high-heeled shoe. The shoe was stolen from a fellow inmate at the Texas facility, a man with a fetish for transvestism. It is one of more than three hundred such weapons Riddick fashioned during his incarceration."
She glanced around at her audience. "Riddick likes to cut. He prefers it to all other forms of violence and murder. It's a personal act for him, almost a sexual one. He has been known to drink the blood of his victims."
A shudder, a tiny one, ran through the assembled group.
"Don't be fooled into thinking that the knife is his only weapon. 'Sir Shiv-a-Lot,' as many of his hunters call him, is equally proficient with virtually every weapon in existence. He just prefers to use a knife. Don't let him get close enough to do so, and don't assume that you're safe just because he's not close enough."
Dr. Aspen set the weapons dossier aside, her point made, and turned to the next folder.
"Riddick is heterosexual. He is very active sexually. Reports indicate that he is very skilled and has an extremely voracious appetite. I want all of you to understand, however -- especially the female operatives here -- that this is not to be viewed as an exploitable weakness. Agent Ruth Baker attempted to use his sexuality against him eight years ago in her bid to capture him. He had no qualms about killing her. Getting him into bed won't protect you from him if he realizes who you work for. He doesn't feel that kind of sentiment."
He doesn't feel any sentiment at all, Jarvis added silently.
Sighing, Aspen turned to the next folder in the pile. The one they both hated to look at. Like Jarvis, Aspen blamed herself personally for what had happened.
"For a while it appeared that he had developed an emotional attachment to a teenage girl, Audrey Jacqueline Kowalczyk, alias 'Jack Kowalczyk' or 'Jack B. Badd.' Kowalczyk ran away from home at the age of eleven and spent the next two years -- three if you count cryo-sleep time -- passing herself off as a boy. She dropped the masquerade once Riddick became her protector. We believed, until recently, that he felt a genuine connection with her. Unfortunately, we were mistaken. We attempted to use her to track him down, without her knowledge. This is what he did to her."
She keyed the coroner's photos and let them appear, one by one, on the screen behind her, listening to the murmurs of shock and horror that filled the room.
Jarvis closed his eyes, refusing to look at the images. They were burned into his brain already anyway, but they weren't how he wanted to remember her. He wanted to remember the composed beauty who had raised her eyebrow at him and then dumped the Tribunal's offer all over the carpet of Parker's office. The little spitfire who'd told him to shove his dick up his own ass for a change, when he'd visited her in the Special Forces hospital. The grave, sad woman who had watched the caged jaguar for three hours with empathy and longing in her eyes...
"The most disturbing new development, from a tactical perspective, is that Riddick may now be killing for money as well as pleasure," Aspen continued. Jarvis opened his eyes. "This could complicate matters because it means that he may have the protection and/or assistance of the local crime syndicates. It means that our tactic of spreading the word among such organizations about his presence and the reward for his capture is no longer one we can use. Any of them could be his friend. Or at least, as close to a friend as he is capable of having."
Jarvis nodded to himself. One of their most effective means of smoking Riddick out had been taken away. He wondered how long it had been since it really was effective.
"Finally, I want there to be no mistake about this. Richard B. Riddick is a certified genius. His adjusted IQ is 240. He was discovered, by one of his grammar-school teachers, to be solving math problems using calculus when he was eleven. As far as we can tell, he is fluent in at least fifteen languages and taught himself how to pilot. He is, in his lucid periods, every bit as organized and meticulous as he is savage during his bouts of psychosis. He will kill in either mental state. His dream patterns are highly abnormal. The closest equivalents the analysts have come up with, in comparison, are the dreams of people suffering from high fevers, or the visions of those using LSD or experiencing epileptic seizures. This is particularly disturbing as none of the other Phase II Operatives have reported anything of the kind. The full meaning of this anomaly, and its relationship to his psychosis, is undetermined."
She glanced over at Jarvis, her eyes questioning. He nodded.
"Until recently," she continued, "we believed that his psychotic episodes had disappeared completely. The discovery of Miss Kowalczyk's body changed that. You may note that none of the other Phase II subjects have been assigned to this mission. There are two very simple reasons for this. First, it was decided after Ruth Baker's death that none of them would be sent against Riddick any more. He outclasses all of them. Ruth was the best of the lot and he killed her entirely too easily. Secondly, and much more importantly, if Riddick has somehow destabilized, and it appears he has, there is the possibility that they may do so as well. All eleven of them have been put under observation."
Aspen stepped back from the podium. Jarvis sighed and stepped back up.
"The Phase II Operatives will be out of action until we've caught Riddick and determined what the hell happened to him. We need these people back in business, kids. Phase III, which was scheduled to begin in four months, has also been suspended pending the outcome of this matter. So we need a good, clean capture. You've been given your assignments. When we reach Troubadour, most of you will be infiltrating New Paris, since that's where his activity seems to be centered. We reach the planet in four days, and you'd better be ready. This is the acid test for all of you. I'm opening the floor to questions now."
He surveyed the room and selected one of his veterans to begin with. It would let the newcomers better understand the protocols involved.
"Lieutenant Jarvis, the official tally of Riddick's murders, according to public record, is sixty-three people. How many additional kills has he actually made that are still classified?"
"We believe that Riddick has personally killed one hundred and forty-seven individuals, Corporal. Our information is sketchy in places. We know that he was one of only three survivors of the Hunter-Gratzner crash, but we're not sure how many of the other survivors he may have killed. There is also a two-year period immediately following the Barracks Incident where we completely lost track of him. God only knows how many people he murdered in that time."
He nodded to another of the soldiers. This one, a woman, was new to the group.
"Isn't he just doing what he was programmed to do? The Charybdis Project, from what I have read so far, was intended to create an Ultimate Killer. Isn't that what he is? What all of the Phase II Operatives are?"
"Yes, Private," Jarvis answered after a moment, his smile bleak. "Riddick is the Ultimate Killer. The problem is, he was supposed to be under our control. He never has been."
He nodded to another of his veterans.
"How much risk is the civilian population in if we encounter Riddick in a public place?"
Excellent question.
"As strange as it may sound, very little. Most of the risk will come from you. Try not to shoot the civvies by accident, people. Riddick has no history of taking hostages or using human shields, surprisingly enough. Most ordinary civilians who encounter him pass by unscathed. The mouse just isn't big enough to interest the tiger, most of the time. The bulk of his kills have been among four groups: military, law enforcement, mercenaries, and fellow convicts. This predator likes the taste of other predators best. His remaining kills all seem to have occurred during the worst of his psychotic periods when his bloodlust was completely out of control."
He closed his eyes for a moment. "Unfortunately, that includes his murder of Jack Kowalczyk last month. The full details of the man Riddick tortured to death in a New Paris alleyway last week have not been made public, but the crime was meticulously executed, and the victim, we have learned, falls into the 'fellow predators' category. He seems to have regained his lucidity. For how long, we can't speculate."
He nodded to another of the newcomers.
"What do we do if we find ourselves in a kill-or-be-killed situation with him, Sir?"
This one hurt. He hated the answer he had to give. "The Tribunal insists on a live capture. They want to find out what's gone wrong with his mind, not just examine his brain in an autopsy. The short answer is, if you find yourself in that situation, you die."
He swept his gaze over everyone. The room was deathly still.
"Don't find yourself in that situation."
No one else raised their hands. He waited a moment, until the silence began to grow painful.
"Dismissed."
He hated telling them that. It was the worst part of the restrictions the Board had saddled him with. There wasn't one of them that he didn't value more than the waste of humanity that was Richard B. Riddick. He watched them as they left the briefing room, subdued and disturbed by what they'd learned. Most of them would spend the next four days studying every detail they could find about their quarry.
He'd keep them safe, he promised himself. Orders or not, Riddick would die on Troubadour. He would see to it.
Accidents, after all, do happen...
28.
Jack: Morning After
"Don't go."
She'd been lying still for half an hour, enjoying his simple presence, when she heard his breathing change. She spoke as she felt his body tense, knowing what was coming.
Riddick froze, then relaxed. "I really should, Jack," he replied softly.
"Why?" She hoped he wasn't going to drag out his not appropriate remark again. He owed her. Yes, she had screwed up in a huge way last night herself, but he still owed her.
"Well, for one thing," he sighed, "my neck has a crick in it now." One of his hands left her back and he reached behind his head, rubbing at the back of his neck. He chuckled after a few seconds. "I'm gettin' soft, kid. Used to be I could sleep in any position and wake up feelin' just fine. Too many cushy beds."
Greatly daring, Jack reached up and slid her hand around to the back of his neck. She couldn't actually see his reaction in the darkness as her fingers began massaging the vertebrae, but she could feel how still he had gone. His fingers brushed hers for a moment and fled, leaving her hand in charge.
Careful, Jack reminded herself. You can't see his face, but he can see yours. Careful, "kid."
She let a wry smile cross her face. "You'll never get soft, Riddick."
He sighed in response and his neck arched back a little against her fingers. "You'd be surprised. How'd you get so talented?"
"There was a girl with a bad back at the shelter. She was one of the few people who didn't treat me like a mutant. She was constantly throwing her back out, or at least she said she was." Jack chuckled slightly at the memory. "I think she may have actually been a lesbian and was hitting on me. That was before the rumors started going around that I was your sex toy. She lost interest fast after that."
Riddick tensed beside her again. "My what?"
Jack frowned slightly. "Well, Jeez, Riddick, what do you think people thought? First of all, your average human being has a very dirty mind."
"Yeah, but--"
"And secondly, nobody thought 'Big Evil' was lugging around some kid because he liked her as a person, you know. They all figured I was paying you with something."
Riddick sighed in exasperation. "Shit."
"Why do you think they called me 'Riddick's Bitch' anyway?"
"They called you what?" He reached back and pulled her hand off of his neck. At least he hadn't stopped holding her yet. He sounded angry, but not at her. He kept hold of her hand.
"Well, it's what they figured I was."
"Christ, kid, you were only fourteen." He sounded disgusted.
She wanted to laugh, but she didn't. It would have been a bitter sound anyway. She'd been eleven when her innocence had been stolen from her, after all. Fourteen, in comparison, felt ancient. It was, she realized, part of the reason that Riddick's continued insistence on treating her like a child grated so much.
"Oh come on, Riddick, you lived in foster homes, yourself. How innocent were the kids in them?"
He sighed. "Point taken. Shit, kid, I knew you had it rough in that place, but I didn't realize--"
"How'd you know?" She figured he'd kept track of her somehow, but she was curious.
"I had a private detective checking in on you. She'd send me pictures of you and information about what you were doing. I got copies of every one of your report cards, you know." He chuckled. "We need to discuss that 'B' you got in Physics sometime."
She laughed back, swatting his chest. He caught her hand. Now he had both in his.
"She never sent me any picture as pretty as the one they had of you in the paper, though," he added softly.
"I don't know when that was taken," she answered, feeling a pang. "I was so careful to keep people from seeing me like that."
"Hiding your feelings behind a lack of expression, huh, kid? Guess I rubbed off on you a little too much."
"I needed it. Those fuckers would have used any weakness I showed against me. Against you." She closed her eyes, resting her head against his shoulder. It had taken a supreme act of will to keep her emotions controlled for those four years, every moment. That picture must have been snapped during one of the times her guard dropped.
"Promise me you'll never hide your feelings from me," he asked her softly after a moment.
I wish I could tell you what I feel, Riddick, she thought with another pang.
"I won't if you won't," she finally answered.
He let go of her hands and tilted her face up. She could only barely make out the outline of his own face in the darkness of her windowless room. "Fair enough," he whispered, and kissed her forehead.
She had no idea what time it was. She still felt pretty wiped out, but that might just be because she hadn't eaten in about twenty-four hours. They should probably get up and do something about that, but she didn't want to move. She didn't want to let go of this moment; there had been too few like it recently.
"So how'd you know I lived in a foster home?" Riddick suddenly asked.
She considered lying for a minute, but she'd already gotten enough shit for that last night. Guess it was confession time.
"I was reading about you at the library. Your old press clippings, you know, that kind of stuff." She shrugged, still feeling a need to downplay her interest as much as she could. "You haven't told me any stories lately, you know."
"Hmm." As usual, his thoughtful noise sounded almost like an animal's growl. It had taken her a while, the first time they were together, to realize that there was no aggression in the sound. "And you lost track of time."
"Well, you're very interesting."
"Only in the tabloids, hon. The truth is some pretty bleak shit." He sighed slightly. "Don't remember all of it too good, myself."
There was a long pause. Finally Riddick spoke again.
"So, you got any questions?"
Jack frowned, thinking. "Yeah. How come you didn't get to the math finals?"
"What, back when I was eleven?"
"Yeah."
"Got sick. Really sick. Day before I was supposed to go to Chicago I started puking my guts out. Didn't stop until after the contest was over. Only time I've ever been sick in my life, too." He laughed wryly. "I was really disappointed. Haven't thought about that in years."
"What happened to you when you were seven?"
Riddick stiffened again slightly. "You mean with the foster home that got closed." His voice had suddenly become guarded.
Jack nodded. She could feel how serious Riddick had suddenly gotten.
"That's a pretty ugly story, Jack. Guess it has a lot to do with why it pisses me off that people thought I molested you the first time we were together."
"You were molested?"
"Nah. Nothing bad happened to me until the day the cops were called. That was the last time I stuck my neck out for anybody until you came along. You and Carolyn." His voice was pensive.
"What happened?" she asked after a long moment.
"I had this foster-sister named Christina. She was kinda wild, nobody could control her too well. Party girl. It wasn't really a foster home as much as a group home. The kids stayed the same, and new sets of parents rotated through every few years. We got this pair of holy rollers about three months before the shit came down."
She heard him swallow and suddenly wished she could see his face.
"They talked God and Jesus at every opportunity. They had this big thing about repentance. Fuck, they oughtta know, I guess. Mr. Holy Roller just couldn't keep his hands off of Christina. I don't blame him for thinking she was gorgeous. She was. But he had no business touching her."
Jack shivered, silently agreeing with Riddick.
"She was only a year younger than you, Jack. Just seventeen. Still figuring out what she wanted to do with the rest of her life and who she wanted to be. Then this fucker came along and started trying to mold her into something he wanted. Tried to make her his toy. And when she couldn't be what he wanted... he got mean."
"How mean?" Jack had a bad feeling that she knew the answer.
"Well, sometimes he was real nice to her, or at least she thought he was. He'd call her his angel and tell her that if she was 'pure' and good for him he'd take her away with him. Sometimes he told her she was a sinner and a whore and he had to 'cleanse' her. Came down to the same thing, however he said it. He wanted her to fuck him, and only him. Guess he could be really charming about it too, 'cuz he sure had her tied in knots over the whole thing. She talked to me about it sometimes. 'Bout how she didn't understand what he wanted her to be but she was trying to be it, and she didn't know what she was doing wrong."
Riddick let out a heavy sigh.
"I think what was really goin' on was he didn't want her to like sex. He wanted this little fallen woman he could redeem from her sinful ways. She'd be pure of heart but still know how to fuck him six ways from Sunday. He wanted to transform her or some shit, so she'd never want any man again 'cept him. Sick stuff. He had no business touching her, and he sure had no business fucking with her mind like that."
His fingers were idly moving through her hair, almost of their own accord, as he spoke. Although his voice was calm, she could feel the emotion beneath his words, buried down deep.
"A person can get fucked up for years by those kinda games, Jack. That's the kind of thing that can knock somebody's mind way off-course until they crash-land somewhere filled with monsters that wanna eat 'em up. If they're lucky -- if they're strong -- maybe they can get themselves back where they're supposed to be. Christina was strong."
He swallowed again and drew her a little closer to him. Jack had the feeling that he'd done so without even knowing.
"She tried to break things off, but how do you get away from your legal guardian? He caught her one night, sneakin' in through my bedroom window. She'd just been out with some friends, maybe having a few beers, but he started yellin' all this shit about how she was goin' to hell and God hated her. He raped her on the floor of my room, right in front of me. That was the first time I ever wanted to kill somebody.
"I got out of bed and grabbed my baseball bat and hit him with it. Didn't hurt him much, of course -- I was only seven. He turned around and smacked me across the room. Next thing I knew I was back on him, biting him anywhere I could reach. All three of us were yellin' by now and the window she'd sneaked in through was still wide open. Mrs. Holy Roller came running in. And you can guess who she blamed the whole mess on. She started beating Christina and screaming some of the craziest shit I've ever heard, even in Slam, and that's saying something. And he started hitting me with my own bat."
Jack closed her eyes, feeling tears leaking through their corners. Riddick paused in his tale to brush them away with his fingers.
"I woke up a week and a half later in the hospital with a fractured skull, a broken arm, and four busted ribs. I guess the neighbors called the cops. I never saw any of them again. Not even Christina. Don't know what happened to her. And that, Darlin', is what happened to me when I was seven."
It took Jack a moment to be able to speak. "I'm so sorry, Riddick."
"No point in that, kid. It's long over. I like to think that Christina made it through just fine. I think she realized that Mr. Holy Roller was the one whose head was full of sick shit, not her. Yeah, she was wild, but she wasn't mean. Nothing wrong with liking to have fun."
He sat up. "Lights to dim."
She watched as he stretched, slowly rolling his head to work the kinks out of his neck.
"And that brings me to the fact that I owe you a huge apology. It's none of my business what you do in your free time, Jack. Doesn't matter if it's losing track of time at the library or out partying harder than Christina ever did. It's still your life."
"Yeah, but I should have paid more attention. I'm sorry, too. Sorry I scared you."
He turned around and smiled gently at her, looking touched. "Thank you, Jack," he whispered.
For a long moment they sat still. Jack was mesmerized by the tenderness in his gleaming eyes. Then his lids dropped and his lips quirked in a sly smile, and the moment was gone.
"Still, I was definitely an asshole to you last night."
She gave him an answering grin. "Yeah, well, Johns said you belonged in the Asshole Hall of Fame."
Riddick let out a gust of silent laughter, shaking his head. "Johns."
It had taken a while for Jack to understand how trivial an opponent Riddick had considered the bounty hunter, despite the fact that Johns was the only one who had successfully captured him since he broke out of the Slam on Nereid. In her own mind, the man loomed almost as menacingly as Riddick did for most people. The first lawman she'd been willing to trust in years, and he'd turned out to be a jackal in a human body.
Johns, the drug addict posing as a cop, who had tried to get Riddick to cut her throat and use her as bait for the things that had been hunting them. Johns, who still haunted her nightmares now and then. Johns, the reason she trusted no one but Riddick himself.
"You okay in there?" Riddick's soft voice pulled her back to reality. She shivered slightly.
"Yeah. Just remembering."
"You give him a lot more credit than he's earned, kid. He never was much of anything. Only reason he caught up with me is I'd just gotten the living shit kicked out of me by a Special Forces platoon, all of whom, incidentally, are now dead. Normally I'd have ghosted his ass the second he got anywhere near me."
He tilted his head, frowning. His neck was still bothering him. He rubbed at it again.
"Let me do that." She crawled over to sit behind him.
"Wha--?" He started to turn around, following her movements.
"Face forward and sit still, Riddick." This time she was in the right position. She reached out and put both hands on the back of his neck. Beneath her fingers she felt him tense up for a few seconds. He relaxed as she began manipulating the vertebrae in his neck once more.
After a moment he sighed. "There is no way you learned how to do that from a lesbian with a bad back, kid."
She grinned. "Shoot, you caught me. My mom taught me how."
"Your mom?"
"Sure. She was a professional masseuse before she met my dad."
"Oh was she?" His voice dropped to a suggestive purr for a second. She let go of his neck and swatted him on the arm.
"Hey! Mind outta the gutter, that's my mom you're talking about. She worked for a health club, not a fuckin' massage parlor."
He caught her hand and moved it back to his neck. "Okay. Sorry. Just don't stop."
"Haven't done this in years," she commented after a moment.
"Well, you're doing wonderfully," he answered. "How come you never told me you could do this?"
"Well, Mister 'I-Can-Dislocate-Any-Joint-In-My-Body,' you never needed any help before."
"Well, now that I know, I'm gonna take advantage of it," he chuckled. But she knew he wouldn't.
That was the problem. He was being so careful about not taking advantage of her. Maybe he was right that she was still just starting out in life, and maybe she was vulnerable to manipulation, like Christina, but she was pretty sure she knew her own mind, knew what she wanted. Him.
No more teases or manipulations, though, she decided. She wasn't sure if he really was impervious to them, or just restraining himself out of principle, but if it was the latter then her behavior was unkind, unfair, and wouldn't help either one of them anyway. She had to admire the irony of it: a felon with a higher sense of honor than most "upstanding citizens."
The whole thing, she realized, only made her want him even more. She'd just have to figure out a way to make him want her, and let him know that it was okay to take what he wanted.
Why the hell is he paying someone to have sex with him, anyway? she suddenly wondered.
Finally he sighed once more and pulled away from her hands. "You hungry, kid?"
"Starved. I haven't eaten in twenty-four hours."
"You forgot to eat? Damn, Jack, I'm not that interesting."
"Sure you are. All the psychology stuff was fascinating." She let him help her up and they headed out into the main room.
"Bunch of psychobabble, in my opinion. They never had a clue what was wrong with me." Riddick went straight to the food prep unit and began punching buttons.
"Really? They didn't? How did they manage to cure it?"
He glanced up, a strange frown on his face. "They didn't."
"It just went away?"
He sighed and sat down at the table. "No, Jack, that didn't happen either. It's all still inside me. I just learned how to control it." For a moment, inexpressible sadness crossed his features and then was gone. "Most of the time. Sometimes it still gets out."
The food prep unit chimed, breaking the silence that had fallen after his words. He gathered their plates and put them on the table. His eyes had not left hers once.
"I'm sorry, Jack. They never cured me. I don't think there is a cure."