CHAPTER17

CHAPTER 17

It had been a contradictory three months since the suicide attempt.
At first, there had been knee-weakening relief and joy when Jack had responded well to the transfusion. Within hours her vital signs had stabilized and the medical staff had declared her out of danger.
By the next day she was conscious.
And an amnesiac.
She had no memories of anything after stowing aboard the Hunter-Gratzner. The doctor speculated that it had something to do with the unholy mixture of extreme physical trauma, the Profearaben in Riddick’s blood and having her cryo-sleep cycle interrupted all those months earlier at the time of the crash. Arrested cryo-sleep had been known to cause some pretty bizarre repercussions.
Whatever the cause, Jack (who wondered why everyone was calling her Jack instead of her real name Audrey) had awoken confused and scared at the strange surroundings and even stranger faces around her. Evidently Audrey had only thought up the name Jack after the crash.
Zar had been nonplussed at first. How could she explain the crappy life Jack, now Audrey, had lived for the last year? The crash, the death, the fear, the rescue, the Elson Brenner debacle, Riddick’s desertion and finally the suicide attempt? Hell, she didn’t even know who Riddick was!
Audrey stared at him, as fascinated as she had been upon first meeting him, as he leaned against the wall. His un-goggled face totally closed off from the rest of them in the room. His attention completely focused on Audrey. He seemed almost wound up. As if he was waiting for an attack. Zar felt unease tickle the back of her neck, but she was too confused over what to do about Audrey’s amnesia to really think it through.
Taking a deep breath she tried to build a plan. Finally she decided on skimming over the last few months. Fill in the gaps as vaguely as possible.
She told her about the Hunter-Gratzner crashing on Taurus 2. How Riddick, who she introduced as Richard Carolyn, and an Islamic holy man they called Imam had gotten her off the planet. About Zar taking the three of them in and then she and Richard becoming involved. As for why Audrey was in the hospital, she said it was due to some “accident” in an alley.
Luckily Audrey was still too out of it to question the gaping holes in Zar’s story. But Zar knew that one day they probably would need to be filled in. She’d deal with that when, and if, the time came.
She and Richard had taken Audrey home the next day.
As the next few days unfolded, Zar watched the bond that had been ripped asunder between the girl and escaped convict grow again.
Richard seemed to calm as Audrey showed no signs of regaining her memory. The doctor had been pretty sure that it wouldn’t come back completely. Though it was possible for some things to resurface. But as for a thorough memory recovery? Highly unlikely.
He had been rescued from having to atone for the damage he had done. Well, not completely. He knew he owed a lot to both Zar and Audrey. He would do his best, but it would be easier to do since Audrey couldn’t remember his treatment of her.
Zar was another story. But being the loving woman she was, she had welcomed with open arms. He knew he should be grateful and he was.
Both he and Zar had agreed to keep his past from Audrey. If the authorities ever found out he was still alive, not an impossible happening, then the less she knew the better.
He had moved back in with Zar the same day Audrey came home. And for the first time in months, Zar felt as if she was completely awake. Not just existing, going through the motions.
She wanted to put Audrey in therapy knowing that whatever had made the kid run away in the first place was still an issue. Hoping to forego a repeat of the attempted suicide. Richard had fought her on it though. His lack of confidence in the psychiatric world a direct result of his experiences with them in prison.
But Zar had persevered. Pointing out to him that with the possibility of the Profearaben rearing it’s nasty head one day, Audrey would need to learn self-control even more. Running away when things got ugly could be lethal to her or someone around her now.
She had almost felt guilt at the look of regret that flashed over his face. But this was something that absolutely needed to be done, and if she had to use guilt to get his cooperation, then so be it. He’d done it to her after all. What was good for the goose was just dandy for the gander.
Zar realized with that uncharitable thought that her heart hadn’t forgiven Richard as easily as she thought. Her body had welcomed him back without reservations, her heart was a little more hesitant to trust again so quickly. Once burned, twice shy. He was such a complex man that she didn’t know what was going on inside his head. For all she knew, he’d been yanking her chain with the promise to stay put.
Riddick seemed to sense her distrust after her initial act of forgiveness. He figured that now that Audrey was back with them, Zar had had a chance to reflect on his misuse of her.
He could only think of one way of reassuring her.
He asked her to marry him.
It would have to be under the name Richard Carolyn, and probably therefore not legal. But it was more an act of reassurance and commitment than a legal one.
Zar had promptly, though smilingly, turned him down.
She had uttered a simple “No thanks” and walked away. Leaving him the one, for once, to wonder what was going on in her head.
Zar was touched he had asked, but simply felt that he was not the marrying kind. With the past hanging over his head, a family would be more of a liability than an asset. He needed to be able to leave without entanglements. She knew he would argue with her, so she didn’t give any specific reason for her refusal. She correctly counted on his pride to keep him from pursuing the issue.
Chances were that he would be leaving one day. It could be voluntarily or not. In days, months or years. But if she had learned one thing over the last year it was this. That the same survival instinct that had let her come through the attack on Jessup 3, had also let her persevere through Riddick’s desertion. She could survive without him. It would only be as half-alive, but it would be survival. She loved him, wanted him, and needed him to a scary extent. But she’d be damned if she permanently tied herself to a man who would be causing her more pain sooner or later.
Their current situation suited her just fine!
Audrey, whose last name turned out to be McAllister, became a totally different person. She didn’t have the baggage of the Fry and Shazza death, or Riddick’s desertion weighing her down anymore. The therapy, which she initially resisted, was helping with the original problem. Though what the problem might be remained a secret between her and her therapist.
She lost the brittle edge of fear that had always seemed to taint her happiness. She laughed more, talked more, simply seemed to enjoy life more. And the nightmares totally ended. There were no more flesh eating monsters anymore to inhabit her dreams.
Then it happened. The day Riddick and Zar had dreaded. She had asked who Fry was. They had just looked at each other, debating what to tell her.
Richard had calmly asked why she wanted to know.
She explained, rather embarrassed, that when she was in the hospital, she had a dream about a blonde, slender woman. She knew the woman’s name was Fry, but she wasn’t familiar. They had been in a wet, semi-dark cave with someone else, though she didn’t know whom. In the dream they were staring at a flame that was slowly dying out. Audrey sensed that when the flame went out, death would claim her.
The woman had taken her hand and squeezed it, giving her hope and comfort from the coming darkness.
Then looked at her and said, “You have to hold on honey! Don’t give up yet. He’ll come save you like he did the last time. He’s bringing someone else too! Just hold on a little longer. Don’t give into the darkness!”
Her words had made Audrey fight the darkness that had been sucking slowly her down. She knew that she was dying and up until then, hadn’t really resisted. Strangely, she didn’t know why she hadn’t resisted. She couldn’t think of a reason now as to why she would want to be dead.
Zar had seen the instant flash of pain spasm over Riddick’s face as Audrey talked about the cave and Fry. As he became more and more in touch with his humanity, the horror’s he’d inflicted on Audrey, Fry and Imam had become like bedsores on his soul. It seemed that whenever he could start forgetting about them, something brought them right back into his face.
Before his life with Zar, Riddick would’ve interpreted that as a sign, from God or Fate, that he didn’t deserve a chance at redemption. That he was doomed to carry around the baggage of his past. But she had taught him to look at memories in a different way. Now he saw those reminders as warnings that if he didn’t stay in touch with his humanity, he could easily slip back into Richard B. Riddick, psychokiller extraordinaire.
Now as he looked at the kid that had become his daughter, with her questioning face and trusting eyes, he knew redemption wasn’t something that you earned once. It was something that you constantly had to qualify for. By choosing to do good, not bad. By thinking of others first. He hoped he was up to the challenge, but new it wouldn’t be easy. There was a lifetime of necessary selfishness to overcome.
He didn’t know what to make of Audrey’s dream. Had Fry told her those words in the cave when the light was dying and before they found the glowworms? Or had Fry managed to come back to once again rescue the girl she so zealously fought for on Taurus 2?
He didn’t know if he believed in ghosts. Probably not. With the amount of killing he’d done he figured if anybody would be haunted it would’ve been him. Nonetheless, he still felt the cold chill of uncertainty ripple down his spine when he let it be a possibility. Maybe they hadn’t come back to torment him before because he really hadn’t had a soul before Zar. Or at least not much of one.
But they still had to answer Audrey’s question. For a split second he contemplated telling her the truth. His conscious demanded it. But then he realized that he would just be burdening her with an ugly episode from his past. And if he was totally honest with himself, he didn’t want to give up this “Jack” that was here now. He still had a hard time remembering her real name. He liked the fact that the one who gazed at him now with trust and admiration was so like the one he met on Taurus 2. Before he and life had done their dirty work on her psyche. He never again wanted to see the one that he had left broken, bruised and sobbing on the floor outside his apartment on that Godforsaken day!
“She was one of the crew on the Hunter-Gratzner. You, her and Imam had taken shelter in a cave while I took some equipment to our rescue ship. There were some...wild animals...on the planet and it was safer for all of you to hide out there till the ship was ready.”
“Oh. Where is she now?”
Richard and Zar looked at each other in the deafening silence.
What could they tell her? What should they tell her?
Zar felt the battle within Richard as he struggled to find the right answer. She saw the man she only half trusted, but fully loved, emotionally bludgeon himself over the memory of Carolyn Fry’s death. He would never forgive himself for her cruel end. It was something he would have to learn to live with, but that didn’t mean Audrey had to also. Sometimes, just sometimes, lying was the best way.
“She came with you guys when you made it to Polaris. But she had to get back to the base for a debriefing. She hasn’t kept in touch. Probably too busy and all.”
Riddick had given Zar a look of gratitude. He wouldn’t have been able to lie to Audrey. He’d done it one too many times and he didn’t have the stomach, hell, the balls, for it anymore. Even if it meant sparing her grief. He was just so damned tired of keeping all the lies straight!
“Oh. I understand.” Actually she didn’t. But she could tell that her dream had really freaked Richard out. She didn’t want to upset him or get him mad at her. Something kept telling her that she wouldn’t like the consequences.
Zar had hoped that would be the end of the reminiscing. And three months later, Audrey still hadn’t experienced anymore flashbacks.
She had become enthralled with Richard all over again. This time he was gentler with her. Talking to her, letting her hang out with him when he wasn’t working at the docks, the job he’d taken back when he returned to the upper levels. He taught her self-defense techniques. Though Zar wasn’t sure how smart that was.
He’d pointed out that martial arts were more about self-control and learning about when a situation merited striking than about violence per se. He figured it would help Audrey if the Profearaben ever reared its ugly head. Zar came around to his way of thinking and even joined them once or twice.
But today, coming home from a grueling shift of dealing with idiots and assholes, she still felt uneasy about things.
She loathed lying to Audrey, but truly believed it was in the girls best interests.
Her relationship with Richard on the other hand just left her feeling...jittery. Stagnant was probably a better word for it. They made love still, slept together every night. He never gave her cause to doubt him in any way. But she kept erecting a barrier to keep him from claiming his former place in her heart. Her heart wanted to trust him, but her mind wouldn’t let her. She didn’t know how long they could go on like that. He was patient now, but it couldn’t be easy for him. She was afraid that she’d lose him due to her own weakness. And she didn’t have the faintest clue on how to convince herself to let the past go and just enjoy the present.
SHE, who had become a champion at letting go of the past in order to save the future, couldn’t get a grip!
So she opened the door to the apartment with a tired soul and body. And raised her eyes to a mind blasting sight. A sight that made all her doubts blow away like sand in the wind.
Richard and Audrey sat facing each other. He with a shiv in his hand, running it over his lathered scalp.
Audrey with one of her own, doing the same thing. She had let her hair grow over the past year and it was to her shoulders. Or it had been. Now it was falling in sheaves to the ground at her feet.
Both man and girl had grown big silly grins on their faces as they spied Zar standing stunned in the doorway.
In that moment Zar knew that everything would work out. There were most probably bad times ahead, but they would stick it out together. They were a family built in love if not in blood. Though plenty of that had been shed in order for them to get to this point.
Riddick had earned his redemption. And had vowed not to throw it away. By including Audrey in a ritual that signified all he ever was or would be, he showed that he had willingly rejoined the human race.
Jack was back!
The new and improved Jack. With Richard and Zar by her side, she would never be the afraid, the weak, the lonely. Ever again.
As Zar smiled back at the absurd duo, she reflected on the paths that had led them to each other.
Through the strength of one another, they had all earned redemption from their pasts. Whether it be from violence, running away or tragedy or all of the above. They were given a second chance. And with each other, they would make sure they used it, not abused it.
Life could throw whatever it wanted at them now. They weren’t alone in body or soul.

Thanks for reading and all the great feedback. Look for the sequel in the coming weeks.