CHAPTER4COC

CHAPTER 4

He hadn’t started out his little expedition with the intention to kill Leffner.
But it seemed the ex-con had a death wish.
Toni and Hill had been staying with them for a week now and Burt Leffner had yet to make an appearance or a threat.
It had made Richard edgy with waiting, until word got back to him that someone was asking around about his kid...Audrey. A man fitting Leffner’s description was putting the word out that he was willing to pay good credits for her address. It seemed she had something he wanted.
It hit him then that the only reason there hadn’t been a confrontation yet was that though Leffner knew who Toni had fled to, he didn’t know where that person lived. But Audrey McAllister was pretty distinctive looking with her shaved head and boys clothes. With the right amount of monetary incentive, Leffner would have the apartments address in no time.
Trying to buy as much time as possible, Richard had put out the word that anyone giving up his address, and therefore his kid, would have to answer to him. That would stop the not terminally stupid. But not the terminally greedy.
He knew it was going to get ugly soon if something wasn’t done to head it off.
That’s when he decided it was time to pay Leffner a little visit.
He’d left work early. The same time as Leffner’s shift ended.
Following him. Stalking him with his night vision eyes. Watching his body glow white and cream and gray in the dark raspberry light of the tunnel.
A part of him felt shame at the rush the hunt was giving him. It brought back nerve endings he had thought long dead. Killed by the horrible consequences of the Brenner fiasco.
The other part of him just shrugged it’s shoulders. Figuring it was true. You could take the killer out of the jungle, but not the jungle out of the killer.
He knew Leffner would have to go through a small alley-like corridor to get to the run down dive he and Toni had occupied. When Richard had first seen it he had just shaken his head in amazement. How people could live like that, of their own free will, was beyond him. All he knew is that he would have begged, borrowed or stolen to make sure his family was taken care of. Leffner obviously didn’t have the same sentiments.
The dim corridor would be the perfect spot to sneak a little “talk” with Leffner. The lack of lighting would give Richard the advantage, keeping Leffner from getting a bearing. He watched as Leffner’s hulking form made it’s way down the corridor. He was a short but wide man. Once large with muscles, he had let himself go. Now he tended more towards bulkiness and fat. Curly brown hair, hazel eyes, bad teeth and pitted olive skin completed the package.
Riddick felt a moment of nausea when he pictured Toni being forced to have sex with that. Grinding and slobbering over and in her young, innocent body. Raping her with brutality and terror. Putting the fear of Riddick in this puss bucket would feel real fine!
The corridor had been totally empty when he had grabbed Leffner roughly. The punch Leffner had thrown at him had been expected. Richard knew that he’d been in prison. Just the simple fact that he had survived showed that he had good self-survival instincts.
What was totally unexpected was the ferocity and skill Leffner reacted with. The punch didn’t connect. It wasn’t supposed to. It was supposed to distract Richard from the knife coming towards his face. It worked.
Caught off guard at the skill of his “victim”, Richard felt the blade cut deep into his cheek. His quick reflexes kicked in a second later.
Even before it had finished it’s downward arc, he had grabbed and twisted Leffner’s wrist, along with the rest of his body. Leffner was brought to his knees with a scream of agony as Richard increased the painful pressure to the point he heard the bones snap. The knife falling to the floor with a clatter. Feeling the hot blood run down his face and neck, he didn’t know whether to be enraged more at himself or Leffner.
He settled on Leffner. Figuring the rage would help emphasize the menace in his voice.
“You shouldn’t have done that Mr. Leffner.”
“Fuck you!!!”
A chuckle of pure evil brushed over Leffner’s skin as Riddick squatted down to face level.
“If anyone’s going to be doing the fucking it’s going to be me. But don’t worry, I find that little girls like you usually have all the tightness gone from their assholes by now. Been used too much.”
Leffner’s arm had gone numb from the brutal pressure on his broken wrist. The slight relief of pain let him get his first good look at the piece of shit that had ambushed him. He recognized him, even though he was wearing goggles and it was dimly lit in the corridor. It was a guy named Richard Carolyn. He worked on the loading dock over from Leffner’s.
Calling him big and mean would’ve been an understatement. Leffner had seen plenty of those kind of men in his time in prison. They were usually the ones that had been unimpressed with Leffner’s own bulging physique. They had raped and beat him. He in turn had raped and beaten the even weaker ones.
Something clicked in his head as he thought of his own humiliating time in a slam. The asshole knew that he’d been butt monkey fodder! He knew Leffner had been in prison. Someone had been doing some checking on him! Why?!
“What the fuck do you want?!”
The gleam of white teeth shown brightly in the corridor. Technically it was a smile, but there was no good will behind it.
“Let’s just say I wanted to catch up with you alone. Have a little chat. Just you and I.”
“I ain’t telling you shit! OWWWW!”
Leffner’s head throbbed and his ears rang as his senses tried to recover from Richard’s blow to the side of his head.
“Did I say I wanted any information from you, Mr. Leffner?”
“What the hell is this all about then?!”
“’This’ is about giving you information. Not taking it from you.”
Leffner’s face fell forward to hide his expression. He knew he had a tendency to telegraph his actions. He didn’t want Carolyn to know that he was just about to rush him.
Richard knew that Leffner was about to rush him. He could feel the energy coming off the man in waves. Leffner obviously didn’t know how to take his medicine. He thought he was the top bad ass of all bad asses.
He didn’t know he was staring the meaning of the phrase in the face.
He was about to learn the hard way.
Before he could launch himself, Leffner saw a flash of a hand reach for his throat. Quick as that, his throat was in a vise-like clamp. His head slammed against the wall and his air cut off.
Panicking, he clawed at the wrist that was constricting his breathing. Digging in his nails, he just wanted to get the hand off his body! But the son of a bitch must be on something! He was only using one hand to hold Leffner immobile and he didn’t so much as flinch when Leffner drew blood. Feeling the world start to go black, Leffner searched for something to stop the death looking in his face.
The goggles! Taking one hand from his attacker’s wrist he ripped off the rubberized protection from Riddick’s eyes. Scratching the skin in his desperation to get the maniac off him.
The hand crushing his throat eased just slightly.
But that seemed irrelevant as Leffner froze at the sight of those silvery orbs staring back at him. Emotionless and cold.
The psycho eye’s had been shined! Which meant one of two things. He’d either been a Sargimite miner or a con from Slam City. Both were known for their cold blooded brutality.
And that’s when Riddick knew he was going to have kill Leffner. From the quick gleam of recognition in the ex-con’s eyes, he knew Leffner had suspicions about his origins. Riddick had made sure that few saw him without his goggles. The few that did, the ones who were outside the circle he trusted, were told that he’d been a Sargimite miner. They always bought it. But they weren’t ex-cons like Leffner.
Leffner would more likely think he was a con from Slam City, where the procedure originated, rather than a miner. Riddick couldn’t take the chance. If it had just been him, he would’ve just taken the next transport off of Polaris Station. But he had Zar and Jack to think of now. They’d probably get caught in any trap or crossfire when the authorities tried to capture him.
Leffner saw the death glimmer flash through Carolyn’s eyes. His death glimmer. Struggling against the hand that still held his throat, he felt his bowels loosen.
“NO!!! Don’t.....! What did I do to you?!”
“You made the mistake of trying to fuck with something that is MINE! I give you credit for figuring out who Toni and Hill ran too. But your fatal mistake was threatening my kid. I never understood why men like you fucked with the young ones. But I would’ve left well enough alone. Until you got my family involved with your sick little world. And that’s exactly what you did when you started asking where Audrey lived.
I was just going to warn you away. Give you a little something to think about while you recovered in your med-lab bed. But I think you’re too stupid to get the message. You do not know who you are fucking with!!!”
The deranged piece of shit was going to ghost him!!!
Leffner redoubled his efforts to escape. But it was useless. Carolyn was just too strong for him to break his hold. Like an animal caught in the sights of a big gauge, he could only stare in terror at the shiv that moved closer to his throat. He couldn’t even take comfort in thinking that the authorities would hunt his murderer down.
He was a piece of scum to them. They’d probably be relieved.
The little bitch Toni would be free of him. Her kid, (he refused to acknowledge Hill as being his) would be safe. No one would grieve for him.
He’d be going to Hell unmourned.
Riddick smiled in the terrified man’s face. Enjoying the fear the sick fuck was swimming in.
Let him know what his victims felt.
There’d be much enjoyment in killing this one. More so than most of his victim’s. Well, with the exception of Johns, the mercenary that had tried to kill Audrey on Taurus 2.
Slowly he pressed the shiv against Leffner’s throat. Under the ear. Telling him, with the slow and steady pressure he applied, that his death would be a long and painful one.
The first drops of blood beaded on Leffner’s throat. Trying to struggle, he was held immobile by Riddick’s forearm against his upper chest. His left hand broken and useless, he tried to punch his right into the face of his executioner. Failing in that, he beat at his arm and body. Trying to kick and dislodge the knees grinding into his thighs that held him down.
For long seconds, Riddick drew the blade shallowly along Leffner’s skin. Part of him reveled in the blood that dripped over his arm and the smell of the man’s bowels that had released in terror. The other part was yelling at him to stop. That he was dangerously close slipping into the Riddick of old. The two sides battled against the other for control of his soul.
He wasn’t sure which side had won, but all of a sudden he was tired of playing the game. It was time to end it.
Moving the arm that held Leffner pinned against the wall, he grabbed him by the hair at the top of his head, spinning him so that his head was in between Riddick’s bent legs. Jammed up against the inside of his left knee.
With a blurring movement he brought the shiv up to Leffner’s exposed neck. Leffner was beyond screaming or begging at this point. The only sound he could manage was the heavy panting of a terrified animal.
Laughter erupted down the corridor.
Innocent laughter. The laughter of children.
Riddick could see their shadows fast approaching. They were running and shouting. Kicking a ball back forth between them.
He knew he could kill Leffner and be gone in less than the thirty seconds it would take for them to see the two men. But it would mean leaving the kids to find the body. The very bloody, brutally mutilated body.
The part of him that had fought for redemption screamed at him to not do it. The other part whispered that the kids would have to know the ugly truth that was life and death sooner or later. Might as well be now.
A series of people burst across his minds eye. Zar’s with her smiling, tender face as she made love to him. Then the memory of Jack as she lay dying in her hospital bed. Finally Carolyn Fry’s as a creature of Taurus 2 tore her from his arms.
He got the message. He’d be throwing away the redemption all those women had worked for, if he subjected those kids to his handy work. He couldn’t do that. Even it meant putting himself in danger of being found out. Even if it meant endangering Zar and Jack.
“You got lucky Leffner. Next time you won’t. Stay away from Toni and Hill. Don’t even think about coming near Audrey! Or I will make you wish I finished the job today. Understand?!”
The hand gripping his hair tightened painfully. A response was required.
“Yes!!! I’ll never come near any of them. I swear!!!”
Leffner watched as his own personal Angel of Death slowly withdrew the shiv from his throat. Not quite believing he was being spared, he lay quiet in his own blood. Watching Carolyn pick up the goggles and then fade into the shadows of the corridor.
Disappearing like he was a ghost.