Disclaimer: I still don't fookin' own it.
Author's Notes: WOW! So many reviews for chapter 13, lol you guys need to get laid damnit :-P Shout outs are at the bottom since they were a little long. O, and btw, I'm not dead yet, just busy lol! Also on another sidenote this chapter was originally a super long, gigantoid chapter but I felt so bad about not posting in so long that I decided to use it to my advantage to better emphasize the chapter titling ;-)
---------------------------------------------------
The warm afternoon air permeated the entire garden. Flowers and herbs of every imaginable kind were in patterned circles. Riddick had been summoned by one of the council members and was to his surprise brought to the Citadel's garden and not the council chamber. I guess it makes sense seeing as they are element-als, thought Riddick. His expert eyes looked for every entrance, exit and hidey-hole he could detect. He noticed that the box windows that were common in Elemental architecture only began at the sixth story. Most likely to keep prying ears and eyes away, he thought, too bad modern technology doesn't care. This planet only had one sun but the temperature rarely left "hot" never really cooling down until late at night. All in all the Elemental Homeworld was beautiful beyond compare and contained more peace and happy moments than any other in his entire life. For once he was on a planet as a guest and not a fugitive, even given spacious quarters and freedom to practically roam wherever he chose, Not like they could have stopped me, he smirked. Riddick made no move other than to perk his ears at the approach of what he presumed was the council member.
"Enjoying the garden, Riddick?" A serenely calm voice asked. Turning slowly he was face to face with the councilwoman who had stopped the near fatal argument at his first meeting.
"A bit open for my tastes." He said flatly. The corner of her mouth twitched as if she suppressed a smile. Moving forward and walking beyond him, deeper into the garden at a leisurely pace she stopped only once to look at him over her shoulder before she continued walking. Riddick matched her pace but kept his distance.
"Why are you here?" she asked, sitting on a bench nestled in a small gazebo.
"Isn't that what you're going to tell me?" he replied back, crossing his arms over his chest. Riddick preferred to stand even though she motioned to a bench next to her.
"Well if I'm going to educate you, at the very least I should introduce myself shouldn't I?" she said innocently, "You may call me Hujan. I believe we met earlier."
"I remember."
"Good." She smiled.
--------------------------------------------------
Vocea by Varekai (Cirque Du Soleil)
Riddick's mind was still reeling from what the Elemental had told him. Walking back to his room in a half daze he let his thought race through his mind.
"You are more than you appear." She said with a slight smirk.
"I could say the same about you." He returned. Riddick's face remained emotionless as he listened to the baiting words of Hujan, who almost mirrored the attitude of Aereon the other elemental women he had met on Helion Prime. Except where Aereon seemed to become lost in the wind, Hujan seemed to shimmer and melt like a mirage before his very eyes. She must have been a Water Elemental; the heat coming up from the earth at their feet made her a breathing illusion. How fitting, thought Riddick. Her eyes pursed as if in conflict over what her next words should be, Riddick merely raised an eyebrow as if to say "just spit it out."
"What do you know of your Father? …Your Mother?"
Riddick's jaw clenched only slightly. She certainly wasn't beating around the bush, but what bothered Riddick more was the specific nature of her question.
"Nothing."
Hujan's eyes stared at him, searching his goggled eyes as if it would reveal the answers she herself was searching for.
"If you are who Aereon and I think you are, then you are the key to everyone's future." She said almost reverently.
"Look, I only came here so that the Holy Man's family would be safe." He snapped; he didn't like where this conversation was going.
"Don't be a child!" She shouted into the stunned silence. Thunder cracked above their heads and Riddick almost wondered if it was in response to her anger. Riddick's low growl was the only sign that he was holding back for the sake of Ziza and Lajjun's sanctuary.
"Be careful who you raise you voice to, Elemental." He purred dangerously low. In a swirl of robes and blatant anger Hujan stood crossing her arms.
"I know who I am raising my voice to, do YOU?" Riddick moved quicker than a flash of lightning; he had his blade pressed against her throat almost daring her to go one. "You are afraid." Riddick couldn't believe the audacity of this woman, but what shocked him enough to drop the blade was the strange softness in her eyes. "If you are who I think you are," she continued in a heavy voice thick with sadness, "then you are the child I could not save." Looking away she fell to the gazebo seat she was previously sitting on, letting memories wash over her. Her eyes seemed to glaze over as Riddick chose for once to sit before anymore earth-shattering news would drop from her lips so carelessly.
Riddick smirked as he reached another corner on the way to his rooms. Yeah, "earth-shattering" didn't really cut it for what came next, more like "galaxy demolishing"… he thought to himself once more as he rolled over what she had said next.
"I… We…" Hujan gulped once to steady her breathing, "We were on the run. Necromongers had come to Furya, I sensed their approach and tried to warn as many as I could." Oh, Gods… thought Riddick, she isn't implying what I think she is, is she? "Varen put me on a ship with many of the other expectant mothers," she said with evident pain, "I begged him to come with me! But that hard-headed fool of a Furyan wouldn't leave without at least trying to defend 'what was his'." She gave a fleeting smile before continuing, "I don't know how we made it out, all I saw was Furya being utterly destroyed as we star jumped away, the screams…" she trailed off, closing her eyes tightly, "the women wailed Furyan chants of sorrow so pained I thought I would go mad. Their entire race swept to the wind, my love, my husband… I had no way of knowing if he lived." She turned her face away from Riddick, but he could still tell a rebellious tear had escaped her eye. "We scattered to the winds, all of us fearing to the lives of the children we carried in our wombs. So many were caught." She paused to snicker at the past as if remembering a joke, "I was caught."
"Was the child a boy or a girl?" Riddick's sudden intrusion on her thoughts made her head snap to face him. She flashed a tortured evil grin before answering.
"A boy." Her eyes bore into his own, as if willing him to the truth and sadness of her words. "Ripped from my arms, thrown into a liquor store garbage bin while I was left to bleed out in the alley next to it."
Riddick stopped mid-stride as he leaned against a still warm pillar. Had anyone been looking on they would have seen only his stony impassive "game" face. But if they had so much as ventured into his mind they'd find a babbling man lost in a world of darkness that had suddenly been plunged into shocking sunlight.
"An Elemental who had been sent to find Furyan or Furyan-bearing mothers found me in the alley. She helped me heal but when she had searched for the child it was nowhere to be found." Her eyes softened once again that hit of pleading once again creeping into her voice, "I searched everywhere, every shred of information I could get my hands on… but nothing." She gave a defeated sigh continuing with her tale, "In the span of a few nights I went from the arms of my love heavy with child, to on the run with my child ripped from my womb—not even a body to weep over." She looked around at the scenery as if seeing it for the first time. "The elemental that found me took me back to our homeworld," she motioned around her, "I used my time wisely." She said with a smirk, finally composing herself back to the High Councilwoman and not the broken women of only a few moments before. Riddick's head swam with the details of her story. His brow furrowing was the only sign he was even listening to her, but inside a war raged as to whether he could even accept the words she had spoken to him. Finally finding his voice he set his hard eyes on her.
"Why tell me this?" he said as emotionless as possible. He could see the hurt she tried to mask unsuccessfully at his words. Slowly she stood taking a few steps to the edge of the gazebo before turning her head only slightly over her shoulder.
"Every child should know his Mother." With that she simply walked out of the garden leaving Riddick to his own thoughts.
Riddick kicked off from the pillar he had been standing against and made his way to his room. Her parting words had nearly made his eyes pop out, he couldn't believe where this whole fucked up story that was "the life of Richard B. Riddick" was going.
--------------------------------------------------
FitMama: Hey there girl, yea I actually put that in there just on the "spur". I mean it plays in important role way later in this story but that's a secret! At first when I wrote the scene it felt a little ham-ish, but I read it over again and added one phrase into a key point making it muchos bueno. So I'm glad ppl are feelin' it :-)
XinnLajgin & marlu5: welcome dears, lol thanx for the comments.
Bima: As always stickin' with me :-P hey thanx for the comment about the songs—sometimes songs inspire a scene or it's a song chosen for the scene. It's good to know that they fit.
Nikita1506: I heart you too hun :-) btw, I've read some of ur work, nice stuff ;-)
Tinca & Spark89: I made the markings not only because it's part of the story later but also because I wanted an awkward moment. I wanted to emphasize how these two people are completely thrown by what's going on between them. I mean when you think about it, Riddick has never felt so close and so connected to ANYONE. And as for Kyra—girl was raped and abused at the age of 12, she's never known what intimacy means, in fact neither of them know what intimacy means. That's why I had to clarify it with the phrases "needing a good fuck", etc. I take a different approach to Riddick; too many times his "animal" is defined as lustful or possessive, when there's so many other attributes like noble, loyal, faithful. And Tinca, yea as long as it inspires me I guess lol, sorry 'bout that. As for the characters themselves, I think Riddick would do it because once he understands and makes a decision he sticks by it—I mean if the mercs hadn't found him on UV6 he really never would have returned. And as for Kyra she's no dummy either, she knows nothing but hell lies before and behind them, they're stronger together fighting as One. I hope this explains it a little better :-)