Riddick
"The criminals, the exiles, the disparate, and the restless." Nim doesn't waste any time when she sets foot into the cargo deck. Her words ring strong, accompanied by the tinny echo of the empty space. I raise a brow at her, curious as the source of that phrase. She's noiseless as she crosses over to me. Her boots dangle from her fingers, her toes dirty from walking barefoot through the forest. I straighten from my search for hidden smuggling panels, and face her as she comes within arms reach of me. Even at this distance, there's still a sharply definable us, hanging in the air.
"You're early." It hasn't even been the full hour I'd given her. I had expected her to be later than sooner.
She shakes her head, and I can't help but be fascinated by the bounce of those curls. My fingers twitch with the want to push the stray corkscrews out of her face.
"That's who was off-world when the Necro's came for Furya." Nim doesn't rise to the challenge in my voice, instead, keeping on her original tact. She drops the boots with a clatter, raising both her hands. "Phillip said my father was one of the restless. If he's still out there, maybe your parents are too."
Hope has never been wielded so cruelly. It's like having a dagger taken to my stomach, the sudden pain and tightening there. For once, I'm thankful for the goggles hiding the pinch of my eyes. The us I felt shimmering in the air snaps in half, as she reminds me how vastly different our worlds are. I turn back to the paneling, grinding my teeth and continuing to tap my way along the wall, listening for a hollow sound.
She's confused at best. In my peripheral vision, I see her toes wiggle uncomfortably. "Riddick?"
I only grunt in reply. I can't concentrate on my search, so I straighten again, and start for the cockpit. Nim follows, scooping up her boots as she does so, her bare feet padding softly on the decking. She's smart enough not to press me. Once we reach the cockpit, I surprise her by sinking down into the copilot's chair, sprawling comfortably while she hesitates, further confused.
"First thing you do, is make sure all the vents and hatches are sealed." I tell her, pointing toward the console. She needs to sit. And she needs to learn. I carefully keep the tone of my voice even, and calm. I won't let her understand the depth of the issue she just raised. Would I even want to know them, if they are still alive?
Nim gets the point, and slowly settles into the pilot's chair. I lean forward, pointing at a bank of lights, both red, and green. She reaches forward, and flips a switch on all the lights showing red. After a few moments, soft thuds and the hiss of pressurization can be heard through the vessel. As soon as all the lights shine green, she glances at me. In the early day's sunlight, even through the dampening aspect of my goggles, her eyes are luminous, almost glowing, as green as the forest surrounding us.
"Make sure all the gauges are showing positive results." Telling her what to do, frees me from her gaze. I wonder for a moment if that's what she feels like when she stares into my eyes. "Once you fire the engines, you'll have to act fast. Right hand controls vertical ascent in atmo, left controls forward thrust. The trick is getting above the tree line before you can try to break the gravity well."
My body shouldn't respond to the way she wraps her hands around the joysticks, fingers fanning and shifting for the best grip. There's something visceral about the way she glances at me, as if she knows that she's causing my gut to clench, and my self-control to stretch to the limits. I swallow the hard lump in my throat, and force myself to think about things that don't involve Nim's hands, and my body.
"Whenever you're ready, hit the ignition, and slowly pull back with your right hand."
She takes a deep breath, and follows my instructions. For a brief moment, the ship wobbles, trying to lift free of the earth. And then slowly, the panorama outside the view port changes, trees swaying from the gaseous blast of the engines. Nim bites her lower lip in concentration, as she eases further and further back on the VTOL system. She will never win a medal for the fastest take-off. But if something happens to me, she needs to be able to do this.
"Good. Now, hold steady on ascent, and push forward with your left. Watch this number, right here." I lean forward and tap the console, showing her where to look. "That's your gravity pressure. Speed counters it, once the dial reaches zero, you've broken the gravity well."
She nods, and complies, but the ship dips dangerously when she eases up on the VTOL. The growl I make is far more effective at getting her to remember what she's doing. The ship evens out, as she fixes her grip, and begins to accelerate. I let her get a feel for this stage of piloting, keeping my silence as the ship picks up speed under her guidance. Both Nim and I watch the pressure gauge, until she's got enough speed to break atmosphere.
"Vertical." It's all I have to say to her, as she pulls back on the VTOL throttle, raising us further from the ground, and into the outer stratosphere. The ship only bucks a few times, as the planet refuses to completely give us up, but soon enough, the blue has given way to black, and the conventional engines sputter and die from lack of oxygen. She looks alarmed, glancing around the console for some indication of what to do next.
"The ion drives take over from here." I push myself up in the copilot's chair. "The Company never changes it's ignition code." Which is about as smart as gills on a bird. I point to her left, and after a few attempts, she finds the panels that flips open to reveal a keypad. She punches the code as I tell her, and the nav-computer flares to life. The preplanned destination shows in full color. Helion Prime alive with lights and people, serves as a solar harvesting center for at least eighteen terraformed planets in the nearby sectors. She confirms the destination, and the low sonorous hum of the ion drives fills the ship. Artificial gravity stabilizes, and Nim sinks into her seat, relieved.
"That wasn't so hard," she muses softly.
I make no comment, kicking my feet up to rest my boots on the edge of the console. She's trying to reconstruct the us that was earlier. But all that ends up happening is an uncomfortable silence, during which she draws her bare feet up into the pilot's chair, and curls up. I choose to let the silence stretch on, denying her of the resolution she craves. I close my eyes, and listen to the silence.
Nim, for her part, keeps it. She doesn't push. She doesn't fill it with meaningless chatter. She knows. She gets it. She spends her time staring at the hundreds of thousands of stars visible through the viewport. The silence stretches onward, and I wonder what she's thinking. It's never unbearable; it just simple iis/i. And then suddenly, I notice it's back. The feeling of ius/i, that calm knowledge that I'm not leaving her behind. Almost as soon as the air changes, she speaks.
"Riddick?" I lower my feet from the console, turning toward her. I slide my goggles up, to show her I'm listening. "Are we doing the right thing?"
"I've never been much concerned with the right thing, Nim." She only looks at me when I answer, her features underlit from the console lighting. She's worried, but unafraid. "When your found, in a dumpster, with your umbilical cord wrapped around your neck, right and wrong turn into a pretty fuzzy area." As much as I try to make it sound like a joke, it doesn't.
Shock registers on her face, and she immediately swivels the pilot's chair toward me. Her toes curl on the decking as she plants her feet and reaches for me. I don't resist her. I like the way she touches me. How cool her fingers are as they cup my face, and draw me closer. Soon, we're both leaning forward out of our seats, foreheads resting together. Does she see her reflection in my eyes? Or does she see something else?
"You want to know what else Phillip told me?" She whispers with a smile. Her thumb skims down my face, as she releases her hold on me.
Instead of moving, I choose to stay where I am. Close to her. "Is it better than the whole restless heart bullshit?"
"He told me, to protect -you-."
I sit up to laugh at the very idea. But when I'm through, she's smiling as if that was her goal all along. "Protect me? From who?"
Standing up, she crosses the span between the two chairs in a single step. With a raised shoulder, she situates herself between my knees. The effect is immediate. A rumble of pleasure rises in my throat as I set my hands on her hips. She only smiles.
"No cryo this time, Riddick. You need to teach me. And I need to figure out what this-" - she raises one hand to gesture between us, to the humming, tangible thing in the air- "-is."