fire scorches raw wounds
pain wafts like acid breeze
skin charred black crumbles
a façade broken in the moment descent tugs at every fiber
of every being
tearing limb from life
with no sense of time or reason
her beaten body plummets
a pregnant mother
fragile cryo-embryos
she labors for integrity
(it's too soon, too soon)
no time for questions
a sacrifice
purge the brood to save the mother?
What if?
Could one sleep with that decision
Or would it weigh heavy in the heart or deep in the belly
He steps disoriented from amidst the wreckage. His large frame twists from side to side surveying the landscape. Smoke drifts and fire belches from the cataclysm around him. He shades his goggled eyes for a good look around. The parched earth scrapes loudly under his feet as he limps and shuffles forward. A body, the only one he can see is twisted, broken, crushed by pieces of the hull. He pulls the prone form free. A woman. Blond hair, half burned away, her face a grotesque mask, frozen forever in surprise. He gently closes her startled lids with careful fingers and steps away.
A strange silence fills the air, deafening. He feels trapped in the heat, engulfed in the suffocating stillness of the dead planet. He feels panic rise like bile in his throat threatening to asphyxiate.
Panic threatens to destroy the man who lacks a strong mind. fire scorches raw wounds
He fans his face with a moist palm and falls to his knees. Imaginary bands, tight like leather restraints close around his chest. He hasn't felt terror like this since the cell. He takes back the thousands of times he cursed the slam, the darkness, just to be there again. Anything but this. Anything but utterly alone.
premature cryo-babies scream for a mercy shecannot givedestroyed, cast about, thrust forth from her protective loins(too soon, much too soon)
a promise of safety now forgotten
survival now gains firmer ground
One.
Crawling, weary across the sand,
restraints dangling,
Steely sub-space umbilicals trailing,
One.
His face presses against the sand. His stomach lurches, threatening to spill. He coughs wretchedly. His head spins as the heat of the air forces his will and his body flat against the ground. A face circles past his eyes. A child. In his mind he watches her play.
Her auburn hair catches the light as she spins; her dark eyes fill with mirth. She sees him hiding watching her from a distance. His heart leaps in his chest as their eyes lock. His eyes. She runs as she always does. Away. Calling for daddy. Not for him. The tall blond man that lifts her high in his arms could never be her father. So light, so fair. Her features a dark contrast against his pale skin and eyes. Every fiber of his being screams in pain as she squeals with delight. The man huddled in the bushes is forgotten. He watches and his heart tears as the small child pulls her "daddy" by the hand into their house.
The tearing of flesh
The screams that echo in his mind
Spiraling into oblivion
Something new
A cry
A cry that penetrates every fiber of his being
and tears his soul
wrenches his heart.
He hears their voices
their shared jubilation
he stands on the outside
forever on the outside
unable to claim what's rightly his
theirs
Her birth certificate would never read Richard B. Riddick – father. Never. But he knew. More sure than he had ever been about anything else. In the moment their passion had collided and his seed had spiraled out of control into her depths, he knew. In the moment he had spoken the unspeakable words; I love you; he knew. Before she acquired a 'special glow' and a swollen belly. He knew.
The moment in which they met was fleeting. Their passion intense. He'd seen her sitting, cocktail in hand, at the bar. He admired her from a distance then had taken vacant seat beside her. His Armani suit had clung in all the right places. He'd seen her admire him with a quick slip of her eyes over his body. Lust hung heavy in the air. Small talk quickly led to fervent conversation. Soon, as evening waned and night began, she'd led him to her suite.
He'd teased her flesh
Heightened her senses
And she'd called out another's name
William...
Her husband, she explained, was a mercenary officer. She'd slipped a picture from her purse and held it out to him. The tall, blond man in the picture smirked at the camera; lips pulled into a boyish grin. A blue eyed devil.
He'd seen her several times since then and it was always the same. He'd tease her, please her and in the final throes of pleasure she'd cry out for her husband. He hadn't minded at first, but it finally began to grate on his nerves that he couldn't seem to pleasure her enough to forget the man she'd married.
Impotent was he, her devil-eyed prince. Some time ago a nasty bugger had nestled a bone shiv against his spine; a piece of which was still embedded. It had severed certain nerves she said, very important nerves. Riddick filled the void in her that her husband could not. And if for those brief encounters she was satisfied in pretending him someone else then so was he.
And so he came to watch his daughter play from a distance as always. Hiding a few feet away, no one the wiser. Riddick often wondered if the impotent merc ever questioned how his flaccid member had ever managed to father a child. He pondered while in wait for his daughter to appear how the fair woman he'd fucked had explained away the child's dark features.
The rain splashes
Hard against his face
As he races through the darkness
with his prize
She screams and pounds his chest with ineffectual blows
Driving it hard to his core that she doesn't trust him
Doesn't know him
Will never call him daddy
He holds her tight to his body as he runs
Wrapped in a light blanket
A vain attempt to keep out the rain.
Tears mingle with the rain on his face as he runs(She's mine, all mine. Finally!)
His legs struggle
From running for most of the night
At last he reaches a motel
Where neon lights beam the salvation of vacancy.
He was startled by the strength of her cries. He'd never thought she'd hate him this much. Her small body thrashed and convulsed with rage on the motel bed screaming for nothing but the daddy he'd stolen her from. There was nothing he could do to quiet her. It was in a final moment of desperation that he left her in the relative safety of the room to writhe and seethe and slipped back out into the night. He walked for many miles with his insides churning at the though of what he'd done. It wasn't till late in the morning that he'd stole back to the motel.
The heat of the flames bathed his body in their bright glow
They danced merrily
Licking greedily
His mind teetered on the cusp of insanity as he stood awash in their glow.
The brittle skeleton of the motel gave a final defeated heave and toppled to the ground. The few firemen that still remained jumped clear then continued spraying the smoldering rubble. Riddick ran a shaking palm over the stubble on his scalp as he stared in shocked disbelief at the charred ruins that certainly held the body of his daughter. He began to laugh, cynical laughter that mocked life, death and the god that would let a little girl die.
The aged fire chief stepped towards him.
"Not really a laughing matter son, someone lost their little girl tonight..." Someone sure did, Riddick thought. "A wet blanket" the chief continued, "someone draped it over the radiator to dry. Must have been some kind of short...you know what these old buildings are like. A shame, a real shame."
Riddick emptied his stomach on the street as the fire chief went to gather his men. A police siren was the last thing he heard before darkness overcame him.
Even in solitary confinement.
Voices pierce his ears
Distant
A hundred words
A hundred tones
Guards...
shuffling walk
forked tongues
Bitter words
"kidnapped a kid"
"burned her alive"
monster...
monster...
"... to the slam.."
"...too dangerous..."
monster
bit in his mouth.
hands tied
monster.
The cryo-tube was a welcome sanctuary after the prison cell. Riddick felt beaten down. In the moment his daughter had died in the motel Richard Riddick had died too. He stared across the passenger cabin at William Johns. How fitting that the "father" of his child should be the one to ensure his arrival at Slam. William's wife had adamantly denied any association with him. He'd tried to make her see. He'd never meant any harm to come to her. He'd loved her. Needed her. That was all.
Riddick's motive for the kidnapping the Johns' daughter was never questioned. And no one believed he had not intentionally started the blaze.
What if she lied?
What if she was never really mine?
There could have been others,
for a woman so lovely,
so lonely. What if she lied?
Then what did I do?
eye for an eye?
He welcomed the carnage, the fire when it came. He reveled in the thought that his end would mirror hers. He relished the idea of the flames licking his body, charring his skin. Dying the way she must have died. So alone, so afraid. Abandoned by the man who'd stolen her to love her. Destroyed by the man who'd given her life.
He opens his eyes and is greeted by the endless burning sun. The sand sticks to his face where rivulets of moisture have escaped the confines of his goggles. His exposed skin feels the first tingles of the sun's scorching rays. He rolls to face the heavens and rests his head back comfortably in the sand. Don't cry baby, he whispers, Daddy will be home soon.
"What If"
By Creed
From the album Human Clay
I can't find the rhyme in all my reason
I've lost sense of time and all seasons
I feel I've been beaten down
By the words of men who have no grounds
I can't sleep beneath the trees of wisdom
When your ax has cut the roots that feed them
Forked tongues in bitter mouths
Can drive a man to bleed from inside out
What if you did?
What if you lied?
What if I avenge?
What if eye for an eye?
I've seen the wicked fruit of your vine
Destroy the man who lacks a strong mind
Human pride sings a vengeful song
Inspired by the times you've been walked on
My stage is shared by many millions
Who lift their hands up high because they feel this
We are one We are strong
The more you hold us down the more we press on
What if you did?
What if you lied?
What if I avenge?
What if eye for an eye?
I know I can't hold the hate inside my mind
'Cause what consumes your thoughts controls your life
So I'll just ask a question
What if?
What if your words could be judged like a crime?