Chapter 1: Snow Blind

A/N: So, this was supposed to be a little bit longer. It's written out in my notebook- and it's, like, ten pages long. I ended up breaking it into two parts, and this is your first. I'll try to have the second typed up soon. Read, relax, and review. We're in for a long, bumpy ride...

The snow came in waves, like the surf crashing into rocks during a storm. It swirled around like wet sand. It cut visibility down to next to nothing. The wind was icy and damp and goddamn cold. Never bright, the light of this world's sun shaded all the way over into the ultraviolet. There wasn't much to see by—even without the massive storm raging overhead.

He hardly noticed the harsh squall. He was far too preoccupied with his instruments to notice the heavy drift. He was cold, however. Despite his high-tech gear, the ice found all sorts of ways to make him shiver. His hands were steady, though. Not that it would've mattered if his hands were shaking because the gun he carried wasn't designed for accuracy. It was consistent, though. And geared up to kill.

Despite his advanced gear and past experience in the trade, Codd's quarry continued to elude him. That it had him searching blindly was starting to grate on his nerves. His was a business in which personal as well as professional pride was taken in delivering the goods. This was one delivery that was particularly overdue.

"Codd," his name crackled unclearly through his communicator.

He rolled his eyes, hand flying to press on his earpiece. "What is it, Jackie-boy?"

"Find anything, yet?" Crackled back.

"Hell, Jack," Codd huffed in irritation. "I can't find my own ruttin' hands in this mess."

There was a chuckle, "Well, get your ass back here. If you can't find him, you can't find him."

"Alright," Codd relaxed—his ultimate downfall. "See you—"

His scanner wailed at the same instant he did. The communicator's earpiece fizzed in the snow. There was no one to hear or respond to the increasingly fretful queries it emitted, even though it was still attached to an ear. Unfortunately, the ear was no longer attached to anything.

On the other end of the line, Jack fretted over the controls. He was trying to get something. Anything. Codd had gone cold—and not from the planet's daily climate. The communicator was nonresponsive. Or rather, it crackled and hissed, popped and hummed. It was the absent Codd that had nothing to say.

Jack tore of there, chasing the sound of a friend and comrad in trouble. He hoped and prayed it was just equipment trouble. Snow gave way to ice as he plowed through. Snow whirled around him, and he fought to stay focused on the task at hand as his thoughts betrayed him—drifting towards warmer memories of tropical climates and solid food instead of the nutrient soup that the hot flow provided.

He was considerably startled out of his thoughts as he came upon the void. At first glance, he couldn't tell if the hollow was natural or artificial. Regardless, it had obviously been turned into a temporary living quarters—honestly, it was more like a lair. Artifacts scattered around the cave hinted that someone hereabouts had exerted knowledgeable efforts with the aim of personal survival. A slight movement made him turn sharply, rifle raised and at the ready. He didn't fire, though. He shifted the light, its beam touching a strung up figure. Jack recognized it immediately: Codd.

A quake of fear shot through him. He was bound and secured with his own cuffs, blood dripping down his neck with a shiv-sized wound in his gut. But Codd wasn't dead. Not yet. Not that the gash he'd sustained was in anyway repairable. Jack leaned in, wondering what to say, or if he should say anything—when abruptly, Codd's lips moved slightly. Jack slipped closer, hands shaking as he neared his dying comrade. Should he comfort him? Lie and tell him it was all right? That he could make it? Jack had to gulp back the bile rising in his throat as Codd tugged pitifully at the restraints holding him. Jack pushed any idea of comforting this mass of death to the back of his mind as Codd tried to form words. Though the dying merc's voice was little more than a whisper, Jack thought he could make out what the other man was saying.

"Behind you…"

Behind… Jack whipped around. The blur that slashed at his head still grazed him even in the perfect condition that he was in. Ice, wind, and horrid light cohorted together to impair his vision, leading him to fire blindly. Repeatedly. Already unbalanced on the slight slope inside the cave, the powerful recoil sent his twisting form stumbling back. He landed on the ice with a thud, sprawled out as he continued to fire at the dodgy target. Obedient to Newton, each shot sent him sliding a little father backwards.

Backwards toward the precipice that fronted the cavern.

He went over and nearly didn't catch himself. Nearly. Reflexes born of necessity saw him throw one arm out. His fingers locked into a crack just wide enough to offer a grip while he clung to his rifle. It was all right. He was okay. All he had to do was work his way up until he was safely in the line of a different danger. He was beginning to work his way back up, finding footholds in the frozen ice and rock, when a pair of feet stepped into his view. They were bound in leather and rubber—they were the kind of boots people killed for.

Almost automatically, his eyes followed them upward. A thick hulk of a man stood there, whose hair had grown out to the point where he resembled a snow beast. Jack could sense, if not see, the musculature rippling beneath the apparition's cobbled-together cold-weather attire. The man's eyes were hidden behind reflective goggles that were at once minimal in size and of clearly advanced design. Jack didn't recognize the style. They didn't appear to be any snow goggles that he'd ever seen before. It was even possible that they were intended to serve some other purpose.

He ambled unconcernedly forward, indifferent to the minimal threat that Jack provided. His posture, as well as his attitude, suggested either supreme stupidity or ultimate confidence. Both of which made his skin itch. There was a pause as the man crouched before him, twirling an odd looking shiv between his fingers. That's when Jack's fear finally came to the fore. He pulled the trigger on his rifle, the motion jerking him back and ruining his grip in the ice. He fell into the deep drop in silence except for his gun, from which he managed a few final shots before hitting the ground far below at bone crushing speed. The multiple rounds were as thunderous as they were wild.

Rising, the stranger walked fearlessly to the edge of the precipice and peered over. He whistled faintly at the sharp drop and sudden stop. His expression unchanging, he backed away from the brink and turned. Thought he didn't reveal it, he was slightly surprised at what he encountered.

The double barrels of a particularly nasty weapon were aimed directly at his midsection. They suited the individual who held them just fine. Toombs' name had always been a good running gag among the colleagues he'd had in his business. None of them had ever used the joke to his face of course. At least, none that could be found alive had done so.

Using the muzzles of the gun, he gestured slightly in the direction of the ragged, wind swept cliff that had recently been depopulated by one. "Two of my best boys. Both gone. You got no idea how careful I brought 'em both along. They had bright futures in the trade." He knew who he was facing off with; he knew he shouldn't let his anger get the best of him. Self-control or no, his voice rose perceptibly. "And now cuzza you—cuzza you—you subhuman piece of shit, they won't be around to split the reward money."

He began to laugh; it was hairsplitting and anything but appealing. Not everyone cackled when they laughed, nor made it sound like the final gasps of a dying man. Toombs chortled like a dyspeptic vulture.

In contrast, the man with the reflective goggles was as silent as the snow he stood in. Still crowing over his triumph, Toombs began to circle his trapped quarry—careful to keep his distance. He was in control, and fully intended to keep it that way.

"Let's see," he muttered, affecting a momentary uncertainty that was false and transparent. "Do I need to regale you with the contents of a hardcopy as to why I'm here? I don't think so. Escapee from Koravan Penal Facility. Escapee from the double-maximum security joint on Ribald Ess. Escapee from Tangiers Three Penal Colony. Escapee from the triple-max lock-down at Half Moon Bay. Officially on the outs for the fifty-eight standard months.

"Is there more? Oh, you know there's more!" He sniggered. "Wanted on five worlds in three systems for… Lessee—how many murders?" He feigned thoughtfulness, practically dancing with excitement. "Oh, yeah, baby, I bagged the man in motion, the killin' villain himself! Too bad about Codd and Jack. I'll just hafta handle their thirds for them. Life's a bitch, but Death, she can give it up whenever she wants to. Guess I must live right."

Now he did giggle, a sound more unsettling than his regular laugh. Removing a pair of cuffs from his utility belt, he dangled them like an enticement to a dance. Toombs tossed the cuffs at his quarry. They bounced off the man's chest and fell into the snow. The quarry glanced down at them, then back up at the mercenary, still not saying a word. Toombs grit his teeth, taking aim and letting loose with both barrels. The breeze from the exposive shells passed close enough to the man's skull to ruffle his tangle of dark hair. It was more eloquent than any threat Toombs could've uttered.

Bending, the quarry picked up the cuffs and worked them around his back. Cuffing oneself wasn't an easy task—not even for a renegade contortionist. He took his time, but he made it look easy. Toombs edged behind him, twin gun muzzles never wavering, he checked the cuffs. With practiced fingers, the mercenary checked and rechecked the bonds. No funny business there, at least. The cuffs were locked and secure.

Licking his lips, he made his voice as low and intimidating as possible. "An' just for the file. Just so you don't forget. The guy all upon your neck right now? It's Toombs. The name of your new shot-caller is Toombs. Easy to remember. It's what you're going to end up in."

This time, the man did react but not in the way Toombs expected. He was too big, too wide, to do what he did. The honest impossibility of it didn't hit Toombs until later. All he knew was that one second his moneymaker was standing before him, and the next, he had sprung into the air in a backwards somersault over the head of the stunned merc. In the process, he simultaneously dislocated his shoulders and his wrists. One freed hand came around in an arc to smack the weapon out of Toombs' hands. The other caught it before it had flipped halfway to the ground.

The man stood before, the now cowering, Toombs with a bored expression. With a sickening pop, he rolled his shoulders back into socket, his face revealing no hint of pain. All he knew was that instead of holding the fun on this behemoth, it was this hulk of a man that was pressing the double barrels just under Toombs' jaw. A single shot would messily remove that important bit of skeletal structure, along with half of the mercenary's head. Toombs fell very still.

"Your life or your ship," his voice rolled out like a low purr. "You decide, shot-caller. And just for the file? My name's Riddick. Richard B. Riddick." The barrels pressed harder against the soft flesh of his neck. "Two things you coulda done better, Toombs. One: never let an established murderer put his own cuffs on. And two—and this is really the more important part—never take a two-man crew to take me out. Idiocy, is what that is. Damn insulting…

"Now… Hand me your ship locator. Or I can sort it out for myself."

Toombs gave a defiant growl, but his shaking hands spoke otherwise as he dug about in his pockets. All manner of hardware hit the snow before he finally found the locator. With a resigned huff, he handed the thing over. In his mind, he'd come up with all sorts of names for the bastard in front of him. He got plenty of time to give them a loud voice later when he was strung up in his own cuffs and buried under two feet of snow.

Tbc.