X.
She should have known that the last night had been a good bye. He had been so different, so … un-Riddick.
She simply had disavowed the truth; she had so much hoped that he wouldn't leave her again. But it's been her fault; she should have made it clear that if he'd ever leave her again like that he could rot in hell and she'd never take him back.
And now he was gone; sneaked out of their bedroom in the wee hours of the morning without as much as a good bye. She still had hoped he'd change his mind when she saw him watching her from the door; she awoke when she didn't feel his presence anymore beside her and for the first time she had been able to fake sleep without him knowing it.
And she hoped he hadn't seen the tear running down her cheek, one of many others to follow; she didn't want him to see how much his leaving hurt her. It actually hurt so much her whole body seemed to ache. She felt ignored, rejected and left alone; and she was more than pissed. She silently cried for hours until she felt numb and dead inside. She didn't get up when the sun rose and ignored the whole day passing by.
She was still staring at the same spot on the door where she had seen him last when she heard somebody knocking. She ignored it, carried on with her staring, hoping who ever it was would go away; she wasn't ready yet to face the world again. She was relieved when the knocking stopped but just for a second, then the door silently got opened and Laney slid into the room. Hope sighed inwardly … she would have to get locks for the front door.
Laney needed just a second to cover the distance to the bed; for a moment she had been worried about Hope's unblinking eyes ... she had looked like dead the way she stared at the door. She sat down on the bed near her, within reach but not yet touching her.
"Hope, my dear, he'll be back. You know keeping you safe was the only reason why he left alone and I'm certain it was as hard for him as it is for you. He loves you so much …" She tried to hug Hope but gave up on that intention when she felt Hope stiffen under her touch and just remained sitting beside her and talking to her, knowing that Hope wouldn't listen to her words but hoping that her calm voice would sooth her somewhat.
Night had begun to fall when Hope finally spoke to her. "If he'd really love me he would have respected my decisions; he just sees me as a property he doesn't want to get damaged. I don't care if he comes back or not; I was finished with him the second he went out of that room. He'd better look for another woman silly enough to fall for him and his damn attitude; I'm out of the game." Fair or not … she still was too angry to think about anything else than him getting his way again. Her gorge was dry from crying and lack of liquid and her raspy voice had a sharp edge nobody ever had heard from her. "You can leave now, I'm fine. Life will go on as well without him."
She stood up without bothering to wrap herself in a sheet to go to the bathroom; she still smelled of sex and Riddick and wanted to get rid of that. And she had to take care of her shoulder where he had pricked her; no need for an infection. She had to get over him and the sooner the better. It would do her no good to wallow in self pity; she was not the kind of woman to run after a man not regarding her. She had conceded herself a day of crying and mourning and that was it. That doesn't mean that it wouldn't hurt but nobody would be able to see it; it was mostly anger that had made her cry anyways. Anger about Riddick's behavior … she knew he'd be back, pretending that he'd done nothing wrong, expecting from her to cave in like she did the last time. And anger about herself coz she wasn't entirely sure she wouldn't do exactly that.
Laney had watched her on her way to the bathroom, seeing the mark on her shoulder but not commenting on it. She was old enough to know the Furyan way better than anybody else did out of first hand experience and understood Riddick's intention why he did that to her.
When she had learned that Riddick had left the planet without Hope to look for the traitor she already had suspected that Hope wasn't consent with his plan and that it would cause a lot of trouble. Furyan males were overprotective and over possessive of their mates and Riddick was no exception thereto. And Furyan females were freedom-loving and independent and also Hope normally was a very kind and gentle person, with her attitude she was in no way inferior to her ancestors and both were hot tempered and stubborn.
Partnerships between Furyans never were easy but amazingly most of the couples stayed together, there were just few records of separations; most of them mated just once. Maybe the deep feelings for each other helped a lot to get over the arguments.
She sighed deeply; she only could hope that Hope would change her mind when he came back. They needed both of them and an alpha pair being at odds with each other would do them no good at all.
The next day Hope stood up early in the morning to take care of her workout and then had breakfast with the others. Laney must have talked to them coz nobody asked any questions or mentioned Riddick and they tried to act as if nothing had happened. She spent most of the day assembling the new long range sensors and the beacons and only stopped with her work when Kerry came and forced her to have dinner.
There was no change in her day's schedule in the next days except that she had started to wander through the woods in the evenings, following the trails Riddick and she had explored on their first visit, trying to find a way to live without her ripped out heart and to cope with the loneliness she felt without him. And she had started to spar in the morning with Tyr or Carlos. Both of them were apprehensive at first but she had made it clear that she was equal to Riddick and if she wanted to spar with them they simply had to obey and follow her orders.
Pooh had stayed by her side since she first came out of the house and was even allowed to follow inside and sleep on the bedroom floor; she didn't feel that lonely when she heard his snoring during the night.
Hope didn't talk much and nobody saw the slightest smile on her face but she fulfilled her duties as alpha and worked herself to the bones for Furya. And she still tried to find out about the identity of the traitor. She knew she was missing something important, that she already had all the information she needed to identify him/her. The information danced at the edge of her consciousness and teased her, slipping away each time she tried to grip it and that didn't do anything good to lighten her mood either.
It was on the tenth day after Riddick's departure when George stormed into her workroom, panting, arms flapping, totally upset. "Unknown ship approaching! Can't hail them!" gasp "Need help to identify!" pant "Sorry to disturb!" wheeze "Nobody else here to ask!"
George was nearly funny in his dismay and Hope couldn't suppress a small smile at his sight. But he was right … they had to identify that ship immediately. Hope quickly followed him to the com room, reading back the data the sensors had gathered, running a few scans George hadn't thought of. As a result the image of a small ship appeared on the screen.
Hope sighed deeply ... she had seen a ship like that before. And never seeing another one of those ships again would have been early enough. "Not now, please!"