6. The Past, part 1
Riddick joined the "Family" from prison. He wasn't the only one, certainly wasn't the first, or the last. He did become the most notorious, among the Family circles. To the rest of the universe he was either just a murderer, or a payday. To the Family, though, he was a Traitor.
The Family taught him to read. It also taught him to kill, efficiently. He was surprisingly smart considering his origin. He picked up languages fast, learned to pilot quickly, and had an affinity for weapons. Of course, his preferred weapons didn't take technical training, and his skills needed verylittle honing there.
Some felt he was too headstrong, a potential wildcard. He was difficult to motivate, when it suited him, and pain was seldom sufficient. But since he needed little to sway him towards violence, he passed the early psych tests on enthusiasm alone.
And Riddick knew a good situation when he saw one. The Family provided him anything and everything within reason, with the exception of mind-altering drugs. Women and alcohol were not forbidden, provided self-control was observed. The Family preferred you 'keep it in the family', but official 'tail' could be sought out with little effort. Only long-term relationships were strictly forbidden, outside the Family.
All of this suited Riddick's personality just fine. He enjoyed the benefits of authorized mayhem enough to play by the rules They set. Killing didn't bother him, and no one bothered him about his mutant eyes.
And the women...
Earth still segregated the sexes in prison; Riddick never cared to sample what was available. He was seventeen when the Family took him in, eighteen when one of his 'brothers' took him on his first visit to a certified tail. Nineteen when his 'sisters' discovered him and he quit having to pay for it. For a little while the women alone kept him motivated to perform.
Maturity, and availability, mellowed him eventually. However, the missions never seemed to fail to provide him with excitement. Stalking his prey never tired him. Surviving strange and dangerous terrain always thrilled him. Living one more day than the last, when no one thought he could, or perhaps should, gave him the strength to live one more day than that.
He never had any reason to disobey, or vary much from any assignment. He considered it a matter of personal self-control to stick to every detail of an objective, yet always planned for contingencies, and could be flexible when necessary to achieve the goal. Still, he avoided leadership, preferring to work alone, preferring to kill alone. His handlers respected that. The Family was never short of Chiefs to tell the Indians what to do.
That was the only drawback to the being a part of the Family. Frequently what they were sent in to do one week needed undoing the next. Riddick didn't care, his particular trade could never be undone. He never tried to look at the bigger picture. His life functioned best right now. Yesterday was set, tomorrow too unformed; the only reality was today.
So when he was given an assignment to track down an AWOL 'mule', and destroy the package she was supposed to have delivered, he didn't think it would alter the course of his life. That she used to be a part of the Family didn't matter to him, either. He'd never met her; she wasn't in the now for him. While some, older and perhaps wiser, considered her a traitor (small 't'), Riddick only thought of her as a mission.
As it turned out, she was his last mission.
They shouldn't have asked him to kill a child.
Riddick had been watching the waitress for a week, usually from a table in the corner. She didn't strike him as a former Family member; she seemed too normal. He'd already followed her home, memorized her daily routines. She worked nights in this shitty little bar, took her daughter to school every morning, slept till the girl got home. They went to the park in the afternoons and did homework, then back to their shitty little apartment for dinner and the routine started over again.
It wasn't the most challenging undertaking of his career.
What he didn't have yet was the location, and nature, of the package this courier had failed to deliver; They hadn't contacted him about it yet. They had assured him that she still had it with her. Whatever it was, it certainly couldn't be worth any money.
The waitress smiled at him again. He'd been quietly flirting with her for days. He could break into her apartment without her ever knowing, unless she was better than she appeared to be. Still, an invite would kill some time as well as giving him a look around. The bar was nearly empty now; Riddick threw some money on the table and walked towards the door, keeping eye contact with...
Carlota. That's what the bartender called her. She'd been Carmen in the Family.
She tipped her head a little at him so he winked. She smiled back. Good enough. He'd wait for her outside and see how it went from there.
Riddick didn't normally smoke, but it was usually the simplest form of camouflage. No one looked twice at a man leaning against a wall smoking a cigarette. He waited for the bar to close and the waitress, Carlota, to appear.
He ended up lighting another. Assassinations took time, planning, and finally, patience. Still, this was not an elimination, just trace and demolish, a little below his skill level. No worries, he was serene. He listened to the quiet, and enjoyed the tranquility, of the night.
She appeared in time, looking harried and tired. But her face lit up a little when she spotted him. That was good. He grinned back at her, dropped his butt and stepped on it.
Small talk ensued, and more smiles from her. He wasn't the most charming man in the Family, his sisters had informed him, but his handsome, brooding presence had a kind of magnetism that made up for it. They had coached him when he was younger, until he realized he didn't really have to talk much to bed a woman. The waitress put her arm through his and led the way.
"Shh. My daughter is sleeping. I don't want to wake her. And I want you gone by morning," she whispered to him as she unlocked the door.
Riddick took his first look around the inside of her apartment; neat and clean, but as run down as the rest of her life. He wondered again why anyone would leave the Family for this.
For a chance to have a kid?
But then why keep a package she was supposed to deliver? As insurance? She had to know she couldn't stand against the capacity of the Family. Could she have completed her mission and simply left on good terms?
Why did they wait nearly a decade to decide to retrieve the package?
That wasn't the kind of question he normally entertained. It was one that plagued him this week, though. Why wait? She couldn't have been that hard to find.
He let it go.
She took his hand and led him through the dark, a dark that was quite clear to him, to her small bedroom. He saw no hiding places, just age and squalor. The tiny apartment could conceal nothing.
"Take your sun glasses off. I know the bar is over-lit with neon signs but..." She reached for his face.
"No," he didn't explain. He redirected her hand inside his shirt. She stroked his skin lightly as he unbuttoned her shirt. "You smell beautiful," he whispered.
"You're full of shit," but she smiled when she said it. "You don't have to talk, now." She shrugged her shirt off. "You've got me half naked already."
"Mmm," he answered readily, as he pulled his shirt off over his head.
She ran her fingernails lightly over his abdomen and he moaned a little. Then they threw themselves at each other, clutching and ripping at their remaining clothes without more preamble.
The waitress tucked one foot behind Riddick's and tipped him in a classic throw onto her bed. Riddick laughed as she threw herself on top of him. Apparently there was a little of Carmen, and the Family training and attitude, left in her. He let her have her way with him, with only token resistance.
They ended tangled and sweaty.
"Thirsty?" She whispered.
"Mmm," he agreed.
She hopped out of bed with more energy than he could muster right that moment. She returned quickly with a glass of water, and a handgun pointed at him.
She drank some water and sat lightly on the edge of a chair, still naked and completely relaxed. The end of the small pistol never wavered.
"Why is the Family suddenly back in my life?"
Riddick fluffed the pillow, laced his fingers behind his head, and regarded the woman coolly. "Who?"
"Don't play games with me," she took another drink of the water and set it on the floor near her feet. "You've been on me for a week. Why now?"
Not 'why', but 'why now'. That was his question too. He didn't have an answer.
"You didn't deliver the package, Carmen."
"Oh, yes, I delivered it." She barked a sharp bitter laugh. "I just didn't turn it over."
Riddick didn't have a response. He was here for the package, word games be damned, and he was going to destroy it, per his orders.
"You can't have her," Carmen/Carlota's voice was flat, cold and dangerous. Definitely the Family attitude.
Her? The package was a...
The package was her daughter.
Riddick froze, inside and out.