Forgotten Past: Chapter Three-Fat Lip

Riddick had only struck her once before, and she’d deserved it. Jack figured she deserved it now, even if she didn’t feel he had the right anymore. He would figure he did.

His face went from slightly worried to stony and dark. His jaw hardened and he set his plate and glass on the small table between the two chairs quietly. Jack gulped and shoved herself as close to the wall as she could.

The last time he’d hit her, she’d been feeling defiant and pissed off. They’d been staying on New Mecca, Imam having gotten them a tiny room to stay in until Riddick could collect the creds that would get them off New Mecca.

At dinner, three nights into their stay, Jack had made a comment about the people at the place of worship being dirty, and not because they didn’t wash themselves neither. She’d said it loud enough and rudely enough to ensure many of the people heard her. No one had said anything, but she’d been able to feel the rage in Riddick building as time passed.

When dinner had ended, he’d grabbed her arm roughly and dragged her back to their room. Then he’d hit her. Not a slap, like a mother might give you for back talking, but a fisted punch in the jaw. Her head had spun and she’d fought unconsciousness, laying on the floor, Riddick standing over her threateningly.

“Never, and I mean *never*, make a comment like that when you are invited to stay in the house of another.” His voice growled menacingly in the darkened room and she nodded, laying out profuse apologies at his feet.

“Shut up,” he growled. “It’s over now, but tomorrow, you will apologize to the people that you really offended.”

And she had apologized, and she had deserved it. But now, she had the feeling that he wouldn’t be so careful about knocking her senseless. He looked ready to slit her throat. He’d never told her about the things he’d done before or after Slam, but Jack knew there’d been some pretty bad things. She also knew the worst things he’d done to people had been while he was in Slam.

“I told you --” he began, making to stand up.

Figuring the best way to convince him it was her decision, and not his, what she did with herself or to herself, she went for the direct approach. “Fuck you, Riddick,” she said, cutting him off.

Rage crossed his face and she stood up, standing in front of his chair. “We both know it was different before. I couldn’t watch myself when you told me no, and you could hold leaving me over my head. But not anymore. You know that if you left, I’d be fine. You’ve taught me how to fight, work, and I can fly almost as good as you, so there’s no reason why I shouldn’t do whatever the hell I want.” Feeling proud of her little speech of independence, Jack sat down in the second chair, gazing at him through her newly shined eyes.

Riddick groaned and sat back in the chair, knowing she was right but wanting to beat her senseless anyway. “Shit.” The word burst from his chest and he cursed a little more, letting the strain and stress out with a litany of swear words.

Finally he looked at her, his silver eyes glowing at her. “How’d you get so grown up?” he questioned quietly. “I shouldn’t care about you, but I do.”

Jack was so startled by his honest revelation she almost fell out of her seat. “What?” was all she could choke past the lump in her chest, which was steadily making its way up to her throat. She coughed to clear it, but it didn’t help.

Riddick looked as started as she felt. “I don’t know where that came from,” he breathed unhappily. He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands.

They sat in silence, neither one saying a thing. Even their breathing so quiet it couldn’t be heard.

“It’s true, though,” he told her after some time had passed.

She stared at him. “Really?” Jack cursed the hopeful tone in her voice. She sounded like a small child, begging to be loved. She didn’t want to care about him anymore, either. Jack had loved Riddick with the sort of love a child shows a parent, a hero. But now that she was older, she’d began to understand that Riddick could leave at any moment, deserting her as she’d been deserted so many times in the past.

That’s what had her distancing herself from him over the past year. The feeling of not being wanted had been haunting her, so she’d pulled away the same way she had in the orphanage she’d been raised in. Jack had known no one wanted her there, so she’d lived in her own head.

When Riddick had never given any indication that he wanted her around, she’d assumed it had been the same thing with him. Knowing he’d want her to leave soon, if not immediately, she’d stopped talking to him the way she wanted him to talk to her. Stopped hoping he’d give some indication that he wanted her around.

He let out a loud sigh in the dark before looking her full in the eye. In the eyes that were the same as his own, now. “Yeah. Really.”

The brilliant grin she bestowed on him then was brighter than any he’d ever gotten from her. Or at least it seemed like it, considering she hadn’t given him more than a wry twist of her lips, or a mocking smirk for close to a year.

He smiled back. “I’m going to miss your old eyes, Jack. They were the same color as your hair.”

She tugged at her hair self-consciously. “Is it better this way?” she asked. “Better than when I shaved it?”

“Definitely,” he chuckled. “It was flattering to have some kid imitating me, but it wasn’t you. And that’s the truth.”

“I’m not used to you telling me the truth,” she answered, her smile fading.

He leaned back in the chair and picked at his fish, popping a few pieces into his mouth. “Maybe we should change that. Both of us. If we’re gonna stay together, we might as well be honest with one another, right?”

Jack nodded. She went in the kitchen and fixed herself a meal the same as his.

“I thought you were going to hit me again,” she stated, sitting back down across from him.

Riddick glanced up from his food to look at her, an expression of mild confusion on his face. “Again?”

“Like in New Mecca? With Imam and I said those nasty things. What the hell was wrong with me, anyway?” She took a swig of the stinging drink, feeling it burn down her throat. They still hadn’t figured out what it was, but knew it didn’t contain alcohol, was safer than the tap water, and killed any bacteria in your body better than anything else. Neither of them had gotten so much as a stomach ache since they’d started drinking it. The natives called it penirog.

Riddick had heard the name and assumed it meant a combination of penicillin and grog. He didn’t want to know what else was in it, and neither did Jack.

He smirked. “Oh, yeah. That learned you quick, didn’t it?”

She laughed. “You could say that.”

“Just did,” he told her.

“Shut up,” she growled back, trying to contain a laugh. “I’m glad you didn’t hit me, though,” she added after a minute.

“I thought about it,” he told her. Then he gazed at her, his gaze burning into her. “It’s not so bad,” he said, checking out her eyes now. “The best lookin’ eyes I’ve ever seen,” he stated proudly.

“Only because they’re like yours, jerk,” she laughed.

He threw back his head and his deep laugh reverberated off the walls. “So?”

“Oh, shut up.”

“You told me to do that already. Still not listening.”

They laughed together while they ate, Jack feeling much better knowing Riddick wasn’t completely piss off at her. And she wouldn’t be walking around with a fat lip and a black eye, like before.

The combination of her small face and his big fist had allowed him to cover the whole left side of her face with the right hook he’d unleashed on her.

What he’d done to her had been obvious to everyone who’d seen her the next day back in New Mecca. No one had brought the subject up again, and after being forgiven, she’d learned to respect and love the people of Imam’s world as much as you could love people you’d only known for a few months.

When holovision had exhausted itself and they were both completely warn out, they crawled into their respective beds. Or rather, cots. Despite the creature comforts of HV, a small kitchen, and running water, this place was short on nice beds. At least the chairs were soft.

Riddick usually fell asleep in his chair, but tonight he was drained.

“Goodnight, Jack,” he growled from across the room.

“Goodnight, Riddick.”

***

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